Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday assured that if any minister of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was caught in corruption charges, then the same would be removed from the cabinet with immediate effect.

Addressing a gathering in the poll-bound state of Tripura, Singh hit at the ruling Communist Party India (Marxist) government in the state and said the chief minister did not have the courage to remove the minister against whom "fingers are raised".

"I want to assure every citizen that if any of our ministers are caught in case of corruption, then we will throw him out of the cabinet like a fly is thrown away from the milk," the union minister said.

The home minister further said political murder was taking place in the state every second day and there was no guarantee of people's safety in the state.

Tripura assembly election is scheduled to be held on February 18. The results of all the same will be declared on March 3.

The term of the Tripura legislative assemblies is ending on March 14.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said 935 terrorists have been "neutralised" since Turkey launched a military offensive against Syria's Afrin held by Kurdish militia, on January 20.

"Of course, we also have martyrs," the President told reporters on Sunday here prior to his departure for the Vatican for a visit, Xinhua news agency reported.

Turkey lost eight soldiers on Saturday, including five killed after their tank was hit by the Kurdish militia known as the People's Protection Units (YPG), marking the deadliest day for the Turkish troops since they started the so-called Operation Olive Branch along with the rebel Free Syrian Army.

Erdogan said an investigation had been launched into the attack, including trying to determine which countries supplied the weaponry being used by the YPG, considered by Ankara as a terror group.

"We have some estimations," he said. "When it is finalised, we will share it with the whole world."

Ankara has been infuriated with US training and arming of the YPG as a reliable force in the fight against the Islamic State, and threatened to move on militarily against YPG-held Manbij in northern Syria, where US special operation forces are based.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The CBI on Sunday said it has recovered documents related to property and bank transactions worth millions allegedly linked to Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain during searches at residences of a registrar and a lawyer of Delhi Dental Council in a bribery case.

The CBI has registered a case under sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act and the Indian Penal Code against the two officials on the allegations of demanding bribe from the complainant for getting him favourable order from the DDC and also for extending help in further legal proceedings in his matter, said officials.

Agency sleuths laid a trap and caught the accused while demanding and accepting a bribe of Rs 473,000 from the complainant on Saturday night. The arrested accused were produced in a court here on Sunday which sent then to four days police custody.

Searches were conducted at the office and residence of Registrar Rishi Raj and advocate Pradeep Sharma, which led to recovery of Rs 2.4 million in cash, half Kg Gold (approx) and also three property documents relating to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Jain.

These include two sale deeds of land and a Power of Attorney for land at Karala village here.

The probe agency also recovered a bank deposit slip book containing counter foils detailing cheque deposits of around Rs 20 million during 2011 in Jain's name and companies wherein he was serving as Director and in the name of his family members; and 41 cheque Books in his name, his wife's name and in the name of a private estate firm.

CBI sources say Jain gave these documents (now seized by CBI) when he was quizzed, raided following registration of a corruption case against him last year.

CBI has registered a case of corruption against him accusing him of misusing his official position. The agency is probing him for his links with Hawala operators, how he set up shell companies to convert black money into white and subsequently purchased huge tracts of land on Delhi's outskirts.

Income Tax has already seized his 220 bighas of land in outer Delhi under the Benami Properties act.

Responding to the agency's charges, an AAP spokesperson said: "The papers that CBI is referring to were given by Satyendar Jain to CBI twice and have been declared in the income tax return for many years."

"What is new about it?" the spokesperson asked, adding the BJP government was trying to ruin the image of Jain.

Party official Nagendar Sharma tweeted: "This is the latest attempt to frame Satyendar Jain. He has nothing to do, even remotely with the registrar in question. Till date BJP has miserably failed in digging out anything against Mr Jain."

"The BJP's central govt has been pulled up by the High Court many times in cases registered by it against Mr Jain.Now this is a fresh BJP conspiracy. The papers planted by CBI have been twice handed over by Mr Jain himself to the CBI and have been declared many times in his IT returns. What is new in these papers ?

The CBI said it will summon Jain for questioning this week.Air quality in the coastal city of Chennai in the past two months was consistently poor with all the samples designated as at least 'unhealthy' as per US standards, an international expert said on Sunday.

Levels of toxic metal manganese in the air during this period averaged 55 per cent higher than they were averaged in April 2017, whereas lead levels averaged nearly three times higher in two months than they were averaged in April.

Mark Chernaik, a scientist associated with the Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide who studied the reports, told IANS that five of the samples in Chennai in the past two months reached a level of 'very unhealthy' and two of them 'hazardous' under the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Air Quality Index.

All of the 12 samples substantially exceeded the Indian 24-hour National Ambient Air Quality Standard for PM (tiny particulate matter) of 60 micrograms (Aug)/m3.

According to Chernaik, the levels of PM 2.5 (a crucial indicator of dangerous pollution) in December and January averaged 165 Aug/m3, 35 per cent higher than PM 2.5 averaged in April.

High levels of manganese, a neurotoxicant, excess expose causes adverse neurobehavioural health effects. It averaged 0.16 Aug/m3 in two months. The World Health Organisation prescribes an annual average standard of 15 Ig/m3.

Likewise, exposure to another neurotoxicant lead causes irreversible mental retardation in children. It averaged 0.16 Aug/m3 in the two months, exceeding the US Environmental Protection Agency's National Ambient Air Quality standard for lead of 0.15 Aug/m3 on a three-month rolling basis.

Chernaik says the air quality in Chennai seems heavily impacted by re-suspension of dust.

"The emissions from the paved road dust contribute significantly to the pollution load as far as PM 10 is concerned. The contribution from the vehicular sources towards PM is only around 10 per cent in Chennai," he said.

The recommendations for policy to be adopted for meeting the pollution levels are: Sweeping and watering of the paved roads to reduce the emissions of the particulate matter.

Aluminum, iron, calcium and silicon, enriched in coal ash are indicators of pollution caused by re-suspended dust. Levels of aluminum, iron, calcium and silicon combined constituted roughly 15 per cent of PM 2.5 in ambient air samples collected both in December and January and in April 2017.

Levels of PM 2.5 trended higher on days when the percentage of combined levels of aluminum, iron, calcium and silicon were higher.

Manganese and lead are also constituents of coal ash.

It is reasonable to assume that over several decades, manganese and lead in coal ash disposed of in Chennai has permeated the city and is re-suspended on a daily basis from paved roads, he added.

Shweta Narayan of Healthy Energy Initiative, India, who is based in Chennai, told IANS: "Considering that aluminum, iron, calcium and silicon that are enriched in coal ash are also enriched in the Chennai dust samples, and given the cluster of coal-fired thermal plants in Ennore, it is reasonable to assume that coal ash dust is a significant contributor to Chennai's air pollution."

A total of 1,189 sq km Chennai Metropolitan Area currently has real-time air quality monitors that measure the levels of PM 2.5 at only four locations.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Markets in the national capital reopened on Sunday after a two-day strike by thousands of commercial establishments protesting against the recent sealing drive by the Municipal Corporations of Delhi.

The shutdown had been called by the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT).

"After two days of Delhi Trade Bandh called by CAIT against sealing, the markets in Delhi opened today restoring the business activities to normal trade though markets observing Sunday as weekly holiday remained closed," the traders' association said in a release here.

"The proposals of DDA (Delhi Development Authority) for amendment in Master Plan 2021 are very confusing since every proposal contain certain riders and conditions which are difficult to follow and as such the basic object of bringing proposals to provide relief to traders from sealing will be highly defeated, according to prominent traders," it said.

CAIT Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal said it appeared that the DDA proposals were drafted "in great haste without considering its compliance obligations and impact".

"It will be more appropriate if the central government suspends the sealing, by bringing a law in the Parliament, for at least six months, and during this period after having a detailed and thoughtful study, the proposals to amend the Master Plan should be drafted to give relief from sealing," he said in the statement.

CAIT on Saturday said it has sent a "traders' charter" to the government suggesting that it take necessary steps to mitigate traders' problems on account of the sealing drive.

"Though appreciating the proposals mooted by DDA for amending the Master Plan to bring relief to traders from sealing, the CAIT has sent a 12 point traders' charter to Hardeep Puri, Union Minister for Urban Development, urging him to take necessary steps to mitigate the problems of the traders on account of sealing," it said.

On Friday, the DDA approved changes to the city's Master Plan -- in a move to provide relief to traders hit by the sealing drive -- on a day lakhs of traders pulled down their shutters to protest against the sealing.

The sealing drive was being carried out against business establishments using residential areas for commercial purposes without paying conversion charges.

DDA's proposed amendments to the Master Plan include increasing Floor Area Ratio (FAR) of local shopping complexes from existing 180 per cent to 300 per cent and regularising agricultural warehouses on 12 metre wide roads.

Though the DDA has approved the proposed amendments, the traders continued with their shutdown on Saturday.

According to the CAIT, the charter sent to the government includes among other steps keeping status quo in special areas till the time its redevelopment plan is prepared and implemented.

"The plot size in LSCs should be increased from 175 metres to 250 metres," the traders' body urged the government.

"While regularising and enhancing the FAR, the condition of parking availability should be withdrawn, three colonies - Greater Kailash, Green Park and South Extension - developed by DLF should be enlisted on the list of rehabilitation colonies developed by DLF," the statement added.

CAIT also urged that commercial use of basements should be allowed uniformly in any street and the limit of paying conversion charges should be fixed for 10 years.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Finally the wait is over for both book vendors as well as book lovers. Delhi's famous weekly market in old city Daryaganj opened after five weeks on Sunday -- albeit truncated to half its size.

The North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) only gave permission to set up shops between Golcha cinema and Delight cinema. The civic body did not allow any shops on the Daryaganj over-bridge due to which more than 50 people were not allowed to set up their makeshift shops.

The market, which earlier used to be more than 2-km long, on Sunday was functioning in around only a 1-km area.

Just like several other book vendors, Dhuv Narayan Gupta had also brought books to sell in the market, but returned disappointed.

Gupta, who has been setting up his shop in the market for the past 27 years, told IANS: "We were happy. I brought books for sale. It has been five weeks of no business, I have a family to look after. I thought the struggle will come to an end, but we were not allowed to set up the shops."

The father of four said he even started working as a labourer at construction sites to make ends meet during the period when the market was closed for five Sundays in a row. Every year, the civic body orders the closure of the makeshift market on the Sunday before Republic Day (Jan 26) and Independence Day (Aug 15) but this year it happened much earlier.

"I was a proud shopkeeper till a few weeks back, but now I am forced to do things for survival," Gupta said, adding two of his kids were in school.

"The school (authorities) will not understand that I am not getting the permission for my shop. I want my children to study... I can't see that happening."

Gupta and another bookseller Manish Kapoor, like dozens of other vendors, used to set up their shops outside the Golcha-Delight stretch.

Kapoor, who is the sole earner of his five-member family, told IANS: "I did not set up the shop as I was scared that NDMC people will take my things with them. I am not able to make any money and so I am not able to pay anything to my co-workers. We are not able to run our house. I am not able to pay my children's tuition fee."

But others who could return to their weekly business were elated.

"We are happy that after their (civic body) actions only booksellers were allowed in the market and no other clothes or shoe sellers were allowed. However, many of us are sad as they were not allowed to set up the shops. We will go and meet the civic body people on Monday and will request them to consider our problem," Qamar Saeed, President, Daryaganj Patri Sunday Book Bazar Welfare Association, told IANS.

On their level, shopkeepers tried to help each other by reducing their shop sizes and also allowed other booksellers to sit nearby. However, they feel the authorities can do this in a better manner.

"If they fix size for each shop, we all can fit in small spaces. We only can request each other to help fellow booksellers, but authorities, by fixing the space, can do this in a better manner," Saeed said.

Although there was uncertainty over the market, the book lovers came in a good number looking for their favourite books.

"We did not expect this much as people were not sure about the market. I hope next week more people will come as the news will reach them," Saeed said.

( can be contacted at nivedita.singh@ians.in)

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has said the government will launch a helpline in two months to deliver services to people at their doorsteps.

Kejriwal said on Sunday that the helpline number would help people take appointment with "Mobile Sahayak" to access Doorstep Delivery services. In the Doorstep Delivery services, if a person wants a certificate from the government, he would telephone the call centre.

"We have increased the old age pension for our elders. We are soon coming up with door step delivery scheme which will make queues and paying touts at government offices for different certificates a history, you will get all your job done at a phone call and at your convenience," Kejriwal said, after laying the foundation stone of an Under Ground Reservoir (UGR) in Sonia Vihar in east Delhi.

"Within two months, we will launch the helpline number that you can call on any time to get your certificates. A government official will come to your home along with a biometric machine and a scanning machine to collect the necessary data, and your certificate will reach within a week," the Chief Minister said.

In the scheme, a 'Mobile Sahayak' would go to the residence or office of the applicant and collect the necessary documents, take photo and biometric details and then process the application.

Applicants can pay the prescribed application fee to the 'Mobile Sahayak'.

The government will offer over 40 government services ranging from grant of water connection to marriage certificate at people's doorstep.

Kejriwal said the government was planning a door step delivery of ration to do away with the problems at Public Distribution Shops.

"We are saving money in every project, as I say there is no dearth of money in (other) governments, there was a dearth of will power.

"I challenge that no government in the country since Independence has worked the way our government has been working for the people tirelessly in the last three years," he said.

He further said that government has not let power tariffs be hiked in the last three years.

"Twenty-thousand litres of water is free for every household... laid pipeline in 319 colonies, we are sure that we will make pipeline and drinking water available in every household of Delhi in next two years," he said.

He further said that all unauthorised colonies will have roads and drains by 2018-end.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)An Indian soldier and a teenaged girl were injured after Pakistan opened "unprovoked and indiscriminate" firing across the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir's Poonch on Sunday, officials said.

"Pakistan army resorted to unprovoked firing on Indian positions on the LoC in Shahpur area of Poonch district. They used small arms automatics and mortars to target Indian positi ons. Indian positions retaliated effectively and strongly," a police official said.

"A 15-year-old girl and an army jawan were injured in Pakistan firing and have been shifted to hospital," the official added.

According to army officials, the firing started around 11 a.m. with Pakistani soldiers using small arms, automatics and mortars. Indian troops retaliated strongly, they added.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Green activists staged a sit-in in Agra on Sunday against the government's proposed move to shift a police battalion headquarters to a protected forest site that will create havoc in the ecologically sensitive area.

Several environmentalists gathered at the Shahid Smarak and said the move to shift the PAC battalion from the Taj Ganj area to Keetham forest on the Delhi-Agra national highway, 20 km from here will prove disastrous in the long run.

"The Keetham forest serves as an ecological buffer between Agra and the Mathura Oil Refinery. Denuding the forest to accommodate police constabulary with arms and vehicles would require large construction and intrusion in the green territory," said Devashish Bhattacharya of the River Connect Campaign.

The Keetham forest is an eco-sensitive zone with bear and elephant rescue centres, a bird sanctuary and the memorial to the blind bard of Braj Bhasha, Soor Das.

"The Mathura Oil Refinery pumps water for its needs from the Soor Sarovar which supports a wide variety of aqua life and reptiles like pythons. The ecological balance should not be disturbed," Green Activist Rimjhim Verma told IANS.

The district authorities have decided to shift the PAC to make way for a Metro Rail yard and depot.

"But this site is very close to the Taj Mahal. Any construction activity in the vicinity of the Taj Mahal will be in clear violation of the recommendations by the Supreme Court-appointed S. Vardarajan Committee," said Shravan Kumar Singh of the Braj Mandal Heritage Conservation Society.

Divisional commissioner Rama Rao, who is also the chairman of the Taj Trapezium Zone Authority, last week said the PAC could be shifted to the Keetham area on 140 acres of land owned by the state horticulture department.

The announcement led to a series of protests by environmentalists.

The administration had earlier come up with the project to set up a leather park in the forest area which was opposed by the eco-activists.

Later, a plan to construct the northern bypass to connect the Yamuna Expressway with the National Highway was also mooted but was withdrawn after stiff opposition.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)British actor, writer and comedian James Corden feels homesick.

"The Late Late Show" host, who is also the voice of Peter Rabbit in a major new movie that mixes live action and animation, may be planning an exit from the US when his chat-show contract ends in 2020. Or so it seems from his interview to Event Magazine, reports dailymail.co.uk.

"I'm almost certain that we won't live here for ever because... I just don't think we will," he said, and added: "This point right now is the only time since we moved here when I've experienced genuine homesickness."

Isn't Los Angeles a lovely place to live in?

"It was. For a while it's lovely. For a time it's great. With young kids it feels like a really great place to live. But then? I don't know.

"A lot of it is psychological. You think we would be like, 'Ah, this is the life', and I'm unbelievably conscious that this is all great, amazing. But at some point - and this is just life - the phone is going to ring and in that instant we're going to feel a million miles away from people who might need us. That's what weighs on my mind," said Corden, who has children Max, six, Carey, three, and a new daughter, Charlotte, born in December, with wife Julia.

Corden dreads a call from home to say something is wrong.

"That starts to inform your decision, when you think about what the future may or may not hold. The money is lovely, but time is the only thing that actually exists. It's the only currency you're ever dealing with, and all you've got is this point right now. Time with people, time to do stuff - it's the only thing that matters.

Corden flew his parents, sisters, nieces and nephews over for Christmas at his own expense.

What's it like being a British TV host in Trump's America?

"You've got to earn the right to be a voice in the conversation. Imagine if some American guy came onto British TV and started talking about post-Brexit Britain. The people of Hull, Plymouth, Newcastle and Oxfordshire would go, 'What would you know? You didn't grow up here! And don't think that just because you live in London you know what represents Britain.'

"In the same way, living in Los Angeles is not a reflection of what America is or stands for."

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Sunday urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to help in resolving the Mahadayi water dispute between the state and BJP-ruled neighbouring Goa.

"On behalf of my people, I urge you to help us resolve the Mahadayi dispute," the Chief Minister tweeted, as Modi was on a day-long visit to the state.

Siddaramaiah had also written many letters to the Prime Minister to intervene in the issue through an out-of-court settlement as the inter-state issue is currently before the Supreme Court and the Mahadayi Water Dispute Tribunal.

Modi was in the city to address a BJP rally that marks the culmination of the party's 90-day rally across the districts of poll-bound Karnataka.

Several pro-Kannada organisations staged protests at Freedom Park in the city centre on Sunday, demanding Modi's intervention in the water issue to meet the drinking needs of the state's four drought prone-districts: Bagalkote, Belagavi, Dharwad and Gadag.

Though the river Mahadayi or Mandovi flows 29 km in Karnataka and 52 km in Goa, its catchment area is spread over 2,032 km in the southern state as against 1,580 km in Goa.

Karnataka has been asking Goa since 2001 to release 7.6 thousand million cubic feet of the river water to meet the drinking and irrigation needs of its people.

Karnataka plans to build two canals across the Kalasa and Banduri tributaries of the river in the state to divert and supply the water to the four districts.

The Tribunal, headed by J.N. Panchal, on July 28, 2016 rejected the state's petition for releasing the water, citing various grounds, including ecological damage the twin canal projects may cause.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday condemned the alleged "honour killing" of a 23-year-old photographer in the city and assured that stern action would be taken against the accused.

"Spoke to Ankit's father. What happened is condemnable. Delhi government will ensure that the best lawyer is hired to fight for justice for Ankit.

"We will make every possible effort that the accused get a strict punishment. May god give strength to Ankit's family. We are with them in this struggle," he said in a series of tweets.

Earlier, his media advisor Nagendar Sharma took to Twitter to respond to the BJP's remark questioning Kejriwal's silence on the incident.

"Some media houses and opposition should stop playing over Ankit's death," Sharma tweeted, adding that the Chief Minister was "personally aggrieved" and was in touch with his family.

"The family has gone to Haridwar. CM will go and meet them as soon as they return. All possible help will be provided," he added.

Ankit Saxena was allegedly killed by the family of a woman he was in a relationship with.

According to Delhi Police, the woman's family was against their relationship as they belonged to different communities and had told him to end it.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Russia has rejected Washington's statements made in its 2018 Nuclear Posture Review that Moscow refuses to further decrease its nuclear capabilities.

"While just having a flick through the document, one can notice that its confrontational charge and anti-Russian focus stare in the face," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Saturday, Xinhua news agency reported.

"The document's statement that Russia allegedly refuses to further reduce its nuclear capabilities is yet another example of the blatant 'falsification'," the statement said.

The US said in its 2018 Nuclear Posture Review that Russia continues to violate a series of arms control treaties and commitments.

"In the nuclear context, the most significant Russian violation involves a system banned by the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty," said the 74-page US nuclear policy report released on Friday.

"In a broader context, Russia is either rejecting or avoiding its obligations and commitments under numerous agreements, and has rebuffed US efforts to follow the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) with another round of negotiated reductions and to pursue reductions in non-strategic nuclear forces," it added.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said it has nothing in common with the actual state of affairs. "Certainly, we will be compelled to take into consideration the approaches introduced now by Washington and to take necessary steps in order to ensure own security," it noted.

The Russian Foreign Ministry urged the US to "team up to look for solutions to the problems that have been accumulating in the field of strategic stability."

The US report, which is largely in line with the 2010 review done by the Obama administration, reaffirms commitments to non-proliferation treaties but emphasizes the need to enhance capabilities to match with Russia, showing supports for US nuclear modernisation projects.

The review, the first of this kind since 2010, also calls for a "lower-yield" option with less powerful explosive capacity for ballistic and cruise missiles launched from submarines.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A Rajya Sabha Member of the Congress said he is feeling "depressed, dejected and ashamed" at being called "mad and a laughing stock" by the Chair on Friday, even though the remarks were later expunged by the Chair.

In a letter to Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman P.J. Kurien, dated February 3, and shared with the media on Sunday, Congress MP K.V.P. Ramachandra Rao has lashed out at Kurien.

He said the use of those words were "not any humiliation for me but... certainly a great humiliation for the people of my state (Andhra Pradesh), who were agitating for fulfilment of their legitimate rights".

On Friday, after the Upper House of Parliament met for the day, Rao stood near the Chairman's podium, displaying a placard to the House.

While a number of opposition members from various parties stood to the left of the podium raising the issue of police high-handedness against Muslims in Uttar Pradesh's Kasganj, Rao stood silently on the right side, with his back to the Chair and flaunting a placard.

Rao was apparently expressing his displeasure at the alleged "continuous apathy" of the Central government towards Andhra Pradesh and the non-implementation of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014 in its "true spirit".

The state, that was bifurcated in 2014, had been seeking special development packages from the Centre.

As Rao stood near the podium, he caught the attention of Kurien who was presiding over the House. Kurien asked Rao to stop but when the latter ignored his instructions, Kurien wondered if Rao had gone "mad" and is thus behaving this way.

Kurien also asked Leader of Opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad to intervene and ask Rao to go back to his seat.

However, Kurien had shortly afterwards expunged the word "mad" and its subsequent references from the records of the House.

In his letter, Rao wrote: "For the first time in life, I could not console myself last night with a deep feeling of depression and dejection and felt ashamed being the Member of Parliament who was compelled to stay a silent spectator during the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh in the name of parliamentary customs and conventions...

"...And now being referred to by Chair as 'mad and laughing stock' solely because of democratically demanding the Central government to implement the A.P. Reorganisation Act and fulfil the constitutional commitments made to the people of the state."

After seeing the "apathy" of the Central government towards Andhra Pradesh and its people during the last four years, "I wish I would have been mad rather than sitting idle in the House" witnessing the injustice being done to the state by the Union government, which has the constitutional obligation to fulfil the promises made during the process of bifurcation, Rao said.

While Rao began his letter on a philosophical note, quoting Plato who called madness as the "divine release of the soul from the yoke of custom and convention", the Congress MP concluded by saying that he wished to continue his fight for the rights of the people of his state and felt "proud even when termed as mad for the sake of people".

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)North Korea on Sunday denounced the State of the Union address by US President Donald Trump as "an omen of new disaster", after Trump described Pyongyang as an adversary in the address.

The whole world is seeing "an omen of new disaster" in Trump's address which asserted "American first" and "unmatched power" based on nuclear arms forcing other countries to submit to the "US chauvinistic interest", a spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was quoted by the official Korean Central News Agency as saying.

The spokesman also accused Trump of "insisting upon 'maximum pressure' against North Korea" and "viciously slandering" the country.

"It is purely a nasty perversity aimed to disturb the advance of inter-Korean relations," he added.

Trump said in his State of the Union address last week that the US government is "waging a campaign of maximum pressure" to prevent Pyongyang's pursuit of nuclear missiles from threatening the US homeland.

Tension between the two countries has escalated since Trump took office last year.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Taking a firm stand against workplace harassment, NASA has launched a new campaign for its employees saying that the space agency will not tolerate any kind of harassment.

"Harassment, including sexual harassment, has no place here at NASA and will not be tolerated. It's not consistent with our values, our employee engagement, and our high-performance culture. It's wrong and it's not acceptable," Robert Lightfoot, Acting NASA Administrator, was quoted as saying in a video message released at the space agency's YouTube channel this week.

Lightfoot outlined the procedures for all NASA employees and contractors to report harassment of any kind.

He also encouraged all NASA members to be "vigilant and immediately report any inappropriate conduct" in helping towards preventing and stopping workplace harassment.

"All reports will be treated appropriately, with a prompt, impartial and thorough investigation. Individuals reporting harassment will have their identity kept confidential," Lightfoot said.

The new campaign requires all current and new members of NASA to undergo anti-harassment training by the end of 2018.

Besides, NASA will also partner with the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to learn about current developments in anti-harassment.

"We need to provide a safe workplace so that our workforce is effective," Lightfoot said.

In October 2017, media reports emerged about Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein's numerous sexual misconduct accusations, following which several victims of harassment worldwide united and shared their stories under the social media hashtag #MeToo.

According to space.com, Lightfoot's message comes after the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology requested that the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) investigate anti-harassment practices at science-based federal agencies.

The GAO letter, signed by Chairman Lamar Smith and Ranking Member Eddie Johnson, asked several agencies (including NASA) to report how many cases of harassment were there at each agency, what anti-harassment policies existed and how grant recipients learn about anti-harassment policies, among other requests.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Nigerian Army has completely defeated the Boko Haram insurgents in the restive northeast parts of the country, said Maj Gen Rogers Nicholas, head of a military operation.

Nicholas, the Theatre Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, said this late on Saturday during the inauguration of the Nigeria-Cameroon Military Joint Mission in Maiduguri, capital of Borno State, Xinhua news agency reported.

He said the collaboration between the two militaries was critical to the successful completion of the counter-insurgency campaign.

"We share information and intelligence to enable us to map out strategies to fight Boko Haram insurgents in our common borders," he said.

Troops under the operation DEEP PUNCH II had on Friday dislodged and occupied the insurgents' tactical ground "Camp Zairo," the military chief said, adding that hundreds of insurgents had surrendered and several others fled their enclave while over 100 civilians were rescued.

"My soldiers are in the heart of Boko Haram enclave that is 'Camp Zairo,' the gallant troops have taken total control of Sambisa Forest.

"We have broken the heart and soul of Shekau's group, taking over the camp and its environs.

"They are on the run and we are pursuing them to wherever they go. This time around there is no place for escape anywhere," the commander said.

The military chief called on the insurgents and abducted persons in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops, stressing that they would not be harmed or killed.

He revealed that the troops had destroyed the insurgents' hideouts, vehicles and ammunition, while hundreds of insurgents surrendered and over 100 civilians were rescued.

According to him, the command would profile the rescued persons for rehabilitation and de-radicalisation for reintegration into society.

While handing over 82 rescued persons to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) in Maiduguri, the military chief called on persons in Boko Haram captivity to submit themselves to the troops.

"People need to be vigilant in their localities, if you see any suspected persons, report to the military or security agents.

"As I speak to you now many of them have surrendered and many more will surrender to the troops. The most important thing is that we are treating these people very humanely because they are Nigerians," the military chief told his audience.

Meanwhile, Rabi Abu-Yasir, wife of Boko Haram's chief physician, on Saturday surrendered to the troops of Operation Lafiya Dole in the ongoing clearance operation to rout out the remnants of the insurgents.

Rabi told newsmen that her husband was the medical doctor to the insurgents' leader, Abubakar Shekau.

She said she was rescued on Friday after the troops dislodged the insurgents' enclaves in Sambisa Forest.

Recounting her ordeal, Rabi said unlike her peers, she enjoyed preferential treatment and privileges in view of her position as a wife to the physician.

Rabi lauded the military for the rescue operation and called on the abducted persons still in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Palestinian National Authority (PNA) on Sunday denounced the demolition of two schoolrooms in a Bedouin community in East Jerusalem by Israel.

PNA Jerusalem Affairs Minister and Jerusalem Governor Adnan Al-Hussaini told Xinhua news agency that the "targeting of the local schoolrooms at Abu Nuwwar Bedouin community in Al-Eizariya town is part of Israel's settlement expansion plans".

He added that it "targets the Palestinian existence and unravels the ugly face of the Israeli occupation".

Israeli forces on Sunday morning demolished two schoolrooms for the third and fourth graders at the local school. It is the only school, funded by the European Union, to serve 26 children of the 650-member Bedouin community near East Jerusalem.

Palestinian sources said that the Israeli Civil Administration accompanied Israeli forces to demolish the classrooms.

Community representative Dawood Jahalin said the school was given an injunction order in the past to stop its demolition pending a decision from Israel's Supreme Court.

--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 Narendra Modi on Sunday embarked on a visit to Karnataka at the end of the BJP's 90-day rally, called "journey to build a new Karnataka", across the poll-bound state.

Modi is expected to address a BJP rally at Palace Grounds here.

"Thousands of party cadres from across the state will participate in the event," a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader said.

Named "Nava Karnataka Nirmana Parivartana Yatra" (journey to build a new Karnataka), the rally across 224 assembly constituencies of the state was flagged off on November 2 by BJP President Amit Shah.

Thousands of youth and IT professionals from the city are expected to attend the event at the sprawling venue at the city centre.

The party's state unit had opened an online registry and used social media to personally invite the youth, techies, educated class and prominent citizens to the venue, assuring them of seating arrangements.

Union ministers Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal, who are in-charge of the BJP poll campaign in Karnataka, Ananth Kumar, D.V. Sadananda Gowda and Ananthkumar Hegde, who hail from the state, are also expected to take part in the event.

The city has been turned into a fortress with heightened security for Modi's visit.

At least 1,000 policemen have been deployed around the venue, with another 1,200 traffic police working to manage the traffic, city Police Commissioner T. Suneel Kumar said.

The rally, held with a view of bringing the BJP back to power in the state on the plank of transforming Karnataka through development, was led by its state unit president and former Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa.

Legislative assembly elections in the southern state are due in April-May.

The BJP came to power on its own for the first time in 2008 but lost to the Congress after five years in the May 2013 assembly election.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Actress Rebecca Ferguson says her favourite of all souvenirs she has taken from her films' set is a skull from the 2014 fantasy adventure film "Hercules".

"Of course I've stolen. But we call it 'liberating'. It sounds so much better," Ferguson, 34, told Total Film magazine.

"(My favourite thing I've taken was) a skull (from 'Hercules'). But I actually did ask the set designer if I could steal it and he looked at me and he just turned his back and walked away. And I interpreted that as, 'Obviously, of course you can steal it'," she added.

Ferguson said she doesn't enjoy working with selfish actors, reports femalefirst.co.uk.

Discussing her worst times on set, she said: "Probably when I end up with very selfish actors. I think this is with any job, and you think, 'God, I'm actually stuck with this person for three or four months.' You just have to make the best of it."

But she admits she has had some great times working on movies, where she has felt the "kindness" and support of her co-stars and crew.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) will continue to provide assistance to refugees who are in urgent need of help, IFRC's Vice Chairman Chen Zhu has said.

Chen made the remarks on Sunday during his visit, accompanied by Chinese Ambassador to Lebanon Wang Kejian, to the Guob Elias Syrian refugee camp located in the Beqaa Valley in Lebanon, Xinhua news agency reported.

The IFRC senior official was briefed by the Red Cross staff on the current conditions of the camp, before talking to the refugees in the camp over their living standards, as well as their medical and educational circumstances.

Earlier in the day, Chen took a trip to the al-Nasira hospital in Beqaa Valley, during which he hailed the hospital's efforts in providing medical assistance to Palestinian and Syrian refugees.

Chen, who is also head of the Red Cross Society of China, said that the Red Cross Society of China is looking forward to enhancing cooperation with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society to better help the refugees worldwide.

Chen arrived in Lebanon's capital Beirut Saturday and held talk with the Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Researchers, including an Indian, carried out a study using equipment to read the minds of participants and find out what song they were listening to by decoding the signals sent by their brains to the machine.

The team of researchers from Brazil, India, Germany and Finland conducted the study at Brazil's D'Or Institute for Research and Education and used a Magnetic Resonance (MR) machine to read participants' minds which displayed 85 per cent success.

The study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, contributed to the improvement of the technique and paved the way for new research on reconstruction of auditory imagination and inner speech.

In the experiment, six volunteers heard 40 pieces of classical music, rock, pop, jazz and others.

The neural fingerprint of each song on participants' brain was captured by the MR machine while a computer was learning to identify the brain patterns elicited by each musical piece.

Musical features such as tonality, dynamics, rhythm and timbre were taken into account by the computer.

The computer showed up to 85 per cent accuracy in identifying the correct song -- a great performance when compared with the previous studies.

In the future, studies on brain decoding and machine learning will create possibilities of communication regardless of any kind of written or spoken language.

"Machines will be able to translate our musical thoughts into songs," said Sebastian Hoefle from D'Or Institute and Ph.D student from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

In the future, Hoefle expects to find answers for questions like "what musical features make some people love a song while others don't? Is our brain adapted to prefer a specific kind of music"?

In the clinical domain, this technology could be used to enhance brain-computer interfaces in order to establish communication with locked-in syndrome patients.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)This might seem unlikely, but India has been purchasing arms from the erstwhile Soviet Union from the 1960s (and later from Russia) but forgot the basics -- what in common parlance is referred to as "after-sales service".

Now, both the countries seem to have woken from their slumber since the non-availability of spares has become a major problem for India, specially for fighter jets like the Sukhoi Su-30MKI, the naval MiG-29 combat jets and Mi-17 V5 helicopters, to name just a few platforms.

But, there's a catch: The Russians want guarantees that they'll get adequate orders.

"We are aware of this problem and are working together with India's Ministry of Defence. By our joint efforts, we have made significant progress in this direction over the past year," Sergey Chemezov, the CEO of Rostec Corporation that has under its wing several strategic companies, and Chairman of Rosoboronexport, told IANS in an interview.

He, however, added that the issue is "complex", one of the issues being the quality of spares India purchased from third countries, given the lack of supplies from the OEMs (original equipment manufacturers).

"It is important to look at it from both sides -- India, the operator of military equipment, and Russia, the supplier of equipment and spare parts," Chemezov said.

"We would like the Ministry of Defence and its units to be as consistent as possible in matters of maintenance, repair and operation of military equipment. There have been cases when the end user purchased spare parts and consumables from other manufacturers, often produced under licence in other countries, which could certainly be cheaper, but it led to problems in the long term," he said.

Chemezov named Bulgaria, the Ukraine and Egypt as some of the countries from where India is purchasing spares for Russian equipment, and added: "When the equipment ceased to function properly, questions and claims were made to Russia."

He said outsourcing may not be the best solution. Russia is interested in setting up facilities in India for making spare parts, but required guarantees about demand.

"Our strategy in this direction is the development of a network of after-sales service centres, a reduction in the timelines and complexity of procedures for delivery of spare parts, and ease of their supply," he said.

"This can be done on Indian territory by creating local capacities together with our partners, within the framework of the Make in India policy. But we need guarantees from the Indian side that this will be in demand. And for this, the relevant decisions and the will of the Indian government and the Ministry of Defence are required," Chemezov said.

According to some estimates, since the early 1960s, India has acquired military equipment worth $45 billion from Moscow which forms more than 60 per cent of equipment in the inventory of the three services.

As per the latest report of Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), India is the world's largest arms importer, accounting for 13 per cent of global arms imports between 2012 and 2016. Russia supplied 68 percent of arms that India bought in this period.

Chemezov noted that at present, Rosoboronexport's portfolio of orders in India exceeds $4 billion.

He also stressed that Russia is the only country that is providing 100 per cent technology transfer to India.

"I would like to emphasise that India is Russia's privileged strategic partner. In a tough global competitive environment, by practice we prove that Russian-Indian military-technical cooperation is not only steadily developing but also deepening," he said.

"I want to note that only Russia transfers 100 per cent of technologies to India, which allows Indian defence companies to develop their own military production in full," Chemezov added.

(Anjali Ojha can be contacted at anjali.o@ians.in)

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)In a retaliatory move, massive Russian air strikes have killed at least 30 militants in Syria, where a Russian fighter jet was shot down, an official said on Sunday.

"A series of high-precision weapon strikes have been delivered in the area controlled by the Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist group, which brought down the Russian Su-25 jet by using a portable anti-aircraft missile system in the Syrian province Idlib," Russia's Defense Ministry said.

"According to radio intercepts, more than 30 Jabhat al-Nusra militants were killed," Xinhua quoted the ministry as saying.

Earlier on Saturday, the ministry said a pilot survived the fighter jet crash but was later killed in a ground fight with terrorists.

The pilot had reported earlier that he ejected by parachute in the area, controlled by Jabhat al-Nusra militants.

In May 2017, the guarantors of the Syrian ceasefire -- Russia, Iran and Turkey -- agreed to set up the Syrian de-escalation zones in Syria, which includes Idlib province.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Spanish and Moroccan rescue teams on Sunday resumed aerial and maritime search operations off the coast of Spain's autonomous city of Melilla in northern Africa, after the bodies of at least 20 migrants were recovered from the sea, according to authorities.

Sources from Melilla's government delegation said a special unit of police divers and a helicopter were called up from their bases early on Sunday to join Moroccan patrol teams in the search for more missing people, Efe news agency reported.

"The 21 people who died were travelling on a small boat bound for Melilla," an activist from the 'Walking Borders' NGO, Helena Maleno, tweeted, adding that the total number of passengers had been higher and there were "no confirmed survivors" yet.

Spanish authorities had earlier said 20 bodies were pulled out from the Alboran Sea after being spotted by passengers on a ferry on Saturday afternoon.

The bodies were discovered roughly half an hour after the ferry departed and maritime rescue services were alerted about the situation.

An underwater search operation was subsequently launched involving a special unit of the Spanish Civil Guard.

Once the bodies were located, the unit sought collaboration with Moroccan patrol boats, as they were in the African country's jurisdiction.

It was unclear when exactly the boat on which the migrants, all of whom were of sub-Saharan origin, were travelling got into trouble, but a coastal storm had swept the area in recent days.

Due to currents and sea conditions, authorities from both countries deemed it necessary to comb the area more extensively.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu on Sunday said that every person should contribute to preserving and propagating the best facets of individual cultures.

"Each country in the world has its own distinct culture. There is a unique richness in each of these cultures. Since we live in an interconnected world, there has been an intermingling of cultures. Our world is richer because of this diversity in cultures," Naidu said.

The Vice President was speaking at the inauguration of the first International Kala Mela organised by the Lalit Kala Akademi here. Union Culture Minister Mahesh Sharma was also at the event which will go on till February 17.

Naidu said that events like these will help have a greater understanding and appreciation of the cultural diversity around the world.

"We should bring out the best traditions, noble ideals and the finest expressions of human excellence in all art forms. We have a unique opportunity today through technology to learn from each other, appreciate the subtle nuances of artistic expressions and enrich our collective cultural capital," he added.

With a total of 325 exhibition stalls, the festival has more than 800 participants from around the world including countries such as France, Britain, China, Spain, Venezuela, Peru, Portugal, Sri Lanka, Poland, Tunisia, Mexico, Bangladesh, Trinidad, Tobago, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Brazil.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)South Sudan has recalled its ambassador to the US, after the American government imposed an arms embargo on the East African nation, presidential spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny has said.

Ateny on Saturday said Garang Diing Akuong has been recalled for further consultations without giving details. The South Sudanese envoy was deployed to Washington in May 2015, Xinhua news agency reported.

"This is routine for any country to recall its ambassador for further consultations. It may not be related to the arms embargo," Ateny told Xinhua by phone.

The Donald Trump administration on Friday announced arms embargo on South Sudan and urged the UN Security Council to enforce a global arms ban on South Sudan.

The US also called on the African Union (AU) and the East African regional bloc, Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) to consider sanctions measures against those who undermine the peace process.

South Sudan has been embroiled in four years of conflict that has taken a devastating toll on the people, creating one of the fastest growing refugee crises in the world.

A peace deal signed in August 2015 between the rival leaders under UN pressure led to the establishment of a transitional unity government in April 2016, but was shattered by renewed fighting in July 2016.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj would inaugurate Saudi Arabias annual Janadriyah Festival on Wednesday where India has been invited as "guest of honour this year", the External Affairs Ministry said on Sunday.

Sushma Swaraj would travel to Saudi Arabia on Tuesday at the head of a delegation and stay there till Thursday, Ministry Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said in a tweet.

"EAM @SushmaSwaraj will visit Saudi Arabia from February 6-8 to inaugurate the Janadriyah Festival of Saudi Arabia on February 7," he tweeted.

In Riyadh, Minister of State for External Affairs V.K. Singh in a joint press conference with Saudi Minister of National Guard Prince Khalid bin Abdul Aziz said that India's participation in the festival will be multifaceted and would take relations of the two nations "to new heights".

He said it was a matter of "great honour for India" to be invited as Guest of Honour country for the prestigious national event that is being organised annually since 1985.

"We will have an Indian pavilion where we will project a number of Indian themes and projects. The India pavilion will comprise glimpses of traditional and modern India," Singh said.

The Indian Council of Cultural Relations (ICCR) is sending nine different cultural troupes for the cultural performances which include Kathakali, Kalariyaptu, Kathak, Manipuri, Chhau, Bhangra, Bollywood, Gujarati and Rajasthani. There will be cultural performances in all the evenings in this 18-day festival, he said.

There will be cultural performances by the Indian school children and the Indian community as well. Yoga performances have also been arranged every day. Indian movies will also be screened during the festival.

There will be displays and presentations by ministries/departments such as Indian Ordnance Factories Board, ISRO, AYUSH Ministry, India Tourism board, Ministries of Shipping, Textiles, Food Processing Industries, Skill development, the Handicrafts Promotion Council, Digital India, Make in India etc, Singh said.

A number of Indian companies including Larsen and Toubro, Tata Motors, Jet Airways, Shapoorji Pallonji, Aster Med city, KRBL Rice and Toshi Electronic etc are also putting up their stalls in the India pavilion, he added.

"On the traditional side, India pavilion will have presentations representing our socio-cultural heritage, folklore, traditional costumes, Indian perfumes, bridal costumes, artefacts, display of specimen of calligraphy, Arabic manuscripts etc. Our Saudi friends will also be able to enjoy Indian food at the 'Flavours of India' booth in the pavilion.

"We greatly value our close and deep-rooted civilizational and strategic relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The Kingdom is also home to more than three million-strong Indian Community. I have no doubt that India's participation in this festival will take our relationship to new heights," Singh said.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Syrian Foreign Ministry has rejected the US claims about the Syrian government using chemical weapons in the war as "lies."

The ministry said in a statement on Saturday that the US remarks about the use of chemical weapons in the Eastern Ghouta region of the east of the capital Damascus are "false claims", Xinhua news agency reported.

Such allegations were timed to undermine the efforts to resolve the Syrian war through a peaceful settlement between the Syrians without foreign interventions, it noted.

The Syrian government reaffirms its position against the use of chemical weapons, and Syria has handed over all its chemical arsenals to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the ministry said.

The US and its allies are "desperately" searching for a pretext to target Syria, following the success of the Syrian army in its war against terror-designated militant groups across Syria, it pointed out.

US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis recently threatened Syria with a military action if hard evidence is found to back up the claims of another sarin attack in Syria.

Last month, activists claimed the Syrian forces used chlorine in an attack on the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta countryside of Damascus, causing 21 people to suffer from breathing difficulties.

In April last year, the US struck a military base in central Syria with more than 50 Tomahawk missiles, in retaliation for an alleged chemical attack by the government forces on a rebel-held town in the northwestern province of Idlib.

The Syrian government denied the accusations, saying it's rebels who mounted the attack to frame the government and draw in a military action from the US.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)When we happen to recall the Second World War's notable battles, the emphasis is more on those fought by the Western Allies -- Dunkirk, Pearl Harbor, El Alamein, Midway Island, D-Day landings and Arnhem, et al, given the large amount of books and films they have inspired. The Eastern Front rarely gets the same attention, though having equally significant clashes -- especially the one by the Volga in southern Russia.

A couple of days ago (February 2) marked the 75th anniversary of the end of the largest (over two million soldiers from six nations), most bloodiest (up to two million killed, wounded and captured) and a major turning point of World War II.

The over-five-month-long Battle of Stalingrad, which marked the high point of Nazi Germany's eastern advance, has become synonymous with urban warfare at its fiercest as well as a microcosm of war's mix of bravery and cowardice, brutality and resilience, and ambition and tenacity.

And it has its fair share of cultural depictions: In books and films, but also music (from classical to heavy metal), poetry and video games, as well as recollections of participants as well as analyses, both general and scholarly. How authentic are they? But before we take a look at them, let's get a brief idea of what led to the battle itself and its broad contours.

Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union in the summer of 1941, and despite occupying large swathes of the country, failed to capture key objectives like Leningrad or Moscow or comprehensively defeat the Red Army. In June the next year, its Army Group South began "Case Blue" to take east Ukraine and the Caucasian oilfields. Split into Groups A and B, respectively, to take the Caucasus and defend their flank near Stalingrad, the latter reached Stalingrad's outskirts on August 23 and were ordered to capture it. Thus began the battle in the city, from which the Soviets had removed all food stocks and equipment possible but forbidden civilian residents to leave.

The fighting continued for the next five months and 10 days, street by street, and house by house, before the Germans, forbidden by Hitler to retreat, shrank into smaller and smaller areas, cut off from each other. The pitiful remnants, led by newly-promoted Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus, eventually surrendered on February 2, 1943.

If we rule out the huge amount of Russian and German works, and keep to English, the battle figures in any standard, overall history of WWII but the conflict's huge canvas precludes much detail. Those devoted to the Eastern Front like Russian-born British journalist Alexander Werth's "Russia At War, 1941-1945" (1964) give it better play.

Werth, who covered the war from Moscow and was among the first Western journalists allowed to visit Stalingrad after the battle, also gave a stark, unsettling picture in "The Year of Stalingrad: An Historical Record and a Study of Russian Mentality, Methods and Policies" (1946).

More Western interest was evoked after the publication of twice Hero of Soviet Union Marshal Vasili Chuikov's translated memoirs -- "The Beginning of the Road: The Story of the Battle for Stalingrad" (1963). Chuikov, who had commanded the 62nd Army in the battle and was present in the city itself, played a key role with his several innovative tactics like "hugging the enemy", where Soviet soldiers kept in close proximity to the Germans to minimise their superior weaponry and air power.

While there is also the military study "Velikaia Bitva na Volge (The great victory on the Volga)" by Marshal K.K. Rokossovsky, who served as commander of the Don Front, it was Chuikov's memoirs that would influence the next books on Stalingrad.

An early one was William Craig's "Enemy at the Gates: The Battle for Stalingrad" (1973) -- from which the three pages about the duel between famed Russian sniper Vassili Zaitsev and an unnamed German opponent formed the basis, with considerable artistic license, of the Jude Law film "Enemy at the Gates" (2001). Then there is British historian Anthony Beevor's magisterial strategic and social account "Stalingrad" (1998) and Geoffrey Roberts' "Victory at Stalingrad: The Battle that Changed History" (2002).

Michael K. Jones, whose "Stalingrad: How the Red Army Survived the German Onslaught" (2007), however, purports to offer a new perspective, drawing extensively from newly-released archival material and interviews with survivors and their families. American military historian David M. Glantz, who has a spate of specialised books on the Soviet experience and operational art, contends that the earlier books suffer from over-reliance on Chuikov's memoirs, which were intended to be "propagandist", inflating German strength and focussing more on "pure" Russian formations among others.

On the other hand, if you prefer fiction, the best is Red Army journalist and author Vasily Grossman's "Life and Fate", his German counterpart Heinz G. Konsalik's "Doctor of Stalingrad" or even Canadian author John Wilson's "Four Steps to Death" (2005).

But whatever you read, fiction or non-fiction, German, Russian or other, the basic message is the same: War is Hell. And if this percolates into our minds, Stalingrad's significance is assured.

(Vikas Datta is an Associate Editor at IANS. The views expressed are personal. He can be contacted at vikas.d@ians.in)

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Actor-turned-Trinamool Congress MP Tapas Paul, who was granted conditional bail by the Orissa High Court three days ago, left for his hometown Kolkata on Sunday, 13 months after his arrest.

Arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on December 30, 2016 in connection with the multi crore rupee Rose Valley Chit Fund scam, he had been taken to Bhubaneswar for further questioning.

Pal, who was admitted to a private hospital from CBI custody for the last few months, claimed he had done nothing wrong and said his party was with him all along.

"I did not do anything wrong. I hope no one has to go through what I have gone through for the last 13 months. My party was always with me," said Pal, who was released from the hospital on Saturday night.

The popular Bengali actor also said he wants to get back to acting after his recovery.

"I am not well. But I am very happy that I am going back to my own people. I want to resume acting, may be after taking rest for a month or so," he said.

The Orissa High Court granted conditional bail to Pal on Thursday while directing him to deposit Rs 1 crore with a bank, furnish two sureties of Rs 2 lakh each, and surrender his passport to the case's Investigating Officer.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)With Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's scheduled visit to the Sikh holy city of Amritsar in Punjab just over a fortnight away, it is still not clear whether Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh will play host to the visiting dignitary or not.

Trudeau is visiting India from February 17 to 23 at the invitation of his India counterpart, Narendra Modi, with stops at Agra, Amritsar, Ahmedabad, Mumbai and New Delhi.

Trudeau's Amritsar visit to the Golden Temple, the holiest of Sikh shrines, carries a political message to a huge constituency back home in Canada with a big Punjabi, especially Sikh, population settled there.

While Trudeau will be feted by the central and state governments in New Delhi and other places, there is uncertainty on whether Amarinder Singh will hold a meeting with Trudeau or play host during the Amritsar visit.

"There is nothing so far," Amarinder's media adviser Raveen Thukral told IANS here when asked about the status of Amarinder receiving or hosting the Canadian Prime Minister in Amritsar.

Well-placed sources in the Punjab government say that the Chief Minister will have to go by the protocol issued by the Centre since Trudeau will be on a state visit. Punjab has a strong Canadian connection with hundreds of thousands of immigrants settled there and thousands of students from Punjab going to Canada annually.

Amarinder had publicly refused to meet Canada's first Sikh Defence Minister, Harjit Singh Sajjan, who was born in Punjab's Hoshiarpur district, when he visited the state last April.

The Amarinder government had cold-shouldered Sajjan, the first Sikh to be the Defence Minister of a Western country, as he visited various places in Punjab. No minister or senior officer of the Punjab government either went to welcome Sajjan or even accompany him during the visit.

Amarinder had accused Sajjan and other ministers of Punjabi origin in the Trudeau government of links to radical elements demanding a separate Sikh state of Khalistan.

Amarinder made it clear that he "would not meet any Khalistani sympathisers".

"Not only Sajjan, but other ministers and MPs, including Navdeep Bains, Amarjit Sohi, Sukh Dhaiwal, Darshan Kang, Raj Grewal, Harinder Malhi, Roby Sahota, Jagmeet Singh and Randeep Sari, are well known for their leanings towards the Khalistani movement," Amarinder had said last year.

The reasons for Amarinder's annoyance with the Canadian government are apparent.

In April 2016, he had shot off an angry letter to protest the Canadian government's denial of permission for his interactive meetings with Punjabis in the cities of Toronto and Vancouver. He was forced to cancel his political rallies following objections raised by Sikh hardliners with the Canadian government.

Amarinder, who was not the Chief Minister at the time, had protested the Canadian government's "gag order" on him. The Canadian government had officially raised its objection to Amarinder's visit through the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), a human rights advocacy group with radical leanings, had lodged a complaint with the Canadian government through a law firm against the election activities planned by Amarinder Singh.

Trying to cash in on the cold vibes between the Amarinder and Trudeau governments, the Punjab unit of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has sought a meeting with Trudeau during his visit to felicitate him.

Canadian authorities are attaching great importance to the Trudeau visit.

"Canada greatly values its strong relationship with India. This visit reflects the high level of priority that Prime Minister Trudeau places on this strategic partnership. Prime Minister Trudeau's visit builds on visits by 11 Cabinet Ministers in the past 18 months," Canadian High Commissioner Nadir Patel said recently.

Trudeau, who took office in November 2015, inducted four ministers of Punjabi-origin in his government.

Canada is home to a large Indian diaspora, as approximately 3.6 per cent of Canadians are of Indian heritage and India is Canada's second-largest source of immigrants. The majority of the immigrants are from Punjab.

Canada is also a leading education destination for Indian students, with approximately 124,000 Indians holding valid Canadian study permits last year.

(Jaideep Sarin can be contacted at jaideep.s@ians.in)

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Actress has joined the list of women who have accused producer Harvey Weinstein of sexual abuse.

Thurman had last year said she has lots to say regarding the controversy, but wanted to wait till she feels "less angry". Now, she has come out about in a New York Times article.

The actress, who has worked with Weinstein on films like the "Kill Bill" franchise and "Pulp Fiction", said the first "attack" happened at Weinstein's suite at the Savoy Hotel in London.

"It was such a bat to the head. He pushed me down. He tried to shove himself on me. He tried to expose himself. He did all kinds of unpleasant things. But he didn't actually put his back into it and force me. You're like an animal wriggling away, like a lizard. I was doing anything I could to get the train back on the track. My track. Not his track," Thurman said.

She says he later tried to apologise with a "26-inch-wide vulgar bunch of roses".

"They were yellow. And I opened the note like it was a soiled diaper and it just said, 'You have great instincts'."

Weinstein, through a representative, has acknowledged making a pass at Thurman, but said he immediately apologized.Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will make sure Karnataka is "Congress-free" after the upcoming elections.

"The countdown for the Congress to be dispelled from the state has begun. We will make sure Karnataka is Congress-free," Modi said at a party rally here.

The Prime Minister was on a day-long visit to the city to address the event that marks the culmination of the party's 90-day rally across the districts of Karnataka.

"The BJP will take Karnataka to new heights on the path of development."

In an attempt to please the people at the rally, the Prime Minister delivered the first few lines of his address in Kannada.

Having landed at the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) Airport in the afternoon, the Prime Minister was flown to the venue in a chopper.

Thousands of youth and IT professionals from the city, along with several farmers and citizens from across the state, attended the event at the sprawling Palace Grounds.

Named "Nava Karnataka Nirmana Parivartana Yatra" (journey to build a new Karnataka), the rally across 224 assembly constituencies of the state was flagged off on November 2 by the party's national President Amit Shah here.

The rally, to bring the BJP back to power in the southern state on the plank of transforming it through development, was led by its state unit president and former chief minister B.S. Yeddyurappa and the party's other state leaders.

Union Ministers Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal who are in-charge of the BJP poll campaign in Karnataka, Ananth Kumar, D.V. Sadananda Gowda and Ananthkumar Hegde who hail from the state, were also at the event.

Legislative assembly elections in Karnataka are due in April-May.

The BJP came to power on its own for the first time in 2008 but lost to the Congress after five years in the May 2013 election.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)In its 11-year journey, the Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF) has seen speakers using the platform to send out strong political messages. But the hundreds of thousands who gather at the literary extravaganza are also adept at sending their own message. And from their cheers and thunderous applause this year, rises a whisper: Things are not all good for Mr Modi -- in the literary space, at least -- and the mood of the nation may be changing.

Narendra Damodardas Modi, the Prime Minister of India, has had a rockstar presence at the lit fest each year since 2014, the year he took power in New Delhi. Even without being physically present, his aura was such that crowds would burst into cheers every time a speaker uttered his name, or one of his policies, for that matter. Name the Prime Minister and the crowds would go gaga; shame him and there would be instant hooting, signifying that the majority of the audience was not in favour of the speakers criticising Modi -- or maybe they were just the loudest.

Consider, for instance, the 2016 closing debate of the festival, on whether freedom of expression was absolute and unconditional. The debate was being held in the backdrop of police complaints being filed against the comedy show "AIB Roast", comedian Kiku Sharda being booked for spoofing Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Singh, and a few such examples. But the crowd at JLF exhibited the mood of the nation.

Bollywood actor Anupam Kher, one of the panelists, said that in a country "where you can abuse the Prime Minister (Modi) and call him a psychopath, let's not create a perception that freedom of speech is under threat". And the crowds began chanting "Modi, Modi..." Kher rose from his chair, looked at the crowds, and chanted "Modi, Modi..." into the microphone, before returning to his seat. It was a sight that would give goosebumps even to Modi's staunchest opponents. He was clearly the hero and they hailed him, unconditionally.

The same year, Shashi Tharoor, in a session on "Swachh Bharat: The India Story" took a subtle dig at the Prime Minister when he said: "The PM on corruption had said, 'Na khaunga, na khaane dunga.' We didn't know he was talking about beef." Tharoor is a well-known and popular face at lit fests, but his snide remark did not go down well with the crowd, which countered him with hard-hitting questions and criticised the Congress party.

In 2017, it was a slugfest scenario again when Manmohan Vaidya, head of RSS' communications department, and Dattatreya Hosabale, the organisation's joint general secretary, participated in a discussion "Of Saffron and the Sangha", attended by Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, among others. Vaidya, when asked by the moderator (Pragya Tiwari) to share his views on intolerance, said that people have diverted from core issues and so there are problems and that intolerance exists among those who are against Hindutva and diversity.

"Hindutva is about bringing everyone together. We do not believe that everyone should accept one faith, but coping with all diversities and yet living harmoniously and working in the interest of the nation is what RSS wants to achieve," he had then said, again to the approval of the crowd, which hailed Modi.

Just a year down the line, the lit fest, which concluded on January 29, saw the same crowd that had chanted "Modi, Modi..." clapping and cheering any statement from the dais that took a dig at the Prime Minister. Tharoor's comments on the politics of Hindutva and Modi's double standards found many takers, but even the likes of Salman Khurshid, Nayantara Sahgal and Salil Tripathi struck a chord with the audience.

The audience expressed itself with its questions too. Somebody asked, "Why can't the Prime Minister speak against the Karni Sena?", and the crowds clapped, perhaps much louder than they ever had in favour of Modi in the past.

Of the half a million visitors to the festival this year, more than 60 percent were under the age of 25 -- and the "Young India" that Modi flirts with in his speeches seems to be unhappy with him. Is there more to the political message arising from the premises of Diggi Palace this year? Only time can tell.

(Saket Suman can be contacted at saket.s@ians.in)

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Bringing the rift in the CPI-M into the open, some party leaders from Kerala slammed General Secretary Sitaram Yechury at a meet here on Sunday, a day after he confirmed that a complaint has been received against State Secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan's son for alleged fraud.

Yechury on Saturday revealed that the party received a complaint against Balakrishnan's elder son Binoy Balakrishnan about an alleged Rs 13 crore fraud committed in Dubai.

In wake of this, many state leaders attacked Yechury in their speeches at the distconference, in which both Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and Balakrishnan took part, with a few even accusing him of being disgruntled for not getting a Rajya Sabha renomination.

While the Congress was willing to support the candidature of Yechury from West Bengal to the Rajya Sabha, his Communist Party of India-Marxist was not in favour of it and in the bargain, it lost a seat in the Upper House.

With Sunday's attack, the inter-party rift has come out in the open.

Cracks started appearing in the party after Yechury took a stand favouring former Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan.

This difference of opinion deepened when the entire Kerala unit of the party early this month voted, at the Central Committee meeting in Kolkata, against Yechury's stand that the CPI-M should tie up with the Congress to fight the common enemy - the BJP.

A few days after Yechury's draft resolution was voted out, came a news report alleging that Balakrishnan junior had duped a firm. A three-page letter -- dated January 5, from the Dubai company sponser H.I.A.Al Marzooqi -- states that legal procedures have ben started against Binoy for the fraud.

Sunday's developments in the CPI-M come ahead of the state party conference to be held in Thrissur later this month where those who will attend the upcoming party Congress would be selected and it seems certain that the delegates from the state will not be supporters of Yechury or his stand.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Dear Reader,

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Digital EditorThe (TDP) on Sunday said it will not snap ties with the BJP-led Democratic Alliance (NDA).

The assertion comes amid speculation that the ruling party in Andhra Pradesh might rethink its ties with the BJP in view of its disappointment over the allocation of funds to the state in the Union Budget.

"The TDP will not break its alliance with the BJP-led NDA," Party leader and Union minister Y S Chowdary said after a meeting of party MPs and senior leaders with Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu here this afternoon.

Chowdary said they would first raise issues concerning the state with the Centre and try to get them addressed.

"If the Centre does not concede to our demands, then we will undertake protest both inside and outside Parliament," he added.

"It was all media speculation," Chowdary said when asked if the TDP was ready for a divorce with the NDA.

Asked if BJP chief Amit Shah had spoken with Naidu, he replied in the negative.

He said Naidu did not speak to Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, the BJP's bickering ally, as some media reports had claimed.

The BJP and the TDP are part of the ruling alliances in Andhra Pradesh and also at the Centre.A 15-year-old girl was injured as Pakistani forces violated ceasefire along the Line of Control (LoC) in the Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir today, officials said.

Pakistani troops targeted forward posts and villages along the LoC in Shahpur sector and the exchange of fire between the two sides was on when reports last came, a police official said.

Shahnaz Bano, 15, of Islamabad village of Shahpur was injured in the Pakistani firing and hospitalised, he said.

A Defence spokesman said Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatics and mortars around 1110 hours. The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

Fourteen persons, including eight civilians, were killed and over 70 others injured in intense shelling by Pakistan along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts from January 18 to 22.

While there were no ceasefire violations by Pakistan reported along the IB since January 22, intermittent shelling has taken place along the LoC.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A parliamentary panel looking into the for almost 27 years is likely to finalise its report on the issue in the current Budget Session, members said.

The CAG report on Bofors is the oldest "pending" matter before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).

The main function of PAC is to examine an audit report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India after it has been placed in Parliament.

The six-member PAC sub-committee on defence is looking into the non-compliance of certain aspects of the CAG report of 1989 and 1990 on the Bofors Howitzer gun deal.

The report has been delayed as action taken notes were not submitted before the panel by the concerned ministry and government organisations, said a member of the sub-committee, chaired by the BJD's Bhartruhari Mahtab.

While deliberating over the defence deal, the panel had asked several top government officials to appear before it and to brief the members about the matter.

The drafting of the report has been initiated and is likely to be finalised during the Budget Session, said another PAC member, who added that the report would be comprehensive and clear misconceptions about the deal.

After the report is finalised by the PACs sub-committee it will go to the main committee for its approval, where, a member said, Congress MPs may oppose portions of the report.

The main committee is headed by Mallikarjun Kharge of the Congress.

The Bofors scandal, relating to the alleged payment of kickbacks in the procurement of Howitzer artillery guns, had triggered a massive political storm and is believed to have led to the fall of the Rajiv Gandhi government in 1989.

Recently, the CBI filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging a 2005 order of the Delhi High Court quashing all charges against those accused in the politically-sensitive pay-off case.

The filing of the appeal assumes significance as Attorney General K K Venugopal had recently advised the agency against moving a petition 12 years after the high court's verdict.In a significant step towards institutionalising federal democratic system in Nepal, four provincial assemblies today started their maiden meetings.

The first-ever meetings of state assemblies in province 2, 5, 6 and 7 were held in the respective provincial capitals.

The meetings were convened at the temporary headquarters Janakpur, Butwal, Birendranagar and Dhangadi respectively.

Janakpur, the temporary capital of Province 2, has seen a spike in political activities in the past few days.

Top leaders of the Sanghiya Samajbadi Forum Nepal and the Rastriya Janata Party Nepal, which gained significance with their movement for federalism and the rights of the Madhesi people, are now in Janakpur.

They are holding consultations for electing officials to hold provincial posts.

There have been a series of protests and movements in the Tarai, mostly in Province 2, over some provisions of the federal constitution adopted in 2015. More than 120 Madhesis were killed in clashes with the security forces.

First time in the history of Nepal elections for provincial assembly were held in two phases on November 26 and December 7 last year.

A total of 550 members were elected for 7 provincial assemblies.

The Left Alliance of CPN (UML) and CPN (Maoist Center) registered massive victory in all states except Province 2.

Two Madhesi parties Sanghiya Samjawadi Forum Nepal and Rashtriya Janata Party Nepal jointly secured majority in Province 2.

Meanwhile, negotiations for formation of central as well as provincial governments are on.

At the central level, CPN-UML and Maoist Centre, which have formed Left Alliance, are all set to form a majority government.

Out of seven provinces, the Left Alliance is in a position to form governments in all except Province No 2.

Madhesi parties will form their government in province No 2, which is situated in southern Nepal.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Forty-seven Indian fishermen have been arrested by Pakistani authorities for allegedly fishing in the country's territorial waters in the Arabian Sea, according to a maritime official.

The Pakistan Maritime Security Agency (PMSA) yesterday arrested 47 Indian fishermen and seized nine launches for illegally fishing in Pakistani waters, a PMSA spokesperson was quoted as saying by the Express Tribune.

The arrested fishermen were handed over to the Docks police for further proceedings and investigation, it said.

The Indian boats have been confiscated for violating Pakistans coastal territory, the spokesperson said, adding that said PMSA vessels and fast attack boats took part in an open sea operation for the purpose.

On January 19, as many as 17 Indian fishermen had been arrested by the PSMA for allegedly fishing in Pakistan's territorial waters. Three boats had also been impounded.

Pakistan had released 292 Indian fishermen as a goodwill gesture in December-January.

Pakistan and India frequently arrest fishermen as there is no clear demarcation of the maritime border in the Arabian Sea and these fishermen do not have boats equipped with the technology to know their precise location.

A number of non-governmental organisations in both India and Pakistan have raised the issue, pressing their governments to release the arrested fishermen without delay.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A five member gang, distributing counterfeit currency and reportedly with links to a group in Afghanistan, were arrested at Cubum town in the district today and fake Rs 2,000 notes with a face value of Rs 2.61 lakh seized from them, police said.

They said one of the gang members, J Ajmal Khan was arrested during routine patrol after he was found carrying fake Rs 2,000 notes.

On being questioned, he said that the gang were into the business of distributing fake currency, being printed here by his father and they had links to a group in Afghanistan.

Based on this information, Khan's house was raided and the fake currency recovered from there, police said.

His father and the other three gang members were later arrested, they said.

Police said they were investigating Khan's claim that the gang had links with a group in Afghanistan.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Madhya Pradesh unit of the Aam Aadmi Party today joined disgruntled BJP leader Yashwant Sinha's sit-in at Narsinghpur.

The protest, organised by Sinha's recently launched Rashtra Manch, has been on in front of the Narsinghpur Collector's office since February 1.

"I am sitting with Yashwantji. Our party has also taken out a mock funeral procession of the Madhya Pradesh BJP government for its anti-farmer policies," state AAP convenor Alok Agrawal told PTI over phone from Narsinghpur.

Agrawal added that Sinha's protest is to press for several demands, among them jobs for farmers who will be displaced by an upcoming coal fired power project in Narsinghpur.

A protester at the site said that BJP's Shatrughan Sinha was also on his way to participate in the protest. The actor-turned-politician had joined Sinha's Rashtra Manch a day after it was formed last month.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Homegrown accessories brand Baggit is stepping up its volume and the product line to meet its target of clocking 25 per cent revenue growth in FY19.

The privately held company had around Rs 160 crore revenue last fiscal year.

"We are stepping up our production to play the volume game and are also launching new products to cater to various customer groups," Nina Lekhi, its managing director, told PTI.

"We are looking a 25 per cent revenue growth in FY19, and a double-digit bottom line growth," she added without quantifying the numbers.

It currently produces about 1.5 lakh pieces a month, which will be increased by about 50 per cent soon, she added.

She said despite the note-ban and GST challenges, they grew in double-digits last financial year, when the revenue touched around Rs 160 crore.

"Next year we are looking forward to further consolidate and grow faster," she said.

While Baggit is present in Sri Lanka, she ruled out making further international forays as the focus will be domestic market.

The brand is available in over 1,000 large format retail stores and receives 3-4 per cent sales through online. It also has nearly 50 exclusive outlets.

The company also launched a private label collection recently, which will target premium clients.

"As a brand, we are going premium but will remain affordable," Lekhi said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Actor Arielle Kebbel is searching for her sister, Julia Kebbel, who has been missing for days.

The "Fifty Shades Freed" star took to Instagram and pleaded for help for the search of her missing sister.

"Alert. My sister Julia Kebbel is missing. Pls repost. She was last seen in silver lake, walking her chocolate lab, Cindy, at 11 pm wed night. 1/31/18 She is 5'3 . Weighs about 105 pounds. Fair skin. Bleach blonde short hair," posted Kebbel, along with a series of photos of her sister and her dog.

"She has tattoos on both fore arms. She has a spiritual symbol w/ a key and the words promise on one fore arm and a blue Phoenix rising on the other. Pls scroll through pictures to see details. Her chocolate lab is named Cindy Crawford. She is chipped. If anyone finds the dog or has seen her, pls let us know," she added.

Arielle also shared Julia's Instagram and Twitter accounts so that fans can see more photos of her and identify her.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Close on the heels of Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to India, a magazine, supported by the jewish community in this country, which aims at boosting ties between the two nations, is set to hit the stands.

The publication, a monthly, is titled 'Namaste Shalom' with BJP leader and former Rajya Sabha MP Tarun Vijay as its editor.

The Jewish community in India is behind the endeavour, with Bene Israel Heritage Museum and Genealogical Centre, a Mumbai-based organisation, backing it.

The editorial board of the magazine comprises several prominent names, including MPs Poonam Mahajan and Rajeev Chandrashekhar as well as Chairman and Managing Director, Bene Israel Heritage Museum Ralphy Jhirad.

Speaking to PTI, Jhirad emphasised that the magazine would be a media-bridge between the two nations and also focus on the heritage of Jews who made India their home.

When the rest of the world persecuted and refused shelter to Jews, India welcomed them and gave equality and respect, he said.

The first issue of the magazine, which is expected to hit the stands on Monday, has received special inaugural messages from President Ramnath Kovind and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Vijay said.

It features a special article on India-Israel civilisational threads written by Principal Economic Advisor to the Government of India Sanjeev Sanyal.

It also has an interview with Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and contributions by several noted columnists and economists.

Vijay, a former Rajya Sabha MP, said the magazine would help strengthen India-Israel relations, especially at strategic and people-to-people levels.

"The two nations are working together in an extraordinary way, without changing its Arab and Palestine policy, and that's the beauty of the understanding and an amazing chemistry between Modi and Netanyahu," he said.

Vijay claimed that the magazine is a historic move, and a first after Independence, perhaps a first for any country at a popular-strategic level supported by the people and not patronised by any government agency.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Union minister Giriraj Singh said he hoped that Sunni Muslims would come out in support of building a Ram Temple in Ayodhya just as Shias extended their support to the cause.

The BJP leader was speaking at the inauguration of the 25th Rashtriya Kavi Sammelan here.

"Shias have already supported the construction of a Ram Temple in Ayodhya. I'm hopeful Sunni Muslims will also extend their support for the cause," he told reporters here last night.

In November last year, the Uttar Pradesh Shia Central Waqf Board had submitted before the Supreme Court a proposal for settlement of the decades-old dispute over the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid site, saying a temple can be built in Ayodhya and the mosque could be raised in Lucknow.

Singh said he widely used social media to blunt the opposition's criticism of Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, where the BJP posted a thumping victory last year.

"The prime minister came under attack by his opponents during the UP elections but I extensively made use of social media to spread the message of what good had been done (under him) and you see the results for yourselves," he said.

In his inaugural address at the meet, he said there was a need to check the growth of population which was a major problem being faced by the country.

He said birth control measures were required to curb population and ease the pressure on utilisation of resources like land and water.Actor Vidya Balan believes that every movie should be released in the way it has been made by the director and says that instead of protesting against a film, people should just not watch it if they feel offended.

The actor's comments came in the aftermath of the controversy over the release of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's "Padmaavat", which faced protests from various Rajput groups, including the Karni Sena, which alleged that it distorted history, a claim repeatedly denied by the director.

The film, starring Deepika Padukone, Shahid Kapoor and Ranveer Singh, was released on January 25 after the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) cleared it with a 'U/A' certificate and five modifications, including title change from "Padmavati" to "Padmaavat".

"I feel every kind of film should be allowed to be released in the way it's been made and then if you don't want to go and watch it, don't watch it. But at least watch it to know what it has," said Balan, who is also a member of the Central Board of Film Certification.

Balan said the protesters should not raise their voices against the film's content till they have actually watched it in its entirety.

"It is our fundamental rights for making film on any subject and its screening in the theatres and should not be violated," the actor told reporters here.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The TDP today said its alliance with the BJP in Andhra Pradesh and the Centre was very much alive, following speculation that the party was disgruntled over the "raw deal" that the state got in the Union Budget.

TDP leader and Union minister Y Satyanarayana Chowdary briefed the media this afternoon about deliberations at a meeting convened by Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu on the Union Budget.

"As and when it is required, the chief minister and party chief will take the decision appropriately. As of today it (the alliance) is just going on. We never said (about snapping ties)...it's all speculation," he said here.

"Our state is in a disadvantageous position due to bifurcation (of united Andhra Pradesh). People are dissatisfied because there is no specific mention of state issues in the Union Budget. All this was discussed," Chowdary said.

The meeting was attended by party MPs, a few state ministers, senior TDP leaders and senior bureaucrats.

"We have already taken up the issues with the Union Finance Minister, Railway Minister (on setting up a railway zone in Visakhapatnam). Definitely, in the next 2-3 days we are hopeful everything will be resolved," he added.

Chowdary added that the TDP would raise the state's demands, if required, in Parliament.

Some of the issues over which the TDP is miffed are the implementation of a special financial package for the state, setting up of a railway zone, deficit finance and schemes related to development of Amaravati as the state capital.

"People (of Andhra Pradesh) are looking forward with anticipation. They (the Centre) have done something, but much more needs to be done. We will discuss these things in the next two-three days and try to work out a solution," Chowdary added.

"If required we will protest inside Parliament. We are discussing specific points. If we don't get clarity, definitely we will protest inside Parliament during the (Budget) session," the Union minister said.

Asked if the two TDP ministers in the Union Cabinet were ready to resign if the state's demands were not met, Chowdary said, "As and when it is required, our CM and party president will take appropriate decision."



"I suggest the media should never anticipate, or think of, a divorce. You should think only of marriage," Chowdary said, when asked if a "divorce" with the BJP was imminent.

Asked if BJP chief Amit Shah spoke with Naidu (after reports about TDP's resentment started doing rounds), Chowdary replied in the negative.

Nor did Naidu speak to Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, BJP's bickering ally in Maharashtra, as some media reports claimed, he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Bharipa Bahujan Mahasangh leader Prakash Ambedkar today alleged that NCP leader Sharad Pawar had, in the past, opposed invocation of the stringent MCOCA provisions against right-wing leader Milind Ekbote, who is now accused of inciting anti-Dalit violence at Bhima-Koregaon.

He will not join hands with the NCP to take on the BJP, Ambedkar said, and indicated that he wasn't willing to align with the Congress either.

An NCP spokesperson denied the allegation, pointing out that Ambedkar's own party was part of the ruling coalition in Maharashtra during the period he was referring to.

Ambedkar, grandson of iconic Dalit leader Dr B R Ambedkar, was speaking to media after a state-level convention of his party here.

In 2001, when the home portfolio in the Congress-NCP government was with the NCP, "Pawar (as NCP chief) opposed pressing charges under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act against Ekbote in a riot case in Pune", Ambedkar claimed.

"I will not align with the NCP. The Left parties are always with me," he said.

"Today Pawar calls others communal. But when he had power, he did not act," Ambedkar alleged, adding that he would consider aligning with other secular parties.

Ambedkar also said that state Congress chief Ashok Chavan should come clean on his "ties with the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Hindu Mahasabha" and then talk to him.

In arecent blog post, Chavan had asked Ambedkar to join hands with the Congress to defeat the BJP.

When contacted for comment, NCP spokesperson Nawab Malik termed Ambedkar's allegation against Pawar as baseless.

"Pawar never interfered in the functioning of (home) ministry. Had Pawar interfered, Bhujbal (an NCP leader who was state home minister in the 1990s) would not have arrested late (Shiv Sena founder) Bal Thackeray.

"Ambedkar (his party) was part of the government from 1999 to 2004. Why didn't his ministers raise voice then?" Malik asked.

The Dalit leader was free to choose his allies, but he should decide who was his primary enemy, the Sena-BJP or the secular parties, Malik said.

Ekbote, who heads the Samast Hindu Aghadi, has been booked by Pune police for inciting violence against Dalits at Bhima-Koregaon war memorial in Pune district on January 1.

One person was killed and several others were injured in the violence which erupted after right-wing outfits opposed the 200th anniversary celebration of the Bhima-Koregaon battle, in which forces of the East India Company defeated Peshwa's army.

Members of the Mahar community among Dalits had fought for the British, while the Peshwas were Brahmins. Dalit groups celebrate the victory as a symbol of their resurgence.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Indian Patent office has granted 8,940 patents during April-December 2017, an increase of 40 per cent over the same period previous year, which experts say reflects growing innovation and economic activities in the country.

As per a data of the commerce and industry ministry, the patent office has also granted trademarks and designs to 2,18,383 and 7,406 applicants, respectively during the period as compared to 1,60,363 and 5,421 during April-December 2016.

Registration of copyrights too jumped multifold to 14,217 as against 2,141 during the same period previous year, the data said.

According to experts, growth in patent and design registration is a good for India if domestic players are getting those, as it reflects increase in innovation and economic activities.

"On an average, domestic players get only 17-18 per cent of patent registration annually, while the remaining goes to foreign players. We need to encourage more local individuals and entities to file more and more patent applications," National Intellectual Property Organisation (NIPO) President T C James said.

However, he said the rise in the number of trademarks reflects increasing commercial activity in the country.

According to Economic Survey 2018, much of India's low patent output could be due to its lower middle-income status.

"Unless there is a greater focus on R&D, rising income alone will not allow India to catch up in the near future," it has said.

The government is taking measures to simplify procedures and fast-track examinations of intellectual property applications.

Further, the data said filing of patents and design applications rose 6 per cent and 12 per cent, respectively during April-December 2017.

The Indian Patent Office has received 35,511 patent applications during the period, while 8,521 design proposals.

Filing of trademark applications however dipped 7 per cent to 1,95,705 during the said period.

The Survey has said if journal publications reflect a countrys prowess in science, patents reflect its standing in technology.

According to the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), India is the seventh largest patent filing office in the world.

In 2015, India registered 45,658 patents in comparison to China (1,101,864), the US (589,410) and Japan (318,721). However, India produces fewer patents per capita.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Army chief General Bipin Rawat today inaugurated a cadets hostel, Cariappa Block, at the Rashtriya Military School in Ajmer today.

The two-storeyed building with cabins, recreation rooms and other modern amenities has been designed to house 200 cadets.

The Chief of Army Staff also inaugurated a restored motivational hall which was originally constructed in January, 1936.

The heritage building was restored with the efforts of Old Boys Association of the school.

The major contribution in the restoration has been made by Captain Kuldeep Singh Solanki, according to a defence spokesperson.

Other senior Army officials from south-western command and alumni of the school were present on the occasion.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)An Army officer and three jawans were killed and four people, including two teenagers, injured today in heavy Pakistani shelling along the LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts of Jammu and Kashmir, forcing Indian troops to retaliate, officials said.

Pakistani forces opened unprovoked heavy firing and shelling along the LoC in Bhimbher Gali sector of Rajouri district this evening, senior Army officials told PTI.

In the heavy shelling, three jawans were killed, they said, adding an officer, who was injured in the shelling, later succumbed to his injuries.

Indian Army was giving a befitting reply as heavy exchanges were on, the officials added.

Earlier in the day, two teenagers and a jawan were injured in Shahpur sector of Poonch district in the shelling from across the border which started this morning and was continuing intermittently, a police official said.

He identified the injured civilians as Shahnaz Bano (15) and Yasin Arif (14), both residents of Islamabad village of Shahpur, and said both the teenagers were hospitalised.

A Defence spokesman said Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatics, and mortars around 1110 hours.

The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

In another ceasefire violation by Pakistan in nearby Rajouri district, the police official said six mortars exploded near Neaka Panjgrain and Tarkundi villages in Manjakote sector around 1540 hours.

The mortars were fired by Pakistani troops and was responded by Indian forces guarding the LoC, triggering an exchange of fire between the two sides which was continuing when last reports were received, he said.

In January alone eight civilians and six security personnel were killed and over 65 injured in ceasefire violations by Pakistan troops along Indo-Pak border in Jammu region.

Pakistani troops carried out intense shelling along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts from January 18 to 22.

While there were no ceasefire violations by Pakistan reported along the IB since January 22, intermittent shelling has taken place along the LoC.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Haryana Chief Minister Mamohar Lal Khattar while replying to a question on CBI charge sheet against Bhupinder Singh Hooda in Manesar land deal case, quoted the scriptures saying, "As you sow so shall you reap."



He said the central probe agency registered a case and filed the charge sheet only on the basis of solid evidence.

"Gita, the holy book of knowledge and wisdom, says 'jaisa karm karogey, waisa he phal paogey' (as you sow so shall you reap)," Khattar said in Rohtak.

According to an official release, the chief minister said, "Earlier, the accused were ready to undergo any kind of investigation. But now, that the CBI has moved into the matter, they are crying vendetta."



"Those who have done wrong will certainly get punished. According to our Constitution, be it small or big, all are equal before the law," he said.

The CBI had on February 2 filed a charge sheet against former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and 33 others in the Manesar land deal case.

The probe agency has alleged in its FIR that about 400 acres land, whose market value at that time was above Rs 4 crore per acre, was allegedly purchased by private builders and others from land owners for only about Rs 100 crore in collusion with government officers.

The CBI had said that a loss of Rs 1,500 crore was allegedly caused to the land owners of Manesar, Naurangpur and Lakhnoula villages of Gurgaon.

To a question on the Sutlej-Yamuna Link (SYL) canal, Khattar alleged that the previous governments did not do anything on this issue in the last 12 years.

"We requested the Supreme Court to list the matter for hearing at the earliest and the verdict came out in favour of Haryana. We are hopeful that the Centre will soon initiate construction of the SYL in Punjab," he said.

Regarding formation of third front, he said such fronts are generally formed in politics.

"At present, the BJP has formed government in 19 states, and we will soon have majority in the Rajya Sabha. The people of the country reposed their faith in policies and programmes of the BJP," Khattar said.

At Rahgiri programme in Rohtak, the chief minister said the event was is not only a stress buster for the people but also provides better platform to the youth and artists to exhibit their skills.

In Bhiwani, Khattar announced that interest-free loan of Rs 25,000 would be provided to small artisans under Saint Guru Ravidas Sahayata Yojana, and hostels would be opened in in 11 districts of the state.

In order to clear the backlog of filling up 200 posts reserved for Scheduled Castes and Backward Classes, the government has invited applications. Steps have been initiated to clear the backlog, he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Assam government on Sunday said it is ready to tweak its investment policies to attract the pharmaceutical sector for setting up units in the state.

As there is no specific pharma policy in Assam, the government is ready to tweak the existing norms to suit the industry players of the healthcare segment to come and invest in the state, state Finance Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said at the ongoing Global Investment Summit here.

"We have a general investment policy. But some of your requirements may be different. The government of Assam is willing to customise the parameters for your requirements," the minister said.

"We will facilitate and go whatever way to help you invest in Assam. The government and political class here is helpful to you. We want investment. So we will go an extra mile to have you in our state," he said.

Sarma, who is also the Health Minister, said the government wants to transform the state and create jobs for the youths.

Health and Family Welfare Department Commissioner Samir Kumar Sinha said that Assam saw an investment of $142 million (over Rs 900 crore) in the healthcare segment with the setting up of nine pharma units.

"The Assam government has been giving top priority to healthcare segment. The Budget allocation for the health and family welfare of the state in 2017-18 jumped by 17 per cent from 2016-17. This was one of the highest," he added.

On this occasion, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between Indian Institute of Technology-Guwahati and Kalam Institute of Health Technology to source innovation from the Assam-based centre and auction them to the industry.Assam has received investment commitments worth Rs 1 lakh crore through over 200 business pacts signed at its first Global Investment Summit here, an official said today.

As many as 25 MoUs, entailing Rs 35,000 crore investment, were signed on the final day of the summit today.

"The two-day summit has seen signing of over 200 MoUs with investment commitments crossing Rs 1 lakh crore," said the spokesperson of 'Advantage Assam - Global Investment Summit 2018'.

As many as 176 MoUs were signed yesterday with a range of companies committing investments worth Rs 65,186 crore in the state.

"This has been a good summit, considering the fact that Assam is organising such a global meet of leading investors for the first time.

"This particular initiative will raise hope and expectation of young people and energise them," Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said at the closing function.

Some of the MoUs include companies like Ola for running river taxi in Brahmaputra and skill mission for setting up three mega centres of excellence.

Besides, another agreement was signed with Ola to train 12,000 youths, the spokesperson said.

MoUs were also signed between IIT-Guwahati and Kalam Institute of Health Technology on technology transfer in the domain of medical technologies.

"We conducted fruitful discussion with Asian Development Bank to set up skill city, having 12 different skill training schools to make the state a global hub of skilled human resource," said the spokesperson, who is a senior bureaucrat of the state government.

Some other developments include laying of foundation stone for tech city of Assam, setting up of NIXI node, establishing a Centre of Excellence for Application Security at NIC and handover of Master Services Agreement for multiple BPO units, he added.

"Discussions were also held to set up a institute in media and film sector with the help of Whistling Woods International of Subhash Ghai and a technical institute with Pawanhans group," the spokesperson said.

On the first day of the summit yesterday, public sector oil behemoth ONGC committed to pump in Rs 13,000 crore in the state in the years to come, followed by the rival oil PSU firm Oil India Ltd with a pledge to pump in Rs 10,000 crore.

Another two oil companies IOC and NRL have also announced investments worth Rs 3,432 crore and Rs 3,410 crore respectively.

Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani had announced an investment of Rs 2,500 crore in Assam in various sectors, including retail, petroleum, telecom, tourism and sports, creating jobs for at least 80,000 people over the next three years.

The state government had identified 12 focus sectors for the summit, including agriculture and food processing, handloom-textile-handicrafts, logistics, river transport-port township, IT-ITeS, pharmaceutical-medical equipment, plastics- petrochemicals and power.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The first-ever global investors summit in Assam has seen investment commitments to the tune of nearly Rs 70,000 crore in various sectors, including petroleum, telecom, health and tourism, Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said today.

"It is a very good beginning. The response of the investors are very exciting and encouraging. I believe the investment commitments will make Assam a better economy," Sonowal told PTI here.

Nearly 200 initial pacts worth nearly Rs70,000 crore were signed at the Advantage Assam summit, he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the two-day event yesterday.Bhutanese PM Tshering Tobgay, several Union ministers,chief ministers of neighbouring Arunachal Pradesh and Manipur, ambassadors and high commissioners of 16 countries, RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani, Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekharan attended the meet.

The chief minister said oil major ONGC committed Rs 13,000 crore investmentin the state, another oil PSU Oil India Ltd. pledgedan investment of Rs 10,000 crore.

Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Numaligarh Refinery Ltd planning toinvest Rs 3,432 crore and Rs 3,410 crore, respectively.

Among private players, RIL chairman and MD Mukesh Ambanihas announced an investment of Rs 2,500 crore in Assam in varioussectors, including retail, petroleum, telecom, tourism andsports, creating jobs for at least 80,000 people over the nextthree years.

TheTata Trusts will invest Rs 2,000 crore to implement acancer care programme jointly with the Assam government in 17 centres across 15 districts of the state from next year, theproject will see an investment of around Rs 2,000 crore.

Indo-UK Institute of Health will be investing Rs 2,700 crore, while Century Ply has shared plans of investing Rs 2,100 crore.

Spicejet chief Ajay Singh has announced the plans of Rs 1,250 crore investment in Assamthrough seaplanes to boost the tourism sector besidesconnecting Lakhimpur and Jorhat under the recently launched central government scheme 'Udaan'.

Infinity Group will be investing Rs 1,000 crore in an IT park and real estate project in Guwahati, theMedanta Group proposed Rs 500 crore investment in the healthcaresector and Dalmia Bharat Cement announced an investmentto the tune of Rs 1,100 crore.

Sonowal said the investments will provide ample employment opportunities to the youth of the state.

"We hope that Assam will be the gateway for India to connect ASEAN countries," he said.

Media advisor to the chief minister, Hrishikesh Goswami, said tourism, which is one of the key focus areas ofthe government, saw an investment proposal to the tune ofRs 736 crore and infrastructure sectorsaw a total investment proposal worth Rs2,347 crore.

Other major companies announcing investments in Assam areBPCL (Rs 350 crore), Essel Infraprojects (Rs 6,000 crore), Star Cement (Rs 2,100 crore), Infinity Infotech Parks (Rs1,000 crore) and Mahindra Holidays and Resorts India (Rs 400 crore).

The Assam government has identified 12 focus sectors for the summit, including agriculture and food processing, handloom-textile-handicrafts, logistics, river transport-port township, IT-ITeS, pharmaceutical-medical equipment, plastics-petrochemicals and power.

Assam has hosted its first global investors summit to showcase its manufacturing opportunities and geostrategic advantages to foreign and domestic investors.

The summitaimed at highlighting Assam's geostrategic advantages and core competencies in different sectors along with the policy initiatives taken by the state government.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Assam is in discussion with the Centre to start flight services to ASEAN countries, Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said today.

"We are keen to start flights to ASEAN countries and we also request these countries to do the same to the region," Sonowal said at a plenary session on North East India and ties with ASEAN and BBN countries, at the Global Investors Summit here.

"There is scepticism from some quarters that it will not be viable in the short-run, but we are sure it will be in the long-run and transform the economy of the region," he said.

He also urged ASEAN countries to set up consulates in Guwahati, which besides boosting economic ties, will also help in promoting cultural relations.

The Centre was exploring possibilities of initiating work on the ASEAN Trilateral Motor Work, which will transform the economic scenario of the region, the CM said.

Meanwhile, Asian Development Bank's Country Director Kenichi Yokoyamana, who was present at the event, said ADB is preparing Assam for the ASEAN market, estimated at around USD 800 billion.

"The North East and particularly Assam has the locational advantage as the centre for the regional cooperation framework for India with the ASEAN and BBN countries," Yokoyamana said.

ADB has Rs 7,000 crore in investments in Assam and is a key to integrating the state with ASEAN countries by preparing a vision and strategy suitable for the South East Asia markets.

The areas where Assam can increase ties with the ASEAN countries were agriculture, agro-processing, services sector, tourism and information technology, he said.

The ASEAN-Indian Business Council (AIBC) called for an initiative to set up a North East Trading Centre in ASEAN countries.

The tourism market in the north east is untapped and there can be tie-ups with ASEAN countries to explore opportunities in this direction, AIBC Co-Chairman Dato Ramesh Kodammal said.

Sonowal also batted for eased travel rules and increased cultural exchanges among students, academics and professionals.

"Cooperation and collaboration can do wonders as is evident from the state-of-the-art skill development centre set up by Singapore here, which has helped our youth extensively," he said.

The CM said Assam had extensive economic collaboration with Myanmar, Bangladesh and other countries of the region before independence but after 1947, transport linkages were snapped, resulting in "economic stagnation and social strife".

"Now with the Act East Policy, increased ties with South East Asian countries will lead to a vibrant Assam," he added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Assam Industries Minister Chandra Mohan Patowary today said the state government will invest Rs 2,250 crore in developing waterways.

"The World Bank is offering Rs 1,000 crore and the Ministry of Shipping has also sanctioned Rs 1,250 crore. Thus a total of Rs 2,250 crore is ready for investment in developing the waterways in Assam," Patowary said at the Global Investment Summit here.

"Assam has huge potential in river transport through two national waterways in the state, namely the Barak and the Brahmaputra. The Inland Waterways Authority of India has already initiated the necessary process for dredging Brahmaputra and Barak," he said.

Besides, the Centre has sanctioned Rs 250 crore to Bangladesh for dredging some parts of the Brahmaputra and the Barak, falling in the neighbouring country.

Patowary added that Central government has also sanctioned six modern ports on the banks of the Brahmaputra and 56 modern jetties, which will start services very soon.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Bahrain has deported eight people to war-torn Iraq after revoking their citizenship and making them stateless, Human Rights Watch said today, accusing the Gulf monarchy of exiling dissidents.

The eight were deported to Iraq's southern Shiite city of Najaf on January 30 and February 1 after being stripped of their nationality in 2012, the New York-based watchdog said.

"Bahraini authorities have dropped all pretense of pluralism and tolerance for dissent and are clearly stripping away the citizenships of people whom they find undesirable," HRW Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitson said.

"Bahrainis who dare speak out for change now risk not only arbitrary detention and torture but statelessness and deportation to an uncertain future," she said.

Under Bahrain's citizenship law, amended after political protests broke out in 2011, individuals who engage in acts deemed "disloyal" to the state can be stripped of their nationality.

The eight deportees were among 31 Bahraini activists and human rights lawyers whose citizenship was revoked in November 2012 on the grounds of damaging national security, HRW said.

Only five of those 31 defendants had dual citizenship, HRW said, leaving the majority stateless.

"Bahrain should immediately put an end to these arbitrary deportations and restore citizenship to those who have been left stateless or whose citizenship was revoked unfairly or arbitrarily," the watchdog said in a statement.

HRW has called on Bahrain to repeal its citizenship laws.

Located between Saudi Arabia and its arch-rival Iran, Shiite-majority Bahrain has been ruled for more than 200 years by the Sunni Al-Khalifa dynasty.

The kingdom has stripped hundreds of its citizens of their nationality and jailed dozens of high-profile activists and religious clerics since protests demanding an elected government erupted in early 2011.

The Bahraini government has accused Iran of backing the protests and attempting to overthrow the government. Tehran denies involvement.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Former Union minister Bandaru Dattatreya today asked the Telangana government to come out with a white paper on its "failed" double bedroom housing scheme.

The senior BJP leader also appealed to Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu andhis Telangana counterpart K Chandrasekhar Rao to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi after some leaders of both the TDP and the TRS expressed their "disappointment" with the Union budget.

"The 2 BHK housing programme of the Telangana government has failed. The Central government is sanctioning funds as its share for the scheme. Despite that, their (TRS government's) promise is still not fulfilled. I demand that a white paper should be brought out on the 2 BHK housing project so that people should also know.

"I know there are difficulties in view of land acquisition for double-bed room houses," the Secunderabad MP told reporters here.

The TS 2BHK scheme envisages providing 2-bedroom Houses to all the houseless poor families in the state in a phased manner.

Dattatreya further said the state government cannot blame the Centre on many of the farmers' issues as agriculture is a state subject.

The former Union minister also accused the Telangana government of not encouraging farmers to avail the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) and other such schemes.

Dattatreya claimed that suicides by farmers have risen in Telangana which is "alarming".

Terming the Union budget as revolutionary, progressive and pro-poor, Dattatraya said, "In the budget, highest priority has been given to farmers and rural areas and big allocations for infrastructure growth.

"The central funds for Andhra Pradesh and Telangana have been increased comparatively from the last year. This should not be made a political issue," he said.

"Instead of coming under pressure of opposition parties particularly the Congress, they (AP and Telangana governments) should see whatever the Central government is giving... Please study in detail and then if any problems are there then come to the prime minister and talk to him," Dattatreya said.

"Rather than that just for the sake of Opposition pressure, if you follow their way it will not be in the interests of either Telangana or Andhra Pradesh states," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The coming Assembly election in Tripura is likely to witness a fight between the CPI(M)-led Left Front and the BJP in the state.

The state had in the past witnessed an electoral battle between the CPI(M) and the Congress.

Sudip Roy Burman, former state Congress president and an MLA who had joined the BJP, said, "The Congress was not serious about fighting the CPI(M)" and claimed that the BJP would defeat the Marxists in the Assembly poll.

Burman, who headed the state Congress in 2013 Assembly election, told PTI, "In 2013, the CPI(M) had faced strong anti-incumbency but Congress central leadership had helped CPI(M) in the state clandestinely for enjoying the party's support in Parliament".

CPI(M) politburo member Prakash Karat also admitted that this time it is a contest between the Left Front and the BJP in the February 18 election.

"All the earlier elections in the state were fought between the Left Front and the Congress but this time, it is a contest between the BJP and the Left Front as Congress leaders and supporters had joined the saffron party", Karat had stated at an election meeting in South Tripura on Friday.

Six Congress MLAs including Burman had crossed over to the BJP.

"We are forced to join the BJP as we found that the Congress is not serious about fighting the CPI(M)", Burman said.

Tripura Congress vice-president, Tapas Dey said, "A communal party like the BJP became so strong in the state due to the misrule and partisan behaviour of the CPI(M)".

The CPI(M) never fulfilled the justified demands of the people, he said and alleged, "They (CPIM) have a vindictive attitude towards people who do not support them."



CPI(M) spokesperson Gautam Das said, Tripura is a model state in the country in terms of development.

"The pro-people programmes of the Left Front government, especially for the poor and the working class, would bring it back to power", he said.

To garner the tribal vote which constituted around 31 per cent in the state, BJP has stitched an alliance with the Indigenous People's Front of Tripura (IPFT).

"The alliance between BJP and IPFT will make a strong impact in the 20 tribal reserve constituencies," said Mrinal Kanti Deb, BJP spokesperson.

Karat had, however, alleged that the IPFT is the mask of insurgents, who had killed people of the state a decade-and- a-half ago.

The BJP forging an alliance with such a party was tantamount to "sedition", the senior CPI(M) leader had said.

That the BJP is very serious in wresting power from the CPI(M) is evident from the list of its star campaigners like Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home minister Rajnath Singh, BJP president Amit Shah and a galaxy of party leaders who will campaign for party candidates in Tripura.

Cautioning the people in the state, Karat had said, "The Assembly election in the state is important not only for Tripura, but for entire India, as it would show which way the country would move".

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The BJP had become "indirectly" responsible for journalist Santanu Bhowmik's death after entering into an alliance with the IPFT as the scribe was allegedly hacked to death by the members of the tribal party, CPI(M) politburo member Brinda Karat said today.

Bhowmik (28), a correspondent of local TV channel "Dinrat", was allegedly beaten to death on September 20 last year when he had gone to Mandai, near the Patnibazar area, to cover an agitation by the Indigenous People's Front of Tripura (IPFT).

Four activists of the tribal party were arrested the day after in connection with incidents of violence and Bhowmik's killing.

"The BJP is now indirectly involved in the killing because it has forged an alliance with the IPFT, which was responsible for Bhowmik's killing," Karat said at a poll rally at Patnibazar, 30 kms from here.

Tripura is set to go to the polls on February 18 and the results will be declared on March 3.

The saffron party was aiming to win the upcoming polls by terror, Karat alleged and appealed to the voters of the state to defeat the BJP-IPFT alliance.

Attacking the IPFT over its demand for a separate state of "Twipraland", the Left leader alleged that the party had plans to divide the state.

"The BJP, RSS and its Hindutva affiliates were involved in attacks on adivasi communities and persecution of Christians in the name of 'ghar-wapsi' in different parts of the country," she said.

Karat also claimed that there was not even one instance of communal attacks during the CPI(M)-led government's rule in the north-eastern state in the last 20 years.

"The election is not just important for the state, but also for the country as it will decide the course of development, peace and integrity," she said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)BJP MP Hukum Singh, who died at at hospital in Noida, was today cremated in his native town Kairana, in Shamli district.

Singh (79) died last evening, almost a month after he was admitted to the J P Hospital in Noida with severe breathing problems, hospital sources said.

Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and several UP ministers, including Satish Mahana and Suresh Rana, visited Kairana to offer their condolences.

Singh, who was elected from the Kairana seat, is survived by five daughters.

He was an MLA in Uttar Pradesh for seven terms and a minister in the state before entering the Lok Sabha in the 2014 polls.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Moroccan rescue services have recovered the bodies of 16 migrants off the coast of Spain's enclave of Melilla, Moroccan and Spanish officials said today.

Three women were among the dead taken to a morgue in the Moroccan city of Nador, a medical official there told AFP.

All were sub-Saharan Africans apart from one Moroccan, the official said.

A spokeswoman for Melilla's authorities earlier said "about 20" bodies had been recovered in Moroccan territorial waters.

The bodies of the migrants were spotted yesterday by a Spanish ship, which alerted the rescue services of both countries, she said.

Late yesterday, a Spanish police patrol boat found one more body, which was taken to Melilla, a Spanish enclave bordering Morocco.

Spanish authorities said a Civil Guard helicopter was supporting Moroccan search patrols this morning.

Migrants are increasingly favouring the so-called western Mediterranean route to reach Europe, which involves making the sea crossing between North Africa and southern mainland Spain.

According to the International Organization for Migration, Spain has been the second most popular point of entry for migrants coming to Europe so far this year, with 1,279 arrivals, after Italy with 4,256.

It said 243 people have died or are missing in the Mediterranean after trying to cross the sea this year, not including those recovered this weekend.

Spain was last year the third point of entry for Europe- bound migrants, after Italy and Greece.

Arrivals by sea tripled in 2017 compared to the previous year, reaching a total of 22,900 migrants, according to the EU border agency Frontex.

According to Omar Naji, of the Moroccan Association of Human Rights, migrants have been making the sea crossing after authorities tightened controls at the Melilla border fence.

"Before more migrants would try to climb the Melilla fence... but now, after stricter controls, they can only cross from the sea," he told AFP.

Naji said that migrants must pay people smugglers 3,000 euros each to undertake the sea crossing "and this traffic is carried out before the eyes of the authorities".

Said Chramti, who heads the Grand Rif Human Rights association, told AFP that Europe is also responsible for the deaths of migrants because it is "tightening the screws on (illegal) migration".

He also criticised the Moroccan authorities for "failing in its battle against illegal migration networks".

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), responsible for promoting the country's exports, needs to be brought under the domain of the Ministry of Finance, a tax officers' association has demanded.

The DGFT is currently under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry.

In a letter to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, the Indian Revenue Service (Customs and Central Excise) association said such a move will help in better facilitation of trade inside and outside of India.

The commerce ministry through the foreign trade policy has undertaken a number of measures like imposition of anti-dumping duty, formulation of trade policies and setting up of Special Economic Zones, said the letter written by Anup K Srivastava, president of the association and a senior IRS officer.

However, with the major function of trade facilitation being with the Ministry of Finance, and the customs being the first interface of importers and exporters, at times there are problems of coordination. This leads to duplicity of work which at times not only increases the transaction cost but is also detrimental to the growth of economy, it said.

"It would be prudent that DGFT be brought into the Ministry of Finance so that there is uniformity in the policy and trade has only one agency to interact with. This, it is felt that such a change would boost the trade measures taken by the government and make India a destination for foreign investment," said the letter.

The association said it was learnt that the commerce ministry had moved a proposal towards taking over the functioning of Directorate of Safeguards, a key directorate looking at the interest of domestic industry, under the finance ministry by way of creation of a Directorate of Trade Remedies.

"It is felt that the same would not only be detrimental to the trade, but the economic development of the country at large," Srivastava said.

The creation of a separate directorate in the Ministry of Commerce when a well developed mechanism of similar type is existing in the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) under the finance ministry, is felt to be leading to "duplication of work" and setting in confusion in the trade, he said.

Srivastava said it has been seen in some cases probed by revenue intelligence agency under the finance ministry that the Importer Exporter Code (IEC) -- mandatory for import and export of goods -- issued by the DGFT had "unknown identities with non-existent addresses".

"These are the IEC codes belonging to unscrupulous elements and drawback to the tune of thousands of crores have been taken by them, besides entering into the business of money laundering, by way of fake exports. This in itself appears to be defeating the work being done by the government towards a corruption-free market," the letter said.

Apart from this, lots of prohibited consignments like fire crackers etc have been imported into the country on fake IEC codes thereby leading to security threat, it said.

"This issue primarily stems from the fact that the officials of DGFT are not tuned and trained towards investigation and enforcement," the letter added.

The association has the support of about 4,000 IRS officers and about 76,000 staff working under the Central Board of Excise and Custom (CBEC).

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Congress leader and former law minister Ashwani Kumar has alleged that the CBI's decision to move the Supreme Court in the Bofors case was "politically motivated" and a "gross act of malice", and held that the matter will be decided in the "peoples' court".

With the government deciding to go ahead with an appeal in the case against the legal opinion of the Attorney General, yet another constitutional institution had been weakened, he alleged.

"The politically-motivated decision of the government is a gross act of malice. The question that begs itself is whether this is a case of lawful prosecution or political persecution. The matter will finally be decided in the peoples' court," he said in a statement.

The former law minister said the decision of the CBI to move court in the Bofors case was an "unprecedented negation" of the "sanctity of the considered legal opinion" of the Attorney General.

"Yet another constitutional institution stands weakened," he said.

The move, he said, was a "brazen infraction of judicial norms" and the settled principle of jurisprudence that criminal prosecution must not be allowed to go on endlessly and that there should be a finality to litigation.

The law of limitation cited by the Attorney General in support of his opinion was based on this principle, he noted.

"The reason given for reopening a case 12 years after the High Court decision is utterly untenable," Kumar said, adding that the "ex-facie self serving statement" by a foreign private detective to a TV channel could not displace the voluminous record of investigation and the well considered judicial verdict in the matter.

Michael Hershmam, president of the US-based private detective firm Fairfax, had alleged in a television interview last year that the Rajiv Gandhi-led Congress government had sabotaged his investigation into the case.

The CBI had on Friday filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging the 2005 order of the Delhi High Court quashing all charges against those accused in the Bofors pay- off case.

Sources had said the CBI in its appeal stated that a further investigation was necessary in view of reports relating to Hershman's interview.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)An estimated 2,53,000 were generated in the last two years, reveals an examination of Union budget 2018-19.

According to the budget documents, presented by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Thursday, the estimated workforce of central government establishments will be 35,05,000 as on March 1, 2018.

This is 2,53,000 more than the head count of 32,52,000 in March 2016.

About 2,27,000 jobs are estimated to have been added in central government departments between 2016 and 2017.

An estimated 34,80,00 people were working with central government departments as on March 1, 2017, the budget documents say.

Though the lion's share of jobs has been added in police departments, the numbers have also gone up in various ministries and departments.

A reading of the budget papers, which gives a sector-wise break-up, details how the numbers stack up.

The budget says, for instance, that the Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers' Welfare will add 1,944 jobs by March 1. Its actual strength in 2016 was 3,996.

Similarly, about 1,519 new jobs are estimated to have been added by the Department of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries between 2016 and March 2018.

The department's estimated strength on March 1 will be 3,861 against 2,342 in March 2016.

The Department of Atomic Energy is estimated to have added 6,279 jobs between March 1, 2018 and 2016. Its actual strength on March 1, 2016 was 30,639 and it is projected to be 36,918 by next month, the documents say.

The Ministry of Civil Aviation had a strength of 1,145 personnel in 2016 and will add 1,197 jobs by March.

Similarly, 3,024 jobs will be added by Ministry of Culture by next month, against its strength of 7,675 on March 1, 2016.

The Home Ministry (excluding police force, cabinet and police departments under it) will add 5,836 more personnel to take its strength to 26,188 by next month.

About one lakh more workforce is estimated to have been added in police departments under the home ministry to take the total head count to 11,25,093 by March 2018.

The strength of police departments under the central government was 10,24,374, as on March 1, 2016.

There will be an estimated increase of 1,196 persons in the Ministry of External Affairs by March 2018 as against its actual strength of 9,672 in 2016, the budget documents say.

The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change is estimated to add 2,234 more jobs by March to take its strength to 5,119 as against 2,885 in 2016, it said.

An estimated 772 people will be part of the workforce of the Minority Affairs Ministry by next month. Its actual strength in 2016 was 774.

The Mines Ministry will have 772 more personnel to take its strength to 8,562. There were 7,790 personnel employed with the ministry in 2016, the documents say.

The numbers of jobs in other government departments are also given in the document.

(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.)Three Naxals, two of them carrying cash reward, today surrendered in Chhattisgarh's Kondagaon district, police said.

The cadres, including a minor, turned themselves in before Kondagaon Superintendent of Police Abhishek Pallav and other officials, citing that they were impressed by the surrender and rehabilitation policy of the state government.

Of the surrendered, Sukhdhar alias Umesh Kumeti (18) was active as a member of military company no.6 under east Bastar division of Maoists and carrying a reward of Rs 8 lakh on his head, Pallav told PTI.

Similarly, a 17-year-old cadre who was an LOS (local organisation squad) member in Bayanar area of the banned outfit was carrying a reward of Rs 3 lakh on his head, he said.

A lower rung cadre Pandru Ram Sori (25) was also among surrendered, he added.

The three admitted to their involvement in the encounters between Naxals and police in Tetam village (2016) and in Irpanar and Tuswal villages (2017), the SP said.

They will be provided facilities as per the surrender and rehabilitation policy, he added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)China today criticised a US report which said that Beijing could secure limited advantage in Asia through limited use of nuclear weapons, saying it has adhered to the policy of "no-first-use" of nuclear weapons under any circumstances.

The Pentagon on Friday released the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) in which it said that the US wants to prevent China from mistakenly concluding that any use of nuclear weapons, however limited, is acceptable.

China said that it "firmly opposed" to the NPR published by the US Department of Defence.

It is the Pentagon's first NPR since 2010.

The 74-page report cast China as "a major challenge to US interests in Asia".

China's Defence Ministry spokesman Ren Guoqiang said that the US document presumptuously speculated about the intentions behind China's development and played up the threat of China's nuclear strength.

The report said the US strategy for China is designed to "prevent Beijing from mistakenly concluding that it could secure an advantage through the limited use of its theatre nuclear capabilities or that any use of nuclear weapons, however limited, is acceptable".

China will resolutely stick to peaceful development and pursue a national defence policy that is defencive in nature, Ren said.

"China has adhered to the policy of no-first-use of nuclear weapons at any time and under any circumstances," he said, adding that under no circumstances will China use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon states or nuclear-weapon-free zones.

China has always exercised utmost restraint in the development of nuclear weapons and limited its nuclear capabilities to the minimum level required for national security, the defence ministry spokesman said.

The US, which possesses the world's largest nuclear weapons arsenal, should conform to the irreversible world trend of peace and development rather than run in the opposite direction, state-run Xinhua agency quoted Ren as saying.

"We hope the US side will discard its 'cold-war mentality', shoulder its own special and primary responsibility for nuclear disarmament, understand correctly China's strategic intentions and take a fair view on China's national defence and military development," he said.

He urged the US side to meet China halfway to make military relations between the two sides a stable factor in bilateral relations, and jointly safeguard global peace, stability and prosperity.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Maharashtra Congress chief Ashok Chavan has appealed to CPI(M) leader Prakash Karat to reconsider his resolution of "no alliance" with the party in the larger interest of the country ahead of the Left party's general session in April.

Appealing to Karat, the CPI(M) politburo member, to do a rethink on his resolution of "no alliance and no cooperation" with the Congress, Chavan said "any prick lines with the Congress can always be sorted out".

In a move aimed at consolidating anti-BJP parties ahead of 2019 polls, Chavan also asked Bharip Bahujan Mahasangh president and Dalit leader Prakash Ambedkar to drop his anti- Congress pitch while dubbing him as an "erudite leader of the Dalits after B R Ambedkar".

In a politically significant development, CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury's draft resolution proposing an alliance with the Congress was defeated in voting during the party's central committee meeting last month.

In a blog yesterday, Chavan said it was "flummoxing " that when comrade Yechury and comrade Raja walked shoulder to shoulder with other opposition leaders in the "save the Constitution" march, the Congress became "untouchable" for comrade Karat at this critical juncture.

Chavan was referring to the march which was held in south Mumbai on January 26 and was attended by Left leaders, JD(U) rebel Sharad Yadav, NC's Omar Abdullah, NCP chief Sharad Pawar and others.

"I can only pray that that he (Karat)does a rethink before his party's general session in April, where his resolution will be ratified or rejected, in the larger interest of the country. Any prick lines with the Congress can always be sorted out," the former chief minister said.

He also took an apparent jibe at Ramdas Athawale, the Union minister of state for social justice in the NDA government.

"Prakash Ambedkar is emerging as an erudite leader of the Dalits after Babasaheb Ambedkar. He is astute, educated, sophisticated and presentable.

"It is these qualities that make him stand apart from those who claim to be champions of the Dalit cause but have fallen for allurement and largesse of BJP," Chavan said.

Athawale's RPI (A) has the largest following among the Dalits in Maharashtra who are divided in various factions.

"I have personally witnessed how they lost their trustworthiness and are being hated by the Dalit community. This is the time when Prakashji needs as many friends as possible across the political spectrum to consolidate his position," Chavan said.

He also showered praises on Prakash Ambedkar, the grandson of B R Ambedkar, but expressed dissatisfaction over his decision of staying away from the march.

He said the march was not the occasion to display the "discomfort" Prakash Ambedkar had with certain leaders.

"It (the march) was an expression of disenchantment with current rulers and solidarity with the Constitution. Why shy away from shaking hands with the Congress to begin with," he said.

"I'm sure Prakash Karat and Prakash Ambedkar are both bright enough to distinguish who the real enemy is and how any rigid stance may eventually help the monstergrow," the Nanded MP said.

Today, we are witnessing what can be described as butchering of innocent people on the false notions of nationalism, he alleged.

"Disastrous economic policies and immature financial decisions have wrecked havoc on the life of workers farmers and lower middle class," Chavan said.

In a bid to reach larger constituency, Chavan said the "religious supremacy" was thrust upon the country.

He alleged that the unchecked arrogance of the current dispensation had reached its peak and religious supremacy was being thrust upon the country.

Minorities and Dalits were being treated as secondary citizens and even ministers were saying that they had assumed power to alter India's secular constitution, Chavan said.

The Congress is trying to bring together opposition parties on a wider anti-BJP platform in a bid to pose a formidable challenge to the saffron party in the 2019 elections.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Disallowing unauthorised constructions in low-lying areas, conservation of lakes and putting in place a good drainage system are some of the major steps needed to prevent disasters due to urban flooding, said experts.

Urban flooding is a global phenomenon and is caused by climate change, they said.

"It (urban flooding) is a phenomenon which is caused due to climate change. Unless and until we take all the safeguards, it will not be possible to really check urban flooding," D S Meshram, President Emeritus, Institute of Town Planners, India (ITPI), told PTI.

He was here to take part in the 66th National Town and Country Planners Congress held last week.

"Unauthorised constructions and encroachments in low- lying areas should not be allowed," said Meshram, a former Chief Planner with the Union Ministry of Urban Development.

Heavy rainfall can occur all of a sudden due to climate change and a drainage system should be in place to let the water drain, he said.

Meshram said plans should be prepared in advance to immediately evacuate people living in vulnerable areas (to safer places) in the event of a heavy downpour.

Urban flooding is witnessed not only in India but in several other countries as well, he said, citing a report of the United Nations.

According to the report, he said, there are 10 cities in the world, including Tokyo, Shanghai and Mumbai, which are vulnerable to urban flooding.

A N Sachithanandan, a retired professor in urban planning with Anna University, Chennai, said lakes in cities and other places should be conserved to preserve the natural ecosystem.

Regretting that lakeshave shrunk in several urban centres in the country due to encroachments and other reasons, he said lakes in the old days had channels for flow of water.

"We should whole-heartedly preserve the lakes. (In recent times) the channels are blocked because of encroachments," he said.

Talking about the importance of drainage system, he said, "If you have enough to drain (water) instead of stagnating, then things can happen."



Most of the new office buildings, including in the IT sector, cover the whole area with cement, leaving little space for absorption, he said.

"If water is flowing, before it goes there, half of it would have been absorbed here (if it is not covered by cement).

"The speed of water that goes there will be less and quantity will also be less. Simple logic. We don't require a great hydrologist to tell this," he said.

Observing that authorities do insist on following the rules in construction of buildings, he said individuals, private companies and others should have the awareness not to "pave" (cover the area with cement) the whole area.

"How can authorities see whether every family, every office building are following (rules) or not. Individuals should become conscious that he is polluting, he is flooding," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Polling stations opened in Costa Rica today for the first round of the Central American country's presidential election, which is being buffeted by a debate on gay marriage.

A total 13 candidates are vying to succeed outgoing President Luis Guillermo Solis, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a second consecutive term.

Same-sex marriage is seen as a key issue in the socially conservative country, where 3.3 million voters are eligible to cast ballots.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)In a stinging attack on the Siddaramaiah government on all fronts, Prime Minister Narendra Modi today accused it of setting new records in corruption and asserted that the countdown for its exit has begun.

"The Congress government is at the exit gate," Modi told a huge public rally here, as he took on the Siddaramaiah rule dubbing it a "10 per cent commission government."



Chiding the government on the law and order front, he said, "instead of the rule of law, the criminals are ruling the roost."



The rally at the sprawling Palace Grounds marked the culmination of the state BJP's 85-day "Parivarthana Yatra" that crisscrossed all 224 assembly constituencies and virtually sounded the bugle for the coming Assembly polls in the state, due early this year.

The BJP has set a 150-plus seats mission.

Asserting that there was a "saffron wave" in the state, Modi said the people of Karnataka had decided to make the state Congress free and to get rid of Congress culture.

"Congress government is a 10 per cent government, where no workhappens without paying a commission of 10 per cent. It is a matter of shame if this becomes the identity of a government," he said.

Charging the state with setting new records in corruption, Modi said "Congress free government means freedom from dynastic rule, nepotism, corruption and loot."



He also referred to the IT raids at the residences of two state ministers and that a raid on a senior Congress leader revealed Benami property and said, "there are 'Steel Mafia', sand mafia and transfer mafia' in the state."



The Prime Minister said some people hatched a conspiracy to pocket crores of Rupees in the name of building a steel bridge.

"Due to public outrage and BJP's protest, the project was dropped," Modi said.

He was referring to a steel bridge project in the city at a major traffic junction, which was scrapped after public protest.

Referring to a spate of killings of activists of BJP and the Sangh Parivar, he said a number of workers associated with BJP and its affiliated organisations have been killed.

"It is an assault on the social fabric. I appeal to the people of Karnataka to vote against the government which attacks the social fabric of the state.

"I am seeing that Karnataka has decided to free the state from Congress. To free from Congress' culture, from society, from public life, from "



The Congress had "ruined" the society, culture and politics, he said, adding, "I can see that the BJP government in Karnataka is not far away."



While referring to the law and order situation, Modi said on the one hand, the BJP at the Centre was trying to take India forward, while on the other, in Karnataka "there is such a government that there is a reverse flow."



He said criminals are ruling the roost in Bengaluru. "In Bengaluru also criminal elements have caused worry to the common man. You might have felt this."



Modi said "in the whole world there is discussion about ease of doing business and there are efforts in that direction. Our government is making efforts for the ease of doing business and talking about ease of living."



"But with the Congress government in Karnataka, here there are discussions regarding ease of doing murders."



He said the BJP government would take the state in the direction of progress with the moto "Sabka Sath, Sabka Vikas".

The "Parivarthana Yatra" was launched by BJP President Amit Shah on November 2 last year.

According to party leaders, the "Yatra' has traversed over 15,000 km during its journey,aimed at "exposing misdeeds" of the Siddaramaiah government.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)With cracks appearing in the CPI(M) over the issue of going for an adjustment with the Congress to counter the BJP, the leadership is trying to walk a middle path to avoid a likely split in the party in the next party congress.

The CPI(M) central committee meeting here on January 21 had voted against a draft political resolution, pitched by its General Secretary Sitaram Yechury proposing alliance with the Congress.

The party had adopted a draft resolution favoured by those supporting politburo member Prakash Karat ruling out any form of electoral alliance or adjustment with the Congress.

"The difference within the party, especially between two senior most leaders is sending out a wrong message about the party in public. We need to solve this urgently," CPI(M) politburo member Hannan Mollah told PTI.

According to CPI(M) sources, the leadership is trying to take a middle path where both the warring factions can be brought to peace by "adopting a political resolution" which can have a "window for some sort of adjustments" with secular forces including the Congress.

A senior CPI(M)leader said the ongoing battle of ideas within the party can be termed as a fight between "pragmatic" CPI(M) represented by Yechury and "dogmatic" CPI(M) represented by Karat.

The cracks within the party came out in the open when Yechury openly stated that he had expressed his desire to quit his post, a claim denied by Karat.

Yechury along with a large section of leaders from Bengal have been vocal about the adjustment with Congress to stop the BJP.

But his political line has been vehemently opposed by Karat, known as a hardliner in the party.

Former CPI(M) central committee member and Lok Sabha speaker Somnath Chatterjee felt that the decision of not going for an adjustment with the Congress will prove to be another blunder in the future.

"I feel very sad after seeing what is happening. The party has committed many blunders from not allowing Jyoti Basu to become Prime Minister in 1996, to not joining the government in 2004. This will be another blunder," he said.

"We have a clear understanding about the menace of the BJP. The Tripura unit is also having a taste of the BJP's divisive But despite attacks of the RSS, the Kerala unit is yet to understand the magnitude of the threat the BJP poses," a CPI(M) central committee member said on condition of anonymity.

Although the CPI(M) is divided over adjustment with the Congress, its allies like the CPI is in favour of broader unity of secular forces including the Congress.

"We feel that there should be broader unity of secular and democratic forces including Congress to stop the march of BJP," CPI leader D Raja said.

Other Left allies the RSP and the Forward Bloc are yet to take a call on this issue.

Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh had criticised the CPI(M) for adopting a draft political resolution ruling out adjustment with the Congress.

"The BJP is the biggest threat the country is presently facing and all the secular and democratic forces should unite with the Congress to counter it," Ramesh had told PTI.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Actor Swara Bhasker today said it was unfortunate that having a different set of opinions could be seen as "dissent" and dissent could be passed off as "sedition" today.

The actor said the problem of intolerance of opinion continued to haunt the country.

Swara had recently criticised "Padmaavat" director Sanjay Leela Bhansali for "glorifying" the now-banned archaic jauhar practise in an open letter, for which she received considerable flak on the social media.

When asked about the backlash, Swara told PTI, "There's a real problem of intolerance of opinion in India. We see difference of opinion as dissent and dissent as sedition."



The actor today turned showstopper for fashion designer Shaila Khubchandani's label Crow.

Dressed in black and grey, Swara walked the ramp with elan.

Talking about her upcoming film, "Veere Di Wedding", she said she is excited about the project.

"The story has an original feel. It's the story of four girlfriends, friendship, love and life. Lots of fun along the way."



Swara featured in the opening show of the last day at the LFW while her co-star Kareena Kapoor Khan is the grand finale showstopper for Anamika Khanna.

Talking about Kareena, the actor said, "I love her. There's no one like her on the ramp at all."



Swara added fashion helps one get the spotlight on oneself without compromising on their identity.

"I'm not an expert. But I think one cannot be fashionable till one is confident and comfortable.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Environmentalists in the Taj city have opposed the district administration's move to shift the PAC battalion from the Taj Ganj area to the Keetham protected forest area on the Delhi-Agra national highway.

Scores of activists staged a dharna at the "Shahid Smarak" in the Sanjay Place commercial area today to protest the move.

Divisional Commissioner Ram Rao had, after a meeting of the district officials last week, indicated that the PAC would be shifted to the Keetham forest area to make way for the Metro Rail yard.

The announcement had invited the ire of the local green activists, who have now launched a campaign called "Say No to PAC shifting".

Shravan Kumar Singh, the vice-president of the Braj Mandal Heritage Conservation Society, told PTI, "The Keetham reserve forest area is a sensitive eco zone, which has a bird sanctuary, a bear rescue centre and an elephant rescue centre, apart from the Soor Smarak, a memorial of the blind bard of Braj Bhasha.

"The Keetham lake has a python point where a large number of reptiles can be seen. No effort should be made to disturb the fragile ecology of the area."



Devashish Bhattacharya of the River Connect Campaign said, "The PAC battalion can be shifted anywhere, why this particular forest area, which is a critical green buffer between the Mathura Oil Refinery and the Taj Mahal?



"Earlier, the administration had identified a site for a leather shoe cluster and announced a plan for a northern bypass. Luckily, the environmentalists were able to stall those projects. The area where the PAC is proposed to be shifted belongs to the Uttar Pradesh Horticulture department."The Metro rail project for Agra has been cleared by the Yogi Adityanath government and the work is likely to begin soon.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has rejected proposals of a partnership with the EU, insisting full membership to the bloc is the only option, in an interview published today.

Hosting Erdogan on a visit to Paris in January, French President Emmanuel Macron said it was "hypocrisy" to say progress could be made on Turkish EU membership, floating the idea of a partnership instead.

The EU must "keep its promises" to Turkey, Erdogan told Italy's Stampa newspaper, ahead of his arrival in Rome today for a 24-hour visit.

"The EU is blocking access to negotiations and suggests that lack of progress is because of us. It's unfair. Just like it is that other countries are pushing for options other than membership," he said.

"We want full membership. Other options are not satisfactory," he added.

He stressed the country's "important" role stemming the flow of migrants to Europe, which he said offered "security and stability" to the continent.

Turkish ambitions to join the EU date back over half a century but accession talks started in October 2005.

Out of the total of 35 chapters needed to be closed to join the EU, 16 have been opened with just one closed. No new chapter has been opened since financial and budgetary provisions was opened in June 2016.

The Turkish leader also defended his recently-launched "Olive Branch" operation in the northern Syrian region of Afrin, fighting Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia which Ankara sees as a terror group.

"The Turkish armed forces are not in Afrin to fight armed Kurdish groups. We don't have problems with the Kurdish Syrians, we are only fighting terrorists, and we have the right to do it," insisted Erdogan, repeating that Turkey was not seeking territorial gains.

Erdogan's flying visit to Italy will include a meeting with his Italian counterpart Italian Sergio Mattarella.

He will also be the first Turkish president to visit the Vatican in 59 years, where he will thank Pope Francis for challenging US President Donald Trump's decision to recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, a city also claimed by Palestinians.

"We are both in favour of the status quo and we have the will to protect it," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The opposition DMK is going full steam ahead with its nearly two-month-long brainstorming sessions to listen to views of functionaries from grass-root level and address their grievances to strengthen the party.

The interactive sessions, which began at the party headquarters here on February 1 and would go on till March 22, aim at galvanising workers, ahead of civic polls expected to be held this year.

Local body polls are likely after conclusion of delimitation and post-delimitation processes that are underway.

According to a senior DMK leader "the situation in Tamil Nadu is such that state assembly election may be called early" alongside the Parliamentary polls next year, besides the expected civic polls.

The view that early Assembly election is a possibility, stems from the ongoing bickering between the ruling AIADMK and its sidelined leader T T V Dhinakaran, and the perceived political instability.

Dhinakaran's 18 loyalist MLAs were disqualified from the Assembly last year and the matter is pending in Madras High Court. Depending on the outcome of the case and its implications, there can be early Assembly election if the ruling party cannot muster a majority.

Under such circumstances, making appropriate corrections to the party apparatus, wherever needed, assumes significance, he told PTI, adding DMK's working president M K Stalin is determined to take remedial action, based on the feedback of cadre at the interactive sessions.

Chaired by Stalin, the almost two-month-long interactive sessions with functionaries, from village panchayat-level secretaries to district secretaries also comes close on the heels of top two film stars Rajinikanth and Kamal Haasan announcing their political entries.

The DMK today named a 16-member panel, headed by senior functionary N R Elango, to look into the grievance petitions of cadre and it will submit a report to Stalin.

A box named 'Theervu Kanum Petti,'(Box to resolve issues) has been kept at the venue of the meeting to encourage party workers to submit their grievances. The panel would look into those petitions.

After a membership enrolment-cum-renewal drive a few days ago, the total membership of the party crossed the 'one-crore' mark, according to provisional estimates, the party leader said, adding, "A significant chunk of the new members, running into lakhs, are youth."



Asked about specific steps to strengthen the party, the senior leader said it was an ongoing process monitored by Stalin and feedback from cadre would be a key factor in this regard.

About strengthening the party in the Western Kongu region, he said the DMK would hold its Coimbatore zonal conference at Erode on March 24 and 25.

During the first 10 days of the interactive sessions, the DMK leadership is focusing on the western region, known in the state as 'Kongu nadu', which includes Erode, Tirupur and Salem, where the ruling AIADMK is comparatively much stronger.

Then, they would focus on cadre from districts, including Tiruchirappalli and Ariyalur districts in central Tamil Nadu, following which workers from other districts would attend the sessions.

DMK has asked its cadre participating in these sessions to attend the meet with a "minute-book" to record the deliberations.

During the meeting, Stalin has been telling the cadre to sink their differences, if any, and work hard to catapult DMK to power in Tamil Nadu. He also has food with them and encourages one-on-one discussions.

The DMK working president has also told the district and union-level office bearers to be sensitive to the views of grass-root level workers and it would go a long way in the party's growth.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Premier medical and research institute PGIMER today said it has successfully performed its first ever simultaneous liver and kidney transplant on a terminally ill patient.

A team of more than 12 doctors, transplant coordinators, technical and nursing staff successfully conducted the over 10-hour-long operation on the 40-year-old male patient.

"Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh accomplished another major feat in the complicated transplant surgery by successfully performing its first ever simultaneous liver & kidney transplant on a terminally ill patient suffering from end- stage liver and renal failure," a release by the PGIMER said.

According to the release, a young girl from Bihar, who was declared brain dead by the Brain Death Certification Committee on February 2, was the donor.

The girl was rushed to PGIMER in an extremely critical condition on January 25 after she was referred here from a hospital near Ludhiana after she sustained grievous head injury in an accident on the evening of January 24.

After she was declared brain dead and her family consented to organ donation, the heart, liver and kidneys were retrieved for transplantation.

As there was no matching recipient for the heart at PGIMER, Regional Organ & Tissue Transplant Organisation (ROTTO), National Organ & Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) in Delhi was approached. With NOTTO's intervention, the heart was allocated to a Delhi hospital for the matching recipient.

It was sent from PGIMER at 10.05 am yesterday through a green corridor for the International Airport here, from where it was airlifted for its destination in a chartered flight.

The liver and one of the kidneys was transplanted to the 40-year-old male recipient, while the other kidney was transplanted on another patient.

PGIMER Director Jagat Ram said, "Team PGIMER has done it again. This time it is simultaneous liver and kidney transplant surgery on a single recipient, one of the most complex and demanding organ transplantations. Even the recipient too had to be selected very carefully for these procedures."



He said it is the combination of highly-experienced transplant specialists, world-class infrastructure and professional support team at PGIMER, that made the efforts culminate into success.

Each and every member of the team involved in the process deserves appreciation for their proactive demeanour and synergized efforts, Ram said.

"So far, the institute has been successfully conducting heart, kidney, pancreas, liver and cornea transplants. With today's commendable initiative, PGIMER has forayed into simultaneous liver and kidney transplant which will, further, contribute to saving of more precious lives," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)BJP MP Ranjanben Bhatt today laid the foundation stone for a satellite station at Chhayapuri near here.

The MP said the station would be operational by the end of the year.

Vadodara Divisional Railway Manager Amit Kumar Singh said Rs 40 crore will be spent for development of Chhayapuri satellite station.

"After this station becomes operational, it will ease out rail traffic congestion at Vadodara railway station," the official added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)British police have charged a fourth man in connection with the kidnap and murder of an Indian- origin jeweller who had been found dead in the city of Leicester last month.

RamniklalJogiya,74, had gone missing as he walked home from work and was later found dead in a nearby lane, triggering a murder investigation by Leicestershire Police.

"Javon Roach, 29, of Norwich Road, Leicester, has been charged with kidnap and robbery of Jogiya," a police statement said yesterday.

Roach will appear before Leicester Magistrates Court in Leicester tomorrow.

Earlier this week three men, aged 19, 20 and 23, were also charged with kidnap and robbery in connection with Jogiya's murder. They have been remanded in custody to appear at Leicester Crown Court on February 28.

Two men, aged 22 and 18, were released under probe and two other men, aged 20 and 21, were released with no further action.

Police have renewed their appeal for information as anti-crime charity Crimestoppers has announced a 10,000-pounds reward for anyone who can shed further light on the attack.

Jogiya, the father of three sons, was last seen on CCTV footage locking up and leaving the family's jewellery store on Belgrave Road known as the Golden Mile due to its row of jewellery shops, mostly run by Indian-origin merchants.

Police are reportedly also hunting for a shopping trolleyseen being pulled by a person who entered Jogiya's store minutes after he had locked up.

A person was caught on CCTV "pulling a trolley and wearing a burka" as they entered the shop.

CCTV footage of a motorbike, which is being linked to Jogiya's death, has also been released by police. It was seen riding in convoy with a white van.

The lead detective in the case Detective Chief Inspector David Swift-Rollinson has issued an open letter appealing for help to solve the murder.

"Jogiya was a husband, father, brother and well-known businessman who was innocently walking home when he was pulled off the street and bundled into a van," he said.

"I cannot even begin to imagine the fear he must have experienced that night, how scared and frightened he would have been and the violence he may have experienced before he died," Rollinson said.

He urged people to come forward anonymously if they are afraid, saying there are "variety of techniques, methods and safety measures we can put in place to preserve your identity and protect you".

Jogiya's family had earlier issued a statement through Leicestershire Police expressing their devastation at his death and paid tribute to a loved member of their "close knit family".

The killing has caused a great deal of unease within the local community, dominated by Indian-origin jewellers.Local Leicester East MP Keith Vaz also called a public security meeting earlier this week.

"The community in Belgrave has been shocked by Ramniklal Jogiya's death," Vaz had said.

Local police have deployed a large contingent of officers to patrol the Belgrave Road area and have been visiting local businesses to reassure them.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)French officials say President Emmanuel Macron and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are talking about working on a "diplomatic road map" for Syria in the "coming weeks."



France's presidency said in a statement today that the two presidents spoke by telephone yesterday about the security, political and humanitarian situations in Syria, including Turkey's military offensive in the Syrian Kurdish enclave of Afrin.

Eight Turkish soldiers were killed there yesterday, making it the deadliest day for Turkey since the country launched its operation targeting Kurds Syrian last month.

France's presidency says Turkey and France want to see a political solution under the aegis of the United Nations, and that talks between France and Turkey will "intensify further in the coming days.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)France and Turkey will be working in the coming weeks on a "diplomatic road map" for an end to the nearly seven-year war in Syria, President Emmanuel Macron's office said today.

The announcement came after Macron spoke by telephone with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan yesterday which discussed in particular Turkey's operation against Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia in Syria.

Macron had incensed Turkish officials last week by saying in a newspaper interview that France would have a "real problem" with the campaign if it turned out to be an "invasion operation".

Turkey's state-run Anadolu agency reported yesterday that Erdogan had sought to reassure Macron during their talk, saying Ankara had no eye on Syrian territory.

"The two presidents agreed to work on a diplomatic road map for Syria in the coming weeks," the Elysee Palace said.

"To that end, discussions between France and Turkey, which both hope for a political solution overseen by the UN, will increase in the coming days."



On January 20 Turkey launched its "Olive Branch" operation in northern Syria against the YPG, which it brands a terror group.

Today it said it could expand the incursion beyond the northwestern enclave of Afrin, to the town of Manbij and possibly east of the Euphrates river.

But Turkey's Western allies do not classify the YPG as a terror group and have worked closely with its fighters in the battle against Islamic State (IS) jihadists.

Erdogan has sought to build a strong relationship with Macron despite rocky ties with the EU, visiting Paris in January for talks.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)In a plea seeking action against encroachment of land owned by a Hindu "mutt", the Madras High Court bench here has impleaded heads of as many as 32 similar religious bodies directing them to furnish to the government data on their properties and revenue.

Hearing a public interest petition filed by a devotee, Radhakrishnan, a division bench comprising justices Kirubakaran and Tharani impleaded the heads of all the "mutts" called "Adheenams" in Tamil Nadu as respondents and directed them to provide details.

The information on properties owned by the "mutts" and revenue from it should be submitted to the inspector general of registration and the top authority should confirm the same, the court said.

The petitioner submitted that "Senkol Adheenam" owned several acres of lands in Tuticorin and Tirunelveli districts and the "mutt" authorities were supposed to undertake religious work and service to devotees from the revenue earned from the properties.

Administration of the "adheenam", however, did not function properly recently, and several persons had encroached the lands and the religious work of the "adheenam" was affected, Radhakrishnan contended.

He sought a direction from the court to the government to constitute a committee in this regard.

The committee should comprise district collectors of Tuticorin, Tirunelveli and Joint Commissioner of Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department and it should take steps to vacate the encroachments after conducting a survey, he submitted.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Oil industry players today asked Assam government to do more in getting environmental clearances faster as it is a challenge in implementing projects in the state.

"Getting forest permission is the most formidable area in Assam. The Ministry of and Forest is on the same page as Petroleum Ministry on this. The state government has to deal at its own level," Director General of Hydrocarbons Atanu Chakraborty said.

Speaking at a session at 'Advantage Assam - Global Investment Summit 2018' here, he pointed out to the public perception that the oil industry is a pollution-causing one and said there are many environmentalists and activists, who talk about the damage to by exploration and production activities.

"This is a point not to put across to the people for creating a negative image. The state government's help is needed in creating the correct awareness among the people," Chakraborty said.

The problems of logistics and short working season were also underlined by the director general.

Expressing similar views, Hindustan Oil Exploration Company (HOEC) Managing Director P Elango spoke about the need for a comprehensive policy in this regard.

Though the company which operates the Dirok gas field in Assam has received good support from the state government, but it wants clear guidelines on environmental clearance issues, Elango said.

He pointed out that such rules are framed by states across the world and "is totally doable here also".

Stating that the brief working season in Assam due to long monsoons is a major problem for developing logistics, Elango said his company had installed pre-fabricated structures at its Dirok plant.

"It has enabled us to ensure that the first gas from the plant was delivered within 27 months of commencing the construction," he added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Global wedding portal Zank You is set to make a foray into India with a focus on major metros and is betting big to tap substantial portion of about USD 20 billion flourishing wedding market, a company official said.

A premier wedding registry and reference platform, Zank You, will provide information and access to various wedding vendors across India and overseas as also venues and other necessary details.

The platform has already garnered over 4 lakh users and about 5,000 registered brides.

"India being one of the largest wedding market witnesses almost 10 million wedding per year and it's not an option for players like us to not be present in such a burgeoning market," Zank You co-founder and CEO Guillermo Fernandez Riba told PTI.

Headquartered in Spain, the portal is present in 23 countries, being a market leader in Europe and South America, including a significant presence in the United States.

"In the countries where we are present, we are either the market leader or the co-leader and the same goal has been set for India too as a large part of the industry is unorganised," Riba said.

According to a Franchise India report, Indian wedding market growing at 25 to 30 per cent annually and the estimated cost of a wedding with no expenses spared could be between Rs 5 lakh and Rs 5 crore.

With half of India's population being under 29 years of age, the marriage market is set to boom like never before over the next five to ten years and the wedding card market in India for the 10 million marriages performed annually is worth Rs 8,000-10,000 crore, the report noted.

The company is looking to utilise its global expertise on weddings including local intricate knowledge across different cultures and people and has already tied up with premium vendors across the board.

Currently, they cater to over 3,50,000 registered couples and over 50 million visitors to their website.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Realty firm has sold 2 lakh sq ft area in its commercial building at Bandra- Kurla complex in Mumbai for nearly Rs 7 billion so far this fiscal riding on the demand for prime rent-yielding assets.

In September 2015, Godrej group's realty firm had sold 4.35 lakh sq ft area in Godrej BKC project to Abbott for Rs 14.8 billion in one of the largest office space deal.

According to an investors presentation, sold 1,99,140 sq ft area for Rs 6.97 billion during April- December period of 2017-18 fiscal.

Now, only 51,000 sq ft area remains to be sold in this 1.3 million sq ft Grade-A commercial building.

"Total sales for 9M FY'18 at Godrej BKC stood at Rs 6.97 billion out of which Rs 5.58 billion is to be received in Q4 FY'18 and Q1 FY'19," the presentation said.

Overall, sales bookings rose 140 per cent to Rs 40.29 billion during the first nine months of this fiscal as against Rs 16.81 billion in the corresponding period of the previous year.

In volume terms, sales rose by 90 per cent to 47.85 lakh sq ft during the period under review.

Out of total sales, residential segment contributed Rs 3.33 billion while commercial projects accounted for Rs 6.99 billion, almost all of it in Godrej BKC project.

Rent yielding commercial assets are in great demand even as housing segment is witnessing sluggish sales.

However, Godrej Properties has bucked this trend and has achieved robust sales bookings in housing segment during last few years.

Godrej Properties has posted 35 per cent decline in its net profit at Rs 930 million in the first nine months of this fiscal.

However, total income rose by 23 per cent to Rs 15.47 billion during April-December period of this fiscal.

Its net debt stood at Rs 30.64 billion as on December 31, 2017, slightly less than the previous quarter.

Godrej Properties is currently developing about 150 million sq ft area across 67 projects.

It has presence in Mumbai, NCR, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Kochi, Mangalore, Nagpur, Pune and Chandigarh.The government is planning to launch 'Market Assurance Scheme' with a corpus fund of Rs 500 crore under which states will procure crops if prices fall below the minimum support price (MSP), according to sources.

The proposed scheme will strengthen procurement and ensure farmers do no suffer from marketing inefficiencies.

A concept paper in this regard has been finalised by the agriculture ministry in consultation with states and union territories (UTs), they said.

As per the proposal, the ownership of the Market Assurance Scheme (MAS), including the decision to procure at MSP, and its actual operation will be vested with states.

States will procure crops (except wheat and paddy) at the MSP, as notified by the Government of India, if prices fall below it.

Keeping in view the limitation of financial resources with states and procuring agencies, the government is planning to initially create a central corpus fund of Rs 500 crore for providing interest free advances towards working capital to states to enable them make revolving fund at state level.

States will decide when to begin procurement and enter the market and start procurement through their own public sector agencies or through other empanelled or authorised private agencies or central procuring agencies.

States will be responsible to deal with and dispose of the procured commodities in an appropriate manner.

However, losses if any incurred in these operations by the states will be compensated by the central government up to a maximum value of 40 per cent of the MSP.

The centre has estimated that compensation support of up to a maximum 30 per cent would be adequate to cover the losses sustained, if any, and serve as an incentive to states on the new scheme.

In case of northeast and Himalayan states, this compensation threshold would be raised to 40 per cent to account for higher constraints of infrastructure and operations.

At present, rice and wheat are procured at MSP by FCI and state agencies. When prices of other crops fall below MSP, the government operationalises the Price Support Scheme (PSS) under which funds are given to states for procurement at a support price. There is also a price stabilisation fund which is used to create buffer stock of pulses.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Voting for around 1,145 village panchayats was held peacefully across Gujarat today, with results scheduled to be announced on Tuesday, officials said.

Around 73 per cent voters cast their votes across 33 districts till 4 pm, and the final figure was likely to go up, an official of the State Election Commission said. A total of over 22.5 lakh voters were eligible to vote, he added.

As many as 218 village Panchayats were declared "Samras" after the villages chose their sarpanch and ward members through consensus, the official informed.

Voting in one booth at a village in Chhota Udepur district was suspended after the candidates complained thet their election symbols were missing from the EVM. The SEC official said that repolling would be held tomorrow at this booth.

Elections for sarpanch and ward members are not held on the symbols of political parties but candidates are generally backed by these parties.

This election comes a couple of months after the state assembly elections, in which the opposition Congress had an edge over the ruling BJP in rural areas of Gujarat.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A body of Gujjar and Bakerwal communities in Jammu and Kashmir today urged the government to come up with a law to strengthen the migratory traditions of the community in the state.

The Tribal Research and Cultural Foundation (TRCF) stressed upon the Gujjar community MLAs to take up the issue of declining nomadic practices among their tribe in the ongoing Assembly session.

"The tribal migration traditions will become a history of the past in the next few decades and a law can protect this part of our tribal culture. In the last few years it declined to a great extend," it said in a statement here.

Thousands of Gujjars-Bakerwals relinquished the nomadic lifestyle and turned into migratory labourers in the Kashmir and Jammu areas, it said.

"The main reason behind the decline in the tribal movement is the closure of pastures near the border areas, forests, other lands, killing of hundreds of nomadic Gujjars on upper reaches, during the turmoil," the TRCF said.

It said due to the lack of "disaster management training for tribals" in the northern states of India, the community suffered a heavy loss of lives and livestock due to landslide, forest fire, snow and hail storm, man-animal conflict every year and because of these natural calamities the percentage of the nomadic Gujjars was also going down.

Gujjars, who lead a tough life in the high-altitude meadows of the Himalayas and the Pir-Panjal, are gradually settling down permanently in the plain area, it said.

It suggested the government to formulate a plan to protect their nomadic identity by providing them education, health and communication facilities during their migration at upper reaches.

It also suggested that the government should on priority formulate a disaster management policy for tribal and nomadic communities and the orders restricting the movement of the Gujjars must be revoked immediately.

Meanwhile,prominent Gujjar leader Shamsher Hakla Poonchi appealed for opening of boarding schools for the Gujjar and Bakerwal students in all the districts of the state.

Boarding schools should be setup in the pattern of Navodaya Vidyalaya in order to solve the problems being faced by the students of the community, Poonchi said in a separate statement.

He said that the mobile schools, which the government had setup for the tribal students, are not moving with the community when they move to the hilly mountain areas.

"These mobile schools remain stationery which kills the basic spirit of opening them," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Bombay High Court has refused to grant relief to a 16-year-old autistic boy whose parents had approached it seeking that he be allowed to sit for the Class X exam this year.

In an order passed earlier this week, a benchof Justices B R Gavai and B P Colabawalla however, suggested that the parents consider shifting the boy to a school that caters to children with special needs and that he take the exam at another suitable time.

The boy currently studies in a regular private ICSE school in Bandra West.

As per the petitioners, the boy "has no problem in understanding and writing his lessons but he simply requires more time than an average student" to do so.

However, his school has refused him permission to appear for the Class X final exams.

The boy's parents had cited previous judgements of the high court that allowed autistic children to study in regular schools as long as the school arranged for a shadow teacher for such a student, and made other requisite special arrangements.

The petitioners also submitted that the state human rights commission, while dealing with a similar case last year, had permitted the child concerned to continue at a regular school.

They also submitted that though the state Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment runs some separate schools for children with special needs, the state Ministry of Human Resource Development promotes an inclusive model where several children with special needs are encouraged to study in regular schools.

The petitioners cited the above and urged the court to permit their child to appear for the Class X exams as a student of his current school.

"He has been studying in the same school since he was in the first standard. There was no problem in the last nine years. We have even paid his fees for this school year. However, now he is not being allowed to sit for the Class X final exams.

"If we are forced to shift him to another school now, he will end up losing a full academic year," the boy's father said.

School authorities, however, opposed the plea, saying the boy was "unfit" to appear for the Class X exams this year.

"While his writing skills are okay and he makes no spelling mistakes, his sentences do not make any sense. He is not merely slow but he has the understanding of a student of standardI or II," the counsel for the school told HC.

The bench took note of the school's submissions and said that it would perhaps be better for all parties if the boy was shifted to a school with an "alternate curriculum."



"Taking an adversarial stand vis-a-vis the school will not be helpful either for(the parents) or for your child. Why not send him to a school that will cater to all his needs," the bench said.

It also directed the school authorities to provide the petitioners with a list of schools with an alternate curriculum suitable for the their son.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Delhi High Court has set aside an order of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) dismissing an application for impleadment filed by a woman staffer of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) who had accused a senior officer of sexual harassment.

It held that this case cannot be put in the category of a conventional service matter where, once the employer gets a complaint against an employee from another staffer and disciplinary proceedings are initiated, the role of the complainant ceases.

The CAT, in its order, had said service jurisprudence did not permit a right of audience to the victim.

Hence, she could not participate in the proceedings pending before it, the tribunal had said while rejecting her application.

The tribunal was hearing a petition filed by a senior legal officer in the Enforcement Directorate, who was found guilty by the Competent Disciplinary Authority (CDA) of sexually harassing the woman.

The CDA functions under the Ministry of Finance.

The officer had opposed the woman's plea and had maintained that he was innocent.

He had also told the high court that the petitioner filed the application for impleadment before the tribunal only to delay the proceedings.

The woman, then posted in Mumbai, had approached the high court after her application for impleadment was rejected by the tribunal.

"This is a case where the petitioner has levelled allegations of sexual harassment and it was at her instance that an inquiry has been conducted by the employer.

"In such circumstances, the petitioner cannot be termed as a busy body or a rank outsider, for shutting the door on her face," a high court bench justices Hima Kohli and Rekha Palli said.

The only person aggrieved in cases of sexual harassment at the workplace is the complainant, it said.

"It would, therefore, be a travesty of justice if the petitioner/complainant is denied audience in a case arising out of proceedings based on a complaint made by her against the wrongdoer," the court said.

It held the woman has the locus standi to file an application for impleadment before the tribunal.

According to the complaint made by the woman in 2012, the senior legal officer had called her frequently to Delhi under the pretext of meetings and briefing counsel of the Supreme Court and on all such occasions he had sexually harassed her.

The woman had made an oral complaint against the officer in July 2012. Her statement was recorded in August that year.

While being posted in Mumbai, she filed a formal complaint in December 2012 after which the matter was referred to the Internal Complaints Committee of the agency.

The panel concluded in January 2014 that allegations against the man were proved and recommended to the CDA imposition of appropriate penalty as well as compensation of Rs 10,000 to the woman.

The man had challenged the CDA order in the CAT, which adjudicates disputes relating to recruitment and conditions of service of the central government employees.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Bombay High Court has directed the Mumbai Crime branch to provide copies of witnesses' statements to artist Chintan Upadhyay, arrested in connection with the 2016 killings of his estranged artist wife and her lawyer.

The HC observed that an accused was entitled to copies of statements of witnesses which were being relied upon by the prosecution.

"The accused person would be entitled under law to have copies of statements of all witnesses which are being relied upon by the prosecution. The prosecution cannot withhold the same," Justice Sadhana Jadhav said while hearing a bail petition filed by Upadhyay last Friday.

Upadhyay had claimed that he was not given copies of statements which, according to him, are vital in proving his innocence in the case.

The HC posted the bail plea for hearing on February 24 and directed the prosecuting agency (crime branch) to provide copies of statements to the accused.

Upadhyay's wife Hema, an installation artist, and her lawyer Haresh Bhambani were killed on December 11, 2016 and their bodies were disposed of in cardboard boxes which were found in a drain in suburban Kandivali.

The high court also permitted the intervening application filed by Bhambhani's family members opposing Upadhyay's bail application.

This is the second bail application filed by Upadhyay in the high court after his arrest in the case.

His first plea was rejected by the same judge in February last after observing that a prima facie case was made out against him.

Upadhyay submitted his second bail plea last December after a supplementary charge sheet was filed against him.

As per his application, the supplementary charge sheet has certain fresh admissions in his favour.

In its February 2017 order rejecting Upadhyay's first bail application, the high court had said that there was more than sufficient material to show that he nurtured a grudge against his former wife and had expressed the same in his diary and had also said that he wanted to eliminate her.

Upadhyay, a noted painter, was arrested soon after the bodies were found.

Vidyadhar Rajbhar, the prime accused in the case, has been absconding since 2016.

Apart from Upadhyay, other accused arrested in the case include Pradeep Rajbhar, Azaad Rajbhar and Shivkumar Rajbhar. The trio was in the business of manufacturing and selling fibre glass, which was used by Upadhyaya and his wife for their installations.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL) Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Kumar Surana will continue to hold his designation if the firm's new promoter, ONGC, is to follow the Coal India Ltd model for governance of subsidiaries.

ONGC last week completed the acquisition of the government's 51.11 per cent stake in HPCL for Rs 369.15 billion (Rs 36,915 crore).

HPCL is now a subsidiary of ONGC and it has been speculated that Surana will lose the Chairman's tag and would be reduced to Managing Director who would report to ONGC Chairman and Managing Director.

Industry sources said this situation can be completely avoided if ONGC follows the Coal India Ltd's (CIL) governance model.

CIL, the world's largest coal producer, is the holding company whose board is headed by a Chairman and Managing Director.

It has eight subsidiaries like Eastern Coalfields Ltd and Bharat Coking Coal Ltd, all of whom have a board headed by Chairman and Managing Director.

The Chairman and Managing Directors of the subsidiaries report to CIL head.

Sources said if this model is followed, Surana will continue as Chairman and Managing Director of HPCL who would report to ONGC head Shashi Shanker.

Prior to the stake sale, the government made it clear that HPCL would continue to be a central public sector enterprise (CPSE), retaining its separate identity and brand and will be independently run by its board.

The alternate governance model has been thrown just as a large section in ONGC feels that HPCL should be governed on lines of the company's other subsidiaries like ONGC Videsh Ltd, which have an independent board and a Managing Director or CEO as heads.

These heads of subsidiaries report to ONGC Chairman and Managing Director.

Last month, ONGC Chairman and Managing Director Shashi Shanker had stated that HPCL is "a good, professionally-run company and will continue to remain so".

Sources said ONGC is likely to revamp HPCL board in coming weeks.

Currently, HPCL board has four functional directors before the Chairman and Managing Director. It also has two government directors on board and six independent directors.

ONGC, they said, may look at nominating one or two of its directors on HPCL board.

Presently, ONGC has two major subsidiaries, ONGC Videsh Ltd and BSE-listed Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd (MRPL).

Both OVL and MRPL have Manging Directors and CEOs as head who report to ONGC Chairman and Managing Director. On both the boards, ONGC directors have a presence.

OVL Managing Director is a special invitee on ONGC Board.

Sources said following the CIL-model of governance would save Surana, who is senior to Shanker, the blushes of a designation downgrade.Sophia the robot, who is the first humanoid to get citizenship as a Saudi national, is expected to be a big draw as the city gears up to host the World Congress on Information Technology (WCIT), touted as the Olympics of the global ICT industry.

The humanoid would make her public appearance at the 22nd edition of the WCIT, to be held in the country for the first time, from February 19.

"We have Sophia, who has been making a lot of in the recent past. The humanoid along with (its) inventor is going to be here," WCIT Hyderabad Ambassador, Suman Reddy told PTI.

"The robot is constantly learning very quickly; every time it makes a public appearance, apparently it's smarter than the previous time. So, that is going to be quite a draw as well," added Reddy, Managing Director of Pegasystems India.

Designed in British actress Audrey Hepburn's image, the robot was created by Hanson Robotics based in Hong Kong, led by American scientist David Hanson.

The robot was given citizenship by Saudi Arabia last year.

It can be recalled that Sophia made her first appearance in the country at the TechFest organised by the IIT Bombay last November.

The Nasscom India Leadership Forum (NILF) would also be held along with the WCIT.

Nasscom officials said WCIT-NILF 2018 will witness 22 power-packed sessions covering AI, blockchain, experience age, innovation, new globalisation and future of work, among others.

Reddy said several top officials of global companies would speak at the event. They include Ed Monser (Emerson Electrical), Shantanu Narayan (Adobe Systems), Andrew Ng (Coursera), Sadhguru (Isha Foundation), Soumitra Dutta (Cornell University), David M Kote (Honeywell), Michael Gorriz (Standard Chartered Bank) and Scott Sandschaffer (Novartis).

"Sri Lankan and Armenian Prime Ministers are also expected to be here," he said.

First held in 1978 by WITSA (World Information Technology & Services Alliance), the WCIT has become a premier international ICT forum since then.

Telangana has partnered with Nasscom and WITSA to host this event.

According to officials, digitisation has pervaded the heart of businesses, though the level of penetration is varied across industry verticals. Now embedded in the core of businesses, this is a disruption of altogether different level.

"The event will focus on its many facets, including opportunities, challenges and will pave the onward journey," an official of the IT industry body said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A Congress MP from Andhra Pradesh said today that he wished he had been "really mad" and acted accordingly to stop the passage of a bill for the bifurcation of the state.

Protesting against the alleged apathy of the central government towards Andhra Pradesh, KVP Ramachandra Rao had on February 2 stood in the well of the Rajya Sabha, carrying a placard that said "Save Andhra Pradesh".

The move had drawn laughter and derision in the House.

Now, in a letter to Rajya Sabha deputy chairman P J Kurien, he said, "I feel that being called as 'Mad and Laughing Stock' was not any humiliation for me Sir, but please keep it in mind that certainly it was a great humiliation for the people of my state, who were agitating for fulfillment of their legitimate rights."



He said he felt ashamed being a member of Parliament as he was compelled to stay as a silent spectator during the passage of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014, in the name of parliamentary customs and conventions, "and now being referred by Chair as Mad and laughing stock solely because of democratically demanding the central government implement" the act.

"I would have acted differently if I were mad on the day of passing the AP Reorganisation Bill by this August House by voice vote by identifying that there was majority of voices saying 'Aye' in a 'disordered House' which was not considered suitable for taking up division," he said in his letter.

The Congress leader said after seeing the apathy of the central government towards Andhra Pradesh and its people during last four years, "I wish I would have been mad rather than sitting idle in the House witnessing the injustice being done to the state".

"...I am 'mad' after the cause of people of Andhra Pradesh and I sincerely wish all the members sitting in this August House and persons holding the positions in the central government shall share the same madness in implementation of AP Reorganisation Act and do justice to the people of the state," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Financial services firm will demerge its finance, wealth and capital business into three separate entities and list them on bourses in a year, a top official of the company, backed by Canada-based Fairfax Financial Holdings, said.

This is part of the company's strategy to reorganise the corporate structure in a changing business environment as organisation now sharply focus on their expertise in niche verticals, Founder and Chairman Nirmal Jain said.

The demerger, followed by listing will involve three units -- IIFL Finance (loans and mortgages); IIFL Wealth (wealth and asset management) and IIFL Securities (capital markets).

"World over, investors and regulators are favouring corporate structures to change from control-oriented close- knit conglomerates to innovation and idea-driven independent enterprises. Incumbent players are being challenged by new entrants like never before.

"The reorganisation will prepare IIFL group companies for the growth opportunities amidst intensifying competition in coming decade," Jain told PTI.

Each company, when listed separately can attract and motivate its key people with stock options, Jain said, adding a clean corporate structure with no cross holdings will ensure transparency, highest governance standards and compliance.

"By separating them, we will allow them to grow to their full potential," he added.

Fairfax will be the "most significant" non-promoter shareholder in all the three companies, he said.

"The reorganisation process requires multiple approvals and can take 10-12 months. However, the scheme will be effective from the appointed date," Jain said further.

As per the existing shareholding structure, promoters have 28.9 per cent stake in IIFL Holdings, Fairfax holds 35.3 per cent, company's employees 4.4 per cent while others have the remaining 31.4 per cent.

Post demerger, the proposed shareholding of IIFL Finance will result into 23.4 per cent stake by promoters, employees 7.7 per cent, others 25.5 per cent, Fairfax 28.6 per cent and CDC Group 14.8 per cent.

IIFL Wealth will have promoters' stake of 15.7 per cent; employees 26.7 per cent; others 17 per cent, Fairfax 19.2 per cent and General Atlantic 21.4 per cent.

In IIFL Securities, promoters will hold 28.9 per cent; Fairfax 35.3 per cent; employees 4.4 per cent and others 31.4 per cent.

Currently, IIFL Holdings' loans and mortgages business has an asset under management of Rs 27,288 crore; wealth and asset management unit manages over Rs 1.28 lakh crore from over 10,000 high networth families and while the capital market business has 40 lakh customers serviced from more than 1,200 locations.

The reorganisation will result in an equity shareholding mix where the owner of seven shares of will get seven shares of IIFL Finance, seven shares of IIFL Securities and one share of IIFL Wealth.

IIFL Holdings has registered an increase of 32 per cent in its consolidated net profit at Rs 235.76 crore in third quarter ended December of this fiscal, against Rs 179.07 crore in the same period a year earlier.To expose its students to rural India and make them understand the culture as well as concerns of villagers, the Indian Institute of Technology, Gandhinagar (IITGN) recently launched a unique initiative.

Under the initiative, "Gram Fellowship", students are required to live in a village for three to eight weeks.

This programme was launched to bridge the rural-urban divide by taking students closer to the rural India, said Prof Jaison Manjaly, Dean of Student Affairs at IITGN.

"It is observed that many of the students in India are rarely exposed to rural life, economy, practices and ethos, despite call by policymakers, since independence.

"IIT Gandhinagar aspires to address this concern by exposing its students to rural India," he said.

Gram Fellowship aims to encourage students to immerse themselves in the "experience of what-it-is-like to live in a village", Manjaly said.

"We want our students to understand that not all problems have technological solutions. Gram Fellowship will be their window to the real world, the world which has common people facing a lack of resources. The fellowship is not a project but an experience."



Till now, nine students of the institute have been chosen for the fellowship and they have visited different villages in the country.

The institute reimburses travel fare and nominal living expenses to the students, who are required to travel only by non-A/c train or bus.

For Subodh Kumar, a fourth year B Tech student who spent most of his life living in cities, the trip not only gave him an insight into the rural life but also opened new career avenues.

Kumar stayed for 21 days in a remote village, close to a Naxal hit area, in Kishanganj district of Bihar.

"I opted for this programme as I am also preparing for UPSC and wanted to learn more about rural India. This 21-day stay gave me a different perspective.

"I travelled by train and stayed in a humble accommodation in the village. During my stay, I witnessed various activities undertaken by an NGO there," said Kumar.

"The biggest takeaway of this trip is that I have learnt about many new sectors. Before this trip, I didn't knew much about social entrepreneurship.

"Now, I am seriously thinking about taking up this as a career in the future," said Kumar.

While this budding mechanical engineer discovered a new career opportunity, Arya Adityan, a first year M A student from Kerala, has now stopped complaining about petty problems after returning from a 17-day stay at a village close to the LoC near Leh in Jammu and Kashmir.

During her stay at the northern most village of India, Arya said she was surprised to see how people were happy despite facing several hardships.

"It was a Muslim-majority village near the LoC. I, along with another student, stayed in a local's home. Though the village was near LoC, we never felt any danger. People were very welcoming," said Arya, who is pursuing M A in Society and Culture.

"There was no mobile connectivity in that remote village. I saw people facing several hardships. They walk almost 500 metres up the hill daily.

"Yet, they were not complaining, which was quite surprising for me. Now, I, too, have stopped complaining about mobile network, or food or hygiene. This trip changed my perspective towards life" she said.

This is not the first initiative by the institute to expose students to the ground realities of the society and the country.

Gram Fellowship was introduced after IITGN received good response from the students for the 'Explorer Fellowship', launched a few years back with an aim to expose students towards the 'Realities of India'.

Under that initiative, which is still on, eligible students are required to travel to at least half a dozen states in a budget of just Rs 36,000.

"That fellowship was a life-changing experience for many students. One student told me that he stood for ten hours in a non-reserved compartment of a train having no space to stand in it.

"Another student spent an entire night in an ATM cabin to save money which he may have to pay to rent a hotel room," said IITGN Director Sudhir K Jain.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Centre aims to double the number of foreign tourist arrivals (FTA) to 20 million in the next three years, Union Tourism Minister K J Alphons today said at an investment meet here.

All stakeholders must work hard to achieve the target, the minister said.

"We have earned 27 billion US dollars in the last financial year but we are not happy with these figures. We want the figures to increase dramatically," Alphons said here during a session on tourism and wellness on the concluding day of Global Investors Summit-Advantage Assam.

He also urged the domestic tourists to visit different parts of the country as "Indians must see India".

"Last year, more than 23 million Indians went abroad and there is nothing wrong with that but at the same time, we must also adopt the policy of 'Let's see India'," the minister said.

The tourism ministry is committed to create an environment that is conducive for the visitors and appoint global ambassadors for promoting tourist circuits and sites, he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has now emerged as an undisputed global leader, is committed to create a 'New India' and "the country today thinks, looks, sounds and acts differently", Alphons added.

Referring to North East, the minister said that there is no better and beautiful place in the world.

"The entire North East has incredible people with beautiful smiles, music, dances, textiles and cuisines. It has scenic places, wildlife among many more things," he said.

Assam, and particularly Guwahati, is the 'Gateway to North East' and the Centre will develop all tourist facilities in the state, Alphons added.

Lauding the Centre's initiative, Assam tourism minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the state has already formulated a new tourism policy and his ministry is ready to cater to the specific requirements of investors.

"Our policy is dynamic and flexible and we are ready to address specific cases as required. The state government will go an extra mile to promote tourism," Sarma said.

There is no law and order problem in the state, and the people of Assam is, by tradition, very hospitable, he added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Panasonic is investing in India to build capacity as it expects the country to emerge as a manufacturing hub for the African and West Asian markets for its appliance business, a top official of Japanese electronics major said.

For Panasonic, India is the fastest growing market globally and the country is among its high priority markets, CEO of Appliance Company & Senior Managing Executive Officer, Panasonic Corporation, Tetsuro Homma told PTI.

Besides, Panasonic Appliances is also pushing India to be a research & development (R&D) hub to serve its other global markets.

"Panasonic Appliance Company has severals regions globally and Indian market is the fastest growing. So we have a confidence in this market and are broadly expanding our product range," Homma said.

"Panasonic Corporation has a very clear strategic intent, and that is to enhance its appliances portfolio for which India has been identified as a developmental hub. Be it innovation, R&D or exports, the corporation aims to mould the country into its Offshore Delivery Centre."



As per its strategy, Panasonic Appliances is placing India along with China in its high priority markets.

"We put high priority on China, India and those so on Asia. Those are our prioritise countries because we change our consumer electronics strategy not to heavily depending on audio visual products but we spend much resources on appliances business and AC business," he added.

In FY2016, Japan contributed 56 per cent to Panasonic Appliances' revenue and the rest 44 per cent came from other markets comprising of Asia, China, Europe and ISAMEA (India, South Asia, Middle-East and Africa).

"Indian population would be bigger than China. We already have USD 10 billion business in China and so we expect same size of business in this country. We would like to grow the appliance business of India as same size of China," Homma said.

On a question that when India is expected to be one of the top three non-Japan markets for appliances, Panasonic India President and CEO Manish Sharma said: "I believe that it is going to take some time. It would take few years but the growth is the fastest."



Yesterday, Panasonic inaugurated its refrigerator factory at Jhajjar, Haryana. It has invested Rs 115 crore in the plant which has annual production capacity of 0.5 million units approximately and cater domestic as well as global markets.

"My expectations to PIAP (Panasonic Appliances India) is that it would be hub for those Africa and Middle East countries both manufacturing and product marketing," Homma added.

Over the business expansion in India, Homma said that Panasonic has a good brand awareness in this country and this could be utilised to expand business.

Citing example of its washing machine unit, he said that it became profitable within three years.

"We would like to duplicate that success model to other products," Homma added.

Panasonic now manufactures all major products such as AC, washing machine and TV panels.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)An Indian man was today arrested in Nepal after he was allegedly found in possession of drugs, police said.

Accused Narayan Giri was held from a Kathmandu-bound passenger bus during a security check at Nagdhunga in central Nepal, the police said.

Over 300 ampules of drugs including lupigesic, phenergan, diazepam and nurofen were seized from Giri's possession, the Kathmandu Post quoted police officer Keshab Bhatta as saying.

The accused has been remanded in police custody and further probe was on, Bhatta said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)He is the mute survivor of the 10-man Islamic State cell that terrorised Paris in November 2015, refusing all pleas to shed light on the attack that left 130 dead or another one in Brussels just four days after his arrest.

After nearly three years jailed in isolation and silence, Salah Abdeslam goes on trial tomorrow in his hometown of Brussels for a police shootout that he himself fled.

The man who covered for his getaway with a spray of automatic gunfire died. Abdeslam's escape was short-lived -- he was captured on March 18, 2016, in the same Brussels neighborhood where he and many of his Islamic State fighter colleagues had grown up.

Four days later, Islamic State suicide attackers struck again, this time at the Brussels airport and subway. In all, that sprawling network of IS fighters killed 162 people in the two European capitals.

Most of the extremists were French speakers, raised in one of the cities they struck. The plot's execution depended upon Islamic State's success in wedding crime and religion.

Abdeslam, who along with his brother was suspected of dealing drugs from the bar they ran, is the starkest example of that convergence. But in Paris, the trial of three men accused of giving safe haven to the attackers also provides a revealing look at the intersection that made possible the deadliest terror attacks in Europe since World War II.

The operational commander of the cell was Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a petty criminal who used his home neighborhood of Molenbeek in Brussels as a fertile recruiting ground for IS. Abaaoud even recruited his younger brother, then 14.

But many of the young men who followed him into IS were small-time criminals themselves, part of the extremist organization's deliberate attempt to make use of "skills" that include accessing black market weapons, forging documents and handling covert logistics.

When the night of carnage in Paris -- November 13, 2015 -- was finally over, seven attackers were dead and three were on the run: Abdeslam, Abaaoud and another Molenbeek native named Chakib Akrouh.

Abdeslam called friends in Brussels to drive through the night and pick him up. Abaaoud also called his cousin, Hasna Ait Belkacem, who lived in a suburb of Paris and vacillated between hard-line Islam and even harder drug use. She was happy to help. She called her dealer. He called another dealer.

It took a few days of sleeping under bushes, but for 150 euros (USD 187) wired from Belgium, they secured a room in the Paris neighbourhood of Saint-Denis, near the national stadium they had attacked on November 13. In the pre-dawn hours of November 18, frantic French investigators tipped off by a friend of Ait Belkacem tracked them to the building and sealed off the neighbourhood.

Abaaoud, Ait Belkacem and Akrouh all died when Akrouh detonated a suicide vest.

Just before his building crumbled to the ground, one of the drug dealers, Jawad Bendaoud, showed up to find out what was happening and explained on live television that he was just "doing a service" by renting out his room. With the cameras still rolling , Bendaoud was taken into custody.

At their trial, his fellow dealer, Mohammed Soumah, explained how he framed the world: Good citizens, delinquents, rapists, and terrorists.

"Me, I don't fit in the terrorist box. I'm a thug, a scumbag," Soumah told the judge. But there he was sitting in the box for terrorism defendants in central Paris alongside Bendaoud. As for why neither man made the connection between the two Belgians desperate for a hideout amid a massive police manhunt and an outpouring of grief for France's 130 victims, Soumah had another explanation.

"The criminal life goes on," he said.

But the lines between terrorists and criminals are less clear now than ever , said Peter Neumann, director of the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation.

"ISIS is perhaps the first jihadist group that has explicitly targeted this demographic, and they've done it very consciously and especially in Europe," he said.

"What we saw in Brussels and Paris -- this is not an isolated case. This is actually reflecting the situation across Europe. If you go to Sweden, Norway, Holland, Germany, they will all tell you that 50 per cent plus of the people who have turned up traveling to Syria or involved in domestic plots have previous criminal convictions, often for petty crime."



On Friday, a Belgian career criminal was transferred into French custody over allegations that he housed the jihadi who attacked the Thalys high-speed train between Brussels and Paris.

The suspect, Youssef Siraj, is also believed to have put up some of the Brussels attackers, according to the Belgian site DH. The same group is also linked to a raid in the Belgian town of Verviers, where authorities say a jihadi cell was on the verge of a coordinated attack against police.

"We are coming to realise that Verviers, Thalys, November 13, the attacks of March 22, it's a large and perhaps single operation of Daesh," Belgian federal prosecutor Frederic Van Leeuw said, using another term for IS.

All were bound by ties of crime and extremism.

The jihadi who wired the money to pay Bendaoud and Soumah was himself a petty criminal in Sweden before joining the Islamic State group, a thief who picked up firearms skills during his time in Syria named Mohamed Belkaid.

It was also Belkaid who opened fire on Belgian police as they raided Abdeslam's Brussels hideout. He was shot dead in the March 15, 2016, raid.

Abdeslam escaped through a window over the rooftops.

He was traced to a cousin's apartment on March 18, 2016, near his Molenbeek home. Still more members of the cross- border Islamic State cell struck Brussels on March 22, 2016, including the bomb-maker for both attacks.

Thirty-two people were killed in Brussels, along with three suicide attackers.

Abdeslam has been imprisoned ever since. This week's trial marks the first time he has been seen in public since his capture.

According to the French network France Inter, Abdeslam stored a message in his computer similar to the farewells written by other jihadis ahead of suicide attacks.

In it, France Inter reported, he explained that his suicide belt malfunctioned in Paris and that, although he dreamed of going to Syria "upon reflection, I concluded that the best thing would be to finish the job with the brothers.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti has assured the business community that her government will take more steps to promote local entrepreneurs.

"My government will do all it takes for encouraging local enterprise and strengthening local industry in the state," Mehbooba said interacting with representatives of industrialists and unit holders at Bari Brahmna Industrial Estate here.

Terming local entrepreneurs as an important component of local economy, Mehbooba said Jammu and Kashmir is perhaps the first state in the country to roll out incentives under GST.

"The government is committed to do more for enhancing the scope and scale of business activity in the state," she said impressing upon the industry leaders to work for creating more jobs in the state.

The chief minister also visited the newly constructed chamber house at Railhead here where she had an extensive interaction session with women entrepreneurs of Jammu who apprised her about their problems and difficulties.

Mehbooba asked the women entrepreneurs to come forward and take benefit of the several incentives and schemes meant for them.

She said soon the entrepreneurship development institute would be having a separate cell for women entrepreneurs from where they can get all the requisite support, assistance and guidance.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A local leader of an Islamist party was shot dead by unidentified gunmen today in northwestern Pakistan, police said.

Jamaat-i-Islami local leader Malik Tufail was killed when unknown armed men on a motorcycle opened fire at him in Bannu's Mughalkhel area in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, Dawn reported, citing police officials.

The suspects escaped from the site after the incident.

Police began search operations in the area in order to arrest the culprits.

A case was registered against unknown suspects.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A jawan and two teenagers were injured as Pakistani troops violated ceasefire by targeting forward posts and villages along the Line of Control (LoC) in Poonch and Rajouri districts today, officials said.

The three were injured in the Shahpur sector of Poonch district in shelling from across the border which started this morning and was continuing intermittently, a police official said.

The injured civilians were identified as Shahnaz Bano (15) and Yasin Arif (14), residents of Islamabad village, the official said. Both of them were hospitalised.

A Defence spokesman said Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing from small arms, automatics, and mortars around 1110 hours. The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

In another ceasefire violation in nearby Rajouri district, six mortars fired by Pakistani forces exploded near Neaka Panjgrain and Tarkundi villages in Manjakote sector around 1540 hours, a police official said.

The Indian forces responded, triggering an exchange of fire between the two sides which was continuing when last reports were received, he said.

Fourteen persons, including eight civilians, were killed and over 70 injured in intense shelling by Pakistan along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts last month.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Congress will not have any sort of understanding with the Asaduddin Owaisi-led All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) for the Karnataka Assembly polls, AICC secretary Madhu Goud Yaskhi said.

He refuted media report that the state Congress leaders had a secret meeting with AIMIM leaders to ensure that there was no division of votes of minorities.

The AIMIM is reportedly set to contest in 60 assembly segments, mainly in minority-dominated areas in the state.

The election to the 224-member assembly in Karnataka is to be held this year. It is the only big state under the Congress' rule at present. Punjab, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Puducherry are the other states/UT where the party is in power.

"We never had any meeting with any AIMIM leader. It is fighting against the Congress. So, there is zero truth that there was any meeting with their leaders," said Yaskhi, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary in-charge for the poll-bound state.

He further accused the AIMIM of having an understanding with the BJP to divide the votes coming the Congress' way.

Yakshi also said the Congress would not have any sort of understanding with the AIMIM for the assembly polls.

According to a senior Congress leader, who did not wish to be named, the party already had a strategy in place to ensure that it got votes from minority communities.

Announcing K Siddaramaiah as the party's chief ministerial face has also been a "good move" to see the votes are not divided, the leader added.

"Siddaramaiah has worked well to consolidate votes from Muslim, OBC and SC communities over the past four or so years. So, we have backing of Muslim community," the leader added.

The leader said the Congress had pool of Muslim leaders whom it would field for campaigning to prevent division of minority votes.

"We did that experiment in other assembly polls, including those in Gujarat and Bihar. It yielded results for us. It will yield result in Karnataka too," he added.

While the schedule for the assembly polls is yet to be announced, campaign for the high voltage election has already begun with the leaders of the Congress and the BJP locked in a war of words.

The state is expected to witness a three-corner contest with the H D Deve Gowda-led Janata Dal (Secular) forming the third angle.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The NIA will soon approach a court to get a Letters Rogatory issued to Pakistan seeking details about some people allegedly indulging in false propaganda and running the website of the Hurriyat Conference's pro-Pakistan faction led by Syed Ali Shah Geelani, officials said here.

The agency will seek details about Zakir-ulllah who, it believes, handles the websites of the Geelani faction of the Hurriyat Conference and terror group Hizbul Mujahideen.

After submitting a 12,794-page charge sheet in a case of terror financing in Kashmir Valley, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) will soon approach the designated court for issuance of Letters Rogatory to Pakistan.

Once the court issues the Letters Rogatory, which is a request from a court of a sovereign nation to a court of another sovereign nation, the same will be vetted by the Legal and Treaties department of the Ministry and External Affairs and sent to Pakistan through diplomatic channels.

So far, Pakistan has never responded to such requests sent in other cases such as the hijacking of Indian Airlines plane in 1999, terror attacks including the Pathankot Indian Air Force base strike.

According to the NIA charge sheet, Zakir-ullah, who hails from Rawalpindi, had designed the website of Tehreek-e- Hurriyat and that of Hizbul Mujahideen and was regularly updating it during 2016 when the Valley was witnessing widespread stone pelting.

The telephone numbers mentioned on the website belong to the same individual and the same needs to be confirmed from Pakistan before further action could be taken, an NIA official said.

The NIA has also identified a few more individuals who were laisoning with the Pakistani establishment especially its snooping agency ISI for the separatists groups hailing from Kashmir Valley.

In its charge sheet, the NIA named Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed, Hizbul Mujahideen leader Syed Salahuddin, seven separatists, including Syed Ali Shah Geelani's son-in-law Altaf Ahmad Shah, and prominent businessman Zahoor Watali.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Days after two Kashmiri students were assaulted in Haryana, the Valley students and professionals working in Pune have sought an appointment of a "dedicated nodal police officer" to address their issues.

Around 100 students and professionals, hailing from Jammu and Kashmir, met with Pune Police Commissioner Rashmi Shukla yesterday and expressed concerns regarding their safety in the city.

The interaction was organised by Sarhad, a city-based institute cum NGO, working on a mission to provide to the Kashmiri youth and bring them to the mainstream. Over 400 students, including girls, from Jammu and Kashmir are pursuing in Pune at present.

Two students from Jammu and Kashmir were thrashed allegedly by nearly 15 people on February 2 evening in Haryana's Mahendragarh after Friday prayers.

During the interaction with Shukla, Owais Wani, a post graduation student, said youths like him have no one to contact with except Sarhad founder Sanjay Nahar.

"....If any incident happens with any Kashmiri student or working professional, his or her only point of contact is Nahar Sir. Someone like a special nodal police officer, preferably from J&K, should be appointed in Pune to address the issues of Kashmiri students studying here," Wani said.

Wani said he was talking to Shukla without any fear now but cannot do so with other police authorities who he might have to approach in case of any incident.

"Once I went to a firm for an interview but the moment the company officials came to know that I belonged to J&K, they refused to entertain me and did not even interview me," he said.

While accepting the plea partially, Shukla said a police inspector or an ACP-rank officer will be designated who will coordinate with students and local police authorities, in case of any tension or incident.

"I cannot bring someone from Kashmir. Whatever we can do, we will definitely do for the Kashmiri youths. You can always message me or coordinate with the designated officer and we will definitely help," the police commissioner said.

Some students shared their experience and incidents that how they were treated by the police as well as other authorities.

"Since we all belong to J&K, sometimes, people including the local authorities look at us with suspicion and even become judgemental," complained one of the students.

On the other hand, a young woman said that after completing her mass-communication course in Shimla, she started working in Delhi before moving to Pune for safety reasons.

"Pune is quite peaceful and safe," she said.

Meanwhile, Nahar told PTI that the meeting with Shukla was a fruitful one.

"Pune has been the second home for the Kashmiri youth who think that it is one of the safest cities in the country. With the polic commissioner promising to designate a dedicated police officer to address the issues of Kashmiri students, we will together create such a mechanism here, which will be ideal for other states and cities also, in order to bridge the gap between Kashmiri students and local people," he said.

A 21-year-old woman Kashmiri student of a Pune college was briefly arrested in April 2017 along with her male friend for allegedly trying to snatch the revolver of a police officer in Bharti Vidyapeeth area.

She left to Jammu and Kashmir as she did not want to stay in Pune as she felt "unnecessarily defamed" in the wake of the incident.

Centre's interlocutor for Jammu and Kashmir, Dineshwar Sharma, who visited Pune recently, had interacted with Kashmiri students and pitched for a "mechanism" to address the issues faced by the Kashmiri youth residing in others parts of the country.

Sharma had met Shukla and asked her to create a mechanism through which a youth from Kashmir, if faced with any issue, could call the authorities.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The last rites of three army jawans, who lost their lives in an avalanche in Jammu and Kashmir, were conducted today with full military honours.

The mortal remains of Havaldar Kamlesh Singh, Sepoy Rajendra and Naik Balveer were taken to their respective places in Rajasthan, a defence spokesperson said.

MP Bahadur Singh, MLA Anita Singh and others paid tribute to Naik Balveer in Bharatpur while other public representatives, district administration and police officers as well as the army personnel offered floral tributes to Sepoy Rajendra in Alwar and Havaldar Kamlesh Singh in Jhunjhunu.

The three soldiers were killed when an avalanche struck their post in Machhil sector of Jammu and Kashmir on Friday.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Online eyewear firm Lenskart on Sunday said it expects its affordable-premium eyewear brand John Jacobs to clock revenues of Rs 5 billion by FY2020-21 as it expands the offline retail presence of the brand.

Lenskart is investing $4 million into the brand to set up more stores across cities like Bengaluru, Mumbai and in Delhi-NCR.

"India needs a premium brand for eyewear but one that is not extremely expensive. John Jacobs is a trendy designer eyewear brand, that is fast creating a name for representing top international styles at affordable prices," Lenskart founder and CEO Peyush Bansal told PTI.

John Jacobs currently has five stores, which will be increased to 20 this year, he added. "In the next 2-3 years, we are looking at 50-odd stores across tier I cities."



The brand is also being sold online on Lenskart's platform as well as 400 Lenskart retail points.

Bansal said the company is also looking at partnering with large format retail stores to sell the John Jacobs range.

"The eyewear market in India is a Rs 200 billion opportunity. Of this, sunglasses and contact lenses is about 40-50 billion," Bansal pointed out.

He said John Jacobs is already clocking revenues of about Rs 1 billion and should cross Rs 5 billion by FY2020-21.

Bansal said Lenskart has already invested about $1 million and the additional USD 4 million will be directed towards the expansion of retail outlets and product range.

John Jacobs has teamed up with Italian design house



Mazzucchelli for material and design partnership. Its range is priced at Rs 3,500 onwards.President Maithripala Sirisena today vowed to fight against corruption which he said has an adverse impact on Sri Lanka's economy as the country celebrated its 70th Independence Day.

Britain's Prince Edward, the youngest son of Queen Elizabeth II, was the chief guest at the 70th Independence Day celebrations.

This is the first time that Queen Elizabeth's son other than Prince Charles has visited Sri Lanka. Charles was the chief guest at the 50th Independence Day celebrations in 1998 and later made two separate trips to the island nation.

The ongoing local election campaign had its effect on the celebrations as Sirisena in his speech chose to deal with his anti-corruption drive in his address to the nation.

Sirisena in the recent weeks has taken Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's United National Party (UNP) to task while campaigning for the February 10 local council election.

He has openly criticised the UNP for corruption, an allegation stemming mainly from the report of a probe he ordered on a scam connected to the issuance of bonds by the Sri Lanka Central Bank.

Sirisena said "patriotism has a new definition which is financial discipline", in an obvious reference to his local election campaign theme.

He said that corruption has become one of the main impediments to the progress towards prosperity, which is the aspiration of all citizens.

He said bribery, corruption, fraud and malpractices are having the most adverse impact on the economic independence of the country and all the politicians should fulfil their duties in an exemplary manner.

The president said that there were adverse repercussions due to the implementation of personal agendas in development strategies.

"There is a requirement of a national movement against corruption in order to establish a clean political culture and such a collective movement must be mobilised with the participation of the intellectual community of the country," he was quoted as saying by Colombo Gazette.

He also paid tribute to the members of security forces who made immense sacrifices to defeat the LTTE.

When the LTTE terrorists attempted to break our country, our Army, Navy, Air Force, Police and Civil Defence Services made sacrifices, their lives and limbs and being handicapped, even denying their children and families a proper family life, suffering many such painful experiences on behalf of the future of the nation, freedom of the nation and unity and the territorial integrity, he said.

He pointed out the need for communal harmony among the Sinhala, Tamil, Muslim and Burgher communities to build the nation.

Pointing out the right of the people to live as equal citizens, the president said the fullest commitment and support of every section was essential to achieve true reconciliation.

Wickremesinghes appointee for the Central Bank governor, Arjuna Mahendran, and his son-in-law were named as suspects in the Central Bank bond scam this week, following the release of a Sirisena presidential probe which found irregularities in the bond issues of 2015 and 2016.

Sirisena on election platform has been attacking the UNP for its protection of the corrupt in order to hamper UNPs chances of winning the local poll which will be held to elect bodies for 341 councils in the island.'



Sirisena was backed by the UNP in the presidential election of 2015 against Rajapaksa. This resulted him from being sacked from the SLFP by Rajapaksa.

In another development just a few hours before Sirisena could address the nation, police arrested Mahendran's son-in- law and his central bank primary dealer firm's CEO in connection with the bond issue case.

The ceremony was also noted for the non-presence of the main Tamil party, Tamil National Alliance (TNA).

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh today said "lotus will bloom" in Tripura after the Assembly polls as the people of the state are "disenchanted" with the "corrupt" Left Front government.

Tripura is set go to polls on February 18 and the results will be declared on March 3.

"Seeing the huge turnout at the party's road show, 'Vijay Sankalapa Yatra', this morning, I now have no doubt that the corrupt Left Front government will be rooted out in the Assembly polls," he said at a public rally at Indranagar in the northern part of the state capital.

The home minister said he was surprised to find out that 66 per cent of the people live below poverty line in the state.

"Lotus blooms in mud. The CPI(M) government, with its scams and corrupt practices over the last 25 years, has created the ground for the blooming of lotus," he said.

Earlier, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh were referred to as "the weak and sick states of the country" but after the BJP came to power in these states, the problems have been taken care of, the Union minister claimed.

"Not a single minister has indulged in any corrupt practice in the NDA governments under the leadership of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Narendra Modi," he said.

The Vajpayee-led government had formed the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) for the welfare of the people, he noted.

Singh also criticised the Tripura government over the law and order situation in the state and promised to order a CBI probe into the killings of two journalists there if the BJP is voted to power.

Shantanu Bhowmick (28), a journalist of local TV channel 'Din Rat', and Sudip Datta Bhaumick (50) of 'Syandan Patrika', were killed in a span of two months in the second half of last year.

"The Manik Sarkar-led government did not recommend a CBI inquiry into the killings of the two scribes here despite pleas by journalist associations. The national average of conviction rate is 46, in Tripura it is 22," he said.

The minister also said that the central government maintains a cordial relationship with its counterpart in Bangladesh and the bilateral ties have helped India contain insurgency in the state to a great extent.

The common people here are insecure as incidents of political violence have increased in Tripura, he said.

"But as the home minister of the country, I can say that if the BJP is voted to power there will be no violence. We will provide safety and security to all, including the supporters and the leaders of the CPI(M)," he added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A total of 1430 bulletproof jackets out of 4600 received by the Maharashtra Police in the aftermath of the 26/11 terror attacks are returned to their manufacturer as they failed the AK-47 bullet test during trials.

"We have sent back more than 1400 bulletproof jackets to their manufacturer as they did not pass our test with AK-47 bullets," Additional Director General of Police (Procurement and Coordination), V V Laxminarayana told PTI.

The jackets returned to a Kanpur-based manufacturing firm were from three different batches.

The police department had ordered 5,000 bullet-proof vests from the company, which also provides such jackets to other Central security forces, for Rs 17 crore but received 4600 pieces after factoring in Customs duty and other charges.

During the trials conducted at the Chandigarh-based Central Forensic Science Laboratory, only around 3,000 jackets passed the test, another official said, adding that the rest 1,430 jackets were rejected as AK-47 bullets pierced through them during the tests.

"We have asked the manufacturer to replace the 1,430 jackets with a fresh stock. There will be no compromise on the quality and standards of the bulletproof jackets and we will take a delivery from the same manufacturer after testing those bulletproof jackets again," the official said.

A major controversy had erupted on the quality of bulletproof jackets after the death of ATS chief Hemant Karkare in the 2008 terror attacks. Karkare was seen putting on the bulletproof vest in the last visuals, before the jeep he was travelling in was attacked in south Mumbai.

The controversy was one of the main reasons that no company was willing to supply the jackets in multiple tenders floated by Maharashtra Police since the 2008 attacks, according to the official.

The jackets are primarily meant to be used by police personnel during anti-Maoist operations in Gadchiroli district and in other pockets, by the Quick Response Team (QRT) of Mumbai Police and the Force One, the elite commando force raised after the terror strikes, he said.

The state police started receiving the consignment of jackets in the last quarter of 2017---the ninth anniversary year of the attacks.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Maldivian Supreme Court dealt another blow to beleaguered President Abdulla Yameen today, asking him to comply with its order to release political prisoners and reinstate dissident lawmakers.

The government had expressed "concerns" over the judicial order and resisted complying with it, but the court said there can be no excuses.

Dissidents must be released because their trials were politically motivated and flawed, the Supreme Court said in a statement.

"There is nothing preventing the prosecutor general from seeking a re-trial after the order has been implemented (and prisoners released)," it added.

Thursday's order to restore the seats of 12 government MPs who defected to the opposition would effectively reduce Yameen's party to a minority and expose him to the risk of impeachment.

Police detained two opposition lawmakers who returned to the country today as the political crisis in the Indian Ocean archipelago nation deepened with its top court pitted against the president.

The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) said its MPs tried to stage a meeting in defiance of a weekend order suspending parliament, but they were pushed back by armed troops.

Security forces have been deployed inside the national parliament - known as the People's Majlis - since March last year when Yameen ordered them to evict dissident lawmakers.

The president's crackdown on dissent has tarnished the Maldives' image as an upmarket holiday paradise and sparked calls from the United Nations and several countries to restore the rule of law in the fledgling democracy.

But the Yameen government has so far refused to comply with the shock ruling, resisting international pressure.

In a national television address today, Attorney General Mohamed Anil remained defiant.

"Any Supreme Court order to arrest the president would be unconstitutional and illegal," Anil said. "So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order."



Yameen also sacked two police chiefs after the court's decision.

Atul Keshap, the US ambassador to Sri Lanka and the Maldives, led international criticism of the Yameen government's refusal to respect court orders.

"What security risk prevents the #Maldives #Majlis from meeting tomorrow? Why are MPs pepper sprayed in the streets and arrested on arrival at airport?" he tweeted today.

Former president and current opposition leader Mohamed Nasheed described the government's refusal to obey the Supreme Court as a "coup".

Nasheed, who was controversially convicted of a terrorism charge and jailed for 13 years in 2015, urged police and troops to uphold the constitution.

"Statements made today by AG Anil... to disobey SC orders is tantamount to a coup. They, and President Yameen must resign immediately," he tweeted on Sunday.

"Security services must uphold the constitution and serve the Maldivian people."



Nasheed, the country's first democratically elected leader, was toppled in 2012. He was barred from contesting elections after his 2015 terrorism conviction, which was internationally criticised as politically motivated.

He has been in exile since 2016, when he left on prison leave for medical treatment. He is currently in Colombo, meeting Maldivian dissidents based in Sri Lanka.

The MDP - which is led by Nasheed - has expressed fears that any move by the government to resist the Supreme Court's order may trigger unrest in the nation of 340,000 Sunni Muslims.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The beleaguered Maldives government today ordered police and troops to resist any move by the Supreme Court to arrest or impeach President Abdulla Yameen over his refusal to release political prisoners.

Police detained two opposition lawmakers as they returned to the country today, as the political crisis in the Indian Ocean archipelago nation deepened with its top court pitted against the president.

The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) said its MPs tried to stage a meeting in defiance of a weekend order suspending parliament, but they were pushed back by armed troops.

Security forces have been deployed inside the national parliament -- known as the People's Majlis -- since March last year when Yameen ordered them to evict dissident lawmakers.

The president's crackdown on dissent has tarnished the Maldives' image as an upmarket holiday paradise and sparked calls from the United Nations and several countries to restore the rule of law in the fledgling democracy.

The Supreme Court on Thursday night ordered the authorities to release nine political dissidents and restore the seats of 12 legislators who had been sacked for defecting from Yameen's party, ruling the cases were politically motivated.

But the Yameen government has so far refused to comply with the shock ruling, resisting international pressure to respect the decision.

In a national television address today, Attorney General Mohamed Anil remained defiant.

"Any Supreme Court order to arrest the president would be unconstitutional and illegal," Anil said. "So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order."



The Supreme Court's reinstatement of the dozen legislators gave the opposition a majority in the 85-member assembly, and it can now potentially impeach Yameen.

But authorities shut parliament indefinitely on Saturday to prevent such a move. Yameen also sacked two police chiefs after the court's decision.

Atul Keshap, the US ambassador to Sri Lanka and the Maldives, has led international criticism of the Yameen government's refusal to respect court orders.

"What security risk prevents the #Maldives #Majlis from meeting tomorrow? Why are MPs pepper sprayed in the streets and arrested on arrival at airport?" he tweeted today.

Former president and current opposition leader Mohamed Nasheed described the government's refusal to obey the Supreme Court as a "coup".

Nasheed, who was controversially convicted of a terrorism charge and jailed for 13 years in 2015, urged police and troops to uphold the constitution.

"Statements made today by AG Anil... to disobey SC orders is tantamount to a coup. They, and President Yameen must resign immediately," he tweeted on Sunday.

"Security services must uphold the constitution and serve the Maldivian people."



Nasheed, the country's first democratically elected leader, was toppled in 2012. He was barred from contesting elections after his 2015 terrorism conviction, which was internationally criticised as politically motivated.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A man allegedly shot at his sister and killed her brother-in-law as she had married against her family's wishes, following which the accused and his two accomplices were arrested, the police said today.

The woman was in coma and have been admitted to a hospital, they said.

Karan and his two accomplices -- Rajesh and Amit -- were arrested from Rajeev Chowk in Sohna on Friday night, Gurgaon Police PRO Ravinder Kumar said.

"On November 4 last year, the complainant had told police that his brother was kidnapped and a case was filed in this regard. The case was taken up by the crime branch," he said.

"During investigation, it was found that Karan's sister had married the complainant against her family's wishes and were hiding," the police officer said.

"Since the complainant's younger brother knew where they were staying, Karan along with his two accomplices kidnapped him and came to know where the couple were hiding.

"Karan reached there and shot in his sister's head. He later strangled to death the complainant's brother and burnt his body," Kumar said.

He said a case of murder, kidnapping and attempt to murder has been registered against the accused.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to visit Nepal soon after the new government takes office, a leader of the CPN-UML left alliance said today.

Nepal's Left alliance is preparing to form a new government which is expected to be headed by former prime minister and CPN-UML chairman K P Sharma Oli.

Oli, through a letter, had congratulated Modi on the 69th Republic Day of India.

CPN-UML Secretary Pradip Gyawali told reporters here that Prime Minister Modi's visit is most likely after Left alliance leader Oli becomes the prime minister of Nepal.

Oli had invited Modi for a visit to Nepal during a recent telephonic conversation with him.

"Modi telephoned Oli twice and both leaders invited each other for a visit to their countries," Gyawali said.

The recent visit by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj was aimed at clearing the mistrust, and the visit had been instrumental in further strengthening bilateral ties, he said.

The External Affairs Ministry described the two-day visit by Swaraj as "successful".

Gyawali said that the Left alliance wants to develop a cordial relationship with India.

Responding to a question about formation of the new government and the proposed unification between CPN-UML led by Oli and CPN-Maoist Centre led by Prachanda, Gyawali claimed that the twin tasks will be completed by next month.

Swaraj was the first senior Indian minister to visit Nepal after the conclusion of elections to local bodies, provincial assemblies and federal Parliament.

Nepal successfully concluded three phase of provincial, local and parliamentary elections as part of its efforts to implement the new Constitution that was promulgated in September 2015.

The clear victory to the Left alliance -- CPN-UML led by Oli and the CPN-Maoist led by Prachanda -- was not seen as a positive development for India given that Oli had publicly criticised New Delhi for interfering in Nepal's internal matters and accused it of toppling his government last year.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The lure of mythology seems to be as strong as ever among readers as the genre has enabled youths to explore folklore and India's legends, says Anuja Chandramouli, who has penned six books on the subject.

But according to the 32-year-old author, mythology writing is not always a smooth sailing and can even evoke "disparaging" feedback from readers who are passionate about legendary characters.

"It is amazing that the lure of mythology seems to be as strong as ever. Young readers are keen to discover the wealth of stories that have been handed down over the eons and have shared that they love how my books combine traditional elements with contemporary themes," she says in an email interview to PTI.

Chandramouli, who is now out with her latest books "Kartikeya: The Destroyer's Son", published by Rupa, says scholars and those already familiar with Indian legends seem eager to reacquaint themselves with the characters from the past.

"They have been surprisingly open to the unconventional approach and reinterpreted aspects of my tales, which they have informed me, capture much of the essence of Puranic lore," she says.

"These lovely compliments plus the occasional strongly worded hate mail disparaging the role of my imagination in retelling myths assure me that interest in mythology remains high and people are still passionate about these remainders from a glorious past. As far as I am concerned that is the best thing ever. And I don't mean that in terms of commerce or marketing," she adds.

Chandraouli, who resides in Tamil Nadu's Sivakasi, says she grew up smitten with the world of mythology, with Mahabharata -- one of the two Sanskrit epics -- remaining her most favourite read.

"Which is why, when it came to writing my first book, Arjuna was the obvious choice (for its subject). And it remains one of the best decisions I have ever taken for that book changed my life," she says of her book "Arjuna: Saga of A Pandava Warrior-Prince", which was published in 2012.

She has since penned books on mythological characters including Kamadeva, Shakti, Yama and Kartikeya.

"There is so much beauty and truth in Indian mythology and it is incredible that so much of it has been preserved thanks to the painstaking efforts of the storytellers who came before us.

"We would do well to treasure these beautiful stories, allow it to entertain as well as elucidate and take care to pass it on to our children," she says.

Talking about her latest book, she says the intention was to take Kartikeya's story to a wider audience and clear up some of the prevailing misconceptions about him.

"Kartikeya may not be as beloved as his sibling, Ganesha, in the regions to the north of the Vindhyas but here in the south, especially Tamil Nadu, we have always loved him to pieces.

"Tamilian poets, scribes and saints have composed beautiful tales and wonderful songs in honour of Shiva's son over the ages and I grew up listening to these, though I wasn't really familiar with the meaning behind the ornate words until much later.

"Therefore, it was only a matter of time before I wrote a book, featuring my take on this enigmatic and mysterious character," she says.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A Nepalese man has been arrested from the Balaigaav area with charas estimated to be worth Rs 31 lakh, police said today.

Superintendent of Police Jugal Kishore said that Narendra Nath Yogi, a resident of Banke district of Nepal, was nabbed by the personnel of Sashastra Seema Bal and local police yesterday based on a tip-off.

He said Yogi was nabbed from the Balaigaav area under Motipur police station and 2.5 kg charas worth Rs 31 lakh was recovered from him.

A case has been registered against Yogi under The Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, the SP said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)NITI Aayog would act as a "facilitator and catalyst" for the north eastern states in implementing the Centre's Act East Policy, a top official of the government think-tank said today.

"We will provide full support in providing advocacy to the north eastern states in the implementation of the policy and the Aayog's role will be primarily to act as a facillitator and catalyst," NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant said.

He was speaking said at the plenary session on North East Indian Economic ties with ASEAN and BBN (Bhutan, Bangladesh and Nepal) countries, on the second day of the Global Investors' Summit here.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has categorically said that the north east would be at the centre of the Act East Policy, whose three key features are connectivity, culture and commerce, Kant said.

Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal is driving the PM's Act East Policy and if the region progresses, "we will be able to lead a vast section of the population towards prosperity", the CEO said.

The Assam government was the first in the country to set up an Act East Department, and the policy is key to the growth, progress and upliftment of people from poverty to prosperity, the official said.

The north east is not just a gateway to South East Asia but is an extended corridor for growth, progress and prosperity, he said.

"Integration of the North East with East and South East Asia... will help in energising the region."



Connectivity is critical not only by road but also by air, railways and river transport, which "we are actively trying to augment and ensure speedy completion", he added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The no-detention policy in schools, which is now being scrapped, has done less harm to learning than it is accused of, according to a study by Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad.

IIM researchers Ankit Saraf and Ketan S Deshmukh have submitted the study report titled "To Fail or Not to Fail?" to a Parliamentary standing committee as well as the panel that is drafting the country's new policy.

"This finding runs contrary to assumption made by the researchers and propounded by many that under the detention system, the performance of students in a given grade would either improve or remain stagnant as they would necessarily need to meet or exceed the required levels of performance," the study says.

A provision in the Right to Act, 2009, the no- detention policy mandated the annual promotion of all children from Classes 1 to 8 regardless of their academic performance.

Several stakeholders have claimed the policy negatively impacted the performance level of students.

The IIM research is based on analysis of national data for 10 years in the Annual Survey of Reports (ASER).

"Implementation of the no-detention policy has not systematically lowered the learning levels of students. It has done less harm than what it is accused of," the study says.

Last year, the government introduced an amendment bill in Parliament to allow states to detain a child at the end of Class 5, Class 8, or both.

That bill is now with the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Human Resource Development.

Union Minister Mahendra Nath Pandey had said last July the government has decided to do away with the no-detention policy from the next academic session.

The decision was taken following representation from most of the states as they said the standard of education had deteriorated because of the policy, he had said.

"There has been a unanimous decision of withdrawing the no-detention policy from the Right to Education Act 2009," the Minister of State for HRD had said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)An oil tanker with 22 Indians on board has gone missing in the piracy-plagued waters off the Benin coast in the Gulf of Guinea near West Africa, the Directorate General of Shipping said today.

No contact has been established with the vessel so far and there have been no reports of a ransom call, it said.

"The region has a history of piracy and it may be a case of suspected piracy. All communication with the vessel has been lost, and right now we do not know if a ransom call has been made," an official of the Directorate General of Shipping told PTI.

The ship has gone mission less than a month after another vessel 'MT Barret' had gone missing off the coast of Benin in January and was later confirmed to have been hijacked.

The crew of 22, most of whom were Indians, were reportedly released after the ransom was paid.

Earlier, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted, "A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals on board, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea."



The India mission in Nigeria was in touch with the authorities concerned and the situation was being constantly monitored, the MEA said.

"Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860," Kumar said.

The DG shipping also said they are in touch with the Indian missions and "all our efforts are concentrated on getting the sailors rescued".

The official said that Anglo-Eastern shipping management is very cooperative and have also opened up an emergency response centre for the crew members' families.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Uttar Pradesh government has informed the Supreme Court that old-age homes are operational in all 75 districts of the state and facilities like medicine, food and clothes are provided to those residing there.

The apex court had earlier directed all the states and union territories to file their affidavits on a petition which raised the issue of status of old-age homes across the country.

In its counter affidavit filed before a bench of justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta, the Uttar Pradesh government said that the state was taking effective steps to ensure financial, food security, healthcare, shelter and other needs of senior citizens to improve the quality of their lives.

"All the old-age homes established in 75 districts of the state have become operational. It is pertinent to mention here that for the financial year 2017-18, budget of Rs 60 crore has been provided for operation and arrangements of old-age homes," the state said.

"It is also submitted that food, clothes, medicines and other necessary facilities are being provided free of cost to senior citizens in the old-age homes," the affidavit said.

It said besides the government financed old-age homes in the state, several NGOs were also running such homes.

The affidavit also referred to the old-age pension scheme run by the state with the Centre's help and said that pension of Rs 400 per month was being given to senior citizens, who are below the poverty line, aged between 60 and 79 years.

The monthly pension for senior citizens above 80 years was Rs 500, it said.

"Under the scheme, a proposal related to increasing the old pension from Rs 400 per month to Rs 1,000 per month is also under consideration before the state government and decision will be taken soon in this regard in view of the budget," it said.

It also said the state was fully committed to implement the provisions of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act 2007 and was providing old-age pension and implementing various welfare programmes for elderly citizens.

During the hearing on January 30, the apex court had expressed displeasure that several states and union territories have not filed affidavits and had observed that it was "quite obvious" that the authorities were not concerned about the aged.

The bench was informed that 23 states and union territories have filed their affidavits, while 11 others have not furnished these yet.

It had granted "last opportunity" to the defaulting states to file their affidavits within three weeks and posted the matter for hearing on March 22.

The apex court had in September last year sought replies from the states and union territories regarding the status of old-age homes in every district on a plea filed by former union minister and senior advocate Ashwini Kumar for protection of rights of senior citizens.

Kumar, in his PIL, had said there was a large number of aged people which has been increasing, with most of them living in poverty, without any roof over their heads or proper clothes and food.

The petitioner has sought that adequate number of old age homes be established in the country and direction be given to maintain and operate such homes with adequate standards to enable the elderly live their life with dignity and in accordance with section 19 of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Oncologists are unanimous that 90 per cent of oral cancers could be prevented if the government implement the Supreme Court's order which banned chewing tobacco being sold rampantly in twin packs.

The Supreme Court on September 23, 2016 had imposed ban on sale of tobacco in twin-packs such as gutka, tobacco, pan masala, khaini etc.

"When we are aware what causes 90 per cent of oral cancers and the law is there to ban these chewing tobacco products in twin packs, then what is stopping the enforcement?" Head and Neck Surgery Oncologist, Dr Sourav Dutta, told PTI on the World Cancer Day today.

Dutta, also the state patron of the Voice of Tobacco Victims, said it is alarming that about 10 lakh deaths are reported every year due to tobacco, and the government must strictly enforce the ban.

"As per the Global Adult Tobacco Survey 2017, there are 26.7 crore users of tobacco in India and 5500 children initiate tobacco use everyday. One-third of these tobacco users will die prematurely," Sambandh Health Foundation Trustee and Head of Tobacco Control, Sanjay Seth told PTI.

"Lakhs of Indian families are devastated with cancer deaths, which are preventable. Tobacco is the single most preventable cause of death."



Former Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Dinesh Trivedi also stressed the need for immediate measure to arrest deaths in cancer.

"Prevention is better than cure. The governments should think over it seriously as it accounts for more deaths worldwide than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined," Trivedi, a Trinamool Congress MP, told PTI.

"As Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, I had suggested the then government to reduce tobacco cultivation and compensate the farmers for the losses in other ways, but nothing has been done as yet," he said.

Interacting with students in Delhi University recently, Trivedi had said, "Confidence comes from the way you carry yourself and not from the brand of cigarette you smoke.... I request you to choose a healthy lifestyle instead of a cancerous hobby.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Pakistan's top security and investigative agency has proposed to set up a fully-equipped 'cyber patrol wing' to deal with the child pornography rings in the country.

Presently, there is no team at any Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) office working full time to track down the suspects involved in selling or uploading pornographic material online.

"So far three cases of child pornography have been traced either on tip-offs from inside the country or outside of it. We do not have any other mechanism to track down the suspects involved in this heinous crime. The child pornography rings are operating here and to nab them we need a dedicated cell equipped with latest soft-wares," says FIA senior officer Usman Anwar.

He said the child pornography rings are moving to the developing countries because of 'easy and cheap market' here.

"To deal with them we have proposed to the federal government that a 'cyber patrol wing', comprising a dedicated team of FIA personnel equipped with the latest software, be set up without any further delay. The FIA teams will do 24/7 patrolling on Internet to track down indigenous networks," he said.

Three cases involving child pornography have surfaced in Punjab province of Pakistan recently.

Saadat Amin of Sargodha (some 200km from Lahore) allegedly made child pornography involving 25 children sold such material online.

Taimur Maqsood, a suspect from Jhang (some 180km from Lahore), has been accused of exchanging child pornographic content online.

Third suspect Nabil of Fateh Jang (some 300km from Lahore) allegedly made porn videos/pictures of some children.

In the first two cases, Norwegian and Canadian authorities alerted the FIA after they arrested members of the child pornography rings in their countries.

In the third case, the families of five children reported the matter to FIA.

There have been calls from all quarters to check child pornography after the brutal murder of a seven-year-old girl of Kasur that shocked the country.

The alleged killer is said to be the serial killer accused of killing at least eight minor girls.

There has also been a demand to enhance punishment for such cases.

According to the cybercrime law the Prevention of Electronic Crime Act - a child pornographer shall be punished with imprisonment for a term of up to seven years or with a fine of up to Rs 5 million or with both.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A Palestinian man has confessed to killing his Israeli ex-girlfriend, saying the murder was motivated by nationalism, Israel's justice ministry said today.

Mohamed Harouf, a resident of Nablus in the Israeli- occupied West Bank, was arrested by Israeli police in August 2017 after the body of Mishal Halimi was discovered.

The 30-year-old went missing in May, according to media reports, and a crime of passion was suspected as she had been pregnant and married to another man at the time.

"The murderer strangled her while she was carrying a baby in her womb and then stoned her and left her without burying her," said the prosecutor, adding that the two sides had reached a plea bargain.

"We have arrived at this agreement to avoid a long trial and we will ask in agreement with the defence for a sentence of life imprisonment," the prosecutor said, quoted in a ministry statement.

The court must determine a verdict at a date yet to be confirmed.

"The court acknowledged that the murderer wanted to kill a Jewish woman for ideological motives," lawyers for the Halimi family said in a statement.

The victim's mother, Guita Zylberman, said "justice has been done" for her daughter.

On May 23, 2017, the day Halimi disappeared, her family informed police who launched a manhunt for her former boyfriend, according to media reports.

Halimi had been living in the Adam settlement, near Ramallah in the West Bank, but was killed in central Israel.

A media blackout had been long been imposed on the case.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Consumer electronics maker Panasonic is considering extending product portfolio under its Sanyo brand by introducing air conditioners in the coming summer season, a top company official said.

Panasonic is pushing Sanyo as a 'niche brand' for online sales only and looks to make it a 'value for money' brand for the segment. It is targeting youth segment with its trendy designs, the official said.

The company is adding ACs to the portfolio almost one- and-a-half years after it introduced TV panels in the Indian market.

The company is quite upbeat after Sanyo bagged an order to supply 60,000 units of ACs to state run Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL) through a competitive bidding.

"We are exploring the situation proposing AC under the Sanyo brand in the upcoming summer season," President & CEO Panasonic India, and & Vice President of Appliances Company, Panasonic Corporation Manish Sharma told PTI.

He further said that both TV and AC would be sold online as per its strategy.

"Sanyo is an exclusive online brand. The strategy, which are wanting to execute is that we would create a niche for Sanyo, which is present only in the online space," Sharma added.

As per its marketing strategy, Panasonic has placed brand Sanyo a notch below it.

"I believe that Sanyo would be positioned a bit below than Panasonic and bit above brands in the tier 2 space," he said.

The company had started online sales of Sanyo exclusively with Amazon and subsequently moved to Flipkart and other platforms and it is doing very well, he said.

"Value proposition of Sanyo brand is targeting the youth of the country and the consumer segmentation is 22 to 35 for these products. In that sense, the language the product would speak is very trendy. Design would be focus and I believe that features which will go behind these products will be very focused to the youth of the country," Sharma said.

Besides, the company is looking to tap the tenders and other opportunities by the government institutions.

"We are looking at the large opportunities to serve the government tenders," he added.

Panasonic sells over a million unit of ACs here.

In December, 2009, Panasonic had acquired 50.2 per cent stake in Sanyo, making Sanyo a subsidiary of Panasonic and in 2011, Sanyo became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Panasonic Corporation.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Pro-Brexit lawmakers are plotting to topple Prime Minister Theresa May if she tries to keep Britain in the EU's tariff-free customs union, media reports said today, ahead of crucial Cabinet meetings over Britain's future relationship with the European Union later this week.

According to UK media reports, Conservative party MPs in favour of a complete break from the EU have threatened to submit a "tsunami" of letters demanding a vote of no confidence unless May backs their demand of a complete exit from the EU customs union.

"We do not wish to be in 'a' customs union, 'the' customs union or 'an' customs union, said Jacob Rees-Mogg, among the most outspoken pro-Brexit Tory MPs and tipped for a key Cabinet role in the event of May's forced exit.

Under a plan reportedly drawn up by civil servants, the UK could keep trading goods tariff-free with the EU and negotiate separate trade deals on services with non-EU countries like India.

However, Brexiteers insist they want to be able to do free trade deals on goods as well as services with the rest of the world.

According to 'The Sunday Times', UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson has been approached to lead a coup by creating a team of so-called "Three Brexiteers" with him as Prime Minister, environment secretary Michael Gove as his deputy and Rees-Mogg as Chancellor.

Senior figures inside the Tory party have indicated that a poor performance in local elections scheduled in London for May this year could trigger a definitive no-confidence vote.

"If people could wave a magic wand tomorrow, she (May) would be gone... if we get wiped out in London, then more will say things cannot get any better under her, an ex-minister told the 'Guardian'.

A formal vote of no confidence in May can be held if Sir Graham Brady, the chairman of the Tory backbench 1922 Committee, receives letters from 48 MPs demanding a contest.

He alone knows exactly how many letters have been submitted so far.

Meanwhile, another senior Conservative Party MP and staunch Brexiteer, Bernard Jenkin, wrote in 'The Sunday Telegraph' that the Cabinet was "vague and divided" over Brexit and must get its act together.

"If ministers are vague or divided, life for officials becomes impossible, as we can see now. Ministerial collective responsibility really matters. If the prime minister sticks to one policy and the Chancellor keeps advocating another, what are officials meant to do," he questioned.

UK Chancellor Philip Hammond had recently suggested that the UKs relationship with the EU would change "very modestly" after Brexit. A stand that was roundly criticised by those in favour of a hard Brexit and a complete break from the economic bloc.

May will chair two meetings of the Cabinets Brexit sub- committee on Wednesday and Thursday, hoping to reach an accord and agreement between her warring ministers about the nature of the future trade deal Britain will seek from Brussels. She faces a tough task balancing both sides of the hard Brexit divide and asserting her authority to lead the government.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Indonesian police said today they would press ahead with an investigation into officers accused of publicly shaming transgender people in conservative Aceh province despite an angry protest against the probe.

North Aceh police chief Ahmad Untung Surianata and several of his subordinates have been questioned by the police internal affairs unit following raids on beauticians' premises in which 12 transgender staff were detained.

Officers were said to have forcibly cut the hair of some of them and made them wear male clothing and speak in a masculine voice.

Surianata said at the time that mothers had complained the transgender people were teasing their sons.

"The investigation is still ongoing," Aceh police spokesman Misbahul Munauwar told AFP. "If proven guilty of violating police conduct (rules), they may face disciplinary sanctions."



Sanctions range from a written reprimand to suspension.

The investigation into the raids sparked an angry protest last Friday amid rising anti-LGBT sentiment in the province.

Prejudice against gay and transgender people has long been widespread in Indonesia, which has the world's largest Muslim population. Parliament is set to pass a long-dormant bill to make sex outside marriage, including gay relations, illegal.

The discrimination is particularly acute in Aceh on Sumatra island, the only province to be ruled by Islamic law since it was granted special autonomy in 2001.

More than 100 people -- including Aceh governor Irwandi Yusuf and a lawmaker -- took to the streets in the provincial capital Banda Aceh last Friday in a show of support for Surianata.

Some beauty shops who employed transgenders have closed down while many beauticians were considering fleeing the province.

"The current situation is very uncomfortable to us. We are now in fear," a 33-year-old long-haired transgender, who requested anonymity, told AFP Saturday at her beauty shop.

"At the moment, I avoid leaving home at night, it's too scary."



Nasir Djamil, the lawmaker who joined the protest on Friday, said: "LGBT is forbidden by Islam. We shall continue efforts to educate them (transgenders) because they are also our brothers."Pictures showing a Hello Kitty doll being burnt by the protesters went viral but it was unclear why the character was targeted.

"I don't know why they used Hello Kitty. I was only invited to join the rally," Djamil of the Islamic PKS party told AFP.

Last month a Christian was publicly flogged for selling alcohol, making him only the third non-Muslim to suffer a public whipping under Aceh's Islamic law.

Human rights activists condemned the police roads on beauticians.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Rahul Gandhi's visits to temples of late were not merely for "demonstration effect" but underlines the fact that what was being done quietly in the past is now done openly, senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor has said.

"Many many Hindus, certainly my generation, grew up as believing and practising Hindus but never showed it outside as they didn't feel like doing so," the Lok Sabha member told PTI in an interview during the recently-concluded Jaipur Literature Festival here.

"In those days, religion was seen as an intensely personal matter you practice what you like you don't have to show the outside world. And in any case, your religion had nothing to do with political affiliation; that was the assumption," the 61-year-old leader said.

However, Tharoor said now Hinduism and religion have been made the front and centre in the of the BJP and those supporting that are openly saying that they are the only good Hindus and everybody else is bad.

"Why should we cede this narrative to them? To my mind, we may as well show publicly what we have been doing privately. This is not in my view merely for demonstration effect or appearances. It is merely that what used to be done quietly in the past is being done openly now," he said when asked about Gandhi's visits to temples during the Gujarat polls campaign.

Tharoor also said he feels that Gandhi was symbolising a change in the Congress.

Noting that the Congress had performed well in Gujarat due to the effectiveness of Gandhi's campaign, he said that the Congress now has an "energetic leader" who does not hesitate to use wit and humour in a relaxed style, which in the past, was not associated with the party leadership.

"So, when Gandhi issues a tweet after Donald Trump makes a pro-Pakistan statement, some ask what is this but many say 'what a refreshing style, let's listen to this guy'. So in many ways I would say, our is changing and Rahul Gandhi is leading and symbolising that change," he said.

Tharoor also said that the Congress stands a good chance in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.

"In fact, we are getting more and more rumours that the government may advance the elections because it thinks it would lose the elections if these are held in March-April 2019 due to the momentum the Congress is clearly beginning to get," he claimed.

He also termed the controversy of the film 'Padmaavat' as very unfortunate.

"The classical principle of freedom of expression is fundamental to any democracy. If you don't like what I have written in my book, don't read my book. If you don't like a film, don't watch it," Tharoor said.

"At the worst, you can even encourage others to boycott it. But you have no right to threaten violence, least of all to conduct violence," the MP from Thiruvananthapuram said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Buoyed by the Rajasthan bypoll results, Congress state unit chief Sachin Pilot said today the victory would also have a bearing on the upcoming elections in other states as the "myth" of the BJP being an election- winning machine has been busted.

Pilot, who spearheaded the campaign on the ground in Rajasthan where bypolls were held in two Lok Sabha constituencies and one Assembly seat, said the election results had sent out a message to the BJP that its "jumlebaazi" (rhetoric) would not work.

He said the results had come at a time when the BJP was on the "back foot".

"The fact that they were forced to make a so-called pro farmer budget shows that the agrarian distress all over India is having its impact and the BJP will have to pay a heavy price for it," Pilot told PTI in an interview here.

The Congress put up a strong performance in Rajasthan where its candidates wrested the Alwar and Ajmer Lok Sabha and Mandalgarh Assembly seats from the BJP by impressive margins last week.

Pilot, who is largely seen as the Congress's chief ministerial face in Rajasthan, said the elections were "very crucial" as they came just seven or eight months before Assembly polls in the state, slated to be held by the end of this year.

"These by-elections are a very positive indication for the times to come, and not just in Rajasthan but in other states also. I think it will have a good bearing on the Karnataka polls that are coming up," the 40-year-old leader said, adding the myth that the BJP was an election-winning machine had been busted.

Noting that bypolls have historically been won in the state by the ruling dispensation, Pilot said the mandate that the Congress received was not just a rejection of the Vasundhara Raje government but an approval of the Congress's stand on various issues and policies.

"The myth that the BJP is an election-winning machine and cannot be defeated at the hustings at the booth level, that myth has been put to rest now.

"The whole pracharak, vistarak and the booth management ... take pride in saying that they are the best apparently... (It) has now been proven that we can defeat them if the Congress party workers work with zeal," Pilot said.

Asked whether the Congress would name a chief ministerial candidate before the polls in Rajasthan, Pilot said, "We as a party have traditionally not done this. The BJP takes pride in doing this but have not done it in Rajasthan."



"In our party, the elected MLAs will decide and the leadership will decide who will form the government. The singular job at our hand is to win the state elections. Collective efforts of all leaders are towards that," he said.

He also asserted that there was no factionalism in the state unit of the party and all leaders were united in their objective of defeating the BJP in Rajasthan.

The margin of victory registered by the Congress had been striking with its candidate Karan Singh Yadav trouncing his nearest BJP rival Jaswant Yadav by 1,96,496 votes in Alwar, and the main opposition party's nominee for Ajmer Raghu Sharma beating BJP's Swaroop Lamba by over 84,414 votes.

The Congress's Vivek Dhakad won the Mandalgarh Assembly seat, defeating his nearest BJP rival Shakti Singh Hada by nearly 13,000 votes.

Asked if the mandate was against the Raje government or the BJP-led government at the Centre, Pilot said, "You cannot segregate. This is a mandate against the BJP."



"Governance has failed in Rajasthan. But the larger BJP policies of the GST, 'notebandi' (demonetisation)... have had their impact," he said.

He also alleged the BJP attempted to polarise the polls and divert the campaign discourse from the main issues.

"I must salute the people of Rajasthan that they did not allow this communal and venomous to take centre-stage ... The BJP's desperate attempt at the fag end to communalise (the bypolls) came a cropper," Pilot said.

He pointed out there were eight Assembly segments in each parliamentary seat and the Congress won all the eight in Alwar and in Ajmer.

"So it shows that even the urban centres where we were not so strong conventionally, those people -- the middle class, young people -- have come strongly in the Congress's fold.

"With this victory on our shoulders we are going to work double hard and with more humility reach out to the people of Rajasthan and do a mass contact programme, so that we are able to get the blessings (of the people) eight months later," he said.

Pilot claimed the tide was turning against the BJP and hailed Congress president Rahul Gandhi for taking on the BJP aggressively.

"Every statement Mr Rahul Gandhi makes at least 15 ministers start challenging that, which shows the nervousness in the BJP camp at the way Mr Gandhi is attacking and aggressively campaigning," he said.

Gandhi had hailed the party's Rajasthan unit for its impressive show, calling the outcome a "rejection" of the BJP by the people.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Hidden from public view ever since its first appearance in 1956, 'Ville Provencale', one of Syed Haider Raza's rare works, will go on sale for the first time at Sothebys Modern and Contemporary South Asian Art Sale here on March 19.

'Ville Provencale' was first exhibited at Venice Biennale in 1956, before it was secreted away into private collections for many decades.

Created during Raza's formative years in France, the painting, distinguished by its vivid colors, displays a semi- abstracted view of a town in rural Provence.

Terming the art a "momentous, museum-quality work", Yamini Mehta, International Head of South Asian Art, said that the painting is "a unique hybridisation of Raza's deep rooted Indian heritage with the post-war modernism that was blossoming in the French art scene".

"It is extremely rare for works by S H Raza from the 1950s of such size and calibre to come to the market. From its illustrious beginnings when painted under the patronage of renowned gallerist Lara Vincy, who was responsible for establishing the artist in the European art market; to its unveiling at the 1956 Venice Biennale, and finally the time spent in a private collection, Ville Provencale is a masterpiece," Mehta said.

Raza, along with M F Husain, Dinkar Kaushik and Akbar Padamsee, represented India at the Venice Biennale, where Ville Provenale was first displayed in 1956.

S H Raza's influential relationship with France began in 1950, when he left India for Paris with a bursary from the French Government to study at the cole Nationale des Beaux- Arts.

This was to be Raza's first experience of France, during which he was exposed to the works of Post-Impressionist artists, in particular, Paul Czanne and Vincent Van Gogh, who became major sources of inspiration to the artist.

Raza's move to France provided him with the foundation on which to grow and flourish as an international artist; however it also encouraged him to reconnect with his Indian heritage. These compound influences proved most significant.

Ville Provencale will be exhibited at The Oberoi Hotel in New Delhi on February 22-23 as part of a traveling exhibition of highlights from the sale.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Reliance Communications has opposed the telecom regulator's directive asking the company to refund unspent balance of mobile subscribers, in the wake of discontinuation of its voice services.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) is, however, of the view that the demand on customer refunds is fully justified as it pertains to premature closure of services by an operator, and therefore, can not be equated with general network port outs cases.

A senior official told PTI that since it is the case of a service provider closing services the "customers must get their unspent balance".

"The situation is not similar to general port out by a consumer, where the consumer chooses the timing of porting out from one network to another network. Here, a service provider has closed services and therefore protection of consumer interest is a must," added the official who did not wish to be named.

Reliance Communications (RCom) declined to respond to an email query on the issue.

However, sources familiar with the development said that the service provider has shot off a letter to arguing against the regulators January 19 directive on refunds.

In the letter, RCom has cited the Mobile Number Portability Regulations, 2009 to highlight that the existing rules mention that the balance amount of talktime at the time of porting "shall lapse", the source pointed out.

"We regret to say that we are unaware of the exact regulation under which a provision exists for refund of balance amount of talk time on a mobile number being ported out for any reason whatsoever ... we request authority to withdraw the direction ... " the source said quoting from RComs written representation to

Meanwhile, RCom is preparing another follow up letter to Trai where it has further argued that there is no precedence of customer refunds being sought in several other cases of operators closing down services in the Indian telecom market.

On January 19, the Trai had directed Reliance Communications (RCom) and Reliance Telecom (RTL) to refund the unused balance of their prepaid customers and security deposits of their post-paid subscribers and report compliance in the coming weeks.

The direction for refund is "pursuant to closure of 2G/GSM, CDMA services and discontinuation of voice services in all the licensed services areas by Reliance Communications Limited (RCL) and Reliance Telecom Limited".

The move comes at a time when RCom has announced plans to sell its spectrum, towers, optical fibre network and other wireless assets to Reliance Jio, the telecom firm of elder brother Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries.

The industry estimates the blockbuster deal to be valued at Rs 24,000- 25,000 crore.The first-ever global investors summit in Assam has seen investment commitments to the tune of Rs 1 lakh crore in various sectors, including petroleum, telecom, health and tourism, Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said today.

"It is a very good beginning. The response of the investors are very exciting and encouraging. I believe the investment commitments will make Assam a better economy," Sonowal told PTI here.

Over 200 initial pacts worth Rs1 lakh crore were signed at the Advantage Assam summit, he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the two-day event yesterday.Bhutanese PM Tshering Tobgay, several Union ministers,chief ministers of neighbouring Arunachal Pradesh and Manipur, ambassadors and high commissioners of 16 countries, RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani, Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekharan attended the meet.

The chief minister said oil major ONGC committed Rs 13,000 crore investmentin the state, another oil PSU Oil India Ltd. pledgedan investment of Rs 10,000 crore.

Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Numaligarh Refinery Ltd planning toinvest Rs 3,432 crore and Rs 3,410 crore, respectively.

Among private players, RIL chairman and MD Mukesh Ambanihas announced an investment of Rs 2,500 crore in Assam in varioussectors, including retail, petroleum, telecom, tourism andsports, creating jobs for at least 80,000 people over the nextthree years.

TheTata Trusts will invest Rs 2,000 crore to implement acancer care programme jointly with the Assam government in 17 centres across 15 districts of the state from next year, theproject will see an investment of around Rs 2,000 crore.

Indo-UK Institute of Health will be investing Rs 2,700 crore, while Century Ply has shared plans of investing Rs 2,100 crore.

Spicejet chief Ajay Singh has announced the plans of Rs 1,250 crore investment in Assamthrough seaplanes to boost the tourism sector besidesconnecting Lakhimpur and Jorhat under the recently launched central government scheme 'Udaan'.

Infinity Group will be investing Rs 1,000 crore in an IT park and real estate project in Guwahati, theMedanta Group proposed Rs 500 crore investment in the healthcaresector and Dalmia Bharat Cement announced an investmentto the tune of Rs 1,100 crore.

Sonowal said the investments will provide ample employment opportunities to the youth of the state.

"We hope that Assam will be the gateway for India to connect ASEAN countries," he said.

Media advisor to the chief minister, Hrishikesh Goswami, said tourism, which is one of the key focus areas ofthe government, saw an investment proposal to the tune ofRs 736 crore and infrastructure sectorsaw a total investment proposal worth Rs2,347 crore.

Other major companies announcing investments in Assam areBPCL (Rs 350 crore), Essel Infraprojects (Rs 6,000 crore), Star Cement (Rs 2,100 crore), Infinity Infotech Parks (Rs1,000 crore) and Mahindra Holidays and Resorts India (Rs 400 crore).

The Assam government has identified 12 focus sectors for the summit, including agriculture and food processing, handloom-textile-handicrafts, logistics, river transport-port township, IT-ITeS, pharmaceutical-medical equipment, plastics-petrochemicals and power.

Assam has hosted its first global investors summit to showcase its manufacturing opportunities and geostrategic advantages to foreign and domestic investors.

The summitaimed at highlighting Assam's geostrategic advantages and core competencies in different sectors along with the policy initiatives taken by the state government.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Naxals killed a 24-year-old man, employee of a road contractor, in Chhattisgarh's insurgency-hit Dantewada district, police said today.

The deceased man's 10-year-old sister-in-law was also injured in the incident at Gatam village under Katekalyan police station limits, a local police official told PTI.

Manoj Podiyam (24), the deceased, was working as an accountant ('munshi') with a private contractor engaged in road construction work in the area.

Naxals stormed into Podiyam's house at Gatam, around 400 km from here, last night, and shot him in front of his wife, the official said.

Podiyam's sister-in-law Muskan Mandavi (10) was hit in the leg by a ricocheting bullet.

After receiving information, a police team reached the spot and shifted the injured girl to a local hospital.

"Her condition is stable," said the police official, adding that a combing operation has been launched in the region to trace the assailants.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Jammu and Kashmir government is working on a silk revival plan with a target of 10 lakh metres silk production per year, a senior official said.

Commissioner-Secretary, Industries and Commerce, Shailendra Kumar brief Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti about the plan which envisages revival of silk rearing units in Rajbagh, Solina, Nowshera, Bari Brahmana and other areas in the coming years.

As per the plan, the government would be infusing adequate funds into the revival of these units to generate a final produce of 10 lakh metres of silk per annum in the state, he said.

Kumar briefed the Chief Minister during her visit to Bari Brahmana Industrial Estate here where she laid the foundation of a silk factory and a filatures unit yesterday. The chief minister also inaugurated the Government Joinery Mills and inspected the work at the EDI complex there.

To be built at a cost of Rs 16.84 crore, the government silk factory would be constructed in five months, an official spokesman said. Mehbooba also laid the foundation of government silk filatures to be built at a cost of Rs 6.64 crore, the spokesman said.

With the setting up of these units, the silk weaving facility from cocoon to yarn would be made available in Jammu province, the spokesman said.

During the visit, Mehbooba also inspected the on-going work at the Jammu campus of Entrepreneurship Development Institute (EDI) at the Industrial Estate. To be built over a cost of Rs 82.89 crore, the Jammu campus of JKEDI is scheduled to be completed in three phases spread over a period of three years.

It would have all the facilities like incubation centre, hostel, library and other interactive facilities for young entrepreneurs, the spokesman said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A first-of-its-kind English-Tamil glossary with over 4,000 common English terms and their corresponding Tamil words has been launched in Singapore to help translate public communication materials to the Indian language.

Tamil is Singapore's fourth official language along with English, Chinese and Malay.

The 200-page glossary contains a glossary in alphabetical order, a compilation of names of government organisations, as well as lists of educational terms and titles of statutes, The Sunday Times reported.

The glossary was produced by the Tamil Resource Panel under the National Translation Committee (NTC) in collaboration with the Tamil Language Council, the Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI) said in a statement yesterday.

It aims to be a guide for the practitioners of the Tamil language, including the media, teachers, students and government agencies who need to translate public communication materials to the Tamil language.

The NTC has also identified a list of experienced translators and vetters for government agencies to tap to improve vetting of Tamil translations.

In his speech at the launch of the glossary at The Indian Heritage Centre, Senior Minister of State for Communications and Information Chee Hong Tat said government agencies have not been consistent when tapping a list of experienced Tamil translators and vetters.

"Some have implemented it well, others I suspect, pay lip service and just go through (the) motion," Chee was quoted as saying by the Times.

"I had to knock some heads over the past year, something which I did not particularly enjoy doing, but until we see consistent improvement across the public sector, we have no choice but to continue enforcing the standards to hold agencies accountable for the quality of their translations."



Last year, pamphlets used in National Day Parade rehearsals contained errors in Tamil translation.

Following that, Minister Ng Eng Hen had told Parliament in August that the original Tamil translation submitted was correct but errors were made by the printers.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)An Army Captain, who was among those killed in the heavy Pakistani shelling along the LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts of Jammu and Kashmir today, was six days short of his 23rd birthday, a senior Army official said.

Captain Kapil Kundu from Ransika village of Gurgaon district was killed when the Pakistani forces opened unprovoked firing and shelling along the LoC in the Bhimbher Gali sector of Rajouri district this evening.

He would have turned 23 on February 10, the official said.

In the shelling, three jawans were also killed, senior Army officials said.

Earlier in the day, two teenagers and a jawan were injured in the Shahpur sector of Poonch district in the shelling from across the border, a police official said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Train movement on the busy Howrah-Mumbai line was stalled for about two hours near Rourkela station today as slum dwellers from nearby areas staged an agitation on the tracks.

The protesters demanded a piece of land from the railways for constructing a four-lane road and installing a water pipe line.

The blockade that started around 11am was lifted at 2pm after the railway officials placated the agitators and promised to look into their demands.

The slum dwellers had also gheraoed the railway assistant engineer's office yesterday to press for their demands.

"The railway authorities are not allowing the construction of road between BSNL Main Office and Basanti Colony here and work on a water pipeline," one of the agitators said on the condition of anonymity.

The divisional engineer of South Eastern Railway at Chakradhrapur has written a letter to the executive engineer of PWD here, mentioning that railway properties would be damaged if the road and pipeline were allowed on the land, he said.

Rourkerla area manager (railways), Narendra Kumar, assured the agitators that he would take up the matter with the authorities.

"We will inform the matter to our higher authorities and some solution might come out soon," Kumar said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Thousands of students and teachers from an Odisha institute will join millions others from across the globe in a UK government-partnered initiative aimed at "connecting people" over shared meals.

The 'Commonwealth Big Lunches' initiative was launched yesterday by British Prime Minister Theresa May.

The initiative has been created by educational charity the Eden Project in partnership with the UK government aimed at encouraging people to get together to celebrate their "Commonwealth" connections through food.

According to the UK government, around 30,000 students and teachers of Kalinga Institute of Social Science in Odisha will be among millions from around the world to participate in the new 'Commonwealth Big Lunches' initiative.

"The Commonwealth is a diverse and vibrant network and its strength lies in the people-to-people links. The Eden Project brings together millions of people as part of their annual Big Lunch so we are delighted to partner with them on Commonwealth Big Lunches," May said.

Lunches of all shapes and sizes are set to take place between March 12, celebrated as the Commonwealth Day, and April 22. The six-week period will be marked by diverse events across the 52 countries that make up the 'Commonwealth'. It also includes a lunch for athletes at the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games in Australia and a joint Scotland-Malawi lunch in Edinburgh.

"Starting in March, Commonwealth Big Lunches will be an opportunity for people across the Commonwealth to come together and, over a shared meal, discover and celebrate their connections, experiences and stories," May noted.

The Big Lunches will coincide with Britain playing host to the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in London and Windsor from April 16 to 20. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to attend the CHOGM alongside other Commonwealth heads of government.

"Commonwealth Big Lunches remind us of the range and diversity of our connections and counterparts in countries and communities far away, and bring us together with those who live alongside us locally.

"They offer wonderful opportunities for people of all ages to bring our great Commonwealth family alive in new ways as we work towards a common future," said Patricia Scotland, Secretary-General of the Commonwealth.

The initiative builds on Cornwall-based Eden Project's annual 'Big Lunch', launched in 2009, as a way to connect people with their communities.It is designed around local communities taking the lead by selecting a venue and inviting local cafes to contribute to an effective open-air picnic.

"Celebrations are anticipated across six continents, which is just phenomenal. Commonwealth Big Lunches bring people together, show the diversity we all have and importantly celebrate the commonality we all share which showcases the true spirit of the Commonwealth," said Peter Stewart, Executive Director of the Eden Project.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Thousands protested in Syria's Afrin today as local authorities called on world powers to intervene to halt a Turkish-led assault, accusing Russia of complicity in civilian deaths in the region.

Ankara and allied rebels launched operation "Olive Branch" on January 20 against the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), which Turkey has blacklisted as "terrorists".

Afrin's local administration - the semi-autonomous government in place since 2013 - shot back the accusation today and urged Moscow to take a firm stand.

"We ask the Russian Federation in particular to rescind its support for the Turkish state's terrorism against the people of Afrin," it said in a statement.

"It bears responsibility for the massacres the fascist Turkish state is carrying out against innocent civilians."



Russia, which intervened militarily in Syria's war in 2015, had troops positioned in Afrin but withdrew them as Turkey launched the assault.

The YPG and Afrin officials say that withdrawal amounted to tacit approval of the Turkish offensive.

Officials today also called for the United States, European Union, United Nations Security Council and the US-led coalition fighting jihadists to "immediately intervene to stop Turkey's aggression".

Ankara says it launched the operation to protect its southern border and insists that it is doing everything it can to avoid civilian casualties.

But the campaign has sparked mass protests, including in Afrin today.

Thousands of people marched to the sound of drums through central Afrin, holding YPG flags and posters of Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

Turkey is vehemently opposed to the YPG because of its ties to the PKK, which has waged a three-decade insurgency against Turkish forces.

"We're holding the whole world responsible because we fought terrorism on behalf of everyone, but today the world agreed to kill Syrians," said Ali Mahmoud, 45.

Men, women and children thronged main roads in central Afrin for today's demonstration, many chanting slogans.

"We will not bow our heads to (Turkish President Recep Tayyip) Erdogan, we are not afraid of him and will never fear him," said one protester, Amina Mohammed.

Some demonstrators clutched olive branches, a symbol of Afrin which is known for its abundant olive groves but which are also now associated with the name Turkey gave its offensive.

"They named their attack 'Olive Branch'. It's a thorn in their hand, but in our hands, it's a gun," said Fikrat Afdal, 33.

At least 68 civilians, including 21 children, have died in Turkish shelling as part of the assault, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

More than 100 pro-Ankara rebels and a similar number of YPG fighters have also died, the British-based monitor says.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Five civilians were treated for "suffocation" today after Syrian regime air strikes on the northwestern town of Saraqeb, a monitor said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported a "foul smell after regime helicopters struck several areas of the town in Idlib province, causing five civilians to suffer from suffocation".

It quoted residents and medical sources as saying "toxic gas" was used in the attack, without elaborating.

Syrian regime air strikes also killed six civilians in the town of Maarat al-Numan in the southern countryside of Idlib province, the Observatory said, causing damage to the main hospital there.

The facility had stopped working until repairs could be carried out, the war monitor said.

The latest developments come as the United States this week accused the Syrian regime of using chemical weapons on opposition forces near the capital Damascus.

The Syrian foreign ministry denied the accusations as "lies".

US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis told reporters on Friday his government was concerned sarin gas may have been recently used in Syria, citing reports from NGOs and rebel groups.

These reports said toxic gas has been used.

Matis however said the United States has no proof to support these accusations.

Last month, 21 people were treated for respiratory problems after rockets were fired on the rebel bastion of Eastern Ghouta outside Damascus.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu today said it was wrong for anyone to take the law in their own hands in the name of religion, caste, region or language.

Speaking at the inauguration of the first International 'Kala Mela' at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts here, Naidu said that people have to be careful about not hurting the sentiments of others because living together in unity, despite the differences, was the essence of the country.

"At the same time, anybody taking law into their hands in the name of religion, in the name of caste, in the name of region, in the name of language is also bad. There is a system, we are a civilised society, there is a government..." he said.

The Vice President said that it was the duty of the government to take care of law so that everyone is able to have their own rights, expressions and views.

Describing culture as the "heartbeat" of a civilisation, Naidu said that it was a symbol of its value system, representing the hopes and aspirations of its people.

"As the world is becoming increasingly globalised, we should preserve and propagate the best facets of our individual cultures.

"He further said that irrespective of caste, creed, sex, religion and region, India is one nation, one, people, one country and that is the basic philosophy", he said.

The Kala Mela, organised by the ministry of culture, is a 14-day festival where different forms of art from across the globe will be showcased by around 1,000 artistes in the heart of Delhi.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Telecom tribunal TDSAT's order that directed the regulator TRAI to issue a framework for assessing tariff consistencies with non-predation principles may stop "race to the bottom" on telecom tariffs, according to industry body COAI.

"The TDSAT order may be helpful in stopping the race to the bottom when it comes to tariffs. Offerings will have to be filtered through the lens of whether they are predatory," Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) Director General Rajan Mathews told PTI.

On February 1, the Telecom Dispute Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) upheld a TRAI order that had allowed Jio's free offers to continue beyond 90 days after its services were launched, but gave certain directions to the regulator.

The tribunal asked the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) to work out guidelines that can be used for checking compliance of tariffs with principles of non- predation.

Till such guidelines are issued by the TRAI, the TDSAT order insisted on a filing requirement and prior approval from the regulator, for operators launching "all services free" offers.

The TDSAT order said that till TRAI issues the non- predation filters, no "all services free" offer can be launched by either Reliance Jio or other telecom operator "without making a written submission to TRAI relating to self check for consistency with regulatory principles of non- predation".

"TRAI will examine such submissions within one week and convey its approval or disapproval in writing with reasons," the TDSAT order has said.

At present, the tariffs are under forbearance, which means operators virtually have a free hand in fixing the rates and only have to report plans to TRAI in seven working days of launch.

The TDSAT has said that it found the TRAI decision with regard to 'Jio Welcome Offer' and the 'Happy New Year offer' to be "in order requiring no interference". At the same time, it asked the TRAI to take "appropriate action" against Jio for non-compliance of the reporting requirement, with regard to the 'Welcome Offer'.

The two offers in reference are 'Jio Welcome Offer' and the 'Happy New Year offer'. Jio had launched the inaugural free voice and data plan in September 2016, and in December 2016, had extended the freebies up to March 2017.

Following this, the established players -- Airtel and Idea -- moved the tribunal against the TRAI order that allowed Jio to provide free services beyond the stipulated 90-day period.

The TDSAT order of last week, also directed the TRAI to issue clear guidelines, benchmarks or methodology for performing self check for consistency with principles of Interconnect Usage Charge (IUC) compliance.

"We direct TRAI to issue suitable direction/order/regulation regarding benchmark/guideline that can be applied for ascertaining consistency with the principles of non-predation," said the order.

TDSAT said its directions, need to be carried out expeditiously and "preferably within four months".

The TRAI is currently working on framing rules of tariff assessment with regard to promotional offers and predatory pricing.

A consultation paper on 'Regulatory Principles of Tariff Assessment' pertains to measures that need to be prescribed to ensure transparency in the tariff offers of telecom operators, and strengthening definition relating to "non-discrimination".

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Tension prevailed in Vadayambadi in the district after two groups of people came face to face over the issue of a wall built on a ground adjacent to a temple.

Dalit outfits said they had been protesting against the alleged "caste wall" constructed by local unit of the Nair Service Society (NSS) on a "public land" adjacent to Bhajana Madom Devi Temple for last 10 months.

Police said several activists of Dalit rights organisations today assembled in Vadayambadi to take out a march and to organise a convention to uphold self esteem of Dalits.

A group of people claiming to be members of a right wing Hindu outfit also assembled there opposing the march.

In a bid to avoid clash between the two groups, police intervened and over 100 people were arrested. They were released later, police said.

Dalit leaders, however, alleged that the police did not arrest the activists of the right wing Hindu outfit who tried to create trouble in the area.

Police said the situation has been brought under control.

The development came a day after the District Collector held a meeting of the socio-political group from the area to resolve the crisis.

After the meeting, collector Mohammed Y Safirullah had said no "caste wall" would be permitted.

The local NSS leadership claimed that the wall was constructed on the land owned by the temple.

The Dalit organisations have challenged the claim by the local NSS leadership. They urged the authorities to cancel the land title deed issued to NSS some years back.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Some 50,000 homes in South Australia will receive solar panels and Tesla batteries, the state government announced today, in a landmark plan to turn houses into a giant, interconnected power plant.

South Australia is already home to world's biggest battery in an Elon Musk-driven project to provide electricity for more than 30,000 homes.

The state government has since been looking for more ways -- particularly through renewables -- to address its energy woes after an "unprecedented" storm caused a state-wide blackout in 2016.

Under a new plan unveiled on Sunday, a network of solar panels linked to rechargeable batteries will be provided free to households and financed by the sale of excess electricity generated by the network, the government said.

"My government has already delivered the world's biggest battery, now we will deliver the world's largest virtual power plant," state Premier Jay Weatherill said in a statement.

"We will use people's homes as a way to generate energy for the South Australian grid, with participating households benefitting with significant savings in their energy bills."



A trial phase will begin with 1,100 public housing properties, each supplied with a 5kW solar panel system Tesla battery.

Following the trial, the systems will be installed at a further 24,000 public housing properties before the scheme is opened up to other South Australians over the next four years.

The government is also set to look for an energy retailer to deliver the programme to add more competition to the market.

The rollout will be supported by the state government through a 2 million Australian dollars grant and a 30 million Australian dollars loan from a taxpayer renewable technology fund.

Tesla said in a statement to AFP that the virtual power plant would have 250 megawatts of solar energy and 650 megawatt hours of battery storage.

"At key moments, the virtual power plant could provide as much capacity as a large gas turbine or coal power plant," the company added.

Australia is one of the world's largest producers of coal and gas but the South Australian blackout raised questions about its energy security.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)At a time when the entire country is talking about the upcoming film "Padman", a woman scientist in Madhya Pradesh, who returned from the US, has been silently working on her mission to educate tribal women about menstrual health and offering them cheap sanitary pads.

Maya Vishwakarma started her mission two years ago, prompted by her own experience of unsafe menstrual hygiene during her early years.

"I did not use sanitary pads till the age of 26. I even did not know about it. At that time, neither did I have money, nor information," Vishwakarma told PTI.

The 36-year-old biologist has returned to her village Mehragaon in Narsinghpur district from the US, where she went for higher studies, and is devoting her energy in spreading awareness about menstrual hygiene among tribal women.

Her early life's experience led her back to her native place, where she is working for menstrual hygiene and cost- effective manufacturing of quality sanitary pads under the banner of her organisation - Sukarma Foundation.

"I was told to use cloth by a woman relative during my first period. This had caused several infections. Talking about menstrual health is still a taboo in our society. My experiences in early life inspired me to work in this field."



Vishwakarma's campaign has come into spotlight at a time when there is a buzz around the Bollywood movie "Padman", which will hit theatres on February 9.

The Akshay Kumar-starrer social drama is a fictionalised account of Tamil Nadu-based social entrepreneur Arunachalam Muruganantham, who invented a low-cost sanitary pad-making machine. His machine manufactured affordable sanitary towels for women in villages.

"My work has nothing to do with the movie. I have been working on menstrual health since the past two years. I had met Muruganantham in connection with my work in 2016. He was known to me from my California days," Vishwakarma said.

"I have seen Muruganantham's machine but it was different from our equipment. Our machines are semi-automatic. Now, more and more women are coming forward to join us."



She said films like "Padman" would create awareness about menstrual cycle and related problems but this alone is not sufficient and more work on the ground is needed.

"Real groundwork is needed. I work in areas, which lack basic amenities like power. We need Padwoman and Padman who can work on the ground. Only movies can't bring change."



She urged Kumar to share the profit of his movie on providing cost-effective pads to women in the tribal areas and villages.

"As compared to branded products, the pads made by us are much cheaper. We procure raw materials at cheaper rates while labour is also cost-effective. So, our cost of a pack of seven pads would be around Rs 15-20 while the price of branded products is much higher."



Vishwakarma, daughter of a poor 'lohar' (blacksmith), said she studied in the village school and then moved to a nearby town for further schooling before shifting to Jabalpur for pursuing MSc in biochemistry.

Later, she got an opportunity to do research at the AIIMS, New Delhi and moved to the US for a PhD in chemical and biological engineering which she could not complete.

Vishwakarma said during the past two years she has been spending about 6-8 months every year in India and the rest in California.

"After two years of research, production of sanitary pads started in October last after machines were arranged through my own resources and crowd funding. We are now working on packaging," she said.

"Women and girls even don't dry their inner clothes in the open. They do not talk about their problems. They consider menstruation a curse. So, education on this issue is needed. I visit tribal villages of Narsinghpur and adjoining districts and educate women about menstruation."



The factory set up by her is producing 2,000 sanitary pads per day. "We are struggling with initial problems but would soon increase the production," she said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Budget hospitality chain Treebo Hotels is planning to add 450 properties to its network by the end of this year as it expands presence in the country.

The company is also looking to add up to 80 cities including business, leisure and religious destinations where it seeks to be present from the current 65 cities.

At present, Treebo Hotels has 300 hotels with over 7,000 rooms in its inventory.

"We are planning to add 450 properties by end of 2018 taking the total number of properties to 750. Our mission is to provide great experience to the budget travellers," Treebo Hotels co-founder Sidharth Gupta told PTI.

The cities which the company will be adding include destinations such as Gangtok, Darjeeling, Jammu, Ludhiana, Surat, Rajkot, Tirupati and Rameswaram among others, he added.

When asked about the business model the company follows, Gupta said: "The business model that we follow is franchise model. We pioneered this concept in 2015 in the budget hotels segment."



The company which had raised around Rs 220 crore in Series C funding led by Hong Kong-based investment firms Ward Ferry Management and Karst Peak Capital in 2017 said it will use the funds for enhancing customer experience and brand building.

"We will be using the funds for brand building, building our technology team and most importantly on strengthening our experience capabilities", Gupta said.

It is also expecting to be EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) positive in three years, he added.

Founded in June 2015, Treebo Hotels is the brainchild of Sidharth Gupta, Rahul Chaudhary and Kadam Jeet Jain.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Two Chinese men have been arrested for allegedly trying to smuggle into the country gold valuing about Rs 1.21 crore at the Delhi airport, an official statement said today.

The duo had arrived in the same flight from Taipei via Hong Kong on Friday, it said.

One of the passengers was intercepted by the customs after his arrival at the airport. A detailed personal and baggage search resulted in the seizure of four gold bars, weighing 4 kg, the statement said.

He had kept the gold bars, wrapped in newspapers, in the pockets of his trousers, it said.

During further investigation, another Chinese national was also found to be involved in the crime, the statement said.

Both the accused have been arrested and the gold bars, valuing Rs 1.21 crore, were seized from their possession, it added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Two fair price shop owners were arrested by the Crime Branch in Surat for allegedly diverting subsidised grains by using a duplicate software and unauthorised biometric data of beneficiaries.

Police said that Babubhai Boriwal (53) and Sampatlal Shah (61), were arrested yesterday and were sent to police custody for five days.

Explaining the modus operandi, Crime Branch Inspector BN Dave said, "The state government had in April 2016 launched the Annapurna Yojana under the Food Security Act-2013. Fair price shops, renamed as Pandit Deendayal grahak bhandar, were computerised so that subsidised food items reached the actual beneficiaries."



Dave said that fair price shops were supposed to use an application called E-FPS, provided by the government, with a databank of beneficiaries fed into it.

He added, "As part of this, fair price shop owners were given a username and password to access the biometric data bank of beneficiaries to create an electronic record of beneficiaries availing subsidised grains from their shops."



"The beneficiary had to provide his fingerprint, details of his ration card and UID (Aadhaar) numbers to match the data fed into the computer. This would generate a slip on the basis of which he was given subsidised ration every month," Dave said.

The arrested duo, he said, used a duplicate software and obtained a data bank of beneficiaries from an unknown source.

"They used this data bank to create an electronic record every month to show that beneficiaries had obtained subsidised foodgrains when in reality they had not," he said.

Dave said that investigations were underway to find out the source of the fake software as well as the biometric data.

Earlier, eight separate FIRs were lodged against as many fair price shop owners in the city following an investigation carried out by the district administration after some beneficiaries complained. The matter was then handed over to the Crime Branch.

Police said that the two had been booked under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) including section 406, 409 (criminal breach of trust), 467, 468, 471 (forgery), as well as sections of the Information Technology Act and the Essential Commodities Act.

(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.)Two persons from neighbouring Karnataka were nabbed here today while they were allegedly trying to sell three stolen antique 'panchaloha' idols, police said.

Based on a tip off, a police team apprehended Shaik Hyder and Shaik Aziz while they were trying to dispose of the idols at Afzalgunj, Hyderabad Commissioner of Police V V Srinivas Rao told reporters.

The seized idols are of deities Lord Venugopalaswamy, goddess Rukmini and goddess Sathyabama.

Hyder and Aziz, both aged 25, hailed from Bhalki town in Bidar district of Karnataka.

"They allegedly stole the idols dating back nearly 600 years, with an international market value about Rs 3 crore, from a temple in Kamareddy town of Telangana, by breaking the lock of the temple door last month," the commissioner said.

Explaining the modus operandi of the accused, Rao said, "the duo used to travel by a bus or a taxi in rural areas abutting towns and conduct a recee of the local area temples wherein antique Panchaloha idolsare available".

He said the duo were wanted in similar cases of theft in Maharashtra and Karnataka.

Hyder and Aziz are being handed over to the SHO of KamareddyTown police stationalong with the seized material, for further investigation, Rao added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Two policemen from Raigad were today arrested for allegedly demanding and accepting a bribe from a scrap dealer, officials from the Thane unit of the Anti-Corruption Bureau said here.

Vivek Joshi, Deputy Superintendent of Police of ACB's Raigad unit said that a police inspector and a constable had demanded Rs 8,000 from a scrap dealer, who in turn filed a complaint with the ACB.

ACB officials said that a trap was laid at Revdanda police station in Raigad's Alibag area during which the two, identified by police as Inspector Prakash Sapkal (49) and Constable Balkrishna Jadhav (38), were arrested.

An official said that Jadhav had come forward to accept the money on behalf of Sapkal during the trap laid by the ACB.

The two were charged under relevant sections of Prevention of Corruption Act, officials said, adding that further investigations were underway.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A delegation of 13 top British healthcare providers, suppliers, and other field experts will be in India as part of a trade mission from February 4-8, officials today said.

The mission would travel to Delhi, Mumbai and Hyderabad, while also participating in the inaugural India-UK Createch Summit on February 6, the British High Commission said in a statement issued here.

"In the year that the UK's National Health Service (NHS) reaches its 70th anniversary, Healthcare UK and the Department for International Trade are bringing a delegation of 13 top British healthcare providers, suppliers, hospitals and trusts in a trade mission to India from February 4-8," it said.

The delegation would be led by Sir Malcolm Grant, Chairman of NHS England, it added.

"The mission will focus on innovation in healthcare, and address the changing needs of medical provision as disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, wearable sensors, and virtual reality become increasingly commonplace," the statement said.

The delegates will demonstrate to Indian healthcare leaders how they can help meet key concerns around driving efficiencies in costs, increasing patient access in remote areas, and providing more personalised healthcare solutions through new technology, it added.

"Through this trade mission, we want to nurture the common and growing interest between India and the UK regarding the latest smart systems and pioneering new healthcare solutions," Grant was quoted as saying in the statement.

In Delhi, the mission would attend a 'Future of Healthcare' event with senior management of hospitals, medical institutes, colleges and healthcare companies, in addition to a round-table meeting with 10 CEOs of local hospitals.

In Mumbai, the delegation would attend the India-UK Createch Summit, and in Hyderabad, it would visit the site of an Apollo Hospital.

The India-UK Createch Summit 2018 is a one-day conference in Mumbai, bringing together thought-leaders from business and government for a series of exclusive keynotes, panel sessions and workshops.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The chief of the UK's state-funded National Health Service (NHS) Sir Malcolm Grant has embarked on a four-day trade mission to India with a delegation of 13 top British healthcare providers to promote collaborations between the two countries in the healthcare sector.

The Chairman of NHS England is leading the team alongside Healthcare UK and Department for International Tradeto promote innovation in healthcare and collaborations between India and Britain in the healthcare sector.

"Through this trade mission, we want to nurture the common and growing interest between India and the UK regarding the latest smart systems and pioneering new healthcare solutions, said Grant.

"As the National Health Service reaches its 70thanniversary year it continues to be ranked amongst the foremost health systems in the world. We are proud of our strong heritage in science and technology development, but we continue to invest in innovation to improve patient care and meet the challenges of the 21stcentury, he said.

The India tour, covering New Delhi, Mumbai and Hyderabad, is aimed at addressing the changing needs of medical provision as disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, wearable sensors, and virtual reality become increasingly commonplace.

In Mumbai, the team will participate in the inaugural India-UK Createch Summit on Tuesday, aday-long summit bringing together over 100British companies from healthcare, film, music, immersive technology, industrial design and sport sectors as part of a series of trade missions to meet leading Indian businesses to discuss opportunities for collaboration and trade between the countries.

With India's healthcare market estimated to grow to USD 280 billion by 2020 and the Indian governments recent commitment to developing 100 smart cities across the country, demand for innovative healthcare solutions has never been higher, a UK government statement said.

The UK delegates are expected to demonstrate to Indian healthcare leaders how they can help meet key concerns around driving efficiencies in costs, increasing patient access in remote areas, and providing more personalised healthcare solutions through new technology.

In New Delhi, the mission will attend a Future of Healthcare event with senior management of hospitals, medical institutes, colleges and healthcare companies, in addition to a roundtable meeting with 10 CEOs of local hospitals.

In Hyderabad, they will visit the site of an Apollo Hospital.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Actor Uma Thurman has opened up about her experience of working for disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein and alleged that he assaulted her in a London hotel suite in the mid-1990s.

The "Kill Bill" star had earlier said that she is "waiting to feel less angry" before she addresses the scandal surrounding Weinstein and the ongoing problem of sexual harassment in Hollywood.

Now, in an interview with the New York Times, Thurman detailed an alleged attack by Weinstein and also discussed her distressed relationship with frequent collaborator Quentin Tarantino.

"It was such a bat to the head. He pushed me down. He tried to shove himself on me. He tried to expose himself. He did all kinds of unpleasant things. But he didn't actually put his back into it and force me.

"You're like an animal wriggling away, like a lizard. I was doing anything I could to get the train back on the track. My track. Not his track," Thurman said about the incident in London's Savoy hotel.

The London incident was preceded by a strange meeting in Weinstein's Paris hotel room, where he stripped down to just a bathrobe during a discussion about a script.

Thurman said that as they were talking he led her to a steam room, and when she asked him why, he got "flustered" and ran out of the room.

Thurman said she was staying with a friend in Fulham when alleged London incident happened, and the next day she received a large bunch of roses from Weinstein.

She said she, along with her friend, returned to the hotel to confront Weinstein and asked him to meet her in the bar. However, his assistants convinced her to return upstairs alone.

Her friend was told to wait outside the room on a couch and Thurman recalled telling Weinstein, "If you do what you did to me to other people you will lose your career, your reputation and your family, I promise you."



A spokesman for Weinstein told the Times that Thurman "very well could have said this".

Thurman's friend, Herman, said when Thurman emerged from his hotel room "she was very dishevelled and so upset and had this blank look".

"Her eyes were crazy and she was totally out of control. I shovelled her into the taxi and we went home to my house. She was really shaking," she said.

Herman said that when Thurman was able to talk again, she revealed that Weinstein had threatened to ruin her career.

Weinstein's spokesperson denied any threat to Thurman's career and said the producer found her to be "a brilliant actress" and he had "a flirtatious and fun working relationship" with her.

"Mr Weinstein acknowledges making a pass at Ms Thurman in England after misreading her signals in Paris. He immediately apologised," the spokesperson said.

Thurman claimed that her fragile equation with Weinstein changed her relationship with "Pulp Fiction" and "Kill Bill" director Quentin Tarantino.

Thurman said she confided in Tarantino about the alleged London attack after which he confronted Weinstein with her accusations. It eventually led to an apology from Weinstein in 2001 at the Cannes Film Festival.

Thurman's working relationship with Tarantino soured after an accident on the set of "Kill Bill" during which the director pushed her to drive a car that a teamster had told her was not fully safe. Thurman crashed the car and was hospitalised.

"When I came back from the hospital in a neck brace with my knees damaged and a large massive egg on my head and a concussion, I wanted to see the car and I was very upset," she said.

"Quentin and I had an enormous fight, and I accused him of trying to kill me. And he was very angry at that, I guess understandably, because he didn't feel he had tried to kill me," she added.

Tarantino did not comment to the Times, which said producers on the film did not recall Thurman objecting to driving the car she crashed.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)After its proposal to make floor cleaners using cow urine, the Uttar Pradesh government has decided to give a push to the use of in preparing medicines.

"The Ayurveda department has prepared eight medicines using gau mutra which can prove to be useful in case of liver ailments, joint pain and immunity deficiency," the departments director Dr RR Chaudhary told PTI here today.

"The department, which has two pharmacies (in Lucknow and Pilibhit) along with other private units, is preparing Ayurvedic medicines using cow urine, cow milk and ghee," he said.

There are eight Ayurvedic medical colleges in the state in Banda, Jhansi, Muzaffarnagar, Allahabad, Varanasi, Bareilly, Lucknow and Pilibhit.

"In these medical colleges, degree course in ayurvedic medicine is imparted. Along with this, in these medical colleges, everyday thousands of patients come for treatment.

"In Lucknow alone, the daily footfall in the OPD of the Ayurveda Hospital is around 700 to 800. If the all patients arriving in eight medical colleges are combined together, then the figure reaches thousands," Chaudhary said.

Elaborating on the benefits of Ayurveda, the director said, "Gau Mutra is an integral part of Ayurveda, and there are eight medicines, which are made using and other cow products.

"New research show that and other cow derivatives can prove to be highly useful. Till now, we have been giving medicines made using cow urine in cases pertaining to liver ailments, joint pain and for boosting immunity. Our endeavour is to expand the ambit of these medicines and use it for curing other ailments and diseases as well," he said.

He said since there are only two government pharmacies in UP, there is comparatively less production at the government level.

"However, in the private sector, there are many companies engaged in manufacturing medicines using cow urine, which are supplied to Ayurvedic medical colleges of the state," Chaudhary said.

The director said the department is working to open new pharmacies and start post-graduate and MD courses in Ayurvedic medical colleges.

In August last year, the Adityanath government had proposed use of cow urine in making floor cleaners.

In July 2017, the Centre set up a 19-member panel, including three members linked to the RSS and VHP, to carry out what it said will be scientifically validated research on cow derivatives including urine, and their benefits, according to an inter-departmental circular and members of the panel.

Headed by Union Science and Technology Minister Harsh Vardhan, the committee was mandated to select projects that can help scientifically validate benefits of panchgavya the concoction of cow dung, cow urine, milk, curd and ghee in various spheres such as nutrition, health and agriculture, the circular says.

Named the Steering Committee, the panel includes secretaries of departments of Science and Technology, Biotechnology, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, and scientists from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi.

It also has three members of Vigyan Bharti and Gau Vigyan Anusandhan Kendra, outfits affiliated to the RSS and VHP.

According to the government note, former CSIR Director RA Mashelkar, known for vigorously campaigning against US patents on turmeric and basmati rice, is a member of the panel.Others include IIT-Delhi director Prof V Ramgopal Rao and Prof VK Vijay of the IITs Centre for Rural Development and Technology.

The government has given the project the acronym SVAROP, which stands for Scientific Validation and Research on Panchagavya, and says it is a programme that is being conducted by the Department of Science and Technology, Department of Bio-technology, and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) of the Ministry of Science and Technology in collaboration with IIT-Delhi.

The document also says this multi-disciplinary programme will involve participation of other related ministries, government departments, academic institutions, research laboratories, voluntary organisations and others to carry out research and development and also build capacities, and cover five thematic areas including scientific validation of uniqueness of indigenous cows.

It will cover scientific validation of panchagavya for medicines and health, scientific validation of panchagavya and its products for agriculture applications, scientific validation of panchagavya for food and nutrition, the circular said.

Vijay Bhatkar, president of the Delhi-based Vigyan Bharti, an RSS-affiliated science body, is the co-chairman of the committee.

The Adityanath government has also cleared setting up 1000-capacity gaushalas (cow-shelters) in seven districts of the state and 16 urban locations in phase one of a giant project which could see the UP government help build such shelters in every block of the state.

The government will help build these new cow shelters with proper sheds and boundary walls and a committee under the district collector is being set up to maintain them with help of NGOs and public.

Focus is first on the seven districts in Bundelkhand where cows will get shelter in the new cow-shelters.

New cow-shelters in urban areas will result in better sanitation and less incidents of cows dying due to eating plastic.

The UP government is also planning to free up its own land from illegal encroachment to set up these new cows- shelters in "safe locations" and with full facility for fodder and water.Democrats today cautioned President Donald Trump that firing top law enforcement officials over the investigation into his campaign's links to Russia could spark a dangerous "confrontation," as Republican lawmakers broke ranks to say the probe should go on unhindered.

The warnings came two days after the Republican-led House intelligence committee released a declassified memo that claims Democrat-funded research prompted the FBI to spy on a former Trump campaign aide, Carter Page.

Democrats stoutly resisted the memo's release, saying it was "deliberately misleading" and possibly intended to lay the groundwork for Trump to fire senior officials and subvert the Russia election meddling investigation led by Robert Mueller.

In a sign of an emerging split in the president's party, four Republican members of the intelligence committee -- Representatives Trey Gowdy, Chris Stewart, Will Hurd and Brad Wenstrup -- said today that the memo should not be allowed to undermine Mueller's investigation.

Dick Durbin, the number two Senate Democrat, warned today that any move by Trump against senior law enforcement officials involved in the inquiry could have grave consequences.

"The question at that moment is whether or not the majority Republicans in the House and the Senate will stand up for the rule of law and the Constitution if the president takes that extreme position," Durbin said on CNN's "State of the Union."



"If the president takes this extreme action, I'm afraid that it could lead to a confrontation we do not need in America."



Durbin contested the suggestion that the FBI's application to a special court for authority to surveil Page failed to note that the request was based partly on a dossier funded by Democrats.

The senior Democrat on the intelligence committee, Representative Adam Schiff, insisted that "the court was notified there was a political actor involved.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Consumer durable major Usha International expects the pump and lighting business to be its high growth drivers in the coming years, a top company official said.

"Usha International has been witnessing majority of revenue contributed from fan and sewing machine business.Going forward, I think the scenario will change. We expect our other businesses like pumps and appliances, lighting (other than fan business) will be our high growth drivers," President(Electric Fans and Pumps), Rohit Mathur told PTI.

He said the new businesses would register higher turnover, while fans would remain the mainline business.

"In the pumps business, we are the No 3 brand in India right now. We were largely a North and East centric brand when it comes to pumps. But now we have designed products for Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Karnataka markets. That contribution to increase the market share will also come up," he said.

He said the electric fan business contributes about 45 per cent of the turnover and it was expected to come down following growth in other business categories.

"I think that by 2020, the contribution of electric fan businesses will come down to 40 per cent from 45 per cent. And the other business segments will grow," he said.

Currently, electric fans business contribute about 45 per cent followed by sewing machines at 20 per cent, appliances 18-20 per cent and the remaining share, from pump business.

Mathur said the company was also looking at expanding the fan business under "new categories."



"We are also strengthening some of our premium sort of categories in the fan category in the Rs 2,000 and above category.. This year we have launched some models.. Some of them will be launched in March and April" he said.

"As a brand we have a very strong association with customers of the South because of electric fans, sewing machines and appliances. We have good revenues here (in South)," he said.

Referring to the pump business, he said the company formed a Strategic Business Unit (SBUs) to bring in focus in the pumps category.

"We believe this can be a high inorganic growth area for Usha International. Organic growth is electric fans, sewing machines. These are our old businesses," he said.

He exuded confidence that the company would be No 2 in electric fans business and said they were the "clear market leader" in sewing machines.

"In the lighting business,we have launched products under the brand name TISVA. We are primarily in the home decorative space, chandeliers and wall lighting," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The license of a driver would be suspended if the person is found driving while talking over mobile phone, according to a new directive from the West Bengal Transport Department said.

"As per the directive, the driving license of the person on the wheel will be suspended then and there if he is found talking over the mobile phone while driving. We will also take the CCTV footages as evidence to take action against the driver," a senior state government official said today.

The notification came after 43 people died after a bus fell into a canal in Murshidabad district last month. The driver of the ill-fated bus was reportedly talking on the mobile phone, which could have led to the mishap.

According to a senior officer of Kolkata Police, people would also be able to upload photographs of the driver violating the law on its social networking site.

"We have talked to psychologists and found that the when a driver is talking over the phone while driving, he looses his concentration leading to accidents. Hence, such a strict decision to suspend license of drivers have been taken," the officer said.

The South Bengal State Transport Corporation (SBSTC) and the North Bengal State Transport Corporation (NBSTC) have already decided to ban the use of mobile phones while driving.

Drivers would be immediately suspended and fined if they were found using mobile phones while on duty.

The same measures would be taken if drivers and conductors are found drunk while on duty, the officer said, adding, SBSTC would soon start installing CCTVs in all its buses to ensure that the rule was followed.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray today alleged the BJP was trying to "upstage" his party on its home-turf, violating an understanding that underpinned the saffron alliance for over two decades.

He reiterated his party will fight all future elections alone.

Addressing a farmers' rally at Paithanin Aurangabad district of central Maharashtra, Thackeray said, "The understanding in the alliance for the last25 years was that the BJP will lead the country and we will deal with Maharashtra. Also, we didn't want a division of Hindu votes.

"We always helped them. Now they (the BJP) are trying to upstage us in our own house. What should we do?"



After his announcement last month that the Sena will contest the next Assembly as well as Lok Sabha polls alone, Thackeray said there was a debate now as to who would be the loser from the decision, his party or the BJP.

"Election results will show who will win or lose. The ShivSena will fight alone and win," he said.

He took a swipe at the NCP too, saying it neglected farmers when it was in power, and now in opposition it is trying to project itself as the champion of their cause by organising rallies.

The NCP had held a rally in Aurangabad yesterday.

It is only the Shiv Sena which has relentlessly fought for farmers over the last decade, he said.

As to the criticism the Sena has faced for constantly sniping at the BJP while sharing power with it in Maharashtra as well as at the Centre, Thackeray said, "Shiv Sena is taking on the government for people's issues and not for self- interest. We will continue to fight with the governmenton the issues concerningcommon people."



The BJP-led state government agreed to give a loan-waiver to farmers only because of Sena's pressure, Thackeray claimed.

The schemes of the Union government remain only on paper and they have nothing to show on the ground, Thackeray said.

Sugar is being imported from Pakistan, shortchanging domestic farmers, he alleged. "What kind of love for farmers this is?" he asked.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal today spoke to the father of a 23-year-old man, who was stabbed to death, and assured the family that his government would make all possible efforts to ensure they get justice.

AAP's Rajya Sabha MP Sushil Kumar Gupta today met the family of the victim, a photographer, and said the "Delhi government will extend all help to the family, whether it is medical aid or financial assistance".

Ankit Saxena was killed in west Delhi's Khyala area on Thursday night allegedly by the family members of a woman with whom he was in a relationship for three years.

"Spoke to father of Ankit. Whatever happened, has to be condemned more. Delhi government will have the biggest advocate to get justice for Ankit. We will make all possible efforts to get punishment for the guilty," Kejriwal tweeted in Hindi.

"May God grant solace to Ankit's family. We are with them in this struggle," he said.

The woman's family opposed her relationship with Ankit Saxena as the two belonged to different communities. The woman's father, mother and uncle have been arrested in connection with the killing. Her minor brother has been held, police said.

Rajya Sabha member Gupta, after meeting the family, told reporters, "The CM has sent us here. This morning the CM had a talk with his (victim's) father. He (Kejriwal) wanted to come himself, but he was going to Haridwar, so he said that he will meet the family after returning to Delhi."



Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari had yesterday questioned the "silence" of Kejriwal over the incident.

"The government is standing with the entire family. And, we will try to ensure that strongest action is taken against the culprit. And, whatever possible help is needed, we will will extend that," Gupta said.

Asked about the compensation, the Rajya Sabha member said, "The chief minister will take a decision on that.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Chhattisgarh's tribal-dominated Jashpur district is turning into a paradise for winter migratory birds and the winged guests belonging to over 40 species have been spotted in sprawling forests in the area.

As per a survey being conducted by the state's Forest department in association with the Bird Count India--a consortium of organisations and groups--as many as 158 species of birds, both migratory and resident, were spotted in the district, located around 400 kms away from the state capital in northern part of the state.

"The dense forest and cold climate conditions of the district have contributed immensely in it becoming a destination for the migratory birds," Ravi Naidu, Project Assistant for Bird Count India, told PTI.

He said the survey was undertaken in Chhattisgarh for the first time to ascertain the number and species of birds found in the state.

"Twenty four districts have so far been covered under the drive and of them, Jashpur, has been the favourite in terms of sighting of birds," Naidu said.

Earlier, there was a record of sighting of only 43 bird species in the district, but as many as 158 bird species were tracked in good numbers since the ongoing survey was launched on January 24 this year, he said.

"Out of them, over 40 were migratory birds namely Blue Capped Rock Thrush,Rosy Minivet, Hum's Warbler, Velvet Fronted Nuthatch, Scarlet Minivet, Rufous Woodpecker, White Throated Fantail, Common Chifchaff, Siberian Chifchaff, White Naped Woodpcker and Long Tailed Shrike (tricolour)," he said.

He said Jashpur has become a favourite for birds as the forest is well-wooded and moist--the ideal conditions for winter migratory birds, particularly Himalayan species.

Though winter migratory birds also arrive in Bastar region southern part of the state, but they appear in small numbers.

"Sighting of birds in good strength in Jashpur indicates that winter migratory birds probably first come to northern part before flying to other region of the state," according to Naidu.

In view of the outcome of the survey, the Forest department has planned several measures for the conservation of birds and to develop the place as a hot spot for eco-tourism.

"These birds have always been there in Jashpur because climate has always been that good. Although, there was only information that winter migratory birds arrive in Jashpur but for the first time, it has been documented. Now we can tell along with proof that the particular species of bird was spotted in which area," Divisional Forest Officer (DFO), Jashpur division, Pankaj Singh Rajput told PTI.

Badalkhol wildlife sanctuary, Gullu forest range and Tapkara forest range are some hot spots where these birds can be spotted although the entire district is ideal for watching birds, he said.

Some pockets like Bagicha and Manora in the district are yet to be explored where good sighting of birds is also expected, he added.

"We are keeping tab on hunters, besides, we will soon launch awareness programmes amongtribalcommunities who havetraditionallypractisedbird-hunting as part of their subsistence", Rajput said.

The department has launched a programme titled "Udaan" under which several initiatives will be taken to sensitise people on conservation of birds.

Workshops, seminars and photo exhibition will be held in schools and colleges to involve students in the effort, he said.

Moreover, a group of "conservation ambassadors" will be raised from among local youths who will be given a primary training on identifying birds and later they will propagate the message of conservation, he said.

"Effortswill be made todevelop Jashpur as an eco-tourismdestination with the active participation of wildlife officials and local communities," Rajput added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A Pune woman labelled a suicide bomber by the Jammu and Kashmir police has been handed over to her family as there is no case against her, the police have said.

"Yes, we have handed her to her family," Director General of Police S P Vaid told PTI.

Sadiya Anwar Shaikh, who turned 18 in November 2017, had travelled to Kashmir from Pune and had been staying in Bijbehara as a paying guest.

The police, who claimed she wanted to join the ISIS, detained her on January 25 from South Kashmir and subjected her to intense questioning during which they found nothing incriminating.

On sustained questioning, it was revealed that the woman, a school dropout, had been "brainwashed" online about the supposed suffering of the Kashmiri people at the hands of security forces and had "fallen prey to false propaganda" on social media, the police said.

The Jammu and Kashmir police had been informed by central security agencies that a Pune-based woman, who had been detained on various occasions by the Pune Anti-Terrorism Squad, had moved to the Valley and that surveillance needed to be mounted.

Subsequently, an alert was issued to all districts. It named her and claimed that she was a suicide bomber who was planning to disrupt a Republic Day function.

The note said there was a "strong input" that an 18- year-old non-Kashmiri woman could "cause a suicide bomb explosion" near or inside the Republic Day parade.

"All are directed to please ensure that frisking of ladies at the (venues) is done meticulously and with utmost caution so as to thwart the designs of ANEs (anti-national elements)," the note, circulated on January 23, read.

Shaikh had been questioned by the ATS Pune in 2015, when it came to its notice that she had been "radicalised" after coming in contact with ISIS supporters abroad.

She was planning to travel to Syria, the ATS had then claimed.

The woman, a Class 11 student at a Pune college, was subsequently sent for a de-radicalisation programme by the ATS.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Chinese President Xi Jinping today said he pays "high attention" to strengthening strategic ties with Sri Lanka, as Beijing beefed up plans to build a Maritime Silk Road project in India's backyard -- the Indian Ocean.

In a message to congratulate Sri Lanka on its 70th anniversary of Independence from British rule, Xi told his counterpart Maithripala Sirisena that China is willing to work with it for better development of strategic cooperative partnership between the two countries.

"I pay high attention to the development of China-Sri Lanka relations, and I am willing to make concerted efforts with President Sirisena to push the China-Sri Lanka strategic cooperative partnership of sincere mutual assistance and long-standing friendship to keep achieving greater development in the better interest of the two countries and its people," he said.

Xi also said that China and Sri Lanka have achieved "fruitful results" by their display of "pragmatic cooperation" within the framework of the joint construction of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road (MSR).

India has expressed reservations over MSR as it has security implications for it in Indian Ocean. MSR is part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

Proposed by China in 2013, the BRI aims to build trade and infrastructure networks connecting Asia with Europe and Africa based on ancient land and maritime trade routes enhancing China's global influence.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang too congratulated his Sri Lankan counterpart Ranil Wickramasinghe on the occasion.

Within the framework of the initiative on construction of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the MSR, China wishes to consolidate the traditional friendship with Sri Lanka, strengthen mutual political trust, deepen practical cooperation and push bilateral relations to a new level, he said in the message.

China has invested over USD eight billion in Sri Lanka over the years for various projects, including Hambantota port which it acquired on 99 years lease as a debt swap. It is also buildingthe Colombo port city project, where Sri Lanka plans to establish an international financial city.

China is in the process of firming up its presence in the Indian Ocean with a string of ports which included Hambantota and Djibouti in the Horn of Africa.

Beijing is also watching warily the developments in Maldives since it recently plunged into a crisis following a Supreme Court ruling which ordered the release of opposition leaders including former President Mohamed Nasheed.

The Supreme Court's decision has put a question mark on incumbent President Abdulla Yameen who is widely regarded as pro-China and signed several key deals including a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Beijing.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)DUBAI (Reuters) - Dubai-based private equity firm Abraaj Group has hired global auditing firm KPMG to look into the finances of its healthcare fund after a reported dispute with some its investors in the fund."We are confident that the exercise being conducted by KPMG will confirm that all the funds were accounted for and used appropriately," it said in a statement on Sunday.The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing unnamed sources, that four investors in a $1 billion healthcare fund managed by Abraaj had hired a forensic accountant to examine what happened to some of their ...It is not a bad thing for us, that the route known as the Goldene Strae or the Golden Road as we will get to know it- has escaped the attention of so many. It has been spared being overrun by hordes of tourists and as you will discoverThere will be no Australian federal financing of a loan facility for Indian conglomerate Adani Enterprises Ltd to build a rail line to its proposed Carmichael coal project, a government frontbencher confirmed on Sunday. Assistant minister for vocational education Karen Andrews told Sky News Speers on Sunday that financing a loan facility for the Adani rail line would not proceed. "Given the position that the Labor state government actually took to the last election and their election, there won't be financing from the Federal Government," Andrews said in the ...China will launch an anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigation into imports of sorghum grown in the United States, the Ministry of Commerce said on Sunday, in a sign of increasing trade tensions between the world's top two economies. The US is the world's top exporter of the grain and China's largest supplier by far, with imports from the US reaching 4.76 million tonnes in 2017, out of just over 5 million tonnes in total. The grain is largely used to feed China's huge livestock sector, especially when other grains like corn are more expensive. But ...By Maha El Dahan DUBAI (Reuters) - Dubai's Al Khaleej Sugar Refinery has agreed to build a major agro-industrial complex to produce beet sugar under a deal signed with the Egyptian government, the world's largest port-based sugar refinery said on Sunday.The project, named Al Canal Sugar, will be located only about 200 km (125 miles) from its market, Jamal al-Ghurair, managing director of the refinery, told an industry conference in Dubai.Investment Minister Sahar Nasr said the project, with a cost of around $1 billion, would produce 900,000 tonnes of sugar annually, filling a supply gap in ...FRANKFURT (Reuters) - U.S. investment bank Goldman Sachs expects a pickup in cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity due to President Donald Trump's tax reform, high cash levels and technological progress, a senior executive told a German paper."It is quite possible that (U.S.) corporations will further consolidate their home market and take over competitors," Wolfgang Fink, co-chief of Goldman Sachs in Germany, told Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung."I therefore expect more M&A activity, though not just inside the United States, but also across borders," he added.Trump in ...With growing stress in balance sheets of stressed companies and that of large banks, role of Asset Reconstruction Companies (ARCs)- envisaged as an institutional response to tackle growing NPAs- have come into sharper focus.

Out of 19 Public Sector Banks (excluding State Bank Group), majority i.e. 10 are under Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) by RBI. Stressed Assets of the system are at a significantly elevated level of around a Million crores and growing.

To address the alarming problem, Government of India have passed the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) which, amongst others, provide for change in management of defaulting company and time bound resolution in a period of maximum 270 days or the defaulting company moves into liquidation.

The Government has further taken the initiative to advise the Regulator RBI to advise banks to refer large NPAs. In the first instance, 12 large NPAs popularly referred as the "Dirty Dozen" having NPAs of over Rs 2 lakh crores have been referred to NCLT and other cases are being referred periodically thereafter.

The eco system around resolution of NPAs is evolving fast with slew of enabling regulations. The positive regulatory environment has encouraged a lot of players in distressed debt- both global and domestic- Special Situation Funds, Hedge Funds, Long Term Funds including Pension Funds, Sovereign Funds, PE Investors, Strategic Buyers, Turnaround Specialists, Specialised Transaction Advisory etc to come forward in large hordes.

And in this NPA space crowded with several stakeholders, how do ARCs stand out and pursue their effective role play, that is where ARCs to have to retrospect, introspect and reinvent themselves.

There are 4 key challenges which restricts ARCs scale up to a leading role in whole NPA play. First and foremost- Funds available with ARCs which is minuscule compared to the vast NPA market. Second, even if funds are available, the price expectation mismatch between selling bank (s) and buying ARC and ever elusive consensus on an acceptable valuation framework.

Third, even if an ARC acquires the NPA of a particular bank, how to expeditiously aggregate loans from all other creditors who have complex and deep rooted inter creditor issues to achieve threshold level for driving resolution- generally 75% of debt, though for sale of asset through SARFAESI it is 60%.

More important component in resolution beyond debt aggregation, is how to address challenges in resolution including finding fresh money, management and technology to revive the Asset. Finally, how to have an exit clause for the investors.

The ARCs have to address all these, which have been discussed at various levels and possible solutions are visible. Starting from the weakest link, absence of a vibrant distressed debt market in India. In a recent function of ARCs organized by an Industry body, RBI DG Viral Acharya rightly focused on this single factor alone.

He suggested setting up of a Distressed Loan Sales Trading Platform and advised formation of a body like Loan Syndication and Trading Association comprising of ARCs, Banks and Rating Agencies to work together for evolving such a platform. Selling of NPAs should be as smooth as selling Sachin Tendulkar's Bat, he added.

The next big challenge for ARCs is to develop and possess requisite skill sets in managing turnaround story. The RBI has already advised ARCs for preparing a panel of sector specific management firms/ individuals having expertise in running firms/ companies which could be considered for managing the (acquired distressed) companies. In fact, ARCs can choose niche area for scope of their operations for greater success in portfolio management.

With regulatory arbitrage over provisioning in banks and ARCs gone, role of ARCs as an exit structure for balance sheet management of banks is largely over. Banks will now look forward to more cash transactions particularly in recent NPAs with little provisions.

This will require ARCs to necessarily have extensive support from deep pockets with risk capital and risk appetite for their survival. For ARCs to get this support, they have to showcase their capability and preparedness to handle complex NPAs and inspire confidence of the investors that they can generate market expected IRR.

The debate on haircut has been ignited by Chairman of India's largest bank recently. How much cut is a cut, and beyond which it is bald for the bank- that is the question.

There is no ready answer. The banks, ARCs and the rating agencies, because they have been associated now for over a decade with Recovery Rating Scale i.e. valuing how much money can be realized from Security Receipts with underlying NPAs, have to devise an acceptable valuation framework and leave it to market forces for efficient price discovery.

Market is right, provided the issues of information asymmetry is addressed. With time, data on Credit Defaults, Loss Given Default, Expected Credit Loss i.e. expected present value of losses that arise if borrowers default on their obligations at some time during the life of the financial asset will evolve and risk pricing can be more quantified.



ARCs are now at a historic juncture. They can recreate successful ARC story by being alive to challenges above and transform into new Avtar. The choice before ARCs is between ability to script and execute a good turnaround story or being consigned to history.



Hari Hara Mishra is a Director, UV ARC Ltd and Advisor to Assocham on ARC, Banking and Financial Services. (Views are personal).There will be no Australian federal financing of a loan facility for Indian conglomerate Adani Enterprises Ltd to build a rail line to its proposed Carmichael coal project, a government frontbencher confirmed on Sunday.

Assistant minister for vocational education Karen Andrews told Sky News Speers on Sunday that financing a loan facility for the Adani rail line would not proceed.

"Given the position that the Labor state government actually took to the last election and their election, there won't be financing from the Federal Government," Andrews said in the televised interview.

Adani planned to use a A$900 million ($713.34 million)government loan to help build a 400 km (250 mile) rail line to connect its long-delayed Carmichael coal mine with a Pacific Ocean port in Queensland.

The loan was to come under the federal government's Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility (NAIF) program but was vetoed by the newly elected Queensland state premier in December.

There had been media speculation that funding may have flowed to the project via legal work-arounds, but in a further blow to the proposed Carmichael coal mine project it was made clear on Sunday that this will not happen.

Resource Minister Matt Canavan's office confirmed there is no funding proposal other than the NAIF loan application which will not proceed.

Adani could not be immediately reached for comment, but told Reuters in December that it would develop the mine on an owner-operator basis.

It then canceled an agreement with Downer EDI Ltd worth a reported A$2 billion to outsource the mine's operation.

The proposed A$16.5 billion Carmichael project, which would be the largest coal mine in Australia if built, has attracted protests from environmentalists.

A number of lenders including Deutsche Bank AG, Commonwealth Bank of Australia and two Chinese state banks, have said they will not provide funding for the Adani coal mine project, given the opposition to investment in fossil fuels.Prime Minister Narendra Modi's plan to provide health insurance for about half the country would require an estimated 110 billion rupees ($1.7 billion) in central and state funding each year, sources familiar with the matter said.

The National Health Protection Scheme, which the government dubs "Modicare", was announced in Thursday's budget for 2018/19 and would provide 100 million families, or about 500 million poor people, with health cover of 500,000 rupees per year for free treatment of serious illnesses.

Several states now offer health insurance but these schemes are generally small and poorly implemented. Modi faces a national election next year and the new health programme is seen as a signature initiative to woo voters in the countryside, many of whom struggle with high healthcare costs.

The government estimates the cost of insuring each family under the new scheme at about 1,100 rupees ($17.15), said a government official who had direct knowledge of the matter and did not want to be identified.

Officials at NITI Aayog, India's federal think tank, on Friday said the government's estimated premium for insuring each family would be 1,000-1,200 rupees, confirming the funding would be shared between federal and state governments.

"This is a turning point for the health sector," Vinod K. Paul, a member of NITI Aayog, told reporters.

Indian officials have said "the world's largest government funded health care programme" would have a central allocation of 20 billion rupees in 2018-19, but added that more funds would be made available as the programme is rolled out over the year.

Some critics have raised doubts whether 20 billion rupees in federal funding is enough to support the programme for 2018-19.

However, the government official said of the 110 billion rupees in premiums required to fund the programme, the federal government would contribute about 70 billion rupees with the 29 states providing the rest.

The 50 billion rupees in federal funding on top of the budget allocation of 20 billion rupees would be made available as the scheme details are worked out over the coming months, the official said.

"Government health insurance companies have readily agreed to fund the programme (at this cost)," the official said.

A second source familiar with the planning said the government could also partly use the funds raised from a newly imposed 1 percent health cess on taxable incomes, and the health scheme would also benefit from the planned merger of three state-run insurance firms announced in Thursday's budget.

"It's a big pool (of people). When you have a mammoth insurance company, the task becomes easier," said the source, adding that the government's premium payments for the scheme were expected to be low and manageable.

Modi's government on Thursday also raised the federal health budget by 11.5 percent to $8.3 billion for 2018-19.

The measures are Modi's latest attempt to reform a public health system that faces a shortage of hospitals and doctors. The government has also in recent years capped prices of critical drugs and medical devices and increased health funding.

Still, India spends only about 1 percent of its GDP on public health, among the world's lowest, and the health ministry estimates such funding leads to "catastrophic" expenses that push 7 percent of the population into poverty each year.

A top official at a state-run insurance company said the government would take 4 to 6 months to finalize the contours of the health plan since it would take time to get hospitals on board.

Nevertheless, a government-sponsored health programme will come as a major boost for the private hospital sector in India. Overburdened public hospitals mean nearly 70 percent of healthcare delivery is in the hands of private players.

The scheme "will be a game changer", said Prathap Reddy, chairman of Apollo Hospitals Enterprise Ltd.Terming the MSME sector as the backbone of the economy, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said the sector would lead the current consolidation phase of the economy.

"Having gone through a series of very major structural reforms in the past two years, now (this) also is a phase for consolidation as far as the economy is concerned. And this phase of consolidation will also be led by the MSME sector," he said after launching CriSidEx, the first sentiment index for micro and small enterprises (MSEs).

Jaitley further said the health of the sector is extremely vital to the economy and with a number of steps taken there is an increased integration of the sector into the formal economy.

Pointing out that it is one of the largest employers, he said, "This is one sector where people not only exhibit their entrepreneurial skills, become part of large value chains but then also become job creators in the process."

That is the reason why the bulk of the jobs in manufacturing, trading have been created in this particular sector, the finance minister added.

He also said that in a country with a vast population, the scope for employment either in government or in the large industry has a limited potential.

CriSidEx, developed jointly by CRISIL and SIDBI, is a composite index based on a diffusion index of 8 parameters, and measures MSE business sentiment on a scale of 0 (extremely negative) to 200 (extremely positive).

This objective index will be of some use to individual companies but certainly it will be of much greater use as far as policymakers are concerned so that the necessary changes can also be brought in, to ensure that the government continues to perform its role as a facilitator as far as the sector is concerned, he said.

"I see a great value in this index as much as in the series of the data, the series of sentiment, which will show, what are the challenges to that sector, what are the strength of that sector, what is the cause of optimism, where is that the shoe pinches...," he added.

Speaking on the occasion, Financial Services Secretary Rajiv Kumar said the launch of index is very timely because the government has really enabled MSME in terms of credit needs and taxation relief in the last 4-5 months.

"In respect of 'Udayamimitra', I would say it's virtual platform now and 3,300 cases have been sanctioned amounting to Rs 750 crore in the last 4-5 months," Kumar said.

The banks have been fully capitalised, their lending capacity has increased. It is really right time that this Udayamimitra online portal becomes really effective and more and more lending takes place, he said.

Similarly, on the part of Trade Receivables Discounting System (TReDS), a large number of PSU and PSBs have already come on board, he said.

"Banks are really ready to support the MSME sector and they being major employment generator and I am sure we will not fail on this aspect," he said.

Noting that it is MSME which generates most of the employment, Economic Affairs Secretary S C Garg said a lot of them talk about 6-7 crore fundamental enterprises in the country, if they get their online ID from Aadhaar as an enterprise ID that will also facilitate their process towards formalisation.

"It will also facilitate their ease of doing business. With one single enterprise ID it is possible that 26-27 business registration will not be required. And it will be possibly much easier to file their returns," Garg said.

Talking about benefit of index SIDBI Chairman and Managing Director Mohammad Mustafa said it captures the sentiment of MSEs very well, and therefore would do two crucial things.

It would be an accurate barometer of on-the-ground trends - given that not much statistical light emanates now from MSE geographies - and play an important role in addressing financial and developmental gaps in the MSE ecosystem, he added.news, latest-news

Many Canberra children and teenagers will spend this weekend nervous about starting back at school. That's to be expected, assured University of Canberra clinical psychologist Vivienne Lewis, who encouraged parents and carers to acknowledge and normalise their child's anxieties. "They're nervous about what friends are they going to make, what teachers are they going to have, what assignments are they going to have, if they didn't have a very good year last year they'd be anxious about that repeating itself this year," she said. "For kids starting at a new school or starting school for the first time it's that apprehension of not actually knowing what to expect that can make them really anxious." The UC High School Kaleen parents and citizens association aims to soften the blow with a picnic ahead of the school year. Ever year, the group invites year seven students to meet with year 10 mentors in a Belconnen park - a chance for students and their families to meet their new peers. "It's a casual way of students getting to eyeball other starting students before they start school again next week, because they've had a big break from when they finish primary school at the end of last year and haven't seen anyone for a while," president Elissa Steel said. "It's quite a big change from year six to year seven, from primary school to high school. "Anything that parents and other students and the schools themselves can do to support students in that change is useful." Dr Lewis encouraged all parents to ensure children felt ready for school. That meant having uniforms bought and ironed, lunch boxes packed, and laptops, pencils and books ready to go, she said. Dr Lewis also suggest parents prepare a small reward for students to enjoy at the end of their first day, such as a favourite meal for dinner. "Parents are often very anxious about their kids starting school as well, so it's important for adults to actually be able to try and contain that because if your child sees you acting very anxious about them going back to school they will actually feel more anxious about it," she said. Dr Lewis said the nerves should settle within the first few weeks of starting back at school. "When they've got ongoing sleep issues, loss of appetite, if they're getting upset where there's crying or a lot of distress then parents need to be a bit concerned, but having said that you really do need to see how they go within the first couple of weeks," she said. "Where parents would need to be concerned is when that distress is actually quite high and ongoing and doesn't seem to be getting better as the child is progressing through the weeks." Term one begins on Monday for new starters, but most ACT students will return to school on Tuesday.

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Canberra is a city that loves an acronym and it has already come up with one for the impressive, million-dollar stone wall that is being built along the Cotter Road: GWOC. As in, Great Wall of Curtin. The sound wall may be being built as part of a 21st century road project, but its skill and artistry harks back to another time, each of the estimated 20,000 stones in the structure placed there by hand. Stonemason Richard Taplin, director of Canberra company Cubic Metre, with his team have been working for months painstakingly placing and cementing each rock in the wall. The 650 metre-long wall is being built as part of stage two of the $28.9 million Cotter Road duplication, which also includes a new shared path. It is believed to be the longest stone wall of its kind in Canberra. Transport Canberra and City Services director of capital works, Ben McHugh, said the noise wall had been budgeted at $1.2 million. "The noise wall location really determines the materials," he said. "We've got residents within about 60 metres of Cotter Road and they're hard to pick up because of all the trees. But trees aren't an effective way to manage noise, the noise just penetrates through the vegetation. "When we did the design, it was identified with the increased traffic volumes that are going to come on Cotter Road, it was going to exceed the noise levels and we needed a noise wall. "The best way to mitigate noise is to get a wall as close to the noise source as possible; road noise generally travels outwards and upwards. "So the further away you go with a noise wall, the higher the wall has to be because the noise is just going to travel upwards. So closer to the road the better and you have to design it to be safe." The approvals process for the wall went through the National Capital Authority because of Cotter Road's proximity to Government House and its location on designated land. "This kind of stone work is coming back and being more common around Canberra because roads that were built 30, 40, 50 years ago by the NCDC are starting to be duplicated now and those roads had a lot of the original stonework along them," Mr McHugh said. Mr Taplin said about 700 tonnes of rocks came from a quarry at Wee Jasper to do the wall, his team working since last October and due to finish both sides by March. "It's done all by hand. You basically place the stone in the mortar bed and then backfill it with more mortar behind and we've also got brick ties to tie it into the wall," he said. "It'll last a long time, it's not going anywhere." Huon project manager Bojan Knezevic said 140 walls had been dug six metres deep to also support the wall. About 1000 cubic metres of concrete was used in the wall and its foundations. Mr Taplin said he was never daunted by the job. "When you first look at it you think, 'Woah, there's a far way to go' but we just did it in sections," he said. "We feel really proud of it." Mr McHugh said the wall would be long-lasting and require little ongoing maintenance, not least because it was not likely to attract graffiti. Perspex screens had also been used in sections close to the equestrian parade grounds to allow in light. They were opaque to ensure horses were not spooked by the traffic. Cotter Road carries about 25,000 vehicles a day but was expected to carry about 35,000 vehicles a day with the growth of Molonglo. Stage one of the Cotter Road duplication was finished three years ago.

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With our unhappy nation still convulsed by Australia Day differences I continue my campaign of suggesting better days (better than offensive, insensitive, 26 January) on which our bosoms could be pumped up to a pneumatic psi of Aussie pride. Meanwhile, how disappointing the refusal of the prime minister and especially of the believe-in-nothing leader of the Opposition to give leadership on this. If I still bothered asking "What is the Australian Labor Party for?" I would be asking it again now, given Bill Shorten's refusal to give the nation a slightly enlightened, slightly Aborigine-respecting alternative on Australia Day matters. But back to my quest for better Australia Days. Today's dead-serious suggested day for a new Australia Day is 1 August. Something wondrous was first achieved by an Australian on 1 August 1978. Do you know what it was? More mischievously (but still in the same spirit of using for Australia Day one of the zillions of famous days in our history) I suggest 10 February. On 10 February a group of Australians (no, not the Bee Gees, for it was 10 February 1879) achieved something together. Do you know who they were and what they did? Stalk today's column for just a few more soul-searching paragraphs and all will be revealed about 1 August and 10 February. But first a couple of digressions. The republic/monarchy debate is stirred up again by recent pronouncements of the prime minister and by the forthcoming monarchy-porn orgy of the 19 May royal wedding. If I were an Australian monarchist (although I find it easier to imagine being a crown of thorns starfish) and committed to resisting a republic, I know what canny argument I would harp on in the debate. I was reminded of it in recent days by something the great US novelist Philip Roth has just said in an interview with the New York Times. Roth, asked if he could have predicted today's Trump-ravaged USA responded that, "No one has foreseen an America like the one we live in today. No one, except perhaps H. L. Mencken [popular, free-spirited US political columnist, 1880-1956] who famously described American democracy as "the worship of jackals by jackasses", could have imagined this 21st-century catastrophe befalling the U.S.A." What a super, in-a-nutshell description of American democracy (and perhaps of so many democracies everywhere) Mencken's is. Yes, what canny Australian monarchists should harp on about is the likelihood that our federal parliament of jackals will choose jackals of their own (shifty, slavering) kind to be our presidents. It was a fear of that kind that (for we, the people were not going to be allowed to make our own choice of president) that sank the good ship YES at the 1999 republic referendum. Why, monarchists should nag, would we begin taking Australian politician-jackals as our Head of State monarchists should harp, when we have done so nicely with the lovely, non-jackal Windsor family? Yes, even arch-republicans like your columnist can see that the royals though often harmless mediocrities, buffoons and/or adulterers are not jackals. Alas, though, those that worship them (Harry and Meghan's current tour of the UK provinces is provoking hysteria among simple-minded Britons) certainly are jackasses. Meanwhile with our federal political jackals distorting the Australia Day debate (some snarling that to want to change the day is to be unpatriotic) decent Australians must push for change. Why not 10 February? Why not 1 August? If we wanted a folkloric date for Australia Day then 10 February is the day, in 1879, when the Kelly Gang, cheekily and endearingly disguised as policemen (and so charging the shoeing of their horses to the government!) held up the bank at Jerilderie. Then Ned, who had brought his heartfelt my-side-of-things Jerilderie Letter with him sought the editor of the local newspaper to publish it. What happened on 1 August 1978 was that Rod Saunders became the first person to have hearing restored and speech made sensible with the aid of a cochlear implant (bionic ear). Saunders received the implant in a surgical procedure conducted by Graeme Clark (the implant's inventor) at the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital in Melbourne. The devices are now a godsend for all mankind. We are an ingenious people and our Australia Day, even if it symbolically half-focuses on just one great day for one great invention, can be trumpeted as a celebration of all the inventiveness there is in the Australian soul. Talking of letters given to newspaper editors (Ned Kelly's given to the editor of Jerilderie's Gazette) I have become aware of a widespread belief that I must be the so-called H. Ronald of Jerrabomberra. Under that improbable name he (or she) writes dry, provocative, ultra-conservative letters to the editor of The Canberra Times. I swear that I am not H. Ronald but whoever he or she is I am in awe of the gifted left-wing satirist who writes the letters. If only I could write that well! The letters are a brilliant caricature of the beliefs of the real H. Ronalds who are out there in their fossilised thousands, albeit more probably in the Tory enclaves, the arch-NIMBY habitats of Deakin and Yarralumla than in Jerrabomberra.

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The Coalition has been waging war against those who've dared to question it since 2013. Its latest gagging grenade has been lobbed under the cover of foreign donations reform, bizarrely egged on by the largely foreign owned mining industry. On election Tony Abbott tried to abolish the newly-legislated Charities Act which enshrined in law the right for charities to engage in political advocacy. There's not much point in (for example) trying to house the homeless without also trying to remove the causes of homelessness. The Act set up an Australian Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission as a one-stop shop for keeping tabs on and assisting charities, as recommended by the Productivity Commission. Abbott lost that battle after the charities themselves appealed to cross benches. Then he tried to strip environment groups of their charitable status. His environment minister Greg Hunt set up an inquiry that recommended they lose the right to tax deductible donations unless they spent 25 per cent of their income on "environmental remediation work". Organisations such as the Australian Conservation Foundation would have to clean up the environment in addition to doing what's most effective: lobbying to prevent it being damaged in the first place. Groups like Lock the Gate would have to plant trees as well as campaign against coal seam gas mining. In December a fierce critic of many of the activities of charities, Gary Johns, became the new head of the Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission - replacing the highly respected company director Susan Pascoe. Senior bureaucrats had urged Malcolm Turnbull's charities minister Michael Sukkar to re-appoint Pascoe who had done her job well. Johns had previously called on the Coalition to abolish the Charities Act. It must "makes it clear to the High Court that advocacy is not a charitable purpose," he said in 2014. It should deny charity status to the "enemies of progress". His book, The Charity Ball, argues that too many charities in Australia do little or no charity work. Now there's the Foreign Influence Transparency Bill and the benignly named Electoral Funding and Disclosure Reform Bill. Turnbull wants to prevent charities that engage in public debate from receiving donations from foreign governments and foreign state-owned enterprises. He wants to force any group that spends $100,000 or more on political activities in the four years before an election to register as a "political campaigner". Political activities are defined as "the public expression of any views on an issue that is, or is likely to be, before electors". There are stiff fines if they don't comply. Finance Minister Mathias Cormann told the Senate in December that while political campaigning was a positive indicator of the strength of Australian civil society, it is important "that these actors are subject to the public accountability of more traditional actors, such as registered political parties or candidates". Charity boardrooms are already urging less advocacy, worried about their funding, and the implications of going on a political campaigner register. Cormann, Turnbull and Sukkar have achieved something rare. They've united Getup and the right-wing Institute of Public Affairs, both of whom oppose the moves saying they will stifle political debate. A donor to a "political campaigner" of gifts totalling more than $13,500 in any financial year (or as little as $4.80 a week) will be required to lodge a return to the Electoral Commission. Institute research fellow Gideon Rozner: "It would effectively give the electoral commission authority over a whole range of community organisations with no relationship to the political process other than commenting on public policy issues," he told Pro Bono News. "It would impose a pointless and unnecessary red tape burden on charities, community groups, service clubs, religious organisations and other civic groups." Getup's national director, Paul Oosting told members in a letter that the requirement would "decimate a lean, grassroots organisation that relies on tens of thousands of online donations". Anglicare's Kasy Chambers goes further, telling me: "The Anglican Church, as you know, has a strong vision and tradition about calling out unjust structures and opposing violence. If a minister does a sermon on that does that make that Church or the priest a political actor? Does that mean every gift or donation over a certain amount that goes in the plate to that parish or church must be traced back?" "This is not about our voices being shut down. It's the fact that we are a conduit for people who don't have the money to buy influence." Gary Johns, the Coalition's pick as the new head of the Charities Commission happens to agree. He wrote on the ACNC website: "The ACNC has submitted a response in relation to the proposed amendments. It is our view that the [Electoral Funding and Disclosure Reform] bill as formulated, will place a further regulatory burden on charities, and may inhibit their ability to advocate as a method of achieving its charitable purpose." One of the clearest voices articulating that charities should be exempt, is that of David Crosbie, head of the Community Council of Australia. He told a parliamentary inquiry last week the proposed changes were unfair because it exempted businesses but not charities. "If commercial activities are carved out  why not charitable activities? My reading is that in practice  if an international company like a Diageo [sought] to influence our alcohol policies, that is okay  no inappropriate foreign influence there," Crosbie said. "But if the Gates Foundation give money to alcohol research by the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education  they would have to register [And] charities already face significant regulations and limitations on their capacity to engage in political activities." Many in the third sector accept that Australia has been, and will be increasingly subject to foreign intervention - some of which will be covet, unfriendly and hostile. But the proposed amendments go too far. Not-for-profits and those they serve already feel muzzled. A recent survey by Pro Bono Australia found that two-thirds of all Australian charities find it harder to be heard by the federal government compared to just five years ago. Toni Hassan is a writer and adjunct research scholar at Charles Sturt University's Australian centre for Christianity and culture in Canberra.

/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/silverstone-ct-migration/05942ed4-2d57-4169-ad69-596dce141dbd/r0_67_2000_1197_w1200_h678_fmax.jpgUnfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in your country. We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to your market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism.Photo: Ken Roberts An SUV and semi-truck collided on the Coquihalla Saturday.

UPDATE: 2:30 p.m.

A medevac helicopter responded to a crash in the northbound lanes of the Coquihalla Highway Saturday morning.

While the extent of the injuries to those involved is unknown, one witness reported the crash was between an SUV and a semi-truck.

While the highway was briefly closed, it has since been reopened.

UPDATE: 1:35 p.m.

Northbound lanes on the Coquihalla have reopened following a collision 45 kilometres south of Merritt, just after noon on Saturday.

DriveBC says motorists can expect delays due to congestion.

ORIGINAL: 12:45 p.m.

The Coquihalla Highway is closed heading northbound due to a collision, about 45 kilometres south of Merritt, according to DriveBC.

No detour is available, and the estimated reopening time isn't known.

One account claims the vehicle incident involved an SUV and a semi-truck and that one person was trapped in their vehicle, but that information is unconfirmed.

Slushy sections and pooling water have been reported on the mountain pass between Hope and Merritt, according to DriveBC. There is also a warning in place to watch for potholes.

Send newstips to [email protected]Photo: Contributed

A minor was arrested over comments allegedly made on social media in the wake of a shooting at a Quebec courthouse that left an 18-year-old badly injured following an altercation with a special constable, Quebec provincial police confirmed.

Police said in a news release that they arrested a male youth in Maniwaki on Thursday on the charge of intimidating a justice system participant, and he was released on a promise to appear in court at a later date.

The head of the union representing special constables said there have been online threats allegedly posted against the officer who was involved in the shooting, ever since video purporting to show Wednesday's incident was posted online.

"I find it unacceptable that people, without knowing the details of the investigation, without knowing exactly what happened, are taking a position and trying to threaten or intimidate a constable who was exercising their duties," Franck Perales said in an interview.

He said he hoped the public would keep calm and allow Quebec's police watchdog to complete its investigation before jumping to conclusions.

Montreal and provincial police did not confirm whether they were investigating any other alleged threats.

An 18-year-old man was hospitalized after being shot in the head during the altercation at the Maniwaki courthouse on Wednesday.

Quebec's police watchdog released a statement saying the man had managed to seize the constable's baton and allegedly used it to strike the officer over the head at the courthouse, about 130 kilometres north of Ottawa.

The constable then took out a gun and fired it, hitting the 18-year-old at least once in the head, according to the statement.

A video purporting to show the shooting showed someone in uniform grappling with a man in a room lined with chairs, surrounded by several other people.

Moments later, the video shows an officer seemingly pointing a gun and shooting once towards a target that is off-camera, followed by the sound of screams.

The 18-year-old's mother posted a message on her Facebook page on Friday saying her son's condition was improving.

"He will have to relearn to talk and eat but he is out of danger," she wrote, thanking those who had supported the family.

Perales said the constable is recovering from his own injuries and is still on sick leave.

"He's affected by everything he sees, everything he hears," he said.Photo: The Canadian Press

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada has completed its work at the scene of Wednesday's fatal helicopter crash near Drummondville, Que.

Three people died after the Robinson model helicopter crashed and caught fire in a snow-covered field just north of the city about 110 kilometres northeast of Montreal.

TSB spokesman Alexandre Fournier says the field phase of the investigation is over and the wreck has been removed.

He says investigators are still deciding which parts to send to the TSB lab in Ottawa for further analysis.

The crash claimed the lives of the 57-year-old businessman Jean-Claude Mailhot, his 32-year-old daughter Janie, and her friend Nathalie Desrosiers.

Police have said the crash is not believed to be a criminal act.Photo: CTV Maple Batalia

The man convicted of being an accessory to the 2011 murder of 19-year-old Maple Batalia has been released from custody early, just one year after he was sentenced.

Gursimar Gary Bedi was sentenced to 22 months in jail last January for renting a vehicle that was used as a getaway car after Gurjinder "Gary" Dhailawl shot and stabbed Batalia, his ex-girlfriend, in a Simon Fraser University parking lot.

Batalia had previously broken up with Dhailawl, sending him into a jealous rage.

Bedi was originally charged with manslaughter for assisting in the murder, but was convicted of being an accessory after the fact.

Batalia's family was recently informed of Bedi's early release by Victim Services of British Columbia, outraging the family.

He did not even know her, had nothing to do with her, and he was the last voice of reason that could have prevented this cold-blooded murder from happening, Rose Batalia, Maple's sister, told CTV News.

When he was sentenced last January, Bedi was given four months credit for presentence custody.

Offenders in Canada, except those serving life sentences for murder, are eligible to apply for parole after serving one-third of their sentence.

Dhailawl pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in 2016 and was sentenced to life in jail with no chance of parole for 21 years.

 with files from CTV VancouverPhoto: Google Maps A crash on Highway 3 has closed the highway for most of Saturday.

UPDATE: 10:45 p.m.

Police in the East Kootenays have confirmed two people and two horses perished in a two-vehicle collision on Highway 95/3 near Irishmen Creek in Moyie, west of Cranbrook.

According to investigators, a tractor trailer heading west at about 9 a.m. hit black ice, and jackknifed, sliding into the eastbound lane.

The tractor trailer collided head-on with a pickup truck hauling a horse trailer.

The driver of the tractor trailer, a 59-year-old man from Edmonton, was ejected and died at the scene. The driver of the pickup, a 51-year-old Cranbrook man, was trapped inside the vehicle and also died at the scene.

His female passenger had to be extracted and was transported to hospital with serious, life-threatening injuries. She was eventually airlifted to a larger hospital.

Two horses inside the trailer also died.

Investigators believe that contributing factors to this collision were icy roads, driving too fast for road conditions, and the fact that the tractor trailer driver was not wearing a seat belt.

UPDATE: 5:55 p.m.

Following a fatal collision east of Yahk, Highway 3 has partially reopened to single-lane alternating traffic.

ORIGINAL: 3:45 p.m.

A morning crash on Highway 3, between Cranbrook and Yahk, has reportedly left two people dead.

The crash occurred Saturday morning, just before 9 a.m., forcing the closure of the highway.

BC Emergency Health Services responded to the scene with four ground ambulances and one air ambulance, but transported just one patient to the hospital in critical condition.

Two others reportedly died in the collision.

The highway has now reopened to single-lane, alternating traffic, according to DriveBC.Photo: CTV Two alleged bank robbers crashed their getaway car in Vancouver Saturday afternoon.

Two people were arrested in Vancouver Saturday afternoon after the alleged robbers crashed their stolen getaway vehicle after a string of bank robberies.

After a bank on Commercial Drive was robbed just after 1 p.m., a second bank robbery was reported just 30 minutes later, at East Broadway and Commercial Drive.

Just minutes after the second robbery, the suspects crashed their stolen black Porsche Cayenne SUV at the intersection of Clark Drive and East 1st Avenue, hitting four other vehicles in the process.

Police were able to block the SUV and arrest the man and woman inside.

Four occupants of one of the vehicles involved in the crash were taken to hospital with what were believed to be minor injuries.

Police continue to investigate the robberies and collision.Photo: Google Maps A pedestrian was hit by a semi-truck and killed Saturday morning in Squamish.

A pedestrian was killed in the early morning hours of Saturday in Squamish on the Sea-to-Sky Highway.

Police responded to the stretch of highway between Loggers Lane and Finch Drive to find a man had been struck by a semi-truck travelling in the northbound lane.

The 20-year-old Squamish man was pronounced dead at the scene.

The driver of the semi-truck, along with several witnesses, remained at the scene and co-operated with police.

The highway was closed until later in the morning.

The BC Coroners Service, along with police, continue to investigate the circumstances that led to the fatal collision.

Squamish RCMP have asked anyone who witnessed the collision to contact them at 604-892-6100.Photo: The Canadian Press

From growing the perfect crop to marketing within restrictive rules, Canadian colleges and universities are cultivating courses for those wanting to work in the booming marijuana industry.

Kwantlen Polytechnic University started offering online courses in cannabis production, marketing and financing about three years ago after officials at the British Columbia school realized there was a need for training and education around medicinal marijuana, said David Purcell, the university's director of emerging business.

Demand is skyrocketing, prompting Kwantlen to offer the classes every four weeks instead of every eight to keep up with demand, he said.

"The uptake in the last six months or so, the demand has risen significantly as we approach recreational legalization, obviously. You can't go a day without seeing some sort of news about cannabis or regulation of the upcoming recreational market," Purcell said.

About 1,200 people have taken the classes, most of whom are between 25 and 40 years old and were working full-time in another industry, he said.

The university isn't alone in offering marijuana-related courses. Niagara College is working on a certificate in marijuana production and the New Brunswick Community College is already teaching cultivation.

There's been a void in the educational marketplace when it comes to training specifically for the burgeoning marijuana market, said Debbie Johnston, dean of the school of continuing education at Durham College in Oshawa, Ont.

"Employers are struggling to find people with that industry-specific knowledge. It's an opportunity that, quite frankly, hasn't been met and we saw it and we thought, this is a great thing to get into," she explained.

Durham College recently began offering a two-day course that provides an introduction to all things marijuana.

The first sessions were well attended, Johnston said, attracting a variety of professions, including a chef, a farmer, investors and health-care workers.

Marijuana companies are looking for professionals, like accountants or business managers, who have industry-specific knowledge, from the terminology and history of the industry to the regulatory framework and basics of cannabis plants, Johnston added.

"What employers want is to know that people are coming in with a basic understanding," she said.

Alison McMahon runs Cannabis at Work, a recruiting agency for marijuana companies, and said completing cannabis courses can help candidates stand out from the crowd.

"I think what it signals more than anything is that somebody has been proactive and they have taken the time to take one of the courses that are on the market," she said.

Right now, there aren't a lot of job seekers with cannabis education on their resumes, McMahon noted, but that's likely to change as both the industry and educational offerings grow.

Kwantlen and Durham College are both planning to expand the variety of marijuana classes on offer.

A course teaching responsible retail sales, safe handling and strain identification will soon be offered through Kwantlen, and the school is also working on a cultivation course that will see students go out and work with cannabis plants at licensed production facilities, Purcell said.Photo: Contributed A sign for the town of Kapuskasing, Ont., is shown in this image from its website

Provincial police say two men have been charged with allegedly defrauding a northeastern Ontario town of about $800,000.

Police allege the town of Kapuskasing, Ont., which has a population of about 8,000, was being defrauded between September 2014 and February 2015.

Police say one of the subjects of the investigation, which began in June 2017, was the owner of a solar panel company contracted by the town.

A man from Napanee, Ont., is charged with fraud over $5,000.

A Crysler, Ont., man faces the same charge, along with one count of breach of trust by a public officer.

The men are scheduled to appear in court in March.Photo: The Canadian Press

A ground-breaking human rights case set to begin on Monday could help hundreds of Nova Scotians with disabilities move out of institutions and into small group homes, says a lawyer who has led a three-year-long effort to bring the cases before a formal hearing.

Vince Calderhead will argue the Department of Community Services is breaking the Human Rights Act by housing 45-year-old Joseph Delaney and 46-year-old Beth MacLean in a hospital-like, institutional setting.

If their cases succeed, he says, it may open the door to others who want to make the shift to supported housing. It could also set a precedent that could assist in similar human rights actions on behalf of people with disabilities in other provinces, he says.

The province says there were about 504 people awaiting some form of support from the Department of Community Services as of last Thursday, and 1,024 people awaiting a transfer to a different housing option or location.

"It raises the profoundly important question for people with disabilities of whether they too are entitled to receive the supports they need to live in the community immediately and as a right," Calderhead said in an interview.

The opening arguments of the Nova Scotia human rights board of inquiry begin at a local hotel in Halifax on Monday and continue through the month and into March.

The hearing is expected to include testimony from MacLean and from Delaney's advocate, his sister Tammy Delaney.

It will also hear from Olga Cain about the story of her sister, Sheila Livingstone, a woman with disabilities who died while the case wound its way through various delays. The Disability Rights Coalition is an intervenor in the process.

MacLean's story is laid out in the complaint while Delaney  who cannot speak  had a complaint prepared by his mother.

MacLean described her life at the Emerald Hall unit of the Nova Scotia Hospital and her years at a facility in the Annapolis Valley as isolating.

"I can't leave the hospital when I want to. I only leave when a staff member happens to be free to go with me and a vehicle is available for a trip to a mall or somewhere, maybe twice a week," she said in the legal document.

Through the years she's repeatedly asked the Department of Community Services for "a life in a home, on a street or in a neighbourhood," stating she could live outside of the hospital if provided supports such as cooking and shopping, says the complaint.

"I have very little of my own money and so I cannot pay for supports that I need to live in the community," she said.

She and Delaney say the institutions are settings where large groups of people were housed in circumstances that "bore little or no resemblance to normal life in a family home, in a community."

Delaney's complaint was prepared by his mother, Susan Lattie, and it says he's a person with intellectual disabilities, epilepsy, hypothyroidism and other health conditions  but that he can live in the community if proper support is provided.

Lattie, who has died since the 2014 complaint was launched, wrote that Delaney was admitted to a psychiatric hospital in 2010, and as a result of having his classification changed hasn't been able to find a spot back in the community in a small options home.

"He ... got trapped in Emerald Hall," she wrote.

Calderhead  who takes up cases such as MacLean's and Delaney's free of charge in order to prompt social change  said he believes Canadians need to evolve away from housing the disabled in institutions because they are too poor to pay for supports.

He will attempt to show that section five of the Human Rights Act in Nova Scotia applies, and will likely be supported by equality rights provisions in the Canadian constitution. The section prohibits discrimination in the providing of "services or facilities" on the basis of physical or mental disability.

The case will unfold in two stages, with the first portion in February and March focusing on whether there is a "prima facie" violation of the human rights act.

Part two of the hearing would consider if there are legitimate reasons for the human right not to be applied, such as that the "nature and extent of the physical disability or mental disability reasonably precludes performance of a particular ... activity," or that the limiting of the right is "a reasonable limit prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society."

The board of inquiry chairperson is J. Walter Thompson.Photo: BANG Showbiz - BANG Showbiz. All rights reserved.

Actress Kim Cattrall has taken to social media for help finding her brother, who police say is missing from his home in Lacombe, Alta.

RCMP say 55-year-old Christopher Cattrall has been missing since Tuesday.

In an Instagram post, Kim Cattrall says her brother's keys, cellphone and wallet were left on a table in the house, and his front door was unlocked.

She says his seven dogs were left alone.

Police describe Christopher Cattrall as being six-feet tall, 200 pounds with blue eyes and short brown hair.

They're asking anyone with information to come forward.Photo: The Canadian Press

The Manitoba government will benefit from the biggest jump in federal equalization payments in a decade, but says it's still keeping an eye on spending controls that include a review of a major tax credit for the film industry.

Documents from the federal government show Manitoba is set to receive more than $2 billion in equalization payments in the fiscal year that starts in March, up 11 per cent  or $217 million  from the current year.

The reason, according to the federal Finance Department, is a stronger economic picture in Ontario.

"Ontario's fiscal capacity has improved relative to that of the other equalization-receiving provinces, including Manitoba," deputy spokesperson Jocelyn Sweet wrote in an email.

Equalization is designed to help poorer provincial governments provide public services that are reasonably comparable to richer ones. It is entirely federally funded and based on a complex formula that measures the fiscal capacity of each province. Six provinces currently receive money under the program.

Manitoba Finance Minister Cameron Friesen said the extra cash is welcome, but the province is dealing with lower-than-expected income taxes this year and is still working to cut a deficit of $779 million.

"Does this solve all our problems? Absolutely not, many challenges ahead. But it is some revenue for certain this year," Friesen said in an interview.

As part of its promise to balance the budget, the government hired auditing firm KPMG to conduct a wide-ranging review of government spending and operations. The report, released last year, said the province's Film and Video Tax Credit should be reduced.

The credit provides either 45 per cent of a project's labour costs or 30 per cent of production costs in Manitoba, along with certain bonuses. The KPMG report said the credit is the most generous among the provinces, and Manitoba should consider reducing it to a level even with other western provinces.

Friesen said he would not reveal his plans in advance of next month's budget, but said he wants to strike a balance between recognizing the value of the film and television industry and getting a return on investment for taxpayers.

"We certainly see the tremendous value that the film and video industry has in Manitoba, not just for filming now ... but also for the post-production work, for the expertise we're building here in Manitoba," Friesen said.

"We have said that we're a government that takes a view that there must be a return on investment. There must be a value-for-money principle in play here."

Film and video production in recent years has produced the equivalent of 680 to 920 direct full-time jobs in Manitoba, according to a 2016 industry report by the Canadian Media Producers Association.Photo: The Canadian Press

The chair of the board of directors for the Montreal Symphony Orchestra is expressing his sympathy to those who have spoken up about alleged psychological harassment and intimidation by its former artistic director.

Several musicians have told Montreal media outlets La Presse and Le Devoir that Charles Dutoit would repeatedly insult, humiliate and verbally lash out at musicians when he was the orchestra's artistic director from 1977 to 2002.

Lucien Bouchard, who in addition to his role with the orchestra is also a former premier of Quebec, says in a statement that the testimonies will strengthen the orchestra's determination to provide a harmonious working environment.

Bouchard pointed out that the orchestra already launched its own independent investigation into sexual harassment in the workplace in December, the day after it received a complaint of that nature against Dutoit.

Dutoit is facing allegations of sexual assault by several women who told The Associated Press that Dutoit assaulted them in the United States, France and Canada between 1985 and 2010.

The 81-year-old Grammy-winning conductor has emphatically denied the accusations of sexual misconduct. His office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the allegations of psychological harassment.

Bouchard said the current administration has worked hard to create and maintain a "climate of respect" in the workplace and will continue to do so.

"We are very compassionate and moved by the suffering expressed in these recently published musicians' testimonies, namely today in LaPresse+ and Le Devoir," read the statement published late Saturday.

"They will serve to strengthen the (orchestra's) determination to ensure that the dignity and fundamental rights of its musicians and employees are respected at all times."Photo: Kevin Rothwell

Emergency crews are attending a couple of collisions in the Okanagan, both single vehicle crashes as a result of slippery conditions.

A small car slid off the road while trying to turn off Highway 97 in Winfield.

An SUV skidded off the road into a concrete barrier in the northbound lanes of Highway 97 just south of Vernon around 10:30 a.m.

Neither incident appears to have resulted in serious injuries.

Meanwhile, DriveBC is reporting that Highway 5 is closed northbound near Hope at Mine Creek.

Highways 1 and 3 can be used as alternate routes to the Interior.

Police are advising drivers to use extreme caution as the temperature hovers around the freezing mark making the roads very slippery.>>> PM visits Laos to co-chair Vietnam-Laos Inter-Governmental Committees 40th meeting

The visit, made at the invitation of Lao Prime Minister Thongloun Sisoulith, is considered an important political event, demonstrating a reaffirmation of the priorities in foreign affairs between both countries. Of main importance is the sustained consolidation and development of the Vietnam-Laos traditional friendship, with special solidarity and comprehensive cooperation while enhancing political credibility and creating a unified steering channel to promote the implementation of high-level agreements in strengthening the cooperation between the two nations.

As close neighbours and friends, the traditional friendship, solidarity, and comprehensive cooperation between Vietnam and Laos have been perennially nurtured by successive generations of leaders and people of the two countries such that they have become a common property of the two nations; an important factor to ensure the success of the cause of national construction and defence in each country, contributing to peace, stability, cooperation, and development in the region and around the world.

The Vietnamese people sincerely congratulate the significant achievements of the Lao Party, State, and people in past years. In 2016, Laos successfully organised the 10th Congress of the Lao People's Revolutionary Party and the 10th National Congress of the Lao Front for National Construction. The Lao economy continues to report a positive growth rate with the average rate of annual GDP growth at about 7% in recent years.

The solid, trusting, loyal, and transparent relations between Vietnam and Laos have been increasingly developed and promoted in an effective and substantive manner in all fields. The two sides maintain sound bilateral cooperation mechanisms, such as the Inter-Governmental Committee on Bilateral Cooperation, and regularly exchange delegations at all levels.

The two sides completed the project to expand and rejuvenate the Vietnam-Laos border marker system and agreed a protocol on the Vietnam-Laos border line and border markers, as well as on the border and border gate management. Cooperation on trade, investment, education-training, transportation, culture, and healthcare are all accelerated.

In the Vietnam-Laos Solidarity Year 2017, the two sides held a range of cooperative activities and exchanges, affirming the meaning of the traditional friendship, special solidarity, and comprehensive cooperation between the two.

Vietnam and Laos have worked closely together and supported each other in regional and international forums, while they continue to strengthen cooperation with other ASEAN member states to build a robust ASEAN Community and maintain ASEAN unity on regional strategic issues.

The 40th meeting of the Vietnam-Laos Inter-Governmental Committee to be held in Vientiane is the inter-governmental committees second meeting to be co-chaired by the two PMs. It aims to promote cooperation between the two countries in a more in-depth, practical, and effective manner. At the meeting, the two sides will assess the implementation of the agreement on the Vietnam-Laos Cooperation Plan in 2017, exchange on directions and tasks for cooperation in 2018, and sign cooperation documents between the two countries.

May the visit to Laos by PM Nguyen Xuan Phuc be a success in once again contributing to the strong and stable trust forged between the two countries' senior leaders and foster the ever-green and ever-sustainable traditional friendship and solidarity between Vietnam and Laos, which meets the interests of both peoples, and promotes the values of peace, stability, cooperation, and development in the region and to the whole world.Jerry C. Jacks of Hixson went home to be with his Lord and Savior on February 3, 2018.

He was born on July 23, 1931 to the late W.G and Ouida Jacks of Booneville, Ms.

He was preceded in death by his son, Eric C. Jacks; his granddaughter, Andrea Galen Jacks; and his brother, Glen Jacks.

Jerry is survived by his wife of 64 years, Elaine F. Jacks; his daughter, Janet J. (Kevin) Connelly of Cleveland, Tennessee; his son, Dr. Alan F. (Janice) Jacks of Connelly Springs, North Carolina; and his son, Robert C. (Patti) Jacks of Hixson. He was a loving grandfather to seven grandchildren and three great grandchildren: Rebecca and David Frady and their children, Mikaela and Nathaniel; Mary and Stephen Runnels and their daughter Remington Elena; Colton and Julia Connelly; Daylan Jacks; Connor Jacks; Anna Jacks; and Alyssa Jacks.

Jerry was a member of Dallas Bay Church of Hixson. Wherever his work took him, Jerry served in various positions of the church to which the family belonged at the time.

He proudly served in the U.S. Army and was stationed in Japan. After leaving the military, he and his wife finished their college work at Mississippi State University. Jerry had a degree in both chemical and mechanical engineering. He joined DuPont in 1957 at the Chattanooga plant, and after multiple relocations, including 10 years in Monterrey, Mexico, he retired after 35 years to the Hixson area.

Jerry was dearly loved by his family and friends and will be sorely missed by all.

Our family would like to thank Hospice of Chattanooga, especially Jerrys case manager, Alison Wheatley, for their excellent and compassionate care during this difficult time. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made to Hospice of Chattanooga, P.O. Box 46, Chattanooga, Tennessee, 37401.

Visitation will be held from 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 5, at Chattanooga Funeral Home North, 5401 Highway 153, Hixson, Tn. 37343, followed immediately by funeral services and interment.

Arrangements are under the care of the North Chapel of Chattanooga Funeral Home, Crematory and Florist, 5401 Highway 153, Hixson.

Please share your thoughts and memories at www.chattanooganorthchapel.comInterview

Christensen: We are hungry to keep riding this wave

Andreas Christensen is aware of the positive feeling around the club following our recent European successes, and the defender wants to help ensure that momentum is maintained as we head into a busy spell of fixtures.Baldwin's Trump, of course had something to say about the memo, as well: "This memo might be the best memo since the Declaration of Independence -- I haven't read either of them."In the photo, Leibowitz was pushing his son Max in a wheelchair. The wheelchair was for Leibowitz in case he got tired of walking, but he was feeling well, so Max, who is able-bodied, jumped in for a ride. Rocio told Leibowitz she was hoping to get 200 shares.There will be other things that we will be doing that are essential to making sure that while we put more police on the street, we have a coordinated effort to reduce carjackings and have a coordinated effort between the Police Department and our partners at the federal and state and local level, Emanuel said. And thats not only from catching but from also prosecuting in that effort, and making sure all parts of the city are experiencing the safety that some parts of the city are experiencing.The awards ceremony was held in Mukdahan province, Thailand yesterday by the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs in coordination with the General Vietnamese Association in Thailand.

The commendation event is the third of its kind, showing the recognition and appreciation of the Vietnamese Party and State for overseas compatriots who have made positive and practical contributions to their homeland and worked to enhance the relationship between Vietnam and Thailand.

On the occasion, several Thai people were also presented with Vietnamese authorities certificates of merit for their contributions in strengthening the friendship between the two peoples.

Prachuab Chaiyasan (left), President of the Thai-Vietnamese Friendship Association, and Sorat Phitchuonchom, former Deputy Principal of Nakhon Phanom Rajabhat University, are two Thais to be awarded with the Certificate of Merit by Vietnamese authorities.

Speaking at the event, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs cum Head of the State Committee for Overseas Vietnamese Affairs, Vu Hong Nam stated that OVs in Thailand are always striving for unity and help each other to stabilise their lives in the host country, while bearing toward the Fatherland. They have been highly praised by local authorities and have contributed greatly to the reputation of Vietnam in the host nation.

Prachuab Chaiyasan, President of the Thai-Vietnamese Friendship Association, expressed his admiration for the solidarity and patriotism of the Vietnamese-Thai community living and working in Thailand, as well as the increasingly developed activities of the Thai-Vietnamese Association, which contributes to strengthening relations between the two countries.

Also on the occasion, a Spring Festival for Vietnamese compatriots in Thailand was held, featuring performances by artists from the Vietnam People's Army Music and Dance Theatre.

Overseas Vietnamese join in with making traditional cakes for the Lunar New Year at Spring Festival held on the sidelines of the event.Temperatures will fall during the day Sunday, Ratzer added, and Sunday night  when many in the area will be watching the Philadelphia Eagles and the New England Patriots face off in Super Bowl LII  will likely be the coldest night in the next few days, with lows between zero and 5 degrees below predicted.McLeod came around the counter and dumped cash from the store's register into a backpack before inquiring about the store's safe, said Assistant State's Attorney Julia B. Ramirez. McLeod forced three store employees to a rear office, but when he couldn't get inside the safe, he took wallets and cash from the employees and fled, Ramirez said. None of the employees were injured.In court, prosecutors said the shooting occurred after Moore and a group of men approached Thomas as he stood with a friend at a bus stop at the station in the first block of West 69th Street at about 1:15 p.m., accused Thomas of being on his turf and ordered him to leave. Thomas told Moore he was waiting for a friend to pick him up for lunch and walked down the sidewalk with the friend away from Moores group, Assistant States Attorney Julia B. Ramirez told the court.Evans was critically wounded when he was shot several times in the 3900 block of West Van Buren Street in the East Garfield Park neighborhood on the West Side around 4:35 p.m., Chicago police said.The man asked if the woman had any money, and she handed over about $20, according to police. The man pushed the woman against a garbage can and then removed some of her clothing, police said. She then pulled her clothes back on and he pulled her onto a porch of a garden apartment on the 3500 block of West Wilton and tried to sexually assault her, police said.And so, I came home that night and said, Ive done nothing wrong, but just being in that conversation makes me feel so gross. And the next day I called up the speaker and I said to him, I just want to make sure in no uncertain terms that theres no agreement between you and me for anything. I dont work that way. And he said, Scott, I dont work that way either,  Drury said."The first wave (of people getting detained) was right after President Trump was elected and came into office. For a few months everyone was basically in hysteria. There were lots of incidents of people getting picked up coming out of the courtroom where they appeared for (check-ins), at churches, jails, schools," Bennett said. "It kind of tapered down over the summer. Now I'm starting to hear over the local attorney listservs, I'm seeing an uptick on the same thing."Although Belmont Beverages will have to open at least some stores on Sunday, Gardner said he and others believe it will be difficult to get grocery shoppers to make an additional stop at a liquor store on the second-busiest grocery shopping day of the week.President Donald Trump listens during a meeting with North Korean defectors where he talked with reporters about allowing the release of a secret memo on the FBI's role in the Russia inquiry, in the Oval Office of the White House on Feb. 2, 2018, in Washington. (Evan Vucci / AP)>>> PM visits Laos to co-chair Vietnam-Laos Inter-Governmental Committees 40th meeting

The centre is a symbol of science and technology cooperation between Vietnam and Laos as it was built by the Vietnamese Ministry of Science and Technology following the 35th meeting of the Inter-governmental Committee on Economic, Cultural, Educational, Scientific and Technological Cooperation between Vietnam and Laos in Vietnams Vinh Phuc province on December 19, 2012.

The Ministry of Science and Technology of Vietnam and Laos worked closely and launched construction of the centre in September 2015 and made the final touches on the work in December 2017.

Built at the cost of over VND98 billion from the Vietnamese Governments ODA source, the centre is capable of training 600-800 scientific managerial officials a year and is a working place of a 70-member staff.

In 2012-2017, 308 Lao officials received short-term and long-term training in Vietnam and the figure is modest compared with Laoss demands and orientations to develop a strong contingent of scientific and technological officials.

Therefore, the centre will help the Lao Ministry of Science and Technology meet the development goals and tasks assigned by the Lao Party and Government to make use of science and technology as a main driver of the national socio-economic growth.

Addressing the event, Minister of Science and Technology of Vietnam Chu Ngoc Anh expressed his hope that the Lao Ministry of Science and Technology will continue working closely with the Vietnamese counterpart on the centres operation.

Lao Minister of Science and Technology Boviengkham Vongdara showed his profound gratitude to the Party, State and Government of Vietnam for their assistance and support to the Lao people. He also thanked the Vietnamese Ministry of Science and Technology for its wholehearted assistance to the Lao counterpart.

The centres first course will be on creative renovation for 50 managerial officials from the Lao Ministry of Science and Technology, other ministries and sectors and businesses.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc is in Laos for the 40th meeting of the Vietnam-Laos Inter-government Committee to which he is the co-chair.Back in 2012, though, the mayor was not so magnanimous. Chick-fil-A was looking to locate a new restaurant in the city, but its presidents position on gay marriage (he was against it) drew Emanuels ire. At the time, Emanuel said, The values expressed are not Chicago values. They are at odds with Chicagos culture.The proposed legislation not only is a distraction; it is wrong-headed. The law permits 18-year-olds to join the military  service may put their lives in danger  and to vote. If they are old enough to make these choices, they should be allowed to make a decision on smoking. Similarly, the state permits 16-year-olds to drive, and their inexperience and lack of judgment behind the wheel puts all of us at risk. If we trust them to drive, we should trust them to elect to smoke or not.But Trump believes he knows better than anyone and, as president, is in a position to do whatever he wants. Our president can spontaneously turn against and attack any person or institution, including those whom he has previously praised. He attacks, even when doing so is to his own detriment.Foxx said her background helps give her a different view of the justice system and what needs to be changed. She said policy decisions must be made with the knowledge that parts of the legal system was based on racist ideology. It may be uncomfortable to discuss it, but it should not be ignored, she said.First responders, community remember 9/11 two decades later

Pueblo commemorated the 20th anniversary of 9/11 with a ceremony held at the Historic Arkansas Riverwalk of Pueblo.The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank will enhance cooperation with the Hong Kong SAR in boosting the Belt and Road Initiative, said the bank's president Jin Liqun on Saturday.

"Hong Kong, as one of the major international financial centers, has advantages in a wide range of areas, including investment, risk assessment, finance, insurance, accounting, legal services and arbitration," Jin said at a seminar in Beijing. "It also enjoys rich experience in infrastructure construction and operation management."

"We are willing to strengthen cooperation with the Hong Kong officials, financial institutions, relevant agencies and enterprises to further promote the initiative, thus contributing to economic expansion in Asia, as well as the global economy," he added.

Jin made the comments at the Seminar on Strategies and Opportunities under the Belt and Road Initiative  Leveraging Hong Kong's Advantages, Meeting the Country's Needs.

The event, organized by the Belt and Road General Chamber of Commerce, gathered a host of top officials and business leaders from the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong to discuss and seek fresh opportunities brought by the initiative.

Zhang Dejiang, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, and Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor, chief executive of the Hong Kong SAR, attended the seminar.

"The SASAC will continue facilitating SOEs in making full use of Hong Kong's capital markets and professional services," said Xiao Yaqing, head of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission.

Key areas of cooperation, Xiao said, would include commerce and trade, industrial development, science and technology.

For years, SOEs have been ramping up efforts to invest and develop in Hong Kong. By the end of 2016, 92 central government-owned companies operated businesses in Hong Kong, with total assets exceeding 3 trillion yuan ($476.31 billion), according to Xiao.>>> PM visits Laos to co-chair Vietnam-Laos Inter-Governmental Committees 40th meeting

Minister Dung made the suggestion during a working session with his Lao counterpart Phet Phomphiphak on February 4 which was held during Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phucs visit to attend the 40th meeting of the Vietnam-Laos Inter-governmental Committee in Laos.

He urged the two offices to accelerate the implementation of signed memorandum of understanding on cooperation, focusing on sharing experience and organising workshops, thus increasing the role of the offices in pushing the bilateral relations.

Sharing Minister Dungs opinions, Lao Minister and Head of the Prime Minister's Office Phet Phomphiphak hoped the two sides will bolster their cooperation in the future, contributing to fulfilling assigned tasks. Flash

An Italian man shot and wounded six African immigrants in what the authorities described as a racially motivated attack in the southern city of Macerata on Saturday.







The man named as Luca Traini, 28, went on a drive-by shooting rampage targeting at immigrants in various parts of the city, then drove to a monument, gave the Fascist salute, wrapped himself in the Italian flag, and awaited arrest, local media reported.





Macerata Mayor Romano Carancini told RAI public broadcaster that one of the victims was seriously wounded in the abdomen while the others are in stable non life-threatening condition.





Traini's rampage -- which caused what local media described as scenes of "panic in the streets" -- took place during a court hearing upholding the pretrial detention of Innocent Oseghale, a Nigerian immigrant accused of killing and dismembering 18-year-old Pamela Mastropietro, stuffing her body parts in two trolleys and dumping them in the countryside.





While the mayor would not say whether the two events were related, he called on everyone to calm down. "We were shocked by what happened to Pamela, but this does not justify hatred and feeding hatred," Carancini told RAI. "Whether or not you agree with the government's immigration policies, we must not stoke violence," he said.





Mastropietro's uncle, Marco Valerio Verni, told RAI in a televised interview that the family wants justice for Pamela but "taking justice into our own hands is wrong".





In 2017, the shooter, Traini, ran for local office as candidate of the Northern League, a rightwing anti-immigrant party whose leader, Matteo Salvini, is aiming for the premiership in the next national election to be held March 4.





"I can't wait to get elected and restore security throughout Italy," Salvini told reporters in televised comments in the aftermath of the Macerata shootings. "Out-of-control immigration brings social conflict," he said.





Other political leaders, including Senate Speaker Pietro Grasso, said the Northern League leader has encouraged racist violence with his rhetoric in an election year.





Interior Minister Marco Minniti has met with Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni to discuss the incident, and is heading to Macerata for a security committee meeting, local media reported.



China Aviation Daily | Feb. 04, 2018

As a region with the world's largest economy and greatest development dynamics, Asia Pacific has stepped into a new stage of development. With its rapid development, Asia Pacific has become the most active region in civil aviation sector.

Feng Zhenglin, Administrator of CAAC, expressed at the first Asia Pacific Ministerial Conference on Civil Aviation that the world's eyes are on Asia Pacific and the Asia Pacific's focus is on China. Over the years, as an important participant in the civil aviation development of Asia Pacific, China is always committed to pursuing common development in the region. According to statistics, China contributed over 25% to the growth of worldwide civil aviation industry, and its contribution to the growth of Asia Pacific exceeded 55% in 2017.

For years, China's aviation industry has always put the principle of safe development first. In the past 5 years, it kept records of zero major accident per million flight hours and zero fatality per 100 million RPKs. By the end of 2017, the industry has achieved a success of continuous safe flight for 88 months, or 56.7million accumulated flight hours, the longest safety cycle in history.

Safety serves in the interest of better development. The civil aviation industry of China has maintained a double-digit growth for over 30 years. In the past 5 years, average annual growths of RTK, passenger traffic volume and freight traffic volume were 12.2%, 11.4%, 5.5% respectively, and the figure for general aviation was 9.3%. By the end of 2017, the civil aircraft fleet reached 5,500 in China; there were 229 licensed airports, 32 of which handled more than 10 million passengers last year.

China has always adhered to green development, advocating green, low-carbon, circular and sustainable development models. In 2017 alone, there were 341,000 flights using temporary routes, shortening a total distance by about 12.84 million kilometers, saving 69,000 tons of fuel, and reducing carbon dioxide remission by 218,000 tons.

In 2017, air cargo between China and ASEAN states was up 27% while passenger traffic grew more than 20%; the growth rate of air cargo and passenger traffic between China and Oceania increased 30% and 20% respectively.

It is estimated that in the coming 15 years, China will import US$24 trillion worth of products; overseas investment will reach US$2 trillion and the number of inbound and outbound travelers will reach 300 million, which will definitely provide a broader market and more precious cooperation opportunities for Asia Pacific states.

At present, China has signed bilateral air transport agreements with 123 countries and regions, 27 of which are Asia Pacific states. There are 134 airlines from 59 countries operating 7544 weekly flights into China, connecting 135 foreign cities with 51 Chinese cities. In the Asia Pacific region, there are 65 airlines from 21 countries operating flights to China, with nearly 7,200 flights travelling between 59 cities in China and 92 cities in the Asia Pacific region every week.

Currently, China has become the region's largest and the world's second largest air transport market. China has the capability and is also willing to provide more public products to the Asia Pacific region and the whole world, especially to put forward new initiatives and ideas and contribute Chinese wisdom to the development and cooperation within the Asia Pacific region.Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site.

0108263 License for publishing multimedia online



Registration Number: 130349 Registration Number: 130349Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi is heading to Oman on Sunday to meet with Sultan Qaboos Bin Said to discuss bilateral and regional issues.

El-Sisi's visit to Oman will be his first official visit as Egypt's president to the Gulf country and the first by an Egyptian president since 2009.

This visit comes out of El-Sisi's keenness to boost historical and brotherly relations between the Omani and Egyptian peoples, and to intensify joint consultation and coordination in several bilateral and regional issues to serve the interests of the two countries, the presidency's spokesperson Bassam Rady said in a statement on Friday.

In a phone call with Al-Assema news program on CBC TV on Saturday evening, Rady explained that the talks will revolve around will three main topics, including the Syrian and Yemeni files, explaining, "It is important to exchange our visions on what is to be done [on those issues] in the coming period."

President El-Sisi and the accompanying delegation will also hold meetings with a number of Omani businessmen to discuss economic cooperation, Rady added.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry met with Qaboos in Muscat last November as part of a regional diplomatic tour that aimed at intensifying consultations and coordination between Egypt and Oman.

Short link:

A court in Egypt has recently handed one-year suspended jail sentences to 19 Muslims who attacked an unregistered Coptic church in Giza in December. A fine amounting to around $20,000 was also given to a Christian for establishing the said church.

On Wednesday, Jan. 31, the Atfih misdemeanor court gave the 19 Muslim defendants suspended sentences for the church attack, which means they only have to serve jail time if they run into trouble with the law once again. The were sentenced for destroying the things found inside a Coptic Christian church outside of Cairo and assaulting its worshippers during a protest held outside, The Associated Press detailed.

According to the Coptic diocese, it had applied for a legal permit for the church building but local authorities often withhold such requests for fear of reprisal from Muslim conservatives. Because of these situations, Christians sometimes resort to illegal construction of churches or gathering congregations in other buildings. Muslims, on the other hand, encounter few restrictions when seeking a permit to put up a mosque.

Some extremist groups have used the situation of Christian churches as a reason to attack them. In a bid to stem sectarian violence, the Ministry of Housing has recently allowed unregistered churches to stay open while their official permits are being processed, Al Monitor reported.

In a statement, the ministry said the decision aims to make it easier for Christians to process legal permits for their churches. It also aims to uphold their constitutional rights.

At present, there are more than 250 churches across Egypt that have been closed, and a number of them were shuttered for security reasons. Church officials have already requested to allow the houses of worship to be reopened.

Former parliament member Assad Gamal, who is also a Christian, welcomed the decision, saying the government appears to be starting to pay attention to the situation of the believers. However, he told Al Monitor that the environment in Egypt must also change into a more tolerant one so that the sectarian violence in the nation would significantly decrease.A well-known priest and exorcist in Dublin, Ireland, has slammed the Catholic Church for sending demon-possessed individuals to psychologists instead of holding exorcism rituals to help them.

Speaking to The Irish Catholic newspaper, Fr. Pat Collins said the last few years have seen an exponential rise in the demand for exorcisms. He then urged the Catholic Church to appoint more priests under this ministry, saying each diocese needs to have at least one trained exorcist, The Irish Times relayed.

"What I'm finding out desperately, is people who in their own minds believe a rightly or wrongly a that they're afflicted by an evil spirit," Fr. Collins told the Catholic newspaper. "I think in many cases they wrongly think it, but when they turn to the church, the church doesn't know what to do with them and they refer them on either to a psychologist or to somebody that they've heard of that is interested in this form of ministry, and they do fall between the cracks and often are not helped."

Last year, Catholic affairs writer Alessandra Nucci said the Catholic Church has neglected the ministry of exorcism for a long time even though there has been a rise in the demand for them. The International Association of Exorcists in Rome said there are around 100 licensed exorcists in France alone, but many of them are inactive, The Economist reported.

Philippe Moscato, a French exorcist, earns 155 euros for an hour's work which consists of assessing a place, lighting a candle, reading out words from a manual, and blessing each room. He usually gets three or four requests for such rituals every week.

Other independent exorcists such as Jean Clement make up to 500 euros for performing a ceremony that supposedly releases a place from harmful "waves." Jean de Paracol, on the other hand, specializes in helping small businesses afflicted by black magic.

The Economist suggested that TV programs depicting exorcism rites may be part of the reason why the demand for such rituals is increasing. It can also be attributed to the more convenient way of finding practitioners online.A court in Ontario has ruled recently that doctors must refer patients requesting for euthanasia to another physician who can provide that service regardless if it violates their Christian or pro-life beliefs.

On Jan. 31, it was confimed by three justices of the Ontario Superior Court that the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario's policy that tells all doctors to refer patients for euthanasia and abortion violates their right to freedom of religion. However, the court also ruled that it was justified to ensure "access to health care," Life Site News detailed.

In the ruling, the justices concurred that the CPSO policy entails no "deprivation of the ability to practice medicine in Ontario" for the doctors. However, some doctors disagreed, saying the court decision puts them in an "impossible situation."

"They don't believe ending a patient's life is medicine, and they don't believe they can offer hope and healing in one room while assisting in killing a patient in another," said Canadian Physicians for Life president Dr. Ryan Wilson.

In addition, Dr. Wilson warned that doctors will be forced to retire early, change their specialty, or move to another location if their religious rights continue to be violated.

Meanwhile, the Knights of Columbus of Ontario has expressed support for Catholic bishops' opposition against a government ban on pro-life groups from summer job grants. The organization's state deputy, Dan Heffernan, issued a memo on Jan. 24 urging all Knights to speak out against the said policy, Life Site said in a separate report.

Moreover, Heffernan slammed Trudeau's administration for allegedly discriminating against pro-life organizations. He said the requirement to sign a pro-abortion attestation in order to obtain summer job grants was in effect telling Catholics that they "need not apply."

Ottawa's Archbishop Terrence Pendergast also wrote an editorial on the Ottawa Sun that said Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau could not be both Catholic and pro-abortion.A megachurch pastor in Singapore who was convicted in a $20 million church fraud has dodged a harsher jail term after a court recently decided not to carry out his original sentence.

City Harvest Church leader Pastor Kong Hee was originally given a sentence of eight years in 2015 for misusing almost $20 million of the church's funds for his wife Sun Ho's pop music career, while five other church leaders were handed varying jail terms. On Thursday, Feb.1, the Court of Appeal denied state prosecutors' call to reinstate the original sentences which were earlier reduced on a technicality, The Daily Mail detailed.

Pastor Kong will continue serving his jail term of three-and-a-half years. One church leader has already concluded serving her seven-month term, and another one is set to begin with his prison sentence on Feb. 22.

Ho, on the other hand, had not been included in the church fraud case.

Meanwhile, the court's recent decision to push through with the reduced sentences of the megachurch leaders was frowned upon by Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam. The Attorney-General's Chambers also issued a statement that said it would take a closer look at the Penal Code to make sure that people in positions of trust are punished appropriately if they breach their subordinates' trust, The Malay Mail Online reported.

"We will have to consider, as a matter of policy, what other steps to take because we cannot relax our stand on (corruption)," said Shanmugam.

Deputy Attorney-General Hri Kumar Nair had earlier stated that the High Court's ruling in the church fraud case "gives rise to a conflict of judicial authority in Singapore." He said it goes against a long-standing principle of handing the harshest punishments to leaders of organizations who breach the public's trust.

The prosecution also pointed out that there were 16 cases in the last four decades which saw directors convicted for similar offenses.Christian charities urged U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May to challenge China's president over the nation's ongoing crackdown on religious freedom during her recent state visit to the Asian country last Jan. 21 to Feb. 2.

Andre Boyd of Release International told Premier that the Chinese government now wants to have all churches registered in order to have a hold on their appointed leaders and teachings. He added that Christians who do not bow to government control are being labeled as evil cults.

May's state visit to China came as the Communist country is due to enforce new restrictions on religion. In light of the situation, Christian Solidarity Worldwide hoped that the British prime minister was able to raise the issue with the Chinese president as they discussed the expansion of their trade.

"We hope she will raise these cases and urge China that if it wants to be a global superpower, which it clearly is in the running for, it needs to uphold human rights for its own people," said Benedict Rogers of CSW.

On the final day of May's tour in China on Feb. 2, the Global Times commended her for having "sidestepped" the calls to challenge the Chinese leadership over the Christian crackdown. The state-run newspaper applauded the British prime minister for prioritizing the economic collaboration between the two countries, The Guardian reported.

In addition, the Global Times said May sees the greater loss her country would incur if she caves in to Western media's clamor during her official visit to China. The publication added that the "mudslinging" of western media cannot stop the cooperation between Beijing and Britain.

It is worth noting that May had vowed to raise the issue of human rights with Chinese leaders when she travelled to China on Jan. 30. However, she failed to mention that topic when she attended a press conference with Premier Li Keqiang the following day."Brotherhood of Warriors" by Aaron Cohen tells the true of a young American who becomes a member of Sayeret Duvdevan, Israeli special forces, after moving to Israel from the United States. His mother remarries a Hollywood executive and lives in Beverly Hills, Calif. Aaron turns into a discipline problem so his mother sends him to Robert Land Academy, a military school in Canada. At this academy he comes under the influence of Colonel Bowman who teaches him the superior training and abilities of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).

Aaron makes the decision to move to Israel and become a citizen. He promptly joins the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). After gaining combat experience and living on a kibbutz, he decides to try out for the Israeli Special Forces and is selected as a member of Sayeret Duvdevan. This is the Israeli equivalent of theNorth Korea fired a missile over Japan in August as Tokyo warned citizens in the north of the country to take cover. Afterward, President Donald Trump fired a warning back to North Korea to take cover:

"Threatening and destabilizing actions only increase the North Korean regime's isolation in the region and among all nations of the world. All options are on the table," the President said.

Could North Korean's isolation in the region and among the world's nations only increase their threatening and destabilizing actions?

To what options does the president refer? Previously, the United States and its allies have initiated several condemnations and penalties, but stopped short of military action. By attempting to secure compliance and cooperation from North Korea with economic penalties, their contempt and indifferent hostility shows the United Nation's ineffectualness.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and South Korea's foreign minister agreed to consider tougher sanctions against the North in response to the missile test.

Yet, tougher sanctions will only produce hardship on Western economies that currently suffer from recession. Besides, North Korea already has rigorous sanctions on it from previous provocations, but it has only aggravated its regime and not resolved the ongoing problems. The United Nations has levied eleven years of powerful, tougher sanctions, but it has produced ineffective, futile results.

The United States government imposed these warrants to cripple the North Korean economy, but the North Korean economic punishments cripple the U.S government by loss of trade and economic growth.

With defiant audacity, however, North Korea responded:

"The U.S. should know that it can neither browbeat the DPRK with any economic sanctions and military threats and blackmails nor make the DPRK flinch from the road chosen by itself," North Korea's official Rodong Sinmun said later, using the initials of the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

From this statement, North Korea feels domineered and controlled by the United States and United Nations. Notwithstanding many administrations trying to deal with their country, their resistance and contempt has a long history that continues in modern times.

Would eliminating all trade and freezing bank assets leading to an economic collapse that would make Kim Jong Un stop his nuclear program? With his people starving and dying, would it lead him to initiate a nuclear war? Better yet, should the United Nations continue ignoring North Korea and keep the country isolated, hoping it will reach a negotiable critical point?

Does Japan's alarm send a message now to humanity all over the world?The Coldspring-Oakhurst Consolidated Independent School District is moving forward with Bond projects and related curriculum plans.

"Bonds from both Proposition A and B have sold at very good rates," said Superintendent Dr. Leland Moore. "The I&S tax rate will end up being approximately 12.5 cents for the upcoming tax year, which is even lower than we expected."

Architects and administrators have been meeting with teachers to work on final drawings for buildings and additions, and construction has already begun on the high school track. It will be finished in time for spring track season. Construction will begin on campus projects when school releases for the summer.

Dr. Moore, district administrators, and Board of Trustees President Barbara Moore traveled to Sam Houston State University on Friday, Jan. 19, to attend a Collaborative Workforce Development Meeting. They met with university leaders from the Office of Research & Sponsored Programs, Center for Innovation & Technology and College of Business Administration, Engineering Technology, Online Education, and College of Health Sciences. The groundwork was laid for future partnerships related to the new Career & Technology Education (CTE) expansion.

"The work that has been made possible by the voters of this district will serve the COCISD students and community for years to come," said Dr. Moore.Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi will head to the UAE capital of Abu Dhabi on an official visit after he wraps up his visit to Oman, which is set to start on Sunday.

El-Sisi will hold talks with the UAE's crown Prince Mohamed Zayed Al-Nahyan on strengthening bilateral relations, as well as the latest regional and international developments, the presidency's spokesperson Bassam Rady told ONTV on Saturday evening.

During the visit, El-Sisi will also meet with a number of business leaders to discuss trade cooperation.

"Egypt and UAE enjoy a very special relationship," Rady explained.



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A Baltimore-based nonprofit floated as a potential partner for taking control of six low-performing Houston ISD schools only wants to work on academics and staff development at each campus, leaving open the question of who would be responsible for hiring and governance of the schools.

Talent Development Secondary, which Houston ISD administrators named Thursday as a "possible partner" for the six schools, has no desire to manage operations of the campuses, regional director Tara Madden said.

As a result, Houston ISD administrators will likely need to find another organization willing to run day-to-day operations at the six schools, which serve 5,900 students.

Houston ISD has proposed surrendering control over hiring, curriculum and governance at those schools in exchange for a two-year reprieve from a potential state takeover of the district's school board. That punishment is tied to the district's failure to improve chronically failing schools.

"Most typically, we are not the ultimate decision-maker," Madden said in an interview Friday. "We don't have a lot of experience operating a school."

The threat of a state takeover, made possible by a 2015 law known as HB 1842, has sent educators across the state scrambling to find solutions that will allow their school boards to retain local control. Under the law, the Texas Education Agency must replace the school board or close campuses in any district with a school receiving five consecutive "improvement required" ratings for poor academic performance.

Houston ISD has 10 schools that must meet state academic standards this year to avoid triggering HB 1842. The district is also concerned about four other campuses that have failed to meet state standards for two or three consecutive years.

The district has two options for staving off punishments under HB 1842: form partnerships with nonprofits, higher education institutions or charter school networks, or close and immediately reopen campuses that serve limited grade levels with entirely new staff members. In a partnership, the district would surrender authority over staffing, curriculum and campus governance, among other powers, but still serve all grade levels and possibly retain most staff.

District administrators on Thursday floated forming partnerships at eight schools and closing-and-reopening six schools, stressing the proposals are preliminary. The changes would take effect at the beginning of the 2018-19 school year.

The proposal named Talent Development Secondary as a "possible partner" at six campuses: Kashmere, Madison, North Forest, Wheatley and Worthing high schools and Henry Middle School.

The two remaining campuses, Dogan and Mading elementary schools, would possibly partner with the Children's Learning Institute at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

But on Friday, Talent Development Secondary's regional director, Tara Madden, said her organization wants to focus on its areas of expertise - which doesn't include staffing and governance.

Talent Development Secondary has worked in dozens of schools across 14 states, employing research-based strategies designed to help secondary-level students in high-poverty areas. Madden said she's had a couple conversations with Houston ISD administrators, and the organization is open to employing its areas of expertise in the district.

"We don't want to bite off more than we can chew," Madden said in an interview. "We know what we do well under our conditions. And we don't want to try operating on something new. It's not good for us, and it's not good for those communities."

Children's Learning Institute representatives declined to comment about their potential involvement in Houston ISD schools, saying it's "too preliminary."

Houston ISD's chief academic officer, Grenita Lathan, said the requirements related to partnerships remain unclear, leaving the district unsure of what responsibilities it must surrender. Proposed rules related to partnerships have been written, but they aren't expected to be finalized until late February.

"Initially, when we received information from the state, the partnership was more about the academic focus," Lathan said. "Partners that have experience in that area, we still feel they can make a difference and enhance our schools."

The district could face challenges in finding partners willing to run multiple campuses, given their size and the short time frame for assuming control. Houston ISD officials have said they discussed partnerships with charter school organizations, which have the most experience operating campuses, but nixed that option.

"We just did not feel at the time that they would meet our needs," Lathan said last month. "We wanted to be able to still maintain some level of control as a district over our schools and make sure we were rebuilding our schools"

Community meetings about partnerships and close-and-reopen plans are expected to be held throughout February. School board members are expected to vote on partnerships in mid-April.A man whose sentence for his role in a brutal Liberty County axe murder sparked outrage more than a decade ago is headed back to state prison, this time for molesting a 5-year-old girl.

Manuel Monreal was hit with 35 years in prison last month for a case out of Dimmit County in South Texas, according to prosecutors there. The charge was enhanced in light of his prior conviction, which netted a 10-year sentence for murder after he helped his brother move the victim's body and clean up the crime scene.

In October 2004, Jose Monreal - Manuel's brother - beat Bernardino Banos to death, bludgeoning him 50 times with a hammer and another seven times with an axe. Jose Monreal was given a 55-year prison sentence and, at the time, then-District Attorney Mike Little said Liberty County prosecutors asked for "substantially the same sentence" for Manuel Monreal.

BEFORE: Family outraged at murderer's sentence

But after Monreal pleaded no contest and waived his right to a jury trial, Liberty County Judge C.T. "Rusty" Hight sentenced him to 10 years for murder, 10 years for a drug charge and 10 years for tampering with evidence, the Chronicle reported at the time.

Afterward, the victim's family voiced their disappointment.

"The Liberty County Sheriff's Office did a wonderful job solving this case and collecting the evidence," said Ed Banos, the victim's brother. "But the prosecutors did not do their job and now he will be back here living in Cleveland in a few years."

Monreal was released on parole in mid-2014 and completed his supervision a few months later, according to Texas Department of Public Safety records.

Then in 2017, he was arrested for touching a little girl inappropriately - the daughter of a woman he was living with, according to prosecutors. He pleaded guilty and, because of his prior record, got an enhanced sentence.

"I find it so heartbreaking that society wasn't protected from him the first time he committed a crime," the victim's aunt said. "He murdered a man then molested a 5-year-old girl, what's next? I feel like he slipped through the system and my family had to pay for it."The dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Banha University and the head of Banha University Hospital resigned on Saturday following a deadly elevator accident at the universty's hospital that killed seven people on Tuesday, the Ministry of Higher Education announced on Saturday.

The ministry had earlier dismissed a number of other hospital officials, including the administrative and engineering directors of the university hospital.

On Tuesday evening, seven people were killed and four injured after an elevator in which they were riding crashed at the hospital in Egypt's Qalioubiya Governorate.

On Saturday, Prosecutor General Nabil Sadek Sadek ordered the detention for four days of the director of the maintenance company responsible for the technical maintenance of the hospital's elevators.

Sadek also ordered the arrest of other officials in the company responsible of the maintenance of the elevator that crashed.

The investigations revealed that one of the elevator's cables was severed and there was no anti-fall safety device to prevent it from falling.

According to prosecution investigations, the elevator's maximum load was 1,000 kg, with a capacity of 10 people. However, there has been no official indication that the elevator was overloaded at the time of the incident.

Minister of Higher Education Khaled Abdel-Ghafer has ordered EGP 100,000 in compensation for the families of each of the deceased, and EGP 50,000 for each person injured.

Banha University is a public university located in the Nile Delta governorate of Qalioubiya. The school had an enrollment of 73,070 students in the 2016-2017 academic year.

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The foreign ministers of Egypt and Sudan, as well as the heads of both countries' intelligence agencies, will meet in Cairo on Thursday to discuss bilateral coordination over a number of regional issues of mutual interest, a statement by the Egyptian foreign ministry announced on Sunday.

Egyptian foreign ministry spokesman Ahmed Abu Zeid said Thursday's upcoming meeting follows plans by Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi and Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir to form a quadrilateral strategic cooperation mechanism between their countries' foreign ministers and intelligence chiefs.

According to Abu Zeid, the newly formed committee aims to "remove any flaws that could hamper this brotherly relationship, solidarity, and unified destiny in face of bilateral challenges."

The anticipated meeting will come nearly a week after El-Sisi met with Al-Bashir in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa on the sidelines of African Union summit.

Also last week in Addis Ababa, Egypt's FM Shoukry met with his Sudanese counterpart Ibrahim El-Ghandour to clear up any "misunderstandings" that had resulted in tensions in recent months.

Sudan recently recalled its ambassador to Egypt for consultations without citing an official reason or revealing when he might return.

Relations between the two countries have been strained in recent months due to Sudans claims of sovereignty over Egypts southern Halayeb Triangle region, as well as the Sudanese stance in the talks on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam.

In January, the Egyptian president stressed that Egypt does not interfere in other countries affairs, and has no intention of fighting its "brothers" in Sudan.

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BEIRUT - Turkey said eight of its troops were killed Saturday in Ankara's military operation against a Syrian Kurdish militia, the deadliest day in the two-week-old offensive in the enclave of Afrin, while in another part of Syria, al-Qaida-linked militants downed a Russian fighter jet, then shot and killed the pilot.

In a statement late Saturday, the Turkish military said five soldiers were killed after their tank in Syria came under attack near Afrin. The soldiers could not be saved despite all attempts, it said.

Earlier in the day, three Turkish soldiers were reported killed in the Afrin offensive - one was killed in the area of the tank attack, another in northern Syria and the third on the Turkish side of the border in what Ankara said was an attack by Syrian Kurdish militiamen.

The total death toll for Turkish troops since the operation, code-named Olive Branch, started on Jan. 20 now stands at 13.

Turkey launched the incursion into Afrin to rout the U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish militia, known as the People's Protection Units or YPG, which it considers to be a terrorist organization and an extension of Kurdish insurgents fighting within Turkey.

U.S. troops in middle

From Istanbul, Turkish presidential spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said Turkey will not tolerate the presence of the YPG "anywhere" along its southern border, hinting that Ankara might expand the Afrin operation eastward.

Turkey's first demand is to see the YPG move east of the Euphrates River and leave the town of Manbij, where American troops backing the Syrian Kurdish fighters are stationed, Kalin said.

He called on the United States to "disengage" from the YPG and said Turkey will continue communications with "our American allies to avoid any confrontation."

Turkey shares a 911-kilometer border with Syria. The YPG controls much of the territory along the border and an uninterrupted strip from Manbij to the Iraqi border.

Pilot dies resisting capture

Meanwhile, in the embattled northwestern province of Idlib, al-Qaida-linked militants said they downed a Russian fighter jet and killed its pilot after he ejected from the plane and landed on the ground.

The pilot resisted being captured and fired at the militants who then shot and killed him, according to one of the militants and Syrian monitors.

The Russian Defense Ministry confirmed the downing of the Su-25 and said the pilot was killed in fighting with "terrorists."

A report on the ministry's Zvezda TV said preliminary information indicated the plane was shot by a portable ground-to-air missile in an area under control of al-Qaida's branch in Syria.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the plane was downed near the rebel-held town of Saraqeb, which Syrian troops have been trying to take under the cover of Russian airstrikes.

Russia is a key ally of President Bashar Assad, and has been waging a military campaign on behalf of his forces since 2015.

Since then, Syrian troops have captured wide parts of the country and in recent weeks have been making advances in Idlib. The province is also a base for al-Qaida's branch in Syria and other Islamic groups.

A Syrian militant in the area told The Associated Press that the Russian pilot was shot and killed when he resisted capture. The pilot opened fire from his pistol as the militants were trying to seize him, said the militant, who refused to be identified by his real name because was not authorized to speak to the media.

A video circulating on social media shows a lifeless body of a man, his face stained with blood, as bearded gunmen stand around him.

One of the armed men shouts: "He is Russian." The authenticity of the video could not be independently confirmed but it corresponded to events reported by the AP.AUSTIN -- Democrat Andrew White on Saturday won the endorsement of the Houston GLBT Political Caucus over primary rivals who are gay.

White is straight.

White, a Houston entrepreneur and son of the late Gov. Mark White, is among nine Democrats who are running in the March 6 primary for a chance to face incumbent Republican Greg Abbott in the November general election.

Among the others are gay Dallas businessman Jeffrey Payne and former Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez, who is lesbian.

"I'm humbled by and unbelievably grateful for the Houston GLBT Political Caucus' endorsement," White said in an statement.

"Mark my words: I will fight hard for full LGBTQ equality as governor and come out swinging against any efforts to discriminate. It's past time to treat all Texans fairly and equally under the law."

The Houston GLBT Political Caucus, billed as the oldest equality rights organization in the South, has been endorsing candidates since 1975.

Valdez was in Houston, which has a large gay voting population, on Saturday campaigning. Payne has been in Houston several times courting votes, as well, since he started his campaign.IOWA CITY, Iowa - Republicans who control a majority of the nation's statehouses are considering a wide range of abortion legislation that could test the government's legal ability to restrict a woman's right to terminate pregnancy.

The Mississippi House passed a bill Friday that would make the state the only one to ban all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. In Missouri, lawmakers heard testimony earlier in the week on a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks.

The Ohio House is expected to consider bills, already passed in the Senate, that would prohibit the most common type of procedure used to end pregnancies after 13 weeks and require that fetal remains be buried or cremated.

Abortion is a perennial hot-button issue in statehouses across the country. Republican-controlled states have passed hundreds of bills since 2011 restricting access to the procedure while Democratic-led states have taken steps in the other direction.

The early weeks of this year's state legislative sessions have seen a flurry of activity around the issue. It comes as activists on both sides say they expect the U.S. Supreme Court to soon consider a question that remains unclear: How far can states go in restricting abortion in the interest of preserving and promoting fetal life?

The state bills debated since the start of the year "are all tests designed to see how far government power to legislate on behalf of a fetus can reach," said Jessica Mason Pieklo, who has been tracking legislation as the senior legal analyst for Rewire, a website that promotes views supporting abortion rights.

She said the outcome will determine whether states can legally ban abortion after a specific time period and outlaw specific medical procedures. Advocates for abortion rights say those strategies undermine the Supreme Court's 1973 ruling that women have the right to terminate pregnancies until a fetus is viable.

The anti-abortion bills have drawn opposition from women who say they have made the excruciating choice to terminate a pregnancy, often after discovering serious fetal abnormalities.

More Information States vote on hot-button issue Abortion policy has been a prominent topic in state legislative sessions that began or resumed last month. A look at some of the actions: California: The Senate voted for a bill that would make California the first state to require public universities to offer medication abortion, a service that is rare on college campuses. Georgia: A committee approved a bill that would require underage girls to justify why they should be allowed to avoid notifying a parent or guardian if they want an abortion. Idaho: A Senate panel introduced legislation requiring the state to provide information to women saying medication-induced abortions can be halted after taking just one of two pills. Indiana: The Indiana Senate approved a bill that would require medical providers to report additional information about patients who seek treatment for an abortion complication. Iowa: A group of Republican House members proposed legislation that would ban abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detected, which is as early as six weeks. Mississippi: The House has voted to advance legislation that would make Mississippi the only state to ban all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. The bill now goes to the Senate. Missouri: Lawmakers are considering several bills to restrict access to abortion, including one that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. Ohio: The Senate has approved a bill that would require Ohio abortion clinics to either bury or cremate fetal remains. The House is expected to consider that measure, along with another already approved in the Senate that would ban the most commonly used procedure to terminate abortions after 13 weeks of pregnancy. South Carolina: State senators voted to delay a bill that would likely ban all abortions, saying they need time to consider possible exceptions to the law. Tennessee: A lawmaker has proposed banning any Medicaid funding going to abortion providers, such as Planned Parenthood, for non-abortion services. A legislative committee has declined to endorse a plan that would ban all abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, amending it to remove that language. Utah: Lawmakers are considering bills that would penalize doctors who do not show an informational video to women seeking an abortion and another that would bar doctors from performing abortions sought because the fetus has Down syndrome. Washington: The Senate passed a measure that would require insurers in the state to offer maternity care that also covers elective abortions and contraception. See More Collapse

"A 20-week abortion ban sounds OK, but if that gets passed, what's next - 18 weeks, 15 weeks? At what point does it make abortion truly illegal?" said Robin Utz of St. Louis, 38, who submitted testimony this week against the Missouri bill. "It's terrifying, and it's willfully ignorant."

Utz recounted terminating her pregnancy in its 21st week in November 2016, after learning her daughter would be born with a fatal kidney disease if she survived birth.

Undeterred by such stories, the National Right to Life Committee and its allies have been pushing for state laws that ban abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy and outlaw dilation and evacuation. Supporters of both measures argue that fetuses are capable of feeling pain after 20 weeks and call the procedure "dismemberment abortion."

In South Carolina this past week, state senators tabled a bill that would have banned most abortions to give lawmakers more time to study the consequences. Also last week, a legislative committee in Tennessee amended a bill to remove language that would have outlawed abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detectable, which is usually around six weeks. The bill's sponsor, Republican Rep. Micah Van Huss, said he would be back.

"I will not stop fighting for the lives of babies until abortion is abolished in this state," he said.Egyptian army spokesman Tamer El-Refa'i on Sunday dismissed a New York Times report alleging Egyptian approval of Israeli airstrikes against terrorist targets in North Sinai over the past two years.

"The Egyptian Army and police are fighting terrorism in North Sinai on their own and without anybody's help," the spokesman said in the statement.

El-Refa'i highlighted the success achieved by Egyptian security forces in restricting terrorist elements into a small geographical triangle in the governorate.

"The Egyptian army's successes against terrorism in North Sinai are praised internationally," the statement added.

The spokesman called on media outlets to be accurate and seek any information related to the Egyptian armed forces from properly designated sources.

Egypts army and police forces have been battling the IS-affiliated terror group Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis for the last several years in parts of North Sinai.

The Egyptian army has killed and arrested hundreds of extremists in the last four years using ground troops and airstrikes by the Egyptian airforce.

In recent months Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, which had initially focused its terror attacks on security personnel, has shifted to attacking civilian targets in the area.

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Go to formEgypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi and Oman's Sultan Qaboos met for talks in Muscat on Sunday to discuss enhancing bilateral relations, Arab Gulf security and cooperation over counter-terrorism efforts, according to a statement by Egyptian presidency spokesman Bassam Rady.

El-Sisi arrived earlier on Sunday for the three-day official visit, his first to the Gulf country, to intensify joint consultation and coordination to serve the interests of the two countries.

"Talks between the two leaders covered several regional and international issues of mutual concern," said the presidential spokesman.

On the situation in Yemen, President El-Sisi heard Sultan Qaboos' vision on efforts and means to solve the crisis and to alleviate the daily suffering of the Yemeni people.

"The two leaders also agreed upon preserving state institutions and territorial unity in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq," he added.

The pair further discussed enhancing cooperation in economic and trade relations.

Sultan Qaboos praised Egypt's role as a major pillar of the security and stability of the Gulf and the Arab region, reaffirming his country's full support for Egypt's war on terrorism.

On his side, President El-Sisi expressed appreciation for Sultan Qaboos' supportive stances toward the Egyptian people.

El-Sisi's visit to Muscat is the first by an Egyptian president since 2009.

After departing Oman, the Egyptian president will head to Abu Dhabi for three days to hold talks with Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan on strengthening bilateral relations.

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We attempted to send a notification to your email address but we were unable to verify that you provided a valid email address. Please click here to update your email address if you wish to receive notifications. Otherwise, you may click here to disable notifications and hide this message.Marttiini Lynx Lumberjack Knife By Gary Zinn

Marttiini Lynx Lumberjack. Illustration courtesy of Marttiini Knives.

Founded by blacksmith, preacher and Christian author Janne Marttiini, Marttiini of Finland (www.marttiini.fi) has been making knives of the Finnish puukko and Saami types since 1928. In 2005, Rapala VMC, the fishing and outdoor gear conglomerate, purchased Marttiini Ltd. from the Marttiini family. Marttiini produces knives bearing its own brand name and for over 50 years has also made Rapala brand knives. Marttiini knives are divided into seven categories, six with fixed blades and one group of folders. In the fixed blade categories, those labeled Outdoor and Traditional are mostly puukko and Saami style knives, while the Hunting knife category leans toward more contemporary designs. Marttiini knife offerings range from utilitarian to fancy. I chose a no frills utility knife for this review, a model called the Lynx Lumberjack Carbon Small (pictured above). This knife follows the traditional design of puukko type working knives. Specifications Model No.: 121016

Blade pattern: straight spine with shallow clip point

Blade length: 3-1/2" (3-3/8" sharpened edge)

Blade steel: carbon steel (Rc 55-57)

Handle material: stained birch wood

Total length: 7-3/8"

Weight of knife: 1.9 ounces

Sheath (weight): leather (1.2 oz.)

Country of origin: Finland

2018 MSRP: $54.95 (retail price discounted approx. 24%) Blade, handle and sheath The carbon steel blade has a 3-3/8 inch sharpened edge and is 5/8 inch wide by .079 inch thick. The blade has the distinctive scandi grind, with a narrow secondary grind (micro bevel) forming the sharpened edge. The blade has a straight spine, with a very shallow clip point. The flats of the blade are unpolished and have a nice blackened patina. I cannot tell if this is oxidation from heat treating, or the result of a separate operation to create the patina. Whatever, the blade has a traditional look, which is part of the reason I chose this knife. The patina helps protect the flat portions of the blade, but obviously not the ground portions, from rust. Those who have experience with carbon steel know the common sense things to do to keep their knives from rusting. Anyone unfamiliar with carbon steel care should bone up before investing in knives with carbon steel blades. Here is a mini course: Carefully clean and thoroughly dry the knife after use. Wipe a very light coat of a nontoxic protectant (e.g., mineral oil or pure canola oil) onto the blade; pay particular attention to the ground portions of the blade, since these are not protected by a patina. Store the knife in a low humidity environment. Never leave the knife in a damp sheath. Marttiini does not provide much technical detail about their steel. They state that their carbon steel contains 0.75 percent carbon and three percent chromium. Without the chromium, the steel used in this knife would be 1075 type plain carbon steel, not a preferable choice for conventional knife blades. The chromium, though, boosts the toughness and wear resistance above that of plain steel with the same carbon content. I believe that Marttiini has been using this steel for a long time, so they must be satisfied with its performance. The handle is stained birch wood. It is 3-7/8 inches long and one inch wide by 3/4 inch thick at the middle. The only hardware on the handle is a brass ferrule at the front and a brass nut pressed onto the end of the rattail tang. The downward curl of the handle butt is seen throughout the various Marttiini Lynx model knives and also appears on some other models. A deep pouch leather sheath completes the package. It is shaped to hold the knife securely, with a plastic liner inside to prevent the blade from slicing or puncturing the leather. A twisted leather thong serves as a belt loop. The "boot toe" shape of the bottom of the sheath is a nod to traditional puukko and Saami sheath detailing. The knife weighs a feathery 1.9 ounces per my digital postal scale and the sheath adds 1.2 ounces to the carry weight. This slender, lightweight knife is similar to what makers of classic American hunting knives would call a Bird and Trout knife. Fit, finish and function I have already discussed the blade grind and finish. The unvarnished handle is sanded just to the point of leaving enough surface texture to provide a secure, nonslip grip. The ferrule is unpolished. All together, the finish of the blade, handle and ferrule are appropriate for a working knife. There is not much to fit together on this simple knife, but the tight fit of the ferrule around the base of the blade and its even junction with the handle surface speak to good fitting of parts. The one minor glitch I found was a very small burr on the end of the tang, where it mates with the brass retention nut. A few swipes with a diamond sharpening plate corrected this. Turning to function, the handle is shaped for a comfortable hold and is adequately, but not generously, sized. Gripping the knife with the last finger in front of the drop at the butt of the handle leaves the forefinger of my medium size hand close to the base of the blade, which lacks a finger guard. Moving my grip back one finger width was more reassuring, while still giving a secure grip with the last finger around, rather than in front of, the drop at the end of the handle. I soon found myself grasping the knife this way without thinking about it. This is one of the smaller Marttiini knives, with the handle sized in proportion to the blade. Knives with longer, heavier blades have handles both longer and with a bit more girth. For instance, the Lynx Lumberjack Carbon with a four inch blade has a handle 13/16 inch longer than the knife reviewed here. I have a qualitative ranking system for describing the sharpness of knives. My ranks are NS (not sharp), SE (sharp enough), VS (very sharp) and ES (extremely sharp). Out of the box, I expect the factory edges of most knives from reputable makers to be at least SE, with an edge keen enough to do routine cutting tasks. The factory edge on my Lynx Lumberjack was Extremely Sharp (ES). I do not give this rating lightly and I have seen very few production knives that attained it out of the box. A series of test cuts that included slicing coated paper and corrugated cardboard, whittling wood and cutting rope and webbing confirmed that this was, indeed, a very sharp knife. I was impressed. Given how thin the blade is, I became curious about the angle of the blade grind. I dusted off my old trigonometry skills and worked out that the angle of the primary grind is about ten degrees on each side of the blade. From this, I am guessing that the angle of the micro bevel that forms the actual cutting edge is no more than about fifteen degrees. These bevel angles go a long way to explain why this knife can take such a sharp edge. It also suggests that this would be a great slicing knife, which it is. I confirmed this by using the knife to break down some large cuts of beef for the freezer. ES edges on knife blades usually do not stay that way for long, if one does much serious cutting. However, the edge on my Lynx held up to my initial test cutting routine without losing any sharpness that I could discern. After some more use, the edge has faded a bit, but I still rate it as VS. Given that the blade is tempered to Rc 55-57, I expect it to be easy to sharpen when the time comes to do so. Meanwhile, the edge is proving more durable than I expected it to be. The Lynx Knife family The Lynx Knife model was one of Marttiini's earliest designs and has been a featured product line ever since. Currently, there are four Lynx Lumberjack variants, all with stained birch handles. Three of these have carbon steel blades and one blade is stainless steel. Another set of nine Lynx Knives features unstained birch or curly birch handles. Most of these knives have stainless steel blades with polished brass ferrules. These knives range from plain work knives to spiffed-up dress knives with elaborately detailed sheaths. The dressiest model is the Lynx Knife 132, with a highly polished blade and ferrule, varnished curly birch handle and embellished sheath. This is a presentation/collection grade package. In addition, Marttiini makes several knives similar to the Lynx series, except with Lapp (Saami) style handles. Marttiini Lynx Knife 132, with sheath. Illustration courtesy of Marttiini Knives. Conclusion The Lynx Lumberjack Carbon Small is a neat lightweight field knife, suitable for everyday use in the field, camp, or around the house. It would be inadequate for really heavy work (for which several Marttiini knives with longer, heavier blades would be better), but most of us have more occasion to use a light duty knife than a heavy one. I am definitely keeping my little Lynx knife and I expect to carry it a lot and use it frequently.CLEVELAND, Ohio -- With the release of the Nunes Memo, President Trump and his two waterboys, Rep. Devin Nunes and Speaker Paul Ryan, served up a not-so-super bowl of cherry-picked partisan botulism.

The memo that was intended to discredit the FBI, DOJ and Mueller investigation, and provide justification to fire deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, instead further discredited Nunes, Ryan and Trump, making the president look even more guilty of obstruction.

Friday, instead of basking in the glow of what had been a generally well received State of the Union address, a scowling Trump was being asked if the Nunes memo will prompt the firing of Rosenstein. "You figure that one out," Trump snapped back.

His anger was understandable, while the State of the Union was well received, the TV News and social media junkie was surely hearing the Nunes Memo was considered a dud.

Hyped by Sean Hannity and other Trumpkins as a bombshell devastating the Mueller investigation, the memo instead damaged the White House and reputations of Nunes and Ryan. And it had been preceded by the Hope Hicks news that appears to further incriminate the White House on obstruction.

Central premises of Nunes Memo debunked.

The two central premises of the Nunes memo have been debunked. The memo claimed former deputy and acting FBI director Andrew McCabe had testified that the Steele dossier was the essential part of the FISA warrant request for Carter Page, and that the warrant would not have been granted without it. The memo also claimed the FISA judge wasn't informed the dossier was paid for by Democrats and that it would not have been granted had the judge known that.

The claims about McCabe have been disputed by Democrats who heard McCabe's testimony and even Sen. Lindsey Graham, who asserted that the dossier was only one part of the FISA warrant request.

The Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Washington post have all reported that the FISA judges were made aware the dossier "research was being paid for by a political entity."

FISA warrant renewed multiple times after initial application.

A typical FISA warrant application can be anywhere from 30 to 60 pages thick. Those making the application are questioned by the court. To win renewal of a warrant, the FBI had to show that the initial warrant, that was based in part, on the dossier, was generating new leads. The FISA renewals weren't based on the dossier, they were based on new evidence gathered as a result of the initial warrant.

Nunes didn't read FISA application.

Gowdy says memo has no effect on Mueller investigation.

Rep. Devin Nunes has admitted he didn't even read the FISA application and warrant. Nunes said he left that to Rep. Trey Gowdy, who has announced he's leaving Congress to resume his legal career.

While Trump, and his Fox News adviser, Sean Hannity, expected the memo to lead to the end of the Mueller investigation, Gowdy said the memo should have no effect on Mueller's probe.

"Not to me, it doesn't - and I was pretty integrally involved in the drafting of it," Gowdy said in a "Face the Nation" interview expected to air this morning.

"There is a Russia investigation without a dossier. So to the extent that memo deals with the dossier and the FISA process, the dossier has nothing to do with the meeting at Trump Tower. The dossier has nothing to do with an email sent by Cambridge Analytica. The dossier really has nothing to do with George Papadopoulos' meeting in Great Britain. It also doesn't have anything to do with obstruction of justice," Gowdy told CBS's Margaret Brennan.

Republicans flip flop on FISA and Carter Page.

Republicans have suddenly and oddly flip flopped on the FISA court system and Carter Page.

Not to long ago, Republicans unanimously voted to renew approval for the FISA court. Ryan was making impassioned speeches on the House floor on how important FISA was to national security.

When news came out that Carter Page was the subject of counter-intelligence investigation, Trump and his staff were suddenly acting like they barely knew him, even though Trump is on the record as citing him as one of his foreign policy advisors. Huckster Huckabee was claiming Page played a minor, brief role in the campaign.

Besides taking attention away from Trump's State of the Union address, and the tax cuts, one of the ways the memo has backfired is that it put attention back on Carter Page and the Trump campaign's connection with Russia, which is not what Trump wanted.

Trumps target FBI "suits not boots," they say.

Don Jr. and his Dad are now spinning their attack on the FBI and DOJ as really directed at what Don Jr. says are the "suits" not the "boots". They're targeting FBI leadership, not the rank and file, they claim. But that leadership is made up of life-long Republicans appointed by President Trump.

Trump, Nunes, Hannity didn't get the memo that the Nunes memo is a dud.

It appears that Trump, Nunes and Hannity haven't gotten the memo that the memo is a dud.

Hannity said the memo demonstrated the charges against Flynn should be dropped, even though Flynn will plead guilty as part of a plea deal.

Nunes said the memo is just phase one. He's going after the State Department next. It's like Geraldo Rivera announcing he's going to re-open Capone's vault a second time

Trump tweeted, "This memo totally vindicates "Trump" in probe."

Memo to "Trump" -- Stop listening to Devin Nunes, Sean Hannity, "Fox and Friends," Don Jr., Eric and Hope Hicks. Start listening to your lawyers.CLEVELAND, Ohio - Imagine a huge wave building in Lake Erie, steadily rolling south, ready to crash on the shores of Northeast Ohio with a force so profound it could change the region for generations to come.

Now imagine that wave as people. Your grandparents. Your parents. And, sooner than you might expect, you.

It's coming: the age wave. Some call it the Silver Tsunami. Are we prepared?

Northeast Ohio is not alone in facing this. America as a whole is growing older. By 2050, the 65 and over population is projected to reach 83.7 million, almost double the roughly 43.1 million in 2012, according to the United States Census Bureau.

Ohio sits on the crest of the wave. By 2020, just two years away, one in four residents in half of Ohio's 88 counties will be 60 and older.

Closer to home, almost one third of Cuyahoga County residents will be over 60 by 2030, according to projections by the Scripps Gerontology Center at Miami University. Also by 2030, the number of seniors in Cuyahoga County will be almost equal to the number of people under the age of 20, according to projections by the Ohio Development Services Agency.

What does the future look like for these folks? More and more older Americans, a whopping 88 percent of adults over 65, want to "age in place," staying in their homes and communities, AARP reports.

Is Northeast Ohio a place where that can happen?

Plain Dealer readers have asked us this question and others, and over the coming months we will be looking at the issues facing us, both as a community and as individuals, in an ongoing series called Living On.

What do we need to do to age well, and live full and engaged lives, if we choose to stay here? Are our public and private institutions ready to support us as we age?

Several aging experts answer yes to the second question, although they concede that the region still faces challenges, some of them quite large, including housing, transportation, loneliness and financial stability.

An Age-friendly City

"My wife and I can think of no place better to live than Northeast Ohio," declared Dr. Michael Roizen, an expert in healthy aging, a prolific author and lecturer, and the Chief Wellness Officer at the Cleveland Clinic.

Roizen, who celebrated his 72 birthday last month, still works full-time at the Clinic, is working on a new book, and called recently from California, where he had given two days of lectures. He has no intention of retiring, he said.

He also has no intention of leaving Cleveland as he grows older.

"As far as educational and cultural opportunities, the low cost of living, the Metroparks, and the ability to get great medical care, there is no place better in the world for it," he said.

Roizen hit on several of the characteristics of city life identified by the World Health Organization as the elements of an "Age-friendly City." In 2010, WHO established the Global Network for Age-friendly Cities and Communities to encourage a public commitment to improving the lives of older people. Eight years later, 541 cities and communities in 37 countries participate.

Read more:

How Cleveland is becoming an Age-Friendly City

What concerns do you have about growing older? Share your stories: Calling all readers

An age-friendly city, according to WHO, is a place that enables people of all ages to actively participate in community activities, treats everyone with respect, makes it easy to stay connected to others, helps people stay healthy and active even at the oldest ages, and aids those who can no longer look after themselves to live with dignity and enjoyment.

Cleveland joined WHO's Global Network of age-friendly cities in 2014 by applying and committing to a four-step process: engaging older residents in an assessment of their needs; creating an action plan; implementing the plan, and, finally, measuring the progress made toward becoming truly age-friendly. Later, the city joined the AARP Network of age-friendly communities.

Following the year-long assessment of Cleveland's pluses and minuses, conducted by the non-profit Center for Community Solutions and the city's Department of Aging, an action plan emerged. Implementation of its 18 recommendations started in 2017 and will go through 2019. (See "How Cleveland is becoming an Age-Friendly City")

Multiple agencies, public and private, exist in Northeast Ohio to serve older adults, so many that one of the key findings in the assessment was: "In some cases, services or assets may exist, but older adults are not aware of them or do not use them."

M.C. "Terry" Hokenstad, emeritus professor in the Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences at Case Western Reserve University, brought the Age-friendly City idea to Cleveland after attending the WHO Assembly in Geneva, Switzerland, in 2014. He then led both the executive committee and the advisory council, comprised of representatives from most of those senior-serving agencies, for Cleveland's age-friendly process.

Hokenstad, an internationally recognized expert on the issues of aging and a member of the United Nations Non-Governmental Organization Committee on Aging, is optimistic about the region's ability to face the age wave.

"Plenty needs to be done," he said. "I don't want to be a Pollyanna about this. But I really am upbeat about what's going on in Cleveland and Cuyahoga County. We have some very good leadership and a good structure at both the public and the non-profit agencies."

He credits that positive factor to the Council on Older Persons, a committee of the Center for Community Solutions. Some 50 professionals, many of them area agency directors, meet every other month to coordinate their work and discuss regional aging issues.

Hokenstad, who is 81, officially retired from CWRU last spring. But he continues to teach and travel for his research and plans to remain in Cleveland the rest of his life. "Cleveland is a doable place to age in place," he said.

Challenges ahead



Of course, aging in place is far more doable for well-established professionals like Hokenstad and Roizen than it is for the 22 percent of Clevelanders over 60 who live in poverty as compared to 35.4 percent for all ages. An additional 17 percent live in near poverty, between 100 and 150 percent of the poverty threshold.the additional 17 percent who live in near poverty.

For that 39 percent of our older population, as well as for merely low-income older people, the challenges of aging in place are far greater.

One of the biggest of those challenges is housing, Hokenstad said. In the city of Cleveland, the median year of construction for housing is 1920, according the the Cuyahoga County Auditor. Many of those houses need costly repairs and maintenance, not to mention improvements, such as creating bedrooms and bathrooms on the first floor, that would make aging in place possible.

href="http://dataexplorer.aarp.org/indicator/65/population-by-age-sex-raceethnicity#/map?dist1=13&dist5=31&dist2=10&loc=1&tf=43&fmt=681&showLabels">AARP reportsthat the state now has the sixth oldest population in the country, not far behind the top three: Florida (of course), Texas and California.

Finding affordable housing can be difficult as well for seniors, said Richard L. Jones, the administrator of the Cuyahoga County Division of Senior and Adult Services.

"I get all kinds of requests from older people who are facing eviction from their homes because they don't have the resources to manage rising costs," he said last week. "Just this morning I signed three vouchers where we are going to provide a month's rent to them."

But what happens after that? The Age-Friendly Cleveland assessment found that over half of adult renters, and 40 percent of owners, live in housing that they cannot afford long-term.

Even more concerning, for Jones, is that 56 percent of older adults don't know where they would go if they had to move out of their home for health or mobility issues.

Jones worries about that. "As a county we not only have to look at in-home services but also look at a continuum of care, when someone cannot remain in their home. The costs for assisted living and skilled-nursing facilities are way beyond the capacity of most people. We have to figure out what can we do as a community to better manage those costs."

John Corlett, the director of the Center for Community Solutions, a key player in the Age-Friendly planning, worries about economic issues facing both the region and individuals as we age.

"People's retirement security is the one I think about the most," he said. "Retirement is traditionally seen as a three-legged stool: one leg is pensions, one is Social Security and one is savings."

But these days, he said, pensions are disappearing, and studies show that savings are minimal for most older adults. Too many people count on Social Security alone to support their older years. For many, particularly women, who are paid less and are generally in the workforce for fewer years than men, Social Security is not enough to live on.

"We should be strengthening the program, not cutting it," as many politicians are keen to do, he said.

Corlett also worries about funding the programs that older people will need as their numbers grow. He points out that older people who have stopped working contribute less in income taxes than young people, and that older people, excluding health care, spend less money than young people.

"They're not buying couches anymore," he said, and thus not contributing to sales taxes. And as older people move out of their homes, they are no longer paying property taxes.

Currently, 21.8 percent of Cuyahoga County's population is under the age of 20, while 16.2 percent is over the age of 65. Corlett fears that soon the number of young people in the county may not be great enough to support elderly people who can no longer work. The Ohio Development Services Agency projects that the number of people over the age of 65 in Cuyahoga will increase until 2030, while the population aged 20 and under will continue to fall.

The county will need to balance the needs of a growing older population with a shrinking younger population as funding decreases.

"You get a sense that retirement is going to disappear as a concept," Corlett said. "That people will need to keep working as they age."

That isn't necessarily a bad thing. Recent research shows that continuing to work may help keep older people healthier and happier. "It might be a good thing to keep people in the workforce longer, both for them and for society," Corlett said.

Despite these concerns, Corlett takes issue with the "Silver Tsunami" label. "Tsunamis are unexpected," he said. "This is not news to us, and I think there are challenges, but we'll figure it out.

"What I find," he went on, "is people like to ignore it because they don't like to think about getting old. We personalize it. And so we don't think about it."

Readers: We're thinking about it. And we will be writing about it.CLEVELAND, Ohio - A Michigan man shot his ex-girlfriend twice in Cleveland's Ohio City neighborhood after kidnapping her from her Bedford Heights apartment, according to police.

Jeremiah D. Little, 38, of Lansing, Michigan, is charged with felonious assault in Cleveland Municipal Court. A warrant was issued for his arrest Saturday. He is not in police custody.

Cleveland police Second District Commander Thomas Stacho gave an update on the Friday evening shooting via a Facebook post.

The incident happened about 5 p.m. on West 25th Street, in a shopping plaza across the street from the West Side Market, the update says.

The shooting wounded Little's 21-year-old ex-girlfriend, Cleveland police said. The woman was shot several times with a .45-caliber handgun, the warrant states.

Police initially reported that the woman was 25 years old.

Little is accused of kidnapping the Bedford Heights woman and forcing her to drive into Cleveland, Stacho wrote. She was shot while trying to escape from Little following "a violent assault."

The woman was taken to MetroHealth Medical Center for treatment after the shooting. Her current condition is unknown.

Investigators say Little drove back into Michigan after the shooting took place. Cleveland police is working with Michigan authorities to find him.

If you'd like to comment on this post, please visit the cleveland.com crime and courts comments section.INDEPENDENCE, Ohio -- Civil War-era historians Paul and Gaynal Goebbel opened Black History Month at the Independence branch of the Cuyahoga County Library on Saturday with a presentation about the Underground Railroad in Ohio for a capacity audience of about 100 people.

In full period costume, the Goebbels took listeners on a journey around Ohio, discussing the significance of different cities and people throughout the state who played a large role in the workings of the Underground Railroad and efforts to help slaves from the South as they traveled north seeking freedom in Canada.

Gaynal Goebbel discussed the fashions and social behaviors of the late 1700s into the middle 1800s. Her costume included an elliptical taffeta covered hoop skirt, a smart hat adorned with lace and feathers and some authentic accessories from the time.

After passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, it became a crime to help slaves seek freedom, with harsh penalties for being caught. It was no deterrent in Oberlin, however, where Goebbel said five routes in and out of town made the town an important and busy stop for slaves escaping north.

During that period, Goebbel said, the Western Reserve was recognized as the most anti-slavery area in the nation behind Massachusetts.

With a vast age range in the audience at the library, Goebbel made it a point to explain the Underground Railroad. Though it had no actual railways or train cars, and described the network of routes and safe houses used by slaves, it used railroad terminology -- from the "conductors" who helped slaves move from one "station" to the next and the "station masters" who kept them hidden to the "agents" who donated whatever was needed to help slaves on their way.

More information on the Goebbels, their more than 30 period topics and where they are giving presentations is atCLEVELAND, Ohio - Cleveland Hopkins International Airport has changed dramatically in the four years since United Airlines pulled its hub, and it's time for the airport's master plan to reflect those changes.

Airport Director Robert Kennedy said the airport is in the beginning stages of updating its master plan, a federally-mandated document that forecasts future growth and outlines recommended capital improvements.

"The airport we were in 2014 compared to the airport we are now - it's like being in another city, in another state," said Kennedy.

Among the many changes:

* United Airlines, though still the largest carrier in Cleveland, has reduced flights dramatically in recent years, and now serves fewer than one-third of Hopkins' total passengers.

* New airlines, including Frontier, Spirit, JetBlue and Allegiant, have entered the Cleveland market, dramatically driving down airfares from Cleveland.

* The number of passengers who connect through Cleveland is down dramatically, while the number of travelers who start and end their trip in Cleveland is up. In 2017, for example, 96 percent of Cleveland's 9.14 million passengers were so-called origin and destination traffic.

* Traffic is more evenly distributed throughout the airport's terminal, thanks to the addition of the new airlines, several of which are housed in Concourse A.

Related: Cleveland Hopkins charges airlines among the highest fees of U.S. airports

Related: New Cleveland Hopkins airport director predicts growth, more flights to Europe

Cleveland Hopkins' current master plan, completed in 2008 and updated in 2012, outlined $1.6 billion in recommendations, some of which were accomplished and others ignored.

The existing master plan, for example, called for a widening of Concourse C, which was filled with Continental/United gates when the airport still served as a hub. The expansion never happened.

Today, Concourse C houses gates for United, American and JetBlue airlines, and it's unclear whether a wider Concourse C is still needed.

Meanwhile, Concourse D - built in 1999 exclusively for Continental Airlines -- has been closed since United, which merged with Continental in 2010, pulled its hub (though United continues to pay down the debt on its construction).

Kennedy said he is constantly asked: "What are you going to do with Concourse D? What are you going to do with C?"

His answer: "I don't know. Let's go through the process."

A private company will be hired to prepare the document. Kennedy said he hopes to put the project out to bid this year. It will likely take another 18 months to two years to complete it, with a final version released to the public in 2021.

He said he's unsure how much it will cost, but Pittsburgh International Airport recently spent $7.6 million to revise its master plan.

Included in Pittsburgh's new document: plans for a $1 billion terminal rebuild to accommodate the airport's dramatically changing passenger traffic. Construction is expected to start next year.

Similar to Cleveland, Pittsburgh has seen major changes at its airport since US Airways closed its hub there in 2004.

Several projects outlined in Cleveland's current master plan have been completed over the years, including the tearing down of the airport's long-term parking garage in 2013. The garage had reached "the end of its useful life," according to the master plan, and was replaced by a surface lot.

The master plan also called for the creation of a permanent Ground Transportation Center, which was completed last year. It serves as the new pick-up and drop-off location for off-site parking and hotel shuttles.

The center, a response to a growing number of vehicles on the terminal access roads, remains controversial because it increases the amount of walking for many travelers and requires a trip down and then up escalators to access the terminal.

Kennedy said some improvements to the Ground Transportation Center are under consideration, including the addition of canopies and heaters to protect travelers from the weather.

Meanwhile, a long-term solution to the roadway congestion problem may be to alter the roads into and out of the airport - something that the master plan will likely consider.

Other proposed improvements included in the current master plan were not implemented at all, including the construction of a new hotel and office complex to replace the Sheraton Hotel, which is on airport grounds.

With so much new hotel construction near the airport and throughout the region, Kennedy said replacing the Sheraton may not be necessary.

The current master plan also calls for the relocation of the airport's U.S. Customs facility, which is at the end of Concourse A.

The airport recently announced plans to upgrade the customs area, in the wake of new international flights from Wow Air and Icelandair. Kennedy said longer-term improvements, including possibly moving customs, may be studied, as well.

Related: Cleveland Hopkins airport renovations customs area in advance of new Iceland flights

Related: Cleveland Hopkins airport passenger traffic grows 8.5 percent in 2017, surpasses United hub yearsCLEVELAND, Ohio - Airport Director Robert Kennedy is predicting continued strong growth in passenger traffic at Cleveland Hopkins - including the possible addition of a third flight to Europe.

In a lengthy interview last month, Kennedy said Cleveland is on the short list for a new route to mainland Europe. Airport officials have had numerous conversations with the carrier, which he declined to name.

If it comes to pass, it would be the third flight to Europe announced during Kennedy's short tenure, adding to two new routes to Reykjavik, Iceland, which start in May.

Kennedy, who recently marked his one-year anniversary in Cleveland, credits the airport's air-service development team for the recent success in passenger growth. The airport announced last month that passenger numbers for 2017 exceeded the number of travelers in the years before United Airlines closed its hub in Cleveland in 2014.

The airport welcomed 9.14 million passengers in 2017, up from 8.42 million the year before and a small increase over the 9.07 million travelers that passed through Cleveland Hopkins in 2013, the last year of United's hub.

Related: Cleveland Hopkins airport passenger traffic grows 8.5 percent in 2017, surpasses United hub years

Said Kennedy: "If I had been here in 2014, and you would have told me that in three years we would surpass our traffic from the hub days, I wouldn't have taken that bet."

And he anticipates more to come: "There are a couple of destinations we're talking about that I cannot mention. It's going to depend on aircraft delivery to the carriers."

Among the routes most coveted by Clevelanders: nonstop service to Salt Lake City; year-round, daily service to Seattle; and of course, additional service to Europe, to supplement new flights to Reykjavik on Icelandair and Wow Air.

Kennedy, a former executive at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson airport, compared the competition among North American airports for new European routes to the heated contest for Amazon's second headquarters: "You've got hundreds of airports that want that finite resource."

In Atlanta, he said, he took part in perhaps 350 pitches for new service and "was successful in maybe 25."

"You get a lot of No's," he said. "You want to be the tortoise in the race."

Kennedy disputed a news report from last fall that he abruptly cleared out his office and walked off the job in October. He said he plans to stick around Cleveland for a while.

"I love it here. My wife loves it here. We are committed to Cleveland," said Kennedy, 65, who recently bought a house in the city's Kamm's Corner neighborhood. "I always live near the airport in case I need to get there fast."

Joe Roman, president of the Greater Cleveland Partnership, has worked with Kennedy over the past year and praised his focus.

"A direct connection to Europe is a top goal," said Roman, and Kennedy's background may help achieve it. "His ability to work with airlines as we grow the airport - it's just what we needed at the right time. He's brought a different skill set to the airport that I think was timely. We're starting to see the benefits of that."

In addition to new air service, Kennedy said his emphasis in Cleveland has been on improving customer service at the airport. Early in his tenure, he created a "landside operations team," focused on improving the passenger experience from airport arrival to security.

Among that team's achievements: a new TSA monitoring system that allows travelers to check on security wait times from home (see clevelandairport.com), water-bottle filling stations throughout the airport, and a Mother's Room for nursing women.

The airport's customer-service scores, as measured by quarterly Airport Service Quality surveys, have increased to their highest level for the past three quarters, according to the airport.

Admittedly, though, work remains to be done. In a J.D. Power survey of customer satisfaction in 2017, Cleveland Hopkins ranked second-to-last among airports of similar size - up from dead last the year before.

In addition, the airport's new Ground Transportation Center remains controversial with some travelers, who object to the longer walk to the terminal after being dropped off by hotel and off-site parking shuttles.

Kennedy said he is hoping to improve the transportation center, by adding new canopies, heaters and widening the walkways.

The airport is also in the early stages of updating its master plan, which could recommend significant capital improvements.

Related: Cleveland Hopkins to update master plan in wake of dramatic changes at airport

Related: Cleveland Hopkins charges airlines among the highest fees of U.S. airportsRelated US says Syria may be developing new types of chemical weapons

Syria on Saturday denied recent accusations by the United States that it had used chemical weapons on opposition forces near the capital Damascus, shrugging them off as "lies."

"The foreign ministry condemns the false claims by the United States that the Syrian government used chemical weapons in Eastern Ghouta," a foreign ministry source said, cited by Syrian state news agency SANA.

Eastern Ghouta is a rebel-controlled enclave adjacent to Damascus.

On Friday, US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis told reporters his government was concerned sarin gas may have been recently used in Syria.

The Pentagon chief cited reports from NGOs and rebel groups in the battlefield who say the toxic gas has been used, although he stressed that the United States currently has no proof to support those accusations.

Syria's foreign ministry seized on his comments, saying even the US acknowledged their own statements were "not based on evidence".

"Claims that the Syrian state used chlorine gas one moment and sarin gas the next prove that these are nothing more than lies," the statement said.

"These are lies based on stories from America's so-called partners on the ground."

Last month, 21 people were treated for respiratory problems after rockets were fired on the rebel bastion of Eastern Ghouta outside Damascus.

Syria has staunchly denied the claims, pointing to its 2013 handover of its chemical stores as part of a deal between the United States and Russia.

That agreement came after accusations that Damascus used sarin gas on Eastern Ghouta in August 2013.

But the United Nations found that Syrian government forces were responsible for chlorine attacks in Syria in 2014 and 2015, as well as sarin use in 2017.

The April 2017 attack on Khan Sheikhun left scores dead and prompted the US to fire 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles at a Syrian air field.

On Thursday, senior US administration officials said Washington was not ruling out fresh military action in the wake of new suspected attacks.

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King Abdullah II of Jordan said Sunday that the United States remains essential to any hope of a peaceful solution between Israel and the Palestinians, despite widespread criticism of the new US stance on Jerusalem.

"We cannot have a peace process or a peace solution without the role of the United States," the monarch said on the CNN program "Fareed Zakaria GPS."

This was true even after President Donald Trump decided to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv -- where nearly every other country has its embassy -- to Jerusalem, he said.

In December, Jordan had called Trump's move "a violation of decisions of international law and the United Nations charter," and Abdullah re-iterated his concerns to Vice President Mike Pence who visited the Middle East last month.

And Abdullah noted on Sunday that Trump's decision had "created a backlash" by leaving Palestinians feeling "that there isn't an honest broker."

But, he added, "I'd like to reserve judgment, because we're still waiting for the Americans to come out with their (peace) plan."

Trump's decision was warmly embraced by Israel but widely decried around the world, sparking outrage and protests from Arabs and Muslims.

Arabs and Muslims

Palestinians claim East Jerusalem as the capital of an eventual Palestinian state and had hoped that peace talks might someday bring international recognition of that status.

"I think we have to give the Americans the benefit of the doubt and all work together" once the White House issues a peace plan, Abdullah said, while adding that "if it is not a good plan ... I don't think we've got a Plan B at this stage."

The United States has long seen Jordan as a source of moderation and stability in the region.

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archiveAfghanistan's long-delayed parliamentary and local council elections scheduled for July this year may have to be pushed back for another three months, an election commissioner said on Sunday citing organisational challenges.

The parliamentary polls, originally scheduled for July 2015, are seen as dry run for a presidential election in mid-2019 and a test of the progress made by Afghanistan's Western-backed government towards establishing durable democratic institutions.

"We are ready to hold the elections with two or three months' delay, but the security agencies must tell us whether they are ready," Wasima Badghisi, deputy head of operations at the Independent Election Commission told Reuters.

The problems in organising the parliamentary vote underline the fragility of the political institutions created in Afghanistan since a US-led campaign brought down the Taliban in 2001.

International donor countries have laid heavy emphasis on the need for successful elections this year following a contentious presidential election in 2014 that was marred by allegations of massive voter fraud on both sides.

Referring to organisational problems, Badghisi said the appointment of a new member of the election commission had taken a lot of time, she also cited budget problems and insecurity.

Afghanistan has held two parliamentary elections since the end of Taliban rule, the first in 2005 and the second in 2010.

The five-year term of the parliament elected in 2010 was meant to expire in June 2015, but elections were postponed because of security fears and disagreements on how to ensure a fair vote after the bitterly disputed presidential election in 2014.

The current assembly is operating under a 2015 decree issued by President Ashraf Ghani extending parliaments mandate until a vote could be held, a decision criticised by many Afghans who questioned whether the extension was legal.

District council elections have never been held, despite being mandated in the 2004 constitution.

Late last year, officials from international partners including the United Nations told the government that even under the most favourable conditions, the earliest date on which an election could feasibly be held was October 2018.

Many Western diplomats believe even that date is impossible.

If not ready by autumn this year, Afghanistan's mountainous terrain, bad roads and lack of security mean that registering voters and setting up balloting stations are likely to face severe delays over the winter, pushing the election into 2019.

The 2014 presidential election produced no agreed winner and led to a US-brokered deal which saw former rivals Ghani and Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah forced into an uneasy coalition that has struggled to win popular support.

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DERBY  As part of a monthly food collection in collaboration between the City of Derby and St. Vincent DePaul Food Bank, residents are asked to donate pasta this February.

Each month, the food bank tells Derby City Hall what food is in short supply. This monthly collection started in Dec. 2015.Contributed Photo / Contributed Photo

STAMFORD  On this day nine years ago, the Stamford police force lost an officer who spent 10 years on the job.

Marcia Lynn Stella, 32, died on Feb. 3, 2008, from injuries she sustained four years prior breaking up a fight at a high school.NORWALK, Conn.  Every time Robert Deluca of Westport thinks of the ocean, he thinks of his father.

The two loved to scuba dive together, and Delucas father had a passion for all things related to the sea.

So when his father passed, Deluca didnt think a traditional burial was fitting. Instead, he went online in search of something special. Thats how he discovered Eternal Reefs, a company that incorporates cremated remains into structures designed for coral reefs to grow over. His father is now part of a reef off the shore of Florida, between Miami and Fort Lauderdale.

Its just beautiful, because its so much better than a regular cemetery, Deluca said. When you drive past a regular cemetery, you think, what a waste. But with a reef, its great  youre creating something new, something alive. Its a great way to remember loved ones.

He has already made arrangements in his will to do the same with his body after he dies.

More and more, people are prearranging their own funerals and moving away from traditional burials, funeral directors throughout Fairfield County told the Hearst Connecticut Media Group.

People want to find more personal meaning in their funerals, said Rebecca Lautenslager, funeral director of Shaughnessey Banks Funeral Home in Fairfield. I think its just part of society now. Everything is tailored to be unique to each person, which is a good thing.

The number of burials, which had long been the most common type of funeral in Connecticut, fell behind the states number of cremations in 2014, according to statistics from the National Funeral Directors Association. As of 2018, 58 percent of dead bodies in the state are cremated. And funeral directors only see that trend rising  the NFDA projects that 80 percent of dead bodies in Connecticut will be cremated by 2030. The Connecticut Department of Public Health has already reported seeing the number of funeral homes licensed to provide cremation services rise over the past few years.

With the rise of cremations came the rise of the question of what exactly to do with those cremains.

While a burial necessitates a plot and a casket, a cremation opens both to deliberation. A casket can be rented to show the body before the cremation for considerably less than the $2,000 the Federal Trade Commission estimates to be the cost of an average casket, but the step can also be skipped all together.

And while a plot eventually works out to be cheaper for urns than caskets (three urns are allowed per plot, according to John Lesko, the director of the Hoyt-Cognetta Funeral Home in Norwalk), the decision of whether or not to inter often comes down to religion. Hinduism embraces cremation and families often scatter ashes in a meaningful location, while the Catholic Church maintains that cremains should be kept together and placed in a grave or a tomb. Cremation is off-limits to Orthodox Jews altogether.

A changing society has also impacted decisions to purchase plots. As Gary Miraldi pointed out, You have no idea where your kids are going to be ... will your kids really visit it like we used to? Also, with population growth, theres less free land.

If not in a cemetery, then where? Miraldi has been designing jewelry in Connecticut for 36 years, and his work has unexpectedly led him to grapple with the question.

Over two decades ago, a customer who had lost a son in a car accident came to him with what was then an unusual request. The person wanted to create a piece with the ashes that didnt seem religious, and Miraldi was able to help.

Since then, objects incorporating peoples ashes  known as keepsakes  have become a significant part of Miraldis business, A Soul to Heart.

Its more acceptable, he said. Jewelry remains a common choice, but he once inserted ashes into a Disney Service Award and has also turned a microphone into a keepsake memorializing a karaoke-loving mother.

You try to give them what they want that makes them connected to the person they lost, he said.

At Nicholas F. Cognetta Funeral Home in Stamford, Crematory Manager Anthony Notaro opened a case of urns ranging from the classic to the unconventional.

Those are actual Harley Davidson parts, Notaro explained of an urn that resembled industrial tongs with drums on either end. The transmission pan and pistons. And inside the transmission pan can go cremated remains.

Other options at the funeral home included an organically shaped vessel made of corn starch, salt and non-toxic glues, designed to dissolve in water for a burial at sea, and a metal rose which could unscrew to hold ashes within the stigma.

The funeral home is one of only four in the state that has its own crematory on the premises and has witnessed cremations rise in popularity. Lesko said that now many people are surprised by all of the options. We ask: What would you like to do? Merchandise evolved for cremation out of the needs of people and what theyd like to have.

But many, like Deluca, have already decided on the ritual that means the most to them. Dolly Curtis of Easton said that when her husband passes away, her family plans to cremate his body and incorporate it into one of her sons works of handblown glass.

It would just be the natural thing to do for his dad, she said. I wouldnt think of anything else.WESTPORT  Famous cartoonist Mort Walker was laid to rest Saturday in Westport.

Walker died peacefully at home due to complications from the flu on Jan. 27. He was 94.

The funeral procession for Walker made its way to Willowbrook Cemetery in Westport on Saturday. Walker was a World War II veteran who satirized the Army in newspaper comics that shows the antics of lazy private Beetle Bailey.

Walker was born Addison Morton Walker on Sept. 3, 1923, in El Dorado, Kansas. He aspired to be a cartoonist from a very young age, an obituary for him said. In his autobiography, Walker said he felt as if he was born into his comic profession.

From my first breath, all I ever wanted to be was a cartoonist, Walker wrote in the autobiography.

At the age of 10, Walker drew cartoons for his school newspaper. At the age of 11, he sold his first comic strip. At 13, his first comic strip, The Limejuicers, ran in the Kansas City Journal. And by 15, Walker was selling magazine cartoons all over the country.

Walkers started his first full-time art job as a Hallmark greeting card designer while he went to Kansas City Junior College.

From 1942 to 1946, Walker served in the Army in Naples, Italy, where he advanced from a private to a first lieutenant. During his time in the war, he kept an illustrated diary. He would later say some of the people he met along the way inspired his Beetle Bailey characters.

After the war, Walker went to the University of Missouri. He graduated in 1948 with a humanities degree.

On Sept. 4, 1950, Walkers Beetle Bailey comic made its debut. It initially ran in 12 newspapers.

In 1974, Walker founded the Museum of Cartoon Art in Greenwich. The museum was later moved to the Ward Castle in Rye Brook, New York. In 1996, the museum reopened as the International Museum of Cartoon Art in Boca Raton, Florida. Today, the collection is housed at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum at Ohio State University.

Walker had seven children with his first wife, the late Jean Marie Suffill.

He is survived by his second wife Catherine Walker, several children and step-children, 15 grandchildren and one great granddaughter.

The funeral arrangements were not made public.

The family requested donations be made to the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum at Ohio State University. Online condolences can be made to the family at www.gallagherfuneralhome.com.The second Sharm El-Sheikh Film Festival (SHAFF) will launch 3 March in the Red Sea city.

Organised by Noon Foundation for Arts and Culture, the festivals executive president is Gamal Zayda, and this years honorary president is Egyptian actress Laila Elwy, in recognition of her career and contributions to Egyptian cinema.

Running for seven days, the festival promises a programme of feature length films, short films, in addition to special events, seminars, and talks with directors. SHAFF also aims to become a platform for filmmakers by linking them with industry professionals.

Director of Photography Kamal Abdel Aziz will deliver a master class in digital filmmaking, focusing on new trends in digital cinematography and the new digital cinema age using DSLRs and mirrorless cameras with new and different lighting techniques, the press release cites.

On 8 March, the festival will hold a special celebration for International Womens Day, with a seminar titled Women & Cinema led by Sana Hashem, professor at the Institute of Cinema.

One of this years honorees is renowned director Ali Badrakhan, with screenings of four of his films.

A documentary on Badrakhans career will be screened and critic Kamal Ramzi will discuss the directors filmography.

The festival will also spotlight late director Youssef Chahine, commemorating 10 years since his death, by screening three of his best known films.

Actor Hassan Hosni and actress Layla Taher will be honoured for their artistic careers.

A special focus will be given to American independent cinema starting in the early 1900s, and the festival will honour an American star that is yet to be announced.

A press conference 19 February will announce further details about SHAFF's programme and participating films.

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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Two studies from the US, that bombarded rats and mice with cellphone radiation found a weak link to some heart tumors, but some scientists say dont worry  it is safe to use your device. They still do.

Previous studies of cellphone users had found little reason for concern, but the newest research took a closer look at the effects of super-high doses in animals to address some lingering questions that could not be tested on humans.

The rat study released Friday found a small increase in an unusual type of heart tumor in male rats, but there were no significant problems in female rats or in a separate study of mice. In particular, scientists could not find hard evidence for concern about brain tumors.

The lead author of the research, John Bucher of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, is not changing his cellphone use or advising his family to.

I am actually holding my cellphone up to my ear, Dr. Otis Brawley, the American Cancer Societys chief medical officer, said in an interview after reading the studies.

The rodent studies do not reflect real-life cellphone use, he cautioned.

These draft reports are bound to create a lot of concern, but in fact they wont change what I tell people. The evidence for an association between cellphones and cancer is weak. And so far, we have not seen a higher cancer risk in people. But if youre concerned about this animal data, wear an earpiece.

The findings about the rare nerve-tissue tumor discovered in the hearts of male rats do not translate directly into a concern for humans, Bucher stressed.

Buchers agency conducted the $25 million study at the behest of the Food and Drug Administration, which quickly said cellphones are safe.

The current safety limits for cellphones are acceptable for protecting the public health, FDA radiation health chief Dr. Jeffrey Shuren said in a statement .

Bucher said typical cellphone use is very, very, very much lower than what we studied.

Rats and mice were bombarded for nine hours a day for up to two years with a radiation level so high that humans would only experience it briefly, such as when a phone with a weak signal expends more energy searching for a stronger one, Bucher said at a news conference.

At best it might be a weak carcinogen. ... if in fact it is a carcinogen, he said.

Confusingly, the radiated rats somehow lived longer than comparison rats that were not exposed to cellphone radiation. Bucher said that could be just chance, or it could be that the radiation reduced inflammation in the rats, which in turn decreased the risk of a rat disease.

The toxicology program released preliminary results two years ago and finalized them Friday. The earlier report showed a hint of increased brain tumors in male rats, but the final results did not bear that out.

The new rat study found what it called equivocal evidence for increases in DNA damage, brain tumors and a few other cancers, but it was not clear that it was related to the cellphones.

Evidence of DNA damage was seen in some tissues of some animals, but we dont feel we have evidence to comment on the biological significance, Bucher said.

Still, it was surprising that the rodents did experience a variety of other effects, even if they were not at high enough levels to be considered significant and possibly linked, said Leeka Kheifets, an epidemiology professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a former head of radiation studies for the World Health Organization.

There is some concern that there is so much activity going on, she said, also speaking from a cellphone. But its not like the sky is falling, a huge effect. Definitely not.

The findings failed to reassure longtime critics of cellphone radiation, such as David Carpenter, head of environmental health at the State University of New York in Albany. Carpenter said the studies were not large enough to uncover some rare problems and that the claim of equivocal findings about brain tumors cannot be dismissed.

Its not anywhere near as dangerous as cigarettes, but is there a real hazard from excessive use? Yes, Carpenter said from a landline.

In 2011, a working group of the International Agency for Research on Cancer said cellphones are possibly carcinogenic. But numerous studies over the years, before and after that listing, have found little evidence of a problem.

Among the largest studies, a 2010 analysis in 13 countries found little or no risk of brain tumors, with a possible link in the heaviest users that the studys authors found inconclusive. And a large Danish study that linked phone bills to a cancer registry found no risk even from more than 13 years of cellphone use, according to the latest update in 2007.

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Last weekend I, along with many around the world, commemorated Holocaust Memorial Day. As editor of the countrys leading Jewish newspaper, The Jewish Chronicle, it is a memorial of particular significance.

Through editing the newspaper, I am confronted daily with the legacy of that unique evil, including the suppression of debate, the distortion of truth and even the burning of books at the heart of that terrible chapter in our history.

I know, too, that the Third Reichs totalitarian impulse  that only one type of question and one type of answer are legitimate, and all else must be extinguished  is far from unique because repressive regimes the world over continue to ban freedom of enquiry and freedom of expression.

We must be on our guard.

If we close our minds to ideas that upset us, the long-term consequence is that our minds will atrophy. We will no longer be able to think for ourselves, writes Stephen Pollard (photograph of Hitler Youth members burning books, dated 1938)

You might wonder, then, what Friday nights attack on Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg as he attempted to give a talk to students has to do with this. Or last weeks decision  now reversed in the face of near-universal outrage  by Manchester Art Gallery to remove a pre-Raphaelite painting featuring mild nudity, Hylas And The Nymphs.

These are both an attempt to silence a view because it offends some people. It is for good reason that a new word entered the Oxford English Dictionary last month: a snowflake is an overly sensitive or easily offended person.

When the snowflake generation seeks to silence an MP because they disagree with him, or prompt an art gallery to remove a painting because someone might be offended by the nude depiction of a woman, they believe they have right and morality on their side.

But theirs is a dangerous delusion. Because free speech  and the offence which can come with it  is the bedrock of freedom itself.

The snowflakes are becoming an avalanche. Barely a week now passes without a fresh demand that they be protected from some form of supposedly offensive behaviour in the name of morality and decency.

The snowflakes are becoming an avalanche. Barely a week now passes without a fresh demand that they be protected from some form of supposedly offensive behaviour in the name of morality and decency (stock image)

We are now witnessing our own version of Newspeak, in which a form of cultural fascism masquerades as caring concern. Last month, for example, Netflix started to show the 1990s sitcom Friends. You might think it is a harmless piece of nostalgic escapism. But according to some people, it is in fact a disgusting litany of racism, sexism, homophobia and, yes, transphobia.

Ross didnt like the idea of his son playing with dolls  sexist. Monica was fat shamed  sexist. Chandler called his drag-queen father by his male birth name  transphobic. And the main characters were all white  racist.

Often the offence taken isnt even theirs. They are, as it were, offended vicariously.

In 2015, students at the University of East Anglia banned a Mexican restaurant from handing out sombreros at the Freshers Fair because it was a form of cultural appropriation that caused offence to Mexicans.

Not, of course, that any Mexicans had actually been offended. The snowflake students were offended on their behalf. This is of a piece with the insistence in recent years that university campuses be safe spaces, where students should be protected from the traumatic risk of encountering anything with which they might disagree or take offence. And this isnt just about student politics. It is affecting academia itself.

We should remember how in his novel 1984, George Orwell coined the word Newspeak to describe the language used by a totalitarian state that removed the capacity for individual thought and turned words meanings on their head (stock image)

Last year it was revealed that some Cambridge University lecturers had started issuing trigger warnings about Shakespeare plays, in case students were upset by discussion of sexual violence. And theology students at Glasgow University received warnings before watching re-enactments of the Crucifixion in films, during a lecture on how Jesus had been depicted on screen.

Still more ludicrously, at last years National Union of Students Womens Conference, attendees were asked to use jazz hands instead of clapping. As the NUS Womens Campaign put it: Some delegates are requesting that we move to jazz hands rather than clapping, as its triggering anxiety. Please be mindful!

God help the poor anxious souls if they ever go to the theatre or a concert.

But there is a far darker side to it than mere idiocy. If we close our minds to ideas that upset us, the long-term consequence is that our minds will atrophy. We will no longer be able to think for ourselves.

We are seeing the stunting of debate, the closing of minds.

Take the furore over seminars held by Nigel Biggar, Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at Oxford, an expert in his field, who has suggested there might have been some positives to the British Empire.

Demands that only one form of thought is permitted, and that anything which deviates from it is offensive and should be banned, are profoundly dangerous. They pretend to be about care and concern, but are in reality a form of intellectual totalitarianism (stock image)

For doing precisely what academics are supposed to do  thinking  he has been attacked in a series of open letters as an apologist for colonialism.

So it was right that the Vice Chancellor of Oxford University, Professor Louise Richardson, should spell out why free speech and thought are so vital on campus.

In a talk, Prof Richardson said she had had many conversations with students who were upset they had tutors who expressed a view with which they disagreed, on homosexuality. And I say, Im sorry, but my job isnt to make you feel comfortable. Education is not about being comfortable. Im interested in making you uncomfortable. If you dont like his views, you challenge them, engage with them, and figure [out] how a smart person can have views like that. Work out how you can persuade him to change his mind.

You can guess what happened next. The students union offered emotional support to anyone who had been made uncomfortable by her words. More than 2,000 students attacked her in a vitriolic open letter. And Prof Richardson then issued a clarifying statement.

We should remember how in his novel 1984, George Orwell coined the word Newspeak to describe the language used by a totalitarian state that removed the capacity for individual thought and turned words meanings on their head.

In Orwells dystopian world, The Party used slogans such as War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, and Ignorance is Strength.

Satire  yes. But a warning, also.

Demands that only one form of thought is permitted, and that anything which deviates from it is offensive and should be banned, are profoundly dangerous. They pretend to be about care and concern, but are in reality a form of intellectual totalitarianism.

Without offence and without upset, there is tyranny.Just like its furniture, IKEA's catalogue is a familiar staple of homes all over the UK.

But a new BBC documentary reveals that the colourful brochure filled the most aspirational of affordable furniture is even more ubiquitous than we thought - so much so that it's distributed more broadly than the Bible or the Quran.

Flatpack Empire lifts the lid on the colossal, nine-month long, multi-million pound effort that goes into producing the annual IKEA catalogue - and the workaholic woman at the centre of it all.

The furniture giant's creative designer, Sara Blomquist, spends the majority of her year lovingly crafting a concept that will showcase IKEA's products to perfection - and most crucially of all - impress the notoriously tough-to-please 'catalogue council', whose approval she needs in order to send the brochure to print.

The show, which goes behind the scenes at the famously secretive Swedish furniture giant - founded in 1943 by the late Ingvar Kamprad, who died last month at the age of 91 - for the first time, reveals how 203 million copies of the IKEA catalogue are printed in 35 different languages each year.

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Creative Designer Sara Blomquist spends nine months putting together the IKEA catalogue which costs hundreds of millions to make

Sara makes a plea to include people of the cover of the 2018 IKEA catalogue - which is the largest publication in the world - but her idea is rejected

Ikea founder Ingvar Kamprad, described as 'one of the greatest entrepreneurs of the 20th century', passed away recently aged 91

Last year nearly 800 million people in 49 countries visited IKEA stores, yielding turnover in excess of 33billion. In Britain alone, just 19 stores contributed 1.8billion to the overall figure.

The importance of the catalogue - the publication of which always leads to a bump in profits - cannot be over-stated.

The scale of the catalogue's reach and influence perhaps go some way towards explaining the staggering numbers involved in the process behind it.

The photo studio for shooting the colourful images, for example, is one of the biggest in Europe, covering a whopping 8,000sqm in IKEA's home town, Almhult.

It's here where Sara Blomquist spends her time building sets using all IKEA furniture; from sofas and tables to lamps, fake plants, cushions, book cases and everything else available at the Swedish store.

There are even tricks to making the set looked lived in - an important factor in selecting the final images that will make it into the catalogue.

The team is seen artfully roughening up the rug by pulling at the threads, and they don't use fresh flowers when dressing the set.

For the 2018 catalogue, Sara hits on a concept of 'people make IKEA', and sets her heart on casting a 'family' to bring the sets she builds to life.

Men, women, children and babies spend hours on set making themselves at home as the photographer snaps away, all overseen by Sara.

But her vision ultimately has to win over the tough crowd of senior managers making up the catalogue 'council', who rarely like to see people featuring on the cover.

Ahead of a final decision on the 2018 lookbook, Sara recalls how the previous year she was sent back to the drawing board to re-shoot a cover, when her suggestion was rejected.

This time, she's keen to get her own vision realised - but admits she's prepared too options for bosses; her preferred option with people, and one without.

'I would fight for anything that is important,' she says.

'This council meeting is like a hen house sometimes, it is total chaos. To actually get them to agree on things you have to be very persuasive,' she adds.

Although Sara didn't get her wish of having people on the cover of the catalogue, her hard work didn't totally go to waste

The BBC documentary 'Flatpack Empire' explores behind-the-scenes of the furniture company for the first time ever

WHAT IS THE STORY BEHIND IKEA? Ikea founder Ingvar Kamprad, described as 'one of the greatest entrepreneurs of the 20th century', passed away recently aged 91 The company is run jointly by Mr Ingvar Kamprad's three sons: Peter, 44, Jonas, 41, and Mathias, 39. The three brothers are co-owners of Ikano - the company that manages the family fortune and runs several Ikea stores. Peter also serves as chairman of Ikano. Mathias is chairman of Inter IKEA Holding, which owns the retailer's brand and intellectual property. His father stepped down from the role in 2013 aged 87, Mr Kamprad recently passed away aged 91. In 2017 nearly 800 million people in 49 countries visited IKEA stores - it has a turnover of over 33 billion. Of that total 19 stores in Britain contributed 1.8bn to the sales. Its photo studio for shooting the iconic catalogue images is one of the biggest in Europe: a whopping 8,000sqm. 203m copies of the famous IKEA catalogue are printed in 35 different languages, making it the largest publication in the world. More copies are printed than the Bible of Quran. The design office is a fully functioning factory of 4,000sqm filled with prototypes. Just one per cent of prototypes made by designers end up in stores. All prototypes have to be tested according to the 52 countries it will be sold in. Meatball sales helped Ikea make 1.7billion from catering in 2017 making them the tenth largest food retailer in the world - they sell one billion meatballs globally every year. IKEA are one of the worlds biggest consumers of wood, using 1 per cent of the worlds commercial wood supply each year. Estimates suggest this is equivalent to 70 million trees. Source: BBC and This is Money Advertisement

She adds: 'Even though [the models] are covering the furniture, I hope we arent going to end up with a cover showing a beautiful empty room without people because that would be such a failure.'

The cameras follow the managers as they deliberate over the images, with some going so far as to pronounce the presence of the people on the cover as 'disturbing'.

One female member of the council, says: 'Whenever its not clear, if I have to look twice then I am getting disturbed... if it is not clear and I have to look twice it disturbs me personally.

Referring to a cushion in one photo the woman adds: 'The second one is this pencil cushion, you cant even realise what it is, that as a consumer - it disturbs me.'

Sara's attempts to talk the council round fall on deaf ears, as her idea is rejected in favour of a shot of a pink room entirely devoid of people.

'For me its a generic solution. Thats not as interesting as it could be,' says Sara, who

'Of course I am a little bit disappointed. I wanted to have more life in this picture.'

The familiar blue and yellow colours of IKEA are worn by the staff who are a dedicated, almost cult-like bunch who love the Swedish company

Undeterred, Sara sets about imagining her 2019 vision.

'I have no idea if there will be people on the front cover next year,' she says.

'We will all fight for it and I will be part of that fight. We believe that we have to have an emotional connection with the world. We want to be just more than a furniture dealer and I think that is the most important message of all.'

The finished product is seen arriving on the shop floor at the end of the show, and staff are asked to give their verdict on the much discussed cover.

Some shoppers say they'd like to have seen people, or pets, because 'everyone loves animals'.

One Warrington store manager jokes that the spartan house on the cover 'looks like its been burgled'.

The three-part Flatpack Empire documentary begins Tuesday 6 February on BBC One at 9pmBillie Piper has slammed agents for subjecting their clients to 'sanctioned pimping' in light of the sexual harassment scandal in Hollywood - but voiced suspicion of the #MeToo movement.

Speaking about the abuse of power in the showbiz industry, the actress, 35, said the behaviour of agents who knew 'full well what's going on' was 'really sickening'.

But the mother-of-two said she has reservations about the 'whole sisterhood thing', arguing that the 'oversexed' images posted by women on social media 'doesn't feel like feminism' to her.

She said women can be 'very judgy and competitive' - especially on social media - 'under the guise of being all supportive'.

Piper also said she knows 'a lot of headstrong actors and actresses wanting to get something who wouldn't say they're victims' of abuse.

Billie Piper, 35, has slammed the 'sanctioned pimping' of stars by their agents, who she describes as 'knowing full well what's going on'

Speaking to The Sunday Times's Style Magazine about the #MeToo movement, Billie said: 'I find the abuse of power really upsetting, but if I'm honest, what I find really sickening is all the agents subjecting their clients to it, knowing full well what's going on. Like sanctioned pimping.'

She also referred to her struggle with what she describes as 'the oversexualised years', explaining how for a long time she wanted to hide her body in baggy clothing following the end of her pop career.

The former pop star, who struggled with an eating disorder aged 16, also described how she struggled following 'the oversexualised years' of her pop career.

'I think that's why, for so long, my desire to hide my body in baggy clothes took hold,' she explained.

During the interview, Billie revealed that she had her doubts about the 'whole sisterhood thing' on social media.

The former pop star (pictured in 2000) also described how she wanted to hide her body in 'baggy clothes' following 'the oversexualised years'

Billie famously married Chris Evans in secret when aged 18 back in 2001, with a 16-year age gap between them. The pair are pictured here in 2004

She commented: 'A lot of social media is about women looking really oversexed. That doesn't feel like feminism to me.'

The actress broke into the showbiz industry when she was just a teenager, signing her first recording contract at the age of just 15.

She famously married Chris Evans in secret when aged 18 back in 2001, with the 16-year age gap between the pair sparking controversy.

The couple divorced three years later in 2004, with Billie later marrying actor Laurence Fox, with whom she shares sons Winston and Eugene.

Billie and Laurence announced they were separating in 2016, following seven years of marriage.

The actress is set to appear in new BBC drama Collateral, alongside Carey Mulligan and John Simm, later this month.In recent years there have been calls for brands to use models of all shapes and sizes, not just the very slim women who have always been the front of advertising campaigns and walking the runway.

But Primark has now joined more forward-thinking brands in casting a more diverse group of models to advertise their clothes - and it's winning praise from fans.

The budget retailer cast a curvy woman to model their Valentine's Day range of lingerie.

After posting an image of the model wearing a skimpy red bodysuit to Instagram, the brand was praised for using a diverse group of models, with one saying 'this is what women like to see'.

A curvy model (middle) features in Primark's advertising campaign for its Valentine's Day lingerie

The brunette model stood between two slim women also clad in Primark's new lingerie range.

Her red bodysuit costs 15 (13) from the US store and features see-through mesh panels on the hip and stomach, which helped to flaunt the model's curves.

The risque photos have been called 'beautiful' by fans who said they wanted to see more diversity in adverts.

One commented: 'Thank you for using normal-sized women to model, She's a beauty!'

Primark's followers praised the photos, with many congratulating the brand for using a 'diverse' group of models

'Beautiful curvy model. Fab Primark just shows all sizes are beautiful,' another posted

A third wrote: '10 stars for using a curvy model Primark!'

'Claps for Primark for that stunning model, well done,' a fourth agreed.

Primark came under fire earlier this week when a woman claimed that she'd tried on another customer's underwear while visiting the store.

The model advertises a risque 15 (13) bodysuit from the US Primark store which features mesh detailing

Natalie Brayshaw, a student from Glasgow, Scotland, discovered a bra on the shop floor that she liked and headed to the fitting rooms to try it on.

When she realised it had no price tags she asked a supervisor to help her out, only to discover that the shop didn't stock that bra and she'd actually tried on a stranger's underwear.

A spokesperson for Primark told MailOnline in a statement at the time: 'We would like to apologise to the customer for this experience. We aim to provide our customers with an enjoyable shopping environment at all times and we are sorry that we didn't on this occasion.'President Trump headed to Mar-a-Lago once again this weekend, and brought along some of the first family.

After landing in Palm Beach on Air Force One on Friday, four-year-old Joseph Kushner was snapped peering out of the plane as his grandfather Donald disembarked.

Ivanka shared the photo of the moment on Instagram Saturday, writing: 'Joseph watching Grandpa deplane Air Force One.'

Scroll down for video

Looking out: Ivanka shared this photo of her son watching his grandfather deplane in Palm Beach on Friday

Proud mama: Lara Trump also shared a photo of her son Luke on Friday (left)

Throwback: On Monday evening, Ivanka took to Instagram to share a photo of her glamorous weekend outing with Jared, in stark contrast with this morning's simple look

The photo, snapped by the Palm Beach Post, sees the little boy leaning on a chair at the edge of the plane with his little face pressed up against the window.

Meanwhile, Ivanka's sister-in-law Lara Trump also couldn't help but post a sweet snap of her little one, Luke, who was born in September.

In a flashback Friday post, Lara is seen holding up her baby son in a white onesie, standing alongside her friend Amanda Kennedy, who is toting her daughter Grace.

'Flashback to Luke already swooning over beautiful Grace!' Lara wrote in the caption.

Earlier this week, Lara was in attendance when Ivanka hosted a cozy family dinner for her siblings at her D.C. home before the group headed off to support Donald Trump at the Capitol for the State of the Union.

Ivanka, 36, shared a short and sweet video clip from the family gathering, showing the group sitting around the large wooden dining table at her home, beaming happily at the camera while the first daughter addressed her followers.

'A little family dinner before the State of the Union!' she says, while perching one-year-old son Theodore on her lap, with the whole group laughing uproariously as the young boy tried to knock over a glass with a large toy car.

All together! Ivanka and Jared Kushner hosted a family dinner at their D.C. home ahead of the State of the Union earlier this week

Gathering: Ivanka's sister Tiffany, and her brother Eric and his wife Lara were in attendance, as well as Jared, and their children Arabella and Theodore, however Donald Jr. did not attend

Naughty! At one point Theodore, who was perched on his mother's lap, tried to knock over a glass with a toy car, but he was stopped in his tracks by his aunt Tiffany

Luckily Eric spotted the youngster's plan and interrupted Ivanka's speech to point out that a glass was about to go flying, as Theodore charged the large toy towards it.

Foiled by his aunt Tiffany, 24, who grabbed the car before it could cause any damage, Theo seemed blissfully unaware of the ceremonious occasion taking place around him as he played happily.

And while the youngster happily butted into his mother's speech, Arabella could be seen sitting in front of Ivanka, looking happily at the camera while wearing a sweet sweater with a star on the front of it.

The dinner appears to have wrapped up by the time the video was filmed, with most of the places clear, and only six-year-old Arabella sitting in front of any remaining food.

But it seems that the importance of the night didn't stop the family from celebrating with a toast or two, and there are several bottles of wine on the table, as well as candles and a bouquet of flowers.

Hostess with the mostest: Ivanka and Jared left their home together, with the mother-of-three looking incredibly well put together in her $2,690 Oscar de la Renta dress

Off she goes: Despite the freezing weather, Ivanka chose to go without a coat, and appeared to have bare legs

Ready for a night out! Georgetown Law student Tiffany wore a very corporate look, opting for a white low-cut shirt which she tucked into a black belted skirt; she also carried a Gucci clutch

Glamorous: Eric and his wife Lara left their baby boy Luke at home for the evening, with the new mother looking very chic, but a little tired, in her green dress and camel coat

Ready to go! The group left together, making their way down the steps from the main entrance of Jared and Ivanka's home, and into waiting SUVs

Shortly after the clip was shared, the entire group was seen departing Ivanka's lavish Kalorama home, with both she and Tiffany daring to brave the bitter D.C. weather without coats, instead showing off their rather glamorous ensembles as they made their way into SUVs that were waiting to whisk them towards the Capitol Building - and Trump's State of the Union.

Ivanka appeared to have glammed herself up from earlier in the day, when she was seen leaving her house with almost no make-up on, and her hair pulled back from her face; this time around, she was seen wearing a chic $2,690 plaid short-sleeved dress by Oscar de la Renta, pairing the red, black, and white design with some simple black heels.

Her hair was styled in a sleek straight style around her face, and she chose to go for a more glamorous evening-appropriate beauty look, wearing visible highlighter and bronzer on her cheekbones, and adding subtle smokey shadow to her eyes.

Tiffany, meanwhile, chose a simpler, more corporate look in the form of a low-cut white shirt, which she tucked into belted black bodycon-style skirt.

She accessorized with chunky circular earrings and a pale pink quilted $790 Gucci clutch, wearing her long blonde hair in a wavy ponytail, and modeling dark eyeliner.

Excited! After arriving at the White House, Ivanka posted another video, this time showing herself urging people to tune in at 9pm

There he is! Despite not attending Ivanka's dinner, Donald Jr did find time to join his sister's video at the White House, popping up at the last minute to tell people what time to watch

Cheesy: The brother-sister duo seemed more than happy to ham it up for the cameras

Supportive: The group then sat together upon arrival at the Capitol, with Ivanka and Jared taking the front seats, while Lara and Eric sat behind them, following by Tiffany and Don Jr

Keeping busy: The family was seen chatting quietly together ahead of the event

New mother Lara, meanwhile, put on a chic show in a forest-green dress, pairing her look with a camel-colored coat - a very sensible move given the sub-zero temperatures.

She also wore a pair of strappy black heels, and left her hair in loose waves around her shoulders.

Both men in the party looked dapper in suits, with Eric wearing a dark grey, while Jared stuck with his trademark navy.

After arriving at the White House, Ivanka then recorded another video for her Instagram Story in which she urged people to tune into the event - with her brother Donald Jr, who did not attend her dinner, popping up in a rather cheesy way to tell people what time to watch.Advertisement

Killers, cannibals and lost souls haunting the streets - while London is a beautiful and diverse place, it also hides a seriously grim past.

Jack the Ripper and the lesser-known Jack the Stripper are two murderers who brutally killed women working in the city before dumping their bodies in dockyards or on the banks of the Thames.

To chronicle the capital's fascinating history, East London-based creative agency, Impero, has created Grim London, an interactive map.

It includes detailed descriptions of the murders, executions, oddities and hauntings that have swept through the streets from around the 12th century to the present day.

Like a dark version of Google Maps, the website allows you to search for your desired location by postcode or borough

Grim London, created by East London-based creative agency Impero, chronicles the murders, executions, oddities and hauntings that have swept through the capital's streets from around the 12th century to the present day

You can click on gold crosses on the screen to reveal the macabre or sordid history of each location

Like a dark version of Google Maps, the website allows you to search for your desired location by postcode or borough.

Gold crosses then appear on the screen, allowing you to click each one and discover what sinister events occurred there.

The map was originally created by Impero's team for Halloween in 2015, but its popularity allowed it to become a permanent fixture for those interested in the macabre.

Soho - renowned historically for its many brothels - and Covent Garden are home to many unpleasant episodes

Digging deeper into some of Grim London's top cases

Jack the Ripper - London's most famous killer whose identity is shrouded in mystery



The infamous serial killer is believed to have murdered at least five women - known as the 'canonical five' in the Whitechapel area of London between August and November 1888.

Despite the similarity of each injury he left on his victims, the culprit has never been found.

To this day, Jack's identity remains a mystery. At the time, police suspected the Ripper must have been a butcher, due to the way his victims were killed and the fact they were discovered near dockyards, where meat was brought into the city.

The victims were Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Jane Kelly. Each one was found in the early hours of the morning.

Nichols was discovered at around 3.40am on August 31, 1888 in Buck's Row (now Durward Street), Whitechapel. Her throat was cut twice and her lower abdomen had some incisions.

Each one of the women was found in the early hours of the morning in east London and had similar injuries. Above is a still from the 1959 film Jack The Ripper

Eddowes's body was discovered on September 30, 1888, in Mitre Square in the City of London. Her throat was cut, her abdomen was slashed open, the left kidney was removed and the major part of her uterus was removed

Chapman's body was discovered at about 6am on September 8 near a doorway in the back yard of 29 Hanbury Street, Spitalfields. Her throat was also cut twice, her abdomen was slashed open and her uterus was removed.

Stride and Eddowes' murders were referred to as a 'double event' as they were both found within an hour of each other on September 30. Stride was discovered at about 1am in Dutfield's Yard, off Berner Street (now Henriques Street) in Whitechapel. She died after her main artery on the left side of her neck was cut but had no damage to her abdomen, prompting discussion as to whether the Ripper was interrupted before mutilating her body.

Eddowes was found 45 minutes later in Mitre Square in the City of London. Her throat was cut, her abdomen was slashed open, the left kidney was removed and the major part of the uterus was removed.

Kelly's mutilated and disembowelled body was discovered at 13 Miller's Court, off Dorset Street, Spitalfields, November 9. Her throat had been severed down to the spine, the abdomen almost emptied of its organs and her heart was missing.

Jack the Stripper - Hammersmith nude murders terrified London's prostitutes in the 1960s

Jack the Stripper's victims, from left, top: Hannah Tailford, Irene Lockwood, Helen Barthelemy. Bottom, from left: Mary Fleming, Frances Brown, Bridget O'Hara

Between 1964 and 1965, six young women were found dead in west London. Their murders horrified 1960s Britain and, as all of them worked as prostitutes, were strangled and found naked, they were dubbed the Thames Nude Murders. The serial killer was dubbed Jack the Stripper, as a nod to the Ripper.

Police identikit picture of 'Jack the Stripper' murder suspect

The victims were Hannah Tailford, Irene Lockwood, Helen Barthelemy, Mary Fleming, Frances Brown and Bridget O'Hara.

It has also since been claimed that he was responsible for the deaths of Elizabeth Figg and Gwynneth Rees.

Tailford was found on February 2, 1964 on the Thames foreshore near Linden House, the clubhouse of London Corinthian Sailing Club. She was strangled, several of her teeth were missing, and her underwear had been forced down her throat.

Lockwood was found on April 8 on the foreshore of the Thames at Corney Reach, Chiswick. She had died as a result of drowning and was four months pregnant, an autopsy revealed. She also had a chest wound, thought to be a result of contact with a boat propeller, and was naked.

Barthelemy was found dead on April 24 in an alleyway near Boston Manor Road, Brentford. Four of her front teeth were missing and there were flecks of paint used in automobile manufacturing on her body.

Fleming was found on July 14 outside 48 Berrymede Road, Chiswick.

Brown was found in Hornton Street, Kensington, on November 25, just over a month after she was last seen getting into a car. She was strangled.

O'Hara was found dead on 16 February 1965 near a storage shed behind the Heron Trading Estate in Acton. She had been missing since 11 January.

In total, 120,000 people were interviewed and over 3,000 forensic samples were collected for analysis. All, however, yielded no information about the identity of the killer.

Police suspected Kenneth Archibald, who confessed to killing Lockwood before later retracting his statement, and Mungo Ireland, who worked on the Heron Trading Estate as a security guard. He later died during inquiries after poisoning himself.

Ratcliffe Highway Murders - The brutal murders of two families which led to the killer's body being paraded through London's streets

Two families were murdered during a 12-day period in December 1811, in homes half a mile apart near Wapping. The first took place at 29 Ratcliffe Highway in a house of a linen drapers (left) and the second at The King's Arms, a tavern at 81 New Gravel Lane (right)

Two families were murdered in a 12-day period in December 1811, in homes half a mile apart near Wapping.

The first took place on December 7 at 29 Ratcliffe Highway, now known as the Highway, in the living quarters behind a linen draper's shop.

The victims were Timothy Marr, his wife Celia, their 14-week-old son Timothy, and an apprentice, James Gowan.

They were found with brutal injuries in the early hours after Mr Marr's servant girl, Margaret Jewell, was sent out to purchase oysters for the couple.

John Murray, a pawnbroker and Marr's next-door neighbour, entered the house and found their bodies after Margaret was unable to get back into the house following her errand.

Twelve days later, the second set of murders occurred, at The King's Arms, a tavern at 81 New Gravel Lane (now Garnet Street).

The victims were John Williamson, who had run the tavern for 15 years, Elizabeth, his wife, and their servant, Bridget Anna Harrington.

John Williams, a lodger at The Pear Tree, a pub on nearby Cinnamon Street, was a principal suspect in the case as he was understood to have been at sea with Timothy Marr.

His roommate told police he returned home after midnight following the murders and his laundress said she noticed one of his shirts was torn and the other had blood on the collar two weeks before the death of the Williamsons.

Williams was sent to Coldbath Fields Prison in Clerkenwell, and ordered to appear in front of magistrates on December 28.

However, he was found dead in his cell that morning after hanging himself. The court later declared him responsible for the deaths of both of the families, taking his death as an evidence of guilt, and home secretary Richard Ryder said his body should be paraded through Wapping and Shadwell.

The Viaduct Tavern, St Paul's - Ghosts haunt this historic pub's dwellings

The Viaduct Tavern, located at 126 Newgate Street (site of old Newgate Prison) has been a hotbed for spooky happenings

Located opposite the Old Bailey and occupying the former site of Newgate Prison, this pub, which dates back to 1875, is believed to be haunted.

In 1996, the pub's manager was tidying the cellar when the door suddenly slammed shut and the lights went out.

He found that no matter how hard he pulled, it refused to open.

Hearing his cries his wife came and opened the door, claiming it was unlocked and easy to open.

Three years later, two electricians were working in an upstairs room when one worker felt a couple of taps on his shoulder.

Shortly after, both men apparently saw a rolled-up carpet lifted and heavily dropped back onto the floor.Modern Sydney is a bustling metropolis of five million people living and working in skyscrapers and commuting to the office by train - but it wasn't always like this.

For decades after the First Fleet landed in what is now Circular Quay, the town was a small trading port until the 1851 gold rush saw its population swell from 35,000 to 200,000 in just 20 years.

One of Sydney's oldest and best preserved areas, Miller's Point, tells the story of the city's transformation, reflected in eye-opening photos through the ages.

Now a desired historical location flooded with tourists, it was one a working class settlement home to workers on the nearby wharves, hauling in grain, wool, and other commodities.

Streets were carved out of thick stone, often with convict labour, most prominently the Argyle Cut, a 20-year project starting in 1843 which tunnelled through to connect the neighbourhood to The Rocks.

Victorian-style houses sprung up along dirt streets that were later paved and the city's tram system snaked into the area, connecting it more easily with the rest of Sydney.

Miller's Point saw a boom in the maritime trade with workers from around the world arriving for employment on the wharves as the gold rush brought more visitors and more commerce.

Many of the area's best landmarks like the Lord Nelson Hotel and the Hero of Waterloo pubs were built in this time, along with some houses that survived the changes to come.

Overlooking it all was the Sydney Observatory, built on a hill behind Argyle Street in 1858 giving panoramic views of the neighbourhood, Sydney Harbour, and the rest of the city.

Most of this view, particularly to the south, is now obscured by new houses and more recently office towers and apartment blocks - but the Sydney Harbour Bridge is clearly visible.

Trade began to slow down by the turn of the century and the area was hit hard by the plague in the 20th Century's first month, leaving 106 people dead.

The area was also outdated and unsanitary due to haphazard building and the government decided to clean it up by buying all the homes and commercial buildings.

New wharves and warehouses were built for the wool trade, and dozens of homes demolished to build new ones to make room for new streets again cut out of the cliffs.

Hundreds of workmen's flats - many of which still stand today - were constructed in terrace style to house workers and their families that laid the foundation for the area's public housing culture.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge was constructed in 1932, after many more buildings were knocked down, and the whole area changed with streets realigned.

Miller's Point was only spared widespread demolition in the 1970s after union and community action that stopped plans to raze it and build office towers, though much south of the Observatory was lost.

Finally, the wharves along Walsh Bay were in the past few years demolished to build the new Barangaroo precinct - just one more evolution of Sydney's ever-changing landscape.A prominent Islamic scholar has been charged with rape after two women accused him of assaulting them in hotel rooms in France.

Tariq Ramadan, a professor of Islamic studies at the University of Oxford, was arrested by French police on Wednesday.

He has denied the allegations and filed a complaint for slander against author Henda Ayari, one of his accusers.

Ms Ayari, 41, claims Ramadan raped her at a Paris hotel during a Muslim convention in 2012.

Tariq Ramadan, a professor of Islamic studies at the University of Oxford, has been taken into custody in Paris as part of an investigation into rape allegations

She first made the allegation in October last year as part of the #MeToo movement in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal.

She later made a formal complaint to prosecutors in Rouen, Normandy on October 20, insisting she had been too scared to speak up until now.

The divorced mother-of-three also accused the contemporary Islamic studies professor of threatening her children to stop her from going to the police.

'He choked me so hard that I thought I was going to die,' she told Le Parisien newspaper.

The other accuser is a an unnamed disabled woman also claims the academic raped her in a hotel room in Lyon in 2009.

Ramadan was remanded in custody pending a bail hearing, to be held within four days.

Accuser: Henda Ayari, 41, a feminist activist, says Ramadan raped her in a Paris hotel room during a Muslim convention in 2012

'If there are other victims in France or elsewhere, they now know that the justice system will respond to what has happened to them,' said Jonas Haddad, lawyer for feminist activist Henda Ayari, the first woman to accuse Ramadan.

Women who have testified anonymously during three months of preliminary investigations might now also file rape complaints, one of the sources said.

The married father of four has denied the accusations from the two women.

In November, Oxford University said Ramadan was taking a leave of absence from his post as professor of contemporary Islamic studies, 'by mutual agreement'.

He has also denied allegations in Swiss media of sexual misconduct against teenage girls in the 1980s and 1990s, denouncing them as 'a campaign of lies'.

Lawyers for Ramadan have accused Ayari of slander and suggested the women colluded to try to disgrace him.

As part of his defence, he has presented investigators with Facebook conversations in which a woman identified as Ayari allegedly made explicit advances towards him in 2014, two years after the alleged rape.Criminal lawyers are swapping the bright lights of Sydney for the coastal high rises of the Gold Coast ahead of the Commonwealth Games with an influx of drugs and criminal activity set to saturate the region.

The international sporting event is expected to attract as many as 700,000 spectators from around the world, which will significantly boost the local economy but will also bring a higher demand for cocaine, MDMA and ice.

Interstate legal representatives are beginning to open up branches in south-eastern Queensland to minimise travel ahead of an anticipated spike in required representation.

'Events like the Commonwealth Games and Olympic Games are always big magnet for people who like to party,' Sydney-based lawyer Ahmed Dib told the Courier Mail.

'I anticipate drug activity will increase around that time and remain very high.'

Criminal lawyers are swapping the bright lights of Sydney for the Gold Coast ahead of the Commonwealth Games as an influx of drugs is set to lead to a rapid rise in criminal behaviour

Interstate legal representatives are beginning to open up branches in south-eastern Queensland to minimise travel ahead of an anticipated spike in required representation

'Events like the Commonwealth Games and Olympic Games are always big magnet for people who like to party,' Sydney-based lawyer Ahmed Dib (pictured) said

The Gold Coast has recently seen a skyrocketing in violent crimes, with a 2016-2017 report by Queensland Police revealing a shocking 85 per cent increase in 'other homicide' crimes including attempted murder and stabbings.

The well-documented presence of bikie gangs in the area has made the picturesque coastline a hotbed of criminal activity, attracting legal officials from around Australia.

Mr Dib, of Havas and Dib Lawyers, said there was an 'abundance' of work in the region and he and his staff had grown tired of repeatedly commuting between the Gold Coast and Sydney.

He set up a four-man team directly across the road from the Gold Coast Courthouse and has represented a number of high-profile cases.

The Gold Coast has recently seen a skyrocketing in violent crimes, with a 2016-2017 report by Queensland Police revealing a shocking 85 per cent increase in 'other homicide' crimes including attempted murder and stabbing

Mr Dib, of Havas and Dib Lawyers, said there was an 'abundance' of work in the region and he and his staff had grown tired of repeatedly commuting between the Gold Coast and Sydney

One of Mr Dib's first cases was Ronnie Refalo (pictured), who was jailed for his involvement in a drug trafficking racket

One of Mr Dib's first cases was Ronnie Refalo, who was jailed for his involvement in a drug trafficking racket.

He is also providing counsel for Chris Duspara, a Commanchero-linked man accused of having a role in a large-scale cocaine syndicate.

Increased police and tactical units will invade the area over the next few months in the lead up to the Commonwealth Games, which run from the 4th till the 15th of April.Britains renowned Special Forces are under threat from controversial cuts to the Royal Marines, MPs warn today.

They fear that reducing the elite infantry corps will weaken the SAS and other Special Forces that recruit heavily from the Marines.

In a scathing verdict, the powerful Commons Defence Committee says it would be militarily illiterate to axe up to 2,000 Marines and two amphibious assault ships.

In a scathing verdict, the powerful Commons Defence Committee says it would be militarily illiterate to axe up to 2,000 Marines and two amphibious assault ships, as planned (stock image)

The cuts are understood to be under consideration as part of a major review of national military capability.

But in a new report titled Sunset For The Marines?, the cross-party Defence Committee says the plans would leave the UK unable to conduct specialised amphibious operations when every other major power was increasing such capabilities.

They single out the grave consequences for Britains vital Special Forces, which take up to 50 per cent of their recruits from the Marines.

The report says: The contribution made to UK Special Forces by the Royal Marines is indicative of the quality of the people who pass through its ranks.

The growth in the use and tasking of Special Forces in recent years makes a continuing pipeline of trained and resilient personnel vital.

Reducing the strength of the Royal Marines will substantially reduce the recruitment pool available and reduce Special Forces amphibious warfare expertise.

MPs also say that talk of major cuts will hit Marines morale and suggest they are being sacrificed by Chancellor Philip Hammonds Treasury.

New Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson is fighting the cuts.The first effects of the Republican's new tax code were felt on Friday, when changes to tax withholding tables caused some people to see more money in their paychecks.

One of those people was Julia Ketchum from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, who told the Associated Press that her check went up a total of $1.50 per week, and she was happy about it.

For some reason, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (Wisconsin) thought that was a point worth celebrating when he retweeted the article on Saturday, and wrote:

'A secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, PA said she was pleasantly suprised her pay went up $1.50 a week ... she said that will more than cover her Costco membership for the year.'

Ryan later deleted the tweet, but before he took it down, social media users had a lot to say about it, and none of it was nice.

A woman from Pennsyvlania told the Associated Press that her check went up a total of $1.50 per week, due to the GOP's tax reform; Paul Ryan saw this, tweeted it, and Twitter freaked out

Ryan tweeted, but later deleted: 'A secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, PA said she was pleasantly suprised her pay went up $1.50 a week ... she said that will more than cover her Costco membership for the year'

US Representative from California Eric Swalwell asked Ryan over Twitter if Ketchum had all the facts.

He wrote, apparently addressing the Speaker:

'Did you tell her how much the paychecks of the 1 percent went up a week? Or that hers could have gone up a lot more if you had given them a lot less?'

Some people on Twitter couldn't believe that Ryan actually meant what he said, when he hit the send button on that tweet at 11.51 am Eastern on Saturday.

'This isn't a typo?' wrote Andrew Kaczynski, a reporter with CNN's KFile.

Colorado-based scientist Phil Plait shared a similar sentiment, asking, apparently sarcastically, 'This is a parody account, right? right?'

Brian Schatz, a US Senator from Hawaii, shared his opinion of the answer to that question.

'That tweet about the $1.50 a week is not a PR mistake,' Schatz wrote. 'It is really what they [Republicans] think.'

Some people on Twitter couldn't believe that Ryan actually meant what he said, when he hit the send button on that tweet at 11.51 am Eastern on Saturday; Ryan is seen here in Washington, DC on January 30

'This isn't a typo?' wrote Andrew Kaczynski, a reporter with CNN's KFile

Colorado-based scientist Phil Plait shared a similar sentiment, asking, apparently sarcastically, 'This is a parody account, right? right?'

'That tweet about the $1.50 a week is not a PR mistake,' Brian Schatz, US Senator from Hawaii, wrote; 'It is really what they [Republicans] think'

AmpliFire News editor Jordan Uhl responded with plain shock, writing:

'Republicans are proud of themselves for [checks notecard....adjusts glasses....squints] someone making 21 cents more a day?'

When Uhl noticed the tweet was no longer posted, he called Ryan out in the thread, saying: 'He deleted it, like a goddamn coward.'

Other users, like Cullen Crawford, took the opportunity to poke fun at the Speaker of the House.

The writer for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert posted a meme of Montgomery Burns, the notoriously frugal power plant owner from the animated sitcom, The Simpsons, telling his employee's daughter, Lisa Simpson, 'Oh, don't pooh-pooh a nickel, Lisa.'

Cullen wrote with the meme, 'We go now to @SpeakerRyan.'

Other users, like Cullen Crawford, took the opportunity to poke fun at the Speaker of the House with a Simpsons meme

HuffPost political writer Matt Fuller referenced House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi 's comments, calling $1,000 bonus checks sent out by companies in response to corporate tax cuts, 'bread crumbs,' when he mocked Ryan

AmpliFire News editor Jordan Uhl responded with plain shock, writing: 'Republicans are proud of themselves for [checks notecard....adjusts glasses....squints] someone making 21 cents more a day?' and then saying, 'He deleted it, like a goddamn coward'



Previously, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (California) was criticized for calling $1,000 bonus checks sent out by companies in response to corporate tax cuts, 'bread crumbs.'

That large corporate tax break, and Ryan's response to Pelosi's choice of words, provided additional ammunition for social media users who were shocked by Ryan's post.

HuffPost political writer Matt Fuller tweeted:

'Paul Ryan: A secretary is saving $1.50 a week from the tax bill.

'Also Paul Ryan: These arent crumbs.'

Senior staff writer for Upworthy and GOOD, Parker Molloy, thought the figure to be extremely comical when she broke it down into a daily figure.

'You gave $1.5 TRILLION to the richest people on the planet, and youre using an anecdote about someone making an extra 21 cents a day to argue it was good for the rest of us? Hahahahahaha,' she wrote.

Vox's Matthew Yglesias responded by running the numbers the other way, which didn't quite seem to add up, either.

'$1.50 a week for 52 weeks equals $78 per year, times 125 million workers, that equals $9.75 billion a year,' Yglesias wrote.

'Yet the tax cut costs $1.5 trillion  with a t  over ten years. Whered the money go?'

Senior staff writer for Upworthy and GOOD, Parker Molloy, thought the figure to be extremely comical when she broke it down into a daily figure

Vox's Matthew Yglesias responded by running the numbers the other way, which didn't quite seem to add up, either

Former Obama administration speech-writer-turned-podcast host, Jon Favreau, may have had the best zinger of all.

The political alum wrote:

'As a thank you for passing a $1 trillion corporate tax cut, Paul Ryan received $500,000 in campaign contributions from the Koch brothers, which would probably cover the cost of buying a Costco.'

DailyMail.com was unable to reach Ketchum to ask whether she would be using the projected additional $78 in her yearly paycheck for a new Costco membership, or to pay for one she had already been using.

Presumably, if it were for a new membership, the secretary might be happy about potential additional savings she could enjoy, by buying in bulk at the wholesale warehouse club.

Of course, that argument ignores the notion that individuals who shop at those kinds of so-called 'big box stores' don't actually save money in the long run, because they end up buying things they don't need.

In any case, Ryan must have felt some embarrassment over the tweet, because he ended up deleting it.

US Representative Eric Swalwell (California )asked over Twitter if Ketchum had all the facts

Former Obama administration speech-writer-turned-podcast host, Jon Favreau, may have had the best zinger of all

Ryan later deleted the tweet, but before he took it down, social media users had a lot to say about it, and none of it was nice

Patton Oswalt wrote, 'Hey @PRyan, whyd you delete this tweet? You seemed so excited about struggling Americans making an extra DOLLAR AND A HALF A WEEK. You s***-lizard'

Whether you saw an increase in your paycheck this week or not, it's important to note that more money up front doesn't necessarily mean you'll get to keep it, come tax time.

Be aware that right now, its the effect of changes to individual paycheck withholding amounts that workers are seeing.

While these changes are meant to anticipate what effect the entire code will likely have on a worker's yearly tax liability, thats not guaranteed, because lots of other changes to the tax code also went into effect.

That means a person's overall tax bill at end of year might be different and lower than it has been in year's past, but it also might stay the same, or even require that money be paid back, if not enough was withheld by that person's employer, throughout the year.

Other tax code changes that will impact that bottom line include that the standard deduction has been doubled, but the personal exemption has been dropped.

'For families with fewer than three dependent kids, thats probably a net gain,' Rick Newman said in a column, writing for Yahoo Finance.

'But for larger families it could push up their taxable income and their total tax bill.'

Deductions for state and local taxes are also now capped at $10,000, which is a pretty big change for those in higher income brackets that pay state tax on that income, and for those with high state and local property or school taxes.

These kinds of deductions aren't factored into what your employer automatically withholds from your paycheck.

Owen Ellickson wrote, sarcastically: '"A Costco mention will please the poors,"' thinks Ryan. "That is where they buy their huts, and the slurry that they eat"'

Whether you saw an increase in your paycheck this week or not, it's important to note that more money up front doesn't necessarily mean you'll keep to keep it, come tax time

It's possible these new default withholding amounts may leave some underpaying, with a tax bill to even things out when they file for the 2018 year.

Individuals can still ask their employers to withhold more taxes from each paycheck if they like, if that's a concern for them.

This new tax overhaul passed the Senate with a vote of 51-48, with all yes votes coming from Republicans.

Sen. John McCain of Arizona is the only Senate Republican who did not vote for the bill, because he abstained from voting at all.

Every Senate Democrat voted no.

The bill passed the House with a vote of 227-203, again with all yes votes coming from Republicans.

No votes came from 12 Republicans and 191 Democrats, with two Democrats abstaining from the vote.

Trump signed the tax bill into law on December 22.For those gathered in the small side room of Christies auction house in London on a quiet afternoon last week, it was a poignant spectacle.

Before them lay a gathering of personal effects belonging to the late Sir David Tang, who died last August of cancer at the age of just 63. His passing marked the end of a life that had been as richly colourful as it was extraordinary, summed up in part by the lots now up for sale.

Among them was an Elizabeth II parcel-gilt silver pillbox, a personal gift from Prince Charles, and a striking photograph of the model Kate Moss, a close friend.

Works by Tracey Emin were mixed with exquisite silverware and furniture, the legacy of a bon viveur known not just for his vast spending and lavish parties but also his munificent generosity and eclectic taste.

Sir David Tang led a life of barely believable opulence, a crucible melding the worlds of fashion, royalty, business and art. He is pictured with model and actress Sienna Miller in 2011

A growing number of people have told The Mail on Sunday they believe Tang (above, with supermodel Naomi Campbell in 2012) died almost penniless

Tang, after all, had led a life of barely believable opulence, a crucible melding the worlds of fashion, royalty, business and art.

Put simply, Sir David knew everyone, from Fidel Castro  who made him Cubas honorary consul in Hong Kong  to Prince Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales. From Margaret Thatcher to Tracey Emin via Russell Crowe, Sir Philip Green, Naomi Campbell and Stephen Fry. And that is to name but a handful.

It would have pleased Sir David to know that thanks to the generosity of the bidders, the Christies auction is understood to have raised almost half a million pounds  far more than the 150,000 estimated in the auction catalogue. Yet that is where, to his closest friends, the good news seems to end.

For a growing number have told The Mail on Sunday they now believe Tang died almost penniless. The beautiful 9 million waterfront home in Hong Kong where he and his wife entertained celebrities including the Duchess of York and Bryan Ferry, has gone, along with the house in Belgravia.

His widow Lucy, Lady Tang, is effectively homeless and living with her mother. Said to be shocked at the true state of her late husbands finances, she has been reduced to auctioning off his most personal possessions in an attempt to salvage something from the wreckage of his debts. It is not even clear how much of this, if any, she will be allowed to keep.

Lady Tang is not the only one to be taken aback. Few of those close to him had any reason to believe that Sir Davids legendary generosity was founded on anything other than his business ingenuity. As one good friend commented ruefully last week, all that glisters is not gold.

What, then, could have brought the dazzling Tang dynasty to such a state of ruin? One answer is perhaps the extensive medical bills which plagued the final years of his life, including a privately funded liver transplant. Then there were persistent rumours that his early addiction to gambling had never entirely gone away.

Among close friends, it was no secret that Tang was a committed gambler. Also a tireless donor-fundraiser, he was happy to bankroll causes close to his heart, including both charities and friends. It is said, for example, he had been particularly generous to Sarah, Duchess of York (above, with him in 2002)

But what is beyond any doubt is the jaw-droppingly lavish scale on which he led his life, leaving those left behind to ask how on earth he could afford it.

It is an unexpected postscript to an extraordinary life, one which saw a boy who arrived in this country aged 13, speaking not a word of English, rise to become not only a business titan, but arguably the best connected person in British society.

Sir David had certainly started off with money. His journey commenced in 1950s Hong Kong, where his great-grandfather first sought refuge from China and eventually set up a successful bank. It allowed him to build his own house, which became home not only to his wife but also his five concubines.

In turn, his son  David Tangs grandfather Sir Tang Shiu-kin  would become a prominent Hong Kong businessman who founded the Kowloon Motor Bus company and was later knighted by a grateful British Empire. Tangs father William, meanwhile, moved to the UK with his family, becoming a restaurateur. On Sir Tangs death in 1986, David is believed to have inherited around 5 million.

A natural polymath, Tang, who studied law and philosophy at Kings College London, was a brilliant pianist and literature-devouring autodidact with an almost encyclopaedic knowledge, a man capable of completing The Times crossword in minutes.

He was a natural entrepreneur, too, and in 1991 he had the idea that apparently opened the way to a fortune of his own: Tang opened The China Club in the penthouse of the monumental former Bank of China building in Hong Kong.

In recent years, a 1.5 million tax bill handed out by HMRC, in response to Tang overstaying his non-dom status in the UK by one day, suggested he was not fully in control of his finances. (Above, with Pippa Middleton in 2013)

A few years later, he founded the upmarket fashion label Shanghai Tang, a brand of modern chinoiserie, which proved eminently marketable.

Further branches followed, as did a diverse business empire. Tang would ultimately oversee interests including oil exploration in China, gold mining in Africa and Australia and a franchise for Cuban cigars for Canada and Asia which meant that every cigar sold there gave him a cut. Today, China Tang, the restaurant he founded in Londons Dorchester hotel, remains a favourite of A-listers and celebrities.

With the wealth came a life of energetic socialising. Tang forged connections which encompassed all classes, generations and political affiliations and he treated all of them with the same mischievous bonhomie and occasional hauteur, dispensing expletive-laden witticisms in a voice which oscillated between Wodehousian Englishness to heavily accented Cantonese.

He was legendarily generous, placing his houses and drivers at friends disposal and entertaining lavishly: Tang would never allow anyone else to pick up the tab and thought nothing of spending tens of thousands on a whim.

One typical Tang gesture is recalled by author Simon Winchester, who met Tang in the 1980s. I was in London and David was in Hong Kong. He phoned up and said, I am bored, lets go to Florence. So he flew to London and me, Lucy and David then flew on to Florence.

We were staying at some luxury hotel like the Excelsior for two or three days and then David said, I would like to go to Cannes so he got some incredibly expensive car that took two credit cards to hire. We drove up to Cannes and he paid for absolutely everything on the trip.

Interior designer Joanna Wood, who owns a shop in Belgravia and who knew him both as a friend and client for more than a decade, told The Mail on Sunday that the true state of his finances came as a complete revelation.

I really had no idea, she said. He always gave the appearance of being very generous and having plenty of staff and money. I feel very sorry for Lucy. I dont think she knew. If his own wife didnt know, then how the hell should I?

It is typical of Tangs fondness for ostentation that when he met Lucy Wastnage in 1990  he had a previous marriage by which he has a grown-up son and daughter  their first date was at a cinema where he had bought every seat in the house to guarantee they would be alone.

Yet he was not all surface, but a tireless donor-fundraiser too, happy to bankroll causes close to his heart, including both charities and friends. It is said, for example, he had been particularly generous to Sarah, Duchess of York.

Away from the public gaze, there was another source of expenditure, too: among close friends, it was no secret that Tang was a committed gambler. The subject was raised in 2011 when Tang was interviewed by Kate Moss for Vogue.

Ive heard rumours you like to gamble, she said. Have you lost everything before?

Oh yes! he replied. I lost everything on one bet, because I thought Id get it back. This was back in 1970 and I lost my flat.

Stephen Fry once described Tang as a gambler capable of losing 250,000 in one night while Simon Winchester recalls how, on their trip to Cannes, one destination was a large hotel casino. David just peeled off something like $1,000 and said to me, Put it on any number you like. It was the roulette table and I put it on 23 and incredibly I won $35,000.

I said to David that it was his money but he would not take it. In the end, we agreed that he took $30,000 and I got $5,000.

In recent years, a 1.5 million tax bill handed out by HMRC, in response to Tang overstaying his non-dom status in the UK by one day, suggested he was not fully in control of his finances.

Then, two years ago, came a devastating blow. Sir David discovered he had liver cancer  a particularly grim diagnosis for a man who had an exceptionally rare blood type which left him unable to obtain a new liver in this country.

Late in 2016, he travelled to Kunming in southern China, known as the countrys transplant capital, where he received a new organ.

Nobody asked any questions about how they found one so quickly, one close friend, who asked not to be named, said. The trip cost thousands and, along with the mounting medical bills when he returned to the UK, doubtless played a part in Tangs financial unravelling.

Today, The Mail on Sunday has established that few if any of Sir Davids assets remain. He never owned the cigar business  it is said to have been based on no more than a handshake with Fidel  while the brands bearing his name were relinquished some time ago. He only rented the small house in Hyde Park that he shared with his wife towards the end.

And when, in an act of generosity, his friend the restaurateur and club owner Richard Caring made enquiries about purchasing Sir Davids restaurant, China Tang at The Dorchester, he found to his astonishment it had been sold some time previously.

Yet both the opulence and the generosity remained with Sir David until the end.

Indeed, he had planned to leave this life much as he had lived it: with a lavish party. By now desperately ill and sequestered in Londons Royal Marsden Hospital with just months to live, he spent his final weeks last year planning a grand farewell to life party at The Dorchester in early September.

Sadly he never made it, passing away at the end of August, amid a legion of loving tributes from friends. RIP dear friend Sir David Tang, the privilege was mine, wrote Russell Crowe in a tweet. Witty, charming, intellectual, salacious, hilarious, loving and funny as f***.

There will never be another like you, added supermodel Naomi Campbell. Few would disagree, although many will today be asking just how well they really knew him.A local MP in the Northern Territory has been slammed for a social media post about a new public bathroom near a popular fishing spot.

Ken Vowles, the Member for Johnston, announced the toilet block had been built through his Twitter account on Friday.

'The new toilet block at Dinah Beach boat ramp is finished as part of our $50 million investment in rec fishing. Your missus will be grateful!,' he wrote.

A Facebook page titled 'Northern Territory Women and Girls Rights' were the first to kick off about the wording of the post, implying it was sexist and tone deaf.

Northern Territory MP Ken Vowles was slammed over the weekend for a 'sexist' tweet

The MP twice included the phrase 'your missus will be happy' in his tweets about a new unisex toilet block

Facebook group NT Women and Girls Human Rights were incensed by the post and shared the first two versions online

'Really Ken Vowles Member for Johnston,' they captioned a screen grab of the tweet.

'You really think their missus will be grateful? Will their hubby be grateful too?

'Get with the program mate, its #2018.'

The bathrooms, installed at the rear end of the boat ramp at the beach, are clearly marked unisex bathrooms.

Mr Vowles' post was then updated to read: 'We've installed CCTV and now we've completed the new toilet block at Dinah Beach boat ramp, all part of our $50 million investment in rec fishing'.

The poster was not too keen on letting the controversial line go, and added '#Yourmisseswillbegrateful' and '#coveringallbases' to the end of the tweet.

Further backlash saw the tweet changed a third time on Saturday, with any references to partners removed.

'We installed CCTV and now we've completed the new toilet block at Dinah Beach boat ramp,all part of our $50 million investment in rec fishing. #coveringallbases #gob4ufish #loowithaview,' the final version read.

The unisex toilet blocks (pictured) were built at the back of the boat ramp at Dinah Beach

The third attempt of the tweet, posted on Saturday, had removed all reference to female partners - sparking a 'better' response from NT Women and Girls Human rights

While it does not appear anyone else publicly slammed the MP for his wording, The NT Women and Girls Rights group were incensed.

In further posts, they pointed out there were large discrepancies between men and women in the Top End, and tried to use the controversy to highlight this.

'Just for fun, let's assume the person who's missus will be grateful they used the new Dinah Beach boat ramp dunny block is a bloke, and his missus is a woman,' they wrote.

'What might that bloke ponder while he sits on the flash new dunny? 'I wonder what I can do to lower the gender pay gap for women in the NT?

'That bloke on the new Dinah Beach boat ramp dunny is probably thinking... "I know I'm supposed to speak up when my mates make dumb sexist comments, like that one Kenny Vowles made when he opened this flash dunny, but sometimes I just don't know what to say".'

A spokesman for Labor told the NT News the tweets had not come from Mr Vowles himself, but instead a media adviser.

'Unfortunately, she used a poor choice of words,' a Government spokesman said.

'Ken knows Territory women love their fishing as much as the men do.

'And both will appreciate this new facility.'

Mr Vowles has been contacted for further comment.A Labour MP once targeted by social media trolls came under fire last night after her partner was accused of a abusive and racist tweet aimed at a hard-Left activist.

Dan Fox, boyfriend of MP Stella Creasy, said that former Momentum vice-chairwoman Jackie Walker was so thick  if you tried to drink her through a straw your ears would bleed.

Ms Walker was suspended by Labour in 2016 for saying the Jews financed the slave trade but was later reinstated.

Dan Fox, boyfriend of MP Stella Creasy (right) said that former Momentum vice-chair Jackie Walker (left) was so thick  if you tried to drink her through a straw your ears would bleed

The tweet by Mr Fox, a former director of Labour Friends of Israel, was in response to a new hard-Left campaign, led by Ms Walker, calling for the lifting of disciplinary action against other party members accused of anti-Semitism, which they describe as a witch-hunt.

Ms Creasy, the MP for Walthamstow and a leading moderate who has criticised leader Jeremy Corbyn, has championed women fighting online attacks after she was a victim of abuse three years ago.

A man was jailed after he threatened to rape her and branded her a witch for supporting a campaign for author Jane Austen to become the new face of the 10 note.

Mr Foxs thick jibe at Ms Walker is not the first time he has criticised her. He said her egregious assertion about Jews and the slave trade had its provenance in neo-Nazism.

Labour had been captured by the hard-Left and their anti-Semitic outbursts were driving ethnic minorities into supporting the Tories, he said.

Ms Walker posted an open letter to Ms Creasy on Facebook yesterday that said: We have both been subjected to abuse and threats on social media. I was forwarded an abusive and racist trope in a tweet by Dan Fox.

Ms Creasy, the MP for Walthamstow and a leading moderate has championed women fighting online attacks after she was a victim of abuse three years ago which lead to a man being jailed

Ms Walker asked Ms Creasy to explain how, as someone who has held significant positions in the party and who has experienced awful abuse themselves she could defend her partners actions.

Labour Against The Witchhunt, a group chaired by Ms Walker, tweeted: Hi Stella. What do you think about this troll and his racist outburst. We believe he is your partner?

Mr Fox said last night: It was extremely rude of me and I am sorry for the offence caused. Ms Creasy did not respond to calls from this newspaper.Fifty Shades Freed actor Arielle Kebbel has asked her followers for help in locating her sister.

Julia Kebbel has been missing from her neighborhood in Los Angeles since Wednesday, which is the same day a fire broke out in her apartment, People reported.

The star shared a post on Instagram on Saturday, describing and including photos of her petite blonde sister, and asking her fans to reach out if they had any information.

'If you have seen her or know anything about her, please DM me, call 9-1-1 or private investigator Russell L. Greene [at] (310) 344-3683,' she wrote.

Julia Kebbel (pictured), sister of UnREAL star Arielle Kebbel, has been missing from her neighborhood in Los Angeles since Wednesday, the same day a fire broke out in her apartment

Julia Kebbel has been missing from Silver Lake since Wednesday night, at around 11.00 pm Pacific.

She is 5-foot-3-inches tall and weighs close to 105 pounds, according to the actor's description.

The woman has fair skin, with short, bleached blonde hair.

Julia Kebbel (right) has been missing from Silver Lake since Wednesday night, at around 11.00 pm Pacific, her star sister said

Arielle's missing sister is 5-foot-3-inches tall and weighs close to 105 pounds, according to the actor's description; The woman has fair skin, with short, bleached blonde hair

'She has tattoos on both fore arms,' the actor wrote in the gallery post.

'She has a spiritual symbol with [keys and words] on one forearm and a blue Phoenix rising on the other.'

She was last spotted in her neighborhood with her dog.

'Her chocolate lab is named Cindy Crawford. She is chipped,' the star wrote.

'If anyone finds the dog or has seen her, please let us know.'

'She has a spiritual symbol with [keys and words] on one forearm and a blue Phoenix rising on the other,' the star said

'Her chocolate lab is named Cindy Crawford. She is chipped,' the star wrote

Arielle added that her sister's Instagram and Twitter accounts are under the username @jkebbz, and that her followers could check those accounts to see more photos of her missing sister, in the hopes that someone could help in her search

Arielle added that her sister's Instagram and Twitter accounts are under the username @jkebbz.

She said her followers could check those accounts to see more photos of her missing sister, in the hopes that someone could help in her search.

Again, the actor has asked that anyone with information either message her directly, call 9-1-1 or call a private investigator by the name of Russell L. Greene at (310) 344-3683.The Prime Minister is heading for disaster in Mays local elections.

Psephological horse-whisperer Sir John Curtice has warned that the Tories could lose half the boroughs they control in London alone.

But for some Ministers, this could be the moment that saves the Conservative Party.

Tory strategists have come to believe Momentums voracious hordes represent an opportunity rather than a threat, says Dan Hodges

Obviously no one wants to lose councils, one explained to me, but if we wake up with Momentum controlling half of London, that would be something we could exploit. Wed have several Petri dishes to point to and say, Want to know what Labour would be like in Government? There you go. 

Since the General Election, Corbynite activists have been riding high.

On Friday it was announced that a Labour Glastonbury will be held in Finsbury Park to recapture that magical Spirit of 17.

Their anthem of Oh, Jeremy Corbyn will again drift across the sultry North London summer air.

But Tory strategists who have been in headlong retreat from the Absolute Boys zombie army have finally decided to stand and fight.

Indeed, they have come to believe Momentums voracious hordes represent an opportunity, rather than a threat.

Partly this is from their analysis of their own disastrous Election campaign.

Downing Street now believes that by choosing to attack Corbyn they were effectively punching a ghost.

Talk of past associations with the IRA or Hamas was too abstract for voters focusing on bread-and-butter issues such as hospitals, schools and shrinking pay.

But were Momentum to seize swathes of Labours local authority base, that would bring the Corbynite threat alive.

Failing to renew Trident goes over most peoples heads, one Tory strategist told me.

But fail to get the bins emptied on time and they notice. And they get very, very angry about it.

Placing the spotlight on Momentums Labour rather than Corbyns Labour is also designed to tap into something Tory MPs are detecting on the doorstep  a sense their nasty party tag is slowly transferring to their opponents.

Contrary to popular perception, the intimidation and harassment meted out by the Corbynites last June was not confined to social media.

'Since the General Election, Corbynite activists have been riding high' he says

Posters were torn down. Constituency offices were defaced with graffiti. Verbal abuse was commonplace.

This is Britain, one Tory backbencher told me. People are cynical about politics but they have a very clear idea of how they expect Elections to be conducted.

'And theres a growing sense theres a nasty streak running through the modern Labour Party.

Thats because there is.

Last weeks resignation of respected Haringey Council leader Claire Kober  hounded out after a campaign that included overt sexism and anti-Semitism  was merely the latest example of Momentums political bloodlust.

Thats why on Tuesday, Theresa May will use a celebration of the 100th anniversary of votes for women to highlight the abuse female politicians receive.

It will be pitched as a general appeal for a return to democratic civil norms. But be in no doubt  her target is Corbyns White Walkers.

Of course, its one thing to have a strategy, quite another to implement it.

A message from 'The Stalker' Labour moderates are becoming concerned they are being politically stalked by their own Shadow Chancellor. Im told John McDonnell has begun appearing in their constituencies without observing the usual protocol of informing them of his arrival, and is sharing platforms with hard-Left activists to  in the words of one Shadow Minister  send a message. The latest target is Walthamstow MP Stella Creasy, who is to be graced with a visit next week as part of an anti-PFI event hosted by Waltham Forest Trades Council. Sharing the platform will be Linda Taaffe, whose husband Peter was a leading light in Militant in the 1980s, and whose daughter stood unsuccessfully against Creasy at the 2015 Election. Johns just there to help, Stella. Advertisement

New Tory chairman Brandon Lewis is said to have been shocked at the state of the operation he inherited from Patrick McLoughlin.

Of particular concern is the once-vaunted Tory press machine, which is not fit for purpose, according to one Cabinet Minister.

Then there are the Conservatives own internal membership problems, which seemed to have peaked with the Tatler Tory affair, but have burst back into life this weekend with the suspension of leading youth activist Stephen Canning.

And the local elections look set to be contested against a backdrop of continuing Tory infighting on Europe, and the Prime Ministers lack of vision or direction.

But there is one big upside to the Conservative master plan. There is very little Corbyn can do to counter it.

Momentum have become his Frankensteins monster. He created them, but he can no longer control them.

Drunk on their perceived success last June, they are in no mood to entertain entreaties for compromise or moderation.

The Momentum zealots truly believe their Marxist nirvana is in sight. Today Haringey, tomorrow the world has become their mantra.

And nobody  not Labour moderates, not ordinary voters, not even the Dear Leader himself, will be allowed to stand in their way.

The dominoes are already falling.

First it was Claire Kober. Twenty-four hours later it emerged that Jon Clempner, Labour council leader in Harlow, had also been purged by Momentum activists who branded him a neo-Nazi.

Now there are reports that they have set their sights on Lambeth, where Labour leader Lib Peck has provoked their wrath by investing 300 million in a council-run private housing company for development of new homes in the borough.

Of course this may be too late to help Mrs May. Her grip on power becomes more precarious by the hour.

But the irony is that Momentum, the Tories most fanatical enemy, could also prove to be their saviour.Veteran MP Harriet Harman is hoping to capitalise on the Pankhurst factor by making a bid to become Commons Speaker, Labour sources say.

Amid reports that John Bercow may signal later this year when he will stand down, Labours former deputy leader is understood to be planning to enter the race to succeed him.

In the year when Westminster is preparing to mark the centenary of the Suffragette triumph over voting rights for women, feminist Harman would be well placed to win support on both sides of the House.

Veteran MP Harriet Harman is hoping to capitalise on the Pankhurst factor by making a bid to become Commons Speaker, Labour sources say

The former Cabinet Minister would be only the second woman to be Speaker, following in the footsteps of Betty Boothroyd who held the post between 1992 and 2000.

If Ms Harman does stand for the position, she would be the main challenger to veteran Labour MP Lindsay Hoyle, the current Deputy Speaker.

One Labour MP said: Harriet is not everyones cup of tea but shes hugely respected on both sides of the House.

And no one can argue that with her experience of the place, she doesnt know all the rules.

Amid reports that John Bercow may signal later this year when he will stand down, Labours former deputy leader is understood to be planning to enter the race to succeed him

The 67-year-old has been an MP since 1982 and holds the record as the longest-ever continuously-serving female MP.

Married to fellow Labour MP Jack Dromey, she comes from blue-blooded stock. Her aunt was Elizabeth Pakenham, Countess of Longford, her cousins include the writer Lady Antonia Fraser and she was educated at the fee-paying St Pauls Girls School, London.

Last night, Labour MP Jess Phillips said she would enthusiastically back Ms Harman if she threw her hat in the ring.

She said: In the history of Parliament, theres only ever been one woman Speaker. Perhaps its time there was another one.

Ms Harman, who last week led calls for MPs on maternity or paternity leave to be given proxy votes in the Commons, was unavailable for comment last night.

A spokeswoman for Mr Bercow, who became Speaker in 2009, said that he had no plans to announce his retirement date later this year.An heir to the Gambino crime family has called the FBI and its former director, James Comey, 'weasels' who 'abuse their power' after the release of a once-classified memo.

Giovanni Gambino told Dailymail.com that the agency has a long history of corruption, particularly when it comes to members of his own community.

He said: 'Many Italians have been [dishonestly] convicted by the FBI. The FBI [arrested] my father with dishonesty and misleading information. I have a message to Comey and the FBI. Times [sic] up.

'American history shows that, in the long run, weasels and liars (like the FBI) never hold the field, so long as good people (like trump) stand up.'

Giovanni Gambino (pictured, right, with Hillary Clinton) an heir to the Gambino crime family has called the FBI and and its former director, James Comey, 'weasels' who 'abuse their power' after the release of a once-classified memo

Gambino told Dailymail.com: 'I have a message to Comey and the FBI. Times [sic] up. 'American history shows that, in the long run, weasels and liars (like the FBI) never hold the field, so long as good people (like trump) stand up' (Pictured, left, Gambino undated, and right, Comey in June 2017

Gambino is a pizzeria owner and author of two novels whose kingpin father Francesco 'Ciccio' Gambino was convicted as part of a massive drug round-up in the US and Italy alongside fellow mafiosos Salvatore Mannino, Antonio Mannino, Grace Mannino and Enzo Varisco.

During his trial in 1987, prosecutors claimed Francesco was the leader of the Sicilian Mafia drug network. He died in prison while serving his 30-year-sentence.

Giovanni Gambino is cousin to Carlo, who was the founder of the Gambino crime family.

Born in Sicily, Carol immigrated to the United States in 1921 as a ship stowaway, settling in Brooklyn and becoming a gang member under Joe 'the Boss' Masseria.

He then worked for Salvatore Maranzano, Philip and Vincent Mangano, and finally, from 1951, Albert Anastasia. He inherited the crime syndicate when Anastasia was murdered.

In 50 years of crime Carlo only served 22 months in prison. He was indicted for hijacking in 1970 and an order for his deportation was upheld in the same year, but severe heart attacks deferred trial or deportation.

More heart seizures led to his death by natural causes six years later.

The four-page document released on Friday contends that the FBI, when it applied for a surveillance warrant on a onetime campaign associate of President Donald Trump, relied excessively on an ex-British spy whose opposition research was funded by Democrats.

At the same time, the memo confirms that the investigation into potential Trump links to Russia actually began several months earlier, and was 'triggered' by information involving a different campaign aide.

Trump, however, tweeted from Florida, where he was spending the weekend, that the memo puts him in the clear

The four-page document released on Friday contends that the FBI, when it applied for a surveillance warrant on a onetime campaign associate of President Donald Trump, relied excessively on an ex-British spy whose opposition research was funded by Democrats.

President Donald Trump (pictured, Friday) took to Twitter on Saturday to claim complete vindication from the memo that released on Friday

Trump's tweet called the Russia probe a 'Witch Hunt' and once again denied Russian collusion

'This memo totally vindicates 'Trump' in probe,' he said. 'But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their (sic) was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!'

The FBI this week expressed 'grave concerns' about the memo and called it inaccurate and incomplete.

Democrats said it was a set of cherry-picked claims aimed at smearing law enforcement and that releasing the memo would damage law enforcement and intelligence work.Diana Junge, 48, was reported missing after she failed to return home from a hike Tuesday night to see the super 'blood moon'

An Arizona woman disappeared earlier this week while on a hike to see the rare super 'blood moon', authorities said.

Diana Junge, 48, was reported missing after she possibly went stargazing Tuesday night or Wednesday morning near Granite Reef Recreation Site in the Tonto National Forest near Mesa to see the rare phenomenon.

Authorities said Junge's 2015 Jeep was found near the recreation site, but there was no sign of her, according to a Facebook post by the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office.

Junge's mother reported her missing after she failed to return home. Police said the mother and daughter live together in Goodyear.

Police said it's not clear what Junge was wearing the day she disappeared , but they believe she had on Hi-Tec hiking boots.

Authorities said Junge also has medical conditions that could be life-threatening if not treated for an extended period of time.

Authorities said Junge possibly went stargazing near Granite Reef Recreation Site in the Tonto National Forest near Mesa Tuesday night or Wednesday morning

Police said Junge's Jeep was found near the recreation site but there was no sign of her. Tuesday's super 'blood moon' was the first time in 150 years that this particular type of eclipse has happened in the US

The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office is asking residents in the area to keep a look out for Junge, who is described as five feet tall and 100 pounds with brown hair and hazel eyes.

According to Space.com, Tuesday's blood moon was the first time in 150 years that this particular type of eclipse has happened in the US. During a blood moon, the moon appears to be reddish in color and larger and brighter than normal.

The next blood moon won't occur until January 21, 2019.

Anyone with information is asked to call the Sheriff's Office at 602-876-8477 and refer to case number IR18-003349.Former TV presenter John Leslie is to face trial over claims he sexually assaulted a woman in a nightclub. The 52-year-old denies he put his hand up a 26-year-old woman's skirt in the popular Edinburgh nightspot

Former TV presenter John Leslie is to face trial over claims he sexually assaulted a woman in a nightclub.

The one time Blue Peter presenter, who went on to host Wheel of Fortune and This Morning, is accused of groping the unnamed 26-year-old while dancing.

It is alleged Leslie, 52, put his hand up young woman's fancy dress tutut and touched her inappropriately during a night out at Edinburgh's Atik club, in June last year.

He strenuously denied the sexual assault allegation when it emerged in November but Scottish authorities have now decided to prosecute.

'He'll be devastated as he was insistent evidence would prove his innocence,' a source told the Mirror.

'He had planned to relaunch his television career, but this will crush those plans,' they added.

Leslie and the alleged victim were at the popular Scottish nightclub to celebrate its relaunch following a 450,000 refurbishment.

Both were partying in the VIP area of the club - which recently featured in the film T2 Trainspotting - where it is claimed Leslie groped the woman celebrating a hen party.

It is alleged Leslie put his hand down the young woman's skirt and touched her inappropriately during a night out at Edinburgh's Atik club (pictured) in June last year

He strenuously denied the sexual assault allegation when it emerged in November but Scottish authorities have now decided to prosecute - scuppering plans for a TV comeback, according to one source (pictured alongside Fern Britton hosting the This Morning programme in 2002)

His solicitor Mark Harrower previously said he believed CCTV footage from the club would clear his client - though this has yet to emerge.

The allegations were enough to force him to turn down a 500,000 offer to be on Celebrity Big Brother and shelve a potential comeback.

MailOnline has approached Mr Leslie's representatives for comment.

While in November Leslie said: 'I totally deny the allegation. I have not done anything wrong.'

Leslie, who lives in Edinburgh, rose to fame in the late 1980s when he became the first Scot to host Blue Peter (pictured) before going on to present Wheel of Fortune and This Morning

MailOnline has approached Mr Leslie's representatives for comment. In November Leslie said 'I totally deny the allegation. I have not done anything wrong' (pictured on Blue Peter)

Leslie, who lives in Edinburgh, rose to fame in the late 1980s when he became the first Scot to host Blue Peter before going on to present Wheel of Fortune and This Morning. More recently he has involved himself in property development.

Reporting on the initial charges in November, a spokesperson for Police Scotland told MailOnline: 'Police in Edinburgh have charged a 52-year-old man following a report that a 26-year-old woman was the victim of a sexual assault at a nightclub in the Tollcross area on Sunday 25 June.'

The trial is due to be held in spring at Edinburgh Sheriff Court. It will be decided by a sheriff alone without a jury.Washington's Patrice Thomas is now dealing with the unthinkable, for the second time within half of a year.

The Seattle mother, who gave birth to four children, lost her son to gun violence on Wednesday, after burying her adult daughter in August, who was fatally shot in July.

'There's no words that I can describe what I'm going through right now,' she said.

'That's a mother's nightmare, worst nightmare. It really is. I'm not supposed to be burying my child. My child is supposed to be burying me years down the line.'

A Seattle woman lost her son, Duane Everett Tyson (pictured), 19, to gun violence on Wednesday, after burying her fatally shot daughter, Che'Reonna Thomas, 20, in August

Thomas's daughter, Che'Reonna, died in August at the age of 20, after she was caught in crossfire while riding in a car in South Seattle in early July.

She celebrated her last birthday in the hospital, before succumbing to her injuries.

Thomas's son, Duane Everett Tyson, was shot in Kent and killed in Kent on Wednesday night, at the age of 19.

Tyson was part of a group of about a dozen young men who were gathered near Bryson Square Apartments, witnesses reportedly said.

Thomas's daughter, Che'Reonna, died in August at the age of 20, after she was caught in crossfire while riding in a car in South Seattle in early July.

Authorities were reportedly on their way to the scene when shots rang out at around 10 pm Pacific, and Tyson died at the scene

As the group grew loud, the police were called.

Authorities were reportedly on their way to the scene when shots rang out.

Tyson died at the scene, and two of the others were injured. The teen is survived by a son, two younger bothers, and his mother.

'These kids need to wake up,' Thomas said. 'Everybody needs to wake up and teach your kids about guns. It's not cool. It's not safe.'

The teen is survived by a son, two younger bothers, and his mother, Patrice Thomas; Thomas is pictured here with her grandchild, Tyson's surviving son

Of Thomas's four children, only her two youngest sons, seen here with Tyson (center), are alive

The death of Thomas's daughter, Che'Reonna, is still under investigation

Tyson's father, also named Duane Tyson, was also killed by gun violence, according to theSeattle Patch.

The 34-year-old was shot and killed in Skyway, Washington on June 20, 2007.

Just few months after that in September 2007, Thomas's boyfriend at the time was also killed, this time in a shooting in front of her home.

'It was a drive-by,' she told the Patch. 'They just drove up into the driveway and shot him.'

Jarrett Bazile, 28, was a Seattle school bus driver. His killer was never found.

The death of Thomas's daughter, Che'Reonna, is still under investigation, but was reported to have resulted from a mutual exchange of gunfire, between the car she was riding in with her boyfriend and another vehicle.

'Witnesses told officers that two cars were driving through the area at a high rate of speed while the passengers were possibly firing shots at each other,' Seattle police wrote in a post describing the incident, according to the Patch.

Che'Reonna's death was reported to have resulted from a mutual exchange of gunfire, between the car she was riding in with her boyfriend and another vehicle

Thomas said she believed the bullets that struck her daughter in the head, and ultimately led to her death, were meant for her boyfriend.

Thomas said she was not angry with her daughter's boyfriend, only with the shooter.

Che'Reonna's father, Eugene from New Orleans, is still alive and was at her funeral in August.

Separate GoFundMe accounts have been set up to raise money for the deaths of Duane Everett Tyson and Che'Reonna Thomas.Bernie Ecclestone, pictured at the High Court during Petra's divorce case, was reportedly quizzed under caution

Former racing chief Bernie Ecclestone has been questioned as authorities intensified scrutiny in a 1billion probe, it has emerged.

The 87-year-old was reportedly quizzed under caution by HMRC in central London at a police station.

The ex-Formula 1 boss has consistently denied owing up to 1billion and was allegedly quizzed over his 2.5billion empire.

He was questioned as his 33-year-old daughter, Tamara, was called to an HMRC base, according to The Sun.

'Bernie was given a date to be questioned by HMRC officials under caution about tax affairs,' a source told the paper.

'This is the first time he has been called in to face taxmen at a police station. It signals a significant move by HMRC in their long-running battle with Bernie.'

There is no suggestion Bernie has broken tax laws but investigators have been looking into his family's Bambino trust for more than 10 years.

It was set up in 1997 by ex-wife Slavica and is based on Liechtenstein. Bambino trust is thought to have raised 3billion from selling F1 stakes.

Slavica, Tamara and her 28-year-old sister, Petra, are all beneficiaries of the trust.

When Bernie had a triple heart bypass in 1999, all of the share capital of F1's parent company was transferred to a business called Petara in Jersey.

Slavica transferred the asset - his most valuable - in case he died.

She then moved the shares to the trust. The trust's offshore location meant no tax was paid on the cash raised from selling the shares.

Bernie Ecclestone, pictured in Mayfair, London, with wife Fabiana, was questioned at a police station by HMRC

Bernie is prevented from controlling the trust because he is a UK resident. Were he to take control, he would be required to pay tax on the money raised from selling the shares.

If UK residents transfer assets to a non-domicile and income becomes payable to that person, the law states that the person making the transfer must not enjoy it.

The ex-F1 boss claims to have never controlled Bambino

The ex-F1 boss claims to never have controlled Bambino and in 2008 it was found he had not breached rules when transferring the shares.

Six years later investigators argued in court they had been 'misled and relied on representations that were false' and rescinded the settlement agreement.

In 2015 Bernie's lawyers appeared at the High Court and it was found he filed three lawsuits in an attempt to block a bill issued by HMRC.

The bill he was trying to block related to 13 years of income the trust had earned that totalled 674million with another 349million in interest.

At the time Bernie said he was 'effectively suing' the government department for 'breach of contract' due to their assessment of him.

Tamara visited HMRC's base in East London in December. It is not suggested that she broke tax laws.



The body is granted the use of police interview facilities to question people they suspect of tax irregularities under caution.

Any evidence that is discovered can then be handed to the Crown Prosecution Service.

A spokesman for HMRC refused to comment about the interview, which reportedly took place last summer.Shona Leigh (pictured) claims she cured her stage two cervical cancer with only the use of cannabis

A Queensland woman has claimed she cured her stage two cervical cancer with cannabis.

Shona Leigh told the Daily Mercury she did not go through the traditional paths of chemotherapy or radiation, and instead looked online for another answer.

Soon after, she was approached by a 'compassionate carer', who supplied her with cannabis oil.

'I cured cancer. Knowing what I know now, I can't be quiet,' she said.

Ms Leigh said her test results came back completely clean just eight months after she began to use cannabis oil to self medicate.

But just four months after she stopped taking the oil due to supply issues, Ms Leigh says she developed 'fist sized' lumps in her breast.

She makes her own cannabis oil and has provided oil, sprays and balms to about 50 people.

However by providing cannabis to people, she is breaking the law.

She was provided with cannabis oil (stock image) by someone she met online, and says within eight months she was returning clear blood scans

'I'm a criminal because of what I do. I don't want to live like this,' she said.

'I've seen this save lives and in the face of what I know, I can no longer be quiet.'

If the stigma of cannabis use was removed, Ms Leigh believes it would be a more popular treatment with people of all ages.

For a patient to be eligible for medical marijuana, they must apply through their doctor, who can either become an 'authorised prescriber', or apply for a 'special access scheme'.

The doctor must be able to prove their patient would benefit from the cannabis treatment, and their particular condition would improve.

Ms Leigh has since provided oils, sprays and balms to about 50 people suffering from pain or cancer

Because it is a difficult and time consuming process, many patients claim they are declined the opportunity or turned away by doctors.

Many doctors have reported there is not enough research on the effects of the drug nor is there enough education available as to how to prescribe it.

Since 1992, 350 Australian patients have been provided legal access to cannabis-based medicines.

Of this, 323 patients have only gained access in the past two years, since restrictions were relaxed in 2016.Hundreds turned out in Melbourne on Sunday to protest the 'intense racist hysteria towards the African community'.

Holding signs that read: 'Dump Dutton', 'Stop racism now' and 'Jobs, education and services not racist law and order hysteria', the group were seen marching with a police escort through the capital city.

They loudly chanted: 'Dutton's game is a racist game - throw the Liberals out' as they moved towards the State Library.

Sunday's rally was designed to fight 'a wave of intense racist hysteria towards the African community in Melbourne', provoked by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Federal Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton, the organisers said.

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Hundreds flocked to the Melbourne City Centre on Sunday to participate in a protest against racism at the Melbourne State Library

The group were rallying against 'intense racist hysteria towards the African community' in relation to a recent spate of gang crime

In an event page on Facebook, the organisers said the protest would also fight against stricter bail laws and enforced deportation rules.

They say an increasingly racial view of crime in Victoria has emboldened far-right groups to attack Africans.

'By racialising crime in Victoria, and spreading the lie that crime is an 'African' problem, Turnbull and Dutton have ramped up racism and fear and encouraged far-right groups to target the African community,' they wrote.

'In the face of such racist fear-mongering, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has called for further punitive policing initiatives such as a national criminal intelligence framework.

'Last year, the state government spent an unprecedented $2 billion from to expand policing. This money could instead have been put into supporting public education, housing and community and employment programs to support young people.'

Richard Deng from the South Sudanese Community Association, State MP Samantha Ratnam from the Greens and lawyer Nyadol Nyuon were expected to address the crowd, among others.

One passionate protester brandished a bright yellow sign telling the Minister for Home Affairs to 'get in the bin'

Others were seen holding signs that said #africanyouthgang and another placard said 'we're not scapegoats'

Protesters chanted: 'Dutton's game is a racist game - throw the Liberals out'

One sign demanded 'elected civilian control boards to control the police' (right) because of racial profiling

A spokeswoman for Victoria Police told Daily Mail Australia officers were in attendance for the protest.

'Police are currently attending a planned protest in the Melbourne CBD to respond and intervene where needed,' she said.

'Community safety is our number one priority.

'People have every right to protest, however we ask that they do so peacefully and without impacting on the rest of the community.'

The protest comes after a series of heavily publicised home invasions and burglaries, allegedly committed by young people of African appearance.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton and Citizenship Minister Alan Tudge have all called for harsher measures to be taken against migrant youths who break the law.

Mr Tudge and Mr Dutton have both publicly backed calls to begin deporting African nationals who had been convicted of a violent crime in recent weeks.

The Prime Minister told reporters last month his government was 'very concerned at the growing gang violence and lawlessness in Victoria, in particular in Melbourne.'

Daily Mail Australia has contacted the organisers of the rally for comment.Just weeks after a wallaby hopped across Sydney Harbour Bridge, another one had to be rescued from the city's waters, and experts are blaming land clearing for the increased sightings of the marsupials in urban areas.

Last month a daring and adventurous wallaby made headlines when commuters spotted him jumping across Harbour Bridge.

On Thursday a helpless wallaby was spotted struggling in the waters 50 metres off Manly Wharf and had to rescued from Sydney Harbour by ferry crew members.

The wallaby (pictured) was spotted hopping across the Harbour Bridge before police caught it

Sydney Wildlife volunteer Jodi Lewis from Balgowlah  who rescued Thursday's wallaby  says land clearing at Manly Vale Public School and the Northern Beaches Hospital is to blame for the recent incidents on the peninsula.

'It's possible the land clearing is starting to have an effect on animals,' she told the Daily Telegraph.

'We do what we can' but explained that they tried to get tunnels built under the roads to help save wildlife, but it didn't happen.

A wallaby stranded in Sydney harbour waters was pulled to safety by a ferry crew (pictured)

Tunnels or wildlife corridors would allow the creatures to move from one habitat to another without getting lost in urban areas.

Sydney Wildlife boss Joan Reid added: 'They are vulnerable [the wallabies].

'They can't get from point A to point B,' she said.

Land clearing is the process of removing trees, stumps, brush, stones and other obstacles from an area - often places where wallabies live and hide.

A wallaby caught outside a small supermarket on Pittwater Rd in Manly in December (pictured)

Late last year a wallaby was spotted hopping across Pittwater Rd in Manly before bouncing through the shopping precinct and heading into an underground carpark.

One was also spotted in Quirk Rd, Manly Vale.

Edwina Laginestra from WIRES who helped rescue the wallaby from the underground car park said wallabies were more becoming a more regular siting for locals.

'Something is spooking them,' she told the Manly Daily at the time.

'It wouldn't be surprising if it was being caused by the school development up at Manly Vale.'The new wife of alleged internet pirate Kim Dotcom insists she's not a gold digger, they want at least two children, and their sex life is no one else's business.

Elizabeth Donnelly, 22, married the 44-year-old boss of defunct filesharing website Megaupload at a secret ceremony in Auckland on January 20.

Their wedding was on the same date as when heavily-armed police swooped on his NZ$30 million mansion to arrest Kim on copyright infringement charges in 2012.

Elizabeth Donnelly, 22, married the 44-year-old boss of defunct filesharing website Megaupload at a secret ceremony in Auckland on January 20

Instagram photos show the slender brunette sporting designer clothes posing next to luxury cars around New Zealand and their poolside bungalow

Since then he has fought extradition to the U.S. to face charges that could land him in jail for 88 years, with the latest of numerous appeals underway.

Liz Dotcom, as she's now known, met her husband in late 2015 as a 20-year-old when he sent her a direct message on Instagram, she told the NZ Herald.

The couple went public with their relationship in February 2016 and announced their engagement 11 months later, a year before the wedding.

With one semester left in a law degree she doesn't plan to use, Ms Dotcom now enjoys a life of luxury she only ever dreamed about.

Liz Dotcom, as she's now known, insists she's not a gold digger, they want at least two children, and their sex life is no one else's business

Kim is fighting extradition to the U.S. to face copyright infringement charges that could land him in jail for 88 years (couple pictured at 2016 court appearance)

Instagram photos show the slender brunette sporting designer clothes posing next to luxury cars around New Zealand and their poolside bungalow.

Kim spent NZ$10 million on his legal defence alone, has US$60 million in account frozen by the U.S. government, and once spent NZ$600,000 on a fireworks display for the city of Auckland.

He at one point owned at least 18 luxury cars  including a pink 1959 Cadillac and three cars with vanity license plates reading HACKER, MAFIA, and STONED.

But Ms Dotcom insists the two were in love and just like any other couple - 'there's just nice things around'.

'Nice cars, nice bags, nice clothes - it's all nice but it's not happiness. It's happiness for a minute or two when you've got it and you're holding it but apart from that, it's when you're with the person you're happy - when I'm with Kim,' she said.

Ms Dotcom took to social media after the announcement to call herself 'the luckiest girl in the world'

Their wedding was on the same date as when heavily-armed police swooped on his NZ$30 million mansion to arrest Kim on copyright infringement charges in 2012

Ms Dotcom with Kim's five children from his first marriage, to Mona Verga, with the couple wanting at least two more their own

The couple have endured countless attacks by internet trolls over their age - and weight - difference, and even faked a breakup to make it stop.

Ms Dotcom said none of it really phased her and the age gap wasn't an issue because Kim was 'the biggest kid anyway'.

'We just clicked. Things got pretty serious straight away. We both knew that's what we wanted. It wasn't like either of us was feeling pressured into it. We both wanted it,' she said.

'He's just so kind. He would never intentionally hurt anyone's feelings. He's so kind and accommodating. Considerate, thoughtful.'

For his part, Ms Dotcom said her husband was attracted to her genuine and kind nature, and because she's 'not faking anything'.

Ms Dotcom met her husband in late 2015 as a 20-year-old when he sent her a direct message on Instagram

The couple went public with their relationship in February 2016 and announced their engagement in 11 months later, a year before the wedding

With one semester left in a law degree she doesn't plan to use, Ms Dotcom now enjoys a life of luxury she only ever dreamed about

Kim also needed someone to stand by him through the exhausting legal saga that broke up his first marriage to Mona Verga in 2014.

Ms Dotcom said she wanted two or three children, adding to Kim's five from his previous marriage, which they discussed early in their relationship.

The babies would likely be conceived through IVF or surrogacy due to Kim's belief in science over nature, but she said the pair do have sex.

'Everything is normal. It's just normal,' she said, and beyond that it was no one business but theirs.

Ms Dotcom insists the two were in love and just like any other couple - 'there's just nice things around'

Ms Dotcom outside their NZ$30 million mansion that was raided by police in 2012

Ms Dotcom said none of really phased her and the age gap wasn't an issue because Kim was 'the biggest kid anyway'

However, the young woman was not naive enough to know her charmed life could come crashing down at any moment if her husband was convicted.

She was firmly on his side in believing there was no legal basis in extraditing him to the U.S. to face trial, even after the NZ High Court a year ago ruled he could be.

Ms Dotcom said she was, like Kim, confident the case would be resolved in his favour, and if it wasn't it would be forced by politics.

'It would be all political because Kim should win,' she said, bluntly.

Kim even sued the NZ government for NZ$6.8 billion as he claimed his arrest led to Megaupload being shut down and his main income stream cut off.

American authorities were pursuing him and two of the site's other founders on conspiracy, racketeering and money laundering charges.

The couple have endured countless attacks by internet trolls over their age - and weight - difference, and even faked a breakup to make it stop

Ms Dotcom said she wanted two or three children, adding to Kim's five from his previous marriage, which they discussed early in their relationship

Dotcom argued he couldn't be held responsible for others who chose to use his site for illegal purposes, and that any case against him should be heard in civil court

Prosecutors alleged intercepted communications showed the men talking about being 'modern-day pirates' and 'evil' and that they were part of a conspiracy to profit from copyright infringement.

They argued the site cost copyright holders, which included Hollywood's major movie studios, more than US$500 million.

Dotcom argued he couldn't be held responsible for others who chose to use his site for illegal purposes, and that any case against him should be heard in civil court.

For now, the couple were happy to revel in their married bliss, with Ms Dotcom taking to social media after the announcement to call herself 'the luckiest girl in the world'.

'Pure love. Pure happiness. Thank you Kim Dotcom for absolutely everything. Forever love,' she wrote.The principal of an Oregon school was found dead in the garage of his home from an apparent suicide just one day after he was placed on administration leave following allegations he had sexual contact with a student.

Police said Michael Fisher was found dead in his Springfield home Thursday afternoon. The 55-year-old director of the Academy of Arts and Academics was being investigated for alleged sexual misconduct.

Authorities were called to the Springfield school Wednesday morning after a former student contacted school officials to report that she had allegedly been victimized by Fisher on school property over a period of years, KEZI reports.

The school immediately called police and told Fisher about the allegations.

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Michael Fisher, the principal of the Academy of the Arts and Academics in Springfield, Oregon, committed suicide on Thursday following allegations he had sexual contact with a student

According to Lt. Scott McKee with the Springfield Police Department, Fisher left the school and went to a pawnshop nearby to purchase a gun. The clerk at the pawnshop was a former student and told a friend who then contacted the school.

Academy of Arts and Academics was then placed on lockdown.

Police said Fisher left the pawnshop and went to another store to buy a .38 caliber revolver. Officers went to Fisher's home and asked him why he had bought the gun and he reportedly said he needed it for self-defense because he was under investigation for misconduct.

Police asked Fisher to voluntarily give up the weapon, which he did. However, around 4pm on Thursday Fisher's wife called police to the home after he was found dead.

Investigators said the director had committed suicide by hanging himself in the garage, according to KEZI.

Police said Fisher's death came less than 24 hours after the school had placed him on administration leave during the investigation.

According to KCBY, the school is on a scheduled break but opened its doors for a few hours on Friday so students, staff and parents could come together and grieve with the assistance of professional grief counselors.

Fisher was placed on administration leave after a female student contacted school officials to report that she had been victimized by Fisher on school property over a period of several years

'An event like this only reaffirms how important it is to support each other and lean in to our community. We are our strongest support system, and together we have the tools we need to get through this,' the school said in a Facebook post.

'At this time, we only know as much as you, and for now we must be okay with not having all the answers. To that end, we encourage you to be thoughtful about how you process this news, as so many details are still not confirmed or publicly released. We know that no one desires to spread hurtful rumors and if the information indeed proves correct we want to be respectful of how that impacts individuals in our A3 community.'

McKee told KEZI he believes there are more victims given Mr. Fishers response to the revelation that there was an investigation going on focused upon him. He said he fears those potential victims won't come forward because of Fisher's suicide.

Fisher had been with the Springfield School District since 1999 and helped create the Academy of Arts and Academics in 2006. He served as principal ever since the school opened.The trio had been fishing off the small island of Kauritutahi, southwest Auckland

A father has died and two of his children are in hospital after getting caught in a fast-moving tide.

The trio were returning from fishing off the small island of Kauritutahi, near the Awhitu Regional Park in southwest Auckland, when an incoming tide swept them up.

Awhitu Volunteer Fire Brigade chief Andrew Hamilton told the New Zealand Herald: 'I think they were fishing on the island  They got caught in the tide when they were making their way back to shore by foot.'

A father has died and his two children are in hospital after getting caught in a fast-moving tide near the Awhitu Regional Park (stock image)

'They are big tides at the moment with a lot of current when the tide is coming in and going out.'

'Special mention must be made of the campers there. They were alerted to it before we got there and went out and helped the family in to shore,' he added.

Police were called to the scene around 12.40pm following reports three people were in trouble in the water, but the father died at the scene.

The children are in a moderate condition and are being treated at Middlemore Hospital.

They were airlifted by the Auckland Westpac Rescue Helicopter after swallowing sea water.

The small island the family were fishing on is about 200 metres from the shore.

A spokesman for the rescue helicopter told the publication: 'When crew got there, CPR was in progress on an adult male patient. He unfortunately died at the scene.

'Crew of Westpac 2 assisted two children who had been rescued prior to the rescue helicopter arriving at the scene.'A dashcam has captured the moment two cars nearly collide after a driver attempts to overtake a series of vehicles in slippery, snowy conditions around a blind corner while another car tries to do the same.

The footage, taken in the Snowy Mountains of New South Wales, shows a convoy of cars moving slowly through the icy roads.

A Volvo four-wheel-drive comes into shot driving significantly faster than the other cars as a Jeep is indicating to change lanes, resulting in both cars swerving to avoid each other.

The footage begins showing a number of cars slowly making their way through the treacherous conditions, with snow falling all around

The dashcam was uploaded to Facebook on Sunday afternoon, attracting many critical commentators of the overtaking driver.

The footage begins showing a number of cars slowly making their way through the treacherous conditions, with snow falling all around.

The road has a broken single centre line, indicating cars may overtake when safe, a situation that wasn't the case for either driver.

The black Volvo comes into shot in the bottom right corner of the footage, driving much faster than the other vehicles.

The black Volvo comes into shot in the bottom right corner of the footage, driving much faster than the other vehicles

As it makes its way past the group, what appears to be five cars, the Jeep in front of the dashcam's car suddenly indicates and pulls out, also attempting to overtake the blind corner

As it makes its way past the group, what appears to be five cars, the Jeep in front of the dashcam's car suddenly indicates and pulls out, also attempting to overtake the blind corner.

The two four-wheel-drives nearly collide as they swerve to avoid each other. It appears the two vehicles did lightly clash at some stage.

They both overtake and continue up the snowy road out of sight of the camera, before they are seen pulled over further ahead up the road.

The two four-wheel-drives nearly collide as they swerve to avoid each other. It appears the two vehicles did lightly clash at some stage

They both overtake and continue up the snowy road out of sight of the camera, before they are seen pulled over further ahead up the road

Viewers reacted angrily to the footage, with many arguing over who was at fault.

'Someone pulled out without checking their mirror to see if they were been overtaken. You dont need snow to be that stupid!!' one person commented.

'What a d***head doing that on wet ice roads the moron should be taken off the road for good,' another said.

Some blamed both drivers for the situation, labelling them 'stupid'.

'How dumb do you have to be to overtake on the inside of a blind corner at all, let alone in the snow.'Federal Education Minister Simon Birmingham wants smartphones banned from classrooms, saying they are a distraction and 'a platform for bullying'.

The recent death of 14-year-old Amy 'Dolly' Everett, a victim of cyber-bullying, has put the spotlight on the issue of access to social media and the harm it causes.

'There's almost no reason students shouldn't have their phones switched off and in their lockers while they're at school,' Senator Birmingham told News Corp.

'Although learning to work with technology is essential, phones can be a distraction from lessons and a platform for bullying unless schools have the right policies in place.'

Smartphones could be banned from schools in a push from the Federal Government

Federal Education Minister Simon Birmingham (pictured) called for students to switch off their phones and leave them in their lockers

Child psychologist Michael Carr-Gregg said no primary aged student should even own a smartphone.

Where youngsters required a mobile for 'security' reasons, they could be given a 'dumb phone', without any bells and whistles.

A recent study by KidsMatter reported 67 per cent of children aged 12 to 13 owned a mobile phone.

The group also found more than half of 10 to 11 year-olds had accessed the internet via a smart phone.

Amy 'Dolly' Everett (pictured) committed suicide aged just 14 last month after being bullied online

State Education Minister Susan Close backed Mr Birmingham's calls, and told News Corp South Australia would seriously consider the proposal.

Ms Close said the State Government would be considering it and consulting with teachers.

Meanwhile in Queensland, a spokesperson for Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk told the Courier Mail there were no plans to implement a ban.

'Decisions about the use of mobile phones during school hours are for the principal, in consultation with the school community,' they said.

New York police arrested 44 people who allegedly went up to a rooftop on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in order to film a rap video for a former gang member late Saturday.

According to police, neighbors called 911 to complain about noise coming from the roof of the Baruch Houses, a public housing development near East Houston Street.

Officers responding to the scene took 37 men and seven women into custody, WPIX-TV reported.

The calls to police were made at around 7:15pm on Saturday.

Police arrested 44 people in New York's Lower East Side on Saturday after they climbed onto the roof of the Baruch Houses (seen above) to film a rap video

Jezz Gasoline and China Mac Music, two local rappers, promoted the video shoot on their social media feeds. China Mac Music's real name is Raymond Yu, a former gang member who served 10 years in prison for shooting a rival rapper in Chinatown in 2003

On his Instagram, China Mac Music (left) posted a video urging followers to come to the Baruch Houses. Jezz Gasoline (right), a New York area rapper, also promoted the event

Officers responding to the scene took 37 men and seven women into custody. A number of people who apparently saw the social media post announcing the film shoot are seen above

In another video he posted, a row of Porsches and BMWs are seen in what appears to be the same area

An NYPD helicopter with a search light is seen hovering above the Lower East Side on Saturday near the scene of the arrest

Police said that all 44 people will be charged with trespassing.

A gun and two imitation firearms were recovered from the scene, according to police.

Jezz Gasoline and China Mac Music, two local rappers, promoted the video shoot on their social media feeds.

According to the New York Daily News, China Mac is a former gang member who served 10 years in prison for shooting a rival rapper in 2003.

In November 2003, China Mac, whose legal name is Raymond Yu, shot Christopher Louie in the lower back at the Yello nightclub in Chinatown.

The shooting left Louie partially paralyzed.

Yu attempted to flee the country but he was caught at the border between Washington State and Canada in December 2004.

Yu was once a member of Ghost Shadows, a notorious Chinese gang that operated in New York.

He was even featured in a documentary series about the notorious Rikers Island jail.

'I did a lot of stupid s***,' Yu told Black Star News in a May 2017 profile.

'I did a lot of stuff to cause pain and grief for people that didnt deserve it. For that I regret it.'

On his Instagram, Yu posted a video urging followers to come to the Baruch Houses.

'Are ya ready for the epic video shoot today?' Yu wrote on Facebook on Saturday.

'Pull up and rock with a real one! Lets show how we do in New mutha York!'

In another video he posted, a row of Porsches and BMWs are seen in what appears to be the same area.Republican Rep. Devin Nunes, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, was the driving force behind the controversial memo's declassification and release

A memo released on Feb. 2, 2018 by the House Intelligence Committee was written by Republican aides who had seen classified documents about government surveillance of a Donald Trump campaign adviser.

The four-page document itself does not appear to allege that anyone violated federal law, but it does outline a pattern of improper conduct by a list of high-ranking FBI and Justice Department officials during the Obama administration.

Republicans will use it to justify complaints that top law enforcement agencies had an anti-Trump bias during an election year.

These were the same agencies that cleared Hillary Clinton of wrongdoing in her classified email scandal, a subject that President Trump railed about consistently as he campaigned for the White House.

Democrats complain that the memo left out important facts and 'cherry-picked' information in order to present a one-sided view of what the FBI and DOJ did to persuade a judge to grant surveillance powers.

WHAT DID THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT DO?

A Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) judge granted the Justice Department a warrant to spy on Carter Page, a Trump foreign policy adviser, partially on the basis of an anti-Trump 'dossier' compiled by an opposition research group funded by Democrats.

Using a law firm as a middle-man, the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee paid the firm, Fusion GPS. Fusion then paid former British spy Christopher Steele more than $160,000 to dig up Russia-related dirt on Trump.

The Republican memo concludes that Steele himself was biased, since he 'was desperate that Donald Trump not get elected and was passionate about him not being president.'

But the FBI continued using him as a confidential source anyway, even after he violated the most basic rule of working with a government intelligence service by telling a reporter what he was up to.

The warrant application also relied on a news article by a Yahoo reporter without telling the judge that leaks from Steele himself were at its center.

When the Justice Department asked the court for permission to spy on Page, it didn't disclose Steele's bias.

It also never mentioned that it was asking for a warrant based on materials that were paid for by Trump's political opponents.

WHY IS THE STEEL DOSSIER SO IMPORTANT?

FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe testified before the House Intelligence Committee in December 2017 that 'no surveillance warrant would have been sought .... without the Steele dossier information.'

The dossier itself was full of bombshell claims about Trump, most notably that he cavorted with prostitutes in a Moscow hotel room that the Kremlin had rigged with recording devices.

Critics say Steele uncritically used information from Russian sources determined to compromise Trump or gain leverage over him  the exact opposite of the Democratic 'collusion' narrative that suggests Trump worked hand-in-hand with Moscow.

WHO IN THE GOVERNMENT IS ACCUSED OF WRONGDOING?

FISA warrants have to be renewed every 90 days; then-FBI Director James Comey, later fired by President Donald Trump, signed three of them. FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe signed another one.

Others to sign off included then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, another official fired by Trump; then-Acting Deputy Attorney General Dana Boente; and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.

Another official implicated in the memo is then-Associate Deputy Attorney General Bruce Ohr. Ohr's wife was employed by Fusion GPS at the same time, but the FBI never told the FISA court about it.

Ohr was reassigned and is no longer in a position to impact the other major Russia investigation  one helmed by special counsel Robert Mueller.

But the fate of Rosenstein and McCabe is up in the air. Republicans on the Intelligence Committee may have given Trump a reason to fire them both.

DOES THIS CHANGE ANYTHING FOR THE MUELLER PROBE?

In a word, no. The memo doesn't say anything that suggests Mueller or his current team are engaged in anything illegal or unethical.

But the appearance of impropriety at the Justice Department, though unconnected, will give Trump supporters ammunition to claim Mueller's investigation is also suspect.

The president has consistently called the multiple investigations a collective 'witch hunt' and insisted he never colluded with Russians to tilt the 2016 election in his favor.

HOW WILL THIS AFFECT THE 'FISA' COURTS?

Judges empowered by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) grant more than 99 per cent of the warrant applications presented by the federal government.

This episode suggests that the process can be compromised by officials who are willing to hide material facts or provide courts with one-sided accounts of what they know and how they came to know it.

The flip side is that if FISA courts begin to scrutinize warrant applications more carefully, they might act too slowly in cases where there are urgent terrorism-related circumstances that require quick action.

WHAT'S NEXT?

Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee have written their own counterpoint, a memo that they say fills in important facts the Republican majority omitted.

That document is winding its way through the same process the GOP's memo went through: committee votes to allow the full House of Representatives to see it, and then to release it to the public.

If that happens, the White House will again have five days to reject a request to declassify the Democrats' version. The White House has signaled that it will treat the two versions of history equally.An American man has been arrested for incest after he dumped his wife and had a baby with his daughter who was given up for adoption.

Steven Walter Pladl, 42, and his biological daughter Katie Rose Pladl, 20, were arrested last week at their home in Knightdale, North Carolina, after Steven's estranged wife told police that he impregnated their daughter.

According to warrants, Katie was adopted out of state after she was born. When she turned 18 she used social media to find her biological parents, KRON 4 reports.

Scroll down for video

Steven Pladl (left) and his biological daughter Katie Pladl (right) were arrested and charged with incest after they had a baby together

Katie Pladl, 20, was adopted out of state as a baby and reconnected with her parents when she turned 18

Shortly after Katie Pladl moved back in with her parents, her father Steven Pladl (pictured) and her mother legally separated. The wife told police that Steven had been sleeping in their daughter's room

In August 2016, Katie went to live with her parents and their two other children in their home near Richmond, Virginia.

The warrants state that Steven and his wife legally separated three months later, in November 2016.

The wife told authorities that the month she moved out of the home Steven had been sleeping on the floor of Katie's bedroom.

The wife also said that she learned her daughter was pregnant and that Steven was the father in May 2017 after reading one of her other children's journal.

According to the warrants, Steven had asked the two younger children to refer to Katie as their step-mom, although she was their sibling.

After learning about the pregnancy, the wife said she contacted her estranged husband and asked if he had impregnated Katie. He allegedly admitted the baby was his and said they planned to get married.

Katie posted an Instagram photo in July stating that she and Steven had gotten 'married', although they legally cannot do so.

Katie's baby boy was born in September, warrants revealed. The father and daughter were arrested in January at their North Carolina home

They have been charged with incest with adult, adultery, contributing to delinquency. Steven (pictured) bonded out of jail, but Katie remains behind bars

Police said at some point after May 2017, Katie and Steven moved to Wake County, North Carolina together. Arrest warrants were issued for them in November 2017 and they were arrested at their Knightdale home in January.

Authorities said when they were arrested a baby boy was with them. Warrants revealed the baby was born in September 2017.

The father and daughter are being held in the Wake County Detention Center pending extradition to Virginia. They have been charged with incest with adult, adultery, contributing to delinquency.

Steven and Katie were each issued a $1million bond. Steven bonded out of jail, but Katie remains behind bars.

It's not clear who the baby is in the care of.

Katie posted an Instagram photo announcing her 'marriage' to Steven, although they legally cannot wedAn Australian backpacker who flew to Colombia for an adventure has revealed how he found himself surrounded by drug-dealing hitmen in a city ruled by a brutal drug cartel.

Austin Galt was a 26-years-old banker and model based in Sydney when he decided to travel to South America in search of an adventure.

In 2001, he was one of few tourists to traverse the country which was struggling economically and at the helm of drug cartels.

Mr Galt, now 43, said it wasn't long before he found himself in danger.

The Australian man married a Colombian woman, Lily (together) and the couple went on to have two daughters together

'We were completely surrounded by hitmen  obviously the word had got around to the sicarios and they just swarmed out table and sat everywhere, right on my back, several of them right on my back,' he told News.com.au.

Mr Galt said the situation ended without bloodshed, but was the beginning of a dangerous trip, which included being searched by guerrillas carrying AK-47s to a drug trafficker threatening him with his life.

In his first book, White Nights, Mr Galt said he grew addicted to the tension in the air and the sense of danger.

'The war in the countryside between the guerrillas and the army, it was like, you see people firing their guns, you see mafia hits, dead bodies all over the place, on highways on street corners, it was just all action,' he said.

Austin Galt (centre) with Thomas McFadden and his friend Rusty Young - the author of Marching Powder

Despite the danger, Mr Galt said he fell in love with the country so much that he never left.

The Australian man married a Colombian woman, Lily and the couple went on to have two daughters together.

While he went on to live a wholesome life with his family, Mr Galt said he came very close to entering the dangerous world of crime.

He said he remembered the moment he was asked by his friend if he wanted to do something criminal.

The country is the setting for Narcos - a show which tells the story of drug king Pablo Escobar (actor Wagner Moura pictured in Narcos)

He said he almost said yes but pulled himself back and never regretted his decision.

'I pretty much entered that world as far as anyone could, without actually becoming involved, and that's how I liked to leave it,' he said.

Living in Colombia, Mr Galt said the country was still overrun by the drug industry.

He believed Colombia would only move forward if it legalised drugs because there would be less violent crime.

While he and his family felt safe, he still described Colombia as the 'Wild West'.Meghan Markle's half-brother Tom has said he wants to ban his sons from attending the royal wedding in May, because they haven't seen her since they were babies

Meghan Markle's wedding is due to be a star-studded affair, with the Obamas, her Suits co-star Patrick J. Adams, and Serena Williams rumoured to be on the guest list.

But two relatives might not be in attendance after Ms Markle's half-brother Tom intervened, saying that he wants to ban his two sons from going.

According to their father, Thomas, 26, and Tyler, 25, haven't seen Ms Markle since they were babies - and he claims they're just trying to cash in on the Markle name.

Tom told the Sunday Mirror: 'Tracy [Thomas and Tyler's mother] and me stopped living as man and wife three months into the marriage because the relationship was such a disaster. She never wanted the Markle name when we were married and now suddenly she acts like she's still part of the family.

Tom said: 'I dont believe Tracy [his ex-wife] or my sons have the right to call themselves Markles. If this embarrasses Meghan then I am sorry, but Tracy cant go on claiming to be a Markle'

'I don't want her to have anything to do with us and the boys shouldn't go along with it. They shouldn't be at the wedding either.

'Both boys were always Dooleys as kids. I got sick of making the name an issue with Tracy and ultimately she had her way. They're Dooleys. You cannot pick and choose when you're a Markle.'

Tom, who currently lives in a bungalow in Grants Pass, Oregon, with his fiancee Darlene Blount, shares a father with Ms Markle.

Tom, who shares a father with Ms Markle, added that both her sons were known as Dooleys as kids after his ex-wife insisted on it, and that they were now trying to cash in on the Markle name (Pictured: Young Tom Markle with Meghan)

He divorced Thomas and Tyler's mother Tracy in 2000.

Tom added: 'Its got to stop. The boys were babies when they met Meghan last and Tracy has never even met Meghan, ever.

'I dont believe Tracy or my sons have the right to call themselves Markles. If this embarrasses Meghan then I am sorry, but Tracy cant go on claiming to be a Markle.'

Last month Tom got into a drunk NYE brawl with his fiancee, which he blamed on the stress from the added attention and scrutiny from being related to Ms Markle

His comments come after he blamed the pressure and scrutiny from Ms Markle's engagement to Prince Harry for a drunken brawl with his fiancee on New Year's Eve.

The flare-up in their Oregon home led to Tom's fiancee Darlene Blount being thrown into jail for two nights for assault.

Last month he said: It hasnt been easy. Meghans relationship with Prince Harry has shone a spotlight on our family. It doesnt help when you have issues and your sister is engaged to Royalty. It adds a whole new level of scrutiny.

Weve been under a lot of stress because of all the attention. At some point you find yourself drinking too much to escape the pressure.

He has since vowed to 'seek help'.

Last year he was arrested for brandishing a gun at his fiancee during another drunken fracas.This is the shocking moment a 15-year-old school girl was knifed repeatedly in the chest during a vicious brawl in a Brazilian school.

The girl was allegedly attacked with a penknife at St Joseph State College in Jaragua, central west Brazil, on Friday morning following a long-standing feud between the two.

The footage shows the moment the assailant launched her frenzied attack.

She raises the knife and strikes several times while other students scream in horror at the scale of the violence.

At the beginning of the film, the knife-wielding pupil is spotted holding the weapon and hiding it behind her back before apparently launching the onslaught.

The clash was broken up by a man who dragged the aggressor away from the conflict and held her in a classroom until police arrived.

The injured student appears defenceless during the attack as she is forced to the ground and tries to fend off the blows.

She was later pictured slumped on a chair being attended to by ambulance crew after the incident.

The vicious penknife stabbing occurred during a brawl at St Joseph State College in Jaragua, central west Brazil, on Friday

Her white school top was soaked with blood.

In another photo, a stained rose-coloured bra with a slash in the left cup shows where the knife reportedly hit the victim.

The schoolgirl was treated at hospital for a chest wound and has already been discharged according to Goias Education, Culture and Sport Department.

The teen assailant has been detained in Jaragua jail, in a special cell for adolescents.

Detective Glenio Ricardo Alves da Costa, investigating the case, said the motive for the fight is still unclear.

He said: 'The teenager who had the pocketknife did not say why she had attacked a colleague.

'All she would say was that they had an old argument and had quarreled earlier. On [Friday] morning she decided to attack the girl with a pocketknife.'

Members of the school board will meet tomorrow to report on the case and to examine what measures should be taken.A mother who was told she would die after delaying vital cancer treatment until she had given birth has been given the all-clear - after Leonardo Di Caprio and Kate Winslet saved her life.

Gemma Nuttall was undergoing her first pre-natal scan when she was told she had an aggressive form of ovarian cancer.

But Ms Nuttall, from Rossendale, Lancashire, refused potentially life-saving drugs because they would have terminated the pregnancy.

Her daughter Penelope was born healthy but NHS doctors later delivered the devastating news to Ms Nuttall that there was nothing more they could do.

Ms Nuttall, 29, was given as little as six months to live and put on end-of-life care.

Gemma Nuttall, pictured here with daughter Penelope, has been given the all-clear from cancer after Hollywood A-lister Kate Winslet stepped in to help

Ms Nuttall was told she had aggressive ovarian cancer while pregnant. She refused life-saving treatment because it would have terminated the pregnancy

Gemma launched the fundraising campaign so Penelope did not have to grow up 'without a mummy' - and is now cancer free

But Ms Nuttall and her mother launched a 300,000 fundraising campaign after hearing about a German 'wonder clinic'.

Hollywood A-lister Kate Winslet heard about Ms Nuttall's story and along with Leo, auctioned off three 'Jack and Rose' date nights, named after their characters in Titanic.

The prizes went under the hammer at a private dinner in July held in St Tropez for DiCaprio's conservation foundation.

And Ms Nuttall finished her treatment five months ago and has now been given the all-clear.

Ms Nuttall said: 'I can't thank Kate enough. Without her donations, and the public's, my story would be very different. We thought it was a wind-up, but then she called and I realised she was serious.

'I was so nervous but she asked me how I was feeling and how my treatment was going  she wanted to help.

'I told her I could never thank her enough and she told me not to be daft. She said she had read about my story online, that she had three kids of her own and had thought about what she would be like in that position.'

Charitable Kate won a prestigious Actors Inspiration Award from the Screen Actors' Guild in November, partly for her work with Ms Nuttall.

Ms Nuttall launched a fundraising campaign for treatment in Germany. Kate Winslet heard about her plight and enlisted Leonardo Di Caprio to helo

The stars auctioned off three 'Jack and Rose' date nights, named after their characters in Titanic. Ms Nuttall paid for the treatment and is now cancer-free

Kate, 42, said: 'I was able to help raise an enormous amount of money and Gemma is cancer free today.'

And receiving the award, she added: 'The greatest privilege has been learning how to use my voice to help others. Standing up for individuals who don't have the means to stand up for themselves... helping a person who is dying  she's still alive by the way  because they don't have the money that could pay for specialist treatment that could save her life.'

Ms Nuttall first found out she was pregnant in 2013 but doctors found large cysts on her ovaries and tests revealed she had aggressive cancer.

She was told by doctors she needed treatment that would have terminated the pregnancy - but refused.

She said: 'I went home and I told my partner 'I can't get rid of her'.

'She saved my life, she was the reason my cancer had been discovered. I felt I had to repay the favour.'

At 26 weeks devastated Gemma was told the disease had spread to her cervix. She had an emergency Caesarean, immediately followed by surgery to remove the tumour.

Gemma and her mother Helen, who sold off her house to help pay for treatment in Germany

Gemma gave birth to Penelope after 26 weeks and the baby weighed 4lbs 5oz when she was born on March 24, 2014. Two weeks later dental nurse Gemma began six months of chemotherapy

'They held Penelope up to me, I saw her and then they took her away and put me to sleep,' she says.

'So I didn't get that precious moment to hold my baby and feel that rush of emotion. I was too unwell to see her that night when I woke up, which was heartbreaking because it was all I wanted to do. It wasn't until the following day when I was taken to see her in my wheelchair.

'She was in an incubator and I reached in and held her hand, for as long as I could. We were both alive and that was all that mattered.'

Penelope weighed 4lbs 5oz when she was born on March 24, 2014. Two weeks later dental nurse Gemma began six months of chemotherapy.

She was cancer free for more than a year but then found a lump on the back of her head.

A -lister Kate and Gemma text from time to time and have even spoken about meeting up soon

Doctors at Royal Blackburn Hospital later confirmed that Gemma had a stage four tumour. Gemma recalls the moment vividly and sobs: 'I could see the devastation on the consultant's face when he told me.

'Then my mum and I burst into tears. I faced brain surgery and was told I might not be the same person afterwards. It was terrifying.'

The brain op went well at Preston Royal Hospital but the tumour could not be fully removed because of its position. The rest would be targeted by radiotherapy.

Swollen by steroids, with one eye closed for six months, Gemma began a job as a soft play centre manager.

But months later she started having headaches and doctors found eight new tumours dotted around her head. The mum, who had recently split up with her partner saying she had 'shut down' her emotions, was given more chemotherapy and radiotherapy, losing her hair for a second time.

Finally, she was told nothing more could be done. She adds: 'I was told I needed to make a will and put things in place for Penelope when I was gone.

'I felt written off completely. But my mum thought 'I'm not having this. I'm not going to let my daughter die'.'

Mum Helen Sproates, 56, says she 'fell apart' seeing Gemma receiving the devastating news. Helen had read about immunotherapy  which boosts the body's natural defences  that was available at Germany's Hallwang Clinic. She sold her house and set up a fundraising page asking for further donations to cover the immense cost.

Gemma flew to Germany last May and started a six-session course of immunotherapy, costing up to 70,000 a time. But she only had enough money for the first round.

Then in July, Helen received an email from Kate Winslet's PA, saying she desperately wanted to help.

The star's financial support, combined with public donations and money from Helen's house sale, funded the treatment. Helen explains: 'Kate told me from one mum to another mum, she couldn't let my daughter die.

'She's been brilliant. She's lovely, really down to earth and funny, it's just like chatting to a friend. Leonardo DiCaprio has a massive ball for his foundation every year, so Kate contacted him. They came up with a plan to auction themselves off. They sold three dates between them.'

Kate spoke about her intervention during an appearance on Graham Norton. She told the TV host: 'Back in July I was doing some fundraising for a cancer sufferer who desperately needed funds for a lifesaving treatment. I called Leo and said: 'Can we do a dinner with Jack and Rose?'

'His foundation is completely unbelievable and he said: 'We'll auction off Jack and Rose for dinner and we'll make those funds'. We raised $1.35 million dollars.'

Helen adds: 'We are more grateful than I can put into words. I really want to say thank you to every single person who donated, including Kate and Leo

'They raised so much they have been able to donate money to other charities too. They saved my daughter.' In November, two months after finishing her course of immunotherapy at The Hallwang, Gemma went for a scan at The Christie cancer treatment clinic in Manchester.

She was told she is cancer free. She says: 'I was amazed. For the scans to come back clear, it means the immunotherapy is working. We were thrilled.'

Gemma will have her next scan later this month. Depending on the result, she is planning to have more immunotherapy to strengthen her position even more. Her GoFundMe page is reopening for donations.

Kate and Gemma text from time to time and have even spoken about meeting up soon.

Gemma smiles: 'I think we would just have a general chit chat if we met up, she'd want to take my mind off it all. I'd love to introduce her to Penelope. I have been asked if I regret having Penelope. But I'd never think that. She saved my life. If it wasn't for her I might not be here now.

You can support Gemma at gofundme.com/teamgemmaPolice are hunting for an offender after a 74-year-old man was robbed while going to the bathroom at a Brisbane shopping centre.

The elderly man was robbed about 8am when he left the food court to go to the bathroom at Westfield Chermside, in the city's inner-north, on Sunday.

When he reached the bathroom, he was approached from behind.

After the brazen robbery, Queensland police released images of a man (pictured) they believe could help with their investigation

When the robber attempted to steal the man's wallet from his back pocket, a scuffle ensued and the elderly man was pushed to the ground.

The 74-year-old was not injured.

The offender managed to steal the man's wallet before he fled on foot.

After the brazen robbery, Queensland police released images of a man they believe could help with their investigation.

Anyone able to identify the man has been asked to phone Policelink on 131 444.

Investigations continue.

Anyone able to identify the man (pictured) has been asked to phone Policelink on 131 444A prison chaplain claims he was ousted from his role after he was accused of promoting 'extreme' Christian views by his Muslim boss.

Paul Song says he was removed from his job at Brixton prison in south London amid accusations that his teachings were 'too radical'.

The former police officer maintains the sacking was also on the basis of false accusations from a Muslim inmate, who said Mr Song referred to him a 'terrorist'.

Mr Song said his position at HMP Brixton, where he had served for 20 years, came under scrutiny after Mohammed Yusuf Ahmed became managing chaplain in 2015.

Paul Song (pictured) says he was removed from his job at Brixton prison in south London amid accusations that his teachings were 'too radical'

Mr Song (left) said his position at HMP Brixton, where he had served for 20 years, came under scrutiny after Mohammed Yusuf Ahmed (right) became managing chaplain in 2015

He claimed the imam told him he was intent on changing 'the Christian domination within HMP Brixton, according to the Sunday Times.

Management said it sacked the 48-year-old following 'allegations of misconduct', and that Mr Ahmed had accused him of 'being unfavourable to the Christians'.

Mr Song, who now works as a pastor in Sutton, south London, was removed from his post in August.

He says he was offered no evidence to support the claims against him and was informed by the Ministry of Justice that he could work 'anywhere but HMP Brixton'.

A prison service spokesperson told the MailOnline: 'We do not comment on individual members of staff.

'However, we recognise the importance of faith and the positive impact that it can have on the lives of offenders, which is why there are multi-faith chaplaincy teams in every prison.'A man has drowned on a beach when rescuers found him face down in the water after getting caught up in a suspected rip tide.

Emergency services, including the Westpac Rescue Helicopter, was called to Pretty Beach in New South Wales on Sunday afternoon.

But despite their best efforts to resuscitate the man, he was pronounced dead at the scene.

The man believed to be aged in his 30s was found face down on Pretty Beach in southern NSW

The man is believed to be aged in his 30s and was not breathing when he was located by rescuers.

First aid was given to the man until paramedics arrived and the helicopter later winched the man into the aircraft to begin CPR.

The incident happened around 30km north of Bateman's Bay on the state's Far South Coast at 2.30pm.

A spokesman for New South Wales Police said they would be investigating the circumstances of the tragedy and are preparing a report for the coroner.

In a statement, the Westpac Life Saver Rescue said: 'Despite valiant efforts of the crew and paramedics, male was unable to be revived. RIP.

'He was earlier located face down in the water and winched aboard the helicopter where CPR was commenced, before landing at nearby Merry Beach.'

Despite efforts by the emergency services the man was sadly pronounced dead at the scene

A police spokesman said: 'Emergency services were called to Pretty Beach, about 30km north of Batemans Bay, at 2.30pm following reports a man had become distressed in the water.

'The man, believed to be aged in his 30s, was found face down in the water.

'Attempts to revive the man were made until NSW Ambulance Paramedics arrived, and he was pronounced deceased.

'Officers from the South Coast Police District will investigate the circumstances surrounding the incident.'

Beachgoers have been reminded about how to stay safe when visiting the beach this summer

Pretty Beach on the Far South Coast in New South Wales where a man was found dead on Sunday

Police also reminded beachgoers to make sure they are aware of the risks associated with the sea and how to stay safe in the water.

'The incident is a timely reminder for swimmers to make safety the priority when in, on or around the water this summer,' a NSW force spokesman said.

'Always swim between the red and yellow flags, read and observe the safety signs, ask a lifesaver/lifeguard for safety advice.'

Advice also includes swimming with someone else, supervising children, never getting in the water after drinking or taking drugs.

Rescuers from the life saving helicopter said valiant efforts were made by teams to revive the man

A key point they have also raised is how to identify a rip.

Surf lifesaver Kenny Jewell explained how to find one and what to do if you get caught in a rip.

'A rip is usually the area void of wave activity and appears darker and deceptively calmer,' he said.

'Always take 5-10 mins when you get to the beach to observe surf conditions and identify where these areas are.

'If you are caught in a rip, DO NOT PANIC. Go into floating mode and raise one arm as a distress signal when possible

'Obviously the safest place to swim is always between the flags on a patrolled beach, but this isn't always practical given the immensity of our coast line.'A TUI holiday rep who suffered 50 per cent burns to her body has said she is 'haunted' by the apology her attacker spouted before throwing acid over her

British woman Ellie Chessell told police her assailant said 'desculpe' - Portuguese for 'sorry' - before throwing two litres of acid over her face, arms, chest and stomach.

The 29-year-old is said to have been attacked by a 'hit man' after being allegedly lured to a Tinder date by her ex-boyfriend, where she went to meet a man called 'Diogo', according to Portuguese court papers and judicial sources.

Ms Chessell, who was treated for post-traumatic stress disorder after returning to her native Newport on the Isle of Wight, admitted to cops: 'I still remember what the man who attacked me said before he threw the liquid at me.

'He used the Portuguese word for "sorry." To this day I still hear the word countless times whenever I close my eyes.'

Ellie Chessell, who suffered 50 per cent burns to her body, has said she is haunted by the apology her attacker said before dousing her in acid (pictured with Claudio Goeveia, who she says organised the attack with a hitman)

TUI rep Ms Chessell was attacked in the Algarve after arranging to go for a date on Tinder. She said: 'To this day I still hear the word countless times whenever I close my eyes'

Alleged attacker Edmundo Helder Rodrigues Fonseca, 44, and Ellie's 34-year-old ex Claudio Gouveia, both from Madeira, are awaiting trial for her attempted murder.

Prosecutors claim Gouveia masterminded the attack on May 6 last year in the Algarve holiday resort of Alvor near Portimao after she walked out on him two months earlier for assaulting her.

Prior to their separation, Ms Chessell had lived in Madeira with Mr Gouveia.

Court files on the horrific attack also show staff at the Lisbon hospital where Ellie was treated for her injuries demanded to see pictures of her former boyfriend suspect because they were so worried about a second assault.

Doctor Ana Ferreira, head of the burns unit at Santa Maria Hospital where she spent a month recovering, wrote to police saying she was worried about the safety of Ellie and staff and asking for photos of the suspect so they could be given to hospital security guards.

Gouveia was arrested at his home in Madeira on May 29 and has been in custody ever since.

He has denied assaulting Ellie during their two-year relationship and is expected to plead innocent to her attempted murder and claim an imposter sent the death threats and other messages she and her family received in the weeks before the attack.

Mr Fonseca, pictured, was found in a Ugandan jail serving time for heroin charges and is allegedly the hitman who was enlisted for the attack

One, dated April 3, titled 'I Will Find You', read: 'I'm going to find you and I will take your head off. You are a slut and you are going to die.'

Nine days later she received a text from his phone saying that he had found her in Algarve, before sending three more sinister messages.

One read: 'You are going to make me do something silly. And honestly, it's not like I have a lot to lose.

'Well I did but not anymore. And you know what. I'm going to take you with me if you don't reply.'

Now Ms Chessell has been forced to detail the clothes that were ruined in the attack as part of a compensation claim lodged with the investigating court in Portimao.

The distressing compensation claim she has lodged with the court - which includes a 140.95 (124.38) bill for new clothes she bought for her fateful night out - makes for painful reading.

She explains in the claim: 'Unfortunately I do not have receipts for these but was wearing some of my best clothes.'

She adds: 'I had a career with TUI that I enjoyed and fully expected to continue in this role, anticipating promotion.

'For the foreseeable future this has now been put on hold pending my complete recovery.'

Portuguese and UK police were warned the holiday rep was in danger at least a month before acid was thrown at her in May 2016, according to prosecution papers.

Police on the Algarve were sent an alert marked 'URGENT' less than a month before she was doused with acid following a tip-off from British detectives, naming Gouveia and advising them: 'He needs to be located and stop-checked to safeguard the victim.'

Mr Gouveia, 34, allegedly sent a message to her parents in Newport, Isle of Wight, that said he was going to burn their daughter's face.

The threats prompted Hampshire police to alert Algarve officers, instructing them to locate Mr Goeveia.

Mr Goeveia allegedly sent messages telling the rep she was going to make him do 'something silly'. Police on the Algarve were sent an alert about him less than a month before the attack, but there is no evidence in the court files that Portuguese police did anything to stop it

There is no evidence in the court files Portuguese police did anything to stop the attack. None of three police forces the alert was sent to have responded to written requests for a comment.

Before the attack she even received a threat that read: 'I will find you... you are going to die.'

Ms Chessell later told police she believed her ex-boyfriend had organised the ambush after she walked out on him when he allegedly smashed her head against a wall in a row about money and his jealousy.

'I thought at first the liquid was urine because it felt warm but I quickly realised it was acid because the heat became burning and I realised I had been caught in a trap set by my ex-boyfriend,' she said.

Court files claim he carried out reconnaissance in the Algarve with alleged hitman Edmundo Helder Rodrigues Fonseca four days before the attack.

The Tinder profile bearing the name 'Diogo' allegedly vanished as the holiday rep was assaulted with acid.

No date for the mens' trial has yet been set.

Its start is expected to be delayed while Portuguese authorities try to extradite alleged 'acid hitman' Fonseca, who left Portugal after Ellie was attacked before being arrested in Uganda with 6.3 kilos of heroin and thrown in jail.

An eagle-eyed British Interpol agent discovered he was wanted over the acid attack after he was caged and alerted Portuguese police.

Ms Chessell has returned to the UK and is undergoing burns treatment as well as receiving therapy for post-traumatic stress.The Lord Mayor of Melbourne has sensationally quit amid sexual harassment allegations.

Lord Mayor Robert Doyle, 64, has been accused of sexually inappropriate behaviour towards former councillor Tessa Sullivan, who resigned in December last year.

Ms Sullivan claims Mr Doyle sexually harassed her on a number of occasions in 2017 including touching her breast inside a car after a council meeting.

Mr Doyle's wife Emma Page Campbell (together) said she supported her husband, who she said was on the 'brink of being broken'

Mr Doyle vehemently denied the claims as he stepped down from the job on Sunday.

The former Lord mayor was hospitalised after his resignation, theHerald Sun reported.

A formal resignation is expected to be delivered to chief executive Ben Rimmer on Monday.

His wife Emma Page Campbell said she supported her husband, who was on the 'brink of being broken'.

'I stand beside him He is a good and decent man. I love him. And because I love him, to watch and share what he has been through in the last seven weeks has been agony,' she said.

Ms Sullivan (pictured) claims Mr Doyle sexually harassed her on a number of occasions in 2017 including touching her breast inside a car after a council meeting

Ms Page Campbell said her husband had been treated unfairly because he was not afforded a presumption of innocence.

These allegations have been made in an environment in which guilt is presumed over innocence and where there is little regard for the irreversible damage that can cause to reputation, character and legacy, she said.

A statement released by Mr Doyles lawyer on Sunday claimed a council investigation had been unjust.

Following allegations seven weeks ago, he has been through a period which he feels has lacked any semblance of natural justice, where the burden of proof does not rest with proving guilt, but rather with proving innocence, Nick Ruskin from K & L Gates said.

Mr Ruskin said the allegations took a huge toll on Mr Doyle, who continued to strenuously deny the allegations.

A new Lord Mayor could be elected as early as next month.

His wife Emma Page Campbell said she supported her husband (together), who she said was on the 'brink of being broken'

Mr Doyle (pictured) has also been accused of sexual harassment by Greens councillor Cathy Oke

Mr Doyle has also been accused of sexual harassment by Greens councillor Cathy Oke.

He has denied the allegation.

The former Lord Mayor is also the subject of a separate sexual harassment investigation.

He was accused of inappropriately touching a woman at a Royal Melbourne Hospital dinner in 2016.

The woman claimed he touched her leg.

Mr Doyle, who was the chairman of Melbourne Health in 2016, strenuously denied the allegation.

A number of guests at Mr Doyle's table claimed they saw no incident.A mother has told how she grew to love her polyamorous son's husband - and his boyfriend.

Debbie McKinnon was delighted when son Ross told her he was marrying long-term partner Iain Waddell, 33.

But Ross, 27, then told her a third man, Pav Gill, 24, would be joining the relationship.

Mrs McKinnon's delight quickly turned to anger but she has now learned to love both of the men in her son's life - and is now a proud mother-in-law.

Debbie McKinnon was delighted when son Ross (centre) told her he was marrying Iain Waddell (back right). But she was angry when told Pav Gill (back left) would be joining the relationship

Ross met fellow nurse Iain on a dating app and they had an open relationship. They married in 2014 (pictured) just days after Pav had moved in to their apartment

Mrs McKinnon, 45, of East Lothian, told the Daily Record: 'I was worried my baby was going to be lying in bed alone at night, crying because his partner was in the next room sleeping with some other bloke.

'But Ross explained that while Iain and him had a deep, deep love, it didn't mean they didn't want to have sex or relationships with other people.

'They still got married, and Pav was at their wedding. Now Pav is Ross's boyfriend  they fell in love as well  and the relationship the three of them have is very beautiful.'

Ross met fellow nurse Iain seven years ago through a dating app and the pair decided to have an open relationship where each man could have multiple partners.

They got engaged but just months later Iain met Pav, from Coventry, who soon moved up to Edinburgh - and into the couple's spare room.

Days later, in September 2014, Iain and Pav tied the knot.

Ross, Iain, Pav and Debbie will feature in a new BBC Scotland documentary titled Love Unlimited, which examines several polyamorous relationships

After the honeymoon, Ross and Pav found it difficult to get along but six months later they were dating.

And three years later, the trio say they are still in a loving relationship and living together in a two-bedroom flat in Edinburgh.

Iain insists the three-way partnership is not just about sex and Ross revealed they do not sleep in the same bed.

Ross says sex with other people is now just a form of exercise for him and said the trio are completely honest with each other.

And he admitted he feels sorry for people who only have one lover.

Ross, Iain, Pav and Debbie will feature in a new BBC Scotland documentary titled Love Unlimited, which examines several polyamorous relationships.

Love Unlimited is on BBC Two Scotland, Wednesday, 9pm.Theresa May was today urged to channel 'Iron Lady' Margaret Thatcher and defy her Chancellor Philip Hammond and deliver a clean Brexit.

Senior Tory Bernard Jenkin hit out at 'vague and divided ' ministers and urged them to get behind the Prime Minister.

He said it was only by defying her ministers and civil servants that Baroness Thatcher 'won the battle' of the EU rebate and dragged Britain out of the failed economic consensus of the 1970s.

And he urged Mrs May to do the same, put an end to the current 'uncertainty' shrouding Brexit and to push through with delivering a clean break from the Bloc.

Mr Jenkin, a long-time Eurosceptic, made his intervention as Mrs May is facing a fresh plot to oust her as leader amid fears she is softening her stance on Brexit.

Senior Tory Bernard Jenkin hit out at 'vague and divided ' ministers and urged them to get behind the Prime Minister (file pic)

Brexiteers fear she will commit to keeping the UK in a customs union with the EU -which could hamper the country's ability to sign trade deals with other countries.

She will hold a crunch meeting of her Brexit war Cabinet later this week to thrash out more details of Britain's negotiating strategy.

Writing in The Telegraph, Mr Jenkin said today's in-fighting between Remain-backing ministers and civil servants is like the situation Lady Thatcher found herself in.

He wrote: 'Sudden changes in fundamental policy are challenged by established group think based on cherished but outdated notions.

'What would have happened to Mrs Thatchers economic policy in 1980 if the Treasury had captured Chancellors Howe and Lawson, and the UK had gone back to the failed economic consensus of the 1960s and 1970s?

'On European policy, she won the battle of the rebate, saving billions every year since, but only by defying the Foreign Office.'

Leading Brexiteers including Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg have accused Treasury officials of purposely drawing up gloomy Brexit forecasts to try to steer the government into a soft Brexit.

And they have hit out at Mr Hammond for talking down Britain's economic prospects after Brexit.

Mr Jenkin wrote: 'If ministers are vague or divided, life for officials becomes impossible, as we can see now.

Theresa May (pictured heading to church today with her husband Philip) was today urged to channel 'Iron Lady' Margaret Thatcher and defy her Chancellor Philip Hammond and deliver a clean Brexit

Bernard Jenkin said it was only by defying her ministers and civil servants that Baroness Thatcher 'won the battle' of the EU rebate and dragged Britain out of the failed economic consensus of the 1970s.

'Ministerial collective responsibility really matters. If the Prime Minister sticks to one policy and the Chancellor keeps advocating another, what are officials meant to do?

'Civil servants tend to support their departmental ministers, because the line of accountability goes direct from the department to Parliament.'

His warning comes amid reports that Tory MPs are plotting to oust Mrs May from No10 and replace her with a 'Brexiteer dream team' if she tries to keep Britain in a customs union with the EU.

Eurosceptics are plotting to install Boris Johnson as PM with Michael Gove as his deputy and Jacob Rees-Mogg as Chancellor if Mrs May goes soft on Brexit.

Mr Johnson is said to have told one of the plotters that the 'cavalry is coming' and he stands 'ready' to swoop in.

The Tories are deeply divided over their negotiating strategy ahead of crunch meeting of Mrs May's Brexit war Cabinet later this week.

Brexiteers fear the PM is paying too much heed to Remain-backers including Chancellor Philip Hammond and will try to push for the UK to stay in a customs union with the EU.

They warn this would seriously hamper Britain's ability to sign free trade deals with other countries around the world.

News of the plot is a major blow to the authority of the PM and comes just 24 hours before she hosts chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier at No10 for lunch.Advertisement

Outbreaks of snow and freezing temperatures will make next week the coldest of the winter, with forecasters warning of travel disruption throughout the seven-day spell.

A series of severe weather warnings have been put in place, with widespread ice and sleet due from today until the following weekend, the Met Office said.

Commuters in London and the rest of the south east of England were warned of treacherous conditions at the start of the working week, with an inch of snow possible on Monday morning.

The mercury could plummet as low as -7C in some parts of the UK, while the bulk of the population can expect to shiver through sub-zero temperatures.

Today is set to be bitterly cold but sunny for much of the country, however snowy spells over the weekend meant it was a picturesque scene in the north of England and Scotland.

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A 4x4 travels along a snow covered road near Alston, Cumbria this morning following widespread snowfall in the north of England this weekend

A series of severe weather warnings have been put in place, with widespread ice and sleet due from today until the following weekend, the Met Office said (pictured right: ice warnings for Monday morning)

A farmhouse surrounded by snow covered fields in Harwood, County Durham presents a wintry scene ahead of a chilly week

Commuters in London and the rest of the south east of England were warned of treacherous conditions at the start of the working week, with an inch of snow possible on Monday morning

The mercury could plummet as low as -7C in sheltered parts of Scotland and spots most prone to the cold in the Midlands and Wales. Pictured: A Dartmoor pony in a field in Whitley Bay as the sunsets this evening

Overnight snowfall brought alpine conditions to Pennines regions, with forecasters warning that the UK will experience the coldest spell of weather this winter with heavy snowfalls and sub-zero temperatures

The mercury could plummet as low as -7C in some parts of the UK, while the bulk of the population can expect to shiver through sub-zero temperatures

The Met Office said ice was likely to form overnight on Sunday from 2am to 10am along the east coast as temperatures plummet, bringing potentially difficult driving conditions. Pictured: A pony in a field in Whitley Bay

Met Office forecaster Craig Snell said the first full week of February will probably be 'one of our coldest weeks of this winter so far'.

He said: 'It's going to be a cold week, plenty of dry weather around, but many places will probably see some snow at some point during the week, but for a lot of us not really amounting to much at all.

'Probably one of our coldest weeks of this winter so far, but snow-fall wise, doesn't really look too disruptive at this stage.'

The Met Office said ice was likely to form overnight on Sunday from 2am to 10am along the east coast as temperatures plummet, bringing potentially difficult driving conditions.

On the whole, Sunday will be much drier and brighter than Saturday, with a bitter north-east wind making temperatures feel close to freezing in East Anglia and the South East.

A further weather warning for snow and ice is in place from 8pm on Sunday until 10am on Monday, spanning south-east England.

Scattered rain, sleet and snow showers coming in from the north sea are expected to be most frequent in Kent and East Sussex on Sunday evening, before affecting parts of East Anglia and Greater London later into the night.

Mr Snell said the working week would start on a 'bitterly cold' note, with the bulk of the population waking up to temperatures between 0C to -2C.

A farmhouse is surrounded in snow in County Durham. Met Office forecaster Craig Snell said the first full week of February will probably be 'one of our coldest weeks of this winter so far'

Today is set to be bitterly cold but sunny for much of the country, however snowy spells over the weekend meant it was a picturesque scene in the north of England and Scotland

Eleven-year-old Alex has fun sledging through deep snow in a winter wonderland scene near Alston, Cumbria this morning

On the whole, Sunday (pictured today, the scene in Cumbria) will be much drier and brighter than Saturday, with a bitter north-east wind making temperatures feel close to freezing in East Anglia and the South East

The cold snap is expected to grip Britain until at least next weekend, with the chance that milder weather may not arrive until the middle of the following week

The mercury could plummet as low as -7C in sheltered parts of Scotland and spots most prone to the cold in the Midlands and Wales.

Then, between 9pm on Monday and 3pm on Tuesday, there is a further chance of snow and ice for the north of England, northern Ireland, north Wales and Scotland.

A spell of rain, sleet and increasingly snow will move east across the UK, gradually weakening across England and Wales.

Mr Snell added: 'Quite a lot of the UK will see some snow as we head through Tuesday but as it ventures into the Midlands, south-west England and eventually later in the day across south-east England, it's just going to be a few flakes of snow.

'So many people will see some snow but don't expect to build a snowman.'

Tuesday morning is again expected to be widely below freezing, with highs of 5 to 6C in spots on the western coast of Wales and south-west England, he added.

Overnight into Wednesday will be another chilly night, while the day will generally be cold, crisp and sunny.

A front of rain is expected to move through the country on Thursday, before the cold air swiftly returns.

The cold snap is expected to grip Britain until at least next weekend, with the chance that milder weather may not arrive until the middle of the following week.

Tuesday morning is again expected to be widely below freezing, with highs of 5 to 6C in spots on the western coast of Wales and south-west England, he added

A spell of rain, sleet and increasingly snow will move east across the UK, gradually weakening across England and WalesSebastien Izambard, 44, has spoken of how his first girlfriend was brutally murdered by a serial killer

II Divo pin-up Sebastien Izambard has revealed in shocking detail how his first girlfriend was brutally murdered by a serial killer.

The French classical vocalist told how he was left traumatised after his childhood sweetheart was killed about 20 years ago.

Paris-born Izambard, one quarter of the classically influenced vocal group, was left needing therapy.

The talented performer was spotted by music mogul Simon Cowell in 2003 and went on to sell more than 30 million records and score 50 number ones as part of Il Divo.

Now Sebastien has talked openly about the scarring experience.

'My girlfriend was killed by a serial killer' he said. 'I don't think I've ever talked about it but that's what healing is.'

'I just couldn't deal with it. [I] couldn't sleep.

'I got back from the studio and had a call from the police and the next thing I know there's this guy who had killed 25 girls and had killed my girlfriend,' he told S Magazine.

Paris-born Izambard, one quarter of the classically influenced vocal group Il Divo, was left needing therapy. The group L-R: David Miller, tenor from the US, Carlos Marin, baritone from Spain, Sebastien Izambard, vox populi from France and Urs Buhler, tenor from Switzerland

Sebastien's life had not been an easy one up to that point.

His father was absent throughout his childhood and has, since his rise to fame, threatened to sue the pop star on a number of occasions.

Sebastien lived with his unemployed mother in a one-room apartment with an outside toilet and only a sink to wash in.

He would bake cakes so his other would have something to come home to.

However, the deprivation left a worrying toll on the small child.

He was often left alone and child services were forced to step in. He began to receive therapy.

Before his rise to fame Sebastien lived with his unemployed mother in a one-room apartment with an outside toilet and only a sink to wash in

I had a difficult childhood, I didnt have very present parents because they separated early and my mum had to keep everything together and manage a child and work,' he told MailOnline.

She was young and she was not very much around, she did the best she could with what she had. But I had to manage myself from an early age, I didnt have a lot of support, so thats why Im really present with my children.

And he is quick to add: Im very close to my mum now I dont see my father - I made a choice, but I feel like Im good, Im lucky.

Now 44, Sebastien resides in Santa Monica, California and says his piano has become his therapist.

The star, now a father to nine-year-old twins Rose and Luca, and six-year-old Jude, met his Australian wife Renee through his record label, Sony, where she worked as a publicist.

The couple wed in August 2008.

In May 2012 he performed with Il Divo for the royal family including the Queen, reportedly a fan.

Sebastien is on the cusp of launching a solo career alongside his and his album We Came Here To Love is out now.An Australian tourist found dead on a beach in Thailand has been named as 59-year-old Andrew Armiger-Grant.

He was discovered lying in the sand in Rayong, south of Bangkok, on January 28.

Police in Thailand had been working to establish his identity after his body washed up at Mae Ram Phueng beach.

Andrew Armiger-Grant was discovered lying in the sand in Rayong, south of Bangkok, on January 28

Mr Armiger-Grant, from Melbourne, is thought to have been visiting on holiday when tragedy struck

Mr Armiger-Grant, from Melbourne, is thought to have been visiting on holiday.

He was found by locals at 7.30am last Sunday who called the police.

Authorities believe Mr Armiger-Grant, a procurement officer at the Bureau of Meterology, was in the water for around three hours before his body was discovered, local media reported.

Police say there were no signs of any physical attacks on Mr Armiger-Grant's body or any indication of a struggle.

Authorities believe Mr Armiger-Grant was in the water for around three hours before his body was discovered

He was found by locals on Mae Ram Phueng beach at 7.30am last Sunday who called the police

Officers say they think he had been out swimming and drowned at sea before his body was brought ashore by the tide, the Bangkok Post reported.

The local police contacted the Australian embassy and informed the family, news.com.au reports.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Mr Armiger-Grant had previously worked for the Victorian Government justice and environment departments.Richard Hammond has damaged his brain after a series of terrible crashes, says Jeremy Clarkson.

The 48-year-old TV star was in a coma for two weeks after he suffered severe head injuries after crashing a jet-powered dragster at 288mph near York while filming Top Gear.

Clarkson told the Sunday Mirror: 'Well it's not his fault , it is because he cannot drive and he went upside down and damaged his brain.

Forgetful: Clarkson has spoken out about his co-star's terrible memory, and said it 'is because he cannot drive and he went upside down and damaged his brain'

Fans were left terrified last year when Hammond flipped an electric supercar which then burst into flames, and he was airlifted to hospital

'He has no capacity for remembering anything and some of it is because he is not interested in anything and some of it is because he has brain damage.'

In June last year, fans were left terrified again when Richard was airlifted to hospital following his accident in June after flipping a 2million electric supercar which then burst into flames as he filmed Amazon show The Grand Tour.

But he miraculously escaped the fireball horror with little more than a fractured knee and was 'conscious and talking' after freeing himself from the vehicle.

In 2006 Hammond nearly died after crashing a jet powered car at 288 mph and slipped into a coma during an attempt to break the British land speed record for the BBC show

57-year-old Clarkson went on to describe the issue with Hammond's memory: 'He has no capacity for remembering anything and some of it is because he is no interested in anything and some of it is because he has brain damage'

The duo still have a great time working together - Clarkson said: 'There are moments where I laughed so much, you know that dangerous laughter when you think, "If I do not breathe I'll suffocate.'"

His Grand Tour colleagues May and Clarkson were 'staggered' he survived because there was 'nothing left' of the vehicle.

In 2006 Hammond nearly died after crashing a jet powered car at 288 mph and slipped into a coma during an attempt to break the British land speed record for the BBC show.

He was driving a jet-powered Vampire dragster when the front-right tyre burst leading the vehicle to spin out of control during a stunt at Elvington airfield near York.

Hammond's Grand Tour colleagues May and Clarkson were 'staggered' he survived his crash last year because there was 'nothing left' of the vehicle

The Grand Tour Mozambique Special will be available on Amazon Prime Video from February 16

Hammond suffered serious head injuries and he was in hospital for five weeks before returning home to his wife Mindy and their two daughters, Isabella and Willow.

The TV presenter, nicknamed 'Hamster', later told how he struggled 'mortally with depression' and spoke regularly to a psychiatrist following the incident.

The duo still have a great time working together - Clarkson said: 'There are moments where I laughed so much, you know that dangerous laughter when you think, "If I do not breathe I'll suffocate.'"

Grand Tour Mozambique Special will be available to watch on Amazon Prime Video from February 16.An Amtrak passenger train, that was traveling on the wrong track, slammed into a freight train parked on a side track in South Carolina early Sunday, killing two Amtrak employees and injuring more than 110 people, authorities said.

Conductor Michael Cella, 36, and the train's engineer 54-year-old Michael Kempf were identified as the two people who died as a result of the crash, according to the Lexington County Coroner's Office.

Rail Safety Expert Michael Callanan said that Cella was a family man and had two small children, ages six and two.

'He always had a smile on his face. He was a pleasure to be in class with and Mike was a pleasure to work with,' Callanan told WLTX. 'This really hits home.'

Cella's widow Christine Praeger Cella said: 'He was amazing and he was a loving father.'

Callanan said he and Cella, were friends, attended the same Amtrak conductor school in 2008 and worked together in Jacksonville, Florida after that.

Sunday morning's crash was the third deadly wreck involving Amtrak in less than two months.

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Amtrak conductor Michael Cella (left), 36, and the train's engineer 54-year-old Michael Kempf (right), were both killed Sunday morning when their train collided with a parked freight train in South Carolina

The Amtrak passenger train, that was traveling on the wrong track, slammed into a freight train parked on a side track in South Carolina early Sunday, injuring 116 people, authorities said

Amtrak's Silver Star was on its way from New York to Miami with eight crew members and about 139 passengers and eight crew members around 2.45am when it plowed into the CSX train at an estimated 59mph, Gov Henry McMaster said

Amtrak's Silver Star was on its way from New York to Miami with eight crew members and about 139 passengers and eight crew members around 2.45am when it plowed into the CSX train at an estimated 59mph, Gov Henry McMaster said.

The wreck took place around a switchyard about 10 miles south of Columbia.

The governor said investigators have yet to determine how the Amtrak train ended up on the wrong stretch of track.

'The CSX was on the track it was supposed to be on,' McMaster said.

The National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the incident and investigators are on the way to the scene.

McMaster said 116 people were taken to four hospitals.

McMaster (pictured Sunday morning) said the wreck took place around a switchyard about 10 miles south of Columbia. The governor said investigators have yet to determine how the Amtrak train ended up on that stretch of track

Several eyewitnesses reported that many of the 'walking wounded' were seen wandering the tracks. Photos showed severely mangled cars strewn across the railway line (pictured)

The National Transportation Safety Board are seen conducting their investigation of the deadly train crash

President Donald Trump also repsonded to the tragic crash Sunday morning on Twitter.

'My thoughts and prayers are with all of the victims involved in this mornings train collision in South Carolina. Thank you to our incredible First Responders for the work they've done!'

Deputy White House press secretary Lindsay Walters also released a statement, saying the president is 'receiving regular updates' about the crash.

'Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone that has been affected by this incident,' Walters added.

Dr Steve Shelton, Palmetto Health director of emergency preparedness, said that the main trauma hospital in the area had three patients in critical or serious condition, with the rest treated for minor injuries such as cuts, bruises and whiplash.

One passenger who was injured and taken to the hospital, was Lynn Winston, 57, who was on her way home to Tampa after spending time with her daughters in New York and New Jersey.

Winston told WFLA that she is still in the hospital, but will be released soon

President Donald Trump also repsonded to the tragic crash Sunday morning

Dr Steve Shelton, Palmetto Health director of emergency preparedness, said that the main trauma hospital in the area had three patients in critical or serious condition. First responders are seen taking a patient out of the back of an ambulance

Investigators work the scene of the derailed train in South Carolina

Drone footage showed the locomotives of both trains crumpled, the Amtrak engine on its side

The derailed Amtrak train sits on the track in Cayce, SC 2018, on Sunday

Winston says she was in the sleeper car and had just woken up to use the bathroom when the crash happened.

'I opened up my door to look outside to see what happened and everybody came out of their rooms and the Amtrak personnel was running back and forth saying "Everybody be calm, we may have to evacuate."'

Winston said due to pain in her leg, she had to be helped off the train.

Drone footage showed the locomotives of both trains crumpled, the Amtrak engine on its side.

Photos showed severely mangled cars strewn across the railway line.

Officials said that more than 5,000 gallons of fuel had leaked from the two trains but there was no threat to the public. By 7am, the leaks had been contained.

The Red Cross opened up a reception site for the injured and family members at a nearby school. The shelter for passengers was set up at Pine Ridge Middle School.

Captain Adam Myrick (pictured speaking) from the Lexington County Sheriff's Department said in a press conference Sunday morning that all of the passengers had been removed from the Amtrak train by 7am

Representatives from the Red Cross (pictured) said during the press conference that Red Cross opened up a reception site for the injured and family members at a nearby school

Captain Adam Myrick from the Lexington County Sheriff's Department said in a press conference Sunday morning that authorities are still working to make sure the crash site remains secure.

'We are teaming up with state troopers to control traffic in the area,' Myrick said, adding that 'deputies have transported those who are not injured to the reception site'.

Myrick said that all of the passengers had been removed from the train by 6.45am.

One car in the middle of the Amtrak train was snapped in half, forming a V off to the side of the tracks.

'It's a horrible thing to see, to understand the force involved,' McMaster said after touring the scene.

Many passengers were asleep when the train began shaking violently and then slammed to a halt, passenger Derek Pettaway told CBS.

'You knew we'd hit something or we'd derailed,' he said.

Myrick said that authorities are still working to make sure the crash site remains secure. A trooper is seen preparing to direct traffic away from the site

Another police car blocked the roadway near the crash to ensure no one traveled by the scene

Elliot Smith told The State newspaper of Columbia that he was staying with a friend when they heard what sounded like a propane tank exploding.

'The sound was so loud, you instantly knew it was bad,' he said. Smith said he and his friend saw passengers limping along the tracks, while others tried to get everyone out of the cars.

Amtrak officials gathered up luggage and other belongings and within hours put passengers aboard buses to their destinations.

Before being sent on their way, those who were not hurt were taken to a shelter, and local businesses provided coffee and breakfast.

'We know they are shaken up quite a bit. We know this is like nothing else they have ever been through. So we wanted to get them out of the cold, get them out of the weather - get them to a warm place,' sheriff's spokesman Adam Myrick said

Lexington County Coroner Margaret Fisher confirmed that the two fatalities had occurred abroad the Amtrak service and not the freight train. This map shows the location of the collision

Officials said that more than 5,000 gallons of fuel had leaked from the two trains but there was no threat to the public. By 7am, the leaks had been contained

It comes days after a chartered train carrying Republican lawmakers hit a garbage truck.

The impact crunched the front of the train's engine, smashed the truck, and left one truck passenger dead and at least five hospitalized.

And on December 18, an Amtrak train ran off the rails along a curve during its inaugural run on a route south of Tacoma, Washington, killing three people and injuring dozens.

It was going nearly 80mph, more than twice the speed limit.

Anyone seeking information about passengers on Train 91 should call the Amtrak info line at 1-800-523-9101.

First responders arrive at the scene early Sunday morningTheresa May faces a week from hell negotiating Britain's future trade relationship with the European Union

Three top mandarins have accused Brexiteers of behaving like Nazis by criticising civil service forceasts as Theresa May faces a week from hell negotiating Britain's future trade relationship with the European Union.

Andrew Turnbull, who led the civil service under Tony Blair, accused Eurosceptic politicians attacking Treasury predictions of 'scapegoating'.

While Lord O'Donnell, the former head of the civil service, accused Brexiteers of issuing 'completely crazy' attacks on officials because they realise leaving the EU will not bring the benefits promised.

The crossbench Peer fumed: 'Of course, if you are selling snake oil, you dont like the idea of experts testing your products.

And a third former Civil Service head, Lord Butler, accused rabid Brexiteers of seeking to intimidate the Civil Service.

The attacks heap more pressure on the Prime Minister as she prepares to meet the EUs chief negotiator in Downing Street today as crucial Brexit talks resume.

Mrs May, who has just returned from leading a three-day trade delegation in China, will see Michel Barnier when he attends a working lunch with David Davis at No 10 ahead of the next phase of negotiations.

Andrew Turnbull (left) accused Eurosceptic politicians attacking Treasury predictions of 'scapegoating', while Lord Butler (right) said rabid Brexiteers wanted to intimidate the Civil Service

Former cabinet secretary Lord Gus O'Donnell also launched an outspoken attack on Brexiteers and their criticisms of the civil service - branding them 'snake oil salesmen'

The two sides have already agreed the terms of the UKs divorce deal. Now they move on to the future trade relationship between Britain and Brussels.

Britain's position in a trade union is expected to be one of the sticking points of the talks.

But Trade Minister Liam Fox said on Friday it would be 'very difficult' for Britain to remain in any kind of customs union with the EU after Brexit.

The remarks by Lord Turnbull, Lord O'Donnell and Lord Butler, come after Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg accused the Treasury of 'fiddling the figures' by drawing up gloomy forecasts to push for a soft Brexit.

Former Tory leader Iain Duncan-Smith (pictured left) and Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg (pictured right) both hit back at the senior civil servant for the Nazi comparison

Former Tory leader Iain Duncan-Smith, a leading Brexiteer, also said the civil service is not and should not be beyond criticism.

He told Mail Online: 'They call us swivel-eyed mad and now they call us Fascists.

'Where they cannot argue anymore they always resort to abuse, and that is what this is all about.

'They have lost the argument and so call critics mad, bad or dangerous to know.

'It is typical of the establishment view of life which is that we must not question our civil servants and assume everything they say is correct.

'Having sat in government for six years there were many many times where I have witnessed some civil servant deliberately not agreeing with the government and pushing their own agenda.

'The idea that to question economic forecasts is somehow trying to silence people is completely absurd.'

He said the 'Treasury has got pretty much every economic forecast wrong' so it is ridiculous to treat is as 'utterly impartial and beyond criticism'.

He said that weather forecasters have given up trying to to do long-term predictions because they realise that it cannot be accurate, and urged the Treasury to do the same.

Meanwhile, Mr Rees-Mogg told Mail Online: 'It is an invariable rule of politics that when people have lost the argument they invoke the 1930s.

'It is worth remembering that George Osborn set up the Office for Budget Responsibility because he believed the Treasury's forecasts were politically biased.'

Mr Turnbull told the The Observer that attacks on Whitehall are like the 'stab-in-the-back' myth that was taken up by the Nazis.

He said: 'Dolchstoss' means 'stab in the back.

'After the first world war there was an armistice, but the German army was then treated as the losers. Then, at the start of the Nazi era, the 'stab-in-the back' theme developed.

'It argued that 'our great army was never defeated, but it was stabbed in the back by the civilians, liberals, communists, socialists and Jews'. This is what I think these critics are trying to do.

'They are losing the argument in the sense that they are unable to make their extravagant promises stack up, and so they turn and say: ''Things would be OK if the civil service weren't obstructing us''.

Lord Turnbull and Gus O'Donnell have both spoken out in criticism of Brexiteer politicians

'When you don't succeed, you find someone to blame for your failure.'

Former cabinet secretary Lord Gus O'Donnell also launched an outspoken attack on Brexiteers and their criticisms of the civil service.

Responding to claims officials distorted their analysis, the former civil servant told Peston On Sunday: 'I think that's completely crazy. The truth is civil servants operate by the civil service code. The values are honesty, objectivity, integrity, impartiality.

'Their job is to look at the evidence and present it as best they can, analyse the uncertainties ... but that's what they do, they're objective and impartial.

'And I think what you find is that tends to get accepted very nicely when it agrees with someone's prior beliefs, but actually, when someone doesn't like the answer, quite often they decide to shoot the messenger.'

He added: 'We look at the evidence and we go where it is.

'Of course if you are selling snake oil, you don't like the idea of experts testing your products.

'And I think that's what we've got, this backlash against evidence and experts is because they know where the experts will go.'Advertisement

Greek protesters gathered outside parliament in Athens on Sunday, calling on the country of Macedonia to change its name in the latest chapter of a 25-year row.

Greeks object to Macedonia's name because they have their own territory called Macedonia. They argue that the use of the name by their neighbour implies territorial claims over Greek land. Greece have blocked Macedonia's aspirations to join NATO and the European Union.

Efforts by the two countries to settle the dispute have been inconclusive since the Balkan state broke away from Yugoslavia in 1991.

Thousands of protesters gathered outside Parliament in Greece as the long-running row over the name of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia continued

Protesters took part in the massive rally as politicians from both sides try to revive attempts to come to a amicable solution between them

Due to Greece's objections, Macedonia was admitted to the United Nations with the provisional name 'The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia' in 1993, which remains its official title in international organisations.

The protesters called on the government to ensure that any solution banned the use of the term Macedonia in the country's new name.

Organisers expect a big turnout for Sunday's rally which follows on from a strong protest in the Greek region of Macedonia in January.

Protesters hold a banner that reads 'Macedonia is Greece' during the massive rally over the name of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia

A huge Greek flag waves as thousands of protesters flock to Greece's capital Athens to call on their government to ensure that the name Macedonia isn't taken by the former Yugoslav republilc

Protests over the use of the name Macedonia have been long-running with the current protests taking place in front of famous Greek landmarks such as the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Athens (pictured)

Greece objects to Macedonia's name because it has its own territory called Macedonia, and argues that its small northern neighbour's use of the name damages their own sovereignty

'Macedonia means Greece' read a big banner on Syntagma square, which has been the main scene of protests against austerity since the debt crisis began in 2010.

Protesters waved Greek flags and held banners reading 'Hands off Macedonia!'

People with Greek flags also attended a rally in front of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Athens.

Among key speakers was world-renowned Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis.

Hours before the rally, unknown assailants threw red paint outside the home of the 93-year old leftist artist, a symbol of resistance against the 1967-1974 military junta, and sprayed slogans on the walls against his involvement.

About 300,000 people turned out at a demonstration on January 21 in Thessaloniki, capital of Greece's Macedonia region.

Due to Greece's objections, Macedonia was admitted to the United Nations with the provisional name 'The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia' in 1993

'The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia' remains its official title of the small country in international organisations

Famous faces such as Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis (pictured centre) took part in the massive rally over the name of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia

Protesters chanted Greek slogans and waved Greek flags while holding banners that read 'Hands off Macedonia!'

A TALE OF TWO MACEDONIAS Macedonia is a region of Greece in the southern Balkans and the second largest and most populous in the country. The mountainous region incorporates parts of ancient Macedon, a kingdom ruled by Alexander the Great (336323 BC) whose campaigns through Asia created the vast Argead dynasty. The Republic of Macedonia is an entirely separate entity - a country in the Balkan peninsula in south east Europe. It declared independence from Yugoslavia in 1991 and became and member of the United Nations in 1993. But as a result of the ongoing dispute with Greece over use of the name, it was admitted provisionally as the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM). Advertisement

Pictured is Thessaloniki, the capital of the Greek region Macedonia, and the scene of fierce and popular demonstrations last month

The case arouses strong emotions among Greeks who consider Macedonia, the ancient kingdom ruled by Alexander the Great, to be an integral part of their homeland and heritage.

The left-led government has proposed a compound name, with a geographical qualifier, which would be the only name that could be used for the country.

A poll published in the conservative Kathimerini newspaper showed that about 70 percent of Greeks oppose the use of 'Macedonia' in any solution.

The issue triggers strong emotions among Greeks who consider Macedonia, the ancient kingdom ruled by Alexander the Great, to be an integral part of their homeland and heritage

The left-led government has proposed a compound name, with a geographical qualifier, although the Athens protesters rejected any new name which incorporated the term Macedonia

An opinion poll published in the conservative Kathimerini newspaper showed that about 70 percent of Greeks oppose the use of 'Macedonia' in any solution

Macedonia is a culturally important region of Greece in the southern Balkans and the second largest and most populous in the country

The issue has triggered domestic upheaval in the past; in 1992, the then conservative government was riddled by dissent and defections.

Today, the same political party has criticised the present administration for its negotiation tactics.

Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias said last week that Greece is preparing proposals which would be the basis of negotiations for a settlement with its neighbouring country.

The issue has triggered domestic upheaval in the past and in 1992, the then conservative government was riddled by dissent and defections

Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias said last week that Greece is preparing proposals to try and find a solution to the long-standing and emotive issue

Protests in Thessaloniki have raged consistently, pictured are farmers as they drive their tractors in front of the White Tower, a landmark of the city, on February 1

The modern Greek state of Macedonia was established in 1830 officially but long before that it was recognised as a region and integral part of the country

Hardline clerics, far-right leaders and Greek diaspora groups had called for January's rallies in Thessaloniki, with the turnout far exceeding media estimates.

Gathered around the statue of Alexander the Great in Thessaloniki were members of the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party and local clergy.

REGIONS WITH COMPLICATED HISTORIES The Republic of Macedonia's history is complex and dates back to the sixth century BC. It has been conquered by the Persian Achaemenid Empire, the Romans and the Ottomans. In the aftermath of WW1 it was incorporated into the Serb-dominated Kingdom of Yugoslavia which became the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1963. The modern Greek state of Macedonia, on the other hand, was established in 1830. Even before that, however, the area was identified as a Greek province albeit without clearly defined borders. Advertisement

Representatives from the main opposition party, New Democracy, were also present despite a tacit order from its liberal-minded leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis to boycott the protests.

Cretans in traditional costumes who travelled from the southern island with their horses, as well as people from northern Greece wearing costumes from the Macedonian wars era a century ago, crowded at the White Tower on the Thessaloniki waterfront from early in the morning.

Greece and Macedonia had earlier returned to the United Nations hoping to reach a compromise that could end dispute over the former Yugoslav republic's name.

No public official was among the five keynote speakers.

The best-known speaker was Fragoulis Frangos, a retired general and former chief of the Greek Army Staff, who is said to harbour political ambitions.

Several local lawmakers attended, as did the local bishop, Metropolitan Anthimos of Thessalonica, whom many people consider the real leader of the nationalist hardliners opposing an accommodation between the countries.

Anthimos, in speaking about the citizens of Macedonia, used the term Skopje, the name of its capital, which is how most Greeks refer to them.

Protesters watch the changing of the Presidential Guard during a rally in Athens during Sunday's massive rally against the use of the name Macedonia

Members of the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, the third largest in the country, were among the groups protesting against the former Yugoslav state

The issue of Macedonia is immensely important to Greek citizens with a number of Greek army veterans attending the rally in Athens on Sunday

The issue has recently re-emerged into the national consciousness after renewed talks between the countries with right wing politicians criticising the present administration for its negotiation tactics

'Demonstrate, my brothers for Macedonia ... Skopje will never be accepted with the name Macedonia by the people's conscience,' Anthimos thundered from the pulpit during his sermon.

'If we only shut [access] to the port [of Thessaloniki], they're dead the following week.'

The march didn't reach the magnitude of one in 1992, when more than one million people - 10 percent of the population - joined a rally in Thessaloniki to proclaim that 'Macedonia is Greek'.

Protesters flocked to parliament in Athens and watched on as Presidential Guards performed while they participated in the massive rally

The huge rally was attended by army veterans, musicians and religious groups, pictured are a group of Greek Orthodox nuns holding Greek flags

The protests were held throughout Athens with the main ones on Syntagma square, which has been the main scene of protests against austerity since the debt crisis began in 2010

A protester holds a Greek map which reads 'Greece is not for sale' while standing in front of the Parliament during a rally

According to a survey conducted for Greek radio station 24/7 by the Alco polling group, 63 percent of respondents said they thought it was in Greece's best interests to seek a mutually acceptable solution at the UN talks.

And the Greek Orthodox Church, which is traditionally opposed to the use of the term Macedonia from Skopje and led the 1992 rally, appears to have distanced itself from Sunday's events.

Its leader Archbishop Ieronymos on Thursday reportedly told Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras that 'national unity is needed... (not) protests and shouts'.

Yet today's protests in Athens suggest that the issue is still a hot one for Greek citizens.

Today's protests in Athens suggest that the issue is still a hot one for Greek citizens, although government figures have tried to cool tensions

The massive Sunday afternoon protest was well attended, pictured is a Greek Orthodox priest as he stands between protesters holding Greek flags during the rallyGerry Adams today back Jeremy Corbyn to be Prime Minister - heaping praise on the Labour leader for talking to Irish republicans throughout their campaign of violence.

The outgoing President of Sinn Fein lauded Mr Corbyn for speaking to the group when most UK politicians shunned them because of the IRA's campaign of terror.

He said the Labour leader is an 'outstanding' politician show deserves to be installed in Downing Street.

And he also praised Ken Livingstone - who is currently suspended from Labour over anti-Semitism claims - saying the pair 'kept the faith' with Sinn Fein.

Some 3,600 people died during the Troubles, when Irish republican groups like the IRA bombed the UK, kidnapped and murdered critics and enemies.

Scroll down for video

Gerry Adams told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show today that he backs Jeremy Corbyn to be Prime Minister - heaping praise on the Labour leader for talking to Irish republicans throughout their campaign of violence.

And many more thousands were injured during the decades long campaign of terror by the group.

As Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher made it clear she refused to negotiate with terrorists, but Mr Corbyn pressed for contact.

And he has previously appeared to praise the IRA - saying there was 'bravery' within the 'nationalist community'.

Speaking to the BBC's Andrew Marr show today, Mr Adams said he would back the Labour leader for PM.

He said: 'Well, I would like to see Jeremy in that position for the benefit of people in Britain, leaving Ireland out of it.

'I think Jeremy is an outstanding politician, I hope my endorsement of him isn't used against him in the time ahead, but yes, he and Ken Livingstone and others kept faith and they were the people who said, when others said no, talk.

Jeremy Corbyn, pictured with Gerry Adams in 1995, has faced criticism for refusing to unequivocally condemn the IRA

'They were the people who were open to conversation about how to deal with conflict and how to get a conflict resolution process, but let's not pre-empt the next General Election.'

Mr Corbyn and shadow chancellor John McDonnell have faced scrutiny over their association with Irish republicans.

Before the IRA ceasefire, Mr Corbyn and his shadow chancellor John McDonnell controversially met Sinn Fein a number of times in Westminster during the 1990s.

Mr Adams, who now sits in the Republic of Ireland's Parliament, was also challenged over whether he was a member of the IRA.

He has always denied being a member of the violent group - even though former senior members have insisted he was.

And today he again claimed he was never in the terror group - despite his long and close ties with IRA members including his former deputy Martin McGuinness.

And he also said that he is 'concerned' that terror and violence could be reignited if there is a return to checkpoints and guards along the Irish border after Brexit.An outgoing Labour council leader today revealed Corbynistas taunted her by singing a song about stalking at her during a campaign to oust her.

Claire Kober is quitting after leading Haringey Council blaming a campaign of 'bullying and intimidation' by Momentum activists.

The Labour moderate said firebrand activists shouted and screamed at her in meetings and vowed to purge her.

And she told of a Labour Party meeting when hard-left activists sang 'I'll be watching you' - words from 'Every Breath You take - a song about stalking by The Police.

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Claire Kober (pictured today on the BBC) is quitting after leading Haringey Council blaming a campaign of 'bullying and intimidation' by Momentum activists.

She said the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn (pictured yesterday giving a speech in Nottingham) had let her down by allowing its NEC to interfere with her local decision making and allowing abuse to sweep through its ranks

She told The BBC's Andrew Marr Show: I've been a leader for ten years a s a borough leader, and as any other politician in a frontline role, you become pretty resilient.

I have to say in the last two years I have attracted more threats more bullying more intimidation than in the previous eight years put together.

It is absolutely sexist  that runs from the way I was treated by my National Executive Committee just last week  and I dont think a man would be treated the same way.

'Through to examples in council meetings where Labour Party members at the end of a meeting have shouted at me and sung a police song, every Breath you take, as a means of intimidating me.

What is the Haringey development vehicle (HDV) and why is it so controversial? Labour-run Haringey council has been embroiled in a bitter battle over its controversial plans to join forces with the private sector to build more housing in the borough. Labour councillors had backed the so-called Haringey Development Vehicle (HDV), a 2billion plan to transfer council assets and land into a 50 50 partnership with private developer Lendlease. The council said the plan was the only way to build badly-needed new housing in the borough. It said the plan would create 6,400 new homes, thousands of jobs, a new school, health centre and library. Councillors pointed out that there are more than 9,000 people on the council list and over 3,000 in temporary accommodation. But critics have slammed the plan which they say amounts to 'social cleansing'. Ms Kober's departure comes after over a dozen other Labour councillors quit or were deselected. Haringey is expected to become the first Momentum-run Labour council after local elections in May. Advertisement

That is a song about stalking. A man would not have been treated that way.

Ms Kober quit as council chief after a loud and angry campaign by Momentum activists to seize control of the council.

And the final straw appeared to come just over a week ago when Labour's NEC - the ruling body which Momentum has recently taken over - took the highly unusual step of urging her to change council policy on a controversial housing scheme known as the HDV.

The move to interfere with local democracy sparked a furious response by Labour councillors across the country who wrote an open letter detailing their anger.

But days later Ms Kober - one of Labour's most senior female local leaders - announced she was going.

She laid the blame for the abuse at a 'toxic culture' which is sweeping through Britain.

She said: 'We see it across the country, the way Jacob Rees -Mogg was treated at the weekend, the way Diane Abbott was treated, we see it when the political editor of the BBC (Laura Kuenssberg) has to take bodyguards to Labour Party conference.

And she told how her attempts to try to help stamp out anti-Semitism in the Labour Party was met with ugly protests by Momentum activists.

She said: Take one example, I proposed a motion on anti-Semitism and momentum called a demonstration of that meeting to protest against that motion.

Demonstrations are part of the political discourse.

But we were screamed and shouted at in that meeting, my councillors were screamed and shouted at that they will be seen in their constituency Labour parties.

'That cannot be an acceptable part of the political debate.

Her comments come amid reports that Labour's NEC is allowing a string of hard-left activists back into the party.

A man accused of anti-Semitism and a former leading member of the far-left Militant faction are among those let back in, according to The Sunday Times.

Leaked documents from Labour's headquarters reveal that a number of hard-left activists are being allowed back into the party's ranks.

It comes after the Momentum group seized control of the party's ruling NEC body.

Mike Sivier, who was expelled by the party last year over claims he had posted anti-Semitic abuse online, was among those being handed back their party membership, the paper reported.

Alan Fogg, 76, who played a leading role in the Trotskyist group Militant in its takeover of Liverpool council in the 1980s, is also said to have bee readmitted to the party.Celebrity chef Matt Moran's swanky Brisbane restaurant has reopened after health inspectors shut it down due to a rat problem earlier this week.

The Riverbar & Kitchen was closed at the orders of Brisbane City Council staff on Tuesday, but reopened on Friday afternoon.

Free drinks were offered by the venue's management after at least one rat was found on the premises.

Matt Moran's swanky restaurant, Riverbar & Kitchen, has been forced to shut down after health inspectors swooped on the popular eatery

The popular restaurant (pictured) was closed by Brisbane City Council staff on Tuesday

The eatery was shut 'due to some issues with its food business licence', according a spokesman for Solotel group, the restaurant's parent company.

'A recent council inspection found some deficiencies in our food handling processes which are being addressed as a matter of urgency,' he told Daily Mail Australia.

A build-up of grit and grime had been blamed for the vermin problem, the Courier Mail reported.

Cleaning crews were spotted working on getting the business cleaned and up and running again ahead of the weekend.

Workers were able to head to the popular drinking spot at the end of the working week as it reopened at 5pm.

A spokesman for Moran's Solotel group, which owns the eatery and bar, described the closure to Daily Mail Australia as 'some issues with its food business licence'.

'Solotel takes these issues very seriously and we acknowledge we took our eye off the ball on this occasion, and our normally very high standards were not adhered to this time,' he said.

The spokesman apologised to the restaurant's customers and said it was doing everything possible to rectify the problem.

'It is important to appreciate that there have been no identified adverse consequences for any patrons. This is simply a situation where we should have done better,' he said.

A team of pest controllers and other tradesmen were seen removing kitchen equipment from the venue on Thursday afternoon, the Courier Mail reported.

'A recent council inspection found some deficiencies in our food handling processes which are being addressed as a matter of urgency,' a spokesman said of the restaurant (pictured)

A sign outside the venue is said to have read: 'Due to unforeseen circumstances we have had to close with short notice. We expect to reopen in the coming days. Please check our Facebook page.'

The restaurant's social media pages have not been updated with any details regarding the closure.

The establishment runs independently from Eagle Street Pier, but is located on Eagle Street.

A sign outside the venue (pictured) on Thursday read: 'Due to unforeseen circumstances we have had to close with short notice'

A Brisbane City Council spokesman said it requires food businesses to meet strict food safety standards, but would not comment on individual cases.

'Each and every complaint made to Council about food safety is investigated with an inspection, and food businesses are not allowed to continue operating if they present a health risk to the public,' the spokesman told Daily Mail Australia.

'Council also conducts regular proactive inspections of food businesses, to ensure all food safety standards are being met.

'Council cannot identify individual food outlets that may currently be under investigation.'

Riverbar & Kitchen opened five years ago and boasts a five-star rating. It had never previously had compliance issues.The teenage girl (pictured) from Wellington Point in Brisbane's east, was last seen about 2pm on Friday

Queensland Police are appealing for help in their search for a 14-year-old girl who hasn't been seen in two days.

The teenage girl from Wellington Point in Brisbane's east, was last seen about 2pm on Friday, February 2, at Carindale Shopping Centre.

Queensland Police said they hold grave concerns for the girl's well-being due to her young age.

The missing girl is described as Caucasian in appearance, 160cm tall and a small build.

She has blonde hair and brown eyes.

The police urged anyone who may have seen the girl, or has any information in relation to her whereabouts, to phone the police.

Phone Policelink on 131 444 or phone Crime Stoppers anonymously on 1800 333 000.Tory in-fighting over Brexit erupted today as Amber Rudd said the UK may stay in a customs union with the EU - only to be slapped down by Dominic Raab who ruled it out.

A row over what Britain's future relationship with Brussels should look like is brewing ahead of a crunch meeting of Theresa May's Brexit war Cabinet later this week.

Ms Rudd, the Home Secretary, left the door open to the UK having a customs union with the EU saying the PM has an 'open mind' on the question.

But within minutes of her making the statement on television Housing Minister Dominic Raab popped up on another channel where he ruled out staying in any form of customs union.

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Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary (pictured on Andrew Marr show today), left the door open to the UK having a customs union with the EU saying the PM has an 'open mind' on the question.

Housing Minister Dominic Raab - a leading Brexiteer - today ruled out staying in any form of customs union with the EU after Brexit

It comes amid reports that Brexiteers are plotting to oust May as PM and install Boris Johnson if she tried to keep the UK in a customs union.

The Tory feuding is a blow for the PM as she prepared to host the EU's chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier for talks at No10 tomorrow lunchtime.

Speaking on the BBC's Andrew Marr show today, Ms Rudd was challenged over what the Government's position is on a future custom union - which would bind the UK to EU tariffs and could harm Britain's ability to strike trade deals globally.

She said it would probably involve some form of customs 'arrangement' or 'partnership' with the EU, but the PM had an 'open mind' as to how that could be achieved.

Ms Rudd said: 'We a want frictionless trade at the border, we want to make sure that there is no border on the island of Ireland and we want to make sure that we can do trade deals outside of the European Union.

'That is the deal we are looking for.

Theresa May (pictured after Church this morning where she played with Border Collie Blitz) is facing a coup by Brexiteers if she tries keep customs ties

'We need to have this wider agreement. I don't know how far that will go over the next few weeks but I hope the Government will be give the space to try and achieve that.'

She also sought slap down reports that the Cabinet is split over the issue insisting they are far more united than reports suggest.

She said: 'I have a surprise for the Brexiteers, which is the committee that meets in order to help make these decisions is more united than they think.

'We meet in the committee. We meet privately for discussions. I think that we will arrive at something which suits us all.

'There will be choices to be made within that, but we all want the same thing which is to arrive at a deal which works for the UK.'

But within minutes of her appearance Mr Raab, the housing minister and leading Brexiteer, ruled out staying in any form of customs union with Brussels after Brexit.

Asked directly if any customs union would be a possibility, he said: 'No I don't think we will be in any form - at least conceived in international trade practice - of customs union.

'Because if we were we would have our hands tied in negotiating free trade deals with other parties, whether that is Brazil, China or India.

'The Prime Minister has been very clear we want to be able to grasp those opportunities.'Sex And The City star Kim Cattrall's brother is missing and she's pleading for any information on his whereabouts.

The 61-year-old actress took to Instagram early Sunday morning and posted that Chris Cattrall, her brother, has been missing from his home in Lacombe, Alberta, Canada, since Tuesday.

'MISSING! This is my brother Christopher Cattrall or Chris as we call him,' Cattrall said on Instagram.

Kim Cattrall posted on Instagram early Sunday morning that brother Chris Cattrall has been missing from home in Alberta, Canada, since Tuesday

Chris's keys, wallet and phone were all left behind and the door to his home was unlocked

'He has been missing since Tuesday, January the 30th from his home in Lacombe, Alberta Canada. His keys, cell phone,& wallet left on the table and his front door unlocked.

'This is not like Chris. He he would never leave his unlocked home without those items nor his 7 beloved dogs. Chris is 55 years old, 6 feet tall, 200 pounds, blue eyes, short brown hair, goatee, average build & usually wearing a waist length hooded winter coat with black gloves, blue jeans and calf high black winter boots.

'Hes a one of a kind brother. Help us bring him home safe. Please spread the world. Many thanks for reading this. Kim #centralalberta #blackfalds #reddeeralberta.'

Another person posted on Facebook that families and friends were 'desperate for any news of him' adding that Chris had been the best man at their wedding.

His step daughter, Katie Osmond, also took to social media to share photos of the man.

'I know its hard to find people when theyve gone missing. Im praying that he comes home safe and unharmed,' Osmond said on Facebook.

'Hes a one of a kind brother. Help us bring him home safe. Please spread the world,' Cattrall said on her Sunday Instagram post

His step daughter, Katie Osmond (center), also took to social media to share photos of the man

'Hes a one of a kind brother. Help us bring him home safe. Please spread the world,' Cattrall said on her Sunday Instagram post

Last October, Cattrall appeared on the show Life Stories in the UK with DailyMail.com Editor-at-Large Piers Morgan. When asked if she were friends in real life with the SATC gang, the 61-year-old was adamant that they weren't.

'We've never been friends. We've been colleagues and in some ways it's a very healthy place to be because then you have a clear line between your professional life and relationship and your personal,' she said.

Her comments came after DailyMail.com exclusively revealed that plans for a third Sex and the City movie had been shelved over claims that Cattrall had made several 'outrageous' demands of the studio just weeks before filming was due to begin.

Cattrall then hit back during her interview with Piers, insisting she simply hadn't wanted to do a third movie, and claiming that she had 'never asked for any money or any projects', while also commenting on her professional relationship with each of the other three stars of the hit series.

Last October, Cattrall appeared on the ITV show Life Stories with DailyMail.com Editor-at-Large Piers Morgan and offered her take on the SATC gang

It's been suggested that Cattrall's character Samantha Jones could be recast, with some suggesting Sharon Stone could play the part.

Sarah Jessica Parker admitted to Andy Cohen that Stone was 'a really interesting idea,' but also suggested that Samantha could be removed from the series altogether.

'I think once everybody has thoroughly experienced the grieving process, then Michael Patrick King can go back and sort of ponder what he might want to do and how he might want to proceed,' she said in response to whether they might simply kill Samantha off.

Anyone with information about her missing brother is asked to contact Blackfalds RCMP at 403-885-3300.The far-left protester caught on camera throwing a punch in a brawl involving Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg posed naked in a bid to become student union president.

Josh Connor, 24, was part of a mob who stormed a speech given by the Tory Brexiteer at the University of the West of England (UWE) in Bristol on Friday night.

The university graduate was kitted out in a hood and dark glasses as he started fighting during the angry fracas.

But previously he has posed naked in a bid to convince his fellow undergraduates to vote for him to represent them on campus.

Mr Connor, a middle class graduate, was branded a naughty boy by his grandmother after he became violent at the meeting on Friday night.

Josh Connor, 24, (pictured posing naked for his bid to be stuent union President) was part of a mob who stormed a speech given by the Tory Brexiteer at the University of the West of England (UWE) in Bristol on Friday night

Josh Connor, 24, (above with girlfriend Andreea Dumitrache) was at the centre of the melee which erupted as Jacob Rees-Mogg gave a talk to the politics society at the University of the West of England (UWE)

The event was dramatically interrupted as Mr Connor and others chanted No platform for racists, no platform for homophobes and branded Mr Rees-Mogg scum.

Video footage shows Jeremy Corbyn supporter Mr Connor  who graduated from UWE in Digital Communication and Media  swinging a punch during the fracas.

It was apparently in retaliation after his 25-year-old girlfriend, Romanian-born student Andreea Dumitrache, was struck in the face by a man in a white shirt.

Mr Connors family home  a 300,000 detached house  is in a leafy middle-class suburb in Nottingham, where he went to school.

The Tory MP talked to students about his life and beliefs on Friday night at the Bristol university

Last night his software engineer father Patrick said I really dont think I can help you  Im very busy and closed the door.

But Joshs 82-year-old grandmother Jillian Connor admonished him, saying of the incident: I saw it and I thought surely not. You naughty boy.

Speaking from her cottage in Kent, she added: He is a very keen Socialist, slightly to the left of Trotsky, he is an ardent Labour supporter.

Who doesnt get cross with Rees-Mogg occasionally? I cant say Im surprised, but I thought [Connor] was maturing.

Connor was unavailable for comment yesterday.Eve Jobs, the youngest daughter of late Apple founder Steve Jobs, is making quite a name for herself.

The 19-year-old, who shows off her luxurious lifestyle on Instagram, currently attends Stanford University and is an accomplished equestrian with years of national and international competition.

Last year, Eve was named 'rider of the month' for March 2017 after competing in the Amateur-Owner division in the East Conference of the Show Jumping Hall of Fame Jumper Classic Series.

Eve Jobs (left), the youngest daughter of late Apple founder Steve Jobs and billionaire investor Laurene Powell-Jobs (right), is making quite a name for herself

The 19-year-old, who shows off her luxurious lifestyle on Instagram, currently attends Stanford University and is an accomplished equestrian with years of national and international competition. Eve is pictured during a competition in April 2016

Last year, Eve was named 'rider of the month' for March 2017 after competing in the Amateur-Owner division in the East Conference of the Show Jumping Hall of Fame Jumper Classic Series. Eve is pictured competing in April 2016

She earned the award riding Charleville, and placed first and second respectively in the Show Jumping Hall of Fame classes during weeks 8 and 9 at the Winter Equestrian Festival in Wellington, Florida.

Eve competes against other young heiresses like Jennifer Gates, daughter of Bill Gates, Jessica Springsteen, daughter of Bruce Springsteen and Destry Spielberg, daughter of Steven Spielberg.

In 2016, her mother, billionaire investor Laurene Powell-Jobs, bought a $15 million ranch in Wellington, Florida, where she frequently competes and trains with Missy Clark.

The ranch features four bedrooms, five-and-a-half bathrooms, a 40-foot long screened-in pool, a detached barn for up to 20 horses, plus a show-jumping training rink.

According to Business Insider, Eve has aced competitions around the world, including events from the Hamptons, Kentucky, Canada and the United Kingdom.

Eve is also dating equestrian and Miami School of Business student Eugenio Garza Perez.

Eve also competes against other young heiresses like Jennifer Gates (pictured with Eve in 2015) in, daughter of Bill Gates, Jessica Springsteen, daughter of Bruce Springsteen and Destry Spielberg, daughter of Steven Spielberg

Eve has aced competitions around the world, including events from the Hamptons, Kentucky, Canada and the United Kingdom

Perez, who is from Monterrey, Mexico, moved to the US at the age of 15 to study and follow the equestrian activity practiced by family tradition.

He and his horse has competed in multiple competitions, and even met Eve at one of the events.

Like Eve, he is also member of a family with successful entrepreneurs. Eugenio is the great-grandson of Eugenio Garza Sada, who was president of the VISA Group and founder of a prestigious private university in Mexico, the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Studies.

Eve and her longtime boyfriend post numerous photos together in luxurious destinations all over the world.

According to Forbes, Eve, her mother, and siblings, are worth nearly $20.1 billion.

Steve Jobs died in 2011 for a pancreatic cancer, and according to his official biographer, Walter Isaacson, Jobs didnt doubt that it would be his youngest daughter who would run Apple in the future.

Eve is also dating equestrian and Miami School of Business student Eugenio Garza Perez (pictured together)

Perez, who is from Monterrey, Mexico, moved to the US at the age of 15 to study and follow the equestrian activity practiced by family tradition. He and his horse has competed in multiple competitions, and even met Eve at one of the events.

Like Eve, he is also member of a family with successful entrepreneurs. Eugenio is the great-grandson of Eugenio Garza Sada, who was president of the VISA Group and founder of a prestigious university in Mexico, the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher StudiesWomen who take antibiotics while pregnant have children with a 20 per cent higher risk of being hospitalised for infection.

Antibiotics were found to affect the good gut bacteria babies are passed from their mothers in utero, leaving the child more susceptible to infection.

The increased risk of infection reportedly persisted throughout childhood, Scimex reported.

The findings were published by Australian and Danish researchers this week.

Antibiotics were found to affect the good gut bacteria babies are passed from their mothers in utero, leaving the child more susceptible to infection

From analysis of 750,000 pregnancies between 1995 and 2009, one in eight pregnant women were prescribed antibiotics.

From those, 28 per cent of children were hospitalised for infection before they turned 14.

Babies born vaginally were at even higher risk of infection.

Children born vaginally to mothers who took antibiotics during pregnancy were at greatest risk for gastrointestinal infection, according to the researchers.

Antibiotics affects the gut microbiome, which is vital to a child's immune development in their early life.

The antibiotics prevented children's immune system from developing properly, the authors of the study claimed.

Antibiotics affects the gut microbiome, which is vital to a child's immune development in their early life (stock)

The antibiotics (stock) prevented children's immune system from developing properly, the authors of the study claimed

The study also claimed antibiotics could affect a child's development if their mother was prescribed the drug before falling pregnant.

Author Professor David Burgner said the results did not suggest antibiotics should be avoided, but simply limited.

Professor Burgner said antibiotics were becoming over-prescribed.

'We need to use antibiotics sensibly in all age groups, including pregnant women,' he told the Sydney Morning Herald.

'Unnecessary antibiotic use can have effects even in the next generation.'Protesting students who targeted a Winston Churchill-themed cafe have inadvertently helped it become one of London's top-rated eateries.

Last week a group of nine demonstrators stormed the Blighty UK cafe in Finsbury Park, north London, urging customers to boycott it for 'colonialism' and chanting 'Churchill was racist'.

Their stunt has now backfired after five star reviews from supporters of cafe propelled it into the top 20 out of 1,180 cafes in the capital on TripAdvisor.

Some of the glowing reviews are from diners claiming to be in the cafe when it was stormed last Saturday, and are more than making up for several scathing reviews left online after the protest.

Protest ringleader Halimo Hussein, a politics undergraduate at the School of African Studies, University of London, wrote: 'Bland breakfasts and awful watery tasting coffee, toilets filthy.'

Last week a group of nine demonstrators stormed the Blighty UK cafe in Finsbury Park, north London, urging customers to boycott it for 'colonialism' and chanting 'Churchill was racist'

Now the protest has inadvertently helped the Winston Churchill-themed cafe, with hundreds of people leaving positive reviews. It is now ranked in the top 20 cafes in London

After an onslaught of negative reviews, the cafe plunged down into the 300s on the travel review site but has since shot up to number 17, and is still racing up the rankings.

One Londoner, Mary H, wrote about how the snowflakes spoilt her visit to the 'patriotic cafe'.

She said: 'Excellent service and menu. Pity the lefty young lazy thick of the country had to spoil my visit with their pointless intrusion.

'They should take in their education we paid for and see why they have freedom of speech instead of being under German rule. Thank you Mr Churchill and Blighty Cafe UK.'

Several reviewers have praised the cafe for its food which is 'the stuff the empires are built on'. It is now ranked 17 out of 1,180 cafes

'Dom C' wrote in his review: 'Lovely place, great food and coffee - standing for someone worth celebrating as part of our historical fabric.

'Churchill was an incredibly complex, contradictory and larger-than-life human being and he wrestled with contradictions during his lifetime, but respect for his achievements in being a pinnacle figure in saving the world from fascism should be enough to prevent the sort of disrespectful, arrogant protest that occurred at this cafe recently.

'We should not be judging historical figures through the lens of today's politics, without context and with such disregard for a balanced debate.'

Others have thanked the protesters for bringing the cafe to their attention after deciding to visit because of the media storm.

Ben D, from Rayleigh, Essex, said: 'Thanks to the snow flakes storming this cafe and giving it free advertising I thought I had to go there and see what all the fuss was about.

Owner Chris Evans said: 'It certainly can't do us any harm and makes up for some of the deliberately dodgy ones the snowflakes were leaving for us'

'I'm so pleased I did. The Winston breakfast is fantastic. Served with an English breakfast tea. Sorry if I offended anyone using the word English!

'I will 100 per cent be back to this great Commonwealth themed Blighty Cafe. Long live the English "Winston" breakfast.'

Owner Chris Evans, 47, said that business has been booming since the demo and that he is 'delighted' by the reviews.

He said: 'We are selling lots of delicious Winston breakfasts and TripAdvisor has exploded with five star reviews.

'I am not sure that all the reviewers writing 'Lefties do one' have actually visited the cafe but we will take all their kind reviews.

'It certainly can't do us any harm and makes up for some of the deliberately dodgy ones the snowflakes were leaving for us.

'It would be great and ironic after the protest if we ended up at number one.'A man accused of anti-Semitism and a former leading member of the far-left Militant faction have been allowed back into the Labour Party, according to reports.

Leaked documents from Labour's headquarters reveal that a number of hard-left activists are being allowed back into the party's ranks.

It comes after the Jeremy Corbyn-backing Momentum group seized control of the party's ruling NEC body.

The decision to allow socialist hard-liners and back into the party was made at the first meeting of the NEC since Corbynistas won a clean sweep of elections to sit on the body.

According to secret documents, seen by The Sunday Times, the party has turned its back on 30 years of trying to root out far left activists in Labour and let hem back in.

Mike Sivier, who was suspended by the party last year over claims he had posted anti-Semitic abuse online, was among those being handed back their party membership, the paper reported (file pic)

Mike Sivier, who was suspended by the party last year over claims he had posted anti-Semitic abuse online, was among those being handed back their party membership, the paper reported.

Mr Sivier reportedly said it 'may be entirely justified' to say Tony Blair had been 'unduly influenced by a cabal of Jewish advisers'.

He also said he was 'not pretending it was a big problem' if Jews were omitted from a list of Holocaust survivors.

And he also claimed 'I'm not going to comment' on whether thousands or millions of Jews died in the Holocaust as 'I don't know', according to the newspaper.

Alan Fogg, 76, who played a leading role in the Trotskyist group Militant in its takeover of Liverpool council in the 1980s, is also said to have bee readmitted to the party.

He was one of 47 councillors banned from public office for five years after flouting Margaret Thatcher and trying to set an illegal budget in 1985.

Mr Fogg stood against Labour in local elections for the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) ain 2016.

Janine Booth, 51, a self-identifying 'Marxist socialist-feminist' and member of the Alliance for Workers', has also reportedly been readmitted.

The decision to let hard-left activists back into Labour comes after the Jeremy Corbyn-backing Momentum group (headed by Jon Lansman, pictured) seized control of the party's ruling NEC body

Lee Japsper, 59, who was forced to step down as Ken Livingstone's race Tsar after document revealed he was having a relationship with a woman whose organisation received City Hall funds, is also reportedly having his membership reviewed.

Luke Akehurst of Labour First, an anti-Momentum pressure group, told The Sunday Times: 'It is simply absurd that these people should be considered eligible to join for Labour.

'Some of [them] are high-profile, public opponents of the Labour Party or leading members of far-left rival parties.'

A senior party source told the paper it no longer recognised the list of proscribed organisations so people linked to them could not be banned.

The source said: 'There is a debate about whether these existed at points in Labour history. Our view is that they no longer exist.'

A party spokesman said: 'We do not comment on leaked documents. The NEC's disputes panel operates in line with our party's procedures.'Australians could see their bills to power and heat their homes rise by more than $400-a-year unless the government takes action to control gas prices.

Analysts have warned the Turnbull government it is not doing enough to stem the tide of wholesale gas prices rising.

It means households could see their electricity bills increase by as much as $430 in some parts of the country by 2020.

Households across Australia could be facing rising electricity bills of $430 more per year

Researchers from the McKell Institute calculated consumers in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland could already be paying $175-a-year more than is believed to be reasonable.

Based on figures from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) and current policy, consumption and price trends, the report published this week said bills for consumers and business would push higher and higher.

'The Cost of Inaction' report warns of Australians potentially facing electricity bills increasing by between $250 and $430.

They predict the current cost of energy bills will continue to rise throughout the east coast states over the next 24 months.

New South Wales residents are expected to be the hardest hit with an annual increase of $434.

Meanwhile, those in Queensland could pay $312 more but Victorians would see the lowest increase at $254 per year more.

But the worst case scenario - where the current inflated prices become the industry average - average residential prices could increase even higher than what they should be.

If this were to continue NSW could pay $660 more than it should, Queensland $579 more and Victoria $443 more.

The reason behind the possible increases is the current inflated price of gas.

New South Wales residents are expected to be the hardest hit with an annual increase of $434

The ACCC recommends the current price should be between $6.30 and $7.80 per gigajoule.

But across the eastern states, this is currently at an average of $9 per gigajoule.

The picture is worse for the industrial sector which is being forced to pay between $16 and $22 per gigajoule.

The report says: ' We estimate that using ACCC advised figures of where the wholesale gas price should have been in 2017, and with the government's current policy-settings, households in New South Wales, Queensland, and Victoria will be paying substantially more for electricity

'Consumers have suffered the consequences of years of policy inertia, inconsistency and a lack of forward thinking by energy policy makers that have created a scenario in which Australians are significantly paying more to power and heat their homes.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is under pressure to bring wholesale gas prices under control

'It is vital that the central role gas plays in shaping prices is not lost in an increasingly complex debate.'

Turbull's government has been slammed by the unions for failing to 'pull a handfull of multinational gas exporters back into line', Daniel Walton from the Australian Workers' Union told the Sydney Morning Herald.

He added: 'By allowing exporters to ship Australia's natural gas to foreign markets without restriction, the federal government is hammering average working families from multiple angles.'

The Prime Minister has previously admitted rising gas costs are the 'single biggest factor in the current rise in electricity prices'.

The report concludes: 'Without significant government action, there is no guarantee that prices could fall to rates the ACCC have suggested are achievable is unlikely.'House Oversight Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy surprised the political world this week by announcing Wednesday that he wouldn't seek re-election later this year.

'My wife hates it when I say this, but I was a pretty good prosecutor, I think. But I've been a pretty lousy politician,' Gowdy said Sunday on Face the Nation.

Gowdy, a South Carolina Republican first elected in 2010, became a national figure as the chairman of the House Benghazi Committee, which probed the deaths of four Americans at a diplomatic compound in 2012, while Hillary Clinton was serving as secretary of state.

Scroll down for video

House Oversight Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy joined the growing ranks of Republican lawmakers who say they won't run again later this year

Rep. Trey Gowdy (left) told CBS News' Margaret Brennan (right) that he was a 'lousy politician' because he could see 'multiple sides of a single issue' and wasn't concerned with always 'winning'

Despite that being branded as a partisan witch hunt by Democrats  and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy infamously remarking that Clinton looked 'unbeatable' until the Benghazi committee brought down her poll numbers  Gowdy indicated he didn't have the appetite for the hyper-partisanship that exists on Capitol Hill these days.

'I just, I see multiple sides of a single issue,' Gowdy explained.

Gowdy, a former U.S. attorney, said he plans to go back into the justice system upon retirement from Congress.

The Republican pointed out that he has many friends across the aisle.

'And the fact that someone disagrees with me, does not make me challenge their love of the country. It doesn't make me believe that they're corrupt ... I don't think the end justifies the means.'

'I think the manner in which we get places matters, and in politics too often winning is the only thing that matters,' Gowdy continued. 'And look, every hero I have has lost. Every one of the them. So losing is not the worst thing in the world.'

'Not knowing what you believe and not caring enough about it to fight for it  that's the worst thing in the world,' he added.

CBS' Margaret Brennan followed that up by asking the South Carolina Republican if he believed he had served justice during his time in the House.

'Not like I did in my previous job,' said Gowdy. 'I tried.'

'There's a reason we throw out search warrants even though we find the murder weapon. There's a reason we throw out confessions even though we think the person did it. The process matter,' Gowdy explained. 'And in politics, it's just about winning. And I can't, I don't want to live like that.'A man and a woman have been charged for stealing 47 boxes of Lego.

Police arrested and charged a 48-year-old man and 28-year-old woman in Sydney on Sunday with theft.

Lego was allegedly stolen from several stores, prompting police to raid a home at 2am Sunday where they found the popular children's toy.

A man and a woman allegedly stole Lego from several Sydney stores

Lego was located by police in the early hours of Sunday morning at a house in Sydney

Police certainly acted quickly, having been notified just one day earlier of the lost Lego.

A 28-year-old woman was charged with four counts of theft and failing to disclose her identity, and the 48-year-old was charged with three counts of theft.

The man and woman were granted 'conditional bail' and will appear in court later this month.A New York City elementary school has postponed its traditional father-daughter dance because of new gender guidelines from the Department of Education that require events to be more 'inclusive'.

The PS 65 'Father/Best Guy & Daughter Dance' in Staten Island was scheduled for Friday, February 9, but the New York Post reports that the party has been moved to March 2.

According to the PTA President no parents complained about the father-daughter theme, instead the school cancelled it to comply with the March 2017 Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Student Guidelines.

This says schools are no longer allowed to hold events like the dance that are considered 'gender-based' and may cause someone to feel left out.

First Son Donald Trump Jr led the charge on Twitter to denounce the cancellation as political correctness gone mad. He tweeted: 'If this doesnt convince you that the PC/SJW movement has lots their minds I dont know what will. This nonsense really needs to stop.'

PS 65 on Staten Island plans to reschedule their father-daughter dance, and make it more inclusive

Students, like in this file photo, enjoy getting dressed up for the annual dance

Donald Trump Jr blames the PC/SJW (social justice warrior) movement for the cancellation

Donald Trump, Jr seen in this file photo with wife Vanessa and four of their five children was quick to react to the cancellation

Father Matthew West, 32 told the Post: 'They're trying to take away everything that everybody grew up on and has come to know and I don't think it's fair or right.'

Jose Garcia, 37, who was looking forward to attending the dance for the third time with his daughter, Jolene, said: 'It's not fair at all, I have nothing against no one but I don't think that it should affect the school, or the kids for that matter.'

Jolene said: 'They had a dance party. We got to wear dresses and hang out with our friends.'

Department of Education LGBT community liaison Jared Fox, told the Post: 'Father-daughter dances inherently leave people out. Not just because of transgender status, just life in general. These can be really uncomfortable and triggering events.'

He conceded that there is no rule explicitly banning father-daughter dances.

Conservative blogger Mike Cernovich tweeted that it is simply about destroying families

Albert Turner waxed nostalgic about going out of his comfort zone to take his daugher to her dance

Mike Cernovic, the controversial conservative blogger tweeted: 'They are trying to ruin our families. That's what this is.'

Others lamented the loss of a tradition, one tweeter posted about his experience with his daughter: 'I was as nervous as a cat on a hot tin roof. I think she appreciated me doing it.'

Jared Fox added: 'For a young trans girl, to be able to go to a father-daughter dance can feel very affirming because in this instance she's recognized as a daughter.'



Online retailer Amazon has been branded 'barbaric' and 'disgusting' after it emerged the site is selling live lobsters.

The 'mouth-watering' Canadian lobster is available to purchase for 42.50 but shoppers are furious and argued it is cruel to deliver any live animal.

They are being sold by British company Fine Food Specialist on Amazon and they even gave details of how to prepare the meal - by suggesting to cook it for 19 minutes.

But one woman was so angry that she threatened to close her account with Amazon after realising they were on sale and can spend days in a box as they are driven around the country.

Amazon is selling live Canadian lobsters on its website and is giving details of how to cook them

The animals are 'usually dispatched within four to five days' and if ordered today the lobster could arrive by Monday, February 12.

Susan McKenna wrote: 'It is disgraceful, barbaric and cruel to send live animals through the post. I am closing my account with Amazon today.'

Amazon user Miranda added: 'This is despicable, living creatures being ordered mail-order as though they were inanimate objects, with instructions in the listing about how to boil them alive.

'Lobsters feel pain - I watched my father boil crabs alive when I was a child and they fought and pushed at the lid of the pan and were so desperate to escape.

'It was extremely distressing and completely obvious to anybody watching that they were in unbearable pain.

'This listing and the others for lobsters and crayfish has no place here and should be removed.'

It comes just days after more than 50 campaigners and celebrities called for protection to stop lobsters and crabs being boiled alive.

Fine Food Specialist is currently selling the Canadian lobster (pictured) on Amazon for 42.50

Wildlife presenter Chris Packham and comedian Bill Bailey are among those who have signed an open letter to Environment Secretary Michael Gove.

They say there is clear scientific evidence that lobsters can feel pain, and call for the crustaceans to be classed as sentient creatures in a new Animal Welfare Bill.

Fine Food Specialist was founded by former chef Drogo Montagu in 2010 and he said there was no evidence that lobsters could feel pain.

He told The Sunday Times: 'In some cases the finest quality is live seafood.

'There is a small market for these products, but it is generally people who love their food and want the very best.'

The description of the Canadian lobster online reads: 'It is known to be larger than its Scottish Cousin, and some say has a slightly sweeter taste.

'This mouth-watering fruit of the sea doesn't require any complicated flavours; all a lobster needs is some herb butter and lots of napkins.'

MailOnline has contacted Amazon and Fine Food Specialist for comment.Chief Constable Anthony Bangham (pictured) sparked fury when he declared that police should no longer be lenient with drivers

A speed trap set up outside the offices of a controversial police chief caught more than 100 drivers an hour breaking the 30mph limit.

Chief Constable Anthony Bangham sparked fury last week when he declared that police should no longer be lenient with those who drive just slightly too fast.

He even angered other police leaders by saying that overstretched officers should focus on enforcing speed limits in order to improve road safety.

However an investigation has found that the police chief may have problems far closer to home.

The speed trap, carried out by the Sunday Times, caught 117 motorists breaking the law in a single hour, right outside his own doorstep in Hindlip Hall, near Worcester.

One of the cars was caught travelling at 51mph, while a quarter were recorded at speeds between 31 and 35mph.

It comes as Mr Bangham became 'public enemy number one' last week after he suggested that drivers caught just 1mph above the limit should be fined.

But The Mail on Sunday can reveal that he is also risking accusations of trying to recruit a Stasi-like army of informants among the public, who will help police as 'guardians of the law' by reporting bad driving using the 'dash-cams'.

Forces are setting up websites where anyone can upload footage of bad driving from cameras that film the road ahead, capturing other drivers' number plates in the hope they can be tracked down.

Mr Bangham, West Mercia Police chief and national lead on roads policing, told a law enforcement conference last week: 'Fear of being caught is still one of the biggest changes of behaviour.

'We've got to make sure they genuinely fear being caught.

The speed trap caught 117 motorists breaking the law in a single hour, right outside his own doorstep in Hindlip Hall, near Worcester (pictured)

'Imagine if you are now clear that the driver next to you could be filming you and police are seeking the footage and will prosecute you for it.

'The offending road-user might understand that they are more likely to be caught than not.'

He told how the four police forces in Wales now run a website called Operation Snap which encourages motorists to upload dash-cam footage of bad driving.

Mr Bangham is the West Mercia Police chief and national lead on roads policing

The first driver to be jailed as a result of dash-cam evidence was James Stocks, from Cheshire, whose dangerous overtaking manoeuvre on a blind bend forced a van off the road. It was seen by a camera in another car, and Stocks was jailed for eight months after pleading guilty to dangerous driving in 2015.

Giles York, Chief Constable of Sussex Police, told this newspaper last year his force had also set up a website, called Operation Crackdown, where anyone can report driving that is 'careless, deliberately aggressive or dangerous', and said he is 'very up' for allegations being backed up by dash-cam footage.

'It can be relatively low-level nuisance stuff, but if that causes other people to get frustrated and drive badly, it is really important to us.

Even down to people pushing in the queue at the roundabout every day  that causes danger.'

Campaigners say that Britain's roads are already well covered by speed cameras, CCTV and the Automatic Number Plate Recognition system.

Silkie Carlo, director of civil liberties group Big Brother Watch, said: 'The idea that motorists should constantly film each other to create 'fear' may be well-intentioned but is woefully misguided.

'The UK has more surveillance cameras than any other country in Europe. The ANPR network that surveils innocent drivers already captures 40 million photos a day.

'The last thing we need is ordinary people being encouraged to spy on each other too. This is a desperately silly idea that risks breeding a culture of mistrust and suspicion.'Jeremy Corbyn has been branded a hypocrite after it emerged he goes to work in a chauffeur-driven gas guzzling diesel car - despite proclaiming himself an environmentalist.

The Labour leader takes the seven-seater people carrier to work in Parliament even though it is just a short tube journey away from his Islington home.

The revelation comes after his own Labour-run council last week called for diesel cars to be banned because they pump out deadly toxins.

And it has been claimed the Labour leader left the Ford Galaxy waiting on a double yellow line outside his north London home for 40 minutes on Tuesday before making the six-mile journey to Westminster.

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen last night accused the Labour leader of 'breathtaking hypocrisy'.

Jeremy Corbyn has been branded a hypocrite after it emerged he goes to work in a chauffeur-driven gas guzzling diesel car - despite proclaiming himself an environmentalist.

The Labour leader takes the seven-seater people carrier to work in Parliament even though it is just a short tube journey away from his Islington home.

He told The Sunday Express: 'He's like one of the old Soviet leaders, riding around in his Zil while the rest of his comrades are on bicycles,' he said.

'Once again it's a case of do as I say, not as I do. It's clear Mr Corbyn is one of the few not the many whom he lectures.'

Last week Islington Borough Council and the neihbouring Labour-run authority Hackney, proposed a ban on diesel cars with drivers flouting the air pollution crackdown facing 130 fines.

Mr Corbyn has spoken out against polluting diesel cars which he warns are creating air pollution which is killing children.

The DVLA database reveals Mr Corbyn's mode of transport emits a hefty 189g of carbon dioxide, putting it in the fourth highest vehicle tax band.

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen last night accused the Labour leader of 'breathtaking hypocrisy' (file pic)

And pictures published in the newspaper show that the chauffeur driven car arrived at the Labour leader's house just before 9am on January 30.

But the MP left the driver waiting for 40 minutes on double yellow lines as he remained inside his terrace home.

A traffic warden in a high-visibility vest approached but immediately appeared to recognise the car and did not issue a ticket.

Mr Corbyn eventually left home just after 9.32am, but headed off towards the shops before coming back to the car five minutes later, it was reported.

Mr Corbyn was offered a chauffeur-driven car by the Government Car Service when he became Leader of the Opposition in 2015.

But he is not obliged to use it and ministers have turned down using their cars previously.

Former Tory MP Andrew Percy criticised the move at the time, saying: 'Jeremy Corbyn's supporters on Twitter are trolling people about privilege but at the first sniff of a perk, Jeremy Corbyn succumbs to a taxpayer-funded car. He should do what the rest of us do  get a standard rail ticket or walk.'Theresa May will target hard-line activists who intimidate election candidates in a major crackdown.

The Prime Minister plans to introduce a new criminal offence to stem the rising tide of abuse in political life.

She will set out her ideas to tackle intimidation in politics in a speech this week marking the centenary of women's right to vote.

Mrs May will warn: In the 21st century it cannot be acceptable for any woman - or any person - to have to face threats and intimidation simply because she or he has dared to express a political opinion.

We can all see this change happening and I know that many share my concern about it.

The Prime Minister (pictured playing with a dog Blitz after attending church in Maidenhead today) plans to introduce a new criminal offence to stem the rising tide of abuse in political life

The PM will launch a consultation on a new offence of intimidating parliamentary candidates and their campaigners.

It will follow an inquiry by the Committee on Standards in Public Life in the wake of last year's general election, during which scores of MPs fell victim to abuse.

She will issue an appeal to politicians on all sides to take a stand for decency tolerance and respect.

She will say no one should have to suffer threats and bullying because they have dared to express a political opinion.

In her speech, Mrs May will pay tribute to those campaigners who braved open hostility and abuse to win the right for women to vote.

And a century on, she will say it is a cause of deep concern that the committee's report found women, ethnic minority and gay candidates were disproportionately targeted in terms of the scale, intensity and vitriol of the abuse they received.

Her comments come after a week in which the Labour leader of Haringey council, Claire Kober, quit over sexism and bullying by hard left supporters of Jeremy Corbyn

Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg was pushed and jostled when hard-left protesters stormed a speech he was giving at a university in Bristol on Friday evening

Her comments come after a week in which the Labour leader of Haringey council, Claire Kober, quit over sexism and bullying by hard left supporters of Jeremy Corbyn.

While Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg was pushed and jostled when he addressed a student debate in Bristol.

The Prime Minister will warn the country faces a permanent coarsening and toxifying of public debate unless steps are taken to address the issue.

She will highlight the role social media and other forms of digital communication play in spreading abuse - often from behind the cloak of anonymity.

In public life, and increasingly in private conversations too, it is becoming harder and harder to conduct any political discussion, on any issue, without it descending into tribalism and rancour, she will say.

British democracy has always been robust and oppositional but a line is crossed when disagreement mutates into intimidation.

When putting across your point of view becomes trying to exclude and intimidate those with whom you disagree.New Prisons Minister Rory Stewart has vowed to 'get back to basics' and repair all the broken windows in jails to stop drug-smuggling drones.

The former Army officer has also vowed to recruit veterans to help beef up security and discipline in England's troubled prisons.

And he will use the best of new technology to jam and block drones being used to sneak contraband in over the walls.

His vow to clean up England's jails comes just days after inmate Khader Saleh, 25, was stabbed to death at Wormwood Scrubs Prison in West London.

And jails across the country have been hit by the worst riots in a generation amid warnings they inmates are being kept in Dickensian conditions where violence and drug abuse is rife.

Speaking three weeks after being given the prisons brief in Theresa May's reshuffle, Mr Stewart said he would tackle the small things - like broken windows and picking up rubbish - to tackle the bigger issue.

New Prisons Minister Rory Stewart has vowed to 'get back to basics' and repair all the broken windows in jails to stop drug-smuggling drones (file pic)

He told The Sunday Express: 'When you have broken windows, discipline goes and violence rises.'

'In Liverpool, the prisoners have smashed all the windows. They claim it's because they want fresh air but when you get smashed windows you get drug use going up.

'There are a lot of people interested in technology, doing a lot of wonderful work on what you can do to jam a drone, to fire a light at a drone to disable its optical system.

'I'm going to start by trying to fix the windows because the drone's no good if you can't stick your hand out of the window. Really it's about getting back to basics.

'Cleanliness also means so much. You suddenly see that prison officers are more confident and prisoners have a better attitude.

'If there's rubbish on the floor and nobody's picking it up, I'm worried because that's an indication of many other things that are going on.'

The technique is reminiscent of the 'broken windows' policing style which was introduced in New York by Mayor Rudy Giuliani in the 1990s, transforming the city.

And, borrowing a phrase from former Tory PM Sir John Major, he aid the policy amounted to a 'back to basics approach' to jails.

He insisted suggestions prisons are not run like 'holiday camps' and said he is 'very comfortable with prisons that are run in a very old-fashioned military way'.

A damning report on Liverpool prison earlier this month revealed a filthy jail with broken windows and piles of rubbish.

While numerous reports have detailed the shocking level of rug use in the UK's jails - with many inmate comatose by taking large quantities of the former legal high spice.

Mr Stewart, who was an Army officer with the Black Watch before becoming a diplomat stationed in the Balkans, said searches will be beefed up under his watch.

He said: 'I think we can do more right on the gate, on entry. If it was easy to keep drugs out of prison we wouldn't have so many drugs in prison but some prisons do better than others.

inmate Khader Saleh, 25, was stabbed to death at Wormwood Scrubs Prison in West London (file pic of jail)

'I want to learn from the high security sector. At Belmarsh they have new types of technology so I'm interested in the type of scanners which you get in an airport which can see if somebody's put drugs inside their body.

'We've got to be searching every human coming in - the prisoner, the family visitor, the staff.'

Mr Stewart, former chairman of the Commons Defence Committee, revealed his plans to recruit an Army of veteran to bring in some military-style discipline to Britain's prisons.

He said: 'I support encouraging more ex-Army personnel to join the prison service,' he said. 'I think they've got fantastic ethos and self-discipline.'

'But in order to protect the public we also have to run decent, clean prisons. We need to make sure these people are educated and as few of them as possible are reoffending.'

Denying jails are cushy, he said: 'There's nobody writing inspection reports saying prisons are holiday camps. Prisoners are locked up for most of the day.

'They can be in here for many years. I don't know anybody who finds it an easy experience.

'Winston Churchill said one of the things you judge a society on is its prisons and I think he was right.'A Georgia college freshman was found dead in his dorm room over the weekend.

Details surrounding Jeremy Bailey's death have not been released, but Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College confirmed that his body was found Friday night.

School officials said the 19-year-old was discovered in the institution's Lakeside Dormitory.

Details surrounding Jeremy Bailey's (left and right) death have not been released, but Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College confirmed that his body was found Friday night

Bailey leavs behind his mother and father and two brothers (pictured), among several other relatives

According to a press release from ABAC, students received notice of his death Saturday morning. Pictured is the Lakeside Dormitory where Bailey's body was found

According to a press release from ABAC, students received notice of his death Saturday morning.

Bailey, who is from Morrow, Georgia, leaves behind two brothers, according to his mother's Facebook page.

Family and friends posted Bailey's photo with heartfelt tributes shortly after hearing of his death.

'I had the privilege of teaching this great young man, Jeremy Bailey, for 4 years at Home of Fine Arts. His loss is devastating for all of us. Please keep his family in your prayers,' Bailey's former teacher wrote on Facebook.

Bailey's death is currently being investigated by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, accordcing to the Tifton Gazette.

No foul play is suspected at this time. An autopsy is scheduled for Monday.

No foul play is suspected at this time. An autopsy is scheduled for Monday

'Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends during this very difficult time,' Lindsey Roberts, director of marketing and communications for ABAC (pictured) said

Bailey leavs behind his mother and father and two brothers, among several other relatives.

'Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends during this very difficult time,' Lindsey Roberts, director of marketing and communications for ABAC, told WALB.

'During this difficult period, it is helpful to remember that the Student Development Center on campus is an available resource for emotional support,' Roberts added.

Students were encouraged to schedule an appointment by calling 229.391.5135 or emailing Dr. Maggie Martin at mmartin@abac.edu.Advertisement

One person has died and several injured as violent winds felled hundreds of trees, downed flights and damaged power lines in Moscow.

A tree crashed onto electric power lines, injuring five and killing one according to the city's Mayor Sergei Sobyanin.

The disaster yesterday came as airports in Russia were forced to delay dozens of flights and more than 2,000 trees fell in heavy snow and strong winds in the capital but the region's Valery Chkalov Cup motorcross event went ahead as planned today.

Motorcycle riders competed in the Valery Chkalov Cup in the city of Mytishchi near Moscow today as the region was hit with heavy snow and wind

A digger clears snow from Red Square after the weather caused a fatal disaster than also injured several people yesterday with authorities warning the conditions will worsen

People were pictured crossing a bridge in Moscow as extreme weather that looks set to worsen brought snow, sleet and power shortages to the capital and surrounding region

Federal agency police were seen struggling through the snow in the capital as flights were delayed and cancelled across the Russian capital

Officers were seen braving the freezing conditions with their trademark ushanka hats as emergency services warned people to stay off the roads during the icy weather

Mayor Sergei Sobyanin today warned on Twitter that the weather is set to 'worsen', as this morning it was revealed that 109 flights had been delayed and 28 cancelled, according to Sputnik.

Today he tweeted: 'Five people have already been injured. Be careful, forecasts say the weather will worsen.'

Yesterday more than 100 flights were delayed and 11 cancelled as Moscow experienced half a month's worth of rain in just 24 hours, according to Fobos weather centre.

A man wraps up warm as he walks past a statue of Zabivaka - the country's official 2018 FIFA World Cup mascot - in Manezhnaya Square, downtown Moscow

A woman was pictured walking her pet in the city's Botanical Garden as heavy snow and winds brought power outages, flight delays and cancellations

A worker carrying a shovel walks past a 2018 FIFA World Cup in Manezhnaya Square as snow brought havoc to the Russian capital

On the ground, drivers face hazardous conditions as the authorities advised people to stay off the roads in the icy conditions.

Snapped power lines brought power outages to about 5,200 people as heavy snow brought chaos to residents in and around Moscow, where people have been told to stay away from frozen trees.

Pictures showed emergency services deploying diggers to shovel through snow in Red Square as families battled through low visibility caused by the gusts.

As federal agency police braced the freezing temperatures with trademark ushanka hats, civilians were seen snapping selfies and attempting to shield their heads from the cold with plastic bags.

Tourists snap a selfie in front of the Kremlin as freezing conditions brought chaos to the capital, leaving thousands without power

This man opted for a plastic bag instead of the traditional ushanka favoured by the police as he braved the capital's freezing conditions

Drivers were warned to stay off the roads as the city centre's Red Square was covered in ice and snow and windy brought power lines down across MoscowByron Bay is one of Australia's most popular holiday destinations and a second home to the likes of Miley Cyrus, Liam Hemsworth and Nicole Kidman.

But locals say the idyllic beachside enclave on the New South Wales north coast is on the brink of destruction at the hands of a methamphetamine epidemic.

There are fears a potentially deadly batch of the highly-addictive drug is being sold in the town after a spate of violent - and often bizarre - crimes.

'A week ago I was up for four nights... It's that strong here... the way it pumps me up, I'll take on the whole army,' one Byron local told The Daily Telegraph.

Byron Bay is being torn apart by a methamphetamine epidemic, according to locals

There are fears a lethally strong batch of the highly-addictive drug is being sold in the beachside town

He said the drug was sold in the town at half the price of capital cities.

Another addict said scoring meth in Byron was as easy as ordering a takeaway meal over the phone, adding that there is 'some pretty good stuff up here'.

On Christmas night, a naked Canadian tourist, who police said was high on ice, was arrested after running down the middle of a busy Byron street.

He threw himself into a police car, shattering the windscreen, before he began headbutting a window as two officers sat inside the vehicle.

Police tasered the 23-year-old to no effect, before his friends finally helped the two officers subdue him.

Earlier, a 15-year-old Byron boy - again naked - was also arrested after running down the street and terrorising passers by.

A naked Canadian tourist, who police said was high on ice, threw himself into this police car

One addict said scoring drugs in the town was as easy as ordering takeaway (stock image)

'They're the incidents that were reported to police. I have no doubt there would be more,' Tweed-Byron Police duty officer chief inspector Luke Arthurs told the paper.

He said a young girl was recently arrested after a search revealed she was carrying ice, cocaine and cannabis.

Community activist Sue Arnold said the town was 'being absolutely destroyed' by meth.

'As a veteran of the hippie culture, we used to think having a joint was fun... I have never seen the kind of incidents caused [now] by ice, being caused by cannabis,' she said.

Statistics released last year show one in 70 Australians had used ice, and 20 per cent of those people used the drug weekly or daily.

One addict said the drug was sold in the town at half the price of capital cities. Pictured, Byron Bay's iconic lighthouseTwo doctors have saved the life of a woman on a plane by constructing a makeshift medical ventilator in mid-air.

Anesthesiologists John Flanagan and Matthew Stevenson were on their way to Jamaica for a vacation with their wives when an elderly woman on the JetBlue flight went into respiratory arrest.

Stevenson noticed the woman was in distress about 20 minutes into the January 6 flight from Orlando, Florida to Montego Bay, Flanagan's wife Xenia wrote on Facebook.

'He flagged John down for help as the lady went into complete respiratory arrest,' Xenia wrote.

Finding that the woman was not breathing, the two doctors asked the flight crew if there was a hand-operated manual resuscitator on board to keep oxygen flowing to her lungs.

Anesthesiologists John Flanagan and Matthew Stevenson are seen giving life-saving intervention to an elderly woman who went into respiratory arrest on a plane last month

Other passengers leaned in to keep Stevenson and the elderly woman from sliding down the aisle of the plane as the plane diverted to make an emergency landing

After taking of from Orlando, flight 1721 diverted to Fort Lauderdale for the medical emergency

The crew didn't have the equipment needed though, and the emergency air masks in the ceiling aren't designed for ventilation. So the doctors, who have a practice together in Jacksonville, were forced to improvise.

While Flanagan used rescue breathing to keep the woman alive, Stevenson went about gathering materials to make a ventilator, Flanagan told the Daily Mirror.

Stevenson cut the tubing and air bag from the emergency masks in the ceiling and managed to connect it to an oxygen tank that was on board to create a ventilator.

'It was both amazing and terrifying at the same time to witness my husband and his friend do something they do everyday..save someones life,' recalled Xenia in her Facebook post.

The doctors advised the flight crew to make an emergency landing, and the plane diverted to Fort Lauderdale Airport.

The Airbus A320, like this one from a file photo, made an emergency landing

Flanagan (right) is seen explaining the situation to first responders after the plane made an emergency landing in Fort Lauderdale

Stevenson (left) and Flanagan (right) did finally make it to Jamaica with their wives, where the two doctors posed with a celebratory drink after saving the passenger's life

As the plane made the emergency landing, the makeshift ventilator kept the woman alive for nearly 45 minutes, Xenia said.

The passengers all gave the two doctors a round of applause when medics rushed on board to take over care for the woman.

'It was beautiful to witness so many good samaritans praying and holding them up during the entire ordeal,' the proud wife said.

'Im so thankful God placed them there at the right time.'

After the crisis was over, the two doctors and their wives did eventually make it to Jamaica, where they posed with a celebratory beer at the Sandals resort.President Trump's original Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Sunday that he never heard the president say he wanted to fire Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

'I never felt, of all the things that we went through in the West Wing, I never felt that the president was going to fire the special counsel,' Priebus said on Meet the Press.

The New York Times reported last month that Trump had ordered Mueller fired in June 2017, just a month after the special counsel's appointment, though backed away from the order after the White House counsel threatened to resign.

Former White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Sunday that he 'never felt' that President Trump was going to fire Special Counsel Robert Mueller

Talking to Meet the Press host Chuck Todd (right), former Chief of Staff Reince Priebus (left) said he never personally heard that the president was mulling firing Robert Mueller, though said the president made it 'very clear' that he had some issues with Mueller's appointment

Priebus, who was pushed out of his White House post in late July, said that it was 'very clear' the president had concerns about 'conflicts of interest that he felt the special counsel had.'

'And he made that very clear,' Priebus pointed out.

However, the former top aide floated, 'perhaps someone interpreted that to mean something else.'

'But I know the difference between, "fire that person, why isn't that person gone?" to what I've read in that New York Times piece,' Priebus said. 'So when I read that I'm just telling you I didn't feel that when I was there.'

Host Chuck Todd then specifically asked Preibus if White House Counsel Don McGahn had expressed that concern, that Trump was eager to get rid of Mueller.

'Not in particular,' Priebus answered.

When Todd asked Priebus if he thought the Times' story was wrong, the former chief of staff said, 'I didn't think it was right. Put it that way. I didn't believe that it was accurate.'

He added that he was 'disputing it from my point of view' because he had never heard the president express that.

'I think he expressed his concerns with the conflicts, but I never heard the idea or the concept that this person needed to be fired,' Priebus said. 'I never felt that it was relayed to me that way either. And I know the difference between a level ten situation, as reported in that story, and what was reality.'

'And it just, to me, it wasn't reality,' Priebus added.

Priebus also answered a definitive 'no' when asked if he saw President Trump preparing to fire Mueller now.

'I only know what I dealt with,' the former top aide also said. 'And I can tell you I've never felt that there was some sort of collusion or some kind of obstruction situation going on in the West Wing.'

'And if there was ever anything at all that caused me any concern, I would go to the White House Counsel's office, we would talk about it and it would get resolved,' Priebus, the former chairman of the Republican National Committee, added.

Todd asked Priebus to fill in the blanks for him on some other highly publicized events as well.

First, the Trump Tower between a Russian lawyer and her associates and Donald Trump Jr. and Trump campaign associates, a meeting that took place when Priebus was still the head of the RNC in Washington.

On that Priebus said he thought 'the people involved truly believed that it was a nothing meeting, totally about these issues of Russian adoption.'

The ex-aide also said that he had heard about the meeting from members of the Trump family and it consistently had been described as a meeting about adoption and the Magnitsky Act, not as a way to get dirt on Hillary Clinton.

'I never felt that I was involved in something nefarious. The whole way through from the beginning to the end,' Priebus protested.

Priebus also revealed new details about a meeting among campaign staff on the heels of the release of the Access Hollywood tape, which nearly derailed Trump's presidential campaign.

In September 2017, 11 months after the incident, former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon told 60 Minutes that Trump asked a roomful of advisers his chances of still winning.

'And Reince started off and Reince said, "You have  you have two choices. You either drop out right now, or you lose by the biggest landslide in American political history,"' as Bannon put it.

Bannon used the anecdote to suggest that Priebus wasn't part of Trump's trusted inner circle after that.

Priebus admitted that Trump brought those comments up occasionally, but also pointed out that he was on the plane with Trump the next day playing faux debate moderator and pretending to be Clinton in order to get the GOP hopeful prepared for the second presidential debate.

'The other thing I'd say is that no one in the room disagreed with what I was saying either,' Priebus said. 'It's one of those things where people ... behind the scenes bring this issue up but none of them spoke up and said, "oh, that's wrong."'

'I mean the truth of the matter is I was making a point to the president. This was a serious issue,' Priebus said of the tape's release, in which audience heard Trump boasting about using his celebrity to get women, saying he could 'grab them by the p***y.'

Priebus explained that he made the point to express 'that we had to do everything that we could do to turn this campaign around, get ready for the second debate, apologize for what happened and move forward.'

Trump, Priebus noted, did exactly that.

'I mean he turned that second debate around and then went on a three week, five speech a day disciplined campaign and won the operation,' the ex-aide said.

'And look, if I didn't believe in the president, I wouldn't have transferred the millions of more dollars that were put into his campaign and the field and data operation to boot,' the former RNC chairman added.House Intelligence Committee Democrats are expected to push for a vote Monday to declassify their answer to the Republican memo, which the president said last night had 'totally vindicate[d] "Trump,"' by alleging FBI surveillance abuse.

Both CNN and Reuters reported Sunday that Democrats plan to offer a motion Monday that would release their memo and, if approved, would then send the matter to President Trump, who would have five days to stop the document's release.

Last week, the release of the GOP-penned memo was central to the drama in Washington, with the FBI and President Trump's own Justice Department squaring off against the president and his Republican allies in Congress.

Sources told CNN and Reuters that Democrats are expected to push for a vote Monday to get their version of the memo released. Rep. Adam Schiff (pictured), the Democrats' top member on the House Intelligence Committee, has been critical of only the GOP memo's release

President Trump, seen Sunday in his motorcade returning to Mar-a-Lago after a trip to his golf club, proclaimed Saturday night that he's been vindicated, after the release of a GOP-penned memo suggested the 'dirty dossier' was used as a reason to snoop on a campaign associate

President Trump has reveled in the GOP memo being released, saying Saturday that the content of the memo 'totally vindicates "Trump,"' because it said that the Clinton campaign-funded 'dirty dossier' was used in a surveillance warrant for one of Trump's associates

President Trump (pictured) and his Republican allies have tried to suggest that Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe is tainted because of the role the 'dirty dossier' has played. The dossier was funded first by a Republican political rival, and then by the Democrats

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, seen Thursday at the GOP's Congressional retreat in West Virginia, and his fellow Republicans blocked a move by committee Democrats to get their minority memo released. They'll try again Monday

Earlier in the week, House Intelligence Committee Republicans voted to declassify their memo  sending it to Trump  while blocking an attempt by committee Democrats to release the minority memo as well, which would have offered the other party's perspective on the intel.

The Republican memo, which was released Friday, said that the FBI had relied on the so-called 'dirty dossier' when it applied for a FISA surveillance warrant on a Trump campaign associate, Carter Page.

The dossier, compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele, had been funded by an unknown Republican during the 2016 primary cycle, and then by the Democrats and Hillary Clinton's campaign, during the general election.

Republicans have long tried to show that the Russia probe, now being handled by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, was tainted from the beginning because it was sparked by opposition research paid for by the Democrats.

The memo, however, kills that theory, as the documents say that the Russia investigation  including probing Trump links to the Kremlin  was 'triggered' by a different campaign aide, George Papadapoulos.

Papadapoulos pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI last fall and is now cooperating with Mueller's investigation.

In May 2016, Papadapoulos had drinks in London with an Australian diplomat and told him that the Russians had damaging information on Clinton, the New York Times previously reported. Papadapoulos had been told three weeks prior that Moscow had thousands of Clinton's emails.

When leaked emails from the Democrats started appearing online two months later, the Australians warned their American counterparts, which kicked off the Russia probe.

Despite that revelation, Trump tried to sound the horn that he was off the hook.

'This memo totally vindicates "Trump" in probe,' the president said, using his trademark third-person. 'But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on.'

'There was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead),' he continued.

'This is an American disgrace!' the president added.

The fact that the White House green-lit the memo's release, against the FBI and Justice Department's wishes and without the minority memo to provide balance, continued to infuriate Democrats on Sunday.

Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat in the GOP-led House Intelligence Committee, called the memo's release a 'political hit job' on ABC's This Week.

'But the goal here really isnt to find out the answers from the FBI. The goal here is to undermine the FBI, discredit the FBI, discredit the Mueller investigation, do the presidents bidding,' Schiff charged.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Wisconsin Republican, had argued in favor for the memo's release, saying it merely showed Congress 'doing its job and conducting legitimate oversight over a very unique law, FISA.'

Schiff argued that if Republican lawmakers were really that interested in their oversight role than they would have wanted to read the underlying information the memo was based upon and they would have wanted to hear from the FBI.

The ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Adam Schiff (left) told ABC's George Stephanopoulos that the goal in releasing the GOP-penned memo was to 'undermine the FBI, discredit the FBI, discredit the Mueller investigation, do the presidents bidding'

The California Democrat said he had put both those options on the table and they had been voted down by the Republican majority.

Now Democrats will push again to get their answer to the memo release.

Schiff had the backing of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, who wrote to President Trump Sunday urging him to release the Democratic memo as well.

'I believe it is a matter of fundamental fairness that the American people be allowed to see both sides of the argument and make their own judgements,' Schumer said in the letter, sent out to reporters.

'A refusal to release the Schiff memo in light of the fact that Chairman Devin Nunes' memo was released and is based on the same underlying documents will confirm the American people's worst fears that the release of Chairman Nunes' memo was only intended to undermine Special Counsel Bob Mueller's investigation,' Schumer said.

Reuters reported that the House Intelligence Committee will meet at 5 p.m. Monday, with Democrats expected to make their move then to get the Schiff-written documents released.This creative couple transformed an old farm trailer into a cosy caravan in a project broadcast on national television.

Sam Thompson, 30, and his partner Jess Allen, 29, converted a livestock box into a nifty mobile home on George Clarke's Amazing Spaces on Channel 4.

The pair, from Mirfield in West Yorkshire, installed a log fire, tasteful armchairs and even a foldable king size bed during the 15,000 renovation.

Sam Thompson, 30, and his partner Jess Allen, 29, (pictured) transformed an old farm trailer into a cosy caravan in a project broadcast on national television

The pair, from Mirfield in West Yorkshire, installed a log fire, tasteful armchairs and even a foldable king size bed during the 15,000 renovation

The enormous bed also doubles up as seating space so the couple can snuggle up together

They insulated the trailer box to keep the cold away and fitted it with windows for fresh air, as well as putting down proper flooring

The back panel (pictured) folds down to create a small patio area. Sam (left) says the renovation was worth every penny

'It was a real labour of love and has brought us closer together as a couple,' said Sam.

'I'd looked into camper vans but it wasn't really our style. We wanted something a bit more modern and different.

'I bought the trailer box second hand and my dad and I went to pick it up.

'We were on the way home when I got an email from the production company that do George Clarke's Amazing Spaces saying they were looking for applicants.'

After being chosen to take part in the show, the couple carried out the four-month renovation last summer.

They insulated the trailer box to keep the cold away and fitted it with windows for fresh air, as well as putting down proper flooring.

The fold-up king size bed also doubles up as seating space, while the back panel folds down to create a small patio area.

Though it cost thousands of pounds to complete, Sam says the renovation was worth every penny.

Before: This is what the couple's livestock box looked like before they started work on it

After: Now the trailer is barely recognisable after undergoing the impressive renovation

When they're not camping in the Yorkshire Dales or Lake District in their ingenious invention, the couple use the trailer as a chill out space.

Jess works as a nurse at St James' Hospital in Leeds, while Sam designs medical equipment products.

'So far we have taken it camping in the Dales and the Lakes and plan to travel all round the country in it,' said Sam.

'We wouldn't rule out travelling abroad either, but it's given us a real opportunity to travel to new places here in the UK.

'I love the idea of pitching up to a campsite in it and people thinking the farmer has turned up, before opening the door and them realising it's a proper space inside.

'It's a real conversation starter and I like that people have come up to talk to us in campsites as a result.'

The pair were filmed for the seventh series of the popular show, in which George Clarke meets people who turn unlikely things into incredible living spaces.Police have declared the death of a 57-year-old woman in South Australia overnight a 'brutal murder'.

Detective Superintendent Des Bray told reporters on Monday morning a the woman's body was found inside her home shortly after 8pm on Sunday.

She was found with 'significant injuries which led police to the inescapable conclusion this woman had been murdered,' he said.

Police were initially alerted to an altercation between the woman and a man known to her when a neighbour walking their dog passed the home on Albert Terrace at Murray Bridge and saw a man trying to kick the door down.

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A 57-year-old woman was killed in her home in a sleepy town south east of Adelaide on Sunday night

She was killed by a man known to her, and well known to police, Detective Superintendent Des Bray told reporters

The man and the woman are known to each other, Det Supt Bray said, and the man is 'well known to local police'.

'Any person that discovered that crime scene could be left with no doubt it was a deliberate murder,' he said.

Officers are confident they know who murdered the 57-year-old, and urge him or anyone who knows him to contact police.

'Multiple people know who is responsible for this murder,' Det Insp Bray said.

The man, who was known to the woman, was wearing a faded red shirt and jeans on the night, but may have changed clothes.

He is described as about 44 years old, pale skinned and balding, but possibly sporting a rats tail.

The public have been warned to stay away from the man if they see him.

'The man obviously committed a brutal murder a short time ago, and is currently fleeing - really anybody in that situation is dangerous and shouldn't be approached by anybody,' Det Supt Bray said.

A crime scene has been established at the woman's home, and the local criminal investigation branch and Major Crime Detectives are investigating.

Anyone with information on the woman's death is asked to contact the police assistance line on 131 444 or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.Measures to clamp down on tax avoidance in offshore havens have brought in only a third as much revenue as the government hoped, new figures have revealed.

HM Revenue and Customs had hoped to bring in almost 1billion from a series of agreements with tax havens such as Liechtenstein and Switzerland.

But HMRC has now told the Office of Budget Responsibility that the measures will bring in only 349million a year, barely a third of the expected amount, The Guardian reports.

The reforms came in the wake of the Paradise Papers, a file of leaked tax records which revealed the extent of offshore avoidance.

HM Revenue and Customs had hoped to bring in almost 1billion from a series of agreements with tax havens such as Liechtenstein and Switzerland

They were expected to bring in 997million in additional revenue as unpaid tax was recovered by the Treasury.

However the new figures, released in response to a Freedom of Information request by the Labour Party, showed that the expected gain is now down to 349million, a mere 35 per cent of the original forecast.

The changes also included an acceleration of payments in which investors would pay disputed taxes upfront, but those reforms have also brought in less than expected.

Labour's John McDonnell said the government had failed to deliver on its promises in the aftermath of the Paradise Papers leak.

He said: 'It's not acceptable any longer for our public services like the NHS to go on being underfunded, while the Tories refuse to take serious action to properly clamp down on tax avoidance and evasion.'

Labour's John McDonnell said the government had failed to deliver on its promises in the aftermath of the Paradise Papers leak

Some of the tax avoidance measures, including changes to stamp duty, have brought in more than expected, it is reported.

A spokesperson for the Treasury said that some 175billion of revenue had been recovered since 2010.

The Paradise Papers included more than 13 million leaked secret corporate files, about half of which belonged to offshore law and corporate services provider Appleby, which has ten offices around the globe.

The German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung obtained the files and shared them with 95 other media organisations around the world.

Offshore tax havens typically offer low or zero tax rates to non-residents who keep money there.

Experts estimate that around $10 trillion (7.6 trillion) is held offshore around the world.

Tenants are excluding hopeful renters based on race and religious preferences in a discriminatory yet surprisingly legal practice.

Advertisements for rooms in Sydney appearing on reputable sites such as Gumtree and Flatmates.com.au are requesting renters with terms such as 'Asian only', 'seeking Indians' or 'only Muslims please'.

The majority of the 'racist' listings are for apartments and unit blocks around the western and southwest Sydney areas and appear to be largely posted by people of Asian, Indian or Middle-Eastern descent.

Advertisements for rooms in Sydney (pictured) are appearing on reputable sites such as Gumtree and Flatmates.com.au are requesting renters with terms such as 'Asian only', 'seeking Indians' or 'only Muslims please'

The majority of the 'racist' listings (pictured) are for apartments and unit blocks around the western and southwest Sydney areas and appear to be largely posted by people of Asian, Indian or Middle-Eastern descent

Dozens of rooms for rent on Gumtree request only Asian or Indian tenants while several specify exact ethnicity such as Vietnamese or Bangladeshi Muslim.

One listing in Parramatta shared to the classified website reads: 'We are looking for Muslim student to share the room with (Preferably from India, Bangladesh or Pakistan HALAL ONLY'.

Another advertisement for a room in the Liverpool area specified: 'I prefer Vietnamese people or Asian', while a listing in Lakemba states: 'Spacious room for rent preferably a Muslim girl'.

The discriminatory listings have also been spotted on Flatmates.com.au - one particular advertisement for a room in Bella Vista, northwest Sydney asks for a Muslim female only.

'We are a Muslim family from Pakistan and are looking for a female Muslim, who understands and respects the values and morals of our culture and religion,' the listing reads.

Dozens of rooms for rent on Gumtree request only Asian or Indian tenants while several specify exact ethnicity such as Vietnamese or Bangladeshi Muslim

Another advertisement for a room in the Liverpool area specified: 'I prefer Vietnamese people or Asian', while a listing in Lakemba states: 'Spacious room for rent preferably a Muslim girl'

This advertisement is seeking an Asian girl to share a room in Haymarket in Sydney's centre

Many of the listings ask specifically for Asian, Muslim or Indian tenants (one room pictured)

Some of the prejudiced tenants buried their ethnic preferences in the description of the advertisements, while some blatantly stated in the title 'Indians only' or 'Asians preferred'.

Under NSW fair trading, tenants cannot be discriminated against because of law race, sex, pregnancy or marital status, disability, sexuality preferences or age.

'Everybody should be given a 'Fair Go' when renting or trying to rent a property. While landlords and agents have the right to choose the most suitable tenant, they are not able to unfairly discriminate against you when you apply for a rental property,' it reads.

Some of the prejudiced tenants buried their ethnic preferences in the description of the advertisements, while some blatantly stated in the title 'Indians only' or 'Asians preferred' (One room pictured)

Under NSW fair trading, tenants cannot be discriminated against because of law race, sex, pregnancy or marital status, disability, sexuality preferences or age (One room pictured)

This listing is asking for only Indians to take a room in Kogarah, Sydney

This Bankstown advertisement on Gumtree asks for 'only Muslims please'

A listing in Parramatta (pictured) requests a Muslim student, preferably from India, Bangladesh or Pakistan

However, according to the NSW Anti-Discrimination Board, it is permissible under state law for existing tenants to cherry-pick housemates based on race and religion - but it illegal for landlords and rental agencies.

A spokeswoman for the Anti-Discrimination Board told the Daily Telegraph that while the listings were not breaking the law, it is 'discrimination'.

'It's discrimination but it is not unlawful discrimination,' she said.

A spokesperson for Flatmates.com.au told Daily Mail Australia they want their members to find housemates they feel 'comfortable' with and encourage them to state preferences in the listings.

The discriminatory listings have also been spotted on Flatmates.com.au - one particular advertisement for a room in Bella Vista in northwest Sydney asks for a Muslim female only (pictured)

'Flatmates.com.au is an inclusive community where all members are expected to treat one another with the utmost respect regardless of race, sex, gender identity, religion, age or sexual orientation,' a spokesperson said.

'It's important that someone lives with someone they feel comfortable with and for that reason, we allow people to state their preference when looking for a house mate for an existing share home.

We moderate every listing that appears on our site and where we find members acting in a manner which goes against our community charter, we will remove their accounts.'

A spokesperson for Gumtree Australia provided the following statement: 'We rely on our users feedback to keep the platform safe. We operate a report and take down process and we strongly encourage our engaged community to report any concerning listings believed to be offensive or unlawful in any way.'

'Our "report ad" function and 24/7 live chat means our community support team are always available to answer questions and take down any listings reported that are offensive or unlawful.'The driver of a train that crashed at a suburban station, injuring 16 people, has broken his silence about the horror smash.

Ritesh Mittal, 39, said he is trying to continue his life as normal after the January 22 crash at Richmond Station in Sydney's north-west.

Witnesses reported seeing passengers flying through the air after the train ploughed into a buffer, leaving carriages splattered with blood from the injured.

The driver (pictured, right, after the crash)of a train that crashed at a suburban station, injuring 16 people, has broken his silence about the horror smash

Ritesh Mittal, 39, said he is trying to continue his life as normal after the January 22 crash at Richmond Station in Sydney's north-west (pictured is an injured passenger)

Witnesses reported seeing commuters flying through the air after the train ploughed into a buffer (pictured), leaving carriages splattered with blood from the injured

'I feel bad for the passengers but talk to Sydney Trains about what happened,' Mr Mittal told The Daily Telegraph.

'It's been really hard for me, I'm just trying to continue life as normal and go for walks with my family.'

Mr Mittal, seen while taking a stroll around the suburb of Glenwood with his wife and children, still has bandages on the leg he injured in the crash.

'I feel bad for the passengers but talk to Sydney Trains about what happened,' Mr Mittal said (pictured is a carriage after the crash)

'It's been really hard for me, I'm just trying to continue life as normal and go for walks with my family,' said the driver (pictured is a carriage after the crash)

The smash left 16 people injured, including a 77-year-old woman who was left with a broken shoulder and collarbone and a man, 22, who suffered a broken leg.

The train hit a buffer at the end of the rail line, the force of the impact lifting the train into the air and sending passengers flying.

One witness described the scene as a 'bloodbath' while others told of hearing an 'almighty bang' and seeing dust fly into the air.

Mr Mittal, seen while taking a stroll around the suburb of Glenwood with his wife and children, still has bandages on the leg he injured in the crash (pictured is an injured rail employee)

The smash left 16 people injured, including a 77-year-old woman who was left with a broken shoulder and collarbone and a man, 22, who suffered a broken leg (pictured is one of the injured)

'I was straight onto the train as soon as I seen people were injured,' said Brett Saunders, who saw passengers knocked off their feet during the crash.

'I walked through and seen the blood everywhere. There is absolutely blood everywhere, it's a big hit.'

Sydney Trains said the cause of the crash is yet to be determined, and the incident is being probed by the Office of Transport Safety Investigations.

The train hit a buffer at the end of the rail line, the force of the impact lifting the train into the air and sending passengers flying (pictured is a damaged carriage)

One witness described the scene as a 'bloodbath' while others told of hearing an 'almighty bang' and seeing dust fly into the air (pictured is the train after the crash)

Sydney Trains said the cause of the crash is yet to be determined, and the incident is being probed by the Office of Transport Safety Investigations (pictured is the scene of the crash)

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau, Office of Transport Safety and the Office of National Rail Safety Regulator are taking part in the investigation (pictured are emergency services at the scene of the crash)

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau, Office of Transport Safety and the Office of National Rail Safety Regulator are taking part in the investigation.

A report on the crash is expected by the end of the year, and Mr Mittal has been removed from driver duties.

The crash came just days before the Sydney rail network was thrown into turmoil by rail union industrial action.

Sydney Trains and the union will meet this Wednesday to discuss pay and working conditions.Minnesota, mainly in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, is home to the largest Somali community in the United States, including people who fled the long civil war in their east African country and children born in the United States. Many are now American citizens.

Al Shabaab's initial recruitment efforts began in 2007 when small groups began discussing returning home to fight Ethiopian troops who entered Somalia to prop up a weak U.N.-backed government and were seen by many Somalis as foreign invaders. The recruiters aimed their appeal at the young men's patriotic and religious ideals.

Even after Ethiopians were expelled from Somalia, al-Shabab continued to target young men frustrated with life in the West, luring them with propaganda videos that glorify jihad and martyrdom.

A high-quality video circulated in 2014 entitled Minnesotas Martyrs: The Path to Paradise which featured what it said were three Minneapolis men who were killed in Somalia. It featured Minneapolis man Troy Kastigar describing fighting with ISIS rebels in Syria as 'like Disneyland'.He has embraced fatherhood with open arms since welcoming daughter Willow last year with fiancee Snezana.

And so it's no wonder Sam Wood was thrilled to introduce his little girl to one of the most iconic children's film in history- Disney's The Lion King on Saturday.

The 37-year-old enjoyed some bonding time with the three-month-old at the Open Air Cinema, on the Rippon Lea Estate near Melbourne.

It's the circle of life! Sam Wood has introduced little Willow to the iconic Disney film The Lion King, on Saturday at the Open Air Cinema, on the Rippon Lea Estate near Melbourne

Sam shared a snap showing himself recreating the presentation scene with Willow by lifting her up in the air at the same time as the lion cub Simba is held up by Rafiki the Baboon, seen on the screen in the distance.

He captioned the snap: 'Little Willows first moonlight cinema session  #simba #lionking.'

Fans of the found his photo amusing, including one who wrote: 'Youre living proof that kids have to fit in with you, not the other way around!'

'You're in for a treat little Willow': Before the film started Sam took to his Instagram story to share a sweet selfie with his little bub strapped into her rocker chair

Like father, like daughter: The fitness trainer has quickly adapted to being a doting dad since welcoming daughter Willow last year with fiancee Snezana

While a fan shared: 'My husband loved doing this to our pug dog then to our daughter when she was born.'

Before the film started Sam took to his Instagram story to share a sweet selfie with his little bub strapped into her baby rocker.

He captioned the post: 'Moonlight Cinema for The Lion King... Oh you're in for a treat little Willow,' along with a heart emoji.

Having a grape time! Sam recently took to Instagram to post a picture with 12-year-old stepdaughter Eve, cutting healthy vegetables and whipping up the ultimate first-day-back school lunchbox

It comes after he recently impressed fans with his lunch box prepping skills.

Sam uploaded a picture to Instagram on Friday, showing him with 12-year-old stepdaughter Eve, cutting healthy vegetables and whipping up the ultimate first-day-back school lunchbox.

'First day of school lunchbox duties. Balancing healthy snacks with some mini cheesymite scrolls,' he captioned the picture.

Adding: 'Let's hope the new uniform stays clean til we arrive.'

Since meeting on The Bachelor's home town visits in 2015, Sam and Eve have formed a strong bond.As I watched these two Royals posing in icy Oslo last week, I couldnt help getting a sense of deja vu  and it seems I wasnt alone.

As the Duchess of Cambridge stepped out with Princess Mette-Marit during Kate and Williams tour of Norway, scores of Royal watchers took to Twitter to say they could have been plucked from the Disney movie Frozen, comparing them to film characters Elsa and Anna.

Not far behind Kate was hairdresser Amanda Cook Tucker, forced to delete her Instagram account days before  after posting an eye-roll emoji next to a snap of the 13 hair brushes needed to style Kates tresses on tour.

As the Duchess of Cambridge stepped out with Princess Mette-Marit during Kate and Williams tour of Norway, scores of Royal watchers took to Twitter to say they could have been plucked from the Disney movie Frozen, comparing them to film characters Elsa and Anna

Blow number two for Butler film

Hollywood hunk Gerard Butler is battling what must be the most expensive illness in movie history after it halted production on his 50 million action flick Angel Has Fallen.

My film crew mole tells me most of them have been given at least a week of paid holiday while Gerard, 48, is laid up  but details of exactly why are being kept secret.

Hollywood hunk Gerard Butler is battling what must be the most expensive illness in movie history after it halted production on his 50 million action flick Angel Has Fallen

Less amused, however, are producers who, though sympathetic, are losing huge sums by postponing filming  an extremely rare last resort in the movie biz.

Production was also delayed in October after Gerard was involved in a motorcycle crash. I do hope hell be OK.He shocked fans when he announced he had been axed from Strictly's line-up earlier this week, after 13 years on the show.

And while Brendan Cole has received a seemingly lack of public support from his co-stars, former judge Arlene Phillips has sympathised with the 41-year-old professional dancer.

The famed choreographer, 74, who was cut from the show in 2009, revealed she knows what the outspoken dancer is going through, likening his sacking to 'divorce'.

Reaching out: Former judge Arlene Phillips has sympathised with the 41-year-old professional dancer, likening his sacking to 'divorce'

'It happens, its divorce by telephone, you get a phone call and suddenly its like hello, my familys gone,' she told the Mirror.

'I understand what Brendan is going through.

'Suddenly you are dropped and all the big fish have swum away from you.'

Axed: Brendan Cole shocked fans when he announced he had been let go from Strictly's line-up earlier this week, after 13 years on the show. Pictured with Charlotte Hawkins in 2017

Arlene's comments about Brendan come after she was axed from the beloved ballroom show herself nine years ago, after six series.

She added that despite a viewers campaign to reinstate the New Zealand dancer, producers 'won't change their mind'.

There's been little support from his fellow co-stars, as the judges on the show have kept quiet and only one of his pro dancer co-stars have publicly acknowledged the matter with a tweet.

Honest: When asked about Brendan's sacking on the show, Arlene said: 'I was shocked. 'I think the show needs conflict, excitement, challenges. Hes always been the outspoken one'

The choreographer appeared on Good Morning Britain earlier this week, where she admitted she was 'shocked' by the news, and claimed the show needs 'conflict, excitement and challenges'.

GMB's Charlotte Hawkins, who was his partner on the 2017 series, added that Brendan had been nothing but supportive during their time on the show - causing co-host Piers Morgan to joke she was to blame, as his 'worst performing partner'.

When asked about Brendan's sacking on the show, Arlene said: 'I was shocked  normally if anyone goes its in June, but this has happened so close to the New Year.'

Brendan was known for his outspoken and rule-breaking nature, which Arlene said the show needs in order to keep it more entertaining and exciting.

'Anton [du Beke] is as much loved as Brendan,' she said.

'He has always been the bad boy. Theres no doubles.'

Unfair: She added: 'Anton [du Beke] is as much loved as Brendan. He has always been the bad boy. Theres no doubles'

Axed: Arlene was axed from the ballroom show herself in 2009 - leading the BBC to be accused of ageism (pictured with Craig Revel Horwood, Len Goodman and Bruno Tonioli)

Back in 2009, the BBC were accused of ageism after they dropped Arlene from the judging panel and replaced her with pop star Alesha Dixon - who is 36 years her junior.

She admitted in an interview with Good Housekeeping last year: 'Ive never really been given a real reason [as to why I was axed]. I dont think I will ever know the answer.'

During the interview with Arlene, GMB host Charlotte expressed her own disappointment at his sacking, as Brendan had very fully supportive as a partner during their time on the 2017 series.

Addressing his famous row with new head judge Shirley Ballas after their Tango, she said: 'I felt he had my back and he was defending me. That week we had tried to come back fighting after a bad week before.'

Arlene added of the so-called spat: 'I think it was mild. And Bruno jumping in, too - what are they, in school? This is a professional show.'

Unprofessional: Arlene added of the spat: ' I think it was mild. And Bruno jumping in, too - what are they, in school? This is a professional show'

Heartbroken: Brendan broke down when he revealed he had been cut from the show on Tuesday, during a live television interview with Lorraine Kelly

Brendan broke down when he revealed he had been cut from the show on Tuesday, during a live television interview with Lorraine Kelly.

The emotional star, who has served on the show for 13 years, said: 'This is hard to talk about. The BBC havent renewed my contract.

'They have made an editorial decision not to have me back on the show. I have had 15 incredible series on the show, they are a great team. I am very disappointed. Its an editorial decision. I will never know the ins and outs.'

Upset: The emotional dancer said: 'I am very disappointed. Its an editorial decision. I will never know the ins and outs'

Brendan, who was partnered with GMB host Charlotte on the last series, implied that his strong opinions may have had something to do with him losing his position on the show.

He famously locked horns with new head judge Shirley when he took her to task over her criticism of his and Charlotte's tango, to Danger Zone by Top Gun.

Len Goodman's replacement said of the routine: 'Its definitely a little bit better' to which Brendan remarked: 'A little bit?'

Not happy: He famously locked horns with new head judge Shirley Ballas (above) when he took her to task over her criticism of his and Charlotte's tango, to Danger Zone by Top Gun

Firm: When Bruno Tonioli scolded Brendan for being 'disrespectful' after Shirley's criticism of their routine, he said: 'I do respect her but I just don't agree'

Shirley retorted: 'Yeah definitely just a little bit Brendan, unfortunately. We've established that there is no rise and fall in tango, you have to make a concrete decision not to use rise and fall.'

Brendan, who had also been tipped for the role of head judge after Len's departure, snapped back: 'I'm really sorry but there was no rise and fall in that.'

Bruno then stepped in to defend his co-judge, adding: 'I'm not an expert, I've only done about 500 shows but I think Shirley's right, you should be more respectful,' he chided.

Pledging his respect to her, Brendan explained: 'I do respect her but I just don't agree'.It's her favourite sunshine holiday spot but socialite Sophia Hesketh wont be returning to South Africa any time soon.

Stylist Sophia, 34, daughter of former Tory peer and Grand Prix team owner Alexander Hesketh, tells me she was in the Western Cape last week for a shoot but over-stayed her visa by a day.

Authorities collared her at Cape Town airport, slapped an undesirable person notice on her  and banned her for a year.

Stylist Sophia, 34 (left and right), daughter of former Tory peer and Grand Prix team owner Alexander Hesketh, tells me she was in the Western Cape last week for a shoot but over-stayed her visa by a day

'WORLD'S HOTTEST FELON' WHO WAS SENT PACKING WHEN HE TRIED TO ENTER HEATHROW IS WELCOMED WITH OPEN ARMS BY RUSSIA Russian border forces clearly welcomed him, as my picture of him looking every inch the party apparatchik in army-style coat, proves His criminal past earned him the label Hot Felon, so how did Jeremy Meeks get away with a modelling trip to Moscow last week? When he tried to enter the UK last year, the blue-eyed beau of Chloe Green, tycoon Sir Philips daughter, was sent packing at Heathrow. Yet Russian border forces clearly welcomed him, as my picture, right, of him looking every inch the party apparatchik in army-style coat, proves. Advertisement

'iPad girls' who hand out gadgets at Tory Black & White Ball are axed in post-President's club era

The annual Tory Black & White Ball will be held at the Natural History Museum on Wednesday, I can reveal  and organisers are so anxious, in the post-Presidents Club era, that they wont use iPad girls who hand out the gadgets to let guests take part in auctions.Heidi Klum's made a vocation of showing off her world-class figure.

But the German beauty was on the sidelines Saturday while shooting a risque scene for Germany's Next Topmodel in Hollywood.

The star, who produces and judges the talent search, looked chic in stylish jacket and sunglasses while she watched a scantily clad model shower herself while rolling on the back of a flatbed truck.

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Making a splash! Heidi Klum watched on as a scantily clad model rinsed off in broad daylight while shooting Germany's Next Topmodel in Hollywood Saturday

Heidi, 44, appeared like she was in producer mode, donning well-tailored jeans and simple stilettos while supervising the photoshoot-on-wheels.

As the Project Runway hostess looked on, a model dressed in a red hot bathing suit seductively rinsed off for the cameras.

Another camera man rolled down Hollywood Boulevard behind the mobile shower-shoot in a black convertible.

The entire production was escorted by two police offices at the rear.

She means business! Heidi, 44, appeared like she was in producer mode, donning well-tailored jeans and simple stilettos while supervising the photoshoot-on-wheels

Heidi's been hosting Germany's Next Topmodel for 13 seasons.

The European reality competition is a nice compliment to the star's other show Project Runway, which wrapped up its 16th season last summer.

Earlier this week Heidi teased an appearance during Super Bowl Sunday commercials on Instagram.

She shared a photo of herself sitting on a stoop with director Spike Lee and an unidentified woman while wearing a gold dress.

Game face! Earlier this week Heidi teased an appearance during Super Bowl Sunday commercials on Instagram

Klum captioned the photo: 'Its always fun when @officialspikelee is on set, especially for the @nbc #SuperBowl commercial! #LetsGoCrazy #SBLII'

Heidi reportedly spent New Year's with her 31-year-old ex-lover Vito Schnabel.

They split up after three years together back in September but are said to have rung in 2018 in Bali, Indonesia according to Star Magazine.

Meanwhile, the German-born supermodel is still close to her musician ex-husband Seal, 54, to whom she was married from 2005 until 2012 and shares four children with.They're no strangers to the opulence.

And on Saturday George and Amal Clooney were once again enjoying the high life as the couple boarded a private jet in Los Angeles.

The trip was apparently launched to celebrate Amal's 40th birthday.

Taking to the skies! on Saturday George and Amal Clooney were once again enjoying the high life as the couple boarded a private jet in Los Angeles

George, 56, looked quite casual as he boarded the aircraft, opting for his trademark dark was jeans and black t-shirt combination.

He also was weighed down with a jacket, which he draped over his left arm, and a backpack slung over his right shoulder.

Amal chose an all black ensemble for the excursion, and opted to cover up almost completely.

This week actor George opened up about his first meeting with Amal - saying they felt an instant attraction.

Not hard to believe: This week actor George opened up about his first meeting with Amal - saying they felt an instant attraction (pictured October 2015)

The American actor, 56, has revealed that he 'didn't even have to leave the house' when he was introduced to the striking Lebanon born other half, 39, by a mutual pal, who knew they would hit it off.

George gave an interesting insight into his first encounter with Amal as he appeared on Netflix's My Guest Needs No Introduction with David Letterman.

'I didn't leave the house,' he said. 'No, it's the wildest thing. A mutual friend of ours said, 'I'm stopping by and can I bring my friend?'

'And I was like, 'Of course.' I got a call from my agent who called me and said, 'I met this woman who's coming to your house who you're gonna marry.''

New information: George gave an interesting insight into his first encounter with Amal as he appeared on Netflix's My Guest Needs No Introduction with David Letterman

Hinting that their love story was fate, George fondly looked back at the meeting with Amal, saying that they 'talked all night' and afterwards, exchanged email addresses.

He continued: 'The funniest thing was my mom and dad were visiting so my parents were there. And we just talked, we stayed up all night talking.'

'And I got her email address, because she was going to send me some pictures of my parents. So we started writing. I didn't know if she wanted to go out with me  I just thought we were buddies.'

Smitten George and Amal went onto marry in a gorgeous ceremony at Venice City Hall in 2014 with the hunk's close friend Walter Veltroni officiating the ceremony.

The couple welcomed their first children, twins Ella and Alexander, at the exclusive Kensington Wing of London's Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in June of last year.They met aboard a lavish boat cruise in December 2016.

And when photos emerged of Today host Karl Stefanovic and shoe designer Jasmine Yarbrough kissing in February last year, their romance was confirmed.

They revealed their engagement one year later on Friday, despite Karl, 43, telling Stellar just months ago the lovebirds were going to take 'things really, really slowly.'

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Lovebirds: Karl Stefanovic and Jasmine Yarbrough revealed their engagement on Friday, despite Karl telling Stellar months ago the lovebirds were taking 'things really, really slowly'

Karl's marriage to fellow journalist Cassandra Thorburn was revealed to be over in September 2016, with the longtime couple's divorce finalised the following year.

The father-of-three reportedly met Jasmine, 34, three months after his split hit the news and in February 2017 was snapped kissing her aboard a Sydney Harbour cruise.

The television host told Stellar in July last year Jasmine had laughed at the uproar surrounding their romance, remarking to him at the time: 'You're not Brad Pitt.'

Making moves: The father of three reportedly met Jasmine, 34, three months after his split with Cassandra Thorburn hit the news

Heartthrob: The television host told Stellar in July last year Jasmine had laughed at the uproar surrounding their romance, remarking to him at the time, 'You're not Brad Pitt'

'We are taking things really, really slowly. I certainly did not expect to meet someone five months after I broke up with my wife. That was not planned,' he told the outlet.

'I met her on a boat in Sydney. We have a really lovely relationship, but it's got to be slow for a variety of reasons,' he described at the time.

After images surfaced of the pair kissing in February, they confirmed their relationship and made their official debut at Mercedes Benz Fashion Week in May.

'We are taking things really, really slowly. I certainly did not expect to meet someone five months after I broke up with my wife. That was not planned,' he told the outlet

After images surfaced of the pair kissing in February, they confirmed their relationship and made their official debut at Mercedes Benz Fashion Week in May

Following that high-profile appearance, the twosome were snapped out and about in Sydney in addition to overseas trips to Bora Bora and Mexico together.

Their Mexican getaway in April reportedly involved Karl meeting Jasmine's parents for the first time, with images from the family holiday shared to social media.

The relationship hasn't come without its detractors, with many female media identities speaking out on Karl's perceived swift move from Cassandra to Jasmine.

Amor is in the air! Their Mexican getaway in April reportedly involved Karl meeting Jasmine's parents for the first time, with images from the family holiday shared to social media

In May last year, former KIIS FM radio host Meshel Laurie blasted Karl and Jasmine's constant public displays of affection as 'insensitive' and 'shameless'.

'It feels a little insensitive, obviously I don't know these people. Is it criminal? No. Is it illegal? No, is it a bit bloody shameless and rotten? Maybe,' she declared.

'All you ever see are photos of the ex [Cassandra] cleaning the house. She's got the kids, she's doing the life and Karl's at Fashion Week or flying off overseas,' she added.

Under fire: In May last year, former KIIS FM radio host Meshel Laurie blasted Karl and Jasmine's constant public displays of affection as 'insensitive' and 'shameless'

'All you ever see are photos of the ex [Cassandra] cleaning the house. She's got the kids, she's doing the life and Karl's at Fashion Week or flying off overseas,' Meshel added

Cassandra, 46, penned an open letter for Now To Love late last year to reveal she was 'happy' and plead for media comparisons between Jasmine and herself to stop.

'I don't feel the need to exact revenge on Karl for leaving me - I'm just happy to be starting a new chapter of my life,' she expressed.

'I went to everything from Derby Day to fashion shows [and] I find it very hurtful they feel the need to compare Karl's new girlfriend Jasmine with me,' she continued.

'I don't feel the need to exact revenge on Karl for leaving me - I'm just happy to be starting a new chapter of my life,' she expressed

'I went to everything from Derby Day to fashion shows [and] I find it very hurtful they feel the need to compare Karl's new girlfriend Jasmine with me,' she continued

Cassandra spoke with Woman's Day in January this year with a new update on her life post-divorce, stating 'I'm unstoppable and I've never felt more empowered'.

Her interview was published only days before it was revealed Karl and Jasmine had gotten engaged.

Jasmine was spotted wearing a giant diamond sparkler on her ring finger during a celebratory lunch at Otto Ristorante in Sydney on Friday.

It's official! Jasmine was spotted wearing a giant diamond sparkler on her ring finger during a celebratory lunch at Otto Ristorante in Sydney on Friday

Claims Karl and Jasmine were engaged first emerged in a Fairfax Media report over the summer holidays.

The publication claimed the couple's 'wide circle of friends' received loved-up text messages that confirmed the engagement.

Fairfax have also claimed the pair are remaining silent in public to protect a 'media deal'.

Overjoyed: The publication claimed the couple's 'wide circle of friends' received loved-up text messages that confirmed the engagement

The publication alleged: 'The couple have struck a [paid] media deal and intend to make a 'big splash' with the news in the very near future.'

The Daily Telegraph reported a friend of the high-profile duo confirmed the news to the paper on Friday.

'They are very happy and enjoying this special time together,' the friend allegedly relayed, adding the proposal was 'very new.'She attacked her estranged husband on Twitter last week, alleging Nick Knowles had subjected her to 'years emotional cruelty and abuse', before deleting the post.

And Jessica Moor has reportedly cut all contact with the DIY SOS star, as pals revealed her plan to 'take him to the cleaners'.

The TV handyman, 55, who has vehemently denied the 30-year-old's claims, has reportedly been left 'devastated' after all lines of communication have broken down, with the pair relying on lawyers.

Feud: Jessica Moor has reportedly cut all contact with DIY SOS star Nick Knowles following her Twitter outburst on Thursday, as pals revealed her plan to 'take him to the cleaners'.

'He is devastated as all lines of communication have broken down and the only contact is now between solicitors,' a source told The Mirror.

In the wake of the allegations, Nick flew home from the US to reportedly have 'crunch talks' with his ex wife, but Jessica reportedly refused to meet with the television personality.

It comes as Jessica's dad, Marc, defended her enraged tweets and said: 'She is a strong, dynamic woman who woke up one day and decided she wasn't going to take it any more.

'There comes a point where you have to stand up for yourself.'

MailOnline has contacted Nick's representative for comment.

Hitting out: Jessica attacked her estranged husband on Twitter last week, alleging Nick Knowles had subjected her to 'years emotional cruelty and abuse', before deleting the post

Jessica, who shares her son Eddie with Nick, shared an open letter about her divorce - to the micro-blogging site, earlier this week.

She penned: 'It takes a lot to break me, but he's done it. As all parents can relate, children starting school is an incredibly emotional and happy time.

'This year parents, including myself, were invited to make their state school preferences for Gloucestershire by 15 by January 2018 for their child's chosen school.

'I did not submit a submission for Eddie as as it has been long agreed by my (soon to be ex) husband that Eddie would be privately educated - a luxury he is in the position to afford, as he has done for all his other children.

'As such, Eddie is enrolled to start private school this September (a school that me and my husband visited and chose together) except that he won't as I was advised by my husband's solicitor that this offer has been withdrawn.

Explosive: Jessica shared a lengthy statement - an open letter about her divorce - to the micro-blogging site, claiming: 'It takes a lot to break me, but he's done it.'

Accusing: However as of Thursday, the posts had vanished from Jessica's Twitter account, which boasts 6,145 followers

'After years of intimidation, emotional cruelty, physical abuse and eventually isolation (that I have kept silent about - of which I have diaries and images), this is the straw that broke the camels back.

'To add insult to injury - like many men in his position of wealth and power he has advised he will not pay any legal fees meaning that I cannot afford to fight for our son's education.

'My husband has also said he will not purchase a house or give a settlement of any kind for us, this is disappointing but not unexpected - some people's generosity is only present in front of the TV cameras.

'Since he was born my sole priority has been Eddie's well being and I felt my silence was in his best interest but now I have to fight, which isn't in my nature, but I'm fighting for my son. What mother wouldn't.'

Over: The 30-year-old, who split from the DIY SOS host in 2016, took to social media last week to attack her estranged husband

It is also claimed Jessica is now reportedly asking for more than 48,000 a year from him in light of their bitter divorce battle.

According to The Sun, Jessica who is currently receiving 4,000 a month as part of their settlement, is demanding an extra 2,000 a month in order to fund their three-year-old son Eddie's education.

'Nick is distraught that Jessica has made these claims. She already gets 4,000 a month from him and he's funded her life for years,' a source told the publication.

Nick is reportedly refusing to pay Jessica the money and has said that he will pay Eddie's school the required fee directly.

Nick and Jessica - who share a 26 year age gap - had married in a ceremony in Rome in 2012, but announced their separation in January 2016, following almost four years of marriage.

He is father to three other children; sons Charlie and Tyrian-J and daughter Tuesday.

Their split was muddied by his fling with Emmerdale star Gemma Oaten and Jessica's shock cancer diagnosis earlier in the year, but he insisted at the time they were happily working on their marriage again and are ensuring their three-year-old son remains their priority.She's the self-described 'Tahitian goddess' who teased fans with a cryptic post about a new love in December.

But it now appears Bachelor star Elora 'Tahiti' Murger is ready to debut her new beau to fans, with the 28-year-old sharing a glimpse of a handsome new mystery man.

Taking to Instagram on Saturday, the brunette beauty shared a short clip of herself looking cosy with a square-jawed exotic male companion.

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New man? Former Bachelor star Elora 'Tahiti' Murger, 28, has shared a clip of herself looking loved-up with a handsome new mystery man

The former reality star appears very loved-up as she walks along a Sydney street, dressed in a figure-hugging tan top and jeans.

Meanwhile, her mystery beau cut a dapper figure in a patterned blue-and-white shirt, completing the look with a pair of 70s style shades.

The affectionate pair both politely say 'hello,' to the camera on the video, which was simply captioned 'Saturday.'

Lucky guy, revealed? Elora took to Instagram back in December last year to post a cryptic snap to her fans saying she enjoyed a 'date night' at Flying Fish restaurant in Sydney's Balmain

Daily Mail Australia has reached out to Elora for comment.

While Elora failed to win over Matthew 'Matty J' Johnson on last year's season of The Bachelor, in December she started hinting to fans she had entered into a new relationship.

Taking to Instagram, the stunner posted a cryptic snap saying she enjoyed a 'date night,' but chose not to elaborate further on the romance.

Where's your mister? In the December photo she can be seen looking out into the distance, sans a partner by her side. She captioned her post: 'Date night in my little black dress from The Only Dress'

In the snap, the 28-year-old flaunted her slender figure in a black mini dress and showcased her toned pins as she sat alone by the dock with her leg crossed over the other.

In the photo she can be seen looking out into the distance, sans a partner by her side.

She captioned her post: 'Date night in my little black dress from The Only Dress.'

Over him: While Elora failed to win over Matty 'J' Johnson on last year's season of The Bachelor, it appears the fire twirler has moved on from her on-screen heart break

Late last year, Elora revealed to Daily Mail Australia that she had no regrets about taking part in The Bachelor.

'I wouldn't really do anything differently, because I was myself the whole time and what I learned mostly is that not all the girls are going to be right for one guy,' the fit F45 trainer said.

She even added that joining the reality show was a great experience for her, despite being dumped by Matty.

'It teaches you what you really want and what you are looking for.'

New love? The reality star has been coy about her love life post appearing on The Bachelor series with hunky Matty JRising rap star Cardi B bared her tattooed belly in a grey-knit turtleneck mini-dress featuring cut-outs at the midriff for a pre-Super Bowl LII bash in Minnesota on Friday night.

It was hours after the 25-year-old hip-hop stunner - who boasts 24.5M social media followers - shot down pregnancy rumors by replying to a fan on Instagram: 'No b**** I'm just getting fat. Let me [be] fat in peace.'

Make-up artist Erika La' Pearl Roman gave the Bronx-born Latina a 'bronze glow' and applied her Lilly Lashes while Tokyo Stylez provided the waist-length hairpiece.

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Rising rap star Cardi B bared her tattooed belly in a grey-knit turtleneck mini-dress featuring cut-outs at the midriff for a pre-Super Bowl LII bash in Minnesota on Friday night

It was hours after the 25-year-old hip-hop stunner shot down pregnancy rumors by replying to a fan on Instagram: 'No b**** I'm just getting fat. Let me [be] fat in peace'

Cardi (born Belcalis Almanzar) finished off her winter attire with a cropped fur coat and thigh-high black suede boots selected by stylist Kollin Carter.

'My family, whatever they want, they get. Everything that I want to buy, I can get,' the Finesse hitmaker told CR Fashion Book on Monday.

'Even though I'm happy, I feel like I was a little bit happier two or three years ago when I had less money. I had less people who had opinions about my life. I felt like my life was mine. Now I feel like I dont even own my life. I feel like the world owns me.'

The ex-stripper flashed bling on her watch, nails, and left ring-finger thanks to the 8-carat, pear-shaped diamond engagement ring she received from her fiance of four months, Offset of the Atlanta rap trio Migos.

Work! Make-up artist Erika La' Pearl Roman gave the Bronx-born Latina a 'bronze glow' and applied her Lilly Lashes while Tokyo Stylez provided the waist-length hairpiece

Bundled? Cardi (born Belcalis Almanzar) finished off her winter attire with a cropped fur coat and thigh-high black suede boots selected by stylist Kollin Carter

The Finesse hitmaker told CR Fashion Book on Monday: 'I feel like I was a little bit happier two or three years ago when I had less money. I had less people who had opinions about my life. I felt like my life was mine. Now I feel like I dont even own my life. I feel like the world owns me'

Ostentatious display: The ex-stripper flashed bling on her watch, nails, and left ring-finger thanks to the 8-carat, pear-shaped diamond engagement ring she received from her fiance of four months, Offset of the Atlanta rap trio Migos

February marks a year since the Bartier Cardi star first met her 26-year-old husband-to-be (born Kiari Cephus), and their fall 2018 nuptials just got postponed.

'We're really into our careers in our lives...We are really workaholics. It's crazy,' Cardi told E! News last Saturday.

'It's not only about the wedding date. It's not just one day. It's gotta be a whole almost two weeks type of thing. We want a honeymoon. Do we even have time for that?'

Offset - who has three children from prior relationships - attended the same Rolling Stone and Tidal party, but he opted to pose with his bandmates Quavo and Takeoff rather than Cardi.

'We are really workaholics':February marks a year since the Bartier Cardi star first met her 26-year-old husband-to-be (born Kiari Cephus), and their fall 2018 nuptials just got postponed

Father-of-three: Offset (M) attended the same Rolling Stone and Tidal party, but he opted to pose with his bandmates Quavo (L) and Takeoff (R) rather than Cardi

The Bodak Yellow beauty will headline her own pre-Super Bowl LII bash Saturday night with Maxim Magazine in Minneapolis.

On Sunday, fans can catch the former Bloods gangbanger as 'Balexa' on Amazon's Super Bowl commercial also featuring cameos from Oscar winner Anthony Hopkins, Australian funnywoman Rebel Wilson, and chef Gordon Ramsey.

Sports Illustrated's Richard Deitsch tweeted last month that the NBC network charged more than $5M, on average, for a 30-second spot this year.

The Love & Hip Hop: New York alum then watched as her Georgia-born man took the stage with his two-time Grammy-nominated act to perform some of their hits.

'Come party with me tonight!' The Bodak Yellow beauty will headline her own pre-Super Bowl LII bash Saturday night with Maxim Magazine in Minneapolis

The MAXIM Party produced by Karma International and sponsored by Rockstar Energy Drinks was once again the number one most-anticipated party, raising the bar during this milestone weekend of sports and over-the-top events in Downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota on February 3rd, 2018. Hosted in a 51,000-sq. ft. event complex, only two miles from the US Bank Stadium and in the heart of Downtown action, the party was designed to impress.

Powered by E11EVEN MIAMI, the world-class ultra-club, art, fashion, music and sports collided for the ultimate party experience with multiple interactive areas, live artistic vignettes, celebrity music performances by American musician Post Malone, DJ Marshmello, female rapper Cardi B, and production elements that included theatrical lighting, concert level sound, and several unique activations.

'This guy want to go to Mars!' On Sunday, fans can catch the former Bloods gangbanger as 'Balexa' on Amazon's Super Bowl commercial

At one point, 26-year-old Quavo (born Quavious Marshall) greeted retired NFL running back Emmitt Smith, who was enjoying the concert from the crowd.

Three-time Olympic gold medalist Aly Raisman was a sight for sore eyes as she smiled at the Mercedes-Benz-sponsored party while clad in a leggy LBD featuring wildlife and matching pumps.

It's nice to see the 23-year-old gymnast having a good time after delivering a brave 13-minute statement to disgraced Olympic physician Larry Nassar - who molested when she was 15 - at his sentencing in a Michigan courtroom.

Insecure creator and star Issa Rae showcased her braids while clad in a black turtleneck, high-waisted jeans, and a cozy b&w midi cardigan selected by her stylist Jason Rembert.

Shout out: At one point, 26-year-old Quavo (born Quavious Marshall) greeted retired NFL running back Emmitt Smith, who was enjoying the concert from the crowd

High pony: Three-time Olympic gold medalist Aly Raisman was a sight for sore eyes as she smiled at the Mercedes-Benz-sponsored party while clad in a leggy LBD featuring wildlife

Brave: It's nice to see the 23-year-old gymnast having a good time after confronting disgraced Olympic physician Larry Nassar at his sentencing in a Michigan courtroom last month

Plaited: Insecure creator and star Issa Rae showcased her braids while clad in a black turtleneck, jeans, and a cozy b&w midi cardigan selected by her stylist Jason Rembert

Ultraviolet songstress Justine Skye - who relies on stylist Danasia Sutton - also opted for black denim with her b&w cropped leather jacket as she caught up with comedian Cipha Sounds.

NBA power forward and Kim Kardashian ex-husband #2 Kris Humphries also attended the football festivities in his native Minneapolis ahead of celebrating his 33rd birthday this Tuesday.

Also enjoying Rolling Stone Live were New York Giants wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. and Minnesota Timberwolves center Karl-Anthony Towns.

And Washington Redskins tight end Vernon Davis opted for blue jeans, blue blazer, and blue button-up to attend the Midwestern party.

'Nothing makes me happier than seeing my GIRL!' Ultraviolet songstress Justine Skye (L) also opted for black denim with her leather jacket alongside comedian Cipha Sounds (R)

6ft9in basketballer: NBA power forward and Kim Kardashian ex-husband #2 Kris Humphries also attended the football festivities in his native Minneapolis ahead of his 33rd birthday

NFL meets NBA: Also enjoying Rolling Stone Live were New York Giants wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. (L) and Minnesota Timberwolves center Karl-Anthony Towns (R)The Jersey Shore cast has been living it up since reuniting in Miami for their upcoming reality revival last month.

And the motley crew of MTV personalities was up to their usual antics on Saturday when they were seen out around the Florida metropolis trailed by cameras.

During the outing with her Jersey Shore Family Vacation co-stars, Nicole 'Snooki' Polizzi looked lovely and laid-back in a low-cut tank top and form-fitting leggings.

Gang's all here! The Jersey Shore cast ventured out into Miami together on Saturday as a group

The mother-of-two, 30, tied a red flannel around her waist while slinging a handsome Louis Vuitton bag across her body.

She tied her caramel tresses into a ponytail topped off with a mustard yellow hat and donned fashion-forward high-top sneakers on foot.

Underneath her hat the star's glam makeup look could be seen.

Several steps in front of the pint-sized party girl walked Jennifer 'JWoww' Farley.

Good things come in small packages! During the outing, Nicole 'Snooki' Polizzi looked lovely and laid-back in a low-cut tank top and form-fitting leggings

Woww factor: Several steps in front of the pint-sized party girl walked Jennifer 'JWoww' Farley

Boys will be boys! Vinny Guadagnino walked into the establishment flanked by DJ Pauly D and Mike 'The Situation' Sorrentino

Chow time! After a quick walk, the crew sat down for a bite to eat at Senor Frog's where Snooki took a hard look at the menu before deciding

JWoww, who stars in the web series Snooki & Jwoww: Moms With Attitude with Snooki, was comfy and cute in a pair of pink joggers and graphic tee with matching Adidas kicks on foot.

Deena Nicole Cortese dressed down in black Ugg boots, a grey tunic and dark hoodie.

Ronnie Ortiz-Magro showed off his beefcake physique in a black v-neck tee and ripped jeans.

Besides him, pregnant girlfriend Jen Harley looked polished in a sheer hoodie and tight bottoms with aqua shoes on foot.

Muscle beach! Ronnie Ortiz-Magro showed off his beefcake physique in a black v-neck tee and ripped jeans

Someone's cousin Vinny: Guadagnino sported a significant beard and aviator sunglasses with tight cargo pants and a grey hoodie

Vinny Guadagnino walked into the establishment flanked by DJ Pauly D and Mike 'The Situation' Sorrentino.

Guadagnino sported a significant beard and aviator sunglasses with tight cargo pants and a grey hoodie.

Pauly D - real name Paul DelVecchio - leaned on his pal's shoulder while donning embellished denim and Yeezy sneakers with a red shirt, black hoodie and his iconic gel-shellacked locks.

The Situation matched Pauly D's trendy kicks with his own grey pair of Kanye West designed shoes.

Simple style: Deena Nicole Cortese dressed down in black Ugg boots, a grey tunic and dark hoodie

Color pop! Ronnie's pregnant girlfriend Jen Harley looked polished in a sheer hoodie and tight bottoms with aqua shoes on foot

Best in the West! The Situation matched Pauly D's trendy kicks with his own grey pair of Kanye West designed shoes

He teamed his cool shoes with a dark sweatsuit and heather grey tee.

After a quick walk, the crew sat down for a bite to eat at Senor Frog's where Snooki took a good look at the menu before deciding on her meal.

Their hit MTV reality series hit airwaves in 2009 and ran for six seasons, focusing on a group of wild roommates and their summer adventures along the famed Jersey Shore, with the cast recently reuniting to film the reunion, Jersey Shore: Family Vacation.

Though the group has been enjoying the sun and sand of Miami, they'll soon be moving on to vacation in the Bahamas to shoot the remainder of the series, which is set for airwaves later this year.She is expecting her second child with husband Darren Robertson.

And Magdalena Roze has opened up about the anguish the couple suffered when she miscarried their first baby in 2015, three months into the pregnancy.

On Sunday, the 35-year-old spoke with Stellar Magazine about the experience, and also revealed how their son Archie, two, reacted to their latest pregnancy news.

Sun after the rain: A pregnant Magdalena Roze has revealed the anguish she and her husband Darren Robertson suffered when she miscarried their first baby in 2015

Magdalena recalled taking a pregnancy test at their Byron Bay home and 'walking around the house' with it prior to telling Archie he had a sibling on the way.

'I saw I was pregnant and said, "Mummy's going to have a baby!" He just put his head against my belly and we hugged in silence. It was surreal,' she recalled.

Two months before finding out she was pregnant with Archie, Magdalena had suffered a miscarriage which saw her 'doubled over in pain on the bathroom floor'.

'I saw I was pregnant and said, "Mummy's going to have a baby!"' Magdalena also spoke about telling her son Archie that she was expecting another child

'So much pain - the worst period pain, times a hundred,' she described.

Magdalena and Darren rushed to the hospital, where an obstetrician told the couple they had tragically lost the baby.

'It was the most depressing thing we've ever experienced. I remember thinking, "Yesterday I had a baby, and today I have nothing". I felt empty,' she said.

Family ties: She is expecting her second child with husband Darren Robertson

Magdalena affectionately declared 'now the gang becomes four' as she prepares for the family's latest arrival.

In addition to her home life, the former weather presenter celebrated the release of her first cookbook, Happy & Whole, last year.

She also launched The Pass, a food and dining podcast she hosts and co-produces, which she described as 'a dream job for a pregnant person who loves to eat'.She's the Logie-nominated actress who has been happily marred to former Neighbours star Daniel MacPherson since 2015.

And as she prepares to fill the shoes of a woman in a less-than-ideal relationship, Zoe Ventoura discussed her role as Mark 'Chopper Read's first wife Mary Ann Hodge in the latest Underbelly mini-series, Underbelly Files: Chopper.

Speaking to the Herald-Sun on Sunday, the 36-year-old said she understood why her character felt a connection with the convicted crime lord while he was in prison.

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Latest role: On Sunday, Zoe Ventoura opened up about what it was like to play crime lord Mark 'Chopper' Read's first wife Mary Ann Hodge in new mini-series Underbelly Files: Chopper

'They were both brought up as very strict, conservative Seventh Day Adventists,' Zoe explained.

'So I think she felt really felt connected to him in that way. Certainly she mentions a few times that she felt like she understood why he did some of the things he did, not that she was condoning his crimes. So she started writing to him.'

Having found a connection through letters after both leaving the religion, the pair married in 1995 while Mark was still imprisoned for the shooting of Sidney Collins. They got divorced in 2001.

And while neither Zoe or her real-life husband Daniel have any crime-related obstacles working against them, the pair share their own hardships with hectic travel schedules.

'He was shooting for six months in Europe, filming in Budapest,' she told the publication while she was filming the two-part series in Melbourne.

Daniel told WHO magazine last year that it was a hard adjustment.

'The first year of marriage was challenging for us in a lot of ways exactly because of the travel,' he said.

Real life obstacles: And while neither Zoe or real-life husband Daniel have any crime-related obstacles working against them, they share their own hardships with hectic travel schedules

'(But now) we're just really good at it. We can operate independently,' he said, adding that the pair have a policy where they can demand that 'time's up' and 'hop on a plane' to see one another.

Meanwhile, things might be changing for the couple, after Daniel spoke to The Daily Telegraph last month about their plans to expand their family.

'We are getting to that time in our lives where that is the next thing for us,' he said. 'We don't know quite when that will be but it's definitely in our near future.'Married At First Sight's Ashley Irvin has revealed her shocking link to Paul Lambert, the man shot and killed by police in 2016 after a horrific assault on another woman.

The 28-year-old flight attendant told News Corp on Sunday that she dated the 36-year-old just months before he stabbed his Tinder girlfriend 11 times before dousing her in petrol.

After matching with Lambert on the dating app, fellow Brisbane resident Irvin agreed to meet with him in person and she said that while he seemed keen, there were no obvious red flags.

Shocked: Married At First Sight's Ashley Irvin has revealed her shocking link to Paul Lambert, the man shot and killed by police in 2016 after a horrific assault on another woman

'The scariest thing would be I never got any red flags, none... I didn't get any sick feeling in my stomach  he was a normal guy,' she said.

'He's the type of guy to send four messages to your one [message]. I'm not a good texter so he used to call quite a bit.'

In November 2016, months after dating Lambert, Irvin's jaw dropped when she came across a story about him on the news.

Horrific attacked: It was revealed Lambert had been killed by police after attacking his girlfriend Port Macquarie obstetrician Angela Jay (R), 28, who he also met on Tinder

Stitches: She was left battered and bruised after the incident

Scars: Dr Jay is left with unsightly scars which act as painful reminders of her harrowing ordeal

It was revealed he had been killed by police after attacking his girlfriend Port Macquarie obstetrician Angela Jay, 28, who he also met on Tinder.

'It's just the weirdest feeling. I was just like, 'How do I know someone who's now dead? And ... because I never saw that side ... you see the super keen, overly eager [side] but you don't see a psycho murderer.'

Dr Jay was stabbed 11 times and doused in petrol by Lambert after breaking up with him.

No red flags: Irvin said of Lambert - 'It's just the weirdest feeling. I was just like, 'How do I know someone who's now dead? And ... because I never saw that side ... you see the super keen, overly eager [side] but you don't see a psycho murderer'

Giving love another try: Ashley begins her quest for love on Married At First Sight tonight at 7:30pm on Channel Nine

He lay in wait at Dr Jay's home before the sickening assault, and was killed by police after he fled the scene while she crawled to her neighbour's house for help.

Dr Jay is now an ambassador for White Ribbon, a campaign to stop violence against women.

Ashley begins her quest for love on Married At First Sight tonight at 7:30pm on Channel Nine.Nicole Kidman donned a short dark wig and prosthetic make-up to better portray the older version of her Destroyer character Erin Bell on the Los Angeles set Saturday.

It was the day after the 50-year-old Oscar winner shared the first glimpse of her undercover LAPD detective looking young and pretty for a flashback scene with co-star Sebastian Stan.

The Hawaiian-born Australian - who boasts 11M social media followers - captioned her behind-the-scenes snap: 'We will all miss you @imsebastianstan. I just loved working with you. Farewell Palmdale!'

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Aged: Nicole Kidman donned a short dark wig and prosthetic make-up to better portray the older version of her Destroyer character Erin Bell on the Los Angeles set Saturday

'I just loved working with you!' It was the day after the 50-year-old Oscar winner shared the first glimpse of her undercover LAPD detective looking young and pretty for a flashback scene with co-star Sebastian Stan (R)

The 35-year-old I, Tonya actor appeared to have a tattoo of Nicole's head on his right bicep, and he's said to be playing the leader of a menacing, cult-like gang in the California desert that resurfaces in present day.

According to Deadline, Erin then 'works her way back through the remaining members and into her own history with them to finally reckon with the demons that destroyed her past.'

Costumer Katie L. Murphy dulled Kidman's glamour by dressing her in a very simple grey henley top, baggy blue jeans, and black shoes.

'I'll miss you too!' The 35-year-old I, Tonya actor appeared to have a tattoo of Nicole's head on his right bicep, and he's said to be playing the leader of a menacing, cult-like gang

Morning paper and coffee: Costumer Katie L. Murphy dulled Kidman's glamour by dressing her in a very simple grey henley top, baggy blue jeans, and black shoes

Female crew: Director Karyn Kusama (The Invitation, Jennifer's Body) is helming Destroyer, which also stars Orphan Black's Tatiana Maslany and Get Out's Bradley Whitford

Director Karyn Kusama (The Invitation, Jennifer's Body) is helming Destroyer, which also stars Orphan Black's Tatiana Maslany and Get Out's Bradley Whitford.

On Friday, the Big Little Lies stunner gave her second husband of 11 years - Kiwi country crooner Keith Urban - a shout-out by reposting the acoustic performance of his new single Female.

'Your heart is so pure Keith Urban,' gushed Nicole.

'Your heart is so pure': On Friday, the Big Little Lies stunner gave her husband Keith Urban a shout-out by reposting the acoustic performance of his new single Female

#Female A post shared by Keith Urban (@keithurban) on Jan 28, 2018 at 3:51pm PST

'Side stage watching Daddy!' Nicole and the 50-year-old Grammy winner - who first met in 2005 - are the proud parents of daughters (from L-R) Sunday Rose, 9; and Faith Margaret, 7

Kidman and the 50-year-old Grammy winner - who first met in 2005 - are the proud parents of daughters Sunday Rose, 9; and Faith Margaret, 7.

On Friday, the bug-eating beauty's 25-year-old daughter Isabella with ex-husband Tom Cruise paid tribute to her adoptive parents by naming her new line of six T-shirts BKC (Bella Kidman Cruise), which cost $85 each on her website.

The four-time Golden Globe winner and the 55-year-old Oscar nominee - who divorced in 2001 - are also the adoptive parents of 23-year-old DJ and fishing enthusiast Connor.On Sunday, The Project's Carrie Bickmore attended a fancy dress party as the Yellow Wiggle, Emma Watkins.

And in a surprising twist, the Channel Ten star revealed the outfit wasn't a knock-off, as she had borrowed the real uniform from Emma herself.

The 37-year-old shared a photo from the event on Instagram, as she posed in the iconic yellow sweater and blue skirt, complete with a matching oversized bow.

Seeing double: On Sunday, The Project's Carrie Bickmore (left) attended a fancy dress party as the Yellow Wiggle Emma Watkins (right)

She wrote in the caption: 'When the goddess that is Emma Wiggle lends you her actual outfit for a dress up party!'

Before long, Carrie's loyal social media followers praised her fancy dress choice.

'Flamin' heck Bickmore! You'd make a black garbage bag look good,' commented one fan on Instagram.

The real deal! In a surprising twist, the Channel Ten star revealed the outfit wasn't a knock-off, as she had borrowed the real uniform from Emma herself. Pictured: Carrie on The Project

Another added: 'Suits you... maybe you should apply to be a Wiggle instead of (hosting) The Project.'

Carrie later posted a Boomerang video of her partner Chris Walker dressed up as the Purple Wiggle.

The couple also attempted to do the 'Propeller' dance move, inspired The Wiggles' popular song.

'Doing the propeller is harder than it looks,' Carrie playfully captioned the clip.

New role: It comes after a big week for Carrie, who welcomed new co-host Lisa Wilkinson (right) to The Project panel following unconfirmed reports of tension between them

It comes after a big week for Carrie, who welcomed new co-host Lisa Wilkinson to The Project panel following unconfirmed reports of tension between them.

Last year, The Daily Telegraph reported that Carrie was 'p**sed off' at the salary Lisa had received after jumping ship from Channel Nine to Network Ten.

Executive producer Craig Campbell later clarified to The Australian that there was no rivalry between the two colleagues.She is nominated for her work on her film, Lady Bird.

And on Saturday, Greta Gerwig stepped out at the 70th Annual Directors Guild Of America Awards at The Beverly Hilton hotel.

The evening is a big night for those nominated, at it is a good sign for whoever takes home the top honor will also win the Oscar, according to the AP.

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Her big night: On Saturday, Greta Gerwig, 34, stepped out at the 70th Annual Directors Guild Of America Awards at The Beverly Hilton hotel

Feeling pretty: Greta looked lovely in a strapless, black-and-white gown

Greta looked lovely in a strapless, black-and-white gown.

The 34-year-old actress and director wore her blonde hair back and away from her face.

The Sacramento native accessorized with minimal jewelry and a small bucket bag.

Sleek: The actress and director wore her blonde hair back and away from her face

Excited: Greta had a proud moment with Saorise Ronan, 23

Bonding: The girls shared a happy moment

Embracing: While on stage, the girls hugged each other

Her look: Amy Schumer, 36, sported a navy, long sleeve dress and strappy heels

Words to say: The comedienne also took the stage that evening

Also out for the evening was Kyra Sedgwick, 52, and husband Kevin Bacon, 59. The couple of 30 years matched in classic black.

Reed Morano, 40, looked sophisticated in stripes, while Frankie Shaw, 31, made a bright statement in green.

Actress Milana Vayntrub, 30, was ready for spring in a floral dress.

Date night: Also out for the evening was Kyra Sedgwick, 52, and husband Kevin Bacon, 59. The couple of 30 years matched in classic black

Golden girls: Natalie Zea, 42, looked lovely in a flirty pink gown with plunging neckline, while Saoirse chose a navy A-line gown

Looking great: Angela Lansbury, 92, looked radiant in a deep red jacket, black slacks and a satin blouse

Red carpet beauties: Betty Gabriel and Gugu Mbatha-Raw brought some gold detail and sparkles with their elegant looks

Couple's evening: Jordan Peele, 38, brought out his hilarious wife Chelsea Peretti,39, for his big night. He is nominated for his film, Get Out

Directors Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer looked sharp in their coordinating suits. The brothers are known for their work on Stranger Things.

Jordan Peele, 38, brought out his hilarious wife Chelsea Peretti,39, for his big night. He is nominated for his film, Get Out.

Guillermo del Toro, 53, is nominated for his film, The Shape of Water. Also attending the event was David Hasselhoff, 65.

Pretty ladies: Reed Morano, 40, looked sophisticated in stripes, while Frankie Shaw, 31, made a bright statement in green. Actress Milana Vayntrub, 30, was ready for spring in a floral dress

All in the family: Directors Matt Duffer (L) and Ross Duffer looked sharp in their coordinating suits. The brothers are known for their work on Stranger Things

Men of the night: Guillermo del Toro, 53, is nominated for his film, The Shape of Water. Also attending the event was David Hasselhoff, 65

Standing out: Sally Hawkins, 41, shimmered in a platinum suit

Big day: Actress Pamela Adlon, 51, and Glenn Weiss, 56, looked enamored

Support system: Lou Diamond Phillips, 55, was joined by his actress wife, Yvonne, for the red carpet event

Best supporting actress frontrunner Allison Janney dressed her 6ft figure in a cleavage-boosting maroon gown selected by stylist Linda Medvene.

The 58-year-old Mom star just scored her first Oscar nod for her scene-stealing role as disgraced Olympic skater Tonya Harding's abusive mother LaVona Golden in I, Tonya.

Golden Globe nominee Judd Apatow served as host of the ceremony, and he was joined by his wife and muse of 20 years, Leslie Mann.

Daytime Emmy winner Aisha Tyler rocked a room high-low LBD while Boys Don't Cry director Kimberly Peirce looked dapper in her modern tuxedo.

Amazon: Best supporting actress frontrunner Allison Janney dressed her 6ft figure in a cleavage-boosting maroon gown selected by stylist Linda Medvene

Career high: The 58-year-old Mom star just scored her first Oscar nod for her scene-stealing role as disgraced Olympic skater Tonya Harding's abusive mother LaVona Golden in I, Tonya

Date night! Golden Globe nominee Judd Apatow served as host of the ceremony, and he was joined by his wife and muse of 20 years, Leslie MannEarlier in the week she met with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.

But on Saturday Angelina Jolie was participating in a decidedly different endeavor, as she attended the Annie Awards, which recognize accomplishments in animation.

The Maleficent star, 42, looked stunning in her shiny silver gown as she traipsed down the red carpet.

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Back on the red carpet! On Saturday Angelina Jolie, 42, attended the Annie Awards, which recognize accomplishments in animation

The eye-catching frock featured a wrap-style sleeveless top, as well as a thigh-high split which gave a brief view of her toned legs.

In a practical twist, the garment also included some no doubt appreciated pockets.

Some very fashionable nude stiletto heels added several inches to her 5ft7in frame.

Accessories were limited to several sizable rings and very modest glittering earrings.

Peek-a-boo! The eye-catching frock featured a wrap-style sleeveless top, as well as a thigh-high split which gave a brief view of her toned legs

Enjoying herself! A smokey eye, subtle blush and a slick of brilliant crimson lipstick ensured the mother of six was glowing on the red carpet

Classic look: Her famous raven tresses were swept off her forehead and styled straight down her back

Her famous raven tresses were swept off her forehead and styled straight down her back.

A smokey eye, subtle blush and a slick of brilliant crimson lipstick ensured the mother of six was glowing on the red carpet.

She was soon joined by two of her children for some snaps, daughter Shiloh, 11, and daughter Zahara, 13.

Shiloh kept things classic in black suit, while Zahara opted for a black blouse and trouser combination.

Finally! In a practical twist, the garment also included some no doubt appreciated pockets

Impressive! The animated film The Breadwinner, which details the struggle of a young girl in Taliban-era Afghanistan, managed to garner an impressive 10 Annie awards in several categories

Interestingly, the Oscar winner was on hand not because of a performance, but for a producing triumph.

The animated film The Breadwinner, which details the struggle of a young girl in Taliban-era Afghanistan, managed to garner an impressive 10 Annie awards in several categories.

The movie also caught the eye of the Academy, and is up for best Best Animated Feature Film in the upcoming 2018 edition of the awards show.

In addition to the Nato Security General, Angelina also met with France's First Lady Brigitte Macron in Paris to discuss her visit and urge members of the UN Security Council to resolve the conflict in Syria.

Proud mom! She was soon joined by two of her children for some snaps, daughter Shiloh, 11, and daughter Zahara, 13

Doting mum: Brad Pitt's ex-wife wrapped her arm around Shiloh at the awards night as she juggled promoting her acting career with being a mum

Pin-credible style: The long trailing silver garment featured a soaring split to showcase her slender legs and she commanded further attention with her sky-scraper nude heels

A mother's gaze! Angelina looked upon her daughter with adoring eyes as they mingled with a whole host of Hollywood's elite at the event

Inside the venue: The mother and daughter showed their close bond as they looked at one another with the same adoring gaze

A mother's affection: Angelina couldn't hide her pride as she beamed brightly while she set her sights on her daughter

Leading lady: Angelina held the hands of her two children Shiloh and Zahara on the red carpet when they finished posing for photographs

Looking incredible: Angelina stood out from the crowd on the red carpet in her glistening silver pleated gown which perfectly framed her lovely figure

Best of both worlds: Angelina brought two of her children onto the red carpet as she promoted the movie with her co-star and director

Photo opportunity! Of course Angelia rubbed shoulders with Director Nora Twomey on the red carpet

Loving lady: The age-defying beauty rested her arm affectionately on the rising star Saara Chaudry's shoulder at the occasion

Pleasing beauty: Angelina was delighted to pose with Saar Chaudry (L) on the red carpet

Pout and about: The Tomb Raider star added a pop of colour to her silver siren looks with a shade of striking scarlet lipstick

Signing away! The film star was every inch the socialite when she signed autographs for people at the glitzy occasion

Age-defying: The sensational woman looked incredibly youthful, with the help of deftly touches of make-up and styling her gorgeous brunette tresses

Wow: The Hollywood queen looked stunning in a plunging silver dress which was nipped at the waist to accentuate her petite waistline

She's got style: Angelina showcased her intimate inkings on her arms when she partied up a storm at the Annie Awards in Los AngelesHe reportedly surprised family and friends with his decision to marry a second time.

And the anticipated nuptials between Jeff Browne and one of Australia's richest women, Rhonda Wyllie, are set to feature Jeff's best friend Eddie McGuire as host.

Eddie, 53, is tipped to MC the wedding for his long-time agent, who is the former Managing Director of the Nine Network, according to The Sunday Telegraph.

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Star power: The anticipated nuptials between Jeff Browne and one of Australia's richest women, Rhonda Wyllie, are set to feature Jeff's best friend Eddie McGuire as host

The ceremony is reportedly set for March 31 and will take place at Rhonda's sprawling family farm in the Western Austrlian town of Coolup.

It will be a third marriage for the bride and second for Jeff, with 'many insisting hell would freeze over' before he walked down the aisle again, reported the newspaper.

The chairman of CarSales.com met Rhonda through a blind date to the Logie Awards in 2013 and eventually moved across the country to live with her in Perth.

Mate's rates: Eddie, 53, is tipped to MC the wedding for his long-time agent, who is the former Managing Director of the Nine Network

He proposed to the widow of late businessman Bill Wyllie at St Kildas Cafe Di Stasio on Valentines Day in 2014.

A planned wedding in Italy was reportedly canned in 2016, after Rhonda decided to include her two adult children and Jeff's three in an intimate ceremony at home.

According to a PerthNow report on Sunday, pop star Boy George has been booked to perform at the upcoming nuptials along with a number of other acts.

A-list: According to a PerthNow report on Sunday, pop star Boy George has been booked to perform at the upcoming nuptials along with a number of other acts

After Bill's death from cancer in 2006, Rhonda took the helm of their family's $500 million-plus investment group.

Her two children from her first marriage, Luke and Melissa, adopted the Wyllie name when she married the tycoon in 1988.

Following Jeff's proposal to Rhonda in February 2014, he told The West Australian the pair were 'both very excited'.Gwyneth Paltrow wished mom Blythe Danner happy birthday with a sweet Instagram tribute Saturday.

The Academy Award winner, 45, took to social media to celebrate her actress mother's 75th year around the sun with a darling mother/daughter photo.

In the image, the Goop mogul and Tony Award-winning star couldn't help but beam while spending quality time together.

Mommy and me! Gwyneth Paltrow wished mom Blythe Danner happy birthday with a sweet Instagram tribute Saturday

In the photo, the newly minted fiance of TV writer Brad Falchuk looked laid-back in a black tee with clean ponytail.

She kept her face makeup free, exuding a natural glow.

Besides Gwyn, her Hollywood veteran mom looked sharp in a monochrome blouse paired with chic blown-out hairdo and smart glasses.

Paltrow captioned with a simple: 'Happy birthday, mama' and a red heart emoji.

Family values: Danner (above with her daughter at the 1996 premiere of Emma) was married to Gwyneth's father Bruce Paltrow from 1969 until his death in 2002

Danner was married to Gwyneth's father Bruce Paltrow from 1969 until his death in 2002.

During that time they also raised Paltrow's younger brother, director Jake Paltrow.

Meet The Parents actress Danner fiercely defended her daughter against accusations she was complicit with Harvey Weinstein's sexually exploitative behavior after her relationship to Weinstein was written about in a September New York Times opinion piece.

Responding to the story with her own letter to the Times, Danner wrote: 'I cannot remain silent while [writer] Maureen Dowd disparages my daughter, Gwyneth Paltrow, for the manner in which she chose to handle Harvey Weinsteins attempt at a sexual encounter when she was 22.'

Defending her daughter: Meet The Parents actress Danner fiercely defended her daughter against accusations she was complicit with Harvey Weinstein's sexually exploitative behavior after her relationship to Weinstein was written about in a fall New York Times opinion piece

Further down she continued: 'Gwyneth did not "put aside her qualms to become 'the first lady of Miramax'" back then, as Ms. Dowd would have it. She continued to hold her own and insist that Mr. Weinstein treat her with respect.'

Meanwhile, Miss Paltrow is getting ready to walk down the aisle for the second time.

She and partner Brad Falchuck announced their engagement back on January 8.

The Royal Tenenbaums actress was previously wed to Coldplay frontman Chris Martin, with whom she shares children Apple, 13, and Moses, 11.Earlier in the week she was partying it up at a Guess event.

But on Saturday Paris Hilton seemed to be spending the evening working, if her steamy selfie is any indication.

The 36-year-old hotel heiress sizzled in a sparkling bodysuit composed of multicolored sequins as she sat in front of a make-up table, ostensibly for a photoshoot.

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Set prep? On Saturday Paris Hilton seemed to be spending the evening working, if her steamy selfie is any indication

The socialite's suggestive garment was held up by two straps, and the plunging neckline provided just a hint of cleavage.

Perhaps the focal point of the photo however was her blonde locks, which boasted an immense amount of volume, as well as some sensual waves.

Dark eye make-up, subtle contouring and some striking crimson lipstick completed the sexy image.

Spitting image! Of course Paris' caption was referring to famous blonde beauty Marilyn Monroe, who made the dramatic flaxen hairstyle iconic

Paris seemed to be going for a very specific look, as her caption read only '#ParisMonroe.'

Of course she was referring to famous blonde beauty Marilyn Monroe, who made the dramatic flaxen hairstyle iconic.

The Simple Things star has been quite active on social media lately, as she also posted a video and snaps of her breaking into one of Kim Kardashian's now infamous Valentine's Day gifts.

Laughing it up! The Simple Things star has been quite active on social media lately, as she also posted a video and snaps of her breaking into one of Kim Kardashian's now infamous Valentine's Day gifts

Bang! She kneels next to Kim's gift before striking it with a hammer

Surprise! Kim's gift was made of chocolate and contained her KIMOJI heart fragrance

In the video, she appears in a powder blue off-the-shoulder dress and white platform heels.

She kneels next to Kim's gift before striking it with a hammer, revealing it's chocolatey, fragrance-filled innards.

Meanwhile, Paris showed she was still part of the A-list earlier in the week, as she attended a Guess party also attended by Jennifer Lopez and Ed Westwick, among others.Their romance has been going from strength to strength after meeting on Married At First Sight, if their social media posts are anything to go by.

And over the weekend, Sarah Roza appeared to confirm that she and Telverne Williams are still very much an item.

The 38-year-old beauty therapist told The Sunday Telegraph she had been watching the series unfold alongside her 'husband', 33.

Falling in love all over again! Over the weekend, Sarah Roza appeared to confirm that she and Telverne Williams are still very much an item, revealing they were watching MAFS together

'We watch it with the rest of Australia so we see it when everybody else does. We cannot wait,' she said.

Sarah and Telv admitted they were looking forward to seeing how the other couples' relationships worked out, after their own pairing appeared to be such a success.

It comes after the loved-up pair were spotted putting on an amorous display last Thursday at a cocktail bar in Melbourne, months after their 'wedding' was filmed.

Still together! It comes after the loved-up pair were spotted putting on an amorous display last Thursday at a cocktail bar in Melbourne , months after their 'wedding' was filmed

Sarah stunned in strapless red dress that showed off her ample cleavage as she cosied up to Telv at The Emerson in South Yarra.

The self-confessed 'bo-glam' - that is, a glamorous bogan - completed her evening look with matching bold red lipstick.

Meanwhile, FIFO worker and single dad Telv looked dapper in a navy blazer teamed with a maroon shirt and beige chinos.

Happily ever after! A source told Daily Mail Australia that Sarah and Telv were 'all over each other' and looked 'very cosy' throughout the night

The couple appeared to get close later in the night as they were seen sharing a tender kiss, which was caught on camera by a pal.

Another source told Daily Mail Australia that Sarah and Telv were 'all over each other' and looked 'very cosy' throughout the night.

Married At First Sight continues on Sunday night at 7pm on Channel Nine.She recently returned home from a sun-soaked trip to Los Angeles, where she enjoyed a short but sweet reunion with her pal Sofia Richie.

But Lottie Moss looked overjoyed at having been reunited with her Chelsea crew, as she hit London's MNKY HSE with friends including Tiffany Watson on Saturday night, with both donning risque looks for the occasion.

Showing off her new Californian glow, the 20-year-old model sported a very plunging white vest top, which she unbuttoned to reveal her ample cleavage.

Girls' night! Lottie Moss hit London's MNKY HSE with friends including Tiffany Watson on Saturday night, with both donning risque looks for the occasion

Lottie - who is the half-sister of the iconic Kate Moss - paired her skimpy top with skintight jeans, which she layered beneath thigh-high boots.

She toughened up her evening style with a leather jacket and sported an on-trend PVC baker boy hat atop her trademark blonde locks.

Lottie finished her outfit with a gold necklace which was emblazoned with the word 'socialite', seemingly a tongue-in-cheek reference to her girl about town status.

Taking the plunge: Showing off her new Californian glow, the 20-year-old model sported a very plunging white vest top, which she unbuttoned to reveal her ample cleavage

Hell for leather: She toughened up her evening style with a leather jacket and sported an on-trend PVC baker boy hat atop her trademark blonde locks

Fashionista: Lottie - who is the half-sister of the iconic Kate Moss - paired her skimpy top with skintight jeans, which she layered beneath thigh-high boots

She finished her style by wearing her blonde locks in softly tousled waves around her face, with the beauty emphasising her sculpted visage with a sun-kissed make-up look.

Made in Chelsea star Tiffany also pulled out the stops for their night out.

The ex-girlfriend of Sam Thompson flashed her enviably long, lean legs in a red, denim skirt, which boasted a plethora of daring rips.

Poking fun? Lottie finished her outfit with a gold necklace which was emblazoned with the word 'socialite', seemingly a tongue-in-cheek reference to her girl about town status

Dare to bare: Made in Chelsea star Tiffany flashed her enviably long, lean legs in a red, denim skirt, which boasted a plethora of daring rips

The bold skirt added a welcome pop of colour to her otherwise monochromatic ensemble as she hit the town in a black-and-white striped crop top and barely-there black stilettos.

The reality star, 24, appeared to get the leather jacket memo as she too rocked the edgy outerwear style.

Demonstrating their close friendship, the girls locked hands as they departed the city hotspot, before hopping into a taxi together.

The night out marked Lottie's third of the week, with the model having already joined her mother Inger Moss, 55, at an exclusive eyewear event on Thursday, just a day after she partied at another star-studded bash in the company of her ex-boyfriend, Sam Prince.

Red hot: Tiffany's bold skirt added a welcome pop of colour to her otherwise monochromatic ensemble as she hit the town in a black-and-white striped crop top

Twinning: The reality star, 24, appeared to get the leather jacket memo as she too rocked the edgy outerwear style

Off they go! The girls appeared in high spirits as they clambered into the back of a taxi later that evening

Embracing life as a free agent: Tiffany is believed to be single following her on/off romance with co-star Sam ThompsonShe's known for turning heads for her unique sartorial choices both on the catwalk and the red carpet.

But Cara Delevingne garnered attention for a different reason altogether as she arrived at JFK airport in New York on Friday - cradling a small pillow adorned with a picture of a baby's face.

While it's unknown who the little one is, the 25 year-old model certainly held on tight to the travel comfort as she strolled through the airport.

Such a baby face! Cara Delevingne paraded her unusual baby pillow as she caught a flight out of New York on Friday

The catwalk queen was worlds away from her usual red carpet glamour as donned a black slogan crop-top and eye catching lemon yellow Puma joggers.

She bounded through the terminal in comfortable black sneakers, tying the look together with a warming black puffer jacket.

Her cropped chestnut locks were swept back underneath an on-trend leather beret, while the Suicide Squad star matched her yellow garb with classic golden aviators.

She draped a chic Burberry scarf around her shoulders as she prepared for her flight, and made sure she had all her personal affects with her - including the unique pillow.

Little one: While it's unknown who the little one is, the 25 year-old model certainly held on tight to the travel comfort as she strolled through the airport

Casually clad: The catwalk queen was worlds away from her usual red carpet glamour as donned a black slogan crop-top and eye catching lemon yellow Puma joggers

Clutching the pillow along with her passport, Cara appeared at ease as she held on tight to the odd cushion, which appeared to show an image of a blonde haired baby.

Since she burst onto the modelling scene in 2009, Cara's had a meteoric rise not just on the catwalk but also on the big screen.

The Model of the Year 2012 revealed she embarked on a career in modelling to run away from her emotional issues but she has since found more comfort in acting where she can express and reflect on her feelings.

On trend: Her cropped chestnut locks were swept back underneath an on-trend leather beret, while the Suicide Squad star matched her yellow garb with classic golden aviators

'Modelling came at a time in my life where I wanted to please people,' she told Stellar magazine.

'I was just doing things to run away from my own problems. I wasn't dealing with things that were going on emotionally. That's why I ended up being unhappy.'

'Being an actor helped me reflect on my own emotions, be able to express them more, be in the moment.'

Stylish: She draped a chic Burberry scarf around her shoulders as she prepared for her flight, and made sure she had all her personal affects with her - including the unique pillow

Moving away from the modelling spheres, the catwalk queen has landed a series of envy-inducing roles in movies and television series.

Cara's latest project, eight-part fantasy series Carnival Row, takes the star to film in the fairytale city of Prague.

Carnival Row follows a murder investigation after a string of unexplained killings in a neo-Victorian city where mythical creatures live, in which Cara takes on the role of a 'fairy fleeing persecution' Vignette Stonemoss.

Home comforts: Clutching the pillow along with her passport, Cara appeared at ease as she held on tight to the odd cushion, which appeared to show an image of a blonde haired baby

Orlando Bloom, David Gyasi (Interstellar), Karla Crome (Misfits), Indira Varma (Game of Thrones), and Tamzin Merchant (Salem) also will appear in the Amazon series.

In a statement that followed the show's announcement, head of comedy at Amazon Joe Lewis said: 'There has never been a series like Carnival Row before.

'The scope of the storytelling combined with the uniqueness of the world, themes and aesthetics haven't been on TV before.'She's back to work at KIIS FM after a lengthy summer holiday.

And Jackie 'O' Henderson was looking suitably relaxed on Sunday as she picked up a takeaway lunch from Chargrill Charlie's in Sydney.

The 43-year-old looked happy and fresh-faced as she put on a leggy display in a short skirt and stylish white top.

Lunch on the go! Jackie 'O' Henderson put on a leggy display in a short skirt and stylish white top as she grabbed takeaway from Chargrill Charlie's in Sydney on Sunday

The Kyle And Jackie O Show star appeared cheerful as she collected her family's Sunday lunch from the trendy chicken shop.

Stepping out in a pair of thongs, Jackie kept her makeup to a minimum and styled her blonde hair in loose waves.

The multitasking mother-of-one held her phone in one hand, and her designer clutch and Chargrill Charlie's bag in another.

Back at it! The 43-year-old recently returned to work at KIIS FM after a lengthy summer holiday

It comes after Jackie and her co-host Kyle Sandilands spoke on-air about how far they have come in their radio careers.

Jackie revealed that she was earning just $10,000 per year when she first started out in the industry.

She admitted: 'Even back then they obviously didn't want me. They said we can only pay you $10,000 and I said, "I'll take it!"'

Don't drop it! The multitasking mother-of-one held her phone in one hand, and her designer clutch and Chargrill Charlie's bag in another

When Jackie signed her five-year contract with Australian Radio Network - which owns KIIS - she demanded, and was subsequently granted, equal pay with Kyle.

According to multiple reports, the radio stars signed contracts to be paid $20million over five years, averaging out to around $4million per year.

For Jackie, that equates to a figure two thousand times higher than her first ever radio salary.He has been hotfooting across the British capital to film a number of high-octane scenes for Mission: Impossible - Fallout.

And Tom Cruise, along with a bevy of other high-profile names starring in the action flick, descended on London's Battersea Park on Saturday night, for what looked to be the location of the final showdown between Ethan Hunt and Lane, played by Sean Harris.

In a video obtained by MailOnline, the award-winning actor is seen limping by the city's River Thames alongside co-star Rebecca Ferguson - five months after he sustained an ankle injury during a daring stunt.

Warning - may contain spoilers

The scene looked set to be one of the movie's most pivotal as the 55-year-old star was joined by Vanessa Kirby, Henry Cavill, Angela Bassett - though it was perhaps his stunt double that would have captured the most attention.

While the Hollywood star is famed for performing all of his own stunts, it seemed he had to enlist the help of a stunt double when filming his late-night scenes, with onlookers claiming that the star was hobbling slightly.

The actor put Mission Impossible 6 filming behind by nine weeks after suffering an unfortunate fall while shooting a stunt scene in August 2017.

On set: In a video obtained by MailOnline, Tom Cruise, 55, is seen limping alongside co-star Rebecca Ferguson on Saturday night as he filmed scenes for the upcoming flick

Daredevil: The Hollywood star injured himself during a failed building jumping stunt while filming Mission Impossible 6 in London last August

Calmer scenes: The New Yorker engaged in conversation with his co-star by the English river

Show time: The award-winning actor, along with a bevy of other high-profile names starring in the action flick, descended on London's Battersea Park, for what looked to be one final showdown between Ethan Hunt and Lane

Star-studded: The scene looked set to be one of the movie's most pivotal as the 55-year-old star was joined by Vanessa Kirby, Henry Cavill, Angela Bassett [pictured]

Another successful mission? It looked as though the scene captured the moment Ethan finally captured Lane, played by Sean Harris

Ensuring the movie makes its July 2018 release date, Tom returned to filming the action franchise earlier this month, but has revealed his foot is yet to heal in full.

Speaking recently on The Graham Norton Show about the nasty injury in August, Tom said: 'I was chasing Henry [Cavill] and was meant to hit the side of the wall and pull myself over but the mistake was my foot hitting the wall.

'I knew instantly my ankle was broken and I really didn't want to do it again so just got up and carried on with the take.

'I said, "It's broken. That's a wrap. Take me to hospital" and then everyone got on the phone and made their vacation arrangements.'

Putting on a brave face: Onlookers claimed the actor was hobbling slightly while onset, no doubt owing to his ongoing ankle injury

Helping hand: While the Hollywood star is famed for performing all of his own stunts, it seemed he had to enlist the help of a stunt double [L] when filming his late-night scenes

Whoops! The actor put Mission Impossible 6 filming behind by nine weeks after suffering an unfortunate fall while shooting a stunt scene in August 2017

Dedicated: Ensuring the movie makes its July 2018 release date, Tom returned to filming the action franchise earlier this month, but has revealed his foot is yet to heal in full

Banishing the chill: Tom wrapped up in a padded jacket between takes, beneath which he sported his typical Ethan Hunt attire of black jeans and a double-breasted jacket

But the actor has carried on being the professional as he once again overlooked his pain to shoot the latest scenes, which showed an in-character Tom holding a brooding gaze while appearing to be followed by men in a black BMW.

However, he looked to be one step ahead of his menacing followers as later takes showed villain Lane in handcuffs.

Angela, who plays the director of the CIA in the movie, then emerges, seemingly congratulating Ethan on another successful take down.

Mission: Impossible 6 Fallout finds Ethan and his IMF team (Alec Baldwin, Simon Pegg, Ving Rhames) along with some familiar allies (Rebecca Ferguson, Michelle Monaghan) in a race against time after a mission gone wrong.

It will hit cinemas this July.

Pensive: An in-character Tom held his signature brooding gaze as he shot the dramatic scenes

Gotcha! The explosive scenes showed Lane being handcuffed and slammed into the back of a car by CIA operatives

Cruisin' across the capital :Tom has been shooting in various locations across the British capital, recently shooting a high-octane helicopter chase above Blackfriars tube station

Up against the clock: The movie will once again see agent Ethan Hunt show off his action man skills as he endures another deadly race against time

All hands on deck: The manpower needed for each scene was evident as Tom and Angela stood flanked by dozens of crew membersThey have been unlucky in love in the Love Island villa and in the outside world.

So Danielle Sellers and Chyna Ellis jetted off to Spain together for a fun-filled girls' break away in the sunshine to forget their exes and on Friday they hit the beach.

Bikini-clad Danielle gave scantily-clad Chyna a piggyback as they frolicked in the sea, which gave onlookers a look at the close bond they have forged.

Sizzling sirens: Scantily-clad Love Island stars Danielle Sellers and Chyna Ellis paraded their enviable figures in tiny bikinis as they sizzled on sunny Spanish getaway on Friday

Chyna wrapped her bronze arms around her female friend's neck while Danielle tucked her hands underneath her pal's thighs for added support.

Busty Danielle struggled to contain her astounding cleavage in her skimpy halterneck bikini top.

The garment was adorned with wrap around straps to draw attention to her assets in proportion to her enviable slim figure.

Dumped Love Islander Danielle scraped her mass of golden corkscrew curls into a messy high ponytail as she beat the sweltering Spanish heat.

Having the best time: Danielle put the focus on her busty appearance in the skimpy bikini while Chyna showed off her peachy derriere in high cut bottoms

Racy display: Busty Danielle struggled to contain her astounding cleavage in her skimpy halterneck bikini top

Gorgeous features: To accentuate her beauty, the model added deftly touches of make-up to her face which she put on full show thanks to her up hairdo

To accentuate her beauty, the model added deftly touches of make-up to her face which she put on full show thanks to her up hairdo.

Meanwhile, Chyna let her golden locks cascade down to her incredibly tiny waistline and she added a fedora to her look to keep cool in the sizzling climes.

Jonny Mitchell's ex highlighted her ample bust in a strapless bikini top which she was seen readjusting after she larked about in the sea.

Playful: The bikini top featured wrap around straps to draw attention to her assets in proportion to her enviable slim figure

Wrapping it up: Dumped Love Islander Danielle scraped her mass of golden corkscrew curls into a messy high ponytail as she beat the sweltering Spanish heat

Letting her hair down! Chyna let her golden locks cascade down to her incredibly tiny waistline and she added a fedora to her look to keep cool in the sizzling climes

The former Love Island star put the focus of her racy two-piece on her very skimpy high-cut bottoms.

The garment was complete with two straps that wrapped across Chyna's phenomenal figure to draw the eye to her impressively toned tummy.

Closer than ever, Danielle and Chyna were happy to skip on male company as the energetic ladies played with an inflatable and ate ice cream on the beach.

Risking a wardrobe malfunction? Jonny Mitchell's ex highlighted her ample bust in a strapless bikini top which she was seen readjusting after she larked about in the sea

Fabulous figure: The former Love Island star put the focus of her racy two-piece on her very skimpy high-cut bottoms

Windswept: The garment was complete with two straps that wrapped across Chyna's phenomenal figure to draw the eye to her impressively toned tummy

It is no surprise the bikini-clad pair sent temperatures soaring on the sandy Spanish shores after they charmed viewers on reality series Love Island.

Aside from her raunchy modelling work, Danielle enjoyed her 'five minutes' on 2017's smash hit reality show.

Both beauties were 'dumped' from the show in the early stages and Danielle lamented she was 'so gutted to be home so soon'.

Keeping cool: Chyna splashed around in the sea to keep herself cool in the sizzling heat of the Spanish temperatures

Shout out to their exes: It is no surprise the bikini-clad pair sent temperatures soaring on the sandy Spanish shores after they charmed viewers on reality series Love Island

Their holiday comes after reports emerged Danielle dated blogger Jack Maynard but the romance ended amid claims the blogger 'didn't see her as girlfriend material'.

The brief I'm A Celeb star, 23, and the blonde beauty were said to be quietly seeing each over the last seven months, although this was not something Jack made known.

Meanwhile, Chyna also enjoyed a romance with fellow Islander Jonny Mitchell that ended with her being dumped on live television during the Love Island reunion show.

Splashing around: The golden-haired beauty raced through the water with an inflatable

Wow: Aside from her raunchy modelling work, Danielle enjoyed her 'five minutes' on 2017's smash hit reality show

There is no love lost between Jonny and Chyna, with the pair engaging in very public bitter Twitter spats following the split.

Jonny whisked Chyna away to Budapest during their love affair before their relationship came to a dramatic end.

The hunk left viewers stunned when he was aloof about their romantic status and said the pair were 'keeping it open' on the Love Island reunion show.

Moving on: Both beauties were 'dumped' from the show in the early stages and Danielle lamented she was 'so gutted to be home so soon'

Closer than ever: Danielle and Chyna were happy to skip on male company as they snacked on ice cream on the beach

He revealed he acted coldly as just a day or two earlier, he claimed to have found out that Chyna had slept with Ex On The Beach's Adam Oukhellou.

The Love Island star alleged he saw a message from him on her phone and he made further claims she confessed as much when he confronted her about the text.

'Obviously I was really taken aback and I was a bit p***ed off,' he told The Sun.

Racy: Chyna grappled with her assets to ensure her bikini remained up while Danielle toyed with her long golden locks

Playing the game: The girls played with an inflatable when they larked about in the sea

Hilarious moment: Chyna wrapped her bronze arms around her female friend's neck while Danielle tucked her hands underneath her pal's thighs for added support

Living their best lives: The ladies almost tumbled into the waves as they frolicked in the sea

Got your back! They have been unlucky in love in the Love Island villa and in the outside world

Girls time: The pair jetted off to Spain together for a fun-filled girls' break away in the sunshine to forget their exes and on Friday they hit the beachShe confirmed her engagement to Karl Stefanovic on Friday, after flashing a huge diamond ring at a celebratory lunch in Woolloomooloo.

And it appears Jasmine Yarbrough may have been getting inspiration for her own wedding day over the weekend as she attended a friend's nuptials with her family.

The 34-year-old Mara & Mine designer wore a plunging blue dress as she posed alongside her sister Jade and mother Cheryl at the ceremony in Manly, Sydney.

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Is it her turn next? It appears Jasmine Yarbrough (right) may have been getting inspiration for her own wedding day over the weekend as she attended a friend's nuptials in Manly, Sydney

The photo of Jasmine at the wedding, which took place at Cardinal Cerretti Memorial Chapel, was posted to mum Cheryl's Instagram account on Sunday night.

The former runway model looked simply sensational in a low-cut dress and with her blonde hair tied back in a chic updo as she smiled for the camera.

Meanwhile, Jade put on a glamorous display in a backless gown and their mother dazzled in an embellished, semi-sheer number.

Check out that ring! The next wedding on the agenda for the Yarbrough family could well be Jasmine's, after she got engaged to Karl Stefanovic last month

'Manly, Sydney with our gorgeous girls. Congrats Ali & Tom,' Cheryl wrote in the caption, alongside the hash tag, 'Beautiful wedding'.

The next wedding on the agenda for the Yarbrough family could well be Jasmine's, after she got engaged to Karl Stefanovic last month.

She proudly showed off her engagement ring on Friday, after the Today show host reportedly proposed while the couple were on holiday in Fiji in January.

New start: Karl and Jasmine are understood to have met in December 2016, just months after the Channel Nine star split with his wife-of-21-years Cassandra Thorburn

After asking Jasmine to be his wife, the pair returned to Sydney to celebrate with family and friends at a 'nine-hour party' held at Karl's brother Peter's house, New Idea reported.

'When Jasmine left the engagement party, she was heard saying ''thanks'' when offered congratulations. Karl also said, ''Thanks guys'',' the magazine's source alleged.

Karl and Jasmine are understood to have met in December 2016, just months after the Channel Nine star split with his wife-of-21-years Cassandra Thorburn.She is often travelling to and fro between Los Angeles and France.

And Lily-Rose Depp made a glowing arrival when she prepared to leave the Los Angeles International Airport on Saturday for a brief break away from the city.

The daughter of Johnny Depp and Vaness Paradis, 18, looked worlds away from her red carpet glamour when she went make-up free for the flight.

Her natural beauty blossoms! Make-up free Lily-Rose Depp displayed her natural beauty as she prepared for flight out of Los Angeles, in California on Saturday

A Chanel ambassador from the tender age of 16 and following in the starry footsteps of her model mother, Lily-Rose was confident in her blossoming natural beauty.

The French-American actress swamped her petite model-honed frame with a loose fitted T-shirt and skintight leggings for her casual airport attire.

Always jetting across the globe, the star already had her passport to hand as well as a number of layers and her Chanel hand luggage as she prepared for the flight.

Beautiful woman: A Chanel ambassador from the tender age of 16 and following in the starry footsteps of her model mother, Lily-Rose was confident in her blossoming natural beauty

It is no surprise Lily-Rose used her bilingual skills for her latest movie role in French film Les Fauves.

The movie follows the story of a campsite where young people start to vanish without a trace.

Stunning Lily-Rose takes on the starring role of Laura alongside French actors Laurent Lafitte and Camille Cottin.

The actress made her debut with a cameo role in Tusk alongside her friend Harley Quinn Smith, her father, and the film's director Kevin Smith.

Of course Lily-Rose is following in the star-studded footsteps of her father as she has embarked on a career in acting like her dad and modelling like her mother.

Raring to go: The rising starlet swamped her petite model-honed frame with a loose fitted T-shirt and skintight leggings for her casual airport attire

Hollywood star Johnny first met Vanessa while he was filming mystery thriller The Ninth Gate in France in 1998.

The couple, who also share 15-year-old Jack, were going strong for 14 years together before they went their separate ways for good in 2012.

Murder On The Orient Express star Johnny went onto remarry model Amber Heard, 23 years his junior, in a private ceremony in Los Angeles in 2015.

Heading out: Always jetting across the globe, the star already had her passport to hand as well as a number of layers and her Chanel hand luggage as she prepared for the flight

The former flames, who met on the set of The Rum Diary in 2011, endured a highly-publicised split in 2016.

Amber filed for divorce from Johnny in May 2016 amid allegations the Oscar-nominated actor abused her, claims which he denied.

Their separation was finalised in January, with Johnny agreeing to hand over $9.3 million to his wife of 14 months.

Although Vanessa has not yet remarried, she has been loved-up with her director boyfriend Samuel Benchetrit since 2016 after she was cast in his fifth movie Dog.

Famous face: Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis (pictured in February 2008), who also share Jack, were together for 14 years before they went their separate ways for good in 2012

Elsewhere, Lily-Rose discussed how she wants to work 'twice as hard' to prove she isn't pursuing a career in acting because of her dad.

The rising star insisted acting wasn't 'easy to do', despite her dad's flourishing success in Hollywood.

She told CR Fashion Book in August 2017: 'A lot of people think Im only acting because of my dad, that I have not had to work as hard to be seen or recognized in the industry, so I think because of that it makes me want to work twice as hard to prove to everyone that Im not just doing this because its easy to do. Im not just doing it because it runs in the family.'She recently split with Channel Seven journalist Ryan Phelan after a whirlwind three-month romance.

And on Sunday, Samantha X denied rumours that the TV network had pressured its newsreader to end the relationship.

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, the 43-year-old former escort claimed that Seven had actually been 'very supportive'.

'I felt very supported by Channel Seven': Samantha X (pictured) has denied rumours that Channel Seven had pressured its newsreader Ryan Phelan to end their relationship

Samantha, real name Amanda Goff, said: 'What happens between two people is very private, but I will say that I felt very supported by Channel Seven.'

She added: 'There are some wonderful women who work in that corporation, for example Sarah Stinson is Ryan's boss on The Morning Show and she was very supportive. We never felt any pressure from Seven.'

It comes after Samantha revealed she had decided to enroll in a university course as a mature age student.

Torn apart: She recently split with journalist Ryan after a whirlwind three-month romance

She is trading in her bedroom tricks for boardroom kicks as she embarks on a new degree, this time a masters in counselling and psychology.

'I understand I wrote a book coming out as Samantha, the escort. But there is so much more to me than my cleavage,' she previously told News Corp.

Samantha first confirmed her split with Ryan to Daily Mail Australia last month.

Split: Samantha first confirmed her split with Ryan (pictured) to Daily Mail Australia last month

'Ryan and I have decided to end our relationship,' she said. 'The love was very deep between us, but sometimes love isn't enough.'

Samantha also shared she will not go back to her former career in the sex industry.

'I will continue continue to help and support other women,' she explained.

'I will not be going back to escorting, and instead look forward to a bright future helping women be the best they can be with or without a man!'He stole Ashley Irvin's heart on Sunday's episode of Married At First Sight.

But it turns out that hearts weren't the only thing Troy Delmege stole, with the goofy groom also plagiarising his heartfelt wedding vows from the internet.

News.com.au discovered that the 35-year-old had composed his vows using an app on the website Shutterfly, which allows users to create their own 'custom' vows by mixing a bunch of generic pre-written statements together.

Copycat: Married At First Sight's Troy Delmege (right) impressed his bride Ashley Irvin (left) with marriage vows he stole off the internet

The app, called 100 Wedding Vows For Him, is open to anyone, and can be easily found with a quick Google search.

Participants on Married At First Sight are required to write their own original marriage vows instead of using the traditional Roman Catholic and Anglican vows that are the standard in Australia.

Troy's reading of his vows to Ashley received quite a glowing edit by MAFS editors, who scored the scene with romantic orchestral strings and cut to glowing reaction shots of both Ashley and her family members.

Sneaky! Married At First Sight stars are required to write their own vows, but Troy decided to use pre-written vows from an online app instead

'It is said that love makes the impossible possible,' said Troy, repeating a line verbatim from the website.

'I promise not only to listen, but to hear, not only to be honest, but to trust, and not only to love but to be loved,' he continued, using more of Shutterfly's lines.

In a bid to cover his tracks, Troy sprinkled a few of his own original lines in with the stolen vows, but they weren't enough to hide his blatant plagiarism.

'It is said that love makes the impossible possible,' said Troy, shamelessly repeating a line from the website Shutterfly

'Yours are so much better than mine!' Ashley was blown away by her husband's vows, and even admitted that she felt her own original vows were lacking in comparison

Blushing bride Ashley appeared to have no idea that she'd just been read recycled vows, as she naively replied: 'Your (vows) are so much better than mine!'

She added: 'He showed me up already!'

Instead of confessing he'd stolen the vows from the internet, the cocky IT manager instead laughed as he soaked up a thunderous applause from the wedding guests.Her bitter feud with younger sister Ruby Davis was once a fixture of the Sydney gossip columns.

But now Roxy Jacenko hopes the estranged siblings can put their differences aside, telling The Daily Telegraph on Monday their rift has been 'heartbreaking' for her mother, Doreen.

The PR queen, 37, said: 'I absolutely hope that we can reconcile in time to come, but there is a lot of water under the bridge which needs to be dispersed.'

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'There is a lot of water under the bridge': Roxy Jacenko told The Daily Telegraph on Monday she hopes to one day reconcile with her younger sister Ruby Davis. Pictured: Roxy in October

She continued: 'To have a sibling who you grow up with and you stay close with is something you dream of. It didn't happen for me and my sister.'

The mother-of-two also claimed she hopes her children - Pixie, six, and Hunter, three - 'remain as close as they are now' into adulthood.

Last year, Roxy hinted that she was no longer estranged from Ruby and that the former rivals had moved on from their past.

Rivals: Roxy's feud with younger sister Ruby Davis (pictured) was once a fixture of the gossip columns, but now the PR queen wants the estranged siblings to put their differences aside

She told Daily Mail Australia in October that she and Ruby were on speaking terms again, saying: 'All is forgotten - no family is perfect.'

Roxy added: 'We all have our challenges, we are no different. Mine are just public!'

The pair have famously been at odds in the past, culminating in police bringing an AVO application against Ms Davis on Roxy's behalf several years ago following an incident at a Kings Cross nightclub.

Ruby allegedly punched Roxy twice at a Kings Cross nightclub while trying to get into an event the PR queen was hosting, News Corp previously reported.

The application was later withdrawn.

'She lives in the US now and is doing really well - married too!' Ruby wed Jackson Eisenpresser, a former Goldman Sachs banker and top aide to Tony Blair, last year

Ruby attended her sister's wedding in 2012 and then left Sydney for LA a few years ago. In 2015 she began a car website for US women called Chickdriven.

Ruby was among the first people to contact Roxy when she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2016.

'She reached out right away to tell me she was sad to hear I had cancer,' Roxy previously said. 'She lives in the US now and is doing really well - married too!'The I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! contestants are forced to indulge in some pretty disgusting food challenges while spending time in the South African jungle.

But after Sunday night's particularly gruesome Tucker Trial involving champion boxers Anthony Mundine and Danny Green - which saw the latter throwing up his lunch in the nearby bushes - host Julia Morris' comment had Twitter in uproar.

Looking over to professional model Simone Holtznagel, the 49-year-old comedian pointed at a sickly Danny and joked: 'Does this remind you of Australia's Next Top Model?'

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'That's a low blow': I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! fans slam Julia Morris (right) for making a joke about models with bulimia to Simone Holtznagel. Pictured with Dr Chris Brown

The joke, which appeared to draw on the stereotype of models having eating disorders, fell flat on a bewildered Simone, who only managed a raise a wry smile in response to the live TV blunder.

While the moment only lasted a second, social media users were quick to point out the inappropriate nature of the comment and demanded an apology from Julia.

'Well that's a very, very low blow,' one person tweeted angrily.

'Does this remind you of Australia's Next Top Model?' The comment came after boxer Danny Green (pictured) vomited following Sunday night's grisly Tucker Trial

Not impressed! The joke, which appeared to draw on the stereotype of models having eating disorders, fell flat for a bewildered Simone, who is a former Top Model contestant

'Mocking eating disorders and making a stereotypical comment about models. I'm disgusted. Julia needs a good wake up call,' another added.

Daily Mail Australia has reached out to Network Ten for comment.

Simone, 24, competed in the seventh cycle of Australia's Next Top Model and was named the second runner-up during the finale at the Sydney Opera House in 2011.

She has since been featured in Playboy magazine, Bras N Things and Guess.

Not happy! While the moment only lasted a second, social media users were quick to point out the inappropriate nature of Julia's comment and demanded an apology from the presenter

In September last year, Simone stood up for women of all shapes and sizes in the modelling industry, admitting she loves 'spaghetti and wine' too much to strap herself into the gym everyday in order to compete with the likes of Victoria's Secret Angels.

'Everyone always has a fit during Fashion Week, saying "The girls are so thin",' she said to News.com.au.

'Embracing all sizes is good and I think people have to remember that some people are born thin, just like some people are born curvy.'

Simone is supporting the mental health charity Beyond Blue during her stint in the jungle.

If you need help or support for an eating disorder, please call Butterfly's National Helpline on 1800 334 673 or e-mail support@thebutterflyfoundation.org.auHe shockingly announced on Tuesday that he had been let go from Strictly Come Dancing's roster of professional dancers, after 15 seasons on the show.

And it appeared that Brendan Cole's tumultuous week had finally caught up with him as he was spotted looking considerably glum while out and about in Cornwall on Saturday.

The ballroom star appeared downcast as he wrapped up in a navy quilted jacket and matching wool scarf as he strolled around for the afternoon with his coffee in tow.

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Downcast: Brendan Cole's tumultuous week appeared finally caught up with him as he was spotted looking considerably glum while out and about in Cornwall on Saturday

The soon-to-be father-of-two donned a pair of dark wash denims which he held up with a brown leather belt and teamed the ensemble with a light blue jumper.

Looking glum as he wandered around, the dance star paired his look with a lace-up boot for the outing.

His weary appearance comes after the ballroom star left fans bereft when he confirmed he had been axed from Strictly's line-up earlier this week, after 13 years on the show.

His long-standing association with the show sensationally ended amid claims of on-air arguments with judges and consistent criticism of his celebrity partners.

Glum: The ballroom star appeared downcast as he wrapped up in a navy quilted jacket and matching wool scarf as he strolled around for the afternoon with his coffee in tow

And now The Sun have reported that Brendan told pals that show judge Shirley Ballas, 57, once 'tried it on' with him, when he was training as a dancer years ago.

'He was against Shirley from the start and kept slagging her off behind the scenes,' a source told The Sun. 'Brendan bragged that she tried it on with him as his teacher years ago.

'He claimed she once flirted with him. He said she had no idea what she was talking about and constantly questioned her judgement.'

Both have since denied the claims to The Sun. MailOnline have contacted Brendan Cole and Shirley Ballas' reps for comment.

Stepping out: The soon-to-be father-of-two donned a pair of dark wash denims which he held up with a brown leather belt and teamed the ensemble with a light blue jumper

A source close to Shirley told The Mirror that Shirley 'was considering legal action over the claims.'

They said: 'Shirley thinks the allegations are ridiculous and friends say she wouldn't touch him with a barge pole.

'It simply isn't true and the idea Shirley would hold a grudge or this has any impact on him being kicked off Strictly is laughable.'

The shocking claims comes after the pair were involved in a face-off when Brendan took Shirley to task over her criticism of his and dance partner Charlotte Hawkin's tango, to Danger Zone by Top Gun.

Moving on: Looking glum as he wandered around, the dance star paired his look with a lace-up boot for the outing

Len Goodman's replacement said of the routine: 'It's definitely a little bit better' to which Brendan remarked: 'A little bit?'

Shirley retorted: 'Yeah definitely just a little bit Brendan, unfortunately. We've established that there is no rise and fall in tango, you have to make a concrete decision not to use rise and fall.'

Brendan, who had also been tipped for the role of head judge after Len's departure, snapped back: 'I'm really sorry but there was no rise and fall in that.'

Bruno then stepped in to defend his co-judge, adding: 'I'm not an expert, I've only done about 500 shows but I think Shirley's right, you should be more respectful,' he chided.

Confirmed: His weary appearance comes after the ballroom star left fans bereft when he confirmed he had been axed from Strictly's line-up earlier this week, after 13 years on the show

Claims: His long-standing association with the show sensationally ended amid claims of on-air arguments with judges and consistent criticism of his celebrity partners

Pledging his respect to her, Brendan explained: 'I do respect her but I just don't agree'.

Since his axing, Brendan is now said to be poised for a new TV endeavour in the Australian jungle after making himself available for an appearance on long-running reality show Im A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here!

The TV star will reportedly say yes to a potential three-week stay in the purpose built camp as he weighs up his options. An ITV source declined to comment when contacted by MailOnline.

Strictly producers 'sacked fiery Brendan after 13 years and 15 series on the show for creating negative press and for his on-air outbursts,' saying that 'no one is bigger than the show', insiders told MailOnline on Tuesday.

Reports: And now The Sun have reported that Brendan told pals that show judge Shirley Ballas, 57, once 'tried it on' with him, when he was training as a dancer years ago

'Producers were said to be furious over his recent interview, in which he criticised his celebrity partners,' a source claimed. 'Theyve always tolerated his rows with the judges as it creates drama and acceptable headlines but this was a step too far.'

Another source said: 'The producers believe no one is bigger than the show.'

'Theyve been struggling to recruit celebs in recent years and the producers thought this interview was a step too far in terms of negative press for the show, made it more difficult to recruit celebrities and was may have been a factor in the decision to not renew his contract.'

Face-off: The shocking claims comes after the pair were involved in a face-off when Brendan took Shirley to task over her criticism of his and dance partner Charlotte Hawkin's tango, to Danger Zone by Top Gun

The emotional star, who famously rowed with new head judge, Shirley Ballas, during the last series, as well as Bruno Tonioli, talked about his shock sacking during an appearance on breakfast show Lorraine.

He said: 'This is hard to talk about. The BBC havent renewed my contract. They have made an editorial decision not to have me back on the show. I have had 15 incredible series on the show, they are a great team.

'I am very disappointed. Its an editorial decision. I will never know the ins and outs.'

The BBC told MailOnline on Tuesday: 'Wed like to thank Brendan for being part of the show since the beginning - winner of the first series - and for the contribution he has made to its success. We wish him all the very best for the future.'

Future: Since his axing, Brendan is now said to be poised for a new TV endeavour in the Australian jungle after making himself available for an appearance on long-running reality show Im A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here!

Taking to the stage: Elsewhere, the Strictly gang were enjoying themselves on the live tourShe won the envy-inducing award at the NTAs for her leading role in Doctor Foster which has reportedly spurred BBC bosses on to produce a third series.

And make-up free Suranne Jones, 39, looked positively glowing when she stepped out, in London on Thursday for the first time since the awards night.

The award-winning actress accessorised with a trendy baker boy hat, with her brunette tresses worn in a poker straight fashion.

Natural beauty: Make-up free Suranne Jones, 39, stepped out in a gym gear in London after it was revealed Doctor Foster 'WILL return for third season'

Keeping comfortable, the television sensation stepped out in form-fitting leggings and Nike trainers.

The Doctor Foster star is well recognised for her titular character who is driven to great lengths to get bitter revenge on her cheating husband Simon.

Suranne's outing comes after she won the Best Serial Drama performance award at the National Television Awards in January.

Racy display: The Doctor Foster star is well recognised for her titular character who is driven to great lengths to get bitter revenge on her cheating husband Simon

It has been reported that her win has triggered the 'green light' for a third series of the gripping psychological thriller saga.

Fans were left at a knife's edge when the second series finished with a dramatic cliffhanger, not giving viewers at home any closure.

A source told The Sun: 'After its ratings success last year commissioners were always keen for it to come back and although its early days they have given it the green light.

Positive vibe: The award-winning actress accessorised with a trendy baker boy hat, with her brunette tresses worn in a poker straight fashion

'Suranne is extremely busy with other projects at the moment but bosses are trying to pin her down for some potential filming dates. Its looking like it would film next year at the earliest.'

But Suranne confessed she was left 'hurt' when fans branded the show 'guilty-pleasure' TV because she considers herself a serious actress.

The star told The Sunday Times: 'It was so split, with people saying, "This is ridiculous, this is a romp, this is crazy  but I'll watch it."

'That hurt, though, in the sense of, "You're saying it's guilty-pleasure TV". I don't want to do guilty-pleasure TV.'

Despite the open-ended ending, Suranne previously insisted there are 'no plans' for a third series, which was also backed by creator Mike Bartlett.

Steamy scenes: It has been reported that her win has triggered the 'green light' for a third series of the gripping psychological thriller saga

However, Mike admitted there were still 'conversations to be had' and he hinted it was all down to lead actress Suranne in an interview in 2017.

Reflecting on the finale to series two, Mike told Radio Times: 'You can see the ending. Tom's gone. So there's a question mark.

'And I think it works as an end to this series and all the things that have been going on. Clearly there's potential there. But obviously there would have to be lots of conversations.

'We need to talk. Suranne and I and lots of other people need to have lots of conversations and we'll see.'He is an indomitable force of the acting world and the favourite to win the Best Actor gong at this year's Oscars.

And Gary Oldman added another accolade to his already brimming trophy cabinet as he picked up the Maltin Modern Master Award at The Santa Barbara International Film Festival on Friday.

This came as his ex-wife Donya Fiorentino spoke out about her 'nightmare' marriage to the star, claiming he 'yelled at me constantly, ruined my life and stole my children'.

Award: Gary Oldman picked up the Maltin Modern Master Award at The Santa Barbara International Film Festival on Friday with his wife Gisele Schmidt by his side

Claims: This came as his ex-wife Donya Fiorentino spoke out about her 'nightmare' marriage to the star, claiming he 'yelled at me constantly, ruined my life and stole my children'

Focusing on awards season, The Darkest Hour actor, 59, looked happy as he picked up the prestigious award and celebrated with his current wife Gisele Schmidt,

The Batman actor looked dapper in a fitted navy blue suit, which featured elegant silk panels, and which he paired with a white shirt, black tie and silk handkerchief.

His glamorous wife, who he married last year, couldn't help but smile as she congratulated her beau on another win, and rocked a blush pink gown, with lilac tulle neckline and a taupe skirt.

Sharing several sweet moments at the awards, Gisele was seen lovingly stroking her husband's face before hugging him as the pair revelled in another awards season triumph in the festival's Dom Perignon lounge.

Affectionate: Sharing several sweet moments at the awards, Gisele was seen lovingly stroking her husband's face before hugging him

Gary has been nominated for Best Actor for his turn as Churchill in the film which depicts the start of his leadership before leading to his treaty with Nazi Germany.

It is Gary's second nod for Best Actor after he was nominated in 2012 for his role as George Smiley in 2011's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.

Of his role as Churchill, Gary previously told Interview Magazine: 'The challenge of playing someone like Winston Churchill is that theres more footage of him than you might believe, and theres certainly enough to read about.

'Next to Washington, I think he has the most biographies about him. And then theres his own writing, which is something like 50 books. I havent read all of them, but Im told every one of them is worth reading.

Look of love: The Batman actor looked dapper in a fitted navy blue suit, which featured elegant silk panels, and which he paired with a white shirt, black tie and silk handkerchief

Dynamic duo@ Gary smiled as he was presented with the award by Batman co-star Ben Mendelsohn

'He changed political parties twice. He fought with distinction in four wars, he served in politics, I think, for over 50 years, and he held almost every political office.'

The appearance comes as the third of his five wives, Donya Fiorentino spoke out about their marriage, claiming he abused her physically and emotionally before using his fame, power and money to gain custody of their sons.

MailOnline has contacted representatives for Gary for comment.

In devastating legal documents filed in 2001, Donya painted the actor as a deadbeat husband who spent thousands on alcohol and prostitutes during drug-fuelled weekends  charges Oldman vehemently denied.

In reply, he called his former wife a fantasist whose own raging addiction to pills and alcohol tore apart their marriage and left her an unfit mother. It is certainly true that a judge eventually sided with Oldman, granting him custody of their young sons.

Pals: Actor Christopher Lloyd posed up with film critic and historian Leonard Maltin in the Dom Perignon lounge

Stylish: Gary looked stylish as he appeared on -stage before receiving the award

He stole my children and ruined my life, she told The Mail on Sunday, tears rolling down her cheeks. The truth needs to be told. I would like Gary to stand up and take responsibility for his actions. Will he? Who knows? He has always denied everything.

Emboldened by the #MeToo movement sweeping Tinseltown  which has already claimed the careers of sexual predators such as Harvey Weinstein  soft-spoken Donya said last night: He is a great actor. Was he a great husband? No.

Our marriage was a giant car crash in which demented things happened. I lost my self-esteem, I was broken.

Ive been empowered by hearing other women speak up. When a woman gets her voice back, she gets her power back.

Animated: Gary has won a host of accolades in the run-up to the Oscars

Donya says it took all the courage I have to give this interview.

Staring over the crystal-blue waters off the Florida Keys, she says: I want our sons and the world to know the truth. I would rather get eaten by a great white shark than go through that marriage again.

I have $20 in my purse. Ive got nothing else he can take from me. Im not speaking out to hurt Gary. In fact, I wish him well. Hes a brilliant actor and he fully deserves his Oscar. But when you are nominated for an Academy Award you have to be held to a higher standard.Many people find cute ways to announce the gender of the baby they are expecting.

But Counting Ons Joseph and Kendra Duggar found a unique and more explosive means to reveal that they are will be welcoming a baby boy, according to Us Weekly.

And they have the 22-year-old's older brother, John David Duggar, 28, who is an Arkansas constable and part-time officer with the Tontitown Police Department, to thank for the idea.

'We are having a baby boy!': Joseph and Kendra Duggar smiled as a puff of blue smoke exploded into the air behind them in this Instagram they posted on Saturday

On Saturday, he mixed a small amount of the explosive tannerite with blue powder which he placed in a field

The Duggar family stood about 20 yards behind John David as he shot a bullet 200 yards into the substance, commonly used in target practice, that exploded in a puff of blue smoke.

The young couple posted a snap of themselves standing with their backs to the smoke on their joint Instagram, captioned: 'We are having a baby boy!' with a heart emoji.

'Wow! We are so happy to learn that our firstborn is a boy!' the couple told Us the same day.

Happy couple: Joseph, 22, and Kendra, 19, tied the knot at the First Baptist Church in Siloam Springs, Arkansas, in September. They were married by her father, who is a pastor

'Our minds are already racing toward all the future memories to be made with this little guy! Most of all, we are already asking God to bless him and help us grow him into a loving and faithful follower of Christ!

The proud parents-to-be shared their happy news in December.

'Wow, its so exciting,' they told Us. 'Its so surreal to think of being parents and having our own little one. We cannot wait to see this new baby!

Stealing his sister's thunder: The couple got engaged at the wedding of Josephs 20-year-old sibling Joy-Anna in May

The couple, who met at church, got engaged at the wedding of Josephs 20-year-old sister Joy-Anna in May.

Joseph and Kendra, 19, wed in an intimate ceremony at the First Baptist Church in Siloam Springs, Arkansas, in September. They were married by her father, who is a pastor.

Counting On returns to TLC on February 26.His future on Dancing On Ice was cast in doubt earlier this week when he fractured his ribs in a horrific fall.

But a defiant Antony Cotton, 42, brushed off his skates as he took to the ice alongside dance partner Brandee Malto on Sunday night.

However, viewers slammed Jason Gardiner's 'harsh' score after the Coronation Street star struggled through his performance, with fans saying the judge was a 'pantomime villain with no compassion'.

'It's showbiz': A defiant Antony Cotton, 42, brushed off his skates as he took to the ice alongside dance partner Brandee Malto on Dancing On Ice on Sunday night

Before sashaying across the ice to Shirley Bassey's I Am What I Am, Antony addressed his injury on his VT.

He said: 'I'm not letting this stop me from doing what I need to do.'

Clad in a glittering multi-coloured ensemble, the soap star refused to acknowledge his pain as he pulled out all the stops for his energetic performance.

Following his routine, Antony clutched his ribs as he told Phil and Holly: 'I'm still alive, it is what it is, it's showbiz. It absolutely bloomin kills, it is what it is.'

Pantomime villain: Viewers slammed Jason Gardiner's 'harsh' score after the Coronation Street star struggled through his performance

Trooper: 'I'm still alive, it is what it is, it's showbiz. It absolutely bloomin kills, it is what it is' he told Phil and Holly after his performance

However, Jason refused to acknowledge Antony's health scare, savaging the routine.

'I didn't get it, are you a next door neighbour, I didn't get any excitement from it,' he said. 'It was very disappointing.'

To which Antony retorted: 'It's called having fun Jason!'

The Australian choregrapher was less than impressed with the routine, scoring the actor four, with the respective judges all scoring him five points, totaling 19 -a slight dip from last week.

True entertainer: Clad in a glittering multi-coloured ensemble, the soap star refused to acknowledge his pain as he pulled out all the stops for his energetic performance

Unimpressed: However, Jason refused to acknowledge Antony's health scare, savaging the routine

In good spirits: In spite of the negative comments, Antony was his usual cheerful self

Viewers watching at home took to Twitter to slam Jason, following his heated exchange with Antony.

One fan wrote: 'Very harsh comments from the judges. Wernt needed considering the circumstances (sic).'

While another added: 'Jason continues to be the pantomime villain only with no sense of humour or compassion.'

Another wrote: 'Well done @AshleyBanjo. At last a judge that actually acknowledged how much of a feat it was for @antonycotton to even be skating tonight. @officialJasonG wind ya neck in love x'

Not giving up: The Corrie star was determined to come back fighting following his fall

Taking it on the chin: The soap favourite didn't let the criticism get him down

Outrage: Viewers watching at home took to Twitter to slam Jason, following his heated exchange with Antony

Antony's performance comes after he was rushed to hospital during Dancing On Ice rehearsals on Wednesday.

And despite suffering from painful injuries, the star revealed he would take to the rink in an interview with Ruth Langsford and Eamonn Holmes on ITV's This Morning on Friday.

The Coronation Street actor was joined by his professional ice-skating partner Brandee, who confessed she initially thought she had killed him.

Committed: Antony revealed he would still take to the rink for this weekend's Dancing On Ice in an interview on ITV's This Morning on Friday

Speaking to the television hosts, the Queer as Folk star insisted: 'Ive never in all my career phoned in sick, never once. Im not calling in sick!'

'Its my choice. And I want to carry on. Ive broken, front and back. It was a mishap, it was nobodys fault. There were two of us in this tango. We basically fell backwards and Brandee landed on top of me and crushed me.'

Seated next to actor, the American ice skater revealed she feared she had killed him during the ill-fated manoeuvre.

Horrific: Antony was rushed to hospital after he fractured his ribs following a horror fall during his Dancing On Ice rehearsals on Wednesday

Strong: He insisted he wanted to 'carry on' with professional dance partner Brandee Malto

Brandee explained: 'I was so scared. I really thought Id killed him because he couldnt breathe. He was just lying on the ice. He was telling me to get help but I didnt want to leave him. We were training.'

Antony recalled: 'I thought, "I dont want to bang my head as we are going down with some force". I went bang on my back and Brandee landed on top of me.

'I knew it was bad. I physically couldnt breathe. I was making this odd noise. I said, "Brandee get help". I had ice skates on, we were in the middle of the rink. Its horrendous pain.'

'I knew it was bad': The TV star went on to describe the tragic fall

'I didn't want to leave him': Seated next to actor, the American ice skater spoke on ITV show in support of her partner

In a statement to MailOnline about the horrific incident earlier this week, Antony revealed: 'Luckily, Brandee was uninjured but I was taken to hospital where I discovered I had fractured a couple of ribs, front and back.

'I'd like to thank the staff at Silver Blades ice rink in Widnes, the doctor and nurse at The Alexandra Hospital in Cheadle, and Brandee, who never left my side throughout.

'But the show must go on and as such, we are going to do our best to continue in the Dancing on Ice competition this Sunday. Hopefully the painkillers and sequins will see us through.'

A Dancing On Ice spokesperson told MailOnline: 'Antony fell on the ice during training and as a precaution was taken to a nearby hospital.

'He has since been released and is now resting ahead of the live show this weekend.'They've made no secret of their raunchy relationship, with Dean Wells joking about eating Tracey Jewel's 'melons' during their honeymoon.

But according to an anonymous source in Womans Day Married At First Sight could be rocked by an 'affair' between Dean and Davina Rankin.

The magazine reports this week that 'alpha male' Dean exchanges 'flirty text messages' with Instagram model Davina Rankin, leaving Tracey 'hurt and heartbroken'.

'She had no idea he was looking elsewhere': MAFS' Tracey left 'hurt and heartbroken' after Dean exchanges 'flirty text messages' with busty model Davina

A source told the publication Tracey's relationship had been rocked when Davina and Dean 'locked eyes' at a dinner party.

They later swapped numbers and soon started exchanging 'flirty text messages', the source claimed.

'[Davina] found a way to contact him and suggested they ''catch up'' sometime,' the insider claimed.

'[Davina] found a way to contact him and suggested they ''catch up'' sometime': Davina and Dean 'locked eyes' at a dinner party.

Rocky relationship: Davina has been paired with tradie Ryan, their marriage off to a shaky start

Tracey found out about Dean's text messages with Davina during a commitment ceremony.

The single mother was 'shocked, hurt and heartbroken' after discovering Dean , the insider alleged.

'She'd just had an amazing wedding and honeymoon and it was obvious she wanted to give the relationship a go,' they claimed.

'She'd just had an amazing wedding and honeymoon and it was obvious she wanted to give the relationship a go': The single mother was 'shocked, hurt and heartbroken' after discovering Dean , the insider alleged

'He broke down and cried': The drama didn't stop there, with Dean reportedly turning his back on Davina and begging Tracey for forgiveness

But the drama didn't stop there, with Dean reportedly turning his back on Davina and begging Tracey for forgiveness.

'He broke down and cried. As for Davina, everybody started to call her a man slayer,' the source claimed.

During their honeymoon Dean and Tracey shocked viewers with their X-rated innuendo.

Dean talked about eating Tracey's 'delicious melons' while Tracey revealed she had previously had a 'swinging' experience with another woman.

Daily Mail Australia has contacted Nine for comment.Married At First Sight stars Carly Bowyer and Troy Delmege were spotted kissing and canoodling at a park - despite reportedly still being married to other people.

IT manager Troy, 35, tied the knot with bubbly bride Ashley on the show, while marketing manager Carly, 32, will allegedly say 'I do' with divorced millionaire Justin.

But turning the show into their own version of Wife Swap, the pair were seen packing on the PDA during a romantic picnic - with sources claiming they 'clearly didn't care who saw them'.

Scroll down for video

New couple? Married At First Sight stars Carly Bowyer and Troy Delmege were spotted kissing and canoodling at a park - despite reportedly still being married to other people

Carly was seen lying on top of Troy as they smooched at a park in Melbourne, in photos obtained by New Idea.

The smiling pair later left their date holding hands - with Troy's wedding band still clearly visible.

An onlooker told the magazine the couple couldn't resist getting tactile, revealing: 'They couldn't keep their hands off each other and clearly didn't care who saw them.

'They had bags from the supermarket and were enjoying a romantic picnic before Carly climbed on top of Troy. There was lots of groping and kissing, it was really full on.'

Oh dear: IT manager Troy, 35, tied the knot with bubbly bride Ashley, 28, on the show

Hmm: Meanwhile marketing manager Carly (left), 32, will allegedly say 'I do' with divorced millionaire Justin (right)

Daily Mail Australia has contacted a Married At First Sight spokesman for comment.

Viewers were introduced to the 'quirky' Troy on Sunday's installment of Married At First Sight.

The unfiltered goofball quickly established himself as one of the most bizarre contestants in the history of the series, beginning with his request for a Barbie doll bride with a 'big chest'.

He declared: 'The girl in my imagination is still a stunning cheerleader combination Barbie girl, so she's gonna look sensational. She's gonna look SO good in the wedding outfit.'

Once he arrived at the wedding ceremony, the outspoken IT manager didn't waste any time unleashing his charm on the mother of the bride.

Steamy: But turning the show into their own version of Wife Swap, she was seen packing on the PDA with Troy during a romantic picnic - with sources claiming they 'clearly didn't care who saw them'

Awkward: The smiling pair later left their date holding hands - with Troy's wedding band still clearly visible

'You look fantastic,' he said as he eyed his future mother-in-law up and down.

Speaking privately to producers, Troy enthused: 'The gene pool is very attractive, especially from the mother's side!'

He continued: 'I instantly hoped that the daughter would be exactly like the mother. I could settle down with that girl instantly if it was a pure breed straight from the mother.'

His controversial comments left the sister of 28-year-old flight attendant Ashley unimpressed however.

Summer warned: 'It just gives off red flags. He's very self-absorbed and he just doesn't care about my sister. I think personally he could be full of s**t.'

'It's hard not to take it further': Troy was open about being tempted by his new bride Ashley, who he married on Sunday night's episode

Hot stuff! The new couple's sexual chemistry was on full display as they shot their wedding photos, with the pair passionately kissing in front of the photographer

Troy also hit the headlines after it emerged that he had plagiarised his 'heartfelt' wedding vows to Ashley from the internet.

News.com.au discovered the cocky groom had composed his vows using an app on the website Shutterfly, which allows users to create their own 'custom' vows by mixing a bunch of generic pre-written statements together.

'It is said that love makes the impossible possible,' said Troy, repeating a line verbatim from the website.

Sneaky! Married At First Sight stars are required to write their own vows, but Troy decided to use pre-written vows from an online app instead

'I promise not only to listen, but to hear, not only to be honest, but to trust, and not only to love but to be loved,' he continued, using more of Shutterfly's lines.

In a bid to cover his tracks, Troy sprinkled a few of his own original lines in with the stolen vows, but they weren't enough to hide his plagiarism.

Meanwhile, Carly will tie the knot with dad-of-two Justin, 41, in scenes not yet aired on the hit show.

Warning signals: Ashley's (pictured) sister was unimpressed with Troy, branding him 'self-absorbed' and claiming he was 'full of s**t'

Gushing over the big day while wearing a wedding dress on her Instagram, she wrote: 'Roses are red. Violets are blue. We're going to wed. And I haven't met you.'

The marketing manager, who described herself as 'unapologetically me', said she struggled to find love due to her long working hours.

The brunette added that she often trawled dating apps and treated dating 'like a business' - often going on three of four dates a week in a bid to find her perfect match.Jasmine Yarbrough was pictured flashing her stunning engagement ring during a lunch in Sydney last Friday after Karl Stefanovic proposed to her over the holidays this year.

And The Today Show host, 43, is believed to have spent more than $100,000 on the diamond sparkler for his fiancee.

Speculation suggests Karl worked with celebrity jeweller Patrick Nader to produce the perfect engagement ring for lady love.

Bling ring! Did Karl Stefanovic (Left) take inspiration from Lance 'Buddy'Franklin for his ritzy $100,000 engagement ring (Pictured) from Sydney celebrity jeweller for fiancee Jasmine Yarbrough (Center)?

In the past, the Nader family business has worked with several celebrity clients - including Jesinta Campbell and Lance 'Buddy' Franklin, Anthony Minichiello and his wife Terry Biviano, Oliver Curtis and Roxy Jacenko, and Karl's very own brother Peter Stefanovic and his wife Sylvia Jeffreys.

Sources claim Karl is likely to have taken inspiration from close friend, AFL star Buddy and his journalist brother Pete for his special ring to propose with.

The Sydney-based jeweller is also close friends with Karl's manager, Sharon Finnigan.

Daily Mail Australia have reached out to Nader Jewellers for comment.

'It is a relatively high quality diamond with very few imperfections': The exact price of the ring is yet to be revealed , but another leading jeweller claimed the weighty sparkler is worth a whopping $120,000

The exact price of the ring is yet to be revealed, but another leading jeweller claimed the weighty sparkler appears to feature three carats of diamonds and is worth a whopping $120,000.

'It's a row of diamonds surrounding the central stone. I estimate it to be an F or G colour, with VS clarity - which means It is a relatively high quality diamond with very few imperfections,' Alexander Breckner, head of diamonds at 77Diamonds.com exclusively told Daily Mail Australia this Friday.

Karl and Jasmine, who reportedly met in December 2016, have become engaged after just fourteen months of dating.

Wow! Patrick Nader made headlines in 2015 after he was revealed as the jeweller behind model Jesinta Franklin's (nee Campbell) 4.5 carat diamond ring

Stunning! The Asscher cut sparkler has an estimated worth of between $75,000 and $100,000, Sydney fine jeweller Emma Swann told DMA at the time

Happy ending! Patrick did not confirm the price but did tell The Daily Telegraph in 2015 that he worked with Buddy for 'about a month' to get the engagement ring 'just right' (Pictured: Jesinta and Buddy on their wedding day in 2016)

Patrick Nader was revealed as the jeweller behind model Jesinta Franklin's (nee Campbell) 4.5 carat diamond ring, which AFL star Lance 'Buddy' Franklin gave her in December 2014.

The Asscher cut sparkler has an estimated worth of between $75,000 and $100,000, Sydney fine jeweller Emma Swann told DMA at the time.

Patrick did not confirm the price but did tell The Daily Telegraph in 2015 that he worked with Buddy for 'about a month' to get the ring 'just right'.

Did Karl ask his bother for advice? The Sydney jeweller was also behind Today show star Sylvia Jeffreys' diamond engagement ring, presented to her in 2016 by Karl's brother Peter

All smiles! Patrick said he collaborated with Sylvia's fiance Peter Stefanovic for around two months to produce the ring

The Sydney jeweller was also behind Today show star Sylvia Jeffreys' diamond engagement ring, presented to her in 2016 by Karl's brother Pete.

Patrick Nader revealed he studied the TV co-host's Instagram page to decide upon her perfect custom-made design.

Speaking to Daily Mail Australia, Patrick Nader of Nader Jewellers claimed he regularly examines his clients' social media profiles to understand the bride-to-be's individual style.

Patrick said he collaborated with Sylvia's fiance Peter Stefanovic for around two months to produce the ring.

'They pretty much put a lot of trust in me to get that right': Speaking to Daily Mail Australia, Patrick of Nader Jewellers claimed he regularly examines his clients' social media profiles to understand the bride-to-be's individual style and works closely with the fiances to held them create the perfect ring for their loved ones

Speaking about the process of working with Buddy and Peter, he revealed: 'They know their partners, but they needed help deciding what sort of ring they wanted.

'They pretty much put a lot of trust in me to get that right. So, I'm doing all this cross-reference, drawing designs, sending them back and forth to make sure they're happy with everything.

'I don't want me to be the only one that picks it, I want them to find the ring that they love as well.'

Fit for a PR queen! Sydney's PR maven Roxy Jacenko also flaunted a stunning $50,000 six-carat diamond band from Nader after announcing her second engagement to Oliver Curtis last year

Sydney's PR maven Roxy Jacenko also flaunted a stunning $50,000 six-carat diamond band after announcing her second engagement to Oliver Curtis last year.

The pricey piece of jewellery featured two rows of diamonds surrounded by a white gold band and according to insiders is worth $50,000.

Roxy captioned the post: 'Perfect I (love) it 'U'ternity Ring,' while tagging Nader Jewellers.Labor looks set for a tougher fight in the by-election in the Melbourne seat of Batman after Malcolm Turnbull indicated the Liberals were unlikely to put up a candidate.

The by-election, expected to be in March, was triggered by the resignation of Labor MP David Feeney after he failed to find paperwork showing he had renounced UK citizenship before entering parliament, disqualifying him under the constitution.

Former ACTU president Ged Kearney is Labor's new candidate for the inner-city electorate.

Greens candidate Alex Bhathal has run in each election for the seat since 2001, barring 2007.

She won the primary vote at the last federal election but Mr Feeney clung on courtesy of Liberal preferences, taking Batman with a margin of one per cent.

Mr Turnbull said the final decision on running a candidate would be up to the Victorian branch of the Liberal Party.

"But I don't expect we will be running a candidate in the Batman by-election," the prime minister told ABC TV on Sunday.

Asked why, Mr Turnbull said it was a political decision and "parties have to assess priorities and the limited resources".

ABC election analyst Antony Green said if the Liberals didn't run a candidate, the Greens were more likely to win the poll - which would give the minor party its second lower house seat and dent Opposition Leader Bill Shorten's numbers.

Senior Labor frontbencher Anthony Albanese - who has experience fighting off Greens in an inner-city electorate - believes the party can retain the seat.

"We need to put our case to the people of Batman (that) the election of a Labor candidate will be an important step in Labor forming government either later this year or early next year," he told Sky News.Senior Labor frontbencher Anthony Albanese says he is busy enough in his own portfolio without thinking about challenging for the Labor leadership.

Mr Albanese, who stood for the Labor leadership against Bill Shorten after the 2013 election, says he's more interested in addressing the cost of living, fixing the National Broadband Network and infrastructure.

"My challenge is doing the right thing by the Australian people as part of Bill Shorten's team. My loyalty is always to the cause of Labor and the people we represent," Mr Albanese told Sky News on Sunday.New Zealand driver Andrew Bagnall has been transferred to hospital during a yellow-flag dominated first six hours of the Bathurst 12 Hour race at Mount Panorama.

Bagnall, competing in the Pro-Am class of the Intercontinental GT event in an Audi R8 for the International Motorsport team was involved in an incident on lap 42.

He was conscious and responsive while being treated on the scene for neck and chest injuries before being transferred to the circuit medical centre, where it was determined he would be taken to hospital for further tests and observation.

At the halfway - six-hour - mark, German driver Christian Haase was leading in an Audi R8 he is sharing with co-drivers Christopher Miers and Markus Winklehoc.

Veteran Supercars driver Garth Tander was running second in another Audi ahead of Australia's Phillip Eng in a BMW.

Eng's team, which includes Supecars driver Steven Richards, was yesterday disqualified from qualifying for a technical breach and pushed from second place to the rear of the grid.A network of at least 50,000 home solar systems backed up by battery storage across Adelaide will create the world's largest "virtual" power plant to cut energy bills, Premier Jay Weatherill says.

Mr Weatherill says a trial is already underway to install solar panels and Tesla batteries on 1100 Housing Trust homes with the cost to be financed by the sale of electricity.

The program will later be rolled out to another 24,000 public housing properties and also offered to other households with a view to having at least 50,000 connected.KEY POINTS IN SA LIBERALS' ELECTION LAUNCH:

* Liberal l;eader Steven Marshall has urged voters to install a majority Liberal government as the only way to avoid a power-sharing deal between Labor and Nick Xenophon's SA-Best.

* He has promised to cut payroll tax for small businesses with payrolls under $1.5 million with the change to take effect from July 1, for a total saving across the sector of $44.5 million a year.

* The Liberals will reinstate remissions to the Emergency Services Levy, saving businesses money and reducing cost-of-living pressures on households.

* The party has reaffirmed its recently-released energy plan to increase interconnection with the eastern states and boost home solar energy storage to cut household power bills by 15 per cent.

* A Liberal government will push ahead with a plan to cap increases in council rates with its scheme to be administered by an independent regulator.Australian No.1 Minjee Lee has bolted out to a commanding four-shot lead early in her final round of the women's Vic Open at 13th Beach.

Lee started the day a shot clear of countrywoman Karis Davidson and quickly extended that advantage to four strokes with a birdie at the third hole and an eagle three at the par-5 fifth.

Davidson is in outright second at six under, a shot clear of Australian Hannah Green and Swede Caroline Hedwall.

Lee, the world No.20, claimed the Vic Open title as a 17-year-old amateur back in 2014.

She has since won three times on the US LPGA Tour.Malcolm Turnbull really wants to start the political year talking about the economy, fanning hopes for personal tax cuts and pushing company tax relief through parliament.

But the prime minister's hopes for clean air were likely to be spoiled as the miasma from the dual citizenship fiasco continued to drag through federal politics.

Labor MP David Feeney last week quit parliament after being unable to find paperwork proving he renounced his British citizenship.

Now the opposition has produced Polish legal advice it said casts doubts on the status of Liberal backbencher Jason Falinski, while the government has threatened to refer Labor MP Susan Lamb to the High Court.

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten pleaded for a ceasefire on Sunday, saying Australians were annoyed by the whole affair.

"To make sure that 2018 is a better year for Australian politics than 2017 I think both sides need to reach sensible compromise," he told reporters in Melbourne on Sunday.

Labor previously asked parliament to send nine MPs - four of its own, four Liberals and crossbencher Rebekha Sharkie - to the High Court, but the coalition blocked the move.

The prime minister and Mr Shorten will start Monday on their knees at the traditional church service to open the parliamentary year in Canberra.

The reflective tone will continue later in the morning with a memorial service for former Labor government minister Barry Cohen.

Treasurer Scott Morrison will keep pushing for the second tranche of corporate tax cuts but debate in the lower house isn't scheduled until Wednesday.

When it gets to the Senate, the government's task of finding votes has been made slightly easier by the recruitment of South Australian senator Lucy Gichuhi from the crossbench to the Liberal Party.

In the upper house, the Liberals' Jim Molan will become the latest senator to be sworn in, replacing the NSW Nationals' Fiona Nash who was disqualified due to her dual citizenship.

One Nation senator Fraser Anning is set to make a short statement indicating his resignation from Pauline Hanson's party and intention to sit as an independent, representing rural and regional Queensland.

Senator Hanson has written to the Senate President Scott Ryan recommending Senator Anning be referred to the High Court over his alleged "bankrupt" status.

But the major parties won't support the referral and Senator Anning - who had a bankruptcy petition against him withdrawn last year - denied having any eligibility problems.

NSW Labor senator Sam Dastyari formally resigned from parliament on January 25 and while the party chose former premier Kristina Keneally to replace him, the timing of her swearing-in would depend on when the NSW parliament's two houses can formally endorse her.

And adding to the musical chairs, former attorney-general George Brandis will deliver his valedictory on Wednesday, before he heads off to London to become Australia's UK high commissioner.A man and woman have been charged after officers raided a Sydney home in the middle of the night and seized nearly 50 boxes of Lego.

A retail store in Botany Bay alerted police to the alleged shoplifting on Saturday with officers executing a search warrant at a Vineyard home at 2am on Sunday where they allegedly seized several items including 47 Lego boxes.

A 28-year-old woman and a 48-year-old man faced several charges of larceny, police said.

The pair were granted conditional bail and are both due to face Downing Centre Local Court on February 22.A man has been charged over two attacks on women including pulling a knife on a 16-year-old girl and later raping a woman in Perth's south.

The 47-year-old approached the teenage girl at about 7.55pm on Saturday under a shelter near the Kelmscott train station, produced a knife and forced her to walk with him, police allege.

She broke free and ran to the train station and the man ran away in the opposite direction.

Less than an hour later, police say the man raped a woman in her 20s at a home in Kelmscott.

Sex Assault Squad detectives went to the man's Camillo home in the early hours of Sunday. He was arrested and charged with rape, deprivation of liberty, threats to injure, endanger or harm and burglary.

He will appear in Armadale Magistrates Court on Monday.Cat owners are being urged to vaccinate their pets against a rare and potentially deadly virus outbreak in Melbourne.

The highly-contagious feline panleukopenia virus, commonly referred to as feline distemper, has been confirmed in a handful of stray kittens, and the RSPCA is urging cat owners to keep their pets' vaccinations up to date.

"The virus is not contagious to humans or any other animals, however, it can be spread to other cats through the clothing and shoes of handlers or owners of infected animals," RSPCA Victoria said in a statement on Sunday.Melbourne City has delivered a bitter blow to Brisbane Roar's A-League finals chances with a 2-1 come-from-behind victory.

The Roar had been bumped out of the top six earlier on Sunday by Western Sydney's win over Central Coast.

Massimo Maccarone's opener looked to have put them on course to jump straight back in but they were ultimately overrun by City, who inflicted their seventh loss at home this season in a pulsating clash at Suncorp Stadium.

It leaves Brisbane in seventh place, three points and goal difference behind the Wanderers, who also have a game in hand.

City, meanwhile, have trimmed the gap between themselves and second-placed Newcastle to just four points after a bright performance in their first match without chief goal-scorer Ross McCormack.

Maccarone had a golden chance to make it 2-2 from the penalty spot in the 78th minute after Michael Jakobsen brought down Fahid Ben Khalfallah, but his limp attempt was saved easily by Dean Bouzanis.

The veteran Italian had headed home a free kick from Eric Bautheac to give the Roar a one-goal lead 14 minutes in.

But it lasted only five minutes as City's man of the moment - Daniel Arzani - generated the equaliser.

The 19-year-old dribbled down the centre of the park and threaded an inch-perfect ball through two defenders for Marcin Budzinski, who fired home from close range.

The two sides traded shots on goal for the remainder of the half, with Dario Vidosic having a header cleared off the line by Maccarone and Brett Holman only kept out by Bouzanis's outstretched leg.

The Roar also had what looked a clear penalty denied, with Jack Hingert taken down in the box by a clumsy Osama Malik challenge.

Much to the dismay of the 9150 in attendance, the video assistant referee did not intervene.

A rare error from the in-form Jamie Young opened the door for the visitors to nudge ahead in the 66th minute.

Young came out to collect the ball but mistimed his approach, inviting Budzinski to skip straight past him.

The Polish marquee doubled back and sent in a cross for an on-rushing Stefan Mauk, who did well to time his jump and crane his neck for a neat headed finish.Gold Coast train services will triple during the Commonwealth Games in April, while commuters on the rest of the southeast rail network make do with a "summer-like timetable".

The state government released its transport plan for the April 4 to 15 sporting event on Sunday.

Transport and Main Roads minister Mark Bailey said there would be "adjustments" on most train lines to enable Queensland Rail to cater for increased demand on the Gold Coast.

Trains will run every 15 minutes during peak times, every half-hour during off-peak times and hourly on weekends on most lines.

In comparison, the Gold Coast line will run 24-hours a day, as will the light rail and Games' shuttle buses.

Transport and Main Roads minister Mark Bailey said the event had been scheduled around Easter and the school holidays when there were 21 per cent fewer people using the rail network.

"It will be a summer-like holiday timetable," he said.

The Beenleigh line will be significantly affected, but Mr Bailey denied the government had broken its commitment not to close any rail lines.

"Every station on the Beenleigh line will have a continuous service provided by us throughout the whole Commonwealth Games timetable," he said.

Only a few stations will be serviced by trains, with high-frequency buses to be used at the rest.

Shadow transport minister Steve Minnikin said the transport plan would mean "chaos" for rail commuters in Brisbane and on the Sunshine Coast and questioned why it had taken so long to release.

"It doesn't give people a great deal of time to get their head around it," he said.

But Mr Minnikin failed to say what the LNP would have done differently, except "start planning it earlier".Australia's early childhood educators will walk off the job next month in a fight for better pay, describing their current pay as "measly".

Parents are being asked to keep their children at home on Tuesday, March 27, so educators can send a message to the federal government about how serious they were about the equal pay issue.

The action came after the government failed to meet a February 1 deadline set by their union to deliver funding for equal pay.

"Malcolm Turnbull has driven educators to take this extreme step as he continues to ignore their demand for equal pay," Helen Gibbons, assistant national secretary of United Voice, the early childhood union told reporters in Sydney on Sunday.

Childcare workers were being paid half the average weekly wage, which can no longer be tolerated, she said.

On March 27, some childcare centres will close for the day, others will close at lunchtime, with others closing certain rooms.Twice-daily flights to southeast Asia are set to land in regional Victoria within a year as AirAsia ditches Melbourne's Tullamarine Airport for Geelong.

The Victorian government says an international Avalon Airport terminal will be up and running in 12 months, ferrying hundreds of thousands of passengers to and from Kuala Lumpur.

The project is expected to cost more than $20 million, create 30 construction jobs and about 200 ongoing roles, with up to 50 reserved for ex-car manufacturers.

"We've had our share of bad news in Geelong, with Ford and of course Alcoa and the heavy manufacturing leaving our shores ... which meant we needed to look at alternative employment methods," Tourism Minister John Eren told reporters on Sunday.

The announcement boosted calls for a rail link to Avalon Airport by its owner Linfox Group.

"We need the rail link, but that's natural," Linfox founder Lindsay Fox AC said.

"That was promised by the previous government. They might sort of react from now."

The federal government was backing the Avalon expansion but when asked about a rail link, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said it was "early days".

Over time, Avalon could also host flights to Indonesia and Thailand, AirAsia Group chief executive Tony Fernandes said.Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Opposition Leader Bill Shorten will start Monday on their knees at the traditional church service to open the parliamentary year in Canberra.

The early morning time for reflection will mark a momentary ceasefire before the parliamentary affray returns for 2018.

The two leaders gave major speeches last week, drawing the battle lines on the cost of living issues that both see as a key contest ahead of a federal election later this year or early 2019.

But in parliament, they're likely to trade barbs over the eligibility of MPs on both sides to hold their seats as the citizenship saga drags on.

The formal parliamentary agenda for the first sitting of the year includes laws to crack down on banking executives, the second tranche of company tax cuts, and a raft of welfare changes.

The Senate will welcome Liberal Jim Molan to its benches, replacing the NSW Nationals' Fiona Nash who was disqualified due to her dual citizenship.

Its cross bench will also see some musical chairs as One Nation senator Fraser Anning indicates his resignation from Pauline Hanson's party and intention to sit as an independent, representing rural and regional Queensland, and independent Lucy Gichuhi joins the Liberal Party ranks.

Outside the building, environmental activists will stage a rally against the planned Adani coal mine in Queensland's Galilee basin, complete with a life-sized puppet of Mr Turnbull.Senior politicians will honour the life and achievements of former Hawke government minister Barry Cohen at a memorial service on Monday morning.

The service at Old Parliament House - where Mr Cohen spent all but three years of his more than two decades in parliament - will pay tribute to a man who dedicated his life to serving the community, both in parliament and during his later years through tireless advocacy for finding a cure for Alzheimer's disease.

In 1969, Mr Cohen won the NSW Central Coast seat of Robertson, which had been Liberal for 20 years, and held onto it until his retirement in 1990.

As a young backbencher, he completed an arts degree at the Australian National University.

He went into the shadow ministry in 1977 but was dropped in 1980.

However when Bob Hawke came to power in 1983, Cohen became home affairs and environment minister, then changed to arts, heritage and environment in 1984. He was also minister assisting the prime minister for the Bicentennial in 1988.

His most lasting achievements involved protecting some of Australia's greatest natural wonders. He extended protection to all the Great Barrier Reef and Uluru and had stage two of Kakadu National Park World Heritage-listed.

He was also in great demand as a marginal seat campaigner. In the 1984 election, he campaigned in 31 seats. At the end of the long campaign, he suffered a heart attack.

But after the 1987 campaign, his faction - the NSW Right - dumped him from its ministerial ticket and he went to the back bench for a term before retiring from parliament.

He and his wife Rae ran a commercial wildlife sanctuary at Calga on the Central Coast until 2005.

The family requested in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the World Wildlife Fund.Nick Kyrgios has dismissed a suggestion by Germany that he succumbed to pressure - not injury - in Australia's 3-1 Davis Cup first round loss in Brisbane.

Kyrgios was frustrated by an elbow complaint, copping a point penalty for racquet abuse before crashing in straight sets to world No.5 Alex Zverev to seal the upset tie victory for the visitors on Sunday.

But Germany team captain Michael Kohlmann suggested world No.14 Kyrgios' concerns were more mental than physical after the 6-2 7-6 (7-3) 6-2 loss at Pat Rafter Arena.

Asked if he thought Kyrgios had been affected by expectation to win at home, Kohlmann said: "Of course.

"If you go into a match knowing you had to win otherwise your team loses it is something for sure you are thinking about - 100 per cent."

Australia had to win both reverse singles on Sunday to qualify for April's quarterfinals after Matthew Ebden and John Peers lost the doubles rubber in five sets to Jan-Lennard Struff and Tim Puetz.

However, Kyrgios denied he was feeling any pressure after the doubles loss - just discomfort in his elbow.

"Not really. They left it all out there," he said of Peers and Ebden.

"They didn't play the best match they could have played but they still fought, but came up short - I wasn't thinking about that at all."

Australia team captain Lleyton Hewitt said the injury - not the must win situation - had made it hard for Kyrgios to focus.

"It's not easy, to try and block that out and try and focus on your end of the court," he said of Kyrgios' injury.

"Once you are looking elsewhere it becomes a tougher battle than the one on one battle."

Kohlmann was relieved Australia did not play Kyrgios in the doubles - the rubber he pinpointed as crucial to the tie.

Kyrgios was not considered due to the elbow injury he suffered in his opening straight sets singles win over Struff.

Hewitt claimed Kyrgios remained a future doubles option for Australia - but admitted it was easier said than done.

"It's an option, it all depends on how his body is," he said.

"We can't always bank on Nick going out there and playing three matches.

"You have to work out the best possible way of getting those three wins, in this case (against Germany) it was him not playing doubles."

Kyrgios has played just one doubles rubber for Australia - and lost.

He teamed up with Chris Guccione to suffer Australia's only defeat in their 2013 World Group playoff 4-1 win in Poland.

Since then Australia have had a 5-6 win-loss doubles record but have lost four of their last seven doubles rubbers.

Australia's world No.4 doubles specialist John Peers has had four different partners since his debut in the 2016 World Group first round at Melbourne.A Perth man is in custody after holding his wife and 18-year-old son hostage during a three-hour stand-off with police.

The 47-year-old's wife called police just before 6pm on Sunday, saying her husband was armed with a rifle and acting aggressively.

The man pointed the weapon at officers when they arrived at the Willeton home and a cordon was established, police said.

The man's wife and son were able to leave the house and just before 9pm, the offender surrendered to police. He was arrested and taken to hospital for self-inflicted wounds to his arms.Aussie women are far less likely to consider wolf-whistling and even being hit up for sex as unacceptable, a study on attitudes about sexual harassment suggests.

Two Perth universities have polled 1734 women from 12 countries, finding Australians will accept certain behaviours than others feel crosses the line.

Just 26 per cent of the Australians surveyed believed it was inappropriate for a man to ask them for sex at a social event.

But that's an absolute no-no for Egyptians, with 100 per cent objecting, along with Indonesians (99 per cent), Japanese (97 per cent), and Portuguese women (88 per cent).

And only 25 per cent of Australian women thought wolf-whistling was inappropriate, compared to 98 per cent of Egyptian women.

However Aussie women are less forgiving when it comes to low-level stalking and mysterious gifts arriving in the mail.

The survey showed 64 per cent of Australian women don't appreciate a man showing up at places they're known to visit in the hope of an encounter.

And 74 per cent think it's inappropriate for a man to send them strange parcels.

The Italians were far more liberal there. Just seven per cent didn't like the idea of men popping up as they went about their business and only 23 per cent thought it wasn't right for men to send them things.

Lead author Dr Lorraine Sheridan, from the School of Psychology at Curtin University, says the survey reveals varied perceptions of what constitutes inappropriate behaviour by men.

While the respondents, all female psychology undergraduates, agreed on the most overt inappropriate behaviours, such as forced sexual contact and death threats, there was little consensus about less explicit actions.

Co-author Dr Adrian Scott, from Edith Cowan University, says the results suggest culture may take precedence over personal interpretations when it comes to grey-area behaviours that are not obviously harmful or benign.

It also seems Aussie woman are generally happy for men to buy them a drink, with just 12 per cent objecting to that, compared to 71 per cent of Indonesians.

The study involved women from Australia, Armenia, England, Egypt, Finland, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Portugal, Scotland and Trinidad. It's been published in the journal Aggressive Behaviour.Indian mining group Adani says groups opposed to its Queensland coal mine development are using "vicious personal attacks" to push their agenda.

Chairman Gautam Adani told a forum in New Delhi on Friday resistance to the project in the Galilee Basin has been intense.

"In recent years our project has faced intense resistance abetted by some international NGOs and competitors who have turned to vicious personal attacks and used the press to their advantage," Mr Adani said, according to Indian business news website Livemint.A senior Turnbull minister has accused Opposition Leader Bill Shorten of wasting taxpayers' money because he's scared of facing by-elections in inner-city Melbourne and suburban Brisbane at the same time.

Mr Shorten has called again for a bipartisan approach to the citizenship crisis that continues to engulf parliament, but Finance Minister Mathias Cormann says Labor should just do the right thing and have its members under doubt quit parliament.

"(Mr Shorten) is clearly frightened of having a by-election in Batman and Longman at the same time. He's trying to sequence the by-elections, imposing additional cost on taxpayers," Senator Cormann told ABC TV on Monday.A grandmother has died after being dragged down a hill between a motorhome and a vehicle on the NSW South Coast in what police describe as a "tragic" accident.

It is understood the motorhome - which was towing the vehicle - was parked at a family member's Bega home when it began rolling down a hill with the 62-year-old woman pinned between the two vehicles on Sunday afternoon, police said.

The woman's four-year-old granddaughter was inside the motorhome but was uninjured, however, she was taken to hospital as a precaution.

Despite efforts by police and paramedics, the woman died at the scene, in what local police said was a "tragic incident".The search for a man who was swept out to sea at a beach on Victoria's Mornington Peninsula is set to resume.

Rescue teams spent Sunday looking for the 23-year-old Narre Warren man after he and his two friends got caught in a rip at Portsea back beach about 5.30pm, but the search was called off due to poor light and will continue on Monday morning.

A 22-year-old Cranbourne West man was rescued and flown to Royal Melbourne Hospital where he remains in a stable condition, while a 23-year-old Cranbourne man was also rescued but did not require treatment.Queensland's education minister says it's time to review the impact NAPLAN testing is having on teaching and learning.

Grace Grace says that after ten years, the federal government must review the annual testing regime, which examines the literacy and numeracy skills of students in years three, five, seven and nine.

"I want to make sure that teachers have time to teach the full curriculum, the right information is used for the right purposes, and any unintended consequences are recognised and addressed," the minister has told The Courier-Mail.Japan's Peace Boat has sailed into Sydney Harbour carrying survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings as well as descendants of Aboriginal survivors of the 1950s Maralinga nuclear testing, to advocate for nuclear disarmament.

The 11-storey vessel is visiting Sydney as part of its 'Making Waves' tour, which is exploring the devastating humanitarian consequences of the use and testing of nuclear weapons.

Survivors from the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster were also onboard.

"The world is closer to nuclear war today than it has been in decades," Greenpeace Australia Pacific Campaigner Alix Foster Vander Elst said in a statement.

The Peace Boat, welcomed by the Maritime Union of Australia and Uranium Free NSW, entered the harbour at 7am on Monday.

Later in the day, a rally will be held outside official government offices, urging the Australian and Japanese governments to sign the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

The Japanese survivors and Indigenous survivors of the 1950s British nuclear weapons testing at Maralinga in South Australia will address the midday rally at the Australian Government offices and the Japanese Consulate-General.Environmentalists are opposed to the Adani coal mine, fearing it will impact the already struggling Great Barrier Reef

Embattled Indian miner Adani's plans for a massive coal project in Australia has been dealt another blow after the government confirmed Sunday it would not fund a rail link to the facility.

The development of the controversial US$16 billion Carmichael mine near the Great Barrier Reef is set to be one of the world's largest. But it has been delayed by several years amid regulatory and legal hurdles.

While a lease was granted in 2016, Adani is still seeking to secure funding for the first stage of a Aus$1 billion (US$790 million) government loan for a vital 189-kilometre (117-mile) rail line linking the mine to a port.

But government frontbencher Karen Andrews said such a loan would not be forthcoming from Canberra amid opposition from the state government.

"For there to be money available through NAIF (Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund), that will require the support of the Queensland (state) Labor government," Liberal MP Andrews told Sky News Australia.

"They are not going to provide that, so the advice that I've been given from the resources minister is that the financing will not proceed."

The Queensland Labor government campaigned against the rail loan last year in state elections.

Andrews said she was hopeful the project would still go ahead, adding that the mine "is actually very, very important for employment and jobs in the northern part of Australia".

Several global banks have already said they would avoid the project amid a growing shift away from investing in fossil fuels.

There was no immediate comment from Adani Australia.

Adani last year cancelled a conditional Aus$2 billion contract with mining services giant Downer to develop and run the mine, saying it would manage the mine on its own to keep costs down.

The mega mine is opposed by environmentalists, who claim it will harm the World Heritage-list Barrier Reef -- already threatened by climate change -- off Australia's northeastern coast.

The Indian conglomerate forecasts it will produce 60 million tonnes of thermal coal a year for export and estimates it will generate 10,000 direct and indirect jobs.Waymo, the former Google car unit whose CEO John Krafcik is seen in a 2017 picture, is seeking at least $1 billion in a lawsuit against Uber alleging theft of self-driving technology trade secrets, with the trial set to open Monday

A billion-dollar trial pitting Alphabet-owned autonomous driving unit Waymo against Uber starts Monday, in what could be a blockbuster case between two technology giants over alleged theft of trade secrets.

The San Francisco courtroom battle will take place as Waymo and Uber race to perfect self-driving cars that people could summon for rides as desired in a turn away from car ownership.

The list of witnesses who might be called to testify includes ousted Uber chief Travis Kalanick as well as Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

The trial stems from a lawsuit filed last year by Waymo -- previously known as the Google car unit -- which claimed former manager Anthony Levandowski took a trove of technical data with him when he left to launch a competing venture that went on to become Otto and was later acquired by Uber.

Levandowski is expected to be called to the stand at trial before federal judge William Alsup.

Uber last year confirmed that it fired Levandowski just ahead of a date set by a judge for the San Francisco-based ridesharing titan to return files taken from Waymo.

- 'Unjust enrichment' -

Anthony Levandowski, who is alleged to have taken documents from Google before moving to Uber, is expected to be a key witness at a San Francisco trial over trade secrets

Waymo's lawsuit contends that Levandowski in December 2015 downloaded thousands of files from a highly confidential design server to a laptop and took the data with him to the startup.

During hearings last year, the judge said that Waymo "supplied a compelling record that Levandowski pilfered over 14,000 files from Waymo," and that Uber knew or should have known about the theft.

A key, however, will be for Waymo to prove to jurors that any swiped secrets actually made it to Uber.

Alsup begrudgingly delayed the start of trial twice, most recently to look into whether Uber connived to hide evidence.

Waymo argues in the lawsuit that a "calculated theft" of its technology netted Otto a buyout of more than $500 million and enabled Uber to revive a stalled self-driving car program.

The Alphabet unit is seeking damages of at least $1 billion.

Levandowski, a co-founder of Otto, headed Uber's efforts to develop self-driving technology for personal driving, delivery and trucking.

Waymo will need to convince jurors that data taken was actually trade secrets; that Uber used or disclosed what it learned, and that the ride-sharing company was "unjustly enriched" as a result.

The eight supposed trade secrets at issue in the trial have not been revealed in court.

Waymo is set to begin calling witnesses on Monday after both sides present opening remarks to the four-woman, six-man jury. The trial is expected to take about three weeks.

- Shifting gears -

Uber co-founder Travis Kalanick may testify in a trial over trade secrets even though he is no longer leading the ridesharing giant

The courtroom drama is playing out as Uber's new chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi strives to get the company on course and prepare for a stock market debut in 2019.

Khosrowshahi's stated goal is to shift Uber to a responsible course after a period of market traction at any price.

Even as Uber has seen unprecedented growth by expanding to dozens of countries, it has been hurt by missteps including allegations of executive misconduct, a toxic work atmosphere and potentially unethical competitive practices.

Japanese telecommunications giant SoftBank in January finished buying a 15 percent stake in Uber. The investment is part of an effort by Uber to move past a series of scandals, reform its board structure and diminish the role of Uber co-founder Kalanick.

Meanwhile, Waymo is striving for a lead in autonomous ridesharing, which involves major automakers, technology developers and services such as Uber and Lyft.

Waymo recently announced it was ordering "thousands" of vehicles from Fiat Chrysler for the expansion of its autonomous ride-hailing service across several US cities.Maryann Borden looks over her yard at Twin Creek, which she says is not the same since Nestle began pumping water in the region

Global food conglomerate Nestle is in a battle with critics in tiny Osceola Township, Michigan where residents complain the Swiss company's water extraction techniques are ruining the environment.

Maryann Borden, a retired teacher who has lived in the western Michigan town since 1953, has photos documenting changes in the Twin Creek river since Nestle began pumping water in the region in the early 2000s for its "Ice Mountain" brand of bottled water.

"It's not the same creek," Borden, 73, told AFP. "It's narrower and deeper and therefore warmer," compared with the "biting cold" water of her youth.

"The trout can't survive in it because the water is warmer," she added.

Located about four hours north of Detroit and with a population of just 900, Osceola Township is a sleepy rural community whose biggest employer is SpringHill Camp, a Christian-oriented program for kids.

The town opposes granting Nestle a permit to build a pumping booster station along a water pipeline that feeds a tanker load dock in Evart, another small town nearby.

The booster station would help the company pump more water from a controversial Osceola County wellhead if the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality approves the project. Nestle wants to pump 400 gallons of water a minute, up from the 250 a minute currently.

Town officials voted in January to appeal a county court's ruling in Nestle's favor, portending a judicial saga.

"If you look at the culverts, they provide an historic landmark," said Tim Ladd, manager of Osceola Township.

Area residents say water extraction techniques of the Nestle Waters bottling facility in Stanwood, Michigan, have damaged the environment

"You don't have to be a geologist or a hydrologist to see those water levels," he added. "The water lake tables are lower today than what they were two years ago."

Nestle rejects this argument and also has some backing among supporters who praise the company for keeping water rates low.

"There's been no measurable changes to the streams, the aquatic life there," said Arlene Anderson-Vincent, natural resource manager at Nestle Waters North America, who notes that dams in the area "can affect those streams."

Nestle points to company-sponsored research that backs up its stance, but there has been no independent scientific review of the matter.

- $200 a year -

Much of the anger in Osceola Township, that voted heavily for President Donald Trump in the 2016 US election, is due to a sense the town is being exploited by a powerful multinational blinded by profit.

Demand for bottled water, such as these stacks at Nestle's facility in Stanwood, Michigan, is rising

Nestle pays just $200 a year to the state of Michigan to pump more than 130 million gallons (590 million liters) of water.

Other US states have struck similar arrangements with big companies, authorizing them to pump as much water as they wish for a pittance as long as they build the infrastructure themselves. This includes the beverage giants Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, which sell water under the Dasani and Aquafina brands.

"Nestle has a reputation worldwide of going to poor rural communities, offering all kinds of economic benefits to the community that never really materialize, and taking as much water as they can get and when the stream runs dry they leave," said Peggy Case, president of the Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation.

Nestle said it spends $18 million a year in Michigan, including $2.4 million in taxes in 2016. The company employs 280 people at its factory in Mecosta County, about 40 minutes away from Osceola Township where about 50 Nestle workers live.

Nestle is turning to Twin Creek River as demand for bottled water rises. Wholesale bottled water sales hit a total of $16.4 billion in 2016, surpassing soda sales of $12.5 billion for the first time, according to the Beverage Marketing consultancy.

Nestle's water brands in the US, which includes Poland Springs and Pure Life in addition to Ice Mountain, garnered 55.3 percent of the company's total worldwide water sales in 2016.

- Affordable water? -

Zackary Szakacs, city manager of Evart, credited Nestle with keeping water rates low in the region. The average income in Osceola Township is just $20,000 per year, around the poverty level for a family of three.

"Thank God we have two of those wells in the city of Evart because I would have to lay people off," Szakacs said.

"They help maintain and keep our water rates low so our residents that are poor that live in this community can afford to pay their monthly water bill."

After finding the chemical perchlorate at some wells in 2015, Nestle financed the cleanup.

Evart is only a couple of hours drive from Flint, where a major water contamination scandal has drawn national attention.

Access to affordable drinking water is becoming more problematic, and as many as 36 percent of US households may be unable to afford water within five years, according to a 2017 study by Michigan State University scholar Elizabeth Mack.Greek Cypriots arrive to cast their vote at a polling station in the capital Nicosia in the first round of the east Mediterranean island's presidential election on January 28, 2018

Cyprus votes Sunday in a tight presidential run-off, with incumbent Nicos Anastasiades and his leftist challenger sparring over who is best placed to reunify the island and boost a fragile economic recovery.

In a first round on January 28, conservative Anastasiades garnered 35.5 percent of the ballots, while communist-backed opponent Stavros Malas picked up 30 percent.

The head-to-head showdown Sunday is a rerun of the 2013 vote that saw Anastasiades cruise into office in the European Union's most easterly member.

But, with last week's losing candidates refusing to back either hopeful, this time around it looks set to be closer as the former lawyer seeks a second and final five-year term.

"Anastasiades still appears to have the advantage but there are many question marks with regards to how the voters will go," analyst Christophoros Christophorou told AFP.

As always, the nearly 44-year division of the eastern Mediterranean island between the Greek-majority Republic of Cyprus and a Turkish-backed statelet looms large.

Anastasiades, 71, has pledged fresh talks with Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci despite the acrimonious collapse last July of UN-backed negotiations that cames closer than ever to sealing a deal.

Dovish former health minister Malas, 50, is one of the loudest proponents for finally reunifying the island and has slammed his opponent for not doing enough to reach an agreement.

The first-round success of the candidates seen as most keen on a deal has sparked hope that progress can be made.

Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades (C) stands next to his wife Andri (R) as he addresses the media after casting his vote in the first round of the Cypriot presidential election on January 28, 2018

But there remain major obstacles, including over the future of some 40,000 Turkish troops in the north, and deep scepticism that Nicosia or a nationalist government in Ankara are willing to compromise.

"The wider political framework in which this president comes to power is not conducive for a settlement," said University of Nicosia professor Hubert Faustmann.

- Economic battle -

This time around the economy has been a dominant issue for the roughly 550,000-strong Greek Cypriot electorate as the island recovers from a 2013 financial crisis.

Anastasiades has claimed credit for an impressive recovery since agreeing a harsh 10-billion euro (more than $12-billion) bailout just weeks after taking power.

But major challenges remain despite record tourist numbers.

The economy is still smaller than before 2013, employment remains around 11 percent and banks are awash with bad loans.

Communist-backed Cypriot presidential candidate Stavros Malas arrives to cast his ballot at a first round of voting on January 28, 2018

AKEL -- the communist party backing Malas -- was in charge ahead of the crisis and is widely held responsible for tanking the economy.

Anastasiades has seized on this and warned Friday of a "return to the dogmatic policies that led us to the brink of bankruptcy".

After a lacklustre race, apathy appears high as no candidate has captured the imagination of voters -- especially young Greek Cypriots.

There was a record low turnout of just over 71 percent in the first round.

Polls open at 0500 GMT and close at 1600 GMT. Results and the inauguration of the next president are expected Sunday evening.Cyprus remains cut in two and a barrier of barbed wire and military posts leaves the capital Nicosia as the world's last divided city

Cyprus holds a tight presidential run-off Sunday, with incumbent Nicos Anastasiades facing leftist challenger Stavros Malas.

Here are five things to know about the popular Mediterranean holiday destination that has been divided for almost 44 years:

- Aphrodite and empires -

Nestled in the eastern Mediterranean, Cyprus is the mythical birthplace of the Greek goddess of love Aphrodite, who legend has it rose out of the foam near the ancient town of Paphos.

The island's strategic location at the crossroads between east and west has made it a target for a succession of empires from the Assyrians and early Greek settlers to the British.

It was given by Roman general Mark Anthony to his Egyptian lover Cleopatra and used by England's King Richard the Lionheart as a staging post during the Crusades before he sold it to the Knights Templar.

For 300 years, it was part of the Ottoman Empire before the British took control in 1878. After an insurgency by fighters seeking union with Greece, the British eventually granted Cyprus independence in 1960.

- Divided island -

Cyprus has been divided since 1974 when Turkish troops invaded and occupied the northern third of the island in response to a coup sponsored by the military junta then ruling Greece.

Ankara's intervention followed a decade of intercommunal tension and violence between the Greek majority and the Turkish minority and the deployment of UN peacekeepers. The division saw some 200,000 people forced from their homes.

Almost 44 years later, Cyprus remains cut in two and a barrier of barbed wire and military posts leaves the capital Nicosia as the world's last divided city.

In the south is the internationally recognised Greek-majority Republic of Cyprus that became an EU member in 2004. In the north is the breakaway Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus recognised only by Ankara.

In July 2017, talks came closer than ever to reuniting the island but collapsed before the finishing line, over issues that included the future of tens of thousands of Turkish troops in the north.

- British bases -

Cyprus is home to the two British Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia that house key military and air force installations.

The areas were established under the treaties that saw Britain grant Cyprus independence, as London sought to maintain a strategic foothold in the region.

The bases have served as intelligence-gathering hubs and a launch pad for British air operations as part of a US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq.

- Holiday destination -

With its year-round sunshine, sandy beaches and crystal-clear waters, prized as the cleanest in the EU, Cyprus has long been a tourist destination.

Before the island's division, the international jet set graced the beaches of Famagusta. Sophia Loren owned a house there, and it was a favourite of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.

The city's Varosha district is now an abandoned and fenced-off ghost town.

But the rest of the island is enjoying a tourist boom.

In 2017, with traditional rivals Egypt, Turkey and Tunisia facing instability, Cyprus smashed records as an estimated 3.5 million tourists flocked to the island.

Britain makes up the biggest market, followed by Russia, Israel and Germany.

- Economic crisis -

The flow of tourists has helped Cyprus recover from a 2013 financial crisis when it was forced to take a stringent 10-billion-euro bailout package to save its crumbling economy and insolvent banks.

The government imposed harsh austerity measures including a haircut on deposits of over 100,000 euros ($120,000) in its biggest bank.

In the wake of the crisis, Cyprus says it has cleaned up its banking system and tightened controls over a sector that was long seen as a haven for cash from Eastern Europe.

Cyprus has stepped up a passports-for-investment scheme, and the government is also looking to cash in on offshore oil and gas deposits.Smoking out corruption at Eskom, Africa's biggest electricity company

The name of Eskom, Africa's largest electricity company, has become synonymous with the worst corruption scandals in South Africa and the utility could well become the final nail in the political coffin of President Jacob Zuma.

The sacking of yet another of its short-lived CEOs this week and the release of dire financial results confirmed the depth of the crisis plaguing the power utility.

Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba admitted Eskom represents the single worst crisis facing the government.

"Eskom is the biggest risk," Gigaba said. "There would be no currency, and no economy for the country if Eskom went belly up."

Parliament in South Africa has for months been probing Eskom over so-called "state capture" -- alleged corruption at South African state institutions.

A damning report published a year ago by the then-ombudswoman Thuli Madonsela first laid bare misconduct at Eskom, a state-owned monopoly founded in 1923.

Thuli Madonsela was the first to report on misconduct at Eskom

Madonsela detailed how the Gupta business family, who are close friends of Zuma, allegedly arranged the 2015 appointment of Brian Molefe as Eskom chief to line up lucrative contracts to syphon off cash.

Officials and former workers appearing before a parliament hearing in recent weeks have made startling revelations of how Eskom executives helped the Gupta family benefit from favourable deals.

Whistle-blower Mosilo Mothepu, who worked for a company advising on the deals, told the parliamentary committee that Eskom was identified as a "cash cow" by the Guptas.

- Dodgy deals? -

In one case, Eskom paid more than $49-million to a Gupta-owned mining firm Tegeta to help it buy a coal mine from Glencore. The Guptas would then sell the coal to Eskom.

Former Eskom chairman Zola Tsotsi told lawmakers how one of the Gupta's three brothers, Tony, summoned him to a meeting and threatened him with dismissal because he was not "helping" them.

"Tony told me 'Chairman, you are not helping us with anything. We are the ones who put you in the position you are in. We are the ones who can take you out!'" he said.

Alleged corruption leads point to Zuma & friends

Respected former finance minister Pravin Gordhan, who was abruptly sacked by Zuma last March, sharply rebuked former Eskom executives appearing before the committee.

"You brought Eskom to its knees, the biggest utility in Africa," Gordhan told the utility's former chief financial officer Anoj Singh.

All implicated executives have pleaded innocence.

"There are hundreds of decisions taken at Eskom that the CEO will not know about or know the details of," said Molefe.

- Risk to national economy -

Opposition Democratic Alliance's MP Natasha Mazzone drew parallels between the denials and "omerta" -- the mafia's code of silence.

But Lynn Brown, a close ally of Zuma and minister in charge of state enterprises, denies that she covered up governance and financial irregularities at Eskom.

"We are not at that point yet that we can prove that people have done things wrong," Brown told MPs.

Eskom's woes started in 2007 with the highly unpopular power shortages that plunged many neighbourhoods into darkness on a nightly basis.

Outages have been sharply reduced, but credit rating agencies have repeatedly downgraded the power utility over its financial and liquidity problems.

Now the new head of the ruling ANC party, Cyril Ramaphosa, has moved in to overhaul Eskom -- as well as ease President Zuma out of office.

In his first major move, Ramaphosa has already appointed a new board and ordered them to sack corrupt executives.

"We are determined to address the damage that has been done to this institution," Ramaphosa said in a statement released on the presidential website.

Rescuing Eskom will not be easy, even after Ramaphosa replaces Zuma as expected.

Its annual financial results, released on January 30, showed profits plummeted 34 percent and the firm is heavily indebted to the tune of over 300 billion rand ($250 million).The political crisis in the Maldives has deepened, with its top court pitted against the president

The Maldivian Supreme Court dealt another blow to beleaguered President Abdulla Yameen Sunday, asking him to comply with its order to release political prisoners and reinstate dissident lawmakers.

The government had expressed "concerns" over the judicial order and resisted complying with it, but the court said there can be no excuses.

Dissidents must be released because their trials were politically motivated and flawed, the Supreme Court said in a statement.

"There is nothing preventing the prosecutor general from seeking a re-trial after the order has been implemented (and prisoners released)," it added.

Thursday's order to restore the seats of 12 government MPs who defected to the opposition would effectively reduce Yameen's party to a minority and expose him to the risk of impeachment.

Police detained two opposition lawmakers who returned to the country Sunday as the political crisis in the Indian Ocean archipelago nation deepened with its top court pitted against the president.

The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) said its MPs tried to stage a meeting in defiance of a weekend order suspending parliament, but they were pushed back by armed troops.

Security forces have been deployed inside the national parliament -- known as the People's Majlis -- since March last year when Yameen ordered them to evict dissident lawmakers.

- 'Unconstitutional and illegal' -

The government has so far refused to comply with the shock court ruling, resisting international pressure

The president's crackdown on dissent has tarnished the Maldives' image as an upmarket holiday paradise and sparked calls from the United Nations and several countries to restore the rule of law in the fledgling democracy.

But the Yameen government has so far refused to comply with the shock ruling, resisting international pressure.

In a national television address on Sunday, Attorney General Mohamed Anil remained defiant.

"Any Supreme Court order to arrest the president would be unconstitutional and illegal," Anil said. "So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order."

Yameen also sacked two police chiefs after the court's decision.

Atul Keshap, the US ambassador to Sri Lanka and the Maldives, led international criticism of the Yameen government's refusal to respect court orders.

"What security risk prevents the #Maldives #Majlis from meeting tomorrow? Why are MPs pepper sprayed in the streets and arrested on arrival at airport?" he tweeted Sunday.

- Political pressure -

Former president Mohamed Nasheed described the government's refusal to obey the Supreme Court as a "coup"

Former president and current opposition leader Mohamed Nasheed described the government's refusal to obey the Supreme Court as a "coup".

Nasheed, who was controversially convicted of a terrorism charge and jailed for 13 years in 2015, urged police and troops to uphold the constitution.

"Statements made today by AG Anil... to disobey SC orders is tantamount to a coup. They, and President Yameen must resign immediately," he tweeted on Sunday.

"Security services must uphold the constitution and serve the Maldivian people."

Nasheed, the country's first democratically elected leader, was toppled in 2012. He was barred from contesting elections after his 2015 terrorism conviction, which was internationally criticised as politically motivated.

He has been in exile since 2016, when he left on prison leave for medical treatment. He is currently in Colombo, meeting Maldivian dissidents based in Sri Lanka.

The MDP -- which is led by Nasheed -- has expressed fears that any move by the government to resist the Supreme Court's order may trigger unrest in the nation of 340,000 Sunni Muslims.The Pentagon's Nuclear Posture Review has called for submarines to be armed with low-yield nuclear cruise missiles

China said Sunday it is "firmly opposed" to the United States' new nuclear weapons policy statement, describing its speculation about Chinese intentions as "wild guesses".

The US Defense Department's Nuclear Posture Review released Friday outlines the Pentagon's nuclear ambitions under President Donald Trump, while spelling out how it foresees nuclear threats in the coming decades.

Although the review largely focuses on Russia, several sections are dedicated to the lack of transparency in China's nuclear buildup.

The report says China has added new types of nuclear capabilities -- ranging from a mobile intercontinental ballistic missile to a new ballistic missile submarine -- "with little to no transparency into its intentions".

The report makes "wild guesses" about China's intentions and exaggerates the threat of its nuclear force, defence ministry spokesman Ren Guoqiang said in a statement.

China is "firmly opposed to this", Ren said.

China "has always kept its own nuclear forces at the minimum level required by national security", Ren said, pointing out that the US has the world's largest nuclear arsenal.

"We hope that the United States will abandon its Cold War mentality," Ren said.

Since taking office in 2012 President Xi Jinping has pushed for a muscular China, including calls last October to develop a "world-class" military by 2050.

China's neighbours have watched warily as the People's Liberation Army has upgraded its arsenal with increasingly sophisticated weaponry and sought to create a more effective and professional fighting force.

Upgrades to its nuclear arsenal have received less attention, partly because of its small size, estimated by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute at just 270 warheads compared to 6,800 for the US.

China has also long maintained it will never allow first use of its atomic weapons.

China "always abides by the principle of no first use of nuclear weapons under any circumstances", Ren said, and will "unconditionally not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states."

The US military wants to revamp its nuclear arsenal and develop new low-yield atomic weapons, largely in response to Russian actions in recent years, the Pentagon said.

Moscow on Saturday denounced the "bellicose" and "anti-Russian" nature of the new US nuclear policy, warning it would take necessary measures to ensure its own security.Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif says the United States' new nuclear policy brings humanity "closer to annihilation"

The United States' new nuclear policy brings humanity "closer to annihilation", Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has said.

His comments late Saturday came a day after the Pentagon revealed plans to revamp its nuclear arsenal, largely in response to a perceived renewed threat from Russia.

Zarif said the new policy was "in violation" of the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

"The US Nuclear Posture Review reflects greater reliance on nukes in violation of the #NPT, bringing humankind closer to annihilation," Zarif said on Twitter.

Zarif said the same impulse was driving the United States to undermine the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, which President Donald Trump has demanded be renegotiated.

"Trump's obduracy in killing the #JCPOA stems from the same dangerous imprudence," Zarif wrote, using the technical name for the nuclear deal.

The latest Nuclear Posture Review published by the Pentagon called for a larger arsenal of smaller, low-yield nuclear weapons to act as a more "credible" deterrent to threats, particularly from Russia.

The NPT, which came into force in 1970 and has been signed by almost all countries including the United States, calls on nations "to achieve at the earliest possible date the cessation of the nuclear arms race and to undertake measures in the direction of nuclear disarmament".

President Hassan Rouhani took a similar line in a speech on Sunday, saying it showed US hypocrisy in opposing Iran's missile programme.

"You see the kind of insolent language Americans are using with Russia, threatening them with new nuclear weapons," Rouhani said in the televised speech.

"How can they then say this is a time of peace, brotherhood and coexistence, and we don't need defensive power? We will always be in need of a defensive power."

Iran's nuclear deal, reached with six world powers, lifted some international sanctions in exchange for curbs to its nuclear programme.

But Trump has consistently attacked the accord and said in January he would not continue to waive sanctions unless new restrictions were placed on Iran's missile programme and wider actions in the Middle East.

The other parties -- Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China -- as well as the European Union have strongly defended the deal, saying it has achieved its aim of limiting Iran's ability to build a nuclear weapon.A Myanmar soldier walking near the 'no man's land' area on the Myanmar-Bangladesh border, as seen from Bangladesh's Bandarban district

A Bangladeshi farmer lost both legs when he stepped on a landmine reportedly planted by Myanmar security forces in a buffer zone between the two countries, officials said Sunday.

The incident happened near the southern Bangladesh border town of Naikhongchari on Saturday when Badiur Rahman crossed into the zone.

"His cow strayed inside the Myanmar border in no-man's land. He accidently stepped on a mine when he went there to fetch the cow," said Sarwar Kamal, a local government administrator.

The 45-year-old was rushed to a local clinic and later moved to hospital in the southern port city of Chittagong.

"His condition is very critical," said Marjia Khatun, a nurse.

Bangladesh border officials accuse Myanmar security forces of planting mines along border areas.

Border Guard Bangladesh commander Anwarul Azim said the area where Saturday's incident happened was unfenced and grazing cows very often strayed across.

"The Myanmar army planted those mines a while ago. Rahman accidentally stepped on one of those and lost both his legs," he told AFP.

Myanmar troops have been accused of waging an ethnic cleansing campaign against the country's Rohingya Muslim minority, nearly 700,000 of whom have fled to Bangladesh since last August.

Rights activists say the mines are aimed at preventing the refugees from returning to their villages.

"By planting these mines, the Myanmar army is trying to ensure that the Rohingya refugees would never try to return home," said Bangladeshi rights activist Nur Khan Liton.

"They don't care whether they are breaching international law," Liton said, adding that such acts were "crimes against humanity".

Since the violence erupted on August 25, several Rohingya have been killed in landmine explosions in no man's land.International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach said the decision by the top sport's court to lift life doping bans on 28 Russian athletes came as a complete surprise to the IOC

A decision by sport's top court to lift life bans for doping of 28 Russian athletes was "extremely disappointing and surprising", IOC chief Thomas Bach said Sunday.

He said that the ruling came as a complete surprise to the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

"We would never have expected this," Bach told a press conference in Pyeongchang just five days ahead of the opening of the Winter Olympic Games.

The IOC's disciplinary commission banned 43 Russian athletes for life and disqualified all Russians from competing at the Pyeongchang Games over a state-sponsored doping conspiracy.

It later ruled that 169 athletes who had proved they were clean would be allowed to compete.

The Court of Arbitration for Sport on Thursday upheld the appeals of the 28 Russians against the Olympic life bans, ruling there was "insufficient" evidence that the athletes had benefited from the doping system at the 2014 Winter Games, hosted by Russia.

Bach said that Olympic officials had asked CAS for an explanation for their ruling and had been told no full accounting would be released until the end of February.

The Games in South Korea end on February 25.

He said the IOC knew only what had been released by CAS in a press statement and this was "extremely unsatisfactory given the gravity of the cases".

"We feel that this decision shows the urgent need for reforms in the internal structure of CAS," he added.

On Saturday, the IOC said that 13 of the 28 athletes cleared by CAS would be considered by a special IOC panel for a possible invitation to take part in the Pyeongchang Olympics.

But Bach said: "The absence of sanctions by CAS does not mean that you are entitled to receive an invitation from the IOC because receiving this invitation is a privilege of clean Russian athletes."Migrants are increasingly trying to reach Europe by making the dangerous sea crossing between north Africa and southern mainland Spain

Moroccan rescue services have recovered the bodies of around 20 migrants in the Mediterranean, a spokeswoman for the Spanish enclave of Melilla said Sunday.

The bodies of the migrants, from sub-Saharan Africa, were spotted Saturday by a Spanish ship, which alerted the rescue services of both countries, the spokeswoman said.

She added that "about 20" bodies were then recovered in Moroccan territorial waters. Moroccan authorities have yet to issue a figure.

Late Saturday, a Spanish police patrol boat found one more body, which was taken to Melilla, a Spanish enclave bordering Morocco.

Migrants are increasingly favouring the so-called western Mediterranean route to reach Europe, which involves making the sea crossing between north Africa and southern mainland Spain.

According to the International Organization for Migration, Spain has been the second most popular point of entry for migrants coming to Europe so far this year, with 1,279 arrivals, after Italy with 4,256.

It said 243 people have died or are missing in the Mediterranean after trying to cross the Mediterranean this year, not including those recovered this weekend.

Spain was last year the third point of entry for Europe-bound migrants, after Italy and Greece. Arrivals by sea tripled in 2017 compared to the previous year, reaching a total of 22,900 migrants, according to the EU border agency Frontex.A picture taken from the outskirts of the Palestinian city of Nablus shows a view of the Jewish settlement outpost of Havat Gilad on February 2, 2018

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said ministers would grant formal authorisation Sunday to a rogue West Bank settlement in response to the murder last month of a rabbi who lived there.

"The government will today regularise the status of Havat Gilad to allow the continuance of normal life there," he said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting, referring to the wildcat settlement in the occupied West Bank.

The official cabinet agenda says ministers will hear a motion to designate the 15-year-old outpost as a "new community" which will have the necessary building permits and a state budget.

Some 50 families live in the outpost.

Rabbi Raziel Shevah was shot dead near Havat Gilad, where he lived, on January 9.

The following week, Israeli troops searching for his attackers shot dead what they described as a Palestinian suspect in the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank, about 35 kilometres (22 miles) north of Havat Gilad.

They did not, however, catch the man considered to have led the attack on Shevah, 22-year-old Ahmed Jarrar.

The manhunt continued on Saturday with a raid on the village of Burqin. In clashes that erupted there, soldiers shot dead a teenager identified by the Palestinian health ministry as Ahmad Abu Obeid, 19.

At Shevah's funeral, there were calls for "revenge" during a speech by Education Minister Naftali Bennett of the far-right Jewish Home party.

Bennett responded by saying that the only revenge should be in building more settlements, and Netanyahu said Sunday that was one of the planks of his policy.

"Anyone who thinks that through the abominable murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, they would break our spirits... is making a bitter mistake," he said.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and major obstacles to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

But Israel differentiates between settlements it has approved and those it has not.

Those without approval are referred to as outposts and tend to be populated by hardline religious nationalists who see the entire West Bank as part of Israel.A picture taken from the outskirts of the Palestinian city of Nablus shows a view of the Jewish settlement outpost of Havat Gilad on February 2, 2018

Israel's cabinet voted Sunday to formally authorise a rogue West Bank settlement in response to last month's murder of a rabbi who lived there, officials said, in a rare move likely to spark an international outcry.

The vote came as European nations voiced growing concern over settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territory, but with US President Donald Trump largely refraining from such criticism, which many Israelis see as a green light.

Israeli authorities have advanced plans for thousands of new settlement homes in recent months, although cabinet votes to authorise a pre-existing outpost are relatively rare.

Sunday's vote to authorise the Havat Gilad outpost was unanimous, an official familiar with the proceedings said on condition of anonymity.

Speaking at the start of the meeting, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "the government will today regularise the status of Havat Gilad to allow the continuance of normal life there".

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chairs the weekly cabinet meeting at his Jerusalem office on February 4, 2018

The official cabinet agenda said the motion would designate the 15-year-old outpost as a "new community" which will have the necessary building permits and a state budget.

The agenda said about 40 families live in the outpost, but envisages its enlargement.

Israeli media, however, said it was unclear how the authorisation would proceed, as parts of the outpost may have to be moved elsewhere if found to have been built on private Palestinian land.

Rabbi Raziel Shevach was shot dead near Havat Gilad, where he lived, on January 9.

The following week, Israeli troops searching for his attackers shot dead what they described as a Palestinian suspect in the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank, about 35 kilometres (22 miles) north of Havat Gilad.

However, they did not catch the man suspected of being responsible for Shevach's killing, 22-year-old Ahmed Jarrar.

The manhunt continued on Saturday with a raid on the West Bank village of Burqin, near Nablus, sparking clashes during which soldiers shot dead a teenager identified by the Palestinian health ministry as Ahmad Abu Obeid, 19.

A Palestinian protester confronts an Israeli soldier during in the Palestinian village of Burqin in the northern West Bank on February 3, 2018

"Yesterday our forces were again in action in an effort to apprehend the last of the assassins and their accomplices in the murder of Rabbi Shevach," Netanyahu told cabinet ministers and media.

"We will not rest until we bring them to justice. And we shall bring them all to justice."

Roger Kuby, Shevach's father-in-law, told AFP the government move was "a small consolation, but an important gesture".

- 'Revenge' -

Mourners at Shevach's funeral interrupted a speech by Education Minister Naftali Bennett of the far-right Jewish Home party with calls for "revenge".

Bennett responded by saying that the only revenge should be in building more settlements, and Netanyahu said Sunday that was one of the planks of his policy.

"Anyone who thinks that through the abominable murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, they would break our spirits and weaken us is making a bitter mistake," he said.

Settlement watchdog Peace Now, however, said that retroactively granting legal status to Havat Gilad, built without development plans or construction permits, was "cynical exploitation" of Shevach's death.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and a major obstacle to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

But Israel differentiates between settlements it has approved and those it has not.

Those without approval are referred to as outposts and tend to be populated by hardline religious nationalists who see the entire West Bank as part of Israel.

Map locating Havat Gilad in the West Bank

Past attempts by Israeli authorities to dismantle Havat Gilad have led to clashes with settlers there.

Israel has several times given retroactive approval to outposts, and last year work began on the first completely new government-sanctioned settlement built in the Palestinian territories in quarter of a century.

Israel faced sharp criticism from the administration of former US president Barack Obama over settlement construction, but that has not been the case with Trump's White House. Israeli officials have sought to take advantage of this.

Trump's declaration of Jerusalem as Israel's capital on December 6 was also hailed by Israelis, while deeply angering the Palestinians who also see the city as their capital.

European officials and UN bodies have maintained their strong opposition to settlement building as well as the long-standing consensus that the status of Jerusalem must be negotiated.Syrian Kurds march in Afrin on February 4, 2018 to denounce Turkey's military operation against Kurdish YPG forces

Thousands protested in Syria's Afrin Sunday as local authorities called on world powers to intervene to halt a Turkish-led assault, accusing Russia of complicity in civilian deaths in the region.

Ankara and allied rebels launched operation "Olive Branch" on January 20 against the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), which Turkey has blacklisted as "terrorists".

Afrin's local administration -- the semi-autonomous government in place since 2013 -- shot back the accusation on Sunday and urged Moscow to take a firm stand.

"We ask the Russian Federation in particular to rescind its support for the Turkish state's terrorism against the people of Afrin," it said in a statement.

"It bears responsibility for the massacres the fascist Turkish state is carrying out against innocent civilians."

Russia, which intervened militarily in Syria's war in 2015, had troops positioned in Afrin but withdrew them as Turkey launched the assault.

The YPG and Afrin officials say that withdrawal amounted to tacit approval of the Turkish offensive.

Officials on Sunday also called for the United States, European Union, United Nations Security Council and the US-led coalition fighting jihadists to "immediately intervene to stop Turkey's aggression".

Syrian Kurds protesting in the northern Syrian city of Afrin on February 4, 2018 denounce Turkey's military operation against Kurdish YPG forces

Ankara says it launched the operation to protect its southern border and insists that it is doing everything it can to avoid civilian casualties.

But the campaign has sparked mass protests, including in Afrin on Sunday.

Thousands of people marched to the sound of drums through central Afrin, holding YPG flags and posters of Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

Turkey is vehemently opposed to the YPG because of its ties to the PKK, which has waged a three-decade insurgency against Turkish forces.

"We're holding the whole world responsible because we fought terrorism on behalf of everyone, but today the world agreed to kill Syrians," said Ali Mahmoud, 45.

Men, women and children thronged main roads in central Afrin for Sunday's demonstration, many chanting slogans.

"We will not bow our heads to (Turkish President Recep Tayyip) Erdogan, we are not afraid of him and will never fear him," said one protester, Amina Mohammed.

Some demonstrators clutched olive branches, a symbol of Afrin which is known for its abundant olive groves but which are also now associated with the name Turkey gave its offensive.

"They named their attack 'Olive Branch'. It's a thorn in their hand, but in our hands, it's a gun," said Fikrat Afdal, 33.

At least 68 civilians, including 21 children, have died in Turkish shelling as part of the assault, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

More than 100 pro-Ankara rebels and a similar number of YPG fighters have also died, the British-based monitor says.The man made a fascist salute and shouted 'Viva Italia'

A far-right supporter suspected of wounding six Africans in a shooting spree in central Italy said the "trigger" for his attacks was the murder of an Italian woman, allegedly by a Nigerian asylum seeker, according to media reports Sunday.

Luca Traini was arrested and taken into custody after drive-by attacks in the town of Macerata wounded five men and one woman from Ghana, Mali and Nigeria on Saturday.

It came a day after a Nigerian asylum-seeker and drug dealer was arrested in the same town for the murder of an 18-year-old woman, whose dismembered body was discovered in suitcases.

"I was driving to the gym when I heard on the radio about the 18-year-old girl," daily newspaper Corriere della Sera quoted him as telling investigators.

"Instinctively I turned around, I went home, I opened the safe and took the pistol and decided to kill them all."

After the shootings, Traini, 28, allegedly got out of his car, made a fascist salute with a tricolour Italian flag draped over his shoulders and shouted "Viva Italia", or "Long Live Italy", and "Italy for Italians", media reports said.

Police who raided his mother's home found far-right literature, including a copy of Adolf Hitler's manifesto "Mein Kampf" and a book by fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.

Interior Minister Marco Minniti said the attack was part of a culture "of right-wing extremism with clear reference to fascism and Nazism" and deplored that the sole link between the victims was "the colour of their skin".

He said the "criminal act" was prompted by "racial hatred" and had been prepared in advance.

- Terror spree -

The man allegedly opened fire in eight areas in the town and also targeted the office of the centre-left Democratic Party in a two-hour terror spree in the sleepy town of 43,000 people, press reports said.

One victim was seriously injured in the thorax, the reports said. The other five had lesser injuries.

The black Alfa Romeo of the suspect was blocked by police

A Nigerian man who was shot in the thigh while buying cigarettes on the street, telling a television channel from his hospital bed that he was in great pain, adding: "It's very serious."

Traini is a member of the far-right anti-immigration Northern League party and had run in local elections last year.

Media reports said police found a gun in the man's vehicle, a black Alfa Romeo.

"Someone who shoots is a delinquent, irrespective of the colour of his skin," said Northern league chief Matteo Salvini, ahead of legislative elections on March 4.

"I'm in a hurry to be in government to bring back security, social justice and serenity to Italy," he said.

- 'Hate will not divide us' -

Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni meanwhile made a pitch for unity after Saturday's incident, saying: "Hate and violence will not divide us."

Italians head to the polls in national elections next month, with immigration shaping up to be a key issue.

The country is a favoured landing point on Europe's southern coastline for migrants making the perilous journey across the Mediterranean, often aboard unseaworthy boats, to enter the continent.

But 2017 was a turning point for Italy: the country went from large-scale arrivals in the first six months to a sharp drop-off, thanks to controversial agreement between the EU and Libya.

Some 119,000 people landed in Italy last year, down 35 percent on 2016.

The Northern League is part of a populist coalition tipped to do well in the elections.

According to opinion polls, the alliance between ex-prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right Forza Italia (Go Italy), the post-fascist Fratelli d'Italia (Italian Brothers) and the Northern League leads with more than 35 percent ahead of the March 4 vote.African migrants demonstrate on January 22, 2018 in Herzliya against Israel's policy to forcibly deport African refugees and asylum seekers

Israel began warning thousands of African migrants Sunday that they must leave by the end of March, officials said, under a plan that could see them jailed if they refuse.

On January 3, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced implementation of a plan to deport about 38,000 migrants who had entered the country illegally, mainly Eritreans and Sudanese.

The controversial plan gives them until the end of next month to leave voluntarily or face jail and eventual expulsion.

Immigration authority spokeswoman Sabine Haddad told AFP that officials began issuing migrants letters on Sunday advising them that they had 60 days in which to leave the country voluntarily.

For now, the notices are being given only to men without families, officials said.

Israeli newspaper Haaretz said "anyone recognised as a victim of slavery or human trafficking, and those who had requested asylum by the end of 2017 but haven't gotten a response" would also be exempt for now.

It added that this left the number subject to near-term deportation at "between 15,000 and 20,000 people".

The authority is offering those who agree to leave a grant of $3,500, a flight ticket and help with obtaining travel documents.

Should they not leave by the deadline, the grant would be reduced and "enforcement measures" would be taken against them and anyone employing them, the authority says.

Israel refers to the tens of thousands of African migrants who entered the country illegally from neighbouring Egypt as "infiltrators".

Israeli officials tacitly recognise that it is too dangerous to return Sudanese and Eritreans to their troubled homelands, but local media say the notices do not specify where departing migrants would be sent.

Aid workers and media have named Uganda and Rwanda, although both countries deny being a destination for migrants being expelled involuntarily.

Public opposition to the plan has been slow to build, but some Israeli airline pilots have reportedly said they will not fly forced deportees.

Academics have published a petition and Israeli Holocaust survivors wrote an open letter to Netanyahu last month pleading with him to reconsider.

The UN refugee agency has called on Israel to scrap the plan, calling it incoherent and unsafe.

A 2016 UN commission of inquiry into Eritrea's regime found "widespread and systematic" crimes against humanity, and said an estimated 5,000 people flee the country each month.

The International Criminal Court has indicted Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir on charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide linked to his regime's counter-insurgency tactics in the Darfur conflict.Des forces speciales maliennes sont deployees a Bamako, le 20 juin 2017, apres un attentat.

At least four civilians have been killed in a suspected jihadist attack in northern Mali over the weekend, local officials said Sunday.

An unknown number of the attackers were also killed in fighting as the "suspected jihadists killed at least four civilians around Talataye," a northeastern town of around 14,000 people, regionals official told AFP.

Mali's deteriorating security situation is of growing concern as Al-Qaeda-linked groups mount increasingly deadly attacks on domestic and foreign forces.

In the Talataye area the jihadists often target an Azawad group, the traditionally nomadic Tuareg people of the desert, who they consider too close to a pro-governmental armed group, another elected local official said.

Civilians considered too close to the Azawad group are, in turn, considered legitimate targets, he added.

According to a Mali security source, the assailants took hostages during Friday's attacks, and killed at least one of them on Saturday.

On Sunday tension remained high in and around Talataye, a foreign security source told AFP.

Friday's attack came after Mali's army decided to ban the use of scooters and pick-up trucks in some areas to boost their fight against armed jihadist groups.

Such vehicles are often used by Islamist fighters, in the north and the centre of the country.

The ban applies to a dozen "circles" in the central regions of Segou and Mopti and northwest Timbuktu region.

"Humanitarian convoys, and all other convoys, must receive authorisation from the local military command in order to receive an escort," the army said, adding that anyone failing to do so would be considered a "military target".

In late January, 14 soldiers were killed and 18 more wounded in an attack on their camp in Mali's restive north.

That attack in Soumpi, in the Timbuktu region, came two days after 26 civilians including mothers and babies were killed when their vehicle ran over a landmine in Boni, central Mali, according to a UN death toll.

Islamic extremists linked to Al-Qaeda took control of the desert north of Mali in early 2012, but were largely driven out in a French-led military operation launched in January 2013.

In June 2015, Mali's government signed a peace agreement with coalitions of non-jihadist armed groups. But Islamist insurgents remain active, and large tracts of the country are lawless.

"Humanitarian convoys, and all other convoys, must receive authorisation from the local military command in order to receive an escort," the army said, adding that anyone failing to do so would be considered a "military target".An Iraqi man looks at a list of the country's 60 most wanted people, including members of the Islamic State group, published by the Iraqi security services on February 4, 2018

Iraqi security services on Sunday published the names of 60 people wanted on suspicion of belonging to the Islamic State group, Al-Qaeda or the Baath Party of late dictator Saddam Hussein.

The list, seen by AFP, includes the name of Saddam's daughter Raghad, who lives in Jordan.

It also features 28 suspected IS jihadists, 12 from Al-Qaeda and 20 Baathists, giving details of the roles they allegedly play in their organisations, crimes of which they are suspected and in most cases, photographs.

All are Iraqis apart from Maan Bashour, a Lebanese man accused of recruiting fellow citizens to fight in Iraq.

"It's an old story that dates back to the American invasion of Iraq when we were partisans of the Iraqi resistance," Bashour told AFP. "Yes, we carried out activities against the American occupation."

The name of elusive IS head Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is absent from the list. A senior security official contacted by AFP declined to explain why.

"These are the terrorists most wanted by the judicial authorities and the security services," the official said. "This is the first time we publish these names which, until now were secret."

The IS fighters the document lists are accused of fighting in Iraq's second city Mosul and the surrounding province of Nineveh, as well as in the provinces of Kirkuk, Diyala and Anbar.

IS seized a third of Iraq's territory during a lightning advance in 2014, before being beaten back by security forces backed by a United States-led coalition.

IS fighters on the list seen by AFP on Sunday are accused of murders, bombings, attacks on security forces, and the financing and transport of weapons.

The list includes senior members of the group, among them Fawaz Mohammad Mutlaq, a former officer in Saddam's Fedayeen paramilitary organisation who later became a member of IS's military council.A derailed Amtrak car seen up the tracks near a crossing after an early morning collision with a CSX freight train in Cayce, South Carolina

Two Amtrak employees were killed and more than 100 other people were injured early Sunday when a passenger train carrying 147 people hit a freight train in the US state of South Carolina, authorities said.

Amtrak train 91 -- traveling from New York to Miami -- derailed in Cayce, outside the state capital Columbia, after colliding with a CSX freight train at around 2:30 am (0730 GMT).

It was the third deadly incident involving an Amtrak train since December, raising questions about the safety of the national railway service.

Amtrak said in a statement that the lead engine derailed along with some passenger cars. Eight crew members and 139 passengers were on board.

A total of 116 people were taken to area hospitals for treatment, many with minor injuries, Governor Henry McMaster told reporters. US media reported injuries ranged from cuts and bruises to broken bones.

McMaster identified the dead as Amtrak personnel and said the freight train, which was stationary, appeared to have been empty.

"It appears the Amtrak train was on the wrong track," the governor said, while cautioning that a full investigation was needed to determine the exact cause.

"We need a conversation around the country" about rail safety, he added, after visiting passengers at a shelter set up in a school by the local Red Cross.

"As you and your loved ones gather at church and other houses of worship today, we ask that you pray for those affected and the families of those who have passed away," he said on Twitter.

- 'Nobody was panicking' -

US President Donald Trump, who was in Florida for the weekend, was briefed and was receiving updates, a White House spokeswoman said.

The president tweeted that his "thoughts and prayers are with all of the victims involved in this mornings train collision in South Carolina."

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said it was investigating the incident. CSX said its personnel were on site to assist law enforcement.

Fatal train crash in the US

The Lexington County Sheriff's Department confirmed all passengers had been evacuated.

Officials added that although 5,000 gallons of fuel spilled following the crash, the leak was contained and there was no danger to the public.

"The incident is very near the state farmers' market and other residential areas, but right now everyone is safe," said Derrec Becker, public information officer at the South Carolina Emergency Management Division.

Passenger Derek Pettaway told CNN he was traveling south from Philadelphia to Orlando in a sleeper cabin when he was jarred awake by the impact of the crash.

"Nobody was panicking," he said. "I'm pretty sure everybody was asleep and I think people were in shock."

Pettaway said Amtrak staff evacuated passengers in a "really calm fashion."

- Questions over safety -

The Lexington County sheriff later said four buses had been made available to take Amtrak passengers to their final destinations.

"My prayers are with the families of those killed in the train crash in Lexington County this morning, and hoping for the best for all those injured. South Carolina is with you all!" tweeted Tim Scott, one of the state's two US senators.

Congressman Joe Wilson called the incident "heartbreaking."

It came just days after an Amtrak train carrying several dozen Republican lawmakers including House Speaker Paul Ryan hit a garbage truck in Virginia, killing one person and causing six others, including a congressman, to require hospital treatment.

In December, three people were killed when an Amtrak passenger train derailed in Washington state near the city of Tacoma, sending cars flying off a bridge and onto a busy interstate highway.

Preliminary information from an event data recorder in the rear locomotive showed that train, in its maiden trip on a new route, was speeding at 80 miles (128 kilometers) per hour in a 30 mph zone.

bur-ska-ia-mdo/bbkDick Durbin, the number two Senate Democrat, warned President Donald Trump against using a Republican memo as a pretext to firing top law enforcement officials

Democrats on Sunday cautioned President Donald Trump that firing top law enforcement officials over the investigation into his campaign's links to Russia could spark a dangerous "confrontation," as Republican lawmakers broke ranks to say the probe should go on unhindered.

The warnings came two days after the Republican-led House intelligence committee released a declassified memo that claims Democrat-funded research prompted the FBI to spy on a former Trump campaign aide, Carter Page.

Democrats stoutly resisted the memo's release, saying it was "deliberately misleading" and possibly intended to lay the groundwork for Trump to fire senior officials and subvert the Russia election meddling investigation led by Robert Mueller.

In a sign of an emerging split in the president's party, four Republican members of the intelligence committee -- Representatives Trey Gowdy, Chris Stewart, Will Hurd and Brad Wenstrup -- said Sunday that the memo should not be allowed to undermine Mueller's investigation.

Dick Durbin, the number two Senate Democrat, warned on Sunday that any move by Trump against senior law enforcement officials involved in the inquiry could have grave consequences.

"The question at that moment is whether or not the majority Republicans in the House and the Senate will stand up for the rule of law and the Constitution if the president takes that extreme position," Durbin said on CNN's "State of the Union."

"If the president takes this extreme action, I'm afraid that it could lead to a confrontation we do not need in America."

Durbin contested the suggestion that the FBI's application to a special court for authority to surveil Page failed to note that the request was based partly on a dossier funded by Democrats.

The senior Democrat on the intelligence committee, Representative Adam Schiff, insisted Sunday that "the court was notified there was a political actor involved."

- 'No obstruction' -

"The goal here is to undermine the FBI, discredit the FBI, discredit the Mueller investigation, do the president's bidding," Schiff said on ABC's "This Week." He said it was "very possible" committee Republicans had "coordinated the whole effort with the White House."

Schiff has said he wants a committee vote soon to release his own secret memo responding to the Republicans' document.

Trump tweeted Saturday that the memo "vindicated" his insistence that there was "no collusion and there was no obstruction." He said leaders of the FBI and Justice Department had acted in a "disgraceful" fashion.

But four Republicans on the committee took pains on Sunday to show support for Mueller, deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein and FBI chief Christopher Wray at a time the FBI and Justice Department are facing almost unprecedented criticism from a US president.

"I've had my differences with Rod Rosenstein, and I still think that he is fully capable of helping run a Justice Department that we can all have confidence in," said Gowdy, who also chairs the House Oversight Committee, on CBS's "Face the Nation."

Stewart told "Fox News Sunday," "I think it would be a mistake for anyone to suggest the special counsel should not continue his work."

Hurd, in turn, told ABC: "I want to stress Bob Mueller should be allowed to turn over every rock, pursue every lead so we can have trust knowing what Russia did or didn't do."

Former CIA director Leon Panetta also defended the work of US law enforcement and intelligence agencies, telling Fox that "when intelligence starts to be used on a partisan basis to score political points, I think that really undermines the way the intelligence committee is supposed to function."

Panetta, a Democrat who also served as defense secretary under President Barack Obama, said it would be "a big mistake" if Trump moved to fire Rosenstein or Mueller.

"If he tries to go after them and tries to somehow appear to be obstructing the process... he's going to hurt himself, he's going to hurt the presidency, but more importantly, he's going to hurt the country."The United States and Argentina are to work together more closely to cut off Lebanese Hezbollah's funding networks in Latin America, both nations' top diplomats said Sunday.

Argentina has a large Lebanese expatriate population and US authorities suspect groups within it of raising funds through organized crime to support the Iranian-backed armed movement.

US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was in Buenos Aires for talks with his Argentinian counterpart Foreign Minister Jorge Faurie, and afterwards they confirmed that the issue had come up.

US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson (L) is in Buenos Aires for talks with his Argentinian counterpart Foreign Minister Jorge Faurie (R), with both agreeing to work more closely to cut off Hezbollah funding networks

Tillerson and Faurie shake hands after giving joint news conference in Buenos Aires

'With respect to Hezbollah, we also did speak today in our discussion about all of the region about how we must all jointly go after these transnational criminal organizations - narcotics trafficking, human trafficking, smuggling, money laundering - because we see the connections to terrorist financing organizations as well,' Tillerson said.

'And we did specifically discuss the presence of Lebanese Hezbollah in this hemisphere, which is raising funds, obviously, to support its terrorist activities.

'So it is something that we jointly agree we need to attack and eliminate,' Tillerson said.

Faurie, standing by Tillerson's side at a joint news conference, agreed, saying that South America had become a 'zone of peace' and that outside groups must not be allowed to jeopardize this.

Supporters of Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah display Hezbollah and Lebanese flags as they listen to him via screen on the 11th anniversary of the end of Hezbollah's 2006 war with Israel, in the southern village of Khiam on August 13, 2017

'And, as Secretary Tillerson said, we need to intensify every possible exchange not only in terms of dialogue but also in terms of information on the actions of these groups which take advantage of transnational crime to foster their interests, which Argentina certainly does not agree with,' he said.

In 1992, the violence of the Middle East erupted in Argentina, when bombers attacked the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires, killing 29 people. Two years later, an attack on a Jewish community center in the city left 85 dead.

None of the bombers were ever convicted, but international investigators followed a trail that appears to link them to Hezbollah - a group which Washington has designated a terrorist organization - and to senior Iranian officials.

The bombings did not continue, but US experts believe that Hezbollah, working under close Iranian supervision, has built a fund-raising network in Latin America that profits from drug smuggling to fund its political and military activities.A picture taken on January 29, 2018 shows destruction around the Udai hospital following airstrikes by government forces on the town of Saraqeb in Syria's northwestern province of Idlib

Five people were treated for "suffocation" Sunday after Syrian regime air strikes on the northwestern town of Saraqeb, a monitor said, adding that 10 civilians were killed in southern Idlib province.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported a "foul smell after regime helicopters struck several areas of the town in Idlib province, causing five civilians to suffer from suffocation".

It quoted residents and medical sources as saying "toxic gas" was used in the attack, without elaborating.

Syrian regime air strikes also killed six civilians in the town of Kafr Nabi, near Maaret al Numan in the southern countryside of Idlib province, the Observatory said.

Four other civilians were killed in regime bombing on Maaret al Numan and Maasarin.

The Observatory also said that "airplanes believed to be Russian hit the main hospital in Maaret al Numan causing damage".

The facility shut down until repairs could be carried out, the war monitor said.

The latest developments come as the United States this week accused the Syrian regime of using chemical weapons on opposition forces near the capital Damascus.

The Syrian foreign ministry denied the accusations as "lies".

US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis told reporters on Friday his government was concerned sarin gas may have been recently used in Syria, citing reports from NGOs and rebel groups.

These reports said toxic gas has been used.

Mattis however said the United States has no proof to support these accusations.

Last month, 21 people were treated for respiratory problems after rockets were fired on the rebel bastion of Eastern Ghouta outside Damascus.MOSCOW (AP) - Tens of thousands of Russians have gathered in rallies across the country to express patriotic unity and support for Russian athletes in the upcoming Winter Olympics.

Police said 60,000 people attended Saturday's rally at Moscow's Vasilyevsky Spusk, an area adjacent to Red Square. Similar gatherings of hundreds or thousands were held in other cities.

The rallies were organized by the government-initiated Civic Chamber and marked the 75th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi forces in the Battle of Stalingrad, a key World War II turning-point and a wellspring of national pride.

Wearing Olympic uniforms with the logo OAR - Olympic Athlete from Russia, Russian short track speed skaters Pavel Sitnikova, right, chats with Ekaterina Efremenkova during a training session prior to the 2018 Winter Olympics in Gangneung, South Korea, Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

The gatherings also come amid resentment of Russian athletes being required to compete in IOC-imposed neutral uniforms in the Pyeongchang Olympics after doping scandals. Some participants in the Moscow rally held signs reading "Athletes without a flag -- athletes without a motherland."LAS VEGAS (AP) - Wynn Resorts has hired a law firm to help investigate sexual misconduct allegations against casino mogul Steve Wynn, the company's chairman and CEO.

A statement by Los Angeles-based law firm O'Melveny & Myers LLP says it will assist the Wynn board's special committee of independent directors with the inquiry.

The statement released Friday says investigators will set up a phone and web-based reporting line for current and former Wynn employees to provide information.

FILE - This March 15, 2016, file photo, shows casino mogul Steve Wynn at a news conference in Medford, Mass. The University of Pennsylvania has announced plans to distance itself from casino mogul Wynn and comedian Bill Cosby in the wake of sexual misconduct allegations against both men. The college on Thursday, Feb. 1, 2018, said it will revoke Wynn's honorary degree and remove his name from both an outdoor plaza and a scholarship fund. The school will also rescind Cosby's honorary degree. The school says it has been a century since it took away an honorary degree but that "credible" allegations against the men warranted the action. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File)

The Wall Street Journal reported Jan. 26 that a number of women said Wynn harassed or assaulted them and that one case led to a $7.5 million settlement.

The Las Vegas billionaire has vehemently denied the allegations, which he attributed to a campaign led by his ex-wife.

He also faces investigations by gambling regulators in two states.SAN DIEGO (AP) - The U.S. Navy on Saturday commissioned its newest warship, the USS Omaha, a futuristic, $440 million vessel named for the Nebraska hometown of billionaire Warren Buffett, who was on hand for the ceremony.

The Omaha, a 218-foot-long littoral combat ship, was commissioned at its new home port in San Diego.

Buffett's daughter, Susie Buffett, who was designated as the ship's sponsor, gave the traditional order for officers and crew: "Man our ship and bring her to life."

In this Jan. 3, 2018, photo released by the U.S. Navy, a Naval Station vessel, right, prepares to assist the future USS Omaha (LCS 12), a 218-foot-long littoral combat ship, pier side during a brief fuel stop in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The Omaha was conducting a change of homeport to San Diego, Calif. (Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class John Philip Wagner, Jr./U.S. Navy via AP)

"Aye, aye, ma'am," they replied and ran to the ship as a band struck up "Anchors Aweigh."

The aluminum-clad Omaha is designed for missions close to shore. It has high-tech computer capabilities and can be reconfigured for various missions, including anti-submarine warfare and anti-mine operations.

"She is a beautiful ship," said Cmdr. Michael Toth, the commanding officer. "To be at her helm is more akin to flying an aircraft with a pilot and a co-pilot than to conning a traditional warship."

Other dignitaries at the ceremony included Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts, Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert and former Nebraska Gov. and U.S. Sen. Bob Kerrey, a Navy veteran and Medal of Honor winner.

"I am proud to share our name, our heritage and our community values with USS Omaha and its commander, and we wish you safety on your missions," Stothert said.

Ricketts, whose state is landlocked, issued what he said was a unique honor in designating the entire crew collectively as "an admiral in the great Navy of the state of Nebraska."

The ship is the fourth to carry the Omaha name since 1869. The last vessel was an attack submarine that was decommissioned in 1995.

"She represents the strength and the fortitude of her city and her state," U.S. Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer said at the ceremony. "This ship is ready to deliver the fight tonight."FAIRBANKS, Alaska (AP) - More than two dozen mushers and their packs of dogs began a long, frigid race through Alaska's wilderness, aiming to be the first to reach the finish line in Whitehorse in Canada's northern Yukon Territory.

The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reports that the dog teams started the 1,000-mile (1,600-kilometer) Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race on Saturday in downtown Fairbanks.

Newcomer Tim Pappas led the pack out of the city for the 35th running after drawing bib No. 1 on Thursday.

Jennifer Campeau, a rookie from Rocky Mountain House, Alberta, leaves the starting gate of the Yukon Quest sled dog race in downtown Fairbanks, Alaska, Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018. (Robin Wood//Fairbanks Daily News-Miner via AP)

The first section of the race takes the teams along the Chena River for several miles until the trail diverges to the northeast to reach the Two Rivers Checkpoint.

The race lasts until the last team crosses the finish line, which typically takes between 10 and 16 days.

___

Information from: Fairbanks (Alaska) Daily News-Miner, http://www.newsminer.com

A haze hangs around spectators on the Chena River as teams left Fairbanks, Alaska, during the start of the Yukon Quest sled dog race Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018. (Robin Wood/Fairbanks Daily News-Miner via AP)

Dogs wait for the start of the Yukon Quest sled dog race Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Fairbanks, Alaska. (Robin Wood/Fairbanks Daily News-Miner via AP)

Dogs from Luc Tweddell's team wait in a dog box before the start of the Yukon Quest sled dog race Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Fairbanks, Alaska. (Robin Wood/Fairbanks Daily News-Miner via AP)DALLAS (AP) - Jamie Benn had good company on the Dallas Stars' top line on Saturday night.

Benn and Tyler Seguin each had a goal and an assist during a four-goal second period and Seguin added another assist in the third, and Alexander Radulov provided a goal and an assist as Dallas beat the Minnesota Wild 6-1.

"The line was good, and Radulov was exceptional," Dallas coach Ken Hitchcock said. "His hunt on the puck and his hound on the puck and the strength on the puck. He was a reckless player today in a good way."

Dallas Stars forward Mattias Janmark (13) celebrates tipping a shot past Minnesota Wild goaltender Alex Stalock (32) during the second period of an NHL hockey game Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Dallas. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)

Seguin has 25 goals, and Benn and Radulov 21 each.

"I can't say that our line was the best line tonight," Seguin said. "I thought it was as close to a whole team effort as you're going to get.

Dallas increased its lead for the Western Conference's first wild card to three points. Minnesota missed a chance to move a point ahead of the Stars.

"We could have leapt over them," Wild coach Bruce Boudreau said. "It's depressing, but you can't let it get you down."

After a scoreless first period, Mattias Janmark and Benn scored on the power play, Seguin scored on an assist from Benn, and Stephen Johns added an unassisted goal. Radulov and Dan Hamhuis scored in the third period for the Stars, and Kari Lehtonen stopped 30 shots to win his fourth straight.

"He's been a starter for most of his life," Hitchcock said of Lehtonen, now a backup to Ben Bishop. "He thinks like a starter, acts like a starter."

Jason Zucker spoiled Lehtonen's shutout bid at 5:40 of the third period. Alex Stalock stopped 25 of the 29 shots he faced through the first two periods, and Devan Dubnyk gave up two goals on nine shots in the third.

In an evenly played first period, neither team had a goal or a penalty as the Wild outshot the Stars 10-9.

That all changed midway through the second period, when Minnesota drew the first two penalties and Dallas scored on both power plays sandwiched around the goal by Johns in a span of 4:08.

Zucker went off for high sticking Lehtonen at 7:41 and Janmark deflected John Klingberg's shot from the blue line past Stalock at 8:59.

"I've got to be careful going to the net high like that," Zucker said. "We've got to respond better after a goal, and not let them get another goal so quick."

Johns stole the puck from Nino Niederreiter in the neutral zone, skated in to the right faceoff circle and sent the puck just inside the right goalpost just 48 seconds later.

"You could see that once they got the second goal, everybody was like this with their shoulders slumping," Boudreau said.

Dallas swarmed Minnesota's net on the second power play. Devin Shore's backhand from just to the left of the goal rebounded to Benn on the right for an easy goal at 11:49.

Seguin increased the Stars' sudden lead to 4-0, taking a pass from Benn low in the left circle.

NOTES: Bishop was scratched after being hit in the face by a puck while sitting on the bench during Thursday's game at Arizona. Rookie Landon Bow was recalled from Texas of the AHL to back up Lehtonen. ... Commemorating 25 years in Dallas since moving from Minnesota, the Stars had four players from the 1993-94 team - Paul Cavallini, Russ Courtnall, Dave Gagner and Craig Ludwig - drop ceremonial first pucks. ... Stars LW Antoine Roussel returned after missing two games because of a nasal infection. ... Minnesota was playing back-to-back nights after a 5-2 home win over Vegas on Friday. ... The Wild came in with a seven-game streak of scoring on the power play, during which they had eight goals. At the other end, they have allowed seven goals in their last 10 penalty-killing attempts over the last four games.

UP NEXT

Wild: At St. Louis on Tuesday night.

Stars: Host the New York Rangers on Monday night.

Dallas Stars defenseman Stephen Johns (28) celebrates with fans after scoring a goal during the second period of an NHL hockey game against the Minnesota Wild Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Dallas. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)

Dallas Stars forward Jamie Benn (14) shoots a rebound past Minnesota Wild defenseman Jonas Brodin (25) and goaltender Alex Stalock (32) during the second period of an NHL hockey game Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Dallas. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)

Dallas Stars defenseman Stephen Johns (28) scores a goal on Minnesota Wild goaltender Alex Stalock (32) during the second period of an NHL hockey game Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Dallas. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)

Dallas Stars forward Alexander Radulov (47) and Minnesota Wild forward Joel Eriksson Ek (14) battle for the puck during the first period of an NHL hockey game Saturday, February 3, 2018, in Dallas. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)

Minnesota Wild defenseman Jared Spurgeon (46) battles Dallas Stars forward Jamie Benn (14) for the puck during the first period of an NHL hockey game Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Dallas. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)

Dallas Stars forward Alexander Radulov (47) scores a goal as Minnesota Wild goaltender Devan Dubnyk (40) and defenseman Ryan Suter (20) defend during the third period of an NHL hockey game Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Dallas. Dallas won 6-1. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)

Dallas Stars forward Alexander Radulov, middle, is congratulated by forward Jamie Benn, left, and defenseman Greg Pateryn after scoring a goal against the Minnesota Wild during the third period of an NHL hockey game Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Dallas. Dallas won 6-1. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)

Minnesota Wild forward Jason Zucker (16) celebrates scoring a goal during the third period of an NHL hockey game against the Dallas Stars on Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Dallas. Dallas won 6-1. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade)ISLAMABAD (AP) - The Pakistani Taliban on Sunday claimed responsibility for a suicide attack the day before that killed 11 soldiers and wounded 13 in the Swat Valley.

Authorities say Saturday's attack was the first in over three years in the northwestern region once ruled by militants.

In a statement sent to media, the extremist group said a lone suicide bomber carried out the attack to avenge the killing and arrests of fellow militants. The bomber detonated his explosives vest near an empty lot where soldiers were playing volleyball.

Islamic militants ruled the picturesque Swat Valley from 2007 until a massive military operation routed them in 2009. Pakistan says militants who escaped from Swat and elsewhere are now operating out of the Kunar province in neighboring Afghanistan.

An Afghan official says Pakistani forces shelled Kunar for several hours starting late Saturday, wounding at least four civilians. Faredullah Dehqan, spokesman for the provincial police chief in Kunar, said more than 180 artillery rounds were fired overnight.

There was no immediate comment from Pakistan, and it was not clear if the shelling was linked to Saturday's attack.

Afghanistan and Pakistan frequently accuse each other of failing to crack down on extremists that operate along their porous border. On Friday, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said Pakistan was partly to blame for a wave of recent attacks in Kabul, and that Islamabad was harboring the Afghan Taliban.TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) - Fourth-seeded Timea Babos defeated Kateryna Kozlova 7-5, 6-1 on Sunday to win the Taiwan Open.

After a tight first set, Babos took control with a hard-hitting display to claim her third WTA singles trophy of her career.

After dropping the first set, the 23-year-old Kozlova had a misstep serving at 1-0 in the second set, when she hit two unforced errors and a double fault to be broken right away. Babos pounced, holding serve for a commanding 3-0 lead.

Kozlova won the next game but Babos held to go up 4-1 and broke her opponent again before serving for the win.

Kozlova, contesting her first WTA final, had beaten Babos in their only previous meeting, in the qualifying of the 2015 Qatar Total Open in Doha.

Babos added to previous title runs at the Abierto GNP Seguros in Monterrey in 2012 and the Hungarian Ladies Open in Budapest last year.MALE, Maldives (AP) - The Maldives' attorney general warned the country's Supreme Court on Sunday that a move to unseat the president would be unconstitutional, amid a political crisis that has left the government in chaos since late last week.

Attorney General Mohamed Anil said at a news conference that he had heard "rumors that the Supreme Court is going to order the impeachment" of President Yameen Abdul Gayoom.

He said that the president can be ousted only through a vote in parliament, and that police and security forces would not obey an impeachment order from an "illegitimate set of people."

Maldivian opposition supporters scuffle with security forces officers during a protest demanding the release of political prisoners in Male, Maldives, Friday, Feb. 2, 2018. The exiled former president of the Maldives said Friday that the government must abide by a Supreme Court ruling to free a group of political prisoners, hours after clashes erupted in the Indian Ocean archipelago's capital in the wake of the surprise verdict. (AP Photo/Mohamed Sharuhaan)

Mohammed Nasheed, the Indian Ocean archipelago's exiled former president and Yameen's main rival, responded angrily on Twitter, saying that comments from Anil and other officials were "tantamount to a coup."

"Security services must uphold the constitution and serve the Maldivian people," Nasheed tweeted.

Under Maldivian law, a vote for impeachment removes a president from office.

The crisis, which has included repeated rounds of clashes between police and opposition protesters, began when the Supreme Court ruled Thursday that that all politicians opposed to Yameen, including Nasheed, be released.

As of Sunday, no prisoners had been released. The government said it had been advised by the chief justice to follow due process in releasing the prisoners.

A government statement on Sunday said the prosecutor general had appraised the Supreme Court on the "numerous legal challenges" in the implementation of the ruling.

In an apparent response to the statement, the Supreme Court said in a news release that "there are no obstacles in implementing the ruling and releasing political prisoners and that this has been informed to the Prosecutor General's office."

Nasheed has been living in exile in Britain since 2016 after being given asylum when he traveled there on medical leave from prison.

In addition to ordering the release of the political prisoners, the court also reinstated 12 lawmakers who had been ousted for switching allegiance to the opposition. When those lawmakers return, Yameen's Progressive Party of the Maldives will lose its majority in the 85-member parliament, which can result in the legislative body functioning as a rival power to the president.

On Saturday, police arrested two lawmakers upon their arrival from overseas. Ilham Ahmed and Abler Mohamed were among the 12 who were reinstated by the Supreme Court.

Police did not explain why they were arrested.

Lawmaker Ahmed Mahloof said opposition lawmakers would try to meet in parliament even though the scheduled opening of the sessions for the year has been postponed indefinitely. They plan to submit no-confidence motions against the attorney general, prosecutor general, home minister and defense minister, Mahloof said.

Military personnel surrounded the parliament building in a bid to prevent lawmakers from entering Saturday morning, and they remained stationed there on Sunday.

Speaking publicly for the first time since Thursday's Supreme Court order, Yameen said Saturday that he did not expect the court ruling, but that all relevant authorities of the state need to do "a lot of work to see how to implement it."

"We are working on making sure we can respect the Supreme Court order in a way that doesn't cause any difficulties to the people," he said at a rally in his support organized by his party

He also said that he is ready to hold early presidential election if the opposition wants to test who is popular among the people.

Known for its luxury tourist resorts, the Maldives became a multiparty democracy 10 years ago after decades of autocratic rule by the current president's half brother, Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

But the nation lost much of its democratic gains after Yameen was elected in 2013. He has maintained a tight grip on power, controlling institutions such as the judiciary and the police.

Yameen had been set to run for re-election this year virtually unopposed, with all of his opponents either jailed or exiled.

On Friday, Nasheed, whose conviction for abducting a judge was overturned by the Supreme Court order, said he would mount a fresh challenge for the presidency this year.

Nasheed was sentenced to 13 years in prison after he was convicted of the abduction charge under the Maldives' anti-terror laws in a trial that was widely condemned by international rights groups.PYEONGCHANG, South Korea (AP) - IOC President Thomas Bach has described as "extremely disappointing and surprising" a recent ruling by the Court of Arbitration for Sport that lifted Olympic doping bans for 28 Russian athletes.

Bach, who made the remarks during a press briefing in Pyeongchang on Sunday, said the decision shows an "urgent" need to reform the court's internal structure.

The CAS ruling on Thursday overturned the doping bans on 28 Russian athletes, citing insufficient evidence. Russia said it wants to send 15 of the 28 to Pyeongchang, including gold medal-winning skeleton slider Alexander Tretiakov and cross-country ski gold medalist Alexander Legkov.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Vitaly Mutko speaks during an interview with the Associated Press in Moscow in Moscow, Russia, Friday, Feb. 2, 2018. Mutko says Russian athletes whose doping bans were lifted deserve to be treated as "clean and honest" at the Pyeongchang Olympics. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)

Bach says an independent panel will review and make a recommendation on Russian cases. He says he hopes a final decision on them will be made "in the next couple of days."JERUSALEM (AP) - Israel on Sunday said it plans to legalize an isolated West Bank outpost in response to the murder of one of its residents in a shooting attack last month.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his weekly Cabinet meeting that his government will legalize Havat Gilad to "allow the continuing of normal life there."

"Whoever thought that through the reprehensible murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, that our spirit can be broken and we can be weakened, is making a bitter mistake," Netanyahu said.

Bedouin children attend improvised school class in the village of Abu Nuwar, West Bank, after the Israeli army demolished a two-classroom school in a Bedouin community in the West Bank, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Israel demolished the school on Sunday, saying the EU-funded structure was built illegally without proper permits and that it was in a precarious condition. The school served nearly 30 third and fourth grade students who were moved to a nearby guesthouse and barbershop to continue classes. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)

Last month, Rabbi Raziel Shevah, 35, was shot dead from a passing vehicle as he drove near his home in the unauthorized settlement outpost near the Palestinian city of Nablus. The Israeli military is still searching the area for suspects.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war, areas the Palestinians want for a future state. Israel has established about 120 West Bank settlements, which it considers legal. In addition, about 100 settlement outposts have been erected without official approval but Israel generally tolerates them. Most of the international community considers all Jewish West Bank settlements illegal.

Havat Gilad, a community of a few hundred Israelis, is among these rogue outposts and is located deep inside the West Bank, away from areas Israel expects to keep under any peace deal with the Palestinians. Critics see their expansion as complicating peace efforts.

The anti-settlement group Peace Now called the effort to legalize the outpost a "cynical exploitation of the murder."

Meanwhile, Israel on Sunday demolished a two-classroom school in a Bedouin community in the West Bank, saying the EU-funded structure was built illegally without proper permits and that it was in a precarious condition. The school served nearly 30 third and fourth grade students who were moved to a nearby guesthouse and barbershop to continue classes.

A statement from Cogat, the Israeli defense body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, said the demolition was approved after it had been challenged in Israel's Supreme Court.

The EU delegation to Israel called on the country to "meet its obligations as occupying power vis-a-vis the Palestinian population."

"Children should not be left without classrooms," it said in a statement.

Roberto Valent, an official with the U.N. humanitarian agency OCHA, said he was "deeply concerned" by the demolition. In a statement, he said the Israeli-issued permits were "nearly impossible to obtain" and that demolitions such as Sunday's, among other Israeli policies, "have created a coercive environment that violates the human rights of residents and generates a risk of forcible transfer."

The demolition took place near the settlement of Maaleh Adumim, in the 60 percent of the West Bank known as Area C that remains under full Israeli control. Israel has imposed severe restrictions on Palestinian development in this area, home to dozens of Israeli settlements.

The EU funds the construction of many homes, schools and other structures in the area and says the projects are needed for humanitarian reasons and economic development.

Israel says that any assistance to Palestinians in Area C must be coordinated with authorities.

FILE - In this Jan. 10, 2018 file photo, Israelis pray during the funeral of Raziel Shevah in Havat Gilad, an unauthorized Israeli settlement outpost near the Palestinian city of Nablus. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018, that it will legalize the isolated West Bank outpost in Havat Gilad, in response to the murder of Shevah. The anti-settlement Peace Now group says the effort to legalize the outpost is a "cynical exploitation of the murder." (AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov, File)

Bedouin children attend improvised school class in the village of Abu Nuwar, West Bank, after the Israeli army demolished a two-classroom school in a Bedouin community in the West Bank, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Israel demolished the school on Sunday, saying the EU-funded structure was built illegally without proper permits and that it was in a precarious condition. The school served nearly 30 third and fourth grade students who were moved to a nearby guesthouse and barbershop to continue classes. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)

Bedouin children stand on the rubble of two classrooms destroyed by the Israeli army in the village of Abu Nuwar, West Bank, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Israel demolished the school on Sunday, saying the EU-funded structure was built illegally without proper permits and that it was in a precarious condition. The school served nearly 30 third and fourth grade students who were moved to a nearby guesthouse and barbershop to continue classes. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)MADRID (AP) - Spanish authorities say an unspecified number of migrants have been found dead in waters near the coast of Morocco.

Irene Flores, head of communication for the regional government of Melilla, tells The Associated Press on Sunday that Spain's Civil Guard found the body of one Sub-Saharan man. Flores said there were more bodies found in the water Saturday but they were recovered by Moroccan patrol ships.

Spanish media reports that around 20 bodies were pulled from the sea in all, apparently migrants who drowned when their boat sunk trying to reach Spanish territory.

Each year thousands of migrants attempt to reach Spain by making the dangerous crossing of the Mediterranean Sea or by entering Melilla and Ceuta, Spain's African enclaves, either by land or sea.WASHINGTON (AP) - It's beginning to look as though Congress' election-year battle over immigration could end up in stalemate or a narrowly focused bill, not broader legislation like President Donald Trump has proposed.

The reasons: deep divides between the two parties; internal divisions, particularly among Republicans; and political incentives that might leave each side content with a minimal compromise or even nothing at all.

A look at where things stand:

FILE - In this Sept. 6, 2017 file photo, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., accompanied by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of Calif., left, and others members of the House and Senate Democrats, speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington. It's beginning to look like Congress' election-year battle over immigration could end up in stalemate or a narrowly focused bill. The kind of broader measure that President Donald Trump has proposed is running into trouble. The reasons: Deep gaps between the two parties, internal divisions particularly among Republicans and political incentives that might leave each side content with a minimal compromise or even nothing at all. ( AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Q: How did this start?

A: The struggle began as an attempt to find a bipartisan way to protect some young immigrants from deportation. About 690,000 "Dreamers" are currently shielded by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, created by President Barack Obama to protect people who were brought illegally to the United States as children.

Trump, whose anti-immigrant rhetoric was a keystone of his 2016 campaign, said last year he was ending the program, claiming that Obama exceeded his legal authority to create it. Polls show wide public sympathy for these immigrants. Trump said he wanted to protect them, and he gave Congress until March 5 to find a way to extend the program. A federal judge has blocked Trump's rollback indefinitely, pending a Supreme Court ruling.

Q: What does Trump want to do?

A: He's proposed giving up to 1.8 million people protected by DACA, or potentially eligible for it, a 10- to 12-year path to citizenship. In exchange, he wants $25 billion to construct a wall along the Mexican border and otherwise fortify the border.

He also wants new restrictions that the conservative-leaning Cato Institute estimates could cut legal immigration by one-half million people annually. Legal immigrants could sponsor only spouses and minor children, not siblings, parents and others. A visa lottery for people from diverse countries would end, with its visas redistributed to other programs to slowly reduce their backlogs.

Q: Where is Trump's plan going on Capitol Hill?

A: Nowhere. Democrats hate its cuts in legal immigration and can easily block it in the Senate. They say it would give Trump everything he's sought for border security, leaving Democrats with no chits to trade for future efforts to help millions of other immigrants in the U.S. illegally but not under DACA's protections.

Conservative Republicans despise the idea of letting DACA recipients achieve citizenship. GOP moderates don't like its legal immigration restrictions. His plan would stand virtually no chance of getting the 218 House votes it would need.

Q: Does that mean Congress won't vote on Trump's plan?

A: Not necessarily. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has opened the door to an immigration debate starting Feb. 8, with both parties offering amendments. He's not said what the initial bill will be, and some speculate it could be Trump's proposal or something like it. If it's not, it might be offered as an amendment. Any measure will need 60 votes to pass, which will be difficult.

Q: What other proposals are there?

A: Numerous lawmakers including several bipartisan groups are meeting or have produced alternatives. Nothing's surfaced yet with a clear shot at approval.

Trump rejected a compromise suggested by six Democratic and GOP senators. A deeply conservative bill with tough restrictions on legal immigration so far lacks the votes to win in the GOP-run House, where Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., has little interest in pushing legislation that would lose or lacks Trump's backing.

While Democrats are united over wanting to renew DACA and seek citizenship for those covered by it, they have tactical differences over how to move ahead. Many in the House want to withhold support for must-pass budget legislation until immigration is addressed, while many Democratic senators have no taste for repeating last month's three-day government shutdown over the issue.

Q: Then where does this go?

A: With elections for congressional control just 10 months off, Democrats have no incentive to alienate liberal and minority voters by accepting a deal that limits legal immigration. Many Republicans don't want to enrage conservative backers by allowing what they call "amnesty" by permitting citizenship for "Dreamers."

Trump's recent comments haven't helped bridge that gap. He used last week's State of the Union address to equate immigrants in the U.S. illegally with gangs, drugs and competition for jobs. He angered Democrats by saying, "Americans are dreamers too," a line some likened to "All Lives Matter," a conservative rejoinder to the "Black Lives Matter" movement.

Republicans will need Democratic votes to get anything through the Senate. That seems to leave a less ambitious bill as the most achievable middle ground.

It might focus on a one-year extension of protection for DACA recipients in exchange for a year's worth of money for the wall and border security, about $2 billion or $3 billion. If such a measure could clear the Senate with Trump's support, that would boost its chances in the House.

Q: If not?

A: Gridlock is possible, an outcome the dysfunctional Congress is used to.

Trump believes he can argue his offer was entirely reasonable, ceding Democrats a big victory by making citizenship possible for nearly 2 million immigrants. "Democrats are AWOL" on immigration, he told a GOP gathering. He could try defusing the issue by extending the program beyond the November elections, though that risks irritating conservative voters.

As much as Democrats say they want a bill, they could be willing to take the issue to Election Day and use anger over Trump's halt to the program to drive voters to the polls.PARIS (AP) - He is the silent survivor of the 10-man Islamic State cell that terrorized Paris in November 2015, refusing all pleas to shed light on the attack that killed 130 people in the French capital or the one in Belgium four days after his arrest.

After spending nearly three years jailed in isolation, Salah Abdeslam is set to go on trial Monday in his hometown of Brussels for a police shootout that he himself fled. The man who covered for his getaway with a spray of automatic gunfire died. Abdeslam's escape was short-lived - he was captured on March 18, 2016, in the same neighborhood where he and many of his Islamic State fighter colleagues grew up.

Four days later, Islamic State suicide attackers struck again, this time at the Brussels airport and subway. In all, that sprawling network of IS fighters killed 162 people in the two European capitals. Most of the extremists were French speakers, raised in one of the cities they struck. The plot's execution depended upon Islamic State's success in wedding crime and religion.

FILE - In this Friday Nov. 13, 2015 file photo a victim under a blanket lays dead outside the Bataclan theater in Paris. Salah Abdeslam, the only surviving member of the 10-man Islamic State cell that attacked Paris in November 2015, is going on trial on Monday, Feb. 5, 2018 in Belgium. The trial covers a shootout that led to his capture in March 2016. (AP Photo/Jerome Delay, File)

Abdeslam, who along with his brother was suspected of dealing drugs from the bar they ran, is the starkest example of that convergence. But in Paris, the trial of three men accused of giving safe haven to the attackers also provides a revealing look at the intersection that made possible two of the deadliest terror attacks in Europe since World War II.

The operational commander of the cell was Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a petty criminal who used his home neighborhood of Molenbeek in Brussels as a fertile recruiting ground for IS. Abaaoud even recruited his 14-year-old brother.

But many of the young men who followed him into IS were small-time criminals themselves, part of the extremist organization's deliberate attempt to make use of "skills" that include accessing black market weapons, forging documents and handling covert logistics .

When the night of carnage in Paris - Nov. 13, 2015 - was finally over, seven attackers were dead and three were on the run: Abdeslam, Abaaoud and another Molenbeek native named Chakib Akrouh. Abdeslam called friends in Brussels to drive through the night and pick him up.

Abaaoud also called his cousin, Hasna Ait Belkacem, who lived in a suburb of Paris and vacillated between hard-line Islam and even harder drug use. She was happy to help. She called her dealer. He called another dealer.

It took a few days of sleeping under bushes, but for 150 euros ($187) wired from Belgium, they secured a room in the Paris neighborhood of Saint-Denis, near the national stadium they had attacked on Nov. 13.

In the pre-dawn hours of Nov. 18, frantic French investigators tipped off by a friend of Ait Belkacem tracked them to the building and sealed off the neighborhood.

Abaaoud, Ait Belkacem and Akrouh all died when Akrouh detonated a suicide vest.

Just before his building crumbled to the ground, one of the drug dealers, Jawad Bendaoud, showed up to find out what was happening and explained on live television that he was just "doing a service" by renting out his room. With the cameras still rolling , Bendaoud was taken into custody.

At their trial, fellow dealer Mohammed Soumah explained how he framed the world: Good citizens, delinquents, rapists, and terrorists.

"Me, I don't fit in the terrorist box. I'm a thug, a scumbag," Soumah told the judge. But there he was sitting in the box for terrorism defendants in central Paris alongside Bendaoud.

As for why neither man made the connection between the two Belgians desperate for a hideout amid a massive police manhunt and an outpouring of grief for France's 130 victims, Soumah had another explanation.

"The criminal life goes on," he said.

But the lines between terrorists and criminals are less clear now than ever , said Peter Neumann, director of the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation.

"ISIS is perhaps the first jihadist group that has explicitly targeted this demographic, and they've done it very consciously and especially in Europe," Neumann said. "If you go to Sweden, Norway, Holland, Germany, they will all tell you that 50 percent-plus of the people who have turned up traveling to Syria or involved in domestic plots have previous criminal convictions, often for petty crime."

The attacks often are interwoven as well. On Friday, a Belgian career criminal was transferred into French custody over allegations that he housed the jihadi who attacked the Thalys high-speed train between Brussels and Paris in August 2015.

The suspect, Youssef Siraj, is also believed to have put up some of the Brussels attackers, according to the Belgian news site DH. The same group allegedly is linked to a raid in the Belgian town of Verviers, where authorities say a jihadi cell was on the verge of a coordinated attack against police.

"We are coming to realize that Verviers, Thalys, Nov. 13, the attacks of March 22, it's a large and perhaps single operation of Daesh," Belgian federal prosecutor Frederic Van Leeuw said, using another term for IS. All were bound by ties of crime and extremism.

The jihadi who wired the money to pay Bendaoud and Soumah was himself a petty criminal in Sweden before joining the Islamic State group, a thief who picked up firearms skills during his time in Syria named Mohamed Belkaid. It was also Belkaid who opened fire on Belgian police as they raided Abdeslam's Brussels hideout. He was shot dead in the March 15, 2016, raid.

Abdeslam escaped through a window over the rooftops.

He was traced to a cousin's apartment on March 18, 2016, near his Molenbeek home. Still more members of the cross-border Islamic State cell struck Brussels on March 22, 2016, including the bomb-maker for both attacks. Thirty-two people were killed in Brussels, along with three suicide attackers.

Abdeslam has been imprisoned ever since. His trial will be the first time he is seen in public since his capture.

According to the French network France Inter, Abdeslam stored a message in his computer similar to the farewells written by other jihadis before suicide attacks.

In it, France Inter reported , he explained that his suicide belt malfunctioned in Paris and that, although he dreamed of going to Syria "upon reflection, I concluded that the best thing would be to finish the job with the brothers."TRENTON, N.J. (AP) - New Jersey could soon become the first state to outlaw the sale of menthol cigarettes.

Legislation banning the cigarettes was approved Monday by the state Assembly's Health and Senior Services Committee and now heads to the Appropriations Committee for further consideration. Similar legislation has not yet been introduced in the state Senate.

The measure would amend existing state law by adding menthol-flavored cigarettes to the state's list of prohibited flavored cigarettes. It also would update that list to include clove cigarettes.

A look at the issue:

___

PROPOSED BAN

Democratic Assemblyman Herb Conaway, who is also a physician, is the bill's sponsor.

He argues that menthol cigarettes should have been outlawed in 2009, when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration forced tobacco companies to do away with other flavored brands, partly because of their allure to youths.

Last summer, San Francisco became the first city to approve a ban on menthol cigarettes. The European Union has also implemented a ban that is due to take full effect in May 2020.

___

PROPONENTS

Conaway describes menthol cigarettes as "enemy No. 1" when it comes to lung diseases. The cooling effect of menthol allows smokers to draw more toxic substances into their lungs and hold them there, he said.

"Science supports the fact that it promotes cancer," Conaway said. "That's why the other flavors and cooling agents have been removed."

The lawmaker and others have also argued that marketing for menthol cigarettes targets blacks and low-income communities. They note studies have shown advertisements for menthol cigarettes are more likely to appear in publications with high black readership.

While acknowledging potential revenue losses for businesses and the state, Conway has said that would more than matched by the "gain in lives."

___

OPPONENTS

A group that represents hundreds of food retailers in New Jersey has rallied against the bill, citing the economic impact it would have on convenience stores, small businesses and the state.

The New Jersey Food Council says its members report that menthol cigarettes account for 35 percent to 40 percent of their total sales. They also say convenience stores and other establishments will lose out on ancillary sales - such as sandwiches, snacks and cups of coffee - if customers stop frequenting those businesses because they can't get menthol cigarettes.

The group also warns the state would take a hit in tax revenue.

The legislation does not contain an estimate of how much the state would lose in sales, but Conaway says any revenue loss is more than matched by the "gain in lives."

State officials have estimated that roughly $750 million in tax revenue is generated annually from tobacco sales.

Lawmakers opposed to the bill expressed similar concerns. They also note that smokers seeking menthol cigarettes could simply buy them in neighboring states.

___

MEDICAL COMMUNITY

Medical and public health groups have not taken a public stance so far on the bill but say they are reviewing it and considering its potential impact.

"We support efforts to reduce tobacco use and the availability of deadly tobacco products, as tobacco use remains the leading cause of preventable death," said Marc Kaplan, a spokesman for the American Cancer Society.

The American Cancer Society says on its website that while specific dangers of menthol cigarettes are an active area of research, they are not safer than unflavored cigarettes and could be even more dangerous.

It says the cooling sensation of menthol cigarettes lessens the cough reflex and covers the dry feeling in the throat that smokers often have, and as a result, people who smoke menthol cigarettes can inhale deeper and hold the smoke in longer - something the sponsor, Conaway, noted.TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Tehran's prosecutor-general says a court has sentenced a suspect to six years in prison for relaying information on the country's nuclear program to a U.S. intelligence agent and a European country.

Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi told the judiciary website - Mizanonline.ir - that the convict allegedly met the agent nine times and provided him with information about "nuclear affairs and sanctions."

Dolatabadi added that he provided the information to a European country too.

He said the court also ordered the confiscation of the money he received for the information.

The report did not identify the convict or provide additional details.RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - The renewed version of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s campaign to lift poor people is holding its first national mobilization, with actions and events planned Monday in 32 states and the nation's capital.

Poor people, clergy and activists in the Poor People's Campaign plan to deliver letters to politicians in state Capitol buildings demanding that leaders confront what they call systemic racism evidenced in voter suppression laws and poverty rates.

Among those who have signed on to the campaign is the Rev. John Mendez, pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, who recalled protesting in New York City in the 1960s.

FILE-In this March 28, 1968, file photo, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rev. Ralph Abernathy, right, lead a march on behalf of striking Memphis, Tennessee., sanitation workers. Fifty years ago, two sanitation workers were killed by a malfunctioning garbage truck in Memphis. Martin Luther King Jr. came to Memphis to support the strike, a move that cost him his life when he was fatally shot on the balcony of a Memphis hotel on April 4, 1968. (Sam Melhorn/The Commercial Appeal via AP)

"I've been waiting for almost 50 years for this to actually happen," said Mendez, 68.

The campaign is especially important now because the leaders who don't want to help the poor "should not have a free hand to say and do whatever they want and there be no resistance," he said.

Led by the Revs. William Barber of North Carolina and Liz Theoharis of New York, the campaign officially began Dec. 4, 50 years after King started the first Poor People's Campaign. King was assassinated a few months later and "nobody really picked it up" until now, Mendez said.

The letters to politicians call for a new course in government. "Our faith traditions and state and federal constitutions all testify to the immorality of an economy that leaves out the poor, yet our political discourse consistently ignores the 140 million poor and low-income people in America," the letter states.

Barber, who will be among the group that delivers letters to the office of House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, said the campaign is building toward a "season of direct action and civil disobedience" that begins on May 13 and continues through June 21, the anniversary of the slayings of three civil rights workers in 1964 in Philadelphia, Mississippi.

The actions, including a poverty tour, will be followed by more work as part of a multiyear campaign to build power "among the poorest and most powerless communities," he added.

And on Feb. 12 - the 50th anniversary of the sanitation workers' strike that brought King to Memphis, where he was assassinated - fast-food cooks and cashiers plan to walk off their jobs in Memphis to support higher wages and union rights. Protesters plan to march from Clayborn Temple to Memphis City Hall, the same route the sanitation workers took.

The most important part of the campaign is that the people who are hurting because of poverty and racism are its leaders, Theoharis said. "I feel very positive that the real heroes and heroines of our country are coming together to cross all kinds of lines that usually divide us like race, gender, economic status, political party."

Leslie Boyd of Candler has followed Barber since he began the "Moral Monday" protest movement in North Carolina almost five years ago. Her son, Mike Danforth, was 33 when he died of colon cancer in 2008 because he lacked insurance even though he had a job and couldn't afford the yearly colonoscopies that he needed.

Her hope for the campaign is that it changes what she sees as a national narrative that not only blames the poor for the poverty but uses religion to do so. Too many people believe that "if you were a good person, Jesus would bless you," she said.

U.S. Census figures show that the poverty rate among blacks was 22 percent in 2016, while it was almost 9 percent among whites. But in sheer numbers, almost 17.5 million white people are classified as living in poverty, compared to 8.7 million blacks. The U.S. poverty rate was almost 13 percent in 2016.

"It's not immoral to be poor," said Boyd, 65. "It's immoral to make people poor with our actions as a government and as a people."

___

Follow Martha Waggoner at http://twitter.com/mjwaggonernc

FILE-In this March 29, 1968 file photo, striking Memphis sanitation workers march past Tennessee National Guard troops with fixed bayonets during a 20-block march to City Hall in Memphis, Tenn. Fifty years ago, two sanitation workers were killed by a malfunctioning garbage truck in Memphis. Martin Luther King Jr. came to Memphis to support the strike, a move that cost him his life when he was fatally shot on the balcony of a Memphis hotel on April 4, 1968. (AP Photo/Charlie Kelly, File)ISTANBUL (AP) - Turkey's president is on his way to Italy to meet Pope Francis at the Vatican, where the status of Jerusalem is expected to top their agenda Monday.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said before leaving Turkey on Sunday that the United States is "alone" in the Trump administration's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

Erdogan said Turkey leads 1.7 billion Muslims worldwide since the country currently holds the term presidency of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the pope is "number one" among Catholics.

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan holds olive branches as he addresses his party members in Batman, Turkey, Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018. The Turkish military says two of its soldiers have been killed in Syria and a third was killed on the Turkish side of the border in an attack by Syrian Kurdish militiamen.(Murat Cetinmuhurdar/Pool Photo via AP)

He noted: "These two important blocks are in fact decisive elements in this region," emphasizing Jerusalem's importance to several world religions.

Syria, the migrant crisis, Islamophobia and racism also are on Francis and Erdogan's discussion list.

Erdogan is scheduled to meet Italy's president and prime minister.

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan poses for a photo in front of a drone at a military airbase in Batman, Turkey, Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018. The Turkish military says two of its soldiers have been killed in Syria and a third was killed on the Turkish side of the border in an attack by Syrian Kurdish militiamen, says Saturday's deaths were related to Turkey's operation against the Syrian Kurdish-held enclave of Afrin. (Murat Cetinmuhurdar/Pool Photo via AP)SRINAGAR, India (AP) - Indian and Pakistani officials traded accusations Sunday following the deaths of four Indian soldiers and one Pakistani civilian, who were killed during an exchange of gunfire along the highly militarized de facto border that divides the disputed region of Kashmir between the nuclear-armed rivals.

Two Pakistani children and two Indian soldiers were injured, officials said.

An Indian official says Pakistan started firing artillery and small arms Sunday onto Indian positions, while a Pakistani official says Indian forces started the violence by firing onto the Pakistani side.

Each said their forces returned fire only in retaliation. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to reporters.

India and Pakistan often accuse each other of violating a 2003 cease-fire agreement. Both countries accuse the other of initiating border skirmishes leading to the deaths of soldiers and civilians.

Tensions have increased since the Hindu nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power in India in 2014.

India and Pakistan have a long history of bitter relations over Kashmir, a Himalayan territory divided between them and claimed by both in its entirety.

The have fought two wars over Kashmir's control since they won independence from Britain in 1947.QUITO, Ecuador (AP) - Ecuadoreans voted overwhelmingly Sunday to limit presidents to two terms in a nationwide referendum that proved a blow to former President Rafael Correa.

Quick count results showed voters approved by an almost 2-to-1 margin a measure reinstating the term limits that Correa eliminated from the constitution in 2015.

The result, which had been expected, was seen as a big boost for President Lenin Moreno, who was a protege of Correa until taking office last year. They have been feuding bitterly almost ever since over Moreno's decision to build bridges with business leaders and others who were bullied by Correa, a leftist firebrand.

People arrive at a voting center during a constitutional referendum called by President Lenin Moreno in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Moreno called for the nationwide referendum that will include a question asking voters whether they want to revoke a law pushed forward by his predecessor allowing presidents to be indefinitely re-elected. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)

"The days of confrontation are behind us," a triumphant Moreno said in televised remarks with his Cabinet at the presidential palace. "It's time to embrace each other."

Correa tried to put a positive spin on the results, saying the 36 percent of voters opposing term limits show that his political movement remains the most-dominant in the country. To prevail, Moreno relied heavily on support from conservative opposition parties.

Six other government-backed proposals on the ballot, some of them seeking to reduce Correa's influence, also easily passed.

One would give Moreno more authority over a council that determines who can lead some of the nation's most important institutions. Another would bar officials convicted of corruption from seeking office - a clause that apparently would apply to Vice President Jorge Glas, another Correa ally who was recently convicted of corruption.

Another would strengthen restrictions on mining by banning it entirely in protected areas, indigenous territory and cities.

The referendum bucks a trend in several Latin American nations, where leaders have pushed for constitutional amendments that would let them stay in power longer, sometimes indefinitely.

In Bolivia, a court recently paved the way for left-leaning President Evo Morales to run for a fourth term despite a voter referendum that rejected it. Venezuela's socialist president, Nicolas Maduro, is running for office in an election that opposition leaders consider illegitimate. And in Honduras, conservative President Juan Orlando Hernandez was recently sworn in for a second term after the Supreme Court ruled that a constitutional ban on re-election violated his rights.

Correa governed Ecuador from 2007 to 2017, winning the loyalty of millions of poor Ecuadoreans with generous health and social programs and lauded for brining stability.

But the combative leader feuded with the business community, the news media, environmentalists and indigenous groups, pushing through measures that consolidated executive power and expanded mineral exploration in indigenous territories.

After leaving office, he moved to his wife's native Belgium, but recently returned to rally against Moreno, who he now calls a "traitor."

Moreno, a paraplegic since being shot in 1998, is enjoying a near 70 percent approval rating.

Ecuador's President Lenin Moreno shows his ballot as he votes in favor of a constitutional referendum at a polling station in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Moreno called for the nationwide referendum that will include a question asking voters whether they want to revoke a law pushed forward by his predecessor allowing presidents to be indefinitely re-elected. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)

A woman casts her vote during a constitutional referendum called by Ecuador's President Lenin Moreno in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Moreno called for the nationwide referendum that will include a question asking voters whether they want to revoke a law pushed forward by his predecessor allowing presidents to be indefinitely re-elected. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)

A woman casts her vote during a constitutional referendum called by President Lenin Moreno in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Moreno called for the nationwide referendum that will include a question asking voters whether they want to revoke a law pushed forward by his predecessor allowing presidents to be indefinitely re-elected. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)

Ecuador's President Lenin Moreno casts his ballot in favor of a constitutional referendum at a polling station in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Moreno called for the nationwide referendum that will include a question asking voters whether they want to revoke a law pushed forward by his predecessor allowing presidents to be indefinitely re-elected. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)

A men casts his vote during a constitutional referendum called by President Lenin Moreno in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Moreno called for the nationwide referendum that will include a question asking voters whether they want to revoke a law pushed forward by his predecessor allowing presidents to be indefinitely re-elected. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)

A woman casts her vote during a constitutional referendum called by President Lenin Moreno in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Moreno called for the nationwide referendum that will include a question asking voters whether they want to revoke a law pushed forward by his predecessor allowing presidents to be indefinitely re-elected. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)

A woman holds her baby as she casts her vote during a constitutional referendum called by President Lenin Moreno in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. Moreno called for the nationwide referendum that will include a question asking voters whether they want to revoke a law pushed forward by his predecessor allowing presidents to be indefinitely re-elected. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)LOS ANGELES (AP) - Pixar's "Coco" swept the 45th Annie Awards, winning 11 trophies at the annual ceremony honoring the year's best in animation.

As expected, the Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) tale was dominant at the Annies, held Saturday night at UCLA's Royce Hall in Los Angeles. In addition to best animated feature, "Coco" won for its direction (director Lee Unkrich and co-director Adrian Molina), best writing, voice acting (Anthony Gonzalez), music, animated effects and character animation.

The strong showing only reinforces "Coco" as the favorite at the Oscars.

In this image released by Disney-Pixar, character Hector, voiced by Gael Garcia Bernal, left, and Miguel, voiced by Anthony Gonzalez, appear in a scene from the animated film, "Coco." Pixar's "Coco" swept the 45th Annie Awards, winning 11 awards at the annual ceremony honoring the year's best in animation. (Disney-Pixar via AP)

"The Breadwinner," directed by Nora Twomey and executive produced by Angelina Jolie, won for best independent animated feature. Twomey, whose movie is about an Afghan girl growing up under Taliban rule, is the first solo woman director to win the award.PARIS (AP) - French officials say President Emmanuel Macron and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are talking about working on a "diplomatic road map" for Syria in the "coming weeks."

France's presidency said in a statement on Sunday that the two presidents spoke by telephone Saturday about the security, political and humanitarian situations in Syria - including Turkey's military offensive in the Syrian Kurdish enclave of Afrin.

Eight Turkish soldiers were killed there on Saturday, making it the deadliest day for Turkey since the country launched its operation targeting Kurds Syrian last month.

Turkey's Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, second left, prays during funeral prayers for Ahmet Bayram, one of seven Turkish soldiers killed on Saturday in fighting against Syrian Kurdish militiamen, during a funeral ceremony in Hatay, Turkey, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018. The military says Saturday's deaths were related to Turkey's operation against the Syrian Kurdish-held enclave of Afrin, codenamed Olive Branch. (Pool Photo via AP)

France's presidency says Turkey and France want to see a political solution under the aegis of the United Nations, and that talks between France and Turkey will "intensify further in the coming days."LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) - Supporters of a Kansas chemistry instructor hope immigration officials will be lenient because he has lived in the United States for 30 years without problems and has a family.

The Kansas City Star reports Syed Ahmed Jamal was arrested in his front yard in Lawrence, Kansas, on Jan. 24 as he walked his seventh-grade daughter to school.

The 55-year-old Jamal, who is from Bangladesh, arrived in the United States in 1987 to study at the University of Kansas. Most recently, he was teaching at Park University.

Jamal's lawyer, Jeffrey Bennett, says an immigration judge allowed Jamal to remain in the country on a supervised basis provided he checked in regularly.

President Donald Trump has toughened immigration enforcement. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials say Jamal lost an appeal of a removal order four years ago.A lack of specialist support for blind and partially sighted school children has lead to a new attainment gap opening up, charity campaigners claimed.

Royal Blind, the organisation which runs the Royal Blind School in Edinburgh, said the number of visually impaired students going on to university was a third less than for sighted youngsters.

It called on the Scottish Government to do more to help blind and partially sighted school pupils, after a significant rise in the number of such students in Scotlands classrooms

Royal Blind School pupil Lewis Shaw (Royal Blind/PA)

According to the charity, the number of children with some form of visual impairment in Scotlands schools increased from 2,005 in 2010 to 4,175 in 2016.

But there was a reduction in the number of specialist teachers for these youngsters over the same period, Royal Blind said  with chief executive Mark ODonnell saying this meant that too often these pupils are being let down.

A lack of specialist resources, and the current presumption for sending students to mainstream schools, is hindering the education of blind and partially sighted students, he argued.

One of our most well known services is @RoyalBlindSch, but where did it begin? In 1793 an educational unit was established to provide mental arithmetic & scripture lessons. In 1875 the educational unit amalgamated w/ the School for Blind Children, founded by Mr James Gall in 1835 pic.twitter.com/VRoieL13bJ  Sight Scotland (@SightScotland) January 17, 2018

Mr ODonnell said: Mainstreaming can work for many vision impaired children, but currently too often the right support isnt there for them.

He spoke out after 18-year-old Lewis Shaw, who is now studying at the Royal Blind School, told how he was excluded in a mainstream secondary.

The teenager, who is preparing to go to university, said he had a horrible time at his previous school and felt very lonely.

He recalled: It didnt help that some class teachers refused to change the way they taught. One teacher used PowerPoint presentations for most lessons and refused to adapt this saying, its just the way I work. All I could hear was the tap tap tap of her pen on the board.

Mr ODonnell said: We support blind and partially sighted pupils being educated in mainstream schools where that is right for them, but too often these pupils are being let down.

We have learned of instances where pupils have not been able to participate in classes because they are told they are too visual or cannot engage in subjects or activities because it is not safe. This does not represent real inclusion for these pupils.

Up to 80% of our learning is through our use of vision, therefore, it is vitally important that specialist support is provided for pupils with vision impairment who have a huge learning disadvantage in comparison to their fully sighted peers.

More research is required into the numbers of vision impaired pupils in Scotland and their specific needs, but the trend is clear  we have an increasing number of pupils with vision impairment. That means more resources needed to support these children, but in fact in many ways there is less.

Our highly specialist teachers in vision impairment do a great job, with no additional incentives provided for them to undertake their training. But our understanding is that there are fewer of them, being asked to do more and more.

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said: We want all children and young people to receive the support they need to reach their full potential. Children and young people should learn in the environment which best suits their needs, whether that is in a mainstream or special school setting. There is a range of provision in place in Scotland to meet the wide range of children and young peoples needs.

We are currently working to implement the recommendations of the Education Committee on the attainment of pupils with sensory impairment and will provide an update later this year.

The Scottish Government is currently consulting on guidance on the implementation of the presumption to mainstream education. We welcome feedback in response to our consultation and will consider all the responses received. The guidance will be finalised taking account of the research which we are currently undertaking into the experiences of pupils, families and those who provide support in schools.Jeremy Corbyn has urged Labour to welcome young energy into the party amid claims his hard left supporters have been intimidating and bullying opponents.

In a speech to Labour councillors, Mr Corbyn said they needed to embrace mass participation if they were to reverse years of Conservative austerity.

His intervention comes after the long-standing Labour leader of Haringey Council, Claire Kober, announced she was quitting, complaining of a campaign of sexism and bullying by Mr Corbyns supporters.

Addressing the Labour local government conference in Nottingham, Mr Corbyn urged the party to come together to defeat the Tories.

Jeremy Corbyn greets Labour councillors in Nottingham (Labour Party/PA)

We should welcome new people, fresh ideas, and young energy into our party, he said.

Its a mass participation that we all must embrace, because what our communities are facing is no less than the dismantling of the civilised society we all love.

It will only be defended if we campaign together  members, councillors and MPs together.

The Labour leader went on to defend the intervention of the partys ruling national executive committee (NEC) in Haringey over the controversial housing development at the centre of the dispute which led to Ms Kobers resignation.

Claire Kober quit as leader of Haringey Council (Yui Mok/PA)

In a highly unusual move, the NEC, which is now controlled by his supporters, called for a halt to the Haringey Development Vehicle (HDV) programme amid criticism of the councils decision to enter into partnership with a private company.

Mr Corbyn acknowledged that Government cuts meant councils were faced with appalling choices and said Haringey believed they were acting in the best interests of residents.

However he added: But HDV is highly controversial with local people worried about their futures.

Thats why 40% of Labour councillors opposed the proposals, as did the majority of party members in both CLPs (constituency Labour parties), both Labour MPs, and local unions.

It has been a unique situation which is why the NEC unanimously asked the council leadership to put their plans on hold and take part in a mediation process to bring everyone together. Because when we bring people together and listen to everyones voices we make better decisions.

My news: in May I will step down as Council Leader and a Haringey Councillor. Its been a privilege to serve https://t.co/ankK5a0l6R  Claire Kober (@ClaireKober) January 30, 2018

Mr Corbyn said the collapse of outsourcing giant Carillion and the bailout of the East Coast Mainline franchise had undermined the arguments for privatisation, and he praised Labour councils which were now taking services back in-house.

We must urgently move on from Tory austerity and the failed privatisation obsession that has allowed services for the many to become cash cows for the few, he said.

In the last month the arguments for privatisation  always threadbare and flawed  have now been brutally exposed by events. The whole edifice of the private good, public bad dogma has crumbled.Rickie Fowler will take a one-shot lead into the final round of the Waste Management Phoenix Open after a big finish on Saturday in Arizona.

The American entered round three in a tie for the lead but was not at his best in the early stages as he turned in level par before birdieing the 13th.

A birdie-birdie-birdie finish saw him card 67, then propelled him to the top of the leaderboard on 14 under.

Rickie Fowler is one shot ahead going into the final day of the Waste Management Phoenix Open (PA)

Fowler enters the final day ahead of countrymen Bryson DeChambeau and former Arizona State alumni Chez Reavie and Spaniard Jon Rahm, who posted a 65 to tie for second.

Dechambeau signed for a round of 68 to join them in second, one shot ahead of five-time major champion  and another former Arizona State player  Phil Mickelson, as well as Daniel Berger and Xander Schauffele.

Fowler told CBS Sports: It was a grind. Just a little off in certain areas and just kind of tried to piece things together.

After grinding out a 4-under-par 67, @RickieFowler heads into Sunday with a one-shot edge over a crowded leaderboard. Hear his thoughts on Round 3 and the extra motivation he has to take home a win in Phoenix. pic.twitter.com/1LSJDjGCNL  PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) February 4, 2018

Rahm ended his round well with four birdies in his last six holes, while Reavie had a birdie-birdie finish.

Scotsman Martin Laird birdied three of his last four holes to sign for a 68 and sit four shots off the lead.Turkey has said eight of its troops were killed in Ankaras military operation against a Syrian Kurdish militia, the deadliest day in the two-week-old offensive in the enclave of Afrin.

In a statement late on Saturday, the Turkish military said five soldiers were killed after their tank in Syria came under attack near Afrin. The soldiers could not be saved despite all attempts, it said.

Earlier in the day, three Turkish soldiers were reported killed in the Afrin offensive  one was killed in the area of the tank attack, another in northern Syria and the third on the Turkish side of the border in what Ankara said was an attack by Syrian Kurdish militiamen.

The total death toll for Turkish troops since the operation, codenamed Olive Branch, started on January 20 now stands at 13.

Turkeys president Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during the funeral for a Turkish soldier killed in the cross-border operation last month (Burhan Ozbilici/AP)

Turkey launched the incursion into Afrin to rout the US-backed Syrian Kurdish militia, known as the Peoples Protection Units (YPG), which it considers to be a terrorist organisation and an extension of Kurdish insurgents fighting within Turkey.

From Istanbul, Turkish presidential spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said Turkey will not tolerate the presence of the YPG anywhere along its southern border, hinting that Ankara might expand the Afrin operation eastward.

Turkeys first demand is to see the YPG move east of the Euphrates River and leave the town of Manbij, where American troops backing the Syrian Kurdish fighters are stationed, Mr Kalin said.

He called on the United States to disengage from the YPG and said Turkey will continue communications with our American allies to avoid any confrontation.

Turkey shares a 911km border with Syria. The YPG controls much of the territory along the border and an uninterrupted strip from Manbij to the Iraqi border.

Part of a Russian plane that was shot down by rebel fighters over Syria (Ibaa News Agency via AP)

Meanwhile, in the embattled northwestern province of Idlib, al Qaida-linked militants said they downed a Russian fighter jet and killed its pilot after he ejected from the plane and landed on the ground.

The pilot resisted being captured and fired at the militants who then shot and killed him, according to one of the militants and Syrian monitors.

The Russian Defence Ministry confirmed the downing of the Su-25 and said the pilot was killed in fighting with terrorists. A report on the ministrys Zvezda TV said preliminary information indicated the plane was shot by a portable ground-to-air missile in an area under control of al Qaidas branch in Syria.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the plane was downed near the rebel-held town of Saraqeb, which Syrian troops have been trying to take under the cover of Russian airstrikes.

Russia is a key ally of President Bashar Assad, and has been waging a military campaign on behalf of his forces since 2015. Since then, Syrian troops have captured wide parts of the country and in recent weeks have been making advances in Idlib. The province is also a base for al Qaidas branch in Syria and other Islamic groups.

Also Saturday, Syrias Foreign Ministry has dismissed as null and void U.S. accusations that Assads government is producing and using new kinds of weapons to deliver deadly chemicals despite committing to abolish its program in 2013.

The American statements are nothing more than lies based on accounts of what the Trump administration called its partners on ground, the ministry said. It also said reports by Western-backed media outlets about Damascus using chemical weapons were a new version of U.S. and Western desperate intentions to create an excuses to attack Syria.

President Donald Trump has not ruled out additional military action to deter attacks or punish Assad, administration officials said earlier this week, although they did not suggest any action was imminent.Sinn Feins policing spokesman has sought legal advice after he was filmed apparently using bolt cutters to remove a clamp from his car.

Gerry Kelly removed the device after finding his car had been immobilised while he was at a gym in Belfast city centre on Friday morning, the party said.

The private parking firm that controls the area outside the Metropolitan Arts Centre (MAC) near St Annes Cathedral has reported the matter to police.

Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) leader Jim Allister called for the Northern Ireland Assembly member to resign and the police to take action.

It must be demonstrated he is not above the law, he said.

A spokesman for parking firm PEA told the Belfast Telegraph: PEA is aware of this incident and has reported the matter to the PSNI (Police Service Northern Ireland) as we do in all such cases.

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams with Gerry Kelly, right, who is the partys policing spokesman

Sinn Fein confirmed Mr Kelly removed a clamp from the front wheel of his car after footage emerged on social media.

The footage appears to show him kneeling down to remove the orange device from the vehicles right-hand wheel, before resting it against a nearby wall.

A pair of bolt cutters appear to be lying beside the wheel.

A Sinn Fein spokesman said: Yesterday, Friday 2 February, Gerry Kelly MLA returned to his car after an early morning gym session to find that his car had been made immobile by a clamp just after 7.20am.

He removed the clamp from the front wheel. He left the device nearby and drove off to pre-arranged meetings.

His solicitor is dealing with the matter and he will be making no further comment at this time.

Mr Kelly is Sinn Feins policing spokesman and has formerly held the position of junior minister at Stormont.

He was part of the partys negotiating team during the years leading up to The Good Friday Agreement and has been MLA for North Belfast since 1998.

During the Troubles the veteran republican was convicted for his part in the IRA bombing of the Old Bailey in 1973.

Ten years later he took part in a mass escape from the Maze paramilitary prison.President Thomas Bach has confirmed the International Olympic Committee is contemplating an appeal against the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruling which overturned lifetime doping bans for 28 Russians.

CAS ruled last Thursday there was insufficient evidence to uphold the suspensions issued by the IOC following an investigation into state-sponsored doping at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.

In a further 11 cases anti-doping violations were confirmed, but their lifetime bans have been reduced just to cover the 2018 Winter Games, which start in Pyeongchang on February 9.

IOC president Thomas Bach speaks in a press conference ahead of the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympic Games (PA Wire/PA Images)

The IOC has complained the CAS rulings could have a serious impact on the future fight against doping and Bach says an appeal is being considered.

The German told a media conference in Pyeongchang on Sunday: Yes  we are considering (an appeal).

(But) you can only look into an appeal seriously when you have the reasoned decision, which we do not have.

We need the reasoned decision to see whether we have any prospect of success. If we have any such prospect, we will appeal.

The IOC has been told it may be the end of February by the time the reasoned decision is available, something Bach described as extremely unsatisfactory.

He called for a review of the internal structures of CAS to resolve issues such as delayed reasoned decisions.

The Winter Olympics open in South Korea on Friday and close on February 25.

Despite not receiving the reasoned decision from CAS, Bach expressed hope that the decision on whether or not to invite the Russian athletes affected by the decision will be made prior to the Winter Olympics beginning.

Bach said: With regard to the Russian cases, we also have made it very clear that the absence of a sanction by CAS does not mean that youre entitled to receive an invitation from the IOC.

Receiving this invitation is a privilege for a clean Russian athlete.

Therefore, we have been following and we will be following the IOC decision of December 5 and have forwarded these cases to the independent panel for review.

This panel will make its recommendation to the implementation group and this group then, as a delegation of the IOC executive board, will take a final decision.

I hope very much that this decision will come in the next couple of days.

There will be Russian athletes in Pyeongchang, competing under the Olympic flag and with the Olympic anthem played. Olympic Athletes from Russia (OAR) will be the third largest athlete delegation, with 169 athletes. Only the United States and Canada will have more competitors.

Those athletes hoping to be promoted to the podium following the findings against Russian athletes have a further wait for their medals.

With regards to the reallocation of medals, we have to wait until all legal remedies are exhausted, Bach said.

Unfortunately, here in Pyeongchang, this reallocation of medals cannot happen yet.

Bach added that the IOC is still to receive from the Russian Olympic Committee the US dollars 15million fine demanded in December.Black cab rapist John Worboys has been transferred back to HMP Wakefield from HMP Belmarsh following uproar at his move to the London jail.

The Prison Service faced a backlash in January after the serial sex offender was moved to the city where he committed his crimes.

The Press Association understands he has been moved back to the category A prison in West Yorkshire while legal proceedings take place over his release on parole.

Worboys transfer to HMP Belmarsh in south east London was met with anger (PA)

Worboys return to HMP Wakefield emerged as a lawyer said she had passed details of fresh allegations made by five women to police.

Harriet Wistrich told the Sunday Mirror that two further women, whose cases were reported to police but not prosecuted as part of his trial, have asked for their allegations to be reconsidered.

Worboys was jailed indefinitely in 2009, with a minimum term of eight years, for drugging and sexually assaulting women passengers.

He became known as the black cab rapist after attacking victims in his hackney carriage.

Worboys has been returned to HMP Wakefield (PA)

The predator was convicted of 19 offences against 12 victims, but has been linked to more than 100 complaints in total.

A Parole Board decision that he should be released on licence after spending less than a decade behind bars sparked outrage when it emerged in January.

A High Court judge later ordered a temporary bar on Worboys release after considering an urgent application by two of his victims.

The women, supported by London Mayor Sadiq Khan, applied for a stay on his release pending determination of the claim for judicial review or further order.

A hearing at the High Court in London is now expected between February 6 and 8, but a date has yet to be confirmed.US banking giant Citi plans to keep the vast majority of its 9,000 strong workforce in the UK, regardless of how Brexit talks pan out.

The group will pepper its EU operations with an extra 150 staff, but is set to bolster offices through a hiring spree rather than a shift of British employees, its local government liaison has assured.

It is understood that job moves will stay in the single digits.

Were moving some roles and will create several, Alan Houmann, head of government affairs for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), told the Press Association.

When asked whether the outcome of Brexit negotiations could spark a larger raft of relocations, he suggested larger trends were at play and that the central causes of any further moves were not directly on Brexit.

Our goal is to be ready to serve our European clients and our plans are very much under way to do that, Mr Houmann said.

Citi is converting its German office into a broker-dealer entity (PA)

The broader banking sector has been looking at moving staff closer to clients, with some taking advantage of outsourcing opportunities for back office operations.

An internal memo sent to staff last year explained that Citi was planning to convert its Frankfurt office, which currently houses 350 staff to a broker-dealer entity, adding to its currently broker dealer operations in Dublin.

Frankfurt makes a lot of sense for us. We know Germany well, weve been there for decades, know and have experience dealing with the regulator.

Citi, which has already submitted its licence application to the German regulator, is expecting to see the new broker dealer up and running by the end of the year.

While the bulk of new roles will be allocated to the converted German office, staff also be hired to work in cities including Paris, Madrid, Milan, Amsterdam and, Dublin.

We will also increase our presence in Luxembourg. Were adding roles in countries where we believe it will benefit our clients, Mr Houmann said.

It is understood Citis hiring plans include adding private banking staff to its Luxembourg operations.

The Wall Street giants liaison was happy with the way the UK Government has been engaging with the financial services sector to date, adding that theres no lack of conversations, whatsoever.

We feel like were being heard. As an industry, and the committees I chairweve done a ton of work, weve been producing reports, so were just churning out evidence in the hope that theres such a thing as evidence-based policy making, and its all going to the appropriate people

Talks with EU government representatives have also been productive, Mr Houmann assured, adding that the bank was more engaged in some countries based on the size of its operations or regional plans.

Were relatively well placed when it comes to Brexit. We have almost 60% of our EU employees already outside of the UK, our Bank chainis headquartered in Dublin and were already on the ground in 21 of the 27 EU countries.

Citi currently employs around 9,000 staff in the UK, 6,000 of whom are based in the City of London.MOSCOW, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Massive Russian air strikes have killed at least 30 militants in northwest Syria, where a Russian fighter jet was shot down, Russia's Defense Ministry said in a statement Saturday.

A series of high-precision weapon strikes has been delivered in the area controlled by the Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist group, which brought down the Russian Su-25 jet by using a portable anti-aircraft missile system in the Syrian province Idlib, said the statement.

"According to radio intercepts, more than 30 Jabhat al-Nusra militants were killed," said the statement.

Earlier Saturday, the ministry said a pilot survived the fighter jet crash but was later killed in a ground fight with terrorists.

"The pilot died in a fight with the terrorists," an earlier statement said.

"The Russian center for reconciliation of opposing sides in Syria and the Turkish side overseeing the Idlib de-escalation area are working to bring the Russian pilot's body home," it said.

The incident requires finding out which countries could have equipped the militants with the man-portable air defense system, Yury Shvytkin, the deputy chairman of the Russian lower house's defense committee, was quoted by Sputnik as saying.

In May 2017, the guarantors of the Syrian ceasefire, Russia, Iran and Turkey, agreed to set up the Syrian de-escalation zones in Syria, which includes Idlib province.

In December 2017, the Russian military announced that Syrian troops supported by Russian servicemen have completed the destruction of Islamic State terrorists in the war-torn country.

Later, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the beginning of a partial withdrawal of Russian troops from Syria. R

ussia reportedly spent an average of 156 million rubles (2.6 million U.S. dollars) every day in the past few years on military operations against terrorist groups in Syria.Gerry Adams has backed outstanding Jeremy Corbyn to become prime minister at the next general election.

The Sinn Fein president steps down next weekend after 50 years in politics when a special party conference, or ard fheis, ratifies his successor, Mary Lou McDonald.

The Labour leader has said he wanted the Troubles bombings and shootings to stop, but refused to single out the IRA for condemnation.

Gerry Adams backed Jeremy Corbyn to become the next prime minister (Aaron Chown/PA)

Mr Adams told BBC Ones The Andrew Marr show: I would like to see Jeremy in that position (PM) for the benefit of people in Britain, leaving Ireland out of it.

I think Jeremy is an outstanding politician and I hope my endorsement of him is not used against him in the time ahead.

He and (former London Mayor) Ken Livingstone and others kept faith and they were the people who said, when others said no, talk.

They were the people who were open to conversation about how to deal with conflict and how to get conflict resolution processes.

Hang on! Youre not in the drivers seat for another week, says I to Mary Lou. pic.twitter.com/A3A0m7v7C2  Gerry Adams (@GerryAdamsSF) February 1, 2018

Mr Corbyn and shadow chancellor John McDonnell have faced scrutiny over their association with Irish republicans.

Before the IRA ceasefire, they controversially met Sinn Fein a number of times in Westminster during the 1990s.

During a wide-ranging interview, Mr Adams reiterated his position that Northern Ireland should enjoy special status within the EU after Brexit.

He said former prime minister Tony Blair enjoyed an opportunity on a plate in his handling of the Northern Ireland peace process, which produced the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and largely ended decades of violence.

Mr Adams, who represents the border county of Louth in the Irish Dail parliament, said he told Mr Blair not to invade Iraq in 2003.

Gerry Adams said he told Tony Blair not to invade Iraq in 2003 (Jonathan Brady/PA)

We said to him, look at the Irish experience, dont go in there.

He said nobody could stand over the killing of children or civilians during the IRAs campaign, but it was different if it was soldiers versus soldiers.

The outgoing political leader, who for decades defended republican violence but was instrumental in its cessation, reflected on the awfulness and horror of war.

He said: I would wish that no one had been killed or injured in the course of the conflict.

We were able to come to an alternative. When you come forward with an alternative sensible people will embrace that alternative.Police have been notified of alleged criminal damage after Sinn Feins policing spokesman was filmed apparently using bolt cutters to remove a clamp from his car.

Gerry Kelly removed the device after finding his vehicle had been immobilised while he was at a gym in Belfast city centre on Friday morning, the party said.

The private parking firm that controls the area outside the Metropolitan Arts Centre (MAC) near St Annes Cathedral reported the matter to police.

A Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) statement said: Police in north Belfast received a report of criminal damage in the Exchange Street area of Belfast at around 2.20pm, Friday 2 February.

It is believed that damage was caused to the wheel-clamp of a car.

Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) leader Jim Allister called for the Northern Ireland Assembly member to resign and the police to take action.

It must be demonstrated he is not above the law, he said.

A spokesman for parking firm PEA told the Belfast Telegraph: PEA is aware of this incident and has reported the matter to the PSNI (Police Service Northern Ireland) as we do in all such cases.

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams with Gerry Kelly, right, who is the partys policing spokesman

Sinn Fein confirmed Mr Kelly removed a clamp from the front wheel of his car after footage emerged on social media.

The footage appears to show him kneeling down to remove the orange device from the vehicles right-hand wheel, before resting it against a nearby wall.

A pair of bolt cutters appear to be lying beside the wheel.

A Sinn Fein spokesman said: Yesterday, Friday 2 February, Gerry Kelly MLA returned to his car after an early morning gym session to find that his car had been made immobile by a clamp just after 7.20am.

He removed the clamp from the front wheel. He left the device nearby and drove off to pre-arranged meetings.

His solicitor is dealing with the matter and he will be making no further comment at this time.

Mr Kelly is Sinn Feins policing spokesman and has formerly held the position of junior minister at Stormont.

He was part of the partys negotiating team during the years leading up to the Good Friday Agreement and has been MLA for North Belfast since 1998.

During the Troubles the veteran republican was convicted for his part in the IRA bombing of the Old Bailey in 1973.

Ten years later he took part in a mass escape from the Maze paramilitary prison.Sex And The City star Kim Cattrall has asked her fans to help spread the word to find her brother, who has been missing for several days.

The actress posted a picture of her one of a kind brother Christopher on Instagram and urged people to contact police in Blackfalds in Alberta, Canada if they see him.

Cattrall wrote: MISSING! This is my brother Christopher Cattrall or Chris as we call him. He has been missing since Tuesday, January the 30th from his home in Lacombe, Alberta Canada.

Kim Cattrall appeals for help to find her missing brother (Yui Mok/PA)

His keys, cell phone & wallet left on the table and his front door unlocked. This is not like Chris. He he would never leave his unlocked home without those items nor his 7 beloved dogs.

The 61-year-old said that Chris, aged 55, is six feet tall, weighs 200lb and is of average build, has blue eyes, short brown hair and a goatee beard.

She added that he will likely be wearing a hooded winter coat with black gloves, blue jeans and black winter boots.

She told fans to contact Blackfalds Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) if he is seen.

Hes a one of a kind brother, she said.

My brother Chris Cattrall is missing. Contact Blackfalds RCMP at 403-885-3300 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477 if you know of his whereabouts. #Alberta https://t.co/ueyBcSpdgm  Kim Cattrall (@KimCattrall) February 4, 2018

Help us bring him home safe. Many thanks for reading this.

The actress also retweeted several messages on Twitter, and a grab from the official RCMP Alberta Twitter account with the details of her brothers case.The number of people awaiting eye care procedures in Ireland has increased by a fifth.

Some were waiting for treatments like cataract surgery for more than a year and half.

Forty thousand queued on lists at the end of last year, the Association of Optometrists Ireland (AOI) said, and diverting to community services could help save 32 million euros and speed the process.

Thousands of people are waiting for eye care procedures (Chris Ison/PA)

It added: We have an unsustainable over-reliance on hospital ophthalmology departments that cannot and will not meet demand.

The 40,000 on outpatient waiting lists at the end of 2017 compared to 32,823 at the end of the previous year  a 21% increase.

The association said 13,812 were waiting more than a year, with 7,589 on hold more than 18 months.

An ageing and growing population is creating an urgent need for better organisation to significantly reduce delays, it said.

AOI chief executive Sean McCrave said cataract surgery contributed more than a fifth of those waiting and called for national rollout of the cost and time-cutting Sligo Post-Cataract Scheme.

Patients follow-up appointments are co-managed by optometrists in the community and ophthalmologists in hospital, axing the need for one consultation, the association said.

Mr McCrave said: With over 20,000 cataract procedures a year, rolling out the Sligo protocol nationally would reduce outpatient cataract appointments by up to 20,000 with no capital expenditure.

This step alone would make a significant impact to reduce unsafe delays within the public system.

He said it was 50% less expensive to treat via local optometrists than in hospital.

We have 600 optometrists across the country who are trained, highly-skilled, have the necessary equipment and want to play a role to solve the waiting list crisis.Petra Kvitova landed the St Petersburg Ladies Trophy title on Sunday with a comfortable victory over defending champion Kristina Mladenovic.

The Czech two-time Wimbledon champion saw off Frances Mladenovic 6-1 6-2 in an hour and five minutes.

It made it 21 career WTA titles for Kvitova, who was appearing in a final for the first time since winning the Aegon Classic in June  a triumph which came just six months on from her sustaining career-threatening hand injuries when she was stabbed by an intruder at her home.

Petra Kvitova beat Kristina Mladenovic 6-1 6-2 (Mike Egerton/PA).

The 27-year-olds successful week in Russia was a return to form after she made a first-round exit at the Australian Open.

Earlier, Timea Babos secured her third career WTA title with a 7-5 6-1 victory over Kateryna Kozlova at the Taiwan Open.

It was not easy, she played really well and really aggressive in the first set, Babos said, quoted on the WTA website. But I stayed there, I got all the important moments, and I really fought hard.

The first set, I think it was very difficult for me to start. I was a bit slower today than before. Its a final, somehow you have to manage a different kind of nerves.Gerard Pique netted a late equaliser as Barcelona salvaged a 1-1 derby draw at Espanyol which extended their unbeaten start to the LaLiga season to a club-record 22 games.

Espanyol had looked set to follow up last months shock Copa del Rey triumph over their neighbours with another upset when Gerard Moreno put them ahead in the 66th minute at a rain-drenched RCDE Stadium.

But Barca, whose cup quarter-final first-leg defeat here brought an end to their 29-match unbeaten run in all competitions this season, battled back and Pique ensured the spoils were shared.

Gerard Pique scored Barcelonas equaliser at Espanyol (Steven Paston/Empics)

Espanyol had lost all three of their matches since beating Barca  including a 2-0 second-leg defeat at the Nou Camp to crash out of the cup  while Ernesto Valverdes treble-chasers were looking to consolidate an 11-point lead at the LaLiga summit.

However, form counts for little in derbies and the testing conditions added an extra element to the encounter.

Despite that, Barca kept faith with their trademark passing game in the opening exchanges and were almost rewarded with a fine opening goal in the 22nd minute.

Sergio Busquets sprayed a cross-field pass into the area where Lucas Digne cushioned a pass back to Philippe Coutinho on the edge of the box, from where the former Liverpool man saw a superb curling effort come crashing back off the crossbar.

Nobody would come closer to scoring in the fist half, although Leo Baptistao twice threatened for an Espanyol side who had lost all three matches since beating Barca in the cup.

Baptistaos first effort was a 25-yard shot that was saved by Marc-Andre ter Stegen, albeit after a fumble, while his second saw him head over from six yards out when he should have done better.

Espanyol thought they had scored seconds after the restart but Morenos effort was ruled out because the ball had gone out of play moments before.

With clear-cut chances still in short supply at either end, Valverde opted to make a double change on the hour, with Messi and Sergi Roberto the men to come on.

Espanyol boss Quique Sanchez Flores followed suit soon after, and his substitution paid almost immediate dividends as the newly-introduced Sergio Garcia set up Moreno to break the deadlock.

The hosts quickly won the ball back from a Ter Stegen clearance before working possession out to the right wing, where Garcia swung an inch-perfect cross in for Moreno to head home.

With standing water becoming an increasing feature of the RCDE pitch, Barca were struggling to fashion opportunities and began resorting to a more direct style.

But they found their reward in the 82nd minute when Pique rose highest in the box to power home Messis free-kick from the left.

Both sides pushed for a winner in the closing stages as tempers began to fray but aside from Espanyol appealing for a late penalty, neither goal was seriously threatened.Minority group representatives in Poland have written to the president about what they see as a rising wave of aggression including anti-Semitism.

They told President Andrzej Duda of their concern over a rising wave of aggression based on nationality, race and religion.

They attributed the voicing of anti-Semitic remarks to passage of legislation seeking to outlaw statements blaming Poles as a nation for Second World War crimes committed by Nazi Germany.

Workers put up barriers around the Israeli Embassy in Warsaw after a local governor banned traffic in the area to prevent a planned protest by far-right groups (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

Israel and international Jewish organisations have strongly criticised the proposal.

The opposition sparked anti-Semitic comments on social media in Poland that some members of the ruling Law and Justice party have retweeted.The Manchester United Supporters Trust has issued a statement in the wake of Jose Mourinhos comments about the Old Trafford atmosphere.

Mourinho said the stadium was quiet as United beat Huddersfield 2-0 on Saturday, going on to cite Portsmouths Fratton Park as an example of a good atmosphere.

In a statement, MUST said: We note our managers further comments regarding the poor atmosphere within Old Trafford following the Huddersfield home game.

Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho (Martin Rickett/PA)

The decline in atmosphere is by no means limited to Old Trafford. Its an issue affecting clubs throughout the country. And its certainly not an issue specific to Manchester United supporters  our away support is widely acknowledged, by fair minded fans, as the best in the country.

Speaking on Saturday, Mourinho was asked about new signing Alexis Sanchez before branching off to discuss the crowd.

He played only three (matches since joining from Arsenal) and the first at Old Trafford, and I think Old Trafford, in spite of being a quiet stadium, the pitch is big, the grass is nice and obviously the players feel very comfortable playing here, he said.

When then asked to explain his comments, Mourinho replied: Its not Portsmouth.

I remember Portsmouth  such a small stadium, the atmosphere was absolutely incredible. In here, the atmosphere is a bit quiet and there is not very (much enthusiasm). But the players like to play at home.

Earlier this season, Mourinho said United supporters were very quiet during the 2-0 win over Leicester in August.

He also, after the 1-0 win over Tottenham in October, expressed his unhappiness with United fans over what he regarded as unfair treatment of Lukaku.

MUST added that a breakdown in the relationship between the fans and the clubs owners may be part of the problem.

We believe that atmosphere is primarily dependent on the perceived relationship between fans and club  including the degree of supporter ownership and engagement, the group added.

In the absence of any imminent changes in the former we therefore concentrate on other areas where we can have an impact in the short to medium term.Antonio Conte has called for public backing from Chelsea in order to quash constant speculation about his future as manager.

The Italian won the Premier League title in his first year in England but there have been persistent rumours about his job being under threat this season due to the Blues indifferent form.

Conte  who was last week linked with a return to managing the Italy national team  has repeatedly expressed his desire to honour the remaining 18 months of his contract.

He would now like a public vote of confidence from his employers to help silence talk of him departing Stamford Bridge.

Chelsea manager Antonio Conte is looking for support (Gareth Fuller/PA)

Maybe Id like that the club prepare a statement for me to tell (the media), I trust in his job, I trust in his work, said Conte, ahead of Mondays trip to Watford.

But at the same time I know that in the past it never happened, this, and for this reason why would I hope for something different?

For sure, I think that Id like to have a statement to support against this speculation.

Chelsea have failed to mount a defence of their title and travel to Vicarage Road 19 points adrift of runaway leaders Manchester City following last Wednesdays humiliating 3-0 home defeat to Bournemouth.

After losing to Arsenal in the semi-finals of the Carabao Cup, their only hopes of silverware come in the Champions League and the FA Cup, while they face a fight to secure a top-four league finish.

The Blues face a tricky two-legged tie against LaLiga leaders Barcelona in the second round of the European competition, while Hull are their fifth-round opponents in the domestic cup.

In spite of struggles on the pitch and him reportedly being under pressure, Conte said he would welcome talks about extending his contract with the London club.

Im giving all of myself, me and my staff and also my players, for this club, he said.

Chelsea were well beaten by Bournemouth (Nigel French/PA)

And then I think that we are doing the maximum for this club and if the club understands this and the club wants to extend a new contract then we can talk, why not?

But, I repeat, I dont like to push with the press (in order to be offered a new deal).

My contract expires in 2019 and my decision is to continue to work with this club.

Olivier Giroud could boost the Blues (Nigel French/PA)

Conte could give debuts to new signings Olivier Giroud and Emerson Palmieri against the Hornets, although neither player is expected to start as they are short of fitness due to recent injuries.

Brazilian duo David Luiz and Willian may return following their injury problems, but centre-back Andreas Christensen (hamstring) and striker Alvaro Morata (back) will be unavailable.A few days back, two Sri Lankan students studying in China returned home for holidays. During their transit in Kuala Lumpur they bumped into an elderly Dutch lecturer, who taught at another Chinese university, and his wife. The Dutch couple were on their way to Sri Lanka for a holiday.

One of the boys was supposed to take a cab from the airport to home. However, he changed his mind and suggested to his friend that it would be nice if they could accompany the elderly Dutch couple to their hotel. The other student agreed. They decided to board the bus the couple was taking to Fort.

Having come out of the Katunayake airport, the two students and the Dutch couple boarded a semi-luxury bus that took the express way to Fort. All four passengers were issued Rs.100 tickets and the two boys had to pay an extra Rs.100 for their big luggage as they had to keep their big bags on another seat. The Dutch couple did not carry big luggage so they did not have to pay extra. Well and good.



More passengers boarded the bus later. An elderly European-like gentleman was among them. He had only his hand luggage. The conductor of the bus announced him the fee, Rs. 200. The elderly gent took his wallet out to pay the amount. One of the students interjected. Why Rs. 200? He only has his hand luggage? the boy asked the conductor. After all, the Dutch couple with hand luggage had to pay only Rs. 100 each. Its our business, you mind your own work the conductor dismissed the boys argument. It was likely that the conductor would have charged extra from the Dutch couple too if they were not accompanied by the Sri Lankan boys.

The new passenger tried to pay the sum however the boy asked him to pay only Rs.100. He smiled and replied to the boy I am used to these things here. This is my ninth visit to Sri Lanka and offered the money. The boy told the conductor Its because of people like you that country is still lagging behind and countries like China are marching forward. These people come to our country for the love of it and just out of airport they are being robbed by people like you. An enraged conductor challenged the boy You meet us somewhere else, I will teach you a lesson.



Once the dispute was over the gentleman introduced himself to the boy out of gratitude. He said he was from Germany and he loved Sri Lanka and that was why he came so often. The boy felt so sad about the treatment he got from the conductor. He said good bye to the German at Fort bus stop and accompanied the Dutch couple to the hotel with his friend. After that he returned home.

By escorting the elderly Dutch couple to hotel the two youngsters no doubt created a positive impression about the Sri Lankan values in the minds of the two tourists. The student who fought for the rights of the German tourist impressed the tourist as an honourable youngster.

However, what about the conductor? Daily thousands of tourists are being plundered and hoodwinked by the conductors, three-wheelers and peddlers. Besides, several cultural and religious sites have been made inaccessible to the tourists with the exorbitant fees charged from foreigners. More often than not the conductors and three-wheeler drivers look at white skin as gold pits. They are ignorant of the fact that not all Caucasians are affluent. There are retirees who have saved money by cutting ends to take a year end trip to this country. There are college students who have made their way up education with the help of part time jobs and visit our country with whatever little savings they have. There are enough and more cheaper destinations in the world for them if we continue to turn them back with our out of reach transport fare and other fees.



The ugly practices by bus conductors, three-wheeler operators and peddlers have been continued for too long. We are no longer a poverty-stricken third world country to ransack tourists this way.

It is high time that the Ministers of Transport and Tourism addressed this matter in the best interest of countrys reputation as a wholesome tourist destination.JERUSALEM, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- Israeli troops apprehended several additional suspects for investigation in hunt for the killers of Rabbi Raziel Shevach in the West Bank village of Burqin on Saturday.

Over the past weekend and the past few hours, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), the Israeli Security Agency (ISA) and the Border Police forces have apprehended several additional suspects for investigation, according to a statement made by the IDF on Saturday evening.

The investigation of the attack and operational activities in the village of Burqin, West of Jenin and the Jenin refugee camp, are ongoing, added the statement.

Israeli media reported that troops arrested four people during the raid, including two members of the Jarrar family. On January 23, Israeli troops arrested Jarrar's brother Suhaib Nassar Jarrar.

Israeli media quoted Palestinian media outlets as reporting that Israeli forces were threatening to demolish the homes if the owners did not turn over Ahmad Nassar Jarrar, the suspected leader of the terror cell that shot and killed 35-year-old father of six Rabbi Raziel Shevach on January 9, as he drove on a highway near his home in the khavat Gil'ad outpost.

The IDF statement said that during the activity several riots were instigated and security forces responded with riot dispersal means.

Israeli media also quoted Palestinian media as saying that several of the youths were injured in subsequent clashes, adding that the IDF had placed a curfew on the village.

A report regarding five injured Palestinians was received and is being looked into, said the Israeli army.

Since the lethal shooting terror attack near Khavat Gil'ad on January 9th, the IDF and ISA forces have been conducting an investigation regarding the attack, the terrorists and the people assisting them.

Over the past month, several Palestinians have been arrested for being suspected of assisting the terrorists who committed the attack, according to the IDF statement.Dhanushka Ramanayake, an academically qualified young professional is contesting for the Maharagama Urban Council from the United National Party (UNP). A first timer to active politics, Dhanushka holds an MBA from Britains Cardiff Metropolitan University and is a Mass Communication graduate from Sri Jayawardenapura University. A product of Isipathana College, Colombo, Dhanushka is a Dharmacharya attached to Siri Vajiranana Dharmayathanaya in Maharagama. Contesting for the Maharagama UC, a traditional Sri Lanka Freedom Party left-wing stronghold, Dhanushka in an interview with Daily Mirror shared the reason for his entry to politics and how Maharagama could be developed as Sri Lankas first modern city.

I am a post-graduate proffessional and I wanted to serve the country with what I have gained from free-education. Initially, I wanted to serve the country and live a peaceful life with my family. But with the circumstances it has changed. Incidentally, it was Minister Champika Ranawaka who invited me to enter politics

Maharagama is a nationally important city. It is one of the main transport hubs with public transport to the highway and it has Apeksha hospital, the countrys biggest cancer treatment centre. It also has a state University and Ayuruvedic Research Institute, among other important institutions. There are also small scale industries including a ready-made apparel hub at Pamunuwa. How do you analyse the importance of this city?

Maharagama is a 39 sq km area with a population of around 207,000 with nearly 127,000 registered voters. It is also an education centre with the National Institute of Education situated there. There is also National Youth Services Centre, Jayawardenapura hospital and Sri Vajiranana Daham Pasala, which provides religious education. There are 63 temples, five churches, two mosques and six Hindu places of worship. When you consider all these, Maharagama is a complete city. According to British archaeological records, Sri Lankas smallest lake, the Boralesgamuwa lake is situated here and surrounding it there was an agriculture society which is non-existent now. There are 24 schools with a national school, 134 pre-schools and 33 state and private institutions. There is also a private sector economy based on Pamunuwa apparel outlets. So compared to other local councils, Maharagama has a higher middle-class population which obtains the services of the Maharagama Urban Council.

I contest from Wattegedara Ward, which is around one sq km in size with 1680 families. Within this comparatively small area, there are 455 graduates, 55 doctors and professors. If we calculate this proportionately, there is a graduate in one of four houses. So this is upper middle-class, educated society. So Maharagama has an updated and an educated society. In a way it is a challenge but on the other hand, to work with such an educated ambient with their support is easy. Maharagama is a sub-city of the major city development plan and we could easily make it a centre

of innovation.

Maharagama with a population of around 207,000, with nearly 127,000 legitimate voters With 455 graduates, 55 doctors and professors. Every one in four houses, there is a graduate Maharagama is a viable economic, transport and healthcare related centre



Over the years, Maharagama also was notorious for some corrupt activities. If you are elected, how would you tackle this corrupt system and clear the name?

It is easy. For 2017, the total income of Mahargama UC was Rs.549 million and recurrence expenditure was about Rs. 101 million. This is a direct and indirect income from 81,000 individuals and institutions. The politicians and officials of the Maharagama UC must know how to increase this income systematically and strategically. We can do this using 39 sq km itself.

The world talks about smart cities and these concepts are entering Sri Lanka also. It is easy to make Maharagama the first city to welcome those concepts due to the reasons I have mentioned and with help of the educated population. People use smart mobile phones and instead of people being forced to go through officialdom and bureaucratic systems, a website or an App could be created for updating taxes and tariff similar to the other utilities such as water and electricity. This is not an uphill task. Our neighbours India and Singapore are using this method quite effectively.

As you said, millions of rupees are being wasted to build roads but they soon become dilapidated. We saw recently roads are being tarred. These might have been done to attract the voters. But I believe people are not fools and they cannot be taken for a ride. They are updated and educated. Every thing is determined by its quality. That is why there are professionals and engineers. As politicians, what we should do is to make policies with a vision for future and let the professionals to adapt them. Instead of 10 - 20% commission goes to the area politicians pocket for development activities, we should create a system to divert that commission to the local council and paid to the workers as an allowance or bonus and create a key performer indicator system and reward them. This will create a happy atmosphere for the employees as they get an additional income added to their salaries, make them happy and dedicated to their duties.

I utilise my position to serve people, I am sure, the people would decide my next step. We are not here to grab peoples money



Maharagama is an SLFP or Joint Opposition stronghold. What are the strategies that you have in store to emerge victorious under UNP?

I am not alone. I am a team member. Representing 41 Grama Niladhari Divisions, Maharagama is divided into 25 divisions. Every party is fielding 25 candidates and I am one of the 25 from the UNP. So as a team, we have discussed not to limit this to a mudslinging campaign where we criticize the opponents. We have drawn a development plan for the area and submit it to the people. What they want is a city where they can live happily and in a healthy background. This is our plan. The bottom-line is we would deliver what we had promised and do it properly to the benefit of the society.



Maharagama sees a large number of outsiders converging daily. It could be due to Apeskha Cancer hospital, Highway bus terminal, Ayuruvedic hospital or the educational institutes. What are the plans you have for the visitors?

Maharagama is a viable economic, transport and healthcare related centre which provides essential services to hundreds of thousands of people every day. There are many businesses taking place on daily basis. We are planning to have a proper shopping complex and the one which exists was built by the UNP government 30 years ago. Over the years, it has been left to the mercy of the elements. We are planning to renovate it. On the other hand, Maharagama is one of the highway hubs and we are planning to shift it to Mahakumbura by the end of March or latest by the National New Year. It would be known as the Mahakumbura Multi-Model Transport hub. It would then be the first properly build Multi-Model Transport hub in Sri Lanka.

In addition, the Railway Department has proposed to have a dual railway line from Maradana to Avissawella. Then the Railway Navinna station would be shifted further towards the Maharagama town. From the Railway Station, an over-head path would be built to Maharagama Youth Centre and multi-purpose transport centre. Maharagama Bus depot would also be shifted to transport centre and the place where the CTB bus depot is now would be converted to an economic centre.

"For the year 2017, the total income of Mahargama UC was Rs.549 million and recurrence expenditure is about Rs. 101 mn. This is a direct and indirect income from 81,000 individuals and institutions. The politicians and officials of the council must know how to increase this revenue systematically and strategically"



This would only be a beginning of your political career. What are your plans for the future?

I am a post-graduate proffessional and I wanted to serve the country with what I have gained from free-education. Initially, I wanted to serve the country and live a peaceful life with my family. But with the circumstances it has changed. Incidentally, it was Minister Champika Ranawaka who invited me to enter politics. I worked with him in three ministries for seven years. I would be taking up a comparatively low-paid profession, but I am not going to worry over that. I utilise my position to serve the people. If I do it, I am sure, the people would decide my next step. We are not here to grab peoples money.



Pic by Pradeep DilrukshanaAgain, one is shaken out of a great complacency. Like the ominous black-clad Knight in Ingmar Bergmans the Seventh Seal, death carried Dharmasena Pathiraja away from us. The complacency was on my part. Not that one expected artistic immortality to extend into the realm of physical existence. Though he had been ailing for some time, he seemed healthy enough for another decade of life when I met him less than six months ago. Suddenly, he was gone at 74, at a time when artistically he was riding his second wind, making Sakkarang and the enigmatic Swaroopa in 2014.

He never compromised in his art and this iron will reflected in his death, too. He wanted the simplest of funerals and got his wish. There were no political speeches and no lobbies vying to hijack his body. True to his secular beliefs, Pathiraja the materialist (as he called himself) did not want sermons at his funeral, hence no clergy were invited. It was carried out in such a short time that some of his closest friends missed it.

Pathiraja correctly judged that its the body of his work, and not his lifeless cadaver, that would be of any value to posterity. To my mind, Pathirajas name ranks alongside that of Lester James Pieris. Both can be called humanists. Lesters humanism came filtered through the westernised, bourgeois world he inhabited. Patharajas political views were radical (Marxist-Trotskyte) but he never wore them on his sleeve. Apart from a brief spell as a university student activist, he remained aloof from political activism, and was never part of JVP radical activity, the natural milieu for many students dreaming of socio-political change in that era. There was nothing radical about his appearance, either, and though he had a doctorate on Bengali cinema, he was Pathi to everyone, not Dr. Pathiraja.

His humanist world view was filtered though his own innate sense of humanism springing from lower middle class societal values. Though he disowned Buddhist influences, the gentle non-political Buddhist stream of thought which fashioned the Sri Lankan psyche until it was overwhelmed by its virulently nationalist, militant and politicised alter ego too, would have played a key role in his art, which believes in making strong statements without laying it on too thick. But his humanism was universal and never channelled into the tunnel vision of religious dogma. It strongly influenced his very moderate views on the ethnic issue, though that won him few friends in the world of art or politics, where most people settled for hardline views.

"Pathiraja was always secure in his fundamental beliefs, and about the quality of his art, and time has proved him right. He was also very fortunate that he peaked artistically with the best creative talents in our acting and related fields"



While Pathiraja could not have made Gam Peraliya and Lester could not have made Ahas Gawwa, there is something of Pathirajas muted radicalism in Lesters 1983 film Yuganthaya (about a mercenary industrialist challenged by his own son) and theres something of Nidhanaya (Lesters heightened artistic statement about a man whose greed for wealth overwhelms his better nature and capacity for love) in Pathirajas Bambaru Ewith and Ahas Gawwa. Unlike Marlon in Yuganthaya, Pathirajas jobless young men in Ahas Gawwa have no rich fathers to rebel against. But they wage their own heroic daily struggle against the Big Brother of ruthless urban exploitation, and in Bambaru Ewith, the demons who destroy Helen and her love are based on wealth and class. As an artist, Pathiraja achieved something rare anywhere in the world  his Ahas Gawwa came to define an entire generation of desperate young men, in the way that Ernest Hemingways novel The Sun Also Rises (in a different context) defined a lost generation of western youth following WWI.

Pathiraja was a master of the sweetest of ironies. In Soldadu Unnehe, Pemakka (Malani Fonseka) is a sex worker who goes hungry on an independence day as she cant find a client. Bambaru Ewith was about sexual and class exploitation. At another level, it is a study of the nature of illusion, another example of the filmmakers innate sense of Buddhist philosophy merging with his humanist politics. The same sense of karma at work is felt overwhelmingly in his last, ambitious work Swaroopa, based on Frank Kafkas the Metamorphosis. And his ever present sense of irony looms in it, too, when he takes a gentle dig at the commercial cinema with that unusual shot of a Morris Minor convertible disappearing into those misty hills, as if its occupants are ready to burst into song.

"Patharajas political views were radical (Marxist-Trotskyte) but he never wore them on his sleeve. Apart from a brief spell as a university student activist, he remained aloof from political activism, and was never part of JVP radical activity the natural milieu for many students dreaming of socio-political change in that era."



He was the Jean Renoir of Lankan cinema, albeit without any trade unions ready to buy tickets in advance to fund his films. Around 1990, he made a telefilm called Mee Peni Saha Alu for Swarnavahini. It was about the exodus of Muslim refugees caused by LTTE attacks in Kalpitiya. For reasons which are not clear, this film was never released.

Lack of funding meant that he made relatively few films during his lengthy career, but they amount to a significant body of work. Like Lester James Pieris, Pathiraja too, was unaffected by fads and trends from the West which sweep the world of art periodically. He was decidedly unimpressed by the tsunamis of post-modernist thinking which came into vogue here in the 1980s, which may be why he fell out of fashion with a new generation of writers and critics. Well read and a graduate in eastern and western culture, he was a little too much for a generation who seem to have read little else besides Derida and Foucault.

But Pathiraja was always secure in his fundamental beliefs, and about the quality of his art, and time has proved him right. He was also very fortunate (like Lester James Pieris) that he peaked artistically with the best creative talents in our acting and related fields, such as Malani Fonseka, Joe Abeywickrema, Wimal Kumara de Costa, and Premasiri Khemadasa as composer of that haunting score for Bambaru Ewith. This is an artistic combination of a calibre we are unlikely to see for a long, long time.

Much has been written about Dharmasena Pathiraja but Handunagaththoth Oba Ma (If only you could know me) would likely remain his epitaph. As his films remain unruffled by time, he remained unruffled by swiftly approaching death. If Bergmans medieval Knight of Death had actually come to meet him in Kandy, one imagines Pathiraja welcoming him with a smile, and getting into a conversation about the nature of life, until it was time to go.Given the raucous cacophony of strident cries of race and religion, it does seem unlikely that this polyphony of voices can ever be blended into a harmonious symphony.

A significant section of the Tamils was in the vanguard of a freedom struggle against the British. The nearest to an anti-British, pro-freedom struggle, in the country came from the north The south...was generally quiet during British rule The dominant Sinhala political class preferred to cooperate with rather than confront the British

By D.B.S. Jeyaraj

Three score and ten years have passed since Sri Lanka, then known as Ceylon, gained Independence from Britain on February 4, 1948. The Island nation had been under colonial bondage for a very long period. The Portuguese rule came first in 1505, followed by Dutch rule in 1658. Finally came the British rule in 1796 that lasted until 1948.



It was the British who unified the Island under a single administration in 1833. They also introduced universal franchise and electoral representation through the State Council in 1931.



Sri Lanka will celebrate her seventieth anniversary of Independence tomorrow February 4th, 2018. Completing 70 years of freedom is indeed a significant milepost. Independent Sri Lanka, or Ceylon, has faced many challenges and problems in the past 70 years. We have had military coup attempts, communal riots, pogroms, armed revolts, external military intervention, assassinations of Heads of State, terrorist violence and above all a long secessionist war that threatened to tear apart the country.



What Sri Lanka can be proud of as Asias oldest democracy is the fact that despite many formidable challenges and crises the country continues to be democratic. Flawed but Democratic! More importantly, perhaps Independent Ceylon/Sri Lanka has succeeded tremendously in improving the quality of life for her people in areas such as education, higher education, healthcare, nutrition, infant mortality, life expectancy, family planning, rural electrification, roads, transport facilities, housing and worker rights.



An illustrative example of the progress made would be life expectancy. When Independence dawned life expectancy for a male was 46 years and 44 for a female in Sri Lanka. After 70 years of Independence, it has risen to 72 years for a male and 78 years for a female.



While Sri Lankas post-independence record is certainly impressive, what is saddening -and somewhat maddening - is the realisation that we could have achieved much, much more but for political mismanagement. Had our post-independence governments ruled wisely, Sri Lanka could have been an economic power in Asia. Our political class -selfish and short-sighted - has through various acts of omission and commission reduced the country to a sorry state. Looking at the prevailing political situation of today, it appears that no effective lessons have been learnt even after seven decades of independence.

An example of the progress would be life expectancy. When Independence dawned life expectancy for a male was 46 years and 44 for a female. After 70 years, it has risen to 72 and 78 years for a female.

As stated earlier Sri Lanka has certainly progressed in many directions. However, it has failed in the key area of nation-building. Ethnic relations between the Sinhala and Tamil people deteriorated due to a series of blunders by politicians on either side of the ethnic divide resulting in what was termed as South Asias longest war.



The separatist war waged by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) is now over and the country has been unified militarily but whether the country has been united politically remains an unanswered question.



Notwithstanding optimistic assertions by those in power the stark reality today is that of the Sri Lankan Tamil people being alienated from the State and estranged from mainstream consciousness.



Archipelago of Communities

Paradoxical as it may seem, I have in the past often referred to Sri Lanka as both an Island nation and archipelago of communities. Given the raucous cacophony of strident cries of race and religion, it does seem unlikely that this polyphony of voices can ever be blended into a harmonious symphony.

It is against this backdrop that this column intends to focus reflectively on the recent past of post-independence Sri Lanka and ponder over its future while drawing extensively from earlier writings of a similar nature.



For anyone being free of colonial bondage, Independence Day would be a day of joy and happiness. But that has not been so for the Tamils of Sri Lanka for many, many years. They remain estranged and alienated from the Sri Lankan state still. Many Tamils are not part of the freedom day festivity emotionally and spiritually.



To many Tamil people whether in Sri Lanka or abroad the future for Tamils in Sri Lanka seems bleak and dreary. This despondency is not one which envelopes sympathisers and supporters of the LTTE alone. It is prevalent more widely, regardless of political affiliation.



There was a time when Independence Day on February 4th was observed as a day of mourning by many Tamils. The advent of the Ilankai Thamil Arasuk Katchi (ITAK/Federal Party) and the rise of Tamil nationalism in the fifties and sixties of the last century, saw the Tamil polity being asked to treat Freedom Day as a day of mourning. The rationale was that independence from British had only resulted in bondage under Sinhalese. There was only a change of masters. So, Independence Day was nothing to celebrate, but only to be observed as a black day, it was argued.



These symbolic protests underwent a change after the Republican Constitution of 1972. Thereafter, May 22nd too was observed as a black day. February 4th lost a little of its significance. The symbolism of black flags on Independence Day however continued. The escalation of the conflict and resultant suffering made the very concept of independence meaningless to Tamils. Years of perceived oppression and suppression had inculcated among Sri Lankan Tamils a feeling of alienation in the land of their forefathers.

The dominant Sinhala political class preferred to cooperate rather than confront the British. They worked for self -rule through negotiation rather than agitation. As a result of this nation never had an anti-colonial struggle as what was conducted in India by Mahatma Gandhi or Netaji Subash Chandra Bose.



Tamil Political Psyche

The Tamil political psyche too had changed over the decades. Tamils saw themselves as being on par with the Sinhalese as a founding race of this nation during the Ramanathan-Arunachalam era; the G. G. Ponnambalam period saw Tamils thinking of themselves as the premier all island minority; S. J. V. Chelvanayagam years saw the Tamils regarding themselves as a territorial minority of the north-east; the Amirthalingam years and the emergence of the TULF saw Tamils perceiving themselves as a distinct nationality with a separate homeland and the right of self-determination. Veluppillai Prabhakaran and other Tamil militant organisation leaders led an armed struggle to liberate this homeland on the basis of the mandate for Tamil Eelam obtained by the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) at the July 1977 elections.

Tamil perception of sovereignty too differed. The Jaffna Kingdom had lost its sovereignty on the battlefield to the Portuguese in 1619. It was then ceded to the Dutch in 1658; the British took over from the Dutch in 1796. It was only in 1833 after the Colebrooke Reforms of 1832 that pre-dominantly Tamil territories were integrated into a unified Ceylon. Until then they were administered separately.

In 1948, the British transferred power to the Sinhala majority. It was the Tamil position that the 1947 Dominion Constitution that paved the way for Independence in 1948, the 1972 and 1978 Constitutions were imposed on Tamils without the consent of the majority of their elected representatives. Tamil sovereignty, therefore, lies within the Tamil nation still and the Sinhala majority has no right to dominate. This position often stated on political platforms was argued brilliantly by Murugeysen Tiruchelvam in courts at the Amirthalingam trial-at-bar case of 1976.



However, Post-independence political problems should not blind us to the fact that a significant section of the Tamils was in the vanguard of a freedom struggle against the British.



Sadly the pioneering role played by Tamils in the quest for Independence is now forgotten. From Sir Ponnambalam Arunachalams famous lecture on Our Political Needs which laid the foundation for the National Congress to the activities of the Jaffna Youth Congress, Tamil efforts have been commendable in this regard.



The south after the heroic and historic 1818 and 1848 rebellions was generally quiet during British rule. The dominant Sinhala political class preferred to cooperate with rather than confront the British. They worked for self -rule through negotiation rather than agitation. As a result of this nation never had an anti-colonial struggle as what was conducted in India by Mahatma Gandhi or Netaji Subash Chandra Bose.



Jaffna Youth Congress

The nearest to an anti-British, pro-freedom struggle, in the country came from the north. It emanated from the now forgotten Jaffna Youth Congress led by the likes of Handy Perinbanayagam, Orator Subramaniam, C. Ponnambalam. Fired by the ideals espoused by Mahatma Gandhi the Youth Congress demanded Poorana Swaraj (Complete Independence) and urged a boycott of the first State Council elections in support. It was the Jaffna Youth Congress which called first for Poorana Swaraj or complete self-rule from the British and rejected the limited reforms proposed by the Donoughmore Commission.



It is recorded that hundreds of Jaffna youths ran about the town streets shouting Swaraj after listening to a lecture by Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya. The 1931 boycott was observed only in Jaffna.



The rest of the country did not follow suit and the boycott ultimately ended in failure. British scholar Jane Russell compared the Jaffna boycott to parallel developments during the Indian freedom struggle and observed that it was like the turkey-cock trying to imitate the dance of the peacock.

Later, southern historians tried to distort the boycott call and depicted it as a communal cry. That, however, was untrue. The Youth Congress boycott was inspired by nobler motives. So praiseworthy was the impact of the Youth Congress, that Philip Gunewardena, the Father of Marxism in Sri Lanka, wrote glowingly in the Searchlight journal that Jaffna had given the lead and asked the Sinhalese to follow suit. Prof. Wiswa Warnapala reviewing the book written by Santhaseelan Kadirgamar on the Jaffna Youth Congress expressed his admirataion of the Jaffna Youth Congress openly and chastised Sinhala political leaders of the colonial period as Bootlickers of Imperialism.



The Youth Congress also conducted several meetings and satyagraha, in support of freedom. Two noteworthy feats were the boycott of a visit to Jaffna by then Prince of Wales and the hoisting of the Nandhi (Crouched Bull) flag in place of the Union Jack.



It was in Jaffna that the erstwhile Jaffna Kingdoms Nandhi flag was hoisted defiantly instead of the Union Jack on the Empire Day. It was Jaffna that boycotted the visit of the then Prince of Wales during colonial rule.



Tragically, political vicissitudes in the post-independence years compelled Tamils to demonstrate with black flags on Independence Day.



The roots of this development and the emotive background to it are understandable. It is to be hoped that a satisfactory resolution of the Tamil national question would bring about a remarkable change in Tamil attitudes towards Independence from the British in the future.



National Anthem In Tamil

The singing of the national anthem in Tamil at the official Independence Day Celebration was made possible by the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe Government. After several decades Namo, Namo Thaayae was sung at an official Independence Day Celebration.



It was a highly commendable move and welcomed by most Tamils. Yet it was only a silver lining in a dark cloud. What is important to note is that unequal relations between the numerical majority community and other numerical minority communities still exist.

The nearest to an anti-British, pro-freedom struggle, in the country came from the north. It emanated from the now forgotten Jaffna Youth Congress led by the likes of Handy Perinbanayagam, Orator Subramaniam ...

This is particularly so in the case of the Sri Lankan Tamils who have been struggling to achieve equality on the Island for decades. The Tamil Eelam demand was a desperate manifestation of the Tamil state of mind. This state of mind is likely to continue until genuine unity is achieved through the creation of a plural and egalitarian society.



The tragedy of independent Sri Lanka has been majoritarian hegemony. Majority rule is a democratic principle. Here it has been interpreted as the majority of the numerically largest ethnicity.



Sri Lanka is a modern State with an ancient civilisation, but the attempt to define Sri Lanka as a modern Nation State has led to conflict and strife. Power is concentrated with the majority ethnicity leaving the others out in the cold. It is a case of Maha Jathiyata Kiri, Sulu Jathiwalata Kekiri. (Cream for the majority, bitter-fruit for the minorities)



The idea of Ceylon was a colonial construct. The British unified the country into a single administration. Sri Lanka was not the only one in this respect. Most countries ruled by the British were their creations in a modern sense.



Ethnic conflict and strife erupted in many countries after the British left. From the Indian sub-continent to Fiji Islands and from Nigeria to Malaysia, there are many instances of this. Sri Lanka too can be classified as an example of post-independence conflict within pre-independence boundaries.

Some ex-colonies have reduced and managed ethnic tensions by evolving new forms of power sharing. They have reinvented themselves as new nations on the basis of equality and forged a strong sense of common identity. In the final analysis, the unity and integrity of a nation do not depend on its military strength or structures of governance but on the will of its people. The nation-state is essentially a state of mind.

Some ex-colonies have reduced and managed ethnic tensions by evolving new forms of power sharing. They have reinvented themselves as new nations on the basis of equality and forged a strong sense of common identity.

The idea of a single Sri Lankan nation has been under severe threat. In reality, we are a divided nation today and military conquest and domination by itself is no answer. If we are to resolve these divisions and create a strong nation on the basis of equitable power-sharing, the structure of the state needs to be radically transformed. There is no consensus on that so far.



Sensible and Pragmatic

The need of the hour is for Tamils to evolve a sensible and pragmatic approach to the situation they are in. What is necessary now is not confrontation but cooperation. Cooperation is not submission. Conciliation is not surrendered.



Those continuing the old politics of sabre-rattling must realise there is no sword or blade in the scabbard or sheath to scare the enemy. Instead, these vocal warriors make laughing stocks of themselves without perhaps realising it.



This inability or unwillingness to recognise the tragic plight of the Tamil people and adopt a practical approach rather than continuing with an unrealistic confrontational mode is not something which evolved in a vacuum. There is a history behind this emotive content in Tamil politics. It has been prevalent ever since the Tamil polity began experiencing political anxiety over the perceived threat of Sinhala majoritarian hegemony.



What is required now is the creation of a just, egalitarian and plural society. There must be equitable power-sharing based on principles of devolution. If one were to simplify the ethnic crisis in Sri Lanka and its potential solution one may say that it is a contest between three ideas. Broadly, three schools of thought have been clashing, namely hegemonism, secessionism and pluralism.



The Sinhala hardliners want Sinhala-Buddhist domination and look upon this country as theirs alone, excluding or reducing others to subservient status in this Chinthana.



They interpret numerical superiority as a divine right to dominate other ethnicities who are treated as children of lesser Gods. Their numerical strength has afforded them the ability to exercise this control through democratic procedures.



They want a Unitary State where the pecking order is clearly established.

The Tamil hardliners want a separate State for the North-East known as Tamil Eelam. Just as Sinhala hawks say Sri Lanka is for the Sinhalese, these Tamil hawks say Tamil Eelam is for the Tamils. The Tigers may have been destroyed militarily but the ideology of tigers still exists. It is fuelled by funds from tigerish elements in the global Tamil Diaspora.



A state for the dominant ethnicity within excludes by definition, other ethnicities living within these real or imaginary borders. Both these Sinhala and Tamil hawkish ideas have brought about disunity, violence and destruction. The nation bled profusely and the country diminished drastically.



Amity and Fraternity

The third idea is that of establishing an egalitarian and plural society where all children of this country can live together in amity and fraternity. It incorporates a vision where no one will claim superior rights on the basis of belonging to the majority race/religion or claim exclusive rights to their historic habitat.

Power will not be confined to Colombo but shared with the periphery. All people regardless of race, religion, caste or creed will have their say and have a role to play.



Sri Lanka will belong to its people from Paruthithurai to Devinuwara and Mannar to Mullaitheevu. At present, this vision seems unrealistically impossible and Utopian!



In spite of the adverse politico-military environment, this is the vision that should ultimately triumph..Visionaries of this nature are an endangered species. They are under attack by hawks on either side of the ethnic divide.



They are dubbed derisively as jokers and traitors. It is, however, this vision that will ultimately salvage Sri Lanka. Hegemonic and secessionist dreams have turned into cruel nightmares. The call for the third option between the hegemonistic one-State and secessionist two-State schools of thought is a voice of sanity and sensibility. It is presently inaudible amidst the raucously divisive cries.

I, however, firmly believe that it will be heard and heard effectively one day. Sri Lanka will then be alive with the sound of concord.



In the clash of ideas, it is the superior one that will triumph. Dialogue and discussion, not bloodshed and destruction, will prove to be final arbiters of our destinies. The current situation is depressing but there is certainly a light at the end of the dark tunnel.



Our Destiny Is Inter-twined

However, estranged and alienated the Tamil people may feel at present, there is no denying the fact that we are an integral part of the Sri Lankan nation. Our destiny is intertwined with those of others living on the Island.



The future lies not in pursuing unrealistic political goals but in struggling together with people seeking justice and peace to forge a brave, new, inclusive nation. It is up to right-thinking members of the majority community to extend their hand of friendship in a spirit of fraternal amity towards like-minded others.



When India gained freedom at midnight, Jawarhalal Nehru spoke of its tryst with destiny. Indias southern neighbour has been awaiting its true destiny for 70 years. The Sri Lankan State needs to be re-structured and the Sri Lankan nation re-invented for its inevitable tryst with destiny. Sri Lanka at 70 faces the unfinished yet challenging task of building a NEW nation! Let me conclude with three verses from the poem Call to Lanka which is one of my favourites. It is by Rev. W.S. Senior. Walter Stanley Senior was a scholar, pastor, teacher and poet who served in Sri Lanka for many years as Vice Principal of Trinity College, Kandy and Vicar at Christ Church, Galle Face.



Inspired by the landscape and people of the Island then called Ceylon, W.S. Senior poetically envisaged a future Lanka of unity and tranquillity where the races had blended and marched to a single drum.



Call To Lanka

Here are three verses from his Call to Lanka-

But most shall he sing of Lanka

In the bright new days that come

When the races all have blended

And the voice of strife is dumb.

When we leap to a single bugle,

March to a single drum.

March to a mighty purpose,

One man from shore to shore;

The stranger becomes a brother,

The task of the tutor oer,

When the ruined city rises

And the palace gleams once more.

Hark! Bard of the fateful future,

Hark! Bard of the bright to be;

A voice on the verdant mountains,

A voice by the golden sea.

Rise, child of Lanka, and answer

Thy mother hath called to thee



D.B.S.Jeyaraj can be reached at dbsjeyaraj@yahoo.comWith Independent Sri Lanka having reached the age of 70, it cannot reconstruct itself without self-criticism. As we live under the shadow of the twin forces of Sinhala Buddhist and Tamil nationalism, where will the impetus for such self-criticism come from? I find a flicker of hope with the emergence of reflective writings by Tamil leftists.

After democratic regime change three years ago, there are many reconciliation initiatives, but little fundamental rethinking about our past. Much of such reconciliation talk is limited to superficial donor or state funded initiatives and NGOised forums and events, which rarely challenge the world views of the people. Those initiatives seem to be more concerned about South Africa  often with flawed perceptions of the success there, without realising the deep inequalities that exclude and undermine the Black population  than our own past. For decades before January 2015, democratic space for serious social reflection was not present with the insurgencies, war and then an authoritarian regime, but what excuse do we have now? In this article, I draw from Tamil dissent, particularly in Jaffna, to begin thinking about our past and future.



Tamil public sphere

There is a long progressive tradition of Lankan Tamil writings that reaches back to the Jaffna Youth Congress in the 1920s, to the writings of leftists and oppressed caste writers in subsequent decades and the effervescence of youth writings in the 1970s and 1980s. Many of the younger generation of progressive Tamil writers met a tragic fate with armed politics, and particularly as the LTTE purged dissent. The early and powerful critic of Tamil militancy, Kovinthan who wrote Puthiyathor Ulagam (New World) in 1984, disappeared years later. Young Tamil feminist poets in the late 1980s were silenced; Selvy disappeared and Sivaramani committed suicide. Sabalingam who sought to write a critical book on the rise of Tamil militancy was gunned down in Paris. While I focus here on dissent and its repression within the Tamil political fold, many other writers and journalists were targeted by state agencies and other armed groups.

During the war, in the face of the powerful march of Tamil nationalism and ruthless suppression of dissent by the LTTE, the courageous writings of the University Teachers of Human Rights (Jaffna), whose co-founder Rajani Thiranagama was assassinated, stand out. But their writings for the most part were in English. The Tamil media for decades cowed down to the demands of the LTTE and eventually internalised narrow Tamil nationalism. Dissident writings in Tamil, increasingly were limited to certain smaller diasporic organisations such as the Illakiya Chandippu (Tamil literary forum), which met regularly for decades in different European cities.

A number of works including critical memoirs by former militants from the different movements including the LTTE have been published in the last decade and a half, first in the West and after the war in Sri Lanka. However, broader progressive and critical discussions in Jaffna have been limited with the stranglehold of Tamil nationalist discourse in the public sphere. Even though the fear of the gun has subsided, the fear of ostracised isolation continues, with many Tamil writers toeing the nationalist line and avoiding public criticism of the LTTE.

"After democratic regime change three years ago, there are many reconciliation initiatives, but little fundamental rethinking about our past."



Rethinking History

For the small groups of leftists in Jaffna, and they are not necessarily united, reflections on the legacy of major local and global historical events have triggered some vibrant discussions. October 2016 marked the fiftieth anniversary of the launch of the anti-caste struggles in Jaffna by the Communist Party, making a major dent on untouchability. Last year marked the 100th year since the Bolshevik Revolution and 150 years since the publication of Karl Marxs magnum opus Capital.

Reflections on such historical developments and an urge to address the past including an evaluation of the work of the left movement, have led to the publications of two important books over the last year. S. K. Senthivels Vaddukottaiyil Irunthu Mullaitivu Warai (From Vaddukottai to Mullaitivu) and N. Raveendrans Saathi Samuha Varalaattril Varkka Porattangal (Class Struggles in a Caste Social History), take as their starting point the launch of the October 1966 anti-caste struggles to discuss the challenges facing left politics today.

And after decades of the Tamil left being silenced by armed politics, these are welcome works that explore Tamil politics through a critique of Tamil nationalism and an examination of the crisis facing the left movement globally.

Senthivel addresses Tamil politics giving importance to conjuncture in the 1970s that culminated in the disastrous Vaddukottai resolution. The response of the Tamil nationalists to their electoral defeats in the election of 1970, the repression of the JVP uprising and the impact of Indias intervention in the formation of Bangladesh, he claims are some of historical developments that he contributes towards the consolidation of Tamil nationalism. Senthivel is not only a writer but also the General Secretary of the New Democratic Marxist Leninist Party, and in chronicling the political history that led to the tragedy of Mullivaikal, he is also writing it through the lens of his party and their work. Furthermore, his work is also in many ways an intervention to redirect Tamil politics away from the hold of narrow Tamil nationalism.

"A number of works including critical memoirs by former militants from the different movements including the LTTE have been published in the last decade and a half"

It is significant that his book was launched last year amidst a major struggle by the oppressed caste communities in Jaffna demanding the removal of upper caste cemeteries adjoining their villages.

Raveendrans work addresses the challenges facing left politics globally over the last many decades, but begins from the vantage point of the anti-caste struggles in Jaffna in the 1960s. He defines history as a discussion of contemporary times with the past, and relates the current challenges facing the global left to a critique of identity politics, including in their ethno-nationalist form. One of the central arguments in his work is that the success of the anti-caste struggles was based on uniting various actors and forces including sections of the upper castes towards overthrowing caste social structure and transforming social relations. In this context, it is also an indictment of Tamil nationalism for having isolated the Tamil community through an increasingly narrow and exclusionary Tamil politics.

Breaking the Silence

I raised some critical questions at the book discussions of both works in Jaffna, in particular whether it is possible to conceive a progressive nationalism in contemporary times; where I see all nationalism including a Lankan nationalism in our times to be regressive. Regardless of such questions, both authors have done a great service in breaking the silence on caste that has excluded and oppressed large sections of the Tamil community, and is consolidating in the post-war years. Furthermore, both works have put forward a challenge to the opportunistic politics of Tamil nationalists that refuse to critically examine legacy of the LTTE and what went wrong with Tamil politics.

Both works are being discussed in many parts of the country. I hope the books will reach a younger audience, and encourage others to write such critical political and social histories as a process of much needed self-criticism to reconstruct Tamil society. It is youth, particularly younger women, conceptualising and struggling against the intersection of caste and gender oppression that may reinvigorate Tamil politics, if we are to draw on political writings from other parts of South Asia.

These works through translations and discussions should reach the Sinhala and Muslim readers. Progressive forces in the South, if they are serious about co-existence and social justice, should engage such discussions propelled by the Tamil left rather than mollycoddle the Tamil nationalists, who in the end only reinforce the Sinhala Buddhist nationalism. Self-criticism and reflection are at the core of not only reconstructing our society but also the progressive movements that want to take up that challenge.Two Sri Lankans were arrested at the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA) while attempting to smuggle 242 cigarette cartons valued at Rs.2.4 million into the country yesterday, Customs Media Spokesman Deputy Director Sunil Jayaratne said.

He said both the suspects aged 27 and 47 years were residents of Colombo and arrested at 10.00 am at the arrival lounge of the Green Channel of the Customs Department by Customs Narcotics Control Unit officers after getting suspicious about her behaviour.

48,800 sticks of a brand of cigarettes Gold Leaf valued at Rs.2,420,000 were discovered inside her luggage wrapped with black colour paper and covered with clothes. They had arrived on a flight from Kuwait, he said.

During the Customs investigation it was revealed that both suspects were executives of a locally based company and they had being to Kuwait for a short visit, Mr. Jayaratne said.

The case was detected by Assistant Customs Superintendents Sumith Udayanga, Suranga Nayanajith Silva, Sandun Batagoda, Brian Arditya and Chathura Perera.

Investigations were being carried out under the supervision of Deputy Customs Director Malsiri Gunathilake, Upul Hettiarachchi and Customs Superintendent Dilan Sumanadasa.

Mr. Jayaratne said the suspects were later released on a penalty of Rs.300,000 by Deputy Customs Director Malsiri Gunathilake. (Chaturanga Samarawickrama and T. K. G. Kapila)Former Sri Lankan Ambassador to Russia Udayanga Weeratunga had been reportedly detained at the Dubai Airport this morning, while in transit to the United States, sources said.

He was to be handed over to the Dubai Police by the immigration officers.

Udayanga Weeratunga, Sri Lankas former envoy to Russia was accused of being the centre of a probe into the acquisition of MiG-27 fighter jets from Ukraine, while he was also accused of supplying weapons to anti-Government forces.

Interpol arrest warrant was taken in October 2016 following an FCID request made to the Colombo Fort Magistrate.

On January 04, 2017 Colombo Fort Magistrate Lanka Jayaratne ordered to suspend the transactions of 16 bank accounts with a balance of USD 1.5 million funds kept by Mr Weeratunga over the inquiry conducted into the huge financial loss caused to the Government in the purchase of Ukraine-built MIG-27 aircraft in 2006.

Fort Magistrate Lanka Jayaratne on January 19 directed Attanagalle and Colombo Land Registrars to prevent the sale of Udayanga Weeratunga's properties found by the FCID, where Rs.40 million and a one-acre land worth of Rs.25 million in Dompe and a luxury apartment (Trillium Residencies) worth Rs.29 million in Borella.

On August 21, 2017, Weeratungas request to annul the arrest order was rejected by Magistrate Lanka Jayaratne.

However, Police sources told the Daily Mirror that although Mr Weeratunga was detained at the Dubai Airport it would take a considerable period to return him to country due to diplomatic and legal concerns. (Thilanka Kanakarathna)The upcoming polls have opened doors for a diverse group of individuals including professionals, youngsters and more females to contest. Representing the United National Freedom Front (UNFF) - a newly formed political party under the leadership of former Provincial Council member Maithree Gunaratne is Chandradasa Jayasinghe competing for the Sri Jayawardanapura Municipal Council from the Nawala-East Ward. Having served as a civil engineer at the State Development and Construction Corporation and an engineer at the Road Development Authority, Jayasinghe believes that more professionals need to be involved in the political system. Speaking to the Daily Mirror , Jayasinghe shared his plans for Nawala.

Excerpts :





"I believe that the present crisis situation in the country in general and in the local government in particular is due to the non-participation of professionals in governance as policymakers. Therefore I wanted to step in to make a change in the system"

Why did you want to contest for an election?

I have been indirectly involved in the political scene because some of my family members were UNPers. It was an uncle of mine who formed the Podujana Party in which I was a member. But I wasnt involved in party politics. However I have been following the political history and as professionals we needed a party to represent the people. Then in April 2005 a few of us got together and formed the Podujana Professional Group with about nine members. Then during the previous general elections we thought of going in as an independent group and the United National Freedom Front (UNFF) was formed as the 70th political party of the country. I believe that the present crisis situation in the country in general and in the local government in particular is due to the non-participation of professionals in governance as policymakers. Therefore I wanted to step in to make a change in the system.

"This is the fault of party leaders. They should know to get professionals involved in order to provide solutions for various matters at hand. When Lee Kwan Yew visited Sri Lanka, he wanted to make Singapore another Sri Lanka. But what has happened to Sri Lanka today?"



What are your plans for Nawala?

If I am elected, I will be mainly focusing on five issues. These include the dengue problem which has caused many issues in the area. The other issue is the garbage problem which will be effectively controlled to make Nawala a beautiful city. Workplace corruption is another issue that we as a party are focusing on. As another avenue we are also looking at stopping all bribing activities which happens in local authorities and make them efficient offices where people can go and get their work done as quickly as possible. Provincial development is another main area of focus.

Many voters are disgusted by this system Flyover causes traffic jam In China engineers involved in politics



The Rajagiriya flyover was one of the main projects which took place under the good governance regime. Has it been an effective solution for the traffic congestion in the area?

No, not at all. Nawala was a traffic-free city but with the flyover, traffic movement has increased. Now nobody can cross the road as well. Flyovers are not an effective solution to curb traffic.



How challenging is it to contest as a new comer of a new political party?

There are 1221 houses in this ward and I have managed to visit almost all the houses. Many voters are disgusted by this system and some are wondering whether to vote or not. I have spent time talking to them and encouraging them to use their franchise wisely. Voting is a form of participation in order to make a democratic country. I have a good relationship with other candidates as well. The people spoke to me about their problems and I have done what I can in my capacity.

" I believe that the present crisis situation in the country in general and in the local government in particular is due to the non-participation of professionals in governance as policymakers"



We dont see many professionals in the present political system. What are your views on this?

This is the fault of party leaders. They should know to get professionals involved in order to provide solutions for various matters at hand. When Lee Kwan Yew visited Sri Lanka, he wanted to make Singapore another Sri Lanka. But what has happened to Sri Lanka today? In China there are many engineers involved in politics. This is how they have developed their country. We cant ask a butcher to do a surgery on human and likewise, we need professionals to take this country forward.

I am confident that at least five or six members would definitely be elected. Our party leader is an unblemished character and we want to keep our identity as professionals



What are your views about the mixed electoral system?

There is very less expenditure this time. It is only a marketing campaign which requires little money but that too doesnt have to be exorbitant amounts. We have to concentrate on our ward and we dont have to keep meetings because door-to-door campaigns are more effective in my opinion.



How confident are you that you would win?

I am confident that at least five or six members would definitely be elected. Our party leader is an unblemished character and we want to keep our identity as professionals.



Pic by Kushan PathirajaDAMASCUS, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- The Syrian Foreign Ministry on Saturday rejected the U.S. claims about the Syrian government using chemical weapons in the war as "lies."

The ministry said in a statement that the U.S. remarks about the use of chemical weapons in the Eastern Ghouta region of the east of the capital Damascus are "false claims."

Such allegations were timed to undermine the efforts to resolve the Syrian war through a peaceful settlement between the Syrians without foreign interventions, it noted.

The Syrian government reaffirms its position against the use of chemical weapons, and Syria has handed over all its chemical arsenals to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the ministry said.

The U.S. and its allies are "desperately" searching for a pretext to target Syria, following the success of the Syrian army in its war against terror-designated militant groups across Syria, it pointed out. U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis recently threatened Syria with a military action if hard evidence is found to back up the claims of another sarin attack in Syria.

Last month, activists claimed the Syrian forces used chlorine in an attack on the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta countryside of Damascus, causing 21 people to suffer from breathing difficulties.

In April last year, the U.S. struck a military base in central Syria with more than 50 Tomahawk missiles, in retaliation for an alleged chemical attack by the government forces on a rebel-held town in the northwestern province of Idlib.

The Syrian government denied the accusations, saying it's rebels who mounted the attack to frame the government and draw in a military action from the United States.The White House's last-minute decision not to nominate prominent Korea-policy wonk Victor Cha as ambassador to South Korea has raised fears that North Korea hawks are winning the tug-of-war in the White House.

Cha was reportedly dumped because he is against a "bloody nose" preventative strike on North Korea and has told the White House so.

The idea is that the U.S. would strike one or two symbolic targets in the North, giving the regime a "bloody nose" rather than decapitating it, with the aim of scaring it into abandoning its nuclear program. But a prerequisite is that North Korea will not launch a retaliatory strike.

The U.S. government is not yet fully behind the idea and has yet to work out any details. But pundits' tongues are already wagging furiously.

Speculative targets include the North's Yongbyon nuclear power facility, the nuclear test site in Punggye-ri, a missile research and development facility at Sanum-dong in northern Pyongyang, and submarine bases in Hamnam and Sinpo.

But any strike could provoke a prompt military response from North Korea, which has prompted some pundits to speculate that the U.S. will avoid the obvious targets and aim at non-military targets instead.

One diplomatic source said, "A possible target is the USS Pueblo," which was captured by North Korea in 1968 and has been moored for display along the Pothong River in Pyongyang.

A military source said, "The damage caused by the 'bloody nose' strategy is not important. The aim is to instill fear in Kim Jong-un that the U.S. can strike without warning at any time."Another goof-up: Alappuzha Medical College declares alive patient dead

The relatives, who made arrangements for the cremation, and reached the hospital for receiving the body, were then told that their patient was still alive and under intensive care.Graceful Malayalam falls impeccably from his lips. The roots havent receded a bit in Raj Nair, grandson of literary giant Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai. Coming all the way from Brisbane in Australia, Raj, in many ways, is making an eventful second coming to Malayalam cinema. The director of Punyam Aham has set his second movie Vyatha in motion. Sometime in the future, he will sketch the life of an unsung heroine. He hopes to be co-producer to Kazhcha Film Forums dream project to launch a female film director in Malayalam. And finally, he is here to follow the legacy of his author grandfather with a novel, to tell a different tale of Thakazhi.

When he vanished after the debut feature, Raj was heard announcing somewhere in 2013 the big project Mulachi, about Nangeli, who chopped her breasts off to protest against mulakkaram or Breast Tax imposed by the erstwhile kingdom of Travancore. The buzz was that Angelina Jolie would come on board and thats it. We were all set to launch that project and I had contacted the actor. Protest mounted in Kerala when the announcement came. The whole thing got politicised. I did not want to roll out a big production amid all the chaos and din. Its there and Ill do it anyway, he states.

The female factor is predominant in manifold ways in his works and ventures. In 2004, he became a director for the first time filming his 85-year-old granny Katha in Kazhchavasthukkal. The voices of his women in Punyam Aham were distinct.

Angelina Jolie project still on

Now that he has arrived to promote female talent, Raj explains in simpler terms that he is a feminist at heart.

I believe in making the voices of women heard. Women here have the right to cast votes. Our Infant Mortality Rate is less. But what use when men remain the same. I have a 15-year-old daughter, who is left to make her choices when she writes, swims and draws. I provide her with a platform to grow. My ammoomma (grandmother) in Thakazhi was a person who inspired me a lot. I am not a Hollywood producer but with what I have, I could offer some fillip to this project where the director, writer and cinematographer is a woman. That is feminism, for me, he clarifies.

Raj was a regular at the parallel film festival KIFF (Kazhcha Indie Film Festival) that happened in December 2017, as a spectator to the live videos streamed on Facebook. He could not sit back as a mere viewer and came here to meet the people behind it. Other than this, he shares an anecdote when an artist talked to him about KIFF frontman and S Durga director Sanalkumar Sasidharan a decade ago.

Sanal and I met at Brisbane last December. I have seen his movie. People at Kazhcha Film Forum walk more and talk less. There is certain quality to what they do. I dont mind their political leanings. I feel this is what we want for good cinema. I wont interfere with their philosophy. All I offer is to add one extra mile to their goals, Raj explains. From the association of his production house, Mirabilia Films, he promises a global arena for the Kazhcha project in the incubator.

Two more things are left. His novel and next movie. The novel Bhoomiyile Paravakal, runs through Thakazhi, Afghanistan, Kuwait and Australia in four chapters.

The Thakazhi from my childhood to recent times are subjects to my plot. Appooppan (author Thakazhi) and I appear as characters in it. He comes as Thekkethile Achan, which is how people fondly referred to him. When he left, they mourned the death of Thekkethile Achan and Appooppan. It does not flow in a continuous pattern, says Raj, who publishes his scribblings, mostly poems, in

a Malayalam magazine.

The film Vyatha (Woe), is a real-life take on the deepest angst and emotions of an NRI. We, the NRIs, are more nostalgic about our place. Its pangs and pains shoot our anxiety levels up. The protagonist in Vyatha is an artiste and it travels through his thoughts starting from the time he reads a newspaper until he goes to bed. He relates his personal issues to the problems in society. It is something from a journalistic portrayal of a situation, he says. Raj hopes the film would be out in 2019.Bhopal: At a time when the entire country is talking about the upcoming film "Padman", a woman scientist in Madhya Pradesh, who returned from the US, has been silently working on her mission to educate tribal women about menstrual health and offering them cheap sanitary pads.

Maya Vishwakarma started her mission two years ago, prompted by her own experience of unsafe menstrual hygiene during her early years.

"I did not use sanitary pads till the age of 26. I even did not know about it. At that time, neither did I have money, nor information," Vishwakarma told PTI.

The 36-year-old biologist has returned to her village Mehragaon in Narsinghpur district from the US, where she went for higher studies, and is devoting her energy in spreading awareness about menstrual hygiene among tribal women.

Her early life's experience led her back to her native place, where she is working for menstrual hygiene and cost- effective manufacturing of quality sanitary pads under the banner of her organisation - Sukarma Foundation.

"I was told to use cloth by a woman relative during my first period. This had caused several infections. Talking about menstrual health is still a taboo in our society. My experiences in early life inspired me to work in this field."

Vishwakarma's campaign has come into spotlight at a time when there is a buzz around the Bollywood movie "Padman", which will hit theatres on February 9.

The Akshay Kumar-starrer social drama is a fictionalised account of Tamil Nadu-based social entrepreneur Arunachalam Muruganantham, who invented a low-cost sanitary pad-making machine. His machine manufactured affordable sanitary towels for women in villages.

"My work has nothing to do with the movie. I have been working on menstrual health since the past two years. I had met Muruganantham in connection with my work in 2016. He was known to me from my California days," Vishwakarma said.

"I have seen Muruganantham's machine but it was different from our equipment. Our machines are semi-automatic. Now, more and more women are coming forward to join us."

She said films like "Padman" would create awareness about menstrual cycle and related problems but this alone is not sufficient and more work on the ground is needed.

"Real groundwork is needed. I work in areas, which lack basic amenities like power. We need Padwoman and Padman who can work on the ground. Only movies can't bring change."

She urged Kumar to share the profit of his movie on providing cost-effective pads to women in the tribal areas and villages.

"As compared to branded products, the pads made by us are much cheaper. We procure raw materials at cheaper rates while labour is also cost-effective. So, our cost of a pack of seven pads would be around Rs 15-20 while the price of branded products is much higher."

Vishwakarma, daughter of a poor `lohar' (blacksmith), said she studied in the village school and then moved to a nearby town for further schooling before shifting to Jabalpur for pursuing MSc in biochemistry.

Later, she got an opportunity to do research at the AIIMS, New Delhi and moved to the US for a PhD in chemical and biological engineering which she could not complete.

Vishwakarma said during the past two years she has been spending about 6-8 months every year in India and the rest in California.

"After two years of research, production of sanitary pads started in October last after machines were arranged through my own resources and crowd funding. We are now working on packaging," she said.

"Women and girls even don't dry their inner clothes in the open. They do not talk about their problems. They consider menstruation a curse. So, education on this issue is needed. I visit tribal villages of Narsinghpur and adjoining districts and educate women about menstruation."

The factory set up by her is producing 2,000 sanitary pads per day. "We are struggling with initial problems but would soon increase the production," she said.Travelling has emerged as a significant aspect in everyones life. But in the midst of these casual travellers is a breed of travellers who put on their globetrotting shoes, bidding adieu to well-paying jobs. For this rare breed, each day is an adventure waiting to unfold. Travelling, to them, is synonymous with living. They realise that the magic of places goes far beyond the highlighted itineraries of guide books and pictures.

Such is the story of a passionate traveller and hardcore food lover from Kottayam, Ebin Jose, who moved to Somalia as part of his management job in 2000 but quit it in 2016 and returned to Kerala. By that time he had already travelled to 19 countries during 16 years of professional life. The year was also when he shifted completely to travelling  hitting the open road or hopping on a plane to a destination unknown. He has helped a friend elope while in Somalia, lived in a cubicle for over seven months in Eritrea, trekked the Tossa Mountains in Ethiopia with his three-month-old baby and walked with African Elephants in the Murchison Falls National Park of Uganda. He also started a YouTube channel to share his travel experiences and in between found time to turn an author by writing under the pen name E.Jey.

It can be terrifying to leave a secure job but to Ebin, wanderlust was deep in his blood. My job with a developmental agency in Africa was something that helped me explore a majority of destinations. The job helped me dig into 15 out of the 19 countries that I have toured to. Yet, to stretch my wings as a dedicated traveller, the job was an obligation, he quips.

Having travelled to almost every nook and corner of the globe, his recent travel over the year-end was planned as a project in India  #OutOnRoads4Hornbill  coinciding with the Hornbill Festival in Nagaland. The 30-day travel project was a road trip with two of his friends and he travelled from Kanyakumari to Kohima. Explaining more, Ebin says, We were living the cultural richness of India from south to northeast. Over 8,000 kilometers and 15 destinations; we lived a gypsy life from 20 November for a month and celebrated the cultural extravaganza during the Hornbill Festival in Nagaland. He has shared his experiences in Jaunt Monkey  his YouTube channel. Meanwhile, he kept updating his blog.

Ebin takes a moment to recall his favourite spots. I am in love with every country and every place I have been to. Nepal was the first country that I travelled to. Somalia was the first African country I flew into. Egypt, Ethiopia, Maldives, Uganda, and every other country that I ventured into are special to me.

Taking off to worlds unknown may sound romantic but the support and unconditional support of a partner is crucial. Ebins wife Kalpita Chakraborty has been the ying to his yang. He says with lot of pride. A man is incomplete without a woman and if I quote the Bible, A blessed mans wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table. My daughters need a little more time to stretch their wings. Well, when it comes to support, their (my familys) curiosity to listen my travel stories and thrill to watch my travel videos are just enough for me to fuel my year long travels, he says.

Ebin also found his calling in the love for the written word. He has already published a novel Afflictions of Love and a collection of short stories Ordeal and the Horoscope. He is busy with his second novel, Somali Days. Before he ends, dreaming of his next destination, he ruminates, We do not know even a small part about our planet. My travels are to find answers for my questions. Yet, a whole lifetime is not enough to answer all my questions.Every year, supporters and members of the LGBTQ community take to the streets of Mumbai to fight for their basic civil rights. (All photos/gifs: Alfea Jamal)

On Saturday, Mumbai's August Kranti Maidan - the historical site where Gandhi announced the Quit India Movement - witnessed another extraordinary movement: Queer Azad March.

The annual march marks the start of 'Mumbai Pride Month' from the maidan to the Girgaum Chowpatty beach.

Every year, supporters and members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community take to the streets of Mumbai to fight for their basic civil rights.

Dressed in the brightest hues, with quirky-yet-strongly-worded placards, they march on, unaffected by judgmental looks that passerbys give.

They own their colours, they own their pride and confidently march on knowing how fabulous they are.

The theme for this years march was 'Section 377 Quit India', which focuses on the LGBTQ community's demand to get rid of the Indian Penal Code's section 377, that criminalises sexual acts "against the order of nature".

The community and supporters came in large numbers to voice their demands and hope for change.

Farmer Ram Rao, who identifies as bigender, came all the way from Chennai to walk the march. "The parade is more vibrant this year, everyone is expressing their heart, not just their art, he said.

People from all around have come for the pride, it's like Mardi Gras in India," Rao expressed.

At the march, this farmer used his clothes to send a strong message. "In India the queer community isn't treated with respect, they are denied all their rights. It's almost like we are plastic bottles, you drink the water and throw it away. So my costume is making a statement that: We may be disposable to society, but we still need our rights," he explained.

His support for the community goes beyond the march. Rao also runs a support group called Pink People, for those who have to struggle with their internal challenges and suffer in isolation.

47-year-old Mykel Dicus, from New York came to Mumbai especially to attend the march. His trip was made possible by a crowd-funding campaign, which he claimed was funded by 85% straight people.

"India is 10 years behind America in terms of equality, it's my hope that it doesn't take you'll 10 years to get LGBTQ rights," he said.

Dicus is associated with 'Broadway to Bombay', a flag-dance workshop that aims to help LGBTQ people who are trapped inside their minds and find it hard to express themselves. Dance, he believes, helps set them free.

Amidst the crowd of rainbows was a pleasant surprise. Suren Abreu, a 50-year-old priest, who came out to support the cause with a group of young college going parishioners.

Father Abreu is part of a group called Green Mad Caps, that fights for the environment, feminism, child rights and LGBTQ rights. Marches like this one he explained have big impact.

"These marches help with two things, first, an awareness that these are humans who need their rights. The second is, we need to move towards a greater acceptance, there is so much positive energy here, maybe it will counteract the negative energy that India has for people that have alternate sex choices," he believes.

Presently section 377 is under the Supreme Court's judicial review, and parade-goer Sumit Pawar has his fingers crossed, "I'm hoping that this time they have a positive outcome, as we all know the Supreme Court is progressive, and it's my hope that the Supreme Court will be in favour. That's my hope!"Ankit had been dating a 20-year-old Muslim woman for the past 3 years, against the wishes of her family. (Photo: Facebook/Ankit Saxena)

New Delhi: Police kept vigil on west Delhi's Khayala area as tensions heightened after a 23-year-old photographer, Ankit Saxena, was allegedly stabbed to death by the family of his Muslim girlfriend.

Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari who met the parents of the photographer said the incident should not be given a communal colour.

He demanded that Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal break his "silence" over the killing and announce a compensation of Rs. 1 crore to the family.

Four people, including the woman's brother, were arrested a few hours after Ankit Saxena was stabbed to death by them.

"Three accused - the mother, father and uncle of the woman - have been sent to judicial custody. Her minor brother has been sent to juvenile home," a senior police officer said.

Also Read: Tension prevails in Delhi's Khyala after Muslim girl's kin kill 23-yr-old Hindu man

Ankit had been dating the 20-year-old woman for the past three years, against the wishes of her family.

Around 9 pm on Thursday night, Ankit was on his way home from work when he was attacked by his girlfriend's parents, uncle and brother in West Delhis Khyala area. At a crossing not far from Ankit's home, they allegedly beat him before slashing him with a sharp weapon.

Also Read: 23-yr-old Delhi photographer killed by girlfriend's kin in full public view

(With PTI inputs)The four policemen involved in the incident were suspended with immediate effect including the sub-inspector who shot at the man. (Photo: ANI/Twitter)

Noida: Two people were allegedly shot at by a police personnel on Saturday in Uttar Pradesh's Noida Sector 122 on Saturday night.

Among both the injured, Jitendra Yadav, who was shot in the neck, is said to be critical, while Sunil has wounded his leg.

The family of the duo alleged that it was a "fake encounter" and that they were attacked for "no reason".

The family said that four boys were returning from Bahrampur at around 10:30 pm, when the police personnel stopped the vehicle and fired at one of them.

The four policemen involved in the incident were suspended with immediate effect including the sub-inspector who shot at the man. The inspector was arrested and sent to jail, SSP Love Kumar said.

The police have also dismissed allegations of "fake encounter".

According to the police, it is case of personal enmity. During the probe it was found that the trainee sub-inspector knew the elder brother of the man who was shot, they said.

(With inputs from ANI)Nellore: Ridiculing Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu purportedly expressing displeasure over the Union Budget, YSR Congress president Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy said that the TD, being a coalition partner, has to be part of the decisions taken by the NDA.

Addressing a large gathering at south Mopuru in Nellore Rural mandal on Saturday, leader of the Opposition said, Chandrababu Naidu expressing dissatisfaction is a drama as the Budget, before being presented, was approved by the Union Cabinet, in which TD has two ministers. The theatrics of Mr Naidu would not work anymore, however best the media tries to project him.

When he had watered down the Special Category Status (SCS) or when he wrote to the Prime Minister that the state is not keen on Dugarajapatnam Port and that some other project be sanctioned in lieu of the port, he did not feel the pinch nor did he express displeasure as it served his purpose. Now, he is talking as if the NDA government has served a raw deal to the state in the Budget.

The Opposition leader said: Mr Naidu backstabbed NTR and he can do the same to Narendra Modi or anyone else when time comes. The Union Budget is a collective decision and TD cannot refrain from taking the blame that the state interests have been ignored.

Mr Naidu failed to mount pressure on the Centre as he always kept his personal interests ahead of peoples interests. From Polavaram to Bhogapuram international airport, he has been looking for kickbacks and was never serious on peoples welfare. He has cancelled the tender of Bhogapuram airport as he wanted to give it to his favoured few and not the Airports Authority of India (AAI) which has given a good deal to the state.

Mr Reddy said the houses for poor have been given to contractors and are being sold at an exorbitant rate of Rs 2,000 per sq.ft while in fact, they would cost nothing more than Rs 1,000 per sq. ft. The contract is designed in such a way that the contractor makes a quick buck while the poor would be paying the EMI life-long, he said.

Chandrababu Naidu may promise moon but the people should use your discretion in the ensuing elections, he said.Chandrababu Naidu had last week hinted at breaking alliance with the BJP. (Photo: ANI/Twitter)

Amaravati: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and Telugu Desam Party president N Chandrababu Naidu held a crucial meeting with the party MPs, senior MLAs and leaders in Amaravati on Sunday.

According to a report in NDTV, party sources said that BJP chief Amit Shah dialed chief minister Chandrababu Naidu asking him to rethink the alliance. Shah asked Naidu to not take "tough decisions".

The meeting comes on the back of the TDP expressing its unhappiness over the Budget allocations to Andhra Pradesh and was reportedly called to review the party's ties with its ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

TDP leader K Rammohan Rao said that the party would discuss about the budget in the meeting.

"Political alliance is different and state government development is different",he said.

"Whatever the Chief Minister decides we will stand by it, but we are not happy with the BJP budget, not happy with the budget allotted to Andhra Pradesh. We MPs are ready to resign, but we are bound by the Chief Minister's decision," Pandula Ravindra Babu, TDP MP Amalapuram told ANI.

The chief minister who is highly disappointed with the Government at the Centre, had stated that no funds were allotted for various projects in the state and also for the construction of APs capital city Amaravati.

He said that various issues including the Polavaram project and the Duggirajupatnam port in Nellore district were ignored in the Budget.

Also Read: Injustice to Andhra in Budget 2018, will declare war: Chandrababu-led TDP

Earlier on Saturday, BJP national general secretary Ram Madhav said that the party and the Centre would soon be extending the olive branch to Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu to resolve his concerns in a mutually beneficial to both parties.

"There seems to be some kind of unhappiness, we will talk it out. TDP is an old ally of the BJP. We will talk it out with them and will tell them we are committed to the interests of Andhra Pradesh," he said.

Madhav further said, "We at the BJP are committed not only to address the TDP's concerns with regard to the Budget proposals, but also, all other issues of concern that it may have. We will convince Naidu and the TDP not to think of severing their ties with the BJP or the NDA. They are a valuable ally."

Chandrababu Naidu had last week hinted at breaking alliance with the BJP.

Also Read: Will go our own way if alliance not needed: Chandrababu Naidu warns BJP

Addressing a press conference in Amaravati at state secretariat, Naidu said, "If the BJP does not want to continue alliance then the TDP will on its own."

TDP-BJP alliance has soured over the past few years and has taken a turbulent turn with the Union Budget.

(With agency inputs)Vice President Venkaiah Naidu arrives in Pedanadipadu Arts & Science College on a bullock cart to attend Golden Jubilee Celebrations of Pedanadipadu Arts & Science College at Pedanandipadu village in Guntur district on Saturday. (Photo: DC)

Guntur: Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu lamenting over shunning the use of mother tongue, Telugu, by the younger generation and asked the public, mainly parents and youngsters, to promote the ancient and sweet language by speaking.

He came to Pedanandipadu in Guntur district on Saturday and inaugurated the golden jubilee celebrations of Pedanandipadu Arts and Science College. Supreme Court judge Lavu Nageswara Rao was also present.

Mr Naidu said that there is nothing wrong in learning English and other languages but forgetting mother tongue is not acceptable. He asked the students to payback to educational institutions which provided them good education. He asked farmers to swtich to horticulture crops and dairy farming to get rid of crises arising due to cultivation of conventional crops.

Lamenting over the suicides by farmers, Mr Venkaiah Naidu felt that poultry and dairy farmers were not getting distressed so as to commit suicides and suggested that farmers think about alternatives to get good income.

Welcoming the allocations of `11 lakh crore of funds for agriculture in the Union Budget, he stressed the need to boost agriculture in the coming years and making India the supplier of agriculture produce to the world.

Lamenting over the division of joint families into nuclear families, he said that India's family culture won accolades in the world. Youngsters can go to foreign countries but they should return and live with family members without forgetting their birth place/villages.

He asked the public not to forget mother, native place, mother tongue and mother country and to serve the country and society in all possible manners.

Mr Naidu, recalling his association and earlier visits to Pedanandipadu, said the locals largely participated in the Indian freedom movement and post Independence, Pedanandipadu produced famous doctors, engineers, leaders, judges, engineers and other professionals. He said that Mr Lavu Nageswara Rao is one of the jewels of Pedanandipadu.Claiming that Karnataka is the number one state in investment and innovation, and highlighting Bengaluru as a start up and innovation hub, Siddaramaiah boasted about having scripted several national firsts across key sectors through a unique model of development. (Photo: PTI/File)

Bengaluru: Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's public rally in Bengaluru, Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Sunday asked him to "find time" to resolve the inter-state Mahadayi River water row with neighbouring Goa.

Claiming that Karnataka is the number one state in investment and innovation, and highlighting Bengaluru as a start up and innovation hub, Siddaramaiah boasted about having scripted several national firsts across key sectors through a unique model of development.

"I welcome PM @narendramodi to Namma Karnataka - the no.1 state in investments, innovation & progressive policies... Through a unique model of development, we have scripted several national firsts across key sectors," Siddaramaiah said in a tweet.

"I am confident that Karnataka's success makes India proud," he said.

"@narendramodi, I am glad you are making time to visit the country's start up & innovation hub, Namma Bengaluru today..On behalf of my people, I urge you to find the time for Karnataka's drinking water needs and help us resolve the Mahadayi dispute #NammaKarnatakaFirst," he said in another tweet.

Responding to Chief Minister's tweets, state BJP Chief BS Yeddyurappa alleged that Karnataka has scripted several firsts like corruption, farmers suicide and collapse of law and order under Siddaramaiah's regime.

"Thanks for the welcome CM @siddaramaiah avare! Yes. Karnataka indeed has scripted several firsts - No.1 Corrupt State, 3,500+ farmer suicides, collapse of law and order, mysterious deaths of officers, transfers of honest officials, crumbling infra of Bengaluru. #KarnatakaTrustsModi," he said in a tweet.

Karnataka has for long been demanding Prime Minister's intervention in resolving the inter-state Mahadayi river water sharing dispute by calling a meeting of chief ministers of riparian states that includes Goa and Mahrashtra.

Various Kannada organisations and farmers groups have called for "black day" on Sunday alleging that the prime minister was not heeding to their demand.

Recently, 'Kannada Okkuta,' an umbrella organisation of various pro Kannada organisation along with farmers' groups, had called for dawn-to-dusk Karnataka bandh on January 25, demanding the prime minister's intervention.

Their plans earlier to observe bandh Sunday also, on the day of prime minister's visit had failed with the Karnataka High Court on Friday issuing the stay on the shut down after terming it as "unconstitutional".

Karnataka, which has locked horns with neighbouring Goa on sharing Mahadayi River water, is seeking release of 7.56 tmc ft water for the Kalasa-Banduri Nala project.

The project is being undertaken to improve drinking water supply to the twin cities of Hubballi-Dharwad and districts of Belagavi and Gadag. It involves building barrages across Kalasa and Banduri, tributaries of Mahadayi River, to divert 7.56 tmc ft water to Malaprabha which meets drinking water needs of the region.

Attempts have been made by Karnataka to amicably solve the issue which is also pending before the Mahadayi Water Disputes Tribunal.The decision to conduct weekly tests for subjects such as maths, Hindi and English was taken in August last, and has been implemented ever since in government schools.

Hyderabad: The decision to not conduct weekly tests in government schools has met with disapproval from teachers associations in the city. The education department decided this after it found that students were bunking classes on the day of tests.

Teachers, however, said that despite the fact that funds were allocated for the purpose, periodic tests were in the interest of students and should not have been done away with completely. In light of the increasing number of student suicides related to stress, many teachers said that students might get even more tense ahead of the final exams if they have not prepared the year round for weekly tests.

Telangana United Teachers Federation general secretary professor Chava Ravi said, Tests should at least be conducted every fortnight. Teachers find the evaluation process too stressful so new measures should be implemented. It is sad that online tests are not held in government schools. Mr Ravi said that the attitude of students towards tests needs to change.

The DEO of Suryapet said, We had received complaints from students and teachers about the evaluation and problems related to weekly tests. But these tests actually benefitted students and helped them in revising the portion better. Therefore, we are trying to reach an amicable solution.

Deepthi Divakar, a teacher, said, In lower grades, some marks are allotted to performance in weekly tests. Good performance in weekly tests helps in quick revision later, and comes in handy for students before the final exams when they have to study the entire years syllabus. The periodic tests can be made less stern, but not scrapped totally. Students should be made to feel more comfortable with the tests and not get averse to taking them.

The decision to conduct weekly tests for subjects such as maths, Hindi and English was taken in August last, and has been implemented ever since in government schools.

The idea behind the tests is to avoid a pile-up of studies for students. Students should be made to understand this. But the tests should not eat into teaching hours. A few changes are required, but they should not be removed altogether looking at the benefits they bring. For teachers, we can have a cross-evaluation procedure between peers once in a while so that they feel less burdened, says Chava Ravi.The Indian Coast Guard station in Haldia received an immediate medical evacuation request from the master of a Panama registered merchant vessel Yan Dun Jiao-I which was about 64 nautical miles south of the Sagar Island in South 24 Parganas on Saturday. (Photo: DC)

Kolkata: In sharp contrast to the China's aggression at the Sino-India border, the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) evacuated a Chinese mariner who fell ill on board a merchant ship in the Bay of Bengal.

At around 5 pm on Saturday, the ICG station in Haldia received an immediate medical evacuation request from the master of a Panama registered merchant vessel Yan Dun Jiao-I which was about 64 nautical miles south of the Sagar Island in South 24 Parganas.

One of the crew members, Xia Jianting (46), was suffering from severe abdominal pain and continuous vomitting, said ICG (North East) deputy commandant Avinandan Mitra.

Swinging into action, the ICG Maritime Rescue Sub Centre diverted ICGS Raziya Sultana, which was patrolling in the exclusive economic zone of India in the deep sea, to the vessel.

The ill mariner was given first-aid by the ICG medical team on board the merchant vessel. When he became slightly stable by midnight, he was shifted to ICGS Raziya Sultana, said Eastern Command chief public relation officer Wing Commander SS Birdi.

Early on Sunday, an ICG fast interceptor boat C-418 was sent from Haldia to the sea. The patient was shifted to the boat which reached Haldia at around 11 am, Wing Commander Birdi added.

He was later handed over to the merchant vessel's local agent for his further treatment in Kolkata.Rahul said the Naga Accord signed by the prime minister was nowhere to be seen yet. (Photo: File)

New Delhi: A day after the Bharatiya Janata Party released its list of 20 candidates for the February 27 Nagaland Assembly polls, Congress President Rahul Gandhi attacked Prime Narendra Modi over the Naga accord.

He said the Naga Accord signed by the prime minister was nowhere to be seen yet.

"August 2015, Mr Modi claims to create history by signing the NAGA accord. Feb 2018, Naga Accord is still nowhere to be found. Modi ji is the first ever Indian PM whose words don't mean anything," Rahul tweeted.

The Nagaland Peace Accord was signed in August, 2015 by Modi and National Socialist Council of Nagaland to end the insurgency in the region.

The BJP became the first political party to release its candidates' list for the Nagaland polls, while the regional parties, tribal groups and civil society organisations in the state are demanding a solution to the vexed Naga political issue before the election.

The BJP has dumped its 15-year-old alliance partner, the ruling Naga People's Front (NPF) to forge an alliance with newly floated Nationalist Democratic People's Party (NDPP) led by former chief minister Neiphiu Rio.

The BJP leaders of Nagaland wrote to party chief Amit Shah, expressing their resentment against the saffron party's pre-poll alliance with the newly-floated party.The Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Bill, 2017 was passed by the Lok Sabha in the recently concluded winter session, but could not be passed in the Rajya Sabha with the opposition demanding that it be sent to a parliamentary panel for detailed scrutiny. (Photo: File)

Aurangabad: NCP chief Sharad Pawar on Saturday said no government has the right to interfere in Islamic laws related to talaq (divorce), which have their origins in the Quran.

He said that said if banning instant triple talaq was about giving protection to women, then "whatever one intends to do should be done by taking prominent people in the Muslim community and clerics in confidence".

"But talaq is a way provided by the Quran in Islam. It's a message, and no ruler has the right to interfere with that," he said at a party rally in Aurangabad.

The Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Bill, 2017 was passed by the Lok Sabha in the recently concluded winter session, but could not be passed in the Rajya Sabha with the opposition demanding that it be sent to a parliamentary panel for detailed scrutiny.

According to the draft law, instant triple talaq will attract a jail term of three years for the husband.

Pawar also hit out at the NDA government over its agricultural policies.

The growers are not getting good prices for their crops and the government isn't worried about farmer suicides, he alleged.

The government promised an increase in the minimum support price for farm produce in the budget, but it didn't spell out how it would be done, Mr Pawar said.

When the UPA government announced a Rs 71,000-crore loan waiver scheme for farmers, money was transferred to farmers' accounts within a few days, he said.

Farmers in Maharashtra are waiting for money even months after the BJP-led state government announced a loan waiver in June 2017.

On violence in Kasganj in Uttar Pradesh, Sharad Pawar alleged that members of the Muslim community who were celebrating Republic Day were attacked by those close to the BJP.

NCP leader and Leader of Opposition in the Maharashtra Legislative Council Dhananjay Munde alleged the state government tried to create hurdles in today's rally by "denying or delaying" permission.

"You may disrupt Internet services, but how would you suppress people's voice," he said.The party also maintained that it will launch protest if its demands are not fulfilled. (Photo: PTI/File)

Amaravati: The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) on Sunday decided to not break alliance with ally BJP-led NDA in a crucial meeting with the party MPs, senior MLAs and leaders in Amaravati on Sunday.

Party leader and Union Minister YS Chowdary said that it will however raise its concerns on issues related to Andhra Pradesh with the Centre. The party also maintained that it will launch protest if its demands are not fulfilled.

The meeting comes on the back of the TDP expressing its unhappiness over the Budget allocations to Andhra Pradesh and was reportedly called to review the party's ties with its ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

According to party sources, BJP chief Amit Shah dialed chief minister Chandrababu Naidu asking him to rethink the alliance. Shah asked Naidu to not take "tough decisions".

Also Read: Rethink alliance, don't take 'tough calls', Amit Shah dials Chandrababu

The chief minister who was highly disappointed with the Government at the Centre, had stated that no funds were allotted for various projects in the state and also for the construction of APs capital city Amaravati.

He said that various issues including the Polavaram project and the Duggirajupatnam port in Nellore district were ignored in the Budget.

Also Read: Injustice to Andhra in Budget 2018, will declare war: Chandrababu-led TDP

Earlier on Saturday, BJP national general secretary Ram Madhav said that the party and the Centre would soon be extending the olive branch to Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu to resolve his concerns in a mutually beneficial to both parties.

"There seems to be some kind of unhappiness, we will talk it out. TDP is an old ally of the BJP. We will talk it out with them and will tell them we are committed to the interests of Andhra Pradesh," he said.

Madhav further said, "We at the BJP are committed not only to address the TDP's concerns with regard to the Budget proposals, but also, all other issues of concern that it may have. We will convince Naidu and the TDP not to think of severing their ties with the BJP or the NDA. They are a valuable ally."

Chandrababu Naidu had last week hinted at breaking alliance with the BJP.

Addressing a press conference in Amaravati at state secretariat, Naidu said, "If the BJP does not want to continue alliance then the TDP will on its own."

TDP-BJP alliance has soured over the past few years and took a turbulent turn with the Union Budget.Nehal had shown an inclination owards the Chief Ministers re-engineering and re-designing of irrigation project at a tender age.

Hyderabad: Enthralled by the articulate performance of five-year-old Nehal, Minister T. Harish Rao on Sunday, appointed him as the brand ambassador for the Telangana irrigation department. He also directed the department to fund all his educational expenditure.

Five-year-old Nehal is a native of Pandillapalli of Chintakani mandal of Khammam district. He is the son of Hanumantha Rao, who works in a private firm at Shapoor Nagar, in the capital city.

He had shown an inclination towards Chief Minister, K. Chandrasekhara Raos re-engineering and re-designing of irrigation projects and grasped their importance at a tender age. Without referring to any book, he was able to explain all irrigation projects at his finger tips. After hearing about his exemplary knowledge and understanding of the irrigation projects from a local TRS leader, on Sunday Harish Rao organised a meeting with hundreds of irrigation department officials and engineers at Jala Sowdha, where Nehal gave a powerful 20-minute speech on the importance of various irrigation projects in the state and the need for them in the backdrop of the Chief Minister redesigning the projects.

Nehal, who is presently studying U.K.G, had virtually flabbergasted everyone present at the meeting. Harish Rao was so thrilled that he immediately made an announcement app-ointing Nehal as the brand ambassador.

When Nehal said that he would like to meet the Chief Minister personally, Harish Rao promised him that he would take him to Chandrasekhara Rao for a presentation.

Harish Rao asked the Kaleswaram Chief Engineer, B. Hari Ram to give Nehal a glimpse of the ongoing works of Kaleswaram projects.New Delhi: The CBI is now tightening its grip around former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi over its probe into the IRCTC hotel scam. It is reliably learnt that the CBI is preparing to issue summons to her for seeking certain clarifications in connection with the case.

The probe agency has already questioned RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav and his son Tejashwi Yadav over the case. After scrutinising the statements given by Lalu and Tejashwi, the CBI is now planning to question Rabri Devi in connection with the case. We will soon issue her summons for questioning, a CBI source said. In July, CBI sleuths had searched the premises of the Lalu Yadav family in a 2006 case of the IRCTC transferring two railway hotels to Sujata Hotel Pvt Ltd, in an alleged violation of norms during Lalu Yadavs tenure as railway minister.Carcass of a deer which was found at the University of Hyderabad campus. (Photo: DC)

HYDERABAD: The carcass of a spotted deer was found at the University of Hyderabads South Campus on Sunday. It was found lying in a public space by morning walkers. This is the second animal carcass to be recovered from the campus in a span of one week.

The university authorities said the deer must have been attacked by stray dogs. The GHMC releases many dogs near the campus which find their way into the UoH campus through the openings in the compound wall. University officials said that many deer had been venturing out of forest limit because of the presence of dogs.

Wildlife lovers in campus have demanded that a complaint be registered given that the spotted deer is a Schedule III protected species. In January, a peacock was found dead on the campus after a suspected dog attack.

Ravi Jillapalli, a student of University of Hyderabad, said, There needs to be a record of wildlife deaths on the university campus. Every year, about a hundred animals, including peacocks, wild boars and spotted deers, die on the campus. There should be more vigilance in the forest areas. The varied biodiversity on the university campus must be preserve.

Meanwhile, the university has strengthened security by positioning four more guards in the forest area.Excise officials dont take action against illegal belt shops during the fair and allegations of officials receiving bribes from traders in return are common. (Representational image)

Hyderabad: The excise department earned Rs 50 crore from liquor sales during the Medaram Jatara, which was held from January 31 to February 3.

There is a huge demand for liquor, country hen and jaggery during Medaram Jatara.

Twenty-two temporary bars had been allowed in Medaram for a week from January 28 to February 3 to meet the demand. The excise department collected a licence fee of Rs 9,000 per day and exempted MRP for traders.

Nearly Rs 14 lakh was earned through licence fees alone. The 22 bars alone earned Rs 4 crore in a week.

Liquor shops in surrounding towns and districts saw a 50 per cent increase in sales during the week, which fetched another Rs 46 crore.

The sales increased sharply in Warangal urban, Warangal rural, Bhupalapally, Mahabu-babad, Jangoan, Khammam, Kothagudem, Adila-bad, Manchirial, and Peddapally districts.

In fact liquor sales in districts surrounding Meda-ram increase two months prior to the jatara.

There is a ritual that devotees worship Sammakka Saralamma in their homes two months ahead of the jatara and invite their relatives and friends to celebrate by serving liquor.

Liquor shops increase their stocks two months in advance which is reflected in increased sales during this period every two years when the jatara is held.

The increased revenues are also attributed to TS Breweries Corporation Ltd supplying liquor for temporary bars in Medaram for a price which is above 30 per cent of MRP.

To recover this, traders are given a free hand to collect above MRP based on the demand. Traders collect an additional Rs 100 to Rs 150 on each bottle.

Though the excise department permitted only 22 bars in Medaram, its an open secret that liquor traders from surrounding districts set up more than 3,000 belt shops,which are spread over a radius of 3-km from Medaram.

Excise officials often dont take action against illegal belt shops during the fair and allegations of officials receiving huge bribes from traders in return are common.

As per preliminary estimates, Rs 50 crore was earned during Medaram Jataram. This will be even more when final figures come out in two days, said an official.TPCC president N. Uttam Kumar Reddy and other Congress leaders at the 10th day shradh ceremony of Boddupalli Srinivas in Nalgonda. (Photo: P. Anil Kumar)

HYDERABAD: Several state Congress leaders are up in arms and have warned the TRS government and the police of dire consequences if, as a senior Congress leader stated, they continue with their murderous politics.

AICC secretary R.C. Kuntia, TPCC president N. Uttam Kumar Reddy, leaders of Opposition in Assembly and Council K Janareddy, Shabbir Ali, working president Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka, former Union minister S. Jaipal Reddy, V. Hanumantha Rao and several other Congress leaders were speaking on Sunday at the 10th day shradh ceremony of Boddupalli Srinivas who was killed in Nalgonda city.

Mr Uttam Kumar Reddy accused energy minister G. Jagadiswar Reddy of his involvement in the murder and said that his involvement was further evident as he had not even condemned the incident nor consoled the family members so far.

He said both TRS leaders and the police were jointly bringing the pressure on the Congress workers and leaders forcing them to change parties. He said that the Srinivas murder was a culmination of such heinous attempts.

Mr Reddy said that the police officials who had allegedly helped the TRS goons in the murder of Srinivas, would be punished in the event of the Congress coming to power in the next elections.

R.C. Kuntia demanded a CBI enquiry into the incident as investigation by the premier agency alone would reveal the involvement of TRS leaders in the crime.

Mr Komatireddy Venkata Reddy, who was the political mentor of the deceased Srinivas, said if murder politics alone was the solution for settling political scores, he could see Nalgonda TRS leaders' bodies floating in drainage canals within no time.

He said he would not leave the murder probe on Nalgonda police alone and would approach the Supreme Court to ensure that a CBI investigation is ordered into it.

Mr Komatireddy Raja Gopal Reddy accused Nalgonda police officials of acting like TRS party agents.Vijayawada: The Telugu Desams distress at Andhra Pradesh being overlooked in the Union budget was somewhat assuaged by the intervention of Union home minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday.

Mr Singh spoke to Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu and assured him that issues concerning the state would be addressed and urged him not to take any extreme steps. He said the BJP national president Amit Shah would be speaking to the Chief Minister.

Somewhat mollified, the TD Parliamentary Party (TDPP) has decided to confine itself to protests on the floor of the House from Monday, with members carrying placards and slogans to the Speakers podium.

Silent protests will be held in front of the Gandhi statue at Parliament. Mr Naidu was so upset with the Budget allocation for AP that he expressed it strongly at the three-hour TDPP meeting on Sunday. There was even some indication that the TD would review its alliance with the BJP. Mr Naidu said it was time to be more vocal as it is our responsibility to protect the states interests.

Though he could take the extreme steps if needed, Mr Naidu said it was also necessary to lie keep low for some time as the state requires Central support being newly born. He compared the state to a baby with malnutrition if it doesnt get Central support.

He said he isnt scared of cases being filed against him as is charged by the Opposition, but is very concerned about the interests of AP.

Briefing the TDPP meeting, Union minister Y.S. Chowdary said that the Centre must be pressurised for allocations and other pending commitments, but made it clear that the TD did not intend to break its alliance with the BJP. Whatever Chief Minister decides, we will stand by it, but we are not happy with the BJP budget allotted to Andhra Pradesh, he said.

Mr Chowdary added that till now there has been no communication between Mr Amit Shah and the Chief Minister, but Mr Rajnath Singh had intimated that Mr Shah was planning to speak with Mr Naidu.In December 2017, the government of President Abdulla Yameen in the Maldives had sought to punish the Indian ambassador for meeting three local officials  not at all an irregular act for a diplomatic representative, specially when Male continues to formally proclaim an India First policy  about the same time that it was ramming a free trade agreement with China through its Parliament without discussion, signalling its strong tilt in favour of Beijing.

On that occasion, New Delhi had officially pleaded with Male to keep Indian sensitivities in mind. In the face of the present looming crisis in the strategically-located Indian Ocean island nation, with its Supreme Court ordering the freeing of political prisoners, including former President Mohammed Nasheed, and President Yameen appearing to defiantly ignore the directive, India appears to have taken a stronger line, although its the follow-through that is important.

Without bothering with diplomatic language, New Delhi asked the government in Male to act in accordance with its own Supreme Courts order. Perhaps it found the freedom to do so as the United States, Britain, Australia and Canada were doing the same. However, these nations dont have the same immediate interest in the Maldives, a member of the Saarc grouping which of late has been surreptitiously promoting Islamist activities in cahoots with Pakistani elements, as India does. As such, India needs to be ready with an action plan to goad Male in the direction it wants, that is to bring the nation back to the democratic track.

For now, that seems the only way to cut its losses in the context of the strategic disadvantage it suffered of late due to the Yameen government undermining Indias position on a consistent basis and advancing Chinas.

After the Supreme Court ordered the release of political prisoners, and subsequently restored the status of Opposition MPs who were disqualified on account of an anti-defection provision, Mr Yameens party appears to be in a minority. Perhaps thats why the President has suddenly stopped a Parliament session from continuing, and given the impression of issuing a threat to Supreme Court judges at a rally. Given this, its hard to take his statement at face value that he is ready to call a fresh election.

India needs to steer the necessary processes in the Maldives in that direction, and ensure that everyone, including Mr Nasheed, is free to contest and no obstacles will be placed in their path. This may call for diplomatic and security-related moves.

The current situation in the island state is fraught with risks for Indian interests. Given the faceoff between the Supreme Court and the presidency, there should be no surprise if the internal situation blows up and street fighting erupts, instigated by Islamist elements with the encouragement of pro-government lobbies.Knowing well that he has to tread a middle path for his political sustenance, Odisha chief minister and Biju Janata Dal president Naveen Patnaik, who is maintaining equidistance from the BJP and Congress, reacted with caution to the Union Budget.

A bitter rival of the BJP, Mr Patnaik appreciated a portion of the Budget and criticised some of its provisions, ostensibly to defuse the boiling anger of the saffron party against him, especially for his governments alleged inaction to punish the accused involved in the gangrape of a 14-year-old dalit girl in Kunduli, Odisha.

The BJP leaders, however, read his statement between the lines. The saffron brigade, which has been trying hard to take advantage of the Kunduli gangrape issue, mounted more heat on the Naveen Patnaik government. In a public meeting addressed by Union minister and BJPs CM face Dharmendra Pradhan in Cuttack, the BJP played the voice of the gangrape victim who before committing suicide had narrated before the media the horrible crime perpetrated on her by three security personnel.

With the plot lost, the BJD strategists changed their stand and all its spokespersons switched their gear to reverse mode. They, in unison, lambasted the Budget dubbing it as anti-poor and anti-farmer.

Pakoda trouble in UP

Ever since Prime Minister Narendra Modi made that now-famous remark about pakoda sellers in a television interview, trouble is brewing for all roadside pakoda sellers in Uttar Pradesh.

While political parties are trying to drive home a point by setting up pakoda kiosks, the police is cracking down on those who sell pakodas for a living.

Recently the Aam Aadmi Party set up a stall to sell pakodas in Lucknow when the cops chased them away. Two pakoda sellers stationed outside the Samajwadi Party office were also shooed away by the municipal authorities.

Sensing the political mileage that pakodas seem to be getting, a group of unemployed youths, including two lawyers, have started a Pakoda Chai Service in the state capital. Since these are educated youth, they demand reasons from the cops before they are bundled off.

The cops, meanwhile, term this as pakoda trouble. We are fed up with this pakoda business. We cannot shut it off without a reason and the netas will not let it run, said an exasperated cop. The pakodas sure are frying in hot watersThe relief for feature phone manufacturers was provided after they complained that installing GPS would push up the cost of these phones.

A trial of panic button facility on mobile phones, aimed at helping women in distress, has been delayed due to the lack of GPS facility in feature phones, according to government sources. The trial across Uttar Pradesh was to start from January 26 for all mobile phone users  users of smartphones as well as feature phones. This exercise would have paved the way for its pan-India implementation by December this year.

While the government had ordered all mobile manufacturers in 2016 to mandatorily provide a panic button and a GPS facility on cell phones to help women in distress, in November last year feature phones were exempted from providing GPS.

"The Department of Telecom has said that enabling GPS location is a technological challenge on feature phones," an official of the Ministry of Women and Child Development (WCD) said on condition of anonymity. Another official said that the number of feature phone users are very high in UP and, therefore, a trial can't be carried out without bringing them under the purview.

No official came forward to explain why the absence of GPS has hit the trial programme. However, GPS service is known to be a much better way of tracking a phone user over alternative methods such as triangulation of mobile phone towers.

"GPS is omnipresent through satellites. Hence it is easy to track a device with the help of GPS in every corner of the country. Cell triangulation is possible only where mobile towers are present and can give the accuracy of 50 metres. High level of investments are required to increase accuracy level through cell triangulation compared to GPS tracking," Kuldeep Singh, a former member of the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT), said.

This also implies that tracing a device in rural areas, where mobile towers are fewer, can also be challenging. The WCD Ministry secretary, R K Shrivastava, is likely to meet Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha to resolve the problem and ensure a smooth roll-out of the panic button. According to the WCD Ministry sources, the ministry will recommend starting the trial without GPS on basic phones.

For the trial in UP, the government has put in place a back-end architecture so that when a user presses the panic button five calls are made to emergency number 112 and SMSes with call log details as well as geo-location of the victim is sent to police authorities. Family members, as well as volunteers in the vicinity of a victim, also receive SMS alerts.

In a notification in November 2017, the Department of Telecom exempted feature phone manufacturers from mandatorily installing Global Positioning System (GPS) after its order in 2016 required all mobile sets to have the location tracking

facility. The relief for feature phone manufacturers was provided after they complained that installing GPS would push up the cost of these phones.

The roll-out of the panic button has been hit by several delays. The government's original order issued in April 2016 required all mobile handset manufacturers to provide a panic button in the form of numeric key 5 or 9 or power on or off button as well as GPS location tracking from January 2017. But the implementation was postponed because mobile manufacturers said that they had too many old phones in their inventory because of a dip in sales post-demonetisation and opposed installing GPS in non-smart phones.

Click on Deccan Chronicle Technology and Science for the latest news and reviews. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter.If a customer has already paid, they might receive reimbursement for the repair cost.

Are you an iPhone 7 user? Heres a good news. Apple is offering free repairs to users who own an iPhone 7, suffering from a pretty serious glitch.

The Cupertino giant has confirmed that some devices are affected by a bug that prevents the phone from connecting to a cellular network and shows No Service on the status bar. The company further said that the problem is occurring due to a failed component on the main logic board, and will offer free repairs to users experiencing the problem.

Apple has determined that a small percentage of iPhone 7 devices may show "No Service" in the status bar (even if cellular coverage is available), due to a component that has failed on the main logic board. These affected units were manufactured between September 2016 and February 2018 and sold in China, Hong Kong, Japan, Macao, and the US, the company stated.

This is the fourth component replacement program that the company is offering for the iPhone since 2015. Moreover, model numbers that are eligible for the component replacement include:

China: A1660, A1780,

Hong Kong: A1660,

Macao: A1660,

US: A 1660,

Japan: A1779

As for the repairing is concerned, users can visit an Apple authorised service provider or Apple retail store or contact Apple technical support. The company says that customers who have purchased their phone within last two years will only be eligible for this program. If a customer has already paid, they might receive reimbursement for the repair cost.

Click on Deccan Chronicle Technology and Science for the latest news and reviews. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter.The reinstatement of the dozen legislators gave the opposition a majority in the 85-member assembly, and it can now potentially impeach Yameen. (Photo: AP)

Male: The beleaguered Maldives government Sunday ordered police and troops to reject any move by the Supreme Court to arrest or impeach President Abdulla Yameen over his refusal to release political prisoners.

The tiny tourist archipelago has been plunged into a political crisis pitting the country's top court against Yameen, whose crackdown on dissent has tarnished the nation's image as an upmarket holiday paradise.

On Thursday -- in a move that surprised many -- judges ordered authorities to release nine political dissidents and restore the seats of 12 legislators who had been sacked for defecting from Yameen's party, ruling the cases were politically motivated.

But the Yameen government has so far refused, shuttering parliament and resisting international calls to comply.

In a national television address on Sunday Attorney General Mohamed Anil said the government remained defiant.

"Any Supreme Court order to arrest the president would be unconstitutional and illegal. So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order," Anil said.

The reinstatement of the dozen legislators gave the opposition a majority in the 85-member assembly, and it can now potentially impeach Yameen.

However the authorities shut parliament indefinitely on Saturday to avert such a move. Yameen also sacked two police chiefs after the court's decision.

The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party -- led by the country's first democratically-elected president Mohamed Nasheed -- has urged the government to respect the top court's decision, fearing any refusal might trigger unrest in the nation of 340,000 Sunni Muslims.

The Maldivian government said Friday it had concerns about releasing those convicted for "terrorism, corruption, embezzlement, and treason".

The United Nations, Australia, Britain, Canada, India and the United States welcomed the court's decision as a move towards restoring democracy in the politically troubled Indian Ocean nation.

Nasheed was barred from contesting any election in the Maldives after a controversial 2015 terrorism conviction which was internationally criticised as politically motivated. He lives abroad after travelling out of the country in 2016 on prison leave for medical treatment.The DPRK is already flouting the most recent resolutions by exploiting global oil supply chains, complicit foreign nationals, offshore company registries and the international banking system, the UN monitors wrote in the 213-page report (Photo: AP)

United Nations: North Korea violated United Nations sanctions to earn nearly USD 200 million in 2017 from banned commodity exports, according to a confidential report by independent UN monitors, which also accused Pyongyang of supplying weapons to Syria and Myanmar.

The report to a UN Security Council sanctions committee, seen by Reuters on Friday, said North Korea had shipped coal to ports, including in Russia, China, South Korea, Malaysia and Vietnam, mainly using false paperwork that showed countries such as Russia and China as the coal origin, instead of North Korea.

The 15-member council has unanimously boosted sanctions on North Korea since 2006 in a bid to choke funding for Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic missile programs, banning exports including coal, iron, lead, textiles and seafood, and capping imports of crude oil and refined petroleum products.

"The DPRK (North Korea) is already flouting the most recent resolutions by exploiting global oil supply chains, complicit foreign nationals, offshore company registries and the international banking system," the UN monitors wrote in the 213-page report.

The North Korean mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the UN report. Russia and China have repeatedly said they are implementing UN sanctions on North Korea.

Syria, Myanmar

The monitors said they had investigated ongoing ballistic missile cooperation between Syria and Myanmar, including more than 40 previously unreported North Korea shipments between 2012 and 2017 to Syria's Scientific Studies and Research Centre, which oversees the country's chemical weapons program.

The investigation has shown "further evidence of arms embargo and other violations, including through the transfer of items with utility in ballistic missile and chemical weapons programs," the UN monitors wrote.

They also inspected cargo from two North Korea shipments intercepted by unidentified countries en route to Syria. Both contained acid-resistant tiles that could cover an area equal to a large scale industrial project, the monitors reported.

One country, which was not identified, told the monitors the seized shipments can "be used to build bricks for the interior wall of a chemical factory."

Syria agreed to destroy its chemical weapons in 2013. However, diplomats and weapons inspectors suspect Syria may have secretly maintained or developed a new chemical weapons capability.

The Syrian mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the UN report.

The UN monitors also said one country, which they did not identify, reported it had evidence that Myanmar received ballistic missile systems from North Korea, along with conventional weapons, including multiple rocket launchers and surface-to-air missiles.

Myanmar UN Ambassador Hau Do Suan said the Myanmar government "has no ongoing arms relationship, whatsoever, with North Korea" and is abiding by the UN Security Council resolutions.

Banned exports, imports

Under a 2016 resolution, the UN Security Council capped coal exports and required countries to report any imports of North Korean coal to the council sanctions committee. It then banned all exports of coal by North Korea on Aug. 5.

The UN monitors investigated 16 coal shipments between January and Aug. 5 to ports in Russia, China, Malaysia and Vietnam. They said Malaysia reported one shipment to the council committee and the remaining 15 shipments violated sanctions.

After the coal ban was imposed on Aug 5, the UN monitors investigated 23 coal shipments to ports in Russia, China, South Korea and Vietnam. The UN monitors said all those shipments "would constitute a violation of the resolution, if confirmed."

"The DPRK combined deceptive navigation patterns, signals manipulation, transshipments as well as fraudulent documentation to obscure the origin of the coal," the monitors said.

The UN monitors "also investigated cases of ship-to-ship transfers of petroleum products in violation (of UN sanctions) ... and found that the network behind these vessels is primarily based in Taiwan province of China."

The monitors said one country, which they did not name, told them North Korea had carried out such transfers off its ports of Wonsan and Nampo and in international waters between the Yellow Sea and East China Sea between October and January.

The report said several multinational oil companies, which were not named, were also being investigated for roles in the supply chain of petroleum products transferred to North Korea.More than 600,000 mainly African migrants have reached Italy by boat over the past four years, and thousands have perished on the journey. (Photo: File/Representational)

Rome: An Italian man opened fire on African migrants in the central city of Macerata on Saturday, injuring six people before he was captured, in what police said was a racially motivated attack.

The shootings happened just days after a Nigerian migrant was arrested in connection with the death of an 18-year-old Italian woman, whose dismembered body was discovered stuffed into two suitcases near Macerata.

Police named the suspected shooter as Luca Traini, 28, and said he had an Italian flag draped over his shoulders when he was seized in the street by armed police. Onlookers said he made a fascist salute before being handcuffed.

He drove around in his car and when he saw any black people he shot them, Marcello Mancini, a Macerata resident, said television. Police said one of the six victims was seriously hurt and needed surgery, but gave no further details.

Traini also fired shots at the offices of the ruling center-left Democratic Party (PD) in Macerata, but did not injure anyone there. The PD said he had stood as a candidate for the rightist Northern League at local elections 2017 but had not received any votes.

The League backs fiercely anti-immigrant policies and is part of ex-prime Silvio Berlusconis center-right alliance that is leading in the polls ahead of a March 4 national election.

League leader Matteo Salvini distanced himself from the shooting, but blamed mass immigration for the tensions.

I cant wait to get into government to restore security, social justice and serenity to Italy, he told reporters.

PD leader Matteo Renzi called for calm.

The man who fired the gun, hitting six people of color, is a squalid, mad person. But the state is stronger than him, he wrote on Facebook.

Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni said Italy would come down heavily on anyone promoting violence.

We will stop this risk. We will stop it immediately. We will stop it together, he said. Hatred and violence will not be able to divide us.

Denied Asylum

Police said the shooter drove around Macerata, which is famed for its outdoor opera festivals, in a black Alfa Romeo car firing out of his window at migrants in various locations.

With police closing in, he left his car in the city center but was almost immediately stopped. Local media said he shouted, Long live Italy, as he was taken away.

Tensions in Macerata had risen this week following the gruesome discovery of Pamela Mastropietros body. The teenager had run away from a drug rehabilitation center on Monday and met a Nigerian asylum seeker, Innocent Oseghale, the next day.

Her body was found on Wednesday and a preliminary postmortem could not immediately identify the cause of death.

Witnesses said they had earlier seen Oseghale with the suitcases in which the body was found. He refused to talk to the police after his arrest. Newspapers said he was denied asylum 2017 but had remained in Macerata to appeal against the decision.

What was this worm still doing in Italy? Northern League leader Salvini wrote on Facebook at mid-week, accusing the center-left government of responsibility for Mastropietros death for allowing migrants to stay in the country.

The left has blood on its hands, he wrote.

More than 600,000 mainly African migrants have reached Italy by boat over the past four years, and thousands have perished on the journey. The center-right bloc, which includes the League, says the vast majority have no right to asylum and has promised mass expulsions if it takes power.

Leftist parties have ruled out any such deportations.

What happened today in Macerata shows that inciting hatred and whitewashing fascism, as Salvini does, has consequences. It can spark violence, said Laura Boldrini, a leftist politician and the speaker of the lower house of parliament.But Trump's arrival in the White House a year ago, and his regular denunciations of the deal with Iran and the country in general, cooled their ardour. (Photo: File)

Tehran: Iran's oil minister lashed out at the United States Sunday, saying that hostile comments by President Donald Trump had torpedoed new oil and gas contracts for the Islamic republic.

"Trump is trying to destabilise market conditions for those who want to work in Iran," Bijan Namdar Zanganeh told a press conference.

"For the past year, every three or four months, he has destabilised the market. One cannot say that this is not without effect," he said.

The agreement in July 2015 of a nuclear deal between Iran and world powers sparked keen interest among international investors keen to focus on the country's petroleum riches.

But Trump's arrival in the White House a year ago, and his regular denunciations of the deal with Iran and the country in general, cooled their ardour.

Zanganeh revealed that Tehran was currently negotiating with "more than 20 foreign companies" to develop its oil and gas fields.

"But I dare not name the projects that are near to being agreed. If I do so, from tomorrow there will be pressure for them not to sign contracts with us," he said.

Some countries "both at the international and regional level" are exerting pressure on European and Asian firms not to agree contracts with Iran, Zanganeh added, without naming them.

However, he did say he was optimistic about a USD 5-billion (four-billion-euro) contract signed last July with the French group Total, which heads a consortium with China's CNPC to develop a gas field.

"I consider that Total is very serious... I hope it will implement the accord and I think that in a short period of time, it will sign agreements with subcontractors," Zanganeh said.

He added that Iran had planned measures "if the deal ever runs into trouble" because of pressure from the United States.The SU-25 came down in an area of northern Idlib province that has seen heavy air strikes and fighting on the ground between Syrias government forces backed by Russia and Iran, and rebel groups opposed to President Bashar al-Assad. (Photo: AP)

Amman: Syrian rebels shot down a Russian warplane on Saturday and killed its pilot on the ground after he ejected from the plane, Russias defence ministry and Syrian rebels said.

The SU-25 came down in an area of northern Idlib province that has seen heavy air strikes and fighting on the ground between Syrias government forces backed by Russia and Iran, and rebel groups opposed to President Bashar al-Assad.

Syrians opposed to Assad see Russia as an invading force they blame for the deaths of thousands of civilians since Moscow joined the war on the side of the government in 2015. The US State Department said it had seen reports about the incident and allegations that the United States provided missiles to groups in Syria.

The United States has never provided MANPAD missiles to any group in Syria, and we are deeply concerned that such weapons are being used, said State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert. The solution to the violence is a return to the Geneva process as soon as possible and we call on Russia to live up to its commitments in that regards.

The Russian plane was shot down over the town of Khan al-Subl near the city of Saraqeb, close to a major highway where the Syrian army and Iranian-backed militias are trying to advance, a rebel source said. Although the Russian pilot escaped the crash, he was killed by rebels who had tried to capture him, the source said.

Tharir al-Sham, a jihadist group spearheaded by the former Syrian branch of al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for shooting down the plane on social media, saying one of its fighters had scored a direct hit with a shoulder launched anti-aircraft missile.

This work is the least we can do to revenge our people. Let the criminal invaders know that our skies are not a picnic and they will not pass through without paying a price, God willing, senior commander Mahmoud Turkomani said in a statement released by the group.

Russias Defence Ministry also said that the aircraft was downed by a portable surface-to-air missile. The pilot reported that he had ejected by parachute, it said, and he was later killed on the ground. The pilot died in a fight with terrorists, the ministry said.

Plane Wreckage

TASS news agency quoted the Russian Defence Ministry as saying Moscow retaliated with a strike from an undisclosed high-precision weapon that killed more than 30 militants in an area of Idlib province where the plane was downed. The Syrian opposition released footage on social media that purported to show the wreckage of the plane and the body of the pilot surrounded by fighters.

Rebels said the downed warplane had taken part in strikes that targeted civilian convoys fleeing along a major Syrian highway from villages that the army and foreign militias had overrun. Syrias civil war, which is now entering its eighth year, has killed hundreds of thousands of people and driven more than 11 million from their homes.

A Russian plane was blamed for the death of seven civilians and scores of injuries after cars were targeted on the highway, according to a witness and two rebels sources.

Syrian soldiers and Iranian-backed militiamen were now around twelve kilometres from Saraqeb, advancing toward the Damascus-Aleppo highway under cover of heavy Russian air strikes, two opposition sources said. At least five civilians were killed in Saraqeb city on Saturday, which residents blamed on Russian planes.

Syrians in rebel-held areas say they can distinguish between Russian warplanes and those of the Syrian air force, because the Russian planes fly at higher altitude.

Residents say thousands of people have been forced by air strikes to flee the area, moving further north to the safety of makeshift camps on the Syrian side of the Turkish border. Russias Defence Ministry regularly says it targets only hardline Islamist militants in Syria.Within days after a senior IAS officer virtually accused the saffron outfits of inciting communal tension in the state, a senior Uttar Pradesh government official has alleged that Kasganj communal riot victim Chandan Gupta was killed by the saffron activists.



Rashmi Varun, Deputy Director in Statistics Department and currently posted at Saharanpur, also lent support to Raghavendra Vikram Singh, Bareilly District Magistrate, who had in a Facebook post said that the saffron outfits had taken out processions without permission in the Muslim-dominated areas and raised "anti-Pakistan" slogans.

"The boy (Chandan) was not killed by a second or third community...he was killed by saffron in the guise of white, saffron and green," she said in her Facebook post on Saturday.

Police have arrested two persons in connection with the killing.

Rashmi wrote that no "pro-Pakistan" slogans were raised at Kasganj nor was the "Tricolour procession" stopped on that day. "It (news to this effect) was the work of Whatsapp University," she said in a sarcastic vein referring to the rumours on the social media during the violence.

The official also supported the Bareilly DM's post and said that even a right person has to apologise after speaking the truth.

The Bareilly DM had in his post said that the saffron outfits were inciting communal tension. "It has become a fashion...take out forced processions in Muslim-dominated areas...shout anti-Pakistan slogans...are they (Muslims) Pakistanis?...the same thing had happened in Bareilly...there were stone-pelting and FIRs were lodged."

After the criticism by the BJP leaders, Singh had apologised for the post and deleted it.Amid severe strain in TDP-BJP ties over absence of any special allocation for Andhra Pradesh in the Central budget, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Saturday said issues concerning the state post bifurcation was being dealt separately.



"The budget is not the place where such issues are dealt with. Hence, it is not there. In fact, the Centre's assistance for Andhra Pradesh (following the bifurcation of the state into Telangana and Andhra Pradesh) is being handled separately," Jaitley said in TV interviews on the budget.

Responding to questions on the TDP's threat to walk out of the NDA, the finance minister said, "In the last three years, as far as Andhra Pradesh is concerned, every commitment we've made, I stand by every word. We have given several institutions to the state which are in various stages. Polavaram is being supported by NABARD. An amount equal to Special Status is being given in the form of EAPs."

Jaitley said, "We have done a fair bit for Andhra Pradesh and we will do whatever else we can as we believe Andhra Pradesh is at disadvantage because of the state's division." Last month, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu rushed a letter to Jaitley reminding him of the "unfulfilled promises" made in State Reorganisation Act.

He had suggested that a special dispensation amount be provided to Andhra Pradesh from NABARD for specified projects, instead of loans from external agencies. Six projects required a total funding of Rs 16,725 crore.

State blamed

Central officials, for their part, said the state government had not submitted the mandatory utilisation certificates (UCs) for funds released by the Centre under various schemes, resulting in freezing of over Rs 800 crore in additional grants.

On January 18, Naidu sounded hopeful after a meeting with Jaitley and said that the Centre had responded positively to the state government's request for Rs 16,000 crore from NABARD, HUDCO and commercial banks, instead of EAP (externally-aided projects).

"The state was to be reimbursed Rs 16,000 crore of revenue deficit, but till date, only Rs 4,000 crore has been released. Recently, Rs 7,500 crore was promised. I reminded the Finance Minister of the same," he had said and added that the matter was before the PMO.

TDP leaders' grouse is that, barring a sum of Rs 400 crore allocated for the Kotipalli-Narasapuram railway line in the two Godavari districts, and roughly Rs 250 crore for 11 central educational institutions in the state, including the IIT and IIM sanctioned during the past four years, there were no other specific allocations in the Budget.Prime Minister Narendra Modi has penned a book containing 25 mantras for students to be motivated and face exams with confidence without succumbing to pressures.



The book titled 'Exam Warriors,' is well-timed for the board examinations starting in March.

Modi also advised parents that they should not seek to realise their "unfulfilled desires" through their children. Instead, parents must spend "quality time" with their wards.

"Exams are festivals, celebrate it. Be an exam warrior, not a worrier," the Prime Minister suggested in his book offering various do-it-yourself tips to students on busting examination stress.

The book was released here by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj at an event attended by a large number of foreign dignitaries, among others.

Human Resource Development (HRD) Minister Prakash Javadekar, students and teachers were also present.

One-way ticket

In one chapter of the 200-page book published by Penguin Random House, the Prime Minister described the answersheet as "a one-way ticket," suggesting that students must take the examination and "move ahead" to the next paper, instead of remaining stuck with the paper already gone.

"The best part of any exam is that it lasts only for two to three hours. But, rarely does an exam leave your mind immediately. It keeps playing on your mind and you start discussing it with friends. It is not advisable to spend hours discussing the exam paper with family and friends. It is a colossal waste of time and energy," the PM noted.

Modi stated in his book that Gujarat Assembly polls of 2012 was no less than an examination for him.



"Like you have exams, I had one of my own exams-the Gujarat elections of 2012. The day polling ended and the votes were cast, I moved ahead and began to work on the tasks at hand. I still remember going to oversee summit and reviewing an irrigation project. For me, the vote, like your answersheet, was a one-way ticket," he said.

Modi urged students not to indulge in unfair practices and maintain discipline in their life, saying, "Cheating in exam is cheap."

Practise yoga

He also advised students to practise yoga to maintain a balance between body and mind. The book offered some yoga lessons too.

In a note to teachers, the Prime Minister suggested that they should empower the students to pursue their interests as well as create their own opportunities. "Motivate them so that they do something driven by their passion instead of seeking to become something," he added.

Each chapter in the book, written in simple language with comic illustrations to draw children, comes with an activity at the end.

The book is priced at Rs 100.The alleged diversion of water of Tsangpo-Bramhaputra river by China does not pose any threat to India, Former Army chief General (retd) Shankar Roy Chowdhury said.



Even if the charge is true, the river, which is the mighty Brahmaputra in India, has enough tributaries with adequate rainfall in catchment areas after coming down to the plains to bring in water to it, he said.

"Even if China diverts water of the river, India does not need to worry," Roy Chowdhury said at a symposium 'India-China relations - Ways to resolve contentious issues'.

China has denied reports that it is diverting water of Tsangpo to Xinjiang province.

Former National Security Advisor M K Narayanan, however, took a stronger view of the issue, saying China is trying to start a water war with India.

"China is actively considering a water war over the Brahmaputra," he said.

Gen Roy Chowdhury blamed the laziness and lack of on the part of the Indian economic sector for lagging behind the Chinese in the industrial and manufacturing front.

Referring to the dumping of Chinese goods in India, including even the Lord Ganesha idols, he said it is India's fault not to have pursued a three-pronged approach of "cooperate, compete and confront."

"It is the lazy and greedy Indian economic sector to blame, and not China. We should manufacture good quality products cheaper than China," he said.

He said 'Made in China' products have overtaken India a long ago and asserted that the Indian manufacturing sector should be strengthened in order to compete with that country.

With the Asian economy outgrowing the western economy, focus has shifted from the USA and Europe to Asia and from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean, Narayanan said.

"Rarely has the world seen the rise of two populations at one time and that too in the same region and the results have not been benign; China and India are competing on several counts - political, economic and military," Narayanan said.

Though the USA is at present their main adversary, the Chinese feel that the real challenge they will face will be from India, the former NSA said at the two-day symposium organised by the Research Centre for Eastern and North Eastern Regional Studies, a Kolkata-based think-tank, that ended yesterday.

Former Indian Air Force chief Air Marshal (retd) Arup Raha said, to counter the Chinese threat of befriending our neighbours, India should engage more with these countries by selling them military hardware and also by holding joint military exercises, both bilateral and multi-lateral.A woman was killed and her sister injured when an 18-year-old man opened fire at them after she declined to marry him, police said on Sunday.



Superintendent of Police Chandra Prakash said Lovely Mishra alias Ilu (18), who lived with her uncle in Ramnath Colony, was being pressured by Amit, a resident of her village Khera Jalalpur, to marry him.

The SP said on Saturday Amit along with his brother, Sumit and two sisters, arrived at Ilu's house and asked her to marry him.

"When she refused, Amit shot Ilu dead, and also shot at her elder sister, Neeraj, when she tried to save her. Ilu died subsequently," he said.

A case was registered and an investigation into the matter is underway, the police officer said, adding that the accused was absconding after the incident.President Donald Trump said on Saturday that a partisan memo released by House Republicans "totally vindicates" him in the investigation into Russian election interference, complaining that the "witch hunt" would go "on and on" even though there had been no collusion or obstruction of justice.



Trump, who is in Florida for the weekend, took to Twitter to proclaim his innocence and denounce the investigation a day after he had authorised the release of the highly contentious classified memo.

The document claimed that top law enforcement officials had abused their powers to spy on a Trump campaign adviser, Carter Page, who was suspected of being an agent of Russia.

"This memo totally vindicates 'Trump' in probe," the president wrote in a Twitter post.

"But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace," he added.

The memo, while trying to paint the origins of the Russia investigation as tainted, did nothing to clear Trump of either collusion or obstruction - the lines of inquiry being pursued by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III.

The memo, in fact, undermined Republicans' effort to cast doubt on the roots of the investigation by confirming that the inquiry was already underway when law enforcement officials obtained a warrant from a secret intelligence court to conduct surveillance on Page.

The Republican document, which Democrats dismissed as containing cherry-picked information and focusing on an obscure figure in the Trump campaign, confirms that a primary factor in the opening of the investigation in July 2016 was initial contacts between a former Trump foreign policy adviser, George Papadopoulos and Russian intermediaries.

But Republicans say the memo raises serious questions. They say the FBI should have told the court that the source of some of the information on which it was basing its request for a warrant involving Page had been paid for by Democrats.

Returning to Twitter on Saturday night, Trump quoted from a Wall Street Journal editorial that claimed the FBI had become "a tool of anti-Trump political actors," writing: "The four page memo released Friday reports the disturbing fact about how the FBI and FISA appear to have been used to influence the 2016 election and its aftermath....The FBI failed to inform the FISA court that the Clinton campaign had funded the dossier....the FBI became....

"...a tool of anti-Trump political actors. This is unacceptable in a democracy and ought to alarm anyone who wants the FBI to be a nonpartisan enforcer of the law....The FBI wasn't straight with Congress, as it hid most of these facts from investigators."

Trump has become increasingly open about his dissatisfaction with top law enforcement officials as Mueller continues to interview former and current White House staff members.

On Friday, after declassifying the memo, the president hinted that senior leaders in the Justice Department and the FBI should face consequences for conduct he called "a disgrace".The government is planning to launch 'Market Assurance Scheme' with a corpus fund of Rs 500 crore under which states will procure crops if prices fall below the minimum support price (MSP), according to sources.



The proposed scheme will strengthen procurement and ensure farmers do not suffer from marketing inefficiencies.

A concept paper in this regard has been finalised by the agriculture ministry in consultation with states and union territories (UTs), they said.

As per the proposal, the ownership of the Market Assurance Scheme (MAS), including the decision to procure at MSP, and its actual operation will be vested with states.

States will procure crops (except wheat and paddy) at the MSP, as notified by the Government of India if prices fall below it.

Keeping in view the limitation of financial resources with states and procuring agencies, the government is planning to initially create a central corpus fund of Rs 500 crore for providing interest-free advances towards working capital to states to enable them to make revolving fund at the state level.

States will decide when to begin procurement and enter the market and start procurement through their own public sector agencies or through other empanelled or authorised private agencies or central procuring agencies.

States will be responsible to deal with and dispose of the procured commodities in an appropriate manner.

However, losses, if any incurred in these operations by the states, will be compensated by the central government up to a maximum value of 40 percent of the MSP.

The centre has estimated that compensation support of up to a maximum 30 percent would be adequate to cover the losses sustained, if any, and serve as an incentive to states on the new scheme.

In case of northeast and Himalayan states, this compensation threshold would be raised to 40 percent to account for higher constraints of infrastructure and operations.

At present, rice and wheat are procured at MSP by FCI and state agencies. When prices of other crops fall below MSP, the government operationalises the Price Support Scheme (PSS) under which funds are given to states for procurement at a support price. There is also a price stabilisation fund which is used to create a buffer stock of pulses.The Bombay High Court has refused to grant relief to a 16-year-old autistic boy whose parents had approached it seeking that he be allowed to sit for the Class X exam this year.



In an order passed earlier this week, a bench of Justices B R Gavai and B P Colabawalla however, suggested that the parents consider shifting the boy to a school that caters to children with special needs and that he take the exam at another suitable time.

The boy currently studies in a regular private ICSE school in Bandra West.

As per the petitioners, the boy "has no problem in understanding and writing his lessons but he simply requires more time than an average student" to do so.

However, his school has refused him permission to appear for the Class X final exams.

The boy's parents had cited previous judgements of the high court that allowed autistic children to study in regular schools as long as the school arranged for a shadow teacher for such a student, and made other requisite special arrangements.

The petitioners also submitted that the state human rights commission, while dealing with a similar case last year, had permitted the child concerned to continue at a regular school.

They also submitted that though the state Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment runs some separate schools for children with special needs, the state Ministry of Human Resource Development promotes an inclusive education model where several children with special needs are encouraged to study in regular schools.

The petitioners cited the above and urged the court to permit their child to appear for the Class X exams as a student of his current school.

"He has been studying in the same school since he was in the first standard. There was no problem in the last nine years. We have even paid his fees for this school year. However, now he is not being allowed to sit for the Class X final exams.

"If we are forced to shift him to another school now, he will end up losing a full academic year," the boy's father said.

School authorities, however, opposed the plea, saying the boy was "unfit" to appear for the Class X exams this year.

"While his writing skills are okay and he makes no spelling mistakes, his sentences do not make any sense. He is not merely slow but he has the understanding of a student of standard I or II," the counsel for the school told HC.

The bench took note of the school's submissions and said that it would perhaps be better for all parties if the boy was shifted to a school with an "alternate curriculum."

"Taking an adversarial stand vis-a-vis the school will not be helpful either for (the parents) or for your child. Why not send him to a school that will cater to all his needs," the bench said.

It also directed the school authorities to provide the petitioners with a list of schools with an alternate curriculum suitable for their son.Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday chose not to speak anything on the contentious Mahadayi river water sharing issue, even as pro-Kannada organisations staged protests in the city seeking his intervention in resolving the issue.



Modi, during his 52-minutes speech at the Nava Karnataka Nirmana Parivarthana rally, spoke at length on how the state would benefit if the same parties are in power at both the Centre and the State. "If the government in Delhi and the state join hands, the farmers will get water to their fields and they can reap gold," he stated.

But he did not mention about the protest being staged by pro-Kannada organisations and the farmers in north Karnataka, demanding Mahadayi water for irrigation and drinking water purpose.

Earlier in the day, activists protesting for the Mahadayi water held two parallel protests at Freedom Park and courted arrest by taking out a march to Palace Ground, where Modi addressed a BJP rally in the evening.

Led by writer Chandrashekar Patil (Champa), farmers and activists of Jana Samanyara Paksha demanded prime minister's intervention to seek an early solution to the dispute.

Champa said it was surprising that Modi, who speaks on minor issues in his Mann Ki Baat address, chooses to ignore an issue that has put lakhs of people in dire straits.

"The problem is huge and the solution is a small one but no party is willing to take an initiative. We hope that the prime minister will have something to say about this at his rally today," he said. Later, they took out a mock funeral procession to protest against Modi's silence.

Next to the Freedom Park, pro-Kannada organisations led by Vatal Nagaraj blocked the Kalidasa Marg and sat on dharna. "We have 2,000 pro-Kannada organisations who have come together to observe this day as black day. Respecting the directions from the court, we have not called a bandh. But we won't sit quietly if Modi fails to address the issue," he said.

The tone of the protest, however, was clearly anti-BJP as was clear from the slogans against Modi. "Hello Mr Narendra Modi, what did you say and what have you done," the protesters chanted.

State Congress president G Parameshwara accused Modi of letting down the farmers on the issue. "Modi did not mention a word about Mahadayi issue during his one-hour speech. How can Modi claim himself to be pro-farmers?" he asked.Amid a renewed push by the NDA government for passage of the triple talaq bill , the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) has planned to include a provision in the "model nikahnama" (marriage contract) making it mandatory for the groom to state that he would not resort to divorce by saying talaq three times in one go.



The board, according to sources, would discuss the issue at its meeting at Hyderabad beginning from February 9.

Sources said that the AIMPLB was not in favour of enactment of a law to deal with this "social evil" and wanted to devise a different method to tackle the issue.

"Triple talaq though sanctioned by the Sharia (Islamic law) is a social evil... it should not be resorted to as it breaks the families," said a senior board member here.

He said that the model nikahnama would include a line to be uttered by the groom at the time of marriage that he would not give triple talaq.

The board member said that at present several model nikahnama are in use in the country and different sections used different nikahnamas.

"Our endeavour is to make one model nikahnama, which can be used by everyone," he added.

He said that once this proposal was accepted by the members, the Board would then take it up with the 'quazis' (the Muslim priests, who solemnise marriages).The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) will not be pulling out of BJP-led National Democratic Alliance for the time being, but will use its entire arsenal to corner the Narendra Modi government inside and outside Parliament on the raw deal meted out to Andhra Pradesh, especially in the recent budget.



On Sunday, it was decided in the TDP Parliament Party meeting at the residence of party president and Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu in Amaravati that party MPs will stage protests in Parliament highlighting the injustice meted out to the state.

Restraining the party MPs, who wanted Naidu to pull out of the alliance looking at the continued injustice to the state in four budgets, he said that they must be able to portray the aspirations and disappointment of the people of the state in the Parliament, rather than issuing threats of breaking the alliance.

Briefing on the decisions taken at the meeting to the media, Union Minister for State Sujana Chowdhury said that priority will be to acquire permissions for the projects which are in pipeline.

"We have not much time left; we are close to general elections now. If the Centre fails to deliver we will protest inside the house and also outside," the minister said.

The TDP's wish list includes a special package, filling up of revenue deficit, a separate railway zone for Visakhapatnam and allocations for Amaravati and Polavaram.

"The BJP is allocating funds to the states where the party is ruling and has benefit in the upcoming elections. We hope that the BJP will realise that losing a friendly party like the TDP will work against its interests," TDP MP TG Venkatesh said.

MP Avanthi Srinivas said that party MPs will meet Modi and explain the injustice done to Andhra Pradesh in the Union budget.

Meanwhile, BJP president Amit Shah and Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh got in touch with Chandrababu Naidu.

The home minister has asked Naidu not to take any hasty decision and wait for some time.

Naidu had spoken to Shiva Sena president Uddhav Thackeray on Saturday over phone and explained the step-motherly treatment meted out by the BJP.The police have arrested Attigundi Mahal Anil alias Anil Naika and Undedasarahalli Murthy in connection with the theft of a large quantity of coffee produce.



Police said that the duo had allegedly stolen 59 sacks of coffee beans meant for drying. The loot has been recovered.

Police added that the duo had stolen the coffee from Mallandur, Kalerkhan, Aldur, Koduvalli, Bhaktarahalli Pampapati estate all of which, had been put out to dry or filled into sacks. They operated during the night when the estate keepers were asleep.

Aldur rural police have registered the case. The team led by Rural Circle Police Inspector Salim Abbas has apprehended the thieving duo and recovered 27.5 quintals of Arabica parchment coffee beans from them.

The accused have been remanded to judicial custody.

Superintendent of Police K Annamalai has announced a cash award to the team that caught the coffee thieves.Close on the heels of Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to India, a magazine, supported by the Jewish community in this country, which aims at boosting ties between the two nations, is set to hit the stands.



The publication, a monthly, is titled 'Namaste Shalom' with BJP leader and former Rajya Sabha MP Tarun Vijay as its editor.

The Jewish community in India is behind the endeavour, with Bene Israel Heritage Museum and Genealogical Centre, a Mumbai-based organisation, backing it.

The editorial board of the magazine comprises several prominent names, including MPs Poonam Mahajan and Rajeev Chandrashekhar as well as Chairman and Managing Director, Bene Israel Heritage Museum Ralphy Jhirad.

Speaking to PTI, Jhirad emphasised that the magazine would be a media-bridge between the two nations and also focus on the heritage of Jews who made India their home.

When the rest of the world persecuted and refused shelter to Jews, India welcomed them and gave equality and respect, he said.

The first issue of the magazine, which is expected to hit the stands on Monday, has received special inaugural messages from President Ramnath Kovind and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Vijay said.

It features a special article on India-Israel civilisational threads written by Principal Economic Advisor to the Government of India Sanjeev Sanyal.

It also has an interview with Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and contributions by several noted columnists and economists.

Vijay, a former Rajya Sabha MP, said the magazine would help strengthen India-Israel relations, especially at strategic and people-to-people levels.

"The two nations are working together in an extraordinary way, without changing its Arab and Palestine policy, and that's the beauty of the understanding and an amazing chemistry between Modi and Netanyahu," he said.

Vijay claimed that the magazine is a historic move, and a first after Independence, perhaps a first for any country at a popular-strategic level supported by the people and not patronised by any government agency.The Congress will not have any sort of understanding with the Asaduddin Owaisi-led All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) for the Karnataka Assembly polls, AICC secretary Madhu Goud Yaskhi said.



He refuted media report that the state Congress leaders had a secret meeting with AIMIM leaders to ensure that there was no division of votes of minorities.

The AIMIM is reportedly set to contest in 60 assembly segments, mainly in minority-dominated areas in the state.

The election to the 224-member assembly in Karnataka is to be held this year. It is the only big state under the Congress' rule at present. Punjab, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Puducherry are the other states/UT where the party is in power.

"We never had any meeting with any AIMIM leader. It is fighting against the Congress. So, there is zero truth that there was any meeting with their leaders," said Yaskhi, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary in-charge for the poll-bound state.

He further accused the AIMIM of having an understanding with the BJP to divide the votes coming the Congress' way.

Yakshi also said the Congress would not have any sort of understanding with the AIMIM for the assembly polls.

According to a senior Congress leader, who did not wish to be named, the party already had a strategy in place to ensure that it got votes from minority communities.

Announcing K Siddaramaiah as the party's chief ministerial face has also been a "good move" to see the votes are not divided, the leader added.

"Siddaramaiah has worked well to consolidate votes from Muslim, OBC and SC communities over the past four or so years. So, we have the backing of the Muslim community," the leader added.

The leader said the Congress had a pool of Muslim leaders whom it would field for campaigning to prevent the division of minority votes.

"We did that experiment in other assembly polls, including those in Gujarat and Bihar. It yielded results for us. It will yield a result in Karnataka too," he added.

While the schedule for the assembly polls is yet to be announced, campaign for the high voltage election has already begun with the leaders of the Congress and the BJP locked in a war of words.

The state is expected to witness a three-corner contest with the H D Deve Gowda-led Janata Dal (Secular) forming the third angle.Continuing its probe into covert activities of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) has arrested a man hailing from Bihar in the national capital, its official spokesman said here today.



Mahfooz Alam is the fourth person to be arrested by the NIA in the case which was registered in December last year following the arrest of Abdul Nayeem Sheikh, a resident of Maharashtra.

The accused was produced before a designated court which remanded him in two days' police custody, the spokesman said.

Besides Sheikh and Alam, the other two arrested in the case are Dhannu Raja, a resident of Gopalganj in Bihar, and Touseef Ahmed Malik, a resident of Pulwama in Jammu and Kashmir.

According to the NIA spokesman, Alam had facilitated and provided logistic, financial support and shelter to Sheikh, who was an active cadre of LeT, a proscribed terrorist organisation, and visited and established bases in Bihar, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir on the advice of his handler based in Pakistan.

Mahfooz also facilitated raising, receiving and collecting fund by Shaikh through International Money Transfer Services such as Western Union Money Transfer by providing his identity documents. These funds were to be later used for carrying out terrorist activities by Shaikh Abdul Nayeem, the NIA spokesman said.

His interrogation led to raids by the NIA at various places in Uttar Pradesh's Muzaffarnagar on two Hawala operators Dinesh Garg and Adesh Kumar Jain, the spokesman said.

During the search of the shop and residence of Garg, the NIA team seized around Rs 15 Lakh in cash, two currency note counting machines, one Indian-made pistol with ammunition, one laptop, four mobile phones, and various documents.

The recoveries made from the residence and shop of Jain includes cash (Indian currency) Rs 32.84 lakh, one Chinese- made pistol with ammunition, some documents containing mobile numbers of associates, currency notes of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, USA, Japan, Thailand, Oman, and electronic devices including two laptops and three mobile phones.

The names of these two hawala operators had surfaced in the chain of terror financing channel of the LeT module being investigated by the NIA, the spokesman said.

The case started after the arrest of Sheikh, a resident of Aurangabad, from Lucknow in November last year and during the investigation, it was found that he had spent some time in trouble-torn south Kashmir and taken pictures of some Army installations, officials said.

The central security agencies, which interrogated Sheikh at length, had told the investigators about his accomplice, Tauseef Ahmed Malik, in Pulwama district of south Kashmir. He was placed under arrest by the NIA on December 9.

During interrogation, Sheikh disclosed that he had stayed in Pulwama, moved to various places with the help of Malik and even photographed some Army and para-military camps, the officials claimed.

Sheikh, who was wanted in connection with a 2014 terror case and had been on the run, told investigators that some important power projects and railway tracks in the valley were surveyed, they said.

He had also visited some places in Himachal Pradesh, especially Kasol, which is frequented by Israeli nationals visiting India, according to the officials.

Security agencies have claimed that Sheikh was roped in for a recce mission similar to that undertaken by David Headley, a Pakistan-American, who is at present serving a prison sentence of 35 years at a US jail for his involvement in terror activities and the 26/11 Mumbai attacks of 2008.A senior Uttar Pradesh IPS officer, who was reportedly a BJP member during his leave of absence, was made the additional director general (ADG) of police, Gorakhpur zone, by the state government.



Gorakhpur is the home town of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.



According to sources, the IPS officer, Dawa Sherpa, had applied for voluntary retirement (VRS) - which was rejected - in 2008 and then went on a leave of absence.



He shifted to Darjeeling, his home town, and reportedly joined the BJP.



Sherpa also sought a ticket from the saffron party for the Darjeeling seat in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls. He, however, failed to secure the nomination and later left the BJP and joined the Gorkhaland movement for a separate state.



Sherpa's application for VRS had been rejected on the ground that he had not completed 20 years of service.



Sources said that Sherpa decided to return to the police service in 2012 and was promoted to DIG rank in 2013.



His appointment as ADG has received flak from Opposition parties.



Samajwadi Party leaders here said the state government was appointing officers who held the same ideology as them in top posts, which they said was "dangerous" and against the spirit of the Constitution. The Congress criticised Sherpa's appointment as well.



A couple of days back, senior IPS officer Surya Kumar Shukla had triggered a controversy after he was caught taking a pledge to build the Ram Temple at Ayodhya on tape.Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday promised that the BJPawould provide 21st century infrastructure for Karnataka even as he accused the ruling Congress of creating hurdles in the implementation of centrally sponsored schemes.



Addressing a large gathering to mark the conclusion of BJP's Navakarnataka Nirmana Parivarthana Yatra at the sprawling Palace Grounds, Modi said the BJPawould take the state on the path of development.

"We will provide 21st century infrastructure including Metro, roads, railway and civic amenities which will place the state on a new path that will match the global benchmark,"aModi said.

'How can you be so careless?'

He said the ruling dispensation was blocking implementation of central schemes. "We have set a target of housing for all by 2022. Karnataka has been allotted 3.36 lakh houses for the poor under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, but the state government has constructed only 38,000 houses. How can any government be so casual and careless ?" he said, throwing the question to the crowd.

He said the state had been allocated Rs 246 crore for the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan for Bengaluru, but Rs 70 crore had remained unspent. "Under Smart City initiative, the state has been sanctioned Rs 836 crore, but the government has so far utilised Rs 143 crore, with the balance lurking in the state treasuries," Modi said.

He accused the Congress of working backwards. "When the BJPais working towards taking the nation forward, here in Karnataka, Ganga ulti beh rahi hai (Ganga is flowing backwards)".

Modi said the BJP always stood for the welfare of farmers. The BJP, he said, has given "TOP" priority to farmers, explaining, "by TOP, I mean Tomato, Onion, Potato".

Modi said the Centre would back BJPastate president BaSaYeddyurappa's promise that Rs one lakh crore would be earmarked for irrigation projects, if the party comes to power. "With the strength of the Centre and the BJP government here, we can bring water to the fields of Karnataka,"ahe said and added that the two governments could help in multiplying the developmental impact in the state.Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah today attacked BJP chief Amit Shah, alleging that instigating communal tension was his "standard".



"Whoever indulges in triggering communal violence in Karnataka, we will not allow them. We will take strict action against those who take the law into their hands," he told reporters here.



"I will not say that (Narendra) Modi will come and instigate to do it, but Amit Shah...that is his standard. He doesn't know anything other than that. He feels it is (political) tactics," the chief minister added.



The comments of the Congress leader came on a day when Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in the city to address a BJP rally.



Siddaramaiah also asserted that Modi's visit or the rally would have no implications in Karnataka.



"They (BJP) are also a political party. He (Modi) is the prime minister of the country, so he is coming to seek votes on behalf of his party. It will have no implications in Karnataka," he said.



Accusing the BJP of spreading lies and indulging only in criticising others, Siddaramaiah said, "They do not know anything else. Lying and criticising are the qualities they have imbibed because they are not pro-people."



In a frontal attack on the Siddaramaiah government on January 25, Shah had called it a "corrupt, malicious and oppressive" regime and asked the people of the state to "root it out" in the Assembly polls due this year.Ayurveda doctors, nursing graduates or qualified community health workers will be deployed in 1.5 lakh health-sub-centres after a six-month specialised training to take care of primary health care needs of crores of Indians.



In the 2018-19 budget, a Rs 1,200 crore package has been announced to convert these sub-centres into health and wellness centres.

The 1.5 lakh health and wellness centres, according to the Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, would bring health care system closer to people's homes by providing comprehensive health care, including for non-communicable diseases and maternal and child health services. They will also provide free essential drugs and diagnostic services.

The Union Health Ministry plans to deliver 12 types of basic healthcare services at these sub-centres ranging from mother and child care to basic ophthalmic and ENT care as well as basic management of mental health care.

For the manpower requirement, the ministry looks at Ayurveda graduate with 4.5 years of training or nursing practitioners. Another option is to recruit those who had completed a B. Sc in community medicine.

All of them have to undergo a six-months bridge course, taught by the Indira Gandhi National Open University.

"People posted at the sub-centres should be able to quickly identify the serious cases and refer them to the primary or community level healthcare centres for check. Nowhere in the world, doctors are employed in the sub-centres to provide basic care," health ministry sources told DH.

In the past, similar plans of posting non-MBBS personnel at the rural health care centres was opposed by the association of doctors. They claim it would lead to two streams of treatments for the rich and poor.

"Everyone above 30 will be screened for diabetes, hypertension and breast, oral and cervical cancer as the toll due to non-communicable diseases is on the rise," said a source.

The scheme would require Rs 25,000 crore in the next five years as each of the 1.5 lakh centres needs nearly Rs 17 lakh for training and equipment purchase, sources said.

Taken together, the health and wellness centres and National Health Protection Scheme would form the core of Ayushman Bharat programme that aims at addressing several health issues in primary, secondary and tertiary care system covering both prevention and health promotion.A young army captain and three jawans were killed and at least four people were injured on Sunday in heavy Pakistani shelling along the LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts of Jammu and Kashmir, officials said.



The Indian Army was giving a befitting reply and heavy exchanges were on, they added.

Pakistani forces opened unprovoked heavy firing and shelling along the LoC in Bhimbher Gali sector of Rajouri district on Sunday evening, senior army officials told PTI.

In the shelling, three jawans were killed, they said. An officer, who was injured in the shelling, also succumbed to his injuries, they added.

Six days before his birthday, 22-year-old Captain Kapil Kundu, a resident of village Ransika in Haryana's Gurgaon district, was killed in the shelling, Army officials said.

Forty-two-year-old Havildar Roshan Lal, a resident of Samba district, 27-year-old Riflemen Ramavatar of Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh and Subham Singh (23) of J&K's Kathua district were also killed, he said.

"Martyrdom of Indian Army soldiers will not go in vain. The unprovoked action by the Pakistan Army will be given a befitting response," an official said.

Earlier in the day, two teenagers and a jawan were injured in Shahpur sector of Poonch district in shelling from across the border, a police official said.

He identified the injured civilians as Shahnaz Bano (15) and Yasin Arif (14), residents of Islamabad village.

A defence spokesman said the Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatic weapons and mortars around 1110 hours. The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

In another ceasefire violation by Pakistan in Rajouri district, a police official said six mortars exploded near Neaka Panjgrain and Tarkundi villages in Manjakote sector around 1540 hours.

The mortars were fired by Pakistani troops and the Indian forces guarding the LoC responded, triggering an exchange of fire between the two sides, he said.

Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti expressed pain at the deaths due to Pakistani shelling along the LoC. "My condolences to the families of the deceased," she said.

Authorities in Poonch issued an advisory asking people to stay inside their homes.

"All 84 schools located in 0-5 km from the LoC stretch from Sunderbani to Manjakote shall remain closed for the next three days," Deputy Commissioner, Rajouri, Shahid Iqbal said.

Officials said the situation was very tense as firing and shelling by Pakistani troops continued round-the-clock.

In January alone eight civilians and six security personnel were killed and around 70 injured in ceasefire violations by Pakistan troops along Indo-Pak border in Jammu region.

Pakistani troops carried out intense shelling along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts from January 18 to 22.

While there were no ceasefire violations by Pakistan reported along the IB since January 22, intermittent shelling has taken place along the LoC.The BJP leaders of Nagaland have written to party chief Amit Shah, expressing their resentment against the saffron party's pre-poll alliance with the newly floated Nationalist Democratic People's Party for the February 27 Assembly election in the state.



The letter was sent to Shah on Saturday night, soon after the agreement between the two parties was signed in Delhi. The announcement of the tie-up was made on Sunday.

Signed by Nagaland BJP president Visasolie Lhoungu and general secretary Eduzu Theluo among others, the letter said the alliance had "no roots at the grassroot level".

It was agreed upon that in the 60-member Assembly, the BJP would contest in 20 seats and the NDPP in 40 seats. The state leaders said that this arrangement was not justified as it was the NDPP that approached the BJP.

"The Nagaland BJP has about 45 potential intending candidates seeking party tickets," the letter said, adding that the prospects of the saffron party were gaining momentum in the north-eastern state with every passing day.

"We are confident of achieving a resounding success across the state, much better than the NDPP... In this context, it is very likely that if the seat-sharing agreement is taken up officially, it will have a highly negative impact on the current status of the party in Nagaland," it said.

Moreover, the supporters of the hopeful BJP candidates might withdraw their allegiance if only 20 seats were allotted to the saffron party, the leaders said.

It also expressed confidence that if it fought the polls on its own, there was more scope for the legislators of other parties to join an alliance with it.

"Taking this into consideration, the Nagaland BJP cannot accept a pre-poll alliance with any party.

"We have, therefore, decided to fight the upcoming Assembly election without any pre-poll alliance and may opt for a post-poll alliance, based on necessity. This decision has been taken after thorough discussions and in consultation with the district units and morchas of the party," the letter said.

Sources in the Nagaland BJP said similar letters would be submitted to the central leadership by the presidents of the 11 district units of the party and its frontal organisations in the north-eastern state.Geo-economic goals constitute the major component of a country's geopolitics. China's contemporary maritime game -- moves in the Indo-Pacific in general and the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) in particular - whether termed 'String of Pearls' or its rebranded version, the 'Belt and Road Initiative' - are manifestations of the geostrategy that China is employing to attain her geo-economic goals. However, as the geo-economic competition space between India and China coincides in the Indian Ocean, there is a very real possibility of competition transforming into conflict, particularly as the adverse impact of climate change upon resources becomes increasingly evident.



Consequently, a central question - for Indian 'doves' and 'hawks' alike - is "What are the combination of circumstances or happenstances that would lead the Government of India to realise and decide that a given Sino-Indian military build-up, stand-off or confrontation is no longer a mere skirmish between their respective armies, whether or not supported by their respective air forces, but one in which India in its entirety is engaged in armed conflict against China?"

If you are a 'dove', you must know the answer so that you can evade or contribute to the evasion of such a combination of circumstances. If you are a 'hawk', you must know the answer to it so that you can engineer or contribute to the engineering of such a combination of circumstances. But if you suffer such a failure of imagination that you cannot answer the question at all, such combinations of circumstances will find you utterly unprepared to deal with them.

It's not merely two armies that go to war, nor air forces, nor two navies, but two nations that go to war. One will also appreciate, even if one does not use military jargon such as 'manoeuvre' as opposed to 'attrition', that the basic foundational principle of 'manoeuvre' as a style of war, which is that rather than pitting strength against strength, one should manoeuvre strategically and position oneself to strike where one's enemy is weakest. Thus, if an adversary addresses us militarily in one location of the theatre of conflict, we must be able to respond at a different point of the theatre, where we hold a comparative advantage.

China's naval presence in the IOR has increased dramatically from 2008 (when it began anti-piracy deployments in the Gulf of Aden) to the present. Today, some 8-10 major Chinese warships may routinely be found in these waters. Regular and protracted patrols by Chinese nuclear- and conventionally-powered submarines, too, have become commonplace.

Reassuringly, the Indian Navy's strategy remains a proactive one, rather than being reactive and responding solely to China's PLA Navy's (PLAN) maritime game-plays. At the strategic level, the Indian Navy, along with Indian diplomacy, forms the principal instrument for the execution of the maritime component of India's contemporary foreign policy. Its principal mechanism is 'constructive engagement' with like-minded nations that operate maritime forces within the IOR. Thus, the country's conceptual framework is defined by the concept of SAGAR (Security and Growth for All in the Region), the political framework is IORA (the Indian Ocean Rim Association), while the executive framework - which will actually "do the doing"- is provided by the 41 navies of the IONS (Indian Ocean Naval Symposium) construct.

The Navy's operational deployment is driven by India's central need to pursue and protect its own maritime interests. India's current merchandise trade, for instance, accounts for some 40% of the country's GDP, of which some $110 billion-worth flows through the Gulf of Aden and $190 billion-worth flows through the South China Sea. Small wonder that the Navy has put in place a new mission-based deployment pattern, involving the continuous and close monitoring of traffic flowing through the seven straits constituting the chokepoints of the Indian Ocean (Hormuz, Bab-el-Mandeb, Mozambique Channel, Malacca, Sunda, Lombok and Ombai-Wetar).

While this deployment pattern is not driven solely by China, it caters to its maritime moves, too. For instance, since Chinese submarines traverse these chokepoints (other than Malacca) underwater, Indian Navy seeks to urgently invest in an 'Integrated Sound Surveillance System' involving sea-bed sensors linked to shore-based analysis stations, and in long-range anti-submarine patrol aircraft.

However, our most stubborn adversary in our national endeavour is not China, but the combination of bureaucratic ineptitude and political apathy. These continue to hobble both naval development plans and its sea-based initiatives. There are several well-known critical shortfalls that bear little elaboration here, but which could well tilt the balance of engagement against our navy. The induction of additional submarines - six SSN (nuclear-powered) and six SSK (diesel-electric powered) - remains mired in a Kafkaesque bureaucratic morass.

Likewise, a single Indian Carrier Battle Group is simply inadequate to cater for China's capability for dispersed naval forces, thanks to its actual and potential bases in countries such as Maldives, Sri Lanka, Djibouti and, of course, Pakistan. Yet, there is little real progress on the second indigenous aircraft carrier to follow the new Vikrant. There is a clear need to beef up the Indian Navy's force levels if its pattern of deployment is to possess requisite capacity by way of ships, submarines, helicopters, fixed-wing aircraft, and their associated weapon-sensor suites. Rhetoric and statements of noble intent will get us only so far. After that, we need substance (material wherewithal) to match and complement our several strengths in terms of human capability.

(The writer is a retired Vice Admiral of the Indian Navy)The state Congress on Sunday hit back at Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying that he has forgotten about the corruption that happened during the previous BJP governments in the state.



"B S Yeddyurappa was sitting next to Modi (during the party rally in Bengaluru). How can he accuse the Congress of being corrupt when Yeddyurappa was sitting next to him?" KPCC president G Parameshwara asked at a press conference organised after Modi's rally.

On the Modi accusing the state government as "10% sarkar," Parameshwara said he should give at least one instance of where in commission has been collected. The steel bridge project has been dropped. So, the question of collecting kickback does not arise, he defended.

Modi has claimed that the Centre is spending Rs 17,000 crores for suburban rail project in Bengaluru. But, the project is proposed to be implemented under the cost-sharing basis. The state government is going to share the cost of the project. This shows that Modi is misleading people, he added.A 47-year-old convict fell to his death from a coconut tree at the Central Prison on Saturday.



K Mohammed, of Lakkinakoppa village in Shivamogga district, had been lodged in the prison for the past 13 years for killing his second wife. His first wife Shamshudha accused the prison officials of forcing him to climb the tree. She claimed the convict did not know how to climb trees.

Four convicts, including Mohammed, were cleaning the guest house inside the prison on Saturday morning. As instructed by officials, Mohammed climbed a 20-foot-high coconut tree, lost balance and fell. He sustained head injuries and was rushed to Victoria Hospital, where doctors declared him brought dead.

Mohammed's brother Babu told DH prison officials first informed the family about his injury about noon on Saturday. They called a second time at 2 pm to notify his death. Babu and others rushed to Bengaluru, but prison officials failed to give them a clear picture on how Mohammed had fallen down.

When Mohammed was home on parole recently, he told Shamshudha prison officials are making him clean their quarters, including the toilets, which he never did in his life. Despite telling them he did not have the strength to hold on to his weight on the tree, he was made to climb, Shamshudha claimed.

She vowed to lodge a complaint against prison officials once Mohammed's last rites are over.

The Parappana Agrahara police cited statements by prison officials, saying Mohammed was assigned to trim the plants and no instructions were given on climbing the tree, adding that the convict did it on his own and fell to his death. The police registered a case of unnatural death, and said would probe the prison officials if the family filed a case.The Maldives has been on the boil since February 1. Besieged by hundreds of seething protesters, the government of President Abdulla Yameen is fighting a losing battle as it stands challenged by the Supreme Court that has ordered the release of all his opponents and a restless Parliament set to impeach the President.



President Yameen struck back on Sunday as Attorney-General Mohammed Anil, flanked by the Chief of Maldivian National Defence Force (MNDF) General Shiyam and the newly-appointed Commissioner of Police Abdulla Nawaz, effectively declared himself the chief judicial authority in the Maldives and ordered the police and the military not to follow rulings of the Supreme Court.

What the Supreme Court ordered on February 1 was the immediate release from detention of former President Mohammed Nasheed, Jumhooree Party Leader Qasim Ibrahim and Adhaalath Party Leader Sheikh Imran Abdulla, former defence minister Mohammed Nazim, MP Faris Maumoon and four other political prisoners.

The ruling said all political prisoners must be released as the trials against them violated the Maldives constitution and international law. The ruling also stated that political pressure was applied on the prosecutors and the courts during these trials. It further ordered that all these cases should be judicially re-evaluated in accordance with law and until a fair trial is conducted, all those persons should be released with immediate effect.

The Supreme Court further annulled the previous controversial 'anti-defection' ruling of July 2017, thus immediately reinstating 12 opposition members of parliament. These members had defected from the ruling party to the opposition and the Speaker had debarred them from holding their parliamentary seats. This act was held unconstitutional as there existed "no law on floor-crossing and changing of party membership by parliamentarians" and that the Yameen government had failed to come up with such a law even more than six months after the event. The restoration of the 12 MPs gives the opposition alliance a clear majority in the Maldivian Parliament.

Following this order, the Commissioner of Police Ahmed Areef declared that he would abide by the orders of the Supreme Court and implement it. Within hours, he was dismissed by President Yameen. He was replaced by Acting Commissioner Saudhee who, too, said he would abide by the Supreme Court orders. Soon, he was replaced by Abdulla Nawaz.

Meanwhile, the youth, led by the united opposition party leaders, have gathered since the night of February 1 to celebrate the Supreme Court verdict and force President Yameen's office to issue orders to implement its decision.

After two days of dithering, the President ordered his Attorney General to issue a direct challenge to the Supreme Court, refusing to implement its orders. Attorney General Mohammed Anil further speculated that he had reports that the Supreme Court would rule on Sunday, February 4, that President Yameen could no longer hold office, following his refusal to comply with the court's February 1 ruling.

The Attorney General said that the Supreme Court was about to rule on Yameen and that such a ruling would be a national security threat, and hence he would not allow its implementation. The Chief of Defence and the Police Commissioner said they would follow the Attorney General's instructions.

The police then attempted to arrest Supreme Court Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed and the court's Judicial Administrator. Protesters and police clashed outside the home of the Chief Justice Saeed late last night, amidst reports that the police were about to arrest him.

Scenes of chaos

Former President Mohammed Nasheed on Twitter labelled this unconstitutional and highly illegal move as tantamount

to a coup d'etat.

Sunday saw scenes of chaos outside the parliament, as both riot police and the military in riot gear, sealed off the legislature in an apparent - and illegal - attempt to stop parliamentarians from entering the building, where the first parliamentary session of 2018 was to begin on February 5.

Military personnel in full riot gear are currently in the chamber, as opposition MPs try to force a vote of no confidence against President Yameen.

The Secretary-General of parliament, who had announced that he would abide by the Supreme Court order to reinstate the 12 MPs, resigned on Sunday. This follows the resignation of a host of officials, including the head of Maafushi prison, where political prisoners are currently detained. Following the Supreme Court's decision to reinstate the MPs, the Speaker had called off the opening of Parliament, scheduled for February 5. Now, the opposition parties claim they have the support of at least 50 MPs to vote for impeachment of the President. A mere 43 votes are sufficient to bring down President Yameen.

In a last ditch attempt to save himself from an united opposition supported by the judiciary and a parliament set to impeach him, President Yameen is likely to declare a national emergency and assume dictatorial powers. There are reports that the Maldivian Defence Forces personnel from islands outside Male are being rushed in hundreds of boats as the opposition, too, is mobilising supporters from other islands. The island nation is all set for a show down.

India is closely monitoring the situation, having already urged all parties to abide by the "spirit of democracy and rule of law and implement the verdict of the Supreme Court."

(The writer served as a diplomat in the Maldives)Throwing a spanner in the household and restaurant budgets, the price of coconuts has seen a steep increase, though prices of some vegetables have significantly dropped.



Coconuts cost Rs 30 each, while a kilo of tomato is priced as low as Rs 9. The prices of beans and beetroots have also fallen to Rs 18 and 13 a kilo, respectively. Cabbage and bottle gourd are priced at Rs 14/kg.

The higher price tag on some vegetables, however, continued with coriander leaves and curry leaves costing Rs 30 and Rs 70 per kilo, respectively. A kilo of onion was billed at Rs 40, even as the same quantity of potato was sold at Rs 25.

Two varieties of the same vegetable - Delhi and Nati carrots - found themselves in the opposite end of the price range. While the Delhi carrot was sold at Rs 50 per kilo, the Nati variety was priced at Rs 28.

Chandra Gowda, president, Horticultural Producers' Cooperative Marketing and Processing Society Limited (Hopcoms), explained that the contrasting price range is due to the good monsoon that increased vegetable yield in the state, while coconuts sold now are the yields from two years ago when the state witnessed a drought.

He asked consumers to brace for price rise as the cost of vegetables would head northward with the rising mercury. The cost of coconuts would also get steeper, Gowda warned, adding that farmers are watching the sowing patterns and weather changes to ensure some level of stability in the prices.

Veerendra N Kamat, treasurer, Bruhat Bangalore Hotels Association, said restaurants are mulling a revision in the cost of the dishes depending on the rise in vegetable prices. Since coconuts are an essential ingredient in most south Indian dishes, he said restaurants are using it sparingly.Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday lambasted the Congress government in the state on the issue of corruption, terming it a "10% sarkar" and vowed to make Karnataka "Congress mukth" (free of Congress) in the coming Assembly elections.



Addressing a large gathering in Hindi, he marked the conclusion of BJP's Navakarnataka Parivarthana Yatra at the sprawling Palace Grounds and hit out at the governments law and order record. "When the Centre is working towards ensuring ease of living, Karnataka is debating about 'ease of doing murders'. Those who oppose the incumbent government are being muzzled. It is a dangerous development in democracy," he stated and called upon people to give a fitting reply by throwing the government out in the elections.



In his first, full-fledged public rally in poll-bound Karnataka, the prime minister said, "Nothing happens without 10% cut. Taking commission has become the hallmark of the government. Builder and sand mafias are ruling the roost. Two of the Cabinet ministers were raided by the income tax department and a senior Congress leader is facing charges of owning disproportionate assets."



Modi said the people of Bengaluru recently witnessed how the government tried to swindle crores of rupees under the pretext of implementing the steel bridge project. "The state government has scaled new heights in corruption. Days for Congress-free Karnataka are not far. The state should be free of the party that is in favour of dynastic rule and corruption," he added.



The crowd, estimated at around one lakh, erupted into applause when Modi commenced his speech in Kannada and invoked noted personalities like Basavanna, Sangolli Rayanna, and Kempegowda. In the same breath, he said: "I have not seen such a crowd before. The whole country is seeing which direction the wind is blowing. The countdown for the Congress government has started. The Congress is standing at the exit gate."



Modi devoted much of his 52-minute speech to patting his own back by explaining the pro-people measures taken by his government and how the Siddaramaiah government has been lax in implementing them in the state.



The prime minister also promised to develop next generation infrastructure in the state, especially Bengaluru, by taking up metro rail and suburban rail projects and providing better education and healthcare facilities.Several hundred highly skilled Indian workers, in long agonising green card wait, from across the US held a rally in front of the White House in support of President Donald Trump's plan for a merit-based immigration system.



Flying to the US capital from as far as California, Texas and Chicago and driving several hundred miles from places like Florida, New York and Massachusetts, these highly skilled Indians, living in the US for the past several years and in many cases for more than a decade, urged Trump to end the per-country limit on legal permanent residency to eliminate the massive Green Card backlog of highly skilled Indians.

"We are looking strictly for a merit-based immigration. That will bring prosperity and fast economic growth of the US," Krishna Bansal, national policy and political director of Republican Hindu Coalition, told the rally of supporters.

"We are with President Trump for taking the initiative towards a merit-based immigration system," Bansal said.

The Republican Hindu Coalition is working with the White House and lawmakers towards a comprehensive immigration bill that should include all these things, Bansal added.

Giving Green Cards to thousands of highly skilled professionals from India would help them realise their full potential and boost the US's growth and prosperity, Bansal said.

The participants, many of them software engineers, held banners and posters with slogans like: "Cut Green Card backlog", "strictly merit-based point system", "end country limit", "we need to support legal dreamers" and "We support Trump".

This was one of the rare pro-Trump immigration rallies at the White House.

President Trump last week used his first State of the Union address to push for the merit-based immigration system that admits skilled people, a proposal that could benefit technology professionals from countries like India.

According to the Republican Hindu Coalition, there are nearly 2,00,000 children of legal immigrants-in-line from India, who have never broken the law, but who simply age out at 21 and have to go back because their parents have a 60-year wait to get their Green Card after it is approved.By Anthony Faiola; Photos by Salwan Georges

16 January 2018

(The Washington Post)  Months after Hurricane Irma blazed its destructive path through the Caribbean, the once vibrant community on the tiny island of Barbuda is still struggling to rebuild paradise lost.

Before the September storm, Barbuda was a forgotten Eden about the physical size of the District of Columbia. Its 1,700 inhabitants were family, literally. The descendants of African slaves brought centuries ago by the British, many islanders were related. The workdays were short and the lobster was sweet. There were no street addresses. Everyone went by their first names.Irmas Category 5 winds damaged virtually 100 percent of the island. In its aftermath, and as Hurricane Jose threatened to hit, the island was completely evacuated.A few hundred Barbudans have since returned, seeking to rebuild. But the hurricane has ripped open old wounds in Antigua and Barbuda, a Caribbean nation of two very different islands where long-standing tensions have spilled over. Barbudans who have returned are furious at, and suspicious of, the national government in bigger, more developed Antigua, insisting it is dragging its feet on restoring electricity to homes and rebuilding schools. They smell a plot to deter Barbudans from going back, in order to sell out the island to developers. The effort by the Antigua government to construct a bigger, more fortified airport on Barbuda, they say, is proof.But the government in Antigua insists the time has come for Barbuda to be dragged into the modern world, abandoning a throwback culture of collective land ownership in favor of modern property laws. If Barbudans own their own land and houses, they can, the government argues, take out loans to rebuild their properties without taxpayer assistance. They can also insure their homes against storms, just as residents do on Antigua.In the balance is a cherished Caribbean lifestyle that Barbudans fear may never again be what it was before the wrath of Irma.On Barbuda, the rebuilding effort after Hurricane Irma has a long way to go. Street debris has been cleared, but many houses remain in tatters. Some of the few hundred returnees are sleeping in tents outside the ruins of their homes.But Wayde Burton, a local city councilor, has managed to reopen the only store on the island, Lil-Lincs Supermarket. And a daily ferry is running between Barbuda and Antigua, leaving in the early morning and going back in the late afternoon. But its unreliable, residents say, and often crowded, making even getting to Barbuda a chore.Shiraz Hopkins, a Barbuda farmer, fled to neighboring Antigua during the island-wide evacuation in September. Much of his livestock survived Irma. But in the storms aftermath, local pit bulls killed off many of his goats, sheep and turkeys. He returned to Barbuda in November, and he argues that the government has been too slow in restoring electricity and water and rebuilding the local primary school.Many Barbudans have stayed on Antigua, finding jobs and building new lives. But he and other returnees are vowing to stay. With Gods help, I will get back what I had and even more, he said. []One bone of contention between Barbudan returnees and the national government in Antigua is the reconstruction of the islands airport. The government is moving ahead with plans for a bigger, more fortified facility that officials say will aid in the reconstruction effort and provide long-term economic benefits. But critics on Barbuda say the project is aimed at opening the long quiet island to larger-scale tourism, which many locals would be firmly against. []Most of the 1,700 Barbudans evacuated from the island in the aftermath of Irma have taken up residence on their sister island of Antigua, where life is radically different. Barbuda was slow-paced, without chain restaurants or major tourism. For them, Antigua is a leap into the modern world, with massive cruise ships, a faster pace of life and even a Burger King. [more]25 January 2017 (The Economist)  America, which has long defined itself as a standard-bearer of democracy for the world, has become a flawed democracy according to the taxonomy used in the annual Democracy Index from the Economist Intelligence Unit, our sister company. Although its score did not fall by muchfrom 8.05 in 2015 to 7.98 in 2016it was enough for it to slip just below the 8.00 threshold for a full democracy. It joins France, Greece, and Japan in the second-highest tier of the index. The downgrade was not a consequence of Donald Trump, states the report. Rather, it was caused by the same factors that led Mr Trump to the White House: a continued erosion of trust in government and elected officials, which the index measures using data from global surveys. In total, it incorporates 60 indicators across five broad categories: electoral process and pluralism, functioning of government, political participation, democratic political culture, and civil liberties.

A similar pattern of declining popular confidence in political elites and institutions has also been evident in Europe. Such disaffection helped cause the scores of more than 70 countries to decline compared with 2015. Although Britain is one of the leading exemplars of this trend, it was one of only 38 countries to record an improved score, thanks to the robust turnout of 72.2% in the June 2016 Brexit referendum. Despite all the movement in the middle, however, the extremes of the ranking are still in place. Norway keeps its spot at the top with a near-perfect 9.93 out of 10, while North Korea remains rooted to the bottom of the table.

Declining trust in government is denting democracyBy Jason Samenow

31 January 2018

(The Washington Post)  As an antidote to the report of minus-88 degree weather in the Siberian outpost of Oymyakon earlier this month, we give you this: The temperature in a settlement just to its east was an astonishing 126 degrees warmer two weeks later.The mercury in Omolon, Russia, reached its highest January temperature ever recorded Monday: a relatively toasty 38.4 degrees.But the warmth flooding east Siberia and parts of the Arctic may, in turn, displace the frigid air that is normally pooled there sending it surging south into the north central and Northeastern U.S. through mid-February.The mild weather over east Siberia can be traced to the development of an enormous, bulging zone of high pressure over eastern Russia. [] Mashable science editor Andrew Freedman called it one heckuva monster on TwitterCountry

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Karnataka to offer 4-year BSc course in 60 Engineering colleges this year There is a proposal to select students through the Common Entrance Test

NEET 2021 UG exam tomorrow; check NTA guidelines here Candidates must follow NEET UG dress code, wear face masks and follow instructions as mentioned on the exam

Alert: NTA releases admit card for ICAR entrance examinations 2021 The examination will be conducted in the Computer Based Test (CBT) mode on September 17Over the past few months, the Hollywood community has been rattled by the ongoing revelations of many sexual assault allegations.

Uma Thurman: #MeToo

Actress Uma Thurman is the latest performer to accuse disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein of sexual assault.

The actress revealed these allegations to famed New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd in a Feb. 3 article. Thurman stated that Weinstein was too busy bombarding her compliments that she did not see potential red flags. The Kill Bill actress noted that Weinstein assaulted her when she had a private meeting with him in London, England.

"It was such a bat to the head. He pushed me down. He tried to shove himself on me. He tried to expose himself. He did all kinds of unpleasant things. But he didn't actually put his back into it and force me. You're like an animal wriggling away, like a lizard. I was doing anything I could to get the train back on the track, My track. Not his track." Thurman told the New York Times.

Thurman also stated that despite that incident, Weinstein tried to make nice with the actress and even had his assistants call her with potential projects. When Thurman had the chance to confront the former Hollywood powerhouse in private, the actress threatened to destroy his career.

Weinstein's representatives have confirmed that the disgraced movie mogul did make a pass at Thurman, but denied the actress's threats against him.

Thurman vs. Tarantino

Weinstein was not the only Hollywood powerhouse that Thurman targeted during this interview. She also blamed Weinstein for interfering with her working relationship with Kill Bill Vol. 1 and Kill Bill Vol. 2 director Quentin Tarantino.

While Tarantino confronted Weinstein several times before the filming process of the first Kill Bill, Thurman stated that the director had put her in mortal danger when she was filming the fan-favorite spaghetti western. The actress reported that she was forced to do a stunt that went wrong and left her with permanent injuries to her neck and knees.

Tarantino and Thurman had a multi-year feud in regards to the footage to prove that she was injured on the job.

Before Thurman's revelation, Tarantino made headlines as he planned to collaborate with Leonardo DiCaprio to work on a Charles Manson film. It is unknown if Thurman's announcement has affected the film's pre-production process.

Other Weinstein Accusers

In addition to Thurman, other women have come forward with accusations that Weinstein sexually assaulted them.

Actress Rose McGowan has crowned herself the 'Architect' of Harvey Weinstein's downfall. She told Stephen Colbert during her appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert that she wanted other women to reveal their own encounters with Weinstein.

One of Weinstein's former assistants, Sandeep Rehal, filed a lawsuit against Weinstein on Thursday, Jan. 25. In the lawsuit, Rehal revealed that Weinstein sexually harassed her and spoke derogatory language at her numerous times. The former assistant left Weinstein's in 2015.

Actress Anne Heche has also stated that Weinstein fired her because she resisted the movie mogul's advances.

Over 80 women have accused Weinstein of sexually assaulting them.REYNOSA, Mexico  One afternoon in late November, a middle-aged man cautiously approached heavily armed police at a checkpoint to report a carjacking.

Drug gangs had been terrorizing citizens in this gritty city, across the border from McAllen, dragging people from their cars at gunpoint. At its peak last fall, a dozen carjackings were reported daily.

Following up on the pedestrians tip, state police located a bullet-riddled SUV in a rundown neighborhood. The vehicles occupants had vanished.

The bodies will never be found, said Carlos Miravete, operations director for the Tamaulipas public safety department. Theyll be burned to ashes.

Miravetes blunt assessment lays bare the violence that continues to escalate in this border state, which recorded 805 homicides last year, a 35 percent increase over 2016. That figure doesnt even include victims such as those in the carjacking, whose bodies vanish without a trace.

The Tamaulipas homicide rate in 2017 was the highest since its peak in 2012, when violence between feuding drug gangs put security forces on a warlike footing. At the same time, the kidnapping rate of 3.84 per 100,000 residents is the worst in all of Mexico.

Tamaulipas shares 230 miles of border with Texas, and its industries benefit from this geography, just as drug cartels do. When the Zetas split from their former allies, the Gulf Cartel, the region was plunged into a drug war.

By 2013, the cartel chiefs had been captured or killed, and the splintered remnants continue to battle for the lucrative trafficking routes, with new leaders popping up regularly.

Reynosa has seen some of the worst violence lately, searing in the minds of residents that their city isnt a safe place to live.

In an effort to restore some semblance of order, Tamaulipas Gov. Francisco Garcia Cabeza de Vaca ordered state police to set up checkpoints across the city last year.

Since taking office in 2016, Cabeza de Vaca has insisted his administration would turn the tide against criminal groups. He assured citizens in the months that followed that conditions in Tamaulipas were improving compared to Mexicos other cartel-plagued states, yet the numbers tell a different story.

Underscoring concerns over deteriorating security, the State Department in January issued its sternest do not travel warning for Tamaulipas, placing the state on the same footing as war-ravaged nations like Syria and Yemen.

Even as Cabeza de Vaca has pressed the federal government to send reinforcements, military patrols and operations have done little to prevent gunbattles from erupting in the streets. Beyond fighting drug cartels, the governor hopes to succeed where his predecessors failed: winning the publics trust.

The governors instructions are to establish all mechanisms necessary to return security to Reynosa, Miravete said. This is what citizens demand.

Authorities say stolen cars are used in all manner of illicit enterprises, including kidnappings and drug smuggling operations. But criminals use vehicles in ways that make it very difficult for authorities to link them with actual crimes.

Surveillance cameras spot suspicious vehicles before they arrive at roving checkpoints, so authorities can check if the vehicle was reported stolen. But some vehicles lack license plates, while others make use of stolen plates or swap out the emblems that identify the vehicles make.

Still, the governors office credits the checkpoints in and around the city with a sudden drop in auto theft, and the menacing occurrence of armed men speeding through Reynosa, but some question a strategy that subjects everyday citizens to arbitrary policing.

There is no coherent strategy from the federal government to address organized crime, so here is a governor taking matters into his own hands, said Guadalupe Correa-Cabrera, an associate professor of policy and government at George Mason University, and an expert on organized crime and border security. Cabeza de Vaca is only justifying his own policies, not addressing the real issues.

The concern is not unwarranted. Earlier this year, Mexicos National Human Rights Commission found evidence that marines and the security detail for the Matamoros mayor were involved in the 2014 killings in of three siblings from the Texas border town of Progreso.

Cabeza de Vaca recently accepted the commissions recommendation that Tamaulipas pursue a thorough investigation of the crime in Progreso.

In a city where the local police department was disbanded after it was found to be working directly with local drug cartels, the checkpoints raise concerns that little is being done to ensure human rights are respected.

One evening, David Guajardo, a 28-year-old college student, and his mother were stopped by law enforcement on their way home from the supermarket. They were interrogated, their vehicle was inspected, and ultimately they were allowed to continue on, but the experience is not one that Guajardo is soon to forget.

You cant avoid going out and living your life because of the insecurity, Guajardo said, But you always worry whats going to happen.

For most residents, it is all they can do to navigate through the periodic spasms of violence roiling their border city. Violence spiked in last April after Juan Manuel Loisa Salinas, a local Gulf Cartel chief known as Comandante Toro, was killed.

In the bloody aftermath, some bystanders were caught in the crossfire, further eroding confidence that authorities are capable of establishing order.

A public safety survey in December conducted by the census agency in Mexico, the National Institute of Statistics and Geography, found 95.6 percent of residents 18 or older consider Reynosa an unsafe place to live.

The insecurity has wreaked havoc on local businesses, forcing some to shutter in the face of extortion. But Reynosas maquiladora sector has been resilient, employing more than 120,000 workers and looking to hire thousands more.

To be sure, maquilas have had to adjust to the threats. Buses shuttle workers living in Texas to maquilas in Reynosa, and other employees drive beat-up cars in an attempt to stay inconspicuous on their way to work.

Security is an issue. We worry, but we have to face it, and live with it, said Enrique Castro, president of INDEX Reynosa, an industry group that promotes maquiladora exports. Its not nice to travel to our plant and not know whats going to happen.

Castro said industry leaders are working with authorities at the federal level, and believe they have a good strategy to reduce the factories vulnerability to organized crime.

The best shield against crime is the success of the maquila industry, Castro said.

Cabeza de Vaca has promoted closer business ties with Texas, and leveraged partnerships with U.S. law enforcement to train Mexican investigators in the latest crime scene evidence processing and auto theft detection. At the same time, Cabeza de Vaca has pressed the U.S. to do its part to stop the flow of weapons into Mexico.

A new report by the Center for American Progress, titled Beyond Our Borders: How Weak U.S. Gun Laws Contribute to Violent Crime Abroad found the percent of homicides committed with a gun jumped from 15 percent in 1997 to 66 percent in 2017.

State forces seized 345 firearms, 19 grenades and 11,320 bullets off the streets last year, including 96 guns and 4 grenades in Reynosa alone.

So far, a new year has brought no respite to Reynosa. Gulf drug cartel leader Humberto Loza Mendez was killed in late January by marines in Reynosa. Loza Mendez, also known as Betillo, had been fighting a turf war with a rival faction of the Gulf Cartel, and was responsible for orchestrating gunbattles and street blockades.

Amid the bloodshed, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto canceled a publicized visit to Reynosa last week to attend the inauguration of a transportation infrastructure project.

Some observers assert the change of plans came after Cabeza de Vaca, who belongs to the opposition National Action Party, or PAN, called for federal attorney general's officials to be investigated after repeated attempts to obtain files on Eugenio Hernandez Flores, the former Tamaulipas governor, were ignored.

Hernandez Flores of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, was arrested by Tamaulipan officials last year, and is wanted in Texas on money laundering and bribery charges.

For their part, the presidents office claimed the visit never was confirmed, and therefore was never officially canceled.

Setting politics aside, as homicides surge to record levels across Mexico, many see little hope for a safer future.

Walking briskly on the way to pick up her kids from school, Ana Pastrana, 33, said the outlook is rather bleak.

This isnt going to end, if anything its going to get worse, Pastrana said pessimistically. There is nobody to stop it.

anelsen@express-news.netShortly after his election to the presidency in 1976, Jimmy Carter attracted tons of media attention when he announced that his 9-year-old daughter Amy would be attending a public elementary school in the District of Columbia.

This was big news because Amy Carter was the first child of an American president ever to attend a racially integrated public school in the D.C. school system.

For Carter, it meant putting action behind the words of his presidential campaign. As a candidate, he had criticized politicians who pay lip service to public education but send their own kids to private schools, describing them as a political and economic elite who have shaped decisions and never had to account for mistakes nor to suffer.

A variation on that issue played itself out during a Jan. 20 candidate forum hosted by the Northwest Democrats of Bexar County. Before a crowd of more than 50 party loyalists, candidates for various offices made brief pitches, laying out their biographies and defining their priorities.

Diana Arevalo, the first-term District 116 state rep facing a strong challenge from her predecessor, Trey Martinez Fischer, used part of her time to fire a brushback pitch in the general vicinity of her rivals noggin.

After Martinez Fischer touted his efforts to restore public-education funding that had been slashed by Republicans in the Legislature, Arevalo suggested that Martinez Fischer was hypocritical because he sends his two young daughters to private, not public, elementary schools.

Martinez Fischer let the remark pass during the forum, but took issue with it in a Facebook post later that day. After thanking the Northwest Democrats for inviting him to the forum, he wrote: I am especially thankful for the support of those of you who were angered, like I was, when my opponent used my children to take a cheap shot at me.

I am open to criticism at anytime, and any place, Martinez Fischer added, but my children are off limits as all children should be during a campaign.

This is sensitive stuff, partly because public schools have for years been derided by conservative think tanks as government schools and prisons for poor kids. Its also sensitive because it politicizes the parenting choices of someone who happens to be running for office. To Martinez Fischer, it violated an unwritten, bipartisan rule of politics: keep the kids out of it.

Arevalo argues, however, that she was not taking a shot at Martinez Fischers children, but at what she perceives to be a gap between his rhetoric and his personal choices.

I did not, nor would I ever, attack any child, Arevalo said. I brought up the fact that this was his choice. And I feel that theres a disconnect. Not everyone can afford that luxury and that privilege. Especially, right now, when our public-school system needs some attention.

The issue is complicated by the fact that Arevalo herself attended private schools, Incarnate Word High School and St. Paul Catholic School, while Martinez Fischer, a graduate of Holmes High School, came up through the public-school system.

The hypocrisy question would be clearer with a candidate who adamantly talks about supporting public schools but drains public-education resources by using vouchers for their own kids. That doesnt apply in this case.

Its also true that members of the San Antonio legislative delegation commonly send their kids to private schools and its not necessarily fair for Martinez Fischer to be called out as though hes an outlier on this issue.

Nonetheless, as Jimmy Carter suggested more than 40 years ago, progressive politicians run the risk of appearing to advocate one thing for other peoples kids, and another for their own, when they send their children to private schools.

Martinez Fischer said Arevalo sensed she was losing the crowd at the forum and tried to goad him into an angry reaction. He sees no contradiction between his advocacy for public-school funding and his choice of schools for his kids.

Im not a woman, but Ive fought like hell for womens health, he said. Im not on Medicaid, but I have fought for folks who dont have health insurance. Ive never been convicted of a crime, but yet I fight for criminal justice reform. There are a lot of things that Im not, that I certainly have a very different advocacy and view for, when it comes to my public policy.

This primary race could be tilted, in part, by whether District 116 voters conclude that Martinez Fischer is being hypocritical or Arevalo is crossing the boundaries of good taste.

ggarcia@express-news.net | @gilgamesh470The Bruce Museum played host to a whole hypothetical animal kingdom in the woods: Squirrels hopped, owls hooted, crows cawed. And somehow, both chickens and dogs wound up in an oak tree.

Such were the scenarios that filled lyrics and ditties at Museum Musicians, a new program that fosters music appreciation among toddlers ranging in age from 10 months to 2 years.

The offering will take place on the first Thursday of each month through May and is included with an adults museum admission. Each session has a theme that coincides with one of the Bruces exhibits, like Shapes and Colors or Space/Moon; this month, the focus was on all sorts of woodland animals.

As Jackie Jacobs, director of Music Together of Fairfield County, led parents, grandparents and nannies through song and dance, their charges also participated, with the occasional wandering soul straying from the group to scout out a large taxidermied moose on the wall. One little girl practically refused to sit still. When she wasnt exploring, she danced and twirled to the rhythms as everyone knocked together egg-shaped castanets in a show of solidarity.

Other children stayed quietly with their guardians, casually swaying or laughing as they were nestled into laps and trotted like wild horses in the forest.

Though some instructors might prefer the latter student, in Jacobs view, a more adventurous reaction to the program is totally worthwhile as well.

Children teach themselves through play, Jacobs said. They teach themselves everything through play. And so their exploration is critical to their learning process. And at this age and stage, we dont need to tell them, Do it this way, in order for them to learn.

Jacobs, who has worked as an educator for 26 years, noted that though most people think of musical capacity as a talent, it is actually a gift that everyone has.

All human beings are born with basic music competence, she said. The underlying goal for all children is to be able to express their inherent musicality.

But to learn about music, a kid does not necessarily have to be following a formula or sitting attentively, singing along with every exercise. Jacobs likened it to learning language: A child doesnt need to always study and focus to pick up words. Instead, he just has to be immersed and encounter for himself.

In Jacobs class, part of that discovery process came from toying with different percussion instruments. Another was ingrained in the types of music she chose  not only English songs in major keys, but also conga beats and traditional Mexican folk.

While Jacobs was present to instruct, she said that a childs most important person  their caregiver  needs to be the one modeling musical behavior to demonstrate its significance. On Thursday, that didnt mean the adults in the room had to be modern Mozarts. They just needed to be willing to try.

For a group of toddlers, there were very few tears during the hourlong program. Jacobs wasnt surprised. In fact, theres science behind the phenomenon: She said that even Neanderthals would sing to calm their babies so they could go out and hunt for food.

When parents and children make music, the stress hormone in your brain and in your child's brain reaches its optimal level, she said.

For the museum, the new class is a way to get younger visitors to traverse its halls. Laura Stricker, who manages youth and family programs, said even though admission is free for kids under 5, people dont always bring their toddlers to the Bruce.

She wants to change that.

My particular goal here is to get families with young children coming to the museum, Stricker said.The following headlines and articles appeared in the Stamford Advocate decades ago on Feb. 5.

10 years ago

Loading Dock reinvented as events hall

At first glance, The Loading Dock events venue that Mimi Sternlicht opened in Stamford seems light years away from the posh hotels her husband, Barry Sternlicht, develops with Greenwich-based Starwood Capital Group.

The new 17,000-square-foot catering hall at 1 Barry Place is nestled among warehouses and industrial buildings near the train tracks in Stamfords Waterside neighborhood. A working loading dock from its previous lives as a printing and mailing facility and warehouse is near the front door.

But thats the effect she wants.

I wanted to build a space in Connecticut that would be the equivalent of a SoHo loft, said Sternlicht, owner and creative director of The Loading Dock. It immediately says to people, this is not your basic space. Its different. Its industrial. Its fresh.

20 years ago

City keeps pound

A selection committee has rejected proposals from two private organizations to run the Stamford dog pound, which will remain under city management.

Safety, Health and Welfare Director John Byrne, who heads the committee, said the city will change the staffing of the long-troubled Magee Avenue pound.

The pound now has two full-time animal control officers, one part-time kennel worker and one full-time manager, a position filled temporarily by a park police officer.

30 years ago

Stamford police chief wants 63 more officers

Stamford Police Chief Daniel Guido has proposed that the department add 63 officers, 16 civilians and five police dogs to the force to battle the problems of downtown crime, drug abuse, traffic violations and burglaries.

The proposal, which city officials said has little chance of being approved intact, would add about 20 percent more officers to the department and raise the current budget by about $4 million, officials said.While United States military personnel are known for their selfless acts of bravery, a certain group of local sewing aficionados have put a new twist on repaying those courageous individuals who have fought for our freedom.

The Main Street Sewing Society, a grassroots community of local quilters, has created quilts for military combat veterans of Faribault County since 2012. Last year, the sewing society produced 32 quilts of valor.

Modeled after the nation-wide Quilts of Valor project, this county-wide initiative lets local veterans know their sacrifices have not been forgotten. The group, who calls the endeavor a labor of love, meets regularly at Micheles Quilting and Sewing Center on North Main in Blue Earth.

Interestingly enough, business owner and sewing society co-treasurer Michele Hard has brought in some reinforcements for this worthwhile cause. Hard and Blue Earth Area Middle School teacher Barbra Carlson came up with the idea to include an enthusiastic collection of 70 to 80 students in the Quilts of Valor project.

Carlsons seventh grade students are broken up into two groups which meets every other day to work on quilting designs. This is the second consecutive quarter in which the students have been participating in the project.

Carlson explains her students were immediately receptive to the Quilts of Valor project after watching a class presentation by sewing society co-president Laurie Halverson in early January.

The kids were very attentive because many of them have veterans in their families and they know to treat this topic with the utmost respect. Anytime you get to engage the students like that, they want to help, and this project gives them that opportunity, Carlson says.

Meanwhile, Halverson also sensed excitement from the children prior to beginning the project. The sewing society co-president says the group she met with had a sense of history beyond their years.

They were aware of what this meant and who we were doing this for. They were really enthusiastic and it was fun to see, Halverson explained.

For the assignment, the eager children are provided with blank squares of background fabric. These pieces of fabric serve as the canvas for various designs using crayons and color pencils.

Once the design blocks have been completed by the students, they are submitted to sewing society volunteers who apply those patterns onto a quilt. Carlsons students have created various designs which include bald eagles, American flags, as well as hearts and stars.

Last quarter, the Main Street Sewing Society received 40 designs from the students, with another 40 soon to be completed. Hard expects to make four quilts using the elaborate designs of some of Blue Earths most creative youngsters.

Halverson feels the input received from the middle school students adds a new look and fresh perspective to the on-going Quilts of Valor project.

Were always looking for new ideas, so we are trying to think outside the box, Halverson says.

Given the positive feedback the sewing society has received from the community in this endeavor, the sewing society plans to seek even more local involvement in the near future.

Next year were going to reach out to the high school, the 4-H group, and also St. Paul Lutheran. Well start out and reach out to some of the different groups because we want to involve the kids and get everyone to be a part of this, Hard added.Republicans and Democrats across Faribault County and the rest of the state of Minnesota will be gathering on Tuesday, Feb. 6, for precinct caucus night.

In Faribault County, the Republicans will be holding their caucus at the Blue Earth Area High School Commons. It will include all 33 voting precincts in the county in the one location.

The Democrats will have two locations, with residents in the eastern half of the county meeting at the Wells Community Center, while those in the western half will caucus at the media center at the BEA High School in Blue Earth.

All caucuses begin at 7 p.m. and anyone age 16 or over may attend.

Attendees at the caucuses will have the opportunity to vote for delegates to the upcoming county political party conventions, introduce and debate resolutions for possible inclusion in the party platform and elect other party officers.

In addition, candidates for various public offices, or their representatives, may be in attendance.

We will also be conducting a straw poll for the gubernatorial race, says Bill Erickson, the county Republican party chair, and the convener of the caucus. Those results will be sent in to the state.

Currently there are nine candidates, from both parties, running for governor.

Erickson says that while 2018 is not a presidential election year, it is still a very important political season in Minnesota.

We will be electing a new governor and a new congressman in the First District this fall, as neither incumbent is running, he says. As well has having both our U.S. Senator seats up for election at the same time.

While there is a lot of attention to those races, Erickson admits he expects a much smaller crowd at this weeks caucus than in February of 2016, when there was a large number of candidates for the Republican nomination for president.

We had set up more tables and chairs and run off more material to hand out in anticipation of a very large crowd in 2016, Erickson says. But it still turned out to be three times more than what we had anticipated. I had never seen such a huge crowd at a caucus ever before.

This year could be back to a normal size caucus attendance.PigPass, which works as a National Vendor Declaration (NVD), was voluntary for producers until now  although the industry pre-empted the start-up date.

WA pig producers have been operating differently to the Eastern States since the Midland saleyards closed in 2010  selling direct to abattoirs or butchers - having done away with pig auctions through saleyards.

Former Linley Valley Pork meat and livestock manager Ron Penn said most of the pigs that went through the facility were already identified so the change wouldnt affect business.

Every pig that comes onsite has to have a tattoo, every pig that comes onsite has to have a PigPass, he said.

So not much is going to change.

Each farmer that fills that in has a PIC (Property Identification Code).

If that PigPass isnt filled out correctly when it arrives onsite we wont slaughter that animal until we make contact with the farmer and then he has to reissue his PigPass.

A lot of the time its just a slip of the pen and they have just missed a column thats all  so it shouldnt impact (too much).

According to the industrys peak body Australia Pork Limited (APL) PigPass will provide real time information on the movements of all pigs in Australia.

This enables authorities to quickly determine the source of a disease outbreak and notify people with pigs in the affected area to stop the spread of disease.

The PigPass NVD form must be completed by all pig owners and producers, regardless of the numbers of the pigs moved from the property.

Failure to comply with the reporting requirements may result in a penalty notice.

APL reminded producers that when transporting pigs off the property owners must complete a PigPass NVD ensuring all information has been completed in full, including the destination PIC.

The receiver must close the loop by reporting the movement online using the originating senders serial number from the PigPass NVD.

A receiver could be an abattoir, a pig producer, a pet pig owner, a saleyard, a knackery, a show or event or a livestock agent.

PigPass is designed to link pigs to a property of origin using a PIC, registered pig identification (ear tags and tattoos) and pig movement documentation (the PigPass NVD).

PigPass helps to ensure that the transport of pigs meets agreed industry and government standards relating to food safety, animal disease control and animal welfare, APL said.EXCUSE the pun but it really was a momentous occasion in Jerdacuttup last week when Lawsons Momentous M518 fetched a tidy $31,500 final bid in the first single vendor Angus stud bull sale in WA this year.

The team at Lawsons Angus once again put together the annual line-up of bulls that encouraged buyers to travel long distances and with quality to be seen right through the 94 strong catalogue, there wasnt much to be disappointed about with all bulls selling by the end of the day.

Setting the tone for Angus bull sales in 2018, the Lawsons genetics proved resilient to the recent reduction in beef prices, averaging $7581 on sale day to be down only $131 on last years sale average of $7712.

The top price on the day was more than double the top set last year, demonstrating the standout qualities of the sleek, well-balanced and showy fella in lot one.

Before the sale, Lawsons Angus principal Harry Lawson said lot one had spurred quite a bit of excitement.

A bull has to be pretty unique to get our attention but Momentous met that criteria, he said.

He comes out of a cow herd and production system that continues to place pressure on fertility and the ability to breed in tough conditions, but he is very quiet and completely sound structurally with the figures and pedigree to make him probably the most complete bull we have ever bred.

Lawsons Momentous M518 is an AI son of Gar Momentum and out of Lawsons Africa H229, born as a late June 2016-drop calf.

The visual outlook of the young bull was impressive and that, joined with a docile temperament, would have been enough to entice plenty of competition but it was the balance of those visual traits with well-rounded EBVs and index values which kept the bids coming until the hammer fell at $31,500.

Some of the bulls standout EBVs included figures of +50, +94 and +117 for 200, 400 and 600-day weights and +23 milk to place it in the top 5 per cent of the Angus breed.

But most impressive were the carcase EBVs of +12.1 EMA and +4.2 IMF which both read in the top 1pc of the Angus breed.

Backing up those impressive figures, Lawsons Momentous was also in the top 1-5pc of all dollar indexes for the Angus breed.

Elders auctioneer Nathan King took the opening bid for Momentous at $15,000 but stiff competition between two online bidders, via AuctionsPlus, saw prices head straight up until a syndicate of three Pemberton-based producers, led by Independent Rural Agents (IRA) principal Colin Thexton, prevailed.

Speaking on behalf of commercial Angus producer trio of Blue River Grazing, Collins Bros and AJ & WJ Ryan & Co, Mr Thexton said Momentous was an outstanding calf.

Hes got everything you want in a bull, he said.

Hes very balanced, quiet, beautiful conformation, excellent IMF and EMA EBVs and basically the complete package.

And we think it was good value buying. Hell be going into a fairly intensive AI program over Angus heifers and the syndicate is looking forward to seeing him progress.

Of the three members in the buying syndicate, two were return buyers to Lawsons and one was a first-timer to the stud.

The syndicate really believes in what the Lawsons team is doing, Mr Thexton said.

And they see this purchase as an opportunity to short circuit what theyre doing and get to where they want their Angus herds to be quickly.

Lawsons Momentous had already been collected for use within the Lawsons breeding herd and the stud elected to retain semen marketing rights and a 50pc revenue sharing interest.

Though it was up for purchase at the Jerdacuttup sale, Momentous was already committed to a contract at Genetics Australia in Victoria from January until at least October 2018 after which time he may travel back to WA for full natural service rights retained by the new owners.

The rest of the sale reflected more moderate prices, with the second top price honours going to lot 12, which sold for $13,000 to Chimera Trust, Mt Barker.

The July 2016-drop son of Gar Sure Fire out of Lawsons Bartel E7 H221, also had a full contingent of balanced figures and indexes which was enough for Lawsons to retain semen marketing rights and 50pc revenue sharing interest.

The index dollar values stood out in particular with the bull ranking in the top 1pc across all four categories.

It also displayed growth and carcase EBVs in the top 10-15pc of the Angus breed which complemented its visual positives.

Buyer Gerald Kilpatrick is a long-time supporter of Lawsons genetics.

A while ago I bought some cattle from people that had used Lawsons bloodlines and I was impressed by how those cattle performed, Mr Kilpatrick said.

Lawsons always has very good, accurate figures which I can trust.

Of the second top-priced bull on the day, Mr Kilpatrick said it was an all-rounder.

I liked his shape and temperament particularly, but his carcase EBVs like eye muscle and intramuscular fat caught my attention too, he said.

The new bull, along with another balanced young bull which was sired by Paringa Judd J5 and purchased for $9000, will go to work with the young second calvers in Mr Kilpatricks operation.

Also buying at the top end of values was another return buyer, Esperance local Wes Graham.

Needing a few bulls to service his sizeable Angus herd, Mr Graham got into the action early, securing five bulls overall including a top of $12,000 and three others at and above the $10,000 mark.

I was looking for bulls with the Sunrise bloodline this year because of the new genetics there, Mr Graham said.

The progeny from that bloodline are an impressive group of bulls that not many people have had the chance to use.

Theyre good all-rounder bulls with high growth and a nice moderate birthweight along with good carcase traits.

Mr Grahams top-priced selection at $12,000 was the seventh bull offered on the day.

Also a July 2016-drop calf, Lawsons Sunrise M502 was sired by Gar Sunrise R760 and out of Lawsons Evident H166.

It was in the top 5pc of the breed for 200, 400 and 600-day weights as well as for carcase weight, EMA and retail beef yield.

It also ranked in the top 10-15pc across all indexes.

Among the contingent of volume buyers on the day was the Cumming family from Jarrahlea, Boyup Brook.

Doug Cumming said the outfit had been sourcing bulls from Lawsons for the past six to seven years.

The figures work, breeding on EBVs works and we see results from Lawsons bulls which is why we keep coming back, Mr Cumming said.

We look for those bulls with low birthweights, fast growth and good EMA figures and that sort of bull is easy to find in the Lawsons catalogue.

Mr Cumming said he thought it was good value buying on the day for quality bulls with the bloodlines he was chasing.

By sales end, Jarrahlea had bought a total of five Lawsons sires, including lot eight at $11,000 and lot 81 at $10,000.

Lawsons Sunrise M492 was the standout for the Jarrahlea team in lot eight, born as a July 2016-drop calf by Gar Sunrise R760 and out of Lawsons Bartel E7 H532.

It ranked in the top 5-10pc across all indexes and also had impressive carcase weight, milk and IMF EBVs in the top 10-15pc of the Angus breed.

Others in the volume buying stakes included Quintarra Farms, Esperance, Durnbond Pty Ltd, Walpole and RK Agriculture, Gordon, Victoria.

Quintarra wound up with eight by the end of the sale including the third top-priced bull of the sale at $12,500 for the son of Gar Prophet in lot 10.

The June 2016-drop calf ranked in the top 10-15pc of the breed across all indexes and also had an excellent milk EBV placing it in the top 1pc of the breed.

Walpole-based Durnbond landed a team of five Lawsons bulls including a top of $10,250 for the son of Gar Anticipation 7261 in lot 68 while Victorian-based RK Agriculture had a representative in the room to secure five sires at $5000 apiece.

Jo Melville, Henderson Glendale, Boyup Brook, was another buyer who travelled to attend the Jerdacuttup sale.

She bought three appealing young bulls with the aim of lining up a well-balanced and consistent team to go over her Angus breeding herd.

I liked those three bulls for their strong, beefy outlooks and of course their EMA and low birthweight figures, Ms Melville said.

In particular I liked the characteristics of the Sunrise bloodline and that bit of Bartel influence as well.

Its a new approach for me to try and get bulls of a very similar type to try and produce the most even line of calves possible but Im happy that these three are like peas in a pod and will do the job well.

Ms Melville was buying at the sale for the first time without her partner Kevin Henderson, who passed away recently, and said she hoped to do him proud with the direction she will be taking the breeding herd in the future.

The volume buyer on the day was IRA principal Colin Thexton who had been bidding via AuctionsPlus on behalf of a number of different accounts.

By the end of the sale he had tallied up 16 other bulls in addition to his initial effort on Lawsons Momentous to average $7109 across the remaining purchases.

The bulls hammered down to Mr Thexton will go to a number of properties throughout the South West.

Mr Thexton said the bulls had the EBV figures and the breeding history of good results to back up their pleasing visual outlooks.

Mr Thextons tally included two sires which sold for five digit values at $11,000 and $10,250, which were sons of Gar Sunrise R760 and Gar Momentum respectively, both ranking in the top 1-5pc across all indexes.

Two other buyers reached the $10,000 mark on sale day with lot nine going to Cadogan Estate, Williams, for $11,000 and lot 45 going to BM & CD Scheer, Esperance, for $10,000.

Lot nine was a son of Gar Prophet with all index values in the top 5pc while lot 45 was a son of Ayrvale Bartel E7 with strong growth EBVs across the 200, 400 and 600-day weights.

Elders auctioneer Nathan King said the sale was a success.

Once again the Lawsons team put together a consistent team right through the catalogue which was recognised by buyers with consistent competition throughout the auction, Mr King said.

The Lawsons bulls all demonstrate impressive figures with good growth and carcase EBVs meaning there is always plenty of choice for buyers.

And with the average only slightly down on last years sale result, it was a very solid sale given the cattle market has come back 20-30pc.

People continue to chase good bulls and the strong presence of return buyers on the day shows their confidence in the Lawsons breeding.

Lawsons Angus stud principals Ruth and Harry Lawson were delighted with the result on the day.

We were particularly glad with the price range which meant that our clients could still purchase world class genetics at affordable prices, Ruth Lawson said.

Its not just about high averages, were about providing choice and value to our clients and were delighted to be providing our clients with further options at our other sales at Cataby and Albany.This weekend saw the Year of the Woman themed series of Celebrity Big Brother come to an end, with Australian drag queen Courtney Act taking home the title with over 49% of the final vote. In second place was former Conservatives politician Ann Widdecombe, who raked in over 39% of the final vote.

Courtney Act won Celebrity Big Brother / Credit: Channel 5

Speaking about her win to media following her exit from the CBB compound, Courtney said how overwhelmed she was with the support she had seen, and was then asked about how she would have found an Ann win during Year of the Woman.

She said: If Ann did win I would have been disappointed, not because of Ann the person, but because of Ann the values.

In Year of the Woman, saying a woman cant choose what happens to their body seems completely counter-intiuitive to the whole point of the celebration.

The former RuPauls Drag Race contestant continued: Hopefully pop culture like CBB having these conversations actually get to reach more people and a younger audience and move the world in a way its already heading, but a little bit faster.

Act is of course talking about Widdecombes voting history during her years in parliament, in which she would consistently vote against giving equal rights, such as marriage, to members of the LGBT+ community. Widdecombe was also vocally against abortion in any circumstances during her time as a politician, and those are arguments she will still have to this day.

Challenged in the house by Act, Widdecombe was firm in her beliefs, whilst Act would offer a completely different point of view, proposing that women should be able to choose what happens to their bodies if they fall pregnant, and that members of the LGBT+ community should be able to be happily married.

Fortunately, the tide looks to be turning in Acts favour in recent years and those to come.

Celebrity Big Brother is set to return for another series in the summer, following a civilian series of Big Brother.

by Daniel Falconer for www.femalefirst.co.uk

find me on and follow me on

SAN FRANCISCO (dpa-AFX) - The Federal Reserve Board on Friday announced that it would restrict the growth of Wells Fargo & Company (WFC) until the company sufficiently improves its governance and controls. The Board found that, in recent years, Wells Fargo pursued a business strategy that prioritized its overall growth without ensuring appropriate management of all key risks. The announced action will restrict Wells Fargo's growth until its governance and risk management sufficiently improves but will not require the firm to cease current activities, including accepting customer deposits or making consumer loans.



Wells Fargo stated that the company is confident it will satisfy the requirements of the consent order it entered into with with the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. Under the consent order, the company will provide plans to the Federal Reserve within 60 days that detail what already has been done, and is planned, to further enhance the board's governance oversight. Wells Fargo will submit a plan to further improve the company's firm-wide compliance and operational risk management program.



The order limits on the growth of the company's total consolidated assets to the level as of December 31, 2017. The asset limitation will remain in effect until third-party reviews have been completed to the satisfaction of the Federal Reserve. Wells Fargo said, based on its preliminary analysis of one set of assumptions for prospective balance sheet optimization activities to manage within the asset cap, the company estimates its 2018 net income would be reduced by approximately $300 to $400 million after tax.



The actions under the plan have included: separating the roles of chairman and CEO and amending the company's by-laws to require an independent chair; and electing six new independent directors in 2017 as five directors retired, bringing to eight the total number of directors elected since 2015, and planned refreshment of an additional four directors in 2018. The plan also includes conducting a board self-evaluation in 2017 facilitated by Mary Jo White, a senior partner at Debevoise & Plimpton LLP and former chair of the SEC.



After Federal Reserve approval, the company will engage independent third parties to conduct a review to be completed no later than September 30, 2018 to confirm adoption and implementation of the plans.



Wells Fargo CEO Tim Sloan said: 'While operating under this constraint, we are open for business and we will continue to serve our customers' financial needs including saving, borrowing, and investing. I want to repeat, we are open for business.'



Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX

Kostenloser Wertpapierhandel auf Smartbroker.deFinance Minister Arun Jaitley has defended Modi's government's plan to roll out the world's largest healthcare initiative across the country.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has said that adequate measures have been taken to fund the Narendra Modi government's plan to roll out the world's largest healthcare initiative across the country. Speaking exclusively to Rahul Joshi, Group Editor-in-Chief of Network18, Jaitley countered the Opposition's charge that the scheme would be another "jumla."

"I have left a lot of leverage for additional measures in this Budget. From a budget of 24-25 lakh crore, to take out 10,000 crores isn't a big deal. I have given a provision of 2,000 crores for the scheme to kickstart," Jaitley said when asked about the rise in allocation from Rs 2,000 crores to Rs 12,000 crores.

The government came under criticism from the Opposition after it was revealed that the Union Budget 2018-19 provided just Rs 2,000 crore for the ambitious National Health Protection Scheme that aims to cover 50 crore poor people. The scheme, which will give health coverage of up to Rs 5 lakh per person, is expected to be launched on 2 October 2018.

Former Union minister P Chidambaram had taken a swipe at Jaitley over his claim that he would raise money for the scheme in the future by calling it a "perfect jumla (gimmick)".

Scheme without money is like flying a kite without a string. The kite flyer will say that the kite is flying, but there will be no kite

and nothing will be flying.  P. Chidambaram (@PChidambaram_IN) February 2, 2018

Jaitley expressed confidence that the government would be able to implement the healthcare scheme and added that the 1 percent cess and the Long Term Capital Gains Tax, which were introduced in this year's Budget, will help in shoring up the funds.

"Now, I am getting Rs 11,000 crore from the 1 percent cess which we have imposed. When the long term capital gain moves ahead, I expect another 20,000 crore in the first year. I hope this will continue in the third and fourth year as well. If the govt wants, they can add to these schemes," he said.

Watch the full interview of the finance minister on CNN-News18 at 10 pm on Monday.Observing that services provided at airports must match global standards, the Bombay High Court has refused to set aside three new conditions imposed while issuing tenders for ground handling services at the Mumbai international airport.

Mumbai: Observing that services provided at airports must match global standards, the Bombay High Court has refused to set aside three new conditions imposed while issuing tenders for ground handling services at the Mumbai international airport.

"Ground handling services to passengers should not fall below international standards. These services have to match with international standards. Today one cannot deprive people of good services," the HC remarked while passing the order earlier last week.

A division bench of Justices S C Dharmadhikari and Bharati Dangre was hearing a petition filed by the Airport Services Providers Association (ASPA) challenging three new eligibility criteria for filing tenders for ground handling concession at the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport (CSIA).

The Civil Aviation Ministry, the Airports Authority of India (AAI), and the MIAL (Mumbai International Airport Limited) were respondents in the matter. The petitioner represents Indian private ground service providers who cater to domestic and international airlines besides private airport operators at various airports in the country.

"As per the new criteria, the bidder should have handled, as a ground handler, at least ten million passengers in the aggregate at international airports, which may be within or outside India. Besides, the bidder company should have a turnover of Rs 75 crore from ground handling business and the bidder should furnish a performance guarantee of Rs 100 crore," the petitioner said

The ASPA claimed that these new conditions were unreasonable, unjust and violative of their fundamental rights. "These conditions have no nexus with the object sought to be achieved," it said.

Hearing arguments from all sides, the HC, however, said it did not see anything unreasonable, unfair or unjust in the

new conditions.

"Given the passenger traffic at the international airport in Mumbai where even some domestic airlines have their operations, we do not think that these conditions are unreasonable or having no nexus with the object sought to be achieved," the bench said.

It said the objective of the conditions was to provide expeditious ground handling services at the airport. "Apart from giving the passengers assistance, cleanliness and hygiene, there are several duties which are to be performed by these agencies. "They should deploy adequate and sufficient manpower so that the services do not suffer. There could be a breakdown in the event the passenger traffic exceeds the limit, particularly during vacations and holidays. In these circumstances and to obtain most efficient services that such conditions are imposed," the bench said and dismissed the petition.A man in Noida Sector-122 was shot at by a sub-inspector of Uttar Pradesh on Saturday leading to the suspension of four policemen on Sunday, media reports said.

Two men in Noida Sector-122 were allegedly shot at by a sub-inspector of the Uttar Pradesh police on Saturday, leading to the suspension of four policemen on Sunday, media reports said. While one has sustained injuries on the leg, the other one is critically injured.

The family of one of the victims, Jitendra Yadav said that caste animosity might have been a cause behind the 'fake encounter', The Times of India reported. The family also alleged four boys were returning from Bahrampur at around 10.30 pm on Saturday when the police personnel stopped the vehicle and fired at one of them without any reason.

According to The Indian Express, the Uttar Pradesh police said that personal enmity and not encounter may have been the reason behind the attack. At a press conference, SSP Love Kumar said that the police condemns the incident and that a 'sub-inspector is not expected to do such a thing.' There have been reports of about 15 police shootouts from 10 districts of the state in 48 hours.

The 4 policemen have been suspended with immediate effect. We have seized service revolver of the sub-inspector who fired the gun shots and sent him to jail: SSP Love Kumar on man shot at by police in Sector 122 in Noida last night. His family alleged this was a 'fake' encounter pic.twitter.com/c8oDy6HTfX  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) February 4, 2018

On Friday, two suspected criminals and as many policemen, including a station house officer, were injured in an encounter in Gorakhpur. The incident took place when Maneesh Yadav and Manoj Yadav were escaping after threatening a village head. Police said that a team was rushed to the spot after the victim informed that he had been threatened by two people.

In the encounter, Station House Officer, Khorabar, Sudhir Kumar, and sub-inspector, Jhangha, Sunil Kumar Singh, suffered minor injuries, they said.

According to PTI, a gangster was killed and nearly two dozen criminals were arrested by police in 15 encounters in different districts of Uttar Pradesh in two days, a police spokesperson said on Saturday. The encounters took place in Bulandshahr, Shamli, Kanpur, Saharanpur, Lucknow, Baghpat, Muzaffarnagar, Gorakhpur, Hapur and Meerut.

The Uttar Pradesh police has intensified its crackdown on criminals after the new DGP OP Singh took charge last month. Chief Minister Yogi Aditynath had vowed to take strict action against criminal elements after his government faced criticism over a string of crimes in the state.

According to NHRC data between 2000 and 2017, Uttar Pradesh accounted for an alarming 44.55 percent (794 cases) of fake encounter cases among 1,782 cases registered across all states.

With inputs from PTIIndia not only has to compete with and contain China, but also confront its neighbour if necessary, former Indian Army chief Shankar Roy Chowdhury said on Sunday.

Kolkata: India not only has to compete with and contain China, but also confront its neighbour if necessary, former Indian Army chief Shankar Roy Chowdhury said on Sunday.

Speaking on India-China relations on the occasion of a book launch, General Roy Chowdhury (retd.) pointed out: "Geography can't change, and India will have to co-exist with China as a neighbour.

"We have to compete, contain but if necessary we also have to confront China."

Roy Chowdhury said that India in 2018 is not the same India that it was in 1962, and assured that there was nothing wrong with India militarily.

"At the level of the soldier, the officer, the commander or the field commander, there is no problem. But, I don't know what is happening at the level of higher command or at the political level. But, it was necessary for India to build its economy, an area where China had excelled over India," he said.

He also noted that policy-makers in Delhi had always paid more attention to the western border, and the "east has always been distant from Delhi".

Bu, all these were now changing, Roy Chowdhury said.

He cited the Look East Policy as an instance, but mentioned that it had come in confrontation with the One Belt, One Road project of China.

Tripura Governor Tathagata Roy said China had no intention of invading India and making it a colony, but wants "to keep the pot boiling and keep India on its toes so that India can't devote its entire energy in economic development".

The book "Shadow of the Dragon and Recent Developments" by journalist Amalendu Kundu was released at the programme.

The book, published by Poets Foundation, is divided into three sections: India-China relations, the Gorkhaland agitation in Darjeeling and the situation in Sikkim.

Besides Kundu, the main author, there are contributions from writers from different walks of life.India wanted peaceful relations with Pakistan, but if one bullet come from across border, countless bullets will be fired to retaliate, Rajnath Singh said

Agartala: India wanted peaceful relations with Pakistan, but its forces have been told that if one bullet come from across the border, they should fire countless bullets to retaliate, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said in Agartala on Saturday night.

"I have given standing orders to our forces to shoot limitless bullets to retaliate a single fire on our territory by the Pakistani forces," he said at an election rally at Barjala on the state capital's outskirts.

"As our neighbour, we do not want to attack on Pakistan first. We want to live with peace and harmony with our all neighbours. But, most unfortunately Pakistan is trying to tear down Jammu and Kashmir and continue attacks on our forces and Indian territory," he added.

Hitting out at the Left Front government, Rajnath Singh said that during its 25 year uninterrupted rule, it did nothing for the development of Tripura, economic prosperity of the state and to remove huge poverty and unemployment.

"During CPM's 35 years rule in West Bengal, they ruined that state, and if the Left parties after the February 18 assembly polls are allowed to rule Tripura further, they would destroy the future of the state and its people," he alleged.

He said that only his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) can develop the country and the northeastern states including Tripura.

"BJP and its allies are now ruling 19 states in India. Why so many states are under BJP and its allies' governance ? Because people of these states trust BJP and people sincerely believe that only BJP can remove their poverty and provide jobs to the youth."

Rajnath Singh said that Tripura has huge natural resources and if BJP comes to power in the state, it would make this northeastern state a number one state in India.

"You have given scope to the Left parties in Tripura many times, give scope to BJP once this time to rule for genuine development of the state with all-round growth of all sections of people," he said.Indian mission in Abuja is in touch with authorities in Nigeria and Benin about a ship carrying 22 Indians believed to have gone missing in Gulf of Guinea

New Delhi: The Indian mission in Abuja is in touch with authorities in Nigeria and Benin about a ship carrying 22 Indians believed to have gone missing in the Gulf of Guinea, the External Affairs Ministry has said.

"A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals on-board, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea," MEA Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said in a tweet.

Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860  Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) February 3, 2018

The India mission in Nigeria was in touch with the authorities concerned and the situation was being constantly monitored, the MEA said.The Jammu and Kashmir government said a student 'detained' in Madhya Pradesh by the Railway Protection Force has been released and is on his way home

Jammu: The Jammu and Kashmir government on Saturday said a student "detained" in Madhya Pradesh by the Railway Protection Force has been released and is on his way home.

The force had arrested a 22-year-old Kashmiri man for travelling with a small LPG cylinder at the Vidisha railway station in Madhya Pradesh earlier this week, an RPF sub-inspector said.

Mohammed Idris was arrested on the night of 31 January, and a local court granted him bail on Friday, he said.

Idris, a resident of south Kashmir's Anantnag district, was part of a group of students of Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology which went to Bhopal for a training course.

"The group of students from SKUAST after completing their training course at Bhopal boarded a train for Delhi.

"Reportedly, in the train a woman clicked a photograph of the man and posted on social media with a caption which created confusion and railway police detained one of the students.

"However, on the intervention of SKUAST and police authorities, the student has been released and is on his way back to Kashmir," Parliamentary Affairs minister AR Veeri said in the Assembly.

Veeri made the statement after opposition members raised the issue in the House.

They also raised concerns about the thrashing of students from the state in Haryana.

CPM leader and MLA MY Tarigami suggested adopting a resolution to appeal the Centre to ensure safety of Kashmiri students studying in educational institutions outside the state.

"Cutting across the political divide, this House should pass a resolution urging the prime minister to condemn such incidents on the floor of Parliament.

"Subsequently he (PM) should assure safe and secure environment for Kashmiri students, businessmen, labourers and others working in various states of the country," Tarigami said.

Reacting to the reports of thrashing of Kashmiri students in Haryana's Mahendragarh last evening, he said a hate campaign has been unleashed on Kashmiris outside the state and it has patronage of "communal forces" in the country.

"Such incidents have serious implications. The prevailing uncertain situation in Kashmir gets compounded by such incidents.

"This (Haryana incident) is not an isolated incident against Kashmiris. In the past, similar incidents have happened in Rajasthan and other states," Tarigami added.A fire broke out at an industrial estate in suburban Mulund late on Saturday night with officials stating that fire-fighting operations were underway

Mumbai: A fire broke out at an industrial estate in suburban Mulund late on Saturday night with officials of the BMC Disaster Control Room stating that fire-fighting operations were currently underway.

A Control Room official said that the there were no reports of injuries to anyone, adding that eight fire engines and an equal number of water tankers had been deployed to douse the fire.

"The fire erupted at some industrial shops in Shanti Agency in Mulund West around 9 pm. The cause of the fire is not yet known," an official said.

Meanwhile, in neighbouring Thane, firefighters continued their efforts to bring under control a raging fire at a godown in Bhiwandi's Mankoli Naka area.

Fire teams from Bhiwandi, Ulhasnagar, Badlapur and Kalyan were engaged in the fire operations since 3 am on Saturday, officials said.

There are no casualties, officials said, adding that it could take some more time to douse the flames.A woman on Sunday through a video on Twitter sought police help against 'torture' by her husband, an automobile businessman.

Mumbai: A woman on Sunday through a video on Twitter sought police help against "torture" by her husband, an automobile businessman.

Cry of a women goes unheard with #KharPoliceStation. @MumbaiPolice @CPMumbaiPolice. Please do the needful immediately before something untoward happens. #BetibachaoBetiPadao. pic.twitter.com/9DK5Bn1nJz  Ashoke Pandit (@ashokepandit) February 4, 2018

Police said they were looking into the matter and would take necessary action after investigations.

In the video posted on Twitter by filmmaker Ashoke Pandit, the woman, a Khar resident, is seen weeping for "help and justice".

I have been "tortured" both mentally and physically by my husband. He has been "torturing me" for several years. I have been in the relationship just for the betterment of my children. But this man refuses to do the needful for my living, the woman said in the video.

She further alleged that despite registering an FIR, police have not taken any action against her husband.

"Kindly help me, because this man will torture me mentally and end up my life. If I don't get justice I will end up tomorrow in the streets of Khar. Please give me justice," the woman said in the video.

A senior police official said the woman and her husband had a domestic dispute.

"The couple has three children and stay in a duplex apartment in Khar. While the husband and two kids stay on the eleventh floor, the woman along with their daughter stay on the 12th floor," the officer said.

He said the woman has recently registered two cases against her husband.

"One case was registered for housebreaking, while another for criminal intimidation," he said, adding police is probing the matter and whatever action is needed will be taken.Forty-seven Indian fishermen have been arrested by Pakistan's authorities for allegedly fishing in the country's territorial waters in the Arabian Sea

Karachi: Forty-seven Indian fishermen have been arrested by Pakistani authorities for allegedly fishing in the country's territorial waters in the Arabian Sea, according to a maritime official.

The Pakistan Maritime Security Agency (PMSA) on Saturday arrested 47 Indian fishermen and seized nine launches for illegally fishing in Pakistani waters, a PMSA spokesperson was quoted as saying by the Express Tribune.

The arrested fishermen were handed over to the Docks police for further proceedings and investigation, it said.

The Indian boats have been confiscated for violating Pakistans coastal territory, the spokesperson said, adding that said PMSA vessels and fast attack boats took part in an open sea operation for the purpose.

On 19 January, as many as 17 Indian fishermen had been arrested by the PSMA for allegedly fishing in Pakistan's territorial waters. Three boats had also been impounded.

Pakistan had released 292 Indian fishermen as a goodwill gesture in December-January.

Pakistan and India frequently arrest fishermen as there is no clear demarcation of the maritime border in the Arabian Sea and these fishermen do not have boats equipped with the technology to know their precise location.

A number of non-governmental organisations in both India and Pakistan have raised the issue, pressing their governments to release the arrested fishermen without delay.Three jawans were killed and five persons injured on Sunday in heavy shelling by Pakistani troops along LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts of Jammu and Kashmir forcing Indian troops to retaliate, officials said

Jammu: An army officer and three jawans were killed and four people, including two teenagers, injured on Sunday in heavy Pakistani shelling along the LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts of Jammu and Kashmir, forcing Indian troops to retaliate, officials said.

Pakistani forces opened unprovoked heavy firing and shelling along the LoC in Bhimbher Gali sector of Rajouri district this evening, senior army officials told PTI.

In the heavy shelling, three jawans were killed, they said, adding an officer, who was injured in the shelling, later succumbed to his injuries.

Indian Army was giving a befitting reply as heavy exchanges were on, the officials added.

Earlier in the day, two teenagers and a jawan were injured in Shahpur sector of Poonch district in the shelling from across the border which started this morning and was continuing intermittently, a police official said.

He identified the injured civilians as Shahnaz Bano (15) and Yasin Arif (14), both residents of Islamabad village of Shahpur, and said both the teenagers were hospitalised.

A defence spokesman said Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatics, and mortars around 1110 hours.

The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

In another ceasefire violation by Pakistan in nearby Rajouri district, the police official said six mortars exploded near Neaka Panjgrain and Tarkundi villages in Manjakote sector around 1540 hours.

The mortars were fired by Pakistani troops and were responded by Indian forces guarding the LoC, triggering an exchange of fire between the two sides which was continuing when last reports were received, he said.

In January alone eight civilians and six security personnel were killed and over 65 injured in ceasefire violations by Pakistan troops along Indo-Pak border in Jammu region.

Pakistani troops carried out intense shelling along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts from 18 to 22 January.

While there were no ceasefire violations by Pakistan reported along the IB since 22 January, intermittent shelling has taken place along the LoC.The body of a former captain in the army was found in the Pune Cantonment area late Thursday night with police stating that he had been bludgeoned to death by two unidentified people.

Pune: The body of a former captain in the army was found in the Pune Cantonment area late Thursday night with police stating that he had been bludgeoned to death by two unidentified people.

Police said that Ravindra Bali (67), a former captain in the army, was living as a recluse in a makeshift tent on a footpath in the Pune Camp Area.

"The watchman of a bungalow, who saw two people assaulting Bali and fleeing from the scene, alerted the police," said an officer with Lashkar police station.

"Bali was not in touch with his family for several years and was leading a reclusive life. During investigations, we managed to get details of his family and this in turn helped us identify Bali," the official said.

He added that a case of murder had been registered against unidentified persons and investigations were underway to identify and arrest them.A Pune woman labelled a suicide bomber by the Jammu and Kashmir police has been handed over to her family as there is no case against her, the police have said.

Srinagar: A Pune woman labelled a suicide bomber by the Jammu and Kashmir police has been handed over to her family as there is no case against her, the police have said.

"Yes, we have handed her to her family," Director General of Police SP Vaid told PTI.

Sadiya Anwar Shaikh, who turned 18 in November 2017, had travelled to Kashmir from Pune and had been staying in Bijbehara as a paying guest.

The police, who claimed she wanted to join the Islamic State, detained her on 25 January from South Kashmir and subjected her to intense questioning during which they found nothing incriminating.

On sustained questioning, it was revealed that the woman, a school dropout, had been "brainwashed" online about the supposed suffering of the Kashmiri people at the hands of security forces and had "fallen prey to false propaganda" on social media, the police said.

The Jammu and Kashmir police had been informed by central security agencies that a Pune-based woman, who had been detained on various occasions by the Pune Anti-Terrorism Squad, had moved to the Valley and that surveillance needed to be mounted.

Subsequently, an alert was issued to all districts. It named her and claimed that she was a suicide bomber who was planning to disrupt a Republic Day function.

The note said there was a "strong input" that an 18-year-old non-Kashmiri woman could "cause a suicide bomb explosion" near or inside the Republic Day parade.

"All are directed to please ensure that frisking of ladies at the (venues) is done meticulously and with utmost caution so as to thwart the designs of ANEs (anti-national elements)," the note, circulated on 23 January, read.

Shaikh had been questioned by the ATS Pune in 2015, when it came to its notice that she had been "radicalised" after coming in contact with Islamic State supporters abroad.

She was planning to travel to Syria, the ATS had then claimed.

The woman, a Class XI student at a Pune college, was subsequently sent for a de-radicalisation programme by the ATS.Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan alleged that the Odisha government was trying to destroy evidence in the gang rape and subsequent suicide of a Class 9 girl in Kunduli area of Koraput district

Bhubaneswar: Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Sunday alleged that the Odisha government was trying to destroy evidence in the gang rape and subsequent suicide of a Class 9 girl in Kunduli area of Koraput district.

"The Odisha government has failed to give justice to the minor girl. It is trying to destroy the evidence in the gang rape and suicide incident," Pradhan told the media in Bhubaneswar.

Claiming that the state government was fully responsible for the suicide of the rape victim, he reiterated the demand for a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the incident.

Pradhan said if the state government had no confidence in the CBI it could also go for a court-monitored inquiry by a Special Investigation Team (SIT).

The minor, who was allegedly gang raped by security personnel in October last year, committed suicide on 22 January.

Pradhan said even 100 days after the gang rape incident and two weeks after the suicide of the victim, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had not yet reviewed the matter.

"Why are you silent, chief minister, on the issue even after 100 days passed? We want a reply from you over the incident."

The minister alleged that the girl has left a suicide note stating that some top police officials were involved in suppressing the case.

"The suicide note was destroyed to suppress facts. The suicide note must be brought under the purview of the inquiry," he said.

Pradhan alleged that the state police chief offered her Rs 90,000 to keep mum about the rape and she was put in a hospital for treatment of mental disorder while she was mentally sound.

"The state government is fully responsible for the suicide. As the judicial probe ordered by this government in many earlier cases have not yielded any result, the Kunduli incident should be probed by the CBI immediately," Pradhan said.

On the other hand, Biju Janata Dal (BJD) spokesperson Pratap Deb said the BJP was politicising the issue.UP deputy CM Dinesh Sharma said the NCERT pattern would replace the existing syllabus in examinations conducted by the UP Board from the next academic session

Mathura: Uttar Pradesh deputy chief minister Dinesh Sharma said on Saturday the NCERT pattern would replace the existing syllabus in examinations conducted by the UP Board from the next academic session to bring school students at par with those in the CBSE-affiliated institutes.

It has also been decided to impart education with a blend of ancient Indian culture and modern development including technical and computer education, he said.

"Since in the existing pattern students of the Board of High School and Intermediate Education, Uttar Pradesh, find it hard to score marks, the NCERT pattern would replace it," Sharma said.

The deputy chief minister said within a year, games facility, digital black board, e-library, smart classes and wifi facility would be provided to every aided and government school.

He said, Yoga has also been introduced in physical education syllabus of the state board.

Sharma said he is committed to reduce time span of examination from present 75 days to 15 days from the next academic session.

He claimed that the exam time span in the current year has been reduced to one month.

Earlier, talking to reporters in Vrindavan, Sharma said carelessness in board examination would not be tolerated.

He said the district inspector of schools of Hardoi has been suspended for the same.

On police encounters, he asserted that police would reciprocate in the same language, if criminals are offencive.

"Gone are the days when criminals would attack police stations," Sharma asserted.

A gangster was killed and nearly two dozen criminals were arrested by police in 15 encounters in different districts of Uttar Pradesh during the past two days.

Normalcy is fast returning in Kasganj since unlawful elements are being severely dealt with, he added.

Violence erupted in Kasganj last week after 22-year-old Chandan Gupta was killed in clashes following stone-pelting on a motorcycle rally taken out to celebrate Republic Day.In addition to being a vibrant religious and cultural rural fair, the Keslapur Nagoba Jatara provides insights into the social customs and traditions of the Mesram Raj Gonds and Pardhans | #FirstCulture

While all the rituals and ceremonies pertaining to the preparation of the Nagoba jatara involve men to begin with, the women gain prominence and participate actively from the day of the mahapuja. Traditionally, most alliances of Raj Gond bachelors are fixed during the post-harvest Dandari-Ghusadi festival, and the nuptials take place between March and May. For the Mesram Raj Gonds and Pardhans, the gamut of weddings is complete only after the bheting ritual, which is held on the first day of the jatara and entails introduction of brides to the serpent god and thereby into the clan. This ritual is most significant part of the Keslapur-Nagoba jatara.

On the day of mahapuja, pots that were made specifically for the festival, are consecrated soon after the arrival of the priests and others to the temple in the morning. The Patels line up beside the pots while Mesram Tirupathi, the kotwal, calls the names of women to whom the pots would be handed over.

The women who come in pairs are daughters of Mesram families but have been married into other clans. They are handed over a pot which is meant for fetching water from a well near the Bhourmachua (banyan tree).

After the distribution of the pots, the head Pardhan Mesram Tukdoji takes a seat and begins to tune his 200-year-old bow-string instrument called kingri for another recital of 'Nagoba Bhidi' in the temple premises. The Pardhans or bards are said to have preserved the myths and stories of Gonds in the oral tradition over centuries. Tukdoji has been singing the Nagoba katha for over 50 years, and has taken a family member under his wing to train him and eventually pass on the baton.

Once again, strains of pipri and dhol begin to waft in the air, as women carrying the earthen pots on their heads begin to line up. Everybody steps aside to make way for them and they begin walking at a uniform pace, the pots balanced on their head, leaving behind a trail of the afternoon shadows that follow rhythmically.

After filling the pots with water at the well, the women return to the temple in a similar fashion. The water in these holy pots is used by women in the ritual of creating small mounds of clay also called boula (anthills). On a nostalgic note, Mesram Manohar says, Prior to early 1980s, all the rituals were performed at the boula. After the temple was constructed and a brass deity of Nagoba was installed, the prayers are offered only at the sanctum.

At twilight, all the occupants under the banyan tree pack up and move with their belongings and bullock carts to set up camps around the temple. A circular open air structure called govad is made specifically for women and the bheti koriad  the daughters-in-law who wait to be introduced.

Inside the govad, at around 2 am, women huddle in small groups huddle around bonfires, to keep warm while the light from the torch-bearers casts a soft glow on the bheti koriad. The girls get busy donning their white saris to participate in the bheting ceremony. Two young girls who will soon lead the procession to the temple, are seated  one a daughter-in-law of a priest while the other is a new bride in a Patels family, who wait as the koriad gets ready.

Mesram Jayanthi, a mother-in-law camped at the govad, explains the bheting ritual: We make our brides wear white clothes, take them to the Sathi temple, and pray for their prosperity and progeny. With their heads covered, the koriad are taken in a procession to the temple led by musicians. They take the blessings of Sathi Devi before being formally introduced to our clan god, Nagoba.

If a family member has passed away recently or the bride is unwell, she cannot participate in the ritual and will have to wait for another year to be ceremoniously introduced into the clan and become eligible to offer prayers at the Nagoba temple. This is why the bheti koriad ensure that they make it to the ritual at any cost.

Barring the banyan tree and the temple compound, the surrounding environs wear the look of a carnival; filled with tea shacks, make-shift restaurants, an amusement arena with giant wheels and many vendors selling household articles and appliances. Most hawkers hope to attract business from newly-weds setting up a new home. Mesram Manohar was quick to point out, All these facilities and conveniences are a much later addition, but the rituals remain the same and have retained their traditional zeal.

At night, the Nagoba jatara provides a stage to many rural folk theatre troupes who perform Gondi Ramayan and Mahabharat, so named as the shows are performed in Gondi dialect. These performances are a major draw and have the audiences riveted till the early hours of the morning.

During the Nizams rule, eminent anthropologist Christoph von Furer-Haimendorf had conducted ethnographic studies on the tribes of Adilabad. In the year 1944 he had introduced the phenomenon of Darbar on the third day of the jatara wherein the aboriginals could voice their grievances and concerns to the representatives of the government. Till date, it is an event the Adivasis look forward to and take an active participation. This year, despite a cloud of uncertainty looming over the Darbar on 19 January 2018 in the wake of the recent Adivasi-Lambada conflict, the event was peaceful.

The general mood of the final day is that of gratitude and thanksgiving. First, the Mesrams assemble near the temple and distribute the prasad and sacred pots among the 22 families who had different roles to play in the festival,

To bid adieu to Nagoba, the Raj Gonds and Pardhans face the temple and offer tobacco and bidis while paying obeisance. It is an expression of thankfulness to the serpent-god and seeking blessings for the year ahead. Among the aboriginal people, the custom of offering tobacco or bidi indicates respect.

The entire group moves towards the govad where the wives of Keslapur Patel and the chief katoda wash their feet as a measure of thanksgiving and paying respect. Soon after, men stand in line and members of the 22 families personally greet and hug each and every member. The women too, join in and express their gratitude to everyone. A great sense of camaraderie prevails as everyone wishes the other well and appreciates their efforts in making this festival a great success.

In the final ritual of Betal puja, a few Adivasi elders have a chance at displaying their skill in wielding the sword. With a thin bamboo stick in one hand, the elder takes as big a leap in air as possible and moves the stick as if it were a sword. This feat which has the entire audience in awe, is said to denote that the Raj Gonds were also warriors. After the Betal puja, the entire gathering forms a circle to sign off the years Nagoba festivities with a dhimsa dance routine.

In addition to being a vibrant religious and cultural rural fair, the Keslapur Nagoba Jatara provides insights into the social customs and traditions of the Mesram Raj Gonds and Pardhans. Clad in spotless white, standing or walking in a straight line, they have unflinchingly continued along the paths taken by their ancestors, with great earnestness.AAP on Saturday said it would launch a 'massive agitation' against the Nitish Kumar government in Bihar next month over issues of health, education and corruption.

Patna: The Aam Aadmi Party on Saturday said it would launch a "massive agitation" against the Nitish Kumar government in Bihar next month over issues of health, education and corruption.

"The state has, in recent past, witnessed a number of scams like Srijan, irregularities in construction of toilets, disbursement of scholarships, etc. We will launch a massive agitation against these in March," AAP Rajya Sabha member and the party in-charge for Bihar, Sanjay Singh told reporters.

Singh said AAP held a review meeting of the party's organisation in the state, and representatives from all districts have submitted their reports.

"We have told our workers that Bihar is a land where revolutions have taken place and they should brace for a fight which would dislodge the NDA from power in Bihar, and help us form our own government like we did in Delhi," he said.

AAP founder and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal is known to have good relations with Kumar. He had taken part in the swearing-in ceremony of Kumar in 2015, inviting criticism from former party colleagues.

However, political equations between Kumar and Kejriwal appear to have changed in the wake of the former allying with the BJP and AAP indulging in frequent spats with the NDA government at the Centre.

The AAP leader also berated the Union budget presented by finance minister Arun Jaitley earlier this week.The BJP believes that the Union Budget's thrust on welfare schemes such as free LPG connection and health insurance for the poor will resonate with the masses and help the party electorally ahead of Assembly polls in a number of key states.

New Delhi: The BJP believes that the Union Budget's thrust on welfare schemes such as free LPG connection and health insurance for the poor will resonate with the masses and help the party electorally ahead of Assembly polls in a number of key states.

The party top brass has briefed leaders on the key pro-poor and pro-farmers highlights of the budget and asked them to reach out to the masses with these details. The opposition claims that there is a growing rural distress and believes it can use the issue to corner the BJP.

The BJP's below-par performance in Gujarat, where it again formed a government, and its comprehensive defeat in three Rajasthan bypolls has boosted the morale of the Congress and opposition parties in the run-up to crucial Assembly polls followed by Lok Sabha elections scheduled for next year.

The Left-ruled Tripura goes to the polls on 18 February, followed by the Congress-ruled Karnataka, where the elections are expected to be held in May, and then in the BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh by this year-end.

BJP sources said victory in states like Tripura and, more importantly, Karnataka will belie the opposition's claim of a larger rural distress aimed against the party and insisted that the budget has given them weapons to fight it.

The key budget provisions include the announcement of a minimum support price for farmers that will be 1.5 times of the cost incurred by them, a health insurance of Rs 5 lakh for 10 crore poor families, dubbed 'NaMo care' by BJP leaders, construction of 2 crore more toilets in the new financial year and giving free LPG connection to 8 crore poor women.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had cited these measures among others at a BJP Parliamentary Party meeting on the day the budget was presented to exhort the partys lawmakers to inform the masses about them.

He had projected the BJP as a party which did not merely talk about social justice but also implement it.

Party president Amit Shah too dwelt at length on these provisions to assert that they will empower the poor and weaker sections of the society.

Under Modi and Shah, the BJP has managed to deepen its support among the Other Backward Classes and Dalits, resulting in the party being in power in 19 states, including those it rules with allies- an unprecedented high in its history.Maharashtra Congress chief Ashok Chavan has appealed to CPM leader Prakash Karat to reconsider his resolution of 'no alliance' with party

Mumbai: Maharashtra Congress chief Ashok Chavan has appealed to CPM leader Prakash Karat to reconsider his resolution of "no alliance" with the party in the larger interest of the country ahead of the Left party's general session in April.

Appealing to Karat, the CPM politburo member, to do a rethink on his resolution of "no alliance and no cooperation" with the Congress, Chavan said "any prick lines with the Congress can always be sorted out".

In a move aimed at consolidating anti-BJP parties ahead of 2019 polls, Chavan also asked Bharip Bahujan Mahasangh president and Dalit leader Prakash Ambedkar to drop his anti-Congress pitch while dubbing him as an "erudite leader of the Dalits after BR Ambedkar".

In a politically significant development, CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury's draft resolution proposing an alliance with the Congress was defeated in voting during the party's central committee meeting last month.

In a blog, Chavan said it was "flummoxing " that when comrade Yechury and comrade Raja walked shoulder to shoulder with other opposition leaders in the "save the Constitution" march, the Congress became "untouchable" for comrade Karat at this critical juncture.

Chavan was referring to the march which was held in south Mumbai on 26 January and was attended by Left leaders, JD(U) rebel Sharad Yadav, NC's Omar Abdullah, NCP chief Sharad Pawar and others.

"I can only pray that that he (Karat) does a rethink before his party's general session in April, where his resolution will be ratified or rejected, in the larger interest of the country. Any prick lines with the Congress can always be sorted out," the former chief minister said.

He also took an apparent jibe at Ramdas Athawale, the Union minister of state for social justice in the NDA government.

"Prakash Ambedkar is emerging as an erudite leader of the Dalits after Babasaheb Ambedkar. He is astute, educated, sophisticated and presentable.

"It is these qualities that make him stand apart from those who claim to be champions of the Dalit cause but have fallen for allurement and largesse of BJP," Chavan said.

Athawale's RPI (A) has the largest following among the Dalits in Maharashtra who are divided in various factions.

"I have personally witnessed how they lost their trustworthiness and are being hated by the Dalit community. This is the time when Prakashji needs as many friends as

possible across the political spectrum to consolidate his position," Chavan said.

He also showered praises on Prakash Ambedkar, the grandson of BR Ambedkar, but expressed dissatisfaction over his decision of staying away from the march.

He said the march was not the occasion to display the "discomfort" Prakash Ambedkar had with certain leaders.

"It (the march) was an expression of disenchantment with current rulers and solidarity with the Constitution. Why shy away from shaking hands with the Congress to begin with," he said.

"I'm sure Prakash Karat and Prakash Ambedkar are both bright enough to distinguish who the real enemy is and how any rigid stance may eventually help the monster grow," the Nanded MP said.

Today, we are witnessing what can be described as butchering of innocent people on the false notions of nationalism, he alleged.

"Disastrous economic policies and immature financial decisions have wrecked havoc on the life of workers farmers and lower middle class," Chavan said.

In a bid to reach larger constituency, Chavan said the "religious supremacy" was thrust upon the country.

He alleged that the unchecked arrogance of the current dispensation had reached its peak and religious supremacy was being thrust upon the country.

Minorities and Dalits were being treated as secondary citizens and even ministers were saying that they had assumed power to alter India's secular constitution, Chavan said.

The Congress is trying to bring together opposition parties on a wider anti-BJP platform in a bid to pose a formidable challenge to the saffron party in the 2019 elections.Voting for around 1,145 village panchayats was held peacefully across Gujarat on Sunday, with results scheduled to be announced on Tuesday, officials said.

Ahmedabad: Voting for around 1,145 village panchayats was held peacefully across Gujarat on Sunday, with results scheduled to be announced on Tuesday, officials said.

Around 73 per cent voters cast their votes across 33 districts till 4 pm, and the final figure was likely to go up, an official of the State Election Commission said. A total of over 22.5 lakh voters were eligible to vote, he added.

As many as 218 village panchayats were declared "Samras" after the villages chose their sarpanch and ward members through consensus, the official informed.

Voting in one booth at a village in Chhota Udepur district was suspended after the candidates complained that their election symbols were missing from the EVM. The SEC official said that repolling would be held tomorrow at this booth.

Elections for sarpanch and ward members are not held on the symbols of political parties but candidates are generally backed by these parties.

This election comes a couple of months after the state assembly elections, in which the opposition Congress had an edge over the ruling BJP in rural areas of Gujarat.Narendra Modi will land at the HAL airport at 3.30 pm in the afternoon, take a chopper to the venue and address the rally around 4 pm

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Modi will land at the HAL airport in the heart of the city at 3.30 pm in the afternoon, take a chopper to the venue and address the rally around 4 pm, reported Deccan Herald .

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to address a massive Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) rally in Bengaluru on Sunday to mark the conclusion of the saffron party's 90-day Nava Nirman Parivarthan Yatra across poll-bound Karnataka, said a party official on Saturday.

The yatra, held with a view to bring BJP back to power in the southern state on the plank of transforming Karnataka through development, was led by its state unit president and former chief minister BS Yeddyurappa and party's other state leaders.

In the run-up to the state election in Karnataka, due in late April and early May this year, BJP conducted the Nava Nirman Parivarthan Yatra, crisscrossing nearly all the 224 constituencies of the Assembly across the state after its national president, Amit Shah, flagged it off in November 2017.

The report also stated that 40 departments have been created within BJP to make necessary arrangements for the rally. Over four cooking halls with 600 cooks are being set up to prepare food in 250 counters for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Auto-tippers and compactors have also been hired to remove garbage from the venue after the event is over.

Elaborate arrangements have been made for Modi's visit to the IT hub. According to The News Minute , 20 LED screens, three helipads and a mini healthcare unit are being set up at the venue, where the prime minister will address the rally.

Ten trucks with 500 boxes filled with water and buttermilk packets have been brought to the venue. BJP workers have started distributing the same to people to beat the heat. A BJP karyakarta, Sadashiv R said, "It is an open air ground and we have made arrangements so people are not uncomfortable."

People are slowly trickling into the venue. The prime minister is expected to reach the venue at 4 pm.

Visuals from the venue: BJP workers distributing buttermilk packets to those at the venue

"Even if we take conservative estimates, a minimum of 10,000 to 15,000 of these techies and urban voters will attend the rally on 4 February," a Times of India report quoted a party member as saying. Apart from this, party volunteers will hand-deliver special passes to the registered techies and ply a special bus service to ferry their supporters to the venue from across the city, the report added.

"About 30,000 people from across the city have responded, expressing interest in attending the rally and listen to Modi's speech. We hope most of them will turn up as elaborate parking facility has been made for their vehicles at the venue," added the official.

The party's state unit has opened an online registration and is using the social media, including Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp to personally invite the youth, techies, educated class and prominent citizens to the venue, assuring them of seating arrangements.

With a focus on attracting young voters and supporters, the BJP had decided to create a separate seating space for techies who wish to attend the event.

Newspapers with highlighting BJP achievements have been placed on chairs at the venue. The sentiment is high after several high-impact schemes were announced this Thursday. It is expected many of the speakers today would ride through this post-budget rally comfortably as they kick off Karnataka's election season.

Several workers and supporters from across Karnataka are also expected to attend the rally. According to The Hindu , more than 25,000 supporters from Chitradurga will be transported in 400 buses to the city to attend Modi's rally.

Pro-Kannada protesters are at Freedom Park agitating over the Mahadayi River water dispute hours before Narendra Modi is scheduled to visit and address a rally in the afternoon, according to News18 ..

Aakash Verna (right), an IT professional with Ecolite Software got a personal invite from the BJP state unit after he registered for the same on their Facebook page.

"Sir, we do not want a Smart City, we do not want a Digital India, we do not want Make in India or your Swacch Bharath, if it doesnt allow municipal workers, construction workers, slum dwellers, and street vendors to live with dignity. We want public education, public health system, and public housing! You are shirking your responsibility to provide us all of this and are instead privatizing our entitlements," the letter read.

In response to a statement Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently made saying that selling pakodas on the street is employment too, street vendors of Bengaluru wrote an open letter criticising 100 percent FDI in single brand retail. The vendors under AICCTU-affiliated Bengaluru Jilla Beedhi Vyaapaari Sanghatanegala Okkuta condemned the approval of 100 percent FDI in single brand retail, GST, Smart Cities Mission, demonetisation etc.

Karnataka plans to build two canals at Kalasa and Banduri, the river's tributaries in the state, to divert and supply the water to the four districts. However, this diversion of water is being opposed by Goa, which contends that Karnataka should not divert water to the Malaprabha river basin as the Mahadayi river already has a water deficit, according to a report by The Hindu . Karnataka, for its part, claims that the river is water-surplus.

Since 2001, Karnataka has been asking Goa to release 7.6 thousand million cubic feet of the river water to meet the drinking and crop irrigation needs of its people in four drought-prone districts.

Though the river flow runs 29 kilometres in Karnataka and 52 kilometres in Goa, its catchment area  the area from where water drains into the river  is spread over 2,032 kilometres in the southern state as against 1,580 kilometres in Goa.

The 77 kilometre-long Mahadayi or Mandovi river originates at Bhimgad in the Western Ghats in Belagavi district of north Karnataka and flows into the neighbouring Goa where it eventually joins the Arabian Sea.

His statement promptly met with sharp reactions from the Shiv Sena and the Congress. The Sena said it expected Parrikar to "fight like a real son of the soil" against all the attempts to share even a drop of water from the Mahadayi river.

"One has to understand that 52 kilometres of the river runs through Goa, 35 kilometres through Karnataka and 16 kilometres through Maharashtra. As such, sharing of water of the Mahadayi river is inevitable as it is passing through all the three states," he had said.

In December 2017, Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar wrote a letter to former Karnataka chief minister BS Yeddyurappa saying that the state was willing to share water from the river for drinking purposes. On 3 January, he also said that sharing of the Mahadayi river with Karnataka is 'inevitable.'

These two IT professionals, who did not wish to be named, were not allowed to enter as they were wearing black. They had received special invites but the police personnel denied them entry.

A BJP supporter at the Palace Grounds venue said that under the Congress rule in the state, Hindus feel threatened. "They are being killed indiscriminately" and hence he wants BJP to come to power in Karnataka.

Govardhan Singh, Convenor of Bajrang Dal, Bengaluru unit says that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has called the Bajrang Dal an extremist organisation. Due to this, they set up a stall at the BJP rally and are getting people to sign up to tell them how the chief minister is spreading false information.

Ahead of the prime minister's arrival, more than 3,000 police personnel and an additional 1,200 traffic policemen have been deployed in the city, reported NDTV .

Gurudas Ram, a farmer from Chitradurga is at the BJP rally in Bengaluru as he hopes that the prime minister will speak about the water shortage issue in his district. He said that as a farmer, his main concern is water and since Congress government has not been able to solve the crisis, he hopes the BJP can.

Speaking of BS Yeddyurappa, Verma says, "He was earlier a chief minister and according to time, he has changed" his approach. "Earlier, had he not left the BJP, Congress would not have come to power. He has learnt from his mistakes and has rejoined BJP again," he added.

He said, "The BJP works efficiently in a cooperative manner. Moreover, they go for progressive policies and there is no corruption or division within the party."

Govinder Verma, a businessman from Bengaluru, sits outside the venue under the tents. He won't be going inside but will listen to Modi from right outside the venue, under the shade.

Bengaluru-based businessman Govinder Verma feels Narendra Modi is a dyanmic leader. "Modiji's policies are progressive and benefit the nation and the general public. He is a dynamic leader who takes courageous steps with confidence. I think there is no other leader who equals him in his power and precision," he said.

According to News18 , ten students attempted to sell pakodas outside Palace Grounds, the venue where Prime Minister Narendra Modi will speak at the BJP rally shortly. Police personnel detained the group, the report stated. Modi had earlier said in an interview, "If a person selling pakodas earns Rs. 200 at the end of the day, will it be considered employment or not?"

Responding to chief minister's tweets, where he asked Modi to "find time" to resolve the inter-state Mahadayi River water row with neighbouring Goa, Karnataka BJP chief BS Yeddyurappa alleged that Karnataka has scripted several firsts like corruption, farmers suicide and the collapse of law and order under Siddaramaiah's regime.

"During the Congress regime, farmers have had to face a lot of trouble. They have protested and been beaten up too. But we have decided to change that," Modi said at the rally

"There are serious allegations of corruption against Congress leaders," Modi said at the Parivarthana rally in Bengaluru. "Reports are coming about them demanding commission in several projects. I have been told that Karnataka govt is being recognised as 10% govt as no work is possible without 10% commission," he added. He also accussed the Congress party of trying to stall the triple talaq and the OBC Bill.

There are serious allegations of corruption against Congress leaders: PM in Bengaluru

Referring to the alleged killings of some RSS and BJP workers in the state, Modi asserted, "Chot ka jawaab vote se dena hai!" (Retaliate to these wounds with votes.)

"Farmers producing fruits and vegetables are our 'TOP' priority. 'TOP' means 'Tomato, Onion and Potato'! We have launched 'Operation Green' in the interest of these farmers. 'Operation Green' will be beneficial for farmers just like the Amul model was successful in dairy," Modi said in Bengaluru

'Operation Green' for farmers will be beneficial for farmers just like the Amul model, PM says

With a speech largely geared towards the rural public, Narendra Modi lists a series of initiatives for rural development. He also said that a "farmer's son" Yeddyurappa will be good for farmers in Karnataka.

"Our Under 19 Cricket Team won World Cup yesterday. Their head coach Rahul Dravid was a significant factor behind this victory and this can't be denied. He teaches us to work honestly and live for others," Narendra Modi said in a lighter moment in his speech. "That is the spirit of the people of Karnataka - they work for others selflessly...but the present state govt is ruining this culture," he added.

Modi is now speaking about healthcare in the state, reiterating the big healthcare announcement in the budget that is intended to benefit the lowest sections of the society.

"There are serious allegations of corruption against Congress leaders," Modi said at the Parivarthana rally in Bengaluru. "Reports are coming about them demanding commission in several projects. I have been told that Karnataka govt is being recognised as 10% govt as no work is possible without 10% commission," he added. He also accussed the Congress party of trying to stall the triple talaq and the OBC Bill.

There are serious allegations of corruption against Congress leaders: PM in Bengaluru

"We aim to provide homes to all poor and middle-class families. Our government has sanctioned 3.36 lakh houses under Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban). However, only 38,000 houses have been completed so far in Karnataka," Modi said at the Parivarthan Yatra rally.

Govt sanctioned 3.36 lakh houses, but only 38,000 houses completed so far in Karnataka: Modi in Bengaluru

Says a man who presided over Indias biggest mining scam during his rule. Only a person totally lacking in #KannadaSwabhimana can call Karnataka, one of the most progressive states in India, No. 1 Corrupt State. https://t.co/ceF4NiYoe1

Meanwhile, members of various farmers' organisations staged a protest in Bengaluru over Mahadayi river water dispute. They have been detained by the police, ANI reports.



A group of ten students were detained outside the venue, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address the massive BJP rally on Sunday in Bengaluru, for selling pakodas.

Modi will land at the HAL airport in the heart of the city at 3.30 pm in the afternoon, take a chopper to the venue and address the rally around 4 pm, reported Deccan Herald.

In the run-up to the state election, due in late April and early May this year, BJP conducted the yatra, crisscrossing nearly all the 224 constituencies of the Assembly across the state after its national president, Amit Shah, flagged it off in November 2017.

The yatra, held with a view to bring BJP back to power in the southern state on the plank of transforming Karnataka through development, was led by its state unit president and former chief minister BS Yeddyurappa and party's other state leaders.

Besides Modi, party's central ministers Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal who are in-charge of the BJP poll campaign in Karnataka, Ananth Kumar, DV Sadananda Gowda and Ananthkumar Hegde who hail from the state and the party's all-state leaders will also participate in the rally and address the public.

No stone left unturned

Elaborate arrangements have been made for Modi's visit to the IT hub. According to The News Minute, 20 LED screens, three helipads and a mini healthcare unit are being set up at the venue, where the prime minister will address the rally.

The report also stated that 40 departments have been created within BJP to make necessary arrangements for the rally. Over four cooking halls with 600 cooks are being set up to prepare food in 250 counters for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Auto-tippers and compactors have also been hired to remove garbage from the venue after the event is over.

All roads leading to the palace grounds have been covered in saffron with a huge 40 x 80 feet stage set up at a height of 20 feet from the ground to accommodate 22 leaders, reported Deccan Herald.

With a focus on attracting young voters and supporters, the BJP had decided to create a separate seating space for techies who wish to attend the event.

"We have invited thousands of youth, especially techies and executives of IT and biotech companies in the city to personally listen to Modi's speech though it will also be telecast live on news channels and available on YouTube," asserted a party official.

The party's state unit has opened an online registration and is using the social media, including Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp to personally invite the youth, techies, educated class and prominent citizens to the venue, assuring them of seating arrangements.

"About 30,000 people from across the city have responded, expressing interest in attending the rally and listen to Modi's speech. We hope most of them will turn up as elaborate parking facility has been made for their vehicles at the venue," added the official.

"Even if we take conservative estimates, a minimum of 10,000 to 15,000 of these techies and urban voters will attend the rally on 4 February," a Times of India report quoted a party member as saying. Apart from this, party volunteers will hand-deliver special passes to the registered techies and ply a special bus service to ferry their supporters to the venue from across the city, the report added.

Several workers and supporters from across Karnataka are also expected to attend the rally. According to The Hindu, more than 25,000 supporters from Chitradurga will be transported in 400 buses to the city to attend Modi's rally.

Meticulous security arrangements have also been made for the rally at the sprawling venue in the city centre where the party is expecting at least one lakh people to attend and listen to Modi's speech.

Though Modi was scheduled to address the rally on 28 January, on the conclusion of the three-month yatra that began in Bengaluru on 1 November, it was put off to 4 February, owing to his pre-occupation with other engagements.

"As the Budget Session of the Parliament was beginning on 29 January and the Union Budget was to be presented on 1 February, Modi could not attend the rally on last Sunday as he was busy then," a party functionary told IANS.

Bandh called off, protesters to observe 'black day'

Pro-Kannada organisations called off the bandh in Bengaluru on Sunday, which was meant to coincide with Modi's election rally in the city, after the Karnataka High Court on Friday termed it "unconstitutional".

The high court stayed the bandh, called by pro-Kannada farmers' groups in the city, on Sunday on the Mahadayi water dispute issue. Passing an interim order, a division bench of acting Chief Justice HG Ramesh and Justice PS Dinesh Kumar asked the Siddaramaiah government to take appropriate steps to prevent a breakdown of law and order on that date.

The same pro-Kannada organisations had called for a shutdown on 25 January during Shah's visit to the state. The protesters will instead observe a "black day" on Sunday.

The bandh was called to protest the "inaction" by the central and state governments to resolve the Mahadayi river water sharing row.

The high court bench observed that the bandh calls given by Kannada Chalavali Vatal Paksha on 25 January and 4 February "violate(s) the democratic rights of citizens".

Meanwhile, the Congress-led state government in Karnataka dismissed allegations of batting for the bandh during the prime minister's visit. "I am not so cheap to back a bandh opposing prime ministers visit," News18 quoted Chief Minister Siddaramaiah as saying.

With inputs from agenciesNarendra Modi at the Palace Grounds in Bengaluru on Sunday said that the Congress countdown has begun in Karnataka, and that they are standing at the exit door.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Palace Grounds in Bengaluru on Sunday said that the Congress countdown has begun in Karnataka, and that they are standing at the exit door.

While the entire country is progressing, Karnataka is going in the opposite direction, he said at the culmination of the Parivartan Yatra.

In a speech that was largely focussed on rural development, the prime minister listed out schemes for farmers, healthcare and SMEs  some of the big ticket announcements from the Union Budget  emphasising that these will help raise the standard of living in rural India and stem migration into cities. We have youngsters from across the country who come here (Bengaluru) and start their own businesses. Todays youngsters are not job-seekers but job generators. To ease their woes, we have made the loan-sanctioning process easier, he said.

Modi didnt forget to make a special mention of the allocation of Rs 17,000 crore for the development of Bengalurus 160-kilometre suburban rail network in the Budget.

Pakoda row

The pakoda controversy found its way outside the venue where a group of students dressed in graduation robes set up a stall to sell the snack. They were detained soon by the police. The prime minister had in an interview recently asked, "If a person selling pakodas earns Rs 200 at the end of the day, will it be considered employment or not?"

The street vendors of Bengaluru, under the AICCTU-affiliated Bengaluru Jilla Beedhi Vyaapaari Sanghatanegala Okkuta, too came out in the open with an open letter to Modi on Sunday. Starting off with a mention of the pakoda remark, they criticised the approval of 100 percent FDI in single-brand retail, GST, Smart Cities Mission and demonetisation. Sir, we do not want a Smart City, we do not want a Digital India, we do not want Make in India or your Swachch Bharat, if it doesnt allow municipal workers, construction workers, slum dwellers, and street vendors to live with dignity. We want public education, public health system, and public housing! You are shirking your responsibility to provide us all of this and are instead privatising our entitlements," they wrote.

Cong vs BJP on Twitter

Meanwhile, a Twitter war erupted between Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and BJP state chief BS Yeddyurappa over the formers comment on the development in the state veiled as an invitation to the Prime Minister. I welcome PM @narendramodi to Namma Karnataka - the no. 1 state in investments,innovation & progressive policies, the chief minister tweeted.

To this, Yeddyurappa replied, Thanks for the welcome CM @siddaramaiah! Yes. Karnataka indeed has scripted several firsts - No.1 Corrupt State, 3,500+ farmer suicides, collapse of law & order, mysterious deaths of officers, transfers of honest officials, crumbling infra of Bengaluru. #KarnatakaTrustsModi

Siddaramaiah, over tweets, had also appealed to the PM to find a solution to the Mahadayi river water row, to which BJP-ruled Goa is a party. However, the issue did not find a mention in Modis speech.

Vatal Nagaraj, the pro-Kannada activist who had called for a Bengaluru bandh on Sunday to seek justice for North Karnataka farmers on Mahadayi, was detained by cops later in the evening. The Karnataka high court had on Friday termed the call for bandh illegal.

Farmers mince no words on Congress

Endorsing Yeddyurappa as the chief ministerial candidate, Modi said the kisan ka beta will work for farmers if he is elected.

Many farmers had come to the venue from Chitradurga, Bidar and Belgaum districts hoping that Modi would refer to the water issues they faced. We have lost hope from the Congress. We do not have any water for our crops, and that means we cant feed our children as we have no money. How can we still hope that Congress will do anything? said Samarappa L from Belgaum.

A similar view was held by the farmers around who said they were living in drought-stricken districts without any government help. We have to keep trying. If the Congress failed, maybe the BJP will help us, Kiran Patil from Belgaum said.

Gurudas Ram, from Chitradurga, said, They (Congress) come to our homes and ask us what is our problem. We ask them to bring water to the district, but do they really do so? No. If we have no water, how will farmers survive? I cannot bring Congress to power again.

Cong-mukt Karnataka not possible

Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president G Parameshwara reiterated that the Mahadayi issue was ignored by Modi in his speech. He said Modi was misguiding people and they (BJP) are only dreaming that they would come be to power.

"Karnataka will not be Congress-mukt, we will come to power again," he declared.

(Nivedita Niranjankumar and Ayswarya Murthy are Bengaluru-based reporters. Both are members of 101Reporters.com, a pan-India network of grassroots reporters.)Congress president Rahul Gandhi took a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the Naga Accord signed by the Centre in 2015 saying that the accord is nowhere to be found.

Ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections in Nagaland, Congress president Rahul Gandhi took a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the Naga Accord signed by the Centre in 2015, saying that the accord is nowhere to be found.

Rahul called Modi the "first ever Indian prime minister whose words don't mean anything" in a tweet.

August 2015, Mr Modi claims to create history by signing the NAGA accord. Feb 2018, Naga Accord is still nowhere to be found. Modi ji is the first ever Indian PM whose words don't mean anything. #CantFindTheAccord  Office of RG (@OfficeOfRG) February 4, 2018

Meanwhile, Congress also tweeted asking if there even is an accord. "In 2015, PM Modi took credit for the so called 'historic' Naga accord. We haven't heard anything of it three years on," the party said in a tweet.

In 2015, PM Modi took credit for the so called 'historic' Naga accord. We haven't heard anything of it 3 years on. Is there even an accord? The people of India have a right to know what has been agreed to. #CantFindTheAccord pic.twitter.com/C40hbAWoWL  Congress (@INCIndia) February 4, 2018

The Nagaland Peace Accord was signed in August, 2015 by Modi and National Socialist Council of Nagaland Isak-Muivah (NSCN-IM) faction to end the insurgency in the region. The deal was signed in the presence of the prime minister, home minister Rajnath Singh and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval by the outfit's leader T Muivah and government's interlocutor RN Ravi.

It was hailed as "historic" by Modi, who said, "Today, we mark not merely the end of a problem, but the beginning of a new future."

"This agreement will end the oldest insurgency in the country. It will restore peace and pave the way for prosperity in the North East. It will advance a life of dignity, opportunity and equity for the Naga people, based on their genius and consistent with the uniqueness of the Naga people and their culture and traditions," he had said.

With little progress in the accord since then, NSCN-IM and six Naga political groups issued a joint declaration last month announcing their decision to boycott the 27 February Assembly polls demanding 'solution, not election' for Nagas in Kohima.

Following this, Rahul accused Modi of not taking into confidence various stakeholders when the Naga Framework Agreement was signed in 2015. "Nobody has understood what the prime minister had signed, (or) whether he had signed. This is his style. This (Naga Accord) is similar to demonetisation and implementation of Goods and Services Tax at midnight," Rahul was quoted as saying by PTI.

With inputs from agenciesRahul Gandhi's temple visits were not merely for 'demonstration effect' but underline that what was being done quietly is now done openly, Shashi Tharoor has said.

Jaipur: Rahul Gandhi's temple visits of late were not merely for "demonstration effect" but underline the fact that what was being done quietly in the past is now done openly, senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor has said.

"Many many Hindus, certainly my generation, grew up as believing and practising Hindus but never showed it outside as they didn't feel like doing so," the Lok Sabha member said in an interview during the recently-concluded Jaipur Literature Festival.

"In those days, religion was seen as an intensely personal matter. And in any case, your religion had nothing to do with political affiliation; that was the assumption," the 61-year-old leader said.

However, Tharoor said now Hinduism and religion have been made the front and centre in the politics of the BJP and those supporting that are openly saying that they are the only good Hindus and everybody else is bad.

"Why should we cede this narrative to them? To my mind, we may as well show publicly what we have been doing privately. This is not in my view merely for demonstration effect or appearances. It is merely that what used to be done quietly in the past is being done openly now," he said when asked about Gandhi's visits to temples during the Gujarat polls campaign.

Tharoor also said he feels that Gandhi was symbolising a change in the Congress.

Noting that the Congress had performed well in Gujarat due to the effectiveness of Gandhi's campaign, he said that the Congress now has an "energetic leader" who does not hesitate to use wit and humour in a relaxed style, which in the past, was not associated with the party leadership.

"So, when Gandhi issues a tweet after Donald Trump makes a pro-Pakistan statement, some ask what is this but many say 'what a refreshing style, let's listen to this guy'. So in many ways I would say, our politics is changing and Rahul Gandhi is leading and symbolising that change," he said. Tharoor also said that the Congress stands a good chance in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.

"In fact, we are getting more and more rumours that the government may advance the elections because it thinks it would lose the elections if these are held in March-April 2019 due to the momentum the Congress is clearly beginning to get," he claimed.

He also termed the controversy of the film 'Padmaavat' as very unfortunate.

"The classical principle of freedom of expression is fundamental to any democracy. If you don't like what I have written in my book, don't read my book. If you don't like a film, don't watch it," Tharoor said. "At the worst, you can even encourage others to boycott it. But you have no right to threaten violence, least of all to conduct violence," the MP from Thiruvananthapuram saidCommunist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) leader Sitaram Yechury on Saturday called the BJP's demand for simultaneous elections a 'ploy' to fight the 'anti-incumbency' against the 'Modi mascot'.

New Delhi: Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) leader Sitaram Yechury on Saturday called the BJP's demand for simultaneous elections a "ploy" to fight the "anti-incumbency" against the "Modi mascot".

"This is a ploy by the BJP... By clubbing the state elections with Lok Sabha elections they think that the Modi mascot can beat the anti-incumbency," the CPM General Secretary told media.

Yechury said as long as there is a provision for imposition of President's rule in the state (under Article 356) by suspending its government, simultaneous elections cannot happen.

"This in our constitutional order is not possible... Simultaneous elections were the order of the day when the elections began in independent India in 1952... We had simultaneous elections in 1952 and 1957. Now, why did that break? Because first the communist government of Kerala was dismissed invoking or misusing of Article 356.

"So, if you have a provision of dismissing an elected government and that provision is exercised... As long as Article 356 exists simultaneous polls cannot happen. Government is silent on what they would do with that," he said.

The former Rajya Sabha member also cited the situation of a government being reduced to minority status in the House after losing support of its partners, making re-election necessary, as another factor which contributes to the impracticality of concurrent elections.

"This (simultaneous polls) is patently anti-democratic," he said.As TDP held meeting to review ties with BJP, Amit Shah rang up Chandrababu Naidu, asking him not to take 'tough decisions'

As Andhra Pradesh chief minister and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president N Chandrababu Naidu held a crucial parliamentary board meeting with the party MPs and senior MLA to review ties with its ally BJP, Amit Shah reportedly rang up Naidu asking him not to take "tough decisions".

According to Times Now, BJP president Shah dialed Naidu and asked him not to take any hasty decision.

Interestingly, post its internal meeting, the party reiterated its stand on 'alliance' with BJP, saying it will take the right decision at the right time. Though TDP demanded more funds for Andhra Pradesh from the Centre, when it comes to party's alliance with BJP, it's still status quo.

TDP said it will not snap ties with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

"The TDP will not break its alliance with the BJP-led NDA," party leader and Union minister YS Chowdary said after the meeting.

Chowdary said they would first raise issues concerning the state with the Centre and try to get them addressed. "If the Centre does not concede to our demands, then we

will undertake protest both inside and outside Parliament," he added.

"It was all media speculation," Chowdary said when asked if the TDP was ready for a divorce with the NDA. Asked if BJP chief Amit Shah had spoken with Naidu, he replied in the negative.

He said Naidu did not speak to Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, the BJP's bickering ally, as some media reports had claimed.

So, was the meeting just a gimmick? It would seem so.

TDP's meeting had come two days after the party, BJP's biggest ally in the South, expressed disappointment over finance minister Arun Jaitley's budget, which it said "did not address Andhra Pradesh's needs".

#BREAKING -- Crucial TDP meet ends; ally demands funds for Andhra Pradesh from Centre pic.twitter.com/dzwg71PFOf  News18 (@CNNnews18) February 4, 2018

Responding to the reports of TDP being upset with the BJP, Jaitley on Sunday, in an interview with CNN-News18, said the differences with the alliance partner will be amicably resolved and exuded confidence that NDA will remain intact to face the 2019 general elections together.

We are implementing the Andhra Pradesh reorganisation package separately. It has nothing to do with the Budget. We will fulfill all that has been promised to the people of Andhra Pradesh, Jaitley had told CNN-News18.

BJP national general secretary Ram Madhav on Saturday had also said that the party and the Centre would soon be extending the olive branch to Naidu to resolve the issue, ANI reported.

"There seems to be some kind of unhappiness, we will talk it out. TDP is an old ally of BJP. We will talk it out with them and will tell them we are committed to the interests of Andhra Pradesh," Madhav was quoted as saying by ANI.

On Friday it was reported that there was a "strong mood" among TDP leaders to break away from the alliance with the BJP, the sources had said. Some senior TDP leaders had said off the record that almost everyone, including many district unit chiefs, wanted the TDP to end the alliance with BJP after the budget "ignored" the state.

However, according to party sources, Naidu had apparently dissuaded his senior party colleagues from speaking about the fate of the alliance with BJP and dwelt on the Rajasthan bypoll results where the BJP tasted defeat.

The TDP sources said that according to Naidu, the bypoll results were a clear example that people would be unsparing if governance was not good.

Naidu also reportedly expressed "serious displeasure" over the Union budget and wondered why the Centre ignored the state.

Last month, responding to a question on the critical remarks made by some BJP leaders against the TDP government, Naidu, refusing to be drawn into a duel with ally BJP, had said that he would speak out if, and when, the latter did not want to continue with the alliance.

With inputs from agenciesTerror activities in North East India have been checked due to Bangladesh's great help and support, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said in Tripura on Sunday.

Agartala: Terror activities in the North East have been checked due to Bangladesh's great help and support while rail links and bus services between the two countries facilitated travel of the region's people to other parts of India via the neighbour without much trouble, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said on Sunday.

"Bangladesh's immense help and support facilitated India to tame the terrorist activities in northeastern states," he said while addressing election rallies.

He said that with his Bharatiya Janata Party-led (BJP) central government's establishment of new rail links with Bangladesh and introducing bus services through that country facilitated the people of northeastern states to go to other parts of India avoiding the problematic journey through mountainous terrain of the region and saving them huge time, costs and problems.

Reiterating that the Narendra Modi government is very sensitive towards the development of northeast India, Rajnath Singh said that to further develop the transportation between India and other parts of the world, New Delhi and Dhaka had signed a trans-Asia rail agreement.

"Various international agencies after conducting surveys confirmed that BJP is the only party in India which boosts country's development in real terms. India now turned into a fastest growing country in the world."

Due to the good governance of the Modi government, India got the best place in various international fora and platforms, he said.

Coming down heavily on the Left Front government's "non-performance", the BJP leader said the Tripura government is now providing salaries and allowances to the government employees at par with the recommendations of the 4th Pay Commission and promised if his party wins, these would be raised at par with what the 7th Pay Commission has recommended.

"National conviction rate of various crimes is 47 percent and in Tripura this is only 22 percent. Women are not at all secured in Left-ruled Tripura," he said adding that the union government has given Rs 25,000 crore to Tripura during the past few years but Rs 2, 400 crore has remained unspent and the Left Front government is alleging that the Centre is depriving it of funds.

"While the national per capita icome is Rs 1.13 lakh, Tripura's per capita income is Rs 78,000. Even after 25-years uninterrupted rule of Left government, 66 per cent people remained below poverty line with no ability to purchase a bicycle," he added.

Union Information and Broadcasting and Textile Minister Smriti Irani also addressed election rallies in Kailashahar in northern Tripura, where she hit out at the Left Front government for its "failure and mis-governance, growing crime against women and unemployment".

Polling for the 60-seat Tripura assembly will be held on 18 February and counting of votes will take place on 3 March.Alleging the Left Front government in Tripura is embroiled in a number of corruption cases, union home minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday asked the people of the state to show it the door in the 18 February election.

Agartala: Alleging the Left Front government in Tripura is embroiled in a number of corruption cases, union home minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday asked the people of the state to show it the door in the 18 February election.

At a rally in Barjala near Agartala, he said that during the BJP's nine-year rule not a single minister was found involved in any scam. In contrast, the 25-year rule of the Left Front in Tripura has been marked by unemployment, starvation and violence which is why the BJP has called for a change of guard in the state, he said.

"If you want to see good governance, you visit the BJP ruled states. We have won 19 states, people would reject the Marxist rule and vote for us," the minister said.

He said development will elude Tripura until the BJP is voted to power. "I can tell you there would be no development until the BJP comes to power.

I urge you to give the BJP a chance for governance in the state and see what we can do. The BJP knows how to run an effective government for distribution of fruits of development," he added. 'Will open volley of fire if Pakistan provokes'

Singh said Pakistan tried to usurp Kashmir from India and murdered innocent people in unprovoked firing.

"Kashmir is ours and would continue to remain an integral part of our country. We have told our security forces we would not open fire first, but if Pakistan does so, we would unleash a volley of fire and it would not stop," he said at an election rally near AgartalaWith cracks appearing in the CPM over the issue of going for an adjustment with the Congress, the leadership is trying to walk a middle path to avoid a likely split

Kolkata: With cracks appearing in the CPM over the issue of going for an adjustment with the Congress to counter the BJP, the leadership is trying to walk a middle path to avoid a likely split in the party in the next party congress.

The CPM central committee meeting in Kolkata on 21 January had voted against a draft political resolution, pitched by its General Secretary Sitaram Yechury proposing alliance with the Congress.

The party had adopted a draft resolution favoured by those supporting politburo member Prakash Karat ruling out any form of electoral alliance or adjustment with the Congress.

"The difference within the party, especially between two senior most leaders is sending out a wrong message about the party in public. We need to solve this urgently," CPM politburo member Hannan Mollah told PTI.

According to CPM sources, the leadership is trying to take a middle path where both the warring factions can be brought to peace by "adopting a political resolution" which can have a "window for some sort of adjustments" with secular forces including the Congress.

A senior CPM leader said the ongoing battle of ideas within the party can be termed as a fight between "pragmatic" CPM represented by Yechury and "dogmatic" CPM represented by Karat.

The cracks within the party came out in the open when Yechury openly stated that he had expressed his desire to quit his post, a claim denied by Karat.

Yechury along with a large section of leaders from Bengal have been vocal about the adjustment with Congress to stop the BJP.

But his political line has been vehemently opposed by Karat, known as a hardliner in the party.

Former CPM central committee member and Lok Sabha speaker Somnath Chatterjee felt that the decision of not going for an adjustment with the Congress will prove to be another blunder in the future.

"I feel very sad after seeing what is happening. The party has committed many blunders from not allowing Jyoti Basu to become Prime Minister in 1996, to not joining the government in 2004. This will be another blunder," he said.

"We have a clear understanding about the menace of the BJP. The Tripura unit is also having a taste of the BJP's divisive politics. But despite attacks of the RSS, the Kerala unit is yet to understand the magnitude of the threat the BJP poses," a CPM central committee member said on condition of anonymity.

Although the CPM is divided over adjustment with the Congress, its allies like the CPI are in favour of broader unity of secular forces including the Congress.

"We feel that there should be broader unity of secular and democratic forces including Congress to stop the march of BJP," CPI leader D Raja said.

Other Left allies the RSP and the Forward Bloc are yet to take a call on this issue.

Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh had criticised the CPM for adopting a draft political resolution ruling out adjustment with the Congress.

"The BJP is the biggest threat the country is presently facing and all the secular and democratic forces should unite with the Congress to counter it," Ramesh had told PTI.IANS

A 43-year-old Chinese national who lived in the US has pleaded guilty to taking part in a counterfeiting operation out of China that involved selling fake iPhones and iPads to customers in the country.

"Jianhua 'Jeff' Li, pleaded guilty before US District Court Judge Kevin McNulty of New Jersey to one count of conspiracy to traffic in counterfeit goods and labels and to smuggle goods into the US, and one count of trafficking in counterfeit goods," the US Department of Justice said in a statement late on 2 February.

Li also received payments worth over $1.1 million in sales proceeds from US accounts into his bank accounts.

The case has been ongoing since 2015, when Li was charged and taken into custody.

From July 2009-February 2014, the Chinese national, working through his company "Dream Digitals", conspired with Andreina Becerra, Roberto Volpe, Rosario LaMarca and others to smuggle and traffic into the US from China more than 40,000 electronic devices and accessories.

The smuggled devices included Apple iPads and iPhones, along with labels and packaging bearing counterfeit Apple trademarks, according to the documents filed in this case.

He shipped devices separately from the labels bearing counterfeit trademarks for later assembly to avoid detection by US Customs and Border Protection officials, the documents filed in the case added.

The counterfeit devices were then shipped to conspirators all over the country.

Li will be sentenced on May 30 while LaMarca, another member of the conspiracy, was the first to be sentenced in July 2017, receiving a prison term of 37 months.

Both Becerra and Volpe, Li's other conspirators, are still awaiting sentence.Reuters

German Chancellor Angela Merkel signalled on 3 February that she was prepared to consider changes to a widely criticised new law that aims to rid social media of hate speech.

The legislation, which came into force on 1 January, can impose fines of up to 50 million euros ($60.1 million) on sites that fail to remove hate speech promptly, sparking concerns that Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms could block more content than necessary.

Of course were now looking at what consequences this law has and what happens, and well definitely evaluate it too, Merkel said in her weekly video podcast.

It might be the case that we need to make changes to it but the basic approach that we need rules is absolutely right and necessary, she said, without giving further details.

Germany has some of the worlds toughest laws covering defamation, public incitement to commit crimes and threats of violence, with prison sentences for Holocaust denial or inciting hatred against minorities. But few online cases are prosecuted.

Merkel said the internet was not a legal vacuum and the new law ensured that platform operators were responsible for the content that they disseminated.

Opposition parties have condemned the law, saying it was wrong for private companies to be making decisions about whether posts are unlawful.

Top-selling Bild newspaper has also called for it to be scrapped, saying it was stifling free speech and making martyrs out of anti-immigrant politicians whose posts are deleted.Asheeta Regidi

The statement of the Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in the Budget speech on cryptocurrencies created quite a disruption, with many speculating that the statement implied that cryptocurrencies were banned in India.

The statement has since been cleared to establish that this was not the case, and only limited uses as legal tender and for illegal activities were not allowed. This article evaluates the legal implications of this statement on the various uses of cryptocurrencies in India:

The current stand on VCs in India

The statement made by the Finance Minister was-

 the government does not consider crypto-currencies legal tender or coin and will take all measures to eliminate the use of these crypto-assets in financing illegitimate activities or as part of the payment system...

What this statement indicates is, firstly, that cryptocurrencies or virtual currencies (VCs) are not legal tender, i.e., they are not a recognized, legal currency in India. This simply reiterates the stand that the Indian government always had on VCs. Secondly, the use of a cryptocurrency to finance illegitimate activities, in any form, is not allowed. This means that illegal uses of VCs are not allowed. Thirdly, their use as a legal currency, in a payment system is not allowed. This indicates that since VCs are not legal tender, they cannot be used to make payments, as a part of a payment system.

Use as a payment system

Legally, the term payment system, as per the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, refers to a system which enables payment between a payer and a beneficiary. The RBI gives a list of such payment systems in India, which includes, for example, a mobile wallet that enables payments, mobile banking, ATMs or a system like NEFT or IMPS. Online payment gateways are another example of infrastructure enabling payments.

While it is unclear if the Finance Minister was referring to payment systems precisely as defined, the definition gives an indication of what the statement could imply. By this definition, the use of VCs on any of these authorized payment systems is not allowed. The result is that you likely cannot upload your mobile wallet with VCs, or similarly cannot purchase goods over a payment gateway using VCs.

The point simply reiterates the governmental stand that VCs are not legal tender and thus cannot be used as such. The impact is that while VCs cannot be used as legal tender, they may be used in other forms, such as-as goods or securities. In a previous notification in February 2017, the RBI stated that dealing with investors, traders, holders, etc. of VCs is at the users' own risk, indicating that such uses, except for a use in a payment system, are not prohibited (See previous notifications- December 2013, February 2017 and December 2017). This indicates that such uses are unregulated, but not illegal.

International approach to regulating VCs

VCs (to the best of the authors knowledge) have so far not been declared to be legal tender in any jurisdiction. Despite this, many laws have been passed regulating their use. This indicates that not having the status of legal tender does not affect the use of VCs in other forms.

Many countries have refrained from actively classifying and regulating VCs as (for example) currency, property or securities, given the wide range of uses they are being put to. A more common approach is to look at how VCs are used in a given transaction and address its legality based on that. A common definition of VCs under foreign laws is thus as a type of digital unit that is used as a medium of exchange or a form of stored value but is not legal tender.

Regulations also often impose requirements on the actors in the VC industry, such as the licensing requirements under the New York BitLicense, or the EUs imposition of KYC requirements.

Looking at uses of VCs

The key issue, in determining the legality or illegality of VC related activities, is thus often determined by the nature of the underlying activity, and the use to which VCs have been put to in that activity. VCs may, thus, act as a payment method, as securities or as goods (in all cases still not legal tender) and attract different laws accordingly.

A look at some of the approaches international regulators have taken is indicative of the kind of transactions that are clearly illegal, and those which remain in the unregulated area. Here, some transactions are assessed based on the stand of foreign regulators:

Purchase of goods/ services-

In some countries, VCs are accepted as payment in cafes, engineering companies, advertising companies, pharmacies, etc. The Indonesian Central Bank, on the other hand, has declared that VCs are not a legal method of method of payment. In countries like Japan, however, the use of VCs as a mode of payment for goods and services has been recognized, without recognizing it as legal tender.

To understand the difference, it is important to understand what legal tender means. As per the RBI Act, RBI issued notes are declared to be legal tender, and thus have to be accepted for the settlement of a debt or obligation. If the legal tender status is withdrawn from a given note, it ceases to have value and becomes paper. The demonetization move, for instance, saw the withdrawal of legal tender status from the Rs.500/- and Rs.1000/- notes.

The declaration by the Indian government that VCs as not legal tender, thus, prevents its use as an official currency, to settle debts and financial obligations. Looking at Japans stand, it is very much possible for something which is not legal tender to be used as a payment method for the purchase of goods and services. Thus previously, VCs were not legal tender in India, but could possibly still be used as a payment method. However, the new statement of the Finance Minister preventing the use of VCs in a payment system indicates that such payments will not be possible in India.

While VCs thus cannot be used as payment, they may still be used to buy goods and services as a barter system. In such a system, the VCs would be treated as goods or property, and not legal tender. Such a use would remain in the unregulated area.

Exchanges and trading-

VC exchanges are involved in a range of activities including buying, selling and trading of VCs, and their conversion into fiat currencies. Such exchanges are recognized in many countries, such as the US, Japan and Philippines. This is despite these countries expressly stating that these are not legal tender. The US, for instance, recognizes exchangers as money transmitters. Since VCs are not legal tender, these money transmitters are limited it to convertible VCs, or VCs which have an equivalent value in fiat currencies.

The Indian stand on exchanges, again, has not been clarified. Since in India, only the use of VCs as legal tender, in payment systems, or in illegal uses is not allowed, VC exchanges are in a grey area. They are unregulated, and not illegal use of VCs. Mere buying and selling of VCs on an exchange, if the transaction involves VCs as goods and not currency, is in the same unregulated area.

Even with the trading of VCs, trading will involve the use of VCs as securities, and not currency, and therefore is likely to be in the same unregulated area. Technically, the term payment systems under Indian laws, excludes stock exchanges. As will be discussed below in the case of ICOs, such trading is nevertheless likely to attract securities laws. The USs SEC, for example, has acted against virtual stock exchanges for allowing buying, selling and trading of VCs without registering as a stock exchange with them. A recent report that the government is seeking to regulate trading in VCs soon is positive news for those in the VC industry.

ICOs-

Initial coin offerings are a form of fundraising where the companies issue their own virtual tokens or coins in exchange for the funds. The international stand on this has been mixed, with some countries like China banning ICOs, and the US Securities and Exchanges Commission ruling that the DAO tokens (the Ethereum hack) are securities, subject to securities regulation. Even in the US, no ICOs have officially been registered with the SEC.

The Indian stand on ICOs is unclear, though so far, the use of VCs as securities has not been banned. Under Indian laws, VCs are so far not declared to be securities, though a given VC related scheme may amount to a security-related transaction. Going by the US stand, each particular transaction will have to evaluated to see if it amounts to a security. If it does, the transaction will attract Indian securities law.

Mining bitcoins-

In the US, the FinCEN has classified bitcoin mining as obtaining VCs, indicating that this is legal. Even in India, since mining of bitcoins, or other VCs, does not imply its use as a currency, it is under the unregulated category. The use the mined VCs are put to, of course, will be subject to the same restriction as other VCs.

The Finance Ministers statement, on the whole, indicate a cautious, but not prohibitory approach to VCs. The recognition of Blockchain technology and its uses is another positive development. Various reports since the Finance Ministers statement have indicated that the government is likely to come out with an official position on such other uses of cryptocurrencies soon. An official government stand will go a long way in clarifying what can and cannot be done with cryptocurrencies.

Disclaimer- Readers must keep in mind that the legality of a given VC related transaction varies greatly based on the details of the transaction. This discussion is for general purposes only and is not to be construed as legal advice. Readers must note that the RBI has cautioned users against the risks of VCs, VCs are not legal tender and cannot be used as such, and other uses of VCs are unregulated.

The author is a lawyer and author specializing in technology laws. She is also a certified information privacy professional.tech2 News Staff

Software giant Microsoft is planning to remove Windows 10 S a separate, stand-alone product. According to reports, the company is planning to replace the operating system with a similar S Mode that will be available as part of all Windows 10 editions moving forward.

To recap, Windows 10 S was a separate edition of Microsofts Windows operating system which locked its users into just running apps fro Microsoft Store. The company had designed this version for its customers in the education sector such as students. The OS was pegged to compete with Googles Chrome OS and this comes just 8 months after the announcement of this separate version.

According to a report by The Verge, Microsoft is planning to add this new mode in the Home, Enterprise and Professional editions of Windows 10 to lock it down to only run apps from Microsoft Windows Store. Another report by Thurrott states that about 60 percent of users have remained on the Windows 10 S and of the total percentage switching to Windows 10 Professional, 60 percent have switched in the first 24 hours of owning a Windows 10 S-powered device. What is more interesting is that if Windows 10 S users dont switch to Windows 10 Pro, 83 percent of users tend to stick with the 10 S installation. The thing to note here is that this data only takes in consideration, lower-end devices while excluding the high-end Surface Laptop.

Another report clarifies that the company is working on five editions of Windows 10, Windows 10 Entry, Value, Core, Core+ and Advanced. The company is planning to price the Entry SUK for $25, Value for $45, Core for $65.45, Core+ for $86.66 and Advanced Edition for $101. The company has not clarified if these editions will be for the enterprises or regular users at the time of writing as Windows 10 Home and 10 Pro are already available for Windows users.

As pointed by The Verge, it is surprising that Windows 10 users are embracing 10 S while sticking with Microsoft Apps. However, because of the popularity of Windows 10 S, Microsoft is planning to bring the locked down mode to more Windows 10 powered devices. The company is thinking of offering Windows 10 Home users to disable the mode free of charge while Windows 10 Pro users with S Mode will have to pay $49 to get full access to the OS. This means that Windows 10 Home S users will be able to upgrade to Windows 10 Home without any charge while 10 Pro S users will have to pay for the upgrade to 10 Pro.

The company has not made any official announcement about this change at the time of writing but Microsoft and its OEM partners need to do a better job of explaining the differences in the different versions of Windows with and without the S Mode. This is essential for the companies to ensure that customers dont get confused between all the different versions of Windows while purchasing their devices for this strategy to work.German chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives will sit down with their historic centre-left rivals today to try and seal a deal to form a government more than four months after legislative elections.

Frankfurt Am Main: German chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives will sit down with their historic centre-left rivals on Sunday to try and seal a deal to form a government more than four months after legislative elections. They have set a deadline of Sunday evening, with the option of extending into Monday or Tuesday.

On the agenda are detailed questions about how a repeat of the "grand coalition" or "GroKo" that has ruled since 2013 will shape healthcare, labour law, pensions and reform of the European Union and euro single currency.

Both sides are reluctant to compromise too much and risk losing support, but are equally fearful of going back to voters in repeat elections that could see a further rise of the far-right.

But neither can they afford to dig in their heels, as a poll for ARD television showed 71 percent of people do not understand "why forming a government is taking so long".

"I hope we can manage it," Merkel said Friday, warning however that there were still "a whole list of very serious points of disagreement".

At stake for Merkel  still rated a "good" or "very good" choice for chancellor by 51 percent of respondents to the same poll  is whether she leads a stable coalition into her fourth term, or risks a fragile minority government or new elections.

The SPD is a reluctant partner, having initially vowed to go into opposition after plunging to a historic low vote share of 20.5 percent in September.

Social Democrats agreed to talks only after Merkel's soundings with two smaller parties, the ecologist Greens and the pro-business Free Democrats, fell through.

Challenged by rebels within his own ranks, SPD leader Martin Schulz has sought political cover by putting any final coalition deal to a vote by all 440,000 members.

Kevin Kuehnert, leader of the SPD youth wing, has become a standard bearer for opponents of a new deal with Merkel.

"This kind of politics was rewarded with a 14 percentage point drop (for CDU and SPD combined) last year, and I suspect things will continue that way" if the coalition materialises, he has said.

Others warn the SPD is too weak to face voters again so soon, garnering 18 percent in some polls -- just a few points ahead of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD).

Merkel too faces grumbling among her troops, with more conservative voices accusing her of marching her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) too far into the political centre, giving up terrain to the AfD.

Meanwhile, the press has scented the end of an era approaching.

Eight years of GroKo under Merkel  from 2005-09 and again from 2013-17  had shown that "the lowest common denominator achieves nothing as long as there is no overarching idea," commented Stefan Braun for the Sueddeutsche Zeitung.

Leaders' aggressive swipes at their counterparts away from the negotiating table highlighted how "hesitant, quarrelsome, demoralising and above all uninspiring" the whole process was, he wrote.

Merkel and Schulz should offer honest, ambitious answers to the country's big challenges or "leave the way clear for new leaders or new elections".Israel's prime minister says it will legalise an isolated West Bank outpost in response to the murder of one of its residents.

Jerusalem: Israel's prime minister says it will legalise an isolated West Bank outpost in response to the murder of one of its residents.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his weekly Cabinet meeting that those who try to "break our spirit and weaken us made a grave mistake."

He said his government will legalise Havat Gilad to "allow the continuing of normal life there."

Earlier this month, Havat Gilad resident Rabbi Raziel Shevah, a 35-year-old father of six, was shot dead from a passing vehicle as he drove near his home in the unauthorised settlement outpost near Nablus.

The community of a few hundred Israelis is located deep inside the West Bank.

The anti-settlement Peace Now group says the effort to legalise it is a "cynical exploitation of the murder."China urged the United States to drop its 'Cold War mentality' and not misread its military build-up, after Washington published a document on Friday outlining plans to expand its nuclear capabilities to deter others.

Beijing: China urged the United States to drop its "Cold War mentality" and not misread its military build-up, after Washington published a document on Friday outlining plans to expand its nuclear capabilities to deter others.

"Peace and development are irreversible global trends. The United States, the country that owns the world's largest nuclear arsenal, should take the initiative to follow the trend instead of going against it," said China's Ministry of Defence in a statement on Sunday.

The review of US nuclear policy has already riled Russia, which viewed the document as confrontational, and raised fears that it could increase the risk of miscalculation between the two countries.

The US military has put countering China and Russia, dubbed "revisionist powers", at the centre of a new national defence strategy unveiled earlier this month.

By expanding its own low-yield nuclear capability, the US would deter Russia from using nuclear weapons, say American officials.

China accused the United States of "presumptuous speculation" about China's intentions, and said it has always adopted a restrained attitude towards the development of nuclear weapons and kept its nuclear forces to a minimum.

"We hope that the United States will abandon its Cold War mentality, earnestly assume its special disarmament responsibilities, correctly understand China's strategic intentions and objectively view China's national defense and military build-up...," the ministry said in the statement posted on its website.

It called on the US to work together with China and for their armies to become a stabilising factor in China-US relations and in the region.China said Sunday it is 'firmly opposed' to the United States' new nuclear weapons policy statement, describing its speculation about Chinese intentions as 'wild guesses'.

China said Sunday it is "firmly opposed" to the United States' new nuclear weapons policy statement, describing its speculation about Chinese intentions as "wild guesses".

The US Defense Department's Nuclear Posture Review released Friday outlines the Pentagon's nuclear ambitions under President Donald Trump, while spelling out how it foresees nuclear threats in the coming decades.

Although the review largely focuses on Russia, several sections are dedicated to the lack of transparency in China's nuclear buildup.

The report says China has added new types of nuclear capabilitiesranging from a mobile intercontinental ballistic missile to a new ballistic missile submarine"with little to no transparency in its intentions".

The report makes "wild guesses" about China's intentions and exaggerates the threat of its nuclear force, defence ministry spokesman Ren Guoqiang said in a statement.

China is "firmly opposed to this", Ren said.

China "has always kept its own nuclear forces at the minimum level required by national security", Ren said, pointing out that the US has the world's largest nuclear arsenal.

"We hope that the United States will abandon its Cold War mentality," Ren said.

Since taking office in 2012 President Xi Jinping has pushed for a muscular China, including calls last October to develop a "world-class" military by 2050.

China's neighbours have watched warily as the People's Liberation Army has upgraded its arsenal with increasingly sophisticated weaponry and sought to create a more effective and professional fighting force.

Upgrades to its nuclear arsenal have received less attention, partly because of its small size, estimated by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute at just 270 warheads compared to 6,800 for the US.

China has also long maintained it will never allow first use of its atomic weapons.

China "always abides by the principle of no first use of nuclear weapons under any circumstances", Ren said, and will "unconditionally not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states."

The US military wants to revamp its nuclear arsenal and develop new low-yield atomic weapons, largely in response to Russian actions in recent years, the Pentagon said.

Moscow on Saturday denounced the "bellicose" and "anti-Russian" nature of the new US nuclear policy, warning it would take necessary measures to ensure its own security.Seven Turkish soldiers were killed in Turkey's offensive against Kurdish militia inside Syria, including five who died in a single attack on a tank

Ankara: Seven Turkish soldiers were killed in Turkey's offensive against Kurdish militia inside Syria, including five who died in a single attack on a tank, the army said.

The losses marked the highest toll in one day for the Turkish military in operation "Olive Branch", launched on 20 January against Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia seen by Ankara as a terror group.

Saturday's attack on the tank, details of which were not disclosed, was also the single deadliest attack on the military of the offensive so far.

The latest clashes brought to 14 the number of Turkish troops killed so far in operation.

The Turkish army and allied Ankara-backed Syrian rebel forces are seeking to oust the YPG from its western border stronghold of Afrin but the operation so far has been marked by fierce clashes.

The army said that one of the soldiers was killed in a clash and another on the border area, without giving further details.

In a later statement, it added a Turkish army tank had been hit in another attack, killing all five servicemen inside.

A previous statement said one serviceman was killed and another wounded in that attack.

In retaliation, Turkish war planes carried out air strikes on the area from where the attack was carried out, destroying shelters and munitions dumps, it added.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday the Turkish army and Ankara-backed rebels had suffered 25 fatalities between them in the operation so far.

Meanwhile, seven civilians have been killed in mortar fire on the Turkish side of the border that Ankara blames on the YPG.

Ankara says that major progress has been made in the 15-day operation, with almost 900 YPG fighters killed so far although it is not possible to verify these figures.

Erdogan sought to reassure France's Emmanuel Macron over the operation, telling the French leader it was aimed against "terror elements" and that Ankara had no eye on Syrian territory.

Macron had incensed Turkish officials by saying in a newspaper interview last week that France would have a "real problem" with the campaign if it turned out to be an "invasion operation".

During the phone call, "the two presidents agreed to work on a diplomatic roadmap in Syria in the coming weeks", the Elysee Palace said in a statement.

Erdogan said in a speech that the Turkish forces were beginning to take mountain positions and would now head towards Afrin itself. "There is not much to go," he said.

Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin meanwhile told journalists in Istanbul that the operation was going as planned but there was no timetable for its duration and it would "continue until we clear all those areas".

But analysts and monitors say Turkey so far has taken control of limited clumps of territory around the border without yet approaching Afrin town.

Turkey says the YPG is an offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.

However, the YPG has been working closely with the United States to fight the Islamic State extremist group in Syria.

The offensive by Washington's fellow NATO member Ankara on a US-allied force has even raised fears of a military confrontation between two alliance powers.Even as political unrest continued to grow after a court ordered the release and retrial of political prisoners, Maldives president Yameen Abdul Gayoom on Saturday said that he was willing to hold an early presidential election to allow voters to decide who they want to lead the Indian Ocean archipelago.

Protesters clashed with the police in Maldives capital Male on Saturday after President Yameen Abdul Gayoom refused to follow its Supreme Court's order calling for a release of all political prisoners including exiled former president Mohammed Nasheed.

In the latest incident in the aftermath of the verdict, the scuffle between the police and protesters broke out right outside Maldives Chief Justice Abdullah Saeed's residence.

After the Thursday's court's ruling was made public, street celebrations by government opponents had transformed into three hours of clashes with police, who used tear gas and batons to break up the gatherings.

Protesters also converged on a prison in Male, where the politicians are being held, demanding their immediate release, but police forced them to leave. They then moved to another location for a sit-in protest that was also broken up. Journalists were kept away from both events by police.

In the meanwhile, Yameen on Saturday said that he was willing to hold an early presidential election to allow voters to decide who they want to lead the Indian Ocean archipelago.

Speaking publicly for the first time since Thursday's Supreme Court order to release politicians opposed to him, including exiled former president Mohammed Nasheed, Yameen said that he was open to holding an election several months before his term ends next November. In addition to ordering the release of the political prisoners, the court also reinstated 12 lawmakers who had been ousted for switching allegiance to the opposition.

When those lawmakers return, Yameen's Progressive Party of the Maldives will lose its majority in the 85-member parliament, which can result in the legislative body functioning as a rival power to the president. Yameen said that he did not expect the court ruling, but that all relevant authorities of the state need to do "a lot of work to see how to implement it".

"We are working on making sure we can respect the Supreme Court order in a way that doesn't cause any difficulties to the people," he said at a rally in his support organised by his Progressive Party of the Maldives.

Yameen dismisses police chief

Earlier in the day, Yameen fired a national police chief for the second time since the court order. Yameen's office said he dismissed Ahmed Saudhee and appointed Deputy Police Commissioner Abdulla Nawaz to act as interim police chief. No reason was given for the dismissal.

Saudhee was appointed interim police chief on Friday, one day after Yameen fired Ahamed Areef, whose dismissal came after the police department announced that it would uphold the Supreme Court's order. Attorney-General Mohamed Anil said Areef was fired because Yameen was repeatedly unable to reach him on the phone.

International reactions

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres asked the Maldivian government to respect the Supreme Court's order, his spokesman's office said.

"The secretary-general reiterates his belief in finding a solution to the political stalemate in the Maldives through all-party talks, which the United Nations continues to stand ready to facilitate," the office said in a statement. "The UN chief also calls on all to exercise restraint," the statement read.

India, a major player in Maldives, urged Yameen to abide by the court's orders and release political prisoners. India on Friday said it was imperative for "all organs" of the Maldivian government to abide by the order "in the spirit of democracy".

In a statement, the Ministry of External Affairs said it was "closely monitoring" the evolving situation in the Maldives and also hoped that the safety and security of Indian expatriates in the island nation would be ensured by the Maldivian authorities under "all circumstances".

The US welcomed the decision by the Maldives' Supreme Court to order the release of political prisoners and to reinstate elected members of parliament on Saturday.

"The United States urges the Maldivian government to respect and abide by the Supreme Court ruling," state department spokesperson Heather Nauert said. "It is imperative that the Maldivian president, government, and security services uphold the Constitution and rule of law and implement the court's ruling in full," she said.

Troubled history

Known for its luxury tourist resorts, the Maldives became a multiparty democracy 10 years ago after decades of autocratic rule by the current president's half-brother, strongman Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

But the nation lost much of its democratic gains after Yameen was elected in 2013. He has maintained a tight grip on power, controlling institutions such as the judiciary and the police. Yameen had been set to run for re-election this year virtually unopposed, with all of his opponents either jailed or exiled.

On Friday, Nasheed, whose conviction for abducting a judge was overturned by the court order, said he would mount a fresh challenge for the presidency this year.

Nasheed was sentenced to 13 years in prison after he was convicted of the abduction charge under the Maldives' anti-terror laws in a trial that was widely condemned by international rights groups.

With inputs from agenciesPrime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to visit Nepal soon after the new government takes office, a leader of the CPN-UML left alliance said on Sunday.

Kathmandu: Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to visit Nepal soon after the new government takes office, a leader of the CPN-UML left alliance said on Sunday.

Nepal's Left alliance is preparing to form a new government which is expected to be headed by former prime minister and CPN-UML chairman K P Sharma Oli. Oli, through a letter, had congratulated Modi on the 69th Republic Day of India.

CPN-UML Secretary Pradip Gyawali told reporters that Prime Minister Modi's visit is most likely after Left alliance leader Oli becomes the prime minister of Nepal.

Oli had invited Modi for a visit to Nepal during a recent telephonic conversation with him.

"Modi telephoned Oli twice and both leaders invited each other for a visit to their countries," Gyawali said.

The recent visit by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj was aimed at clearing the mistrust, and the visit had been instrumental in further strengthening bilateral ties, he said. The External Affairs Ministry described the two-day visit by Swaraj as "successful".

Gyawali said that the Left alliance wants to develop a cordial relationship with India.

Responding to a question about formation of the new government and the proposed unification between CPN-UML led by Oli and CPN-Maoist Centre led by Prachanda, Gyawali claimed that the twin tasks will be completed by next month.

Swaraj was the first senior Indian minister to visit Nepal after the conclusion of elections to local bodies, provincial assemblies and federal Parliament.

Nepal successfully concluded three phases of provincial, local and parliamentary elections as part of its efforts to implement the new Constitution that was promulgated in September 2015.

The clear victory to the Left alliance  CPN-UML led by Oli and the CPN-Maoist led by Prachanda  was not seen as a positive development for India given that Oli had publicly criticised New Delhi for interfering in Nepal's internal matters and accused it of toppling his government last year.The Nigerian Army has completely defeated the Boko Haram insurgents in the restive northeast parts of the country, said Major General Rogers Nicholas, head of a military operation.

Lagos: The Nigerian Army has completely defeated the Boko Haram insurgents in the restive northeast parts of the country, said Major General Rogers Nicholas, head of a military operation.

Nicholas, the Theatre Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, said this late on Saturday during the inauguration of the Nigeria-Cameroon Military Joint Mission in Maiduguri, capital of Borno State, Xinhua news agency reported.

He said the collaboration between the two militaries was critical to the successful completion of the counter-insurgency campaign.

"We share information and intelligence to enable us to map out strategies to fight Boko Haram insurgents in our common borders," he said.

Troops under the operation DEEP PUNCH II had on Friday dislodged and occupied the insurgents' tactical ground "Camp Zairo," the military chief said, adding that hundreds of insurgents had surrendered and several others fled their enclave while over 100 civilians were rescued.

"My soldiers are in the heart of Boko Haram enclave that is 'Camp Zairo,' the gallant troops have taken total control of Sambisa Forest.

"We have broken the heart and soul of Shekau's group, taking over the camp and its environs.

"They are on the run and we are pursuing them to wherever they go. This time around there is no place for escape anywhere," the commander said.

The military chief called on the insurgents and abducted persons in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops, stressing that they would not be harmed or killed.

He revealed that the troops had destroyed the insurgents' hideouts, vehicles and ammunition, while hundreds of insurgents surrendered and over 100 civilians were rescued.

According to him, the command would profile the rescued persons for rehabilitation and de-radicalisation for reintegration into society.

While handing over 82 rescued persons to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) in Maiduguri, the military chief called on persons in Boko Haram captivity to submit themselves to the troops.

"People need to be vigilant in their localities if you see any suspected persons, report to the military or security agents.

"As I speak to you now many of them have surrendered and many more will surrender to the troops. The most important thing is that we are treating these people very humanely because they are Nigerians," the military chief told his audience.

Meanwhile, Rabi Abu-Yasir, wife of Boko Haram's chief physician, on Saturday surrendered to the troops of Operation Lafiya Dole in the ongoing clearance operation to rout out the remnants of the insurgents.

Rabi told newsmen that her husband was the medical doctor to the insurgents' leader, Abubakar Shekau.

She said she was rescued on Friday after the troops dislodged the insurgents' enclaves in Sambisa Forest.

Recounting her ordeal, Rabi said unlike her peers, she enjoyed preferential treatment and privileges in view of her position as a wife to the physician.

Rabi lauded the military for the rescue operation and called on the abducted persons still in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops.US House Speaker Paul Ryan came under fire over a tweet that framed a worker's $ 1.50 per week pay increase as an impressive result of his party's massive tax cut plan

Washington: US House Speaker Paul Ryan came under fire over a tweet that framed a worker's $ 1.50 per week pay increase as an impressive result of his party's massive tax cut plan, US media reported.

Ryan's tweet, now deleted, told of a secretary featured in an Associated Press report who was "pleasantly surprised" by the marginal pay rise, drawing condemnation from critics who accused the politician of being out of touch with lower-income Americans.

Paul Ryan tweets: "A secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, PA, said she was pleasantly surprised her pay went up $1.50 a week" and bragged that was all due to GOP tax cut. So corporations get 40% cut while middle class gets $1.50 a week more https://t.co/tmH2m89RCG  (((DeanObeidallah))) (@DeanObeidallah) February 3, 2018

But Democrats, who were quick to round on Ryan, pointed out that wealthier Americans and big corporations benefit much more from the tax cuts. "Wells Fargo, fresh off of defrauding millions of Americans, gets $3.4 billion," retorted Minnesota congressman Keith Ellison.

Wells Fargo, fresh off of defrauding millions of Americans, gets $3.4 billion from the GOP tax cut....good job rewarding the crooks.  TimelineTrump (@timeline_trump) February 4, 2018

Paul Ryan deleted his embarrassing tweet of a blatant admission because he and Republicans dont want you to know the truth: the #GOPTaxScam is a gift to corporate America and the top 1% at your expense. He also doesnt want you to know he got $500.000.00 from the Koch family. pic.twitter.com/ENXxASfAMP  Nancy Pelosi (@TeamPelosi) February 3, 2018

Meanwhile, Randy Bryce, a Democrat hoping to unseat Ryan in Wisconsin, saw the blunder as a campaigning opportunity.

Moments ago, @PRyan deleted this tweet after we told him just how out of touch he was. Show Paul Ryan what you think of his tax bill. Chip in $1.50 now to help us repeal and replace Ryan permanently this November.https://t.co/c3Fii4Q0Jn  Randy Bryce (@IronStache) February 3, 2018

The tax bill slashes the federal corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent, and the maximum individual income tax rate, for the nation's wealthiest, drops from 39.6 percent to 37 percent. It also doubles the standard deduction for families, and doubles the child tax credit, while eliminating or limiting several deductions that millions of middle-class families currently claim.Syrian rebels shot down a Russian warplane and killed its pilot on the ground after he ejected from the plane, Russias defence ministry and Syrian rebels said

Amman/Moscow: Syrian rebels shot down a Russian warplane on Saturday and killed its pilot on the ground after he ejected from the plane, Russias defence ministry and Syrian rebels said.

The SU-25 came down in an area of Syrias northern Idlib province that has seen heavy air strikes and fighting on the ground between government forces backed by Russia and Iran, and rebels who oppose President Bashar al-Assad.

Syrians opposed to Assad see Russia as an invading force they blame for the deaths of thousands of civilians since Moscow joined the war on the side of the Syrian government in 2015.

The Russian plane was shot down over the town of Khan al-Subl near the city of Saraqeb, close to a major highway where the Syrian army and Iranian-backed militias are trying to advance, a rebel source said.

Although the Russian pilot escaped the crash, he was killed by rebels who had tried to capture him, the source said.

Tharir al-Sham, a jihadist group spearheaded by the former Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda, claimed responsibility for shooting down the plane, saying one of its fighters had scored a direct hit with a shoulder-launched anti-aircraft missile.

This work is the least we can do to revenge our people. Let the criminal invaders know that our skies are not a picnic and they will not pass through without paying a price God willing, senior commander Mahmoud Turkomani said in a statement released by the group.

Russias Defence Ministry also said that the aircraft was downed by a portable surface-to-air missile. The pilot reported that he had ejected by parachute, and he was later killed on the ground.

The pilot died in a fight with terrorists, it said.

Tass news agency quoted the Russian Defence Ministry as saying Moscow retaliated with a strike from an undisclosed high-precision weapon that killed more than 30 militants in an area of Idlib province where the plane was downed.

The Syrian opposition released footage on social media that purported to show the wreckage of the plane and the body of the pilot surrounded by fighters.

Rebels said the downed warplane had taken part in strikes that targeted civilian convoys fleeing along a major Syrian highway from villages that the army and foreign militias had overrun.

Syrias civil war, which is now entering its eighth year, has killed hundreds of thousands of people and driven more than 11 million from their homes.

A Russian plane was blamed for the death of seven civilians and scores of injuries after cars were targeted on the highway, according to a witness and two rebels sources.

Syrian soldiers and Iranian-backed militiamen were now around twelve kilometres from Saraqeb, advancing towards the Damascus-Aleppo highway under cover of heavy Russian air strikes, two opposition sources said.

At least five civilians were killed in Saraqeb city on Saturday, which residents blamed on Russian planes.

Syrians in rebel-held areas say they can distinguish between Russian warplanes and those of the Syrian air force because the Russian planes fly at higher altitude.

Residents say thousands of people have been forced by air strikes to flee the area, moving further north to the safety of makeshift camps on the Syrian side of the Turkish border.

Russias Defence Ministry regularly says it targets only hardline Islamist militants in Syria.The Indian and the US air forces will significantly step up operational cooperation to complement strategic interests, US Air Force chief David Goldfein said.

New Delhi: The Indian and the US air forces will significantly step up operational cooperation to complement the strategic interests of the two countries in the Indo-Pacific region, Chief of US Air Force General David L Goldfein has said, while expressing concern over China's rising military influence over the area.

Calling India a "central strategic partner" of the US in pursuing common interests in the region, he said two of the world's largest air forces were going to jointly shift the focus on the Indo-Pacific region while asserting that the rules-based order must be preserved in the critical sea lanes.

Goldfein, who held extensive talks with Air Chief Marshal BS Dhanoa and the top brass of the defence set-up during his three-day India visit that ended on Saturday, said the "Quadrilateral" coalition among the US, India, Japan and Australia would provide for deeper cooperation between the Indian and American air forces.

Asked if cooperation between the two forces would deepen in the wake of the four countries joining hands with an aim at containing China's influence in the Indo-Pacific region, he replied, "I do (think so) and that is a big part of my visit and in my discussions here".

In June last year, two Lancer heavy strategic bombers of the US Air Force had conducted flights over the South China Sea, sending a clear message to China against its military build-up in the disputed area. Three US aircraft carriers  the USS Nimitz, USS Ronald Reagan and USS Theodore Roosevelt - have also been operating in the Indo-Pacific region...We have common interests in preserving the rules-based order. So while we look for opportunities for partnerships, it is actually appropriate also for us to be critical for those who are trying to change that in ways that may not benefit the region," he said in an interview.

In November, India, the US, Australia and Japan gave shape to the long-pending "Quad" to develop a new strategy to keep the critical sea routes in the Indo-Pacific free of Chinese influence.

Referring to the "Quad" or "quadrilateral coalition", the US Air Force Chief said there was a natural convergence among the four countries to work towards preserving the rules-based order, adding cooperation between Indian and US air forces would increase at several levels.

"India is absolutely a central strategic partner in moving forward in our common interests, and where we take this in the future is the purpose of my visit," he said.

Goldfein, who has 4,200 flying hours under his belt and flew in the Gulf war and in Afghanistan, also talked about India's place as mentioned in the recently unveiled national defence strategy of the US.

"It will be at a number of levels. It is on interoperability, how do we look beyond new platforms and sensors and look more broadly in the longer term," he said about cooperation between the US and the Indian air forces.

The visit assumes significance as he was accompanied by Terrence O'Shaughnessy, Commander of the US Pacific Air Force.

Goldfein did not give a direct reply when asked if the US would increase its military presence in South China Sea.

"We want to be strategically predictable but operationally unpredictable. I am not going to share with our adversaries what our intentions are. If in fact we are to increase our presence or decrease our presence, that is something we will do at our time and place of our choosing," he said.

India, US and several other nations have been pressing for freedom of navigation in the disputed South China Sea. The US has been periodically sending naval ships and planes to assert freedom of navigation, much to the chagrin of China.

The US Air Force Chief said connecting capabilities of the two forces will be one of the priority areas to enhance interoperability.

Elaborating, he said the focus of the cooperation will be to "make decision faster than our adversaries and then act in ways that may bring multiple dilemmas at a pace the adversary could never keep up with".

"I believe that's going to help us to find deterrence in the 21st century. Being able to produce multiple dilemmas means being able to operate simultaneously from all domains. So as we look at our partnership with IAF, the question for me is not perhaps what individual platforms and sensors we can bring but how do we bring increasing connectivity, how do we actually connect our capabilities in ways that allow us to act, to observe or decide and act faster than our adversaries. That is the big idea going forward," he said.

Goldfein also talked about his and IAF chief Dhanoa's roles in "combat campaign" in Kosovo and Kargil in 1999.

"He was leading in the Kargil campaign and I was involved in the Kosovo campaign. He was developing night tactics as a squadron commander and I was also developing night tactics as a squadron commander... Who would have thought that the two squadron commanders engaged in combats, building similar tactics, grow up to be the chiefs of two of the largest and most professional air forces on the planet," he said.

"Where do we take that. Again we have these relationships built at all levels, I am excited. There is plenty of opportunities," he added.

US President Donald Trump, in his first prime-time televised address to the nation as commander-in-chief last year, had laid out his South Asia policy saying a "critical part" of it was to further develop the US's strategic partnership with India.

In June 2016, the US had designated India a "Major Defence Partner" intending to elevate defence trade and technology sharing with India to a level commensurate with that of its closest allies and partners..           - .    .      ,     "".   ,        ,       ,   . "           -   ...Back in 2015, the CDC estimated that more than a third of Americans had diabetes or prediabetes. That number is probably larger now and the cost for treatment and care is in the tens of billions per year. Fitbit (NYSE: FIT) wants a piece of this market. The fitness tracker company is researching diabetes, and it reportedly has invested $6 million in Sano, a start-up specializing in minimally invasive glucose monitoring. This is a super-cool technology, and is one more example of how Fitbit is getting beyond just selling fitness trackers and expanding into the healthcare market.

Sano and its tech

Sano is a company founded by Ashwin Pushpala in 2011 that is working on a wearable patch that can provide continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). This can help diabetics manage the disease by providing real-time feedback and alerts on glucose levels to help stay in a safe range. What makes Sano's device different from other devices is that it doesn't actually penetrate the skin.

It has a patent on its device, which is made up of a silicon layer of microstructures similar to sandpaper that are chemical sensors. These sensors can be activated with enzymes to detect glucose or other molecules such as lactic acid, cholesterol, sodium, and a number of others.

This technology is built into a small sensor that can be worn on the skin, with its data sent to a mobile device. The company hasn't released its product to the market yet.

In a presentation by Pushpala at the Hyper Wellbeing summit in November 2016, one slide indicated the company was "starting with the preventive segment of the market unserved by products on the market today." Pushpala expanded on the statement in his talk.

Sano's website doesn't mention diabetes and the company hasn't shown any indications that it will pursue FDA approval for its device. It seems the device will act more like a fitness tracker, which doesn't require FDA approval, providing general feedback to its wearer that would help with behavior modification and insight into how food and activity affect glucose levels throughout the day.

Fitbit's investment

Since Sano isn't a public company, it has been pretty secretive about its progress on product development. The only hint we have is from the Hyper Wellbeing summit. At the time, Sano was finishing a clinical trial of its prototype device and was targeting a consumer-focused product launch in 2017.

Fitbit isn't the only investor in Sano, but it's the only one that isn't a venture capital company. Fitbit's $6 million investment is actually the third round of investment the company has received, according to Crunchbase.

Given where Pushpala indicated the company was over a year ago, it's possible that its device could be ready for production. Partnering with an experienced manufacturer of consumer wellness devices, like Fitbit, could provide Sano with important insight about the manufacturing, marketing, and distribution of its product.

The payoff is a long way off

While Fitbit has its eyes on driving the tech-enabled healthcare revolution, the Sano investment isn't the magic bullet, for a number of reasons. First, Sano's technology is unproven. Even cash-rich tech giants Apple and Alphabet have reported working on noninvasive ways to do CGM, with neither having released products yet.

Even if Sano launches a product integrated with a Fitbit device, I see this as similar to Fitbit's current arrangement with Dexcom. There wouldn't be a significant advantage for users to receive CGM information on their Fitbit device or app versus Sano's smartphone app.

Lastly, some have questioned the effectiveness of a device like this for a nondiagnosed population. Gizmodo interviewed Dr. Mark Schutta of the Penn Rodebaugh Diabetes Center, who said that "there isn't really any merit to" CGM in nondiabetics, and he said that if you're at risk for diabetes, a primary care doctor should be screening you with the appropriate test.

Fitbit's investment is less than 1% of its available cash, so this long-shot bet isn't a large one for the company. While I don't see this making a difference for Fitbit in the short term, I like that the company is pushing the envelope in healthcare. With Sano's technology having the potential to monitor more than just glucose, this might be the beginning of something bigger.

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Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Brian Withers owns shares of Alphabet (A shares), Alphabet (C shares), Apple, and Fitbit. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Alphabet (A shares), Alphabet (C shares), Apple, and Fitbit. The Motley Fool has the following options: long January 2020 $150 calls on Apple and short January 2020 $155 calls on Apple. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.British Prime Minister Theresa May was under mounting pressure Sunday to take sides in the Conservative Party's civil war over Brexit, as a new round of talks between Britain and the European Union is set to begin.

Since becoming prime minister in 2016, May has walked a fine line between two feuding factions in her party: those who want a clean break, even if it means trade barriers with Europe, and those who want to keep Britain's economy closely aligned to the 28-nation EU.

EU negotiator Michel Barnier is due to meet British Brexit Secretary David Davis in London on Monday ahead of a new round of talks this week. The two sides have just months to negotiate future relations before Britain leaves in March 2019.

First, Britain must decide what it wants. Tensions within May's government are spiking ahead of meetings of senior ministers this week to hammer out a negotiating position.

Sunday's newspapers teemed with allegations of plots against May by "hard Brexit" rivals including Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg, head of the pro-Brexit European Reform Group in the British Parliament.

The Sunday Times claimed pro-Brexit lawmakers are prepared to topple May if she tries to compromise and keep Britain in the EU's tariff-free customs union.

They accuse Treasury chief Philip Hammond, who favors a "soft Brexit," of trying to block Britain's EU exit.

Brexit-backing Conservative legislator Bernard Jenkin urged May to rein in Hammond, writing in the Sunday Telegraph that a majority of British people "want a clean Brexit and an end to the present uncertainty."

Euroskeptic politicians have also turned on civil servants for allegedly promoting a gloomy picture of the economic impact upon Britain for leaving the bloc.

After last week's leak of government documents forecasting that Brexit will hurt the economy, Rees-Mogg accused civil servants of "fiddling the figures."

May's grip on power was weakened when she called an early election last year in hopes of increasing her majority and strengthening her hand in Brexit talks. Instead, voters left her atop a minority government that relies on support from a small Northern Ireland party to stay in power.

May insisted last week that she is "not a quitter" and intends to lead Britain through Brexit.

May's allies defended her leadership on Sunday, but did not make clear what sort of final relationship with the EU the government wants.

Home Secretary Amber Rudd said Britain was open to "either a customs arrangement or a customs partnership" as part of a deal to deliver "frictionless" trade.

And she insisted the Cabinet committee that will decide on the government's Brexit stance is more united than many think.

"I think that we will arrive at something which suits us all," Rudd told the BBC. "There will be choices to be made within that, but we all want the same thing, which is to arrive at a deal which works for the U.K."

___

Follow Jill Lawless on Twitter at http://Twitter.com/JillLawlessEve Jobs, the youngest daughter of late Apple founder Steve Jobs, is living it up.

The 19-year-old, who shows off her high-flying lifestyle on Instagram, attends Stanford University and is an accomplished equestrian.

Eve was named rider of the month last year after she competed in the Amateur-Owner division in the East Conference of the Show Jumping Hall of Fame Jumper Classic Series.

Eves Instagram features many pictures of her on horseback, interspersed with images of her friends.

The Apple founders daughter competes against other young heiresses like Jennifer Gates, daughter of Bill Gates, and Jessica Springsteen, daughter of Bruce Springsteen.

Her mother, billionaire investor Laurene Powell-Jobs, bought a $15 million ranch in Florida in 2016.

The ranch reportedly has four bedrooms, five-and-a-half bathrooms, a 40-foot long screened-in pool, a detached barn for 20 horses, plus a show-jumping training rink.

According to Business Insider, Eve has aced competitions around the world, including events from the Hamptons, Kentucky, Canada and the United Kingdom.

Eve is dating Miami School of Business student Eugenio Garza Perez, who also shares her love of horses.

Perez, who is from Monterrey, Mexico, moved to the U.S. at the age of 15 to study and follow the equestrian activity practiced by family tradition.

Garza, along with his horse, has already won competitions such as the Hoolw Creek Farm Grand Prix in Kentucky, and the Upperville Jumper Classic in Virginia.

Like Eve, he is also from a family of accomplished entrepreneurs. Eugenio is the great-grandson of Eugenio Garza Sada, who was president of the VISA Group and founder of a prestigious private university in Mexico, the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Studies.

Eve and her longtime boyfriend post photos of loving moments together in destinations worldwide.

According to Forbes, Eve, her mother, and siblings, are worth nearly $20.1 billion.

Steve Jobs died in 2011 of pancreatic cancer, and according to his official biographer, Walter Isaacson, Jobs didnt doubt that it would be his youngest daughter who would run Apple in the future.Kim Cattrall announced the death of her brother, 55-year-old Christopher Cattrall, on social media Sunday, hours after seeking help in finding him.

It is with great sadness that myself and my family announce the unexpected passing of our son and brother, Chris Cattrall, she wrote. At this time we ask for privacy. We want to thank you all on social media for your outpouring of love and support in this trying time.

No further details were available.

The news came after the "Sex and the City" star revealed on Instagram that her sibling had been missing for several days.

He has been missing since Tuesday, January the 30th from his home in Lacombe, Alberta Canada, she said in a post, sharing a photo.

His keys, cell phone,& wallet left on the table and his front door unlocked, she continued. This is not like Chris. He he would never leave his unlocked home without those items nor his 7 beloved dogs.

Before announcing her brother's death, Cattrall had called him a one of a kind brother.Cardiologists are not telling women with breast cancer to decline treatment  far from it. But in its first-ever statement on the most common female cancer, the American Heart Association warned on Thursday that breast cancer survivors, especially those treated with common chemotherapies, are at increased risk for heart failure and other cardiovascular diseases. And it called on cancer doctors to weigh the benefits of those treatments against the heart risks they pose.

It has been known for years that some breast cancer drugs (including some also used for other cancers) can weaken the heart muscle, causing heart failure. But the group of heart doctors is concerned that if heart symptoms arise years after cancer treatment, the link to chemo may be missed.

An older class of drugs called anthracyclines, which includes doxorubicin, can kill cardiomyocytes, which make up the heart muscle, especially in older women or those with pre-existing heart disease. Taxanes, such as paclitaxel, can cause an abnormally slow heart rhythm, while hormone drugs such as tamoxifen can cause potentially fatal thromboembolisms, or blood clots.

The aromatase inhibitor anastrozole has been linked to heart attacks and other cardiovascular events. Trastuzumab (Herceptin) can cause heart failure, especially in women over 50 and those with underlying heart disease or hypertension.

In most cases, however, the absolute risk is fairly low, said Dr. Laxmi Mehta, director of the Womens Cardiovascular Health Program at Ohio State University and lead author of the AHAs statement, which was published in the journal Circulation. Herceptin studies have found a heart failure incidence of up to 4 percent, for instance.

The greatest risk is from doxorubicin, and it increases with the number of treatment cycles. Eight treatments at the typical intravenous dose brings a 5 percent risk of heart failure, but a 26 percent risk after 11 such treatments and a 48 percent risk after 14.

The intent of the paper is certainly not to say dont treat breast cancer, Mehta said. We want patients to undergo the best treatments available. But we also want patients and their doctors to be aware that breast cancer drugs can damage the heart.

Thats especially important many years after treatment. Insurers usually wont pay for cancer survivors to keep seeing an oncologist, so primary care physicians need to be aware that women who were treated for breast cancer are at higher risk of heart disease, said Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer of the American Cancer Association.

And if a woman goes to an emergency rooom with symptoms of heart failure, he said, triage nurses need to factor in past breast cancer treatment when making the initial determination of whether she has heart failure.

Knowing a womans history of breast cancer treatment can be crucial when treating her heart. Dr. Susan Gilchrist, a cardiologist at MD Anderson Cancer Center who runs the only U.S. program for womens heart health after cancer, said she would treat hypertension, obesity, and other risk factors even more aggressively in a patient who had received doxorubicin, for instance.

And awareness of how chemo affects the heart can in some cases limit the risk: giving IV therapy slowly seems to cause less risk of eventual heart failure than giving it all at once.

The AHA statement might help explain two puzzles about cancer treatment. One is why patient survival is higher at comprehensive cancer centers than in community practices, meaning those not affiliated with an academic institution. Doctors at the former are generally more experienced, and having cardiologists under the same roof can mean better management of the cardiovascular harms from cancer treatment.

I think the general oncologist absolutely knows the side effects of cardiotoxic drugs such as anthracyclines and Her2 targeted therapies, said Dr. Neelima Denduluri, a breast oncologist in Virginia who was not involved in the AHA statement. But primary care physicians might not be as knowledgeable, and its useful to remind the busy general practitioner and the medical oncologist that they need to pull the cardiologist in.

Another puzzle is why screening mammography, meant to detect breast cancer when it is supposedly more treatable, doesnt seem to reduce the risk of premature death from all causes, rather than breast cancer only.

In one of the worlds longest-running mammography studies, researchers in Canada found that among women aged 40 to 59 who were randomly assigned to regular mammograms, mortality after 5, 10, and 15 years was indistinguishable from women not getting regular mammograms. But beginning at 20 years, deaths from all causes were slightly higher in the mammogram group.

It may be that lives saved from breast cancer are being lost to heart disease. Treatment-related mortality [from heart disease] is not reliably captured in breast-cancer mortality, said Dr. H. Gilbert Welch of the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice.

Cardiovascular disease kills more women than breast cancer. Among older women, it even kills more who have been diagnosed with localized (not advanced) breast cancer: The long-running Womens Health Initiative reported last year that among women in their 70s with localized breast cancer, over a 10-year period 17 percent died from breast cancer and 22 percent from cardiovascular disease.NEW You can now listen to Fox News articles!

Men are scared, and feminists are delighted. But the urge to call out and punish male sexual transgression is bound to clash with an inescapable truth: Were all in this together, men and women.

Consider whats happening in the capital of Florida. Female staffers and lobbyists have found many male legislators will no longer meet with them privately, reported The Miami Herald. I had a senator say, I need my aide here in the room because I need a chaperone,  lobbyist Jennifer Green told the paper. I said, Senator, why do you need a chaperone? . . . Do you feel uncomfortable around me? Well, he said, anyone can say anything with the door shut. 

Im getting the feeling that were going back 20 years as female professionals, said Green, who owns her company. I fully anticipate Im going to be competing with another firm that is currently owned by some male, and the deciding factor is going to be: You dont want to hire a female lobbying firm in this environment. 

This kind of thinking is catching on in aggressively P.C. Silicon Valley, where men are taking to message boards like Reddit to express interest in sex segregation  sometimes labeled Men Going Their Own Way, or the Man-o-Sphere. How will that work out for women in the tech industry, where they already face substantial challenges?

Across industries, Several major companies have told us they are now limiting travel between the genders, Johnny Taylor, president of the Society for Human Resource Management, told the Chicago Tribune, citing execs who tell men not to go on business trips or share rental cars with women co-workers. UCLA psychologist Kim Elsesser, the author of Sex and the Office, sees a nascent sex partition. If men start to back away from women, at least in professional settings, its difficult to see how that will aid the feminist cause.

Turning men and women into hostile opposing camps is not going to be good for either sex.

As is characteristic of movements led by the left in general, #MeToo faces the prospect of being seen to push too far, too fast. Not long ago, the British magazine The Spectator depicted the cause a feminist Reformation, with a modern woman nailing her demands to the door of a church like Martin Luther. These days the entirely justified anger and calls for change are venturing into iconoclasm: Lets knock over some innocent statues and shatter all those stained-glass windows!

Outraged feminists triggered by Therese Dreaming, a suggestive 1938 painting of a clothed pubescent girl by the Polish-French artist Balthus, demanded the Metropolitan Museum of Art remove it. (The Met refused, to its credit). Moms are dressing their sons in humiliating the Future is Female T-shirts. The womens Web site Bustle banned the word flattering because it implies theres an ideal shape for a woman, and we all know women arent interested in looks.

Companies are firing perverts and sexual harassers, which is great, but those who cant find any bad behavior to punish are casting around angrily looking for random things to attack. Jordan Peterson, the University of Toronto professor and author of the bestseller 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos who has become a YouTube sensation by rebutting crazy left-wing students, has been lambasted on social media for citing sociological studies that say women are more agreeable in the workplace and suffer some salary repercussions because of it. Although this is essentially a restatement of the thinking behind Lean In  if you want it, push for it  Peterson found himself being subjected to an absurdly hostile interview by British broadcaster Cathy Newman in a confrontation that went viral and led to more abuse being heaped on Peterson.

Writing in The American Interest, Claire Berlinski calls the #MeToo movement a frenzied extrajudicial warlock hunt that does not pause to parse the difference between rape and stupidity and a classic moral panic, one that is ultimately as dangerous to women as to men. She tells a story about how she just discovered she has a new power: the power to ruin the career of a professor she knew at Oxford who grabbed her butt 20 years ago while drunk at a party. I was amused and flattered, she writes, saying, I knew full well hed been dying to do that. Our tutorials  which took place one-on-one with no chaperones  were livelier intellectually for that sublimated undercurrent. He was an Oxford don and so had power over me . . . But I also had power over him  power sufficient to cause a venerable don to make a perfect fool of himself at a Christmas party. Unsurprisingly, I loved having that power.

Reformers should keep her underlying point in mind: Change may be good, but be wary of unintended consequences. Turning men and women into hostile opposing camps is not going to be good for either sex.

To read more Kyle Smith on the New York Post click here.NEW You can now listen to Fox News articles!

Since President Lyndon Johnson declared a War on Crime in 1965, politicians have been embracing tough-on-crime policies every election cycle. Unfortunately, this has exacted a horrific toll. The U.S. crime rate has never fallen below 1965 levels, and the incarceration rate now approaches that of North Korea.

What 50 years of uninterrupted bipartisan tough-on-crime policies have produced is a 16 percent higher crime rate, a near doubling of violent crime, and thousands of murders.

The population equivalent of Houston is behind bars, while the public is less safe than a half-century ago. Lady Justice has cast her scales aside in disgust and fallen on her sword.

Despite a dismal track-record, these policies have taken hold in a sizable contingent of Americans who ascribe to the Sherriff Joe Arpaio school of corrections, which conflates tough-on-crime with being tough on the criminal. Their logic follows that since crime is bad, criminals are bad and should be punished, and therefore harsher punishment will solve crime.

Most nonviolent offenses are for crimes related to untreated drug addiction or mental illness. Incarceration does nothing for either affliction, while treatments that produce better long-term outcomes at a fraction of the cost are withheld.

These law-and-order types see highly effective methods of rehabilitation as soft if they are insufficiently punitive.

Thats just wrong. The National Institute of Justices statistics show that over two-thirds of ex-convicts are rearrested within five years. Crime is disproportionately recidivistic in nature, making successful rehabilitation the single most effective crime fighting measure.

Tough-on-crime policies only work in dealing with violent offenders whose release poses a threat to society. However, 1.3 million Americans  over half the nations prisoners  are behind bars for non-violent offenses.

Of these, 296,000 have not even been convicted of a crime. Yet despite officially being presumed innocent, they sit in jail awaiting trial, unable to afford bail.

Most nonviolent offenses are for crimes related to untreated drug addiction or mental illness. Incarceration does nothing for either affliction, while treatments that produce better long-term outcomes at a fraction of the cost are withheld. Current policy is both a humanitarian and fiscal disgrace.

At the core of the rot is a corrupt plea bargain system. An accused person faces a Sophies Choice: to paraphrase the innocent and maliciously prosecuted CEO-cum-justice-reform-advocate Howard Root, plead guilty or be destroyed before you get to trial.

Those who proceed to trial can look forward to a pre-emptive finding of guilt in the court of public opinion (by prosecutorial design), twice as harsh a sentence if convicted than if they plead guilty, and bankrupting legal fees  all for a 5 percent chance of exoneration.



As Mark Steyn describes, the process is the punishment and innocent people plead guilty (often on advice of counsel) to avoid that process with greater frequency than we in a society of laws should abide in good conscience.

Fanatical prosecutors use any means necessary to achieve a conviction, routinely contorting the plea system to manufacture evidence. Conducting a boundless fishing expedition, they dredge up some unrelated statutory violation committed by some figure peripheral to their target.

Given the sprawling criminal code and vast prosecutorial dragnet, they always turn up something, which is used to terrorize the peripheral figure into flipping on the primary target. They exchange a guaranty against prosecution for the dredged-up infraction for suborned, veraciously agnostic testimony, provided it leads to a conviction.

This textbook tactic of effectively planting evidence is protected by the wink, nod and wall of silence adhered to by most prosecutors and their ex-prosecutor cohorts on the bench.

President Trumps economic policies hold the promise of a positive and lasting impact on crime. Economic and job growth will spur demand for labor, while stricter immigration policies would cut the supply of illegal workers.

The law of supply and demand will drive wage growth and incentivize greater labor force participation.

Studies show the most important predictor of successful reintegration of prisoners is the ability to find employment upon release. Prison-to-work job placement programs consistently reaffirm this, reporting precipitous declines in recidivism rates among participants.

With the implementation of mandatory E-Verify, those employing the 8 million illegals working in the U.S. will have to change their hiring practices. Facing unmet labor needs, they are apt to start giving parolees a chance.

When Americas 1.3 million non-violent offenders are released, historical recidivism rates imply over a million will return to a life of crime. However, the economic drivers of President Trumps agenda will make it easier than ever for them to find work.

Within this roaring economic backdrop, hundreds of thousands of Americans  mostly people of color  will be freed from the revolving door in and out of jails and prisons. That averted wastage of human potential and public money will be a giant leap toward making America great again.A U.S. Air Force brigadier general has returned to the military branch after service with the National Security Council following the leak of a memo that advocated for a government takeover of development of the nations 5G mobile telecom network, according to a report.

Air Force Brig. Gen. Robert Spalding was the author of the memo, which became the focus of a story by news organization Axios that irked the telecom industry and irritated the White House, the Washington Post reported Saturday.

Spaldings last day with the NSC was Jan. 31, the Post reported, citing information from a senior Trump administration official. The report said Spalding was not implicated in the leak, but officials decided his backing of the potential government takeover of the 5G network exceeded his NSC role.

The brigadier general was told he would be leaving the NSC before his memo and PowerPoint proposal were leaked, the report said.

In recent weeks, senior officials became concerned that Spalding had pushed too hard for the takeover the idea, the report added.

Last week the Wall Street Journal reported that some White House officials viewed next-generation 5G wireless service as a key area of competition, and saw a potential threat from China as justification for a moonshot government effort behind the networks development.

But after the Axios story appeared, Federal Communications Comission chairman Ajit Pai told the New York Times that he opposed the idea of a government-built 5G network, and industry group USTelecom said government involvement would likely slow the technology's development.

There were no plans to replace Spalding at NSC, the Post reported. Spalding declined the newspapers request for comment.The dossier used to secure a federal warrant to surveil the Trump presidential campaign read like a "two dollar novel," a Republican lawmaker told "Fox News Sunday," as the partisan clash over the so-called "FISA memo" continued to dominate the battle inside the beltway.

Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah, made the colorful claim just two days after Republican leaders of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence released the now-declassified memo regarding the early stages of the FBIs investigation into alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

The memo alleges the Obama Justice Department and FBI abused their authority, in part by requesting a warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court for then-Trump campaign adviser Carter Page based on a minimally-vetted, opposition-research dossier that was financed by Democrats.

Its just political garbage," Stewart said of the dossier. "Its no more credible than a two-dollar novel.

HERE'S WHAT THE CONTROVERSIAL HOUSE INTEL SURVEILLANCE MEMO SAYS

The memo charges the dossier was compiled by ex-British spy Christopher Steele and financed by the Democratic National Committee and the campaign of Trumps 2016 rival, Hillary Clinton. The memo asserts that ex-FBI official Andrew McCabe told the committee the warrant was dependent on the dossier, and it further states that the FBI did not divulge to the court critical information regarding its dubious provenance.

Democrats have countered that the memo is misleading and was made public to undermine Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into possible collusion.

It does appear that way, said Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., who sits on the committee. We believe that the memo the Republicans put out shows not a single abuse but a willingness to risk our republic to protect the president.

Trump has frequently expressed his frustration about the probe being a drag on his first year in office, and recently suggested it should end because no collusion has been found.

This memo totally vindicates Trump in probe," Trump tweeted Saturday. "But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their (sic) was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!

Stewart said Sunday Mueller's probe should continue, but that the memo revealed damning flaws in the process that led to the probe.

It doesnt end that need at all," he said. "Its an absolute abuse of power, and we just want people to know that. The memo has nothing to do at all with the special counsel. I hope the special counsel completes his work and reports it to the people.

Swalwell also called on Stewart to protect Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who oversees the Mueller probe and purportedly approved one of the requests for an extension of the FISA warrant, which has sparked speculation that Trump wants him fired.

The White House has denied it is considering firing Rosenstein, the No. 2 official at the Justice Department. But Trump, asked recently if he had confidence in Rosenstein in light of the memo's revelations, made his frustration clear.

"You figure that one out," Trump told reporters.Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and fellow congressional Democrats are ratcheting up the pressure on President Trump to release to Democrats version of Republicans so-called FISA memo, in the interest of full transparency.

The New York senator and others made their plea Sunday, two days after Republican leaders of the House Intelligence committee released their memo, which alleges abuses by the FBI and Justice Department when requesting a surveillance warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, or FISA court, on then-Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

I believe it is a matter of fundamental fairness that the American people be allowed to see both sides of the argument and make their own judgements, Schumer said.

The GOP memo alleges the warrant was requested by the two federal agencies based, at least in part, on a largely unsubstantiated anti-Trump dossier financed by Democrats.

California Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, has suggested that Republicans used information out of context to draft their memo and as a result is trying to release Democrats version.

Schiff is expected on Monday to officially request that the committee, led by California Republican Devin Nunes, release Democratic members 10-page memo, with the promise to send it to the Justice Department for redactions.

The president would have five days to decide whether the memorandum can be made public, as he did with the GOP memo.

I again urge you to support the release of ranking member Schiffs memo so that the American people can make their own judgement on the facts of the case, Schumer also said.

Schumer also argued the release of the GOP memo, after Trump declassified its content, was only intended to undermine the Justice Department collusion investigation, now being led by special counsel Robert Mueller.

Congressional Republicans have rejected that argument.

The memo has nothing to do at all with the special counsel, Utah Rep. Chris Stewart, a Republican member of the Intelligence committee, told Fox News Sunday. I hope the special counsel completes his work and reports it to the people.

Later on the show, Rep. Eric Swalwell, a Democrat on the committee, argued the memo indeed appears intended to undermine Mueller and his investigation.

And he urged Stewart to return to Capitol Hill this week to support legislation that would protect Mueller and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and support the release of the Democrats memo that puts into context, point by point, the seriousness of this investigation as well as new, unseen evidence that bolsters the FBI's credibility.A North Dakota woman who earlier admitted killing a pregnant neighbor to get her baby did it by cutting the baby from the mother's womb as she faded in and out of consciousness, prosecutors said Friday.

Brooke Crews, 38, was sentenced to life in prison without parole in a hearing that for the first time detailed the August death of Savanna Greywind, 22, of Fargo.

Ashton Matheny, the baby's father, said learning how his baby was born and his girlfriend died "tore me apart." Greywind's mother, Norberta Lafontaine-Greywind, fought back tears, but said she was satisfied with the sentence  the toughest Crews could have received.

Prosecutors said the two women argued, and Greywind was pushed and briefly knocked out before Crews began cutting her. Greywind eventually bled to death, they said.

East Central District Judge Frank Racek cited the predatory and cruel nature of the crime in handing down the maximum sentence.

Crews, wearing orange prison clothing and cuffed at the wrists, cried as she read a statement of apology. She said she wished she could take the family's pain.

"There is no excuse. There is no rationalization. There is nothing," she said. Later, she showed no emotion as the judge passed sentence.

Crews' boyfriend, William Hoehn, faces a May trial in the case. He has pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors had cited his pending trial in withholding public details of Greywind's death earlier.

Prosecutors asked for a sentence of life in prison with no parole. Defense attorney Steven Mottinger had asked for less, pointing out Crews admitted guilt without any promise of leniency.

"Acceptance of responsibility is important," Mottinger said in court. "It has to mean something."

Greywind was eight months pregnant when she disappeared in August, sparking extensive searches. Kayakers found her body wrapped in plastic in a river. The baby was found alive in the apartment Crews shared with Hoehn.

Norberta LaFontaine-Greywind, one of four family members to give statements during sentencing, said that what Crews did was "beyond evil," and said she was suffering horrific nightmares. Her husband, Joe Greywind, said the family is trying to heal, "but we find it nearly impossible."

Fargo Police Chief Dave Todd earlier called Greywind's death a "cruel and vicious act of depravity."

Crews initially claimed that Greywind gave up her newborn daughter, but she later admitted taking advantage of the woman to get the child, according to court documents.

Hoehn told police he came home on Aug. 19 to find Crews cleaning up blood in their bathroom. Hoehn said Crews presented him with an infant girl and said: "This is our baby. This is our family." Hoehn told police he took garbage bags containing bloody shoes and his bloody towels and disposed them away from the apartment complex.

A bill in Congress aimed at protecting Native American women and girls from violence, abduction and human trafficking is named for Greywind. Savanna's Act, introduced by Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp would improve tribal access to certain federal crime information databases and create standardized protocols for responding to cases of missing and murdered Native Americans.

It also would require an annual report that would include statistics on missing and murdered Native American women.

"You would never wish this suffering on anybody, on anybody's family, on anybody's sister or daughter or mother," said Gloria Allred, attorney for the Greywind family. "But the only good that will come out of it ... is more attention to change on this issue for other Native American women in the future."A Maryland police officer is facing drug-related charges over allegations he illegally took opioids belonging to a disabled resident who's confined to a bed while on duty, according to WJLA.

Sgt. Christopher Michael Barnett of the Hagerstown Police Department was arrested Thursday after video evidence showed that he engaged in illegal activity on duty, a news release from Hagerstown police said. Barnett was taken into custody at his home in Pennsylvania with the help of the Pennsylvania State Police, Hagerstown Police Chief Victor Brito said during a Friday news conference.

FLORIDA MAN TRIES TO STEAL TWO PLANES, TAKE JOYRIDE IN GOLF CART AND FUEL TRUCK, COPS SAY

I cannot and I will not make any excuses for this betrayal of our agency, our badge and our community, Brito said. Im disappointed and quite frankly Im sickened by this betrayal and this criminal act.

Barnett allegedly entered the apartment of a disabled, bedridden resident while on duty and went through the individuals prescriptions, WJLA said, citing police. The residents caregiver reportedly realized that the pills were missing and notified authorities.

However, the suspect was reportedly the officer that took the complaint call, which allegedly prompted him to return to the apartment, police told the outlet. While there, the officer was reportedly caught on video saying hed return the pills and asking not to be reported.

ACROBAT HEARTBROKEN AFTER THIEF STEALS 7-FOOT UNICYCLE FROM AIRPORT BAGGAGE CLAIM

During the news conference, Brito said police received credible evidence on Thursday, which was from a few days earlier, and the department responded within the hour.

Investigators were presented with video footage of Sergeant Barnett providing a prescription narcotic to another individual at a location within the city of Hagerstown, the news release said. Once police were able to corroborate the video with witness accounts, criminal charges were filed.

Barnett was charged with distribution and possession of controlled dangerous substances as well as malfeasance in office and theft of less than $100, Brito said.

The suspect, a 15-year-veteran of the police force, has been placed on unpaid administrative leave pending the resolution of the criminal case, he said.Two Amtrak personnel were killed and over 100 others were injured when an Amtrak passenger train collided with a parked CSX freight train early Sunday just outside the capital of South Carolina, officials said.

The South Carolina Emergency Management Division said Amtrak 91 was traveling from New York to Miami when it collided with the CSX train in Pine Ridge around 2:35 a.m.

It appears to me that the CSX train was on the track it was supposed to be on, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster said at a news conference. It appears Amtrak was on the wrong track. Thats what it appears to me.

Amtrak said in a statement the train's lead engine derailed, as did some passenger cars that was carrying eight crew members and approximately 139 passengers on board. TV footage from the crash scene showed the aftermath of the collision, with the Amtrak engine on its side and its front crumpled.

McMaster said the two people killed in the crash were Amtrak personnel and 116 people were taken to area hospitals. Lexington County Coroner Margaret Fisher identified the two victims of Amtrak crash as engineer Michael Kempf, 54, and conductor Michael Cella, 36. Fisher said that several people remain in critical condition.

"We have anywhere from scratches and bumps to more severe broken bones," Lexington County spokesman Harrison Cahill told reporters.

"It appears to me that the CSX train was on the track it was supposed to be on. It appears Amtrak was on the wrong track. Thats what it appears to me.  South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster

McMaster said the first engine of the freight train was "torn up," while the engine on the Amtrak train is "barely recognizable." The governor added that no one was on the CSX train at the time of the crash, and the Amtrak train was estimated to be going 59 mph.

"Two trains, that's as forceful as can get," he said, adding that "I would ask this is a Sunday, everyone go to church and say a prayer for these people involved."

In its statement, Amtrak it is cooperating fully with the National Transportation Safety Board, which is leading the investigation.

"CSX owns and controls the Columbia Subdivision where the accident occurred," Amtrak said. "CSX maintains all of the tracks and signal systems. CSX controls the dispatching of all trains, including directing the signal systems which control the access to sidings and yards."

Hospital officials told Fox News they have received nearly 90 patients from the crash, but most of which have been discharged already. Lexington Medical Center spokeswoman Jennifer Wilson said the facility received 27 patients from the crash, all of which had "minor injuries" and since been discharged.

A spokesperson from Palmetto Health said they received 62 patients as a result of the crash at three of their facilities. The health care network said there are two patients that are expected to be admitted, but most are expected to be released after they are evaluated and treated.

"The thoughts of all our team members are with the family and friends of those injured in this accident," Palmetto Health spokesperson Tammie Epps said. "Palmetto Health is coordinating with local authorities, Amtrak and the American Red Cross to assist these families in any way possible."

No immediate information was available about the CSX train, but SCMED Public Information Officer Derrec Becker told reporters that officials are working to secure a fuel leak that resulted from the spill.

AMTRAK'S DEADLIEST CRASHES IN RECENT YEARS

As of now, 5,000 gallons of diesel fuel has spilled and crews are trying to secure the leak, according to Becker.

"There is no danger to anyone in the nearby area of Lexington County," Becker told "FOX & friends Weekend."

Amtrak officials gathered up luggage and other belongings and within hours put passengers aboard buses to their destinations. Before being sent on their way, those who were not hurt were taken to a shelter, and local businesses provided coffee and breakfast.

Amtrak said that anyone with questions regarding passengers on the train can contact them at 1-800-523-9101.

South Carolina's Red Cross chapter tweeted that emergency responders were at the scene. The people who weren't hurt were taken in patrol cars to a shelter, Lexington County Sheriff's spokesman Adam Myrick said.

"We know they are shaken up quite a bit. We know this is like nothing else they have ever been through. So we wanted to get them out of the cold, get them out of the weather - get them to a warm place," Myrick said.

The National Transportation Safety Board said it was launching a "Go Team" to investigate the deadly crash and plans a press conference for later in the day.

President Trump tweeted about the crash on Sunday, saying "my thoughts and prayers are with all of the victims involved in this mornings train collision in South Carolina. Thank you to our incredible First Responders for the work theyve done!"

Trump was briefed on the train accident and is receiving regular updates, according to Deputy White House Press Secretary Lindsay Walters.

This is the third Amtrak crash since December. On Dec. 18, an Amtrak train derailed in Washington state, killing three people and injuring dozens more. Just last week, one person in a truck died when an Amtrak crash carrying Republican members of Congress struck the vehicle at a crossing. Two other people in the vehicle were severely injured.

Fox News Bryan Llenas, Lucas Tomlinson, Terace Garnier, and The Associated Press contributed to this report.Two years after a 13-year-old Virginia girl was found stabbed to death, a former Virginia Tech student is going on trial in her killing.

David Eisenhauer's first-degree murder trial in the 2016 death of Nicole Lovell is scheduled to begin Monday in Montgomery County Circuit Court in Christiansburg.

Prosecutors say Lovell climbed out her bedroom window one night in January 2016 to meet Eisenhauer, who was then 18 and a freshman engineering student at Virginia Tech.

Three days later, her body was found just over the state line in North Carolina.

Eisenhauer's friend, Natalie Keepers, also a former Virginia Tech student, is charged as an accessory in Lovell's death. Her trial is scheduled for September.An Indiana man has reportedly filed a federal lawsuit claiming his constitutional rights were violated when he was ticketed for giving an Indiana State Trooper the finger.

Mark May, of Terre Haute, is seeking unspecified damages against Police Master Trooper Matt Ames, the Tribune-Star reported, citing a complaint filed in court on Thursday by the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana.

MOST RESIDENTS IN SUFFERING US AREAS RESPECT POLICE, SURVEY SAYS

May said in the lawsuit that on Aug. 21, 2017, he flashed his middle finger at the state trooper after he claims he was cut off by Ames, who was pulling over another driver on U.S. Route 41.

May was issued a provocation ticket  which carries a fine of up to $500  after he gave the trooper the rude gesture, which Indiana Criminal Code states is issued when a person who recklessly, knowingly, or intentionally engages in conduct that is likely to provoke a reasonable person to commit battery commits provocation.

Kenneth Falk, legal director of ACLU Indiana, argued that Mays gesture toward Ames was fully protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

"While perhaps ill advised, Mr. May's gesture, which in no way interfered with the Master Trooper's lawful activities, was fully protected by the First Amendment," Falk told the newspaper.

Falk also claimed Mays Fourth Amendment rights were violated because the state trooper had no cause whatsoever to initiate the stop.

Capt. David Bursten, Chief Public Information Officer for Indiana State Police, told Fox News that as of Friday, the department had not yet been notified of the lawsuit  but stated that "it often takes several days" for the police unit to be informed after a suit is filed.

MAN CARRYING CONCEALED PISTOL STOPS ATTACK ON UTAH POLICE OFFICER

May was reportedly found guilty in Terre Haute City Court when he challenged the ticket, however, the Vigo Superior Court vacated the conviction, according to the Tribune-Star.

A self-employed carpet cleaner, May claims he lost income because of court appearances, and is also seeking attorneys fees in the lawsuit.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.Even a dog with a microchip can go missing for a long time. But even a dog thats missing for a long time can end up back home where she belongs.

Thats what a Pennsylvania family learned recently when they recovered their black Labrador mix, Abby, who had run away 10 years ago from the familys home in Apollo, about 33 miles east of Pittsburgh.

After some time went by, Debra Suierveld and her family assumed Abby had died. But on Jan. 27 Suierveld received word that someone had found their dog.

Abby showed up on George Speiring's front porch in Lower Burrell, 10 miles west of Apollo. Speiring contacted Animal Protectors of Allegheny Valley, which discovered the dog's microchip and was able to contact Suierveld.

Someone had taken good care of Abby over the years. The dog was in great health and still remembered some things the family taught her, Suierveld said.

"She would lie on the floor and cross her paws, and she remembers my daughter's commands, and she remembers the commands I taught her," Suierveld told KDKA-TV.

Suierveld called her 22-year-old daughter, who is a student at Miami University, in Oxford, Ohio, to share the news.

It feels like a part of my kids' childhood is back, part of our family is back. It's pretty awesome."  Debra Suierveld, owner of Abby

She cried, Suierveld told the Tribune-Review.

Suierveld's family has planned a reunion dinner for Sunday to welcome Abby back.

"It feels like a part of my kids' childhood is back, part of our family is back," Suierveld said. "It's pretty awesome."

The Associated Press contributed to this story.A Utah police officer who was being attacked on Friday was saved by a passerby with a concealed pistol, officials said.

The unidentified police officer confronted the attacker, identified as Paul Douglas Anderson, after spotting feet dangling from a donation bin in Springville, FOX13 Salt Lake City reported on Saturday. Anderson got out of the bin, but refused to remove his hands from his pocket.

The officer ordered Anderson to remove his hands out of his pockets. Anderson eventually took his hands out of his pants pockets and began repeatedly punching the officer in the face.

Derek Meyer told FOX13 he was driving by the area when he spotted the police lights and saw Anderson attacking the cop. Meyer turned around and pulled out his pistol.

I carry a gun to protect me and those around me, but primarily I carry a gun to protect my family first and foremost," Meyer, who has a concealed-carry permit, told FOX13. "Outside of that, if I were to use my gun to protect anyone it would be law enforcement or military personnel."

DRAMATIC DASH CAM VIDEO CAPTURES DEADLY OFFICER-INVOLVED SHOOTING

Meyer aimed the pistol at Anderson and yelled at him to stop attacking the officer. Anderson bolted from the scene as responding officers arrived. The attacker, who was found hiding under a flatbed trailer, was arrested and faces several charges, according to FOX13.

The officer suffered a fractured eye socket and lacerations around his eye.

Cpl. Cory Waters of Springville Police told FOX13 Meyers quick action helped save the officers life.

Had he not been in the right place at the right time, who knows what would have happened, Waters said. But he definitely stopped the attack from continuing and becoming much worse. He might have even saved either one of their lives. It could have gone really bad, even for the suspect.

Meyer said he stepped in because it was in his nature. He added

[I didnt do it] to get any extra attention or to have people talk about me or anything I did, he told the news station.

Meyer added that hes sharing his story because there arent enough good stories from responsible, gun-owning people.

The officer was released from the hospital and is expected to be ok.A naked driver crashed into a daycare center, hit a tree, rolled her car, then had to be subdued by police with a stun gun, authorities said.

The suspect, identified as Malina Churchill, 44, allegedly crashed into the Stay-n-Play Day Care Center in Putnam County, Fla., on Thursday night, Fox 30 reported.

Becky Cox, owner of the business, told the station she received a call from her alarm company, notifying her that a burglary was in process. One of her employees who lives near the daycare center went to investigate and told Cox the walls gone.

After crashing into the daycare center, the driver hit a palm tree about 4 miles away and flipped the car, witnesses told the station.

As the suspect exited the car, she was reportedly naked, and had to be subdued with a stun gun. She was then intubated and transported to a local hospital.

The daycare center was closed Friday so workers could clean up the mess. Churchill faces multiple charges when she is released from the hospital, authorities said.A 42-year-old North Carolina man and his 20-year-old daughter have been arrested on incest charges after having a love child last year--and reportedly getting married.

Steven Pladl, 42, of Knightdale, and Katie Pladl, 20, were arrested Jan. 27, WNCN-TV reported, citing "warrants." They have also been charged with adultery and contributing to delinquency. The maximum sentence for the incest charge is 10 years in prison.

The child, a boy, was born in September, the station reported.

Steven Pladl was released on a $1 million bond. Katie Pladls bond is also $1 million but as of last week she was still being held in a North Carolina jail. They appeared in court last week.

The charges were brought in Virginia where authorities believe the relationship began.

The station reported that Pladl gave up Katie for adoption when she was an infant.

They reunited in 2016 when she tracked him down through social media.

At the time, according to the station, Pladl was living outside Richmond with his wife, Katies mother, and their two children, girls who would have been Katie's sisters.

TEXAS MAN ACCUSED OF SELLING TEENAGE DAUGHTER FOR SEX

Katie moved into the home, the station reported.

Subsequently, Pladl and his wife legally separated in November 2016 and began living apart.

Online records show the wife filed for divorce in March 2017 and obtained a divorce decree three months later.

The ex-wife told authorities that just before she moved out Steven would sleep on the floor in Katie's room, the station reported.

The ex-wife learned Katie was pregnant last May after reading one of her daughter's journal, the station reported.

Eight days later child welfare workers in Virginia began conducting interviews, according to the station. They interviewed the two young Pladl girls who said they had been told their father fathered Katie's baby.

The warrants show that Steven told his two daughters to call Katie their step-mom, the station reported.

Police in suburban Richmond issued arrest warrants for Pladl and Katie last November.

The ex-wife told Richmonds WTVR-TV that her former husband and Katie married in Maryland and then moved to North Carolina.

She believes her ex-husband brainwashed and manipulated Katie, the station reported.

This is a pretty unique set of facts I would say, the stations legal analyst Todd Stone said.Colombia's government has opened its first shelter for Venezuelans who are pouring across the border in ever-larger numbers to escape their nation's economic crisis.

The bare-bones shelter opened Saturday near the border city of Cucuta will provide shelter of up to 48 hours for 120 people a day. Pregnant mothers, the elderly and minors who entered the country legally will be given priority. It will be administered by the Red Cross.

Cucuta has been overwhelmed in recent weeks by an increasingly large exodus of Venezuelans. Many are sleeping on the streets and crime in the city has spiked as gangs recruit and take advantage of the desperate migrants.

Some 35,000 Venezuelans cross into Colombia each day, many of them settling in with relatives or making short trips to buy food and medicine that has been scarce for years back home.The head of Germanys domestic intelligence agency is accusing North Korea of using its Berlin embassy to secretly shop for parts for its nuclear missile program.

In a program that will be aired Monday, Hans-Georg Maassen told Norddeutscher Rundfunk Broadcasting that his agency observed instances where it believed North Korea was procuring parts for its weapons program by means of underground buyers or other markets, Reuters reported.

We determined that procurement activities have been carried out from there that are, in our view, done with a view to the missile program and sometimes also for the nuclear program.

He added that when the agency was made aware of these activities, it intervened to stop them. But Maassen warned that the agency can only do so much.

We cant guarantee that we can detect and prevent this in all cases.

Non one at the embassy in Berlin was immediately available for a comment to Reuters.

Pyongyang has been responsible for a high number of missile launches this year, despite strong threats made by the Trump administration including the possibility of a military solution.

North Korea was also recently caught defying U.N. sanctions after a report showed the country exporting coal and other banned commodities to China and Russia.China decried the U.S. for its Cold War mentality on Sunday after Washington announced last week that it plans to diversify its nuclear arsenal with smaller bombs.

The U.S. military believes its nukes are seen as too large to be used and wants to develop low-yield bombsa move that has prompted condemnation from China, Iran and Russia.

The country that owns the world's largest nuclear arsenal, should take the initiative to follow the trend instead of going against it," China's defense ministry said on Sunday, reports BBC.

China said it firmly opposed the Pentagons nuclear policy review.

On Twitter, Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif also lashed out.

The US Nuclear Posture Review reflects greater reliance on nukes in violation of the #NPT, bringing humankind closer to annihilation, Zarif said on the social network.

Russia's foreign minister called the move "confrontational" and expressed "deep disappointment."

However, America is concerned that its arsenal wont remain an effective deterrent without being modernized. The U.S. has named China, Russia, Iran and North Korea as potential threats.

The document released on Friday by the Pentagon, known as the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), argues that developing smaller nuclear weapons would challenge that assumption. Low-yield weapons with a strength of under 20 kilotons are less powerful but are still devastating.

The policy also recommends: Land-based ballistic missiles, submarine-launched missiles, and air-delivered weaponsto be extensively modernized, as begun under ex-President Obama. Bringing back sea-based nuclear missiles. Modifying some submarine-launched nuclear warheads to give a lower-yield detonation.

ISLAMIC STATE ATTACKER SHOWS INTERSECTION OF CRIME, TERROR

The defense ministry in Beijing said Washington had played up the threat of China's nuclear threat, adding that its own policy was defensive in nature.

We hope that the United States will abandon its Cold War mentality, earnestly assume its special disarmament responsibilities, correctly understand China's strategic intentions and objectively view China's national defence and military build-up, its statement said.

This isnt the first time that China has used the Cold War label to denounce U.S. policy. Last year it said that Washingtons defense strategy tied to outdated notions.

In the NPR document, the U.S. accused China of "expanding its already considerable nuclear forces" but China defended its policy on Sunday saying it would "resolutely stick to peaceful development and pursue a national defence policy that is defensive in nature."next Image 1 of 2

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French officials say President Emmanuel Macron and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are talking about working on a "diplomatic road map" for Syria in the "coming weeks."

France's presidency said in a statement on Sunday that the two presidents spoke by telephone Saturday about the security, political and humanitarian situations in Syria  including Turkey's military offensive in the Syrian Kurdish enclave of Afrin.

Eight Turkish soldiers were killed there on Saturday, making it the deadliest day for Turkey since the country launched its operation targeting Kurds Syrian last month.

France's presidency says Turkey and France want to see a political solution under the aegis of the United Nations, and that talks between France and Turkey will "intensify further in the coming days."Authorities in northern Mexico say gunmen shot up a clandestine cockfight arena in the Chihuahua state capital, killing six people and wounding 14.

The state prosecutor's office says in a statement that several masked attackers fired at people gathered at the "Santa Maria" cockfight club late Saturday off a highway on the southern edge of Chihuahua city.

Prosecutors said Sunday that four victims were killed at the scene and two more died while receiving medical treatment. Two children ages 7 and 10 were among the wounded.

There were no immediate arrests.North Korea on Sunday slammed President Donald Trumps State of the Union address, calling it the height of Trump-style arrogance and vowing that the regimes nuclear capabilities would deter the president and his lackeys from showing off on the Korean peninsula."

Pyongyangs foreign ministry spokesman hit back at Trump in an interview released by the state-run Korean Central News Agency. The official disputed the presidents claim that the U.S. had made incredible progress and achieved extraordinary success in the last year.

This is indeed the height of Trump-style arrogance, arbitrariness and self-conceit, the spokesman said.

"The whole world is deeply concerned, seeing as an omen of new disaster the address of Trump who asserted 'America First' and 'unmatched power' based on nuclear weapons while forcing other countries to submit themselves to the U.S. chauvinistic interest, he continued, according to Yonhap.

The foreign ministry official said that North Korea's "self-reliant defense capability with the nuclear force as its backbone will, however, completely deter Trump and his lackeys from showing off on the Korean peninsula."

He added, "If Trump does not get rid of his anachronistic and dogmatic way of thinking, it will only bring about the consequence of further endangering security and future of the United States.

Trump said in his State of the Union address last week that North Koreas reckless pursuit of nuclear missiles could threaten the U.S. in the near future.

No regime has oppressed its own citizens more totally or brutally than the cruel dictatorship in North Korea, Trump said in his address.

Trump said the U.S. is waging a campaign of maximum pressure against North Korea.

The president added, I will not repeat the mistakes of past administrations that got us into this dangerous position. We need only look at the depraved character of the North Korean regime to understand the nature of the nuclear threat it could pose to America and our allies.

Trump on Friday met with about half-dozen North Korean defectors in the Oval Office, including Ji Seong-ho, who was at the State of the Union and raised his crutches in triumph when Trump singled him out among attendees. Ji had used crutches to escape the reclusive country after a train ran over his limbs.

The president has expressed a willingness to deal with rising tensions with Pyongyang through diplomacy, but he has said the U.S. would use military force on North Korea if needed.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.next Image 1 of 2

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Turkey's president is on his way to Italy to meet Pope Francis at the Vatican, where the status of Jerusalem is expected to top their agenda Monday.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said before leaving Turkey on Sunday that the United States is "alone" in the Trump administration's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

Erdogan said Turkey leads 1.7 billion Muslims worldwide since the country currently holds the term presidency of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the pope is "number one" among Catholics.

He noted: "These two important blocks are in fact decisive elements in this region," emphasizing Jerusalem's importance to several world religions.

Syria, the migrant crisis, Islamophobia and racism also are on Francis and Erdogan's discussion list.

Erdogan is scheduled to meet Italy's president and prime minister.Government News 4/2













Leaders pay tribute to President Ho Chi Minh on CPV founding anniversary



A delegation of national leaders on February 3 paid tribute to President Ho Chi Minh at his mausoleum and laid wreaths at the Heroic Martyrs Monument in Hanoi on the occasion of the 88th founding anniversary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV).



The delegation included Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, former Party General Secretaries Le Kha Phieu and Nong Duc Manh, President Tran Dai Quang, former President Tran Duc Luong, former National Assembly Chairman Nguyen Van An, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, and President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee Tran Thanh Man, among others.



The leaders showed respect and gratitude towards President Ho Chi Minh, the founder and leader of the CPV, a vanguard organisation of the working class and the nation, and a decisive factor for all victories of Vietnams revolution.



Currently, the whole Party, people and army are implementing the Politburos directive on strengthening the studying and following of the thought, morality and style of President Ho Chi Minh in combination with the Party Central Committees resolution on Party building.



At the Heroic Martyrs Monument, the delegation recalled the devotion of martyrs who sacrificed their lives for the national independence and reunification.



The same day, representatives from the Central Military Commission, Defence Ministry, Public Security Ministry, the Party Committee and Peoples Committee of Hanoi, and the Party Central Committees Commission for Organisation also paid tribute to the martyrs at the Heroic Martyrs Monument.



Leaders pay Tet visits to former Party chief Do Muoi

















General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) Nguyen Phu Trong visited former Party General Secretary Do Muoi at his home on February 2 on the occasion of the upcoming Lunar New Year (Tet) and the 88th founding anniversary of the CPV (February 3).



Meeting the former Party chief, who turns 101 on the day, Trong wished him good health and longevity, and informed him of the countrys situation as well as the works the Party and State are doing to develop the country.



Former Party General Secretary Do Muoi expressed his hope that the Vietnamese Party, State and people will continue upholding the spirit of solidarity and work to build a stronger and more transparent Party, for the interests of the nation and people.



Also on the day, President Tran Dai Quang paid a Tet visit to the former Party leader.



He said he hopes that former Party General Secretary Do Muoi would give more valuable suggestions to build a strong and transparent Party and foster the nations rapid and sustainable development.



Do Muoi, born on February 2, 1917, in Dong My commune in Hanois Thanh Tri district. He assumed the position as the Party leader from June 1991 to December 1997.



NA Chairwoman presents Tet gifts to poor families in Long An









Chairwoman of the National Assembly (NA) Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan (second from right) visited and presented gifts to policy beneficiaries, disadvantaged children and poor people in the Mekong Delta province of Long An on February 3



Chairwoman of the National Assembly (NA) Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan on February 3 visited and presented gifts to policy beneficiaries, disadvantaged children and poor people in the Mekong Delta province of Long An ahead of the 2018 Lunar New Year (Tet).



Ngan affirmed that the Party and State always remember the great sacrifice of war invalids, martyrs families and those who rendered service to the nation as well as pay attention to the material and spiritual lives of people.



The NA Chairwoman praised Long An for its comprehensive achievements in the previous year, saying they reflected the solidarity and efforts of local authorities and people.



She also called on local authorities at all levels and people to continue taking care of policy beneficiaries, poor households and people who made contributions to the nation.



Congratulations to re-elected Finnish President









Re-elected Finnish President Sauli Niinisto



President Tran Dai Quang on February 2 cabled a message of congratulations to Sauli Niinisto on his re-election as President of Finland for the second consecutive term.



Vietnam and Finland set up diplomatic relations on January 25, 1973.



Vietnam is among Finlands major partners in Asia and a bridge connecting Finland with other ASEAN members. The two countries have launched various exchange programmes and training cooperation, and about 2,500 Vietnamese students are currently studying in Finland, said Finnish Ambassador to Vietnam Kari Kahiluoto.



Finnish firms are paying heed to Vietnams market, especially in clean energy, environment, waste treatment, smart urban areas, information management and health care.



In addition, he stressed that Finland will promote the implementation of the Framework Agreement on Comprehensive Partnership and Cooperation between Vietnam and the European Union (EU) and accelerate the signing and ratification of the Vietnam-EU Free Trade Agreement, aiming to open new prospects in bilateral trade-investment cooperation.





Free Freightnet Membership

List your company in the Freightnet directory. It's Free, it's Easy and your company can be displayed in front of potential freight buyers within 24 hours.What to do

If you think you are a victim of contractor fraud, the Galveston County District Attorney's office wants to know. The major fraud division suggests the following advice:

 Call the law enforcement agency for your city or area. In addition to filing a report, you can also fill out a form for the county's major fraud division.

 Be organized. Keep all contracts, text messages, correspondence, copies of checks and receipts.

 Bring in everything you have when you make the complaint.

 If you want to also file a civil suit, you can do that. You would have to hire a lawyer.Galveston, TX (77553)

Today

Rain showers early will evolve into a more steady rain for the afternoon. High near 85F. Winds E at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 80%. Rainfall may reach one inch..

Tonight

Rain. Potential for heavy rainfall. Low 78F. Winds SE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall may reach one inch."Today I congratulate the Polish government. In just seven days it achieved something that Polish diplomacy couldnt achieve in 70 years" - saidcofounder of Beit Warszawa Severyn Ashkenazy in an interview with Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

Do you protest?

No, I congratulate. I congratulate the Polish government on proposing this law. For years our diplomats did not know how to defend Poland. They simply lacked the skills. The job of a diplomat is to be polite and diplomatic. They did not learn how to present arguments in defense of their country in an elegant manner, and too often they do not have the time or the knowledge to defend their country. I am speaking about diplomats who receive insufficient training, and are not prepared to defend Poland, especially against accusations of anti-Semitism. And I have said several times that for centuries Poland was a Jewish home.bohlah at 3-02-2018 02:00 PM (3 years ago) (m)

Billionaire daughter,DJ Cuppy (real name is Florence Otedola) was the official DJ at the Global Citizen event held in Dakar yesterday.

Billionaire daughter,DJ Cuppy (real name is Florence Otedola) was the official DJ at the Global Citizen event held in Dakar yesterday.

The event also had a session of teaching French President Emmanuel Macron and Senegalese President Macky Sall how to DJ.



Photos and videos from the event was captured captured by media mogul, Dele Momodu, and the event was also attended by superstar artiste Rihanna.



The event also had a session of teaching French President Emmanuel Macron and Senegalese President Macky Sall how to DJ.Photos and videos from the event was captured captured by media mogul, Dele Momodu, and the event was also attended by superstar artiste Rihanna.

Post Reply I have been reporting on latest news from Nigeria for almost 10 years now. I report on every possible news area I come across, but always ensure my reports are compiled with dignity and fact to uphold my personal values and duty as a journalist Posted: at 3-02-2018 02:00 PM (3 years ago) | Addicted Herobohlah at 4-02-2018 01:39 PM (3 years ago) (m)

The Nigerian Community in South Africa has confirmed the death of two members who were stabbed to death by a fellow Nigerian on Saturday.

The Nigerian Community in South Africa has confirmed the death of two members who were stabbed to death by a fellow Nigerian on Saturday.

It was gathered that the suspects Sunday from Anambra State stabbed 34 year old Ekweghiariri Chidi Isaac and one Nzechukwu Alabuche over business dispute.



The Secretary of Nigerian Union in South Africa, Emeka Ezinteje told the News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, that We have received a report that at 3.00am on Saturday, Mr Ekweghiariri Chidi Isaac, 34, a native of Ehime in Isiala Mbano Local Government of Imo and Mr Nzechukwu Alabuche, 35, from Azia in Anambra were stabbed to death by one Sunday from Awgbu in Anambra.



The incident occurred at Rossetinville, south of Johannesburg.



We understand that there was a business dispute between them, that made the assailant to stab the victims to death,



He said that the union had reported the incident to the Nigerian mission and the South African police.



The assailant is on the run while the police have commenced investigation into the incident.



The union condemns the killing of any Nigerian and will partner with relevant government agencies to ensure that justice is done in the case,



The secretary said that the police had taken the bodies to the hospital for autopsy. It was gathered that the suspects Sunday from Anambra State stabbed 34 year old Ekweghiariri Chidi Isaac and one Nzechukwu Alabuche over business dispute.The Secretary of Nigerian Union in South Africa, Emeka Ezinteje told the News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, that We have received a report that at 3.00am on Saturday, Mr Ekweghiariri Chidi Isaac, 34, a native of Ehime in Isiala Mbano Local Government of Imo and Mr Nzechukwu Alabuche, 35, from Azia in Anambra were stabbed to death by one Sunday from Awgbu in Anambra.The incident occurred at Rossetinville, south of Johannesburg.We understand that there was a business dispute between them, that made the assailant to stab the victims to death,He said that the union had reported the incident to the Nigerian mission and the South African police.The assailant is on the run while the police have commenced investigation into the incident.The union condemns the killing of any Nigerian and will partner with relevant government agencies to ensure that justice is done in the case,The secretary said that the police had taken the bodies to the hospital for autopsy.

Post Reply I have been reporting on latest news from Nigeria for almost 10 years now. I report on every possible news area I come across, but always ensure my reports are compiled with dignity and fact to uphold my personal values and duty as a journalist Posted: at 4-02-2018 01:39 PM (3 years ago) | Addicted Herobohlah at 4-02-2018 08:23 PM (3 years ago) (m)

Miss Emmanuelle Oziofu, a nine-year-old of Fortune Schools in Benin, Edo State, Nigeria. Has created a website called Food Website set to launch in February 2018.

Miss Emmanuelle Oziofu, a nine-year-old of Fortune Schools in Benin, Edo State, Nigeria. Has created a website called Food Website set to launch in February 2018.

She made this known at her ninth birthday celebration where she enthused



The website, known as Food website is to encourage both parents and children to eat healthy local and international dishes and to cut down on junk food. One of the contents of the website is Goodbye Junk Food, Hello Super Healthy Food, which contains all African food, continental dishes and a list of restaurants in various cities in the world.



The website also has a form for customers feedback. I am working on the food order, delivery content and also a mobile app that would be available on Google Play Store.



The young girl also talked about her venture into the world of Information and Communications technology:



At seven, I enrolled at Mikon Institute of Information Technology where I graduated with a certificate in Basic Training, with this I specialized in Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint. I also have a certificate in Desktop Publishing, Advance PowerPoint, Advance Excel, Corel Draw and Adobe Page Maker.



On her driving force, Ozoifu said



hard work and support from my parents helped me achieve the feat, and I am encouraging children to embrace ICT as a tool for national development. I want to be a gynecologist in future, and I believe my knowledge of ICT will enable me to practice my profession better, make me more innovative and render quality health care service.

The young ICT guru said she intends to teach children about ICT, expand her knowledge and break records before she turns 14.



Mr. Nelson Osamudiamen, Emmanuellas instructor, described her love for ICT as incredible and said Emmanuella is ever ready to learn.



Emmanuella has learned how to design a website, and I look forward to teaching her Java and other related programmes so that she can also be a website developer.



Osamudiamen advised parents and the Federal Government to create an enabling environment for children at a very young age to learn ICT.



Children in countries like China are doing very well when it comes to ICT; Nigerian children are smart and can also do well in ICT. The government should create a good ICT infrastructure in schools and the enabling environment for children to learn the course. She made this known at her ninth birthday celebration where she enthusedThe website, known as Food website is to encourage both parents and children to eat healthy local and international dishes and to cut down on junk food. One of the contents of the website is Goodbye Junk Food, Hello Super Healthy Food, which contains all African food, continental dishes and a list of restaurants in various cities in the world.The website also has a form for customers feedback. I am working on the food order, delivery content and also a mobile app that would be available on Google Play Store.The young girl also talked about her venture into the world of Information and Communications technology:On her driving force, Ozoifu saidMr. Nelson Osamudiamen, Emmanuellas instructor, described her love for ICT as incredible and said Emmanuella is ever ready to learn.

Post Reply I have been reporting on latest news from Nigeria for almost 10 years now. I report on every possible news area I come across, but always ensure my reports are compiled with dignity and fact to uphold my personal values and duty as a journalist Posted: at 4-02-2018 08:23 PM (3 years ago) | Addicted Heroxspraise at 4-02-2018 08:39 PM (3 years ago) (m)

The apartments linked with Senate President Bukola Saraki

Transparency International has accused the Senate President, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, of acquiring properties in the United Kingdom with proceeds of corruption worth 15 million.

The apartments linked with Senate President Bukola SarakiTransparency International has accused the Senate President, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, of acquiring properties in the United Kingdom with proceeds of corruption worth 15 million.

The properties are located at 7 and 8, Whittaker Street, Belgravia, London.



According to Transparency International, the report was conducted by Unexplained Wealth Orders, a new investigative power designed to help law enforcement agencies act on corrupt assets.



TI said the houses at the two addresses are owned by Landfield International Developments Limited and Renocon Property Development Limited.



The report said the companies are managed by Toyin Saraki, the wife of the Senate president, and one of Sarakis personal aides.



The report is particularly useful where there is no realistic prospect of cooperation or conviction in the country of origin, but there are sufficient grounds for suspicion that an asset has been acquired with the proceeds of corruption, UWO said.



Other people indicted in the report include Igor Shuvalov, Russian First Deputy Prime Minister; Ahmed Mahmoud Azwai, former Libyan Major General; Nawaz Sharif, former Prime Minister of Pakistan; and First family of Azerbaijan, a country in Asia.



It could be recalled that in 2015, Panama Paper exposed Sarakis ownership of at least three secret offshore firms, which he allegedly used in concealing assets abroad.



Also In November 2017, Saraki was named among over 120 politicians and leaders in nearly 50 countries who have reportedly been utilising shell companies in tax haven to conceal assets, evade tax or launder funds.







The properties are located at 7 and 8, Whittaker Street, Belgravia, London.According to Transparency International, the report was conducted by Unexplained Wealth Orders, a new investigative power designed to help law enforcement agencies act on corrupt assets.TI said the houses at the two addresses are owned by Landfield International Developments Limited and Renocon Property Development Limited.The report said the companies are managed by Toyin Saraki, the wife of the Senate president, and one of Sarakis personal aides.The report is particularly useful where there is no realistic prospect of cooperation or conviction in the country of origin, but there are sufficient grounds for suspicion that an asset has been acquired with the proceeds of corruption, UWO said.Other people indicted in the report include Igor Shuvalov, Russian First Deputy Prime Minister; Ahmed Mahmoud Azwai, former Libyan Major General; Nawaz Sharif, former Prime Minister of Pakistan; and First family of Azerbaijan, a country in Asia.It could be recalled that in 2015, Panama Paper exposed Sarakis ownership of at least three secret offshore firms, which he allegedly used in concealing assets abroad.Also In November 2017, Saraki was named among over 120 politicians and leaders in nearly 50 countries who have reportedly been utilising shell companies in tax haven to conceal assets, evade tax or launder funds.

Post Reply I am Victor, I write reportage on sport news and latest metro happenings in Nigeria. Posted: at 4-02-2018 08:39 PM (3 years ago) | HeroAs emergency managers, we are looking for attention to our profession and hoping for more support of our programs. One way to do that is to share what went right and what needs to be changed to improve our disaster response actions following a major disaster. Not everyone is comfortable with bearing witness to what went wrong during a response.I ran across this newspaper piece, What went wrong in Irma? Woes ran gamut from passwords to power Broward County, Florida should be commended for making their report public. Then I also noted that on their Home Page they have a prominent section devoted to Hurricane PreparednessiStock/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) -- Reaction across Capitol Hill to the controversial memo compiled by Republican staff on the House Intelligence Committee was swift.



Democrats harshly criticized the decision to release the memo, which President Trump authorized Friday morning in a letter relayed to the House Intelligence Committee. The memo details the process that led to the court-approved surveillance of former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, a suspected Russian agent.



Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, wrote in a statement Friday, "Chairman Nunes' decision, supported by House Speaker Ryan and Republican Members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, to publicly release misleading allegations against the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation is a shameful effort to discredit these institutions, undermine the Special Counsels ongoing investigation, and undercut congressional probes."



Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, called the decision "reckless and demonstrates an astonishing disregard for the truth."



"This unprecedented public disclosure of classified material during an ongoing criminal investigation is dangerous to our national security. This will make it far more difficult for the Intelligence Committees to conduct meaningful, bipartisan oversight of intelligence activities in the future. This action was also taken without regard to the damage it could do to our ability to protect Americans from threats around the globe," Warner said.



Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee, declined to comment on the memo when asked by ABC News.



In a letter to President Trump, top Democrats from the House and Senate warned against using the contents of the memo as a rational to fire special counsel Robert Mueller.



"We write to inform you that we would consider such an unwarranted action as an attempt to obstruct justice in the Russia investigation. Firing Rod Rosenstein, DOJ Leadership, or Bob Mueller could result in a constitutional crisis of the kind not seen since the Saturday Night Massacre," the letter, sent Friday by both Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and other members of the House and Senate leadership, said.



Senator John McCain, R-Ariz., also harshly criticized the release of the memo.



"In 2016, the Russian government engaged in an elaborate plot to interfere in an American election and undermine our democracy," McCain wrote in a statement Friday. "The latest attacks on the FBI and Department of Justice serve no American interests  no partys, no presidents, only Putins. The American people deserve to know all of the facts surrounding Russias ongoing efforts to subvert our democracy, which is why Special Counsel Muellers investigation must proceed unimpeded. Our nations elected officials, including the president, must stop looking at this investigation through the warped lens of politics and manufacturing partisan sideshows. If we continue to undermine our own rule of law, we are doing Putins job for him."



Other Republicans, however, defended the decision, saying the information needed to be released to the public in order to ensure full transparency.



Some Democrats expressed grave concerns over the precedent set by the release of the memo.



Republicans, like Representative Tom MacArthur, R-N.J., took a more nuanced approaching, acknowledging the concerns raised by the memo but also urging caution.

Representative Trey Gowdy, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said that while the memo raises concerns, he still has confidence in Mueller, the FBI and the Department of Justice.

Copyright  2018, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.This blog is dedicated to the understanding of the current Greek (but also European) economic, political and institutional crisis. It was created by Prof. Aristides Hatzis of the University of Athens , after many requests by his students who seek a source of reliable analysis on the Greek current affairs. Its aim is to post commentary and reports published mainly in the major U.S. and European media and to encourage a rigorous discussion.Social News 4/2

Enhancing rescue centres capacity is one of the most critical aspects of efforts to put an end to the bear bile farming industry in Viet Nam, experts emphasised at a forum yesterday.Initiated by World Animal Protection (WAP), the third Asiatic Black Bear Forum: Sharing experiences of bear bile farming management and keeping bears in the wild held in Ha Noi follows two previous efforts in China to become a platform for wildlife experts, non-government organisations, state agencies and related forces to discuss bear protection policies and solutions.Viet Nam was a hotspot of bear bile farming in the 2000s. However, over the past 13 years, thanks to cooperation between the Government and wildlife protection organisations, the number of farmed bears has decreased from more than 2000 in the period of 2006 to 2012 to about 1000 in 2017.Despite positive signs, according to Nguyen Manh Hiep from the Viet Nam Administration of Forestry, there are several challenges, including improving living conditions at rescue centres, especially in the southern region, and encouraging bear farm owners to hand over bears to the Government.Representatives of South Koreas National Assembly and Green Korea United Organisation (GKU) presented policies for combating the bear bile farming industry in their country. Their sterilisation programmes to ensure no new bear was born at bear farms were completed in early 2017. As of May 2017, there were only 660 sterilised bears captive at 36 farms. The progress has been made thanks to the advocacy by WAP and GKU towards the South Korea government and bear farm owners in the past 14 years.Jung-mi Lee, South Koreas National Assembly member, stressed the importance of the cooperation of public and private sectors in addressing bear bile farming.I think in South Korea and other countries including Viet Nam, peoples awareness of protecting animals is rising. Therefore, it is important for us to make bear farmers understand the significance of wildlife preservation beyond profits made from the bear bile trade, she said.Le Viet Dung, deputy head of ong Nai Province Forest Rangers, raised the idea of a safari which is large enough to receive, take care of and create a semi-wild environment for rescued bears.Because even sterilisation may be considered a violation against bears, he said.ong Nai Province is one of the localities, including Ha Noi, Hai Phong City and Binh Phuoc Province, implementing microchipping programmes developed by WAP in farmed bear management. The number of farmed bears here dropped from 163 to 91.Karanvir Kukreja from WAP said that innovations in the new microchipping programmes allowed experts to evaluate conditions of bears without using anesthesia. Moreover, WAP in collaboration with Education for Nature Vietnam (ENV) and Four Paws developed a detailed blueprint to put an end to bear bile farming.

















Quality education, good health and well-being, gender equality, zero hunger and poverty, peace, justice and strong institutions are the top goals that Vietnamese youth are ready to strive for.



This was revealed in the first-ever Youth Survey on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) released in Ha Noi on Friday.



At the launch of the survey, Caitlin Wiesen, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Country Director in Viet Nam, said UNDP had teamed up with the Sustainable Development Office of the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) and the Centre for Sustainable Development Studies to conduct this survey.



According to Wiesen, the aim of the survey was to better understand the concerns, perceptions and interests of the youth and which SDG goals they saw as vital for their future.



It is time to shift the notion of partnering with young people from engaging the youth as beneficiaries to partnering with the youth as agents of change, driving the SDGs and the future they want, she said.



More than 7,000 young people from all 63 provinces in the country responded to the survey, with nearly three-fourths of the respondents being female. More than 65 per cent of them lived in urban areas. Notably, three out of four respondents said they had not heard about the SDGs.



Coordination and support mechanisms by actors, gender-sensitive approaches, awareness campaigns and public engagement activities are among the key recommendations of the survey to empower the youth to take action in achieving the SDGs.



ao inh Tan, director of the Sustainable Development Office under MPI, said Viet Nam had registered to present the voluntary national report on SDGs implementation at the high-level political forum at the United Nations in New York in July this year.



The results and findings of this survey will be useful inputs for the report that Viet Nam is to present at the forum, Tan said.



Ha Tinh produces bumper orange crop for Tet



Farmers in central Ha Tinh Province have enjoyed a bumper crop of oranges and believed the Tet (Lunar New Year) price will bring them a high income.



Meanwhile, the local agriculture sector aims to apply sustainable cultivation practices to the development of large orange tree farms, with the goal of adapting to climate change.



According to a report by the Division of Agriculture and Rural Development of the provinces Huong Son District, there are 844ha of oranges ready for harvesting to supply the Tet market.



Le Quang Ho, the divisions head, said advanced cultivation techniques applied by local farmers have resulted in a bumper crop, estimating that each hectare yields 15 tonnes of orange fruits.



A report by local Ha Tinh newspaper said some trees bear so many fruits that they appear orange instead of green.



Ngo Xuan Linh, a farmer who owns an orange farm of 38ha in Son Mai Commune said he expected a total income of VN15 billion (US$660,000) from the orange fruits as this type of fruit is favoured by consumers nationwide thanks to its flavour.



Almost all fruits will ripen in the days ahead of Tet [which falls on February 15] and I believe I will make a high income thanks to the fruit quality, Linh said, adding that he planned to expand the total area to 50ha next year.



Local authorities supported the expansion by Linh and other orange farmers. Nguyen Kieu Hung, the districts deputy chairman said orange farms have lifted up the local economy and orange has been chosen as the key tree to flourish in the hard soil in this mountainous district.



Pham Quang Hung, a farmer in Huong Khe Districts Huong Thuy Commune, said he had 3,500 orange trees in his farm, expecting a yield of 20 tonnes of fruits and total income of VN1 billion (US$44,000) this crop, with market price of about VN80,000 each kilogramme.



Hung said the bumper crop was the result of organic cultivation. I used waste from husbandry and fermented soya bean to fertilise the trees. At the same time, I have a system that help water the trees with gradual drops, he said.



The provinces Department of Agriculture and Rural Development said its agriculture was hit hard by climate change, thus the department has encouraged local farmers to practice sustainable cultivation for adaptation.



The departments deputy director Le uc Nhan said the sector has facilitated the development of large farms using cultivation methods that are safe for environment, including the farms growing orange trees in the mountainous districts of Huong Khe and Huong Son.



The department also targeted the application of VietGAP (Vietnamese Good Agricultural Practice) criteria into the farms, expecting to export local orange fruits.



VFF ensures warm Tet for disadvantaged people



President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front (VFF) Tran Thanh Man has visited and presented Tet gifts to disadvantaged people and policy beneficiaries in the northern mountainous province of Ha Giang.



In a working session with the provincial leaders the same day, Man highlighted that the Party and Government always pay due attention to taking care of the poor and the policy beneficiaries.



He asked local authorities to continue its efforts to take care of the ethnic people and poor households with special circumstances and support them to develop socio-economy, alleviate poverty and improve livelihoods.



On the occasion, he presented 3 billion VND (132,000 USD) from the Central Emergency Response Fund to the provincial leaders. The money will be used to build houses for families affected by natural disasters.



The following day, VFF Vice President Bui Thi Thanh visited and extended warm Tet greetings to households in the Ta Nen resettlement area in Dong Nghe commune, Da Bac district, Hoa Binh province.



Sixty four Tet gifts, each worth 1 million VND (44 USD), were given to families in the zone.



The Ta Nen resettlement zone houses 64 families whose houses were collapsed in the historic flood in October, 2017.



Additional 1.8 billion VND to support mountainous children in Tuyen Quang



The National Fund for Vietnamese Children (NFVC) recently received 1.8 billion VND (79,200 USD) raised from the Singapore-Vietnam friendship charity run to build facilities at Sinh Long primary schools establishment in La village, Na Hang district, the northern mountainous province of Tuyen Quang.



The information was announced by the NFVC on January 28.



The friendship run is the first event organised by the Singaporean Embassy in Vietnam to kick off an array of activities in 2018 to mark 45th anniversary of the diplomatic ties between the two countries.



In the past years, both sides have enjoyed sound cooperation in the fields of politics, economy and culture.



HCM Citys district achieves target of no poor households



Ho Chi Minh Citys District 6 is the first in the city to no longer have households under the poverty line, achieving the target three years ahead of schedule.



According to the city standard, a poor household has an average income below 21 million VND (925 USD) per year per person, and a near-poor household has an average income of 21 million-28 million VND (1,233 USD) per year per person.



Early last year, District 6 had 660 poor households with 3,541 people, accounting for 1.13 percent of total households in the district, and 2,700 near-poor households.



Nguyen Thi Thu, deputy chairwoman of the Peoples Committee of HCM City, praised the districts achievements in poverty reduction.



The districts fund for poverty reduction provided a loans totalling 35 billion VND (1,541 USD) to more than 1,200 poor and near-poor households last year.



It awarded 5,200 scholarships worth over 5.1 billion VND (224,591 USD) to students, including more than 3,600 who live in difficult circumstances, and provided vocational training to 116 children living in poor and near-poor households.



Thu urged the district to continue to support policies for people living under difficult circumstances and ensure that poverty reduction is sustainable.



Scholarships, gifts given to people in need ahead of Tet



Scholarships and gifts have been presented to impoverished and ethnic people across the country to bring them a warm Tet (Vietnamese Lunar New Year) holiday.



The Vietnam Red Cross Society on January 26 allocated 6.57 billion VND (289,000 USD) for its chapters cross the country to aid poor families and Agent Orange/Dioxin victims ahead of Tet holiday.



The Red Cross Society plans to present at least two millions gift packages to help the disadvantaged households enjoy Tet.



The Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union Central Committee presented scholarships and gifts, including clothes and blankets, to impoverished ethnic students and families in the border districts of Trung Khanh and Ha Lang in northern Cao Bang province in a programme entitled Spring at border 2018.



They also brought a warm spring to border guards at Thi Hoa Border Guard Station with gifts and art performances.



Spring at border 2018 continued to take place in Ha Quang district of northern Cao Bang province on January 27.



Also, the Vietnam Youth Federations chapter in Hung Yen province provided free medical examinations for 200 policy beneficiaries in Da Loc commune, An Thi district.



Twenty gifts, each worth 1 million VND (44 USD), were given to disadvantaged families in the locality.



Vietnam-China friendship association established in Soc Trang



The Vietnam - China Friendship Association in the Mekong Delta province of Soc Trang was set up at its first congress held in January 26.



To Ai Vang, vice head of the provinces delegation of National Assembly deputies, was elected as President of the association for the 2018-2023 tenure.



The association has set the task to deepen the cordial relationship between Soc Trang and Chinese localities, contributing to the Vietnam-China friendship.



Soc Trang province is home to more than 65,000 people of Hoa ethnic group, accounting for 5.2 percent of the provinces population.



The same day, a ceremony marking the 68th year of Vietnam-China diplomatic ties (January 18, 1950 - 2018) was organised in Ho Chi Minh City by the HCM City Union of Friendship Organisations (HUFO) and the Vietnam-China Friendship Association in the city.



Speaking at the event, President of the Vietnam-China Friendship Association in HCM City Duong Quan Ha stressed that the traditional friendship between the two countries has been consolidated by their leaders and people over the years.



The Consul General of China in HCM City Chen Dehai lauded the local friendship organisations contributions to people-to-people exchanges of the two countries. Vietnam and China are important trade partners of each other and cooperation in other fields has also seen strong growth, the diplomat said.-



Workshop discusses biomass energy planning in Soc Trang



A consultation workshop on biomass energy planning in the Mekong Delta province of Soc Trang by 2020, with a vision to 2030, was held in the province on January 25.



The event was co-organised by the provincial Department of Industry and Trade and the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI).



Deputy Director of the department Le Thach Thanh said Soc Trang boasts huge advantages in agro-forestry development, which provides sources of biomass energy.



Biomass energy planning plays a significant role in promoting the provinces efficient use of biomass sources for electricity production in combination with agricultural development and improvement of local peoples livelihoods.



A biomass power plant of 12 MW using bagasse has been put into operation in the province while three new thermo power plants and wind turbines will be built in the coming time.



At the workshop, consulting agencies introduced legal framework for biomass planning, along with methodology, procedures and results of drafting provincial-level biomass energy plans and lists of proposed projects.



Participants also discussed regional biomass energy planning, cooperation between Soc Trang and other localities in tapping biomass energy potential, as well as environmental impacts and solutions to financial issues.



1968 uprising lessons remain significant to Vietnam today



The Mau Than General Offensive and Uprising in spring 1968 has left valuable historical lessons, especially those on how to promote the strength of the national great unity in the nation building and safeguarding cause today.



The statement was made by Nguyen Van Hung, deputy head of the Party Central Committees Commission for Mass Mobilisation, at a symposium on the general offensive and uprising held by the Ho Chi Minh National Academy of Politics in Hanoi on January 26.



The lessons stressed the need to gather high consensus of the entire Party, army and people under the sound leadership of the Party Central Committee and the strategic directions of the Central Military Commission; to specify clearly defence and security tasks in the national protection; to involve the entire people in defense and security; and to take advantage of support and help from international friends, according to Hung.



At the symposium, delegates focused on clarifying the sound guidelines and leadership of the Party Central Committee, the Political Bureau, and the Central Executive Committee of the People's Revolutionary Party of South Vietnam in the Mau Than General Offensive and Uprising.



They analysed the reasons behind the victory and historical lessons of the general offensive and uprising for the resistance war against US forces and the nations revolutionary cause.



Associate Professor, Doctor Nguyen Manh Ha from the Institute of Party History said that the general offensive and uprising was a turning point of the resistance war. It had been the biggest military effort and showed the highest determination to win of the entire Party, army and people since the beginning of the war.



It also created the most strong wave of protests against the USs war in the US itself and all over the world, Ha added.



The general offensive and uprising began in the early morning of January 31 in 1968 when liberation forces at the same time launched attacks on the enemys bases in cities such as Hue, Da Nang, Quy Nhon and Sai Gon, and hundreds of towns from Quang Tri to Ca Mau.



The offensive helped the liberation forces destroy huge amounts of facilities and logistics used by the US and the Southern regimes armies.



People in rural areas also took this opportunity to rise up against the US-backed governments administration at commune and district levels.



Sai Gon-Gia Dinh (now HCM City), the headquarters of the US-backed Southern regime, was a focus of the Mau Than offensive.



Tet gifts presented to people with disadvantages nationwide



One thousand gift packages worth a total 700 million VND (30,800 USD) have been presented to people with disadvantages nationwide to help them enjoy a happy Lunar New Year (Tet) as the traditional festival approaches.



On January 25, a delegation of the Vietnam Buddhist Sanghas Ho Chi Minh City chapter presented gifts to low-income families, the elderly and ethnic minority people in Phu Rieng and Dong Phu districts of southern Binh Phuoc province.



Meanwhile, the Vinh Phuc provincial Confederation of Labour held a Tet celebration for local workers. At this event, it handed more than 400 million VND (17,600 USD) to 40 workers to help them build houses while offering 635 million VND (28,000 USD) in aid for 324 others.



About 1,150 gift packages were also presented to workers in the northern province ahead of Tet.



The same day, the Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange (AO)/Dioxin visited and sent Tet gifts to war veterans who are AO/dioxin victims in Vinh Phuc province.



On January 22 and 23, the association also presented Tet gifts to AO/dioxin victims in the central provinces of Nghe An, Quang Tri and Thua Thien-Hue. From now to February 10, about a week ahead of the Lunar New Year, it plans to continue the tour offering Tet support in many other provinces, including Ha Giang, Tuyen Quang, Bac Giang, Tay Ninh and Binh Phuoc.



Vietnam to raise forest coverage, exports



Vietnam aims to raise its forest coverage to 41.6 percent and to earn 8.59 billion USD from exporting wood and forestry products while providing jobs to 25 million people in 2018.



This was announced at a meeting of the State Steering Committee on Forest Sustainable Development Target Programme for 2016-20.



Addressing a meeting in Hanoi on January 25, Deputy Prime Minister Trinh Dinh Dung, Head of the State Steering Committee on Forestry Sustainable Development Target Programme, said Forest protection and development must go hand in hand with socio-economic development, environmental protection and improving the peoples living conditions.



To achieve these targets, the first thing we have to do is to complete our national institution and policies on forestry production and development, Dung said. Forestry restructuring should start from good planning  an effective tool in the state management towards forest protection and development.



The Deputy PM also asked the Ministry of Planning and Development to work closely with the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to review all ODA projects on forestry development, particularly in the Central Highlands, northwestern region and coastal areas.



Dung set a target for the Steering Committee to complete a proposal on forest restoration, protection and sustainable development in the Central Highlands from 2016-25 by the end of the first quarter of 2018.



A report presented at the meeting said that by late 2017 the forestry coverage was 41.45 percent, an increase of 0.26 percent compared to that of 2016.



In 2017, more than 235,000 ha of concentrated forestry were planted  achieving 102.4 percent of the target. Meanwhile, the volume of wood products extracted from concentrated forest plantation was 18 million cubic metres, 6 percent over the targeted plan. Meanwhile the value of wood and forestry product exports was nearly 8 billion USD, an increase of 9.2 percent over the previous year.



The programme for Sustainable Forest Development for 2016-20 and Decision 419-TTg, issued on April 5, 2017, established the national programme to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through the mitigation of deforestation and forest degradation, conservation and enhancement of forest carbon stocks and sustainable management of forest resources through 2030.



French audience enjoy a night of Vietnamese music and culture



A concert titled Cham (Touch), hosted by the young musician Hoang Thu Trang, brought French audiences a glimpse of Vietnamese music and culture. The event was held in the cultural centre Espace Cosmopolis in the city of Nantes on February 3.



This is one of a series of art activities organised in the framework of AuxCoeurx du Viet Nam (To the Hearts of Viet Nam) to celebrate Viet Nam Month in Nantes. The event is organised by 80 non-professional artists who are Vietnamese students, Vietnamese residents of France and French people living in Nantes, Paris, Lorient and neighbouring provinces and cities.



Aux Coeurs du Viet Nam is organised by Viet Nam Loire Atlantique Friendship Association and the Association of Vietnamese Students in Nantes. The event features more than 20 activities introducing Viet Nam, its history, people and culture. It takes place from January 31 to February 18 in Nantes.



An exhibition featuring the costumes of the 54 different ethnic groups in Viet Nam was held at the opening event on Wednesday.



The concert Cham (Touch) brought the audience to Viet Nam  the S-shaped country in the southeast Asia with spectacular landscapes, rich culture and diverse food. Each song in the concert included French subtitles and be accompanied by fine images, which helped to give the audience the opportunity to touch and feel the quintessence of Vietnamese culture.



I combine traditional Vietnamese music with modern melodies, accompanied by images and light in order to bring the best experience to audience. There have been many difficulties as most participants are non-professionals and many in the team do not speak Vietnamese fluently but must perform in Vietnamese. We have been practising for three months to mount an hour on stage. Music will make us overcome all the geographic and language barriers and bring us close together, Trang said before the event.



In this concert, Trang launched her latest song  Ha Noi Cua Em, Ha Noi Cua Anh (Your Ha Noi, My Ha Noi).



Mai inh Lang Bien (Communal House of a Coastal Village) song is a sweet, peaceful melody about Vietnamese heritage and the inh lang (communal house), a place of community and worship that has been preserved for years.



Cheerful, festive melodies depicting the traditional Tet of Vietnamese people with the signature items of peach blossom flower and banh chung (square sticky rice cake) will also be featured.



The beautiful and poetic images of the capital of Ha Noi with Hoan Kiem lake, the flower season, the street covered with golden leaves and small alleys are illustrated in the two songs Ha Noi 12 Mua Hoa (Ha Noi, 12 Flower Seasons) and Ha Noi Cua Em, Ha Noi Cua Anh (Your Ha Noi, My Ha Noi).



The concert also introduced the audience to the unique features of Vietnamese music such as the flute or ca tru (ceremonial singing).



Nearly 80 non-professional artists prepared for the concert. They include Musique Rendez-Vous music band, comprised of Vietnamese students in France, and NEST VIET orchestra, whose 40 members are Vietnamese mothers and their children growing up in France.



Vu Tuyet Chinh in Nantes said, As a mother of two Vietnamese French children, I find it important to teach them Vietnamese and develop the love for Viet Nam. I have spent three months with the team and my children to prepare for the event. I practise with my children, learn Vietnamese songs and will have the opportunity to perform on such a big stage to introduce Vietnamese music and culture. It is such a memorable and precious experience for me and participants.



Hoang Thu Trang, who started composing at the age of 12 and graduated from Ha Noi Conservatory of Music, is currently living in Nantes. She is the founder of the music band Music Rendez-Vous in France. Over the last few years, Trang has organised more than ten concerts with the band across France to introduce and promote Vietnamese music and culture.



Work starts on memorial house for VGCL founder Nguyen Duc Canh



The Vietnam General Confederation of Labour (VGCL) and the northern port city of Hai Phong on February 3 started construction of a memorial house dedicated to Nguyen Duc Canh, founder of the Tong Cong Hoi Do Bac Ky, the predecessor of the VGCL, on the occasion of his 110th birthday.



Addressing the ceremony, VGCL President Bui Van Cuong recalled the revolutionary life of the late communist, who was once Hai Phong Party Committee Secretary. He said that the memorial house is expected to serve as a venue to remember the late leader.



Located in An Dong commune, An Duong district, the project covers 3.04 hectares and is scheduled to complete in 2019 on the occasion of the 90th founding anniversary of the Vietnam Trade Union.



In 2007, locals of Hai Phong built a memorial house for Canh and martyr Ho Ngoc Lan in Thong Nhat shoe company in An Duong district.



Canh was born on February 2, 1908 in Diem Dien village, in today Thai Thuy district of Thai Binh.



Being enlightened by the revolutionary ideology, he joined various patriotic movements in 1925-26 when he was studying in Thanh Chung Nam Dinh High School. Then he joined the Vietnam Youth Revolution Association, which was a turning point in his revolutionary life.



In 1928, he was assigned to work as Hai Phong Party Secretary. In 1929, the working class movement had developed well and Canh had made lots of contributions to Tong Cong Hoi Do Bac Ky (the predecessor of the Vietnam General Confederation of Labour).



In March 1929, at House No 5D, Ham Long street of Hanoi, the first Communist unit in Vietnam was established with eight members including Canh.



In June 1929, he was elected to be a provisional member of the Central Committee of the Indochina Communist Party.



In April 1931, he was captured by the French. Though he was tortured by the invaders, he did not reveal any secrets of the Party. He was sentenced to death by the French and was killed in 1932.



Earlier on February 2, a scientific seminar was held in Hai Phong to discuss the contributions of Canh to the working class and trade union development of Vietnam.



Vietnam-Cambodia Association helps tighten bilateral ties



The Vietnam-Cambodia Friendship Association has held a lot of activities in 2017 to contribute to tightening the friendship and solidarity between the two nations.



In the year, the association organised free health check-ups and treatment for people in Cambodias Svay Rieng province, and granted 1,000 gifts including medicine and medical equipment to locals, heard the associations conference to review its operation in 2017 and put forward 2018 tasks.



The associations local chapters also held numerous activities such as helping build houses, presenting scholarships to students, and providing medicine for people in Cambodias border provinces.



Speaking at the event, Cambodian Ambassador to Vietnam Prak Nguon Hong affirmed that the Vietnam-Cambodia Friendship Associations activities have helped nurture the friendship and solidarity between the two countries people.



On this occasion, the ambassador granted Orders of the Royal Cambodia and the Cambodian Prime Minister to the association and its outstanding members.



Workshop on CPVs founding, 1968 General Offensive held in Algeria



The Vietnamese Embassy in Algeria held a seminar on February 2 on the occasion of the 88th founding anniversary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) (February 3) and the 50th anniversary of the 1968 Spring General Offensive and Uprising (January 31).



Speaking at the event, Ambassador Pham Quoc Tru highlighted the significance of the foundation of the CPV on February 3, 1930 as well as the role of the Party in the countrys revolutionary cause and main achievements Vietnam has gained over the past nearly nine decades.



He also recalled major developments of the 1968 Spring General Offensive and Uprising, which marked a strategic turning point for the resistance war against the US and its lackeys.



Other delegates also focused discussions on the two topics of the seminar. They clarified the role of late President Ho Chi Minh and other Vietnamese leaders in the Party building and development process as well as the struggle for national liberation, building and safeguarding.



The event helped consolidate the trust in the Party among Party members and overseas Vietnamese in Algeria, helping them understand more about the foundation of the CPV and the role of the late President.-



Government provides rice for Nghe Ans farmers



Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue on February 2 instructed the Ministry of Finance to allocate rice from the national reserves to support people in the central province of Nghe An, who had suffered from a poor crop.



Accordingly, more than 794,710 tonnes of rice will be sent to the province.



The provincial Peoples Committee is responsible for promptly distributing the rice to people in need.





She may be new to the job, but she certainly is no stranger to the area.

Mary Kennedy is the economic development director for both the city of Blue Earth and Faribault County.

She is an employee of the company Community and Economic Development Associates (CEDA), of Chatfield, which recently contracted with both the city of Blue Earth and the county to provide professional assistance for economic development.

She was supposed to start her new job on Monday, Jan. 22, but it was delayed one day due to the big blizzard.

This is her first position with CEDA, but, this is not Kennedys first time in Blue Earth or Faribault County.

I grew up in Fairmont, she says. And I graduated from Fairmont High School. My family all lives in Fairmont, Mankato or Buffalo Center (Iowa).

Her parents are Mark and Julie Paskey and she is the youngest of six children. In fact, she has six nieces and nephews and she is closer to their ages than to her siblings.

After she graduated from Fairmont High (where speech was her favorite class and being in musicals and plays was her extracurricular activity), Kennedy went off to college at St. Cloud State. She was majoring in Planning and Community Development.

After two years, however, she transferred to Minnesota State University, Mankato, and was in their Urban and Regional Studies program.

She graduated this past December. But, Kennedy says she feels she has had a lot of experience in the field, as well.From May of last year until just recently, actually Friday, Jan. 19, I have been at an internship with the city of Jordan, Kennedy says. I was an intern in their city planning department.

CEDA came calling a few months ago, when they had a contract with the city of Jackson. But now, coming to Blue Earth is a much better deal she says.

I am really excited to be so close to my hometown, she says. I am lucky to land this position here, as CEDA has a lot of communities all over that they serve. So to get here is great.

And while she is very familiar with Blue Earth and Faribault County, she still plans to spend much of her time getting to know the community and especially the businesses and learn how she can be of help.

My biggest goal right now is to meet and get acquainted with as many people and business owners as I can, Kennedy explains. I want to build a relationship with them, develop open lines of communication, build their trust in me. I want to learn what the needs are, and let the city and county know I am here to help.

The CEDA contract with the city is for three days a week, while the one with the county is for two days a week. For now, Kennedys office will be at the Blue Earth City Hall, but it is expected to move to the Ag Center at some time in the near future.

There is one thing Kennedy cannot wait to get involved with.

I am really, really, excited about the Three Sisters buildings, she says. I think there can be some great things done with those buildings. And there could be something happening soon since people have an interest in them.

Kennedy says she has already toured the buildings and adds they are a great opportunity for someone in the community.

I am really looking forward to helping in any way I can to see them back to being used, she says. They are in such a great location.

When she was not busy completing her college degree, getting a new job, and helping with economic development, Kennedy says she likes to play with her puppy, play her guitar, and of course, spend time with her family and her boyfriend, David Mertens, of Wells.

When I was a Cardinal in high school in Fairmont, I never thought I would end up in Buccaneer territory, she laughs. But I couldnt be happier to be here. Blue Earth is a great city and a wonderful community, and it, and the county as a whole, has a lot to offer.

Kennedy has just started in her new job, but she is excited to get going and do as much as she can.

It will be interesting to see what happens here, and I have a feeling great things are going to happen, she says. I am just lucky to be here, help where I can, and be a part of it.



iciHaiti - Environment : Laying the foundation stone of the 6th Plant Propagation Center





Saturday Jovenel Moise accompanied by Prime Minister Jack Guy Lafontant and members of the Government went to Grand Pre (Quartier Morin) in the North for the laying of the first stone of the Center of Germplasm (**) and plant propagation, which will have a production capacity of 4.5 million seedlings a year. The building firm TURBO is in charge of the construction.



"[...] With this center of young people from the North will be trained as agricultural and environmental agents [...] This new Center of germplasm and plant propagation, sponsored by the Presidency, will contribute to the improvement of the plant cover of the country," said the Head of State.



Remember that this is the 6th Center launched in Haiti under the Moise Government:



The first Center was launched in July 2017 in Camp-Perrin (South Department, Les Cayes) https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-21531-haiti-environment-launch-of-a-central-nursery-in-camp-perrin.html ;



The second was launched in August 2017 to Fonds des Negres

(Nippes) last August https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-21931-haiti-agriculture-laying-the-foundation-stone-of-the-plant-propagation-center.html ;



The 3rd was launched in early October 2017 in Marfranc, in the department of Grand'Anse https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-22274-haiti-agriculture-third-plant-propagation-center.html ;



The 4th was launched at the end of October 2017 in the 3rd section Aubert commune of Port de Paix (North) https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-22550-icihaiti-agriculture-laying-of-the-first-stone-of-the-4th-plant-propagation-center.html ;



The 5th was launched in December 2017 to Levy first communal section of Camp Perrin (South) https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-22875-icihaiti-environment-inauguration-of-the-plant-propagation-center-south.html



Note that at least 4 of these 6 centers are funded through cooperation: 1 by Taiwan (Republic of China) and 3 by the Federal Republic of Mexico.



(**) Germoplasme : Qualifies any element derived from the plant capable of giving a new individual (DNA, seeds, cuttings etc...)



S/ iciHaiti

















The domain fishinghd.com may be for sale. Please click here to inquireDecision Making on Anti-Gun Bills Deferred Until Next Week by Senate Committee on Public Safety

From NRA-ILA, February 3, 2018

On February 1st, the Hawaii Senate Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs (PSM) heard Senate Bill 2046 and Senate Bill 2436. Decision making for both measures has been deferred until February 6th. The House Committee on Judiciary heard Bill 2024 and has deferred this measure. Please contact members of the Senate Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs Committee and urge their opposition to SB 2046 and SB 2436. Click the Take Action button below to contact committee members.

Senate Bill 2046 , sponsored by Senator Karl Rhoads (D-13), would make it a crime to own, manufacture, possess, sell, barter, trade, gift, transfer, or acquire a firearm accessory or any other device, part or combination of parts that is designed to or functions to accelerate the rate of fire of a semi-automatic firearm. In addition, SB 2046 would also criminalize installing, removing, or altering parts of a firearm with the intent to accelerate the rate of fire. The broad and overreaching provisions of SB 2046 could criminalize firearm modifications such as competition triggers, muzzle brakes, and ergonomic changes that are commonly done by law-abiding gun owners to make their firearms more suitable for self-defense, competition, hunting, or even overcoming disability. Decision making by PSM Committee is deferred until February 6th.

Senate Bill 2436 , sponsored by Senator Clarence Nishihara (D-17), would drastically shorten the time period a prohibited person, whether temporarily or permanently prohibited, has to comply with the current requirement to surrender their firearms from 30 days to an unspecified number of hours. This expedited time period could subject an individual, who may have nothing more than allegations as the basis for the prohibition, to an unfettered search of their home and/or business within hours of being accused; all this without taking into account the many issues surrounding surrender statutes in general, including possible violations of an individuals right against self-incrimination. Decision making by PSM Committee is deferred until February 6th.1 / 3 Josh Ellars, founder of Patri. Courtesy Patri 2 / 3 Promotional image showing Patri software. Courtesy 3 / 3 Promotional image showing Patri software. Courtesy  

When private sector solutions can solve public sector problems, its a winning situation for both sides. But many companies struggle to find how their puzzle piece fits with government needs.

Spencer Dent, co-founder of Clozd, said public/private sector partnerships can be very profitable and successful for both sides, but are much more complicated than business-to-business transactions. Business contracts with government entities are unique because, among other things, the decision-making process is longer and involves multiple decision points, and companies often need additional qualifications or certifications to work with these groups.

Many tech companies spend far too much time chasing government business that, in some cases, they have no business chasing. They have tons of investment costs going into marketing to this sector, Dent said. It is a consistent, common pain point across all tech companies that wasnt solved.

Josh Ellars, a colleague of Dents, founded Patri to solve just this problem. The Springville-based company launched in October 2017, but is already serving companies in Silicon Valley, the District of Columbia, and others, in addition to Utah businesses.

Globally, the public sector IT market spends $430 billion annually, Ellars said, explaining that it can be very lucrative for tech companies to work with the government. But too often, tech companies dont know how to do business with the public sector.

Many companies, Ellars said, enter the public sector market too slowly or do not even understand how to navigate the process. Thus, they lose out in millions of revenue. Patri helps to simplify the process.

Ellars has years of experience facilitating these relationships, and part of his service at Patri, is to consult and train business teams who are pursuing government contracts. But he also wanted to allow these same teams a platform to autonomously assess and decide on government requests for proposals.

Thus, Patris software platform, built in partnership with Provo-based Start Studio, was born.

Josh has systemized it in a unique way, Dent said. If youre trying to climb the ladder to selling to the government, Patri gives you the rungs, and the ladder itself. This is a no-brainer in the amount of money it will save you.

Patris software, known as Bid Score, allows companies to prioritize bid opportunities they should pursue. Dent explained that most companies try to put a team and processes in place to make these decisions, but often are setting up the process blind. Responding to requests for proposals is a long process in itself, and researching which ones are a fit for a company can take hundreds of man-hours. Patris software does this work instead.

It assesses the RFP and tells you your likelyhood of winning the RFP, while highlighting the strengths and weakness of your company. It allows companies a data-driven decision process, Ellars said.

Ellars leverages a robust advisory board at Patri, and will be adding to his team this year, as he is the companys only employee so far. Despite that, Patri, and Ellars consulting services are in demand both locally and nationally. He expects the business to expand significantly in the coming years as it isolates companies that are the best fit for public sector business.Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily!

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Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items.A police patrol car was involved in a crash with another vehicle Saturday morning in west Houston, according to authorities.

The Houston Police Department SUV was hit around 12:20 a.m. on Eldridge Parkway and Rincon after a gray Toyota Camry failed to yield at a stop sign and drove in front of the patrol vehicle, authorities said.Alarming efforts by Houston ISD Superintendent Richard Carranza to perform a lobotomy on the state's largest school district seem all the more radical when you consider a policy the school board adopted only three months ago.

Carranza has said he wants to centralize the district long celebrated for its decentralized approach. Instead of principals making decisions for each unique campus, more decisions would be made by somebody sitting in central office.

That flies in the face of what the board voted to support in November.

"The District is fully committed to a de-centralized system of schools, giving principals the authority over the educational and operational systems," reads the board's educational philosophy.

It clearly states the board's belief that decision-making on campuses should "be placed as close as possible to the teacher and the student," and that the board and the superintendent should pretty much play supporting rules until poor performance triggers intervention.

OPINION: Make Houston ISD magnet schools diverse again

"The central office shall turn the traditional management pyramid upside down and become an enabler rather than an enforcer," the policy states. "Its role shall be to train, consult, provide resources and evaluate."

The vote on Nov. 9 was 5-1, with two absent. But even the trustee who voted against, Anna Eastman, who term has since expired, says her opposition had nothing to do with the philosophy of the policy, which she supports, only her desire to get more input from stakeholders.

The document explicitly states: "Schools shall be given control over budgets, delivery of curriculum, teaching methodologies, and personnel, provided they are led by a strong and effective principal, function as a team, and collaboratively develop a vision and a plan to achieve that vision."

Sounds rational. Of course, principal performance is often the rub. But the board provides for the scenario where a school leader doesn't have the skill set for maximum autonomy. The level of freedom is conditioned on how well schools perform, innovate and demonstrate operational excellence, the document states.

"However, other schools may need greater support and guidance; and until they reach acceptable levels of performance, the District must manage for them critical areas such as curriculum, professional development, and operational systems."

Fair enough. As I asked in a previous column, why throw out an entire system when you can just address the few folks having trouble with it?

Another controversial reform proposed by Carranza and his staff would take Houston schools from a weighted funding system, giving students who are learning English, have disabilities, or are gifted, extra funding to address their special needs, to a model known as "FTE," which traditionally gives the same amount of funding to each child.

OPINION: Before proposing changes to school funding, HISD administrators should do their homework

The reason given by Carranza's finance chief, Rene Barajas, and the president of HISD's board of trustees, Rhonda Skillern-Jones, is that the FTE system promotes equity. But equity was the very reason HISD pioneered the current system in the 1990s.

A system that abandons personalization in favor of standardized funding may be equal, but it's certainly not equitable, as I wrote previously.

Apparently back in November, the board, including Skillern-Jones, who voted for the policy, agreed.

"Closing achievement gaps requires unequal resources for unequal needs," the policy states. "Weighted funding allocations address individual differences, allowing the money to follow the child in accordance with his or her unique instructional needs and thereby ensuring access to the resources that enhance student achievement."

Now, the superintendent doesn't have a vote on such policies. And it doesn't appear Carranza needs a board vote to change to the FTE model. But his staff should at least know the board philosophy on the issue. When I asked Barajas about the policy last week, he seemed unfamiliar with it.

I also asked Skillern-Jones why she would vote for such a policy when she told me last week that she's long been in favor of centralizing. She said "that was the plan we were on" then, but this is now.

"We're hired a new superintendent who has a different vision that I support," she said.

Carranza had been on the job more than a year before the board approved the policy. But since the vote, the board has seen turnover and the district announced a grave financial crisis that calls for deep cuts  which may have created the political will to change the system. Carranza's staff maintains the cuts have nothing to do with the shift to centralization, but Skillern-Jones holds another view.

She says HISD simply doesn't have the funds to maintain the current model, including weighted funding for special populations. She says it favors large schools and keeping it would force smaller campuses to close.

"I don't understand how people think that's OK," Skillern-Jones said. "I don't see how anyone can support taking schools away."

At that same time, the board president maintained that "I don't support one-size fits all," so she has asked the superintendent to assess each school's needs, and then split the remaining dollars equally among campuses for "wants."

Carranza's plans aren't finalized, and details are unclear. He may be thinking of a hybrid plan that would address some concerns.

But the fact that his philosophy is diametrically opposed to one recently adopted by the board that governs the district shows a disconnect and suggests Carranza's plan evolved in haste, rather than through a careful deliberative process.

Consider that the current system took years to design, because it involved the input and study of hundreds of Houston business and civic leaders working with the district through committees and advisory groups.

"It was the work of the city," said Don McAdams, a former trustee who served during the overhaul. "It took four years to really cycle it through.

McAdams, who became a school reform expert, has written books on the subject, has performed case studies of districts across the country, and has trained administrators in hundreds of districts, says decentralization is the model that seems to work best.

"The more you empower a school and give them (principals) a sense of ownership, the more innovative and creative they'll be, the more enthusiastic they'll be about their work," he said.

But, he adds, "it only works well if it's combined with good measures of performance and accountability."

That's the area that needs some work in HISD. The thing that doesn't work, McAdams says, is funding all kids the same.

"That would be like having two children and one of them needs brain surgery and you spend the same amount on both of them," he told me.

That makes about as much sense as pushing through reforms that advocate the opposite of what the elected trustees say they stand for - at least on paper.

Superintendent Carranza, slow down and listen to what many parents and members of the community are saying.

Meaningful improvement is not a top-down exercise.

But don't take it from me. Consult the policy of the board who hired you  Page 4, fourth paragraph.The FBI's investigation into possible collusion between Russia and a prominent presidential campaign is a worthwhile one, in my opinion.

The internet's ongoing investigation into the Russia investigation, by contrast, is entirely fruitless, and has already driven many Americans, on both sides of the aisle, to the edge of reason.

That was clear this week, after pundits turned their attention to a secret memo, produced by Republican U.S. Rep. Devin Nunes, which was ultimately released on Friday by the White House.

The decision came after the Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee, which Nunes chairs, voted in favor of authorizing its release. That happened on Monday, after about a week's worth of rumors that the memo would show that the FBI's investigation is politically motivated - as Donald Trump, now the president, has repeatedly insisted.

DECLASSIFIED: GOP memo criticizing FBI surveillance is released

Democrats on the committee were opposed to its release, on the basis that the memo draws on classified information, which Nunes' staffers had cherry-picked. The FBI seconded those concerns.

"As expressed during our initial review, we have grave concerns about the material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo's accuracy," the FBI said in a public statement issued on Wednesday.

Now that the memo has been released, we can see that Democrats, and the FBI, were telling the truth.

The memo alleges that the FBI abused its power while conducting surveillance of a former Trump campaign aide, Carter Page - and that their efforts to do so were signed off on by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, among other people.

The memo also notes that the FBI sought approval to conduct surveillance of Page as part of an investigation that was triggered by information it received about a different Trump campaign aide, George Papadopoulos, in July 2016.

ANALYSIS: Rep. Nunes drops his cherry-picked memo: This is it?

The FBI agent who launched that investigation, Peter Strzok, is demonstrably not a Trump fan. During the course of the 2016 election he sent many texts criticizing the Republican nominee to an FBI lawyer with whom he was personally involved, named Lisa Page.

And so, long story short, the Nunes memo is apparently designed to give readers the impression that the Russia investigation is a "witch hunt," as Trump says. It also seems to provide a pretext that Trump might use to fire Rosenstein, who has thus far refused to fire Mueller, to the clear frustration of Trump, who wants to scuttle the Russia investigation.

But Trump, as president, doesn't actually need a pretext to fire Rosenstein. So I suspect that the goal of the Nunes memo is to provide a pretext for Congressional Republicans, who may be called on at some point to defend Trump for doing so.

What's strange is that congressional Republicans actually have no need for such a pretext either, because Rosenstein himself had already provided them with a reason to defend Trump if, or when, he makes such a decision.

Last year, Rosenstein authored a memo criticizing how James Comey, who was then the FBI director, had handled the investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server during her years as Secretary of State in the Obama administration. The White House used that memo to defend Trump's decision to fire Comey, and to deny that it had anything to do with Comey's refusal to scuttle the Russia investigation.

OPINION: Why I voted to release the Nunes memo

I bring all this up because many Americans are worried that for Trump to fire Rosenstein would be an attack on the rule of law - and a decision that might even put us at risk of a constitutional crisis.

I agree with them that the rule of law is under assault, and that Trump is among the politicians who's been assaulting it lately. But he does so haphazardly, if not accidentally, and in such an explicitly egocentric way that I'm not sure he's actually undermining the concept, really.

We already know that Trump believes he's above the law. He's said so repeatedly. He has actually bragged about his ability to flout the rules that govern regular people, most notoriously on the "Access Hollywood" tape.

In a sense, this notion was central to the sales pitch that he made to voters, during the course of the Republican primary. At the Fox News debate in March, for example, Trump bragged that he could compel the military to obey his orders, even if they were illegal.

"If I say do it, they're gonna do it. That's what leadership is all about," he said.

But Trump's point was that the other contenders for the GOP nomination could not promise such results to the American people. And what's intriguing, all things considered, is that Trump seems to have accepted that there are certain constraints on the powers of the presidency. He's occasionally expressed how frustrating that is for him personally.

It's as if Trump believes that he is above the law, but understands that the president may not be. Or, perhaps, it's been a relief to learn that the powers of his office aren't limitless, since he believes his own to be.

The people undermining the rule of law, I would argue, are the ones who have explicitly defended Trump's self-declared right to do whatever he pleases in other situations, or tacitly accepted it by, for example, ignoring his breezy attacks on our nation's top law enforcement agency.

But I don't think we're at imminent risk of a constitutional crisis as a result of the memo's release. Trump can't fire Mueller directly, because Mueller was appointed by Rosenstein. But Trump could fire Rosenstein, and nominate someone more compliant as his replacement. That might not be a popular decision, or a good one. But it wouldn't be out of bounds, legally.It was late Saturday afternoon, and the weather was cold and drizzly, but here was Lupe Valdez's chance to introduce herself to Houston voters as a Democratic gubernatorial candidate, and she was doing so with enthusiasm.

"It's about the grassroots," said Valdez, 70, to the cheering crowd of about 40 people gathered around picnic tables at the West Alabama Ice House. "I care about the common person."

Not quite a month had passed since Valdez, on Jan. 7, launched her campaign, which she runs out of her home. She had announced she would run a month before that, on Dec. 6, when she resigned from her 12-year post as Dallas County Sheriff. Valdez was the state's first Hispanic, lesbian sheriff.

A Democrat has not been elected governor of Texas in nearly three decades, making Valdez's bid a long shot, political scientists have said. But Valdez had planned from the start to gain support by driving her Tacoma pickup across the state. She has walked in the women's march in Austin, gone to a Mexican restaurant in McAllen and rallied supporters at Alamo Beer in her native San Antonio. She'd been already to Houston once for a candidate forum.

MORE: Lupe Valdez rolls out Democratic challenge to Gov. Greg Abbott

The meet-and-greet on Saturday marked Valdez's fourth and final public event of the day. Earlier, she had mingled with Democrats in Pasadena and chatted with local precinct chairs in Houston. Midday, in a church nearby, she'd lost the Houston GLBT Caucus endorsement to one of her eight opponents for the nomination, Andrew White, a Houston entrepreneur and son of late Gov. Mark White. (White also has a campaign event planned at the West Alabama Ice House on Wednesday.)

Now, at a distinctly Houston spot as beloved for the tacos sold across the street as for its beer, Valdez wore rolled-up jeans and drank a Topo Chico as she spoke about the importance of education, the need for compassion in law enforcement and the lack of strong state leadership that allows people, as she put it, to disagree without tearing each other apart.

"Somebody needs to stand up and lead," she said.

For much of the two-hour event  to which she arrived early and stayed late  Valdez shook hands, gave hugs and listened. She met people like Tom Caraher, 23, a graduate student at the University of Houston who was curious what Valdez was all about, and Catherine Louvier, 60, who had driven from Sugar Land hoping also to learn more about Valdez's platform.

"She seems really personable," Caraher said.

"I like the fact that she's so accessible to everybody," Louvier agreed.

RELATED: Andrew White raises $200K, Lupe Valdez at $46K in Dem race

There were clear Valdez supporters, like a coordinator from the Texas Gulf Coast Area Labor Federation, which had endorsed Valdez. And others, such as Carla Valenzuela. As a Latina, Valenzuela said that  in addition to liking Valdez's positions on education, her past experience and support of the GLBT movement  it meant a lot to her to see another Latina run for the position.

"I see me in her," she said, surprised as tears fell from her eyes.

Friends James Taylor and Ed Mason, who had just met Valenzuela, listened as she spoke. Taylor recalled never expecting Barack Obama to be elected president or Annise Parker elected Houston's mayor. Anything, perhaps, is possible.

Valdez's fundraising has fallen well short of White's, and both lag far beyond Gov. Greg Abbott, but to Valdez that did not matter, she said. The people in the room would be power enough.Winning the governor's mansion in 2018 is a long shot for any Texas Democrat.

Gov. Greg Abbott is the comparatively popular leader of a Republican Party that hasn't lost a statewide election in almost a quarter century. And he has amassed a staggering $43 million campaign fund, almost enough to mail every registered voter in the state a check for three dollars.

ENDORSEMENTS: See who the Houston Chronicle editorial board supports in the primaries

Nonetheless, Democratic voters casting their ballots in next month's primary will choose between nine candidates for governor. Most of them have no chance of winning, but they're running anyway for the simple and admirable reason that they believe somebody has to offer Texans an alternative to the state's cynical current leadership.

Democrats need to choose the candidate who, quite simply, will appeal to the most voters in a contest against Abbott. We believe that candidate is Andrew White.

JOE STRAUS: Texans, make your voices heard in primaries

White, 45, is a Houston entrepreneur who's never before run for office, but he's not exactly a political novice. He's basically the Democratic George W. Bush of this race. Like Bush in 1994, he's never won an election. And like Bush, his most valuable political asset is his father's name. He's the son of former Gov. Mark White, an education reformer who was respected by many Texas Democrats until the day he died last August.

White has cast himself as a common sense Democrat running for governor "to bring sanity and reason back to state government." His top priority is improving public education, and he's campaigning on a pledge to give every public school teacher a $5,000 a year raise. White proposes to fund his teacher pay hike by closing loopholes under which big businesses routinely dodge paying billions of dollars in commercial property taxes.

We're not exactly fans of political dynasties, but White ultimately won our endorsement with his answer to one obvious question. He's the only Democratic gubernatorial candidate who seems to have given serious thought to the state government's role in protecting Gulf Coast residents from flooding. While the other candidates who spoke to our editorial board offered only vague thoughts about this critical issue, White specifically discussed the need for a third reservoir in west Harris County and the importance of leveraging federal funds to build a coastal barrier system.

EDITORIAL: Let 2018 become the year voters demand action on flood control

After Hurricane Harvey, flood control should be the top concern voters in the Houston area consider when they cast their ballots. Maybe White has a grasp of the issue only because he lives here and he piloted his boat around inundated neighborhoods rescuing flood victims. But any serious candidate for governor speaking to people in Houston should have good answers for basic questions about this topic.

Here's how seriously we take flooding issues. If not for his fuzzy answer to this predictable question, we might have thrown our support to another candidate. Adrian Ocegueda runs a private equity firm in Dallas, and he was an economic policy adviser to the mayor of El Paso. Beyond his views on priorities like education and health care, Ocegueda brings up big issues that aren't on any other candidate's radar. He's concerned Texas isn't doing enough to train workers who are about to lose their jobs as technology displaces human labor. He even has the courage to touch the third rail of Texas politics, suggesting we need to seriously discuss introducing a state income tax. Ocegueda is a conspicuously smart and impressive candidate who has little or no chance of becoming governor, but he deserves serious consideration if he decides to run for another office.

HEY HOUSTON: Register to vote now!

Lupe Valdez, the former sheriff of Dallas County, is arguably the most high profile contender in this primary, but she also stumbled over flooding questions. Also on the ballot are Jeffrey Payne, a Dallas business owner; Joe Mumbach, a Houston audio-video technician making his first run for public office; and Grady Yarbrough, a retired educator and perennial candidate for statewide office. Three other candidates - Tom Wakely, James Jolly Clark and Cedric Davis Sr. - did not appear before our editorial board.

Next month, Democrats must pick a standard bearer with the best chance of winning votes not only for him or herself, but also for candidates running in down-ballot races. They would be wise to choose Andrew White as their nominee for Texas governor.FINEST KIND CLINIC AND FISHMARKET.... Discussing medicine, culture, and the joys of cooking Pansit.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.

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IT IS VERY IMPORTANT TO USE THE NUMBER OFF OF THE MOST RECENT ISSUE OR ANYTHING AFTER JANUARY 28, 2019 TO GAIN ACCESS!

OLD ACCOUNT NUMBERS WILL NOT WORK

The account number and zip code are easily available on your most recent issue of the High Plains Journal or Midwest Ag Journal in the address fields as is shown here. Sometimes the account number has extra zero's in front of it, just ignore those.In a forward-looking research project at Aalto Universitys Business School in Helsinki, together with partner companies and public organisations such as the Finance Ministry of Finland , we are studying one of the future change drivers, blockchain technology . Much media attention is given to blockchain and its best-known use case, Bitcoin . However, the most impactful business and societal implications of blockchain are yet to be discovered, despite ongoing experimentation ranging from finance and logistics to healthcare and beyond.

The power of blockchains

Different types of blockchain technologies and other decentralised ledger technologies are important building blocks of our future. When they are combined with AI, AR/VR, IoT, robotics or 3D printing, they provide completely new ways to set up the societies we live in. They hold the potential to disrupt not only the internet, but the way our societies are governed and what we know of as the current way of doing business. The impacts could be vast. Blockchain technologies are already being applied to the fields of finance, government, IoT, energy, accounting, logistics, insurance, healthcare, education, record keeping and governance.

Why are they so powerful? Blockchain technology is a novel data-architecture. We live in the data-driven era. The most important businesses, such as Google and Amazon, are about data. Blockchain technology stores data in a decentralised way in multiple computers to make sure it is not tampered with. There are hundreds of different decentralised ledger technologies today and their governance structures ensure that a single computer cannot decide what data is stored. This way, we can trust that the stored information will not be corrupted by a party that would benefit from it. The system creates programmable trust.

Trust in the data-driven society

Trust is the building block of any transaction and our society is based on transactions. If there were no trust, we would not dare to make any transactions. To ensure trust, we have traditionally done business with people and businesses who we were familiar with, or if that was not possible, we used third parties to ensure trust.

In a data-driven society, we would like to find trust fast, at the location of the transaction and with low cost. The availability of internet and all the different mobile apps have opened up a possibility to engage in transactions with far more people and businesses than the generation before us did. We cannot know all of these new business partners and if they broke their part of the deal, how would we go after them? It is costly to be cheated, so there is a price for being able to prevent it, i.e. trust. Also, the market for trust has grown as there is more demand for it. Traditionally, for example, banks, agents, referees or custodians have been able to take high fees in exchange for trust. However, the market mechanisms for buying trust as we knew previously, do not serve us anymore. Trust needs to be more readily available and have a lower price point per transaction. There are two new solutions to trust: reputation systems and blockchains.

Governance models of the future

In 2008, an unknown author with the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto wrote a whitepaper which described the governance model of the bitcoin blockchain. It detailed a governance structure that enabled a currency without a central authority watching over it. That introduced new power structures to the financial world. It showed that blockchains can change business models and governance systems. Potentially, we could do all transactions in peer-to-peer networks and third parties would not be needed anymore.

Today there are a variety blockchains with a variety of governance systems. There are also different types of options on who is allowed to access and store data on them. There are public blockchains, federated blockchains, private blockchains, permissioned and permissionless blockchains. Generally, the more closed the system is, the more focused it is on creating process efficiencies for a defined number of users. For giving more power to the larger community and for creating new business models, the blockchain governance systems need to be more open and permissionless. Blockchain-based identification systems can further enhance novel governance structures, by giving the ownership of data to the people who created it. There are numerous ways to enhance and redesign blockchain governance systems to better fit our understanding of fair societies.

An opportunity

Blockchains will be part of our lives. It may take even a decade to develop the infrastructure to the point that blockchains will be mainstream. They are over-hyped and as such, many pilots will fail. The beginning will be slower than what we expect, but they are here to stay. Before long, blockchains will be used in everyday lives and they will dictate how we are governed.

How we create trust and whom we trust, how we exchange value and how power is distributed will be completely transformed. We are still at the beginning of the blockchain era and it is a good time to affect the governance of a society and to reimagine how it could serve you in the best possible way.

Our research

These are the types of questions that we at the ReCon research project are thinking about and experimenting on. Certainly, we engage in pilot projects, hackathons, studies, workshops and keynotes. Our mission is to describe, analyse and experiment on the potential societal impact and new business models of blockchain-like technologies. More information regarding the ReCon research team and our partner organisations can be found at http://recon.site/

Source: https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/blockchains-trust-power-governance-models-future/41705/The library has been on Main Street since 1925 but hasn't seen much for visitors in recent years. The library will be looking to get an updated globe too. The small library was built in 1925. What the library looked liked before. The collection was very dated. Furniture was dated and a children's area was improved. The books are a lot more organized now. PreviousNext

Small Forgotten Hancock Library Spurred Back To Life



After being elected as a library trustee, Olivia Johnson has dedicated herself to reviving the Taylor Memorial Library. HANCOCK, Mass.  Olivia Johnson loves the role libraries play in a community.

She went to her local library, the Taylor Memorial Library on Main Street, opened the doors and it was musty. The 1925 building retained moisture. The books on the shelves were breaking apart. They were disheveled. And most of them dated back to the 1950s or before.

There wasn't much of a catalog and what was there was out of order or mislabeled. She spun the globe that sat on one of the tables and when it came to a rest, she saw the U.S.S.R.

"I believe if you want to see change, you have to be part of change," Johnson said.

Johnson was elected as a library trustee two years ago and has set her mind to revamping the Taylor Memorial Library. She found volunteers, revitalized the collection, updated the cataloging, organized the space, and last month held a grand re-opening, with expanded hours and expanded collection.

"It was daunting when you look at a considerably aged collection, the majority of which were 1950s and earlier. It did feel overwhelming especially when we are only here two hours a week. We didn't see people coming through the door. It was, 'where do we start?'" Johnson said.

For the first year of being a trustee, she saw about 10 different people come through the library, which was only opened for two hours a week. She believed that many in town didn't even know it existed. So she started making the presence known.

"We didn't have a Facebook, free marketing. We didn't have a website, free marketing. We just didn't have visibility in any way," Johnson said, and now the library has both.

She wanted a road sign indicated the library's location and started looking up prices but wasn't sure how she'd pay for it out of the $5,875 annual budget.

She emailed the state Department of Transportation asking how to go about doing it. The department said it would put it up for free. Five days later, a sign was installed on Route 43 directing drivers where to go.

"It is amazing to me. I didn't know what I needed to do. I researched how much it would cost. We have such a meager budget, how was I going to afford signs?" Johnson said. "It may not seem like much but to me that was astounding."

She shared her vision with others and ultimately got connected with Williams College. The college was tearing down the building that housed the math and science library and offered her the shelving units. She rallied four volunteers to disassemble and then reassemble the units in Hancock.

And then started the dreaded process of weeding the collection. She had made connections with a number of volunteers and librarians from all over Berkshire County and Pownal, Vt., and Stephentown, N.Y., and together they launched on a process to properly label and organize the collection. The owner of Down in Denver Bookstore pitched in her time.

"We weeded, which is a very normal and natural protocol for libraries but it hadn't been done. It is a daunting process when you don't know where to start. We started and then kept going and going and going," Johnson said.

The collection is now organized and neatly lined up on the new shelves. The next step was to update it and bring in new books. Friends groups from a number of libraries offered a number of materials from books to DVDs to audiobooks.

"They use the book sales to raise money for themselves so for them to be willing to do this for us is admirable," Johnson said.

When a nearby bookseller went out of business, Johnson was able to get a lot of new books at an inexpensive price to add to the collection. And then the work of cataloging continued as the new books were organized and added to the shelves.

"We took a collection that was incredibly dated and we updated it. We didn't want to get rid of everything so if the book was in good enough shape, we kept it," Johnson said.

But because so few patrons had been coming in, Johnson doesn't know exactly what they would want.

"You want to make sure what you are purchasing is what people want. If you don't have people coming through the door, you don't know what that is. So you have to run the gambit," Johnson said.

Sears donated a dehumidifier to keep the materials from getting musty, someone else donated new smoke detectors. Some new furniture was donated and lots of volunteer time cleaning the space was given.

Williams College donated a pull-down movie projector and Brain Spiral is donating a projector. The DVD collection went from just a few to two shelving units. The audios went from three to too many to keep them all on the shelves at once. The top of the shelves displays books from 2017.

On Halloween, they opened the library up to show it to the community and 128 people, in a town of only 720, came through the doors to see the newly revamped library.

"We needed a new collection to bring people through the door and then hours that people could come," Johnson said.

The small reader's library was only open on Saturdays from 11 until 1. But now, it is opened on Monday and Thursday from 2 to 6 and on Saturday from noon until 2. On Jan. 22, the library kicked off those new hours.

"In the last week we have issued 20 library cards. We have more than 35 items checked out to more than 20 people, which is amazing when you factor in that for the first year and a half I was here I didn't see 10 different people," Johnson said.

"It has been heartwarming to see the need, want, and willingness to have a library in town is there."

One person was surprised to see the library is now carrying James Patterson books. Patterson is likely the most known modern author of dozens of books. Johnson said that reaction is a reflection of how people previously viewed the Taylor Memorial Library.

The town has had a library since 1887, three years before the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners was formed.

"We actually had a library in this tiny little town before even that. In 1925, upon Jane Taylor's passing she left a request for this stand-alone library," Johnson said.

The new building was constructed in 1925 and the library moved from the basement of Town Hall. But as the years passed, it had become nearly forgotten. And Johnson is now hoping to bring new life to it.

"I think oftentimes our sense of community gets lost. We are in a unique area where community is everything. This community has always rallied for the things that mattered once they knew that the need was there," Johnson said.



The library hadn't received a brand new book in a decade. "We're going to see if we build it, will they come? And so far it is working."

Next on her agenda is to become certified by the state, which would bring additional dollars to support the library. She has meetings scheduled and is bringing a budget to the Board of Selectmen that will allow for 20 percent of the town's appropriation be spent on new materials -- a condition to meet state certification standards.

Johnson said the effort is all on a tight budget. The annual budget of just under $6,000 has to pay for utilities, payroll, buildings and grounds maintenance and the new media.

Johnson says such things as purchasing franchising rights to host movie nights are made easier because of the generous donations other have made.

"We're just constantly working toward better. I think that is all you can ask. Don't expect perfection but strive for it," Johnson said.

She also has ideas for new programs. She's talked with the school about ideas, looking to organize a magic lesson for children and to have arts and crafts. She is talking about knitting groups and a new program to deliver materials to people who are shut in.

"I'm hoping going forward each week we can offer something," Johnson said.

She believes that the library can live up to today's expectations. But, she knows it is going to take a lot of hours and a lot of work. She is willing to put that time and effort in and she believes that people will support it.

"It is up to us to save it. It is up to us to value it. It is here, it is ours, we should appreciate it and we should be thankful for it," Johnson said. "I did what you do when you love something, you fight for it."



This Isnt Our Last Love Letter



Dear Don Don,

Way back in 92



I walked into the room and knew



Never felt this way before



I shook your hand while gazing into your eyes



And the feeling grew



As I took a seat I knew



A love that would have my heart



Forever



I knew



Way back in 92





They say love at first sight doesnt always last or isnt true



We were the exception to that rule



Our love had no where to hide



A spark set fire



As if this is how the universe started





I never doubted our love or what we could do



Together we grew



Forming a bond everlasting



That became our glue



My euphoria was YOU



Im eternally grateful for the love and life we shared



For how fortunate we were :



to have and to hold

through sickness and in health

Til death do us part



Until we are together again



This isnt our last love letter



I love you with all my heart and soul



Yours forever,



Deirdre (Mrs. Hank Snow)





Im fortunate to have fallen in love with, marry and make a life with the sharpest, coolest, funniest, most rare, bad ass, tender loving, loyal man on the planet, my husband Don Imus.









A True American Hero

I dont know why it has been so hard for me to write about my dear friend Don Imus.



I certainly know what he meant to me, my family, my charity, my hospital and the millions of fans that listened and loved him for so many years.



I keep reading all the beautiful condolences that people are writing about how much a part of their lives were effected by listening to him over the years.

But what most people dont talk enough about is what he did for all of us.

In every sense of the word, he was an American Hero. His work with children with so many different illnesses and his dedication to their future was unmatched by anyone I have ever known or heard about.



Besides raising over $100,000,000 for so many causes, he took care of young people for over 20 years in a state where he could not breathe. Along with his incredible wife Deirdre, he created a world where children were not defined by their disease. That was a miracle! He was a miracle.

I will miss him ever day for the rest of my life.

I was blessed to be a part of his and Deirdes life.

No one will ever do what he did.

I love you Don Imus - A TRUE AMERICAN HERO





David Jurist

IMUS IN THE MORNING

FIRST DAY BACK!A third piece of art believed to be by graffiti artist Banksy has appeared in the same city in the space of just seven days.

The new work features a young girl sitting next to a dead bird, and has appeared on the side of a mechanic's workshop.

Passersby are adamant it is one of Banksy's works because it is a direct reference to famous Hull graffiti piece 'Dead Bod'.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 31 August 2021 Gold Medallist Sarah Storey of Britain celebrates on the podium Reuters UK news in pictures 30 August 2021 Extinction Rebellion protesters hold a a tea party on Tower Bridge in London EPA UK news in pictures 29 August 2021 A police office tussles with a demonstrator on Cromwell Road outside the Natural History Museum during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion in London PA UK news in pictures 28 August 2021 Members of the British armed forces 16 Air Assault Brigade walk to the air terminal after disembarking a Royal Airforce Voyager aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire POOL/AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 27 August 2021 Fabio Quartararo crashes during a MotoGP practice session at the British Grand Prix, Silverstone Circuit Action Images via Reuters UK news in pictures 26 August 2021 An Extinction Rebellion activist holds a placard in a fountain surrounded by police officers, during a protest next to Buckingham Palace in London Reuters UK news in pictures 25 August 2021 Gold Medallist Great Britains cyclist, Sarah Storey, celebrates after winning the Womens C5 3000m Individual Pursuit Final at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games. It was her 15th Paralympic gold Reuters UK news in pictures 24 August 2021 A demonstrator dressed as bee during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion on Whitehall, in central London PA UK news in pictures 23 August 2021 Former interpreters for the British forces in Afghanistan demonstrate outside the Home Office in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 22 August 2021 Police officers form a line in front of the entrance to the Guildhall, London, where protesters have climbed onto a ledge above the entrance during an Extinction Rebellion stage a protest PA UK news in pictures 21 August 2021 People take part in a demonstration in solidarity with people of Afghanistan, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 20 August 2021 People zip wire across the sea from Bournemouth pier towards the beach. PA UK news in pictures 19 August 2021 Supporters of Geronimo the alpaca gather outside Shepherds Close Farm in Wooton Under Edge, Gloucestershire PA UK news in pictures 18 August 2021 Former Afghan interpreters and veterans hold a demonstration outside Downing Street, calling for support and protection for Afghan interpreters and their families PA UK news in pictures 17 August 2021 Military personnel board the RAF Airbus A400M at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, where evacuation flights from Afghanistan have been landing Reuters UK news in pictures 16 August 2021 Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer takes part in a minute's silence at Wolverhampton police station for the victims of the Plymouth mass shooting last week PA UK news in pictures 15 August 2021 2Storm, a ten-metre tall puppet of a mythical goddess of the sea created by Edinburgh-based visual theatre company Vision Mechanics, makes its way alongside the seafront at North Berwick, East Lothian, during a performance at the Fringe By The Sea festival PA UK news in pictures 14 August 2021 A woman and two young girls look at floral tributes in Plymouth where six people, including the offender, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident PA UK news in pictures 13 August 2021 Forensic officers in the Keyham area of Plymouth where six people, including the shooter, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident on Thursday evening PA UK news in pictures 12 August 2021 Children ride horses in the River Eden in Appleby, Cumbria, during the annual gathering of travellers for the Appleby Horse Fair PA UK news in pictures 11 August 2021 Stella Moris (left) reacts after talking to the media outside the High Court in London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal, n London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal. The US government has won the latest round in its High Court bid to appeal against the decision not to extradite Julian Assange on espionage charges PA UK news in pictures 10 August 2021 Students react after they receive their A-Level results at the Ark Academy, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 9 August 2021 The final athletes from Great Britain arrive home including Jason Kenny, Laura Kenny and Katie Archibald (front left-right) at Heathrow Airport, London following the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games PA UK news in pictures 8 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny during the closing ceremony of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at the Olympic stadium in Japan PA UK news in pictures 7 August 2021 People from the Glasgow Southside community take part in the Govanhill Carnival, an anti-racist celebration of pride, unity and the contributions immigrants have made to the community in Govanhill, at Queen's Park, Glasgow PA UK news in pictures 6 August 2021 Chijindu Ujah of Britain, Zharnel Hughes of Britain, Richard Kilty of Britain and Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake of Britain celebrate winning silver as they pose with Asha Philip of Britain, Imani Lansiquot of Britain, Dina Asher-Smith of Britain and Daryll Neita of Britain after they won bronze in the women's 4 x 100m relay during Olympic Games Day 14 Getty UK news in pictures 5 August 2021 A protester places flowers on a photograph of an executed man during a demonstration organised by supporters of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) to protest against the inauguration of Iran's new president Ebrahim Raisi in central London AFP via Getty UK news in pictures 4 August 2021 England's Joe Root looks on as India's KL Rahul doesn't make it to a catch during day one of Cinch First Test match at Trent Bridge, Nottingham PA UK news in pictures 3 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny and Jason Kenny with their silver medals for the Women's Team Pursuit and Mens Team Sprint during the Track Cycling at the Izu Velodrome on the eleventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 2 August 2021 Great Britains Charlotte Worthington competes during the Womens BMX Freestyle Final at the Tokyo Olympics PA UK news in pictures 1 August 2021 EPA UK news in pictures 31 July 2021 James Guy, Adam Peaty and Kathleen Dawson celebrate winning the gold medal in the mixed 4x100m medley relay final at the Tokyo Olympics AP UK news in pictures 30 July 2021 Great Britain's Bethany Shriever and Kye Whyte celebrate their Gold and Silver medals respectively for the Cycling BMX Racing at the Ariake Urban Sports Park on the seventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 29 July 2021 Team GB's Mallory Franklin during the Womens Canoe Slalom Final on day six of the Tokyo Olympic Games. She went on to win the silver medal Getty UK news in pictures 28 July 2021 Canoers on Llyn Padarn lake in Snowdonia, Gwynedd. It was announced that the north-west Wales slate landscape has been granted UNESCO World Heritage Status PA UK news in pictures 27 July 2021 A view of one of two areas now being used at a warehouse facility in Dover, Kent, for boats used by people thought to be migrants. PA UK news in pictures 26 July 2021 A woman is helped by Border Force officers as a group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, onboard a Border Force vessel, following a small boat incident in the Channel PA UK news in pictures 25 July 2021 Vehicles drive through deep water on a flooded road in Nine Elms, London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 24 July 2021 Utilities workers inspect a 15x20ft sinkhole on Green Lane, Liverpool, which is suspected to have been caused by ruptured water main PA UK news in pictures 23 July 2021 Children interact with Mega Please Draw Freely by artist Ei Arakawa inside the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern in London, part of UNIQLO Tate Play the gallery's new free programme of art-inspired activities for families PA UK news in pictures 22 July 2021 Festivalgoers in the campsite at the Latitude festival in Henham Park, Southwold, Suffolk PA UK news in pictures 21 July 2021 A man walks past an artwork by Will Blood on the end of a property in Bedminster, Bristol, as the 75 murals project reaches the halfway point and various graffiti pieces are sprayed onto walls and buildings across the city over the Summer PA UK news in pictures 20 July 2021 People during morning prayer during Eid ul-Adha, or Festival of Sacrifice, in Southall Park, Uxbridge, London PA UK news in pictures 19 July 2021 Commuters, some not wearing facemasks, at Westminster Underground station, at 08:38 in London after the final legal Coronavirus restrictions were lifted in England PA UK news in pictures 18 July 2021 A view of spectators by the 2nd green during day four of The Open at The Royal St George's Golf Club in Sandwich, Kent PA UK news in pictures 17 July 2021 Cyclists ride over the Hammersmith Bridge in London. The bridge was closed last year after cracks in it worsened during a heatwave Getty UK news in pictures 16 July 2021 The sun rises behind the Sefton Park Palm House, in Sefton Park, Liverpool PA UK news in pictures 15 July 2021 Sir Nicholas Serota watches a short film about sea monsters as he opens a 7.6 million, 360 immersive dome at Devonport's Market Hall in Plymouth, which is the first of its type to be built in Europe PA UK news in pictures 14 July 2021 Heidi Street, playing a gothic character, looks at a brain suspended in glass at the worlds first attraction dedicated to the author of Frankenstein inside the Mary Shelleys House of Frankenstein experience, located in a Georgian terraced house in Bath, as it prepares to open to the public on 19 July PA UK news in pictures 13 July 2021 Rehearsals are held in a car park in Glasgow for a parade scene ahead of filming for what is thought to be the new Indiana Jones 5 movie starring Harrison Ford PA

Richard Dewhurst, 40, joined a small crowd of people who had driven to see the spectacle in Hull's old town.

Mr Dewhurst said: "There are just too many things which have happened over the last few days which means this has got to be the real deal.

"This is Banksy's tribute to Dead Bod - it has got to be. Everyone is saying it."

Banksy himself confirmed one piece of art on his instagram which was a mural of a boy holding a toy pencil tagged onto the side of a disused bridge.

The anonymous graffiti artist has not yet confirmed two more Banksy-esque stencilled paintings in the city.

Mr Dewhurst said he was adamant it was the art of the elusive artist.

However, another on-looker admiring the mural painted on the side of a mechanic's workshop in Bromley Street disagreed.

The man in his 30s, who wished to remain anonymous, said: "I don't think it could be 'a Banksy' his because he usually puts a little bit of colour on it."

The East Yorkshire city's very own 'Dead Bod' was saved from being destroyed after being deemed 'art' and has since been captured in local folklore.

The art work started off as a drunken prank when skipper Len Rood and engineer Gordon Mason took a pot of white paint and graffitied a crude image of an upturned dead bird on to a corrugated iron shed in the city's Alexandra Dock in the 1960s.

Invisible to most except those fisherman who would see it from the estuary, it became one of those familiar sights which symbolised home and is now one of the oldest known pieces of contemporary graffiti in the UK.

Dead Bod featured heavily last year in events as Hull won the accolade as City of Culture 2017.

SWNSA man who hacked into his ex-partner's Instagram account and deleted pictures of her has been banned from Essex for a year.

Joshua McMurtry, 22, subjected his former girlfriend to months of unwanted contact after she split up with him for being too "controlling".

He bombarded her with unwanted calls, sending emails and long letters to her home address - before recording an audio message threatening to kill himself.

Prosecutor Kathy Wilson told Colchester Magistrates: "She then described alterations being made to her email accounts like passwords and some of her social media accounts were deleted.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 9 September 2021 Troops from Wiltshire based 4 Armoured Close Support Battalion Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers during final inspection at Wellington Barracks in London, ahead of providing troops for the Queens Guard PA UK news in pictures 8 September 2021 Workers cross London Bridge during the morning rush hour in London Reuters UK news in pictures Mixing it up: Painting it up press view in London A gallery employee poses for photographers next to a painting entitled Prairie by British artist, Louise Giovanelli during the exhibition 'Mixing it up: Painting it up' at the Hayward Gallery in London EPA UK news in pictures 6 September 2021 Traders in the Ring at the London Metal Exchange, in the City of London, after open-outcry trading returned for the first time since March 2020, when the Ring was temporarily closed due to the pandemic PA UK news in pictures 5 September 2021 People enjoy the warm weather on Sandbanks beach, Poole PA UK news in pictures 4 September 2021 Demonstrators from Animal Rebellion and Nature Rebellion protest in Trafalgar Square in London. PA UK news in pictures 3 September 2021 South Africa's Ntando Mahlangu (centre) wins the Men's 200 metres T61 Final ahead of second placed Great Britain's Richard Whitehead at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games PA UK news in pictures 2 September 2021 A young common seal on the beach at Horsey Gap in Norfolk, as hundreds of pregnant grey seals come ashore ready for the start of the pupping season. PA UK news in pictures 1 September 2021 Goldfinches fighting over food in a garden in Strensham, Worcestershire PA UK news in pictures 31 August 2021 Gold Medallist Sarah Storey of Britain celebrates on the podium Reuters UK news in pictures 30 August 2021 Extinction Rebellion protesters hold a a tea party on Tower Bridge in London EPA UK news in pictures 29 August 2021 A police office tussles with a demonstrator on Cromwell Road outside the Natural History Museum during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion in London PA UK news in pictures 28 August 2021 Members of the British armed forces 16 Air Assault Brigade walk to the air terminal after disembarking a Royal Airforce Voyager aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire POOL/AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 27 August 2021 Fabio Quartararo crashes during a MotoGP practice session at the British Grand Prix, Silverstone Circuit Action Images via Reuters UK news in pictures 26 August 2021 An Extinction Rebellion activist holds a placard in a fountain surrounded by police officers, during a protest next to Buckingham Palace in London Reuters UK news in pictures 25 August 2021 Gold Medallist Great Britains cyclist, Sarah Storey, celebrates after winning the Womens C5 3000m Individual Pursuit Final at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games. It was her 15th Paralympic gold Reuters UK news in pictures 24 August 2021 A demonstrator dressed as bee during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion on Whitehall, in central London PA UK news in pictures 23 August 2021 Former interpreters for the British forces in Afghanistan demonstrate outside the Home Office in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 22 August 2021 Police officers form a line in front of the entrance to the Guildhall, London, where protesters have climbed onto a ledge above the entrance during an Extinction Rebellion stage a protest PA UK news in pictures 21 August 2021 People take part in a demonstration in solidarity with people of Afghanistan, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 20 August 2021 People zip wire across the sea from Bournemouth pier towards the beach. PA UK news in pictures 19 August 2021 Supporters of Geronimo the alpaca gather outside Shepherds Close Farm in Wooton Under Edge, Gloucestershire PA UK news in pictures 18 August 2021 Former Afghan interpreters and veterans hold a demonstration outside Downing Street, calling for support and protection for Afghan interpreters and their families PA UK news in pictures 17 August 2021 Military personnel board the RAF Airbus A400M at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, where evacuation flights from Afghanistan have been landing Reuters UK news in pictures 16 August 2021 Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer takes part in a minute's silence at Wolverhampton police station for the victims of the Plymouth mass shooting last week PA UK news in pictures 15 August 2021 2Storm, a ten-metre tall puppet of a mythical goddess of the sea created by Edinburgh-based visual theatre company Vision Mechanics, makes its way alongside the seafront at North Berwick, East Lothian, during a performance at the Fringe By The Sea festival PA UK news in pictures 14 August 2021 A woman and two young girls look at floral tributes in Plymouth where six people, including the offender, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident PA UK news in pictures 13 August 2021 Forensic officers in the Keyham area of Plymouth where six people, including the shooter, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident on Thursday evening PA UK news in pictures 12 August 2021 Children ride horses in the River Eden in Appleby, Cumbria, during the annual gathering of travellers for the Appleby Horse Fair PA UK news in pictures 11 August 2021 Stella Moris (left) reacts after talking to the media outside the High Court in London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal, n London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal. The US government has won the latest round in its High Court bid to appeal against the decision not to extradite Julian Assange on espionage charges PA UK news in pictures 10 August 2021 Students react after they receive their A-Level results at the Ark Academy, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 9 August 2021 The final athletes from Great Britain arrive home including Jason Kenny, Laura Kenny and Katie Archibald (front left-right) at Heathrow Airport, London following the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games PA UK news in pictures 8 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny during the closing ceremony of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at the Olympic stadium in Japan PA UK news in pictures 7 August 2021 People from the Glasgow Southside community take part in the Govanhill Carnival, an anti-racist celebration of pride, unity and the contributions immigrants have made to the community in Govanhill, at Queen's Park, Glasgow PA UK news in pictures 6 August 2021 Chijindu Ujah of Britain, Zharnel Hughes of Britain, Richard Kilty of Britain and Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake of Britain celebrate winning silver as they pose with Asha Philip of Britain, Imani Lansiquot of Britain, Dina Asher-Smith of Britain and Daryll Neita of Britain after they won bronze in the women's 4 x 100m relay during Olympic Games Day 14 Getty UK news in pictures 5 August 2021 A protester places flowers on a photograph of an executed man during a demonstration organised by supporters of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) to protest against the inauguration of Iran's new president Ebrahim Raisi in central London AFP via Getty UK news in pictures 4 August 2021 England's Joe Root looks on as India's KL Rahul doesn't make it to a catch during day one of Cinch First Test match at Trent Bridge, Nottingham PA UK news in pictures 3 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny and Jason Kenny with their silver medals for the Women's Team Pursuit and Mens Team Sprint during the Track Cycling at the Izu Velodrome on the eleventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 2 August 2021 Great Britains Charlotte Worthington competes during the Womens BMX Freestyle Final at the Tokyo Olympics PA UK news in pictures 1 August 2021 EPA UK news in pictures 31 July 2021 James Guy, Adam Peaty and Kathleen Dawson celebrate winning the gold medal in the mixed 4x100m medley relay final at the Tokyo Olympics AP UK news in pictures 30 July 2021 Great Britain's Bethany Shriever and Kye Whyte celebrate their Gold and Silver medals respectively for the Cycling BMX Racing at the Ariake Urban Sports Park on the seventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 29 July 2021 Team GB's Mallory Franklin during the Womens Canoe Slalom Final on day six of the Tokyo Olympic Games. She went on to win the silver medal Getty UK news in pictures 28 July 2021 Canoers on Llyn Padarn lake in Snowdonia, Gwynedd. It was announced that the north-west Wales slate landscape has been granted UNESCO World Heritage Status PA UK news in pictures 27 July 2021 A view of one of two areas now being used at a warehouse facility in Dover, Kent, for boats used by people thought to be migrants. PA UK news in pictures 26 July 2021 A woman is helped by Border Force officers as a group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, onboard a Border Force vessel, following a small boat incident in the Channel PA UK news in pictures 25 July 2021 Vehicles drive through deep water on a flooded road in Nine Elms, London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 24 July 2021 Utilities workers inspect a 15x20ft sinkhole on Green Lane, Liverpool, which is suspected to have been caused by ruptured water main PA UK news in pictures 23 July 2021 Children interact with Mega Please Draw Freely by artist Ei Arakawa inside the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern in London, part of UNIQLO Tate Play the gallery's new free programme of art-inspired activities for families PA UK news in pictures 22 July 2021 Festivalgoers in the campsite at the Latitude festival in Henham Park, Southwold, Suffolk PA

A work email account was deleted and on Instagram there were modelling photos deleted."

In an impact statement read out to the court, the victim described how her mental health had been severely affected.

She said: "When I go out with friends, I put on a brave face but when I get back home, I crumble."

The court heard how the couple, who were together for three years, split up abruptly following a trip to Paris in May last year.

McMurtry later accused his ex-girlfriend of infidelity before recording an audio message saying he did not want to live anymore.

Louise Maples, mitigating, said it was McMurtrys first relationship.

She said: "The relationship came to an abrupt end and he struggled.

It was very devastating for him that it ended without any real explanation.

Hed never been through a breakup and felt particularly awful and was seeking answers, but also to relay how he was feeling.

She added: It was also his last year of university and the breakup coincided with his final exams so his stress levels were already quite high."

McMurty, from Nottingham, pleaded guilty to harassment without violence between May and August last year, at Colchester Magistrates' Court on Thursday.

Magistrates ordered him to complete 160 hours of unpaid work and banned him from Essex for a year.

He must also pay 170 in court costs.

SWNSForecasters are warning the first full week of February could be one of the coldest of the winter so far, with most of the UK braced for snow and ice in the days ahead.

A series of yellow weather warnings have been issued, with temperatures plummeting to as low as -7C in some places.

And the cold snap will grip the country until at least next weekend, with milder weather not expected until the middle of the following week.

But while the bulk of the population will shiver through sub-zero temperatures, the Met Office says the majority of the country will see at least "a few flakes" of snow.

"It's going to be a cold week, plenty of dry weather around, but many places will probably see some snow at some point during the week, but for a lot of us not really amounting to much at all," said forecaster Craig Snell.

"Probably one of our coldest weeks of this winter so far, but snow-fall wise, doesn't really look too disruptive at this stage."

The Met Office said ice was likely to form overnight on Sunday from 2am until 10am along the east coast as the mercury plummets, bringing potentially difficult driving conditions.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 9 September 2021 Troops from Wiltshire based 4 Armoured Close Support Battalion Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers during final inspection at Wellington Barracks in London, ahead of providing troops for the Queens Guard PA UK news in pictures 8 September 2021 Workers cross London Bridge during the morning rush hour in London Reuters UK news in pictures Mixing it up: Painting it up press view in London A gallery employee poses for photographers next to a painting entitled Prairie by British artist, Louise Giovanelli during the exhibition 'Mixing it up: Painting it up' at the Hayward Gallery in London EPA UK news in pictures 6 September 2021 Traders in the Ring at the London Metal Exchange, in the City of London, after open-outcry trading returned for the first time since March 2020, when the Ring was temporarily closed due to the pandemic PA UK news in pictures 5 September 2021 People enjoy the warm weather on Sandbanks beach, Poole PA UK news in pictures 4 September 2021 Demonstrators from Animal Rebellion and Nature Rebellion protest in Trafalgar Square in London. PA UK news in pictures 3 September 2021 South Africa's Ntando Mahlangu (centre) wins the Men's 200 metres T61 Final ahead of second placed Great Britain's Richard Whitehead at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games PA UK news in pictures 2 September 2021 A young common seal on the beach at Horsey Gap in Norfolk, as hundreds of pregnant grey seals come ashore ready for the start of the pupping season. PA UK news in pictures 1 September 2021 Goldfinches fighting over food in a garden in Strensham, Worcestershire PA UK news in pictures 31 August 2021 Gold Medallist Sarah Storey of Britain celebrates on the podium Reuters UK news in pictures 30 August 2021 Extinction Rebellion protesters hold a a tea party on Tower Bridge in London EPA UK news in pictures 29 August 2021 A police office tussles with a demonstrator on Cromwell Road outside the Natural History Museum during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion in London PA UK news in pictures 28 August 2021 Members of the British armed forces 16 Air Assault Brigade walk to the air terminal after disembarking a Royal Airforce Voyager aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire POOL/AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 27 August 2021 Fabio Quartararo crashes during a MotoGP practice session at the British Grand Prix, Silverstone Circuit Action Images via Reuters UK news in pictures 26 August 2021 An Extinction Rebellion activist holds a placard in a fountain surrounded by police officers, during a protest next to Buckingham Palace in London Reuters UK news in pictures 25 August 2021 Gold Medallist Great Britains cyclist, Sarah Storey, celebrates after winning the Womens C5 3000m Individual Pursuit Final at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games. It was her 15th Paralympic gold Reuters UK news in pictures 24 August 2021 A demonstrator dressed as bee during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion on Whitehall, in central London PA UK news in pictures 23 August 2021 Former interpreters for the British forces in Afghanistan demonstrate outside the Home Office in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 22 August 2021 Police officers form a line in front of the entrance to the Guildhall, London, where protesters have climbed onto a ledge above the entrance during an Extinction Rebellion stage a protest PA UK news in pictures 21 August 2021 People take part in a demonstration in solidarity with people of Afghanistan, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 20 August 2021 People zip wire across the sea from Bournemouth pier towards the beach. PA UK news in pictures 19 August 2021 Supporters of Geronimo the alpaca gather outside Shepherds Close Farm in Wooton Under Edge, Gloucestershire PA UK news in pictures 18 August 2021 Former Afghan interpreters and veterans hold a demonstration outside Downing Street, calling for support and protection for Afghan interpreters and their families PA UK news in pictures 17 August 2021 Military personnel board the RAF Airbus A400M at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, where evacuation flights from Afghanistan have been landing Reuters UK news in pictures 16 August 2021 Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer takes part in a minute's silence at Wolverhampton police station for the victims of the Plymouth mass shooting last week PA UK news in pictures 15 August 2021 2Storm, a ten-metre tall puppet of a mythical goddess of the sea created by Edinburgh-based visual theatre company Vision Mechanics, makes its way alongside the seafront at North Berwick, East Lothian, during a performance at the Fringe By The Sea festival PA UK news in pictures 14 August 2021 A woman and two young girls look at floral tributes in Plymouth where six people, including the offender, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident PA UK news in pictures 13 August 2021 Forensic officers in the Keyham area of Plymouth where six people, including the shooter, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident on Thursday evening PA UK news in pictures 12 August 2021 Children ride horses in the River Eden in Appleby, Cumbria, during the annual gathering of travellers for the Appleby Horse Fair PA UK news in pictures 11 August 2021 Stella Moris (left) reacts after talking to the media outside the High Court in London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal, n London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal. The US government has won the latest round in its High Court bid to appeal against the decision not to extradite Julian Assange on espionage charges PA UK news in pictures 10 August 2021 Students react after they receive their A-Level results at the Ark Academy, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 9 August 2021 The final athletes from Great Britain arrive home including Jason Kenny, Laura Kenny and Katie Archibald (front left-right) at Heathrow Airport, London following the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games PA UK news in pictures 8 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny during the closing ceremony of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at the Olympic stadium in Japan PA UK news in pictures 7 August 2021 People from the Glasgow Southside community take part in the Govanhill Carnival, an anti-racist celebration of pride, unity and the contributions immigrants have made to the community in Govanhill, at Queen's Park, Glasgow PA UK news in pictures 6 August 2021 Chijindu Ujah of Britain, Zharnel Hughes of Britain, Richard Kilty of Britain and Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake of Britain celebrate winning silver as they pose with Asha Philip of Britain, Imani Lansiquot of Britain, Dina Asher-Smith of Britain and Daryll Neita of Britain after they won bronze in the women's 4 x 100m relay during Olympic Games Day 14 Getty UK news in pictures 5 August 2021 A protester places flowers on a photograph of an executed man during a demonstration organised by supporters of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) to protest against the inauguration of Iran's new president Ebrahim Raisi in central London AFP via Getty UK news in pictures 4 August 2021 England's Joe Root looks on as India's KL Rahul doesn't make it to a catch during day one of Cinch First Test match at Trent Bridge, Nottingham PA UK news in pictures 3 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny and Jason Kenny with their silver medals for the Women's Team Pursuit and Mens Team Sprint during the Track Cycling at the Izu Velodrome on the eleventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 2 August 2021 Great Britains Charlotte Worthington competes during the Womens BMX Freestyle Final at the Tokyo Olympics PA UK news in pictures 1 August 2021 EPA UK news in pictures 31 July 2021 James Guy, Adam Peaty and Kathleen Dawson celebrate winning the gold medal in the mixed 4x100m medley relay final at the Tokyo Olympics AP UK news in pictures 30 July 2021 Great Britain's Bethany Shriever and Kye Whyte celebrate their Gold and Silver medals respectively for the Cycling BMX Racing at the Ariake Urban Sports Park on the seventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 29 July 2021 Team GB's Mallory Franklin during the Womens Canoe Slalom Final on day six of the Tokyo Olympic Games. She went on to win the silver medal Getty UK news in pictures 28 July 2021 Canoers on Llyn Padarn lake in Snowdonia, Gwynedd. It was announced that the north-west Wales slate landscape has been granted UNESCO World Heritage Status PA UK news in pictures 27 July 2021 A view of one of two areas now being used at a warehouse facility in Dover, Kent, for boats used by people thought to be migrants. PA UK news in pictures 26 July 2021 A woman is helped by Border Force officers as a group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, onboard a Border Force vessel, following a small boat incident in the Channel PA UK news in pictures 25 July 2021 Vehicles drive through deep water on a flooded road in Nine Elms, London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 24 July 2021 Utilities workers inspect a 15x20ft sinkhole on Green Lane, Liverpool, which is suspected to have been caused by ruptured water main PA UK news in pictures 23 July 2021 Children interact with Mega Please Draw Freely by artist Ei Arakawa inside the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern in London, part of UNIQLO Tate Play the gallery's new free programme of art-inspired activities for families PA UK news in pictures 22 July 2021 Festivalgoers in the campsite at the Latitude festival in Henham Park, Southwold, Suffolk PA

On the whole, Sunday will be much drier and brighter than Saturday, with a bitter north-east wind making temperatures feel close to freezing in East Anglia and the South East.

A further weather warning for snow and ice is in place from 8pm on Sunday until 10am on Monday, spanning south-east England.

Scattered rain, sleet and snow showers coming in from the north sea are expected to be most frequent in Kent and East Sussex on Sunday evening, before affecting parts of East Anglia and Greater London later into the night.

Up to 3cm of snow could accumulate inland, but mainly on hills more than 100 metres high.

Mr Snell also said the working week would start on a "bitterly cold" note, with the bulk of the population waking up to temperatures between 0C and -2C.

The low temperatures of -7C are expected in sheltered parts of Scotland and spots most prone to the cold in the Midlands and Wales.

Then, between 9pm on Monday and 3pm on Tuesday, there is a further chance of snow and ice for the north of England, northern Ireland, north Wales and Scotland.

A spell of rain, sleet and snow will move east across the UK, gradually weakening across England and Wales.

Mr Snell added: "Quite a lot of the UK will see some snow as we head through Tuesday but as it ventures into the Midlands, south-west England and eventually later in the day across south-east England, it's just going to be a few flakes of snow.

"So many people will see some snow but don't expect to build a snowman."

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Tuesday morning is again expected to be widely below freezing, with highs of 5-6C in spots on the western coast of Wales and south-west England.

Overnight into Wednesday will be another chilly night, while the day will generally be cold, crisp and sunny.

A front of rain is expected to move through the country on Thursday, before the cold air swiftly returns.

Additional reporting by PAAmber Rudd has refused to rule out suggestions she could work under Boris Johnson should he become the next Prime Minister.

The Home Secretary said it was such a difficult question on so many different levels that she would be unable to answer, after being asked if she could ever imagine such a scenario by Andrew Marr on his BBC politics programme.

Her comments follow reports that Brexiteer Tory MPs could launch a plot to oust Theresa May with a governing dream team if she does not commit to removing the UK from the customs union.

Eurosceptics are said to be pushing foreign secretary Mr Johnson as the next Prime Minister, and trying to get him to agree to make Michael Gove his deputy and backbencher Jacob Rees-Mogg his chancellor should he be successful, according to The Sunday Times.

It was also suggested Mr Johnson may have to make Ms Rudd his chancellor initially, if he is to win the support from non-Eurosceptics.

Recommended Tory Brexit battle laid bare as senior ministers contradict each other

But the Hastings and Rye MP appeared to dismiss the reports, insisting the Government is more united than Brexiteers would believe.

I have a surprise for the Brexiteers, which is the (Cabinet) committee that meets in order to help make these decisions is more united than they think, she said.

We meet in the committee. We meet privately for discussions. I think that we will arrive at something which suits us all.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 9 September 2021 Troops from Wiltshire based 4 Armoured Close Support Battalion Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers during final inspection at Wellington Barracks in London, ahead of providing troops for the Queens Guard PA UK news in pictures 8 September 2021 Workers cross London Bridge during the morning rush hour in London Reuters UK news in pictures Mixing it up: Painting it up press view in London A gallery employee poses for photographers next to a painting entitled Prairie by British artist, Louise Giovanelli during the exhibition 'Mixing it up: Painting it up' at the Hayward Gallery in London EPA UK news in pictures 6 September 2021 Traders in the Ring at the London Metal Exchange, in the City of London, after open-outcry trading returned for the first time since March 2020, when the Ring was temporarily closed due to the pandemic PA UK news in pictures 5 September 2021 People enjoy the warm weather on Sandbanks beach, Poole PA UK news in pictures 4 September 2021 Demonstrators from Animal Rebellion and Nature Rebellion protest in Trafalgar Square in London. PA UK news in pictures 3 September 2021 South Africa's Ntando Mahlangu (centre) wins the Men's 200 metres T61 Final ahead of second placed Great Britain's Richard Whitehead at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games PA UK news in pictures 2 September 2021 A young common seal on the beach at Horsey Gap in Norfolk, as hundreds of pregnant grey seals come ashore ready for the start of the pupping season. PA UK news in pictures 1 September 2021 Goldfinches fighting over food in a garden in Strensham, Worcestershire PA UK news in pictures 31 August 2021 Gold Medallist Sarah Storey of Britain celebrates on the podium Reuters UK news in pictures 30 August 2021 Extinction Rebellion protesters hold a a tea party on Tower Bridge in London EPA UK news in pictures 29 August 2021 A police office tussles with a demonstrator on Cromwell Road outside the Natural History Museum during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion in London PA UK news in pictures 28 August 2021 Members of the British armed forces 16 Air Assault Brigade walk to the air terminal after disembarking a Royal Airforce Voyager aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire POOL/AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 27 August 2021 Fabio Quartararo crashes during a MotoGP practice session at the British Grand Prix, Silverstone Circuit Action Images via Reuters UK news in pictures 26 August 2021 An Extinction Rebellion activist holds a placard in a fountain surrounded by police officers, during a protest next to Buckingham Palace in London Reuters UK news in pictures 25 August 2021 Gold Medallist Great Britains cyclist, Sarah Storey, celebrates after winning the Womens C5 3000m Individual Pursuit Final at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games. It was her 15th Paralympic gold Reuters UK news in pictures 24 August 2021 A demonstrator dressed as bee during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion on Whitehall, in central London PA UK news in pictures 23 August 2021 Former interpreters for the British forces in Afghanistan demonstrate outside the Home Office in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 22 August 2021 Police officers form a line in front of the entrance to the Guildhall, London, where protesters have climbed onto a ledge above the entrance during an Extinction Rebellion stage a protest PA UK news in pictures 21 August 2021 People take part in a demonstration in solidarity with people of Afghanistan, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 20 August 2021 People zip wire across the sea from Bournemouth pier towards the beach. PA UK news in pictures 19 August 2021 Supporters of Geronimo the alpaca gather outside Shepherds Close Farm in Wooton Under Edge, Gloucestershire PA UK news in pictures 18 August 2021 Former Afghan interpreters and veterans hold a demonstration outside Downing Street, calling for support and protection for Afghan interpreters and their families PA UK news in pictures 17 August 2021 Military personnel board the RAF Airbus A400M at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, where evacuation flights from Afghanistan have been landing Reuters UK news in pictures 16 August 2021 Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer takes part in a minute's silence at Wolverhampton police station for the victims of the Plymouth mass shooting last week PA UK news in pictures 15 August 2021 2Storm, a ten-metre tall puppet of a mythical goddess of the sea created by Edinburgh-based visual theatre company Vision Mechanics, makes its way alongside the seafront at North Berwick, East Lothian, during a performance at the Fringe By The Sea festival PA UK news in pictures 14 August 2021 A woman and two young girls look at floral tributes in Plymouth where six people, including the offender, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident PA UK news in pictures 13 August 2021 Forensic officers in the Keyham area of Plymouth where six people, including the shooter, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident on Thursday evening PA UK news in pictures 12 August 2021 Children ride horses in the River Eden in Appleby, Cumbria, during the annual gathering of travellers for the Appleby Horse Fair PA UK news in pictures 11 August 2021 Stella Moris (left) reacts after talking to the media outside the High Court in London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal, n London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal. The US government has won the latest round in its High Court bid to appeal against the decision not to extradite Julian Assange on espionage charges PA UK news in pictures 10 August 2021 Students react after they receive their A-Level results at the Ark Academy, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 9 August 2021 The final athletes from Great Britain arrive home including Jason Kenny, Laura Kenny and Katie Archibald (front left-right) at Heathrow Airport, London following the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games PA UK news in pictures 8 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny during the closing ceremony of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at the Olympic stadium in Japan PA UK news in pictures 7 August 2021 People from the Glasgow Southside community take part in the Govanhill Carnival, an anti-racist celebration of pride, unity and the contributions immigrants have made to the community in Govanhill, at Queen's Park, Glasgow PA UK news in pictures 6 August 2021 Chijindu Ujah of Britain, Zharnel Hughes of Britain, Richard Kilty of Britain and Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake of Britain celebrate winning silver as they pose with Asha Philip of Britain, Imani Lansiquot of Britain, Dina Asher-Smith of Britain and Daryll Neita of Britain after they won bronze in the women's 4 x 100m relay during Olympic Games Day 14 Getty UK news in pictures 5 August 2021 A protester places flowers on a photograph of an executed man during a demonstration organised by supporters of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) to protest against the inauguration of Iran's new president Ebrahim Raisi in central London AFP via Getty UK news in pictures 4 August 2021 England's Joe Root looks on as India's KL Rahul doesn't make it to a catch during day one of Cinch First Test match at Trent Bridge, Nottingham PA UK news in pictures 3 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny and Jason Kenny with their silver medals for the Women's Team Pursuit and Mens Team Sprint during the Track Cycling at the Izu Velodrome on the eleventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 2 August 2021 Great Britains Charlotte Worthington competes during the Womens BMX Freestyle Final at the Tokyo Olympics PA UK news in pictures 1 August 2021 EPA UK news in pictures 31 July 2021 James Guy, Adam Peaty and Kathleen Dawson celebrate winning the gold medal in the mixed 4x100m medley relay final at the Tokyo Olympics AP UK news in pictures 30 July 2021 Great Britain's Bethany Shriever and Kye Whyte celebrate their Gold and Silver medals respectively for the Cycling BMX Racing at the Ariake Urban Sports Park on the seventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 29 July 2021 Team GB's Mallory Franklin during the Womens Canoe Slalom Final on day six of the Tokyo Olympic Games. She went on to win the silver medal Getty UK news in pictures 28 July 2021 Canoers on Llyn Padarn lake in Snowdonia, Gwynedd. It was announced that the north-west Wales slate landscape has been granted UNESCO World Heritage Status PA UK news in pictures 27 July 2021 A view of one of two areas now being used at a warehouse facility in Dover, Kent, for boats used by people thought to be migrants. PA UK news in pictures 26 July 2021 A woman is helped by Border Force officers as a group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, onboard a Border Force vessel, following a small boat incident in the Channel PA UK news in pictures 25 July 2021 Vehicles drive through deep water on a flooded road in Nine Elms, London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 24 July 2021 Utilities workers inspect a 15x20ft sinkhole on Green Lane, Liverpool, which is suspected to have been caused by ruptured water main PA UK news in pictures 23 July 2021 Children interact with Mega Please Draw Freely by artist Ei Arakawa inside the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern in London, part of UNIQLO Tate Play the gallery's new free programme of art-inspired activities for families PA UK news in pictures 22 July 2021 Festivalgoers in the campsite at the Latitude festival in Henham Park, Southwold, Suffolk PA

There will be choices to be made within that but we all want the same thing which is to arrive at a deal which works for the UK.Leading Tory Brexiteers have become a direct threat to democracy in the UK after their attacks on civil servants, Labour MP Chuka Umunna has said.

Mr Umunna accused MPs such as Jacob Rees-Mogg and Brexit minister Steve Baker of making dark and dangerous claims after they provoked an angry backlash by questioning the integrity of government officials.

The Streatham MP claimed rhetoric of leading Brexiteers and their allies has a strong whiff of the 1930s".

The Brexiters and their allies in the media and beyond pose a direct threat to the institutions that maintain democracy in this country," he said.

The disgraceful attack on our politically impartial civil service, accusing them of fiddling the figures, is just part of it.

The Streatham MP said Eurosceptics have also accused senior judges of being enemies of the people, attacked anti-Brexit MPs as saboteurs, and criticised the independent Bank of England.

He added: This is taking our country into a very dark place indeed and has a strong whiff of the 1930s about it. it is being done in the name of nationalism and the pursuit of unfettered free market ideology.

As patriots, we all have to call it out, defend our right to challenge the government and defend our right to speak out on the future direction of the country.

He had earlier told the BBCs The World this Weekend: There is something in this debate which is getting quite febrile at the moment.

I think theres something quite dark and dangerous that is happening and we see this in the attacks on the impartial civil service that we have in this country by senior Brexiteer figures.

It comes after Mr Baker was forced to apologise to the House of Commons for appearing to give credence to allegations that Treasury civil servants had deliberately skewed analysis in order to influence policy in favour of the UK remaining in the EU customs union.

While Mr Baker later admitted he should have dismissed or corrected the rumours, Mr Rees-Mogg, leader of the influential European Research Group of Eurosceptic Tory MPs, refused to back down.

Instead, he repeated his claim that officials are fiddling the figures and claimed the Treasury is running policy that is not government policy and then illicitly leaking details to journalists.

Brexit so far: in pictures Show all 53 1 /53 Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit campaign Boris Johnson led the VoteLeave campaign PA Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit campaign Boris Johnson MP, Labour MP Gisela Stuart and UKIP MP Douglas Carswell address the people of Stafford in Market Square during the Vote Leave Brexit Battle Bus tour on 17 May 2016. Their lead line on the tour was: We send the EU 350 million a week, let's fund our NHS instead. Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Voting day A man shelters from the rain as he arrives at a polling station in London on 23 June 2016. Millions of Britons voted in the referendum on whether to stay in or leave the European Union AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Referendum results Leader of Ukip, Nigel Farage, reacts at the Leave EU referendum party at Millbank Tower in central London as results indicated that it was likely the UK would leave the European Union AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Protesting the result A young couple painted as EU flags and a man with a sign reading Im not leaving protest outside Downing Street against the voters decision to leave the EU on 24 June 2016 Getty Brexit so far: in pictures David Cameron resigns British Prime Minister David Cameron resigns on the steps of 10 Downing Street on 24 June 2016 after the results of the EU referendum were declared and the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Theresa May Becomes the new Conservative Party leader Theresa May receives a kiss from her husband Philip, after becoming the new Conservative Party leader on 11 July 2016. May became Prime Minister two days later and although she voted to remain in the referendum was keen to lead Britains Brexit talks after her only rival in the race to succeed David Cameron pulled out unexpectedly. May was left as the only contender standing after the withdrawal from the leadership race of Andrea Leadsom, who faced criticism for suggesting she was more qualified to be prime minister because she had children AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Lancaster House keynote speech on Brexit British Prime Minister Theresa May delivers her keynote speech on Brexit at Lancaster House in London on 17 January 2017. Where she spoke about her offer to introduce a transition period after the UK formally leaves the European Union in March 2019. Despite repeating the pro-Brexit mantra of no deal is better than a bad deal, the Prime Minister claimed she wanted a tone of trust between the negotiators and said Britain was leaving the EU but not Europe. She said there should be a clear double lock needed for the transitional period to make sure businesses had time to prepare for changes to their trading relationships with the EU Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Triggering of Article 50 British Prime Minister Theresa May in the cabinet, sitting below a painting of Britain's first Prime Minister Robert Walpole, signs the official letter to European Council President Donald Tusk invoking Article 50 and the United Kingdom's intention to leave the EU on 29 March 2017 Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Gibraltar nonsense Tensions have risen over Brexit negotiations for the Rock of Gibraltar. The European Council has said Gibraltar would be included in a trade deal between London and Brussels only with the agreement of Spain. While former Conservative leader Michael Howard claimed that Theresa May would be prepared to go to war to protect the territory. Spain's foreign minister stepped in only to assert that there was no need for the dispute Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Shock snap election Soon after triggering Article 50, Theresa May called on 18 April 2017 for a snap general election. The election would be on 8 June and it came as a shock move to many, with her reasoning to try to bolster her position before tough talks on leaving the EU AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Dissolution of Parliament for General Election Campaign Prime Minister Theresa May makes a statement in Downing Street after returning from Buckingham Palace on 3 May 2017. The Prime Minister visited the Queen to ask for the dissolution of Parliament signalling the official start to the general election campaign Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Conservatives lose parliamentary majority An arrangement of British daily newspapers showing front page stories about the exit poll results of the snap general election. British Prime Minister Theresa May faced pressure to resign on 9 June 2017 after losing her parliamentary majority, plunging the country into uncertainty as Brexit talks loomed. The pound fell sharply amid fears the Conservative leader would be unable to form a government AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Labour gains Britains opposition Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn gives a tumbs up as he arrives at Labour headquarters in central London on 9 June 2017 after the snap general election results showed a hung parliament with Labour gains and the Conservatives losing their majority AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit negotiations begin Brexit Minister David Davis and European Commission member in charge of Brexit negotiations Michel Barnier address a press conference at the end of the first day of Brexit negotiations in Brussels on 19 June 2017 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures May speaks in Florence British Prime Minister Theresa May speaks on 22 September 2017, in Florence. May sought to unlock Brexit talks after Brussels demanded more clarity on the crunch issues of budget payments and EU citizens' rights AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU council summit  insufficient progress German Chancellor Angela Merkel joins other EU leaders for a breakfast meeting during an EU summit in Brussels on 20 October 2017. The EU spoke about Brexit and announced that insufficient progress had been made AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures DUP derails settlement on the withdrawal part of Brexit DUP Deputy Leader Nigel Dodds walks off after speaking to members of the media as a protester holding flags shouts after him outside the Houses of Parliament on 5 December 2017. British Prime Minister Theresa May was forced to pull out of a deal with Brussels after the DUP said it would not accept terms which see Northern Ireland treated differently from the rest of the UK Getty Brexit so far: in pictures May suffers defeat over EU (Withdrawal) Bill Theresa May suffers defeat in parliament over EU (Withdrawal) Bill on 13 December 2017. The Government was defeated by Conservative rebels and Labour MPs in a vote on its key piece of Brexit legislation. MPs amended the EU (Withdrawal) Bill against Theresa May's will, guaranteeing Parliament a meaningful vote on any Brexit deal she agrees with Brussels. Ms May's whips applied pressure on Conservative rebels who remained defiant in the Commons throughout the day and in the end the Government was defeated by 309 votes to 305 Brexit so far: in pictures EU council summit  sufficient progress Britain's Prime minister Theresa May arrives to attend the first day of a European union summit in Brussels on 14 December 2017. European leaders discussed Brexit and announced there was finally sufficient progress at the end of the two days AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures The game moves to transition Brexit Secretary David Davis gives evidence on developments in European Union divorce talks to the Commons Exiting the EU Committee in Portcullis House, London, on 24 January 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures Trade deal is what May wants French President Emmanuel Macron gestures to Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May after they hold a press conference at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, on 18 January 2018. May and Macron agreed a new border security deal, through which the UK will pay more to France to stop migrants trying to reach British shores on 18 January 2018 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Transition period agreed The UK and EU agree terms for Brexit transition period on 19 March, 2018 Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures No agreement on Irish border The EU and UK however failed to reach an agreement on the Irish border during the successful talks on other Brexit issues AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU attacks Mays fantasy strategy For months after the March deal is struck there is little significant progress in talks. One senior EU official tears into Britains fantasy negotiating strategy and accuses Theresa May of not even having a position on a variety of important issue Getty Brexit so far: in pictures UK releases Ireland plan Britain releases a new customs plan to solve the Northern Ireland border but Michel Barnier says it leaves unanswered questions and would not prevent a hard border EbS Brexit so far: in pictures Chequers plan agreed The cabinet agrees on a plan known as the "Chequers deal" on July 6 2018. The plan seeks regulatory alignment on goods and food, divergence on services, freedom from the European Courts of Justice and an end to free movement. Many were surprised that the hard Brexiteers of the cabinet would agree to this plan PA Brexit so far: in pictures Chequers plan sparks resignations Brexit Secretary David Davis and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and numerous ministers resign in the days following the Chequers agreement Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Davis out, Raab in On 9 July, Dominic Raab replaces David Davis as Brexit Secretary. Raab is a keen Brexiteer and was a housing minister before taking over from Davis Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Barnier's "deal like no other" EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier claims on August 29 2018 that they are prepared to offer Britain a trade deal like no other, though he stressed that they will not divide or change the single market to accommodate Britain AP Brexit so far: in pictures "My deal or no deal" In an interview on Panorama on September 17, the Prime Minister insists that any Brexit deal will be offered to the EU on her terms. She asserts this amongst continued attacks on her approach to Brexit by Boris Johnson and the European Research Group, headed by Jacob Rees Mogg BBC/Jeff Overs Brexit so far: in pictures EU leaders reject Chequers Quite the blow was dealt to the Prime Minister at a EU leaders summit in Salzburg on September 20. European Council President Donald Tusk stated that the Chequers deal "will not work" Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures May demands respect Following the rejection of her Chequers plan the day before, the Prime Minister voiced her anger that the EU had dismissed it without offering an alternative. She stated that throughout this process, I have treated the EU with nothing but respect. The UK expects the same. A good relationship at the end of this process depends on it." Getty Brexit so far: in pictures People's Vote march As the People's Vote campaign and The Independent's Final Say campaign gain traction, 700,000 people turn out in London to demand a final say on the UK's Brexit deal on October 20 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures More resignations As the Prime Minister settles on a Brexit deal, Brexit secretary Dominic Raab resigns along with Work and Pensions secretary Esther McVey and many other ministers Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Final Say petitions delivered to Downing Street People's Vote supporting MPs Chukka Umunna, Justine Greening and Caroline Lucas and The Independent editor Christian Broughton deliver over a million signatures in favour of a People's Vote to the Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street on December 3 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures May delays vote On December 10, the Prime Minister delayed the vote on her Brexit deal as it was near certain not to pass through the Commons due to Tory rebels and lack of DUP support AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures No confidence motion Tory MPs triggered a confidence vote in the Prime Minister on December 12. She won by 200 votes to 117 Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Commons rejects the deal Following the delay, the Prime Minister's deal was rejected in the Commons by a historic 230 votes AFP Brexit so far: in pictures Corbyn tables a no confidence motion Following the rejection of the Prime Minister's deal, opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn tabled a motion of no confidence in the government, which the government won by a margin of 19 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Plan B The Prime Minister won the support of the commons to return to Brussels to renegotiate the backstop on January 29. In the same sitting, MPs also voted against a no-deal Brexit in a non-legally binding motion PA Brexit so far: in pictures EU council president savages Brexit campaigners who failed to plan for departure: Special place in hell There is a special place in hell for pro-Brexit campaigners who demanded Britain leave the EU without explaining how it should happen, Donald Tusk has said. The European Council president launched the scathing attack as he accused anti-EU campaigners of pushing for Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely. Mr Tusk also dismissed suggestions that the EU could reopen negotiations over the controversial Northern Ireland backstop, dealing a blow to Theresa Mays hopes of securing fresh concessions as she tries to get her exit deal through parliament. Speaking in Brussels alongside Irish taoiseach Leo Varadkar, Mr Tusk said: Ive been wondering what a special place in hell looks like for people who promoted Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely. He also tweeted the accusation moments later Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU and UK announce talks to restart after Theresa May visits Brussels Both have agreed to restart Brexit talks to find a way through the deadlock in Westminster, following a visit by Theresa May to Brussels. In a joint statement the British government and European Commission said Ms May had had a robust but constructive meeting with president Jean-Claude Juncker, and that the pair would meet again before the end of the month. But the EU again refused to reopen the withdrawal agreement and its controversial backstop  with any negotiations expected to focus on the future relationship between the UK and EU instead Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit strategy lost MPs voted down May's Brext plans, with a majority of 45. The prime minister did not appear in parliament to see another defeat PA Brexit so far: in pictures Labour and Conservative MPs resign and create the Independent Group Back row of Chris Leslie, Gavin Shuker, Chuka Umunna and Mike Gapes, middle row of Angela Smith, Luciana Berger and Ann Coffey and front row of Sarah Wollaston, Heidi Allen, Anna Soubry and Joan Ryan PA Brexit so far: in pictures Non-biding votes on amendments to Brexit motion On February 27 he house held a series of votes, unanimously calling for the UK and EU to guarantee citizens rights in a no-deal scenario AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Attorney General publishes legal advice A hammer blow for May as Geoffrey Cox said her renegotiated deal can still leave UK in backstop against its will. Mr Cox did say the prime ministers efforts had reduced the risk of the UK being trapped in the backstop indefinitely. MPs went on to vote against her deal by 391 to 242 UK Parliament/PA Brexit so far: in pictures No-deal off the table MPs rejected a no-deal Brexit by 43 votes on March 13, with cabinet ministers rebelling in another humiliating defeat for Theresa May. A day later they voted in favour of the prime minister seeking an extension to Article 50 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures House speaker bans May from third Commons vote on same Brexit deal John Bercow sensationally told Theresa May he would stop her making another attempt to pass her Brexit deal unless she has secured changes. The Speaker said a further meaningful vote would be ruled out of order if the motion was the same or substantially the same  under an ancient convention to stop the government bullying parliament on issues MPs have rejected Parliament Live Brexit so far: in pictures May writes to Tusk The prime minister wrote to Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, to ask for a three-month extension to give her more time to try to get her deal through parliament. However the European Commission advises the EU27 should offer a short extension to May 23 or a longer one meaning the UK would participate in European elections 10 Downing Street/AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures European Council summit Theresa Mays request to extend triggering Article 50 until the end of June was rejected by the EU, and instead offered a shorter time frame. She accepted the offer of a delay until May 22 if her withdrawal deal is approved by Parliament. If MPs rejected it for a third time, the EU said Britain must propose a new plan by April 12. Ms May said she will not support a long delay because it would mean Britain participating in elections for the European Parliament Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brussels confirms preparations for a no-deal Brexit are completed They warned that it is increasingly likely the UK will crash out. In a statement the European Commission (EC) said preparedness and contingency work, which the EC has been conducting since December 2017, was now finished. The announcement came days after EU leaders agreed to a request by Theresa May to extend the UKs Brexit date AFP Brexit so far: in pictures May resigns Reuters

Mr Umunna also called on his party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, to commit to keeping the UK in the EU single market and customs union.

The Labour leader is facing mounting pressure from within his own party to shift stance and speak out against a hard Brexit.

The Independent revealed on Friday that Carwyn Jones, the Welsh First Minister, believes a policy change is likely within months, while Labour MPs have also urged Mr Corbyn to get off the fence and stop hedging bets on Brexit

Mr Umunna said staying in the economic bloc was the only way of resolving the Irish border issue and was supported by a majority of Labour voters, including those who voted Leave.

It is also vital the Labour Party provides clear opposition to a Tory Brexit by at least arguing to stay in the customs union and single market permanently, he said,

In a swipe at allies of Mr Corbyn, he added: There is a lie being peddled, to avoid engaging with the substance of this issue and which ignores the breadth of support for at least custom union and single market across our membership, that this is being used as a proxy to attack the leader.

It is ridiculous for a number of reasons: the most vociferous advocates tend to be in our trade unions, particularly the national officers charged with looking after particular sectors, the overwhelming majority of our membership voted for Jeremy Corbyn in both 2016 and 2016, and the same people support customs union and single market membership.

In the end, it's not actually about the market  it's about social justice.Downing Street has moved to reassure Tory Brexiteers that Theresa May is committed to taking Britain out of the EU customs union, amid growing dissent on her backbenches and speculation she could face a leadership challenge over the issue.

With anger rising among Tory Eurosceptics over suggestions the Prime Minister was considering softening her Brexit stance, Number 10 sources insisted the UK would categorically [be] leaving the customs union.

The move by Downing Street came after warnings from senior Brexiteers and reports that anti-EU Tory backbenchers could launch a bid to topple Ms May if she joined pro-EU Cabinet ministers including Philip Hammond, the Chancellor, and Amber Rudd, in advocating an ongoing customs union with the EU.

Recommended Tory Brexit battle laid bare as senior ministers contradict each other

Reports last week had suggested Downing Street was willing to remain in a union with the EU for goods, but not services. This prompted Liam Fox, the International Trade Secretary, and Jacob Rees-Mogg, chair of the influential European Research Group of Tory backbenchers, to argue that doing so would prevent the UK making new trade deals with other countries.

The confusion deepened on Friday when a Downing Street spokesman confirmed Ms May was keeping an open mind on the matter and, speaking during a trip to China, the Prime Minister refused to rule out the option of remaining in some kind of customs union with the EU.

 Jacob Rees-Mogg claims civil servants are 'fiddling figures' on Brexit

However, as rumours mounted of a potential Breixteer coup to instal Boris Johnson as Prime Minister with Michael Gove as his deputy and Mr Rees-Mogg as Chancellor, Number 10 moved to calm matters last night.

A Downing Street source said: To put this to rest, we are categorically leaving the customs union.

At home, Brexit is about taking back control of our money, laws and borders. We are going to deliver that, but Brexit is also about the freedom to strike out into the world and sign our own trade deals. We want a good, deep trade deal with the EU and customs arrangement which are as frictionless as possible.

They added: But we must also be free to sign those trade deals with the rest of the world. We have brilliant companies in the UK and we want to strengthen their opportunities to export. We would not want to do something that limits those opportunities.

So it is not our policy to stay in the customs union. It is not our policy to stay in a customs union.

Our policy was set out very clearly in the summer in our customs future partnership paper: we are proposing either of two models  a customs partnership or a highly streamlined customs arrangement. And we are going to get a deal that works for the UK.

The tensions come ahead of two crunch meetings of the Cabinets Brexit sub-committee, where ministers will attempt to find enough common ground between them to agree a plan for Britains future relationship with the EU.

Ahead of a crucial week of Brexit discussions, senior Tory MPs warned Ms May she must hold her ground.

In a Sunday Telegraph article, prominent Brexiteer Bernard Jenkin had warned the Prime Minister not to let Mr Hammond dictate the terms of the UKs departure from the EU.

The backbencher accused ministers of being vague and divided, saying Ms May sticks to one policy [while] the Chancellor keeps advocating another.

Mr Jenkin said: Theresa May will be rewarded for her continuing consistency and determination.

Her MPs will back her, because we are overwhelmingly at one with the majority of the British people who now want a clean Brexit and end to the present uncertainty. It is time for her ministers to back her too and to end the confusion they are fomenting in government.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 6 September 2021 Traders in the Ring at the London Metal Exchange, in the City of London, after open-outcry trading returned for the first time since March 2020, when the Ring was temporarily closed due to the pandemic PA UK news in pictures 5 September 2021 People enjoy the warm weather on Sandbanks beach, Poole PA UK news in pictures 4 September 2021 Demonstrators from Animal Rebellion and Nature Rebellion protest in Trafalgar Square in London. PA UK news in pictures 3 September 2021 South Africa's Ntando Mahlangu (centre) wins the Men's 200 metres T61 Final ahead of second placed Great Britain's Richard Whitehead at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games PA UK news in pictures 2 September 2021 A young common seal on the beach at Horsey Gap in Norfolk, as hundreds of pregnant grey seals come ashore ready for the start of the pupping season. PA UK news in pictures 1 September 2021 Goldfinches fighting over food in a garden in Strensham, Worcestershire PA UK news in pictures 31 August 2021 Gold Medallist Sarah Storey of Britain celebrates on the podium Reuters UK news in pictures 30 August 2021 Extinction Rebellion protesters hold a a tea party on Tower Bridge in London EPA UK news in pictures 29 August 2021 A police office tussles with a demonstrator on Cromwell Road outside the Natural History Museum during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion in London PA UK news in pictures 28 August 2021 Members of the British armed forces 16 Air Assault Brigade walk to the air terminal after disembarking a Royal Airforce Voyager aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire POOL/AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 27 August 2021 Fabio Quartararo crashes during a MotoGP practice session at the British Grand Prix, Silverstone Circuit Action Images via Reuters UK news in pictures 26 August 2021 An Extinction Rebellion activist holds a placard in a fountain surrounded by police officers, during a protest next to Buckingham Palace in London Reuters UK news in pictures 25 August 2021 Gold Medallist Great Britains cyclist, Sarah Storey, celebrates after winning the Womens C5 3000m Individual Pursuit Final at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games. It was her 15th Paralympic gold Reuters UK news in pictures 24 August 2021 A demonstrator dressed as bee during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion on Whitehall, in central London PA UK news in pictures 23 August 2021 Former interpreters for the British forces in Afghanistan demonstrate outside the Home Office in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 22 August 2021 Police officers form a line in front of the entrance to the Guildhall, London, where protesters have climbed onto a ledge above the entrance during an Extinction Rebellion stage a protest PA UK news in pictures 21 August 2021 People take part in a demonstration in solidarity with people of Afghanistan, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 20 August 2021 People zip wire across the sea from Bournemouth pier towards the beach. PA UK news in pictures 19 August 2021 Supporters of Geronimo the alpaca gather outside Shepherds Close Farm in Wooton Under Edge, Gloucestershire PA UK news in pictures 18 August 2021 Former Afghan interpreters and veterans hold a demonstration outside Downing Street, calling for support and protection for Afghan interpreters and their families PA UK news in pictures 17 August 2021 Military personnel board the RAF Airbus A400M at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, where evacuation flights from Afghanistan have been landing Reuters UK news in pictures 16 August 2021 Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer takes part in a minute's silence at Wolverhampton police station for the victims of the Plymouth mass shooting last week PA UK news in pictures 15 August 2021 2Storm, a ten-metre tall puppet of a mythical goddess of the sea created by Edinburgh-based visual theatre company Vision Mechanics, makes its way alongside the seafront at North Berwick, East Lothian, during a performance at the Fringe By The Sea festival PA UK news in pictures 14 August 2021 A woman and two young girls look at floral tributes in Plymouth where six people, including the offender, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident PA UK news in pictures 13 August 2021 Forensic officers in the Keyham area of Plymouth where six people, including the shooter, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident on Thursday evening PA UK news in pictures 12 August 2021 Children ride horses in the River Eden in Appleby, Cumbria, during the annual gathering of travellers for the Appleby Horse Fair PA UK news in pictures 11 August 2021 Stella Moris (left) reacts after talking to the media outside the High Court in London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal, n London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal. The US government has won the latest round in its High Court bid to appeal against the decision not to extradite Julian Assange on espionage charges PA UK news in pictures 10 August 2021 Students react after they receive their A-Level results at the Ark Academy, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 9 August 2021 The final athletes from Great Britain arrive home including Jason Kenny, Laura Kenny and Katie Archibald (front left-right) at Heathrow Airport, London following the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games PA UK news in pictures 8 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny during the closing ceremony of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at the Olympic stadium in Japan PA UK news in pictures 7 August 2021 People from the Glasgow Southside community take part in the Govanhill Carnival, an anti-racist celebration of pride, unity and the contributions immigrants have made to the community in Govanhill, at Queen's Park, Glasgow PA UK news in pictures 6 August 2021 Chijindu Ujah of Britain, Zharnel Hughes of Britain, Richard Kilty of Britain and Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake of Britain celebrate winning silver as they pose with Asha Philip of Britain, Imani Lansiquot of Britain, Dina Asher-Smith of Britain and Daryll Neita of Britain after they won bronze in the women's 4 x 100m relay during Olympic Games Day 14 Getty UK news in pictures 5 August 2021 A protester places flowers on a photograph of an executed man during a demonstration organised by supporters of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) to protest against the inauguration of Iran's new president Ebrahim Raisi in central London AFP via Getty UK news in pictures 4 August 2021 England's Joe Root looks on as India's KL Rahul doesn't make it to a catch during day one of Cinch First Test match at Trent Bridge, Nottingham PA UK news in pictures 3 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny and Jason Kenny with their silver medals for the Women's Team Pursuit and Mens Team Sprint during the Track Cycling at the Izu Velodrome on the eleventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 2 August 2021 Great Britains Charlotte Worthington competes during the Womens BMX Freestyle Final at the Tokyo Olympics PA UK news in pictures 1 August 2021 EPA UK news in pictures 31 July 2021 James Guy, Adam Peaty and Kathleen Dawson celebrate winning the gold medal in the mixed 4x100m medley relay final at the Tokyo Olympics AP UK news in pictures 30 July 2021 Great Britain's Bethany Shriever and Kye Whyte celebrate their Gold and Silver medals respectively for the Cycling BMX Racing at the Ariake Urban Sports Park on the seventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 29 July 2021 Team GB's Mallory Franklin during the Womens Canoe Slalom Final on day six of the Tokyo Olympic Games. She went on to win the silver medal Getty UK news in pictures 28 July 2021 Canoers on Llyn Padarn lake in Snowdonia, Gwynedd. It was announced that the north-west Wales slate landscape has been granted UNESCO World Heritage Status PA UK news in pictures 27 July 2021 A view of one of two areas now being used at a warehouse facility in Dover, Kent, for boats used by people thought to be migrants. 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Another senior Eurosceptic, former Culture Secretary John Whittingdale, said Ms Mays future depended on the direction she takes in Brexit negotiations.

He told ITVs Peston on Sunday: We have an overriding imperative for the next eight months to get as good a deal as we can, and to distract from that with what could be a two-month leadership contest would be very damaging.

Now, the future of the Prime Minister is to some extent going to be tied up with what happens in the Brexit negotiations. But at the moment its absolutely right that we give her all the support we can in getting a good deal.

The divisions were laid bare when ministers contradicted each other within minutes and offered different proposals for the UKs trading relationship with Europe after Brexit.

Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary, told the BBCs Andrew Marr Show: We do not want to have tariffs at the border, so that is a form of customs agreement, arrangement [or] partnership. It is likely to be something within the customs framework.

In a warning to her Cabinet colleagues insisting the UK leave the customs union, she added: If you set up trade barriers, there is a consequence to a trading nation.

But minutes later Dominic Raab, the housing minister, said: I dont think well be in any form of customs union, at least as conceived in international trade practice.

If we were we would have our hands tied in negotiating free trade deals with other parts of the world, whether its Brazil, whether its China or India. The Prime Minister has been very clear we want to be able to grasp those opportunities.The divisions among senior Tories over Brexit were laid bare on Sunday as government ministers contradicted each other on vital details within minutes.

Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary, and Dominic Raab, the housing minister, offered drastically different predictions of the UKs future relationship with the European Union.

Ms Rudd said the UK should remain in some form of customs arrangement with the bloc  a view she suggested was shared by Theresa May. However, Mr Raab, a Brexiteer, said he did not think Britain would be part of any kind of customs union after Brexit.

The divisions come ahead of two crucial meetings of the Cabinets Brexit sub-committee this week, at which warring ministers will attempt to thrash out a common position on the UKs future relationship with the EU single market and customs union.

The Government has said it wants to maintain frictionless trade with the EU  an aim widely thought to require some form of customs agreement.

Ms Rudd told the BBCs Andrew Marr Show: We published a document last year and we proposed either a customs arrangement or a customs partnership. Those are both alternatives we could look at.

We do not want to have tariffs at the border, so that is a form of customs agreement, arrangement [or] partnership. It is likely to be something within the customs framework.

In a warning to her cabinet colleagues insisting the UK should leave the customs union, she added: If you set up trade barriers, there is a consequence to a trading nation.

I am very enthusiastic for making sure we have as few trade barriers as possible. The Prime Minister has said she wants frictionless trade at the border and thats what we need to achieve. If we put up trade barriers, it wont help our economy.

However, minutes later, Mr Raab told Sky Newss Paterson on Sunday: I dont think well be in any form of customs union, at least as conceived in international trade practice.

Because if we were we would have our hands tied in negotiating free trade deals with other parts of the world, whether its Brazil, whether its China or India. The Prime Minister has been very clear we want to be able to grasp those opportunities.

Brexit so far: in pictures Show all 53 1 /53 Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit campaign Boris Johnson led the VoteLeave campaign PA Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit campaign Boris Johnson MP, Labour MP Gisela Stuart and UKIP MP Douglas Carswell address the people of Stafford in Market Square during the Vote Leave Brexit Battle Bus tour on 17 May 2016. Their lead line on the tour was: We send the EU 350 million a week, let's fund our NHS instead. Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Voting day A man shelters from the rain as he arrives at a polling station in London on 23 June 2016. Millions of Britons voted in the referendum on whether to stay in or leave the European Union AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Referendum results Leader of Ukip, Nigel Farage, reacts at the Leave EU referendum party at Millbank Tower in central London as results indicated that it was likely the UK would leave the European Union AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Protesting the result A young couple painted as EU flags and a man with a sign reading Im not leaving protest outside Downing Street against the voters decision to leave the EU on 24 June 2016 Getty Brexit so far: in pictures David Cameron resigns British Prime Minister David Cameron resigns on the steps of 10 Downing Street on 24 June 2016 after the results of the EU referendum were declared and the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Theresa May Becomes the new Conservative Party leader Theresa May receives a kiss from her husband Philip, after becoming the new Conservative Party leader on 11 July 2016. May became Prime Minister two days later and although she voted to remain in the referendum was keen to lead Britains Brexit talks after her only rival in the race to succeed David Cameron pulled out unexpectedly. May was left as the only contender standing after the withdrawal from the leadership race of Andrea Leadsom, who faced criticism for suggesting she was more qualified to be prime minister because she had children AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Lancaster House keynote speech on Brexit British Prime Minister Theresa May delivers her keynote speech on Brexit at Lancaster House in London on 17 January 2017. Where she spoke about her offer to introduce a transition period after the UK formally leaves the European Union in March 2019. Despite repeating the pro-Brexit mantra of no deal is better than a bad deal, the Prime Minister claimed she wanted a tone of trust between the negotiators and said Britain was leaving the EU but not Europe. She said there should be a clear double lock needed for the transitional period to make sure businesses had time to prepare for changes to their trading relationships with the EU Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Triggering of Article 50 British Prime Minister Theresa May in the cabinet, sitting below a painting of Britain's first Prime Minister Robert Walpole, signs the official letter to European Council President Donald Tusk invoking Article 50 and the United Kingdom's intention to leave the EU on 29 March 2017 Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Gibraltar nonsense Tensions have risen over Brexit negotiations for the Rock of Gibraltar. The European Council has said Gibraltar would be included in a trade deal between London and Brussels only with the agreement of Spain. While former Conservative leader Michael Howard claimed that Theresa May would be prepared to go to war to protect the territory. Spain's foreign minister stepped in only to assert that there was no need for the dispute Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Shock snap election Soon after triggering Article 50, Theresa May called on 18 April 2017 for a snap general election. The election would be on 8 June and it came as a shock move to many, with her reasoning to try to bolster her position before tough talks on leaving the EU AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Dissolution of Parliament for General Election Campaign Prime Minister Theresa May makes a statement in Downing Street after returning from Buckingham Palace on 3 May 2017. The Prime Minister visited the Queen to ask for the dissolution of Parliament signalling the official start to the general election campaign Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Conservatives lose parliamentary majority An arrangement of British daily newspapers showing front page stories about the exit poll results of the snap general election. British Prime Minister Theresa May faced pressure to resign on 9 June 2017 after losing her parliamentary majority, plunging the country into uncertainty as Brexit talks loomed. The pound fell sharply amid fears the Conservative leader would be unable to form a government AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Labour gains Britains opposition Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn gives a tumbs up as he arrives at Labour headquarters in central London on 9 June 2017 after the snap general election results showed a hung parliament with Labour gains and the Conservatives losing their majority AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit negotiations begin Brexit Minister David Davis and European Commission member in charge of Brexit negotiations Michel Barnier address a press conference at the end of the first day of Brexit negotiations in Brussels on 19 June 2017 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures May speaks in Florence British Prime Minister Theresa May speaks on 22 September 2017, in Florence. May sought to unlock Brexit talks after Brussels demanded more clarity on the crunch issues of budget payments and EU citizens' rights AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU council summit  insufficient progress German Chancellor Angela Merkel joins other EU leaders for a breakfast meeting during an EU summit in Brussels on 20 October 2017. The EU spoke about Brexit and announced that insufficient progress had been made AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures DUP derails settlement on the withdrawal part of Brexit DUP Deputy Leader Nigel Dodds walks off after speaking to members of the media as a protester holding flags shouts after him outside the Houses of Parliament on 5 December 2017. British Prime Minister Theresa May was forced to pull out of a deal with Brussels after the DUP said it would not accept terms which see Northern Ireland treated differently from the rest of the UK Getty Brexit so far: in pictures May suffers defeat over EU (Withdrawal) Bill Theresa May suffers defeat in parliament over EU (Withdrawal) Bill on 13 December 2017. The Government was defeated by Conservative rebels and Labour MPs in a vote on its key piece of Brexit legislation. MPs amended the EU (Withdrawal) Bill against Theresa May's will, guaranteeing Parliament a meaningful vote on any Brexit deal she agrees with Brussels. Ms May's whips applied pressure on Conservative rebels who remained defiant in the Commons throughout the day and in the end the Government was defeated by 309 votes to 305 Brexit so far: in pictures EU council summit  sufficient progress Britain's Prime minister Theresa May arrives to attend the first day of a European union summit in Brussels on 14 December 2017. European leaders discussed Brexit and announced there was finally sufficient progress at the end of the two days AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures The game moves to transition Brexit Secretary David Davis gives evidence on developments in European Union divorce talks to the Commons Exiting the EU Committee in Portcullis House, London, on 24 January 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures Trade deal is what May wants French President Emmanuel Macron gestures to Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May after they hold a press conference at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, on 18 January 2018. May and Macron agreed a new border security deal, through which the UK will pay more to France to stop migrants trying to reach British shores on 18 January 2018 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Transition period agreed The UK and EU agree terms for Brexit transition period on 19 March, 2018 Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures No agreement on Irish border The EU and UK however failed to reach an agreement on the Irish border during the successful talks on other Brexit issues AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU attacks Mays fantasy strategy For months after the March deal is struck there is little significant progress in talks. One senior EU official tears into Britains fantasy negotiating strategy and accuses Theresa May of not even having a position on a variety of important issue Getty Brexit so far: in pictures UK releases Ireland plan Britain releases a new customs plan to solve the Northern Ireland border but Michel Barnier says it leaves unanswered questions and would not prevent a hard border EbS Brexit so far: in pictures Chequers plan agreed The cabinet agrees on a plan known as the "Chequers deal" on July 6 2018. The plan seeks regulatory alignment on goods and food, divergence on services, freedom from the European Courts of Justice and an end to free movement. Many were surprised that the hard Brexiteers of the cabinet would agree to this plan PA Brexit so far: in pictures Chequers plan sparks resignations Brexit Secretary David Davis and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and numerous ministers resign in the days following the Chequers agreement Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Davis out, Raab in On 9 July, Dominic Raab replaces David Davis as Brexit Secretary. Raab is a keen Brexiteer and was a housing minister before taking over from Davis Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Barnier's "deal like no other" EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier claims on August 29 2018 that they are prepared to offer Britain a trade deal like no other, though he stressed that they will not divide or change the single market to accommodate Britain AP Brexit so far: in pictures "My deal or no deal" In an interview on Panorama on September 17, the Prime Minister insists that any Brexit deal will be offered to the EU on her terms. She asserts this amongst continued attacks on her approach to Brexit by Boris Johnson and the European Research Group, headed by Jacob Rees Mogg BBC/Jeff Overs Brexit so far: in pictures EU leaders reject Chequers Quite the blow was dealt to the Prime Minister at a EU leaders summit in Salzburg on September 20. European Council President Donald Tusk stated that the Chequers deal "will not work" Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures May demands respect Following the rejection of her Chequers plan the day before, the Prime Minister voiced her anger that the EU had dismissed it without offering an alternative. She stated that throughout this process, I have treated the EU with nothing but respect. The UK expects the same. A good relationship at the end of this process depends on it." Getty Brexit so far: in pictures People's Vote march As the People's Vote campaign and The Independent's Final Say campaign gain traction, 700,000 people turn out in London to demand a final say on the UK's Brexit deal on October 20 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures More resignations As the Prime Minister settles on a Brexit deal, Brexit secretary Dominic Raab resigns along with Work and Pensions secretary Esther McVey and many other ministers Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Final Say petitions delivered to Downing Street People's Vote supporting MPs Chukka Umunna, Justine Greening and Caroline Lucas and The Independent editor Christian Broughton deliver over a million signatures in favour of a People's Vote to the Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street on December 3 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures May delays vote On December 10, the Prime Minister delayed the vote on her Brexit deal as it was near certain not to pass through the Commons due to Tory rebels and lack of DUP support AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures No confidence motion Tory MPs triggered a confidence vote in the Prime Minister on December 12. She won by 200 votes to 117 Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Commons rejects the deal Following the delay, the Prime Minister's deal was rejected in the Commons by a historic 230 votes AFP Brexit so far: in pictures Corbyn tables a no confidence motion Following the rejection of the Prime Minister's deal, opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn tabled a motion of no confidence in the government, which the government won by a margin of 19 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Plan B The Prime Minister won the support of the commons to return to Brussels to renegotiate the backstop on January 29. In the same sitting, MPs also voted against a no-deal Brexit in a non-legally binding motion PA Brexit so far: in pictures EU council president savages Brexit campaigners who failed to plan for departure: Special place in hell There is a special place in hell for pro-Brexit campaigners who demanded Britain leave the EU without explaining how it should happen, Donald Tusk has said. The European Council president launched the scathing attack as he accused anti-EU campaigners of pushing for Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely. Mr Tusk also dismissed suggestions that the EU could reopen negotiations over the controversial Northern Ireland backstop, dealing a blow to Theresa Mays hopes of securing fresh concessions as she tries to get her exit deal through parliament. Speaking in Brussels alongside Irish taoiseach Leo Varadkar, Mr Tusk said: Ive been wondering what a special place in hell looks like for people who promoted Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely. He also tweeted the accusation moments later Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU and UK announce talks to restart after Theresa May visits Brussels Both have agreed to restart Brexit talks to find a way through the deadlock in Westminster, following a visit by Theresa May to Brussels. In a joint statement the British government and European Commission said Ms May had had a robust but constructive meeting with president Jean-Claude Juncker, and that the pair would meet again before the end of the month. But the EU again refused to reopen the withdrawal agreement and its controversial backstop  with any negotiations expected to focus on the future relationship between the UK and EU instead Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit strategy lost MPs voted down May's Brext plans, with a majority of 45. The prime minister did not appear in parliament to see another defeat PA Brexit so far: in pictures Labour and Conservative MPs resign and create the Independent Group Back row of Chris Leslie, Gavin Shuker, Chuka Umunna and Mike Gapes, middle row of Angela Smith, Luciana Berger and Ann Coffey and front row of Sarah Wollaston, Heidi Allen, Anna Soubry and Joan Ryan PA Brexit so far: in pictures Non-biding votes on amendments to Brexit motion On February 27 he house held a series of votes, unanimously calling for the UK and EU to guarantee citizens rights in a no-deal scenario AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Attorney General publishes legal advice A hammer blow for May as Geoffrey Cox said her renegotiated deal can still leave UK in backstop against its will. Mr Cox did say the prime ministers efforts had reduced the risk of the UK being trapped in the backstop indefinitely. MPs went on to vote against her deal by 391 to 242 UK Parliament/PA Brexit so far: in pictures No-deal off the table MPs rejected a no-deal Brexit by 43 votes on March 13, with cabinet ministers rebelling in another humiliating defeat for Theresa May. A day later they voted in favour of the prime minister seeking an extension to Article 50 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures House speaker bans May from third Commons vote on same Brexit deal John Bercow sensationally told Theresa May he would stop her making another attempt to pass her Brexit deal unless she has secured changes. The Speaker said a further meaningful vote would be ruled out of order if the motion was the same or substantially the same  under an ancient convention to stop the government bullying parliament on issues MPs have rejected Parliament Live Brexit so far: in pictures May writes to Tusk The prime minister wrote to Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, to ask for a three-month extension to give her more time to try to get her deal through parliament. However the European Commission advises the EU27 should offer a short extension to May 23 or a longer one meaning the UK would participate in European elections 10 Downing Street/AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures European Council summit Theresa Mays request to extend triggering Article 50 until the end of June was rejected by the EU, and instead offered a shorter time frame. She accepted the offer of a delay until May 22 if her withdrawal deal is approved by Parliament. If MPs rejected it for a third time, the EU said Britain must propose a new plan by April 12. Ms May said she will not support a long delay because it would mean Britain participating in elections for the European Parliament Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brussels confirms preparations for a no-deal Brexit are completed They warned that it is increasingly likely the UK will crash out. In a statement the European Commission (EC) said preparedness and contingency work, which the EC has been conducting since December 2017, was now finished. The announcement came days after EU leaders agreed to a request by Theresa May to extend the UKs Brexit date AFP Brexit so far: in pictures May resigns Reuters

Theresa May has previously said she has an open mind on the issue. She will this week attempt to find a middle ground between senior ministers who have very different views on the UKs future relationship with the EU.

Leading Brexiteers Boris Johnson, Liam Fox and Michael Gove are set to strongly resist plans for any kind of customs union. That places them firmly on a collision course with cabinet colleagues Ms Rudd, Philip Hammond and Greg Clark, who believe any move towards imposing tariffs would harm the economy.

Reports suggest Mr Fox could resign if he does not get his way. The International Trade Secretary said last week that it was very difficult to see how being in a customs union is compatible with having an independent trade policy.

Tory Eurosceptics are also thought to be considering a coup to replace Theresa May with Mr Johnson, assisted by Mr Gove as his deputy and Jacob Rees-Mogg, a leading backbench Brexiteer, as Chancellor.

Ms Rudd, however, said she was confident a deal would be reached.

She said: I have a surprise for the Brexiteers, which is that the committee that meets in order to help make these decisions is more united than they think. We meet in the committee, we meet privately for discussions and I think we will arrive at something which suits us all.

She was "not intimidated" by the Eurosceptics' demands, she added.

 Jacob Rees-Mogg claims civil servants are 'fiddling figures' on Brexit

But in a further sign of widening Tory divisions over Brexit, the Home Secretary criticised Mr Rees-Mogg, chair of the influential European Research Group of Eurosceptic Tory MPs, for suggesting civil servants are fiddling the figures to influence policy in favour of a softer withdrawal from the EU.

Mr Rees-Mogg claimed on Saturday that Treasury officials were running policy that is not government policy and has previously alleged the department deliberately skewed an analysis document.

Asked about the allegations and the integrity of civil servants, Ms Rudd said: I have complete confidence in them. We are envied the world over for the high standards of our civil servants.

She added: Im very surprised at Jacob because he is famously courteous, famously thoughtful and articulate, so Im very surprised that hes used this language. I think that he is wrong.

This document he is referring to is not a Treasury document anyway, its prepared across different departments and its a tool for informing those of us who are on the EU sub-committee about the choices that are going to be made. Its not about projecting one way or another, so I think he is wrong.The leaders of four opposition parties have written to Jeremy Corbyn urging him to rethink his stance on Brexit and work with them to keep the UK in the EU single market and customs union.

In a joint letter, the SNP, Liberal Democrat, Green Party and Plaid Cymru leaders called on Mr Corbyn to join forces with them in opposing the Tories damaging plans.

The Labour leader has previously refused to engage with other parties that are campaigning against the Governments plans for a hard Brexit.

The latest attempt to encourage Mr Corbyn to cooperate comes as he faces mounting pressure from within his own party to soften his stance on Brexit and commit to keeping the UK in the single market and customs union.

Carwyn Jones, the Welsh First Minister, told The Independent he expected Mr Corbyn to announce a shift in policy in favour of staying in the customs union within months and warned that leaving the bloc would be economically daft.

Earlier in the week some Labour MPs said their leader needed to get off the fence and stop hedging bets on Brexit.

Mr Corbyn has so far suggested the UK should leave the single market and existing customs union. He has proposed forming a new customs agreement after Brexit and wants the UK to have unfettered access to the single market.

Last month the Labour leader was empty-chaired at a cross-party summit designed to help boost coordination between the political parties opposing the Conservatives stance.

In their letter, the SNPs Ian Blackford, Lib Dem leader Sir Vince Cable, Plaid Cymrus Liz Saville Roberts and Green Party co-leader Caroline Lucas again urged Mr Corbyn to meet with them to discuss Brexit.

Brexit so far: in pictures Show all 53 1 /53 Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit campaign Boris Johnson led the VoteLeave campaign PA Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit campaign Boris Johnson MP, Labour MP Gisela Stuart and UKIP MP Douglas Carswell address the people of Stafford in Market Square during the Vote Leave Brexit Battle Bus tour on 17 May 2016. Their lead line on the tour was: We send the EU 350 million a week, let's fund our NHS instead. Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Voting day A man shelters from the rain as he arrives at a polling station in London on 23 June 2016. Millions of Britons voted in the referendum on whether to stay in or leave the European Union AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Referendum results Leader of Ukip, Nigel Farage, reacts at the Leave EU referendum party at Millbank Tower in central London as results indicated that it was likely the UK would leave the European Union AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Protesting the result A young couple painted as EU flags and a man with a sign reading Im not leaving protest outside Downing Street against the voters decision to leave the EU on 24 June 2016 Getty Brexit so far: in pictures David Cameron resigns British Prime Minister David Cameron resigns on the steps of 10 Downing Street on 24 June 2016 after the results of the EU referendum were declared and the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Theresa May Becomes the new Conservative Party leader Theresa May receives a kiss from her husband Philip, after becoming the new Conservative Party leader on 11 July 2016. May became Prime Minister two days later and although she voted to remain in the referendum was keen to lead Britains Brexit talks after her only rival in the race to succeed David Cameron pulled out unexpectedly. May was left as the only contender standing after the withdrawal from the leadership race of Andrea Leadsom, who faced criticism for suggesting she was more qualified to be prime minister because she had children AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Lancaster House keynote speech on Brexit British Prime Minister Theresa May delivers her keynote speech on Brexit at Lancaster House in London on 17 January 2017. Where she spoke about her offer to introduce a transition period after the UK formally leaves the European Union in March 2019. Despite repeating the pro-Brexit mantra of no deal is better than a bad deal, the Prime Minister claimed she wanted a tone of trust between the negotiators and said Britain was leaving the EU but not Europe. She said there should be a clear double lock needed for the transitional period to make sure businesses had time to prepare for changes to their trading relationships with the EU Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Triggering of Article 50 British Prime Minister Theresa May in the cabinet, sitting below a painting of Britain's first Prime Minister Robert Walpole, signs the official letter to European Council President Donald Tusk invoking Article 50 and the United Kingdom's intention to leave the EU on 29 March 2017 Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Gibraltar nonsense Tensions have risen over Brexit negotiations for the Rock of Gibraltar. The European Council has said Gibraltar would be included in a trade deal between London and Brussels only with the agreement of Spain. While former Conservative leader Michael Howard claimed that Theresa May would be prepared to go to war to protect the territory. Spain's foreign minister stepped in only to assert that there was no need for the dispute Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Shock snap election Soon after triggering Article 50, Theresa May called on 18 April 2017 for a snap general election. The election would be on 8 June and it came as a shock move to many, with her reasoning to try to bolster her position before tough talks on leaving the EU AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Dissolution of Parliament for General Election Campaign Prime Minister Theresa May makes a statement in Downing Street after returning from Buckingham Palace on 3 May 2017. The Prime Minister visited the Queen to ask for the dissolution of Parliament signalling the official start to the general election campaign Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Conservatives lose parliamentary majority An arrangement of British daily newspapers showing front page stories about the exit poll results of the snap general election. British Prime Minister Theresa May faced pressure to resign on 9 June 2017 after losing her parliamentary majority, plunging the country into uncertainty as Brexit talks loomed. The pound fell sharply amid fears the Conservative leader would be unable to form a government AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Labour gains Britains opposition Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn gives a tumbs up as he arrives at Labour headquarters in central London on 9 June 2017 after the snap general election results showed a hung parliament with Labour gains and the Conservatives losing their majority AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit negotiations begin Brexit Minister David Davis and European Commission member in charge of Brexit negotiations Michel Barnier address a press conference at the end of the first day of Brexit negotiations in Brussels on 19 June 2017 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures May speaks in Florence British Prime Minister Theresa May speaks on 22 September 2017, in Florence. May sought to unlock Brexit talks after Brussels demanded more clarity on the crunch issues of budget payments and EU citizens' rights AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU council summit  insufficient progress German Chancellor Angela Merkel joins other EU leaders for a breakfast meeting during an EU summit in Brussels on 20 October 2017. The EU spoke about Brexit and announced that insufficient progress had been made AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures DUP derails settlement on the withdrawal part of Brexit DUP Deputy Leader Nigel Dodds walks off after speaking to members of the media as a protester holding flags shouts after him outside the Houses of Parliament on 5 December 2017. British Prime Minister Theresa May was forced to pull out of a deal with Brussels after the DUP said it would not accept terms which see Northern Ireland treated differently from the rest of the UK Getty Brexit so far: in pictures May suffers defeat over EU (Withdrawal) Bill Theresa May suffers defeat in parliament over EU (Withdrawal) Bill on 13 December 2017. The Government was defeated by Conservative rebels and Labour MPs in a vote on its key piece of Brexit legislation. MPs amended the EU (Withdrawal) Bill against Theresa May's will, guaranteeing Parliament a meaningful vote on any Brexit deal she agrees with Brussels. Ms May's whips applied pressure on Conservative rebels who remained defiant in the Commons throughout the day and in the end the Government was defeated by 309 votes to 305 Brexit so far: in pictures EU council summit  sufficient progress Britain's Prime minister Theresa May arrives to attend the first day of a European union summit in Brussels on 14 December 2017. European leaders discussed Brexit and announced there was finally sufficient progress at the end of the two days AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures The game moves to transition Brexit Secretary David Davis gives evidence on developments in European Union divorce talks to the Commons Exiting the EU Committee in Portcullis House, London, on 24 January 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures Trade deal is what May wants French President Emmanuel Macron gestures to Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May after they hold a press conference at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, on 18 January 2018. May and Macron agreed a new border security deal, through which the UK will pay more to France to stop migrants trying to reach British shores on 18 January 2018 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Transition period agreed The UK and EU agree terms for Brexit transition period on 19 March, 2018 Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures No agreement on Irish border The EU and UK however failed to reach an agreement on the Irish border during the successful talks on other Brexit issues AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU attacks Mays fantasy strategy For months after the March deal is struck there is little significant progress in talks. One senior EU official tears into Britains fantasy negotiating strategy and accuses Theresa May of not even having a position on a variety of important issue Getty Brexit so far: in pictures UK releases Ireland plan Britain releases a new customs plan to solve the Northern Ireland border but Michel Barnier says it leaves unanswered questions and would not prevent a hard border EbS Brexit so far: in pictures Chequers plan agreed The cabinet agrees on a plan known as the "Chequers deal" on July 6 2018. The plan seeks regulatory alignment on goods and food, divergence on services, freedom from the European Courts of Justice and an end to free movement. Many were surprised that the hard Brexiteers of the cabinet would agree to this plan PA Brexit so far: in pictures Chequers plan sparks resignations Brexit Secretary David Davis and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and numerous ministers resign in the days following the Chequers agreement Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Davis out, Raab in On 9 July, Dominic Raab replaces David Davis as Brexit Secretary. Raab is a keen Brexiteer and was a housing minister before taking over from Davis Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Barnier's "deal like no other" EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier claims on August 29 2018 that they are prepared to offer Britain a trade deal like no other, though he stressed that they will not divide or change the single market to accommodate Britain AP Brexit so far: in pictures "My deal or no deal" In an interview on Panorama on September 17, the Prime Minister insists that any Brexit deal will be offered to the EU on her terms. She asserts this amongst continued attacks on her approach to Brexit by Boris Johnson and the European Research Group, headed by Jacob Rees Mogg BBC/Jeff Overs Brexit so far: in pictures EU leaders reject Chequers Quite the blow was dealt to the Prime Minister at a EU leaders summit in Salzburg on September 20. European Council President Donald Tusk stated that the Chequers deal "will not work" Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures May demands respect Following the rejection of her Chequers plan the day before, the Prime Minister voiced her anger that the EU had dismissed it without offering an alternative. She stated that throughout this process, I have treated the EU with nothing but respect. The UK expects the same. A good relationship at the end of this process depends on it." Getty Brexit so far: in pictures People's Vote march As the People's Vote campaign and The Independent's Final Say campaign gain traction, 700,000 people turn out in London to demand a final say on the UK's Brexit deal on October 20 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures More resignations As the Prime Minister settles on a Brexit deal, Brexit secretary Dominic Raab resigns along with Work and Pensions secretary Esther McVey and many other ministers Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Final Say petitions delivered to Downing Street People's Vote supporting MPs Chukka Umunna, Justine Greening and Caroline Lucas and The Independent editor Christian Broughton deliver over a million signatures in favour of a People's Vote to the Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street on December 3 2018 PA Brexit so far: in pictures May delays vote On December 10, the Prime Minister delayed the vote on her Brexit deal as it was near certain not to pass through the Commons due to Tory rebels and lack of DUP support AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures No confidence motion Tory MPs triggered a confidence vote in the Prime Minister on December 12. She won by 200 votes to 117 Reuters Brexit so far: in pictures Commons rejects the deal Following the delay, the Prime Minister's deal was rejected in the Commons by a historic 230 votes AFP Brexit so far: in pictures Corbyn tables a no confidence motion Following the rejection of the Prime Minister's deal, opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn tabled a motion of no confidence in the government, which the government won by a margin of 19 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Plan B The Prime Minister won the support of the commons to return to Brussels to renegotiate the backstop on January 29. In the same sitting, MPs also voted against a no-deal Brexit in a non-legally binding motion PA Brexit so far: in pictures EU council president savages Brexit campaigners who failed to plan for departure: Special place in hell There is a special place in hell for pro-Brexit campaigners who demanded Britain leave the EU without explaining how it should happen, Donald Tusk has said. The European Council president launched the scathing attack as he accused anti-EU campaigners of pushing for Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely. Mr Tusk also dismissed suggestions that the EU could reopen negotiations over the controversial Northern Ireland backstop, dealing a blow to Theresa Mays hopes of securing fresh concessions as she tries to get her exit deal through parliament. Speaking in Brussels alongside Irish taoiseach Leo Varadkar, Mr Tusk said: Ive been wondering what a special place in hell looks like for people who promoted Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely. He also tweeted the accusation moments later Getty Brexit so far: in pictures EU and UK announce talks to restart after Theresa May visits Brussels Both have agreed to restart Brexit talks to find a way through the deadlock in Westminster, following a visit by Theresa May to Brussels. In a joint statement the British government and European Commission said Ms May had had a robust but constructive meeting with president Jean-Claude Juncker, and that the pair would meet again before the end of the month. But the EU again refused to reopen the withdrawal agreement and its controversial backstop  with any negotiations expected to focus on the future relationship between the UK and EU instead Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brexit strategy lost MPs voted down May's Brext plans, with a majority of 45. The prime minister did not appear in parliament to see another defeat PA Brexit so far: in pictures Labour and Conservative MPs resign and create the Independent Group Back row of Chris Leslie, Gavin Shuker, Chuka Umunna and Mike Gapes, middle row of Angela Smith, Luciana Berger and Ann Coffey and front row of Sarah Wollaston, Heidi Allen, Anna Soubry and Joan Ryan PA Brexit so far: in pictures Non-biding votes on amendments to Brexit motion On February 27 he house held a series of votes, unanimously calling for the UK and EU to guarantee citizens rights in a no-deal scenario AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Attorney General publishes legal advice A hammer blow for May as Geoffrey Cox said her renegotiated deal can still leave UK in backstop against its will. Mr Cox did say the prime ministers efforts had reduced the risk of the UK being trapped in the backstop indefinitely. MPs went on to vote against her deal by 391 to 242 UK Parliament/PA Brexit so far: in pictures No-deal off the table MPs rejected a no-deal Brexit by 43 votes on March 13, with cabinet ministers rebelling in another humiliating defeat for Theresa May. A day later they voted in favour of the prime minister seeking an extension to Article 50 AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures House speaker bans May from third Commons vote on same Brexit deal John Bercow sensationally told Theresa May he would stop her making another attempt to pass her Brexit deal unless she has secured changes. The Speaker said a further meaningful vote would be ruled out of order if the motion was the same or substantially the same  under an ancient convention to stop the government bullying parliament on issues MPs have rejected Parliament Live Brexit so far: in pictures May writes to Tusk The prime minister wrote to Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, to ask for a three-month extension to give her more time to try to get her deal through parliament. However the European Commission advises the EU27 should offer a short extension to May 23 or a longer one meaning the UK would participate in European elections 10 Downing Street/AFP/Getty Brexit so far: in pictures European Council summit Theresa Mays request to extend triggering Article 50 until the end of June was rejected by the EU, and instead offered a shorter time frame. She accepted the offer of a delay until May 22 if her withdrawal deal is approved by Parliament. If MPs rejected it for a third time, the EU said Britain must propose a new plan by April 12. Ms May said she will not support a long delay because it would mean Britain participating in elections for the European Parliament Getty Brexit so far: in pictures Brussels confirms preparations for a no-deal Brexit are completed They warned that it is increasingly likely the UK will crash out. In a statement the European Commission (EC) said preparedness and contingency work, which the EC has been conducting since December 2017, was now finished. The announcement came days after EU leaders agreed to a request by Theresa May to extend the UKs Brexit date AFP Brexit so far: in pictures May resigns Reuters

In their letter, the four leaders wrote: We write to you today, ahead of your planned discussions on Labours Brexit policy, to urge you to rethink your opposition to the UKs continued membership of the single market and customs union.

With each passing week we see mounting evidence of the perils of a hard Brexit and the leaked papers last week make it clear that leaving the EU will, in all circumstances, harm the economy of every nation and region in the UK.

We believe that the big decisions facing us, over membership of the single market and the customs union, can no longer be ducked.

Arguing that a hard Brexit makes progressive goals far harder to achieve, they said the best protection for our economy and in turn our public services, and to protect jobs, is to remain in the single market and customs union.

The leaders added: Though all party leaders must take account of multiple factors when making decisions of this magnitude, we urge you to focus specifically on the effects that a hard Brexit will have on people who are already suffering in this country.

By campaigning for the UK to remain permanent members of the customs union and single market you could change the course of Brexit, and in turn protect our economy and society from some of its worst effects.

Please do consider changing your position, and joining us in opposing the Tories damaging plans.

The group has also invited Frances OGrady, general secretary of the Trades Union Congress, to attend a second meeting of the cross-party alliance.

Mr Blackford said: It is vital that all opposition parties in Westminster work together and put the brakes on a hard Brexit. We will work to protect our membership of the Single Market and Customs Union  which puts jobs and living standards front and centre of the Brexit negotiations.

There is still a seat at the table for Jeremy Corbyn to join with other Westminster opposition leaders and work with us before its too late.

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable added: It is time for Labours leadership to join us and fight for Britains economic future, rather than allow the Conservatives to steer the UK towards a damaging and unmandated hard Brexit.

This means, at the very least, they work alongside us to keep the UK within the single market and the customs union, a position the overwhelming majority of Labours members and parliamentarians support.

Ms Lucas called on Labour to ditch their fence sitting and join us in campaigning for Britain to remain a member of the single market and customs union, while Ms Roberts said there was a rare opportunity to force the Tories into taking the sensible option  but only if the Labour Party work with us.Amtrak is under mounting pressure after two of its employees were killed and 116 passengers injured when a passenger train hit stationary freight cars  the second deadly incident involving the company in a week.

Officials said the accident happened at around 2.45am close to Columbia, South Carolina, as the passenger train made its way from New York to Miami. Images showed the front engine and that of the freight train wrecked and strewn by the sides of the track.

As it was announced the FBI was helping local police in documenting the scene of the incident, the National Transportation Board (NTSB) said it was launching an investigation. Meanwhile, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster told reporters it appeared the freight train, owned by CSX, was not moving and had no people on board.

It appears to me that the CSX train was on the track it was supposed to be on. It appears Amtrak was on the wrong track, he said on Sunday morning.

I think it will prompt a new conversation around the country. We just cannot have these accidents. We go to great pains to make sure these things do not happen, but occasionally they do.

Mr McMaster said two people had been killed and 116 injured. He said he visited some of those who were hurt and found them to be in a reasonable mood, considering the situation.

Lexington County coroner Margaret Fisher later identified the two fatalities as Amtrak employees Michael Kempf and Michael Cella. Mr Kempf, 54, of Savannah, Georgia, was the trains engineer, while Mr Cella, 36, of Orange Park, Florida, was its conductor.

We should have had a lot more casualties, but we didnt, said Ms Fisher.

 South Carolina officials give statement on Amtrak train crash

When you consider a train that size and how many people were on board, you would expect more fatalities just because they are trains, but God blessed us and we only had the two, not that they were in any diminished because they were very, very hard.

She said she had been speaking to the mens relatives. They are very distraught, very shocked, as anybody would be in this situation. We are working with them to make sure they are taken care of.

Tom Allen, a South Carolina transportation safety official, told The State it was probably a switching issue that caused the Amtrak train to run onto the side track.

Part of the preliminary indications are that it would have to be a switching issue, he said. It was no derailment caused by a flaw in the track. The Amtrak was on the wrong track.

The crash was the third deadly accident involving Amtrak in less than two months. On Wednesday, a train carrying Republican members of Congress to a retreat in West Virginia hit a truck carrying garbage in Virginia, killing a passenger in the truck.

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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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. 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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

In December, an Amtrak train ran off the rails while travelling on a new route near Tacoma, Washington, killing three people and injuring dozens. At the time, it was moving at nearly 80mph, more than twice the speed limit.

The Associated Press said the latest incident happened near a rail yard about 10 miles south of Columbia, where several track spurs split off for freight cars to be unloaded.

Amtrak officials worked to gather luggage and other belongings and line up buses to take passengers on to their destinations. Those who were not hurt were taken in patrol cars to a shelter, and local businesses stepped in to provide drinks and meals.

We know they are shaken up quite a bit. We know this is like nothing else they have ever been through. So we wanted to get them out of the cold, get them out of the weather  get them to a warm place, said sheriffs spokesman Adam Myrick.

President Donald Trump said on Twitter: My thoughts and prayers are with all of the victims involved in this mornings train collision in South Carolina. Thank you to our incredible first responders for the work theyve done.

Yet others pointed out the pressing need for what they said was a failing infrastructure. Amtrak is partly owned by the US government.

Lawrence Summers, a Harvard economist who served as director of Barack Obamas National Economic Council, said: Third major Amtrak accident in two months. Constant infrastructure breakdowns. Rising death rates for the middle aged. USA showing symptoms, like USSR in 1980s, of decay. This, not demonising FBI, should be focus of President Donald Trump and government.Sex and the City actress Kim Cattrall has announced that her missing brother has been found dead, hours after making an appeal on social media for help in finding him.

In a message posted on Twitter, the 61-year-old star wrote: It is with great sadness that myself and my family announce the unexpected passing of our son and brother, Chris Cattrall.

Earlier in the day, the actress had asked for information that could help locate her brother, who disappeared from his home in Alberta, Canada, last Tuesday.

This is not like Chris. He he would never leave his unlocked home without those items nor his 7 beloved dogs, she wrote.

Chris is 55 years old, 6 feet tall, 200 pounds, blue eyes, short brown hair, goatee, average build and usually wearing a waist length hooded winter coat with black gloves, blue jeans and calf high black winter boots.

 Sarah Jessica Parker says she was heartbroken when she heard Kim Cattrall never considered them friends

She added: Hes a one-of-a-kind brother. Help us bring him home safe. Please spread the world. Many thanks for reading this.

The 61-year-old actress, probably best known for playing the character of Samantha Jones in the New York-based television series and movies, for which she received five Emmy Award nominations, used her Instagram, Facebook and Twitter pages to ask for help.

Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage Show all 22 1 /22 Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318648.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318645.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318647.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318643.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318581.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318634.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318633.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318632.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318571.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318631.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318630.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318570.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318629.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318564.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318626.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318618.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318621.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318616.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318610.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318608.bin Getty Images Kim Cattrall on sex and the stage 318604.bin Getty Images

She requested that anyone who knew where he was to contact the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in the town of Blackfalds, Alberta, or CrimeStoppers.

His step daughter, Katie Osmond, also used social media to share photos of the man.

She wrote: I know its hard to find people when theyve gone missing. Im praying that he comes home safe and unharmed.

The RCMP confirmed to CBC News that Mr Cattralls body had been found, and their investigation into his disappearance had concluded. Police said the death is not considered suspicious.Longtime televangelist Pat Robertson is recovering after suffering an embolic stroke, according to the Christian Broadcasting Network, a Virginia-based television network Robertson founded.

Robertson, 87, was rushed to the nearest stroke centre on Friday after a family member recognised "the onset of symptoms," the CBN report says.

"Within minutes of receiving [clot-busting drugs], Dr Robertson was awake and responsive and able to move all of his limbs," CBN states. He is expected to make a full recovery.

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

Robertson hosts CBN's flagship show "The 700 Club," where he has praised and interviewed President Donald Trump during his campaign and after his election. Robertson and some other evangelical leaders have stood by the President, even after some thought they might abandon him. Robertson, for instance, called Mr Trump's "Access Hollywood" video "macho talk." In the fall, Robertson connected the Las Vegas mass shooting to disrespect for Mr Trump.

For decades, Robertson has been an influential leader among certain kinds of evangelicals who consider themselves to be charismatic or Pentecostal, including those who might engage in healing services and speaking in tongues.

Robertson has founded numerous organisations, including Regent University, which is based in Virginia Beach.

Robertson's past remarks, including a claim that the 2010 earthquake in Haiti was God's judgment, have generated controversy.

The son of a US senator, Robertson campaigned to become the Republican Party's nominee in the 1988 presidential election. He also founded the American Centre for Law & Justice, a conservative organisation that is seen as often being in opposition to the American Civil Liberties Union.

The Washington PostChina has criticised suggestions by the US government that it could be a potential nuclear adversary, accusing the Trump administration of peddling a Cold War mentality.

The US defence department said its nuclear program had been tailored to prevent Beijing from mistakenly concluding that it could gain advantage by using its nuclear weapons in Asia.

But a spokesperson from Chinas defence ministry said its arsenal is the minimum level required for security and called on Washington to reduce the size of its own weapons programme.

It also pledged never to be the first to discharge any nuclear device under any circumstances.

The Chinese side expresses firm opposition to the report, said Chinese ministry spokesman Ren Guoqiang.

We hope the US will abandon a Cold War mentality and earnestly shoulder its special and prior responsibility for its own nuclear disarmament.

The comments followed the publication of a US policy statement known as the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR).

The document highlighted Russia as the USs most dangerous nuclear opponent, along with North Korea and China.

The ruling Communist Partys military wing, the Peoples Liberation Army, has the worlds fifth-largest nuclear arsenal, with 300 warheads, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. The US and Russia each have about 7,000 warheads, or about 20 times as many as Beijing.

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

Beijing has rattled Japan, South Korea and Southeast Asian governments with increasingly assertive gestures and belligerent comments aimed at enforcing its claims to disputed islands and swathes of ocean.

In December, China sent bombers and fighter planes to fly around Taiwan, the self-ruled island the communist mainland claims as its territory. The warplanes flew near South Korean and Japanese air space, prompting Japan to dispatch fighter jets to intercept them.

Mr Trump responded to the reports findings on Friday, saying it confirmed the US commitment to nuclear non-proliferation.

Recommended China considers legal gambling on island the size of Switzerland

Over the past decade, despite US efforts to reduce the roles and numbers of nuclear weapons, other nuclear nations grew their stockpiles, increased the prominence of nuclear weapons in their security strategies, and  in some cases pursued the development of new nuclear capabilities to threaten other nations, he said.

The strategy develops capabilities aimed at making use of nuclear weapons less likely. It enhances deterrence of strategic attacks against our nation, and our allies and partners, that may not come in the form of nuclear weapons.

And, importantly, it reaffirms our commitment to arms control and nuclear non-proliferation, maintains the moratorium on nuclear testing, and commits to improving efforts to prevent, detect, and respond to nuclear terrorism.

Additional reporting by agenciesFloodwater released from a hydroelectric dam has completely submerged a Cambodian village, turning it into a silent waterworld.

The new Lower Sesan 2 Dam has unleashed a deluge of water on Srekor, in the northern province of Stung Treng, according to California-based campaign group International Rivers.

More than 60 families have been forced to abandon their homes as floodwater levels have gradually risen around seven metres since the dam began operating in November.

Recommended Statue dating back 800 years discovered near Angkor Wat in Cambodia

The thriving community of Srekor has become a silent waterworld, International Rivers said in a statement, adding the villages farms, temple, ancestral graves and fishing grounds had all been destroyed.

The 400-megawatt dam, a joint-venture between Chinas Hydrolancang International Energy Company and Cambodias Royal Group is around 75 metres high and five miles long.

Part of Chinas hydropower ambitions in the Mekong River region, it is aimed at generating electricity for Cambodia.

However, several environmental groups have issued stark warnings the project will have a devastating impact on fisheries and biodiversity.

Water levels in the village have risen by around seven metres since November (EarthRights International)

Srekor resident Bong Kheun told Washington-based EarthRights International water levels were so high in the village, he was unable to find his home when he returned to collect belongings.

I had tears in my eyes when I saw my flooded home and village, he said.

More than 70 families Srekor have been displaced by the flooding (EarthRights International)

Every time I think about my life before our village was flooded, I long to go back to that time.

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has labelled those who have raised concerns about the dam radical, saying Cambodia needed to keep up with rising energy demand.

The village is now entirely submerged (EarthRights International)

International Rivers estimates around 5,000 people, mostly from the regions indigenous and ethnic minority groups, have been displaced during the project.

Hundreds of families from five villages have been moved by government officials to designated resettlement sites.

Villager Ota Khami had his home bulldozed to make way for the Sesan 2 Dam (Getty)

Around 10 families from Srekor had been relocated, although dozens more had chosen to stay behind.

A Stung Treng provincial authority spokesman said the floods were expected and that villagers could still approach authorities about resettlement and compensation.

Additional reporting by ReutersNorth Korea has attacked Donald Trump after he criticised the regimes human rights record in his State of the Union address, suggesting he is terrified of its power.

Pyongyang continued the heated war of words between the two nations on Sunday, claiming its nuclear capabilities would deter Trump and his lackeys from showing off on the Korean peninsula.

In his address last week, Mr Trump hit out at the secretive state, claiming "no regime has oppressed its own citizens more totally or brutally than the cruel dictatorship in North Korea."

"We need only look at the depraved character of the North Korean regime to understand the nature of the nuclear threat it could pose to America and to our allies," the US President added.

A North Korean foreign ministry spokesperson fired back at the President, claiming the speech was sinister, and talking up Pyongyang's nuclear arsenal.

Trump also insisted upon the maximum pressure against our country, the spokesman said: However, it is no less than the screams of Trump terrified at the power the DPRK has achieved.

Trump even reveals his sinister intention to do something against us by relying on strength while talking about American resolve.

Our self-reliant defence capability with the nuclear force as its backbone will, however, completely deter Trump and his lackeys from showing off on the Korean peninsula."

The spokesman added: If Trump does not get rid of his anachronistic and dogmatic way of thinking, it will only bring about the consequence of further endangering security and future of the United States.

On Friday, Mr Trump sought to increase pressure on Pyongyang over its nuclear program by consulting with allies and highlighting the human rights abuses suffered by defectors from North Korea.

North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Show all 21 1 /21 North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Pukguksong-2 missile - 2 May 2017 A solid-fuel "Pukguksong-2" missile lifts off during its launch test in North Korea on May 22, 2017. They said that it was examining operational plans for attacking Guam, an angry reaction to UN punishment for previous North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile tests and a US suggestion about preparations for possible preventive attacks to stop the North's nuclear weapons program. Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Hwasong-12 -16 September 2017 North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un inspecting a launching drill of the medium-and-long range strategic ballistic rocket Hwasong-12 at an undisclosed location. Kim vowed to complete North Korea's nuclear force despite sanctions, saying the final goal of his country's weapons development is "equilibrium of real force" with the United States, state media reported on September 16, 2017. AFP/Getty Images North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Donald Trump address South Korean assembly - 7 November 2017 President Donald Trump talks with South Korean President Moon Jae-In during their joint press conference at the presidential Blue House on November 7, 2017 in Seoul.Trump was the first US President to address the South Korean National Assembly since President Clinton in 1993. He addressed Kim Jong Un warning him to not underestimate the US and that for talks to materialize then Pyongyang would need to take steps into denuclearization. Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Demilitarized Zone Haean-Myeon, is a small military town near the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and border between North and South Korea, in Gangwon province. The zone is a strip of land running across the Korean Peninsula and was created after the 'Korean Armistice Agreement'. Any negotiations between the two countries tend to take place in this zone. AFP/Getty Images North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Declared state sponsor of terrorism by Trump - 20 November 2017 President Donald Trump speaks to the media during a cabinet meeting at the White House on November 20, 2017, where he officially designated North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism. North Korea had previously been on the list, however was removed in 2008. Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Hwasong-15 intercontinental ballistic missile - 29 November 2017 The North Korean government launches it's Hwasong-15 intercontinental ballistic missile at an undisclosed location in North Korea on November 29, 2017. It is supposedly capable of reaching all parts of the US. Korean Central News Agency via AP North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Hwasong-15 intercontinental ballistic missile - 29 November 2017 North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un celebrating the launch of the Hwasong-15 missile on November 29, 2017. AFP/Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Kim Jong-Un New Year's speech - 1 January 2018 North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un delivering his New Year's speech. He vowed North Korea would mass-produce nuclear warheads and missiles in a defiant New Year message on January 1 suggesting he would continue to accelerate a rogue weapons programme that has stoked international tensions. Korean Central News Agency via AFP/Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Intercontinental ballistic missile ice sculpture - 1 January 2018 Fireworks are seen above the Taedong River during New Year celebrations as visitors pose for a photo in front of an ice sculpture of an intercontinental ballistic missile at the Pyongyang Ice Sculpture Festival in Kim Il Sung Square in North Korea on 1 January, 2018. REUTERS North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures US-South Korean military drills postponed - 4 January 2018 South Korean President Moon Jae-in talks with US President Donald Trump on January 4, 2018 in Seoul. South Korea and US agreed to delay the annual "Foal Eagle" military drills until after the PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games in an effort to "de-conflict" the Games and "focus on ensuring the security" of the event. South Korean Presidential Blue House via Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures North and South Korea have first official talks in over two years - 9 January 2018 Vehicles transporting the South Korean delegation, led by South Korean Unification Ministrer Cho Myoung-Gyon, drive past a checkpoint on the road connecting South and North Korea at the Unification Bridge, near the Demilitarized zone (DMZ) separating them both on January 9, 2018 in Paju. They began their first official face-to-face talks in two years. Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures North and South Korea have first official talks in over two years - 9 January 2018 Members of the South Korea delegation (R) shake hands with members of the North Korean delegation (L) during their meeting at the border truce village of Panmunjom in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) dividing the two Koreas on January 9, 2018. They focused on the forthcoming Winter Olympics after months of tensions over Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programme. AFP/Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Foreign Ministers Meeting on Security and Stability on the Korean Peninsula - 16 January 2018 Foreign Ministers from twenty countries from North and South America, Asia, and Europe pose for a photo at the Vancouver Foreign Ministers Meeting on Security and Stability on the Korean Peninsula, in Vancouver on January 16, 2018. The US urged an escalation in pressure on North Korea over its nuclear missile program, despite a more cautious tone from key US ally South Korea. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, co-hosted the event with Canada's foreign minister Chrystia Freeland, and called for North Korean ships to be intercepted and for new punitive measures to be implemented every time Pyongyang tests new weapons. AFP/Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures North Korea and South Korea to march together at Winter Olympics - 20 January 2018 PyeongChang 2018 Olympics President Lee Hee-beom, North Korea's Sports Minister and Olympic Committee president Kim Il Guk, International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach, South Korean Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Do Jong-hwan and South Korea's National Olympic Committee President Lee Kee-heung join their hands as they pose during a signing ceremony at the Olympic Museum on January 20, 2018 in Lausanne. North Korea will send 22 athletes to the Winter Games in the South. The two nations will also march together at the opening ceremony. AFP/Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Anti-North Korea activists protest delegation arrival - 22 January 2018 Anti-North Korea activists burn a portrait of leader Kim Jong-Un during a rally Seoul Station as a North Korean delegation arrived to check out performance venues for the Winter Olympics on January 22, 2018. Protesters led by the Korean Patriots Party gathered and complained that the talks to encourage North Korea's participation is stealing the spotlight from their country to the benefit of the regime. Donga Daily via Getty North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Panmunjom - 7 February 2018 South Korean soldiers stand guard at the border village of Panmunjom in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) between South and North Korea on February 7, 2018. In a sign of thawing bilateral ties, North Korea today announced that Kim Yo-jong, the sister of North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, will attend the opening ceremony of the PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games. Getty Images North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures North Korean ferry arrives in South Korea - 6 February 2018 North Korean ferry Mangyongbong-92 carrying a 140-strong orchestra approaches a port in Donghae, South Korea, February 6, 2018. REUTERS North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Anti-North Korea protest - 6 February 2018 A member of a conservative civic group tears a portrait of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during an anti-North Korea protest as the North Korean ferry Mangyongbong-92 carrying a 140-strong orchestra approached. REUTERS North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures North Korea at the athletes village - 8 February 2018 A North Korean flag is seen hanging on a building at the Winter Olympics athletes village in Gangneung, South Korea. REUTERS North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Olympic Welcome ceremony - 8 February 2018 Democratic People's Republic of Korea Vice Sports Minister Won Gil-woo receives a gift from mayor of the Olympic Village Kim Ki-hoon during the welcome ceremony ahead of the PyeongChang 2018 Games at the Olympic Village on 8 February, 2018 in South Korea. Getty Images North Korea  South Korea relations: in pictures Mike Pence meets Moon Jae-in - 8 February 2018 US Vice President Mike Pence shakes hands with South Korean President Moon Jae-in before their meeting at the presidential office in Seoul, South Korea on 8 February, 2018. REUTERS

The President hosted several North Korean defectors in the Oval Office, including Ji Seong-ho, who had used crutches to escape the country after a train ran over his limbs.

Days earlier, Ji raised his crutches in triumph when Mr Trump singled him out during his State of the Union address.

Mr Trump has expressed a willingness to deal with rising tensions with Pyongyang through diplomacy, but he has also insisted the US would use military force on North Korea if needed.

Additional reporting by Associated PressA secret code used by the Spanish king Ferdinand II of Aragon 500 years ago has been cracked by Spains intelligence agency.

The coding system contained over 200 special characters and was used by the king to communicate with his military commander, Gonzalo Fernandez de Cordoba.

No one had been able to decipher the letters for centuries, as the substitution table the king used to create the code had not been preserved.

However, when the Army Museum in Toledo displayed the letters in 2015, experts from the Spanish National Intelligence Center (CNI) were asked for help to crack the code.

Recommended Mysterious manuscript decoded by computer scientists using AI

The museum provided the CNI with two letters written in 1502 and 1506.

At the foot of one letter de Cordoba, known as The Great Captain, had deciphered a few sentences, allowing the experts an insight into the code.

Within the letters the CNI specialists found orders, threats and instructions for military engagements.

The discovery was described by Spanish national daily newspaper ABC as one of the great mysteries in the history of Spain.

In total, 88 different symbols and 237 combined letters were used to create the Great Captain code.

Encrypted letters were a common system in Italy at the time Ferdinand II wrote his, but the experts who broke the code described this one as very well thought out.

It is a precursor of the so-called Vigenere cipher, but an advanced form that was not widely used until the 17th century.

Ferdinand II was the king behind the final defeat of the Moors in Spain in 1492, as well as the sponsor of Christopher Columbus on his discovery of the New World.

The decoded letters dated from the time of the second French invasion of Naples, which the Spanish controlled at the time.

They therefore represent a key moment in Spanish history, when Spain and France were fighting for dominance in the Mediterranean region.

Historian Jose Enrique Ruiz-Domenec, a specialist in de Cordoba, told ABC this was a highly important finding that showed the Spanish king in a new light.

With the knowledge garnered by the CNI, historians can now unravel the code used in the remaining letters written by Ferdinand II.A far-right extremist suspected of shooting six Africans in a racially motivated attack in Italy was lucid and determined, aware of what he had done and showed no remorse, police have said.

Luca Traini, 28, was arrested on suspicion of multiple counts of attempted murder aggravated by racial hatred following the drive-by attack in the central city of Macerata.

Five men and one woman were wounded in the two-hour shooting spree on Saturday night. They were from Nigeria, Ghana, Gambia and Mali, according to RAI state television.

Italian authorities said they seized Adolph Hitlers Mein Kampf and other publications linked to Nazism from Trainis home on Sunday. They also found a flag with a Celtic cross, a symbol commonly used by white supremacists.

Traini, who is Italian, was an unsuccessful candidate last year in a local election for the anti-migrant Northern League political party. Italys ANSA news agency quoted acquaintances saying he previously had ties with the neo-fascist Forza Nuova and CasaPound parties.

Photographs released by police showed Traini with a neo-Nazi tattoo prominently on his forehead. Video footage showed him with an Italian flag draped around him as he was arrested.

Colonel Michele Roberti, the Carabineri commander in Macerata, told Sky TG24 that Traini demonstrated no remorse for the two-hour rampage and its likely that he carried out this crazy gesture as a sort of retaliation, a sort of vendetta for the gruesome killing of a white Italian teenager a few days earlier.

A Nigerian man has been arrested on suspicion of murdering 18-year-old Pamela Mastropietro, whose dismembered remains of were found in two suitcases days after she walked away from a drug rehab community.

Police said her bloody clothes, a receipt from a pharmacy where she bought a syringe, and knives linked to crime were found in the suspects apartment.

Roberti ruled out any personal connection between Traini and the teenager.

One of the people wounded in Saturdays shooting said she no longer feels free to walk around the city with peace of mind.

The 29-year-old Nigerian, identified only as Jennifer, told Italian daily newspaper La Stampa from her hospital bed she was talking and laughing with three other people when she was struck by the bullet.

I never hurt anyone, she added.

The car from which a drive-by shooter opened fire on African migrants (Reuters)

Another of the six victims was treated and released on the night of the shooting.

The remaining patients were all in stable condition, with one in intensive care and Jennifer facing surgery on her shoulder, doctors said.

Jennifers boyfriend told La Repubblica they were waiting at a bus station when he saw a man pointing something at them from a black car. He realised then that it was a gun.

Ogie Igbinowania said: I gave Jennifer a push to get her out of the way and threw myself down. And I heard a shot: Boom!

Jennifer told the newspaper she arrived in Italy seven months ago and joined her boyfriend in Macerata.

I have always been comfortable here. People are friendly. I dont know why that guy fired at us, she said.

A Nigerian community leader in Macerata, Sammy Kunoun, said he heard the shots as he was going to meet with cultural mediators about organising a sit-in to support Ms Mastropietros family. They called off the event after the shootings for fear of further racist attacks.

Now, we are all victims in this story, said Mr Kunoun, adding that the immigrant community has always been well-integrated in Macerata. According to official statistics, foreigners account for 9.2 per cent of the citys 43,000 residents.

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. 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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. 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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

The shooting spree came amid a heated general electoral campaign in which anti-foreigner sentiment has become a key theme.

Hundreds of of thousands of migrants have landed in Italy in the last few years after crossing the Mediterranean Sea in smugglers boats.

Matteo Salvini, the head of the rebranded Northern League party, had capitalised on the teens killing in campaign appearances before the shooting spree.

Salvini is pledging to deport 150,000 migrants in his first year in office if his party wins control of parliament in the 4 March election. He has been accused of using the migrant crisis to foment xenophobia for political gain.

Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni warned the state will be particularly severe against whoever thinks of feeding the spiral of violence.Israeli authorities have begun distributing deportation notices to thousands of African refugees and migrants, who have been threatened with jail if they do not leave the country.

In letters delivered on Sunday, the government told asylum-seekers they had 60 days to leave for an unnamed African country in exchange for $3,500 (2,500) and a plane ticket.

Those who remain by 1 April face indefinite imprisonment under plans which have prompted outrage and protests in Israel.

Recommended Israel orders African refugees to leave within months or face prison

About 60,000 migrants, nearly all from Eritrea and Sudan, crossed Israels border with Egypt before the government erected a fence along the desert frontier. Many were fleeing persecution and violence.

Roughly 20,000 have already been expelled, according to the Israeli government. But some have lived for years in Israel and many work in low-paying jobs that many Israelis shun. The country has granted asylum to fewer than one per cent of those who have applied and has a years-long backlog of applicants.

In the letter, Israel's Population and Immigration Authority told asylum-seekers they would be sent to an unnamed country with a "stable government" that has "developed tremendously over the last decade and has absorbed thousands of returning residents as well as migrants from various African countries".

The Israeli government has refused to publicly name the country but officials have indicated migrants would be sent to Rwanda.

Many of those ordered to leave have expressed fear of being sent to the East African nation and said they would rather be sent to prison.

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

Groups of pilots, doctors, writers, rabbis and Holocaust survivors have condemned the mass deportations and called on the government to halt the plan. They say the deportations are unethical and would damage Israels image as a refuge for persecuted Jews.

A group of Israeli rabbis launched an "Anne Frank-inspired" activist programme to protect African asylum-seekers facing forced expulsion.

But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called the migrants illegal infiltrators and claimed their presence was a threat to Israels social fabric and Jewish character. One government minister has referred to the migrants as a cancer.

We have expelled about 20,000 and now the mission is to get the rest out, Mr Netanyahu said.Israel will legalise an isolated outpost in the occupied West Bank in response to the murder of one of its residents in a Palestinian shooting last month.

Benjamin Netanyahu, Israels Prime Minister, told his weekly Cabinet meeting that those who try to break our spirit and weaken us made a grave mistake.

Mr Netanyahu said the decision to retroactively authorise the 50-family outpost of Havat Gilad was designed to allow the continuation of normal life there.

The anti-settlement Peace Now group said the move to legalise the settlement is a cynical exploitation of the murder.

Most countries consider Israeli settlements in the West Bank, land Israel captured in a 1967 war that Palestinians want for a future state, to be illegal, but Israel disputes this.

Israelis pray during the funeral of Rabbi Raziel Shevah in Havat Gilad, a currently unauthorised Israeli settlement outpost near the Palestinian city of Nablus (AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov)

Palestinian officials condemned the move and said it seemed to be the result of a change in US policy towards Israel.

In December, Donald Trump recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, breaking with decades of US policy that the citys status must be decided in peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.

Netanyahu is trying to make facts on ground. All settlements in the West Bank, including in Jerusalem, are illegal, said Wasel Abu Youssef, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organisations executive committee.

Earlier this month, Rabbi Raziel Shevah, a 35-year-old father of six and resident of Havat Gilad, was shot dead from a passing vehicle as he drove near his home in the unauthorised settlement outpost near Nablus.

 Palestinian teenager Ahed Tamimi slaps Israeli solider

A suspected associate in the attack was arrested in the northern West Bank overnight on Saturday, the Israel Defence Force said in a statement.

Earlier in the day, a 19-year-old protester was killed in clashes with IDF soldiers calling for the surrender of Ahmad Nassar Jarrar, who is suspecting of leading the cell that killed Mr Shevah, the Times of Israel reports.

Ahmad Abu-Obeid was shot by soldiers when stone-throwers confronted them, the Palestinian Health ministry said.

Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Show all 18 1 /18 Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Israeli forces scuffle with Palestinians at Damascus Gate in Jerusalem's Old City AFP/Getty Images Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' A Palestinian protester hurls stones as tear gas is fired by Israeli troops Reuters Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' A Palestinian protester runs during clashes with Israeli troops REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Israeli forces scuffle with Palestinians at Damascus Gate in Jerusalem's Old City AFP/Getty Images Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Palestinian protesters run during clashes REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Israeli border policemen and a Palestinian protesters clash REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Palestinian protesters react to tear gas REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Israeli border policemen hold on to a Palestinian protester REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Palestinian protesters react to tear gas fired by Israeli troops REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Israeli border policemen and Palestinians scuffle after Friday prayers in Jerusalem's Old City REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' A Palestinian protester moves a burning tire during clashes with Israeli troops REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Worshippers chant as they hold Palestinian flags after Friday prayers Reuters Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' A Palestinian protester hurls back a tear gas canister fired by Israeli troops REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' A wounded Palestinian protester is evacuated during clashes with Israeli troops REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Israeli border policemen and a Palestinian youth scuffle REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Israeli border policemen detain a Palestinian man REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' A Palestinian protester uses a sling to hurl stones towards Israeli troops REUTERS Palestinians clash with Israeli troops during 'Day of Rage' Journalists react to tear gas fired by Israeli troops REUTERS

It comes after a senior leader of Hamas said the US decision to add him to its list of international terrorists would not change the Islamist militant groups positions and policies.

They will only make us move forward with confidence, Ismail Haniyeh said.

The US already considers Hamas a terrorist organisation  the group has killed hundreds of Israelis and fought three wars with Israel since taking over the Gaza Strip in 2007.

On Saturday, Israeli jets hit two Hamas targets at a military site in southern Gaza, a spokesperson for the IDF said.

The strike was said to be in retaliation for a rocket fired from Gaza at Israel on Friday night, which exploded in an open area and caused no injuries or damage.

The IDF sees Hamas as being solely responsible for what happens in Gaza, the spokesperson added.

Additional reporting by agenciesTurkish guards at the Syrian border have shot at Syrian asylum seekers who are attempting to cross into their country, Human Rights Watch have said.

Refugees who had succeeded in crossing to Turkey, using smuggling routes, made the claims and said that people had died due to border police firing shots.

A senior Turkish government official denied the report and said the country had taken 3.5 million refugees since the conflict started in 2011.

The official told Reuters: There has been absolutely no case of civilians being fired upon at the border.

Human Rights Watch said it had spoken to 16 Syrian refugees, 13 of whom said border guards had shot towards them as they tried to cross while still in Syria, killing 10 people, including one child, and injuring several more.

Syrians fleeing to the Turkish border seeking safety and asylum are being forced back with bullets and abuse, Lama Fakih, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said.

As fighting in Idlib and Afrin displaces thousands more, the number of Syrians trapped along the border willing to risk their lives to reach Turkey is only likely to increase.

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 were also claims that Turkish border police had abused asylum seekers and refused to provide refugees with medical treatment and instead returned them to Syria.

Turkeys generous hosting of large numbers of Syrians does not absolve it of its responsibility to help those seeking protection at its borders, a Human Rights Watch statement said.

The accusations come as Turkish troops fighting against Kurdish groups suffered their deadliest day, with eight soldiers killed.People sitting in cafes in Baghdad under the rule of Saddam Hussein used to be nervous of accidentally spilling their cup of coffee over the front page of the newspaper spread out before them. They had a good reason for their anxiety, because Iraqi newspapers at that time always carried a picture of Saddam on their front page. Defacing his features might be interpreted as an indication of disrespect or even of a critical or treasonous attitude towards the great leader.

Saddam Hussein invariably got star billing in the Iraqi press, but he would be impressed at the astonishing way in which it has become the norm in the US media for the words and doings of President Trump to monopolise the top of the news. Day after day, the three or four lead stories in The New York Times and CNN relate directly or indirectly to Trump. And, unlike Saddam, this blanket coverage is voluntary on the part of the news outlets and overwhelmingly critical.

Trumps outrageous insults and lies have succeeded in keeping the spotlight firmly on him ever since he declared his candidacy for the presidency in 2015. Whatever else he may be, he is seldom boring, unlike so many of his defeated rivals and opponents, who believed that his obvious failings must inevitably sink him.

One day they may be proved right, but that day is a long time coming; the open loathing for Trump on the part of much of the American media is curiously ineffectual because it is repetitious and no great disaster has so far hit America one year into his presidency. Commentators note that, for all his bellicose rhetoric, he has yet to start any wars  unlike all his Republican predecessors going back to President Ford.

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

The constant demonisation of Trump carries another danger that is underappreciated and may produce a real-world disaster. The US media blames everything on him and respectfully portrays the bevy of generals who populate the upper ranks of his administration  Chief of Staff John Kelly, Secretary of Defence Jim Mattis and National Security Adviser HR McMaster  as the only adults in the room. Yet it may turn out that they and other business and political figures, such as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and the CIA chief Mike Pompeo, are more likely to bring about a war than Trump himself.

Just how poor is the judgement of the very people who are meant to be a restraining force on Trump was shown last month when Tillerson made a classic blunder that may have negative results for the US for years to come. On 17 January, he announced the US military forces would stay in Kurdish controlled north-east Syria after the defeat of Isis, in order to weaken Iran and President Bashar al-Assad. Just three days later on 20 January, Turkey, predictably enraged at what it saw as a US territorial guarantee of a de facto Kurdish state, sent its forces across the Syrian border to invade the Kurdish enclave of Afrin.

Tillerson had unwittingly initiated a new phase in the Syrian conflict in which the US is self-isolated and Turkey, Russia, Iran and Assad had been brought closer together. The Kurds in Afrin, one of the few places in Syria not devastated by war, have to hide in caves as the direct result of the new US initiative.

Trumps isolationism may be less risky than the neo-interventionism of his senior advisers. Reports from Washington suggest that the decision to get more fully engaged in the Syrian civil war was contrary to what Trump himself wanted. By this account, he would have preferred to use his State of the Union address to announce that the US mission in Syria had ended in triumph with the defeat of Isis and that he was withdrawing US ground forces. Instead, the decision went the other way as McMaster and Mattis, supported by Tillerson, successfully argued for keeping US ground forces in Syria and Iraq.

 Donald Trump claims Orrin Hatch called him 'the greatest president in the history of our country'

These senior officials were only advocating the consensus opinion of the US foreign policy establishment, as was swiftly illustrated by media commentators. Even as Turkish tanks were rolling into Syria, an editorial in The Washington Post was applauding Tillerson for having bluntly recognised a truth that both President Trump and President Barack Obama attempted to dodge  which is that the US needs a political and military presence in Syria.

What Trump and Obama were really dodging was repeating the post-9/11 US mistake in pursuing open-ended military ventures against multiple enemies in fragmented countries like Afghanistan and Iraq where it could not win. In the case of Obama, this sense of caution and ability to see what might go wrong was carefully calculated; in the case of Trump, the caution is instinctive and not always operative, but the end result was often the same.

Despite all Trumps condemnation of Obamas supposed weakness, his strategy in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria did not differ much from his predecessor  that is until his chief security officials switched to an interventionist policy in Syria last month.

Recommended Majority of airstrike deaths in Syria and Iraq have been under Trump

Traditional policy of relying on force to overcome all obstacles, or what Obama nicknamed the Washington playbook, looks as if it is back in business. He privately condemned the US foreign policy establishment for being wedded to dubious allies like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in pursuit of overambitious objectives.

American strength in the world was ebbing before Trump, though the divisive and mercurial nature of his presidency is speeding up the decline. In every continent a power vacuum has opened up which is being filled by many eager candidates. They generally have the same ingredients of populism, demagoguery, authoritarianism and nationalism, though the quantities of each may differ, and they are certainly making the world a more dangerous place because they do not know the limits of their own power.

From Manila to Warsaw, there has been the rise of the mini-Trumps who tend to know the politics of their own country well, but be dangerously ignorant of that of other countries. It is in the nature of arbitrary rulers who have suppressed domestic criticism, such as Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Saudi Arabia, that they pursue exaggerated ambitions, moving over ice that is always thinner than they imagine.

US power in the world is declining, having reached its peak between the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the start of the Iraq war in 2003. Two dangers are emerging: one is the feckless nature of Trump administration which acts as a sort of out-of-control wrecking ball, though the damage done is limited by Trumps low attention span and divisions in Washington.

A second danger is the US foreign policy establishment, which having learned nothing new from past failures, would like to restore US power to what it once was and does not understand that this can no longer be done. This is the Washington playbook, which Obama came to deride and ignore and is just as dangerous as anything Trump may do.One of the advantages of a hung parliament is that it forces the Government to justify everything it does. As we report today, this means new hope of compensation for the victims of IRA bombs  because it is harder for Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, to block the setting up of a fund.

This is a complex story about a historical injustice, but it matters. The Government has been reluctant to use assets linked to Muammar Gaddafi, the former Libyan ruler, that have been frozen in London banks to compensate the victims of IRA bombings. Gaddafis regime for years supplied the IRA with Semtex explosive that it used in its campaign of terror.

The Independent reveals today that the Foreign Office has given up its attempt to block a bill in the House of Lords  knowing that it would lose the vote. More significantly, the Government would be unable to reverse that defeat in the House of Commons. There, the Governments majority depends on the support of the 10 Democratic Unionist Party MPs from Northern Ireland  and there is no prospect of their doing anything that could be seen as turning their backs on the victims of IRA terrorism.

Thus the loss of the Governments majority continues to force it to do the right thing. We can add this small victory to the ditching of plans in the Conservative manifesto to extend academic selection at age 11 and to force pensioners to use the value of their homes to pay for dementia care.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 6 September 2021 Traders in the Ring at the London Metal Exchange, in the City of London, after open-outcry trading returned for the first time since March 2020, when the Ring was temporarily closed due to the pandemic PA UK news in pictures 5 September 2021 People enjoy the warm weather on Sandbanks beach, Poole PA UK news in pictures 4 September 2021 Demonstrators from Animal Rebellion and Nature Rebellion protest in Trafalgar Square in London. PA UK news in pictures 3 September 2021 South Africa's Ntando Mahlangu (centre) wins the Men's 200 metres T61 Final ahead of second placed Great Britain's Richard Whitehead at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games PA UK news in pictures 2 September 2021 A young common seal on the beach at Horsey Gap in Norfolk, as hundreds of pregnant grey seals come ashore ready for the start of the pupping season. PA UK news in pictures 1 September 2021 Goldfinches fighting over food in a garden in Strensham, Worcestershire PA UK news in pictures 31 August 2021 Gold Medallist Sarah Storey of Britain celebrates on the podium Reuters UK news in pictures 30 August 2021 Extinction Rebellion protesters hold a a tea party on Tower Bridge in London EPA UK news in pictures 29 August 2021 A police office tussles with a demonstrator on Cromwell Road outside the Natural History Museum during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion in London PA UK news in pictures 28 August 2021 Members of the British armed forces 16 Air Assault Brigade walk to the air terminal after disembarking a Royal Airforce Voyager aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire POOL/AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 27 August 2021 Fabio Quartararo crashes during a MotoGP practice session at the British Grand Prix, Silverstone Circuit Action Images via Reuters UK news in pictures 26 August 2021 An Extinction Rebellion activist holds a placard in a fountain surrounded by police officers, during a protest next to Buckingham Palace in London Reuters UK news in pictures 25 August 2021 Gold Medallist Great Britains cyclist, Sarah Storey, celebrates after winning the Womens C5 3000m Individual Pursuit Final at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games. It was her 15th Paralympic gold Reuters UK news in pictures 24 August 2021 A demonstrator dressed as bee during a protest by members of Extinction Rebellion on Whitehall, in central London PA UK news in pictures 23 August 2021 Former interpreters for the British forces in Afghanistan demonstrate outside the Home Office in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 22 August 2021 Police officers form a line in front of the entrance to the Guildhall, London, where protesters have climbed onto a ledge above the entrance during an Extinction Rebellion stage a protest PA UK news in pictures 21 August 2021 People take part in a demonstration in solidarity with people of Afghanistan, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 20 August 2021 People zip wire across the sea from Bournemouth pier towards the beach. PA UK news in pictures 19 August 2021 Supporters of Geronimo the alpaca gather outside Shepherds Close Farm in Wooton Under Edge, Gloucestershire PA UK news in pictures 18 August 2021 Former Afghan interpreters and veterans hold a demonstration outside Downing Street, calling for support and protection for Afghan interpreters and their families PA UK news in pictures 17 August 2021 Military personnel board the RAF Airbus A400M at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, where evacuation flights from Afghanistan have been landing Reuters UK news in pictures 16 August 2021 Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer takes part in a minute's silence at Wolverhampton police station for the victims of the Plymouth mass shooting last week PA UK news in pictures 15 August 2021 2Storm, a ten-metre tall puppet of a mythical goddess of the sea created by Edinburgh-based visual theatre company Vision Mechanics, makes its way alongside the seafront at North Berwick, East Lothian, during a performance at the Fringe By The Sea festival PA UK news in pictures 14 August 2021 A woman and two young girls look at floral tributes in Plymouth where six people, including the offender, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident PA UK news in pictures 13 August 2021 Forensic officers in the Keyham area of Plymouth where six people, including the shooter, died of gunshot wounds in a firearms incident on Thursday evening PA UK news in pictures 12 August 2021 Children ride horses in the River Eden in Appleby, Cumbria, during the annual gathering of travellers for the Appleby Horse Fair PA UK news in pictures 11 August 2021 Stella Moris (left) reacts after talking to the media outside the High Court in London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal, n London, following the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal. The US government has won the latest round in its High Court bid to appeal against the decision not to extradite Julian Assange on espionage charges PA UK news in pictures 10 August 2021 Students react after they receive their A-Level results at the Ark Academy, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 9 August 2021 The final athletes from Great Britain arrive home including Jason Kenny, Laura Kenny and Katie Archibald (front left-right) at Heathrow Airport, London following the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games PA UK news in pictures 8 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny during the closing ceremony of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at the Olympic stadium in Japan PA UK news in pictures 7 August 2021 People from the Glasgow Southside community take part in the Govanhill Carnival, an anti-racist celebration of pride, unity and the contributions immigrants have made to the community in Govanhill, at Queen's Park, Glasgow PA UK news in pictures 6 August 2021 Chijindu Ujah of Britain, Zharnel Hughes of Britain, Richard Kilty of Britain and Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake of Britain celebrate winning silver as they pose with Asha Philip of Britain, Imani Lansiquot of Britain, Dina Asher-Smith of Britain and Daryll Neita of Britain after they won bronze in the women's 4 x 100m relay during Olympic Games Day 14 Getty UK news in pictures 5 August 2021 A protester places flowers on a photograph of an executed man during a demonstration organised by supporters of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) to protest against the inauguration of Iran's new president Ebrahim Raisi in central London AFP via Getty UK news in pictures 4 August 2021 England's Joe Root looks on as India's KL Rahul doesn't make it to a catch during day one of Cinch First Test match at Trent Bridge, Nottingham PA UK news in pictures 3 August 2021 Great Britain's Laura Kenny and Jason Kenny with their silver medals for the Women's Team Pursuit and Mens Team Sprint during the Track Cycling at the Izu Velodrome on the eleventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 2 August 2021 Great Britains Charlotte Worthington competes during the Womens BMX Freestyle Final at the Tokyo Olympics PA UK news in pictures 1 August 2021 EPA UK news in pictures 31 July 2021 James Guy, Adam Peaty and Kathleen Dawson celebrate winning the gold medal in the mixed 4x100m medley relay final at the Tokyo Olympics AP UK news in pictures 30 July 2021 Great Britain's Bethany Shriever and Kye Whyte celebrate their Gold and Silver medals respectively for the Cycling BMX Racing at the Ariake Urban Sports Park on the seventh day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Japan PA UK news in pictures 29 July 2021 Team GB's Mallory Franklin during the Womens Canoe Slalom Final on day six of the Tokyo Olympic Games. She went on to win the silver medal Getty UK news in pictures 28 July 2021 Canoers on Llyn Padarn lake in Snowdonia, Gwynedd. It was announced that the north-west Wales slate landscape has been granted UNESCO World Heritage Status PA UK news in pictures 27 July 2021 A view of one of two areas now being used at a warehouse facility in Dover, Kent, for boats used by people thought to be migrants. 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Without a majority, the Government is vulnerable to rebellions by quite small numbers of Conservative MPs or the DUP. There was much agonising among liberals at the time of the deal between the Conservatives and the DUP about the influence it gave to a party with reactionary policies on womens rights, but in practice there is a majority in the Commons for moderate progressives.

One of the first victories of the new parliament was an amendment proposed by Stella Creasy, the Labour MP, requiring the Government to pay for abortions in England and Wales for Northern Irish women  it was opposed by the DUP but enough Conservative MPs supported it.

Since then the Labour Party has exploited Conservative divisions to force the Government to publish Brexit documents  even ones that had not really existed at the time. On several occasions the Government whips have instructed their charges to abstain in order to avoid a humiliating defeat.

The Independent has long been at the forefront of campaigns to make our democracy work better. But we recognise that now, in a hung parliament, the Government has to be more responsive to many of the peoples concerns. True, it may make it harder to carry out some of the bold policies that the country needs, such as raising taxes.

But if it means Brexit is more difficult and more transparent, and that the Government is forced to do the right thing by the victims of IRA atrocities, then it is a good thing.Could this be it: the final cabinet showdown that clarifies our Brexit plan, indeed the future of the Government? Furthermore, who would have predicted, during the referendum campaign, that continued membership of the customs union would emerge as the key issue?

Whats not to like about the customs union? Staying in would save manufacturing, indeed probably boost it, such would be the relief at the outbreak of common sense.

It would solve the Northern Ireland border problem. Importantly, for Brexiteers, it would still permit control of EU migration.

We would still be able to agree services-only trade deals ourselves, the EU would deal with goods. But, services are about 80 per cent of our economy.

It seems that the only blocks to this great national compromise, which would end our Brexit drift at a stroke, are Messrs Johnson, Gove and Fox, playing their usual games in the case of Johnson and Gove, pursuing his usual honest delusions in the case of Dr Fox.

If they cannot compromise on this modest softening of their hard-Brexit stance they should leave the Government. Such a departure would be a harsh blow, but one that we might just have to bear.

John Gemmell

Shropshire

Labour is coming to its senses

Back in those long-ago halcyon days, when the EU referendum was announced, I always stated to anyone that asked: Common sense will prevail. Well, I got that one wrong  oops!

Since then many months have elapsed and we have seen an inexcusable waste of public funds, a needless election, indecision, mendacity and a lot worse  but very little common sense.

Then all of a sudden I notice that Welsh First Minister, Carwyn Jones, has said that the UK should stay in the customs union. Further, this apparently is likely going to be the Labour Party policy shortly, having been discussed with Jeremy Corbyn and Sir Keir Starmer.

Obviously said politicians must have been talking to the gatekeepers of wisdom and sound judgment at last, which is to be loudly applauded. Let us hope we continue on this sensible road and as Carwyn Jones also said; do what is best for working people.

Robert Boston

Kingshill

The Government has lost its mind

I feel as though I have been transported to a parallel universe. Our parallel Government is planning, despite the forecasts, to make the country poorer by continuing with its Brexit plans. Did the people really vote for that conclusion?

Michael Pate

Preston

It is reported that Theresa May has said that Brexit will still go ahead in spite of the bleak economic forecasts. So there we have it  a campaign to leave the EU based on lies and now a determination to leave at all costs. It surely is the triumph of irrationality  how much worse can it get?

Mark Morsman

London

I have concerns about all-women shortlists

On Thursday, Lily Madigan wrote about her experience in the Labour Party and her opposition to Jennifer Jamess campaign to protect female representation in the party.

Im also a member of the Labour Party and I also happen to be a trans woman, though that is unimportant when I am campaigning with my local party to re-elect our Labour councillor.

I know that Im not really a woman. Women are female and I am male, but that matters little in my day-to-day life. The law lets me change my legal sex, society respects the credibility of the process and I am accepted for who I am.

Tragically, the campaign for self-identification risks all that, as it spawns doubt and confusion: if anyone can self-identify as a woman, what does the word woman even mean? In this strange post-modern world, self-ID cuts straight across the rights of women to organise and associate as a sex.

Transgender campaigners tell me that men would not self-identify as women just to access all-women shortlists (AWS). Im not convinced, especially if they want to see AWS brought into disrepute so they can abolish them. The result: those men get what they want, women lose, and trans people get the blame.

Ive therefore given my money to Jennifers campaign. We must keep AWS to protect the representation of women. Trans people do need to be represented, but not at womens expense.

Sadly, in a vicious environment where men and their trans allies allegedly conspire in a secret Facebook group to force women from the party, I must remain anonymous. My solidarity, however, is total.

Name and address supplied

We seem to be forgetting about China when discussing communism

Your report into the death of Fidel Castro refers, as do other branches of the media, to communist Cuba. However, we are treated to endless reports of Theresa Mays visit to China. Presumably no longer regarded a repressive communist state. Funny, must have missed the recent democratic elections.

G Forward

StirlingFor full functionality of this site it is necessary to enable JavaScript. Here are the instructions how to enable JavaScript in your web browserDemonstrators take part in a vigil and silent protest against the alleged gang-rape of a nun in the eastern state of West Bengal in Siliguri March 17, 2015. Hundreds of priests, school girls and other protesters staged a peaceful rally March 16, 2015 in the Indian city of Kolkata to support an elderly nun who was gang-raped at her convent school. (Diptendu Dutta/AFP/Getty Images)Almost all Nigerian youth on social media have one interest at the moment, and its the Big Brother Nigeria 2018 edition. The show has got most of them glued to the Tv and back to social media especially Twitter to further discuss whatever went down.

Well, right now from whats going on Twitter, it seems Cee-C is the least favourite housemate as many BBNaija fans are calling for her to go home.

Sadly, if this happens, her other half, Tobi will go home with her as that is the way this years edition has been structured to run.

Cee-c who was last week rumoured to be the sister-in law of the host, Ebuka Obi-Uchendu (after a photo of both Cee-C and Ebukas wife were paired online) has fallen out of favour with most of the viewers because according to them she doesnt do any chore, doesnt interact with anybody in the house except Tobi and acts like shes better than everyone.

See some reactions from Twitter users below:

Cee c has never cooked, Ive not seen her clean, Ive literally not seen her do anything like chores.. and you are saying I hate her? No sir! But you are right I hate her #BBNaija pic.twitter.com/UJpnavzH4m  THE KING (@KingBallary) February 4, 2018

Dear Lord neither Tobi nor Cee-C shud win HOH this week, Queen Cee-C shud be dropped to ground level, that upstairs is part of what is giving her superiority complex. Let humility be served to her this week, amen!! #BBNaija  Roxy (@Ebironke) February 4, 2018

There is nothing ds Cee- c will do that will make me change my mind to start rooting for her. Even if she was my sister. She has fucked Up. The funny thing is she thinks she is the smart one.  Nigerians will shock u #Bbnaija  Ozi (@LenekeRahila) February 4, 2018

Am i the only one who thinks cee c needs to go back home today not even next week. I cant watch her walking upandan not doing anything. If u are with me pls retweet #BBNaija  Kenny NOT Kennies (@iamkennychem) February 4, 2018

Ceecee upsets me,its not pride its inferiority complex,segregation urself like you much better than then,retweet if you are tired of her control freak #BBNaija  Ray (@Rayelliswaldorf) February 4, 2018

And it goes on and on. Anyways, are you on the BBNaija train? Do you agree with them that Cee-C should go?Nollywodd actress, Chika Ike is sharing her secrets on how she got in to one of the mot prestigious schools in the world, Harvard Business School, in the new issue of Vanguard Allure Magazine.

The actress is right now in Cambridge, Massachusetts attending classes and looking good while doing it.

source: StargistThen you may as well cry away the thought of peacefully drifting off into the La La Land, since we still dont have a cure for period pain, despite the fact they can be as painful as a heart attack. Thankfully, experts have revealed that sleeping in the foetal position is the best way to ensure a good nights sleep when mother nature comes knocking on your door.

By sleeping on one side with your legs tucked up next to your stomach, the foetal position takes pressure off the abdominal muscles, gynaecologist Lisa Lindley explains to an America glossy magazine.

Many women report that the foetal position can help relieve cramps, adds M.D. Jennifer Wider. This is because the muscles around the abdomen are encouraged to relax, which reduces the tension and therefore the cramping.

Period-tracking app Clue have also shown that the foetal position decreases the chances over overnight leakage, as the legs are squeezed together. So whatever you do, just make sure you avoid sleeping face-down when Aunt Flo is in town. Lying on your stomach can cause the uterus to squeeze, which can increase the amount of blood lost, warns Dr. WiderPunch

The Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom, has faulted the claims by President Muhammadu Buhari that his administration had taken positive actions to halt herdsmen killings in the state.

Vanguard

Military rescues 84, captures Boko Harams weapons

At least 84 people have been rescued and heavy military weapons recovered from Boko Haram fighters by Nigerian army.

Thisday

The General Overseer, Pastor Enoch Adeboye, Friday night led members of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) to pray against people shedding blood in Nigeria, their protectors as well as their sponsors at the churchs February Holy Ghost Service held at the Redemption Camp.

Daily Times

There is palpable anger in the political circles in Plateau, especially in the two major political parties, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress over a statement by former Governor and senator representing Plateau North senatorial zone that the Senate is not meant for young people.

Guardian

The Lagos State government has perfected plans to boost the states economy in 2018 through its Embedded Power Supply initiative and review of the Land Use Charge Law.

Daily Trust

The rate at which politicians are changing platforms is on the increase. In many states across the country, there has been a gale of defections and political alignments as the 2019 election season gradually unfolds.

Tribune

Founder and General Overseer of Holy Trinity Authority Prophetic Ministry International, Prophet James Omitade, has called for three-day fasting and prayers for Nigeria, to avert looming bloodbath, which he said would shake the foundations of the country.THE MEANING OF IGALA AND THE IGALA PEOPLE by Felix Omachoko

A word is a representation of an idea, of a thought or an image. For example, when one says: Apple, one is necessarily describing the idea of what an apple is, its physical properties, appearance, taste etc. One may not explicitly say that an apple is sweet or red but those images come to ones mind nonetheless.

Hence it increasingly becomes difficult to understand someone or some text when one does not understand the meaning of a few words as one is unable to visualize the idea represented by the word.

THE MEANING OF THE WORD IGALA IGALA is a compound word with Iga as its root and Ala as the qualifying noun. In Igala language, Iga means a partition, blockade, a dividing wall e.g. partition of India . And the qualifying noun, Ala means Sheep. This could imply that the first settlers in Igalaland (the Igalamela) saw themselves as Gods flock or sheep that eventually found their greener pasture in this location. They probably felt it was better to settle here. They came, they saw it was a fertile ground full of prospects and they settled here from antiquity.Perhaps, they made Iga-Ala Mela that is, making nine sheep apportionments, partitions, dividing walls or simply, fences against possible invading troops, as it was common in those days in search of a formidable security. They were then referred to generally as the IGA-ALA people. The name gradually metamorphosed from Iga-ala to IGALA as a result of the combination of the two vowels (a + a). The nomenclature then became IGALA. The name must have come in the figurative sense of people referring to themselves, as the sheep feels shielded and protected under its shepherd.

God (Ojo), is often seen by the Igala people as Ochamachala (owner of the entire universe), Odobogagwu (the all-powerful one), Ane-magedo (the all-courageous one), etc.

This sense of being protected under Gods shadow was extended into the naming of a certain street, UBI-IGA (behind the partition) in Idah, during the Benin/Igala War in A.D. 1515  because of the partitioning against foreign invaders. Other parts of Igalaland are not left out in naming villages after their functions. For instance, villages which served as formidable fortresses against foreign invasion at a certain period of history or the other, had such names e.g. Iga-Ebije (iron partition), Iga-Ikeje (Ikejes wall); Igaliwo (Aliwos wall), Iga-Olijo (Adders wall), Igagbo (Agbos wall); Igojo (Gods protective wall), etc. It is interesting to note that the Igas were practically erected in those days for defensive purposes.

According to 0ral tradition, the Odogo (ancient storey building) in Atas palace was used as a hideout. From there the soldiers had a full view far over and across the cliff near the River Niger. By this means they were able to detect enemy troops afar. A river is also believed to have changed its course or totally dried up around Okpakpala-Ukwaja. This river also served as another shied against enemies.

From the above, it is obvious that Igala people are people who feel highly secured under Gods umbrella. That is why in times of adversity, they would simply exclaim Ojoma (God knows or God is in control). IGALA meaning is not in any way connected to that of  ANTELOPE IN YORUBA LANGUAGE ..linking of the Igala with Yemen In Arabia is another highly speculative opinion. This story was probably a device of the Northerners to enslave Igala people. The people of Igala had long settled before the Galas entered Ethiopia. because tradition has it that it was only in the century A.D, that the Gala migration to Ethiopia took place. In addition, it is quite improbable that the Semite Galas would metamorphose into Negroes of the contemporary Igalaland overnight. The similarity in name is thereby merely coincidental.

The Mali connection remains baseless too because the similarities between the words Mela (nine of them) of Igala-Mela (the nine Igala kingmakers) is in no way attributable to 9 as originating from Mali. To the Igala mind, nine simply symbolizes perfectness.

Likewise, the supposition that the Igalas came out of the Fulanis, carries no weight, since no tradition in Igala supports it. History attests to the fact that the Fulanis were still in the region of Senegal by the time the Igala were already having a centralized state system  in the 12 century. Again ,that Igala have a traditional link with the Benin kingdom is indubitable. There abound theories for instance, that support a Benin origin of Igala kingship. However, there was already in existence indigenous Igala people with their kingship systems before the arrival of the Benin kings. But it must be understood that at some stage of Igala history, the Benin people wielded some power of influence over them. The difference in their system of government alone is enough reason to prove that it is never true to say the entire Igala originated from Benin.

The tradition, which holds that the Igala has the same origin with the Yoruba seem to be a plausible one. This humble submission is based on the fact that the Igala language has a lot in common with the Yoruba. Okwoli supports this view when he said: When people speak the same language. or related languages, there is every reason to believe that they have common origin or have met somewhere.

THE JUKUN /IGALA LINK, though that there were certain Jukun immigrants who came among the Igalas at some stage of the development of the Igala kingdom is quite true but mind you Igala were in existence before the arrival of JUKUNS

THE FACT AND THE REAL ORIGIN OF IGALA : The problem is that we human beings often dont base our worldview and values on the Bible and Quran . Instead, we ignore Gods truth and adopt mans ideas and values. This is always dangerous and most destructive in the area of human origins and its implications for social behavior. IF THE ORIGIN OF ALL PEOPLE GROUPS BEGINS AT THE TOWERS OF BABEL. GENESISS 10:32 ITS MEANS ALL TRIBES INCLUDING IGALA PEOPLE ORIGINATED FROM TOWERS OF BABEL : The biblical account of the tower of Babel is found in Genesis 11. The tower was built by the some of the descendants of Noahs sons who survived the Great flood. They had eventually traveled eastward and began to settle in a plain area called shinar (Babylonia) in Mesopotamia, and of course shared the common language. Having developed ungodly character, they began the planning of great tower out of their egotism, pride and rebellion .This group said  come lets us build for our selves already city with tower that can reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for our selves : otherwise,we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth (Genesis 11:4)in Gen. 11:8-9 when God saw their intentions and the purpose of their efforts, his judgement on man was once again brought forth. He scattered them them across the earth confusing or confounding their language so that they could no longer communicate with each other  So the the lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stop building the city. That is why it was called Babel -because there the Lord confused the language of the world..

SUMMARY OF IGALA JOURNEY SO FAR :

From the Towers of Babel>Egypt>Sudan>Ethiopia>Congo> Brono state > Taraba state : kwararafa (Wukari)> Abejukolo-efeKogi State (Omagede Otutubatu ) to IGALA MELA-Idah in same Kogi State and then scattered all over Nigeria Including those of Olu areas in Anambra state ( including Ijam, Odekpe, inoma Akator, owele, Igbokenyi, Olumbanasa) Ebu in Delta state, Ifeku, odogume, illushi,inyelen all in Edo state & those in Ojor, Ogurugu, Igah, Asaba and Enugu state.

The meaning of Igala was never antelope and we are not from any tribe but who we are, created by God!

If you are proud to be Igala Pls share this with all your friends and family as you read..You have permission to edit this article.

Edit CloseIn his latest investors note, KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo claims that Apple will be exclusively using Intel modem inside its 2018 iPhone lineup. Apple had first started using Intel baseband inside iPhones starting with the iPhone 7 in 2016. However, the majority of baseband orders from Apple have always gone to Qualcomm, with Intel only supplying the baseband for selected iPhone models used in the United States.

Apple continued making use of Intel baseband inside the iPhone 8 and iPhone X this year despite tests claiming that the Intel model was inferior to the Qualcomm supplied modem by a significant margin.

Despite Apple making use of Intel modems inside its 2018 iPhone lineup, Kuo believes that Qualcomm can make a comeback in Apples supply chain in the future. Theres a possibility that Intels 5G chips might not be ready in time for Apple to use in future iPhones which may force the company to fall back on Qualcomm. Additionally, Apple might also start sourcing modem from Qualcomm as a concession for their ongoing patent lawsuit.

Apple will reportedly be using a faster LTE modem on the 2018 iPhone lineup with 44 MIMO support. This will be paired with a new antenna design for faster data transmission speeds. Back then, it was reported that Apple would still be sourcing around 30 percent of modem from Qualcomm.

Our Take

The news of Intel now possibly supplying all the baseband to Apple this year is definitely not going to go down well with Qualcomm. The company is already fighting a major lawsuit against Apple, with the Cupertino company getting its other supply chain vendors to hold their royalty payments to Qualcomm. Considering just how big of a client Apple is for Qualcomm, this move will negatively affect the companys bottom line hard this year. Samsung, another major Android OEM, already uses its own baseband in the international variant of its flagship Galaxy S devices. With Qualcomm losing out orders from major smartphones OEMs, the company might just have to reconsider its business strategy here.

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As a subscriber, you are shown 80% less display advertising when reading our articles.

Those ads you do see are predominantly from local businesses promoting local services.

These adverts enable local businesses to get in front of their target audience  the local community.

It is important that we continue to promote these adverts as our local businesses need as much support as possible during these challenging times.

CloseMedford, OR. -- This year's flu epidemic is now impacting prescriptions for the virus.

Tib Alvarez, a pharmacist at a Medford Walmart told NewsWatch12 there is a nationwide Tamiflu shortage. Tamiflu is an antiviral that has no substitute.

Alvarez says the ERs and Immediate Cares in Southern Oregon are packed with flu patients, "It's going kinda crazy through the valley right now."

Alvarez told NewsWatch12 if you test positive for the flu virus, most doctors will prescribe Tamiflu. Since the flu is a virus, there isn't a medicine that can fully kill it. However, Tamiflu can help ease the symptoms, and help you fight it off quicker.

Alvarez says because so many people are sick this season, Tamiflu is back-ordered across the country. He says they are having trouble filling the brand name, and the generic version.

He says the affordable cost of the generic brand is adding to the shortage, and health insurance companies are trying to help.

"Some of the insurance companies are not covering the brand name. But because of the shortage they've been making exceptions and covering the brand," says Alvarez.

Alvarez says in order for Tamiflu to work best, you need to take it within 72 hours of getting the flu.TALENT, Ore. -- A Talent man was jailed Friday after Jackson County Sheriff's Office deputies served a search warrant at Brad's Budget Automotive. Deputies say they found drugs, stolen property, and people living in "squalor."

Bradley Wayne Keever, 46, was arrested on a warrant as well as charges of possession of methamphetamine and first degree theft by receiving.

On February 2, deputies say they searched the property of Brad's Budget Automotive on South Pacific Highway. Deputies seized drugs and stolen property.

Deputies say they found multiple people, including children, in unsafe living conditions at the auto repair shop. Deputies also found evidence of drug use and sewage leaking from travel trailers. Deputies say people were living in those travel trailers. The Jackson County Sheriff's Office says Department of Human Services-Child Welfare caseworkers also came to assess the children's living conditions. Jackson County Code Enforcement will be investigating code violations. Phoenix and Talent Police officers also helped with the search warrant.



Keever was lodged at the Jackson County Jail.This combo of photos provided by the Toronto Police Service shows the five men Toronto landscaper Bruce McArthur is accused of killing, from left to right; Selim Essen, 44, Sorush Mahmudi, 50, Dean Lisowick, Andrew Kinsman, 49, and Majeed Kayhan, 58. A downtown Toronto community will come together this evening to mourn the deaths of several men in the LGBTQ community at the hands of an alleged serial killer. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO, Toronto Police Services MANDATORY CREDITFILE-In this March 28, 1968, file photo, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rev. Ralph Abernathy, right, lead a march on behalf of striking Memphis, Tennessee., sanitation workers. Fifty years ago, two sanitation workers were killed by a malfunctioning garbage truck in Memphis. Martin Luther King Jr. came to Memphis to support the strike, a move that cost him his life when he was fatally shot on the balcony of a Memphis hotel on April 4, 1968. (Sam Melhorn/The Commercial Appeal via AP)FILE - In this May 18, 2017 file photo, actress Uma Thurman poses for photographers during the photo call for the Un Certain Regard jury at the 70th international film festival, Cannes, southern France. Thurman has accused embattled Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein of forcing himself upon her sexually and director Quentin Tarantino of making her perform a dangerous car stunt that injured her. Thurman is quoted in The New York Times on Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, as saying Weinstein attacked her in London. She says he pushed her down and tried to shove himself on her and expose himself. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)Guillermo del Toro poses in the press room with a plaque honoring his nomination for outstanding directorial achievement in a feature film for "The Shape of Water" at the 70th annual Directors Guild of America Awards at The Beverly Hilton hotel on Saturday, Feb. 3, 2018, in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP)SPRINGFIELD, Ore.  Hundreds of people are gearing up to celebrate the big game Sunday.

Springfield Police know that as people gather for watch parties it is very common for alcohol to be involved. That is why they're preparing to watch the roads and keep everyone safe.

In Oregon, drivers are considered alcohol impaired if their blood alcohol level is .08 or higher.

Traffic patrol officer with Springfield Police, Tom Speldrich, told KEZI 9 News if you are planning on drinking make a plan and designate a driver or consider other alternatives. He said spending the night at a friends or familys place is worth it  even if you have work the next day.

Speldrich said it is very important for people to take this advice seriously.

Impaired drivers are normal everyday people that didnt want to hurt anybody, he said. Its too late, once it happens its too late.

Police said in 2016 there were more than 10,000 deaths involving drunk drivers. Now they are urging people to prevent more tragedies by making responsible choices.KHOBAR, Saudi Arabia, Feb 4 (Reuters) - Saudi Aramco has left its March price for Arab Light grade for Asian customers unchanged versus February at a premium of $1.65 per barrel to the Oman/Dubai average, it said on Sunday.

On Thursday, five traders at refineries and trading houses in a Reuters survey expected Saudi Arabia to keep prices of light crude grades it sells to Asia little changed in March, tracking stability in Middle East benchmark Dubai crude. The company cut its Arab Light OSP to Northwest Europe by 55 cents for March to a discount of $1.75 per barrel to the ICE Brent.

The Arab Light OSP to the United States was set at a premium of $0.90 a barrel to the Argus Sour Crude Index (ASCI) for March, unchanged from the previous month.

The tables below show the full FOB prices for March in U.S. dollars.

Saudi term crude supplies to the United States are priced as a differential to the Argus Sour Crude Index (ASCI). United States

MARCH FEBRUARY CHANGE

EXTRA LIGHT +3.10 +2.60 +0.50 LIGHT +0.90 +0.90 0.00 MEDIUM -0.70 -0.60 -0.10 HEAVY -1.95 -1.85 -0.10 Prices at Ras Tanura destined for Northwest Europe are set against ICE Brent: NW EUROPE

MARCH FEBRUARY CHANGE EXTRA LIGHT +0.45 +0.65 -0.20 LIGHT -1.75 -1.20 -0.55 MEDIUM -3.35 -2.55 -0.80 HEAVY -5.35 -4.20 -1.15 Saudi term crude supplies to Asia are priced as a differential to the Oman/Dubai average: ASIA

MARCH FEBRUARY CHANGE SUPER LIGHT +6.10 +5.95 +0.15 EXTRA LIGHT +3.25 +3.15 +0.10 LIGHT +1.65 +1.65 0.00 MEDIUM -0.20 +0.05 -0.25 HEAVY -1.55 -1.25 -0.30 Prices at Ras Tanura for Saudi oil destined for the Mediterranean are set against the ICE Brent: MEDITERRANEAN

MARCH FEBRUARY CHANGE EXTRA LIGHT -0.15 +1.15 -1.30 LIGHT -2.35 -0.95 -1.40 MEDIUM -3.85 -2.35 -1.50 HEAVY -5.10 -3.40 -1.70

(Reporting by Reem Shamseddine; editing by Jason Neely)Shenandoah, IA (51601)

Today

Partly cloudy this morning, then becoming cloudy during the afternoon. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 86F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

A few clouds. Low 64F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph.

By Park Si-soo







K-pop titan EXO rocked thousands of fans with hit songs and powerful dance acts at a fan meeting in Seoul, Saturday.







The fan meeting, named "Green Nature 2018 EXO Fan Festival," was held in Korea University's main gymnasium, which was packed with 6,000 fans, including 1,500 from China, Thailand, Indonesia and other countries where K-pop is in vogue.







South Korean cosmetics brand Nature Republic hosted the event. EXO has been the brand's commercial model since 2013.







The concert was streamed live on the company's Chinese website, through which more than 150,000 people watched the two-hour event.







The fan meeting started with the boy band's new song "Ko Ko Bob," the lead track of its fourth album. The band excited the crowd with three other songs and synchronized dance moves, as did entertaining and gift-giving events hosted by popular comedian Yang Se-chan.





A satellite photo from Airbus Defence and Space taken on Jan. 28 shows people and vehicles in formation in Pyongyang in a rehearsal for the 70th founding anniversary of North Korea's armed forces on Feb. 8. / Captured image from 38 North



By Yi Whan-woo



North Korea appears to be trying to enliven the mood for 70th anniversary of its armed forces, Feb. 8, the day before the opening of the PyeongChang Winter Olympics.

Last week, the Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the ruling Workers' Party, promoted the military's achievements, including its "victory over the U.S. imperial forces in the liberation war."

The repressive state has also been mobilizing tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians, as well as military assets for a massive parade scheduled in Pyongyang.

Such a move comes after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un shifted the anniversary date for the country's military from April 25 to Feb. 8 in 2015. For almost four decades, North Korea commemorated the founding of the anti-Japanese guerrilla force  the Korean People's Revolutionary Army (KPRA)  led by the country's founding leader Kim Il-sung on April 25, 1932.

In 2015, Kim Jong-un designated Feb. 8 as Armed Forces Day, in reference to the day the KPRA transformed into a regular army in 1948.

However, none of the Armed Forces Days from 2015 to 2017 were marked with parades, fueling speculation that Pyongyang deliberately planned the parade this year to intimidate Seoul and dampen its first Winter Games.

On Jan. 29, the Rodong Sinmun referred to the country's armed forces as the "most elite troops that win 100 victories in 100 battles."

"Our military was able to deter the vicious U.S. forces from invasion and triumph in the liberation war for our motherland," the newspaper said.

It also said the military is "at its heyday under the outstanding leadership" of Kim.

On Jan. 27, the daily published an article praising the "immortal achievements" of the North Korean leadership in building a strong military. Further, from Jan. 28 to 29, it published a series that dealt with the founding of the armed forces while calling for readiness against the enemy.

Meanwhile, multiple government sources in Seoul said the number of people mobilized at Mirim Airport in Pyongyang for the parade increased from 13,000 to 50,000 last week. Satellite images from Planet, a private U.S. Earth imaging company, showed the Kim Il-sung Square, located 7.5 kilometers west of the airport, covered with "red waves" that suggested a massive crowd.

The images also showed the crowd practicing in formation, creating the name of their Supreme Leader and the symbol of the Workers' Party. Additionally, hundreds of heavy tow-trucks, combat vehicles, tanks and long-range, self-propelled artillery were parked in formation on the sides of the square.

According to the sources, the shape and size of the crowd resembles those at the parade in April 15, 2017, when 150,000 people were mobilized to celebrate the 105th anniversary of Kim Il-sung's birth.

By Lee Kyung-min



A full compliance with the safety and disaster management guidelines saved patients at Severance Hospital in Shinchon, Seoul, where no casualties were reported despite a fire Saturday morning, fire authorities said Sunday. Soon after the fire started at 7:56 a.m. on the third floor of the hospital's main building, medical staffers instructed the patients to run in the opposite direction from where the smoke began billowing. Over 300 patients were all safety evacuated. Eight people inhaled toxic gas, but remain in stable condition. Around 400 patients and caregivers evacuated returned to their rooms later.



About 270 firefighters and 80 fire extinguishing vehicles were mobilized only eight minutes after the fire incident. It was largely put out at 9:11 a.m. less than an hour after the report was filed, and the fire was completely extinguished at 9:59 a.m. Police and firefighters confirmed no one was injured by the fire. Sprinklers were in full operation with no malfunctions reported. Compartmentalizing blockades inside the building were all functional, isolating the fire area.



Such a swift and well-controlled response is in stark contrast to a similar incident at Sejong Hospital in Miryang, where a deadly fire killed 39 people and injured 151 more, two weeks ago. The high casualties in South Gyeongsang Province were attributed to suspected safety breaches and emergency guidelines violations. Fire authorities concluded that the hospital failed to maintain basic safety guidelines. Firefighters found six victims, who had been admitted to a room on the first floor, trapped inside the elevator on the ground floor, an indication that no one advised them against using the elevator in the burning building. Those seeking to evacuate are never to use an elevator, as the elevator shaft could work as a smokestack through which toxic gases and fire move upwards.



The rescue efforts were severely hampered, the authorities said, due in large part to illegal remodeling of the building in 2006. The city government imposed a 30 million won ($28,000) fine on the hospital in August 2012 for the illegally remodeling. The hospital paid the fine and has not since been subject to any additional punitive measures for not upgrading the building in accordance with safety guidelines.



By Kang Aa-young, Park Si-soo



A woman has been sentenced to 10 months in prison for killing her premature baby, an appellate court in Gwangju said Sunday.

The court upheld a lower court's guilty verdict, but reduced the sentence from one year to 10 months, after taking into account her "deep remorse" and that she had no criminal history.

According to court documents, the woman, 39, delivered a premature baby at home in August 2016 when she was in the 28th week of pregnancy. Instead of going to a hospital, she wrapped the baby in a blanket and abandoned the child in a closet. The woman's sister found the dead baby a day later and told police.

The court said the accused woman did not go to hospital despite clear signs of premature delivery. Even after the baby was born, she had done nothing to ensure its survival, it added.

By Lee Kyung-min



A special investigation team has questioned a prosecutor who raised a sexual harassment allegation that sparked a flood of #MeToo-style claims in Korea over the past week. The team, under the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office, questioned Seo Ji-hyun, Sunday, who claimed then a senior prosecutor Ahn Tae-geun groped her at a funeral eight years ago.



The questioning came amid full-blown #MeToo-style campaigns among women who share similar experiences on social networking websites. Hundreds of internet users supported the online campaign launched by female cabin crew at Asiana Airlines seeking to file a complaint with the Ministry of Employment and Labor against Chairman Park Sam-koo, for organizing a monthly event where they were forced to give him a hug or a shoulder rub. The crew said they were required to "look pretty" and line up in a lobby at company headquarters in Gangseo, Seoul, every first Thursday of the month at 7:30 a.m. Some supervisors reportedly asked the women to run to him first clapping, cheering and crying and to give presents. Others said they were not allowed to have short hair or to wear pants suits. The company said Park only tried to boost the workers' morale, adding that no one was forced to attend or suffered physical harm. Many attendants responded, "It is the person who was harassed that has the right to say whether the act was inappropriate, not the perpetrator."



The team under the district office will determine whether Seo was subject to undue punishment including unwanted relocation to rural areas and poor evaluations from sudden work performance reviews, as she alleged. Ahn maintains the harassment did not happen, but also said that he could not recall anything because he was drunk.



The team will also review how and why Seo's then-supervisors failed to conduct a thorough investigation into the allegation and whether outside influence was involved, a claim denied by the justice ministry. The ministry maintains that the matter was closed because Seo had not "vigorously" demanded punishment for the alleged perpetrator at the time. Justice ministry officials are likely to be questioned for allegedly failing to resolve the incident promptly and about why Minister Park Sang-ki failed to implement disciplinary action for more than two months following a meeting between Seo and a ministry official held under his directive after she sent an e-mail seeking redress. The ministry refused to disclose what happened at the meeting, citing the "sensitivity" of the matter. No punitive measures can be taken now, because Ahn was dismissed and the statute of limitations has expired.



Kim Jae-ryon, a defense attorney for Seo, said earlier she suspected the minister deliberately kept quiet out of fear that such an "explosive" allegation would have considerable repercussions. Kim resigned as Seo's attorney following heavy criticism of remarks she made over a foundation set up with 10 billion yen for former sex slaves under Japanese occupation during WWII. "I hope we can do our best by yielding to make the future peaceful," she said then, drawing criticism for undermining the victims' dignity. Most of them and the public at large took it as an insult because Japan failed to acknowledge its legal responsibility by trying to "buy off the victims."









By Lee Min-hyung



There is a possibility that the PyeongChang Winter Olympics will set the stage for direct talks between the United States and North Korea.



Pyongyang has yet to confirm whether it will send any high-ranking figures to the Olympics. But speculation is growing that Choe Ryong-hae, a vice chairman of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea, will attend, based on the fact that he visited South Korea in 2014 for the Incheon Asian Games.



Choe is believed to be the No. 2 man in North Korea.



This raises the possibility that Choe could meet U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, who is leading Washington's delegation to the Olympics. He will arrive in Seoul, Friday, and is scheduled to have dinner with President Moon Jae-in.



"There is a 50-50 chance of Choe's visit to the Olympics, as North Korean leader Kim Jong-un offered a peaceful gesture to South Korea in his New Year address," said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies, Sunday.



He said this was not an absurd assumption, because it would not be the first time the regime has sent Choe and other high-ranking political figures to a sporting event in South Korea.



But the professor said there was little chance for Choe and Pence to have an in-depth diplomatic discussion, because a meeting has not been arranged in advance.



"Even if a possible meeting is arranged, both sides are unlikely to share details about their ongoing political conflict," Yang said. "My view is that Pence and Choe will merely exchange greetings if they meet each other."





Blackleaf said: Britain is having 138 of them, so a fair amount of money will be spent. Click to expand...

You ain't got it. The final number will be much lower. This weapon system is too expensive and it puts everyone's eggs in one small basket. This aircraft might end up substantially weakening the Western world if we all spend all of our defence monies on buying such piddly little numbers of them, instead of some defence in depth. The All-American rip-off system has reached it's penultimate. We're like the City of Rome was when the Visigoths were "mere barbarians just camped over the hill (nothing to worry about!)".By Lee Min-hyung



North Korea has secured components for its missile and nuclear development programs through its embassy in Germany, according to Germany's intelligence chief.

"We determined that procurement activities have been carried out from there, and in our view, this is done with a view to the missile program and sometimes also for the nuclear program," Hans-Georg Maassen, chief of Germany's BfV intelligence agency, was quoted as telling a local broadcasting company.

He also reportedly said that the German authority took preventive measures, but has not been able to stop all the activities, at least for the time being.

"We cannot guarantee that we can detect and prevent this in all cases," he said.

Nothing specific has been unveiled about how the North Korean Embassy in Berlin contacted traders or manufacturers involved in the missile and nuclear components industry.

The United Nations is intensifying pressure on the North to stop the regime from continuing to develop its ballistic and nuclear missiles.

Despite international economic and political sanctions, the regime shows no signs of ceasing research and development to enhance its defense and military ability.

According to a recent U.N. report, the North is teaming with countries, such as Syria and Myanmar, in trading military weapons and parts.

The report, obtained by overseas media, also noted that North Korean diplomats across the globe were at the center of the regime's offensive weapons development programs.By Anne-Marie Slaughter and Adrienne Klasa







WASHINGTON, D.C.  Cyril Ramaphosa's victory in December's contest to lead South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) was a resounding repudiation of President Jacob Zuma. Ramaphosa will now almost certainly be elected South Africa's president in 2019  if not before. He has promised to stimulate the country's moribund economy and implement a wide-ranging anti-corruption agenda.







The key question, however, is how much impact change at the top will have on South Africa's troubled democracy.







Ramaphosa is unlikely to be a miracle worker. First, he faces the challenge of reforming his own party. The ANC's identity as the party that liberated South Africa from the scourge of apartheid in 1994 has delivered it every election since. Yet today the ANC stands accused of both fecklessness and moral decay, and it suffered unprecedented losses to the opposition Democratic Alliance in urban areas in local elections in 2016.







Disillusioned ANC members can be strong allies for Ramaphosa's reform attempts; they were powerful enough to elect him over Zuma's preferred candidate, his ex-wife and former African Union Commission chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. But, as in many countries, from Iran to Russia, young urban voters pushing for change run up against older rural voters, the core of the ANC's base. These voters are unlikely to turn against the party, thus buffering any existential threat to its dominance at the ballot box and putting a damper on reform efforts.







The larger challenge facing Ramaphosa comes from the state itself. He must tackle the structural decay fostered under Zuma. South Africa's networks of patronage and corruption have become so endemic that the term "state capture"  coined by the World Bank to describe central Asian post-Soviet states where oligarchs coopted public institutions for personal profit  has entered widespread use.







South Africa's state capture is deeply embedded. The country is a democracy, for all its flaws, with complex institutions. Unlike in a tightly controlled dictatorship, cutting off the head will not kill the monster.







In order to coopt so many interests, Zuma's tentacular patronage networks must reach through many layers of bureaucracy and business hierarchies. Dissolving this lucrative conglomeration at a time when the economy has little else to offer multitudes of civil servants and workers  unemployment currently stands at almost 28 percent  will be difficult and unpopular.







Moreover, Zuma is weakened but not gone. Ramaphosa won the leadership contest by a slim margin, and his elected deputy, David Mabuza, and ANC secretary-general, Ace Magashule, are Zuma acolytes.







Zuma's faction has also notionally retained control of the ANC's 86-member National Executive Committee. Although some members' allegiances now appear to be in flux, the NEC was vital in shielding Zuma from previous attempts to remove him.







Finally, Ramaphosa himself may well be conflicted. As a key architect of the deal that ended the apartheid regime, he proved himself to be a formidable negotiator. He was tipped to be Nelson Mandela's deputy when Mandela became South Africa's first post-apartheid president, but he stepped aside when asked, demonstrating pragmatism and patience.







But he is also very much a product of the ANC system. His large fortune was tantamount to a gift from the ANC's Black Economic Empowerment programs in the 1990s. While he is viewed as clean despite his lavish lifestyle, he has certainly benefited from ANC patronage.







Assuming Ramaphosa has the determination, political savvy, and support to drive sweeping change, he will not be alone. Some of South Africa's institutions  including the judiciary and the public protector  have proven resilient in the face of immense pressure to capitulate to Zuma's agenda.







On Dec. 29, the Constitutional Court delivered a shot in the arm to those who want to see Zuma removed before the end of his term in 2019. The court ruled that Parliament had failed to hold the president accountable in a scandal concerning diverted state funds. The judges demanded the National Assembly consider impeachment.







The courts' moral stature makes them an important ally in efforts to clean up South African politics. But impeachment, a lengthy and fraught process, would be unlikely to lead to Zuma's removal much before the end of his term.







The other path to consolidate Ramaphosa's position is a no-confidence vote within the NEC. But, in a clear sign of his current weakness, Zuma was able to keep a no-confidence motion off the NEC agenda earlier last month, only by making a major concession: permitting an inquiry into state capture that he had been blocking for more than a year. His own links with the scandal-plagued Gupta family will feature prominently.







The ANC's national executive committee has debated establishing a process to secure Zuma's resignation, which Ramaphosa supporters want within weeks. But no timeline has yet been specified. Given Zuma's political acumen, he could well prolong the process for many months. Nonetheless, his days are numbered.







Ramaphosa, for his part, has cautioned that Zuma should never be humiliated. His acknowledgement that power within the ANC is "a very delicate matter" is telling. He understands all too clearly the constraints he faces.







The international community can play a role in supporting Ramaphosa. The classic scenario is to expect too much of a new leader and then to become disillusioned when he fails to deliver quickly. If international investors and stakeholders who support his agenda are too impatient, he will be unable to bring about the economic growth that will bolster his support among South African voters.







Ramaphosa's victory is an important sign that many within the ANC understand that they must change or risk being remembered as the party that allowed an avaricious few to sell off the country. But change will be slow and hard. Ramaphosa is expected to win a high-stakes game with a middling hand. South African voters and the watching world must understand that his opponents are unlikely to fold quickly.









Anne-Marie Slaughter is president and CEO of New America. Adrienne Klasa is editor of "This is Africa," the Financial Times' flagship Africa publication. Follow her on twitter @adrienneklasa. Copyright belongs to Project Syndicate (



By Chang Se-moon





Sad feelings of terminally ill patients are likely seeping into their already fragile minds. In the U.S., several states have enacted assisted dying for these patients, while Korea is in the early stages of the process of allowing terminally ill patients to legally refuse further treatment.



This may be a good time to review the experience of Oregon, a pioneering state in the assisted dying of terminally ill patients.



On Oct. 27, 1997, Oregon enacted the Death with Dignity Act (DWDA), which allowed terminally-ill patients to end their lives through the voluntary self-administration of lethal medications, legally prescribed by a physician. Oregon thus became the first state in the United States that legalized assisted dying of terminally-ill patients.



It took more than 10 years for other states to follow Oregon in authorizing legal assistance in dying. These states are Washington (2008), Montana (2008), Vermont (2013), New Mexico (2014), California (2015) and Colorado (2016).



Medical assistance in dying in New Mexico was authorized owing to a lawsuit filed jointly by Compassion & Choices and the American Civil Liberties Union, rather than through the state legislative process. On Dec. 20, 2016, Mayor Muriel Bowser of Washington, D.C., signed the D.C. DWDA into law.



The history of efforts to oppose medical aid in dying is just as colorful as efforts to support such aid. On Jan. 12, 2017, some members of the U.S. Congress introduced a law to block the DWDA of Washington, D.C. When these efforts failed, a group of ten congressmen introduced last September a nonbinding resolution to make opposition by the U.S. Congress to medical aid in dying official.



This may be a good time for both sides to sit back and review what the 20-year Oregon experience is telling us.



Fortunately, lessons from the Oregon experience were articulated by Tara Haelle in her Sept. 18, 2017 piece in medscape.com. The title of her article is "Oregon's Death With Dignity Act: Two Decades of Data." My friend, Rosalind Kipping of Leisure World of Maryland, emailed me a good summary of the article on which my introduction below is based.



Between 1998 and 2017, 1,857 Oregon residents received DWDA prescriptions. Of those residents, 64 percent died from taking the prescribed drugs. Since there were 614,972 all-cause deaths during the period, the number of DWDA-assisted deaths represented only 19 per 10,000 deaths, i.e., 0.19 percent of the total.



Further findings are that DWDA-assisted deaths have been rising; that 72 percent had some college or more education; that 52 percent were male; and that the median age was 72 years, while the median age was 76 among Oregonians who died of the same underlying illnesses without a DWDA prescription.



The article by Haelle also points out that the "patients' primary reasons for seeking DWDA prescriptions were a loss of autonomy, cited by 91 percent, and a decreasing ability to participate in enjoyable activities, cited by 89 percent. Just over a quarter (26 percent) cited pain, and 4 percent cited finances."



The real question that I want all of us to think about is this: Although the number of DWDA assisted deaths is rather small at less than 1,200 out of more than 600,000 total deaths, do we really have the right to take away the choice that the small number of dying patients made voluntarily?



Let me put the question this way. Can any of us say with total confidence that we know exactly how much agony and pain, mental and physical, the DWDA patients had before they passed away? If we cannot, what right do we have to take the choice they make away from them?



On Feb. 16, last year, I testified at the joint hearing of the Health and Government Operations Committee and Judiciary Committee of the Maryland General Assembly. Because I was the last presenter, I was able to hear arguments from both sides. Although both were sincere in their presentations, there was one striking difference between the two.



Those who supported assisted dying were mostly those who had a personal and intimate experience of caring for their loved ones who passed away, cruelly struggling for breath or to control pain. Those who opposed stressed general principles of human lives.



Those patients who want DWDA type assistance are all proud human beings who are facing the end of life that is totally beyond their control. By having the option that is within their power, these patients can face their death more courageously, because dying without the assistance is their voluntary option, not a fate beyond their control.



Regardless of whether we are liberal or conservative, we all agree on the importance of freedom to make our own choice. When you try to impose your will to take away the assisted dying option from terminally ill patients, I am wondering whether your approach is any better than that of terrorists who try to impose their will upon others who do not agree with them.





Chang Se-moon (changsemoon@yahoo.com) is the director of the Gulf Coast Center for Impact Studies.







In this Thursday, Dec. 3, 2015, photo, North Koreans pick from a crop of cabbage covered in snow in Pyongwon county, South Pyongan, North Korea. / AP-Yonhap



Casey Lartigue Jr. , co-founder of the Teach North Korean Refugees Global Education Center, compiled these statements from interviews with the refugees.



Chang-geum, female, arrived in Seoul in 2007



I lived in the northwestern part of North Korea, but I prefer not to say which area. We were not in a good situation, so I always wore a sweater and thick clothes at home. We burned wood to keep warm and always used a blanket to cover the floor because it was so cold. We would boil water at home to have hot water.



Home was cold, but school was even colder, I don't remember ever having a heating system in school. I preferred to skip school so I could stay at home to keep warm. There were times that we were so cold at school, shivering, that we would tap our feet on the floor to keep our feet warm. Our teachers would tell us to pay attention, but sometimes it was impossible. At school, we would burn wood in the classroom. I don't think we thought about any health issues, we just wanted to stay warm.



When the famine hit, we would take wood from the mountain so we could burn it. But everyone started doing that, so later there was no wood, then we were all freezing. I have no good memories about cold weather in North Korea.



Hyekyung, female, arrived in South Korea in 2014



I lived near the border with China. It is cold here and there, but it is easier to be warm when you are inside. It was inconvenient because there was a town on the other side of the river and it was a long walk to the bridge nearby.



Sometimes it was tempting to go across the ice, but it was also dangerous because the ice wasn't always thick. I remember when one of my neighbors was going to marry a girl on the other side of the river. He drowned on his wedding day because the ice wasn't thick enough. I would guess that about 10 people died every year crossing that icy river.



Geum-byol, female, arrived in South Korea in 2015



It was much colder in my hometown, in the northwestern part of North Korea. The people in Pyongyang are usually fine, but outside of that, many people lack facilities to stay warm. We always wore padding and extra layers of clothing. I don't remember anyone in my area ever having a coat. I did know some people in Pyongyang, they would also wear padding, but they also had coats. And the trend was purple in winter for women, red in other seasons.



Humans in North Korea must be stronger. My friends here say the same thing, that people in South Korea don't seem to be physically strong. In Seoul, everything is so convenient. Here, I can take a bus or the metro almost anywhere, but in North Korea, even to go the distance of just two stops here, I would have to walk in the cold.

By Shon Ga-ram





Flying a drone in Seoul is restricted because the population is so dense because the Presidential Blue House and major military facilities are located within the city. So it is almost legally impossible to fly a drone within Seoul city limits.



In fact, as shown in the picture below, most of central Seoul is a prohibited airspace (P-73A and P-73B), and the area north of Seoul toward the demilitarized zone (P-518) is also a no-fly zone.



On the other hand, the yellow section of the map, designated R-75 is a restricted area where flights are permitted under certain regulations. Moreover, the pilot of a drone must get additional prior permission from the Republic of Korea Army.



The Korean government recently announced a policy to deregulate technologies to promote their growth and development. Accordingly, I applied for a permit to fly a drone. Such permits are valid for one time only _ a new permit must be obtained for each flight. For small hobby drones, no separate pilot's license is necessary, but for larger, heavier drones, one is required.







Application process



In the past, it was necessary to contact the Ministry of Capital Defense and the Ministry of National Defense separately to obtain permission. However, the procedure has become somewhat streamlined. Now it is sufficient to visit the dedicated of the Airline Business Plan One-stop Processing System (or APS, at http://www.onestop.go.kr/) and submit one application.



Generally speaking, when you have received a permit for aerial photography, you see the following screen:





Flight day



You must meet a supervisor before flying your drone. I met my supervisor and he observed me constantly throughout the flight. He carefully recorded the take-off and landing times. While the drone was in the air, I was able to take this picture of the Han River.



By Tom Coyner



Everyone seems to be photographing these days, even if their photos are limited to selfies and pictures of friends and family. Particularly with the ease and economy of digital photography, people are becoming increasingly creative. Failures are inexpensive and goofs are readily apparent.



At the same time, people tend to confine their creativity to "staying within the box" literally and figuratively. In the first case, most people confine their images' dimensions to what they can see within their viewfinders or their LCD screens.



Some people experiment with panoramas -- and this is great. However, too often panoramas are restricted to giant landscape vistas. Panoramas can be often more effectively used within smaller spaces, such as neighborhoods or even a single room. Unfortunately, we remain pretty much conforming more or less to the aspect ratio of 35mm film negatives and slides when in fact most of us no longer even use film.



But when I mention a "panorama," most likely you will think of an image that is much wider than tall, since that is almost always the way we view panorama images. That may seem natural, since we tend to look much more left and right than up and down. That is simply habit. But there is physically much more up and down in the universe. So why not try photographing vertical panoramas?



One of the answers to "Why not?" in this online digital age is that social media websites are more elastic horizontal than vertical. Yet that should not be the reason for not trying vertical panoramas. Furthermore, panoramas of any sort can be made by taking a "normal" photograph and then cropping it down into panoramic dimensions.



Below are some of my panoramas -- horizontal and vertical. In the case of the latter, I am involved in a project to capture some of the wonders of Seoul's modern architecture by taking pictures of buildings reflected in the windows of other buildings. In most cases, that requires me to shoot and crop vertically, in which case I'm really shooting out of the "35mm format box." I often use a wide-angle lens and later crop the image.





Northern Seoul. Photo by Tom Coyner, May 25, 2015.





Jongro 2 ga. Photo by Tom Coyner, April 29, 2016.



When shooting vertically in claustrophobic cities, I have to adjust for "key stoning," which is the look resulting from correcting images where nearby tall building first seem to fall backward.



Within my computer, I can have the images fall forward, returning to their natural upright position. But in doing so, the picture's dimensions "keystone," where the top of the picture is much wider than the bottom. In such cases, I have to crop so that the left and right sides are parallel to each other. Just as important, we should consider cropping any image -- vertically or horizontally.





Koreana Hotel Reflection. Photo by Tom Coyner, January 3, 2018.



Most importantly, I'm creating unusual images in two ways. First, I'm focusing on the reflected building rather than simply the buildings serving as mirrors. And second, I'm creating unusual vertical panoramas. Through these kinds of exercises, I try to liberate my usual perspective in more than one way.



Hankook Corporation office in Jung-gu, Seoul / Courtesy of Hankook Corporation



Hankook Corp. CEO targets quantum jump through partnership with Amazon Web Service



By Nam Hyun-woo





Hankook Corp. CEO Kim Hyun-kyumYoo Gye-hoon, a corporate history writer, holds an interview at The Korea Times office in Seoul, Wednesday. He recently published "The Final Dream of Hoam" that narrates Samsung Group founder Lee Byung-chull's push for semiconductor business in the 1970s and 1980s. / Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul



By Jun Ji-hye



A corporate history writer who has watched Samsung for two decades believes that Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong should be released from prison at his appellate trial scheduled for Monday.



Writer Yoo Gye-hoon, who recently published a book about the junior Lee's late grandfather and Samsung founder Lee Byung-chull, told The Korea Times last week that there would be a diversity of opinions on Lee's fate, but he thought, when considering the issues with a focus on economic matters, Lee's release from jail would be right.



Yoo's book, "The Final Dream of Hoam," narrates the group founder's push for semiconductor business despite opposition from his staff as well as the then government in the 1970s and 1980s, which led to huge success for the conglomerate. Hoam is the late founder's pen name.



Yoo said Vice Chairman Lee was tasked with leading the nation's most-influential business group and contributing to a better future for the nation by expanding business territories beyond components such as memory chips and displays.



"I hope Lee will be released from prison so Samsung can move to other things after the remarkable growth of its semiconductor business," Yoo said in an interview. "To make new businesses work well, quick decisions are necessary, which can be done under the management of the owner family."



Lee received a five-year jail term on Aug. 25 after being convicted on five charges, including bribery, embezzlement and hiding assets overseas, which were involved with former President Park Geun-hye's massive corruption and influence-peddling scandal that led to her impeachment.



From Samsung's point of view, the best scenario at Lee's appellate trial would be for the court to hand down a not guilty verdict, reversing the lower court's ruling. The alternative would be a suspended prison sentence.



Yoo acknowledged that Samsung had made some blunders in what critics claimed was a back-scratching alliance of government and businesses, but said the group's great influence on the nation's economy could not be denied.



"Through my book, I wanted to deliver messages to Samsung people that they need to make a new start bearing Hoam's spirit in mind," Yoo said. "At the time, Hoam staked his all on the semiconductor business in his 70s and kept saying it was not for Samsung but for the nation's economy."



Without the success of that business, Samsung Electronics could not have survived because at the time it depended largely on imports from Japan, Yoo said.



He said that through his book, he also wanted to inform readers about the late founder's way of managing a company and making decisions.



"Hoam read all the reports and books about semiconductors and asked his people a number of questions," Yoo said. "After collecting all the materials and organizing his thoughts, he then finally made decisions on his own."



The writer with a 30-year career interviewed 103 people, including scientists and engineers, who worked for Samsung inside or outside the company.



Before this, he wrote three books related to history of Samsung affiliates including battery maker Samsung SDI.



Dear Liz: Two years ago I got out of prison after being there for nine years. I lost everything that I had. When I got out, my credit rating was 565. I recently bought a car and have made four payments so far. Can you tell me when I might have good credit again?

Answer: As long as you continue to make on-time payments, you should see gradual improvement in your scores. Its impossible to predict how long it might take to achieve good scores, though. That depends on the information thats in your credit reports, what credit score formula is used and whats considered good by whichever lender is evaluating your application.

For the record: An earlier version of this column said credit builder loans are typically offered by credit bureaus. Such loans are typically offered by credit unions.

You should first make sure your payments are being reported to all three credit bureaus. Unfortunately, some car dealerships that specialize in bad-credit lending dont report their loans, which means your payments wouldnt be helping your scores. If thats the case, consider getting a credit builder loan. These loans, typically offered by credit unions, put the amount you borrow into a savings account that you can claim after making 12 monthly payments.

Payments should always be made on time, by the way. A big chunk of your credit scores is determined by your payment history. Your low scores mean you fell seriously behind on your obligations, but even a single skipped payment can hurt. Consider putting payments on automatic so theres no chance of a lapse.

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Another large portion of your scores is determined by credit utilization, or how much of your available credit youre using. Paying down an installment loan over time helps that ratio. So, too, does paying down or lightly using a revolving account such as a credit card. If you dont have a card, consider applying for one. There may be a small initial hit to your credit scores, but that will fade quickly. People with bad credit often need to start with a secured credit card, which requires you to deposit a certain amount  typically $200 or more  with the issuing bank. Use only a small portion of your available credit  30% or less is good, 20% or less is better, 10% or less is best. Pay the bill in full each month, since theres no advantage to carrying a balance.

Another way to speed up your credit rehabilitation is to be added as an authorized user to the credit card of someone with a solid credit history. This other person doesnt have to give you access to the card itself, but naming you as an authorized user may allow that persons history with the card to be imported into your credit reports. Not all credit card issuers report this information, though, so the primary cardholder would need to ask. Its also important that the other person continue to behave responsibly with credit. If the primary cardholder misses a payment or maxes out the card, your scores could be hurt, too.

You can track your progress using one of the many websites offering free credit scores. Your bank or the credit card issuer may offer free scores as well. The scores likely wont be the same score a lender might use to evaluate you, but they should give you a general idea of where you stand.

IRA distributions and the tax man

Dear Liz: I am 79, in fairly good health and fortunately have almost $600,000 in my IRA account. My minimum required distribution is currently about $30,000 a year, which means my IRA funds will last until I am well over 100! I realize that I can pay a penalty and draw down some of the funds but I dont want to be pushed into a higher income bracket. Any suggestions on how I can enjoy the money while I am able?

Answer: You wont pay a penalty for pulling more than the minimum from your IRA. That early withdrawal penalty disappeared 20 years ago, after you turned 59. You will owe income taxes, of course, but a visit with a tax pro can help you determine how much more you can withdraw before youre pushed into a higher tax bracket.

Where to find financial planner fiduciary oath

Dear Liz: You often mention that a financial planner should be willing to sign a fiduciary oath to put your interests first. Is there a form or formatted letter available to financial planners who are willing to sign said oath?

Answer: There is. The Committee for the Fiduciary Standard, a group that promotes the idea that advisors should put their clients best interests first, has just such a form letter at www.thefiduciarystandard.org/fiduciary-oath.

Liz Weston, certified financial planner, is a personal finance columnist for NerdWallet. Questions may be sent to her at 3940 Laurel Canyon, No. 238, Studio City, CA 91604, or by using the Contact form at asklizweston.com. Distributed by No More Red Inc.Workplace wellness programs have two main goals: improve employees health and lower their employers healthcare costs. Theyre not very good at either, new research finds.

For the study, 3,300 employees of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign were given a year of access to iThrive, a workplace wellness program similar to what many companies offer workers. A control group of 1,534 didnt get access to it.

Those offered the program were randomly split into six groups. All were offered biometric screening, a health assessment and various services and classes, such as chronic disease management, tai chi and a fitness challenge. But the six groups were paid different incentives for completing each step of the program  from $50 to $350.

The researchers wanted to answer three questions: Do wellness programs have any effects on health outcomes, medical spending and other measures including productivity? (The jury has been out on that.) Can money spur more people to participate? (Many programs have trouble with enrollment.) And finally, whos most likely to participate? (If only healthy people do, the programs wont achieve much.)

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Their study found that wellness programs  even those with incentives  dont change employees behavior much. The findings were published as a working paper at the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Over the years, hundreds of studies have examined the efficacy of wellness programs with mixed results; a study from Rand Corp. found most programs dont reduce companies health costs, while a 2010 review found they do.

Much of that research has calculated savings by looking at the difference in healthcare spending between employees who opt in to such programs and those who dont. But the new study, as a randomized control trial, measured differences by randomly creating a control group with no access to the wellness program at all. With that method, the researchers found that medical spending disparities preexisted the wellness program.

Our results are significantly different, said Damon Jones, an associate professor at the University of Chicagos Harris School of Public Policy who conducted the study along with two researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. They rule out the kind of effects you find in nearly 80% of those prior studies.

We dont see anything trending toward savings.

First, money isnt much of an incentive. Without any cash offered, a little less than half of employees completed the assessment and screening. A $100 reward for completing the screening boosted that rate to 59%. Doubling that reward didnt make much difference, raising the share of employees finishing the screening merely to 63%.

Not that it may have mattered much to their employer. Looking at health insurance claims throughout the year, the researchers found participation in the wellness program didnt result in better health outcomes or lower healthcare costs. The medical spending habits of the employees who didnt have access to the program were almost identical to those of the workers who did, Jones said.

It turns out that those most likely to take advantage of their employers wellness offerings are healthy people who dont spend a lot on healthcare, and employees with the highest healthcare costs are the least likely to participate. Surveys the researchers offered enrollees also found that wellness had no effect on job satisfaction or productivity.

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Despite questions as to whether wellness programs actually work, companies are still pouring money into them. The industry ballooned from $1 billion in 2011 to $6.8 billion five years later, according to an IBIS World analysis, and last year almost a quarter of employers increased their wellness offerings, the Society of Human Resource Management found in its yearly benefits survey.

Some studies have found that wellness programs can take about three years to yield any benefits; the researchers in the University of Illinois analysis tracked savings for only a year, though they plan to keep tracking for four. It is possible that effects will emerge in the long run, said David Molitor, another researcher on the study.

But the first year of results, he said, doesnt suggest future savings. In fact, the control group had slightly lower health insurance claims than those with access to the program.

Molitors team also tracked how often employees using the wellness program went to the gym and whether they participated in a local run, to see if the program inspired healthier behaviors. They didnt do either more often than the control group.

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Greenfield writes for Bloomberg.Astaire Dances American Contemporary Ballet re-creates four of movie legend Fred Astaires classic dance routines. The Bloc, 32nd floor, 700 S. Flower St., L.A. Sun., next Sun., 4 p.m.; Thu.-Sat., 8 p.m.; ends Feb. 14. $40-$105. (213) 304-3408.

RIFT L.A. Contemporary Dance Company performs new works by three local choreographers; part of Dance! at the Odyssey 2018. Odyssey Theatre, 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd., West L.A. Ends Sun., 2 p.m. $25. (310) 477-2055.

naked Choreographer Corina Kinnear explores the non-sexualized human form and perceptions of nudity; part of Dance! at the Odyssey 2018. Odyssey Theatre, 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd., W. L.A. Thu.-Fri., 8 p.m. $25. (310) 477-2055.

Okwui Okpokwasili: Poor Peoples TV Room The Bessie Award winner and company celebrate womens movements in Nigeria in this multidisciplinary work. REDCAT, 631 W. 2nd St., L.A. Thu.-Sat., 8:30 p.m.; next Sun., 7 p.m.; ends Feb. 11. $26-$35. (213) 237-2800.

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Saloon Cirque Eloize mixes music, dance and acrobatics in this Wild West-themed show. Irvine Barclay Theatre, 4242 Campus Drive, Irvine. Thu.-Fri., 8 p.m. $28-$100. (949) 854-4646.

The Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence Step Afrika! performs this show inspired by the artists 1941 series of paintings documenting the post-WWI movement of African Americans from the rural South to the industrial North. Younes and Soraya Nazarian Center for the Performing Arts (The Soraya), 18111 Nordhoff St., Northridge. Fri., 8 p.m. $33 and up. (818) 677-3000.

Dance by the Fire Works by local choreographer Angela Todaro. Miles Memorial Playhouse, 1130 Lincoln Blvd., Santa Monica. Sat., 8 p.m. $5, $10. (310) 458-8634.

Immigrant Stories, An American Journey Danza Floricanto/USA performs eight fact-based tales inspired by members of the local immigrant community. Rosenthal Theatre at Inner City Arts, 720 Kohler St., L.A. Sat., 8 p.m. $20, $25. (323) 261-0385.

Louise Reichlin & Dancers/Los Angeles Choreographers & Dancers The company performs A Jewish Childs Story, Tap Dance Widows Club and more. Culver City Senior Center, 4095 Overland Ave., Culver City. Next Sun., 1 p.m. Free. (310) 253-6700.The Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department is investigating the death of a man who collapsed and died after a confrontation with deputies attempting to arrest him.

The man, whose name has not been released, lost consciousness after he was shocked with a Taser and handcuffed by deputies outside of his home in northern Los Angeles County on Saturday afternoon, according to a sheriffs department news release.

Sheriffs deputies were searching for the man, who was suspected of criminal activity. They found him in his backyard in the 40,000 block of 176th Street East in Lake Los Angeles, an unincorporated community east of Palmdale.

A sheriffs spokesman said that although the man was initially cooperative, he suddenly turned and punched a deputy, sending him to the ground. The man then jumped onto the fallen deputy and continued to attack him, the spokesman said.

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A second deputy used a Taser on the man. But according to a spokesman, the shock had no effect. The man then turned and tackled the deputy to the ground, the spokesman said. A neighbor intervened and the man was ultimately placed in handcuffs.

Soon after, deputies reportedly noticed the mans breathing was labored and that he was unresponsive.

They tried to revive him with CPR, as did officials with the fire department, but their efforts were unsuccessful, officials said. The man was pronounced dead at the scene.

The cause of his death remains under investigation. Neighbors told NBC4 that the man was a former Marine who may have suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Meanwhile, both deputies were taken to a local hospital for treatment and later released.

anna.phillips@latimes.com

Twitter: @annamphillipsA San Diego police officer was punched in the face and three people were arrested Saturday during a clash at Chicano Park between a small group holding a Patriot Picnic and a larger gathering of park supporters defending its cultural roots.

San Diego police reported three arrests, one for battery on a police officer. The officer suffered a bloody nose as he tried to arrest a suspect who refused an order to get out of the street, said Lt. Scott Wahl. The suspect was not injured, Wahl said.

The event started about 10 a.m., with police initially reporting that both groups were law-abiding and peaceful.

But as the crowd ballooned to an estimated 700 people, Chicano Park advocates far outnumbered the 50 or so picnickers, who staged the event in an attempt to hoist the American flag at the park, where the Aztlan and La Raza flags fly. A U.S. flag flies in a corner of the park near a veterans monument.

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The event today is not a protest, Roger Ogden, an organizer of the picnic, said in a statement. The goal is just to demonstrate whether there is city-sponsored discrimination at Chicano Park against certain people, due to their race, ethnic background and politics.

Were just a group of Americans who found out about this park and how they exclude people if you are not Chicano or Mexican. This should be an American park for the American people, said Jesse Medina, a business owner from Los Angeles.

Another event showcasing the cultural significance of the park was already planned for Saturday, Chicano Park Steering Committee members said. As word spread about the picnic, hundreds of park supporters rallied to assert their presence.

We just felt this was something we needed to do at this point, to make sure that people knew something about the park, said Alberto Lopez Pulido, a University of San Diego professor and member of the steering committee.

On the other side of Logan Avenue, several people mingled amid the parks colorful murals for an event billed as an Educational Tour Day. Aztec dancers performed a dance of peace and love, inviting people to join in. Speeches by community members and representatives of the clergy rang out from the main stage.

I dont want to give them any attention, Pulido said, referring to the Patriot Picnic group. This is our story, and will remain our story. We want to let people know what the park means, the fact that we have 88 murals here, we have National Landmark status.

The park, he said, is sacred for some people, like a church would be or a synagogue or a mosque. It has that feel because this park comes out of struggle, or resistance, and people identify with that.

Tensions rose as members of the Patriot Picnic group prepared to leave with a heavy police escort, and members traded angry words with park supporters. A few people  it wasnt clear which side they supported  instigated fights in the street as the crowds were dispersing, police said.

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A similar showdown occurred at the park in September, with protesters calling on the city to remove the murals of Chicano leaders, civil rights activists and Mesoamerican themes that decorate the park, which was designated a National Historic Landmark last year.

sandra.dibble@sduniontribune.com

kristina.davis@sduniontribune.com

Dibble and Davis write for the San Diego Union-Tribune.

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UPDATES:

10:00 p.m.: This article was updated with more comments from police and both park critics and supporters.

This article was originally posted at 5:15 p.m.The man poised to become San Diegos next police chief comes from a law enforcement family and says he thinks about police work nearly around the clock, but Dave Nisleit didnt aspire to be the citys top cop until late in his career.

Nisleits father was a 35-year San Diego Police Department veteran who retired as a captain in 1999, his uncle was a police officer in Wisconsin, and his son Ryan recently graduated from the San Diego Police Academy and joined the local force.

We kind of consider law enforcement a family business, especially with San Diego, Nisleit said on Thursday after Mayor Kevin Faulconer tapped him to become the citys next chief. Its a passion; its a hobby; its a job.

Nisleits appointment as chief must be confirmed by the City Council during a hearing thats been scheduled for Feb. 26, two weeks after a Feb. 12 council subcommittee hearing to gather feedback from the public on Nisleit.

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If he is confirmed as chief, Nisleit said he will be achieving a goal that only seemed possible to him recently.

Hired as a patrol officer in 1988, Nisleit quickly achieved his initial goal of joining the SWAT team and then completed his long-term ambition of becoming captain of a patrol command, which he described as being the mini-chief of a community.

Nisleit, 52, said thoughts of rising to chief didnt occur to him until he got exposed to bigger things after transferring to the homicide division and then watched one of his mentors, Shelley Zimmerman, rise to chief in 2014.

I started to think this would be a pretty cool thing, said Nisleit, who was promoted to assistant chief in 2016. Its been a dream of mine for a while now, and its almost surreal that its actually coming true.

Nisleit has put together an impressive police career that has included steadily rising through the ranks with assignments focused on gangs, sex crimes, robbery and narcotics.

He was assigned to the beach communities when alcohol first became illegal at the beach a decade ago. He has overseen planning for more than 1,000 special events such as Comic-Con and the recent Womens March. And he coordinated the investigation leading to the 2016 arrest of a serial killer targeting the homeless.

Nisleit also has experience in some of San Diegos most diverse neighborhoods. His first patrol assignment was in Logan Heights, and his first command post was leading the Mid-City Division, which includes City Heights.

He said he will focus on making the department more ethnically diverse as he tries to fill 200 officer vacancies with a national recruiting campaign, larger police academies and signing bonuses for officers from other law enforcement agencies.

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Another priority will be addressing the issue of racial profiling, following a San Diego State University study that found blacks and Hispanics get searched more often after getting pulled over by San Diego police.

Despite those problems, Nisleit said hes taking over a department thats far better off than when Zimmerman became chief four years ago.

He said staffing problems and some ethnic tensions are far less daunting than the more than a dozen misconduct cases Zimmerman inherited, which led to a U.S. Department of Justice audit and 40 recommended policy changes.

I truly believe that is behind us, he said.

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Nisleit, who worked closely with Zimmerman during several portions of his career, said shes had a significant influence on him and his leaderships skills.

Shes been a mentor of mine ever since I was a sergeant, he said. Ive learned a lot from her both in one-on-one conversations, but also from watching. Her work ethic is unmatched. Im going to try to match it as close as I can.

Zimmerman, who must retire March 1 because of her participation in the citys deferred retirement option program, on Thursday praised Nisleit as a worthy successor.

He is an exceptional, proven leader who has given his all to our department and city, she said.

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He was also praised by the leader of the policer officers labor union, who called Nisleit a cops cop and a fair leader who hasnt shied away from tough assignments.

The union president, Jack Schaeffer, said Nisleits wide range of experience in various units of the department means he has seen how things get handled from many different angles.

Hes a very task-driven person who can get things done, Schaeffer said.

Mayor Faulconer also praised Nisleit, whom he chose from among six finalists for the chief job after a national search than began in September.

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Ive had the opportunity to work with Chief Nisleit -- and Captain Nisleit -- for a number of years and hes a person of integrity, a person whos approachable and a person whos well-respected in the community, Faulconer said.

If confirmed as chief, Nisleits annual salary would increase from $147,790 to $205,000.

Garrick writes for the San Diego Union-Tribune.

david.garrick@sduniontribuneMarlene and John Okulick had never heard of a business improvement district when the letter showed up in the mail.

It touted the formation of a new group that would clean up alleys, improve safety and promote businesses in Venice Beach for five years.

The price? A new charge tacked onto their tax bill.

That letter was the beginning of an unusual battle pitting the Okulicks and others who own shops, apartment buildings and other properties in Venice against the newly formed business improvement district and the city itself.

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More than a year after its founding, the Venice Beach Business Improvement District has done little but stirred up plenty of angst.

There are no cleanup crews or safety patrols. Community activists complain that nearly $2 million annually  which includes city funding derived from public property in the new district  is being controlled by an unelected board that looks little like Venice. They fear the new district will eventually become a tool to roust homeless people and privatize the public boardwalk, changing the face of the Venice they love.

The Okulicks and other unhappy property owners are suing the city and the new entity, trying to dissolve it. They argue that the Venice Beach Business Improvement District improperly folded in homes, apartments and other properties that will get little benefit from the new charges, but must pay thousands of dollars annually.

And they have accused its founders of gerrymandering the unwieldy district to rope in city properties and make it easier to win approval.

With the help of the city, a couple of neighbors with large properties can increase your taxes by 50%, John Okulick said, pointing to annual charges exceeding $4,000 for their property.

A confluence of events

So far, the Okulicks and other property owners have been billed twice. In August, the new district got its first infusion of nearly $1.7 million. Yet as of January, the Venice Beach Business Improvement District had no website and no office. It had yet to turn in a required annual report on its plans, which city officials said could hold up future funds.

And the newly minted board of the Venice Beach Property Owners Assn.  the nonprofit contracted with the city to run the district  had met publicly only once. At that meeting, Venice resident and property owner Larry Perloff called the new entity a total rip-off.

If I sound a little ticked, its because I am. Because Ive been paying a lot of money and got nothing for it, Perloff said.

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At the meeting, district executive Tara Devine told attendees that cleanup and safety programs had been delayed by a confluence of events, most of them beyond board members control. She said they would eventually like to diversify the board, but cautioned it was a demanding position for a newcomer. Board President Mark Sokol, one of the owners of Hotel Erwin near the beach, urged the crowd to give us a chance.

Give us our money back! someone shouted in response.

Devine declined a request for an interview, saying that the group was trying to launch services by March and that all of our resources are currently needed to reach that goal.

She provided a timeline indicating that over the last year, the district had sought proposals for cleaning and safety services, sent out three written updates to property owners and started setting up administrative systems. At the January meeting, the board chose a cleanup company and a security firm.

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Sokol assured property owners in a letter that any money that was not spent during the first year would be carried over and used to provide more frequent or intensive services in the following years. City Councilman Mike Bonin, who had championed the formation of the new district, said it was premature to judge what it had accomplished.

I firmly hope the Venice Beach BID will help create a cleaner and safer boardwalk for everyone to enjoy, and Im eager for it to begin its work, Bonin wrote in an email.

Flashpoint in gentrification debate

But the delay has drawn scrutiny from City Clerk Holly Wolcott, who said her office is researching whether any of the money can be refunded to property owners.

The furor over the newly formed district is unusual, said Adrian Riskin, a blogger who has written critically about business improvement districts in Los Angeles.

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For decades, California law has allowed the formation of such districts, which charge business or property owners an assessment for additional services in their area. The city is sprinkled with business improvement districts that provide sidewalk cleaning, safety patrols, business promotion and other services or improvements.

Some business improvement districts have been accused in court of violating the rights of homeless people or street vendors, but most of them fly under the radar, Riskin said. People dont know what they do.

In Venice, however, forming the new district quickly became a flashpoint in the ongoing debate over gentrification.

The funky, bohemian burg where beachgoers can skateboard, shop for dream catchers or balance their chakras is now the stomping grounds of tech giants like Google. Rents have hit dizzying highs. Snapchat has moved in and the Venice Beach Freak Show has moved out.

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Critics complain that some of the champions of the business improvement district have been sued by City Atty. Mike Feuer for allegedly running Venice Beach apartment buildings as illegal hotels, a phenomenon bemoaned by tenant activists.

How is this acceptable with all of the power brokers in this city? Why is white-collar crime a nonissue when making deals that involve city officials at the highest levels and taxpayer money? Margaret Molloy, a member of the Venice Coalition to Preserve Unique Community Character, wrote in an email.

Carl Lambert, a former Venice Beach Property Owners Assn. board member sued by Feuer, said in court filings that the building pinpointed by the city attorney was historically used as a hotel and was authorized for that use. Lambert declined an interview request.

Feuer also sued Andy Layman and Matthew Moore, another board member with the group, over a building advertised as the Venice Beach Suites and Hotel. In court filings, they have denied breaking the law.

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At a City Hall hearing, business and property owners who backed the new district said they had decided to pony up more money to make Venice Beach cleaner and safer, not to eject the homeless or change the areas bohemian feel.

The last thing I and most of my constituents want is this place to turn into a Santa Monica Third Street Promenade, Layman said.

Weighted balloting favors bigger properties

When the Venice Beach Business Improvement District ultimately went up for a vote among property owners, more people voted no than yes. But the new district was still approved because the ballots were weighted by how much each property would be assessed.

John Okulick stands outside a home located in the Venice Beach Business Improvement District. Its owner is among the plaintiffs suing to dissolve the district. (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times )

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Bigger properties with more street frontage got a bigger say  and many of the owners of the biggest properties backed the plan. That included the city, which has properties that account for roughly a quarter of the Venice Beach assessments.

Not all Venice Beach properties were charged: State law barred the new district from incorporating buildings or lots in residential zones. But the new district did include homes that were deemed to be sitting on commercially or industrially zoned land, including affordable housing run by Venice Community Housing, which now must pay more than $10,000 in assessments annually.

Its super troubling that this very undemocratic process can impose this fee and strip resources away from a nonprofit affordable-housing developer in the middle of a housing crisis, said Bill Przylucki, executive director of the group People Organized for Westside Renewal.

At the January meeting, Devine emphasized that usage can change frequently, saying the key term in the law is zoning.

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On a balmy day, the Okulicks strolled out of their Hampton Drive art studio, past a stop sign branded with a sticker to read Stop gentrifying Venice, and down to the beach, consulting a map of the district. After walking along the famed boardwalk, they turned inland to study a Horizon Avenue bungalow shaded by rustling palms.

Roughly 2,000 miles away in Chicago, its owner, Louis Traeger, complains he is being charged more than $2,000 annually in assessments on the house. He joined the Okulicks in their lawsuit, arguing the new district provided no benefit to his property, which has always been used as a residence.

If Venice needs to be cleaner, why doesnt the city just spend the money? Traeger asked.

emily.alpert@latimes.com

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Twitter: @AlpertReyesLos Angeles police found Reed Segovia slumped in a folding chair near the Venice boardwalk early one spring morning in 2016 and shook him awake.

The officers handed the homeless street artist a ticket for sleeping on the sidewalk.



For the record: An earlier version of the graphic with this article listed incorrect data for arrests in 2011.

Three months later, LAPD officers were citing Segovia again when they discovered an unpaid ticket for sleeping on the beach. This time, they handcuffed him, loaded him into a squad car and took him to jail.

L.A. officials have denounced criminalizing homelessness. But as Los Angeles struggles with a growing homelessness crisis, arrests of homeless people have gone up significantly, a Times analysis of police data shows. And the most common offense  the one Segovia was arrested for  was failure to appear in court for an unpaid citation.

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Officers made 14,000 arrests of homeless people in the city in 2016, a 31% increase over 2011, the Times analysis found. The rise came as LAPD arrests overall went down 15%. Two-thirds of those arrested were black or Latino, and the top five charges were for nonviolent or minor offenses.

In 2011, 1 in 10 arrests citywide were of homeless people; in 2016, it was 1 in 6.

(@latimesgraphics )

Los Angeles has more than a dozen quality-of-life laws  restricting sleeping on the sidewalk, living in a car or low-level drug possession, for example  that police enforce against homeless people, usually with a citation.

The tickets themselves typically start out at less than $100, but often top $200 or even $300 once court fees are added. Tickets pile up, and homeless people go to jail for not paying for offenses that warranted only citations.

To pay $400 and be serving jail time because you had the audacity to sit on the sidewalk because youre homeless  thats just not justice, said attorney Colleen Mullen, who has defended homeless clients against tickets.

Los Angeles Police Department officials attribute the rising arrests to the spread of homelessness and related crime. City officials say they have to balance the rights of homeless people against the quality of life and safety of the whole community.

What were trying to do is our best to serve and solve a complex problem that is far beyond what we have been given the tools and mechanics to fix, Cmdr. Todd Chamberlain, the former head of LAPD homelessness efforts, said in an interview.

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But tickets catch homeless people in a revolving door of debt and arrests that can disqualify them from housing and jobs and prolong their homelessness, advocates and federal officials say.

The Times analyzed jail bookings provided by the LAPD from 2011 to 2016  the last year with consistent data  counting those with a transient address as homeless.

A spokesman for the LAPD, whose officers made 90% of the citys homeless arrests in 2016, said that methodology inflated the number because people who simply refused to give officers an address were also labeled as transient.

But the LAPD said in 2015 that a transient address very likely meant that a person was homeless, according to a report by then-City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana. Counting transients probably produced an underestimate of homeless people, the report said.

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L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti tours a new hygiene facility for people on skid row. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times )

Mayor Eric Garcetti applauded recent LAPD reforms in dealing with homeless people but said officers still were making too many homeless arrests.

The department needs to get with the program, and Im going to make sure it does, Garcetti said in an interview last year. If these numbers are a trend  and quite frankly, if its not a trend  there are probably too many people being arrested.

Segovia, who sells his artwork on the Venice boardwalk, has received as many as a dozen tickets, his lawyer said  mostly for sleeping, smoking and letting his artwork spill out of his boardwalk vendor space  and has gone to court five times to clear his record. He rolls his eyes at his multiple treks through the legal system.

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What was accomplished? he asked. Nothing.

Fees can mount for unpaid tickets

Many residents and businesspeople welcome quality-of-life enforcement to clean up the streets. Police and some advocates see enforcement as a tool to persuade homeless people to move to shelters or accept other services.

If the only way you can get someone in to talk about services is to have them get a ticket, then its a good thing, said Betsy Starman, a downtown resident and homeless advocate.

But California lawmakers have piled on fees and assessments that make the states ticket penalties among the stiffest in the country, according to a study in May by the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area.

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The base fine in L.A. for sleeping or lying on the sidewalk, for example, is $35, but fees take the total to $238, L.A. County Superior Court spokeswoman Mary Hearn said in an email. A $300 civil assessment and other levies can be added, more than doubling the financial stakes.

(Los Angeles Times )

You or I can pay them, but these people cant do that, said attorney Andrew Chen, who ran a Venice citation clinic for homeless youth.

What were trying to do is our best to serve and solve a complex problem that is far beyond what we have been given the tools and mechanics to fix. Cmdr. Todd Chamberlain, former head of LAPD homelessness efforts

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If anyone, homeless or not, misses the deadline to appear in court on an unpaid citation, the Superior Court automatically issues a bench warrant for his or her arrest. A decade ago, L.A. Superior Court computers were spitting out 8,000 bench warrants a week for failure-to-appear charges, according to a 2014 California Supreme Court opinion. Annual revenue from such complaints exceeded $75 million, the opinion said. (The court did not provide more recent figures.)

Its all about generating revenue for the courts, said former Fresno County Traffic Court Commissioner Robert J. Thompson.

Most homeless people spend no more than a couple of days in jail on warrants. Judges can cancel some fees or order community service.

But fines are so high, and community service pay scales so low, people can face a daunting number of hours to work off their debt, according to an April report commissioned by state Chief Justice Tani G. Cantil-Sakauye. The report recommended fewer civil assessments and more fee reductions.

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Judges in San Francisco stopped issuing bench warrants for unpaid quality-of-life tickets in 2015. In 2016, the court canceled more than 60,000 warrants, fines and fees, saying the penalties were unfair to poor people and the debt was unlikely to be collected.

(Los Angeles Times )

Beginning in January 2016, Los Angeles Superior Court reduced failure-to-appear citations from misdemeanors to infractions.

But there remain thousands in our system that were issued as misdemeanors prior to that date, and the court continues to automatically issue arrest warrants for failing to pay the citations or report to court, said Hearn, the court spokeswoman.

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The Los Angeles Superior Court follows the law in these cases, Hearn said.

A maze of courthouses and systems

Many homeless people fear theft or confiscation by the city if they leave their belongings unattended while they go to court, said Wendell Blassingame, a skid row advocate.

They may lack internet access to make online payments or an address where they can receive court reminders. And tickets and warrants dont always show up on the courts citation website, multiple lawyers said.

Figuring out where to go can also be a challenge.

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LAPD officers arrest a man on skid row in 2016 for possession of a stolen shopping cart during a sweep with sanitation crews. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times )

Infraction tickets from Venice are filed at the Beverly Hills courthouse but tried in Santa Monica, while misdemeanor citations for the same violation  sleeping on the beach, for instance  are handled at the airport court. Misdemeanor citations issued in Malibu go to the Van Nuys courthouse, a 70-mile round trip that could take hours by bus.

People generally have 90 days to pay tickets, but officers sometimes shorten that window.

Merrian Cruse had only a month to clear up a June 2016 ticket for failing to take her skid row tent down by 8:30 a.m. LAPD spokeswoman Patricia Sandoval said she did not know why the due dates were cut short.

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Adding to the confusion, officers can take up to a year to submit citations to the court  or never file them at all.

Youre told you have to check every two weeks for a year, said Noah Grynberg, another lawyer who volunteers to represent homeless people in ticket court. Nobodys going to do it.

One of Grynbergs homeless clients, Aaron Dollard, said he spent a year watching for a ticket that never appeared. It made me feel like a criminal, Dollard said.

Hearn said citations are very clear on when and where to report.

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If an individual contacts the court and his or her citation is not in our system, court personnel will direct that person to the issuing police agency to inquire as to the status of the citation, she added.

The role of police evolves

Homeless enforcement in Los Angeles has evolved over the last 35 years from openly punitive measures to softer approaches.

Former Chief Daryl F. Gates swept up scores of those he referred to as the so-called homeless, carting their things off in skip loaders. Under the 2006 Safer Cities Initiative, then-Chief William J. Bratton sent a special detail of 50 officers to skid row to enforce minor violations.

The LAPD said Safer Cities reclaimed public space and allowed agencies to serve homeless people without fear of crime. Police teams also helped fuel the massive gentrification that swept through downtown Los Angeles.

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But a UCLA law school study found that officers were handing out 1,000 citations a month and jailing those who didnt pay them, many of whom later returned to the streets. The city lost several civil rights lawsuits over police crackdowns on skid row.

After Garcetti took the mayoral office in 2013, he and other officials began saying that enforcement was not the answer to homelessness.

We cant simply criminalize homelessness, Garcetti told National Public Radio in 2015.

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The city scaled back some punitive measures. In 2014, City Atty. Mike Feuer asked the LAPD to reduce quality-of-life citations from misdemeanors, which can draw jail time, to infractions. But police continued to hand out misdemeanor tickets to homeless people like Robert L. Smith, who was cited in July 2016 for illegal possession of a Target shopping cart.

Rob Wilcox, Feuers spokesman, said police still can issue misdemeanors in cases with extenuating circumstances, adding, When individuals break laws, there need to be consequences.

Feuer also revived citation clinics to help homeless people resolve ticket backlogs through community service or enrollment in rehabilitation programs. In their second year, the clinics, staffed by the city attorneys Homeless Engagement and Response Team, or HEART, enrolled 825 people and resolved citations for 531. But dismissing tickets can take months, and the clinics cant take care of ticket warrants.

Safer Cities was rebranded as RESET  the Resources Enhancement Services Enforcement Team  with a mission to protect and serve the skid row community by utilizing outreach and service providers. RESET pledged to ease up on arrests for petty offenses, and the LAPD ordered all officers to treat homeless people with compassion and empathy.

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On skid row, officers switched from yellow to red crime tape to rope off homeless cleanup sites.

Honestly, its a perception thing, then-Central Division LAPD Capt. Howard Leslie, now a commander, said in 2016.

Beginning that year, the LAPD began rolling out Homeless Outreach and Proactive Engagement, or HOPE, teams to conduct encampment sweeps. The teams  comprised of police officers and sanitation, mental health and homeless outreach workers  are focused on bringing services, not enforcement, to homeless people, the department said.

A city sanitation worker power washes the sidewalks and gutters along San Pedro Street between 5th and 7th streets, part of a skid row cleanup in 2016. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times )

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The city also adopted new laws restricting living in vehicles and storing tents and oversize belongings in the streets. LAPD Chief Charlie Beck, in an August report to the Police Commission, said arrests of homeless people were up 49% in the first half of 2017, which he attributed in part to differences in how police reports on homeless people are coded.

But an October study by UCLA researchers largely echoed The Times findings of a six-year rise in arrests of homeless people, and a December follow-up report found the arrests continued to climb in the first half of 2017, to nearly 20% of the LAPDs total bookings.

Policing of houseless people is becoming a larger share of what the LAPD does, said UCLA professor Kelly Lytle Hernandez, interim director of the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies, which released the reports.

Many officers have embraced helping homeless people, but some are as frustrated as Segovia at the arrest merry-go-round.

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Old tickets can loom for years

Crackdowns may ebb and flow, but unpaid tickets live on for years.

After his July 2016 arrest, Segovia pleaded no contest to sleeping on the beach and was ordered to stay away for a year from the Santa Monica lifeguard station where police found him.

Segovia was arrested again on warrants for three old tickets that his lawyer, Monique Alarcon, said she couldnt find on the courts traffic website. A courthouse clerk ran Segovias ID, but the tickets still didnt surface, Alarcon said.

Its as if they went into a black hole, Alarcon said. The tickets, with combined fines and fees of $1,358, eventually showed up under the warrant numbers, she said.

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In June, Segovia went before Los Angeles Superior Court Judge James K. Hahn, former L.A. mayor, on the sidewalk sleeping ticket.

LAPD Sgt. Michael Fox, who headed the West Bureau HOPE team, agreed to drop the case after phoning a homeless outreach worker who verified that Segovia was making progress toward finding housing.

Were not going to arrest our way out of homelessness, Fox said.

Segovia still lives on the street, selling his artwork on the Venice boardwalk. On Friday, sanitation workers, accompanied by police, threw away some of his artwork and a display table during a bulky-item crackdown, Segovia and other art vendors said. It was demoralizing, he said.

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The worst part of his June 2016 arrest was being handcuffed to a bench outside the police station for passersby to gawk at, he said, adding, It felt like they were trying to break my spirit.

To learn more about the methodology and review the computer code that generated the analysis, visit www.latimes.com/homeless-arrests.The United States is considering imposing sanctions on Venezuela that could cripple its oil industry and is probing whether the plan would be supported in the region, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Sunday in Argentina.

Tillerson and his Argentine counterpart, Jorge Faurie, also said in a news conference that their countries had agreed to work together to combat fundraising in Latin America by the militant group Hezbollah, a rare acknowledgment of the Middle Eastern groups active presence in the region.

Tillerson was in Argentina midway through a five-nation diplomatic swing through Latin America and the Caribbean. On Monday he meets with Argentine President Mauricio Macri before continuing to Lima, Peru.

Throughout the trip, Tillerson has sought to rally regional support for a widening campaign to put pressure on the leftist government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Many leaders in the hemisphere as well as human rights organizations accuse Maduro of trampling on democracy and sending his nation into a humanitarian and economic crisis.

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The United States has imposed sanctions on more than 50 Venezuelan officials and businesses in hopes of isolating Maduro, and several countries in the region have joined or applauded the efforts.

But taking the next step  banning sales of Venezuelan oil in the United States and halting refining of Venezuelan crude by U.S. companies  is more complicated because of the potential harm to the already suffering Venezuelan people as well as to American businesses and neighboring countries that depend on Venezuelan oil.

Is it a step that might bring this to an end, to a more rapid end, to a more rapid close, Tillerson said of the Maduro governments actions, because not doing anything to bring this to an end is also asking the Venezuelan people to suffer for a much longer time.

Faurie also expressed caution.

We should closely follow up on this to ensure an appropriate balance between what the Venezuelan nation needs and what is being used by the leaders of the Venezuelan government to enrich themselves, he said.

Several Latin American and Caribbean countries such as Colombia have been reticent to cut off Venezuelas oil revenue but at the same time have expressed frustration that sanctions and talks so far have had little impact.

Maduro, after shutting down congress and setting up his own assembly of loyalists, called snap presidential elections to take place by April 30. He will use the vote to further solidify his grip on power, critics say.

On the issue of Hezbollah, both Tillerson and Faurie said they agreed to jointly oppose efforts by the Lebanon-based group to raise money in South America to finance what the American diplomat called terrorist operations.

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We did specifically discuss the presence of Lebanese Hezbollah in this hemisphere, which is raising funds, obviously to support its terrorist activities, Tillerson said. So it is something we jointly agree we need to attack and eliminate.

Faurie said that Hezbollah posed a threat to regional peace.

It was unusual for an Argentine leader to acknowledge the presence of the group in his country. Argentina has a large Lebanese population  a former president was of Lebanese descent  and a history of terrorist incidents, including a deadly 1994 bombing at a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that was blamed on Iranian agents. Hezbollah is often a proxy for Iran.

Tillerson indicated the discussion was broader than Hezbollah, saying he and Faurie spoke about how countries in the hemisphere must all jointly go after these transnational criminal organizations -- narcotics trafficking, human trafficking, smuggling, money laundering -- because we see the connections to terrorist financing organizations as well.

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Tillerson made a point of welcoming Argentina back into a role as a world leader, praising Macris 2-year-old government and its partnership with Washington. This was an implied slap at the previous leftist government of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.

Even so, the two governments are at odds over thorny trade issues, including high tariffs imposed by the Trump administration on imports of Argentine biodiesel fuels, which Buenos Aires says are costing it millions of dollars.

Faurie said he raised the issue with Tillerson but that talks would have to continue. Washington claims the Argentine industry benefits from government subsidies. Argentina has said it will file a complaint with the World Trade Organization.

tracy.wilkinson@latimes.com

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For more on international affairs, follow @TracyKWilkinson on TwitterThe families of six Americans kidnapped and killed during the 1990s by the Colombian guerrilla organization known as FARC are seeking potentially tens of millions of dollars in damages from banana giant Chiquita Brands International because of payments the company made to the group.

Trial is scheduled to begin with jury selection Monday in West Palm Beach, Fla., federal court in lawsuits that accuse Chiquita of violating the Anti-Terrorism Act. Chiquita has admitted paying FARC  a Spanish acronym for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia  about $220,000, but says it did so only to protect its employees and interests from violence.

One $10,000 payment to the guerrillas was hidden in a spare tire on the back of a Jeep, according to court documents.

The families claim Chiquitas financial support of FARC, as a known terrorist group, means it should be held responsible for the Americans deaths and pay damages. The families must prove that Chiquita executives knew FARC was engaged in violent terrorist acts that could affect Americans and that the deaths of their loved ones were foreseeable when the payments were made, said an attorney for the plaintiffs, Gary Osen.

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These are folks who have been through an enormous amount in their lives. Theyve waited 10 years for their day in court, Osen said.

In a statement issued in January, Switzerland-based Chiquita said its only motivation in paying FARC was protecting its own employees from violence.

A banana plantation worker in Santa Marta, Colombia, in 2000. (Luis Acosta / AFP/Getty Images )

We have been clear that, at all times, the company prioritized the safety of its employees and their families, and acted accordingly, the statement said.

FARC and other paramilitary groups were engaged in a decades-long civil war in Colombia that took thousands of lives. The bloodshed finally ended in 2016 when a peace accord was signed. Chiquita also admitted paying $1.7 million to a right-wing group opposed to FARC, eventually pleading guilty in 2007 to a U.S. crime and paying a $25-million fine.

It was only after that case became public that family members of the six Americans slain by FARC learned that Chiquita had also paid FARC, leading to the lawsuits.

Five of the Americans killed by FARC were members of a missionary group based in Sanford, Fla., called New Tribes Mission: David Mankins, Rick Tenenoff, Mark Rich, Stephen Welsh and Timothy Van Dyke. The sixth, Frank Pescatore Jr., was a geologist for an Alabama company working on a project in Colombia who was shot trying to escape his kidnappers, according to court documents.

Tania Julin of Winter Springs, Fla., was married to Rich the night he was kidnapped on Jan. 31, 1993, in the village of Pucuro, Panama, about 15 miles from the Colombian border. She said armed men burst into their home  where their two young daughters were sleeping  tied Rich up and ordered him, Mankins and Tenenoff to march into the jungle.

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She never saw her husband again.

It was so terrifying. I just never imagined. It was so out of the blue and unexpected. I was only 23 years old, with two little kids, said Julin, who now teaches kindergarten. I was just terrified of what might happen and so confused about why anyone would do this to us. We were only there to help people.

I have never been so afraid in all of my life.

Later, FARC demanded a $5-million ransom for the three, but it soon became apparent the men had probably been killed, Julin said. It took years for the families to find out for sure, and they never received any remains.

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The years of not knowing were so difficult. Christmases would go by, and the one thing the girls wanted for Christmas was for their dad to come home. It was lots of years of disappointing heartaches and hard to watch [the] girls grow up without their dad, she said.

Well before their deaths in the 1990s, Chiquita had established about 35 banana farms in the Uraba region of Colombia that employed about 3,000 people. It was well known that FARC was active in the area and routinely used extortion and threats to obtain payments from people and businesses  a practice called vacuna, which is Spanish for vaccine.

FARCs initial payment demand from Chiquita came in 1989, when the group sought $10,000. Court papers show Chiquita executives decided to make the payment, the first of 57 it would give to FARC over the next decade.

A consulting company called Control Risks that worked with Chiquita outlined the dire nature of the issue in a memo at the time, court documents show:

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You have to pay. These people are serious. The military is not able to control them, the memo said. You cant just turn them in, give their names to someone. Because they will take retribution for that, and you can expect violence.

Ultimately, a Chiquita executive traveled to Colombia with $10,000 in cash, exchanged it for Colombian pesos and arranged to deliver the money hidden in the Jeep spare tire to a FARC guerrilla, court documents show.

Despite their assertion that the money was paid to protect employees, Chiquita executives at the time discussed it in terms of a cost of doing business  and the company had no intention then of ending its banana operations in Colombia, the documents show.

Were not going to stop doing business in Colombia because, you know, were going to have to spend an extra $25,000. Thats not realistic. Right? one executive was quoted as saying.

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U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra, who will preside over the estimated four-week trial, ruled in January that Chiquita cannot use a defense that the payments were made solely under duress.

There is no evidence of a specific ultimatum or threat from a FARC commander at any time during the nine-year continuum in which it paid money to the FARC, Marra wrote. Chiquita had reasonable, legal alternatives to maintaining and expanding its fruit operations in Colombia. It could have withdrawn and could have sought government intervention in Colombia or the United States.

Although the lawsuit asks for no specific damages, Osen says other similar cases have resulted in verdicts in the tens of millions of dollars  in part because any damages awarded are automatically tripled.

Family members of terror victims suffer uniquely because of the shocking and unexpected nature and the malice and cruelty involved, Osen said.

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Julin said that after all this time she is anxious but also optimistic now that the case is heading for trial.

I finally am going to get my day in court, she said. Theres a sense of a little bit of nerves, but a sense of some wrongs being made amends for.

To read this article in Spanish, click herePresident Trumps claim of exoneration in the Russia investigation was undercut Sunday by several Republican lawmakers, including one who helped draft a controversial memo the president has embraced, alleging the FBI abused its surveillance powers.

Rep. Trey Gowdy of South Carolina said in an interview on CBS Face the Nation that the memo, spearheaded by the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Tulare), did not have any impact on the Russia probe.

Gowdy is a member of the committee, and the only Republican on it whos read classified documents that are the basis of the disputed four-page memo.

On Saturday, Trump had seized on the GOP memo, which was publicly released Friday after hed declassified it over Justice Department objections, as confirming his own repeated contention that the investigation led by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III is a witch hunt. In a tweet from his Florida resort, the president declared that the memo totally vindicates him.

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Even before seeing it, the president also reportedly told associates that the memo bolstered the case for ousting Deputy Atty. Gen. Rod Rosenstein, a Trump appointee who oversees Mueller. Democrats as well as some Republicans have warned that such a move could spark a constitutional crisis.

Gowdy, a former federal prosecutor, said the material the FBI used to win a secret surveillance courts approval for its surveillance of former Trump campaign associate Carter Page did not prompt the bureaus wider look at whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to influence the 2016 election. Gowdy, who has announced plans to retire, also said he supports Mueller 100%" in conducting the probe.

A fellow Republican congressman, interviewed on CNNs State of the Union, also said that the overall Russia investigation is a separate issue from matters addressed in the memo. Its more looking within the agencies, something we have oversight over, said Rep. Brad Wenstrup of Ohio.

A third Republican on the committee, Rep. Will Hurd of Texas, also said he disagreed that the memo bolsters the case the White House has been making for months against the impartiality of Mueller.

I dont believe this is an attack on Bob Mueller, Hurd said on ABCs This Week. Hurd, who formerly worked for the CIA, added, I would say that [the Justice Department] should continue doing their job.

The comments from Hurd, Gowdy and Wenstrup were not only a break with Trumps stance, but with that of many House Republicans whove suggested the entire investigation is corrupted. The three lawmakers reflected the more measured stance of House Speaker Paul D. Ryan, who insisted on Friday that the memo isnt an indictment of the FBI and Justice, nor does it impugn Muellers probe or Rosenstein.

Democrats again decried what they call Nunes politicization of intelligence in the memos release, saying Trumps allies were inappropriately trying to use it to discredit Rosenstein and by extension Mueller.

It is the duty of Congress to focus on the Russia investigation and not cherry-pick facts in a bid to exonerate the president, Senate Minority Whip Richard J. Durbin of Illinois said on CNN.

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The information, the facts, tell a totally different story than the narrative put forth by Nunes with the support of Republicans on the Intelligence Committee, Durbin said.

Nunes has come under heavy criticism from some former intelligence community leaders, including ex-CIA director John Brennan, who on Sunday termed the memo appalling. Speaking on NBCs Meet the Press, Brennan said Nunes had abused the chairmanship of the House Intelligence Committee.

The committees ranking Democrat, Adam B. Schiff of Burbank, who is trying to win public release of a 10-page Democratic rebuttal to the memo, on Sunday said the Nunes-backed document was not a legitimate attempt to exercise congressional oversight of law enforcement.

The interest wasnt oversight, Schiff said on This Week. The interest was a political hit job on the FBI in service of the president.

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A former senior Trump aide, meanwhile, disputed news reports that the president had ordered Mueller fired last year but was dissuaded by White House counsel Don McGahn, who threatened to quit rather than carry out the order.

Former White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, who was pushed out in July, was still at his post in June when Trump was reported to have given the order. Priebus, interviewed on Meet the Press, said he never heard of any such contention.

I never felt that the president was going to fire the special counsel, Priebus said.

Many associates have implored Trump to stop talking and tweeting about the Mueller investigation, fearing his public statements offer ammunition to the special counsel in building a case of obstruction of justice.

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Last month, the president startled aides with an off-the-cuff declaration to reporters that he was willing to be interviewed under oath. His lawyers quickly stepped in to say that would need to be negotiated.

laura.king@latimes.com

@laurakingLATWashington state officials Sunday canceled a lease with Cooke Aquaculture Pacific at the site where net pens holding farmed Atlantic salmon collapsed last summer, releasing thousands of nonnative fish into Puget Sound.

The decision comes days after a multiagency state investigation found the Canada-based company negligent for failing to adequately clean its nets, saying that directly contributed to the net-pen failure in August at the facility.

The report released Tuesday said the nets failed because they were excessively laden with mussels and other marine organisms. That increased the drag on the nets from tidal currents and overwhelmed the mooring system.

State officials last week also accused the company of misleading them by under-reporting how many fish escaped into Puget Sound on Aug. 19 and over-reporting how many fish were captured. It fined the company $332,000 for alleged clean water law violations for releasing invasive species into Washington state waters.

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Cooke has flagrantly violated the terms of its lease at Cypress Island, Public Lands Commissioner Hilary Franz said in a statement Sunday. The companys reckless disregard endangered the health of our waters and our people, and it will not be tolerated.

Cooke did not immediately respond to a call and email Sunday about the lease cancellation.

Last week, the company criticized the states investigation as incomplete and inaccurate. The company disputed the findings, including its accounting of fish. It said that Cooke employees were under state supervision when the recovered fish were counted and that the state relied on wrong estimates about average fish weight.

This is the second Cooke lease that Franz has canceled in two months. Franz oversees the Washington state Department of Natural Resources, which manages and leases state-owned waters. All of Cookes marine-farmed salmon operations hold state leases.

In December, Franz ended the states lease with Cooke at its marine aquaculture in Port Angeles, saying the company violated the terms of its lease by not maintaining the facility in a safe condition. Cooke has challenged that decision in Clallam County Superior Court.

Cooke is the largest U.S. producer of farmed Atlantic salmon. Before the two lease cancellations, the company operated eight commercial salmon net pens at four locations. The company bought the facilities from Icicle Acquisition Subsidiary in 2016.About an hours drive north of Manhattan, past the point where the Hudson River widens out, sits a quiet nook of a town, just two square miles. Streets slope upwards from the waterfront, passing stone churches and the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, where the writer Washington Irving is buried.

The small glen, which every fall welcomes out-of-towners with spectral house decorations, haunted hayrides and meals at the Horseman Diner, was the site of Ichabod Cranes ill-fated attempt to woo a young lady in Irvings 1820 story, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

The area is also home to Kykuit, the Rockefeller familys opulent hilltop estate, and the vast Rockefeller State Park Preserve, which includes a network of carriage roads traversing woodlands, fields and streams.

Down at the rivers edge, where General Motors workers once assembled cars and barges unloaded oil, sit a four-story apartment building and a townhouse complex, both built in recent years. To the south looms a sparkling new bridge replacing the former Tappan Zee crossing. Visible under it, a miniature New York City skyline beckons, and to the north, the open Hudson.

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But extending directly out from the waterfront is a wooden pier, and at the end of that the newest addition to Sleepy Hollow  one that some residents arent too happy about: a retired fireboat.

On Friday, the 129-foot John D. McKean rocked peacefully from its mooring on the wind-whipped waters, its candy-red water tower shooting up toward the blue sky. Below its deck, four 1,000-horsepower engines  two to power the boat and two to pump water  thundered as the owner demonstrated how to start them.

The boat, which once belonged to the Fire Department of New York, is now the property of a restaurateur based in North Salem, N.Y., who just opened an outpost in Sleepy Hollow.

Named after a marine engineer who was fatally burned in an explosion aboard another boat, the McKean was commissioned into service in 1954 and has played more than a bit part in New Yorks history.

In the days after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, it drafted water from the Hudson River to put out the fires at ground zero. When Capt. Chesley B. Sully Sullenberger landed a plane on the Hudson River in 2009, the McKean ferried passengers to safety.

After 56 years in service, the McKean was retired in 2010.

Two years ago, Edward Taylor bought it at a city auction with business partner Michael Kaphan for around $70,000, Taylor said. They refurbished it, scrubbing the wheel and brass fixtures, replacing the rotting floors and freshly coating it in gleaming red, white and black paint.

You come on board an old gal like this and you dont want to see her go to the scrapyard, Taylor said.

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Last Thanksgiving the McKean pulled into the cove at Sleepy Hollow, straight down the pier from where Taylors new restaurant sits in the ground floor of the riverfront apartment building.

Thats when the trouble started.

At the meeting of the village Board of Trustees in November, residents complained that the boat blocked their views and that they hadnt been properly notified.

I woke up from a nap Sunday morning, and I saw a ship. This isnt a boat. It doesnt belong here, said Michael Savitsky, who lives in a river-facing apartment.

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As a taxpaying resident of Sleepy Hollow I had a reasonable expectation to at least have forewarning of a major change in my neighborhood, said Paul Viboch, whose townhouse is one of nearly a dozen that line the inlets northern edge.

The John D. McKean pulls a US Airways jet that crashed into the Hudson River. (Mario Tama / Getty Images )

In interviews, Savitsky and Viboch said Taylor didnt have the right permits to moor the boat at its current location, or to build a gangway down to it. They worried Taylor would use the boat as an extension of his restaurant, adding noise and crowding to the now-tranquil adjacent public path.

Taylor said the McKean was legally moored and that as a private citizen leasing the pier, he was within his rights to bring the boat to Sleepy Hollow. He also said he plans to operate the boat, which on Friday had three picnic tables and a grill on its deck, as a nonprofit educational institution that will be open to the public.

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Anthony Giaccio, the village administrator, said the site where the boat is moored is under the jurisdiction of the Army Corps of Engineers, from which he said the boats owners were in the process of getting a permit. Giaccio also said the local building department had notified the piers owners that they will have to amend their site plan for the gangway, subject to a public hearing.

I dont have an opinion and the Village Board hasnt issued any judgment, Giaccio said. What I can say is weve gotten a lot of emails and letters in support of keeping the boat there. Weve received more in favor than against.

Some of those in favor say the boat is simply a part of riverfront life.

Look at that  it makes the scene, said Kim Babicz, a Sleepy Hollow resident who was eating a berry-and-cream-topped dessert at Taylors restaurant Friday afternoon. Youre on the river  get a grip!

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Others said the boat should be honored for its history.

John Korzelius, chief of Sleepy Hollows all-volunteer Fire Department, which assisted on 9/11, said, For us, that boat has a special meaning. The whole Fire Department is 100% in support of that fireboat.

As he spoke, a Tappan Zee Constructors tug made its way north of the new bridge and dropped off three workers at the Sleepy Hollow dock.

Lt. Billy Ryan, a New York City fireman who lives in the village, had worked at ground zero. As he dropped his two daughters off for swimming and ballet lessons Friday afternoon, he described searching for survivors among the burning remains of the World Trade Centers twin towers. All the water mains and hydrants in the area were broken.

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If the water wasnt there from that boat, we wouldnt be alive. Hands down  take it to the bank, Ryan said. I understand [some residents] displeasure, but I have an obligation to be respectful to the boat and its history.

Those opposed to the boats presence in Sleepy Hollow say they dont discount the historic value or the beauty of the McKean.

Its a nice boat. Its in the wrong place, said Michael Aaronson, adding that it should be in a museum somewhere.

Standing in the ground-floor living room of his townhouse along the inlet, Aaronson pointed toward the boat, which filled the better part of the view framed by the glass doors to his backyard.

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Look at what that did  I used to be able to see the city, he said.

Aaronson may not have to wait long to see New Yorks skyline again. Taylor said that when construction on the new bridge is complete, he plans to pull his boat in lengthwise along the dock  under an apartment building currently being built.

Thats going to be all new owners, Aaronsons wife, Nancy, said of the new development. Theyre not going to be happy.

nina.agrawal@latimes.com

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Twitter: @AgrawalNinaBuild a wall and my generation will tear it down, read a sign held by a young anti-Trump protester at a recent rally, a cry reiterated by Rep. Joe Kennedy in his response to President Trumps State of the Union address. That sentiment could serve as a slogan for millennials, now in their 20s and early 30s, who are well placed to serve as a bridge between the older adult population and the Americans who are now in their teenage years or younger.

One major fault line in our divided America is generational. The last three presidential elections, for example, showed a sharp split along the dimension of age. In each, those over 40 voted primarily for the Republican candidate, while younger people voted primarily for the Democrat.

This divide, evident in areas other than politics, has demographic and cultural underpinnings.

Forty-four percent of millennials are racial minorities: Latinos, blacks, Asians and other smaller groups. Three out of 10 are first- or second-generation Americans, and 1 out of 6 are multilingual. Millennials are thus on the front lines of the nations diversity shift, between the baby boomers and Gen Xers who are more white, and the post-millennials, sometimes called Generation Z, who are less white. By the year 2035, millennials elders will be 65% white, and those younger than them, who will make up nearly half of the population, will be 46% white.

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Whereas older whites express fears of what the changing racial and ethnic demography means for the nations future and possibly their own safety  fears fanned by President Trumps signature positions on immigration and policing  millennials are known for their tolerance.

Nearly 1 in 7 millennial marriages is multiracial, compared to 1 in 20 among baby boomers when they were the same age. In contrast to adults over 35, a majority of millennials believe that, since the 1950s, American culture and way of life have mostly changed for the better. They are also more likely to believe that immigrants strengthen the country and that Americas best days lie ahead.

Its not just millennials of color who support a more diverse America as well as the politicians who promote it. Millennial whites, far more than older whites, also espouse favorable views of immigration and the nations future.

Perhaps the most important attribute of millennials as a bridge to Americas diverse future is their relentless optimism.

If millennials are to succeed economically, and to lay the social groundwork for the highly diverse generations that follow, we urgently need to invest in a variety of education and safety-net programs. While millennials as a whole have achieved higher levels of post-secondary and college educations than their elders, black and Latino millennials have fared decidedly worse than their white peers on those measures, as well as on home ownership and income  often a consequence of under-resourced schools and community services.

The current administration is doing the opposite of whats necessary. Fueled by an older political base that does not view diverse millennial families as their children and grandchildren, Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress tried to gut the Affordable Care Act and passed a tax law that will dramatically increase the federal debt, paving the way for cuts in domestic programs that would aid young families.

Damage will continue unless, and until, the demographic clout of millennials and their successors is more fully realized  clout potentially delayed at the ballot box by racially-targeted voter suppression and gerrymandering.

Political leaders need to view millennials and their children, both native and foreign born, as the core of Americas future labor force and prepare them for a more globalized economy. At the same time, they should make the case to their too often fearful political base that they have a co-dependent relationship with this racially diverse America. While millennials will benefit from government investments in their well-being today, older Americans will benefit from their contributions to Social Security and Medicare for decades to come.

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Perhaps the most important attribute of millennials as a bridge to Americas diverse future is their relentless optimism, especially minority millennials who actively embrace the American Dream. A 2017 GenForward survey found that Latino, Asian and black millennials are more likely than whites to say they will do better financially than their parents.

By example and as advocates, millennials of all racial backgrounds will undoubtedly continue to make the case that investing in a more inclusive, younger America is essential to the nations economic success and can only help todays older populations. Older Americans should listen, and help make the country whole.

William H. Frey is a senior fellow with the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution and author of the report The Millennial Generation: A Demographic Bridge to Americas Diverse Future.

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Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion or FacebookU.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been making news with its brutal crackdowns on immigrants. Arrests of men and women with no criminal record are up 142% since January 2017. In December, the federal inspector general found widespread civil rights abuses at ICE detention centers. Last month, ICE agents rounded up workers at 7-Elevens, and the director of ICE, Tom Homan, has promised more such raids.

We hear daily horror stories of longtime U.S. residents torn from their families: Edwin Marcial, father of four, who worked for 15 years at my neighborhood brunch spot, the New York Bagel Co. in Brentwood, got detained in December. Stories like Marcials abound: Jorge Garcia, a 39-year-old father of two from Detroit was deported to Mexico on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Green-card holder Dr. Lukasz Niec, who has lived in the U.S. since he was 3, faces deportation for misdemeanors committed 25 years ago, when he was a teenager.

ICEs deportation zeal stands in contrast to a particularly shameful chapter in its history. When it was known as the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, from 1945 to 1979, it repeatedly failed to investigate and remove European war criminals from the U.S. And that included Holocaust perpetrators.

The re-opening of our borders in the years following World War II allowed thousands of collaborators and accomplices of the Nazi regime to make their way to the United States. A small number of them were knowingly brought in by U.S. intelligence services. Most came through the system undetected amid an influx of nearly 400,000 war-displaced persons. At the time, officials set a preposterously high bar for complicity in war crimes. That, combined with an initial lack of knowledge about the Holocaust, made it easy for applicants to cover up their backgrounds on their immigration forms.

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Once here, it was as easy to escape justice. Adrija Artukovic, minister of the Interior and Justice in Croatia during the war, sneaked into the U.S. under an assumed name in 1948 and settled in Seal Beach. Known in Yugoslavia as the Butcher of the Balkans, Artukovic was described by a U.S. official as Croatias Himmler. American authorities knew he was here as early as 1949, but he wasnt arrested and returned to Croatia for trial until the 1980s. His death sentence was never carried out; he died in 1988.

For the first two decades after World War II, the INS brought very few denaturalization cases to court, a total of five for the entire 1950s. Only one of these war criminals was successfully denaturalized. The 1960s saw just two cases pursued, despite INS being flooded with dozens if not hundreds of tips on potential war criminals living among us. The cases it did manage to bring to court in the 1950s and 1960s were so poorly constructed that even a Romanian Iron Guard member and virulent anti-Semite, Valerian Trifa, was not stripped of his citizenship. As for deportations, the INS filed no more than 10 cases against suspected war criminals from 1945 to 1973.

Its possible that skin color and country of origin played a role in the INSs lack of interest in investigating the war records of newcomers from places like the Baltics and Ukraine. They blended in, and records show that INS agents at every turn had a hard time seeing these immigrants as dangerous. They humanized them, and so did others, even after evidence emerged to the contrary. A suspected Nazi unit commander was identified in a Minnesota newspaper as a pillar of the church and a man who takes care of his yard and walks with his wife. A concentration camp guard living in New York was referred to as a feeble old man by neighbors.

ICEs deportation zeal stands in contrast to a particularly shameful chapter in its history.

The Kowalchuk brothers, Sergei and Mykola, of Philadelphia, served together in an auxiliary police force in the Ukrainian town of Liuboml, where more than 4,000 Jews were killed. Sergei was chief of police. In 1966, an INS investigator noted that Mykolas Jewish boss told an interviewer he could not believe his employee was complicit in wartime violence, as if such a comment from such a source should be considered exculpatory. In a New York Times article, a police officer and neighbor of Kowalchuks said, They are good people from what I can see. They get up early in the morning and work hard every day.

It took the heroic efforts of two members of Congress, Elizabeth Holtzman (D-N.Y.) and Joshua Eilberg (D-Pa.), aided by Jewish organizations and journalists, to call the INS to account for its failure to pursue war criminals. Congressional hearings in the 1970s demonstrated how often the agency had failed to act on tips and how badly it botched investigations. Holtzman admonished INS for its appalling laxness and superficiality.

The hearings resulted in the establishment of an Office of Special Investigations in the Department of Justice specifically to find and remove war criminals. Still, the INS was not particularly cooperative: One document shows officers mocking the new office, flippantly noting that Nazi hunters are on the loose again.

ICE now houses the evidence of the INS failures, and it too isnt cooperative on the subject of war criminals. It has been extremely reluctant to release its files through the Freedom of Information Act, and when it does, it routinely applies unwarranted redactions to their contents, demonstrating a higher concern for the privacy of deceased accused war criminals than for transparency about the agencys history.

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The next time you hear about ICE agents hauling away a hard-working, law-abiding immigrant, put the incident in the context of the same institutions history of allowing Nazis, and their accomplices, a safe haven in the United States. Like Mykola Kowalchuk, Edwin Marcial is a hard-working member of his community  but he isnt white and he didnt participate in war crimes.

Jared McBride is a lecturer in the history department at UCLA. He is at work on a book about war crimes prosecution during the Cold War.

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinionand FacebookWhile everyone else was poring over some important memo about government surveillance Friday, I pored through an entirely different  and much more interesting, lets face it  set of documents. The California Legislature released dozens of pages from internal investigations involving sexual misconduct complaints against California state legislators and staffers.

Though heavily redacted, the documents revealed more details about some of the reported allegations against former Assemblyman Raul Bocanegra and state Sen. Tony Mendoza (D-Artesia), who is currently on leave, and others. There were also some new and surprising names among the data dump, including a gubernatorial candidate, Assemblyman Travis Allen (R-Huntington Beach), and Assemblywoman Autumn Burke (D-Marina del Rey), who was accused of sexually explicit talk with a staffer.

In my experience, most of the time a man delivers a hug, the target is a woman. That should be a warning right there.

If there was one big takeaway, other than the obvious dont-sexually-harass-people one, it would be this: Leave the hugging at home.

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At least four of the investigations included in Fridays document dump featured some sort of unwanted hugging. Allens alleged misconduct, for example, included aggressively demanding a hug from an unwilling staffer. In two other investigations, one involving a legislative staffer and the other a legislative consultant, a hug was the prelude to other alleged misconduct that included genital groping and neck nuzzling, respectively.

The complaints relating to Sen. Bob Hertzberg (D-Van Nuys), whose hugs of both men and women are so famous that his nickname is huggy bear, are in there too, as well as a complaint that he engaged in unwanted dancing, which is really just a hug thats in motion.

I know we live in a culture in which its not unusual to encounter a random hug in the professional world, but Ive never thought it was appropriate to engage in a full-body embrace in the workplace. Unlike handshakes, the rules of engagement just arent clear. Unless you are comforting a coworker after a mass shooting, you are gambling that it wont be misconstrued.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, left, shakes hands with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki. (Czarek Sokolowski / Associated Press )

Complicating it further, theres often a gender component to a workplace hug. In my experience, most of the time a man delivers a hug, the target is a woman. That should be a warning right there. Furthermore, even if the hug isnt sexual, it may breach personal boundaries.

I took an informal poll of the people sitting around me Friday afternoon and not one of them thinks on-the-job hugs are a good idea. I dont either, and maybe this is a good time for hug-givers to consider that at best their warmly meant embrace may not be well received and, at worst, it could lead to a sexual harassment complaint.

I know this new #MeToo landscape is confusing and scary for a lot of people, so its good to point out bright lines when they pop up. Heres an easy one: Just say no to hugs.

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mariel.garza@latimes.com

Follow me @marielgarzaLATTo the editor: Its an ugly fact. Larry Nassar is a convicted child molester who hid behind his medical license to justify his crimes. There is nothing medically acceptable about his actions.

Yet the the Jan. 26 op-ed article, Dr. Larry Nassar was not a doctor, recklessly compared a known but rarely used treatment to a sadistic sex act and further implied that the osteopathic medical profession condoned the practice.

No need to fact check that, the author wrote. In a blow to its credibility, the Los Angeles Times granted this columnists wish.

Fact-checking would have found that there are no approved medical procedures that involve grabbing a woman, young or otherwise, by the vagina. Physicians who are not convicted child molesters call that sexual assault.

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Defaming all osteopathic physicians with no factual basis shows a willful disregard of basic journalistic standards. All physicians, DO or MD, follow well defined protocols for intra-pelvic procedures, regardless of the diagnostic or therapeutic purpose.

Dont take our word for it. Ask your doctor.

Mark A. Baker, DO, Chicago

The writer is president of the American Osteopathic Assn.

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and FacebookGavin Newsom releases ad that highlights his push to allow same-sex couples to marry By Phil Willon A new ad from Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gavin Newsom features Phyllis Lyon, who with her partner, Del Martin, received the first marriage license after Newsom vowed to allow same-sex couples to marry when he was mayor of San Francisco in 2004. The current lieutenant governors push for marriage equality thrust him into the national spotlight and he has emphasized that effort to portray himself as a bold, progressive leader. Facebook

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Failed California housing bill was not a bad idea, Gov. Jerry Brown says By Liam Dillon Gov. Jerry Brown (Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press) Earlier this month, high-profile housing legislation that would have allowed for four- to five-story apartments and condominiums near transit stops failed to advance in the state Legislature. But had it reached his desk, would Gov. Jerry Brown have signed it? Maybe. I think that was not a bad idea, Brown said of Senate Bill 827 at a meeting with business leaders from the Bay Area Council on Monday afternoon. The bill, written by Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), attracted national attention and a maelstrom of opposition in part because it would have eliminated single-family zoning near transit stops in favor of apartments or condominiums. Brown said that a relative of his who lives in West Portal, a low-density neighborhood in San Francisco, told the governor he was horrified by the bill. Brown also lamented dramatically rising housing costs. He said he bought his first house in Los Angeles in 1973 for $75,000 at a time when his salary as secretary of state was $35,000. Now, he said, buying a house for a little over twice ones annual salary is virtually impossible anywhere in the state. FOR THE RECORD

May 1, 9:32 a.m.: This post originally misstated the year Brown purchased his house as 1970. It was 1973. Facebook

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John Cox begins California barnstorm with the delivery of gas tax repeal signatures By Javier Panzar Gubernatorial candidate John Cox, left, and Assembly candidate Bill Essayli load boxes of signatures for the gas tax repeal initiative. (Francine Orr) GOP gubernatorial candidate John Cox strolled up to the stack of 12 boxes in front of the Los Angeles County registrar-recorders offices in Norwalk on Monday and placed his hands on top of his partys hope for success in 2018. The boxes, stacked four across and three high, contained 211,000 signatures for an initiative to repeal recent increases in Californias gas tax and vehicle fees. Cox says the effort has gathered more than 940,000 signatures from registered voters to put the measure on the ballot  far more than the 585,407 signatures that are required. The aim: to bring out the partys base to the polls this November and help candidates in tough congressional and legislative races down the ticket. A USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll in November found 54.2% of registered voters surveyed said they would repeal the tax and fee hike, but a survey a month earlier by another group said a majority would vote to keep the higher taxes. Cox was flanked by Bill Essayli, a former federal prosecutor who is challenging Democratic Assemblywoman Sabrina Cervantes of Riverside in the June primary. Cervantes voted for the gas tax and Essayli plans to use that vote against her. He even launched his campaign at a 76 gas station in Norco. This is a central issue in my campaign, he said. Cox also submitted signatures in San Diego on Monday and is headed to Bakersfield, Fresno and Sacramento, as well as Shasta and Butte counties in coming days. We are going all across the state, Cox said. The whole state is paying this tax and the whole state wants it gone. Facebook

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All Californians would be able to serve on state boards  even people in the U.S. illegally  under new bill By Jazmine Ulloa Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens) (Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press) State lawmakers on Monday introduced legislation that would allow all Californians to serve on state boards and commissions regardless of immigration status. Senate Bill 174, by Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens) and Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo (D-Los Angeles), comes as the state is locked in a broader legal battle with the Trump administration over state immigration laws and his call for mass deportations. Lawmakers point to what they say is the states own discriminatory history as their basis for introducing the legislation. The proposal would amend an 1872 provision that was first adopted to exclude Chinese immigrants and other transient aliens from holding appointed civil positions. At the time, antipathy toward the Chinese had been building in California, though, Chinese immigrants opened hundreds of businesses across the state and would play a critical role in building the transcontinental railroad. The Senate bill would delete the phrase transient aliens from the government code and make clear that any person, regardless of citizenship or immigration status, can hold an appointed civil office if they are at least 18 years old and a resident of the state. That would allow any Californian to serve on hundreds of boards and commissions that advice in an array of policy areas, including farm labor, history and employment development. Californias two million undocumented immigrants are a source of energy for our state, Lara said in a statement. It is shocking to read the words of fear and exclusion that are still in California law but belong in historys trash can. Facebook

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Tony Mendozas fundraising dries up after resignation amid harassment inquiry By Patrick McGreevy Former state Sen. Tony Mendoza (D-Artesia). (Steve Yeater / Associated Press) Political contributions to Tony Mendoza, who resigned from the state Senate under pressure amid sexual harassment allegations, have nearly dried up. New documents he filed with the state in his bid to reclaim the seat he once held show that his support has eroded. As a result, five other candidates for the 32nd District senate seat in the June 5 election have raised more than Mendoza so far this year. With the June 5 election approaching, Mendoza has reported raising just $7,750 in cash from six supporters during the nearly four-month period from Jan. 1 to April 21. Mendoza, a Democrat from Artesia, went on a leave of absence from the Senate Jan. 3 and resigned a month later under the threat of expulsion from colleagues. An investigation ordered by the Senate found a pattern of unwanted flirtatious or sexually suggestive behavior based on testimony from six women. Mendoza has denied wrongdoing. Last year, Mendozas reelection campaign raised $412,600, or an average of about $34,000 per month, from more than 350 supporters. Most of Mendozas 2018 total was contributed by the political arm of the Southern California Pipe Trades District Council 16 on Jan. 22, a month before Mendoza resigned. Mendoza also reported that his campaign loaned $125,000 this year to his legal defense fund. That left him with $446,600 in his campaign account at the end of April. Mendoza is running against eight Democrats and two Republicans. Democrat Bob J. Archuleta, a Pico Rivera city councilman, raised the most, $210,000, during the period. On Monday, Mendoza suffered another setback when the State Legislative Womens Caucus endorsed Democrat Vicky Santana, a member of the Rio Hondo College Board. Facebook

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Newsom and Villaraigosa affairs coming to TV ads in California By Phil Willon An independent political committee backing Republican John Cox for governor released an ad blasting both Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa for their past sexual affairs. The California Deserves Better ad, which was first reported by Politico, criticizes Newsom for having an affair with a woman on his staff in 2005 while he served as mayor of San Francisco. It also goes after Villaraigosa for having an extramarital affair with a television reporter in 2007 while he was mayor of Los Angeles. The ad, which begins airing on Fox stations in the states top media markets Monday, links Newsom and Villaraigosa to the men accused of sexual impropriety in the #MeToo movement, including movie mogul Harvey Weinstein and disgraced Today show veteran Matt Lauer. Powerful men are finally being held to account, punished for inappropriate sexual conduct with women over whom they exercise power, the ad begins. Newsom and Villaraigosa think the rules shouldnt apply to them. The independent campaign committee, called Restore Our Values, already has raised more than $100,000, said Leigh Teece of Emeryville in Northern California, co-founder of the group. Teece, the CEO of a nonprofit that helps line up students with professional mentors, said the campaign will actively support Cox. She called him a true conservative and noted that he supports cutting taxes and opposes Californias sanctuary state policy. John is a business person who has demonstrated integrity, Teece said. Facebook

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Was that Cisneros in the voicemail? Dispute is latest espisode of Democratic infighting in crowded primary races By Christine Mai-Duc Gil Cisneros speaks during a forum at Fullerton College in January. (Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times) With less than five weeks to go before Californias primary, insults and accusations are flying with abandon in the most crowded races Democrats hope to ultimately win. The latest example of this is in the 39th Congressional District, where a half dozen Democrats are vying for a chance to replace Rep. Ed Royce, whos retiring. Its one of several California contests where Democratic leaders are already worried that divisions could ultimately split votes and shut Democrats out of key pickup opportunities. In that race, millionaires Gil Cisneros and Andy Thorburn are going negative  about going negative. Cisneros was recently elevated to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committees Red to Blue program in hopes it would serve as a signal to Democratic activists and donors that his campaign was the most viable. But both Cisneros and Thorburn have poured millions into the race, which promises to be a knock down, drag out fight through June 5. At the center of the latest controversy is a voicemail, allegedly left by Cisneros on Thorburns home answering machine earlier this month. The recording, which the Thorburn campaign turned over to media outlet The Intercept, lasts less than 10 seconds. Hi Andy, its Gil Cisneros. Im gonna go negative on you, a mans voice is heard saying. Cisneros campaign manager Orrin Evans denied the candidate made the call, posting a cease and desist letter to The Intercept on Twitter. The letter, sent by a Cisneros campaign attorney, called the voicemail fabricated and demanded that the story be taken down, calling it defamatory. It gave the publication until 3 p.m. Friday to take down the story before they pursue all legal rights and remedies. An attorney for The Intercept, in a letter to Cisneros, said the publication confirmed with multiple sources familiar with Mr. Cisneros that his voice was on the recording, and that it stands by its reporting. Thorburns camp says it flatly rejects Cisneros denial, and that the timing of a negative website filled with unflattering background on Thorburn, released three days later, suggests it was him. Track the California races that could flip the House According to The Intercepts report, Cisneros campaign manager did not respond to initial inquiries about the voicemail, calling its questions ridiculous. In a follow-up statement Friday, Evans said called the episode a dirty, desperate trick by the Thorburn campaign and said they are readying to pursue legal action for defamation and false light against both him and the publication. It sounded like him to me! said Thorburns wife, Karen, in a statement released by the campaign. She was the one who first heard the voicemail, they said. Thorburn campaign manager Nancy Leeds called Cisneros threats Trump-like tactics and accused the candidate of trying to harass and intimidate anyone who stands in his way. Its not the first time candidates from the same party have clashed in the lead-up to the June 5 primary, and its all but certain to not be the last. Cisneros sued two of his opponents, Thorburn and Sam Jammal, over their ballot descriptions until they had to change them. Earlier this month, Democrat Bryan Caforio asked his opponent, Katie Hill, to sign a pledge rejecting the use of independent expenditure committees, entities that neither of them can legally coordinate with, in the race to unseat Rep. Steve Knight (R-Lancaster). Hill refused and called the attempt hollow and likened it to political theater, while Caforio accused her of empty campaign promises. Facebook

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California Politics Podcast: The money raised in the race for governor hints at a race thats now red hot By John Myers With less than six weeks before election day, the cash raised in the California governors race mirrors the overall dynamics: one major front-runner and a heated race for second place. This weeks podcast episode offers a glimpse into those cash reports and how the Republican field seems more settled in a new statewide poll than the battle between Democrats. We also examine the reasons why a nationally talked-about housing bill in Sacramento was killed by the Democratic authors own allies. Im joined by Times staff writers Melanie Mason and Liam Dillon. You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud and Stitcher. Facebook

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L.A. County politician sexually assaulted woman when she was 16, lawsuit claims By Dakota Smith A woman sued an unnamed politician in Los Angeles County on Friday, alleging the man sexually assaulted her when she was a teenager after he gave her an unusual-tasting drink. The politician, identified as John Doe, was in his early 40s and a public figure at the time of the 2007 assault, according to the lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court. The man is an elected official today and lives in Los Angeles, said attorney Lisa Bloom, who is representing the woman identified in the lawsuit as Jane Doe. Bloom declined to say what branch of government the man represents. Read More Facebook

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Villaraigosa touts his working-class upbringing, accomplishments as mayor in first TV ad By Phil Willon Democrat Antonio Villaraigosa released his first TV ad in the governors race Friday, touting his record and accomplishments as mayor of Los Angeles when up against the economic downturn during the recession. The 30-second television spot opens with a sweeping shot of Los Angeles and cuts to Villaraigosa sitting on a bus. In kindergarten, my sister and I took three buses to get to school. As mayor, I remembered that, Villaraigosa says into the camera. And despite the recession, we built more new schools and rail lines than any city in America, added 200,000 living wage jobs, built 20,000 units of affordable housing and nearly doubled graduation rates. Campaign spokesman Luis Vizcaino said the ad will air statewide over the next week at a cost of approximately $1 million. The commercial will being airing Saturday. Two Democratic rivals in Californias race for governor, Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom and state Treasurer John Chiang, also launched ads this week, signaling the biggest ramp-up of the campaign as the June 5 primary approaches. Newsom is the front-runner, while Villaraigosa is battling for second place with Republican John Cox. One recent poll has Villaraigosa trailing both Cox and Republican Assemblyman Travis Allen of Huntington Beach. Chiang has been stuck in the single digits in almost all polling in the race. Last week, an independent expenditure group called Families and Teachers for Antonio Villaraigosa for Governor, funded largely by a trio of wealthy charter school backers, launched a spot in support of the former mayor of Los Angeles. That ad campaign is focused on increasing Villaraigosas chances of coming in second in the June 5 primary and moving on to the general election. Villaraigosas ad, titled Three Buses, emphasizes the struggles he faced growing up in East Los Angeles and addresses one of his central campaign themes  that hes the candidate best suited to help working-class Californians. I know how far a bus can take you, Villaraigosa says in the ad. Facebook

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Sen. Dianne Feinstein wont participate in pre-primary debate By Sarah D. Wire (Tom Williams / CQ Roll Call) California Sen. Dianne Feinstein will not participate in a proposed pre-primary debate because there are too many candidates in the race, her campaign spokesman said Thursday. Political activists with the group Indivisible Los Angeles said they had a venue and date  May 5  reserved for a debate with four of the Senate candidates. But they said if Feinstein does not participate, it will be canceled. Feinstein faces 31 primary opponents in her bid for a fifth full term representing California in the Senate. Feinstein staffers initially said she had a prior commitment on May 5 in San Francisco. When organizers offered to let her campaign pick another date, her campaign said it wasnt fair for the group to invite only some of the candidates when there is such a big field, said Tudor Popescu, volunteer community organizer with Indivisible Los Angeles. The invited candidates, all Democrats, were Feinstein, state Sen. Kevin de Leon, political action committee director Alison Hartson and lawyer Pat Harris. They were selected based on fundraising and poll numbers. There are 11 Republicans, 10 Democrats, nine independents and 2 third-party candidates running for Senate on the June ballot. Indivisible Los Angeles is still hoping Feinstein will pick another date, Popescu said. Feinstein spokesman Jeff Millman pointed to a San Francisco Chronicle endorsement of Feinstein, which indicates that she told the editorial board she would be willing to have a debate ahead of Novembers general election. Senator Feinstein looks forward to debating her opponent in the general election, Millman said in an email. Feinstein holds a substantial lead in both fundraising and in the polls. Front-runners in statewide races have routinely declined to debate their challengers, knowing that its free publicity for candidates who dont have the cash to increase their name recognition on their own. De Leon spokesman Jonathan Underland said the state senator has done candidate forums before, but planned to attend the May 5 debate only if Feinstein did. We basically said well clear his calendar 100%, well clear his calendar if Feinstein shows up, Underland said. Wed love to make it happen, but we want her to be there. Facebook

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NRA, Olympic shooter sue California over its restrictions on ammunition sales By Patrick McGreevy Olympian Kim Rhode is a plaintiff in a lawsuit filed by the NRA and its state affiliate against California. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) The National Rifle Assn. and its state affiliate have filed a fourth lawsuit against California over its gun control laws, this time challenging new restrictions on the sale and transfer of ammunition. The NRA and the California Rifle and Pistol Assn. filed a challenge in federal court to a requirement that ammunition sales and transfers be conducted face to face with California firearms dealers or licensed vendors, ending purchases made directly from out-of-state sellers on the internet. The lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Southern District of California also challenged a requirement starting next year for background checks for people buying ammunition. The lawsuit was filed in the name of Kim Rhode, a six-time Olympic medal-winning shooter, and others. It challenges Californias new ammunition sales restrictions as a violation of the 2nd Amendment and the commerce clause of the United States Constitution. Restrictions on ammunition purchases were included in Proposition 63, approved by voters in 2016, and in bills approved by the Legislature. As a result of these laws, millions of constitutionally protected ammunition transfers are banned in California, Chris W. Cox, executive director of the NRAs Institute for Legislative Action, said in a statement. Californias law-abiding gun owners are sick of being treated like criminals and the NRA is proud to assist in this fight. Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is running for governor, defended his initiative and vowed to fight the NRA lawsuit. We wrote Proposition 63 on solid legal ground and principle: If youre a felon banned from possessing guns in California, then you should not be able to purchase the ammunition that makes a firearm deadly, Newsom said in a statement. California voters said loudly and clearly that guns and ammunition do not belong in the hands of dangerous individuals  but once again, the NRA has prioritized gun industry profits over the lives of law-abiding Californians. Facebook

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Republicans hope to ride a gas-tax repeal to victory By Patrick McGreevy In a Central Valley barn decked out in red, white and blue, dairyman and state Senate candidate Johnny Tacherra drew cheers from a crowd of fellow farmers when he said he opposes the California Legislatures hike on gas taxes and vehicle fees. I would not have voted for that. It is not the time to be voting on (raising) the gas tax, said Tacherra, a Republican running against Democratic Assemblywoman Anna Caballero, who voted for the tax increase last year. Three hundred miles away the same week, a campaign mailer arrived at homes in Orange County from an Assembly candidate with a message blaring from the cover in bold type: Republican Greg Haskin  tough enough to stand up to Jerry Brown and repeal the gas tax. Read More Facebook

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Treasurer John Chiang launches ad in governors race touting his record as a fiscal steward By Seema Mehta In his first television ad in the governors race, state Treasurer John Chiang touts his record on fiscal issues as California faced the recession. Some thought we were done, Chiang says in a voiceover in the 30-second spot he released Thursday, with images of him standing seriously at a lectern and complimentary headlines about his work as controller and treasurer. But I knew better. I made the tough calls. And brought California back from the brink of financial disaster because you trusted me to manage our economy. Chiangs campaign is spending about $500,000 to air the ad in Los Angeles and San Diego in coming days. That buy is dwarfed by seven-figure purchases for ads supporting Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. Newsom is the front-runner, while Villaraigosa is battling for second place with Republican businessman John Cox. Chiang has been mired in the single digits in almost all polling in the race. His ad, called Quiet Storm, tries to portray Chiang as a progressive who is effective and can move policy in Sacramento. Chiang points to his work challenging Wells Fargo before arguing that he could accomplish what doubters say is impossible to improve the states healthcare, housing and schools. I say, we got this, Chiang concludes. Facebook

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Been ignoring the race for California governor? Thats OK, in some ways its just starting By Mark Z. Barabak On a recent trip to Iowa, Eric Garcetti  the mayor of Los Angeles and a possible 2020 White House contestant  raised eyebrows with a bit of exuberant outreach. Los Angeles and Iowa, Garcetti insisted, have a ton in common, and he didnt simply mean both are inhabited by carbon-based life forms needing oxygen to survive. Urban or rural, farmer or fashion plate, all of us harbor the same hopes and dreams, the mayor suggested, and if it wasnt a terribly original thought it also wasnt the most egregious sort of political pandering  like, say, ordering that every home in Los Angeles be powered by Iowa-produced ethanol. Read More Facebook

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California voters should expect to decide on an $8.9-billion water bond in November By Liam Dillon (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times) A proposal to borrow $8.9 billion for improvements to Californias water quality systems and watersheds and protection of natural habitats is eligible for the statewide ballot in November, Secretary of State Alex Padilla announced in a press release Wednesday. Padilla said the measure, which is backed by agricultural interests, had exceeded the 365,800 valid signatures it needed to qualify for the general election ballot. The bond measure will appear on the ballot unless proponents withdraw it by June 28, the release said. The bond is one of many voters could decide on in 2018. A $4-billion bond for parks and water infrastructure improvements will appear on the June 5 ballot. State lawmakers approved it last year. Facebook

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They came for Darrell Issa. They stayed with their inflatable chicken, blue wall and signs for political therapy By Christine Mai-Duc (John Gibbins / San Diego Union-Tribune) A mother of two turned ringleader of the resistance and more than a hundred of her faithful followers gathered on Tuesday morning outside Rep. Darrell Issas office in a northern San Diego County suburb. Across the street was her foil, a wedding DJ in a red Make American Great Again cap, setting up hefty speakers for an upcoming war of words. For about 65 weeks the deep divide in America played out along this 100-yard stretch of road in Vista. Here, at 10 a.m. every Tuesday, passersby found signs, chants, songs and, if they were lucky, sometimes a 20-foot-tall inflatable chicken with a Trump-esque coif. Theyd also glimpse the state of the body politic in 2018, a time when shock has turned to anger and post-2016 calls for reconciliation have morphed into grudging acceptance that each side might be better off in their respective corners. Or in this case, their sides of the street. On Tuesday, the anti-Issa, anti-Trump contingent fought this particular battle for the last time, declaring it their final protest at the congressmans office. They said they planned to use their energy to knock on doors and get out the vote, with an occasional protest on the side. Their pro-Trump rivals vowed to show up wherever they do. Read More Facebook

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Efforts to regulate bail companies have some unlikely allies: bail agents By Jazmine Ulloa Jane Un, chief executive and founder of Abba Bail Bonds, works with a client. ( Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times) In recent years, the seriousness and number of official complaints related to the bail industry in California have significantly increased while bail agents and bounty hunters face limited oversight, putting vulnerable communities at risk of fraud, embezzlement and other forms of victimization. This year, as Gov. Jerry Brown has pledged to work with lawmakers in a push to overhaul how courts assign defendants bail and to better regulate bail agencies, even some who profit from the court practice admit its time for regulation. These bail and bail-recovery agents could become unlikely allies, saying they advocate for change because theyve seen the system abuse the poor. Read More Facebook

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California voters: Get ready for an onslaught of television ads By Seema Mehta After a sleepy campaign, California voters are now being bombarded with television advertisements in the governors race, an onslaught that is expected to ramp up in coming weeks. The ads most frequently seen on television are those promoting Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, the front-runner in the race, and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who is trying to secure the second spot in the June primary. Newsoms campaign and an outside group backing Villaraigosa are spending seven figures weekly on these efforts, according to filings with the California secretary of states office and a media buyer who asked not to be identified in order to freely discuss the ads. Other gubernatorial candidates are expected to hit the airwaves soon, the media buyer said. State Treasurer John Chiang has reserved a half-million dollars in the coming days in the Los Angeles and San Diego markets, and Villaraigosas campaign has requested availability in at least five of the states biggest TV markets. The GOP candidates in the race, who will be seeking the state Republican Partys endorsement at its convention next weekend, have been much less active. Businessman John Cox in recent weeks has been spending about $90,000 per week, but doubled that this week in Los Angeles and added small buys on KFI-AM radio and cable in markets including Fresno, Bakersfield and Salinas. State Assemblyman Travis Allen of Huntington Beach, who has been scooping up Republican Party endorsements across the state, has yet to make a notable television or radio buy, though he and Cox have received some attention as commentators on Fox News. Facebook

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Republicans ready to turn in signatures for ballot measure to repeal California gas-tax increase By Patrick McGreevy A Chevron gas station in Sacramento shows prices last year. (Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press) Republican activists said Tuesday that they have collected at least 830,000 signatures for an initiative to repeal recent increases in Californias gas tax and vehicle fees, more than enough to qualify the measure for the November ballot. The activists need 585,407 signatures of registered voters to qualify the ballot measure. Because signatures are still being processed and counted by the campaign, backers hope to have 900,000 by the time they begin turning them in to the counties on Friday, according to Carl DeMaio, a former San Diego City Council member and organizer of the drive. The breadth and depth of voter anger over the car and gas tax hikes is just amazing, said DeMaio, who hosts a radio talk show. We are seeing Democrats, independents and Republicans sign the petition and volunteering to carry the petition, people from all walks of life. The initiative targets a law approved in April 2017 by the Legislature and Gov. Jerry Brown that is expected to raise $5.4 billion annually for road and bridge repairs and improvements to mass transit. The money comes from a recent 12-cents-per-gallon increase in the gas tax, a 20-cent increase in the diesel fuel excise tax and a new annual vehicle fee ranging from $25 for cars valued at under $5,000, to $175 for cars worth $60,000 or more. The petition drive raised more than $2 million with significant contributions from the California Republican Party and Republican members of Congress from California, including House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield and Reps. Ken Calvert of Corona and Mimi Walters of Irvine. Republicans hope the issue will help their candidates for office in this years election and hurt Democrats who support the higher taxes. I think this is going to put Democrats in real bad spot, DeMaio said. A spokesman for Brown declined to comment until the signatures are filed. DeMaio said there were approximately 20,000 volunteer petition circulators who brought in more than 250,000 signatures, with the rest collected by paid circulators who received $1 to $2.50 per signature. Its a pretty comfortable margin [of signatures] that we have been able to hit here, DeMaio said. Opposition will grow, he said, as more Californians get their annual vehicle registration notice. The repeal campaign hopes to raise $5 million for the campaign to pass the constitutional amendment, which would not only repeal the increase in the gas tax and vehicle fees but require future increases to be submitted to voters. We know that Gov. Brown and his cohorts are going to spend an amazing amount of money to mislead voters, DeMaio said. But I feel pretty confident that we will repeal the gas tax. Read More Facebook

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Rep. Duncan Hunter sets up trust to raise money for legal expenses amid ongoing criminal investigation By Morgan Cook Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Alpine, has filed paperwork to establish a legal expense fund amid an ongoing federal criminal investigation into misused campaign cash. Hunter filed the required paperwork March 27, seeking a rarely granted Legal Expense Fund through which members of Congress under investigation or being sued in connection with doing their jobs or running for office can raise money for their legal expenses. Such funds are administered by an independent trustee and allow donors to give above the maximum amount they can contribute a candidates campaign. Hunter has spent more than $600,000 of campaign money on lawyers. Read More Facebook

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Kamala Harris says she wont take corporate donations anymore By Sarah D. Wire (Jose Luis Magana / Associated Press) California Sen. Kamala Harris says she will no longer accept money from corporate political action committees. In an interview with WWPM-FMs The Breakfast Club, in New York that aired Monday, the senator said she wasnt expecting a question at a town hall this month about whether she would accept money for corporations or corporate lobbyists. At the time, Harris said it depends, but she said on Monday that she had reflected on the matter and changed her mind. Money has had such an outside influence on politics, and especially with the Supreme Court determining Citizens United, which basically means that big corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money influencing a campaign, right? Harris said. Were all supposed to have an equal vote, but money has now really tipped the balance between an individual having equal power in an election to a corporation. So Ive actually made a decision since I had that conversation that Im not going to accept corporate PAC checks. I just  Im not. You can watch the video of the interview here. (Harris corporate money comments come about 30 minutes in.) Harris wouldnt be on the ballot for a second Senate term until 2022, though its widely believed that she is planning a presidential bid in 2020. Other potential 2020 presidential candidates, including Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), have also ruled out taking corporate PAC money. Soon after Mondays show aired, Harris campaign sent out a fundraising request noting her new stance. As corporate PACs continue to corrupt our politics and twist Congress priorities at your expense, were going to focus on raising money from small-dollar, individual donors like you, the email says. Facebook

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With money tied up in court, California lawmakers try again with new plan to spend $2 billion on homeless housing By Liam Dillon A man sleeps on the sidewalk in front of the Union Rescue Mission in the skid row neighborhood of Los Angeles. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) A measure to spend $2 billion on housing homeless Californians could be on the November statewide ballot. State Sen. Kevin de Leon (D-Los Angeles) is pushing the idea to deal with what he said was a burgeoning humanitarian crisis whose epicenter is here in California. De Leons new measure is a do-over for a 2016 plan passed by the Legislature to redirect $2 billion toward building homeless housing from a voter-approved 1% income tax surcharge on millionaires that funds mental health services. A Sacramento attorney sued over that decision, arguing that the move violated constitutional rules on approving loans without a public vote and that lawmakers shouldnt take money away from mental health treatment. The case remains active in Sacramento Superior Court and its unclear when, or if, the state will be able to spend the $2 billion. De Leons Senate Bill 1206 would put the $2-billion loan on the ballot in November, freeing up the money if voters approve the measure. De Leon said had he been able to predict the 2016 plan would end up in court, he would have sought a ballot measure at the time. We thought this was like apple pie and baseball and puppies, De Leon said. Who would oppose the idea of repurposing the dollars to build immediate housing as a permanent solution for homelessness? Obviously with a crystal ball, had I anticipated the litigation, I would have worked to place it on the ballot. De Leon noted that the 2016 plan had bipartisan supermajority support in the Legislature, something his new bill also will need to get on the ballot. Sen. John Moorlach (R-Costa Mesa) is a coauthor of the plan. SB 1206 is scheduled for its first hearing in the Legislature on Wednesday. Should De Leons measure be approved, it will join a crowded list of housing issues before voters in November. Californians will decide on a separate $4-billion bond to help finance new low-income housing and home loans for veterans. De Leon said hes not worried those two measures will compete against each other because voters are aware of the scale of the states housing problems and the proposed homeless housing bond redirects existing dollars instead of raising taxes. Once [voters] know that the impact on their pocketbook is not existent, Im confident that theyll join me and my colleague John Moorlach in support of this measure, De Leon said. Facebook

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California lawmakers say too many former felons are being denied professional licenses By John Myers Assemblyman David Chiu (D-San Francisco) along with supporters of bills to allow more former felons to receive professional licenses. (John Myers/Los Angeles Times) A trio of California Assembly members urged colleagues on Monday to pass legislation that would prohibit state commissions and agencies from rejecting a professional license for those who were once convicted of less serious crimes. We cant say we want to rehabilitate people, and then block them from getting the jobs that they need when theyre released, said Assemblyman David Chiu (D-San Francisco). That leads to more recidivism and to more crime. The bills, scheduled to be heard in Assembly committees Tuesday, would ban the use of arrest or conviction records as the reason for denying a professional license. The bill would not apply to Californians who served time for any of the offenses on the states list of violent crimes. The authors, all Democrats, said that a government-issued professional license is required for some 30% of all jobs in the state. Their bills would change the licensing process at the California departments of Consumer Affairs and Social Services and agencies that certify emergency medical technicians. The bills would block prior convictions from leading to the delay or denial of a license unless that crime is directly related to the profession the person intends to pursue. Two of the bills also specifically say convictions less than 5 years old could continue to play a role in licensing decisions. Last year, Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law that keeps private sector employers from inquiring about a job applicants conviction history prior to an offer of employment. Advocates joined the lawmakers at a press conference in Sacramento to point out that limits on awarding licenses should focus only on those whose prior criminal activity could pose a threat to consumers. Continuing to hold people back for crimes that are 6, 7, 8, 10, 20 years old does not actually make sense if youre looking at public safety, said Jael Myrick of the East Bay Community Law Center. One of the proposals, Assembly Bill 2293, seeks to make it easier for ex-felons to get a license allowing a job with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection  the same agency that often uses prison inmates to battle blazes around the state. If a person is good enough to risk their life fighting fires for the state of California as an inmate, said Assemblywoman Eloise Gomez Reyes (D-Grand Terrace), their previous actions should not prevent from having a job utilizing the skill set that they learned. Facebook

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Assembly speaker rebukes building trades union after it targets Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia By John Myers ( (Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press)) The decision by a politically powerful labor group to openly campaign against an embattled Los Angeles-area lawmaker drew a sharp rebuke on Friday from Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon. The Lakewood Democrat lashed out hours after the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California filed paperwork for a political action committee to defeat Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia (D-Bell Gardens). Garcia, whos seeking her fourth term, took an unpaid leave of absence in February following allegations of sexual misconduct. She has denied the reports and an Assembly investigation remains underway. Rendon didnt criticize the labor group by name, insisting instead that the decision was driven by oil and gas industry interests. This is a thinly veiled attempt by Big Oil and polluters to intimidate me and my members. It is an affront to my speakership, Rendon said in a statement. We are proud of the work that the Assembly has done to increase jobs and wages while defending our environment. We will vigorously defend the members of our caucus from any ill-advised political attack. A statement from the labor group, which sparred with Garcia last year on her effort to link new climate change policies with a crackdown on air pollution, said it had decided to reverse past support for her. The Trades have thousands of hard working members in Garcias district, and we look forward to lifting up another Democrat in the 58th Assembly to better represent them and their families, said the statement. The political action committees campaign finance filing on Friday listed nonmonetary in kind contributions from Erin Lehane, a public affairs consultant aligned with the building labor group. Lehane said she had begun researching Garcia in November. In January, a former legislative staffer accused her of groping him in 2014. Lehane, who identified herself as a spokesperson for the labor groups political action committee, said on Friday that she believed Garcias hypocrisy threatened a movement that will dictate how much harassment and abuse my daughter will face in her work life. Garcia, who has been an outspoken advocate for women in the #MeToo movement, has complained that her political opponents helped fan the flames of the accusations. Through a campaign consultant, she declined to comment on Friday. Rendons critique came on the heels of a full-page ad in The Times on Friday, partly paid for by the Trades Council, that criticized well-funded ivory tower elites who push proposals that hurt the oil and gas industry. We are the real jobs that fuel the real California economy, read the advertisement. Facebook

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Legal tiff breaks out over independent committees ad backing Antonio Villaraigosa for governor By Phil Willon An attorney representing Gavin Newsoms campaign for governor is demanding that California television stations cease airing an ad by an independent political committee supporting his Democratic rival Antonio Villaraigosa. Attorney Thomas A. Willis, in a letter to the stations, said the ad is false and misleading and violates California law because it uses snippets of video footage from Villaraigosas own campaign ads. Willis called that illegal coordination between the campaign and PAC. Under California law, advertisements made by entities other than a candidate are presumed to be coordinated  and thus not independent expenditures  when the advertisement replicates, reproduces or disseminates substantial parts of a communication, including video footage, created and paid for by the candidate, the letter states. A representative for the independent expenditure committee  Families & Teachers for Antonio Villaraigosa for Governor  fired back. Attorney Brian T. Hildreth says those allegations have no merit and accused the Newsom campaign of being misleading. Hildreth sent a letter to the television stations in response, urging them to ignore the Newsom campaigns accusations. He said the Newsom camp appears to intentionally misrepresent the law and that the video use was permissible. He said only six seconds of video from Villaraigosas campaign ads was used, which is well within the legal limits. The independent committee is sponsored by the group California Charter Schools Assn. Advocates, according to the California secretary of states office. The ad is airing on broadcast and cable stations statewide. The committees ad is focused on Villaraigosas record as Assembly speaker and as mayor of Los Angeles when there was a drop in crime. Facebook

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Governors race snapshot: Californians are generally upbeat but not focused on the campaign By Mark Z. Barabak Armand Werden, a 29-year-old community college student who works the taps at Dust Bowl Brewery in Turlock, said the state is on the upswing. (Phil Willon / Los Angeles Times) As California chooses a new governor  one of just a handful in the last 40 years not named Jerry Brown  the state seems to be enjoying something unusual in these tumultuous political times: a feeling of relative contentment. Not to say things are perfect. Still, more than 100 random interviews conducted over the length and breadth of the state  from Redding in the north to Santee in the south, from the Pacific coastline to the edge of the Sierra Nevada  found most saying things are looking up, at least so far as Californias direction is concerned. Read More Facebook

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Sierra Club backs Gavin Newsom for California governor By Phil Willon Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks with members of the public following a debate at USC in January. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) The Sierra Club endorsed Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom in the race for California governor, with officials in the established environmental group praising the Democrats record on climate change and clean energy. He has a proven record for leading on environmental protection, public health and clean energy, Kathryn Phillips, director of Sierra Club California, said in a statement released by the Newsom campaign. He understands that we are feeling the effects of climate change and that California must reduce carbon emissions and reach 100% renewable energy to achieve our climate goals. Phillips said the Sierra Clubs extensive network of volunteers will campaign for Newsom as the June 5 primary approaches. Sierra Club executive director Michael Brune also praised the Democrat, saying he will protect California from Donald Trumps attacks on our clean air and water. The Sierra Club joins a series of other influential groups in California that have backed Newsom. The California Medical Assn., the powerful state doctors lobby, announced its endorsement of Newsom on Thursday. The California Nurses Assn. and the Service Employees International Union, one of the most powerful labor unions in the state, also support Newsom. Newsom is the races front-runner in polls and fundraising. A poll released earlier this month by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California found that 26% of likely voters backed Newsom. John Cox, a Republican from Rancho Santa Fe, was favored by 15% of likely voters and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a Democrat, by 13%. Facebook

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Californias GOP House members are taking their challengers more seriously and the numbers show it By Christine Mai-Duc For much of last year, consultants and campaign managers for some of Californias most vulnerable Republican incumbents maintained a bullish tone on the prospect that the GOP would hold the House in this years midterms. The National Republican Congressional Committee insisted that longtime Republican incumbents in California had built up reputations as effective champions of local issues that would help them weather a flood of Democratic enthusiasm. Since then Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton) and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista) have decided not to seek reelection and the NRCC has opened a West Coast headquarters in Orange County. Read More Facebook

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California officials say Pentagon has confirmed National Guard funding despite Trump threat By John Myers (Evan Vucci / Associated Press) The awkward dance between Gov. Jerry Brown and the federal government over the National Guard jerked back toward discord on Thursday, when Trump said he would refuse to pay for a new deployment of troops  just hours after his administration said otherwise. And a few hours later, California officials said they had received written confirmation from the Pentagon that the mission would indeed be funded. Trump had earlier called Browns decision to approve 400 troops for a mission focused on combating transnational crime and drug smuggling a charade in a tweet. We need border security and action, not words! the president wrote. Governor Jerry Brown announced he will deploy up to 400 National Guard Troops to do nothing. The crime rate in California is high enough, and the Federal Government will not be paying for Governor Browns charade. We need border security and action, not words!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 19, 2018 A spokesman for Brown pointed to a tweet written Wednesday night by Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, thanking the California governor for his efforts. Trump was meeting on Thursday with Nielsen at his Mar-a-Lago estate not long after his tweet was posted. A tweet later posted by the California National Guard said that almost three hours after Trumps comment, the state received written confirmation from the Pentagon to fund the mission as outlined by Brown the day before. In short, nothing has changed today, said a subsequent Guard tweet. Just spoke w @JerryBrownGov about deploying the @USNationalGuard in California. Final details are being worked out but we are looking forward to the support. Thank you Gov Brown!  Secretary Kirstjen M. Nielsen (@SecNielsen) April 19, 2018 Brown was the last of the nations border governors to respond to Trumps insistence earlier this month that National Guard troops were needed to assist with immigration-related duties at the U.S.-Mexico border. And he has consistently refused to allow California troops to engage in any mission related to federal immigration law. This will not be a mission to build a new wall, Brown wrote last week to Nielsen and Defense Secretary James N. Mattis. It will not be a mission to round up women and children or detain people escaping violence and seeking a better life. Exactly what the California operations will cost remains unclear, as state officials have said it will depend on decisions made once the mission begins. The funds would not be transferred to the state, but instead would be paid directly by the Department of Defense. Trump has critiqued California several times over the past few days, often writing tweets that embrace the actions by some cities and counties to join his administrations lawsuit against the states sanctuary immigration law. He made similar comments to reporters on Thursday afternoon. If you look at whats happening in California with sanctuary cities  people are really going the opposite way, Trump said. They dont want sanctuary cities. Theres a little bit of a revolution going on in California. 2:26 p.m.:This article was updated with additional information from the California National Guard and with remarks from Trump. This article was originally published at 9:51 a.m. Facebook

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Gay conversion therapy services would be banned under measure advancing in California By John Myers (Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press) The California Assembly voted Thursday to add gay conversion therapy to the states list of deceptive business practices, following a debate that focused on the personal experiences of several lawmakers and hinted at potential lawsuits to come. It is harmful and it is unnecessary, Assemblyman Evan Low (D-Campbell), the bills author and one of the Legislatures most vocal LGBTQ members, said of the practice. Low, who told Assembly members that he explored conversion therapy as a teenager and suffered depression over his sexual orientation, insisted that the bill would be limited to efforts that involve the exchange of money. Theres nothing wrong with me, he said in an emotional speech on the Assembly floor. Theres nothing that needs to be changed. The bill, which now heads to the Senate, has become the focal point of intense debate on social media. Some religious groups have said that such a law would be a violation of their constitutional rights, while advocates insist the provisions are narrow and theres no credible evidence that the services work. One key part of the debate centers on whether Assembly Bill 2943 would stretch beyond businesses that charge for these programs and extend to printed documents, even Bibles. An analysis by the Assembly Judiciary Committee says the bill would apply only to services that purport to change a persons sexual orientation and offered on a commercial basis, as well as the advertising and offering of such services. Lawmakers who spoke in support of AB 2943 also made clear that they believe those kinds of services have been discredited. This is fraudulent, it should not be occurring, said Assemblywoman Susan Eggman (D-Stockton). But you can still try to pray the gay away, if you like. Assemblyman James Gallagher (R-Yuba City), who said the bill addresses a difficult issue, nonetheless said that its important to ensure laws dont tamper with religious freedom. We have to think about the legitimate experience of people who have gone through conversion therapy and said this was a good thing for them, Gallagher told his colleagues. California law already bans the use of conversion therapy by mental health professionals on those under age 18. Lows bill would expand the states efforts beyond minors. It would join a list of commercial activities deemed unfair or deceptive acts or practices and therefore banned under state law. Facebook

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Gavin Newsom gets backing from doctors group, despite differences over single-payer healthcare By Melanie Mason Gavin Newsom speaks at the California Democrats State Convention in San Diego on Feb. 24. (Kent Nishimura) Californias doctors are siding with Gavin Newsom in the governors race, even though they dont see eye-to-eye on a defining issue of the campaign: single-payer healthcare. The California Medical Assn., the state doctors lobby and a political heavyweight, announced its endorsement of the lieutenant governor on Thursday. Gavin is a lifelong champion for health care in California, and we know he will continue to fight for pragmatic solutions to our most crucial health care challenges, including working to achieve universal access and tackling our states physician shortage, CMA President Theodore M. Mazer said in a statement. Newsom has made his support for state-financed healthcare a centerpiece of his campaign, and he earned the early backing of the most ardent single-payer supporters, the state nurses union. The doctors, meanwhile, oppose the nurses bill, SB 562, which emerged as a flashpoint in the healthcare debate last year. The CMA said the bill would dismantle the healthcare marketplace and destabilize Californias economy. Newsom has said SB 562 should advance in the Legislature, but also said it has open-ended issues that still need to be addressed. The doctors group is also battling with another prominent Newsom endorser, the Service Employees International Union, over a new measure that would impose price caps on an array of medical services paid for by commercial health insurers in the state. The SEIU is a leading sponsor of the proposal; the doctors fiercely oppose it. Newsom and the physicians group have a history of political alignment. Newsom was the first statewide official to support Proposition 56, a 2016 tobacco tax pushed by the CMA that raised revenue in part to increase money for doctors who saw Medi-Cal patients. That year, the association also endorsed two initiatives championed by Newsom: Proposition 63, which imposed new gun control measures, and Proposition 64, which legalized recreational marijuana. Facebook

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Independent committee backing Antonio Villaraigosa for governor hits the airwaves with first ad By Phil Willon Antonio Villaraigosa speaks at the 2018 California Democratic Party Convention in San Diego in February.. (Denis Poroy / Associated Press) A well-financed independent committee backing Antonio Villaraigosas bid to be Californias next governor released its first television ad Thursday, praising his record for working with Republicans and as a candidate for all of California. The ad, which is to air statewide on broadcast and cable stations, is focused on Villaraigosas record as Assembly speaker and mayor of Los Angeles, including on education and a drop in crime while he was at City Hall. To move California forward, we need to help more Californians get ahead, the ad says. Thats why Antonio Villaraigosa brought both parties together to balance the state budget with record investments in public schools and new career training programs. The independent expenditure committee behind the ad campaign, Families & Teachers for Antonio Villaraigosa for Governor 2018, is sponsored by the California Charter Schools Assn. Advocates, according to the California secretary of states office. The committee is spending seven figures per week on the ad buy, said Josh Pulliam, a political consultant for the committee. As mayor of Los Angeles, Villaraigosa clashed with teachers unions, starting with his failed attempt to take political control of the Los Angeles Unified School District. His fight with those unions continued after he left office in 2013. Money has poured into the committee this month from wealthy charter schools supporters: Reed Hastings, chief executive of Netflix, donated $7 million, and Los Angeles billionaire and philanthropist Eli Broad donated $1.5 million. On Wednesday, former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan donated $1 million. The independent expenditure committee is expected to provide a boost to Villaraigosas campaign. Democratic front-runner Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom has a major advantage in fundraising over all other candidates in the race and has received the backing of the California Teachers Assn. and other education unions. A recent Public Policy Institute of California poll also showed Villaraigosa lagging in third place in the race, trailing Newsom and Republican businessman John Cox. The candidates who finish in the top two in the June 5 primary will advance to the November general election, regardless of their party affiliation. Facebook

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Gov. Jerry Brown says Trump administration will fund his National Guard mission  without immigration duties By John Myers (Alex Wong / Getty Images) Gov. Jerry Brown formally mobilized 400 California National Guard members Wednesday for transnational crime-fighting duties, thus preventing any effort by President Trump to have the troops focus on immigration enforcement on the Mexican border. The governor announced that federal officials have agreed to fund the plan he announced last week  a mission to combat criminal gangs, human traffickers and illegal firearm and drug smugglers in locations around California, including near the border. The order Brown signed makes clear that the troops will not be allowed to perform a broader set of duties as envisioned by Trumps recent comments. California National Guard service members shall not engage in any direct law enforcement role nor enforce immigration laws, arrest people for immigration law violations, guard people taken into custody for alleged immigration violations, or support immigration law enforcement activities, the order read. The cost of the mission, a spokesman for Brown said, will be paid directly by the federal government. No initial estimate has been made, as the exact amount will depend on exactly how the troops will be used. Though the duties of California Guard members were outlined last week, the state had been waiting for an agreement by federal officials to pay for the operations. Since that time, the president has taken Brown and the state to task over its decision to avoid any immigration-related duties at the border. On Wednesday morning, Trump tweeted, Jerry Brown is trying to back out of the National Guard at the Border, but the people of the State are not happy. Want Security & Safety NOW! There is a Revolution going on in California. Soooo many Sanctuary areas want OUT of this ridiculous, crime infested & breeding concept. Jerry Brown is trying to back out of the National Guard at the Border, but the people of the State are not happy. Want Security & Safety NOW!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 18, 2018 Looks like Jerry Brown and California are not looking for safety and security along their very porous Border. He cannot come to terms for the National Guard to patrol and protect the Border, Trump tweeted Tuesday. There was no immediate reaction from the White House to Browns announcement. On Tuesday, Brown told reporters in Washington that his plan was consistent with a safer border. That sounds to me like fighting crime, the governor said. Trying to catch some desperate mothers and children, or unaccompanied minors coming from Central America, that sounds like something else. The order Brown issued Wednesday after returning from a brief trip to talk climate change in Toronto and to speak to a national trade union and visit with reporters in Washington is set to expire at the end of September. It specifically says no Guard service member may participate in a mission that would exceed the mission scope and limitations related to transnational crime activity. It also says troops cannot help build any new border barrier. 5:27 p.m.: This article was updated with information related to the cost of the Guard mission and Browns trip to Washington. This article was originally published at 5:13 p.m. Facebook

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California bill aims to end practice that keeps workplace misconduct cases out of court By Melanie Mason A California bill would prohibit employers from requiring workers to use private arbitration to settle disputes, a practice that critics say shields improper workplace conduct from public view. The bill by Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher (D-San Diego) would bar businesses from making employees, when they are hired, waive their future rights to take any harassment, discrimination or other claims to court. Arbitration can be a highly effective dispute resolution method when both parties can choose it freely, when both parties are equal, Gonzalez Fletcher said at a news conference on Wednesday. It is far less successful when the more powerful party forces the other to accept those terms, especially as a condition of employment. Forced arbitration has come under increasing scrutiny since the #MeToo movement, with high-profile figures such as former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson pointing to the practice as shielding workplace abusers from public disclosure because arbitration resolutions often include nondisclosure agreements. Last year, a bipartisan bill was introduced in Congress to end mandatory arbitration in employment agreements. Gonzalez Fletcher said she was pursuing an unusual tool to draw attention to the issue  a subpoena issued by the Legislature to compel testimony from a worker bound by a nondisclosure agreement as a result of arbitration. The Legislature has subpoena power but it is rarely used. The bills sponsors believe lawmakers last issued a subpoena in 2001 while investigating price manipulation by Enron. Gonzalez Fletcher said she has requested Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Lakewood) to issue the subpoena to require Tara Zoumer, who sued the company WeWork in 2016 for overtime pay, to testify before the Assembly Judiciary Committee next week. Zoumers suit was moved to arbitration and resolved. She is now subject to a nondisclosure agreement and could face a financial penalty for speaking publicly about her case. A spokesman for Rendon said the subpoena request is under consideration. Business groups oppose the bill, AB 3080. The California Chamber of Commerce has dubbed it a job biller, claiming it would dramatically increase legal costs for businesses. Banning such agreements benefits the trial attorneys, not the employer or employee, the group said. The bill must first advance from the Assembly Labor Committee on Wednesday. Facebook

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At least 240 House lawmakers want a vote on immigration. California supporters say they arent ready to force one By Sarah D. Wire Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Turlock), flanked by Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Redlands) and Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas) speak about DACA legislation (Bill Clark / CQ Roll Call) Rep. Jeff Denham says at least 240 of the 430 current House members have signed onto his resolution to hold votes on four immigration bills, and he hopes House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) and President Trump are paying attention to the show of support. But, the Republican from Turlock and his allies said Wednesday that they are not yet willing to commit to forcing Ryans hand through a little-used procedural move called a discharge petition; they acknowledged theres no guarantee that all of 47 Republicans and 193 Democrats House co-signers will back them up if they try to force the issue. Im sure that it is something that will be discussed in the coming weeks. You should not need a discharge petition. When you can show the overwhelming majority of the House, the support of it, you should not need a discharge petition, but it is something we would talk about in the future, Denham said. It is far too early to talk about next steps. Ryan said last week that he opposes Denhams effort, saying its a waste of time for the House to vote on bills the president might veto. Denhams resolution would prompt debate and votes on four very different immigration bills: one favored by the Trump administration, one preferred by Democrats, one bipartisan proposal and another immigration bill of Ryans choice. Whichever got the most votes would move forward to the Senate. All four bills would help Dreamers to differing degrees and include varying levels of border security or immigration enforcement. For example, the Trump-backed bill would also dramatically reduce legal immigration, while the Democrats would only deal with legal status for Dreamers. Democrats say they dont expect the show of support will sway Ryan. Congressional Hispanic Caucus Chairwoman Rep. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D-N.M.) said Tuesday night she expects Ryan will have to be forced into allowing a vote. It doesnt matter how many signatures we get. We could have every signature, technically, except his, on the floor of the House and... if he doesnt want to, it doesnt happen, Lujan Grisham (D-N.M.) said. Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Redlands), who gathered the Democratic co-sponsors for Denham, also wouldnt give a deadline for House leaders to act, but said the co-sponsors are only willing to wait weeks not months. We do want to give them an opportunity to bring up the rule and to use whatever process they want, Aguilar said. They do have options, but I think they need to understand that we have options too. Facebook

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Billionaire Democratic activist Tom Steyer endorses Kevin de Leon in his insurgent bid against Sen. Dianne Feinstein By Seema Mehta Tom Steyer, left, and California state Sen. Kevin de Leon (D-Los Angeles). (Getty Images; Los Angeles Times) Billionaire Democratic activist Tom Steyer is endorsing state Sen. Kevin de Leon in his insurgent challenge to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, and did not rule out funding an outside effort to boost De Leons chances. I think hes the kind of young progressive that reflects California and would be a very strong advocate for our state nationally, Steyer said in an interview on Tuesday, pointing to De Leons efforts on issues such as immigration, climate change and gun control while he was the state Senate leader. I know him well and hes a friend. We share a lot of values. Steyer, who flirted with running for the Senate seat, did not criticize Feinstein as he has in the past. Sen. Feinstein has been an outstanding public servant who has dedicated the bulk of her adult life to the service of our state and the country, he said. These are two strong, very good Democrats. I just believe Kevin is the true progressive and he reflects something we need representing California going forward. I have nothing bad to say about Dianne Feinstein. I have a lot of good to say about Kevin de Leon. De Leon faces enormous odds as he tries to oust Feinstein, who has served in the Senate for a quarter-century, is well known to the states voters and has daunting leads in polls and fundraising. But De Leon has gained notable endorsements, most recently from the 2.1-million-member California Labor Federation last week. Campaign finance reports released this week show that Feinstein has more than $10 million in the bank, while De Leon has just more than $670,000. Feinstein, a multimillionaire and one of the wealthiest members of the Senate, has already lent her campaign $5 million and could easily write another check. But Steyer, a billionaire former hedge fund manager, could write a larger one. He is among the largest Democratic donors in the nation and has already committed more than $50 million to push for the impeachment of President Trump and to register young voters. He was noncommittal when asked if he would fund an independent expenditure group on behalf of De Leon. I dont have any concrete plans for that, he said. Read More Facebook

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Californias largest pension fund sends next years invoice to state government: $6.3 billion By John Myers The California Public Employees Retirement System building (Max Whittaker / Getty Images) As part of a shift toward less optimistic expectations for investment returns to pay for government worker pensions, board members of the California Public Employees Retirement System voted Tuesday to require an almost $6.3-billion payment from the state budget in the fiscal year that begins on July 1. The action, which could receive final approval on Wednesday, reflects a gradually higher annual contribution to public employee pensions by the state and from local governments across California. In 2016, CalPERS approved a half-percentage point decrease in its official estimate of the long-term investment return on its $353.3-billion portfolio. That shift was designed to happen over several years, in hopes it would lessen the financial shock of shifting more of the costs onto government employers. The highest costs are also, in part, a reflection of increases in the size of the states payroll. The states CalPERS payment will be about $450 million more than the total paid in the current fiscal year and more than double what it was only a decade ago. CalPERS board members voted on Tuesdays staff proposal with little discussion, save for a question about the increase in contributions also required from workers hired after a pension overhaul that took effect in June. It seems like it will be a ding on peoples salaries, said Theresa Taylor, the chairwoman of CalPERS finance committee and a member of SEIU Local 1000, the union that represents some 96,000 state employees. The $6.299-billion payment required from Californias state government must now be factored into the budget crafted by the Legislature and signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown in late June. Brown had already assumed a similarly sized payment in his budget proposal unveiled in January. In February, a coalition representing city governments warned about the effects of rising pension costs under the expectations of less money from Wall Street investments. The report issued by the League of California Cities projected an average increase of more than 50% in annual pension payments made by the states largest cities over the next seven years. A CalPERS staff report notes that the net return on all of the funds investments for the fiscal year that ended in July was 11.2%. But expectations on profits over the next 30 years remain significantly more modest, and theres long been a robust debate about how to properly set those future expectations. The lower the rate of projected investment return, the larger the share of pension costs that must be covered by taxpayers and some employees. Overall, CalPERS officials believe the system has assets to cover 71% of its long-term obligations. Facebook

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California warns legal pot sellers not to participate in unlicensed 4/20 events By Patrick McGreevy Marijuana on display at a dispensary in Los Angeles. ( (Frederic J. Brown / AFP/Getty Images)) The state issued a warning Tuesday that businesses holding licenses to sell marijuana could face penalties if they participate in unlicensed temporary events away from their stores, including on Friday, April 20, which has become an annual celebration for counterculture groups. The warning was issued ahead of 4/20 by the state Bureau of Cannabis Control. Since Jan. 1, the bureau has issued more than 700 state licenses to sell marijuana for medical or recreational use. The bureau has issued 47 temporary event licenses to groups that are limited to holding the marijuana celebrations on county fairgrounds that have authorized such events with city approval. Any bureau licensee participating in an unlicensed cannabis event may be subject to disciplinary action, the warning said, adding that lawful participation by bureau licensees in any temporary cannabis event that allows sales and/or consumption is dependent upon issuance of the appropriate licenses from the bureau. While many Californians have been issued medical approval to sell or use marijuana, the law does not allow them to participate in unlicensed events, also referred to as Proposition 215 events after the ballot measure that legalized medical pot two decades ago in the state. Participation in such events may lead to civil penalties for unlicensed commercial cannabis activity, the warning said. Meanwhile, a survey of some 1,000 marijuana users that was released Tuesday by the firm LendEDU found that the average 4/20 participant plans to spend $71 on marijuana to celebrate the unofficial holiday, and about 35% of respondents are planning to take off work Friday. Facebook

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California police groups shift position on officer discipline records, now consider support for making some of them public By Liam Dillon Los Angeles Police Department recruits at a graduation ceremony in April (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) Some major law enforcement groups signaled Tuesday they are willing to support making part of police officer disciplinary records public, a dramatic departure from their past positions. Local and national attention on police shootings and misconduct has led law enforcement organizations to reconsider their blanket opposition to proposals that would give public access to some internal disciplinary investigations of officers. Were going to be open to supporting efforts that would allow for some records to be released, said Ryan Sherman, a lobbyist with the Riverside Sheriffs Assn. Debate over secrecy provisions in officer disciplinary files came during a legislative hearing on Senate Bill 1421 from Sen. Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley). Skinners bill, which advanced out of the Senate Public Safety Committee on Tuesday, would require public disclosure of all internal officer shooting investigations and confirmed cases of sexual assault and lying while on duty. Currently, all police discipline information is confidential outside of a courtroom in California, which has some of the nations strictest standards against public disclosure. Unfortunately, the fact that we have such strict restrictions on any access to public records has affected certain communities trust towards our law enforcement, Skinner said during the hearing. Prior to Skinners effort, other have tried to loosen these rules, some of which date back 40 years. Most recently in 2016, a bid by then-Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) failed in a Senate committee. In debate two years ago, no major law enforcement groups indicated they would accept changes to state laws that would make individual internal investigations public, saying they were essential to protect officer privacy and safety. But Tuesday, Sherman and other lobbyists including those representing the states largest police labor organization, signaled they might be willing to entertain changes. They said they were negotiating with Skinner on the bills details. Law enforcement groups still have major concerns about SB 1421 as written. Ed Fishman, an attorney for the Police Officers Research Assn., told legislators that the bill would wrongfully expose police officers who acted within departmental policy to invasions of their privacy. It has unintended consequences that are extreme and will hurt the public, Fishman said. Tuesdays hearing featured testimony from many who have had relatives killed by police officers in recent years advocating for the bill. Senators on the Public Safety Committee also gave public rebukes to law enforcement lobbyists, criticizing them for a lack of diversity and insensitivity to concerns raised by communities of color. I think that you are completely and utterly out of touch with the realities of how those you are representing are perceived by major segments of California, said Sen. Holly Mitchell (D-Los Angeles). You are not going to be able to continue to lobby your way out of it. The bill faces at least one more committee hearing in the Senate before reaching the floor. It will have to pass both houses of the Legislature by the end of August. Facebook

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Newest member of the California Assembly arrives ready to work on criminal justice issues By John Myers Assemblywoman Sydney Kamlager-Dove prepares for the oath of office from Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon with her husband, Austin Dove. (California Assembly Democrats) Two weeks after winning a Los Angeles special election, the newest member of the California Assembly says she hopes to focus on reforms to the states criminal justice system during her time in Sacramento. Assemblywoman Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Los Angeles) took the oath of office on Monday, filling one of three vacant seats representing Los Angeles County in the lower house. The Democrat, a former community college trustee and legislative staffer, thanked her mentors in remarks from the Assembly rostrum. So many women, and in my life so many black women, have paid in giving me the kind of morals and integrity and grit that is required to fight on behalf of people that you know, and people that you dont know, she said. Kamlager-Dove won handily on April 3, receiving 70% of the votes cast in the 54th Assembly District which encompasses communities west of downtown Los Angeles, from Crenshaw to Culver City and as far north as Westwood. She will serve the remaining eight months of the term of former Assemblyman Sebastian Ridley-Thomas, who resigned last year citing health concerns. She has said she hopes to focus her attention on poverty issues and on reform of the states criminal justice system. I think we have an opportunity to really push the needle in terms of how we look at rehabilitation, how we look at incarceration, and how we look at changing the lives oftentimes of poor men and women of color, Kamalager-Dove said on Monday in a video released by Assembly Democrats. Facebook

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Survivors of violent crime raise their voices in California to call for a new approach to criminal justice By Jazmine Ulloa Aaliyah Smith marches with her cousins. (Jazmine Ulloa / Los Angeles Times) Her father, uncle, a cousin and two older brothers. Those are some of the family members 16-year-old Aaliyah Smith has lost to gun violence. Then there are her friends. Jermaine Jackson Jr., 27, was shot and killed in 2016 while he painted over graffiti in San Francisco. Toriano Tito Adger, 18, was shot there a year later at a bus stop. He called Smith, who was nearby, and warned her to run. She made it inside a library moments before the crack of gunfire. Last week, Smith was among hundreds who gathered in Sacramento for annual National Crime Victims Rights Week events, where calls were issued for a new approach to criminal justice and public safety in California, one that puts survivors at the center of policy. But a debate is brewing over what that entails. Read More Facebook

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California expects $14 billion in tax payments this month By John Myers State workers handle income tax returns at the California Franchise Tax Board offices. (Laura Morton / For The Times) Gov. Jerry Browns proposed state budget is built on what taxpayers might find an audacious assumption: almost $14 billion in tax payments in the month of April, an average of $83 million collected per hour on every business day of the month. Most of that money will come from the taxes Californians pay in advance of Tuesday nights filing deadline for income tax returns. If history is any guide, the rate of payment could quadruple by weeks end. While tax rules have shifted some of the payment schedules to other months, April remains a vitally important month to the fiscal health of state government. The state controllers office reports more than 15% of all personal income tax revenues in 2017 were collected in April. In the recession years of a decade ago, tax revenue predictions were frequently off the mark by hundreds of millions of dollars. The last two state budgets have seen significant windfalls of personal income tax revenue, thanks in part both to an improving economy and to the continuation of a temporary surcharge on the wealthiest taxpayers  extended by voters in 2016. In the budget plan he sent to lawmakers in January, Brown projected a $6.1-billion windfall and proposed using a sizable amount to top off Californias rainy-day fund ahead of schedule. The independent Legislative Analysts Office reports that through the end of last week, the months income tax tally stood at $3 billion, slightly ahead of projections. By the end of the current week, a single days total could be almost that large. Lawmakers began reviewing the governors $190.3-billion spending plan during the winter, but few decisions are made until they get a look at Aprils tax revenues. The governor will release a revised plan based on the new data next month; lawmakers are required to send him a completed budget no later than June 15. Facebook

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Feinstein war chest tops $10 million while Kevin de Leon struggles to keep pace By Sarah D. Wire Sen. Dianne Feinstein widened her already-massive fundraising advantage in the run-up to Junes primary, raising twice as much in the first quarter than her strongest Senate challenger has sitting in the bank. Feinstein raised $1.3 million between January and March, bringing her war chest to just over $10 million as Californias U.S. Senate race begins in earnest, according Federal Election Commission reports. Former state Senate leader Kevin De Leon, the best known of the more than 30 people who will appear with Feinstein on the June primary ballot, raised just $575,991 in that same period, bringing his cash on hand to $672,331, according to his quarterly FEC report. Read More Facebook

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Trump has met his match, says Gov. Jerry Brown in promoting climate action on a quick trip to Canada By John Myers (Rich Pedroncelli/Associated Press) Gov. Jerry Brown told a Canadian audience Monday that he believes President Trumps efforts to reverse course on climate change policy are a momentary deviation as others in the United States seek limits on greenhouse gas emissions. Thats very temporary, I can assure you, Brown said at a joint event in Toronto with Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne. The governors quick international trip, announced only late last week, comes as Wynnes Liberal Party faces a stiff challenge in Junes election from the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario and its leader, Doug Ford. Critics of Wynnes party have called for Ontario to pull out of the Western Climate Initiative, a cooperative agreement between three Canadian provinces and California on efforts to limit greenhouse gases. Brown sought to link the efforts of Canadian conservatives with Republicans in the United States who oppose existing climate change programs. In contrast, he told the audience, several GOP lawmakers voted last summer to renew Californias cap-and-trade program. I would say to the conservatives of Canada, wake up and see what your friends in California are doing, he said. The Democrat took particular notice of Trumps efforts to shift away from climate change policies from the administration of former President Obama, as well as a push by the Environmental Protection Agency to cancel Californias strict limits on automobile emissions. If Trump tries to change that, well have litigation well beyond his term in office, Brown said while also noting Chinese government efforts to produce more low-emissions vehicles. Between California and China, Trump has met his match. What hes saying is not going to happen. Many of the governors remarks, though, were aimed at the tough political situation in which Wynne finds herself with seven weeks to go before Ontarios parliamentary elections. Dangers abound, but success is right in our hands, Brown said. So dont blow it! Facebook

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California voters are getting to know the states attorney general through his aggressive stance challenging Trump By Patrick McGreevy Less than two months from his first statewide election, California Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra has become adept not only at challenging President Trump but at using the bully pulpit of his office to raise his profile with voters. The aggressive effort may help boost the former Los Angeles congressmans chances at winning a full term in office this fall, almost two years after he was appointed to replace Sen. Kamala Harris in 2017. Appointed by Gov. Jerry Brown, Becerra took office as attorney general four days after Trumps inauguration. Thats afforded him an opportunity to get in front of Californians  and potential voters  on an array of issues including immigration, healthcare and the environment. Read More Facebook

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Gov. Jerry Brown forms commission for 2020 census outreach By Melanie Mason In an effort to make sure California has a strong showing in the next national census, Gov. Jerry Brown on Friday established a state commission to prepare outreach for the decennial count. It is vitally important for California to do everything it can to ensure that every Californian is counted in the upcoming census, Brown said in a prepared statement. The commissions formation comes on the heels of a Trump administration plan to ask about citizenship status as a part of the census. State officials fear that such a question, which has not been asked in a census since 1950, could chill participation among California residents. That could result in the state losing billions of dollars in federal funds and a seat in Congress. The 23-member panel, appointed largely by Brown as well as picks by legislative leaders, comes from private- and public-sector backgrounds, including civil rights groups, religious institutions and educational institutions. Facebook

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Garcetti kicks off Iowa visit with 2020 on his mind and a hardhat on his head LA Mayor - and 2020 prospect - Eric Garcetti makes his Iowa debut at the Carpenters Union Training Center. Fearlessly flaunts the never be photographed in head gear/safety glasses rule. pic.twitter.com/14bUOPXMvF  Mark Z. Barabak (@markzbarabak) April 13, 2018 Facebook

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Asm. Rocky Chavez takes the lead in race to replace Issa, while Doug Applegate slips By Joshua Stewart A new poll shows that Republican Assemblyman Rocky Chavez has taken a clear lead over 15 other candidates running to replace Rep. Darrell Issa in Congress and has overtaken Democrat Doug Applegate, the previous frontrunner. In a SurveyUSA poll by 10News and The San Diego Union-Tribune, Chavez, R-Oceanside, has support of 16 percent of likely voters, putting him ahead of Applegate, a lawyer, who was favored by 12 percent of voters and is in second place. The top two vote-getters in June, regardless of party, will proceed to a November runoff election. Competing with Applegate for the No. 2 spot is Democrat Mike Levin, also a lawyer, with support of 9 percent of voters. Several other candidates were right at his heels. Democratic Businessman Paul Kerr and Board of Equalization Member Diane Harkey, R-Dana Point, were tied for fourth at 8 percent each. Read More Facebook

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Pro-Kevin de Leon group launches ad castigating Dianne Feinstein By Seema Mehta A group that is supporting Kevin de Leons bid for the U.S. Senate launched a blistering ad against Sen. Dianne Feinstein on Thursday, questioning her progressive principles and tying her to President Trump. The ad buy from A Progressive California is minuscule  $10,000 to air it in Los Angeles for one day on CNN and MSNBC during programming such as The Rachel Maddow Show, Hardball with Chris Matthews and Anderson Cooper 360. The minute-long ad features news clips about Feinstein not getting the California Democratic Party endorsement earlier this year, as well as footage of Feinstein saying that Trump can be a good president and appearing to share a laugh with Trump. That moment actually came during a White House meeting in the aftermath of the Parkland, Fla., school shooting when the president suggested an assault weapons ban should be included in a bipartisan bill to expand gun background checks. It also features extensive clips of de Leons speech at the state partys convention. De Leon, who just ended his final term as leader of the state Senate, announced last year he would run against fellow Democrat Feinstein as she seeks her fifth full term. Feinsteins longtime political advisor dismissed the ad, noting the size of the buy. Its not really a buy, said Bill Carrick. Ten thousand dollars in cable in L.A. Poof, its gone. Still, he said he planned to have the campaigns lawyers review the ad to see if it violates campaign law that limits what outside groups like A Progressive California can do. Such groups cannot coordinate with campaigns or candidates, and are limited in how much their messages can support a candidate. Ann Ravel, the former chair of the Federal Election Commission and the California Fair Political Practices Commission, said if the ad was in a state race, she is certain that the state commission would open an investigation into potential coordination with de Leons campaign because of the messaging and the types of footage in the ad. But the bipartisan federal commission cant agree on how to enforce the federal regulations, she said. The problem is [outside groups] understand that given the lack of very strong enforcement at the federal level, theres the ability to stretch the law, she said. A spokeswoman for the FEC declined to comment. Dave Jacobson, a spokesman for A Progressive California, disputed the suggestion that the ad violated campaign law. This frivolous allegation shows that Sen. Feinstein is afraid of the public seeing an ad which showcases her own words, that Donald Trump can be a good president, he said. Facebook

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Dispute over money emerges in campaign to repeal Californias gas tax increase By Patrick McGreevy A motorist prepares to gas up her vehicle in San Rafael, Calif., in 2015. (Justin Sullivan / Getty Images) A proposed initiative to repeal hikes to Californias gas tax has been caught in the middle of a dispute involving Republican rivals in the governors race. Assemblyman Travis Allen, a Republican candidate for governor, decided in January to drop plans for his own initiative and said he would urge supporters to sign a separate petition being supported by several Republican members of Congress. Then last week, the committee Allen formed to finance his ballot measure reported a $300,000 contribution from PISF Inc., a Novato, Calif., real estate firm. Now, an organizer of the still active Give Voters a Voice committee is urging the Allen committee to immediately donate their funds in support of the ongoing signature gathering efforts. There is only one gas tax repeal measure currently in circulation and that is the measure sponsored by the Give Voters a Voice Committee, said Dave Gilliard, a consultant to the group. PISF Inc., he said, gave to repeal taxes aThere is something worse than seeing your political party lose  yet again  the race for one of Californias most prominent offices.

Its when your partys voters simply dont show up on election day. And if enough of them simply sit out due to a lack of interest, it can endanger the partys power for years to come.

That brings us to the U.S. Senate race, where Sen. Dianne Feinstein is seeking a fifth full term. With only days to go before the formal filing season opens, theres not a single California Republican with any name I.D. who seems prepared to run against her.

If re-elected, the venerable Democrat will almost certainly set the record for the longest Senate tenure of any Californian in history. She won her most recent three races  in 2000, 2006 and 2012  by an average of almost 23 percentage points. The only close contest was her 1994 nail-biter victory over Republican Michael Huffington. No doubt that weighs on the mind of any would-be GOP challenger.

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But 2018 has some unusual markings, none more striking than the challenge mounted by a prominent member of her own party, state Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon. His strategy seems clear: Try to outflank the often centrist, pragmatic-sounding Feinstein by fanning the liberal flames set by Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in 2016 and kept burning by the words and actions of President Trump.

That probably wont work if a Republican with state party support can motivate their base. Republicans desperately need a viable statewide candidate in November to bring out their voters, wrote GOP analyst Tony Quinn in an online column last month.

Its hard for Republicans to win statewide in California if they dont have candidates 

If Republican voters skip the race, Feinstein and De Leon could both advance to November  a replay of the U.S. Senate primary in 2016, although that was caused by a multicandidate field that splintered the GOP vote.

Heres what also is different: Theres no presidential election to bring out voters this November, though Trump has hardly shown his ability to help. He only received votes on 30% of the ballots cast in California in 2016  down from the roughly 40% received by recent Republican candidates for president and governor.

This years race for governor has three visible GOP hopefuls: Orange County Assemblyman Travis Allen, businessman John Cox and former U.S. Rep. Doug Ose of Sacramento County. But what if they split the June vote and Democrats take the top two slots? That, plus a barren Senate race, would mean no Republican standard-bearer come November.

Under that scenario, Quinn argued in his analysis, Republicans could easily lose half the congressional delegation and a third of their legislators to a fired up high turnout Democratic base.

Theres a season for California ballot measures, and this is it 

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That creates the kind of anxiety that motivated Republicans last summer to embrace a novel idea, to put their money and muscle behind a November ballot measure to repeal Californias new gas tax increase. The theory is that an anti-tax vote could fire up the base and tip the scales just enough for the party to hang on to most, or all, of its seats in the House.

Still, a strong Senate candidate couldnt hurt. Not that this unselfish player-to-be-named-later would have much of a chance of actually winning the job. At this point, its hard to see how enough wayward Democrats or unaffiliated independent voters would be persuaded in the fall to shift the balance of power in a legislative body that could decide the fate of the Trump presidency.

And so the question is whether theres a Republican out there with the right resume who also is willing to take one for the team in 2018. If so, he or she needs to step up soon.

john.myers@latimes.com

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Updates on California politicsDemonstrators filled Main Beach in Laguna Beach on Saturday for a rally opposing President Trumps proposal to open Californias coastline to offshore drilling for the first time since 1984.

The protest, which included actor Ted Danson, featured participants holding hands as they formed a line across the sand, was organized by a coalition including activist groups Indivisible OC 48, Oceana, the Surfrider Foundation and Orange County Coastkeeper.

Similar demonstrations took place in Santa Monica and San Diego.Dance the tango, wear beads to a Mardi Gras fest and take in a Year of the Dog celebration. Choices are all over the map for next weekend.

Oceanside

And you thought Valentines was just a day, but Oceanside Valentines Week includes a Sunset Market, a family bike ride and a wine-tasting harbor cruise.

When: Various times from Feb. 8-14

Cost, info: Prices vary by activity. Family friendly. Well-behaved dogs on leash OK in some areas, but not on rides or in some businesses. (800) 350-7873

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Irvine

Attend a thought-provoking conference titled Who Do We Think We Are? American Identity and the Ideal of Democracy in the 21st Century in room EDU 1111 at UC Irvine. Fridays keynote speaker is Jill Lepore, Harvard professor, staff writer at the New Yorker and author of The Secret History of Wonder Woman.

When: Jill Lepore, 4 p.m. Feb. 9. Panels 10 a.m. Feb. 10.

Cost, info: Free. Not suitable for children. Only service dogs permitted. (949) 824-3638

Venice

Wear flashy costumes, put on face paint, find some Mardi Gras beads and dress to parade and party Feb. 10 at the 17th Venice Beach Mardi Gras along the Venice Beach Boardwalk.

When: Pre-party at 10 a.m. at the Venice Ale House; parade at 11:45 a.m.; after-party at 2 p.m. at Surfside Venice. Feb. 10.

Cost, info: Free (food and drinks for purchase). Family friendly. Dogs on leash OK. (310) 745-1064

Santa Monica

Wear undies or a more creative wacky costume for Cupids Undie Run, a mile-ish trot at your own pace. Its a party and fundraiser for the Childrens Tumor Foundation for neurofibromatosis research. The race starts and ends at the Victorian Santa Monica.

When: noon Feb. 10

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Cost, info: Adults 21 and older. $40. No children. No dogs. (847) 636-9976

San Pedro

Celebrate the Year of the Dog by watching traditional dances and listening to cultural storytellers at the Port of Los Angeles Lunar New Year Festival at Crafted at the Port of Los Angeles. Visitors will find crafts and food trucks, and kids can visit the Chinese zodiac petting zoo. Dont miss the fireworks finale.

When: 3 p.m. Feb. 10.

Cost, info: Free. Family friendly. Dogs on leash OK. (310) 732-1270

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Beverly Hills

The seventh celebration of Chinese New Year at the Saban Theatre will feature the Charming Jing Jin Ji variety show, which includes music performances and acrobats.

When: 2 p.m. Feb. 11.

Cost, info: $8 plus fees. Family friendly. Only service dogs permitted. (888) 645-5006

travel@latimes.com

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@latimestravelAs we as a nation grapple with sexual misconduct, we tend to think of this as an earthbound-issue. Its not.

In December, CNN reported on the experiences of four women who said they were sexually assaulted or harassed on commercial airliners.

The problem, CNN reported, appears to be growing.

The incidents included repeated groping and unwanted touching at the hands of a man, the report said.

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Because many incidents of sexual assault or harassment go unreported, the exact number of in-flight occurrences is unclear.

But, CNN said, FBI investigations into midair assaults have increased by 66% from fiscal year 2014 to 2017. The bureau says it opened 63 investigations into sexual assault on aircraft [in 2017], compared with 57 in 2016, 40 in 2015 and 38 in 2014.

One such incident occurred in 2016 on a flight from Dallas to Portland, Ore. A 13-year old girl, traveling as an unaccompanied minor, was sexually assaulted by 26-year-old Chad Cameron Camp who was seated next to her, authorities said. According to the criminal complaint in the case, a flight attendant happened to notice a single tear on the girls cheek. The attendant also noticed Camps hand near the girls crotch, the complaint said.

The girl was immediately reseated in another area of the airplane. Police and FBI agents met the plane and arrested Camp.

Camp subsequently pleaded guilty to assault with intent to commit abusive sexual contact of a minor and to indecent sexual proposal of a minor. As part of a plea agreement, he spent 11 months in jail and six months in home detention. For the next 15 years hell be a registered sex offender.

How do airline employees prevent such incidents? British Airways tried a radical solution. For many years, male passengers on its planes were not assigned seats next to an unaccompanied minor.

If by chance a man ended up sitting beside the child, flight attendants were required to move him to a different seat.

This policy led to a discrimination lawsuit filed by a male passenger who said he felt he had been treated like a pedophile. In 2010, the policy ended. Six years later, British Airways abolished its unaccompanied-minor program.

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Compared with most gathering places, an airborne aircraft is one of the few settings in which the public has no direct access to police or security personnel. In a bar, office building or concert hall, security guards often handle problems until police can respond.

Assaults on buses and trains are dealt with as soon as the conductor stops to allow authorities onboard. On a cruise ship, onboard security officers can lock offenders in a brig until the next port of call.

But an airplane is different. If an assault occurs, it could be hours before the plane lands. Meanwhile, theres no brig. There are no onboard security officers trained to subdue a suspect. (As for air marshals, of the 7,000 or so flights Ive worked as a flight attendant in the last three decades, fewer than 20 flights took off with air marshals onboard.)

Flight attendants are trained in conflict resolution and situational awareness. We routinely separate combatants, calm frayed nerves and identify passengers with a variety of hard-to-read issues. Some of us have been trained to recognize possible human traffickers.

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But theres no blueprint on how to handle claims of in-flight sexual assault. Its an issue we have yet to be thoroughly trained for.

Of the women in the CNN report who said they experienced sexual misconduct on an airliner, one made a striking comment about the crews handling of her ordeal.

I felt like no one, no one that was supposed to be in charge could handle the situation, she was quoted as saying. I kept on feeling  like Im the one who is doing something wrong, and Im not being protected.

At 30,000 feet, the best protection is for crew members to move an accuser as far from a suspect as possible. Ask her to write a detailed account of what transpired. Gather witness statements. Implore the captain to radio ahead so authorities can meet the aircraft.

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To subdue criminally disruptive passengers, able-bodied flight attendants  myself included  have been forced to tackle and subdue suspects.

Its in my best interest as a representative of the airline to know how to deal with sexual misconduct and to address it. Its also in my best interest as a human being. After all, I have a girlfriend, a mother and a sister, all of whom fly commercial airlines, and my 14-year-old niece flies frequently as an unaccompanied minor.

travel@latimes.com

Twitter: @latimestravelRegarding Off to Adventure by Rosemary McClure (Jan. 28): When considering a cruise aboard a small ship, find out if it has some kind of counterbalance or stabilizer system, especially when sailing in rough seas.

Medication can help relieve some seasickness, but just walking around can be dangerous. As the ship lurches in all directions, heavy doors can slam on your hand or fingers, and its easy to fall.

On a recent cruise I took in the seas around Antarctica aboard a 279-foot ship that had 85 to 90 passengers, a woman fell down the stairs and suffered multiple fractures.

We had to sail two days to get to an airstrip where she could be evacuated. I almost flipped over the bar at one point, and my back got slammed against the wall next to my bed.

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Walking on deck in rough seas is forbidden, and educational presentations are canceled. This is not fun.

Randy Kahn

Calabasas

Dangerous act?

I realize that article in Departure Points was written by a high-school student with good intentions (Go Ahead, Take That Step, Jan. 21). Nevertheless, it encourages a dangerous scenario known to every experienced hiker: hiking alone or with strangers you meet in the wilderness. Although the author gives lip service to danger that lurks in the wilderness... and playing it safe, she encourages leaving your hiking companions (in this case, her parents), going off by yourself and trusting people you do not know. Believe me, as a life-long hiker all over the world, this is a recipe for disaster, particularly for a young person. Her naivete is understood, but your publication encourages a dangerous act.

Michael Miller

Los Angeles

travel@latimes.com

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@latimestravelDuring his visit to Mexico City on Friday, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was carefully trying to explain to his counterparts from Mexico and Canada just why the United States efforts to restrict both legal and illegal immigration are not mean-spirited.

Just outside Washington, however, President Trump was holding forth with U.S. Homeland Security officials, complaining about immigrants who are in the country illegally and drugs flooding across the southern border and questioning the commitments of both Mexico and Colombia, which Tillerson plans to visit on Tuesday, to stop the traffic. Perhaps he should just cut off their foreign aid, the president groused.

So much for Tillersons weeklong goodwill tour of the region, as Trumps words inevitably traveled south.

The presidents comments were not helpful, said a senior State Department official who accompanied Tillerson, in rare acknowledgment of the messaging gulf between Trump and his secretary of State.

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It was the latest incident in which Trump has undercut Tillerson, Americas top diplomat, by announcing or simply tweeting policies  or insults  at inopportune moments. Last year, memorably, as Tillerson returned from delicate talks with China about cooperating to confront North Korea, Trump tweeted that Tillerson should stop wasting your time with diplomacy on the matter.

Amid Tillersons talks Friday with Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray and Canadas Chrystia Freeland, Trump spoke at a federal facility in northern Virginia, near Washington, to a roundtable of border and customs agents about illegal immigration and drug trafficking.

And what are Mexico and Colombia and these other countries  what are they doing about it? Nothing, Trump said. When he was told the countries actually were close partners with the United States in policing efforts, Trump replied skeptically, Do you think theyre really trying?

Speaking of the influx of illegal drugs, Trump said, These countries are not our friends. You know, we think theyre our friends and we send them massive aid. And I wont mention names right now, but I look at these countries, I look at the numbers we send them  we send them massive aid and theyre pouring drugs into our country and theyre laughing at us.

I want to stop the aid, Trump added, if they cant stop drugs from coming in.

Diplomats have said that such harsh rhetoric from the president impedes the broader mission of Tillerson and other State Department envoys who seek to build relationships to further the U.S. agenda.

At a news conference after the talks in Mexico City, Tillerson sidestepped a question about how the contradictions between what he and Trump say ultimately make his job more difficult.

Other State Department officials, while carefully avoiding direct reference to Trump, emphasized that it is Tillerson who articulates American foreign policy and who oversees how some immigration policies are shaped. Yet that has not always been the case in the year-old Trump administration. Also, if Tillerson speaks on American policy, and Trump says something else, foreigners are all but certain to accept the presidents version over his aides.

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Tillerson is a respectful person who wants to help those who are in limbo to reach a solution, said Steven Goldstein, undersecretary for public diplomacy and public affairs. He doesnt change his speech, regardless of what might be happening in the world.

Different people speak different ways, but the policy hasnt changed, and the secretary spoke about U.S. foreign policy today, added Goldstein, in remarks to reporters traveling with Tillerson as he flew from Mexico to Saturdays stop in Bariloche, Argentina.

Despite the backdrop of tensions, Videgaray and Freeland lavished praise on Tillerson, though not Trump, with the Canadian foreign minister referring to the American secretary of State as the voice for the respect of international rules.

Mexican officials were apparently so chagrined at Trumps recent rhetoric that they tried at the last minute to conceal who had attended a dinner with Tillerson on Thursday night at the residence of the U.S. ambassador to Mexico, Roberta Jacobson, according to a U.S. official with knowledge of the proceedings. In addition to Videgaray, Mexicos top military brass attended, an unusual twist of protocol.

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Trump, at his meeting at the Border Patrol National Targeting Center in Sterling, Va., seemed surprised to learn that among the countries that have refused to take back deported nationals were China, Guinea and Eritrea.

Those are unusual names, he said, because you normally think in terms of South America.

tracy.wilkinson@latimes.com

For more on international affairs, follow @TracyKWilkinson on TwitterA Florida man has been jailed after allegedly extorting a man for nearly $8,000 over his tryst with a prostitute in Monroe County.

Authorities said John David Golom, 53, of Safety Harbor, was arrested Feb. 1 in Queens, New York, after spending several months on the run.

Investigators said they had been searching for Golom since this past October, but were first tipped off about him in April 2017 when a "john" -- a customer of prostitution services -- came forward saying a person who went by the phony name "Bobby Lupo" was extorting him for cash.

That investigation ended when police couldn't identify Lupo by his true identity or the alleged prostitute the victim had an encounter with, authorities said.

A detective with the Monroe County District Attorney's Office reportedly was able to find Golom during an Oct. 23 prostitution sting operation. Authorities said the detective contacted a woman on a website promoting prostitution and arranged for her to meet a male detective at a Tannersville motel. When the woman agreed to exchange cash for a sex act, she was arrested, police said.

Police then learned of a second woman possibly promoting prostitution in another room of the motel, authorities said, and ordered her and her infant child out of the room. Investigators later obtained search warrants for both rooms, and seized a laptop computer as well as hard drives and thumb drives, authorities said.

Investigators said police were able to match photographs on the computer and the website with one of the women at the hotel.

In interviews with investigators, authorities said, the women revealed Golom met one in Florida when she was homeless, and vowed to take care of her, before telling her to go work at a strip club. He then took any money she earned at the club, police said.

Golom then told the woman to start engaging in prostitution at the strip club and she was eventually fired in doing so, police said. Golom allegedly became "angry" over the firing and began advertising the woman for prostitution services on the website, according to police.

The other woman interviewed told police she responded to an ad placed by Golom for an escort agency. Once hired by Golom, she then began promoting prostitution along with the other woman. She agreed at the time that the money she made -- upward of several hundred daily for sex acts -- would go to Golom, police said.

The homeless woman allegedly was told by Golom if she didn't take money he would "dispose of her," and claimed in court records he was violent toward her. The other woman claimed she was raped by Golom on at least one occasion, according to police.

The pair told police they traveled to Pennsylvania when Golom fled police in a separate charge in Florida.

The "john" in April told investigators he was forced to pay "Bobby Lupo" thousands in hush money over the sexual relationship he had with one of the prostitutes, police said. Golom threatened to reveal the encounters to the man's wife when the prostitute became pregnant with the man's child, police said.

Golom ultimately told the man's wife about the pregnancy anyway, police said.

Police were able to identify the woman during the prostitution sting, and then identified Golom as "Bobby Lupo" through social media photographs matching those found on a seized computer.

Detectives called Golom on Oct. 26 and informed him of the seizure of the electronics, to which he allegedly replied for an officer to "throw them away." Golom also told a detective he was related to the two women at the hotel, but wouldn't say how, according to police.

Police said they learned through cellphone records of alleged prostitution transactions set up by Golom in Florida, New York and Pennsylvania. Further investigations revealed Golom had trafficked the women through a fictitious escort agency in Florida, where he would recruit them to work for him as prostitutes in both strip clubs and the online website, authorities said.

Investigators also learned Golom had been at the Tannersville hotel during the Oct. 23 sting operation but fled during the arrests, police said. Police said he later traveled with the pregnant woman to various areas, including Queens, and had threatened that if she didn't cooperate with him, she wouldn't see her child again.

Golom has been charged with two counts of involuntary servitude, rape, two counts of trafficking in individuals, four counts of promoting prostitution and criminal use of a communications facility, authorities said. All of the charges are felony offenses.

Authorities said Golom was arraigned on the charges before District Judge Daniel Kresge, who set his bail at $500,000. As of Sunday, he remains jailed at the Monroe County jail in lieu of bail.

Authorities said they believe there could be more extortion victims and are continuing their investigation.

Pamela Sroka-Holzmann may be reached at pholzmann@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow her on Twitter @pamholzmann. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.Drivers of Tesla electric vehicles should have have a new place to fuel up, so to speak, in the Lehigh Valley area.

Tesla Motors Inc. proposes one of its Superchargers outside Wawa at 1300 Route 22 in Pohatcong Township. Superchargers offer eight charging stations fed by a bank of four cabinets screened off inside an enclosure.

There are 1,130 Supercharger stations throughout North America. The next closest one to the Phillipsburg area one is the Allentown Supercharger at the Tilghman Square Shopping Center, 4680 Broadway in South Whitehall Township.

Tesla, on its website, also lists several Lehigh Valley area destination charging stations with up to three connections each, at the Lafayette Inn in Easton, Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem and Sayre Mansion in Bethlehem, Human vs. Room Escape Room in Bethlehem Township, Homewood Suites by Hilton in Upper Saucon Township and Hampton Inn outside Clinton in Franklin Township, Hunterdon County.

Tesla's charging stations are for Tesla models only, spokeswoman Kady Cooper said. She declined to comment on the Pohatcong Township plan.

The company is scheduled to appear 7:30 p.m. Feb. 13 before the township land use board for approval of the new Supercharger station, board secretary Wendy Acevedo said.

With board approval, the project is good to go for construction, Pohatcong Mayor James Kern III said.

He sees a need for the new station as electric cars gain in popularity, and with the site's location off Route 22 near Interstate 78.

"This Route 78 corridor is crucial for people commuting from the Lehigh Valley, western New Jersey, toward New York," Kern said.

The Supercharger's power cabinet enclosure and eight charging stations are oriented perpendicular to Route 22, in existing parking spots outside Wawa, a schematic drawing from Tesla Motors shows.

This schematic drawing from Tesla Motors Inc. shows an enclosure with four Supercharger cabinets and eight charging stations oriented diagonally along the bottom, as proposed outside Wawa at 1300 Route 22 in Pohatcong Township. Route 22 runs along the top right in this drawing.

Superchargers are designed to charge up a Tesla in about a half-hour, according to tesla.com. Model S and Model X owners receive 400 kWh of free Supercharger credit annually, enough to drive about 1,000 miles. The cost beyond that is a fraction of that of gasoline, according to the company: about $90 to drive 1,500 miles more, versus $195.

They can be charged in rain or snow. Home charging stations are also available, in addition to Tesla's destination and Supercharger stations.

Kurt Bresswein may be reached at kbresswein@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @KurtBresswein. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.Organizations & Institutions World's leading provider of respiratory care technology opens new office in Dubai Airport Freezone



04.02.2018 06:20:15 -  Irish Minister & DAFZA Director General lead inauguration of Aerogens new facilities



(live-PR.com) - H.E. Dr. Mohammed Al Zarooni, Director General of the Dubai Airport Freezone Authority (DAFZA), has officially inaugurated the new office of Aerogen, a leading provider of acute care aerosol drug delivery for major hospitals in the world, in DAFZA. Joining the Director General were H.E. Jim Daly, Irish Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People; H.E. Paul Kavanagh, - H.E. Dr. Mohammed Al Zarooni, Director General of the Dubai Airport Freezone Authority (DAFZA), has officially inaugurated the new office of Aerogen, a leading provider of acute care aerosol drug delivery for major hospitals in the world, in DAFZA. Joining the Director General were H.E. Jim Daly, Irish Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People; H.E. Paul Kavanagh, Ambassador of Ireland to the UAE and John Power, Founder and CEO of Aerogen, along with other Irish and DAFZA officials. The opening is part of Aerogen's continuing expansion efforts across the Middle East--aiming to ensure the availability of high-performance inhaling devices for healthcare providers in the region.



According to DAFZA, Aerogens new office will serve as a hub for the Middle East to ensure timely delivery of critical healthcare equipment in the region for the treatment of various respiratory illnesses. The opening follows after Ireland expressed its eagerness to drive in a 40 per cent increase in its exports to the UAE--looking to reach AED 8.61 billion before 2020. In view of this, the inauguration of Aerogens new facilities in DAFZA is expected to play a key role in the further consolidation of trade relations between the two countries and to attract more Irish companies to set up businesses in the UAE.



H.E. Dr. Al Zarooni, said during his speech: This is an auspicious start for our latest key partner from Ireland, which embodies our freezones commitment to assembling some of the best names in healthcare in Dubai. The opening of Aerogens new office demonstrates DAFZA's strategy to drive in more foreign direct investments (FDI) across various industries, especially in healthcare, and to also provide key support for the country's economic diversification policy through the achievement of Dubai Plan 2021, which has named the development of a global health system as one of its top priorities. This inauguration provides a timely opportunity for us to celebrate the UAEs blossoming relations with Ireland and share with you how DAFZA can help Irish companies achieve their ambitions and grow beyond their expectations.



He added: We are delighted to include Aerogen among the global members of DAFZAs elite healthcare fraternity. To date, 45 per cent of DAFZAs healthcare customers are multinational companies. Moreover, we are confident that our presence at this year's Arab Health will further reinforce our efforts to support the move to position Dubai as a major national and regional treatment center. We are excited as well to introduce you to opportunities to benefit from, and complement, the objectives of Dubai Health Strategy 2021 and the overarching UAE Vision 2021 development agenda, which aspires to establish a world-class health system. We highly appreciate Aerogens trust in DAFZA as the best place to pursue growth in Dubai, the UAE and the region. We assure you that we will always be within your reach to provide all the necessary support to ensure your success.



In his turn, John Power the founder and CEO of Aerogen, said: "We are pleased to announce the opening of our new regional Middle East office in Dubai based in the Dubai Airport Freezone. Aerogen has taken the decision to expand our Middle East team and open the Dubai office in order to get closer to our customers and support its growth in the Middle East region. Our Dubai office is an integral part of the Aerogen growth strategy and the investment in it demonstrates Aerogens long-term vision to developing and supporting its customers in the Middle East region. We would like to take this opportunity to thank DAFZA for all the help extended to Aerogen during the process of establishing our office within their premises."



The opening ceremony was also attended by several of Irelands senior dignitaries and industry leaders including Padraig Kelly, Private Secretary to the Minister; Joe Breslin, Regional Director, SEMEAI, Enterprise Ireland; Mike Hogan, Regional Manager, MENA, Enterprise Ireland; Dr. Tom Kelly, Divisional Manager, Industrial, Lifesciences and Consumer Products, Enterprise Ireland; Clare Roche, Market Adviser Enterprise Ireland; and Saleh Al Nabulsi, Aerogen Clinical Support Manager Middle East.



Healthcare is among the key sectors for DAFZA as part of its strategic efforts to contribute to the UAEs and the Middle Easts healthcare goals to provide a safe and healthy environment offering high quality services. The UAE, for instance accounts for 26 per cent of the total healthcare spending in the GCC. DAFZA continuously supports global healthcare companies offering their products and services up in the region by providing them with integrated solutions that facilitate their entrance into the region as they set up their offices within DAFZA. The Freezone currently hosts several globally-renowned healthcare players such as Actavis, Johnson & Johnson, Himalaya Drug Company, Terumo Medical Corporation, Roche, and Panasonic Healthcare.



Aerogen is a global leader in high performance aerosol drug delivery--applying intelligence and expertise in the creation and development of breakthroughs in new science aimed at the greater good of patient care. The company is backed by core values centered on its commitment to develop better technology to deliver better patient outcomes. Aerogen has served more than six million patients of all ages in over 75 countries, providing effective treatment and critical care through its pioneering range of aerosol drug delivery technology. The company's diverse portfolio of products includes Aerogen Solo, Aerogen Ultra, Aerogen Pro-X Controller and the Aerogen USB Controller, among others.

Ambassador of Ireland to the UAE and John Power, Founder and CEO of Aerogen, along with other Irish and DAFZA officials. The opening is part of Aerogen's continuing expansion efforts across the Middle East--aiming to ensure the availability of high-performance inhaling devices for healthcare providers in the region.According to DAFZA, Aerogens new office will serve as a hub for the Middle East to ensure timely delivery of critical healthcare equipment in the region for the treatment of various respiratory illnesses. The opening follows after Ireland expressed its eagerness to drive in a 40 per cent increase in its exports to the UAE--looking to reach AED 8.61 billion before 2020. In view of this, the inauguration of Aerogens new facilities in DAFZA is expected to play a key role in the further consolidation of trade relations between the two countries and to attract more Irish companies to set up businesses in the UAE.H.E. Dr. Al Zarooni, said during his speech: This is an auspicious start for our latest key partner from Ireland, which embodies our freezones commitment to assembling some of the best names in healthcare in Dubai. The opening of Aerogens new office demonstrates DAFZA's strategy to drive in more foreign direct investments (FDI) across various industries, especially in healthcare, and to also provide key support for the country's economic diversification policy through the achievement of Dubai Plan 2021, which has named the development of a global health system as one of its top priorities. This inauguration provides a timely opportunity for us to celebrate the UAEs blossoming relations with Ireland and share with you how DAFZA can help Irish companies achieve their ambitions and grow beyond their expectations.He added: We are delighted to include Aerogen among the global members of DAFZAs elite healthcare fraternity. To date, 45 per cent of DAFZAs healthcare customers are multinational companies. Moreover, we are confident that our presence at this year's Arab Health will further reinforce our efforts to support the move to position Dubai as a major national and regional treatment center. We are excited as well to introduce you to opportunities to benefit from, and complement, the objectives of Dubai Health Strategy 2021 and the overarching UAE Vision 2021 development agenda, which aspires to establish a world-class health system. We highly appreciate Aerogens trust in DAFZA as the best place to pursue growth in Dubai, the UAE and the region. We assure you that we will always be within your reach to provide all the necessary support to ensure your success.In his turn, John Power the founder and CEO of Aerogen, said: "We are pleased to announce the opening of our new regional Middle East office in Dubai based in the Dubai Airport Freezone. Aerogen has taken the decision to expand our Middle East team and open the Dubai office in order to get closer to our customers and support its growth in the Middle East region. Our Dubai office is an integral part of the Aerogen growth strategy and the investment in it demonstrates Aerogens long-term vision to developing and supporting its customers in the Middle East region. We would like to take this opportunity to thank DAFZA for all the help extended to Aerogen during the process of establishing our office within their premises."The opening ceremony was also attended by several of Irelands senior dignitaries and industry leaders including Padraig Kelly, Private Secretary to the Minister; Joe Breslin, Regional Director, SEMEAI, Enterprise Ireland; Mike Hogan, Regional Manager, MENA, Enterprise Ireland; Dr. Tom Kelly, Divisional Manager, Industrial, Lifesciences and Consumer Products, Enterprise Ireland; Clare Roche, Market Adviser Enterprise Ireland; and Saleh Al Nabulsi, Aerogen Clinical Support Manager Middle East.Healthcare is among the key sectors for DAFZA as part of its strategic efforts to contribute to the UAEs and the Middle Easts healthcare goals to provide a safe and healthy environment offering high quality services. The UAE, for instance accounts for 26 per cent of the total healthcare spending in the GCC. DAFZA continuously supports global healthcare companies offering their products and services up in the region by providing them with integrated solutions that facilitate their entrance into the region as they set up their offices within DAFZA. The Freezone currently hosts several globally-renowned healthcare players such as Actavis, Johnson & Johnson, Himalaya Drug Company, Terumo Medical Corporation, Roche, and Panasonic Healthcare.Aerogen is a global leader in high performance aerosol drug delivery--applying intelligence and expertise in the creation and development of breakthroughs in new science aimed at the greater good of patient care. The company is backed by core values centered on its commitment to develop better technology to deliver better patient outcomes. Aerogen has served more than six million patients of all ages in over 75 countries, providing effective treatment and critical care through its pioneering range of aerosol drug delivery technology. The company's diverse portfolio of products includes Aerogen Solo, Aerogen Ultra, Aerogen Pro-X Controller and the Aerogen USB Controller, among others. Contact information:

Orient Planet PR & Marketing Communications



P.O.Box. 500266, Dubai, UAE



Contact Person:

Jessy Chami



Phone: 0097144562888

eMail: eMail



Web: http://www.orientplanet.com

Author:

Pratik Karkera

e-mail

Web: http://www.orientplanet.com

Phone: 0097144562888 04.02.2018 06:20:15 -

Disclaimer: If you have any questions regarding information in this article please contact the author. Please do not contact Live-PR.com. We are not able to assist you. Live-PR.com disclaims content contained in this article. Live-PR.com is not authorized to give any information about content and not responsible for content posted by third party.This item is available in full to subscribers.

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Otherwise, click here to view your options for subscribing.A woman who was reported as missing in Humboldt County was found this week in a rather visible place  the reality series "The Bachelor."

Rebekah Martinez, 22, of Fresno, was reported missing on Nov. 18 by her mother, who told the Humboldt County Sheriff's Office that her daughter had gone to the area to work on a marijuana farm.

The North Coast Journal included Martinez in a cover story featuring images of the 35 people listed as missing in Humboldt County on the California Department of Justice's website.

The story titled "The Humboldt 35: Why does Humboldt County have the highest rate of missing persons reports in the state?" was published on Facebook on Thursday in a post that asked readers if they recognized anyone.

Amy Bonner O'Brien of Trinidad was the first to respond on the Facebook post and identify Martinez as a contestant on the current season of "The Bachelor."

"My sister always calls me Sherlock Holmes," O'Brien said. "I was just scrolling through the 35 missing people and I recognized some of them from news stories. When I got to her, I was like wait a minute, she looks so familiar and I instantly thought of 'The Bachelor.'"

O'Brien doesn't regularly tune into "The Bachelor," but on a recent visit to see her sister they watched this season's first episode together.

The North Coast Journal reached out to the Humboldt County Sheriff's Office, who contacted Martinez over the phone and promptly removed her from the missing person's list.

"(The mother) had phone contact with Bekah via a friend on November 12th," said Public Information Officer Samantha Karges. "Bekah had told her she was coming to Humboldt County to work on a marijuana farm and she wouldn't be able to contact her for a week or so."

On "The Bachelor," Martinez got attention for her 14-year age difference with the lead Arie Luyendyk Jr.

She has been actively posting on Instagram and Twitter since she was reported missing and often posts about appearing on the show. When her bizarre story was reported by media on Feb. 2, she tweeted a message referring to the photo used in the missing person's report.

"Honestly the scariest thing about this story is that my efforts to conceal The Worst Drivers License Photo Of All Time have been thwarted," she wrote.

Find more of her Tweets in the gallery at the top of the story.The San Antonio Rampage continued its campaign against breast cancer with its annual Pink in the Rink game Friday night at the AT&T Center.

Decked out in special pink jerseys, which were later auctioned off, Rampage players joined the audience in celebrating breast cancer survivors in the eighth annual event that benefits Susan G. Komen Foundation.1 Nominee withdrawn: The White House has confirmed plans to withdraw the nomination of a climate change skeptic with ties to the fossil fuel industry to serve as President Trumps top environmental adviser. Kathleen Hartnett White was announced in October as Trumps choice to chair the Council on Environmental Quality. The former Texas environmental regulator has said carbon dioxide should be considered the gas of life rather than a pollutant. Carbon dioxide emissions contribute to global warming. Trump himself has called climate change a hoax and has laid the groundwork for withdrawing the U.S. from the Paris climate accords.

2 Murder trial: Two years after a 13-year-old Virginia girl was found stabbed to death, a former Virginia Tech student is going on trial in her killing. David Eisenhauers first-degree murder trial in the 2016 death of Nicole Lovell is to begin Monday in Montgomery County Circuit Court in Christiansburg. Prosecutors say Lovell climbed out her bedroom window in January 2016 to meet Eisenhauer, who was then 18 and a freshman engineering student at Virginia Tech. The two met through social media. Three days later, her body was found just over the state line in North Carolina.It was April 12, 1861 -- almost 157 years ago -- when Confederate forces began shelling Fort Sumter in South Carolina.

Washington Territory was not yet eight years old, and Seattle was but a village on Elliott Bay.

Walla Walla, with 722 inhabitants, was the most populous "city" in the territory.

An unknown number of territorial residents headed east to enlist, mostly for the Union, but some for the Confederacy, according to historylink.org.

The war would eventually envelope nearly 3 million Americans, see 620,000 soldiers killed, and leave a scar across the American landscape that can still be seen today.

In Washington Territory, the issue of slavery was, to some extent, a moot point, but racism was alive and well.

RELATED: Photos: Boeing's war machines through the years

And, despite the territory's inability to participate in federal elections, there were opinions aplenty. Historylink.org reported more than a few here:

"What was of significance to all was the threat that the slavery battle posed to the cohesiveness of the nation. Even before the election of 1860, the Pioneer and Democrat [printed in Olympia] warned: 'It is the firm settled conviction of the public mind that we are approaching, nay, have reached a crisis in political affairs, compared with which all former ones were as gentle gales to the destroying whirlwind" ("The Present Position of the Parties"). But the newspaper left no doubt where its sentiment lay on the core issue: 'no force of argument can dislodge the simple but powerful fact, that the abolition of slavery, except by the lapse of time and the direct destiny of man, could confer no blessings on the white or colored race in American" ("The Present Position of the Parties").'"

On the matter of secession, most Washingtonians wanted no part, historylink.org wrote of the era. Residents of the region hoped for eventual statehood (not to come until 1889), and they wanted it as part of an undivided nation.

RELATED: Photos: The hell that was the Eastern Front of WWII

Over the course of the developing war, Washingtonians, despite mixed feelings on the issue of slavery, generally got behind the Union cause.

Washington Territory residents forced into service joined the First Washington Volunteer Infantry (volunteer being maybe a misnomer there), a unit that never saw battle, aside from something referred to as a massacre of Shoshone Indians, according to historylink.org.

For the most part, the war between the states was a far-off thing that didn't tangibly affect most Washingtonians at the time.The cause of the girl's misbehavior was obvious, the women said. There was a demon inside her, and it needed to come out. It would not do so willingly.

So the women - Peggy LaBossiere, 51, and Rachel Hilaire, 40, of East Bridgewater, Massachusetts - bound the 5-year-old's feet together and tied her hands to a long stick over her head, preventing her from resisting the voodoo ritual that followed, according to a police report obtained by the Enterprise, a Brockton, Massachusetts, newspaper. Then LaBossiere kissed the girl "all around her face like a snake," the report said, then used "a pointy object like a needle" to cut the girl on her arm and around her collar, drawing blood.

Then came the burning.

LaBossiere blew flames from a burning stick over the girl's face. She also put oils and at least one caustic chemical on the girl's head and in her eyes, causing a burn that doctors say will cause permanent disfigurement, the police report said.

LaBossiere also allegedly worked voodoo on the girl's 8-year-old brother. When he resisted, she threatened to cut his head off with a machete, police said, according to the Associated Press. LaBossiere made him undress and rubbed his entire body with a "plant-like substance and blew fire on him."

It's unclear what caused the police in East Bridgewater, about 25 miles south of Boston, to ultimately intervene, but when they arrived, both children smelled of smoke, the AP said. They were taken to a hospital.

LaBossiere and Hilaire are both charged with assault after being arrested in mid-January. Hilaire is accused of aiding in the ritual by holding the children down.

The children's mother, a hairdresser who has LaBossiere as a client, was not charged, although she was taken to a mental hospital for evaluation. The children were taken into custody by child welfare authorities, police told the AP.

All the people involved are of Haitian descent, including the children's mother. The public defender for LaBossiere and Hilaire could not immediately be reached for comment.

The siblings had been told they were going to LaBossiere's house for a sleepover.

According to the AP, the women told authorities they've performed "cleansing baths" for friends and family for years. During such practices, they chant prayers and rub eucalyptus oils, frankincense, myrrh and sea salt on people's bodies.

Burns are a part of the rituals, the sisters told authorities, saying they happen as evil spirits are leaving the body.

Hilaire and LaBossiere remain jailed. They have another hearing Wednesday, which will determine if they will be a danger to the public if released.

Long a popular horror movie trope, voodoo is an Afro-Caribbean religion that originated in Haiti but is practiced in many countries in the Western Hemisphere.

It started with slaves who combined aspects of their West African traditions with the Catholicism they were forced to adopt by their masters, according to Live Science.

As The Washington Post's Sarah Kaplan wrote in 2015:

"The faith ... is revered for its role in Haitian's successful struggle for independence from French rule. Like Christianity, voodoo has one God, but in practice the religion bears much more resemblance to the traditions of the West African slaves who founded it: Spells are cast, animals are sacrificed, one of the religion's 401 spirits are invited to possess followers at raucous, colorful ceremonies."

But aspects of the religion have been appropriated and distorted for horror movies or to sell voodoo dolls, potions and broomsticks to tourists.

In 2015, The Post's Karen Tumulty reported that former president Bill Clinton had written about a day he and Hillary Clinton saw voodoo in practice near Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital.

The priest gave the visitors what Clinton described as a "brief course in voodoo theology," and then the late-afternoon ceremony began.

"After several minutes of rhythmic dancing to pounding drums, the spirits arrived, seizing a woman and a man," Bill Clinton wrote. "The man proceeded to rub a burning torch all over his body and walk on hot coals without being burned.

"The woman, in a frenzy, screamed repeatedly, then grabbed a live chicken and bit its head off. Then the spirits left and those who had been possessed fell to the ground."PEORIA, Ariz. - At their final debate, shortly before early ballots went out, five of the Republicans running to represent Arizona's 8th Congressional District tackled their most divisive issue.

Which of them had done the most to support President Donald Trump?

"I'm the only one standing here to support President Trump in the primary," said former Republican legislator Phil Lovas.

"I've defended him in National Review; I've defended him in the Daily Caller; I've said his energy policies give conservatives reasons to cheer," said former corporation commissioner Bob Stump.

"I was a Trump delegate," said former state senator Steve Montenegro. "I've been on national media, in English and in Spanish, to explain why what he's doing is right."

The battle to replace Trent Franks, who resigned last year after urging a female staff member to become a surrogate mother for his child, has turned less on any traditional conservative issue than on who would best defend the president and enact his agenda.

Republican primaries, which once demanded that candidates please a constellation of interest groups and answer every conservative questionnaire, have increasingly become about the agenda of one man. Trump critics inside the GOP, such as Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., Gov. John Kasich, R-Ohio, and Mitt Romney, hold outsized roles in the national political debate. But the candidates bidding for Republican votes can't praise Trump enough.

"President Trump is very popular here, and it's because he's doing a good job," said former state senator Debbie Lesko, another contender for the seat. "I think it's important that we tell voters that we support the president's plans, because some people don't."

In December, when Franks resigned his seat in Phoenix's western suburbs, 12 Republicans jumped in to replace him. The 8th Congressional District, a stretch of resorts, retirement communities, and middle-class neighborhoods, had given 58 percent of the vote to Trump. Franks, one of the most conservative members of the House, had always won by landslides.

Trump, in the 2016 primary, had won handily, but with most Republican voters picking another candidate. He ran behind Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, with Mormon voters; he lost some suburban voters to Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Kasich. That November, Flake and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., had refused to vote for Trump, and he came closer to losing the state than any party nominee in 20 years.

That was then. Now, in Arizona, the president's magnetic pull has been strong enough to make Joe Arpaio, a former sheriff pardoned by Trump, a contender in this year's U.S. Senate primary. At a recent party meeting in Phoenix, candidates down the ballot introduced themselves as Trump allies, and activists gathered petition signatures - one from Arpaio himself - to put the party on record in favor of releasing a congressional memo that they say exonerates the president in the probe of Russian meddling in 2016.

"They all become Trump people at election time," Arpaio said in a short interview.

The fastest-selling item at a merchandise table was a blue hat with the Trump-inspired slogan "Make America a S---hole: Vote Democrat." Rep. Martha McSally, R-Ariz., the Tucson-area Republican who just entered the race for Flake's seat, seemingly renounced her pre-election criticism of Trump.

"I made a couple of, a very small number of statements about particular statements that were made, and on the spectrum of things, it was very measured compared with a lot of other Republicans," she told the Los Angeles Times at the convention.

In the 8th District, the contenders run along a similar spectrum. Lovas, the former Trump chairman for Arizona, has framed his entire campaign around the president. Lawn signs reproduce a photo of the president and the candidate giving thumbs up; Lovas' logo reproduces the blue and white Trump logo, with his own name swapped in for the president. Campaign materials call him "an unwavering leader who will stand with our president as he makes America great again," and remind voters he was "with Trump at the start," when it was not easy.

Montenegro, who originally backed Cruz for president, has a different pro-Trump resume; he is with him on the issues, and he's defended him on TV. Last year, the week that the administration pardoned Arpaio, Montenegro appeared on CNN to debate Jorge Ramos, smiling as the Univision host accused him of selling out.

"Sheriff Arpaio discriminated against thousands of Latinos," said Ramos, asking how an immigrant from El Salvador, like Montenegro, could support Trump.

"I do remember that I'm an immigrant myself," said the former senator. "This narrative that the left tries to push, that Republicans are racist - look, if you're watching at home and you think you're seeing a white Republican, you need to adjust your screen."

In an interview, after a party for volunteers at his spartan family home in Goodyear, Montenegro didn't say whether the exposure had helped him. "We didn't know that this race would be happening when I went on TV last year," he said. "It was just the right thing to do. It's what I've been doing. We, as Republicans, have been able to articulate the constitutional conservative message in English and in Spanish."

Stump, a conservative journalist who jumped into politics in his 20s, had the tougher sell. As in the debate, he admits it: He had not supported Trump. In his defense, it was because he worried that the president was not conservative enough.

"This was a candidate who'd donated to Democrats, who'd dabbled with the Reform Party and who, I thought, would throw the election to Hillary Clinton," Stump said in an interview. "I have been pleasantly surprised, and I tell everyone who asks that I've been pleasantly surprised."

Stump still differed from his competition with a policy critique. The president, he said, was wrong to put a tariff on solar panels - but that's about it. And having vetted his Trump supporters, opponents had already moved on to attacking him for ditching his first name - Christopher - when he began a career in politics among Republicans who remember a long-serving and deceased politician named Bob Stump.

For the rest of the field, Trump's policies are untouchable, even if - as on DACA, or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals - they change from week to week. Democrats, who are bearish on their chances in the district, ask if the dynamics can help move some votes. Hiral Tipirneni, the physician who is favored to win the party's nomination this month, said in an interview that she would run against the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act over its minor effect on small businesses and the risk of cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

Republicans had a simpler case to make: Things were going well, so long as nobody got in Trump's way. Every candidate had a version of Trump's promise to "drain the swamp." Richard Mack, a retired sheriff who had run as both a Libertarian and Republican - and who had won his other races far outside the district - said that he jumped into the race because the cluster of "mainstream candidates" made it winnable. His campaign manager nearly got Jim Gilchrist, the former leader of the border-patrolling Minuteman Project, over the top in a California primary.

Over lunch at Applebee's, Mack struggled to think of a problem with the Trump administration. So much had gone right after eight scary years when Barack Obama threatened to "disarm" Americans and shred their rights.

"Out of all the presidents that I've ever known, he's done the most in his first year," said Mack, an NRA Hall of Fame member who carries a Constitution in his shirt pocket. "The economy has been amazing. I'd only complain that he hasn't drained the swamp enough. Jeff Sessions is not a swamp drainer. We still have rogue federal judges, committing crimes."

Mack pondered the question again. "And we need to abolish the IRS."WASHINGTON - Reince Priebus, the former White House chief of staff, said Sunday that he "never felt that the president was going to fire the special counsel," disputing a report in The Washington Post that he was "incredibly concerned" that President Donald Trump was moving to fire Robert Mueller III last summer.

"I never heard that," Priebus said on NBC's "Meet the Press." Pressed on whether he was aware of the president's views on the issue, Priebus said Trump was "clear" about what he saw as Mueller's conflicts of interest in the job and allowed that others may have "interpreted that" as Trump's desire to fire Mueller.ROME - A man draped in Italy's tricolor flag wounded at least six "people of color" in a drive-by shooting in a central Italian city Saturday before being detained, authorities said. The suspect had been a candidate for the anti-immigrant Northern League party in municipal elections last year, according to a party spokeswoman.

The suspect's motive in the shootings in Macerata was not known, but a young Italian woman was gruesomely murdered in the city this past week, allegedly by a Nigerian immigrant, prompting a wave of anger in a nation where many were already seeking to reduce the entry of migrants.

The attack's connection to the Northern League was likely to unsettle Italy as it approaches national elections March 4. Far-right groups have been gaining in the polls, and the Northern League looks as though it may have a chance to govern as a junior member of a coalition with other right-wing parties.

A police spokesman said 28-year-old Luca Traini was detained near Macerata's central war memorial early Saturday afternoon. A handgun was in the suspect's car, and the green-white-and-red flag of Italy was tied around his shoulders, the official said. Traini admitted his guilt as he was arrested, added the spokesman, who declined to be publicly identified under ground rules set by the force. The five men and one woman who were shot were expected to recover, Macerata Mayor Romano Carancini said.

Local news outlets said the man was detained after he stepped out of his black Alfa Romeo 147 near the memorial, gave a fascist salute, and shouted "Italy for the Italians." It was not clear whether the victims were Italian citizens.

After the attack, Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni called on political leaders on all sides to stop a "cycle of violence."

"Let's stop this risk, let's stop it now, let's stop it together," he said in a nationally televised statement from his residence, the Palazzo Chigi, in Rome. "Hate and violence won't be able to divide us."

Large numbers of migrants began sailing across the Mediterranean toward Italy after Libya plunged into lawlessness and civil war following the 2011 downfall of Libyan dictator Moammar Gaddafi. More than 620,000 migrants, many of them African, have arrived in Italy since the beginning of 2014, contributing to a growing sense among Italians that the country was taking in far more people than it could handle.

Anti-immigrant sentiment has become a main theme in the campaign leading up to next month's elections. Northern League leader Matteo Salvini has vowed to expel 150,000 immigrants from Italy and close the country's borders to most new arrivals.

The murder in Macerata this past week of 18-year-old Pamela Mastropietro drew national attention to the city of 43,000 and added fuel to the debate on migration. On Wednesday, her dismembered remains were found packed into two suitcases. A 29-year-old Nigerian man, Innocent Oseghale, was charged with her murder.

"What was this maggot still doing in Italy? He wasn't fleeing war, he brought war to Italy," Salvini wrote on Facebook on Thursday.

The suspect in Saturday's shooting ran as a Northern League candidate last June for a seat on the municipal council of Corridonia, a town of 15,000 people just south of Macerata, according to a Northern League spokeswoman who spoke on condition that her name not be used.

"Violence is never the solution, violence must always be condemned. And those who are wrong need to pay," Salvini wrote on Facebook on Saturday after the Northern League connection to the attack became clear. "Out-of-control migration brings chaos, rage, social clashes. Out-of-control migration brings drug-dealing, rapes, thefts and violence."

He did not further address the alleged assailant's connections to his party.

During the campaign, Salvini visited Corridonia and met with local candidates,according to the town's center-left mayor, Paolo Cartechini, although it was not immediately clear whether the suspected shooter was present. The mayor said in an interview that last year's campaign focused on the same issues that were being debated nationally, including immigration, but that the Northern League politicians did not use violent rhetoric.

One of Traini's longtime acquaintances said the suspect gradually radicalized over at least six years. Traini would openly give the stiff-armed fascist salute and complain about African immigrants in the town, using a highly offensive term for them, said Francesco Clerico, who owns the gym where Traini trained for a decade. Clerico said the 28-year-old was stripped of his gym membership in October because of his views.

"It was very hard for him to relate to others," Clerico said. "More than a criminal, he's an individual with psychological problems."

Asked about the shootings at a news conference earlier Saturday, before it became clear that a former Northern League candidate was the suspect, Salvini said that "whoever shoots is a criminal, no matter the skin color," adding that "uncontrolled" migration leads to clashes, according to Italy's ANSA news agency.

The Northern League's opponents seized on the killing as evidence that the right-wing party's rhetoric was stirring violence and division within Italian society.

"What happened today in Macerata demonstrates that inciting hatred and excusing fascism, as Salvini does, has consequences," said Laura Boldrini, the president of the lower house of Italian parliament and a member of the left-wing Free and Equal alliance of parties.

The mayor of Macerata said the city had been unsettled by Mastropietro's slaying this week, which added to an already-tense discussion of migration.

"Everything that happened between the death of Pamela and today was fanning the flames of hate between people," said the mayor, Romano Carancini, of the center-left Democratic Party, in an interview. "It could have caused individuals who might not be entirely balanced to commit crimes like this."

- - -

Birnbaum reported from Brussels.SANAA, Yemen - The 3-year-old Yemen conflict has largely been cast as a war that pits an internationally recognized government against Iranian-backed rebels who ousted it from the capital and now also control much of the north.

But fighting in the southern Yemeni city of Aden over the past week revealed the extent to which Yemen's war is also driven by other historic grievances that could pose serious obstacles to negotiating an end to the conflict, according to Yemeni and Western analysts.

Over several days, southern separatists battled their estranged partners - forces loyal to ousted President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi - and briefly seized control of Aden. Both sides belong to the same alliance led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which is fighting the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in an effort to restore Hadi to power.

The battles in Aden have exposed the fragility of that alliance and highlighted the diverging agendas of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The separatists, known as the Southern Transitional Council (STC), have long sought to restore the independent state of South Yemen, which existed before Yemen was unified in 1990. They have long been suspicious of the northern-based central government in Sanaa, which Hadi presided over, accusing it of corruption and undermining the south.

The violence, said analysts, is a reflection of these long-simmering tensions.

"It shows how the war has shattered the country, fracturing it along historical divides," said April Longley Alley, a senior Yemen analyst for the International Crisis Group. "The narrative of a 'legitimate government' fighting the 'Iranian-backed Houthis' obscures a complex local reality, and it hinders efforts to achieve peace."

The infighting within the alliance intensified the despair in the Middle East's poorest nation. More than three dozen people died in last week's clashes, adding to the war's death toll of more than 10,000, mostly civilians killed by Saudi-led coalition airstrikes. Millions more are suffering from hunger and disease in what aid agencies describe as one of the world's most dire and forgotten humanitarian crises.

Yemen's war began in the spring of 2015, after the Houthis seized the capital, Sanaa, and forced Hadi and his government to flee south to Aden. Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Muslim countries entered the conflict largely to prevent their regional rival, Iran, a Shiite Muslim theocracy, from projecting its influence along their borders by backing the Houthis.

Hadi had come to power after his predecessor, Ali Abdullah Saleh, who ruled the country for more than three decades, was himself forced to step down after a populist revolt, part of the Arab Spring uprisings. When Hadi was chased out of Sanaa, he set up a government in exile in Aden with the backing of the Saudis and Emiratis, even though he has presided mostly from the Saudi capital, Riyadh.

Many southerners had expected the Hadi government to improve their lives. But over the past three years, Hadi has struggled to exert political authority or bolster the economy. Aden has been shaken by suicide bombings and other violence, staged by al-Qaida's Yemeni branch as well as by a nascent Islamic State affiliate.

"Very little has been done to stabilize the situation and get things working again," said Gerald Feierstein, a former U.S. ambassador to Yemen. "People have gotten increasingly frustrated there."

The trigger for the past week's clashes was the expiration of a deadline set by the separatists for Hadi to dismiss his government. They accused the government, run day-to-day by Prime Minister Ahmed Obaid bin Daghr, of corruption and mismanagement. After the separatists took control of much of Aden, Hadi's officials were confined inside the presidential palace, and some contemplated fleeing the city.

Amid these divisions in the alliance, there are "real questions about the viability or the credibility of the Hadi government and what exactly do they represent sitting at the other side of the table," said Feierstein.

"These are the kinds of issues that are going to make rebuilding Yemen difficult," he added. "In the immediate term, it complicates efforts to revive the political process."

Further imperiling the chances for a political settlement is a separate set of divisions within the Iranian-backed alliance. Late last year, the Houthis had a falling out with the influential former president Saleh, who had aligned himself with them, and they killed him. That raised questions about whether the Houthis have the desire or will to negotiate an end to the conflict.

A day after the southern separatists surrounded the presidential palace in Aden, Saudi Arabia and the UAE sent delegates to defuse the animosities and put in place a cease-fire.

Saudi Arabia is the main backer of the pro-Hadi forces. The UAE is the main supporter of the separatists, training them and working closely with them in fighting both the Houthis and Islamic extremists.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE have other differences as well. Saudi Arabia, Alley said, is closely aligned with an influential Yemeni party, Islah, which has historic links to the Muslim Brotherhood. (The party recently announced that it had severed links to the Brotherhood.) The UAE, for its part, opposes Islah.

Yet despite the tensions, it is highly unlikely that Saudi Arabia and the UAE will part ways over Yemen. Both countries share the belief that the Houthis and Iran pose an existential threat to the region.

The southern separatist group, Alley added, "is on a collision course with the pro-unity Hadi government and has been for some time. Now what we see is the UAE and [Saudi Arabia] scrambling to paper over differences between the two so that they can maintain, at least while the war with the Houthis continues, the myth of a unified front under an internationally recognized government."

In Aden, many residents view the UAE's growing presence suspiciously and worry the country could seek economic gain by trying to control Yemen's ports, especially Aden, which is nestled beside key shipping lanes.

"The Emirates has ambitions in the south, and one of its most important ambitions is the port of Aden," said Hassan Aljalal, a Yemeni journalist. "And its support for the southern movement shows this ambition."

Hesham Alghannam, a Saudi researcher at the University of Exeter, said the violence in Aden was an indictment of Yemen's exiled government, which should "submit its resignation if it is unable to manage the battle against the Houthis and provide services to the citizenry at the same time."

The authorities had received several billion dollars of aid from the Saudi-led coalition, and "where did the money go?" Alghannam said. The coalition, he added, also needed to put more pressure on the government to "deliver for the people."

As for the southerners and their hopes for independence, "they must wait until things become clear," Alghannam said. Despite their apparently conflicting approaches to the south, the UAE and the Saudis were in agreement over the need to tamp down any moves toward secession, he said.

"You cannot start another war in the south. It would be a contradiction for the Arab coalition," he said, adding that, by resorting to violence, the pro-secession forces were, "knowingly or not, serving the Houthis."

- - -

The Washington Post's Kareem Fahim contributed to this report from Riyadh.The hardest thing for writers is staring at a blank screen. In yesteryears, the blank screen was the white page lodged between the platen roller and carriage of an old Smith-Corona looking like Moby Dick to Captain Ahab.

Deep in the West Side, I discovered a writer who claimed to be chronicling the entire history of the West Side with all its denizens: paleta vendors, tavern owners, shoe shop repairmen, plus the elixirs inside botanicas  all told from a phantasmagorical point of view.

When we met, Julian Jay Garcia showed me crates and crates bulging with handwritten yellow legal pads bursting with squiggly letters, crossed-out words and marginalia.

Its all there. Countless drafts. Aborted beginnings. All of it. His magnum opus is tentatively titled The History of the West Side.

COMMENTARY: Penca Books a chapter to highlight in West Side's literary history

Its my 5,000-page memoir, he adds. And Im not even halfway.

I was reminded of Joseph Mitchell, who wrote a New Yorker profile piece, Professor Seagull, about Joe Gould, a Harvard-educated recluse who was writing the oral history of the world. Mitchell estimated Joes manuscript contained 9,000,000 words, all in longhand.

But Joe Gould didnt grow up on the West Side of San Antonio.

Jay didnt have billionaire parents with tax-sheltered annuities and hidden accounts in the Cayman Islands. He lived in a dilapidated house on Tampico Street with his grandparents, a block from Cooper Junior High. The small house had curtains dividing rooms, and his quarters were close to the outdoor privy.

Jay worked early in life, shining shoes, washing dishes at downtown restaurants, and caring for his grandparents.

How do you explain your passion for writing? I asked him.

Lots of paperbacks and comics. A life without a telephone, not even a TV, much less the luxury of radios, Jay said. We were dirt poor.

RELATED: Westfort could be San Antonio's next historic district

My next door neighbor had a radio near his bedroom window tuned to Jalapeno KEDA radio with Guero Polkas blasting conjunto music in the mornings. In the evenings the radio was tuned to KUKA that played Chicano music with Sunny Ozuna and the Royal Jesters, he adds.

His imagination produced full-blown stories about rejected love, abandoned families and street vendors hawking their goods down alleys. Even though Jay went to school to learn the auto mechanic trade, that was not his calling.

After graduation from high school, Jay enrolled at Our Lady of the Lake University, graduating with a bachelors degree in education and later earning a masters at UTSA with further studies at Texas State University.

Along the way, Jay honed his writing skills while writing short fiction and bad poetry. Since retiring from teaching, Jay has maintained a daily regimen that includes getting up at 4 a.m. to write until his stomach growls for his favorite breakfast at his neighborhood fast-food restaurant. He takes his laptop and begins the editing process.

Writing drafts and getting rejections are part of the writing vocation.

Ive been rejected by the best. The New Yorker, Atlantic Monthly, Harpers, you name it. But Ive also gotten published in literary magazines and journals, he adds.

Jay cited Victor Villasenors Burro Genius, a memoir about the struggles a writer with dyslexia had to endure to become a successful author. According to Jay, Villasenor garnered 289 rejections.

I cant let that deter me, he adds.

After a while, Jay pointed to his watch and said my time was up because he had to resume his battle against the white screen.

I bid a hearty farewell to Captain Ahab and told him not to be swallowed up by his magnum opus.

Rafael Castillo teaches English and humanities at Palo Alto College and is director of publications and special projects for Catch the Next Inc.The White House is seeking a 72 percent cut to clean energy research.

This move falls squarely under the huh? category even if Congress is unlikely to go along with the budget request, reported first by the Washington Post.

Last year, Congress rejected the Trump administrations request for a two-thirds cut in spending to the Energy Departments Office of Energy Efficient and Renewable Energy. The Energy Department is run by former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who has largely gone along with the presidents preference for fossil fuels, particularly coal, which Trump describes as beautiful and clean.

It, of course, is neither of those things. Among its emissions: sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, particulates, carbon dioxide, mercury and other heavy metals. Trump has promised to revive the coal industry, but the main culprit for its demise is the availability of cheaper natural gas. In fact, natural gas is one of those fossil fuels that the administration now wants to emphasize over wind and solar energy generation. Furthering that goal, Trump earlier announced tariffs on foreign solar panels.

Texas is, by any measure, a fossil fuel state. It is a driver of the states economy. But even this state has embraced wind and solar energy generation. All of the above (except for coal) is a good strategy, and one this administration should follow. Congress should again reject this cut.Paul Elizondo, 82, has been a political fixture in San Antonio for decades, serving on the Bexar County Commissioners Court since the 1980s. Hes seeking an unprecedented 10th term on the court, but this primary he faces two dynamic challengers in Queta Rodriguez and Mario Bravo.

Rodriguez is the countys veterans service officer who retired as a captain from the U.S. Marine Corps. Bravo works for the Environmental Defense Fund, has worked on numerous political campaigns and is outspoken about improving health outcomes and making Bexar County more transparent.

Both speak with a sense of urgency about addressing festering economic and health disparities in District 2. They have energy and passion in abundance.

Urgency is an admirable trait. But so is experience and accomplishment in county government. And thats what sets Elizondo apart from his challengers.

Elizondo, viewed by many as the countys budget guru, has spent much of his lengthy career working to improve health and economic disparities in this community.

He was an important player in the expansion of University Health Systems trauma center, the renovation of the Robert B. Green campus as well as the forthcoming Women & Childrens Inpatient Tower at the South Texas Medical Center.

In the past, Elizondo has played a key role in addressing flood control issues across the county, and he has been responsive to addressing shoddy and unpaved county roads.

For decades, he has been involved in every big county decision; and hes also been instrumental in streamlining operations and creating a county manager position.

If elected, Elizondo has said this will be his last term. He has said he would like to see several large projects through fruition such as the transformation of the San Pedro Creek into a walkable linear park and the renovation of the long moribund Alameda Theater downtown.

His experience could also prove invaluable as the region pursues a potentially transformative transit plan.

Born in 1935, Elizondo is a former Marine. Hes also a former teacher, band director and music supervisor at the Edgewood and San Antonio independent school districts.

He served in the Texas House from 1979 to 1982. He was first elected to represent Precinct 2 in 1983.

He remains sharp on the issues, has the pulse of the entire community and is deeply involved in county government.

There will be a time when San Antonio politics and Elizondo arent synonymous, but we dont believe this primary is the right moment. While Rodriguez and Bravo are outstanding candidates, we recommend Elizondo in the Democratic primary for Precinct 2.A young boy is in critical condition after authorities say he was thrown out of a truck on Route 3 in Weymouth Saturday night.

State Police say the man driving the car, a 34-year-old Weymouth man, was under the influence of drugs during the accident.

Florian Roshi of Weymouth was driving his Ford F-250 truck on Rte. 3 in Weymouth when he grazed a guardrail and veered back into traffic around 10 p.m.

The 4-year-old child, who police say was unrestrained in the truck, was then thrown out.

"Preliminary investigation by State troopers indicates that the boy was not restrained in the vehicle as required by law," State Police said in a statement.

The boy was taken to Children's Hospital with life-threatening injuries, State Police said.

There was an 8-year-old boy also in the truck. He was not hurt. Authorities have not said if Roshi is the father of both boys.

Troopers determined Roshi was under the influence of drugs at the time of the accident.

Roshi is facing charges of driving under the influence of drugs, child endangerment and other motor vehicle charges.A 43-year-old man was killed in an officer-involved shooting in Reading Saturday after police responded to a Main Street location for a report of an assault.

Reading police responded to a home on Main Street around 3:45 p.m. after they were told the 43-year-old man was assaulting another person inside, the Middlesex County District Attorney's Office said.

When police arrived, the man was no longer at the residence. Police were familiar with the location already after they responded to another report of a fight Friday night involving the same man.

The same man ran from the scene Friday night as well, police said.

Officers found the door to the home was dead-bolted from the inside Saturday night. Officers were able to get inside, but the man was gone, authorities said.

Police searched for the man and around 4:33 p.m., there were shots fired in the area of 1400 Main St. A Reading police officer shot the 43-year-old man, the district attorney's office said.

The man was taken to an area hospital where he was pronounced dead. His name has not been released.

The officer was treated at a hospital, then released.

The district attorney's office along with State Police and Reading Police continue to investigate the shooting.An Israeli national pleaded guilty to federal drug and money laundering charges after authorities say he tried to have $2.5 million worth of cocaine sent to Israel through Boston.

Jalal Altarabeen, who is also known as Glal El Tarbin, Jalal Salamah, and Abu Rasheed, 34, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to possess with intent to distribute and to distribute more than five kilograms of cocaine and six counts of international money laundering.

Sentencing is scheduled for April 13. Altarabeen was extradited from Poland after he was indicted with another suspect last year.

The U.S. Attorney's Office said from October 2015 through April 20, 2016, Altarabeen and his cohort conspired in Boston, Colombia, Poland, and elsewhere to distribute 50 kilograms of cocaine and to launder money internationally.

"They also negotiated to buy 50 kilograms of cocaine from an undercover officer posing as a drug trafficker," authorities said. "The undercover officer's relationship with the co-conspirator began in 2008 and included a meeting in Nicosia, Cyprus."

The men agreed to pay the undercover officer $50,000 per kilogram to have the cocaine delivered to Israel. The undercover officer said the cocaine would be delivered from Colombia to Boston and then to Israel.

Altarabeen sent six wire transfers from Turkey in the amount of just under $1 million as a payment. The money was sent to a bank account in Boston, investigators said.

The remaining $1.5 million would be paid after the 50 kilograms of cocaine was delivered.A hospital in Massachusetts has banned children from visiting patients in light of the flu season.

Winchester Hospital in Winchester, Massachusetts posted the new visitor policy Friday night in a Facebook post.

Children ages 13 and under are not allowed to visit patients in the hospital because of the flu season.

"Patients, particularly pregnant women and children, can get very sick from visitors who may only have mild flu systems," the hospital wrote.

Anyone showing signs of fever, cough, sore throat, runny nose or nasal congestion are also banned from visiting.SOUTH HADLEY - Police and Northwestern District Attorney David E. Sullivan's Office are investigating a shooting that happened at Anthony's club early Sunday morning.

The shooting happened at about 1:30 a.m. near the adult club at 500 New Ludlow Road, said Mary Carey, spokeswoman for the Northwestern District Attorney's Office.

At least one person was injured. Carey described the crime as a "non-fatal shooting."

Massachusetts State Police assigned to the Northwestern District Attorney's Office and South Hadley Police are investigating the shooting.

Carey did not release any other details about the shooting.

This is a breaking story. Masslive will update as more information becomes available.QUINCY - A Quincy man is facing child rape charges after being accused of assaulting multiple children at an unlicensed daycare center operated out of his home, according to The Patriot Ledger.

Adalberto H. Freitas, 67, is charged with multiple counts of rape of a child by force and indecent assault and battery on a child under 14. He pleaded not guilty to the charges in Quincy District Court on Tuesday.

Authorities say Freitas, who is a Brazilian immigrant, ran an illegal daycare center with his wife out of their apartment at 105 Copeland St., Apt. 105.

He was arrested after two girls--one 12-years-old and the other 10-years-old-- told their parents that he had been molesting them for four years.

Court records apparently show that as many as four children could have been abused, the paper reports.

The Department of Early Education and Care (EEC) is now investigating the alleged incidents.

Kathleen Hart, spokeswoman for the EEC, told The Ledger that the agency "received a report of a possible unlicensed child care program operating at 10 Copeland Street in Quincy and is investigating this matter along with the Department of Children and Families."

Freitas is being held after a judge set his bail at $50,000.

He is scheduled to reappear in court on Feb. 28.A Russian warplane was shot down while on patrol over an area of northern Syria's Idlib province on Saturday, according to the New York Times.

The plane's pilot parachuted out, surviving the initial attack, but was located and killed by rebel militia once on the ground, Russia's Defense Ministry said.

The incident took place in one of the state's alleged "de-escalation zones"-- areas created by Russia, Turkey, and Iran in 2017 as a means of reducing conflict throughout the country.

The plane, a Russian Su-25, was hit by a missile, which caused it to fall out of the sky.

The province where the incident occurred is controlled by a number of different insurgent factions-- including the Free Syrian Army, which has received considerable funding from the CIA.

The identity of the pilot that was killed has not yet been released to the public.

Russian lawmakers have promised an investigation into the incident, with some criticizing the U.S. for supplying weapons to the rebels.

"We have warned that the Americans will deliver such equipment, and they cannot control it later," Aleksei Chepa, a member of the State Duma, told the Times.

The Syrian civil war began in 2011, becoming a conflict that lasted over half a decade. Multiple foreign nations--including the U.S. and Russia--would become involved in the funding of opposing combatants within the country, leading some to call it a "proxy war."

The CIA rebel-funding program was allegedly halted in 2017, and Russia withdrew the majority of its troops from the country in December after Vladimir Putin declared their mission accomplished.

Video of the flaming wreckage of the plane was posted over social media Saturday, apparently by some of the rebels.SPRINGFIELD - A woman and a man were arrested on multiple drug charges after police broke up what is being described as a heroin manufacturing, distribution and production center in the Old Hill section of the city.

The raid netted an estimated $17,000 worth of illegal opioids, including 61 grams of raw heroin which could have been turned into 3,000 bags of drugs to be sold on the street, said Ryan Walsh, Springfield Police spokesman.

The police Narcotics Unit under the direction of Capt. Brian Keenan and Sgt. Christopher Hitas raided a first floor apartment at 691 State St. Friday afternoon. Along with the raw heroin, they also allegedly confiscated 141 prepared bags of heroin, cocaine and $2,500 in cash, he said.

Israel Silva-Guzman and Angelie Cabrera were arrested in the raid and charged with heroin trafficking, possession of heroin with the intent to distribute, possession of cocaine, possession of ammunition without a permit and violation of a drug free school zone, he said.

Walsh did not release the age or address of either suspect.

The two are expected to be arraigned in Springfield District Court on Monday.SPRINGFIELD -- City police are asking for the public's help in identifying the person responsible for a Thursday shooting inside of a State Street jewelry store.

The Springfield Police Department released a series of images on Facebook Saturday of an individual who's suspected of being behind the Thursday incident.

Police are urging anyone with information on the person's identity to contact Springfield police at 413-787-6355 or to leave the agency a message on Facebook.

Photos of the person responsible for a shooting inside a jewelry store on State St. on Thursday. If you have any... Posted by Springfield Police Department on Saturday, February 3, 2018

Tips can also be sent to the Springfield Police Department by texting CRIMES, and typing "SOLVE" before leaving the tip, according to officials.

Police responded to reported shooting in front of the El Dorado jewelry store, located at 817 State Street, that took place at about 5:45 p.m. on Thursday.

Police spokesman Ryan Walsh said one person was shot during the alleged armed robbery and sent to Baystate Medical Center.WEST SPRINGFIELD - Police are asking for help to identify a woman who is suspected of stealing a $500 guitar.

The guitar was stolen at about 6 p.m., Jan. 23, from the Riverdale Shops on Riverdale Street, police said.

The woman, who was caught on a surveillance camera, may have left the area on a PVTA bus following the theft, police said.

Anyone with information is asked to call detectives at 413-263-3210 ext. 229. Callers may remain anonymous, police said."We all have a good memory; the problem is no one taught us how to use it," says four-time USA Memory Champion Nelson Dellis.

By Stephanie Vozza

https://www.fastcompany.com/40524058/use-these-five-tricks-to-never-forget-something-important-again?utm_source=postup&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Leadership%20Daily&position=2&partner=newsletter&campaign_date=02022018U.S. Sen. Steve Daines https://www.daines.senate.gov/ toured True North Steel http://www.truenorthsteel.com/ on Friday morning and touted the impact of the Republicans recent tax-cut plan for Montanans.

"This is an important employer in the Billings area. And the good news is, because of whats going on right now in the economy, as we see the tax cuts and tax reforms, they suddenly have got more business than they know what to do with. Thats a good problem. They need to hire 35 more people," Daines said.

True North Steel is a steel production company with eight locations. Two are in Montana. Of those 35 new job openings, seven will be available in the state.

By Steele Stephens

http://www.kpax.com/story/37421591/sen-daines-brings-56-county-tour-to-billingsThe Bozeman Daily Chronicle has selected 20 people under 40 years old who will be awarded for their business achievements and community service.

The sixth annual 20 under 40 awards acknowledges the best and brightest young business professionals in the Gallatin Valley. Nominees had to be younger than 40 on Dec. 31, 2017.

The 20 under 40 recipients will be featured in a special section inside the Chronicle on Feb. 25. The 2017 awards will be presented at the B2B networking luncheon on Feb. 26, 2018, at the Hilton Garden Inn.

https://www.bozemandailychronicle.com/news/business/chronicle-to-award-young-business-professionals/article_de2ed955-8050-5847-854d-848afb9ff8c8.html-LAfrica Finance Corporation , le principal fournisseur de solutions dinfrastructure en Afrique, annonce aujourdhui la designation du Dr Kingsley Obiora comme nouveau president du conseil dadministration et de M. Henry Oroh, Mme Soula Proxenos et M. Batchi Baldeh comme directeurs non executifs.

Designation du Dr Obiora en tant que president du conseil dadministration

Un economiste eminent qui occupe actuellement le poste de sous-gouverneur (en matiere de politique economique) a la Banque centrale du Nigeria, Dr Obiora jouit de 19 ans dexperience dans les services bancaires et financiers. Il etait conseille pour trois presidents nigerians en matiere de politique economique, ainsi quau gouverneur de la Banque centrale du Nigeria (CBN).

Auparavant, il etait directeur executif suppleant au Fonds monetaire international (FMI) a Washington, aux Etats-Unis. A ce titre, il etait membre du Conseil dadministration, collectivement responsable de la conduite des operations quotidiennes du FMI. Il a egalement aide a representer au Conseil les interets de 23 pays africains, dont le Nigeria.

Dr Obiora est titulaire de deux doctorats, le premier en Economie Monetaire et Internationale et le second en Econometrie, respectivement de lUniversite Ibadan au Nigeria et de lUniversite George Washington aux Etats-Unis.

Dr Obiora vient remplacer Dr Joseph Nnanna, qui, apres ses trois annees de services distingues a la Societe, a pris sa retraite du Conseil dadministration de lAFC.

Designations supplementaires

Outre Dr Obiora, lAFC annonce egalement les nominations suivantes a son conseil dadministration :

 Mme Soula Proxenos rejoint la Societe en tant que directrice independante non executive. Elle etait auparavant Directrice generale a lInternational Housing Solutions, le gestionnaire de fonds immobiliers sud-africain specialise dans le logement abordable. Elle occupe plusieurs postes en tant que directrice non executive independante, ainsi que la fonction de Professeure adjointe a lUniversite John Hopkins SAIS et a la Carey Business School

.

Mme Proxenos etait egalement Directrice generale des Services financiers internationaux du logement a Fannie Mae aux Etats-Unis, et avait ete responsable de transformer les activites dOld Mutual avant et pendant la transformation politique vecue par lAfrique du Sud. Elle apporte plus de 30 ans dexperience en matiere de services financiers et detient une maitrise en administration des affaires (MBA) de Stellenbosch ainsi quun diplome de lUniversite de Witwatersrand

.

 M. Batchi Baldeh rejoint la Societe en tant que directeur non executif representant la Banque africaine de developpement a la suite de sa recente souscription aux actions de lAFC. Banquier investisseur, developpeur dinfrastructures et specialiste en gestion des services publics, M. Baldeh apporte 33 ans dexperience, dont celle de son poste actuel comme Directeur du Developpement des Systemes dAlimentation Electrique, a la Banque africaine de developpement. Il est egalement ancien de lAFC, ayant occupe le poste de Directeur, des Activites dAlimentation Electrique, a la Division des Investissements. Il a de meme offert ses services consultatifs a plusieurs gouvernements africains, au Groupe de la Banque mondiale, a lUnion europeenne et a dautres organisations publiques et privees.

M. Baldeh est titulaire dun diplome universitaire en Sciences (avec mention) en Genie electrique et electronique de lUniversite de Newcastle-upon-Tyne, au Royaume-Uni. Il est membre de lInstitute of Engineering & Technology, au Royaume-Uni, ainsi quun membre de lInstitute of Directors, en Afrique du Sud. Il est egalement titulaire dun MBA de lUniversite de Boston, aux Etats-Unis.

 M. Henry Oroh, a rejoint lAFC en tant que directeur non executif representant Zenith Bank International Plc, ou il occupe egalement le poste de Directeur executif. M. Oroh jouit de deux decennies dexperience en services bancaires internationales, surtout apres avoir occupe la fonction de Directeur general et PDG de Zenith Bank Ghana, et avoir passe sept ans avec Citibank dans les Operations, la Tresorerie et le Marketing.

Comptable agree, M. Oroh est titulaire dun diplome en Droit de lUniversite de Londres, dune licence en comptabilite de lUniversite du Benin et egalement membre de Chartered Institute of Bankers, au Nigeria. Il est egalement titulaire dun MBA de lUniversite dEtat de Lagos.

Samaila Zubairu, President-Directeur-General de lAFC, a commente lannonce des nominations : Au nom du conseil dadministration de lAFC, je souhaite la bienvenue au Dr Obiora comme nouveau president. Son experience, ayant travaille avec des gouvernements et des institutions financieres multilaterales a divers titres, y compris la soutenabilite de la dette et le financement du developpement, est incroyablement pertinente pour la Societe alors que nous realisons des progres pour creer une croissance inclusive et durable a travers lAfrique.

Je suis egalement ravi daccueillir Mme Proxenos, M. Oroh et M. Baldeh au sein de notre conseil dadministration. En effet, ils saverent capables delargir et dapprofondir lexperience et les competences importantes de notre conseil non executif et aideront la Societe dans sa strategie de croissance.

Enfin, je voudrais remercier Dr Nnanna, qui na pas seulement fourni un leadership fort et excellent a notre organisation pendant une periode de transitions diverses, mais a egalement donne des conseils avises dune grande importance. Je parle au nom de la Societe dans son ensemble pour le remercier pour ses services.

Pour sa part, Dr. Obiora a egalement commente sa designation en annoncant : Au cours de la derniere decennie, AFC est devenu lun des principaux investisseurs en Afrique, ayant realise des projets qui ont transforme les communautes et les economies. En la rejoignant en tant que president du Conseil dadministration, jai hate de mettre mon experience au service de cette organisation reputee pour laider a elargir son empreinte en matiere dinvestissement a travers toute lAfrique.Advertisement

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Tata Trusts signed an MOU with the Assam government during the ongoing Summit, giving a formal shape to the plans.Assam Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said: "The paper works of the project has already been completed. We are going to set up a joint venture company, where both the parties will put in around Rs 1,000 crore each. So, the total investment will be around Rs 2,000 crore."An official of the Trust said the proposed infrastructure footprint comprises 17 centres across the state and it will be able to provide much-needed services starting early next year.Source: IANSAdvertisement

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 Neurons secrete dopamine in a fast, spatially precise manner through a limited number of specialized active release sites, a finding that runs counter to current models of dopamine signaling. Study may open the door for new strategies to precision target dopamine release for the treatment of disorders such as Parkinson's disease and addiction.Studied for decades for its critical role in movement control and reward-seeking behaviors, the neurotransmitter dopamine has been the focus of numerous efforts to understand its activity, particularly when it goes awry in disorders such as Parkinson's and addiction.While researchers have made great strides, less is known about the mechanisms that healthy dopamine cells use to release the neurotransmitter, a gap that has limited scientists' ability to develop treatments for a range of dopamine-related conditions.Now, researchers from Harvard Medical School have for the first time identified the molecular machinery responsible for the precise secretion of dopamine in the brain.Their work, published in, identifies specialized sites in dopamine-producing neurons that release the dopamine in a fast, spatially precise manner--a finding that runs counter to current models of how the neurotransmitter transmits signals in the brain."The dopamine system plays an essential role in many diseases, but fewer studies have asked the fundamental question of how healthy dopamine neurons release the neurotransmitter," said senior study author Pascal Kaeser, assistant professor of neurobiology at Harvard Medical School."If your car breaks down and you want it fixed, you want your mechanic to know how a car works," he added. "Similarly, a better understanding of dopamine in the laboratory could have a tremendous impact on the ability to treat disorders in which dopamine signaling goes awry in the long term."In the brain, roughly 0.01 percent of neurons are responsible for dopamine production, but they control a broad and diverse range of brain processes, including motor control, the reward system, learning and memory.Dopamine research has centered on its dysfunction and on the protein receptors that neurons use to receive dopamine, said Kaeser. Despite the neurotransmitter's importance, studies on how it is released in the brain under normal circumstances have been limited, he added.To identify the molecular machinery responsible for dopamine secretion, Kaeser and his colleagues focused on dopamine-producing neurons in the midbrain, which are involved in the neural circuitry underlying movement and reward seeking.They first searched for active zones--specialized neurotransmitter release sites located at synapses, the junctions that connect one neuron to the another. Using super-resolution microscopy to image sections of the brain into which dopamine neurons project, the team found that dopamine neurons contained proteins that mark the presence of active zones.These zones indicate that a neuron may engage in fast synaptic transmission, in which a neurotransmitter signal is precisely transferred from one neuron to another within milliseconds.This was the first evidence of fast active zones in dopamine neurons, which were previously thought to engage in only so-called volume transmission--a process in which the neurotransmitter signals slowly and nonspecifically across relatively large areas of the brain.Active zones were found at lower densities in dopamine neurons than in other neurons, and additional experiments revealed in detail how the neurotransmitter is rapidly secreted and reabsorbed at these sites."I think that our findings will change how we think about dopamine," Kaeser said. "Our data suggest that dopamine is released in very specific locations, with incredible spatial precision and speed, whereas before it was thought that dopamine was slowly and promiscuously secreted."In another set of experiments, the researchers used genetic tools to delete several active zone proteins. Deleting one specific protein, RIM, was sufficient to almost entirely abolish dopamine secretion in mice. RIM has been implicated in a range of diseases including neuropsychiatric and developmental disorders.Deleting another active zone protein, however, had little or no effect on dopamine release, suggesting that dopamine secretion relies on unique specialized machinery, the authors said."Our study indicates that dopamine signaling is much more organized than previously thought," said study first author Changliang Liu, an Alice and Joseph Brooks Postdoctoral Fellow and a Gordon Fellow in the Kaeser lab."We showed that active zones and RIM, which is associated with diseases such as schizophrenia and autism spectrum disorders in human genetic studies, are key for dopamine signaling," Liu said. "These newly identified mechanisms may be related to these disorders and may lead to new therapeutic strategies in the future."The team is now working to investigate these active zones in greater detail to build a deeper understanding of their role in dopamine signaling and how to manipulate them."We are deeply invested in learning the entire dopamine signaling machine. Right now, most treatments supply the brain with dopamine in excess, which comes with many side effects because it activates processes that shouldn't be active," Kaeser said."Our long-term hope is to identify proteins that only mediate dopamine secretion," he said. "One can imagine that by manipulating the release of dopamine, we may be better able to reconstruct normal signaling in the brain."Source: EurekalertUPPER THUMB  As the United States, Canada and Mexico renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement, local farmers are dealing with the impact this has had on the agriculture industry.

With Canada and Mexico being prime destinations for U.S. agricultural products, famers are concerned about maintaining the gains seen from NAFTA.

Since NAFTA's implementation in 1994, agricultural exports to Canada and Mexico have totaled about $310 billion and increased by more than 300 percent from pre-NAFTA levels, according to Michigan Farm Bureau.

With the sixth round of NAFTA negotiations recently taking place in Canada, talk of changes to or discontinuation of the agreement began in 2016 when then-presidential candidate Donald J. Trump announced his desire to renegotiate or scrap the deal.

Michigan Farm Bureau National Legislative Counsel John Kran says Michigan farmers, more than any other state, have the most to win or lose, based on NAFTAs future.

Canada and Mexico now account for approximately two-thirds of all Michigan agricultural exports, Kran said in a press release. While there is always room for improvement, overall NAFTA has been a tremendous asset to Michigan agriculture.

Huron County ranked first in the state in the 2012 Census of Agriculture for total value of agricultural products sold. Sanilac County ranked fourth, and Tuscola County ranked seventh.

Huron also ranked first in the state in production of corn for grain; dry edible beans; sugarbeets; and wheat for grain.

Michigan is the nations leading producer of black beans.

Joe Cramer, executive director of the Michigan Bean Commission, told the Tribune the NAFTA renegotiations are causing uncertainty in the market.

Given the uncertainty occurring during this modernization of NAFTA, our traditional customers in Mexico are actively seeking alternatives, Cramer said. They arent willing to commit to a purchase because they arent sure what their final cost will be or if theyll be able to take delivery.

Renegotiations have also upset the wheat market, according to David J. Milligan, secretary of the National Association of Wheat Growers.

Milligan has a 4,000-acre farm in Elkland Township where he and his son, Michael, raise wheat, corn, dry beans and soybeans.

Mexico, our largest wheat export customer, is buying from other countries, Milligan said.

Before NAFTA, Mexico purchased very little U.S. wheat. After NAFTA, Mexico has grown to be our largest wheat customer, Milligan added. The elimination of NAFTA would be very negative for the wheat prices in this country.

Regarding renegotiating the deal, both Milligan and Cramer agree it would be best for the local agriculture industry if nothing changes.

Cramer said he is optimistic about the black bean industry in Mexico surviving.

Im optimistic that the buyer-seller relationships developed over 30-plus years will continue and Michigan Black Beans will continue to be consumed in Mexico," he said.

(U.S. Agriculture Secretary Sonny) Perdue understands our needs and has the best interest of our industry at the forefront of every conversation he has with the negotiators, their staffs and the Trump administration," he added.

Milligan said the National Association of Wheat Growers and other farm organizations asked growers on one day last month to call, Tweet or email the White House urging the president not withdraw from NAFTA, and that many lobbying efforts are continuing.

Although the United State does not export sugarbeets, officials in that industry are watching the NAFTA negotiations as well.

We are monitoring NAFTA talks to make sure Canada  another sugar-importing country  doesnt seek to create a loophole by which they can flood our market with cheap, subsidized sugar that they import from other countries, said Ray Van Driessche, director of government relations for Michigan Sugar Company.

This kind of transshipment is usually prohibited from trade deals, but we must always remain vigilant, he added.

Mexico ships sugar to the United States and was found guilty of breaking U.S. trade laws by dumping subsidized sugar on the U.S. market in 2013 and 2014, Van Driessche said.

Those actions cost U.S. sugar producers about $4 billion in damages before the problem was addressed in a 2017 agreement between the U.S. and Mexican governments. In other words, our biggest issue with a NAFTA trading partner has already been addressed, and our biggest focus is ensuring terms of that deal are properly enforced.

A round of NAFTA negotiations recently concluded in Montreal, Canada.

(Trade negotiators) know what U.S. agriculture needs out of this agreement, what needs to be protected and what can be helped, said Dave Salmonsen, American Farm Bureau Federation senior director of congressional relations in a press release.

Agriculture is a big industry in all three countries and the negotiating teams have a big appreciation for agricultures contributions, he added.

While additional NAFTA negotiation rounds are scheduled throughout the spring, Salmonsen is optimistic.

You can never predict when things are going to get wrapped up, he said. The big issues in this whole negotiation has been about auto parts, rules of origin, manufacturing  if those issues can be dealt with, then I think the rest of the agreement could rapidly come to a close.LANSING  State Rep. Edward J. Canfield, D.O., recently praised his colleagues in the Michigan House of Representatives for approving his resolution declaring Feb. 1, 2018, as Blue Star Mothers Day in Michigan.

Blue Star Mothers of America, Inc. is a national organization of mothers whose sons and daughters serve in the nations armed forces. Sherry Kramer, a resident of Harbor Beach and president of the Department of Michigan Officers, was in attendance.

We must recognize the contributions Blue Star Mothers of America have made to our state and nation, said Canfield. It is an honor to recognize Blue Star Mothers who ensure emotional support and respect for the community.

Canfield, who is a U.S. Navy veteran, visited with members of the Blue Star Mothers of America in the House chamber.

There also members of the Legislature who are Blue Star Mothers.

House Resolution 242 was adopted with overwhelming bipartisan support.Theres another womens march happening in Connecticut, but this time, homemade signs such as Grab em by the midterms are being replaced by campaign signs.

A wave of first-time women candidates, energized by a year of protests, are running for office in the state.

As group, I think we are part of a movement, said Anne Hughes, a social worker from Easton who is running for the state Legislature.

Hughes was one of the political newcomers gathered for a Women Belong in the House fundraising reception Wednesday in Stamford. It was organized by the state House Democrats and drew about 60 supporters and a half-dozen first-time legislative candidates.

Hughes, 52, is seeking the Democratic endorsement in the 135th House District, which also includes Weston and Redding. She recently took part in the Womens March in Hartford, where several legislative hopefuls who are part of the so-called Trump resistance made their debut.

More than 30,000 women across the country have have reached out to Emilys List expressing an interest in running for office since Election Day 2016, hundreds of them from Connecticut, said a spokesman for the group, which trains pro-choice Democratic women.

The unprecedented surge has drawn the attention of Patty Russo, the executive director of the Womens Campaign School at Yale University, who has spent 30 years trying to recruit female candidates.

Ive never seen anything like it, said Russo, a Norwalk resident. After the first march, literally hundreds of women were calling and emailing. Im mad. I marched. I want to run. Help me. 

The flood of interest far exceeds the 300 applications the school normally receives for 85 spots in a five-day training program for women candidates, she said.

Even the night of the State of the Union at 11:30 we were getting calls from women wanting to run and wanting more information about our programs, Russo said.

That same night, Caitlin Clarkson Pereira, a higher education professional from Fairfield, held a kickoff event at a friends house for her campaign in the 132nd House District.

Im not sure I can watch (the State of the Union), Pereira said. I have no doubt it will affirm and motivate and remind me that I definitely made the right choice.

Pereira rode on the bus with students from Fairfield University to last years Womens March in Washington, D.C. This year, she went to Hartford. The seeds of a run for office were planted on election night in 2016 as she tried coming to terms with a Trump presidency, she said. Her daughter Parker was sound asleep.

I just remember looking at her and this sort of mama bear burst of energy permeated out, she said.

Pereira, coordinator in the educational services office at Southern Connecticut State University, is challenging Republican Brenda Kupchick, who is in her fourth term. But Pereiras strategy isnt to apply a Trump litmus test to Kupchick.

I dont think thats fair or what the voters are looking for, Pereira said. This should really be about the leader that the voters believe should be in office trying to fix the budget and make sure education stays on the right path and looking out for vulnerable communities. I have nothing but respect for her and what shes done for this community over many, many years.

Kupchick said she looks forward to discussing all of the issues facing Connecticut, which are important to women, with Pereira. At the same time, she questioned whether her opponents energies might be better spent elsewhere.

I just dont really understand running for an office that doesnt have an impact on what youre really upset with, Kupchick said. Personally, if I was part of this resistance, I would go work on a race in another part of the country where you can win a seat if you want to hold the president accountable.

Democrat Ashley Gaudiano, who won a seat on Trumbulls town council last fall and is now running for the Legislature in the 134th District, said the effort is not misguided.

I think that our core Democratic values are under attack in Washington right now, Gaudiano said. States have opportunity to minimize the impact of whats happening down there. So our legislature can really make a difference when were talking about the things that (Trump) and his administration are attacking.

The 30-year-old mother of two said its up to states to push back against Trumps policies on immigration, abortion, taxes, the rollback of environmental and consumer protection regulations and student loan debt.

The 2016 election really woke me up, Gaudiano said.

State GOP Chairman J.R. Romano said its Republicans who have created opportunities for women, noting that House GOP caucus has more female members than the House Democrats and is led for the first time by a woman, Derbys Themis Klarides. He also cited New Britains third-term mayor, Erin Stewart, who is exploring a run for governor, as a rising star in the party.

Im thrilled at the fact that so many women are running for us, Romano said.

The states top Republican pointed out that both Pereira and Gaudiano are challenging women incumbents.

This isnt about unseating men, Romano said of their political ambition. Theyre masking it behind gender politics.

State Rep. Cristin McCarthy Vahey, D-Fairfield, along with her Stamford colleagues Patricia Billie Miller and Caroline Simmons, helped organize last weeks Women Belong in the House fundraiser. In 2010, she did Yale womens campaign program.

I remember sitting in the room thinking, Im not sure I belong here, McCarthy Vahey said. I dont know if Im qualified.

Its important for women to support each other, she said, and remind each other of their strengths as candidates.

We know there are so many well qualified women who are strong candidates and will bring a diverse perspective to the caucus, she said.

Julie Kushner, 65, a longtime union organizer for the United Auto Workers who is from Danbury, last week registered as a state Senate candidate in the 24th District. She is the co-chair of the liberal Connecticut Working Families Party and will seek the cross-endorsement of the Democrats for her challenge of Republican Michael McLachlan.

It does feel like its a pink wave and thats a good thing, Kushner said, alluding to the ubiquitous pink pussy hats at the womens marches. I think women feel a responsibility to say, We're going to run for office, were going to legislate, we have the capacity to do this, but moreover we have a responsibility to do it. That's very motivating.

While the midterm elections this fall are the next front of the Trump resistance, women candidates announced their presence in a big way in last falls municipal elections, from Vicki Tesoros win in the Trumbull first selectmans race to an infusion of newcomers on the Greenwich Representative Town Meeting such as Jennie Baird.

So many of us came back from (last years) march and said, What can we do?  said Baird, 50, who went to Washington for the first one.

This year, she went to New York.

I think there was much more of a sentiment of something that had coalesced over the year, Baird said. There was much more focus on the 2018 and 2020 elections. I love seeing younger women standing up.

 Staff writer Zach Murdock contributed to this report

http://twitter.com/gettinviggy; nvigdor@hearstmediact.com; 203-625-4436ANN ARBOR, MI -- First graders dance, the sounds of thrilled children playing games echoes in the background and the smell of Chinese food fills the air. Walk into the Towsley Auditorium at Washtenaw Community College on Saturday night, Feb. 3, and you've found the annual Chinese New Years celebrations, hosted by the Ann Arbor Chinese Center of Michigan.



The family event started with children's games and traditional Chinese dishes served buffet-style, then moved into the main auditorium, where over 15 groups from the Ann Arbor Chinese School performed traditional music and dance.



"This event is about family, culture, heritage, and pride ... It's about getting dressed up and having a good meal," said Frances Kai-Hwa Wang, Outreach Coordinator of Ann Arbor Chinese Center of Michigan.

Acts included a Shadow Puppet Show, Chinese Drum and Lion Show, and Ribbon Dance, performed by students of Ann Arbor Chinese School.

"The students are the main focus, as most of the performers are the students. All the parents are working together to help the children learn the language and the culture ... It's like a big family here at the school," said Shery Gal-Spencer, Ann Arbor Chinese School Co-Principal.PORT HURON, MI -- Police have tracked down a Port Huron jeweler in Florida that's accused of taking jewelry that belonged to several customers from a now-closed business.

The 62-year-old man was located and arrested Friday, Feb. 2 by the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Task Force Northern Florida Division on Interstate 75 near Jasper, Florida after information provided by the Port Huron Police Department's Neighborhood Enforcement, or NET, team.

He's wanted in connection with missing jewelry from the now-closed Rick Currie Master Goldsmiths on Huron Avenue in Port Huron. Police say a large amount of suspected stolen jewelry was found in his vehicle.

The suspect, whose not being named because he's not yet been arraigned, is being held in the Hamilton County Jail, pending extradition to Michigan on felony warrants for larceny by conversion, $20,000 or more, and larceny by conversion, $1,000 or more/less than $20,000.

"This has been an active investigation by members of the Port Huron Police Department with every effort being put towards attempting to locate and return the stolen jewelry to the victims of these crimes" and locating the suspect, reads a department news release.

The effort include numerous leads and search warrants during the investigation led by the NET team, with assistance from the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Task Force Northern Florida Division.

Port Huron police investigators will work on contacting victims who filed complaints to try and positively identify their jewelry after it's returned and inventoried by the department.

A Jan. 12 Port Huron Times Herald story notes more than 110 complaints have been filed by customers who'd left jewelry at the suspect's business, with a combined value of around $250,000.

Extradition of the suspect may take two weeks or more, police said.GRAND RAPIDS, MI - Most students on the Grand Rapids Community College campus don't even know the names of members of the school's Board of Trustees.

But everyone knows Ellen James, GRCC Executive Deputy to the President and Board Liason Misty McClure-Anderson said.

Now, many more people outside the GRCC community will know her. On Saturday night, the school honored James as an influential leader in the African-American community with its Giant among Giants Award.

McClure-Anderson said James made a point of going around campus and talking to people.

She went directly to people instead of waiting for them to come to her, which was unique, she said.

James was first elected to the GRCC Board of Trustees in February 1991. After 25 years of service, she ended her tenure on the board on Dec. 31, 2016.

During those 25 years, James served in several roles for the board, ranging from treasurer to chairperson to secretary.

From the time she stepped forward as a board member, James made sure her voice was heard. But she did not have a personal agenda, McClure-Anderson said. Instead, James listened to others so she could serve them and their interests.

McClure-Anderson said she learned what it meant to be a civil servant from James.

"You look up civil servant and that's Ellen," she said.

Although James has been retired from the GRCC board for more than a year, she still uses her time to stay involved. She keeps herself informed so she can still be a voice for the college

James sometimes calls McClure-Anderson from the grocery store or doctor's office when she is trying to help someone, whether it is by getting them into a certain class or helping them to attend college.

"She's one of our biggest cheerleaders and I know she'll be doing that until she can't anymore," McClure-Anderson said.

James has served on numerous boards in Grand Rapids and the wider community, which include:

Association of Community College Trustees (ACCT) Central Region Nominating Committee

Mount Mercy Housing Corporation Board of Directors

Kent County Black Elected Officials

Grand Rapids Police Chief Advisory Committee

Grand Rapids Community Foundation African American Heritage Fund

Grand Rapids Community College Foundation

NAACP Executive Board

Delta Sigma Theta Sorority

James has also been widely recognized for her advocacy work, and has received the following awards:

Michigan's Women's Foundation Women of Courage Award

YWCA Tribute to Women Advocacy Award

Giants W.W. Plummer Humanitarian Award

United Methodist Community House Triumph Award

Selected by Grand Rapids Magazine as one of the Top "10" Leaders With A Mission

First recipient of the Nelson Mandela Presidential Award from the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE)

If she could use one word to describe James, McClure-Anderson said, she would use "sincere."

Even people who have only talked to James once say it seems like they have known her their whole lives, she said. She has that kind of charisma.

When James meets someone, she really listens and is interested in that person, McClure-Anderson said.

"She lives to help people," she said.WALKER, MI -- A prank about a missile launch at U.S. targets that came over a Meijer store intercom sounded almost automated, causing concern for some shoppers.

The message came over a the intercom at the Standale Meijer store at Wilson Avenue NW and Lake Michigan Drive about 9:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 2.

Sabryna Aguilar stopped there with her toddler daughter to grab a few items. They had been at the hospital earlier because her daughter has the flu.

She said the intercom made an odd noise for about 30 seconds, like someone was trying to access the system but could not.

Then, a voice that "sounded automated" announced that three missiles had been launched from North Korea, at California, New York and another location. The voice advised people within certain radius' to take shelter.

"It seemed automated, so it sounded real," Aguilar said. "I was freaking out."

She estimated the message lasted 30 seconds or longer.

She said people around her began looking at their phones for news and Meijer employees gathered near a customer service desk.

Aguilar called her mother and asked if she had heard anything.

When she learned there was no news, she began to relax.

"I had just gotten out of the hospital with my daughter. I was already stressed out," she said.

Walker police say they continue to investigate the incident but quickly determined it was a prank. Police think the call was made from an unknown phone in the store.OSCODA, MI -- It looks like snow, but it's not.

Residents near the former Wurtsmith Air Force Base in Oscoda Township have become increasingly concerned over the past year as toxic fluorochemicals leaching through the groundwater have generated white foam that's washing ashore on public beaches and private waterfronts around the picturesque Van Etten Lake.

The foam contains alarmingly high levels of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances known as PFAS or PFCs and locals consider it a worrisome manifestation of a toxic groundwater problem that, until now, has been out of sight and to some degree out of mind.

"We never had this type of foam before," said Greg Cole, who owns a lakefront cottage rental business with his wife, Vicky, and operates the Van Etten Creek dam, which allows Van Etten Lake water into the Au Sable River and Lake Huron.

It's "affecting our business, our environment and our property values."

A July 2017 test showed perfluorooctanesulfonic acid, or PFOS, in the foam at concentrations up to 165,000 parts per trillion (ppt), which is roughly 13,000 times Michigan's limit of 12-ppt for PFOS in surface waters like lakes, rivers or streams.

PFOS in the surrounding lake water has tested at 254-ppt.

The contamination level has strained the state's relationship with the Air Force, which is responsible for cleaning up the former nuclear B-52 bomber base. On Dec. 14, the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality initiated a formal dispute under a joint program, saying federal efforts are not adequately curbing the plumes.

The first granular activated carbon groundwater treatment system installed on the southwest side of the base in April 2015 "is not intercepting or containing the PFAS contaminated groundwater, nor is the system effectively preventing expansion of the plume," wrote acting DEQ remediation division director Kathleen Shirey.

"The USAF must move more aggressively and more quickly to define and remove the ongoing threat to public health and the environment."

On Jan. 19, the state issued a violation notice after the Air Force blew past a deadline to install a second PFAS treatment system on base -- a system that was supposed to be operational last year, but the Air Force says will go online this summer.

Whether that system will reduce lake foaming is a matter of debate. DEQ directors say the new system should have some effect on the plume entering the lake, but how much is an open question. Township officials don't believe it will do much.

Oscoda residents are frustrated with both state and federal efforts, arguing that the Air Force is moving slowly and tackling cleanup piecemeal. They want the state to be more aggressive with the military and more forthcoming with information.

Some are also skeptical that the foam is safe to touch.

The Van Etten Lake Association, Anglers of the Au Sable and Oscoda Township have each sent letters demanding the military clean up the plume entering the lake at the source.

Township officials characterize the foam as the latest symptom of a toxic problem that's metastasizing as the state and federal government bicker over how exactly the state's water quality standards apply to PFAS levels in Van Etten Lake.

What might seem simple at first blush -- lake contamination levels exceed state rules and therefore the Air Force must act to fix the problem -- is complicated by regulatory minutiae regarding exactly where samples are taken and which state rules apply.

The DEQ's Rule 57 Water Quality Value of 12-ppt for PFOS was developed in 2011 to guide fish consumption advisories and residents involved with a newly established citizen's cleanup advisory board say the state hasn't enforced it in Oscoda before.

Instead, the DEQ wants to rely on its Part 201 toxic cleanup criteria, which has 70-ppt enforceable limits on PFAS in groundwater.

Sue Leeming, DEQ external relations director and former remediation division chief, said the state needs sampling data from the very spot where groundwater enters the lake water; what's known as the groundwater-surface water interface (GSI).

To ensure that, more sampling is being scheduled.

"We think it's an issue and in order to confirm that, we have to have data from the appropriate monitoring spots," said Leeming. "That's what this new testing will do for us -- give us fresh data we are confident is coming from a GSI monitoring point."

Meanwhile, locals have a lake with toxic froth on top.

"Whenever the wind blows, the wave action causes (the PFAS) to regenerate into AFFF," said Aaron Weed, Oscoda Township supervisor.

Aqueous Film Forming Foam, or "A-Triple-F," is the original source of PFAS contaminating the groundwater. The synthetic foam was used to coat hydrocarbon fires. The flame-retarding PFAS chemistry suppresses combustion by keeping fuel from mixing with oxygen. It's highly effective at quashing jet fuel fires.

Leftover foam from old base fire training and airplane crashes created several huge PFAS plumes which have been seeping into nearby wetlands, the Au Sable River, Van Etten Lake and drinking water wells at homes around the base.

The state has been investigating PFAS at Wurtsmith since 2011, first in local fish and subsequently in drinking water. It was the first of what's become 14 locales around the state with known PFAS contamination.

In 2016, the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services escalated the alarm in Oscoda Township when it told local residents on private wells to find an alternative drinking water source because of the scope of chemical spread.

Renewed focus helped shake loose state and federal funding to extend municipal water mains down some streets, provide bottled water and filters, and re-establish the local advisory board, but residents are frustrated by the slow pace of actual cleanup work.

PFAS-contaminated runoff has particularly frustrated local officials, who've watched high PFAS levels entering the Au Sable River and Lake Huron for years. In September, testing showed a combined PFOS and PFOA level of 166,200-ppt entering the river at a storm drain outfall.

The discharge comes from a groundwater treatment system installed decades ago to remove volatile organic compounds like trichloroethylene. Although those levels had dropped enough by 2014 to stop pumping, the DEQ required the Air Force to keep the purge wells operating to slow the migrating PFAS plumes.

The DEQ told the Air Force it needed to treat the PFAS discharge in 2016. Construction finally began in January. The system should go online this summer.

Unfortunately, there are doubts about whether it will touch the PFAS plume entering Van Etten Lake at Ratliff Park, the public beach across from the base. That's where a group of Michigan State University research students who were denied access to the base found what at first appeared to be protein foam in July.

Testing confirmed a toxic calling card: PFOS, PFOA and PFHxS. "This is coming back almost entirely with an AFFF signature," said Weed.

On Dec. 6, the day of a community meeting involving the state, Air Force and local health department, Anthony Spaniola walked out of his home on the northeast shore of Van Etten Lake and saw "foam as far as the eye can see" in each direction along the beach.

Spaniola had been eyeing the foam with increasing concern after stumbling across contractors taking samples near the beach gazebo in August. At first, he said, neighbors were skeptical about the hazard, but they came around after he got his hands on state and federal test results showing extremely high PFAS levels in the foam.

Shortly thereafter, on Sept. 1, the state and local health departments issued a joint advisory recommending Labor Day visitors "avoid ingesting" the foam.

During the No Spills conference in Traverse City in January, Michigan DHHS toxicologist Christina Bush said the potential that young children might swallow the foam while playing on the beach helped prompt the warning. Exposure to the chemistry has been linked to certain cancers, thyroid malfunction and other diseases.

"We're saying avoid contact with it, but the concern we have is because of the possibility of swallowing it," she said. "Not because we have a concern about skin contact."

Bush said that because PFOS is a surfactant, a chemical microlayer on the water surface gets sudsy when wind conditions are right.

The foaming has also been observed on Lake Margrethe in Crawford County, where the DEQ is also conducting a PFAS plume investigation at the Camp Grayling Michigan National Guard base. The DEQ took foam samples from the lake late last year.

"It's different than the foam you'd see on disturbed water," Bush said, describing it as whiter and frothier. "It's like Mr. Bubbles suds."

Photos of the foam taken by Cole in December show a wide expanse near the lake's dam outlet, with patches that look like pancake ice.

When Leeming flew into Wurtsmith in December, the foam was visible as a "white ring around parts of the shoreline," she said.

"It's sticky and accumulates in piles," said Spaniola, a Troy attorney who thinks the Air Force should have to clean up the plume entering Van Etten Lake under the 12-ppt rule.

He argues the Air Force already acknowledged the Rule 57 limit applies to waters around Wurtsmith in a March 2017 letter to the state Senate Fiscal Agency, in which the military branch wrote it was working with the DEQ "to ensure compliance with" the rule related to polluted groundwater entering Clark's Marsh south of the base.

The letter was a response to passage of Public Act 545 of 2016, which required the state or federal government provide safe water to any property owner with a polluted well if the health department issued an advisory and the government caused the pollution.

The Air Force has fought compliance, saying the law discriminates. Air Force spokesperson Mark Kinkade said last year the Michigan law, Public Act 545 of 2016, does discriminate "as it only applies to federal and state agencies, not to all entities and persons," he said.

In contrast to the PFAS pollution caused by shoemaker Wolverine World Wide in Kent County, the Air Force will only provide a whole-house drinking water filtration unit for homes testing above the Environmental Protection Agency's 70-ppt health advisory level.

Only two Oscoda wells have tested above that limit. In Kent County, Wolverine is providing filters to many homes with any PFAS detection.

One of those Oscoda wells is in the middle of the Van Etten Lake plume. In 2016, it tested for 3,300-ppt PFOA, 96-ppt for PFOS and 12,000-ppt PFHxS. Total PFAS in the well was 19,734 ppt.

Attorney General Bill Schuette's office referred questions about PA 545 and Rule 57 to the DEQ and would not provide any information about the status of its involvement.

The military could be forced to conduct more cleanup measures under Michigan's new Part 201 criteria of 70-ppt for PFOS and PFOA in groundwater used for drinking water, although it's unclear whether that would apply to the plume entering the lake.

Spaniola is frustrated the state isn't being more aggressive about enforcing the existing PFOS surface water quality standard of 12-ppt.

The Air Force told MLive it's "not taking a position" on whether it believes Michigan's 12-ppt rule for PFOS "will apply to any particular response action."

The Air Force said it will "comply with any surface water quality criteria that are found to be applicable or relevant and appropriate under the circumstances," as determined by certain sections of the federal Superfund law, known as CERCLA.

In response to local demands for cleanup of the plume entering the lake, the Air Force said only that "the public will have the chance to weigh in on" the process during local advisory board meetings and subsequent investigation planning stages.

The Air Force doesn't plan any further foam testing.

That's not much comfort to residents like Greg and Vicky Cole.

"Being a business owner that depends on the lake and surrounding area for providing us its natural beauty, we are outraged at this poison dumping into our environment," Greg Cole said.SOUTH HAVEN, MI -- Hundreds of locals and guests turned out under snowy skies at the Lake Michigan shoreline Saturday to celebrate winter at the 25th annual Ice Breaker Festival.

Many like Fred Beach and Paulette Reiger, who make the trip from Kalamazoo each year, enjoyed activities such as a chili cook off, carriage rides, curling, a pub crawl and the ice sculpting contest.

Though the couple disagreed on the best chili -- Reiger voted for returning champion HawksHead, while Beach said Sophie's was better -- they both enjoyed Greenbush Brewing's take on an Irish Car Bomb shot, poured straight through a crack in a sheet of ice into a cup.

Despite plentiful activities included in past year's festivals, the main attractions Saturday were the newest additions. The frozen fish toss, new this year, and the cardboard sled race, new last year, drew the biggest crowds of the day.

Ooos, ahhs, gasps and laughter could be heard from blocks away as person after person lined up for their turn chucking frozen fish across a field.

Some tossers got creative. There were reverse hurls, wind-ups, under-hands and over-hands. One competitor's discus-style throw landed a frozen fish on top of a car parked down the street.

Crowds at the fish toss station didn't dwindle until the cardboard sled race began.

Children and adults alike carried creations ranging from the Star Wars-inspired "Millenium Falcon" to one made from a Nike shoe box up a steep hill before testing to see whose would go furthest and fastest.

Justin Quick got a lot of attention as he helped his two daughters and niece carry their sled, a giant shower with inflated bubbles and tinsel streaming from the shower head, up the hill to the starting line. He was quick to say, however, that the girls' grandpa, James Quick, deserved all the credit. The sled was his design.

He took the girls to the race last year, and this time they insisted on doing more than watching, he said.

The festival, which kicked off Friday, ends Sunday with a continuation of the "pub slide," open skating at the Huron Street Pavilion ice rink from noon to 6 p.m. and a 3 p.m. performance of "The Princess Who Had No Name" at Listiak Auditorium.

Though there may be plenty more winter to come, South Haven's ice breakers will have to wait until next year to enjoy all the festival has to offer.Cindy Larsen presents her talk, "What Do You See", during TEDx Muskegon at the Frauenthal Center for the Performing Arts in Muskegon, Mich., on Nov. 12, 2015. (Kevin Manuel | MLive.com file)

MUSKEGON, MI - In recognition of her role in attracting more than $1 billion in investment in the Muskegon area, the Muskegon Lakeshore Chamber of Commerce president recently was named 2017 Newsmaker of the Year.

President Cindy Larsen accepted the award from the Grand Rapids Business Journal this week.

"From large businesses and small business start-ups to investments by education and government, Muskegon's resurgence is now unstoppable," Larsen said.

The chamber was one of 225 nominees considered in 16 categories. The top selection from each category was recognized with an industry Newsmaker award. The chamber was the winner in the economic development category. The Newsmaker of the Year is chosen from among the industry category winners.

The $1 billion in investment includes the opening of GE Aviation and La Colombe manufacturing facilities in Norton Shores, Walmart in Whitehall, ongoing construction of Mercy Health Muskegon, expansion at Arconic in Whitehall, ongoing construction of Terrace Point Landing houses and Berkshire Muskegon Senior Housing in downtown Muskegon, Muskegon Community College's new downtown campus and more.

The community engagement strategy formulated by the Watch Muskegon campaign has tapped the energy of more than 100 community stakeholders and thousands of residents, according to a news release from the chamber.

"It is great to see Muskegon being recognized for its economic success," Larsen said. "The Watch Muskegon campaign was launched at the perfect time to capture the amazing story of Muskegon's evolution."

The chamber is celebrating its 125th anniversary this year.In a blow to the Adani group, the Australian government today said it would not finance a vital rail-link project that supports beleaguered Indian energy giant's 16.5 billion dollars Carmichael coal mine.

Adani has sought a 900 million dollar concessional loan for rail to link the Carmichael mine to port. The announcement by Minister Karen Andrews could spell the end of the project entirely if it can't secure private finance.

Andrews, the assistant minister for vocational education and skills, said that since "all the approvals are already in place for the Adani mine" it was now "just a financing issue for Adani" whether the mine goes ahead.

"Let's be clear, though, given the position that the Labor state government took to the last election and their election, there won't be financing from the federal government," Andrews was quoted as saying by Sky News Australia.

Asked to confirm there would not be federal financing, she said: "No  it won't be proceeding. For there to be money available from the Naif (Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility), that would require the support from the Queensland Labor government".

She further clarified that the advice she has been given by the resource minister and given the position the Labor government took to last year's state election there won't be financing from the federal government for this rail line

Nevertheless Andrews talked up the benefits of the mine, labelling it "very important for employment and jobs in northern Australia" and said she would like to see it proceed.

There was no immediate reaction from the Adani group.

The Labor leader, Bill Shorten, stepped up the opposition's rhetoric on the Adani mine last week, first refusing to rule out stopping the project on Tuesday and then on Friday threatening the mine's licence in a bid to boost the party's environmental credentials for the Batman byelection.

Before its re-election last year, the Queensland Labor government promised to veto Adanis application for a loan from the Naif.

Federal Labor, which has already ruled out providing a public subsidy or loan to the Adani mine, is now looking at further measures to block it.

The Carmichael project, expected to create hundreds of jobs in Australia, has been facing opposition from environmentalists and indigenous groups.

The Adani Group has for over five years battled the opposition to any expansion of the Abbot Point port, saying it will cut into the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area.

The Adani group entered Australia in 2010 with the purchase of the greenfield Carmichael coal mine in the Galilee Basin in central Queensland, and the Abbot Point port near Bowen in the north.

Adani Australia currently employs over 800 people and has invested over 3.3 billion dollars in Queensland, which is the biggest investments by an Indian company in Australia, the company said on its website.live bse live

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The much-tracked auction of Bhushan Steel saw a flurry of activity as the bid deadline got over at 6pm on Saturday, February 3.

JSW Steel, Tata Steel and a consortium of Bhushan Steel's employees, possibly backed by a Singapore-based fund, have put in bids for the troubled steel maker.

The company, which had accumulated debt of over Rs 50,000 crore, had been put up for auction by the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT). The bids were submitted on Saturday at the Gurgaon office of Deloitte, whose Vijaykumar V Iyer is the IRP (insolvency resolution professional) for Bhushan Steel.

It is learnt that other companies such as ArcelorMittal, UK-based Liberty House and Steel Authority of India, who had earlier submitted expressions of interest, did not submit bids for the company. "The company hasn't submitted a bid," said a source close to Liberty House, owned by NRI billionaire Sanjeev Gupta.

The bids will now be opened on Tuesday.

While the exact bid amounts couldn't be ascertained, it is believed to be around the Rs 28,000-30,000 crore mark. That is nearly twice the liquidation value of Rs 15,000 crore. The race, say executives, is a close one, and JSW Steel might just have its nose ahead in the race.

The bid by Bhushan Steels staff is backed by 400 of the company's employees. "This includes employees from across the organization, including the plants, and also from across hierarchy," a senior official from the company told Moneycontrol. The identity of the fund, which is backing the employees, couldn't be ascertained.

Bhushan Steel, which has a steel facility and mining lease in Odisha, had accumulated debt of nearly Rs 50,000 crore.

Controversy

Although the bidding process generated a lot of interest, it wasnt without its share of controversy. Some of the bidders alleged that ArcelorMittal placed its bid after the 6pm deadline on Saturday.

"According to the rules, this is not possible," said a senior executive from a company that's in the race. One bidder even planned to lodge a protest with Deloitte on Monday.

But by late evening on Sunday, ArcelorMittal said it had not bid for Bhushan Steel.

"ArcelorMittal can confirm it has not bid for Bhushan steel, but we remain interested at looking at future opportunities in India," a company representative told Moneycontrol in an emailed statement.

Now all eyes are on the next round of the auction, which is the opening of bids on Tuesday.Air India Express, the international low-cost arm of the flag carrier, may see a plunge in profit in fiscal 2018 at around Rs 200 crore, down from Rs 297 crore booked in the previous year, driven down by rising fuel bills and a higher payout to the parent Air India.

The Kochi-headquartered Air India Express operates 555 flights a week, with a fleet of 23 Boeing 737 planes. It plans to induct two more such aircraft planes by August-September, according to a senior official.

The airline will also be the first to operate to and fro from the upcoming Kannur international airport in its home state Kerala where it deploys over 65 percent of its capacity.

"This time around I expect the bottomline to print in at around Rs 200 crore," K Shyam Sundar, the chief executive officer at the airline, told PTI here over the weekend without ascribing a reason.

In fact, reflecting the fuel prices, in the last year also, its profit was lower than the previous year. After the first Rs 100 crore profit in FY15, its profit soared to Rs 361.7 crore in FY16 but came down to Rs 296.7 crore in FY7.

But it can be noted that all the airlines have had an easy life last fiscal as crude oil hovered USD35-40 a barrel throughout the year, but the same is trending at USD 70 and the average for this year could be around USD 60 a barrel. Which is an almost 50 per cent spike over the last years average.

Airlines across the world, barring of course those in the Gulf nations, burn almost half their cash on fuel alone. In the Indian context, since petroleum products are out of GST, it varies from a low 4 percent in states like Telangana to an absurd 34 per cent in Maharashtra.

Air India Express, which flies to the Middle-East (West Asia) and Southeast Asian destinations, booked its first profit in FY15 with Rs 100 crore after it was set up a decade ago in April 2005 on the back of a 25 per cent plunge in crude prices in the year.

Sundar said he expects the load (PLF) to increase by 150 bps next fiscal over the present 78.5 per cent, as he also expects the aircraft utilisation levels to go up to 6-7 per cent over 14 hrs from 13.25 hrs with the introduction of the two new 737 NGs planes.

On the volume side, Sundar expects to ferry 4.5 million next fiscal year. In FY17, it carried 3.4 million passengers. He didn't offer a number for this year.

Sundar said AI Express will be the first airline to operate from the greenfield airport in Kannur, northern Kerala.

The fourth international airport in the tiny state is scheduled for commissioning this June, behind more than a year.

"We committed to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan that we will be the first airline to take off from Kannur. We will be deploying the two new aircraft in this facility, he said.

"We will also launch a new service between Kochi and Bahrain soon,"he added.

On OTP (on-time performance), he said the overall it's 86 per cent but this is 95 per cent from the country. The delay is due to longer time we have to take to skirt the Oman airspace now.

On the payout to the parent Air India, which is put on sale now, Sundar said, "in FY17, it paid Rs 450 crore, while this was Rs 350 crore in FY16. This is year it may go up further, which will impact the bottomline.

"On top of this, we have around Rs 200 crore of financing cost towards aircraft loans per annum. But FY19 should be better as our finance cost will come down to Rs 150 crore," he added.

The airline connects 13 international cities from 17 domestic cities.

On the domestic front, it connects Thiruvananthpuram- Chennai, Kozhikode-Thiruvananthpuram, Kochi -Thiruvananthpuram and Kochi-Kozhikode, as per its website.Rechristening of the apex indirect tax policy-making body CBEC to Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) is likely to happen by April after the budgetary exercise gets Parliament nod.

With excise duty, service tax, alongside nearly a dozen other central and state levies being subsumed in the Goods and Services Tax (GST) rolled out from July 1, the ambit of the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) has widened.

In his budget speech for 2018-19, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said with the rollout of GST the name of CBEC would be changed to CBIC.

"Through Finance Bill 2018, we are amending the Central Boards of Revenue (CBR) Act, 1963, as well as the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017, replacing CBEC with CBIC," a government official told PTI.

The official said since the CBR Act provides for constitution of separate boards of revenue for direct taxes and excise and customs, the name of CBEC has to be replaced with CBIC in the Act.

Also, the Central GST Act mention CBEC, but the Integrated GST (IGST) and the Union Territory GST (UTGST) talks of only 'Board' without elaborating.

"Once the amendments are cleared by Parliament, the government will notify the changed name of CBIC," the official said.

The Finance Bill is likely to get Parliament approval in the second leg of Budget which is slated to begin on March 5 and end on April 6.

The official said that while the name of some departments within CBEC like NACIN, DGGSTI, is in line with the new work profile of the Board, the name change of CBEC was delayed as a couple of amendments had to be carried out through the Finance Bill.

The National Academy of Customs, Indirect Taxes & Narcotics (NACIN) is the premier training institute and is under the administrative control of CBEC. Besides, the Directorate General of Central Excise Intelligence (DGCEI) has already been renamed as the Directorate General of Goods and Services Tax Intelligence (DGGSTI).

Besides, the Directorate General of Analytics and Risk Management (DGARM) was set up last year to provide analysis of data relating to customs, excise and GST.

The re-organisation of field formations of the CBEC for implementation of GST, and its renaming to CBIC was approved by Jaitley in March last year.

GST was introduced from July 1, 2017. With legislative approval not in place for change of name, CBEC has been notifying all rules and provisions of the new indirect tax regime.

As per the reorganisation plan, the proposed CBIC will supervise the work of all its field formations and directorates and assist the government in policymaking in relation to GST, while continuing central excise levy and Customs functions.

The CBIC will have 21 zones and GST Taxpayer Services Commissionerates.Ravi Shankar Prasad

Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad today appealed to investors to invest in Assam, which is witnessing a change, signaling the emergence of a new India.

Addressing the first-ever Global Investors Summit in Assam, the Union Electronics and IT minister said, "I see a lot of passion in the people of the North east region. No more 'lahe lahe' (slowly slowly). That image is changing to 'faster and faster'. Assam is growing. Keep it up, a bright future awaits you".

He also asked the investors to "hand-hold the North East Region and guide them", while inaugurating a number of IT-based projects.

Stating that all youths across the country have similar dreams, he said, BPOs were now operating from Nagaland and getting contracts from Australia.

If youths in Kokrajhar district (in Assam) were asking for setting up of BPOs for development, it meant emergence of a new India, he said.

In this connection, Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said permission for five BPOs has been granted by the Centre. The BPOs would be set up at Diphu, Majuli Island, Nagaon, Silchar and Kokrajhar.

The Union minister said Prime Minister Narendra Modi had stated that if the North East region was not developed, then India would lag behind.

"Guwahati must become the gateway to ASEAN countries," he said.

On the PM's push for Digital India, he said it is designed to empower ordinary Indians with the power of technology.

Prasad recommended that the state government use the Umang app so that people get 1,200 services at the click of a button. "Load Assam's services for Indians to see the services available in the state".

Speaking on the Rs 119.89-crore Tech City Electronic Manufacturing Cluster on 100 acres in Guwahati, projected to provide employment opportunities to 8,000 people, Prasad said, "We gave some funds and Assam Government contributed the rest".

One power company has come forward to invest Rs 86 crore in the Cluster to produce electronic items for the markets of ASEAN countries and push them there, he said.

Pointing out that only two mobile manufacturing companies were producing hand sets in the country till a few years back, he said today there are 115 such mobile phone manufacturing plants across the country.

Digitally inaugurating the National Internet Exchange of India point near Guwahati, the union minister said NIXI will be a mode for domestic internet traffic from Guwahati today for the North East region making the internet service here more effective without depending on places outside the region.

Also inaugurating an NIC Excellence Cyber Security centre here, Prasad said it is very important as some try to abuse the system.

The minister also launched a Microwave Tea Drying Technology for tea, agricultural products and bakery industry along with a Universal Moisture Metre for grains, pulses, construction material, fertilisers, food sector, etc., and a Radio Frequency Disinfection Technology System for tea, grains, etc.

Sonowal also added that Assam and the North East region is a potential zone for tourism with "better oxygen", water biodiversity and nature.

Top global IT giant companies such as Microsoft, IBM, C-DACT also participated in the programme.assam, sarbananda sonowal

The first-ever global investors summit in Assam has seen investment commitments to the tune of nearly Rs 70,000 crore in various sectors, including petroleum, telecom, health and tourism, Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said today.

"It is a very good beginning. The response of the investors are very exciting and encouraging. I believe the investment commitments will make Assam a better economy," Sonowal told PTI here.

Nearly 200 initial pacts worth nearly Rs 70,000 crore were signed at the Advantage Assam summit, he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the two-day event yesterday. Bhutanese PM Tshering Tobgay, several Union ministers, chief ministers of neighbouring Arunachal Pradesh and Manipur, ambassadors and high commissioners of 16 countries, RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani, Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekharan attended the meet.

The chief minister said oil major ONGC committed Rs 13,000 crore investment in the state, another oil PSU Oil India Ltd. pledged an investment of Rs 10,000 crore.

Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Numaligarh Refinery Ltd planning to invest Rs 3,432 crore and Rs 3,410 crore, respectively.

Among private players, RIL chairman and MD Mukesh Ambani has announced an investment of Rs 2,500 crore in Assam in various sectors, including retail, petroleum, telecom, tourism and sports, creating jobs for at least 80,000 people over the next three years.

The Tata Trusts will invest Rs 2,000 crore to implement a cancer care programme jointly with the Assam government in 17 centres across 15 districts of the state from next year, the project will see an investment of around Rs 2,000 crore.

Indo-UK Institute of Health will be investing Rs 2,700 crore, while Century Ply has shared plans of investing Rs 2,100 crore.

Spicejet chief Ajay Singh has announced the plans of Rs 1,250 crore investment in Assam through seaplanes to boost the tourism sector besides connecting Lakhimpur and Jorhat under the recently launched central government scheme 'Udaan'.

Infinity Group will be investing Rs 1,000 crore in an IT park and real estate project in Guwahati, the Medanta Group proposed Rs 500 crore investment in the healthcare sector and Dalmia Bharat Cement announced an investment to the tune of Rs 1,100 crore.

Sonowal said the investments will provide ample employment opportunities to the youth of the state.

"We hope that Assam will be the gateway for India to connect ASEAN countries," he said.

Media advisor to the chief minister, Hrishikesh Goswami, said tourism, which is one of the key focus areas of the government, saw an investment proposal to the tune of Rs 736 crore and infrastructure sector saw a total investment proposal worth Rs 2,347 crore.

Other major companies announcing investments in Assam are BPCL (Rs 350 crore), Essel Infraprojects (Rs 6,000 crore), Star Cement (Rs 2,100 crore), Infinity Infotech Parks (Rs 1,000 crore) and Mahindra Holidays and Resorts India (Rs 400 crore).

The Assam government has identified 12 focus sectors for the summit, including agriculture and food processing, handloom-textile-handicrafts, logistics, river transport-port township, IT-ITeS, pharmaceutical-medical equipment, plastics-petrochemicals and power.

Assam has hosted its first global investors summit to showcase its manufacturing opportunities and geostrategic advantages to foreign and domestic investors.

The summit aimed at highlighting Assam's geostrategic advantages and core competencies in different sectors along with the policy initiatives taken by the state government.Banking reforms in order to resolve the non-performing asset (NPA) crisis in the banking sector could have come a little earlier, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has said. In an exclusive interview to News18 Network, Jaitley spoke how the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the government are taking efforts to clean the balance sheets of banks struggling with NPAs of over Rs 8.5 lakh crore.

In 2016, the government passed the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code to tighten the grip on the defaulting promoters and giving more power to bankers to take decisive action.

On being asked if the reforms should have come earlier, Jaitley said: "Could have. Because we were making all honest efforts and so was RBI. They wanted to make sure through their various schemes, whether the restructuring etc could revive these companies, but it looked a little too late.

Over the past two years, the central bank has come out with various NPA resolution mechanisms such as corporate debt restructuring (CDR), strategic debt restructuring (SDR), Scheme for Sustainable Structuring of Stressed Assets (S4A) and 5:25 refinancing scheme among others.

Most schemes have not helped banks in a big way given the over-leveraged corporates and weak economic climate leading to weak cash flows for most of the indebted firms.

The gross non-performing assets as a percent of loans have only increased from 9.6 per cent to 10.2 percent between March and September 2017.

With the help of the IBC, in 2017, bankers were forced by the RBI to take loan defaulters to courts. Weighed down by the heavy pile of stressed assets and the asset quality review that followed in December 2016 under the leadership of former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan, it became a mission for banks to clean up their balance sheets.

So far, in 2 lists, the banking regulator has asked banks to send nearly 40 NPA accounts with nearly 30 percent of the share of gross bad loans in the system for immediate bankruptcy proceedings. The first list had the lion share with 12 large corporate accounts worth 25 percent of the bad loans at around Rs 1.8 lakh crore.Coca-Cola India is weighing options of sourcing mangoes and a few other fruits from West Bengal for brands like Maaza, a company official has said.

The company would soon make a decision on it, the official said.

"We are exploring 2-3 fruits for sourcing from this state including mangoes and pineapples," Coca-Cola India and South West Asia president T Krishnakumar said.

The company is holding dialogues with the horticulture department of the state for sourcing mangoes initially.

"Currently, we do not source any fruit from Bengal. We are holding dialogues with the horticulture department. In this summer season, some trial sourcing might be carried out for mango," Bengal Beverage-Dankuni managing director S R Goenka told PTI.

Bengal Beverage-Dankuni is a bottler for Coca-Cola in West Bengal.

Sources said, Coca-Cola may also test market Maaza by mixing Bengal varieties of mangoes.

The state produces several mango varieties including 'Himsagar' and 'Langra'.

West Bengal's average mango production is around 7 lakh tonnes. In a bumper year, it has even touched 10 lakh tonnes in the past.

Setting up of a processing unit through partners may come up later as it will require a certain level of volume, they said.

Coca-Cola has embarked on enhancing the existing portfolio of juices with fruits that are locally grown in various regions of India. The initiative is aimed at becoming a complete beverage company.

Coca-Cola India expects its mango fruit drink Maaza to become a USD 1 billion (approx. Rs 64,000 crore) brand by 2023.

Coca-Cola, along with its bottling partners in India, presently procures around 1 lakh metric tonnes of mango pulp annually.

This may double to 2 lakh metric tonnes, worth nearly Rs 1,100 crore and help 1,00,000 farmers by 2023, the company officials had said earlier.The BJP believes that the Union Budget's thrust on welfare schemes such as free LPG connection and health insurance for the poor will resonate with the masses and help the party electorally ahead of assembly polls in a number of key states.

The party top brass has briefed leaders on the key pro-poor and pro-farmers highlights of the budget and asked them to reach out to the masses with these details. The opposition claims that there is a growing rural distress and believes it can use the issue to corner the BJP.

The BJP's below-par performance in Gujarat, where it again formed a government, and its comprehensive defeat in three Rajasthan bypolls has boosted the morale of the Congress and opposition parties in the run-up to crucial assembly polls followed by Lok Sabha elections scheduled for next year.

The Left-ruled Tripura goes to the polls on February 18, followed by the Congress-ruled Karnataka, where the elections are expected to be held in May, and then in the BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh by this year end.

BJP sources said victory in states like Tripura and, more importantly, Karnataka will belie the opposition's claim of a larger rural distress aimed against the party and insisted that the budget has given them weapons to fight it.

The key budget provisions include the announcement of a minimum support price for farmers that will be 1.5 times of the cost incurred by them, a health insurance of Rs 5 lakh for 10 crore poor families, dubbed 'NaMo care' by BJP leaders, construction of 2 crore more toilets in the new financial year and giving free LPG connection to 8 crore poor women.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had cited these measures among others at a BJP Parliamentary Party meeting on the day the budget was presented to exhort the partys law-makers to inform the masses about them.

He had projected the BJP as a party which did not merely talk about social justice but also implement it.

Party president Amit Shah too dwelt at length on these provisions to assert that they will empower the poor and weaker sections of the society.

Under Modi and Shah, the BJP has managed to deepen its support among the Other Backward Classes and Dalits, resulting in the party being in power in 19 states, including those it rules with allies- an unprecedented high in its history.Union Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Singh Puri today told Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar that Gurugram would be considered for inclusion in the Smart City Mission.

Responding to a specific request by Khattar, Puri said an apex body would be constituted to look into the matter, an official release said here today.

The Haryana government had requested for the Centre's technical assistance to include Gurugram in the Smart City Mission, while saying that financial implications for the same would be taken care of by it, the release said.

The chief minister put forward the request while speaking at a review meeting of various flagship missions of the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs held under the chairmanship of Puri here today, it added.

These flagship missions include AMRUT, Smart City Mission, Swachh Bharat Mission and Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana.

Speaking at the meeting, Haryana Urban Local Bodies Minister Kavita Jain said a survey was conducted in all 80 cities of the state under the Shehri Awas Yojana, and 3.23 lakh applications were received by the government.

As many as 93 slums were selected in 20 towns to be covered under the In-Situ Slum Rehabilitation. The State Level Sanctioning-Cum-Monitoring Committee (SLSMC) had given its approval to 65 towns under the Housing for All Scheme, and proposals for 56 towns were sent to the central government for approval, Jain said.

A Detailed Project Report (DPR) for 77,511 beneficiaries in 66 towns were approved by the SLSMC, she added.

Urban Local Bodies Department Principal Secretary Anand Mohan Sharan said while the Centre had approved DPRs on 28 cities, submission of DPRs on 38 cities was underway. Apart from this, DPRs on 14 cities would be submitted by February 28, he added.

Sharan said street lights in 80 cities were being replaced with LED lights. The work of replacing street lights with LEDs had started in Gurugram and would be completed in other cities by February 15, he added.Finance Minister has assured that the proposal to cut corporate income tax to 25 percent, saying that move wouldnt make India an unfriendly destination for investments.

In an exclusive interview to News18 Network, the Finance Minister said he had foreseen this. Three years ago, I had announced that we would gradually bring it down to 25 percent and waive off all the exemptions, Jaitley said.

When specifically asked about his commitment to lowering the corporate income tax, Jaitley said: Of course, I walk the talk. I have set a roadmap.

In his Budget speech, Jaitley had proposed to cut the corporate income tax rate to 25 percent for companies with a turnover of up to Rs 250 crore, meeting a key demand of the corporate world that has been seeking lower tax payouts to enable greater investment and jobs creation.

I have been gradually stepping up the number of companies which come under the 25 percent category, Jaitley told News18 Network. Today, 99 percent of the companies with Rs 250 crore turnover and below are all within 25 percent category.

Our study shows that those above the 25 percent category  that is a 30 percent category  are 7,000 companies left which are in any case paying just about 22 percent due to the exemptions. So, they can live with the exemptions for some time. As the exemptions die out, and get phased out, the scope of further expansion will be there, he added.

In Budget 2015-16, Jaitley had laid a roadmap to bring down corporate tax rate to 25 percent, which is yet to be implemented. This will benefit 99 percent of all companies that file taxes, Jaitley had said, adding that mini, micro, small and medium enterprises will gain the most.

Major industry bodies had been urging the government to reduce the corporate tax rate, in sync with what was announced three years ago.

In November 2015 the government had laid down a comprehensive road map for phasing out the corporate tax exemptions by 2018 as it looks to reduce the tax rate, simplify administration and improve Indias competitive edge globally.

Last November, the Finance Ministry constituted a six-member task force suggest redrafting of Indias income tax law and rules. Arbind Modi, Member (legislation) of Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) is the convenor. Chief Economic Adviser (CEA) Arvind Subramanian is a permanent special invitee in the task force.

While the report needs is slated to be submitted to the government by May 2018, the decision to cut the corporate income tax rate for a large number of companies could be precursor of more comprehensive direct tax reforms.Chairman of USD 11-billion Adani Group Gautam Adani today said India now stands on the "cusp of explosive growth" and game-changing policies like GST, Aadhaar and Jan Dhan Yojana will lay the platform for decades of strong growth.

With GDP growth rates of over 7 per cent, it is anticipated that India will become the world's third largest economy by 2030 and second largest by 2050, he said.

"India now stands on the cusp of explosive growth that barring the US and China, no nation in modern history has witnessed," Adani said while addressing the SRCC Business Conclave.

He said over the past few years, there has been a dramatic progress in positioning India as a nation integrated into the global economy, a nation flexing its power and building key strategic alliances and a nation that is firm yet restrained and extending a helping hand to those in need.

Adani said over the past few years, the Narendra Modi government has introduced "game changing" policies which will drive foundational changes across India. The implementation of the GST - while still to be streamlined - will unify internal markets and become the catalyst for GDP growth, he said.

Stating that Aadhaar is a "remarkable initiative" of getting 1.3 billion people on one common identification platform is a game changer for both tax collections and direct benefits distribution, Adani said it will transform the way government manages its subsidies.

Over 31 crore bank accounts opened under the Jan Dhan Yojana in just three years and has yielded a staggering Rs 73,000 crore of deposits. Besides, the Digital India revolution is on track to ensure over 100 crore of our fellow countrymen have a mobile device in their hands by 2020  and over 50 crore internet users come online - thereby enabling a technology revolution of unprecedented scale, he said.

"The combination of these initiatives will change India in ways hard to imagine. It will unlock the bottom-of-the pyramid and lay the platform for expanding the middle class and setting off decades of strong growth," Adani said.

He also highlighted the hurdles to economy saying India faces deepening income inequality, challenge of income security of farmers, job growth, and increased geostrategic polarisation.The Indian mission in Abuja is in touch with authorities in Nigeria and Benin about a ship carrying 22 Indians believed to have gone missing in the Gulf of Guinea, the External Affairs Ministry has said.

"A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea," MEA Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said in a tweet.

The India mission in Nigeria was in touch with the authorities concerned and the situation was being constantly monitored, the MEA said.

"Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860," Kumar tweeted yesterday.17:19 "I have a dream that even a person who wears slipper should also be able to fly," says Narendra Modi.

17:17 Under Udan Yojana, about 56 new airport and 31 new helipads

will be constructed: PM Modi

17:14 You can estimate the speed at which our government work. Our government laid down more than 200 km railway track: PM Modi

17:12 In Bengaluru, a Rs 17,000 crore worth 160-km railway suburban metro project will start very soon. It will benefit 15 lakh people in the state, says Prime Minister Modi.

17:08 More than 1 crore loans have been sanctioned for the people of Karnataka under Mudra Yojana: PM Modi

17:06 Under Swachh Bharat Mission, nearly 44 lakh toilets are being built in Karnataka so far. Under Saubhagya scheme people will be given free electricity. If Bengaluru does not receive electricity for a day, it will be a disaster. But nearly 7 lakh households in Karnataka and 4 crore households in India live in darkness. They are living a life of 18th century: PM Modi

17:00 The countdown of the Congress government in Karnataka has started. They will be defeated soon. The BJP Government in Karnataka in not very Far: PM Modi

Parivartana

Yatre

Bengaluru

Prime Minister has started addressing therally inThe recent Congress victory in key bypolls in Rajasthan has busted the "myth" of the BJP being an election-winning machine and sent out a message that its "jumlebaazi" (rhetoric) will not work, party state unit chief Sachin Pilot said today.

Pilot, who campaigned intensely and worked at the grass- roots level for the two Lok Sabha constituencies and one Assembly seat, said the outcome would also have a bearing on the upcoming polls in other states, including Karnataka.

He said the results had come at a time when the BJP was on the "back foot".

"The fact that they were forced to make a so-called pro- farmer budget shows that the agrarian distress all over India is having its impact and the BJP will have to pay a heavy price for it," Pilot told PTI in an interview here.

The Congress put up a strong performance in Rajasthan where its candidates wrested the Alwar and Ajmer Lok Sabha and Mandalgarh Assembly seats from the BJP by impressive margins last week.

Pilot, who is largely seen as the Congress's chief ministerial face in Rajasthan, said the elections were "very crucial" as they came just seven or eight months before Assembly polls in the state.

"These by-elections are a very positive indication for the times to come, and not just in Rajasthan but in other states also. I think it will have a good bearing on the Karnataka polls that are coming up," the 40-year-old leader said, adding the myth that the BJP was an election-winning machine had been busted.

Noting that bypolls have historically been won in the state by the ruling dispensation, Pilot said the mandate that the Congress received was not just a rejection of the Vasundhara Raje government but an approval of the Congress's stand on various issues and policies.

"The myth that the BJP is an election-winning machine and cannot be defeated at the hustings at the booth level, that myth has been put to rest now," he said.

"The whole pracharak, vistarak and the booth management ... take pride in saying that they are the best apparently... (It) has now been proven that we can defeat them if the Congress party workers work with zeal," Pilot said.

Asked if the mandate was against the Raje government or the BJP-led government at the Centre, Pilot said, "You cannot segregate. This is a mandate against the BJP."

"Governance has failed in Rajasthan. But the larger BJP policies of the GST, 'notebandi' (demonetisation)... have had their impact," he said.

"There is a message also for the BJP that four years of jumlebaazi, of creating so many crore jobs, depositing Rs 15 lakh in each account etc will not work. That has also been very clearly indicated in the elections," Pilot said.

Asked whether the Congress would name a chief ministerial candidate before the polls in Rajasthan, Pilot said, "We as a party have traditionally not done this. The BJP takes pride in doing this but has not done it in Rajasthan."

"In our party, the elected MLAs and the leadership will decide who will form the government. The singular job at our hand is to win the state elections. Collective efforts of all leaders are towards that," he said.

He also asserted that there was no factionalism in the state unit of the party and all leaders were united in their objective of defeating the BJP in Rajasthan.

The margin of victory registered by the Congress had been striking with its candidate Karan Singh Yadav trouncing his nearest BJP rival Jaswant Yadav by 1,96,496 votes in Alwar, and the main opposition party's nominee for Ajmer Raghu Sharma beating BJP's Swaroop Lamba by over 84,414 votes.

The Congress's Vivek Dhakad won the Mandalgarh Assembly seat, defeating his nearest BJP rival Shakti Singh Hada by nearly 13,000 votes.

Pilot alleged the BJP attempted to polarise the polls and divert the campaign discourse from the main issues.

"I must salute the people of Rajasthan that they did not allow this communal and venomous politics to take centre-stage ... The BJP's desperate attempt at the fag end to communalise (the bypolls) came a cropper," Pilot said.

He pointed out there were eight Assembly segments in each parliamentary seat and the Congress won all the eight in Alwar and in Ajmer.

"So it shows that even the urban centres where we were not so strong conventionally, those people  the middle class, young people  have come strongly in the Congress's fold.

"With this victory on our shoulders we are going to work double hard and with more humility reach out to the people of Rajasthan and do a mass contact programme, so that we are able to get the blessings (of the people) eight months later," he said.

Pilot claimed the tide was turning against the BJP and hailed Congress president Rahul Gandhi for taking on the BJP aggressively.

"Every statement Mr Rahul Gandhi makes at least 15 ministers start challenging that, which shows the nervousness in the BJP camp at the way Mr Gandhi is attacking and aggressively campaigning," he said.February 04, 2018

Weekly Review And Open Thread 2018-05

Jan 28 - Robert Parry Has Died

I am really, really sad about this.

Jan 29 - Syria - Neo-Conservatives Demand "Action" - Hope For A Larger War

The crazies won't let go. They are not alone. U.S. media is solidly supporting them. See for example this screenshot from today's New York Times. The actual piece is about cooperation of Israel and Egypt against ISIS in the Sinai. Nothing in the report has to do with Lebanon, Syria, Iraq or Iran. But it is headed by a picture of Netanyahoo pointing at the mystic 'Shia Crescent'. What for?

Jan 30 - U.S. Runs Headscarf Campaign Against Iran

Voice of America and similar U.S. government entities are obviously instruments of 'regime change' which is why they initiated the fake headscarf campaign. The University of Maryland just published a new poll it made in Iran: Iranian Public Opinion After the Protests (pdf). Large majorities in Iran support their system of governance. While they see demonstrations about economic problems as justified they are against the aims of those who hijacked them. They favor the Iranian support for Syria and Iraq and want to uphold their somewhat conservative, religion based values.

Jan 31 - Sleuthhound Puppy Takes 'Deep Dive' Into MoA - (Funny)

Some nutty kid tried to dox Moon of Alabama and gloriously failed ...

Feb 1 - Syria - Erdogan's Bashibazouk Want To Ravage Afrin

There is some weird dealing behind the Afrin campaign between the Russians and Turkey. The Syrian army has temporarily halted parts of its campaign in east Idleb and Turkey has promptly transported a large number of its Takfiri 'rebels' from Idleb across the border into Turkey to intensify the attack on the Kurdish enclave Afrin from there. I am not sure who is playing whom in this.

Feb 2 - Memo: Democrats Made Up Evidence Enabled Eavesdropping On Trump Campaign

The turn of the anti-Trump campaign from "Publishing the memo is treason!" to "The published memo is a nothing-burger." was quite amusing to watch. It demonstrated that there is some panic that more might be revealed. David Habakukk at Sic Temper Tyrannis puts the anti-Trump anti-Russia campaign into its much larger context.

Feb 3 - Freelancer Despairs: "My Lies About Hizbullah Can't Compete With Trump" - (Updated)

A dissection of a quite devious way to smuggle anti-Hizbullah lies into the record ...

A request to my readers: Help this blog to become better. Which of the posts this weeks were good, which were not so good? What other themes should I post about?

Use as open thread ...

Posted by b on February 4, 2018 at 15:13 UTC | Permalink

CommentsNatural gas processing plants are cropping up throughout the Permian Basin as the business opportunities created by the areas oil and gas riches flow through the economy.

Honeywell, for example, said its UOP Russell subsidiary is providing a third cryogenic gas processing plant to Brazos Midstream. The plant, named Comanche III, will process liquids from natural gas produced in the southern Delaware Basin.

Our company was originally Thomas Russell Co., founded by Thomas Russell, Craig Ranta, vice president for UP Russell, said in a phone interview from his Des Plaines, Illinois, office.

Russell had pioneered a standardized processing plant that was flexible enough to be designed once and then replicated for use in producing basins from the Delaware to the Marcellus. It was widely used in the shale gas boom from 2005 to 2012, when Honeywell purchased the company, Ranta said.

The U.S. was awash in associated gas, and there was a large demand to process gas, he said.

The Permian Basin is rich in natural gas liquids, and producers and processors alike are looking for ways to maximize the extraction of those liquids and maximize revenue streams, he said.

The key to success for companies such as UOP Russell is speed-to-market, said Ranta. The key to realizing that speed-to-market is modular plant design.

If you look at other plants, theyre engineered off-site, then all the components are ordered and then a contractor builds the plant, he said. Ours is more an assembly process. The plants are pre-assembled before it gets to the field. Our plants are assembled in our controlled shop environment thats not susceptible to weather or susceptible to labor issues. We take the equipment, assemble in the shop on skids, drive it to the location. The skids are in place, so its a matter of connecting the equipment.

That flexibility allows each plant to be adjusted to the particular gas composition of the basin, Ranta said.

The Comanche III unit UOP Russell is delivering to Brazos Midstream is a high recovery unit that can process 200 million cubic feet per day. High recovery units are designed to maximize the recovery of natural gas liquids for producers and processors. With 140 plants in operation in producing basins throughout the U.S., the company has developed retrofit solutions to convert each plant into high recovery units.

Thats been our focus: high recovery units, retrofit solutions and digitization  making the best use of assets (by) taking plant data and having a digital platform that offers reliability and lets operators maximize production, Ranta said. It also offers an aspect of training, which helps train new operators and keeps reliability in place.

UOP Russell engineered, fabricated and supplied Comanche III to Brazos, bringing to 460 million cubic feet the amount of gas-processing capacity UOP has supplied Brazos Midstream. Ranta said the company has been active in midstream infrastructure in both the Midland and Delaware basins.Population in the Permian Basin has been growing, thanks to the regions thriving oil and gas industry. That growth is not being confined to the human variety.

In the span of one week, two Calgary, Alberta-based drilling companies announced plans to relocate drilling rigs to the Permian Basin.

AKITA Drilling has contracted its Rig 90, an ultra-high spec deep capacity rig, with a major operator that has a significant Permian Basin presence. The Rig 90 is being moved to the Permian Basin from the Western Canadian natural gas basin, where it had faced limited opportunities, the company said in a press release. The rig is well-equipped to drill the deepest lateral wells in the Permian Basin. AKITA said it also has other rigs well-suited for deployment in the United States.

A week after that announcement came word from Trinidad Drilling that it would be moving eight rigs into the Permian Basin: two from Canada, three from elsewhere in the U.S. and three from Saudi Arabia.

From our point of view, it makes sense to place rigs where the demand is strongest, and demand is strongest in the U.S., and particularly the Permian Basin, said Lisa Ottmann, Trinidads vice president, investor relations.

There are benefits to working in the U.S. For one, in Canada there are seasonal issues, such as the beginning of spring or winter that require drillers to wait for ground conditions to improve before they begin work, Ottmann said in a phone interview from her office in Calgary,

Thats a shorter season, so its more competitive in the U.S. because you can work year-round, she said.

A second benefit hinges on the regulatory environment. Ottmann said the economic and regulatory environment in the U.S. is more favorable.

Trinidad entered the U.S. market in 2005, and while Ottmann didnt have an exact date when the company began work in the Permian Basin, she estimated it was not much later than 2005. Already, the company is the fourth most active driller in the Permian Basin, she said.

Moving drilling rigs is quite time-consuming and costly but Trinidad is willing to undertake the effort and expense, she said.

We think the Permian Basin will have strong demand for quite some time, Ottmann said.

The three rigs coming from Saudi Arabia originally were deployed in the U.S., Ottmann said. The costs will be covered partly by Saudi customer-paid demobilization fees and the remaining costs, along with the costs of moving the other rigs from elsewhere in North America, will be paid by Permian customers. The rigs from Saudi Arabia are expected to be ready to work sometime in the third quarter, while the rigs coming from elsewhere in the U.S. and from Canada are expected to be ready to work in early to mid-2018.

Reconfiguring the rigs from Saudi Arabia will be fairly simple because they originally were deployed in the U.S., while the rigs coming from Canada will be have to be outfitted for hot weather, she said.

Each of the eight rigs will be equipped with the companys RigMinder suite of technology products, which include RigMinder Criterion directional advisory software, electronic data recorders and downhole tool capability.

Drilling technology has significantly advanced over the last five years, Ottmann said.

Wells that are being drilled now have longer laterals so they need more mud-pumping capacity to get the mud to the end of the well, she said. Our customers also like to have a moving system that allows us to move the rig without pulling it apart and putting it on tracks.

That plays into the trend toward pad drilling, where multiple wells can be drilled from a single pad, she said. That trend has also been credited with reducing the need for more rigs, but Ottmann said the demand is for specific rigs, not merely more rigs.

What were seeing is demand for rigs that fit specifications customers are looking for, and thats where the market is tight. Thats why youre seeing rigs moving into the Permian Basin. The demand is for specific rigs, not more rigs, she said.

To help contain costs, Trinidad will more four idled rigs to inventory, where their parts, such as mud pumps and generators, can be utilized for rig upgrades.

Trinidad will now have 69 rigs at work in the U.S., including about 31 in the Permian Basin.

Ottmann said Trinidad will be hiring crews for the new rigs. The company has an office in Midland; its U.S. headquarters is in Houston.

The company expects the cost of relocating the eight rigs to be approximately $40 million, including $21 million in upgrade costs on Trinidad-owned rigs, $6 million (net to Trinidad) on Trinidads international joint venture rigs and $13 million in additional maintenance capital to re-activate the rigs. Trinidad expects to earn a full cycle return (including net book value of the existing assets and inventory values) on the capital invested of approximately 20 percent and payback of approximately 1.5 years.Authorities on Friday conducted a raid at an alleged chop shop on the 400 block of Our Road in San Jacinto County, located off U.S. 59 northeast of Cleveland.

The raid, which took place just before daybreak, was conducted by the Montgomery County Auto Theft Task Force, San Jacinto County Sheriff's Office Hot Spot Team and the Liberty County Pct. 6 Constable's Office.

Officers, dressed in tactical gear and carrying high-powered rifles, breached the camping trailers, house and outbuildings on the Our Road property, while helicopter air support flew overhead and an ambulance stood by in the event of an injury.

Five people with confirmed gang ties to the Aryan Brotherhood are in custody and facing multiple felony charges, said Bryan Carlisle, spokesperson for the Montgomery County Task Force.

The suspects have been identified as Matthew Follis, 38, Alexandria Holloway, 26, Shain Whitmire, 38, Everitt McAdams, 34, and Shasta Cole, 33, all of Shepherd.

Follis and Holloway each are charged with nine counts of Theft of Vehicle and two additional counts for Possession of Controlled Substance and Felon in Possession of a Firearm.

Whitmire is charged with two counts of Vehicle Theft while McAdams and Cole each face one count of Possession of a Controlled Substance.

At least eight stolen vehicles were recovered at the scene and another, a gray Volkswagen, was found at a property one street over at 50 Little John St., Shepherd, said Sgt. Larry Allen of the constable's office. Investigators also found three firearms and numerous amounts of narcotics including marijuana, methamphetamine, heroin and oxycotin.

"The Volkswagen was reported stolen last night from Campbell Street in Cleveland and the suspect in that case is Shain Whitmire, one of the suspects arrested Friday at the chop shop," Allen said.Midland ISD recorded mixed results on its 2016-17 federal report card, which was released Friday by the Texas Education Agency.

The district outperformed results from the previous year in 15 of 28 (53.5 percent) categories that measure the percentage of students performing at or above approached grade level or what was formerly determined to be the Level II satisfactory standard.

Results covered grades three through high school and subject areas including math, reading, writing, science and social studies.

MISD seventh-graders failed to outperform results from the previous year in all three of its subject areas. The district also missed in four of five end-of-course measurements. When considering all grades, Midland ISD outperformed the previous year in 50 percent of the subject areas.

The federal report card showed not only district results but also how Midland ISD performed against Region 18 and state averages. MISD typically outperformed the region in the elementary and junior high categories, while results were more comparable when taking into account performance on end-of-course exams. Region 18 has been reported to be one of the academically worst-performing districts in the state.

Midland ISD did not out-perform the state average in any of the 28 categories. In only one category  eighth-grade math  did MISD tie the state average.

When looking at percentage of students meeting grade level, MISD outperformed its results from 2016 and 2017 Region 18 on five of six subject areas (all subjects, reading, math, science and social studies). In none of the six  the other subject area being writing -- did the district reach the state standard.

When it came to the percentage of students mastering grade level, Midland ISD again outperformed its results from 2016 and 2017 Region 18 on five of six subject areas (all subjects, reading, math, science and social studies). In none of the six did the district reach the state standard.

The report card also shows student achievement and state academic annual measurable objectives.

The performance of all students is broken down as is the performance of students by race (African-American, Hispanic, white, American Indian, Asian, Pacific Islander and two or more races). Performance is also measured by economically disadvantaged, ELL and special education students. Those subject areas were reading, math, writing, science and social studies. Across the board, the district met 28 of 47 (59.5 percent) of all measures. That included 40 percent for reading, 90 percent for math, 22 percent for writing, 78 percent for science and 67 percent for social studies. The report card shows special education students didnt meet any standard, African-American and Hispanic students met three of five categories (math, science and social studies), economically disadvantaged students met two of five (math and science), and ELL met one of five (math). The state target on all categories appears to be 60 percent.

None of the student groups tested met the 91 percent federal standard in reading or math, the only areas tested.

The U.S. Department of Education requires each state to publish an annual report card with specific district- and campus-level data.

Every district that receives Title I, Part A funding is responsible for distributing the state-, district- and campus-level report cards to each of its campuses, the parents of all enrolled students and the general public.A 21-year-old Fort Worth man admitted to police that he punched a one-year-old baby in the head twice because the child would not stop crying, local media reports.

Derrick Pete Silva, 21, was arrested Thursday after confessing to police that he struck the 19-month-old baby last November in a fit of rage, according to the Star-Telegram and CBS DFW.

Police said Silva was involved with the infant's 16-year-old mother, who told authorities Silva would tell the one-year-old not to cry "like a little bitch" and also threatened to have the child's "pee pee" chopped off.

POLICE: Texas City man arrested in connection to bomb threat made to preschool

Silva told investigators he punched the baby "really hard on the back of his head," causing the child's hands and feet to begin to twitch and shake.

The 21-year-old then left the room to watch television and calm down, police said.

Shortly after, Silva's cousin found the crying baby on the floor and alerted Silva, who carried the one-year-old baby to his mother and told her something was wrong, according to the suspect's interview with police.

STANDOFF: Suspect who shot a deputy while handcuffed identified

An ambulance was called to take the child to a local hospital where he died from blunt force injuries, according to the Tarrant County Medical Examiner's Office.

The child's mother told hospital staff she believed the one-year-old fell from his bed. Hospital officials alerted police when they noticed the child's injuries were not consistent with a two to three-foot fall.

See some of the most shocking crimes that occurred near the Houston area in recent years.Vous etes confrontes a une infestation par la puce, la punaise de lit ? Voici plusieurs actions qui sont a mettre en uvre pour faire []In Focus with Allison Walker is a 30-minute public affairs program, featuring a roundtable of newsmakers representing a range of perspectives, including local officials and expert analysts as they tackle topical issues of importance to Floridians.

In Focus airs Sundays at 11:30 a.m. and 8:30 p.m., right after Political Connections.Federal safety officials are focusing on why a railroad switch was set in the wrong position sending an New York-to-Miami bound Amtrak train with more than 140 people aboard off the main line and onto a side track where it collided with an empty freight train early Sunday.

Two people were killed and 116 injured in the crash that occurred around 2:35 a.m. in Cayce, South Carolina, a few miles south of Columbia, officials said. The two men who died were Amtrak employees - the engineer and conductor who were riding in the front of the train.

The Lexington County coroner identified the victims as engineer Michael Kempf, 54, of Savannah, Ga., and conductor Michael Cella, 36, of Orange Park, Florida.

The crash caused the lead engine and "some passenger cars" to derail, Amtrak officials said. The CSX train was parked on a track next to the main railroad line and was empty, according to South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, R.

In a briefing with reporters Sunday afternoon, Robert Sumwalt, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, which is investigating the crash, detailed what is known so far.

The Amtrak train, traveling on tracks owned and maintained by freight railway giant, CSX, was supposed to pass over the switch to continue on to the main line tracks, but instead was directed onto the pad-locked crossing into a portion of track known as "siding" which was occupied by a parked CSX train, Sumwalt said.

"For whatever reason that switch was, as they say in the railroad industry, 'lined and locked,'" he said. "Which basically means it was aligned for the train coming this way to be diverted into the siding."

"Key to this investigation [is] why that switch was lined that way," Sumwalt said.

He said investigators have recovered the front-facing video camera from the Amtrak train and that it has been sent to labs at NTSB headquarters in Washington, D.C., where it will be reviewed. The footage will be important because it can offer details about what happened in the minutes before the collision.

However, he added that investigators have been unable to recover the event data recorders from either train in part because of the extent of the damage.

Sumwalt said there was ". . . catastrophic damage to each of the locomotives," adding that the Amtrak locomotive ". . . was not recognizable at all."

Derrec Becker of the South Carolina Emergency Management Division said injuries from the crash included minor cuts and broken bones. Lexington County spokesman Harrison Cahill said passengers who were hurt were taken to local hospitals, but none had life-threatening injuries.

There were two leaks from the train, spilling an estimated 5,000 gallons of fuel, but there was "no threat to the public at this time," Cahill said at a morning news conference. He later said that it was unclear from where the fuel had leaked.

It will take several months to determine the cause of the crash, Sumwalt said. But he added that he expected to have more details Monday. In addition to investigators from the NTSB, personnel from the Federal Railroad Administration, which oversees the safety of the nation's railroads are also at the site.

"The Federal Railroad Administration Investigative team is on site to support to the National Transportation Safety Board's investigation," the U.S. Department of Transportation said in a statement. "We are closely monitoring the situation and have been in contact with CSX and Amtrak as well as federal, state and local officials."

The Transportation Department said Secretary Elaine Chao also sent her senior adviser, Jim Ray, to the crash site.

"It is important to understand the factors that contributed to this tragic accident and how all stakeholders can ensure a safe and reliable rail system going forward," the DOT statement said.

Sumwalt said NTSB investigators had heard, but not confirmed, reports that maintenance work was being performed on the signal system prior to Sunday's crash.

Officials from CSX said its personnel were on the scene assisting state and local authorities, but did not respond to questions about whether the collision could have been the result of a switch issue or if there had been other issues - including a signal outage - on that stretch of track.

Earlier in the day, Amtrak CEO Richard Anderson said that the signalling system was not operating, which is why trains were being directed through the corridor manually by CSX dispatchers.

Anderson said CSX owns and controls the Columbia Subdivision tracks where the crash occurred and is responsible for overseeing the dispatching of trains and signal systems.

"They are in complete control of the track, the signaling, the switching - and in fact our train engineers and conductors as we move over their railroad are directed and in regular contact with the dispatch center at CSX," Anderson said, adding, ". . . the signals and particularly the switches are controlled by CSX."

He said he did not know the reason for the signal outage. Anderson said the Amtrak train would normally travel on the main line track, not the section of the track where the collision occurred.

"As I said, control of which train is on which track is within the authority of the dispatcher and the host railroad that controls the switch," Anderson said.

Tom Allen, program manager for the South Carolina Office of Regulatory Staff, which oversees rail safety in the state, said the collision could have been the result of a switch issue that sent the Amtrak train away from the main track and toward the parked freight train. But he emphasized it will be up to federal investigators to determine the cause.

President Donald Trump offered his words of support and thanked first responders in a tweet sent Sunday morning.

This is the third crash involving an Amtrak train in less than three months. Last week, a special charter Amtrak train carrying GOP lawmakers to a retreat in West Virginia collided with a garbage truck. One person in the truck was killed in the crash in Crozet, Virginia. In December, an Amtrak train in Washington state derailed while crossing an overpass, spilling cars onto a busy highway and killing three people.

Federal investigators have not determined the cause of the earlier crashes; investigations can take months or even years, but the incidents are likely to raise concerns about the safety of the nation's rail system and focus more attention on the push to install a technology known as positive train control, an automatic braking system that federal safety officials say could have prevented hundreds of deaths and thousands of injuries over the years.

Even though it is early in the investigation, Sumwalt was adamant about the benefits of positive train control, and how it could have factored into an incident like Sunday's.

"An operational PTC system is designed to prevent this type of accident," he said. "A fully operational positive train control system could have avoided this accident, and that's what it was designed to do."

Asked for a simple explanation of such a system, Sumwalt said it would automatically halt a train entering an occupied track.

"If you have a red signal . . . and you go blasting through that signal, it will enforce that signal and [not] allow you to go through that signal," he said.

In a letter sent last month to railroad industry officials, Chao warned them that they are expected to meet the federal deadline to have the systems installed by the end of this year.

On Sunday, Amtrak's Anderson also emphasized that it was important for railroads to meet the Dec. 31 deadline to install PTC.

He did not know if it could have prevented Sunday's crash, but said the track components involved would likely have been covered under such a system.

"Theoretically a well-run operable PTC system not only would cover speed, but would also cover switches and signals," he said. It's ". . . important that PTC be implemented by the end of the year and that we don't give any extensions."

Amtrak passenger Derek Pettaway said he woke with a jolt when the collision happened Sunday, suffering minor whiplash. He had taken shelter with other passengers at the nearby Pine Ridge Middle School, where authorities were providing medical care. "No one was panicking. I think most people were asleep. I think people were more in shock," Pettaway said in an interview with CNN.

The White House press pool was told that President Trump had been briefed on the situation and was receiving regular updates. Other officials also offered statements of support. Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., said his "prayers are with the families of those killed."

Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., said those who were affected were in his thoughts.

Heartbreaking news this morning. Roxanne and I are sending our thoughts and prayers to all those injured and to the loved ones of the two people who lost their life in this tragic accident.

Sumwalt said the Amtrak train contained seven passenger cars and one locomotive, while the CSX train contained two locomotives and 34 empty "autorack" cars, meant for transporting automobiles.

"The expectation of course was that the Amtrak would be operating straight down" the track, Sumwalt said.

---

Luz Lazo and Alisa Tang contributed to this report.Atlanta

Christopher Wray certainly knew what he was getting into.

As the eighth director of the FBI, the Atlanta lawyer took over an agency in the crosshairs of congressional ethics probes, internal investigations and a series of incendiary tweets by the president himself. Not to mention, Wray was succeeding an old colleague, James Comey, whom President Donald Trump unceremoniously dumped from the same post last May.

Since being confirmed in August by a 92-5 vote, in a rare showing of bipartisan support in the Senate, Wray has encountered one landmine after another. But former colleagues say the 50-year-old former federal prosecutor in Atlanta is up to the task.

"He didn't go in there with blinders on," said Amy Weil, an Atlanta lawyer who once worked with Wray in the U.S. Attorney's Office here. "He took the job for all the right reasons. He's not somebody who's swayed by political winds. He has a very good compass and it's always been pointed in the right direction."

Wray took on the president this week when he went public with a request that the White House block the release of a classified memo that alleges abuses by the FBI in the Russia investigation. On Friday, Trump gave the green light for the House Intelligence Committee memo to be released, so the White House is now at loggerheads with the FBI  and more specifically, with Wray.

Wray also has been confronted with internal tensions at the bureau. As this tumultuous week began, his deputy director, Andrew McCabe, abruptly stepped aside after meeting with Wray. McCabe told friends he felt pressured by Wray to leave his position, The New York Times reported. Wray also discussed with McCabe a forthcoming inspector general review of how the bureau investigated Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server, published reports say.

This development prompted some to question Wray's ability to remain independent, given the number of pointed and taunting tweets by Trump as he openly questioned McCabe's impartiality in the Clinton probe.

"FBI Director Wray needs to testify in public about his role over the last few months during Trump's attacks on McCabe," Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., who opposed Wray's nomination, said in a tweet. "Has he stood by his deputy director or given in to pressure?"

The next day, in an internal message to FBI personnel, Wray said it would be inappropriate for him to talk specifics about the inspector general's review.

"But I can assure you that I remain staunchly committed to doing this job, in every respect, 'by the book,'" Wray wrote, according to NBC News. "I will not be swayed by political or other pressure in my decision making."

Larry Thompson, deputy attorney general under President George W. Bush, said Wray will be true to that pledge.

"Chris would not have taken this job if he didn't have a lot of respect for the FBI," Thompson said. "He wouldn't take the job if he wasn't prepared to defend the FBI against what he might consider to be inappropriate criticism."

Thompson, who worked with Wray at the Atlanta firm King & Spalding, took Wray to the Justice Department to serve as associate deputy attorney general in 2001.

"We worked side by side after 9/11," Thompson said. "There wasn't any playbook as to what you should do when 3,000 of your fellow citizens are murdered. But Chris was very deliberate, made sound decisions, had good judgment and never got panicked. I relied upon him a great deal."

As for what's going on now, Thompson said, "(Wray) just needs to shut out the noise and do his job. I have complete confidence that's what he's going to do."

Joe Robuck was an FBI agent in 2000 when he worked with Wray, then a federal prosecutor, to obtain corruption convictions against the city of Atlanta's former chief investment officer and a politically connected businessman.

"He's an incredibly intelligent person who's truly a patriot," Robuck said. "As a lawyer, he's a chess player in how he approaches whatever is in front of him."

Now retired, Robuck said he and his former FBI colleagues have been deeply disturbed by some of the news coming out of the bureau. He specifically mentioned the scandal involving FBI officials Lisa Page and Peter Strzok, who were having an affair and exchanging text messages disparaging Trump during the campaign. Strzok was later ousted from the ongoing Russian investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

"I think Chris has got a daunting task ahead of him to put the bureau back in the good light it needs to be in," Robuck said. "But he's up to it. You're not going to wear him down. His work ethic is off the charts."

Robuck also said that, as long as he's known him, Wray has never expressed strong positions on political issues.

But Wray is unquestionably a Republican. Over the past decade, he has contributed more than $30,000 to GOP candidates in state, local, congressional and presidential races. (He did not contribute to Trump's presidential campaign, according to federal filings.)

From the get-go, Wray has insisted he will remain faithful to the rule of law.

At his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Wray was asked: What would you do if the president asked you to do something illegal or unethical?

"First, I would try to talk him out of it," Wray answered. "If that failed, I would resign. There isn't a person on this planet whose lobbying or influence could convince me to just drop or abandon a properly predicated and meritorious investigation."

Later, Wray was reminded that Trump had called Mueller's Russian investigation "the greatest witch hunt in political history." Do you agree? Wray was asked.

"I do not consider Director Mueller to be on a witch hunt," he answered matter-of-factly.

In December, Wray was tested again when Trump, in a tweet, said the FBI's "reputation is in Tatters  worst in History!"

Days later, Wray appeared before the House Judiciary Committee and was asked about Trump's tweet.

"The FBI that I see is tens of thousands of brave men and women who are working as hard as they can to keep people they will never know safe from harm," Wray answered. "The FBI that I see is people, decent people, committed to the highest principles of integrity and professionalism and respect."

Then, Wray gave a statement in which he may have unwittingly foreshadowed what was going to play out this week with McCabe's surprising departure.

"Now do we make mistakes?" Wray said. "You bet we make mistakes. Just like everybody who is human makes mistakes. When we make mistakes, there are independent processes like the independent, outside inspector general that will drive and dive deep into the facts surrounding those mistakes. And when that independent fact-finding is complete, we will hold our folks accountable if that's appropriate."A 21-year-old man is behind bars after police say a 16-year-old girl's father found a video of the man and his daughter having sex.

Officers were called to a home in San Antonio's South Side on Jan. 19 about a missing child.

The father told police that he believed his daughter was staying at a home in the 500 block of Fay Avenue, according to an arrest affidavit.

RELATED: Report: Stripper paid by Round Rock student to show up at middle school

The father says he took his daughter's phone on Jan. 9, when she first ran away from home. After the second incident of running he said he looked through the phone for clues to where his daughter might be, which is when he discovered a 13-minute sex video.

Officers went to the home and found the girl there. She told police she ran away from home 10 days prior to stay with Giuseppe Colla Crocker, 21. She also told police she had sex with him, according to the affidavit.

Crocker was arrested by police Thursday and is charged with sexual assault of a child and sexual performance of a child.

Fares Sabawi covers crime in San Antonio and Bexar County for mySA.com. Read more of his stories here. | fsabawi@mysa.comA pedestrian is in critical condition after being hit by a pickup truck as he and another person attempted to run across Interstate 37 Saturday night, San Antonio police said.

The man was transported to Brooke Army Medical Center with severe head and face trauma after being struck by a pickup around 8 p.m., on the southbound lane of I-37 between Pecan Valley Drive and Hot Wells Boulevard , according to SAPD Sgt. Gary Mucho.The random thoughts of a veteran, immigrant, and now citizen on our current challenge of immigration:

The much-quoted Emma Lazarus poem, The New Colossus, prominently displayed at the base of the Statue of Liberty, is commonly referenced when describing our convoluted immigration policy and laws.

Especially relevant are the closing lines:

Give me your tired, your poor.

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me.

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

It is especially poignant now, considering the recent turmoil in Congress. First, let me be clear, I am not advocating or supporting either point of view, political party or candidate. But, while observing the aftermath of the government shutdown, I wanted to add one more perspective to the discussion. The perspective of an immigrant, one whose family respected the law to achieve citizenship. My parents (Jack and Gladys), blue-collar, working-class people from Scotland, worked tirelessly for 10-plus years to attain visas to emigrate to the United States, with dreams of a better life for their two boys. They achieved that goal in January 1979, arriving in New York with nothing but three suitcases and a dream.

My father worked several jobs, often changing locations and jobs for small gains, some as little as a raise of 10 cents per hour. My mother, a trained pharmacist assistant, settled for a job as a beautician. They provided a stable, loving home to my brother and me. As with most stories, tragedy struck with heart disease taking my mother at the young age of 41. Her death  and love of country  energized me to serve my adopted country and home. I entered the Army at 19 as a private, ultimately serving more than 30 years.

My story is not unique or special, but an example of perseverance, commitment and patience to enter our country legally, the right way. I spent 30-plus years committed to our nation and all it stands for. As I reach the end of my military career, it is disturbing seeing many in the world demand the United States allow them entry  legal or not.

Yes, the United States is the beacon of freedom for the world. However, recent incidents illustrate the critical need to enforce immigration laws. It is unconscionable to turn a blind eye to the background of those seeking entry. How many of us would invite a stranger into our homes to spend the night knowing nothing about them? Not very many.

I do not oppose immigration  far from it. I personally would not be here if not for my parents, who sought new opportunities, but it is crucial, now more than ever, that we demand our elected officials enforce our laws. A nation without laws is not a nation at all. When we enforce our immigration laws, guidelines and regulations, we are and always will be a beacon of freedom. A country abiding by the closing lines of the Lazarus poem.

Mark Aitken is a husband, dad and head dishwasher who lives in Boerne.Ankur Sharma By

Express News Service

NEW DELHI: The brazen murder of a young photographer, Ankit Saxena, by relatives of his alleged girlfriend in West Delhis Raghubir Nagar has taken a political turn, with BJP leaders questioning the silence of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and chief minister Arvind Kejriwal.

Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari, along with other party leaders, also visited Ankits house and met his family members. Nobody from AAP had reacted on the incident by Saturday evening.

Shocked and Horrified on cold-blooded murder of #AnkitSaxena. Culprits should be punished with the highest quantum, Tiwari tweeted earlier in the day. The BJP also demanded that the Delhi government should pay `1 crore to the family of the deceased.

Ankit was reportedly set to marry the woman, but her family was opposed to their relationship as they belonged to different communities. Four of her family members, including her father, uncle and minor brother, assaulted and stabbed 23-year-old Ankit, before slitting his throat in full public view on Thursday.

The locality remained tense on Saturday even though the four accused were arrested on Friday. Paramilitary and police were deployed in the area.

Shocked and Horrified on cold blooded murder of #AnkitSaxena .

Culprits should be punished with the highest quantum @CPDelhi @DelhiPolice #JusticeForAnkit  Manoj Tiwari (@ManojTiwariMP) February 3, 2018

To maintain the law and order situation and prevent the communal conflagration, the Delhi Police refused to divulge much details to the media.

Police have arrested all the accused and the case is under the supervision of senior officers, said Vijay Kumar, DCP, West Delhi.

Meanwhile, the girlfriend of the deceased told a news channel that her uncle had killed Ankit and now she was also facing threat from her family. My uncle killed Ankit. We wanted to get married. I am also very scared now, she told the channel.

Several celebrities too condemned the murder. Actor-director Farhan Akhtar tweeted, Horrified to hear about the cold-blooded murder of #AnkitSaxena in Delhi. And for what??? #shame Cannot imagine the grief his parents must be going through. My deepest condolences to them.

While #Budget2018 has been distracting no doubt, the 'relative' lack of outrage over the horrific killing of Ankit is disturbing. Such perceived double standards don't augur well for the larger liberal cause.  Gul Panag (@GulPanag) February 3, 2018

Actor Gul Panag posted a tweet saying, While #Budget2018 has been distracting no doubt, the relative lack of outrage over the horrific killing of Ankit is disturbing. Such perceived double standards dont augur well for the larger liberal cause.By ANI

AMARAVATI: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president N Chandrababu Naidu held a crucial meeting with the party MPs, senior MLAs and leaders in Amaravati on Sunday.

The meeting was reportedly called to review the partys ties with its ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Naidu is apparently upset with the saffron party over the poor allocation for the state in the Union Budget 2018 that was presented on February 1 by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.

"We are discussing about budget, political alliance is different and state government development is different", said K.Rammohan Rao told media.

"Whatever the Chief Minister decides we will stand by it, but we are not happy with the BJP budget, not happy with the budget allotted to Andhra Pradesh. We MPs are ready to resign, but we are bound by the Chief Minister's decision," said Pandula Ravindra Babu TDP MP Amalapuram told ANI.

ALSO READ: Post internal meeting, TDP decides to not sever ties with BJP, for now

An upset TDP pitched its senior leader and union minister Y S Chowdhary to tell the media in no uncertain terms that it was unhappy over no monetary allocation for Andhra Pradesh on many issues such as Polavaram project, funding for the new state capital of Amravati, making Visakhapatnam a zonal railways headquarters and clearance for the Kadappa steel plant project.

During the meeting #UnionBudget2018 budget & no allocations to Andhra Pradesh were discussed. We will continue pressurising the centre for it. We will also raise the matter in the Parliament, if it is needed: Andhra Minister YS Chowdary after TDP Parliamentary Board meeting pic.twitter.com/N60uLH5ybL  ANI (@ANI) February 4, 2018

Chowdhary, on February 1, had warned that the TDP had three options before it, namely, (1) either try and continue the alliance (2) make their MPs resign and (3) simply terminate an association with the BJP and the NDA.

CM N Chandrababu Naidu did not speak to Shiv Sena. There has been no communication between Amit Shah and the CM either: MoS YS Chowdary after TDP Parliamentary Board meeting pic.twitter.com/6TCuj2XaFQ  ANI (@ANI) February 4, 2018

He had said that the TDP executive would in all probability meet on Sunday to take a final decision on the matter.

Last week, Naidu had issued an ultimatum to the BJP chart its own course if the BJP did not wish to continue with the alliance.

The TDP is the BJP's largest political ally in southern India. Its warning came shortly after another disgruntled ally, the Shiv Sena, publicly slammed the BJP for treating its allies improperly and threatened to sever the partnership.

The TDP had branded the 2018 Budget proposals as 'anti-people and corporate friendly', and a betrayal of the interests of Andhra Pradesh. It had said that its concerns were of a serious nature and need to be addressed effectively and promptly.

The TDP, which has been an ally of the BJP and a member of the NDA between 1998 and 2002, and again since 2013 to the present, is reportedly looking at a political alternative in the run-up to the 2019 general elections. It is being reported that the party and Chief Minister Naidu have already carried out an assessment of the pros and cons of a split with the BJP.

Meetings have reportedly been taking place between the leadership of the two parties, but as of now, the options are few and far, and if the TDP's demands are not met, it could withdraw its members from the union cabinet as a first step.

To improve his vote share, Naidu is eyeing the sizeable minority vote in the state. Last time, the Muslim vote had gone to the YSR Congress as the Congress party was seen as a weak rival to keep the BJP away.

The TDP and the BJP had contested the 2014 elections in alliance and the BJP has two MPs and five MLAs from Andhra Pradesh.

The BJP is reportedly concerned about gaining a toehold in South India. It wants to have allies in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.By Express News Service

VIJAYAWADA: At a time when the State BJP leaders upping the ante against the State government, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has maintained that he is strictly following the coalition dharma by not speaking against the saffron party.As per the coalition dharma, I am strictly controlling the TDP leaders from criticising the BJP. When a leader from Tadepalligudem in West Godavari made some remarks against the BJP, I gave a strict warning to him. It is up to the saffron party leaders to decide whether they follow the same dharma or not while dealing with the TDP, he said. If they dont want alliance, we will just say a Namaskar and will speak then, he said.

ALSO READ: Post internal meeting, TDP decides to not sever ties with BJP, for now

Speaking to mediapersons at the Interim Government Complex in Velagapudi on Saturday, the Chief Minister made a mockery of YSRC chief YS Jaganmohan Reddys readiness to sail with the BJP if the Centre accords Special Category Status (SCS) to AP. Was it the first time he (Jagan) is saying so. He gave support to the BJP in both the President and Vice-President elections without any condition on SCS. He also announced the resignation of YSRC MPs for the cause. He is doing all this just to protect himself from the cases and portray himself as a fighter for the cause of SCS, Naidu said.

Stating that he urged the Centre several times that all the illegal assets amassed by Jagan or anyone else should be recovered by the government and spent for public welfare, he said taking over the assets would be the real punishment.

It will send a strong message to those involving in corruption that they will have to lose all property once found in disproportionate assets case, he said. As of now, those amassing wealth illegally are of the opinion that they can enjoy the money by spending some time in jail and that feeling should be eliminated by taking over the ill-gotten properties, Naidu said.

Vizag Railway Zone

When asked about the agitations for Visakhapatnam Railway Zone, he said that he would welcome all those fighting for the cause sincerely. But, will not spare those hitting roads for political benefits and asserted that he is not comprising with the Centre on any issue. It is the responsibility of the Centre to give hand holding to the State, which suffered damage due to the unscientific bifurcation. It is our right to get the required support from the Centre, he said.When asked on the demand for separate Governor to the State, he said it is not fair to comment on a person holding a honourable post.

BJP leaders hit back

BJP Women Morcha leader and former Union minister D Purandesari, while responding to the statement made by the Chief Minister regarding the alliance between TDP and BJP, said that it is better for Naidu to spell out his stance clear whether he wants to sail with the BJP or not.When contact by TNIE, BJP MLC Somu Veerraju alleged that the BJP was following the coalition dharma even when the TDP had violated the same on several occasions. He sought to know whether the Chief Minister himself announcing to knock the court, blaming the Centre on Polavaram issue, is coming under coalition dharma or not.Stating that the BJP will never say that there will be no alliance with the TDP and they have to take a decision, he said and suggested the Chief Minister to withdraw the statement.By AFP

ATHEN: Tens of thousands of Greeks staged a mass rally in Athens Sunday, urging the government not to compromise in a festering name row with neighbouring Macedonia.

Organisers claimed some 1.5 million people from across Greece and the Greek diaspora turned out to express their opposition to attempts by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras' government to broker a deal.

IN PICS | Thousands of Greeks protest against Macedonia name compromise

But police put the figure at around 140,000.

"The million protesters that the organisers imagined was wishful thinking," Tsipras said in a statement released by his office.

"The crushing majority of Greek people conclude that foreign policy issues should not be dealt with with fanaticism."

Earlier in the day a huge Greek flag flew over central Syntagma Square from atop a crane, and Greeks from all over the country and abroad chanted "Hands off Macedonia", "Macedonia is Greek" and "We won't leave until we are vindicated".

Among those in the cross-generation crowd were former PM Antonis Samaras -- who was foreign minister when the name row began in 1991 -- in addition to mayors, senior clerics, army officers and monks.

Keynote speaker Mikis Theodorakis, the renowned Zorba the Greek composer and resistance icon, called on the government to hold a referendum before taking a decision.

"Macedonia was, is and will forever be Greek," 92-year-old Theodorakis told the cheering crowd of protesters.

"If a government considers signing on behalf of our country... there is no doubt it must first ask the Greek people," he said, calling the neighbouring northern state "illegitimate".

Athens objects to Macedonia's name, arguing it suggests that Skopje has claims to the territory and heritage of Greece's historic northern region of the same name.

"Macedonians united Greece against the (Persian Empire)," said Nina Gatzoulis of the US Pan-Macedonian Association, arguing that a Greek climbdown on the name issue would create "permanent instability" in the region.

However, leftist Tsipras has been considering a resolution to the 27-year-old dispute, angering many opposition members and his own nationalist coalition partners.

- Unresolved dispute -

Several protesters wore traditional garb, including the uniform of Greek guerrillas who fought Bulgarian bands and Ottoman forces in Macedonia in the early 20th century.

"Cretan eagles lie in the earth of Macedonia," a Cretan representative told the crowd. "We tell our sister, Macedonia, we will not allow anyone to carve you up."

The protest -- the second on the Macedonia issue in a fortnight -- was organised and funded by Greek diaspora groups, with the support of retired officer associations, cultural unions and church groups.

Anarchists stationed a counter-protest nearby, with riot police deployed to keep the two crowds apart.

Two weeks ago, tens of thousands had protested in Thessaloniki, the capital of Greece's Macedonia region. Police had estimated the turnout at over 90,000, while organisers claimed at least 400,000 attended.

The dispute has remained unresolved since the former Yugoslav republic's independence in 1991.

Greece considers the name "Macedonia" to be part of its own cultural heritage, as the province was the core of Alexander the Great's ancient empire.

Athens seeks guarantees that the use of the name by its neighbour implies no claim to parts of its own territory.

The government has accused far-right hardliners and the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party of trying to exploit the issue.

- Boost Balkan stability -

The government insists the rallies will not affect its determination to solve the issue and boost stability in the often tense Balkan region.

Athens says it is ready to accept a composite name that will establish a clear distinction from Greek Macedonia.

"The government is trying to give a patriotic solution to a problem that has troubled the country, its international relations and its diplomacy for over 25 years," government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said Sunday.

"Not having a solution undermines our national interest," Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said last week.

Because of Greece's objections, Macedonia in 1993 joined the United Nations as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM).

To break the deadlock, longterm UN mediator Matthew Nimetz has now proposed several alternative names in Macedonian, including "Republika Nova Makedonija" or the "Republic of New Macedonia".

A resolution of the issue is needed before Macedonia can join NATO or the EU.

"They seek to join NATO and the EU with our own vote, so they can threaten us tomorrow from a position of strength," Theodorakis said.

Greece in 2008 threatened to veto Macedonia's NATO entry. Skopje subsequently took the issue to the International Court of Justice, which said Athens had been wrong to block its land-locked neighbour's aspirations.Shepaug Valley School in Washington will play host to Minds in Motion Shepaug on Feb. 24 from noon to 4 p.m.

Co-presented by Region 12 and Connecticut Association for the Gifted, the event is a learning adventure for students in pre-K through eighth grade, along with their parents and educators.

Last years event drew nearly 200 attendees from around the region.

The age range has been extended to include kids in pre-K and the number of sessions has grown from 20 to 26.

While several of last years most popular sessions return, this years event will have an increased emphasis on STEM with workshop leaders from Boehringer Ingelheim, Robotics And Beyond and UCONN Engineering Ambassadors.

At a cost of $15, children can select two workshops, and parents, caregivers and educators are welcome to attend a keynote and breakout sessions at no cost.

Children can choose from 26 workshops with topics that include music, cooking, movement, acting, photography, video, animals, robotics, engineering, math and more.

A keynote and a selection of sessions are offered for adults that provide strategies to enhance learning, promote creativity and resilience and help raise asset-strong youth.

Steep Rock Association will be featured.

Through her talk Discovering The Outdoors: The Importance Of Nature In The Life Of The Child, Steep Rocks Executive Director Lori Paradis Brant will help parents unlock the power of nature as a learning resource, inspire a lifelong stewardship of natural resources, and bring families closer together.

Breakout sessions for adult attendees include Banishing the Boredom, presented by education consultant Kate Maupin; College Readiness, presented by Shepaug Valley Schools school Counseling Director Todd Dyer; and Think Like da Vinci, in which education consultant Ruth Sullo will unlock the powerful intersection of mathematics and creativity.

For event registration, visit www.ctgifted.org or call 203-291-6586.

Financial aid is available.

For information, email mimshepaug@ctgifted.org.Want some apples? Here's where you can pick your own in Newport County

around-townSuccess! An email has been sent to with a link to confirm list signup.Reporter

Mary Schenk is a reporter covering police, courts and breaking news at The News-Gazette. Her email is mschenk@news-gazette.com, and you can follow her on Twitter (@schenk).One of Editor & Publishers 10 That Do It Right 2021New Delhi: The government will come out with a strategy document on increasing the share of exports to 20 percent of the GDP, Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu said on Sunday.

In an interaction with export promotion councils in Kolkata, he asked the industry to come up with a detailed plan to push the country's exports.

"He (Prabhu) informed that government is also coming up with strategy document to increase export to 20 percent of GDP. For this he requested industry to come up with proper business plan to increase exports," the commerce ministry said in a tweet.

According to Federation of Indian Export Organisation (FIEO), the current share of exports in GDP is 18 to 19 percent.

In his budget speech last week, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had said that India's exports are likely to expand by about 15 percent in the current fiscal, ending March 31.

"Indian economy is now $2.5 trillion - seventh largest in the world. India is expected to become the fifth largest economy very soon," he had said.

The country's merchandise shipments rose 12.36 percent to $27.03 billion in December 2017.

Cumulatively, exports during the April-December period of 2017-18 grew by 12.05 percent to $223.512 billion.

Total exports value was recorded at USD 274.64 billion in 2016-17, up from USD 262.29 billion in the preceding year.Jammu: A 15-year-old girl was injured as Pakistani forces violated ceasefire along the Line of Control (LoC) in the Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir today, officials said.

Pakistani troops targeted forward posts and villages along the LoC in Shahpur sector and the exchange of fire between the two sides was on when reports last came, a police official said.

Shahnaz Bano, 15, of Islamabad village of Shahpur was injured in the Pakistani firing and hospitalised, he said.

A Defence spokesman said Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatics and mortars around 1110 hours. The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

Fourteen persons, including eight civilians, were killed and over 70 others injured in intense shelling by Pakistan along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts from January 18 to 22.

While there were no ceasefire violations by Pakistan reported along the IB since January 22, intermittent shelling has taken place along the LoC.Lucknow: A sub-inspector in Noida shot at two men in Noida on Sunday night, which the victims family claim was without any reason. The victim is in a critical state and undergoing treatment at a private hospital.

Sub-inspector Vijay Darshan allegedly accosted 25-year-old Jitendra Yadav and his friend Sunil near Noida Sector 122 police chowki while they were returning from a wedding.

There were three other friends of Yadav who were accompanying him in a car when the policeman approached them and got into an altercation.

There could be some personal reason behind the firing as the two were known to each other. Also, the sub-inspector was under the influence of alcohol and he has been arrested, said Noida SSP Luv Kumar. Kumar met the family at the hospital on Sunday and assured them of a fair probe.

Family members of the victim said that the accused police officer used to visit a gym that is owned by Yadav. They further alleged that Darshan shot at Yadav for no apparent reason.

Kumar further added, Besides sending the accused trainee sub-inspector to jail, the role of three other policemen, two constables and a sub-inspector is being investigated. The four policemen have been suspended with immediate effect. We have seized the service revolver of the sub-inspector who fired the shots and have sent him to jail."

Meanwhile, opposition Samajwadi Party did not waste any time in grabbing the opportunity to lash out at the BJP government in Uttar Pradesh.

The Samajwadi Party has alleged that UP Police is killing innocent people for self-promotion and the two men were victims of fake encounter.

Samajwadi Party spokesperson, Pankuri Pathak tweeted, Innocent man named Jitendra Yadav shot in the neck in another failed encounter bid by @noidapolice in Noida. @UPGovt trying best to keep the issue from media. He is fighting for his life in Fortis Hospital. @Uppolice officers shooting innocents for promotions. Plz RT. (sic)

As many as 24 criminals have been arrested and one killed in 15 police encounters reported in 10 districts over the past few days. The encounters were mainly reported from Muzaffarnagar, Gorakhpur, Lucknow, Meerut, Kanpur, Baghpat and Bulandshahar.New Delhi: In a fresh round of ceasefire violation by Pakistan, four Army personnel were killed in Jammu and Kashmir's Rajouri Sector.

The dead include: Capt Kapil Kundu, riflemen Ram Avtar and Subham Singh; and Havildar Roshan Lal. The one injured has been identified as Lance Naik Iqbal Ahmed.

Pakistani forces opened unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatics, and mortars around 1110 hours along LoC in Bhimbher Gali sector of Rajouri district this evening, said a senior army official.

The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

The Army also said that "the martyrdom of Indian Army soldiers will not go in vain. The unprovoked action by Pakistani army will be given a befitting response".

Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti expressed pain at the deaths due to Pakistani shelling along the LoC. "My condolences to the families of the deceased," she said.

Authorities in Poonch issued an advisory asking people to stay inside their homes.

All 84 schools located in 0-5 Km along LoC from Sunderbani to Manjakote have been ordered shut by Deputy Commissioner, Rajouri, Dr Shahid Iqbal.

The officials said that the situation was very tense as firing and shelling by Pakistani troops continued round the clock.

In January, schools along the International Border and the LoC in five districts -- Jammu, Samba, Kathua, Rajouri and Poonch -- were closed for over a fortnight because of firing and shelling by Pakistani troops.

Earlier in the day, a 15-year-old girl was injured as Pakistan intensified firing at Indian military posts and villages along the Line of Control or LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts.

Fourteen persons, including eight civilians, were killed and over 70 others injured in intense shelling by Pakistan along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts from January 18 to 22.

While there were no ceasefire violations by Pakistan reported along the IB since January 22, intermittent shelling has taken place along the LoC.New Delhi: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has expressed confidence that the crisis in the countrys highest judiciary will be resolved, saying this was not the first time it happened.

In an exclusive interview to News18 Network, Jaitley said, I think this is not the first time that this has happened. It does not happen very often, but I do not think this is the last time this is happening. I have great faith in our institutions and their resilience. I am quite sure that they are competent enough to resolve it themselves.

Recently, four senior-most judges of the Supreme Court  Justice Jasti Chelameswar, Justice Ranjan Gogoi, Justice Kurien Joseph and Justice Madan B Lokur  had aired their grievances outside the hallowed walls of the Supreme Court and said that the roster system to allocate cases to judges must be re-considered.

After failing to resolve the crisis with Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, the four judges had spoken out at a press conference, considered to be unprecedented in the history of Indian judiciary.

Recently, CJI Misra introduced a new roster system, wherein each judge of the Supreme Court would be allocated cases according to a specific subject.

Under the new system, effective February 5, cases will be allocated based on the subject matter they entail, said a posting on the official website of the Supreme Court. The CJI will hear all special leave petitions (SLPs) and matters related to public interest, social justice, elections, arbitration and criminal matters among others. These form a big chunk of the important matters heard by the apex court.

Left for the other judges are matters related to labour disputes, taxation, compensation, consumer protection, maritime law, mortgage, personal law, family law, land acquisition, service, company etc.New Delhi: The expert panel which had been constituted by Bar Council of India to decide on whether legislators can continue to be lawyers has reached a majority decision confirming that they can do so.

However, Advocate S Prabhakaran, who was a special invitee in the panel, has differed from the majority view of the other three panel members and has said that "MPs and MLAs cannot practice as lawyers due to their conflict of interest".

BCI Chairman Manan Kumar Mishra told News18 that though a final decision on the matter would be taken next week.

"We met today to consider a report by the sub-committee on the representation by Ashwini Upadhyay. Out of four members of the committee, three think that legislators can be allowed to practice on the condition that if a motion to remove him is moved in the Parliament, then he won't intervene. S Prabhakaran thinks that they have to be debarred," said BCI Chairman.

Mishra also said that by next week, they would complete a period of eight weeks since the formation of the expert panel and the extension time as sought by MPs and MLAs.

"General council thinks the matter needs more consideration and hence the matter is deferred till next week. We have received replies to notices seeking an eight-week extension and with regard to principles of natural justice, we will take a final call by then," said Mishra.

The sub-committee had recently submitted its report to the Bar Council of India and had also accepted last minute submissions from applicant advocate Ashwini Upadhyay.

A three-member expert committee, constituted by the Bar Council of India to decide whether lawmakers can be lawyers, had also decided to issue notices to more than 500 lawyers who are MPs, MLAs and MLCs.

Bar council chairman Mishra told News18: "The decision to issue notices was taken so that if the BCI cancels their enrolments, they cannot claim that principle of natural justice was violated".

Sources have told News18 that one of the key factors that have impacted this decision was a point that "taking the fee from litigant and salary from Public Fund is a professional misconduct".

Advocate Debi Prasad Dhal, co-chairman of BCI and member of the expert committee, told News18 that the ground raised by "Upadhyay citing Rule 49 of BCI was being deliberated upon and notice was issued to follow due process".

Some of the names that are under the radar include: Kapil Sibal, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, KTS Tulsi, P Chidambaram, Vivek Tankha, K Parasaran, Bhupendra Yadav, Meenakshi Lekhi, Pinaki Mishra, Satish Mishra and Ashwini Kumar.

BJP leader and Supreme Court advocate, Ashwini Upadhyay, who had filed a plea to debar lawyers, said there is a clear conflict of interest as MPs and MLA have powers to "impeach judges".

"The MPs who have the power of impeachment and can impeach a judge of the Supreme Court where they appear day in and day out; it could be possible that the judges concerned may not be able to discharge their duty without fear. Judges are mostly men of great wisdom and are fearless. However, the public may sometime perceive that judges give favourable orders to few lawyers... As it is said that Caesar's wife should be above suspicion!" read the additional statement filed by Upadhyay.

Upadhyay said that a legislator plays important role in the development of his state and cannot be 'sailing in two boats.Lucknow: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has arrested two hawala operators from Muzaffarnagar in Uttar Pradesh for alleged involvement in terror funding.

The two hawala operators, Dinesh Garg and Adesh Jain, have been accused of funneling funds from the UAE to Lashkar-e-Taiba militants in the country.

This came after the arrest of Bihar-based LeT sympathiser Mahfooz Alam and LeT militant Shaikh Abdul Naeem.

Mahfouz was remanded to two-day police custody by the NIA Special Court and under interrogation, he revealed that he had facilitated raising and collecting fund for Naeem through international money transfer services such as Western Union by providing identity documents. These funds were to be later used for carrying out the terrorist activities.

Mahfooz further led the NIA to Garg and Jain for allegedly routing money for him through UAE.

It is suspected that Naeem helped Alam to set up hideouts for LeT operatives in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Odisha along with Jammu and Kashmir with money raised with the help of hawala operators.

NIA recovered Rs 15 lakh in cash, a pistol, two note counting machines along with mobile-phones and laptop from Garg. From Jain, NIA recovered Rs 32.84 lakh in cash along with one Chinese pistol and records of foreign hawala traders.

Currencies of other countries along with phone numbers of suspects were also recovered by NIA during the raids.

As per the information, both the hawala operators were doing business in United States, Thailand, Japan and Oman and other Gulf countries. These people were sending money to the LeT operatives through hawala.Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala Finance Minister Thomas Isaac was caught in a row today over reimbursement of his Ayurvedic treatment bill, a day after the assembly Speaker courted controversy for getting his costly spectacles refunded from the state exchequer.

Earlier, state health minister K K Shylaja had purchased glasses worth Rs 28,000 and got it reimbursed, while Speaker P Sreeramakrishnan had purchased a pair of spectacles for nearly Rs 50,000.

The latest RTI reply revealed that Isaac had spent Rs 120,048 lakh for his 14-day treatment at a private Ayurveda hospital and got it reimbursed.

The total amount comprised Rs 79,200 as room rent, Rs 21,990 as treatment expenses, besides the other things, it said.

In a further embarrassment, the amount for 14 'thorthu' (small cotton bath towel), used by him during the treatment, was also mentioned in the bill, claimed by him.

The RTI reply came to the limelight days after Isaac, during the budget presentation, had urged all government departments to tighten their belts and restrict expenses in the wake of the acute financial crunch faced by the state.

Meanwhile, the opposition BJP rapped the ruling LDF government over the alleged extravaganza of its ministers and members.

BJP state president Kummanam Rajasekharan today mocked at Isaac and said the Finance Minister who was 'wailing' about the fiscal crisis, had claimed public money even for the pillow and 'thorthu' used by him.

The government should explain why its ministers were not trusting the public health sector while waxing eloquent about its high standards, he said.

Yesterday, another RTI replay had revealed that Assembly speaker P Sreeramakrishnan had spent Rs 49,900 for spectacles - Rs 4,900 for the frame and Rs 45,000 for the lens.

The Speaker had also got medical reimbursement of Rs 4.25 lakh between October 5, 2016 to January 19, this year.

Earlier, Health Minister K K Shylaja had landed in a controversy after she purchased spectacles worth Rs 28,000 and got it reimbursed from the exchequer.

There were also allegations that she had forged documents to claim reimbursement of medical expenses for her husband.New Delhi: An oil tanker with 22 Indian sailors onboard has gone missing off the West African coast. According to a statement issued by the Ministry of External Affairs, the merchant vessel has gone off the radar near Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar, in a tweet on Sunday morning wrote, A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

The ministry has got in touch with its officials in Nigeria, who are in turn talking to authorities in Benin, a West African country. Meanwhile, the external affairs ministry has set up a helpline for those seeking information about the 22 missing Indian sailors.

A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea. Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) February 3, 2018

According to an ANI report, the owners of the tanker have urged the Directorate General of Shipping in Mumbai to get in touch with their counterparts in Nigeria and Benin to carry out search operations for the merchant ship that was loaded with gas oil.Lucknow: Upset over allegations of not respecting the national flag, Agras Muslim community has decided to take out a Tiranga Yatra in which around 500 Muslims are expected to participate. A social activist Shabana Khandelwal, who was pained by the recent Kasganj communal clashes, said such incidents are shameful for the society and Indian Muslims are no less patriot and are committed to the nation.

As per Shabana Khandelwal, due to some political outfits, a wrong message was being propagated in the society regarding Muslims of India. We want to end this myth that Muslims dont respect Indian Tri-colour. Around 500 Muslims from the non-political background will be holding the Indian flag and will march to spread the message of peace.

As per Khandelwal, all the necessary permissions have already been sought for the Tiranga Yatra from the administration. A letter seeking permission for the event has already been sent to the DM office on Saturday and we will be conducting the march with the Indian flag in our hands from Shaheed Smarak to MG Road where we will be handing over a memorandum to the District Magistrate, she said.

However, the Agra police officials claimed that they were yet to receive information about any such march from DMs office. SP City, Kunwar Anupam said, As of now, we have not yet received any information regarding any such event. As per the rule, the administration seeks the report from police and permission is given only after analysing a situation.

A few days earlier, the district administration didnt give permission to Vishwa Hindu Parishad for a Tiranga Yatra and hence the event was stopped at Shaheed Smarak and a memorandum was handed over to them on the spot by the members of VHP.

Meanwhile, in the Kasganj communal clashes, the Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JIH) has accused the Yogi Adityanath government of being biased against the Muslims as many Muslim youths were arrested after the Kasganj violence, which claimed the life of a 22-year-old boy. The JIH General Secretary, Mohammed Salim had demanded a judicial probe in the Kasganj violence.New Delhi: On Thursday night, Ankit Saxena was near his house in Raghubir Nagar (RG Nagar) in Delhis Khyala when he was stabbed and killed by the family members of a Muslim woman he was in love with.

Since Friday, the area has been under heavy security cover over fears of communal tension, with additional forces being deployed on Saturday due to VIP movement. BJPs Delhi chief Manoj Tiwari paid a visit to the 23-year-olds house in the evening and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is likely to arrive on Sunday.

The heavy deployment, however, has not stopped the neighbourhood from murmuring how the deceased was everyones favourite and the girl mostly kept to herself.

Ankit had been in love with Shahana (name changed) over the last two years, say police. Those in RG Nagar Block B, where Shahana lived, say they had been in a relationship for about 5-6 years.

Earlier, Ankit used to stay in Pocket A and Shahana was his neighbour. She later moved to Pocket B along with her family, just a few metres away. The two, however, continued to talk and love blossomed.

Characterised by his long hair at one time and a jovial nature, Ankit was fondly known as Mowgli in the locality. Everyone knew him and everyone loved him. So did Shahana.

A former tuition mate of Shahana from 2-3 years ago said that the two used to meet before she started classes at 5 pm. He used to come 10 minutes before the class and just meet her. Shahana was dropped to the classes by her younger brother at times, so Ankit would wait for her brother to leave, the classmate said on condition of anonymity. The younger brother has now been apprehended for Ankits murder.

The friend recalls that Shahana hardly spoke to anyone. If her brother did not pick her up from the classes, she would walk back home, which was barely a kilometre away. She spoke very little in class, but was liked by everyone. She was not like the others. She didnt mingle much with people, but she was liked by everyone. There were no bad vibes, the classmate said.

The murder, the classmate said, was shocking and unexpected but those who knew of the relationship were sure that the couple would not have a smooth sail.

Ankits family knew about the two and locals say they didnt have a problem with the relationship. Shahanas family, however, were vehemently against the relationship.

Shahanas family knew about her relationship with Ankit. About 6-8 months ago, her brother had an altercation with Ankit at a park in the locality. The argument soon turned into a scuffle and people had to intervene to resolve the matter. Much before that, about a year ago, Shahanas mother caught hold of Ankit at the local market near Pocket B and is said to have asked him to stay away from her daughter.

Ankit is reported to have handed her a phone to use, which she hid from her family.

Cut to Thursday night: Right before the 23-year-old photographer was murdered by Shahanas family, the latter kept probing him for Shahanas whereabouts.

Shahana had locked her family inside the house and called Ankit from the same phone that he had given her. She asked him to meet her at the Tagore Garden Metro station. However, her family members managed to get to Ankit before her. The group apprehended him near his house before and even assaulted his mother, who fell to the ground. As Ankit tried to help her, one of Shahanas family members held his head from behind and slit his throat.

The area has been put under heavy security cover fearing communal tension. (Image: Aishwarya Kumar/News18)

Shahana said she wanted to get married to Ankit and that her family members had killed him. RG Nagar locals say her family was bad anyway. Of the over 1,500 families, there are just seven Muslim families in the locality and even among those seven, three of the families are Shahanas relatives. Talk of extramarital affairs, local boys being framed in false cases often come up.

There are some Muslims families in the locality who have been staying here for the last 15-10 years and we have been very friendly with them. Things have, however, taken a turn for the worse ever since this family landed here. We are not against any religion, but then whats wrong is wrong, said Vandana (name changed), a resident of Pocket B.

On Saturday, beauty parlours run by Shahanas mother and aunt were asked to be shut. Her aunt is said to have gone back to Gorakhpur along with her family. On Saturday evening, they were escorted out of the locality by security personnel.

The exit was fuelled by the Bajrang Dal. Although not an active member, Ankit was associated with the Bajrang Dal and was a regular at the big rallies that the outfit would organise, including the December 6 annual rally to mark the Babri Masjid demolition.

We have shut down the beauty parlour, said Bajrang Dals West Delhi chief Jagjit Singh Goldie.

Ankits family has, however, been instrumental in making sure that the area is peaceful. WhatsApp messages shared by Ankits family members say Please dont share this picture. The photograph is of Ankits bloodied body with his throat slit open.

They dont want more problems and have been telling us that they dont need the money or any help. They are making sure that there is no violence because of the death, said Goldie.

The Bajrang Dal, however, has planned to take out a candle light vigil on Monday evening for Ankit.Hark! The very floor you stand judders softly and if you listen closely, you could pick up hoof-falls from battle-ready horses, clang of swords and hushed whispers of devout pilgrims who think destiny has summoned them to this inn in Nottingham in England, only to set them off on a pilgrimage to a far-off land the following morn. It is a pilgrimage where they would fight with the infidels and perhaps die all for their deep faith in the church.

The inn, clung to the side of a rocky castle, is one of their last stopovers before the journey to their final battleground in the east at Jerusalem begins.

Some called the sport 'the Crusades.'

Drinking at the Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem in Nottingham, the oldest inn in England, is a trip back in time. It would take you back to some happening moments 800 years ago, where you could conjure (after perhaps downing a mug of ale) the spectres of brave men to settle around you in rickety chairs, bellow out for drinks, oblivious of a snoopy visitor from future.

One could easily imagine Richard I, the Lionheart, who ruled England in the 12th century, sitting hunched over a pitcher of ale surrounded by his generals and knights, generations of them, rolling into the hall with tumultuous uproar and in hushed voices broaching strategies to free the holy land from the Saracen infidels.

Much courage, much foolishness, much hope, much despair, much world-weariness could all have dunked their souls in the coarse ale poured and sloshed around inside these dim-lit rooms.

There are intricate caves deep below in this inn, where a brewstore once functioned. That serpentine cellar still holds in its dim-lit entrails, 900 years of miasma of ale-infused breaths of men (people claim that a strange whiff still comes alive at times), musty walls and creaking timber.

Mind it. The inn was born in 1189 AD.

What holds your eyes in rapt attention at the rock lounge as you climb a short flight of stairs from the entrance of the inn is a model ship hanging from the ceiling. Caked with decades of dust, veiled in beds of cobweb, the galleon, which could have been gifted to the inn by some sailor, is now but a cursed spectre.

Local legends warn you from brushing your hands against the ship that tempts as much as it could to dust up its length. Three men who tried to clean the ship in the past met gory ends, the stories tell us. None attempted again, ever since the tragedy.

The inns fascination with spectres does not stop with the galleon.

Keys disappear, an old-world perfume  lavender or rose water  suddenly wafts across the hall, glasses and bottles fly off shelves and smash themselves open when no one is around (no one never found any shards of glass on the floor. The ghost in the inn is more aural and olfactory than visual). Dogs avoid a clock hanging on a wall and only howl at it from a distance with terror gleaming in their eyes.

Many hold the ghost of Yorkey, George Henry Ward, who owned the pub between 1894 and 1914 responsible. But, if a place has a history of nearly a 1000 years, it is foolish not to look beyond what is obvious, closer, and in the immediate neighbourhood in time.

Fingers are pointed at Roger de Mortimer, English nobleman and de facto ruler of England. He is known to have colluded with his lover Queen Isabella in disposing off the body of her husband, Edward II.

Eventually, the villain was hunted out and hanged by Isabellas son, Edward III.

Legend has it that Montgomery met his ladylove in a secret chamber somewhere deep in the cellar, which is connected to the castle far above through one of its serpentine arms, yet to be unearthed.

At the inn, youd feel all the 800 years of history in a single glass of ale you hold in your hand. Dare to begin your crusade?

(Manu Remakant is a freelance writer who also runs a video blog - A Cup of Kavitha - introducing world poetry to Malayalees. Views expressed here are personal)Patna: The BJPs rout in Rajasthan bypolls seems to have emboldened its NDA allies in Bihar to seek a bigger share of seats for the next Assembly elections  two years before they are due.

Smaller parties like Union minister Upendra Kushwahas Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) and former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhis Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) had been wary of their place in the alliance ever since the JD(U) made a comeback to the NDA fold.

Now, with the BJP seemingly losing its grip in other stronghold states, Manjhi has demanded 50 seats for his party in the 2020 Bihar elections. The Bihar Assembly has 243 seats.

Our party wants to contest on at least 50 seats. Only then will we be able to do justice to our supporters. I am in favour of installing two deputy chief ministers  a Dalit and a Muslim, Manjhi told News18.

Manjhi had been the only leader to win from his party in the 2015 Assembly elections. But his defence of jailed RJD leader Lalu Prasad Yadav and the latters invitation to him to join the Mahagathbandhan has prompted the NDA camp to woo the Dalit leader. Chief Minister and JD(U) president Nitish Kumar had even gifted his own bullet-proof vehicle to Manjhi recently.

The other NDA constituent vying for a bigger share of the electoral pie is Upendra Kushwaha. The Union ministers issues with the ruling JD(U) came to the fore when he recently organised a human chain campaign against the state governments education policy. The event led to a heated war of words between his RLSP and the JD(U). The argument snowballed to a point where RLSP leader Nagmani threatened to part ways.

Kushwaha had also been critical of Nitish Kumar, but seemed to have warmed up to the CM after the JD(U)s return to the NDA, despite his party not getting any state ministerial berths.

But now Kushwaha has upped the ante and his party leaders claim that no government can be formed in Bihar without its support. They have also pitched Kushwaha as a CM probable.

The RLSP has three MPs in its ranks  Ram Kumar Sharma from Sitamarhi, Arun Kumar Sinha from Jehanabad and Kushwaha himself from Karakat. He, however, failed in converting his Koiri vote in favour of the NDA in 2015. The vote bank had then sided with Nitish Kumar-led JD(U)-RJD-Congress combine.

With Nitish Kumar back in the NDA, the RLSP might not get the seat share it expected. Asked if he would remain in the NDA will the Lok Sabha elections next year, Kushwaha said, Its a long journey and it would not be wise to say anything right now.

The NDA currently holds 31 of Bihars 40 Lok Sabha seats. This count excludes the JD(U), which fought the 2014 Lok Sabha elections alone. But in 2019, the BJP would have to accommodate its foe-turned friend too, which means it will have to risk disappointing Kushwaha and Manjhi.

RJDs aggressive push to wean away local satraps like Anand Mohan and Pappu Yadav and a possible tie-up with Sharad Yadav-led faction of the JD(U) have given smaller NDA partners a possible platform to voice their demands.

RLSP insiders said Kushwaha will part ways with the NDA as the Lok Sabha election nears. But sources said he wants the BJP to oust him so he leaves with the sympathy factor. But the BJP-JD(U) combine seems in no mood to do that.

Our leadership, along with that of the BJP, is aware of his moves. He (Kushwaha) knows that he will get only one seat to contest. He has no option but to leave. But he also wants to hold onto his ministerial berth. So his exit may be around two-three months before the election, a close aide of Nitish Kumar said.Hyderabad: The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) has decided to remain in the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance for now, but says it will continue to demand a special package for Andhra Pradesh.

Addressing the media after Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu chaired a crucial meeting of party MPs and senior leaders, TDP minister YS Chowdary said the matter would be raised in Parliament if needed.

During the meeting, the Union Budget and the absence of allocations to Andhra Pradesh were discussed. We will continue pressurising the Centre for it. We will also raise the matter in Parliament if needed, Chowdary said.

The emergency meeting had been called by Naidu after Andhra Pradesh failed to get substantial budgetary allocations for many key projects in the Union Budget. This was the Modi governments last complete Budget before the 2019 General Elections.

Lack of Andhra-centric sops in the Budget had brought the rift between the TDP and the BJP out in the open in recent days. For a long time, Naidu was disappointed that Andhra Pradesh was denied promised financial assistance by the BJP-led Centre, despite the state reeling under financial crisis after bifurcation.

The resentment grew after state BJP leaders started making public comments against "friendly" ally in the state.

The opposition had been quick to take advantage of the situation.

YSRCP chief Jagan Mohan Reddy said, The Budget is approved by the Union Cabinet which has two TDP ministers. The theatrics of Chandrababu Naidu will not work. The Union Budget is a collective decision and TDP cannot refrain from taking back the blame that state interests have been ignored. He is acting as if NDA government has presented Budget for first time serving raw deal to the state."

"Did he not feel the pinch when he watered down on the demand of Special Status? Chandrababu Naidu may promise moon to the people, but use your discretion in ensuing elections," Reddy added.

But with elections just round the corner, the pressure is building on Naidu to deliver on the promises of development which brought the TDP-BJP alliance to power in the state.The Congress will not have any sort of understanding with the Asaduddin Owaisi-led All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) for the Karnataka Assembly polls, AICC secretary Madhu Goud Yaskhi said.

He refuted media report that the state Congress leaders had a secret meeting with AIMIM leaders to ensure that there was no division of votes of minorities.

The AIMIM is reportedly set to contest in 60 assembly segments, mainly in minority-dominated areas in the state.

The election to the 224-member assembly in Karnataka is to be held this year. It is the only big state under the Congress' rule at present. Punjab, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Puducherry are the other states/UT where the party is in power.

"We never had any meeting with any AIMIM leader. It is fighting against the Congress. So, there is zero truth that there was any meeting with their leaders," said Yaskhi, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary in-charge for the poll-bound state.

He further accused the AIMIM of having an understanding with the BJP to divide the votes coming the Congress' way.

Yakshi also said the Congress would not have any sort of understanding with the AIMIM for the assembly polls.

According to a senior Congress leader, who did not wish to be named, the party already had a strategy in place to ensure that it got votes from minority communities.

Announcing K Siddaramaiah as the party's chief ministerial face has also been a "good move" to see the votes are not divided, the leader added.

"Siddaramaiah has worked well to consolidate votes from Muslim, OBC and SC communities over the past four or so years. So, we have backing of Muslim community," the leader added.

The leader said the Congress had pool of Muslim leaders whom it would field for campaigning to prevent division of minority votes.

"We did that experiment in other assembly polls, including those in Gujarat and Bihar. It yielded results for us. It will yield result in Karnataka too," he added.

While the schedule for the assembly polls is yet to be announced, campaign for the high voltage election has already begun with the leaders of the Congress and the BJP locked in a war of words.

The state is expected to witness a three-corner contest with the H D Deve Gowda-led Janata Dal (Secular) forming the third angle.Taking to the stage in Bengaluru, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, said countdown of Congress to make an exit in the state has begun. "Congress is standing at the exit gate in Karnataka. It has caused destruction here and Karnataka doesn't need a Congress culture," said PM Modi. Lauding the work of his government at the Centre, PM said his motto is 'reform, perform, transform'. Welcoming the PM, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah tweeted that Karnataka was the No.1 state in investments, innovation and progressive policies. Hitting back, BJP state unit chief BS Yeddyurappa said the state had become 'No.1 in corruption' under the Congress. Ahead of the PM rally, pro-Kannada groups also staged a protest, demanding the Centres intervention in Karnatakas Mahadayi river dispute with BJP-ruled Goa.



Stay tuned as Ashish Yechury brings you LIVE updates:Bengaluru: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be in poll-bound Karnataka on Sunday to address a BJP rally in capital Bengaluru, marking the conclusion of the saffron party's 90-day Nava Nirman Parivarthan yatra.

With the pro-Kannada organisations withdrawing their call for a Bengaluru shutdown over the Mahadayi river dispute with Goa, the BJPs event organisers are betting on a huge response to the rally on a weekend.

Elaborate security arrangements have been made for the rally at Palace Grounds, the sprawling venue in the city centre where the party is expecting at least one lakh people to attend.

"Modi will arrive in the city on Sunday afternoon and address the rally at the Palace grounds in the evening. Thousands of our cadre from across the state and people from the city will participate in the event," news agency IANS quoted a BJP official as saying.

Though Modi was scheduled to address the rally on January 28, on the conclusion of the three-month yatra that began here on November 1, it was put off to February 4, owing to his pre-occupation with other engagements.

"We have invited thousands of youth, especially techies and executives of IT and biotech companies in the city to personally listen to Modi's speech though it will also be available on YouTube," the official said.

The party's state unit has opened an online registration and is using the social media  Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp  to personally invite the youth, techies, educated class and prominent citizens to the venue.

"About 30,000 people from across the city have responded, expressing interest in attending the rally and listen to Modi's speech. We hope most of them will turn up as elaborate parking facility has been made for their vehicles at the venue," added the official.

In the run-up to the state election, due in late April and early May, the BJP conducted the yatra, criss-crossing nearly all the 224 constituencies of the Assembly across the state after its national president Amit Shah flagged it off.

The yatra, held with a view to bringing the Bharatiya Janata Party back to power in the southern state on the plank of transforming Karnataka through development, was led by its state unit president and former chief minister BS Yeddyurappa and party's other state leaders.

Besides Shah, party's central ministers Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal, who are in-charge of the BJP poll campaign in Karnataka, Ananth Kumar, DV Sadananda Gowda and Ananthkumar Hegde, who hail from the state and the party's all-state leaders will participate in the rally and address the public.Thiruvananthapuram: Bringing the rift in the CPI-M into the open, some party leaders from Kerala slammed General Secretary Sitaram Yechury at a meet here on Sunday, a day after he confirmed that a complaint has been received against State Secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan's son for alleged fraud.

Yechury on Saturday revealed that the party received a complaint against Balakrishnan's elder son Binoy Balakrishnan about an alleged Rs 13 crore fraud committed in Dubai.

In the wake of this, many state leaders attacked Yechury in their speeches at the conference, in which both Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and Balakrishnan took part, with a few even accusing him of being disgruntled for not getting a Rajya Sabha re-nomination.

While the Congress was willing to support the candidature of Yechury from West Bengal to the Rajya Sabha, his Communist Party of India-Marxist was not in favour of it and in the bargain, it lost a seat in the Upper House.

With Sunday's attack, the inter-party rift has come out in the open.

Cracks started appearing in the party after Yechury took a stand favouring former Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan.

This difference of opinion deepened when the entire Kerala unit of the party early this month voted, at the Central Committee meeting in Kolkata, against Yechury's stand that the CPI-M should tie up with the Congress to fight the common enemy - the BJP.

A few days after Yechury's draft resolution was voted out, came a news report alleging that Balakrishnan junior had duped a firm. A three-page letter, dated January 5, states that legal procedures have been started against Binoy for the fraud.

Sunday's developments in the CPI-M come ahead of the state party conference to be held in Thrissur later this month where those who will attend the upcoming party Congress would be selected and it seems certain that the delegates from the state will not be supporters of Yechury or his stand.New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday portrayed his government as farmer-friendly, saying they were TOP priority for it.

The farmers who grow vegetables and fruits like tomatoes, onions and potatoes that are also top priority for us. Take T from tomato, O from Onion and P from Potato, you get TOP. Farmers are TOP priority for us, Modi said.

The comments were made at rally in Bengaluru, marking the end of the BJPs 90-day Nava Nirman Parivarthan Yatra in Karnataka. The state is slated to go to polls later this year.

Modi further said that these three TOP staples found across the country symbolised his government's initiative called 'Operation Greens' to improve the living condition of farmers. Keeping these growers in mind, Operation Greens has been announced in the budget, he said.

Comparing Operation Greens to AMUL, he said that like AMUL brought great benefits to dairy farmers, Operation Greens would prove beneficial for vegetable growers.

Sticking with the theme, he pitched for BJPs chief ministerial candidate in Karnataka, BS Yeddyurappa, as farmer-friendly.

If Yeddyurappa, son of a farmer, becomes CM of Karnataka, the projects for farmers will work at its best because Yeddurappa has farmer's best interest at heart. When facilities are provided to villages, migration to cities will go down and the mounting pressure on cities will be released, Modi said.

He assured farmers that Yeddyurappa would earmark Rs one lakh crore to improve the irrigation system in Karnataka if he becomes the Chief Minister after the assembly elections.

This comes after the Union Budget for 2018-19 gave special emphasis to farmers with a slew of schemes for them, from increasing MSP for crops to giving a subsidy to stop crop burning. With general scheduled for 2019, the government has been trying to address farmer grievances and rural distress.New Delhi: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley believes that the BJPs differences with alliance partner Telugu Desam Party (TDP) will be amicably resolved and that the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) will remain intact to face the 2019 General Elections together.

Speaking exclusively to News18 Network, Jaitley said, We are implementing the Andhra Pradesh reorganisation package separately. It has nothing to do with the Budget. We will fulfil all that has been promised to the people of Andhra Pradesh.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and TDP leader Chandrababu Naidu is miffed with the BJP for neglecting the state in Budget 2018, and for not fulfilling promises made at the time of the states bifurcation five years ago.

Assembly elections in Andhra are slated to be held along with the Lok Sabha elections in 2019.

The simmering tensions between the BJP and its southern ally were ratcheted up by YSR Congress leader Jagan Mohan Reddys recent interview to News18. In the interview, Reddy had indicated his willingness to work with the BJP in the future if the Centre grants special status to Andhra.

Naidu has called a meeting of party MPs in Vijayawada on Sunday to decide the next course of action even as he is said to be in touch with the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra, another key NDA ally.

Speaking to News18 Network, Jaitley, however, indicated that the BJPs differences with its oldest ally Shiv Sena were of a different nature.

I know for a fact that we were willing to accommodate Sena as a senior partner in Maharashtra and give them more seats in the last Assembly elections, Jaitley said.

As the Sena remained adamant, the issue was settled with both parties parting ways ahead of the Assembly polls and contesting on their own strength, Jaitley said.

After elections, in which the BJP emerged as the single-largest party, the two allies again joined hands to form the government in Maharashtra. Their relations have since remained tenuous with the Sena leaving no opportunity to attack the BJP on key political issues.

I want the NDA to remain intact and all our allies to remain with us, Jaitley said when asked if the two parties will contest the Lok Sabha elections together.

Sena, in its national executive meeting in Mumbai last month, passed a resolution declaring that the party would not tie up with the BJP in the General and Assembly elections.Bengaluru: By calling Karnataka "No. 1 corrupt state", the BJP's CM face BS Yeddyurappa seems to have scored a self goal. A few minutes before PM Modi's special plane touched the tarmac at Bengaluru's HAL airport, chief minister Siddaramaiah took a jibe at Modi in a welcome tweet.

He welcomed the PM to one of the most progressive states, which is also number one in investments and job creation, according to latest data. His tweet went viral.

A few minutes later, Yeddyurappa angrily reacted to his tweet calling Karnataka number one corrupt state in India. In his eagerness to please the party bosses, the BJP's CM-in-waiting perhaps forgot that he too was at the helm for three and a half years. His tweet drew sharp reactions.

In July 2011, the BJP high command had ordered Yeddyurappa to quit as Karnataka CM after the then Lokayukta Justice N Santosh Hegde indicted him in a mining scam worth over Rs 50,000 crore.

Siddaramaiah, who is highly active on social media, hit back at Yeddyurappa calling it a great irony.

"Says a man who presided over Indias biggest mining scam during his rule. Only a person totally lacking in #KannadaSwabhimana can call Karnataka, one of the most progressive states in India, No. 1 Corrupt State.

Says a man who presided over Indias biggest mining scam during his rule. Only a person totally lacking in #KannadaSwabhimana can call Karnataka, one of the most progressive states in India, No. 1 Corrupt State. https://t.co/ceF4NiYoe1  Siddaramaiah (@siddaramaiah) February 4, 2018

A few minutes later, state Congress president Dr. G Parameshwara held a press meet to give a point by point rebuttal to Modi's charges against Congress Government in the state. He said the speech was full of lies and Modi was misinformed by his own men about Karnataka.

He said: "Karnataka is not one of the top ten states when it comes to crime, etc. Top ten states are BJP ruled UP, Bihar, MP, etc. He should talk about that."

Lashing out at Yeddyurappa, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said that the former can't be trusted as he has rubbished his own state to curry favour with RSS.

Yeddyurappa's tweet has now led to a war of words between Congress and BJP supporters.Dubai: Iran accused the United States on Sunday of threatening Russia with new atomic weapons after Washington published a document outlining plans to expand its nuclear capabilities to deter others.

The review of US nuclear policy published on Friday has riled Russia, which viewed the document as confrontational, and raised fears that it could increase the risk of miscalculation between the two world powers.

"The Americans are shamelessly threatening Russia with a new atomic weapon," Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, a pragmatist who opened the way to Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers including longtime adversary Washington, said in a speech.

"The same people who supposedly believe that using weapons of mass destruction is a crime against humanity ... are talking about new weapons to threaten or use against rivals," he said in his televised address.

Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif earlier warned in a tweet that the US policy document posed the risk of "bringing humankind closer to annihilation".

The US military has put countering China and Russia, dubbed "revisionist powers", at the centre of a new national defence strategy unveiled earlier this month shifting priorities away from fighting Islamist militants.

By expanding its own low-yield nuclear capability, the United States would deter Russia from using nuclear weapons, according to American officials.

Russia's Foreign Ministry said on Saturday it was very disappointed by the content of the document, which, it said, has a confrontational feel and anti-Russian orientation.

German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said the US decision showed "the spiral of a new nuclear arms race is already underway" and added that Europe was, much like during the Cold War, especially vulnerable.

"That's why we need to start new initiatives in Europe for arms control and disarmament," Gabriel said in a statement, adding that developing new weapons sent the wrong message and risked triggering an arms race.

Zarif also said in his tweet: "(US President Donald) Trump's obduracy in killing the #JCPOA (Iran's nuclear deal with world powers) stems from the same dangerous imprudence".

Trump gave the Iran nuclear deal, negotiated before he took office, a final reprieve last month but warned European allies and Congress they had to work with him to fix "the disastrous flaws" in the pact or face a US exit.

He said he would waive sanctions against Iran that were lifted as part of the international deal for the last time unless his conditions were met.

The ultimatum put pressure on European Union powers - key backers and parties to the 2015 international agreement to curb Iran's nuclear programme  to satisfy Trump, who wants the pact strengthened with a separate agreement.Jerusalem: Israel's cabinet voted Sunday to formally authorise a rogue West Bank settlement in response to last month's murder of a rabbi who lived there, officials said, in a rare move likely to spark an international outcry.

The vote came as European nations voiced growing concern over settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territory, but with US President Donald Trump largely refraining from such criticism, which many Israelis see as a green light.

Israeli authorities have advanced plans for thousands of new settlement homes in recent months, although cabinet votes to authorise a pre-existing outpost are relatively rare.

Sunday's vote to authorise the Havat Gilad outpost was unanimous, an official familiar with the proceedings said on condition of anonymity.

Speaking at the start of the meeting, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "the government will today regularise the status of Havat Gilad to allow the continuance of normal life there".

The official cabinet agenda said the motion would designate the 15-year-old outpost as a "new community" which will have the necessary building permits and a state budget.

The agenda said about 40 families live in the outpost, but envisages its enlargement.

Israeli media, however, said it was unclear how the authorisation would proceed, as parts of the outpost may have to be moved elsewhere if found to have been built on private Palestinian land.

Rabbi Raziel Shevach was shot dead near Havat Gilad, where he lived, on January 9.

The following week, Israeli troops searching for his attackers shot dead what they described as a Palestinian suspect in the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank, about 35 kilometres (22 miles) north of Havat Gilad.

However, they did not catch the man suspected of being responsible for Shevach's killing, 22-year-old Ahmed Jarrar.

The manhunt continued on Saturday with a raid on the West Bank village of Burqin, near Nablus, sparking clashes during which soldiers shot dead a teenager identified by the Palestinian health ministry as Ahmad Abu Obeid, 19.

"Yesterday our forces were again in action in an effort to apprehend the last of the assassins and their accomplices in the murder of Rabbi Shevach," Netanyahu told cabinet ministers and media.

"We will not rest until we bring them to justice. And we shall bring them all to justice."

Roger Kuby, Shevach's father-in-law, told AFP the government move was "a small consolation, but an important gesture".

'Revenge'

Mourners at Shevach's funeral interrupted a speech by Education Minister Naftali Bennett of the far-right Jewish Home party with calls for "revenge".

Bennett responded by saying that the only revenge should be in building more settlements, and Netanyahu said Sunday that was one of the planks of his policy.

"Anyone who thinks that through the abominable murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, they would break our spirits and weaken us is making a bitter mistake," he said.

Settlement watchdog Peace Now, however, said that retroactively granting legal status to Havat Gilad, built without development plans or construction permits, was "cynical exploitation" of Shevach's death.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and a major obstacle to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

But Israel differentiates between settlements it has approved and those it has not.

Those without approval are referred to as outposts and tend to be populated by hardline religious nationalists who see the entire West Bank as part of Israel.

Past attempts by Israeli authorities to dismantle Havat Gilad have led to clashes with settlers there.

Israel has several times given retroactive approval to outposts, and last year work began on the first completely new government-sanctioned settlement built in the Palestinian territories in quarter of a century.

Israel faced sharp criticism from the administration of former US president Barack Obama over settlement construction, but that has not been the case with Trump's White House. Israeli officials have sought to take advantage of this.

Trump's declaration of Jerusalem as Israel's capital on December 6 was also hailed by Israelis, while deeply angering the Palestinians who also see the city as their capital.

European officials and UN bodies have maintained their strong opposition to settlement building as well as the long-standing consensus that the status of Jerusalem must be negotiated.Amman/Moscow: Syrian rebels shot down a Russian warplane on Saturday and killed its pilot on the ground after he ejected from the plane, Russia's defence ministry and Syrian rebels said.

The incident took place in an area of Syria's northern Idlib province that has seen heavy air strikes and fighting on the ground between government forces backed by Russia and Iran, and rebels who oppose President Bashar al-Assad.

Syrians opposed to Assad see Russia as an invading force they blame for the deaths of thousands of civilians since Moscow joined the war on the side of the Syrian government in 2015.

The Russian plane was shot down over the town of Khan al-Subl near the city of Saraqeb, close to a major highway where the Syrian army and Iranian-backed militias are trying to advance, a rebel source said.

Although the Russian pilot escaped the crash, he was killed by rebels who had tried to capture him, the source said.

Russia's Defence Ministry said that the aircraft was downed by a portable surface-to-air missile. The pilot reported that he had ejected by parachute, and he was later killed on the ground.

"The pilot died in a fight with terrorists," it said.

Tass news agency quoted the Russian Defence Ministry as saying Moscow retaliated with a strike from an undisclosed high-precision weapon that killed more than 30 militants in an area of Idlib province where the plane was downed.

The Syrian opposition had shown on social media what they said was the wreckage of the plane and the body of the pilot surrounded by rebels.

They said the downed warplane was one of the planes used to target civilian convoys fleeing along a major Syrian highway from villages that the army and foreign militias had overrun.

Syria's civil war, which is now entering its eighth year, has killed hundreds of thousands of people and driven more than 11 million from their homes.

A Russian plane was blamed for the death of seven civilians and scores of injuries after cars were targeted on the highway, according to a witness and two rebels sources.

Syrian soldiers and Iranian-backed militiamen were now around twelve kilometres from Saraqeb, advancing towards the Damascus-Aleppo highway under cover of heavy Russian air strikes, two opposition sources said.

At least five civilians were killed in Saraqeb city on Saturday, which residents blamed on Russian planes.

Syrians in rebel-held areas say they can distinguish between Russian warplanes and those of the Syrian air force, because the Russian planes fly at higher altitude.

Residents say thousands of people have been forced by air strikes to flee the area, moving further north to the safety of makeshift camps on the Syrian side of the Turkish border.

Russia's Defence Ministry regularly says it targets only hardline Islamist militants in Syria.Government plans to reduce power tariffs to below what is charged by its regional counterparts in a bid to improve the countrys competitiveness.





The average regional price stands at 7,50c/kWh compared to the tariff of 12,8c/kWh customers pay in Zimbabwe.





This follows calls by the manufacturing industry and other electricity consumers to improve mining and manufacturing sectors competitiveness.





Energy and Power Development Minister Simon Khaya Moyo told Business Weekly that the country will soon slash electricity tariffs as part of efforts to stimulate economic production.





We are engaging some key economic and energy stakeholders to review electricity prices downwards as part of efforts to make our country and economy competitive.





Our cost of production has been very high over the years, but now its time to review electricity downwards to match regional standards to an average of around 7,50c/kWh.

Just like we did in the fuel sector, we want to remove all impediments to make our electricity affordable to every sector, said Khaya Moyo.





He said given the increased optimism to invest in the electricity sector, the tariffs would be seen going down in the next few months.





The pronouncement comes exactly a week after Government also reduced fuel prices by 3 percent in a bid to improve the countrys general economic environment.

Minister Khaya Moyo said the new administration has brought hope in the investment into the power sector.





Given the lack of investment and lines of credit in the sector our electricity was bound to be expensive but due to the appetite for investment in the electricity sector shown at Davos we will see ourselves reducing electricity tariffs lower than our regional counterparts.

We will certainly push for the tariffs to around 7,50c/kWh to improve all sectors of the economy, said Khaya Moyo.





Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI) president Sifelani Jabangwe, said the proposed move will augment the import management programme  Statutory Instrument 64 of 2016  to improve local industrys competitiveness.





If the country could reduce its electricity tariff for industry to that level of around 7,50c/kWh, it would go a long way in improving its competitiveness as electricity is one of the key cost drivers of the manufacturing industry.





Electricity will reduce cost of production significantly in many goods in our industry, therefore this will also raise the industrys capacity utilisation, said Jabangwe.





Also, local mining companies were pushing for a downward review of electricity tariffs, especially in the wake of declining commodity prices on international markets.

Given this new development, many miners will ramp up production and return to profitability as electricity gobbled almost half of the production costs.





The mining sector is presently being charged about 12,8c/kWh for power, and mining houses want the tariff cut to 7c/kWh or less.





Recently the Chamber of Mines of Zimbabwe claimed besides the effects of power shortages and high tariffs, the sector was grappling with low capital and FDI inflows, and generally high local cost structures.





Chamber of Mines CEO Isaac Kwesu, indicated in a recent report that: Most producers feel that the current electricity tariff regime is too high and not sustainable for the quality of deposits being exploited hence there is need for a review.





The average tariff for the mining industry is currently around 10c/kWh, though most gold producers are paying around 13c/kWh compared to the national average or general tariff around nine cents.





If we reduce our tariffs to the regional standards most miners will remain in business and increase its production levels.





Uganda has since halved its tariffs to around 9c/kWh from around 18c/kWh to improve its competitiveness.





Zambia and Angola are some of the countries with lower power tariffs in the region and the world, and Zimbabwe is moving towards that path to become competitive.  BusinessWeekly.It is a contest to look forward to, one pundits will surely relish. A former State Vice-President, ex-Finance Minister, former Deputy Justice Minister and the Deputy Finance Minister have all thrown their hats into the ring for one National Assembly seat during the forthcoming harmonised elections.



The coveted prize is Harare East, Deputy Finance Minister Terrence Mukupes current seat.

While the country has hundreds of constituencies, Harare East appears to be the candy that everyone is after.





Eyeing the seat are National Peoples Partys Dr Joice Mujuru, Peoples Democratic Party leader Mr Tendai Biti and MDC-T spokesman Mr Obert Gutu.





However, before venturing out to confront Cde Mukupe, the opposition camp is already burning, with open confrontation characterising interactions between MDC Alliance acting president Advocate Nelson Chamisa, Messrs Biti and Gutu.





The three are at each others throat over the seat despite the MDC Alliance having set guidelines for candidate selection.





Mr Gutu is so enticed by the constituencys allure such that he had to tell off his boss, Advocate Chamisa, when counselled against facing Mr Biti in the poll.

Dr Mujuru  though linked to an emerging party that seeks to provide a home for G40 characters  is also said to be interested in the seat.





Her spokesperson, Mr Gift Nyandoro, promised to respond to inquiries from The Sunday Mail. However, his phone later went unanswered.





But PDP spokesperson Mr Jacob Mafume said Mr Bitis experience and competence make him the best candidate.





He said: He has won the seat before and the Harare East people have given the nation a competent Finance Minister who not only assisted the constituency, but the nation at large.





Residents of the constituency are aware of Mr Bitis capabilities. His game plan to win the seat is to present himself for service to the constituency and the nation. Mr Biti has shown competence and excellence.





However, Mr Gutu was not in a good mood. Said Mr Gutu: Your questions are now getting onto my nerves. You are irritating me. I am busy with other stuff and will only respond when Im ready.

Cde Mukupe is confident he will retain the seat.





I will retain the seat because my work speaks for me. Biti is a selfish man. He should first tell us where the money he was given under the Constituency Development Fund went, said Cde Mukupe.

He is always aiming at every political seat. There is no need for me to campaign. I will just work. Sunday MailZimbabwe will rejoin the Commonwealth this year, and President Mnangagwa has formally informed the British government of this position, The Sunday Mail has gathered.



The President has also  on top of undertaking to dispatch technical teams to London to kickstart comprehensive talks  reminded Prime Minister Theresa Mays administration of its colonial obligation to provide compensation to white farmers affected by Zimbabwes Land Reform Programme.



Senior Government last week said President Mnangagwa expressed commitment to re-engagement when he met PM Mays special envoy, Mrs Harriet Baldwin, in Harare last Friday.





That this was Mrs Baldwins first overseas engagement as Britains Minister for Africa speaks volumes about President Mnangagwas drive to normalise Zimbabwes relations with the entire international community.





Officials on Friday also said President Mnangagwa had expressed his readiness to meet PM May.

Mrs Baldwin was in Zimbabwe to explore restoration of diplomatic relations between the two governments.





Her predecessor, Mr Rory Stewart, met President Mnangagwa soon after his inauguration in Harare on November 24, 2017 to discuss the same subject.





An official told this paper, President Mnangagwa articulated the land issue at length, affirming that while the programme was irreversible, Government was committed to bringing finality to the matter which sparked the fallout between the two countries spanning nearly two decades.

Minister Baldwin listened attentively as President Mnangagwa explained the position on the land issue and she promised to deliver the message to her principals in London. The meeting went well and yes, the President declared Zimbabwes intention to rejoin the Commonwealth.





It was significant that the Head of State himself made such a commitment. Britain appreciates that this will go a long way in mending relations between the two countries.





Another said, It is our intention to join the Commonwealth, but this is something that is not going to take place immediately. It is definitely going to happen at the appropriate time.





I think for now, (Britain) are arranging their Commonwealth Summit for April. We will not be joining before then, but in the very near future. Well be able to set out plans of when we will start making efforts to rejoin.





Minister Baldwin said of her visit: I am pleased that my first overseas trip as minister has been to Zimbabwe. The historic events the country has experienced over the last few months have created an opportunity to strengthen UK-Zimbabwe relations as part of a wider process of international engagement.





The upcoming elections are a major milestone for the people of Zimbabwe. When I met President Mnangagwa, I said my government welcomed his commitment to hold credible, peaceful, free and fair elections monitored by international observers.





I have seen for myself that Zimbabwe is a country of enormous potential. With the right leadership, the right policy environment and a vibrant democracy and civil society, Zimbabwe can undergo the transformation it so richly deserves.

Fridays meeting touched on how Britain could assist Zimbabwe clear arrears to the World Bank, IMF and African Development Bank.





The UK Foreign Office confirmed as much, saying, Minister Baldwin met with Finance Minister (Patrick) Chinamasa and Reserve Bank Governor John Mangudya to discuss the Governments plans for clearing debt and normalising relations with the international financial institutions.





Minister Baldwin welcomed the Governments recommitment to the Lima Plan and confirmed that the UK would continue to support the Governments reform agenda. Minister Baldwin also welcomed Government plans to attract more investment into agriculture through ensuring land tenure and compensation are tackled.





Minister Baldwin met with Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa and Foreign Minister Sibusiso Moyo to discuss the Zimbabwean Governments vision for domestic transformation and international engagement through comprehensive political and economic reforms.





As a central plank of this, they discussed the importance of the elections later this year being peaceful, credible, free and fair. Minister Baldwin welcomed the Presidents commitment to invite international observers from the EU and UN as well as Sadc and AU.





Zimbabwe withdrew from the Commonwealth in 2003 at the height of diplomatic tensions between Harare and London over land reforms.





Then British PM Tony Blair refused to provide compensation for land acquired from white commercial farmers for redistribution to indigenes as agreed at the 1979 Lancaster House Conference, which formalised Zimbabwes Independence from British colonial rule. Sunday MailHe Spent Weeks

on the Pile After 9/11.

What Did It Do to His Brain?(Newser)  An Italian gunman with extreme right-wing sympathies shot and wounded six African immigrants Saturday in Italy during a two-hour drive-by shooting spree, the AP reports. Police photos showed the shooting suspect with a neo-Nazi tattoo prominently on his forehead as he sat in custody and an Italian flag tied around his neck as he was arrested in the central Italian city of Macerata,. Authorities identified him as Luca Traini, 28. Traini had run for town council on the anti-migrant Northern League's list in a local election last year in Corridonia, the party confirmed, but its mayoral candidate lost the race. The news agency ANSA quoted friends of his as saying that Traini had previously been affiliated with Italian extremist parties like the neo-fascist Forza Nuova and CasaPound.

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The shooting spree came days after the arrest of a Nigerian man in connection with the slaying of 18-year-old Pamela Mastropietro and amid a heated electoral campaign in Italy where anti-foreigner sentiment has become a key theme. Interior Minister Marco Minniti said the gunman had been motivated "by racial hatred" and had "a background of right-wing extremism with clear references to fascism and Nazism." Authorities said the six woundedfive men and one womanappeared to be random targets in various parts of the city of 43,000. Italian news reports indicated that the gunman's trajectory included the area where the Italian murder victim was found and where the suspect in her slaying lived. One victim remained hospitalized in intensive care.

(Read more racism stories.)(Newser)  House Speaker Paul Ryan used Twitter to highlight a school secretary benefiting from the Republican tax overhaul, then deleted the tweet after online criticism that he is cheering an increase of $1.50 a week. The AP reported on Thursday that changes in tax withholding were sparking bigger paychecks, citing as one example Julia Ketchum of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, whose check went up $1.50 a week. She told the AP that the $78 a year would more than cover her Costco membership.

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Ryan on Saturday posted a Tweet noting the secretary's increase and linking to the AP storywhich was quickly met with mockery, notes the Washington Post, particularly among those comparing the size of Ketchum's windfall with that the nation's wealthy. Typical was Rep. Joe Kennedy III, who tweeted that, "Meanwhile the wealthiest 0.1% of Americans receive an extra ~ $3,000 per week," while a Post reporter notes that Ketchum's $78 a year is less than Ryan makes in an hour as speaker. Ryan has posted several other examples of worker pay increases and bonuses since the overhaul, some as much as $1,000. Ryan's spokeswoman didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

(Read more Paul Ryan stories.)(Newser)  Kim Cattrall's Instagram is sprinkled with pictures of landscapes and fun times with family, but the Sex and the City star put up a more disturbing post over the weekend asking for help from the public, per TMZ and People. "This is my brother Christopher Cattrall or Chris as we call him," she wrote. "He has been missing since Tuesday, January the 30th from his home in Lacombe, Alberta Canada." The 61-year-old actress added her 55-year-old brother's keys, cellphone, and wallet were all left inside his residence, and the door was left unlocked. "He would never leave his unlocked home without those items nor his 7 beloved dogs," she added.

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Cattrall goes on to describe her brother as 6 feet tall and 200 pounds, with blue eyes, a goatee and short brown hair, and "usually wearing a waist length hooded winter coat with black gloves, blue jeans and calf high black winter boots." The Royal Canadian Mounted Police also shared a missing-person release on Christopher Cattrall. "He's a one of a kind brother," Kim Cattrall wrote. "Help us bring him home safe. Please spread the [word]." (Read more Kim Cattrall stories.)(Newser)  Thousands of demonstrators have marched in the Ukrainian capital to demand the resignation of President Petro Poroshenko. The protest of about 5,000 people in Kiev on Sunday (TASS puts the number closer to 1,000) was led by Mikheil Saakashvili, the former Georgian president who moved to Ukraine as a Poroshenko ally but then was stripped of his citizenship last year, per the AP. Saakashvili was abroad when he lost his citizenship, but he forced his way back into Ukraine in September and since has led repeated protests against Poroshenko, alleging the president is corrupt. The rally was broadcast live on his Facebook page, with protesters making a few demands: the resignation and impeachment of Poroshenko, a new parliament in which members serve for a term of one year, and a new government that would implement a program called "70 Days of New Power."

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Saakashvili called Poroshenko a "frightened huckster with iron diapers," seemingly referring to the tight security at the rally, and told participants: "Today's action is the beginning of a campaign to dismantle this rotten and corrupt system. And Poroshenko's resignation is only the first step." Protesters have even selected a resignation date for Poroshenko: Feb. 18, when they want him to come to Kiev's Independence Square (aka Maidan Nezalezhnosti) to announce he's stepping down. "At noon [on that day], we will come to Kiev's Maidan, to [squares] in each and every Ukrainian city. There will be millions of us. Get out of our way!," a member of Ukraine's parliament said at Sunday's rally. No arrests or clashes with police were reported.

(Read more Ukraine stories.)(Newser)  The cause of Sunday morning's deadly train crash in South Carolina appears to be the most basic one imaginable: The Amtrak train that plowed into a parked freight train was on the wrong track, say state officials. Now the big question is how that happened. Two people are deadthe conductor and engineer aboard the Amtrak trainand more than 110 people injured, per the latest count from the AP. At least three of the injured were in serious or critical condition, and almost everyone else had relatively minor cuts or bruises. The Amtrak Silver Star from New York to Miami had been traveling about 50mph when it crashed into the empty CSX train, well within the 59mph speed limit for that stretch of tracks in Cayce, South Carolina, reports the State. The best guess at this point is that a switch in the wrong position sent the Amtrak train onto the wrong path.

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Part of the preliminary indications are that it would have to be a switching issue, says a state transportation official. "It was no derailment caused by a flaw in the track. The Amtrak was on the wrong track. He adds that CSX owns the track and would be the one responsible for maintaining the switches. Amtrak emphasized that point in its own statement, which also said it was "saddened" at the death of its two employees. NBC News reports that the Amtrak train received verbal permission to use the set of tracks because the CSX signals were offline for maintenance. The crash might have been avoided if the tracks had a safety system known as the Positive Train Control system, which sends warnings to trains ahead of a possible collision. PTC is being phased in around the country, but it's not up and running yet on these tracks. (Read more Amtrak stories.)Sorry!

This content is not available in your regionFairbanks, AK (99707)

Today

Sun and clouds mixed. High 66F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy this evening, then becoming cloudy after midnight. Low around 50F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph.The Daily News-Miner encourages residents to make themselves heard through the Opinion pages. Readers' letters and columns also appear online at newsminer.com. Contact the editor with questions at letters@newsminer.com or call 459-7574.

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Send Community Perspective submissions by mail (P.O. Box 70710, Fairbanks AK 99707) or via email (letters@newsminer.com). Submissions must be 500 to 750 words. Columns are welcome on a wide range of issues and should be well-written and well-researched with attribution of sources. Include a full name, email address, daytime telephone number and headshot photograph suitable for publication (email jpg or tiff files at 150 dpi.) You may also schedule a photo to be taken at the News-Miner office. The News-Miner reserves the right to edit submissions or to reject those of poor quality or taste without consulting the writer.

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Send letters to the editor by mail (P.O. Box 70710, Fairbanks AK 99707), by fax (907-452-7917) or via email (letters@newsminer.com). Writers are limited to one letter every two weeks (14 days.) All letters must contain no more than 350 words and include a full name (no abbreviation), daytime and evening phone numbers and physical address. (If no phone, then provide a mailing address or email address.) The Daily News-Miner reserves the right to edit or reject letters without consulting the writer.New Delhi:

IIT Bombay on Sunday morning has issued a statement clarifying that the Institute has not banned non-veg food in the campus as reported by few publications.

A letter was issued to the caterer of a cafeteria atop Civil Engineering Department for purely health and safety reasons as he was serving stale food, read the statement released by IIT PRO.

Earlier, a circular was released by the Institute authorities intimating students and mess authorities that non-veg food items have been strictly banned and such items should not be served in the cafeteria.

Students were also instructed to use separate plates for non-vegetarian food in the hostel mess.New Delhi:

Karni Sena leaders Lokendra Singh Kalvi, who spearheaded the protest against Padmaavat, and Sukhdev Singh Gogamedi said on Saturday that their objection to the controversial film still stands and the protest will continue.

The clarification from the two leaders came a day after news reports said the Mumbai branch of Shree Rashtriya Rajput Karni Sena had withdrawn their protest against the film.

Kalvi heads Shree Rajput Karni Sena and Gogamedi is the chief of the other group with similar name - Shree Rashtriya Rajput Karni Sena.

The Mumbai branch of Gogamedis group had issued a letter to the production house behind the film, stating their protest is withdrawn after its members found that the movie glorified Rajputs.

The letter, signed by Mumbai leader Yogendra Singh, stated that the groups members watched the film and decided to withdraw the protest unconditionally.

However, Gogamedi said today no such direction was issued to the Mumbai branch. "I have issued no such direction and our protest is continuing. I have expelled all of them whose names and signatures are on the letter," he told reporters here.

"The letter is being circulated on social media and misleading the public. The letter is not authentic," he said.

The protest against the film - based on the saga of the historic battle of 13th century between Maharaja Ratan Singh and his army of Mewar and Sultan Alauddin Khilji of Delhi - is spearheaded by Shree Rajput Karni Sena chief patron Kalvi.

The other group has also protested against the film over similar grounds, that the movie allegedly distorted history.

Kalvi said his group is still opposed to the film and the "janta curfew" it has imposed at movie theatres will continue.

"There were two issues: one related with faith and the other with history. The filmmaker has made changes to the film to respect the faith of the Rajput community but distortion of historic facts is still there in the film," he told reporters at a separate press conference.

He said the protest has not been withdrawn.

However, Kalvi clarified the group will not oppose the special screening of the film at a theatre in Jodhpur, where a high court judge is scheduled to watch it on Monday in connection with a case against director Sanjay Leela Bhansali.

The controversial film had faced resistance from various Rajput groups, who accused the filmmakers of "distorting history" and showing Rani Padmini in poor light.

Historians, however, are divided whether the queen actually existed.

The film missed its December 1 release as it was stuck with the CBFC over certificate clearance issues. It finally released on January 25, with five modifications, including change in the title from "Padmavati" to "Padmaavat", and multiple disclaimers.

For all the Latest Entertainment News, Bollywood News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.Amaravati:

The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) on Sunday said it will not snap ties with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

The assertion comes amid speculation that the ruling party in Andhra Pradesh might rethink its ties with the BJP in view of its disappointment over allocation of funds to the state in the Union Budget.

The TDP will not break its alliance with the BJP-led NDA, Party leader and Union minister Y S Chowdary said after a meeting of party MPs and senior leaders with Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu here this afternoon.

Chowdary said they would first raise issues concerning the state with the Centre and try to get them addressed.

Read More | Disappointed with Budget 2018, NDA ally TDP to declare 'war' against BJP

If the Centre does not concede to our demands, then we will undertake protest both inside and outside Parliament, he added.

It was all media speculation, Chowdary said when asked if the TDP was ready for a divorce with the NDA.

Asked if BJP chief Amit Shah had spoken with Naidu, he replied in the negative.

He said Naidu did not speak to Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, the BJPs bickering ally, as some media reports had claimed.

The BJP and the TDP are part of the ruling alliances in Andhra Pradesh and also at the Centre.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.Noida:

BJP MP from Uttar Pradeshs Kairana, Hukum Singh, who was suffering from breathing problem, died on Saturday at J P Hospital in Noida. The 79-year-old leader was admitted to the hospital for nearly a month, the official said.

Singh, who was elected from the Kairana seat, is survived by five daughters. He was an MLA in Uttar Pradesh for seven terms and a minister in the state before entering the Lok Sabha in the 2014 polls.

Condoling his death Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Twitter, Anguished by the demise of MP and veteran leader from Uttar Pradesh, Shri Hukum Singh Ji. He served the people of UP with great diligence and worked for the welfare of farmers. My thoughts are with his family and supporters in this hour of grief.

Anguished by the demise of MP and veteran leader from Uttar Pradesh, Shri Hukum Singh Ji. He served the people of UP with great diligence and worked for the welfare of farmers. My thoughts are with his family and supporters in this hour of grief.  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) February 3, 2018

BJP president Amit Shah said Singhs demise was an irreparable loss for the party. Uttar Pradesh Governor Ram Naik and Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath also condoled the BJP leaders death.

In a tweet Union Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Vijay Goel expressed shock over Singhs death and said it was a huge loss for the BJP.

Before the UP Assembly elections last year, he had highlighted the issue of alleged migration of the Hindus from parts of his Lok Sabha constituency and its neighbourhood.

The Lok Sabha is likely to be adjourned on Monday as a mark of respect to the BJP leader after paying tributes to him.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

The CBI has recovered property documents, bank deposit slips of about Rs 2 crore allegedly linked to Delhi minister Satyendar Jain, and companies where he was the director, during searches at the residences of Delhi Dental Council Registrar, the agency sources said.

The documents were recovered during CBI searches at the residences of Dental Council Registrar Rishiraj after he was arrested in a separate case on Saturday, they said.

Reacting to the development, a senior Delhi government official alleged it was an attempt by the Centre to malign Jains image and that he had nothing do with the registrar.

Rishiraj and N Pradeep Sharma, a lawyer for the council, were arrested last night while allegedly receiving a bribe of Rs 4.7 lakh from a doctor, they said.

The CBI has registered a case...on the allegations of demanding a bribe from the complainant for getting him favourable order from the Delhi Dental Council and also for extending help in further legal proceedings in his matter, CBI Spokesperson Abhishek Dayal said.

He said the CBI laid a trap and caught the accused while demanding and accepting the bribe from the complainant.

Later during the searches, the CBI recovered from Rishirajs locker property documents in Jains name at Karala village, cheque books in the name of the AAP leader, his wife Poonam and JJITL estate private limited, the sources said.

They said IDBI bank slips showing deposits worth Rs 2 crore in the name of Jains companies in 2011 were also found during the searches.

Three property documents including two sale deeds of land measuring 12 bigha 2 bishwa and 8 bigha 17 bishwa at Karala village, Delhi; one power of attorney for land measuring 14 bighas in the village (were found), Dayal said in a statement.

He said a deposit slip book of a bank containing counter foils detailing deposits of approximately Rs 2 crore during 2011 in the name of Jain and companies, where he was serving as director, and in the name of his family members were also recovered.

Besides, 41 cheque books in his and his wifes name and in the name of a private estate firm were also found, he said.

The CBI also claimed to have recovered 500 gram gold and Rs 24 lakh cash but it was not clear if these are also linked to Jain, the minister for Power, PWD and Health.

The sources said the documents were original and the agency would soon be calling the minister for seeking his explanation on the recoveries.

Last year, the CBI had booked Jain in case related to disproportionate assets.

The sources said they believe that these documents could have been shifted to the premises of Rishiraj for safe-keeping and to escape the CBI searches last August in connection with alleged corruption cases against the minister, they said.

Why will a person keep original property and bank documents at a third persons residence if he was not attempting to hide facts? an official connected with the probe asked.

Rishiraj was nominated as the registrar of the Delhi Dental Council by the Aam Aadmi party government.

Meanwhile, the senior Delhi government officials said, Jain has nothing to do even remotely with the registrar in question. Till date, the BJP has miserably failed in digging out anything against Jain.

The BJP-led central government is only trying to malign his (Jains) image. This is the latest attempt to frame Jain.

He said the papers planted by the CBI have been twice handed over by Jain himself to the agency, and have been declared many a times in his I-T returns.

What is new in these papers? This is a fresh BJP conspiracy, he claimed.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

Union Home Minister Rajnath singh on Saturday said India wants peaceful relations with its neighbour Pakistan, but a single fire from across the border will be met with countless Indian bullets.

"I have given standing orders to our forces to shoot limitless bullets to retaliate a single fire on our territory by the Pakistani forces," Rajnath Singh said at an election rally Tripura.

Rajnath said Pakistan wants to divide our country and separate Kashmir but India will never let the the country succeed in its evils designs.

Also Read | Lashkar-e-Taiba militants arrested in Kashmir, received VISA from Pak High Commission in Delhi

"Our neighbour is Pakistan. They are always trying to divide India or trying to create havoc in our country. They say that they will separate Kashmir from India. But they do not have the strength to separate Kashmir from us, the Home Minister said.

"Kashmir hamara tha, hamara hai, aur hamara hi rahega (Kashmir was ours, and will always remain ours)," he added.

Rajnath maintained that India wasnt to live with peace and harmony and wont resort to attack Pakistan first.

"As our neighbour, we do not want to attack Pakistan first. We want to live in peace and harmony with our all neighbours.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president N Chandrababu Naidu will hold a key party meet on Sunday to take a call on alliance with BJP.

TDP is not happy with the allocation of funds to Andhra Pradesh in the Union Budget 2018 despite repeated appeals for more money for the construction of new state capital Amaravati.

TDP is BJPs second largest partner in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and both parties had contested the 2014 election in alliance.

However, the TDP expressed serious displeasure over the Union Budget 2018 and one of the party MP said they will declare a war against the BJP.

Also Read | Disappointed with Budget 2018, NDA ally TDP to declare 'war' against BJP

The CM and TDP leaders upset with the Centre for ignoring Andhra Pradesh. Even common man is angry because of the injustice that has been done. Today, we plan to review our ties with the BJP, Kesineni Srinivas, Vijayawada MP, said.

TDP President Naidu will hold a meeting of partys Parliamentary Committee in Amaravati and will meet senior MLAs and leaders to review ties with the ruling BJP.

'Whatever CM decides we will stand by it, but we are not happy with the BJPs budget, not happy with the budget allotted to Andhra Pradesh,' TDP MP Ravindra Babu said.

On being asked about whether TDP will break alliance with the BJP, he said, that we have to see, our CM will decide, we will follow him.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

An oil tanker with 22 Indians on board has gone missing in the piracy-plagued waters off the Benin coast in the Gulf of Guinea near West Africa, the Directorate General of Shipping said on Sunday.

No contact has been established with the vessel so far and there have been no reports of a ransom call, it said.

"The region has a history of piracy and it may be a case of suspected piracy. All communication with the vessel has been lost, and right now we do not know if a ransom call has been made," an official of the Directorate General of Shipping told PTI.

The ship has gone mission less than a month after another vessel 'MT Barret' had gone missing off the coast of Benin in January and was later confirmed to have been hijacked.

The crew of 22, most of whom were Indians, were reportedly released after the ransom was paid.

Earlier, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted, "A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals on board, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea."

Also Read: Indian Navy launches ultramodern Scorpene class submarine Karanj

The India mission in Nigeria was in touch with the authorities concerned and the situation was being constantly monitored, the MEA said.

"Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation.

A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860," Kumar said.

The DG shipping also said they are in touch with the Indian missions and "all our efforts are concentrated on getting the sailors rescued".

The official said that Anglo-Eastern shipping management is very cooperative and have also opened up an emergency response centre for the crew members' families.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

PM Modi started his 90 day Nava Nirman Parivarthan yatra in the poll-bound Karnataka. The Prime Minister has enumerated the achievements of the NDA government. While addressing the mass Modi held the Congress as the party which believes in politics of appeasement and nepotism.

Hitting out at the Congress the PM said that, the opposition does not want to give Muslim women their rights and thus are stalling the, 'Triple Talaq' bill in the parliament.

His address at the rally has come out as one of the most aggressive one in recent times.

"We aim to provide home to all poor and middle class families. Our government has sanctioned 3.36 lakh houses under PM Awas Yojana (urban). However, only 38,000 houses have been completed so far in Karnataka," said the PM.

LIVE UPDATES:

# 8.5 lakh women were given free Gas connection in Karnataka under UjjwalaYojana.

# Congress party is blocking the tripple talaq bill in the parliament. It does not want to see Muslim women having better standard of living.

# There are serious allegations of corruption against Congress leaders. Reports are coming about them demanding commission in several projects. I have been told that Karnataka govt is being recognised as 10% govt as no work is possible without 10% commission

# The government has set a goal to build more than 9,000 kms long National Highway across the nation this year. Under Bharatmala Pariyojana, 35,000 km of roads will be constructed with an investment of Rs 5,25,000.

# Soon 160 KM long suburban railway network with 28 stations, worth Rs. 17,000 crore will come up benefiting around 15 lakh commuters of the city, said PM.

# In this budget, government has made a significant decision so that correct price of crops are given to farmers. If Yeddyurappa, son of a farmer, becomes CM of Karnataka, the projects for farmers will work at its best because Yeddurappa has farmer's best interest at heart, says PM.

# During Congress regime, Karnataka got Rs. 73000 crore. However, we have provisioned Rs. 2 lakh crore for it which is more than 180% more than Congress had provided.

# Has the previous Congress governments at the centre and the state ever shown this kind of sympathy towards the farmers before? The country sees all that.

# More than three lakh kilometres of village roadways.

# I lay top priority to Tomato, Onion and Potato which stands for TOP under the green initiative.

# If both the Karnataka and the Central government joins hands then our farmers are bound to produce gold from mother earth.

# I want to ask you if you have seen the correct use & impact of extra money provided by the Center to the state government: PM Modi at Parivartan Yatre in Bengaluru.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a rally in Bengaluru on Sunday afternoon and mark the conclusion of the partys 90-day Nava Nirman Parivarthan Yatra in the poll-bound state of Karnataka.

PM Modi will be addressing the rally in Bengalurus Palace ground at 2 pm. BJP Karnataka President BS Yeddyurappa invited the people of the city to attend the rally by sharing this news on his Twitter account.

The partys state unit is using all means of social networking site to disseminate the information and gather as much crowd as they can. They have also opened online registration for the same. Elaborate security arrangements have been made in the city ahead of the rally.

An official of the party told IANS, We have invited thousands of youth, especially techies and executives of IT and biotech companies in the city to personally listen to Modis speech though it will also be telecast live on news channels and available on YouTube. About 30,000 people from across the city have responded, expressing interest in attending the rally and listen to Modis speech. We hope most of them will turn up as elaborate parking facility has been made for their vehicles at the venue.

Also Read: Chandrababu Naidu holds crucial TDP Parliamentary Committee meet to take call on alliance with BJP

Earlier, pro-Kannada groups were set to observe a bandh in the city over the Mahadayi river dispute with Goa on Sunday, but the bandh had been called off since the High Court had ordered a stop. However, now, they will observe a black day in the city.

The black day will be observed at the freedom park and the activists will be wearing black bands.

Prior to this, PM Modi was scheduled to address this rally on January 28, 2018, but because of the Parliament session and budget presentation, the rally was pushed to Sunday.

The 90-day Nava Nirman Parivarthan Yatra was flagged off by BJP Chief Amit Shah on November 1 and was led by Yeddyurappa.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

Ahead of Nagaland assembly elections, Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Sunday took a dig at PM Modi over the proposed Naga Peace Accord signed between the centre and an armed rebel group in 2015.

August 2015, Mr Modi claims to create history by signing the NAGA accord. Feb 2018, Naga Accord is still nowhere to be found. Modi ji is the first ever Indian PM whose words don't mean anything. #CantFindTheAccord, Rahul Gandhi tweeted from his official handle.

Rahul Gandhis swipe at PM Modi came a day after the BJP announced to contest the Nagaland Assembly election together with Nationalist Democratic People's Party (NDPP).

Also Read | Ahead of PM Modi's rally, pro-Kannada groups observe Black Day in Bengaluru

After years of peace talks, Modi govt had signed a peace accord with Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland  an armed rebel group  to end insurgency.

Under the accord, the rebellion group had accepted Indian Constitution and gave up its demand for independent "greater Nagaland".

However, last month, the ruling Naga People's Front including 10 other parties had decided not to contest the elections which is scheduled to be held on February 27.

They wanted the demand of tribal bodies and civil society groups to resolve the Naga political problem should be met first.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

Travel freaks should start packing their bags as Mumbai's Gateway of India is offering yet another mind-boggling visual treat apart from the arched monument erected during the 20th century in Bombay.

Yes! A 23-foot-wide replica of the Moon, half million times smaller than the real celestial body was on Saturday unveiled at Gateway of India and people in and around Mumbai are going crazy to catch a glimpse of this startling site.

British artist Luke Jerram is the gem behind such a historical creation and the replica has been created using imagery from NASAs Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera.

The Museum of the Moon, as it's known, is a miniature replica and is currently on a tour of India, with a two-day stopover in Mumbai, Saturday and Sunday.

The principal reason behind this beautiful creation is to give audiences a feel of earths only satellite, where man first landed successfully on July 20, 1969.

Meanwhile, the replica comes a year before the golden jubilee of the historic moon landing accomplished by astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin.

For eons, the moon has impacted society and culture, it's been worshipped as a deity, used as a timekeeper, inspired artists, poets, scientists, writers and musicians worldwide, Jerram was quoted while interacting with IANS.

Also Read: Google withdraws $30m prize money from Team Indus's much-awaited mission to Moon

He said before gas lamps and electricity, the moon was the only source of light at night, plus it was used for navigation, but living in cities now illuminated heavily by electricity, we have become disconnected to the moon.

I hope this project restores a sense of wonder, inspires questions and reconnects people with the night sky, Jerram said of the project supported by the Maharashtra Government.

The Museum of the Moon is also expected to feature different space-themed lectures on topics like Women in Space, Life Beyond Earth: Prospects and Possibilities, Going Back to the Moon and Landing on a Comet and many others.

Top British scientists including Prof. Monica Gardy, Professor of Planetary and Space Science, Open University will take part in some of those amazing lectures of the Museum.

After Bangalore and Mumbai, the Museum of the Moon will drool New Delhi and Kolkata people over its beauty, according to a spokesperson from the British Council.

Also Read: Aliens may cause end of human lives on Earth? Experts warn!

The Museum of the Moon is being created to mark 70 years of the British Council in India.

For all the Latest Science News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

Massive protests continue in Male as President Abdulla Yameen has refused to follow the Supreme Courts ruling to release key political prisoners and reinstate 12 MPs.

Hundreds of people have rallied in the Maldives' capital urging Yameen to comply with the court ruling ordering the release of jailed opposition leaders.

Protesters chanted slogans such as respect the constitution and enforce the Supreme Court ruling now even as they sang and danced outside an opposition campaign hall on Friday.

A scuffle broke out between Police and protestors on Sunday outside Chief Justice Abdullah Saeed's residence in Male.

Protesters managed to open the gate of Maafushi Prison where the 12 MPs have been detained.

Absolute breakdown of law and order. The public is on the edge. I am very concerned as we are facing increased unrest. They have just used pepper spray and tear gas on crowd, said Eva Abdulla, Member of Parliament, Maldives.

For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.New Delhi:

The Press Club in Islamabad on Sunday witnessed massive protests by thousands of Azadi (Freedom) chanting Pashtuns who undertook a Long March demanding justice for Naqeeb Mahsood, a Pashtun killed in a fake police encounter on January 13 in Karachi.

The Long March was joined by more than 10,000 Pashtuns from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan provinces.

The protestors allege gross human rights violations against the Pashtun community by the Pakistan Government.

They said the Police had presented false accusations against Naqeeb including that he had connections with Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and ISIS which were contested by his family and relatives.

Subsequently, an inquiry commission was set up by the government of Sindh province to investigate the matter. The commission said that Naqeeb was innocent and was killed in a fake police encounter.

A protester while addressing a gathering said, "The people of this region are not the terrorists, but this government is a terrorist, which represents the elite class of Punjab."

(With ANI inputs)

For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.Once again we have saved our summer vacation to the very end. Even as much of the nation is already back to school, our kids will be toti...Tokyo Metropolitan Police have released security camera footage showing an elderly woman being dragged for several dozen meters by a truck during a purse-snatching incident in Katsushika Ward on Thursday, reports TBS News

At around 12:20 p.m., a man driving the white vehicle called out to the woman as she walked with an umbrella on a road in the ward. As she turned to face the front of the vehicle near its right rear view mirror, the driver grabbed her purse through the window and sped off.

In the provided video footage, the woman can be seen clinging to the bag and the umbrella as the truck barreled through the residential district, her body swinging face-down off to the side of the vehicle.

As the truck started to turn left, her body flopped over and her left foot got caught under its right-rear wheel, causing her shoe to come off. As the truck finished the turn, she let go of the bag and the vehicle disappeared from view.

The woman suffered light injuries to her head during the incident, in which she was dragged an estimated 30 meters. The bag contained about 1,000 yen in cash, police said.

Police are searching for the whereabouts of the driver on suspicion of robbery resulting in injury.Organic grape farming, while common on the West Coast, poses so many challenges on the East Coast that vineyards using such natural processes are few and far between.

Steamy summers, bitterly cold winters, multiple rainy seasons and the proliferation of weeds and insects all conspire against grape farmers wishing to grow their vineyards organically. For Mark Langford, business manager of DiGrazia Vineyards, the extra work is worth the effort.

Theres not a rush to go out and grow organically because its expensive and labor intensive and works on only a few varieties, Langford said during an interview in the tasting room at his familys Tower Road winery. Theres always new threats with invasive weeds and insects and weather. Theres definitely a learning curve.

Langford has been using organic farming methods at the winerys one-third-acre vineyard at the Brookfield site for two years. DiGrazia Vineyards has a 40-acre vineyard in Amenia, N.Y., as well. Langford is converting the smaller plot first because any failures will not affect the bottom line drastically.

The results have been positive so far, Langford said. Heavy and frequent rains made for less-than-ideal growing conditions in 2017, he said, but the yield and quality of the harvest was excellent.

It can be daunting, but the whole idea is to use natural methods instead of just spraying something on it, Langford said. After two years, its definitely promising and worth the effort. There has always been a healthy aspect to the wines made here.

The Brookfield vineyard produces Elvira grapes for the winerys Anastasias Blush rose wine.

Dr. Paul DiGrazia, who founded the vineyard in 1978, sees the organic conversion as a logical next step to meet the demand of todays consumer.

People want something thats not contaminated with chemicals, said DiGrazia, who is still a practicing physician at Danbury Hospital. Down the road, I hope they have better labeling on wine so people know what they are drinking. When that happens, well be at the forefront of organic wine making.

An organic vineyard

Applying an organic growing method here or there is not enough for Langford. He is shooting for the strict USDA certification and hopes to someday display that designation on DiGrazia Vineyards wine labels.

Growing organically includes using no synthetic ingredients for fertilizer or weed control. Natural compost must be used to feed the plants, and weeds must be controlled by pulling or whacking them. Cover crops, such as oats or rye, are fast-growing annuals that protect and enrich the soil as well as control weeds. When the cover crops die, they become compost for the soil. Langford has experimented with six cover crop varieties so far.

Returning soil to its natural state without tilling, or turning over, the soil is a main component of organic farming.

My feeling is if you are going to go organic, you may as well go all the way, Langford said. The fertilizer is more expensive and theres a lot more labor involved, which is also expensive. But there is definitely a demand for organic products. Making better wine will help the bottom line eventually so the extra work will pay off in the long run.

Jeff Cordulak, director of the Connecticut chapter of the Northeast Organic Farming Association, said organic farming and landscaping is growing in popularity throughout the state. Connecticut NOFA will hold its annual Organicon event in March at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury.

We are excited to hear about their efforts to practice organic farming at their Connecticut winery, he said. They are joining a few other pioneers in our region that have realized synthetic chemicals are not needed to grow great crops. I look forward to following his progress in the coming year.

A light bulb moment

It was during an intensive, four-day organic course held by NOFA that Langford got the idea to convert the Brookfield vineyard to an organic plot. Langford also owns a landscaping and plowing business and took the course to educate himself on organic land care. He said land and lawn care is another aspect of the organic movement that is growing in demand.

I was halfway through the course when a light bulb went off. This could help the grapes. This is the way it should be, Langford said. I realized I could apply these principles to our vineyard to solve some of the problems we have.

Invasive weeds had been an issue for the vineyard, as well as countless other farms, lawns and woods throughout New England. The proliferation of Japanese knotweed, kudzu, Oriental bittersweet and other introduced weeds poses major challenges for farmers and has altered the ecosystem of the region.

The weeds move in and become harder to eradicate by traditional methods. Oriental bittersweet will take over your woods. It will do the same thing to vineyards, he said. Natural soil will control weeds. Weeds love a chaotic environment because they can prosper there. Just look at the sides of roads. Weeds are an indication of a problem. Grapes are like trees in that they like a structured system.

Booming winery scene

Just like the craft beer scene in Connecticut, the business of small craft wine is burgeoning in the state, as well.

DiGrazia, now 85, started growing grapes in 1978 with the intent of selling his crops to other wineries. In 1984, he opened his own winery. DiGrazia Vineyards became one of the original six wineries on the Connecticut Wine Trail in the early 1990s.

There are now nearly 40 wineries in the state  24 of which are included on the wine trail.

Theres a strong interest in grape-growing now, Langford said. Wineries are big for tourism now.

DiGrazia Vineyards has limited hours from January through April and is open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. In the summer and fall, the winery is closed only on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Wine tastings, which include six varieties, are $10. Tours of the winery are free.

DiGrazia wines are found in more than 150 retail stores in Connecticut.

It remains a family-owned and operated business and is now in its third generation with DiGrazia, Paul DiGrazia Jr., Langford, and Langfords daughter Alexa all involved with the winery.

Its very much a family-run business, which is unusual these days, Langford said.

The writer may be reached at cbosak@hearstmediact.com; 203-731-3338/ Orangetown Police Department /Contributed photo

BETHEL  A Bethel man was scheduled to appear in a New York court last week after he was accused of stealing more than $50,000 from his employer.

The Orangetown Police Department charged Richard Farrah, 59, with stealing from the Orangeburg, N.Y.-based Dynarex Incorporation, where he worked as an international sales associate. Farrah is accused of falsifying orders, so that he was paid for products instead of the company, according to police./ Contributed

DANBURY  Police are renewing a call for help in locating a 53-year-old city resident that has been missing since October 2017.

More News Police find car of missing Danbury woman

Authorities said Laelcira DeLima was last seen by her family around 5 p.m. on Oct. 20, 2017. DeLima left her residence in Danbury in her red Honda Accord, which police located unoccupied on Nov. 7, 2017, at the Putnam Diner in Patterson, New York.Starting next week, Connecticut youths can apply to participate in the third annual future law enforcement youth academy.

The New Haven Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Yale University Police Department announced the third annual overnight summer camp. From July 15 to July 21, students will be chaperoned by law enforcement and FBI employees while they complete daily events.

The program will include Yale police officers, FBI employees and academy alumni. The alumni will be assigned to students from their same county in an effort to create some preliminary networking opportunities.

The purpose of the program is to promote future law enforcement career paths for youths in Connecticut. The students will receive classroom training and practical exercises. The classes will feature information on cyber-technology techniques for combating violent crime, gang awareness, civil rights and hate crimes, counter intelligence and other state and federal violations.

To participate in the program, youths must be between the ages of 15 and 16 and returning to a Connecticut high school in the fall of 2018. Participants must be full-time Connecticut residences with a commitment to physical fitness and a minimum 2.7 GPA in school.

To apply, students can visit fbi.gov/newhaven, where they will be promoted to submit an application and a 200-word written essay. The application process opens on Feb. 9. Applications can be submitted until 5 p.m. on April 6. The program is looking for a total of 30 students  15 girls and 15 boys.

Those who submit applications will need to participate in an initial phone interview and in a final panel-style interview at FBI New Haven headquarters. The program is free of charge.

Any questions can be sent to fleyaprogram@fbi.gov.WOLCOTT  A state police trooper was killed in a head-on crash on Wolcott Road on Saturday night.

State police announced with a heavy heart and great sadness Sunday morning that Trooper Danielle Miller died from her injuries. Miller graduated from the Connecticut State Police Academy in 2014 and worked at Troop L in Litchfield. She was from Southington, according to news reports.

Miller was off duty when her cruiser collided with a pick-up truck around 8:45 p.m. Saturday, closing Wolcott Road for several hours.

We are grateful for her dedicated service to the Connecticut State Police and the residents of Connecticut, and our thoughts and prayers are with her family and friends during this difficult time, state police said in a release.Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc.'s plan to turn a traditional Mexican dessert into a growth driver has sputtered, leaving the beleaguered burrito chain seeking other new menu items.

The dessert known as bunuelos, a fried-tortilla dish topped with honey, sugar and cinnamon, was sold in the chain's New York Next Kitchen -- a testing ground for new fare -- and it wasn't a hit. The item is "on hold" for now, according to spokesman Chris Arnold.

"We didn't love the bunuelos, but have other items moving into the Next Kitchen in the coming months, including other options for dessert," he said in an email. The restaurant was created "to test things, so it will be very normal for things to move in and out," he said.

The company has struggled to reignite growth after an E. coli crisis torpedoed sales in 2015. Food-safety fears have continued to dog the chain since, and a hacker attack last year further tarnished its image.

Founder Steve Ells announced plans to step down as chief executive officer in November, saying the company needed a new leader to oversee its turnaround. For most of its history, Chipotle had taken pride in its simple -- and unchanging -- menu. But its difficulties have made a shake-up more necessary.

The company also has been experimenting with frozen margaritas, a test that has spread to Austin, Texas. Investors likely will get an update on its efforts when Chipotle reports earnings next week.

Chipotle had a more optimistic attitude about bunuelos when it discussed them last year on a conference call with analysts.

"Bunuelos are simple to make using our existing equipment and require us to add just a few additional ingredients," Ells said at the time. "They're delicious and complement our menu nicely."HAMDEN  Joseph White is a grateful man.

A onetime crack addict who spent many nights sleeping on the New Haven Green, White now lives a quiet, comfortable life in his Putnam Avenue apartment, clean and sober for more than two years.

He said he owes his success to Columbus House, the homeless shelter that helped find him his apartment; to Teen Challenge, a faith-based recovery program; and, most of all, to God and his church, Empowerment Christian Church on Dixwell Avenue.

I love my place here. I still love it as if Id just moved in, said White, 51, who move in July 22, 2015, with only an air mattress to sleep on. Im thankful for it. Im thankful for Columbus House.

White was the subject of a New Haven Register story at Christmastime in 2015, but White is so happy with his new life that he invited a reporter to pay him a visit to see how far hes come.

More than two years later, Whites one-bedroom townhouse is no longer sparse. Because of a large retroactive Supplemental Security Income payment, hes been able to buy a sofa and loveseat, a bed, a desk, a TV and a laptop. He has two bicycles  the first one he bought has wide tires that wouldnt fit on the bus rack so he bought a second. Hes able to entertain his three daughters and three grandchildren.

When the family comes over, we can all sit down and have a good meal together, a lot of laughter, he said.

It wasnt always like that.

If youre homeless, its hard to sustain, White said. Sometimes when it downpours you just want to give up. You say, Whats the use? Might as well have a drink. You end up drinking, you end up drugging, youve blown your sobriety.

Ive been homeless so long, its terrible to be out in the pouring rain. All your important papers are going to get ruined, from your Social Security card to your birth certificate. Thats what a homeless [person] carries around, pretty much their whole life in a plastic bag.

Sleeping in a shelter isnt easy either. You can come across a lot of times bullies  or you just dont want to really follow the rules because for you theyre rather strict, but its for your own safety.

Now, he not only doesnt drink or take illegal drugs, hes stopped smoking by using Chantix: 15 days, craving was gone, he said.

He no longer has a caseworker at Columbus House. The only connection  besides his visits to the shelter  is a representative payee, who gets his monthly checks, pays his subsidized rent and utilities and gives him $80 a week for expenses. He also receives food stamps.

Eighty dollars doesnt go far for me but its good enough for me because Im able to buy detergent, bleach, he said. Eventually, Im going to maintain my own money, because everyone around me knows Im capable.

When he bought his furniture, Ive had $1,000 put in my hand, White said. I stapled all my receipts together, handed them in and I was able to gain trust like that.

White pays $221 a month for rent, which is subsidized by the federal rental-assistance program through the Hamden Housing Authority. The full rent is $850, according to Tara OKeefe, property manager for Natale Management Enterprises, which manages the apartment house.

A difficult transition

Hes been really successful, said Alison Cunningham, chief executive officer of Columbus House. Hes done really well. Hes so happy with his housing. Hes living successfully in his community. Hes reconnected with his family and thats terrific.

Cunningham said that, while White is not in Columbus Houses supportive housing, the agency found him an apartment through its rapid-rehousing program. The trickiest time for someone making that transition is really in the first couple of months, she said. It can be really hard for someone going from living in an active, dynamic environment with lots of people around to living by oneself. Theyve never had an apartment in their own name before  Theyve never had to figure out how to manage their own money.

Among the challenges are how to deal with issues of loneliness, how to keep up with taking their medication. We kind of back away as the new tenant becomes  more capable of taking care of themselves and living independently.

Columbus House, besides running a shelter on Ella T. Grasso Boulevard, provides services for about 300 formerly homeless people who are now in permanent supportive housing, Cunningham said.

A life changed

Whites days are pretty quiet. Hell talk to a friend on the phone or walk around the aisles at Walmart.

White has put on weight in the last couple of years and has diabetes and stage 4 kidney disease. But it doesnt bother me, and if it didnt show up in the blood work, I wouldnt know I had it, he said of his kidney disease. Theyre keeping me from dialysis. Im not ready for it. He takes insulin for his diabetes.

White is originally from Danbury. He said he had been homeless on and off since he was 17. My father would take me in, throw me out, take me in, throw me out. His mother was often hospitalized.

To be honest with you  a lot of time when a person becomes homeless, a lot of times its got nothing to do with drugs and alcohol, he said. A lot of times its someone at the home wants to take advantage of somebody  and they throw you out.

White spent five months in jail for stealing DVD players and selling them on the street for 20 bucks apiece.

Finally, I got out. I smoked a bag of crack. I said to God, God, I dont know how to live  I packed a small bag and went to Teen Challenge. Thats when my life changed. God used Teen Challenge to change my life forever.

Theres no craving for crack, no desire. I have victory, joy, joy every morning. I love the Bible, praying, I love my church and I have support there.

White joined Teen Challenge in April 2011. I didnt want to go because I knew it was a 15-month-long program and its one of the hardest programs out there, he said.

Its all about God and you begin to read the Bible, you begin to see change in your life, White said. All I can say is God is faithful. I couldnt get clean from crack. I was hooked, strung out and look, Im free, and its a great feeling. The testimonies that come out of there are crazy. Lives that are set free from prostitution, addiction. God makes a way for them to get their kids back. Its amazing.

Pastor Rick Welch, executive director of Teen Challenge for Connecticut and Vermont, said of White, He was here for about three years and  he was addicted to crack cocaine. His life was unmanageable.  He just grasped onto it and he did remarkably well.

Teen Challenge, which actually accepts adults of all ages, requires that members get their high school GED if they havent graduated and offers vocational skills, including culinary, construction or in retail at its Branford thrift shop.

Joseph has done a lot of remarkable work, Welch said. Hes done a lot of heavy lifting.  One of the reasons I believe is he stays in contact with us here and he has a relationship, friendship with many of the guys who are here and the staff members. Hes still plugged in.

Welch said that a person in recovery needs a support system and Joe has that. He has that in more than one place. Its a recipe for success and thats what hes done. Were very proud of Joe.

Early morning prayer

White has trouble sleeping through the night from years of fearful nights spent outdoors, so hes often up before 5 a.m. He writes the time he gets up  4:55 a.m.  and the times he starts and stops praying, as well as the Bible passage hes read: Genesis 40:1-23. Underneath hell write something like, Holy Spirit, love you! Love you so much!

Getting something out of the Bible gives me strength for the day and basically I pray for strength for others, White said.

His church is another anchor for White, as is his pastor, Corey Saulsbury. Hes real open, hes real down to earth and hes a good pastor, White said. Hell attend church on Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays and get on a conference call on Wednesdays.

I dont sing in the choir but I lift up my hands up to the Lord.  I couldnt be more thankful. Hell help out by picking up trash around the church or the bus stop.

Saulsbury said that when White began attending church he was drawn to others that might feel as though they are in the same situation that he was in. He volunteers in our outreach efforts. Even when were not having a service I usually get a phone call or text message asking if theres anything going on at the church tonight so he can attend. Hes an overall good guy.

Loveone LaRoche, one of Whites three daughters and the mother of his grandsons, said her father is definitely 100 percent happier. When he was homeless and on crack, We didnt really see him at all [for] months at a time, she said. He called on the pay phone once in a while.

Now, though, He calls almost every day.  Were planning on going down there in the next week or so to have dinner and hang out. Now hes more family oriented .

Contact Ed Stannard at edward.stannard@hearstmediact.com or 203-680-9382.NEW HAVEN  It has been said life is about the journey, not the destination, but for two computer science students at Southern Connecticut State University, it might be about the code and not the algorithm.

Neither Michael Silati, 27, nor Robert Crowdis, 25, took traditional paths to what will be their graduations from college in May.

I was kicked out for not doing well academically, Silati said. Through the Fresh Start program, Im set to graduate 10 years after high school.

The SCSU Fresh Start program offers students who leave the school for poor grades an opportunity to begin again after demonstrating changed work and study habits.

Although Silati confesses he made mistakes, he said hes been able to learn from them.

Lisa Lancor, chairwoman of the SCSU Computer Science Department, said Silati came back with a vengeance.

Ive never seen anything like it, she said.

Crowdis initially enrolled in Western Connecticut State University as a music major, but left to work as a sound engineer for three years.

I wouldnt call it soul searching so much as just some time off, he said.

Part of his reasoning, he said, was he no longer felt challenged. After learning more about computer science, he decided to jump back into school at SCSU, because its a complete 180 from music while still indulging his creative side.

Lancor said having a creative touch is essential to being successful in computer science, which benefits both Silati and Crowdis.

I have a passion for creation and making products and services, Silati said.

The two students were instrumental in coordinating the first Google DevFest at SCSU, which brought 130 people to consider ways to increase the representation of women in computer science. The following week, they went to Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts for a hackathon, a competition to create a program to solve a problem in a 24-hour window.

The program they created as a team with three other people is an application that runs recognition software to determine if a classroom is welcoming for women and people of color.

If you scanned a poster of a male physicist, like Einstein, it would recognize hes a white man, Crowdis said.

Often, STEM fields can skew very male and white, and creating a classroom with only images of accomplished white men sends a message about who is welcome in the field, they concluded.

Lancor said the department of about 300 students is only about 10 percent women, and the only women in the incoming class are transferring from other universities.

At Mount Holyoke, Crowdis and Silatis team won first place. The following week, the duo repeated the accomplishment, winning first place at the Connecticut Technology Council College Tech Challenge for their app intended to connect senior citizens with Connecticuts state parks.

... So senior citizens can stay active and healthy, we put all this information in one place, Silati said.

Both Silati and Crowdis believe their exposure to the workplace before graduation has bolstered their studies.

I think its definitely an advantage, Crowdis said. I have different priorities than a first-time student. Im much more open to the abilities of others and to motivate them to succeed.

Silati said appreciates the lessons hes learned.

I feel like Im in a better place and Im seeing the fruits of my labor, he said.

Both work at Checkmate Digital on Temple Street, giving them work experience in the field as they finish their degrees this May.

Lancor said she believes Crowdis and Silati are something of role models for the other students, especially as they involve the community in their work.

Were trying to get students to go downtown, she said.

brian.zahn@

hearstmediact.comHADDAM  Health-care professionals, emergency service personnel, social service providers, elected officials and families who have lost children to opioid abuse met recently to give U.S. Sen. Christopher Murphy, D-Conn., a report from the front lines in the battle against the plague.

More than 40 people gathered at the Haddam Fire Station to share their thoughts about an overdoes crisis that took the lives of 1,076 Connecticut residents in 2017, and which shows no signs of relenting.

Murphy was on a recent five-town visit to cities and towns, with stops in Branford, Colchester, North Stonington and Waterbury, in addition to Haddam.

Murphy said he wanted to meet with people in the center of the fight against the scourge of opioid addiction to hear about their best practices, their successes and the obstacles you face.

Murphy came bearing little good news, saying, This is getting worse, not better.

Its taken us far too long to wake up to the problem, even though, We had tons and tons of warnings. Were getting smarter and we are doing better. But we still have more people who are dying, Murphy said, adding, This is a problem I work on every day in Washington.

In 2016, Congress allocated $1 billion to deal with the opioid crisis, he said. But that is $1 billion divided by 50 states.

In 2017, the picture became even bleaker, as advocates for more aid to deal with the crisis faced cuts to Medicare totaling 44 percent, Murphy said. That could mean a reduction of 35 percent to 40 percent in aid for Connecticut to fund the fight against opioids, Murphy said.

The senator underscored the depth of the problem by noting while Congress had allocated $1 billion to fight opioid addiction, it allocated $4 billion in 2015 to fight the Ebola virus.

Only four or five people in this country got Ebola, Murphy said, asking the painful question, Why on earth did Ebola get $4 billion and opioids only got $1 billion?

In large part, Murphy said, the answer is discrimination.

This is not discrimination based on race or religion, but perhaps an even more pernicious concept: that folks who get addicted need to fix it because its their fault, Murphy said. Despite a staggering rise of deaths, we are not treating this as a public health crisis.

Weve got to attack that bias and prejudice head-on, he said.

But, to date, the ruling party in Congress and the president have been loath to confront the issue head on and adequately fund it, Murphy said.

Murphy disparaged the presidents choice to help lead the nations response to the continuing crisis: Taylor Weyeneth.

According to a Huffington Post report, Weyeneth is a 24-year-old former Trump campaign worker who was appointed last year to be the deputy chief of staff at the Office of National Drug Control Policy, the agency tasked with coordinating federal drug-control efforts.

As the conversation expanded, several speakers criticized hospitals for discharging patients who overdosed without dealing with the larger issues, which often include mental health issues.

Murphy was sympathetic, but he said in many cases, hospitals are forced to discharge patients  and not just addicts  because they do not have enough beds. The reason? They are not being adequately reimbursed by Medicare.

Catherine Rees, community benefit officer at Middlesex Hospital said, Hospitals in Connecticut are talking about this. Fortunately, Connecticut is a small enough state that we can work together.

A spokeswoman for the Shoreline Collaborative said members get together every month in a different community to discuss for dealing with social problems, including homelessness.

The states 211 help line exists in part to asset the homeless.

But that we dont have that for people with mental health issues, she said.

Murphy said it is not fair to just blame hospitals. Weve got to get tough with the drug companies that are pushing these pills and with the health-care providers who continue to prescribe them.

For many people afflicted with opioid addiction, their problems began when they were prescribed oxycodone, which served as a gateway drug to heroin and other even more dangerous drugs.

Two women who lost family members of the opioid crisis took the system to task for unregulated sober houses.

One family member said, Youve got to be high to get admitted to some of these sober houses, so addicts go out and buy drugs in an effort to get admitted for treatment.

But as soon as an addict starts to feel better, many of the sober houses send them right back out on the street. Its a joke, she said.

Ann Lindstrom, who lost her 28-year-old daughter, a talented glass maker, to an overdose last year, said the entire issue of drugs revolves around two realities: greed and money.

Theres no accountability to anyone, Lindstrom said. I was involved every single day because I was trying to save my childs life.

But all too often, rehab treats you for drugs, not for the underlying mental problems.

Lindstrom called upon the state to enact a Baker Law, which allows a family to commit a member to a treatment facility if he/she poses a threat to his or herself.

Essex First Selectman Norman Needleman pushed for more education programs to alert people to the dangers of drugs. He was joined by another speaker in calling on Murphy to do more to halt the wave of synthetic drugs  in particular fentanyl  flooding into the country.

Its almost a homeland security issue, the man said.

Needleman also said the insurance industry needs to be brought to heel.

Murphy said he has proposed placing a fee on each oxycodone pill to build up a fund to provide enhanced treatment. However, he said the prospects for passing such legislation are not good.

Murphy said he wants to see addicts brought back into the community so they begin to re-enter society and in doing so have access to a fuller range of assistance.

Reporter Jeff Mill covers East Hampton, Portland and Cromwell. Contact him at jeff.mill@hearstmediact.com.The Indigenous People of Biafra has alleged that its members in Aba and Port Harcourt are being persecuted and arrested by security agencies since President Donald Trump recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel .In a statement by IPOB  s Media and Publicity Secretary , Emma Powerful , the group complained about the open persecution of its religious group, Shalon Synagogue Church of Israel .The group said its ordeal began shortly after Trump pronounced Jerusalem as the capital of Israel .It enjoined Trump and Israel to intervene in the ordeal to save its members from annihilation by the President Muhammadu Buhari - led government.The statement read , We, the family members of the Indigenous People of Biafra, worldwide , condemn the ongoing religious persecution , harassment and arrest of IPOB members , especially those of the Shalom Synagogue Church of Israel in Aba, Abia State , last week .Since President Trump announced US recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel , the wave of arbitrary arrests and persecution of Biafrans that practise Judaism in Aba and Port Harcourt have dramatically increased.Nigerian government is setting a very ugly and dangerous precedent. Those arrested for their faith must be released immediately, including all those illegally detained for expressing their legitimately held views that they are better off in Biafra than Nigeria .Powerful added , Arresting members of Shalom Christian Church because they are connected to the Jews in Israel is religious discrimination of the worst kind . Every religion has a root and in as much as nobody can deny that Saudi Arabia is the root of Islam , nobody can deny that Israel is the foundation of both Judaism and later Christianity . Barely weeks after the former President Olusegun Obasanjo wrote a letter to President Muhammadu Buhari telling him to go home and forget ...

Barely weeks after the former President Olusegun Obasanjo wrote a letter to President Muhammadu Buhari telling him to go home and forget 2019 elections, residents of the Presidents polling unit in Sarkin Yara A ward, Daura Local government area of Katsina State has on Saturday called on Buhari to recontest in the 2019 general election.The residents of the polling unit, 003, Babban Gida, where the President cast his votes during elections, said it endorsed the President for a second term.The residents under the auspices Daura Youth Support Group, led by its Chairman, Aliyu Dahiru at a solidarity rally held at the weekend in Daura appealed to the President to recontest. Dahiru said it is calling on him to recontest, putting into consideration his achievement within a short period in office. The Chairman said it organized the gathering to show solidarity and support for the Presidents administration.We appeal to him to recontest in 2019 because we are satisfied with his leadership style in the areas of Security, fight against corruption among others.We want him to recontest to complete the good work he has started, Dahiru said. Posters displayed carry inscriptions such as: We appeal to Buhari/Osinbajo to recontest and We appeal to the President to Contest for the Presidential election to mention but a few.Erstwhile military dictator, Gen. Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, has warned President Muhammadu Buhari not to allow his own personal ambiti...

Erstwhile military dictator, Gen. Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, has warned President Muhammadu Buhari not to allow his own personal ambition for second term to override national interest.IBB said, come 2019 and beyond, Nigerians should raise a new breed leadership with requisite capacity to manage its diversities and jump-start a process of launching the country on the super highway of technology-driven leadership in line with the dynamics of modern governance.He called on Nigerians to cooperate with President Muhammadu Buhari to complete his term of office on May 29th, 2019 and collectively prepare the way for new generation (of) leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country.In what appears to be a departure from ex-President Olusegun Obasanjos recent open letter to President Muhammadu Buhari, IBB warned that his was not an open letter to the President, but that he had only shared his thoughts with fellow compatriots on the need to enthrone younger blood in the mainstream of national political leadership starting from 2019.While expressing fright at the issues plaguing the country, he said he was perplexed by the gory themes of killings that have engulfed certain parts of the country, from southern Kaduna to the western parts.In a statement released on Sunday (today) and signed by his media spokesman, Kassim Afegbua, IBB, who claimed to be speaking as a stakeholder, former president, concerned Nigerian and a patriot, noted that though President Buhari has an inalienable right to vote and be voted for, argued that there comes a time in the life of a nation when personal ambition should not override national interest.He urged the Federal Government to reinvent the wheel and tap into the resources of younger generation.In a veiled condemnation of the Federal Governments anti-graft war, IBB reiterated that modern leadership is not just about fighting corruption, it is about plugging the leakages and building systems that will militate against corruption.He urged the government to share in citizens aspirations and give them cause to have confidence in the system.Condemning the nations leadership cadre, IBB said his support for a new breed leadership derived from the understanding that it will show a marked departure from recycled leadership to creating new paradigms that will breathe fresh air into our present polluted leadership actuality.Confronting the Buhari administrations disposition towards the continued killings by persons suspected to be Fulani herdsmen in many states of the federation, the ex-military president said the unchecked activities of the herdsmen have continued to raise doubt about the capacity of the Federal Government to handle with dispatch security concerns that continue to threaten our dear nation.He named such security concerns as including suicide bombings, kidnappings, armed banditry, ethnic clashes and other divisive tendencies.We need to bring different actors to the roundtable, IBB counselled; warning that the festering nature of this crisis is an inelegant testimony to the sharp divisions and polarizations that exist across the country.He lamented that while the Fulani herdsmen issue is not altogether a recent phenomenon, the anger in the land is suggestive of the absence of mutual love and togetherness that once defined our nationality.He warned that if left unchecked, the killings portend danger to our collective existence as one nation bound by common destiny; and may snowball into another internecine warfare that would not be good for nation-building.He urged the Federal Government to reorient the minds of the herdsmen or gun-men to embrace ranching as a new and modern way to herd cattle; and to also expand the capacity of the Nigeria Police, the Nigeria Army, the Navy and Air Force to provide the necessary security for all.Nailing the ruling All Progressives Congress change slogan, IBB said when the ruling party campaigned with the change mantra, he had thought it would device new methods, provoke new initiatives and proffer new ways to addressing some of the nations developmental problems.By now, in line with her manifesto, one would have thought that the APC will give fillip to the idea of devolution of powers and tinker with processes that would strengthen and reform the various sectors of the economy, he noted; warning that devolution of power or restructuring is an idea whose time has come if Nigerians must be honest with one another.We need to critically address the issue and take informed positions based on the expectations of the people on how to make the union work better. Political parties should not exploit this as a decoy to woo voters because election time is here. We need to begin the process of restructuring both in the letter and spirit of it, he said.Reiterating the need for Buhari to step down after his tenure in 2019, IBB said the search for new breed leadership must start now as the nation prepares for 2019 electionGovernor Samuel Ortom on Saturday accused the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, of being an accomplice to the recent attacks b...

Governor Samuel Ortom on Saturday accused the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, of being an accomplice to the recent attacks by suspected herdsmen on Benue residents, a day after the police chief reportedly demanded a suspension of anti-open grazing law.If truly the IGP said what was widely reported by the media, our conclusion is that his is a clear case of a man who is either on a mission to mislead the nation or is complicit in the attacks on Benue communities and the killing of many people by terror herdsmen, Mr. Ortom said in a statement on Saturday evening.In November 2017, Benue became the second state to implement a law that specifically targets the activities of herdsmen in the state, coming months after Governor Ayodele Fayose started enforcing a similar law in Ekiti State.The laws followed attacks by suspected herdsmen reported in many states.At a Senate hearing on the recent surge in attacks linked to killer herdsmen across the country, Mr. Idris testified before a closed panel of lawmakers that the anti-open grazing law in Benue State was to blame for the scores of deaths that had been recorded in the agrarian state in recent weeks.So far this year, over 100 people have been killed in herdsmen attacks across the state. Two local government areas suffered more than 100 deaths in successive attacks between January 1 and 3, an incident that brought the activities of herdsmen under renewed focus across the country.An outraged Nigerian Senate launched an inquiry into the attacks, with Mr. Idris finally testifying on Friday after initially failing to honour invitations. The Senate also plans a national security summit with the executive over the killings, which are also being regularly recorded in Nasarawa, Taraba, Adamawa and Kaduna States.A senator who was present at the closed-door hearing told newsmen on Friday evening that Mr. Idris demanded a suspension of the anti-open grazing law in Benue and elsewhere.The police chief suggested that laws against open-grazing should only be imposed when ranches have been created for the grooming of livestock, escalating a confrontation that began with Mr. Idris description of the killings as a communal clash last month.He asked for stoppage of implementation of the law until ranches are provided, then the law can be gradually implemented again., the senator said, pleading anonymity.The comments came days after the Minister of Defence, Mansur Ali, also blamed the anti-open grazing laws for recent killings.Harsh criticisms poured in for the police chief shortly after his comments surfaced in the media, with many pointing out that herdsmen attacks predated the enactment of anti-open grazing laws.Since 2013, more than 50 attacks linked to herdsmen were reported in Benue and neighbouring states like Nasarawa and Taraba.In February 2016, more than 500 residents were killed in Agatu, Benue State.Investigation showed how Comment (17) between 2013 and 2016, but hardly had anyone been punished for the killings.More than 100,000 villagers are currently living in several camps for the internally-displaced persons across Benue, according to state officials.Herdsmen have accused the villagers of stealing their livestock, with Fulani leaders telling reporters in a 2016 interview that the massacre in Agatu was a reprisal attack for the alleged theft and the 2013 killing of one of their leaders.Mr. Ortom replied Mr. Idris with a statement to newsmen Saturday evening, saying the fact that the police had not denied the reports indicates that the Inspector-General was accurately quoted.Indeed it was this unrelenting spate of attacks that prompted the people of the state to seek a permanent solution to the incessant clashes between farmers and herders hence the law for the establishment of ranches as the best method of animal husbandry across the globe, the governor said in a statement signed by his chief press secretary, Terver Akase. The law which has constitutional backing followed due process with the requisite public hearings and inputs from various stakeholders.The police authorities had ample opportunity to also make inputs while the process was ongoing. They, however, failed to do so, he said.Mr. Akase further described Mr. Idris claim as unfortunate, accusing him of dereliction of duty.The unfortunate claim by the IGP indicates that some of those saddled with the responsibility of protecting and property and maintaining law and order have abdicated their duty and become accomplices with those undermining the very existence of the country. This is unacceptable.The Open Grazing Prohibition and Ranches Establishment Law of Benue State is certainly not the cause of the crisis as insinuated by the IGP. Mr Idris needs to be reminded that Fulani herdsmen attacked Benue State more than 50 times and killed scores of people before the law was enacted.The IGP should tell Nigerians if states like Adamawa, Zamfara, Kaduna, Nasarawa, Enugu, Edo, Plateau among others where armed herdsmen have killed hundreds of people also have anti-open grazing laws in place.It will be recalled that a few days after the killings took place and all fingers were pointed towards the direction of armed herdsmen, the IGP quickly rose in defence of the herdsmen and frankly tried to divert attention from the genocide being perpetrated by herdsmen with a comment that it was a mere communal clash. Did he not know that there was a law in place in Benue State when he made that first statement?With his latest demand that the ranching law of Benue be suspended, it is now clear where the loyalty and interest of the Inspector General of Police lies  certainly not with innocent Nigerians. He has now positioned himself not only as the mouthpiece of those who are killing Benue people but indeed as their shield. Little wonder herdsmen still proudly carry out sophisticated weapons and willfully terrorize innocent people in the state without being arrested, Mr. Akase said.The spokesperson also said Mr. Idris only spent one day in Benue, contrary to President Muhammadu Buharis order that he should relocate to the state.We wish to place it on record that contrary to the directive by President Muhammadu Buhari that the Inspector General of Police should relocate to Benue to ensure that the killings stop, the IGP spent only one day in Benue and left for a destination where only he could tell. No one has seen him in Benue since that day, Mr. Akase said.The comments followed online reports about how the Inspector-General brazenly ignored Mr. Buharis January 9 order for him to relocate to the state.The report found that Mr. Idris spent only three days in Benue between, arriving on January 10 and leaving on January 12.Mr. Idris shunned Benue even as the villages that were attacked on January 1 remained inaccessible to both the police special forces deployed there and residents who fled.Mr. Ortom had initially told newsmen that it was not necessary for Mr. Idris to relocate to Benue since a deputy inspector-general is on the ground to coordinate the police activities across the state.But the governor now appears to have modified his position, according to Mr. Akase.Even if we had said we werent interested in him being here, the fact is that the president ordered him to stay here, Mr. Akase said.Mr. Akase said Mr. Idris has failed to live up to his constitutional responsibility to protect lives and properties, consequently putting his competence into question.If the Inspector General of Police, Mr. Idris is not competent to help bring an end to the invasion and killing of innocent people in Benue and other states by herdsmen, the noble thing to do is to resign instead of twisting facts to suit his objective, the spokesperson said.Ex-Military President, Gen. Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (retd.) has disowned a statement signed and distributed by his media aide, Mr. Ka...

Ex-Military President, Gen. Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (retd.) has disowned a statement signed and distributed by his media aide, Mr. Kassim Afegbua.In the widely-circulated statement, Afegbua quoted IBB as advising President Muhammadu Buhari not to stand for re-election in 2019.However, the new statement, signed by IBB, noted that he (IBB) had unfettered access to Buhari and that where necessary, he would speak to the President in camera instead of resorting to open letter as alleged.MY COUNSEL TO THE NATIONBY GENERAL IBRAHIM BADAMASI BABANGIDA, GCFRDistinguished Members of the Fourth estate of the realm.It has been drawnd to my attention a press statement on the State of the nation, particularly 2019 general elections and beyond.Let me categorically state that as former President and Statesman, I have unfettered channel of communication with the highest authorities without sensational public correspondence, therefore those views expressed over there are personal views of the writer.However, with due respect to individual opinion and constitutional rights, it is worrisome that Political events and civil unrest in many part of the country, has raised many questions on the governance and unity. Indeed 2018 is inundated with seasons of literatures on the corporate existence of this country. Many of such literatures have shown concerns of the corporate existence of Nigeria beyond 2019 general elections.It will be recalled, that in my message to this years Armed Forces Remembrance Day, I specifically expressed the dire need for proactive measures to stop farmers/herders clashes in the middle belt, Cattle rustling, armed robbery, Kidnapping, gangsterism and Cultism. Our security agencies have to step up surveillance with more efforts on intelligence gathering for maximum success.Recent happenings and utterances by political gladiators is alarming and not in the interest of common man that is already overstretched and apparently living from hand to mouth due to precarious economic conditions. Despite all these challenges, I am optimistic that the political actors will play within the ambits of political norms and decorum to ameliorate the problems facing our society now.I am a realist that believes in all issues in a democratic atmosphere are sincerely discussed and resolved in the spirit of give and take. Since after my military years that metamorphosed to the only Military President in the history of Nigeria and my civilian life, I always have one clear objective that freedom can only be achieved through democracy. Some people find this freedom as an avenue for eroding democracy by antics of hate speeches under the guise of religion, tribal or self imposed mentorship. This trend of pitching political class and the people is unhealthy and skewed.The clamour for re-alignment of governance in the country as we are approaching 2019 election year is a welcome development only if the agitations are genuinely channeled through legislation and total supremacy of the constitution . Any attempt outside this circle of democratic tenants is deceptive and divisive idea capable of plunging our political journey into disarray.Our present political parties and their structures need parameter pillars that will make them more strong with unique ideologies. However, our present political parties need surgical operation that will fusion them in to a reasonable numbers. I have been an advocate of two party systems but in our present reality in Nigeria, our political parties can fusion into strong political association/party that can form a formidable opposition to a ruling party.As students of history, we are aware that many advanced democracies have two distinct ideological political parties, with a handful of smaller political parties that serve as buffer whenever any of the known political parties derailed or became unpopular. I still believe in two party systems as the best option for Nigeria.It is high time that, we dialogue more on any issue in order to have a political solution on any problem affecting us. It is sad that, Nigeria had its fare share of conflicts, and we cannot continue to fall back to those dark years of bloodshed.As a people, now is the time to come together to address all Communal conflicts and criminality under any guise to further unite the country in line with the vision of our founding fathers so that as a nation, we can forge ahead in the task of building a more prosperous nation.Irans oil minister lashed out at the United States on Sunday, saying that hostile comments by President Donald Trump had torpedoed new o...

Irans oil minister lashed out at the United States on Sunday, saying that hostile comments by President Donald Trump had torpedoed new oil and gas contracts for the Islamic republic.Trump is trying to destabilise market conditions for those who want to work in Iran, Bijan Namdar Zanganeh told a press conference.For the past year, every three or four months, he has destabilised the market. One cannot say that this is not without effect, he said.The agreement in July 2015 of a nuclear deal between Iran and world powers sparked keen interest among international investors keen to focus on the countrys petroleum riches.But Trumps arrival in the White House a year ago, and his regular denunciations of the deal with Iran and the country in general, cooled their ardour.Zanganeh revealed that Tehran was currently negotiating with more than 20 foreign companies to develop its oil and gas fields.But I dare not name the projects that are near to being agreed. If I do so, from tomorrow there will be pressure for them not to sign contracts with us, he said.Some countries both at the international and regional level are exerting pressure on European and Asian firms not to agree contracts with Iran, Zanganeh added, without naming them.However, he did say he was optimistic about a $5-billion (four-billion-euro) contract signed last July with the French group Total, which heads a consortium with Chinas CNPC to develop a gas field.I consider that Total is very serious I hope it will implement the accord and I think that in a short period of time, it will sign agreements with subcontractors, Zanganeh said.He added that Iran had planned measures if the deal ever runs into trouble because of pressure from the United States.AFPAt least 84 people have been rescued and heavy military weapons recovered from Boko Haram fighters by Nigerian army.

At least 84 people have been rescued and heavy military weapons recovered from Boko Haram fighters by Nigerian army.The Army said on Saturday that the breakthrough was recorded during an operation in Borno State.A total of 84 persons held hostage by the insurgents at Camp Zairo were rescued by the troops and have been handed over to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA).The Theatre Commander of Operation Lafiya Dole, Major General Rogers Nicholas, that some of the women rescued were found to be pregnant while the children among them looked malnourished. The 84 persons were flown by the Air Component of the Operation Lafiya Dole to Maiduguri, the state capital after being freed from the heavily guarded camp. Major General Rogers Nicholas, who handed the victims over to SEMA, said most of them are tasting freedom for the first time in about three years after their abduction. The Nigerian Army has revealed another breakthrough recorded during an operation in which a military tank and other weapons were recovered from the Boko Haram terrorists in Borno State.A total of 84 persons held hostage by the insurgents at Camp Zairo were rescued by the troops and have been handed over to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA). The Theatre Commander of Operation Lafiya Dole, Major General Rogers Nicholas, disclosed this on Saturday to reporters in the state. According to him, some of the women rescued were found to be pregnant while the children among them looked malnourished.The 84 persons were flown by the Air Component of the Operation Lafiya Dole to Maiduguri, the state capital after being freed from the heavily guarded camp. Major General Rogers Nicholas, who handed the victims over to SEMA, said most of them are tasting freedom for the first time in about three years after their abduction. At least 26 Boko Haram members surrendered to the military authorities in Damboa Local Government Area of Borno State earlier in the week.The repentant terrorists were paraded on Friday in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital after they were quizzed by the military. They were said to have surrendered last week and turned over their arms and ammunition including RPGs, after which they were taken to Maiduguri for deradicalizsation. More than 2300 fighters have surrendered in the last 13 months following intensive military action and seizure of the Sambisa forest, the main enclave of the insurgents. More than 25,000 people have been killed in the insurgency since 2009 and at least 2.4 million Nigerians displaced in the northeast states of Adamawa, Yobe and Borno.Meanwhile, the Army has confirmed it would conduct more exercises in 2018 to assist civil authorities to deal with internal security challenges in parts of the country. The Chief of Army Staff, Lt.-Gen. Tukur Buratai, said on Friday after leading troops on a 15km Route March. Buratai said exercises `Harbin Kunama III, Crocodile Smile III and Egwu Eke Dance III would also be conducted in 2018. Exercise Harbin Kunama I and II were conducted in 2016 and 2017, respectively, to deal with the menace of cattle rustling and herdsmen/farmers clashes in parts of North-West and North-Central.Mrs. Rabi Abu-Yasir, wife of the Boko Harams chief physician, on Saturday surrendered to the military on Operation Lafiya Dole. The a...

Mrs. Rabi Abu-Yasir, wife of the Boko Harams chief physician, on Saturday surrendered to the military on Operation Lafiya Dole.The army is currently on clearance operation to route out remnants of the insurgents.Maj.-Gen. Rogers Nicholas, the Theatre Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, made the disclosure while handing over 82 women and children rescued from the insurgents captivity, to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA), in Maiduguri.Rabi told newsmen that her husband was the medical doctor to the insurgents leader, Abubakar Shekau.She said that she was rescued on Friday after the troops dislodged the insurgents enclaves in Sambisa Forest.Recounting her ordeal, Rabi said that unlike her peers, she enjoyed preferential treatment and privileges in view of her position as a wife to the physician.My husband, Abu-Yasir, is Shekaus physician, he also treat patients and conduct surgical operation.My type of food and other consumables are better from what they gave out to other women and children in the camps.We suffered in their hands and they warned us that Nigerian troops will kill anybody who surrenders to them.They always told us to stay with them and encouraged us not to submit to the troops.The military are taking care of us, as against the wrong notion the insurgents made us to believe, she said.Rabi lauded the military for the rescue operation and called on the abducted persons still in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops.Nicholas explained that Rabi was among the 84 civilians rescued by the troops.He disclosed that eight of the 84 rescued persons were currently receiving treatment at the Nigerian Air Force Medical facility in Maiduguri.The commander noted that the abducted persons were subjected to inhuman treatment in the hands of the insurgents.Nicholas said that the abductees were rescued after troops dislodged and occupied Shekaus group operational headquarters deep in Sambisa Forest.He revealed that the troops had destroyed insurgents hideouts, vehicles and ammunition, while hundreds of insurgents surrendered and over 100 civilians rescued.According to him, the command would profile the rescued persons for rehabilitation and de-radicalisation for reintegration into the society.I call on those still in the bush to come out; we are not killing anybody, we are here to rescue and assist you. (NAN)Gaten Matarazzo didn't need to sing a single word to send the Starland Ballroom crowd into hysterics. Fans shrieked and screeched nearly every time the "Stranger Things" star and Work In Progress front man got remotely close to the stage on Saturday night before his set.

When the 15-year-old Little Egg Harbor native did finally take the mic, the hundreds of tweens and teens in attendance lost their collective minds. And the actor known for playing demogorgon-battling Dustin in the hit Netflix sci-fi show was just as excited to see them at the Sayreville venue, a little more than a month after selling out The Stone Pony.

"This is our biggest gig yet," Matarazzo told the crowd in between songs. "We're going to remember this one for the rest of our lives."

Matarazzo ran around the stage with abandon, dancing and bobbing his signature moptop when he wasn't singing. He refreshingly didn't have the air of a professional musician, but rather a kid singing his favorite songs, jamming out with his friends and soaking in the moment. The band's 22-song set lasted more than 90 minutes and consisted of a slew of contemporary rock covers. Even when Matarazzo was off stage, he was interacting with fans and jamming out to the music.

While the crowd was obviously there to see their favorite Hawkins, Indiana resident, this wasn't just the Dustin Henderson show. Matarazzo's backing band was strong, and nearly every member of the six-part rock cover band sang at one point or another, with their front man going out of his way to make sure the crowd showed them love.

That included Matarazzo's sister, Sabrina, who shined taking the lead on vocals for Paramore's "Misery Business" and "Behind These Hazel Eyes" by Kelly Clarkson. Matarazzo's little brother, Carmen, was on the drums, and sang for the first time in a concert setting during the acoustic portion of the set.

Matarazzo led Blink-182's "Stay Together For The Kids," and was especially strong on "Reptilia" by The Strokes and Otherside by The Red Hot Chili Peppers, which he called his favorite song by the group. (For the record, it came out in 1999, three years before he was born.)

There's no doubt that the kid can sing, but acting will always be Matarazzo's calling card. He flashed the same precocious charm that has made him a breakout star on "Stranger Things."

The band got together after a two-song encore and took a bow, paying homage to Matarazzo's acting background.

"Thank you all so much for coming tonight. It means so much for you to support us like this," Matarazzo said. "This is a night we won't forget, and it's all because of you."

Jeremy Schneider may be reached at jschneider@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @J_Schneider. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Oh hey, Tina Fey and Rachel Dratch  #SNL pic.twitter.com/jAwZnZCoVq  Saturday Night Live - SNL (@nbcsnl) February 4, 2018

It's the second Eagles-Patriots matchup in the Super Bowl, but the battle of New England against Philadelphia goes back to Colonial times.

Saturday Night Live gave everyone a pre-Super Bowl history lesson ... even if some liberties were taken.

With guest appearances by former cast members Tina Fey (Philadelphia) and Rachel Dratch (New England), Saturday Night Live brought delegations from the two cities together to debate winning the Battle of Bunker Hill amid modern references to Dunkin' Donuts and Wawa.

"Dynasty!" host Natalie Portman said in a thick accent. "That's the word you're looking for."

The gist of the Revolutionary War-themed sketch? The Patriots win a lot ... and fans are obnoxious about it.

The funniest lines belonged to Fey:

"Grease up them poles because Philly is going to win and one of these guys is going to punch a police horse."

And cast member Beck Bennett:

"Patriots of New England, you have truly achieved remarkable success. I believe I speak for this entire chamber when I say, just shut up. Shut up. Yes, you have won in the past, but by no means does that guarantee future victory.

"And Philadelphians, you are overdue for victory, and I wish you all the best in your upcoming battle, but if you do win, please, be cool. Just because the British did not burn down your city, doesn't mean you have to. Do we have an understanding?"

The independent parties in the sketch share an opinion held by many Giants and Jets fans: It's a shame both teams can't lose.

One interesting omission, especially considering the show takes place in New York City? There was no mention of the Giants' two Super Bowl upsets of the Patriots.

Here is video courtesy of Deadspin.com.

Tina Fey and Rachel Dratch popping up on #SNL for a revolution-era Philly vs. Boston showdown was just perfect. pic.twitter.com/Hlz9kHnDrR  mikasa (@mikasa22) February 4, 2018

Ryan Dunleavy may be reached at rdunleavy@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @rydunleavy. Find our Giants coverage on Facebook.

JERSEY CITY -- Firefighters made quick work of a fire in the former home of legendary songwriter Stephen Collins Foster on Bloomfield Street in Hoboken this afternoon.

There was a fire in the former home of legendary songwriter Stephen Collins Foster in Hoboken today, Feb. 3, 2018.

At 2:51 p.m., there was a report of a fire in the basement of the building at 601 Bloomfield and it was ruled under control by 3:13 p.m., according to emergency responder radio transmissions.

Freelance photographer Joe Shine told The Jersey Journal that smoke was coming from the rear of the 4-story building on its Sixth Street side.

The person who answered the phone at the Hoboken Fire Department said he had no information to release about the fire.JERSEY CITY -- A firefighter was injured battling a three-alarm blaze in the Greenville section of the city on Sunday morning.

The fire broke out just before 8 a.m. at 23 Myrtle Ave., Jersey City Fire Chief Steve McGill said.

One firefighter fell more than 10 feet and was brought to Jersey City Medical Center for treatment. McGill, who was at the hospital with the injured firefighter, said he's having tests done and doesn't appear he broke any bones.

The firefighter told the chief he doesn't remember what happened.

It appears the fire began in the back of the two-story building and officials are working to determine if the blaze began inside or outside of the home.

The fire spread to 21 Myrtle Ave., another two-family home. The cause remains under investigation.

Sunday's fire is just a few blocks away from where a four-alarm fire broke out last week. One man suffered serious injuries after being pulled from the basement of a home on Grant Avenue. He continues to recover at the burn center in Livingston.

Caitlin Mota may be reached at cmota@jjournal.com. Follow her on Twitter @caitlin_mota. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.JERSEY CITY -- A man accused of stealing thousands of dollars worth of merchandise from Newport Mall barricaded himself inside a home Saturday morning when police tried to arrest him, officials said.

Johnny Nunez, 41, told police he had a gun and was holding people hostage inside 115 Dwight St., city spokeswoman Kimberly Wallace-Scalcione said.

At about 9 a.m., police were executing an arrest warrant for Nunez, who they allege stole $80,000 worth of merchandise from the Downtown mall on Nov. 23.

But when police tried to arrest him, he ran into the home and barricaded himself in the bathroom. Nunez was disguising his voice to make police believe he had multiple people in the room with him, Wallace-Scalcione said.

Negotiators spent about 90 minutes talking to Nunez before he surrendered. No weapons or hostages were found, she said.

Nunez was also charged with three other burglaries and more charges are expected against him.

Caitlin Mota may be reached at cmota@jjournal.com. Follow her on Twitter @caitlin_mota. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.If the Philadelphia Eagles win the Super Bowl, Dunkin' Donuts is offering free coffee on Monday -- whether you were rooting for them or not.

Customers will receive a free, medium coffee in participating Dunkin' Donuts in the greater Philadelphia area, including parts of southern New Jersey. To receive a cup of Joe, customers must be sign up or be a member of the DDPerks membership rewards card.

Dunkin' Donuts designed an Eagles donut for Sunday's Super Bowl.

Only one free coffee per person.

Stores in southeastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey, and Kent and New Castle Counties in Delaware will participate in the "Eagles Win, You Win," promotion.

The Super Bowl LII kicks off at 6:30 p.m. between the Eagles and the New England Patriots.

Karen Yi may be reached at kyi@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter at @karen_yi or on Facebook.Rick Fuentes headed the New Jersey State Police for 15 years before retiring in October. He was appointed by Jim McGreevey, a Democrat, and stayed through the administration of Chris Christie, a Republican.

"I always believed the state police should be apolitical," he said. "You serve both sides of the aisle."

He decided to retire almost exactly a year ago, he said, long before the eventual near-certain election of Gov. Phil Murphy began to take shape.

"I had an excellent cadre of lieutenant colonels," he said. "I thought it was time to give some of them a chance."

So, he didn't retire because of Murphy's promise to legalize marijuana. But had Fuentes not retired before the election, he would have done so right after.

That's how strongly he disagrees with the legalization of marijuana.

"I would have stepped aside," he said. "It would have been a moral compromise for me."

New Jersey State Sen. Ron Rice (D-Essex) also sees moral compromise in passing a marijuana legalization bill without "bringing all the issues to light."

Rice, a former Marine and Newark police officer, is the chairman of New Jersey Legislative Black Caucus.

He is reaching out to those members and the larger New Jersey Black Elected Officials Policy Alliance to discuss the ramifications of legalized pot on the black community. He is planning a series of town halls in urban centers, beginning with Jersey City on Feb. 21.

"Everybody says, 'Let's legalize pot because we're locking up more blacks -- three times more than whites -- on pot charges,'" Rice said. "Well, we can decriminalize. We don't have to legalize to turn those people loose."

MORE: Recent Mark Di Ionno columns

Rice and Fuentes said that the legal pot industry is targeting minority communities in Colorado.

"Look at where the stores are," Fuentes said. "Many are clustered in depressed neighborhoods."

"The last thing we need in Newark, which is finally starting to experience a comeback, is more stoned people on the street," Rice said. "I see this as big-money interests coming in to do harm to our community. Believe me, I've seen the effects of drugs on our streets. There are foreseeable consequences of legalization we would be negligent not to look at."

The two strongest arguments for legalization, both men said, are tax revenues and the disparity of arrests between whites and people of color.

"You can't make an economic argument when people's lives are at stake," Rice said.

Fuentes believes that any tax revenue will be negated by what it will cost to oversee and regulate implementation.

"For what the state will make, the social cost is too high," he said. "To legalize it, then spend the revenue on drug enforcement, education and treatment is like a dog chasing its tail."

Fuentes, 67, has vast experience fighting drugs, dating back almost 30 years.

It began with the discovery of a Sylmar, Cal., warehouse where two Colombian drug cartels stored 21 tons of cocaine to distribute across the country.

"Many of the trucks outside were registered in New Jersey, so we knew it was headed here," Fuentes said, who was on a joint anti-terrorism squad with the FBI in Newark at the time.

But the big California case made the New Jersey State Police realize they needed more resources on drug enforcement and Fuentes was pulled into the "war on drugs." Not at the street level. At the distribution level. Working with police in California, Texas, Florida and other states, he and state police detective Greg Wilson gathered intelligence to stop major supplies from coming into New Jersey. In four years, they intercepted 4,000-pounds of cocaine.

"I saw how enormous a problem it was," he said. "Before that (while in anti-terrorism), I had never even seen a crack vial. But then I saw the impact it had on the street level."

Fuentes became so intrigued with the enormity of large-scale distribution, it was the subject of his criminal justice doctoral thesis at City University of New York. With access to records of the Drug Enforcement Agency and interviews with cops and convicts alike, Fuentes researched the Cali drug cartel's business model, from the growing fields of Colombia to the streets of American cities.

Now he is taking the same "academic approach" to his personal war on the legalization of marijuana.

"I'm basing my opinion not on emotion, but science," he said. "There is evidence being overlooked by the pro-legalization side, or not brought into the discussion, that needs to be looked at."

For starters, Fuentes cites a 2015 report from the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Traffic Area, a group of federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.

Among the findings are that marijuana-related traffic deaths rose 154 percent from 2006 to 2014, and marijuana-related emergency room visits climbed 77 percent from 2011 to 2014. The report also looked at high school suspensions and expulsions, which climbed 40 percent from 2008 to 2014. Colorado voters approved recreational pot use in 2012 and it was legalized in January 2014.

The report is controversial in that the pro-pot advocates say the language can be loosely applied. Marijuana "related" doesn't necessarily mean pot was the cause of the crash, the ER visit, or trouble in school. Pot advocates say THC, the psychoactive chemical in cannabis, can stay in the bloodstream long after the person is no longer impaired by its effects.

For Fuentes, those semantics are like playing with fire. Especially when it comes to cannabis users under the age of 21.

"Marijuana use by kids from 12 to 17 in Colorado leads the nation," he said. "And there are plenty of studies of the negative effect of marijuana on brain development in youth."

Because recreational pot is being sold in edibles, like brownies and cookies, Fuentes said, emergency calls to poison control are up 150 percent in Colorado.

Rice began his police experience in 1982, in the early days of the crack cocaine epidemic.

"I've seen it," he said. "I've seen what it does to a community. Now it's heroin, and opiates. Maybe you can't compare those to marijuana, but it is morally wrong for us to legalize any drug without fully understanding what we're getting into. There's a lot of problems with this and, to me, those problems are going to come down on the heads of the black community."

Are you interested in the N.J. cannabis industry? Subscribe here for exclusive insider information from NJ Cannabis Insider

Mark Di Ionno may be reached at mdiionno@starledger.com. Follow The Star-Ledger on Twitter @StarLedger and find us on Facebook.Nothing Mother Nature threw at Oliver Crane of Lawrenceville could stop him from rowing across the Atlantic Ocean in a 23-foot boat by himself.

Not the blazing heat. Not the lack of drinking water. Not even a painful foot infection, which he cured himself by shaving off skin.

"The thing that means so much to me is that I didn't quit," Crane, 19, said in an interview Thursday, days after completing his six week row across the Atlantic.

The journey made Crane the youngest rower to cross the ocean on a solo voyage.

Along with some of the most beautiful sunrises and sunsets he has seen, Crane said he experienced a oneness with nature he didn't think he would ever find anywhere else.

"I wanted that extra challenge with the isolation," he said. "I like that added challenge of doing it all on my own."

The voyage was part of the Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge, an annual transatlantic race that bills itself as "The World's Toughest Row." Crane rowed to raise money for ocean conservation and for HomeFront, a local organization that advocates for the homeless in New Jersey.

Crane, who took a year off between graduation from the Peddie School and his first year at Princeton University, starting rowing on Dec. 14, 2017 and didn't stop until Sunday, Jan. 28.

The voyage took him from the Canary Islands to Antigua.

"I wanted to take on a challenge that tested my limits," he said. His sponsors, who included his parents, helped raise $50,000 to purchase a used, custom-made boat with an airtight water cabin that would be perfect for long-distance rowing.

Crane faced competitors in the challenge, who formed two teams and rowed together. Both teams abandoned the race after their boats capsized - in one instance the boat's battery caught fire, he said.

As for Crane, his challenges were many and he wasn't always sure he'd make it.

In the first week, he developed a foot sore that wasn't getting better. Using a satellite phone, he called the organization's doctor.

"I had a full medical kit onboard, but the wound became infected and I thought I needed antibiotics," he said.

But after speaking with the doctor he learned side effects for medication included sensitivity to sunlight - which on the ocean there was an abundance of. The side effects might also cause him to slowdown, he said.

"I was really struggling with the seasickness and now this foot infection," he recalled. "I remember thinking, 'If this wound gets worse, am I really willing to lose a foot for this?'"

Crane ended up scrubbing the area "and cutting away the infected portion," he said.

His foot bandaged and his face and body lathered up with SPF 90 suntan lotion, he got back on the oars and pressed on.

"It was incredibly hot," Crane said, noting that daytime temperatures soared over 100 degrees.

"There was no shade on the boat and the cabin turns basically into an oven," he said.

Making things more unbearable, Crane said his desalination machine - a device that makes salt water drinkable - began to malfunction.

"The salt content in the water was getting higher and higher," he said. "It was making me sick."

The machine broke in the last few weeks of the voyage. Fortunately, Crane said, he had an emergency stash of drinking water, which he portioned over the remaining days.

Before and during his voyage, Crane said he had practiced yoga.

"I practiced yoga to bring myself to a calm place if I found myself freaking out," he said. "Mentally, it's just about not giving up. It's about saying, 'I'm going to stay on that boat until I get across."

The isolation and sameness of each day was hardest to overcome, he said.

"I don't think there is a way to prepare for two to three months by yourself in complete isolation," he said.

"It's not only that you're not talking to people," he said. "You don't see signs of human life. It definitely sort of scares me."

On Christmas Day a yacht full of revelers passed him and sang holiday songs, took pictures and wished him luck he said.

Other than that brief visit, occasional calls from wildlife kept him company.

"The same bird - or I like to think the same one - flew along with me as I rowed the first few days," he said. One time a whale popped up in front of him and he heard the air rush through its blowhole.

"I saw the tail of the whale go back into the water," he said.

Crane said he never saw sharks but was aware they could be near, especially when he dove into the water to bathe himself or to scrape barnacles off the boat.

Arriving in Antigua, Crane said he was amazed by the large welcoming party, which included some New Jersey residents who were on vacation and following his voyage online.

"I was a celebrity on the island," he said. "Everyone knew me and everyone knew how I got there."

Crane stayed in Antigua a few days before flying back to JFK Airport Tuesday night.

Walking on dry land has been difficult because because his body got used to the rocking of the boat.

As of Thursday, conversations and interaction on social media remained difficult, too, he said.

"Your body and mind get used to not dealing with all sorts of information as before," he said. "I'm still getting used to things."

"It still feels like I'm in a dream," he said.

Anthony G. Attrino may be reached at tattrino@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyAttrino. Find NJ.com on Facebook.When the parishioners of Resurrection of our Lord Parish Catholic Church in Northeast Philadelphia gathered for Mass this weekend, they wore their Sunday best -- Carson Wentz jerseys and Eagles green.

"Come out and pray before we play," the church wrote on its Facebook page inviting the community to its Super Bowl weekend services. "Wear your best green."

The Resurrection of our Lord Parish catholic church welcomed parishioners for an Eagles-themed Mass on Superbowl Sunday.

On Sunday, hundreds gathered at the 8:30 a.m. Mass to sing hymns about birds, get their throats blessed in honor of the feast day of Saint Blaise, and have the strength to cheer loudly for the Birds.

"I was born in 1950," Deacon Dennis Friel told NJ Advance Media. "And I've been cheering for the Eagles ever since."

The priest and becan blessed the throats of parishioners for the feast day of Saint Blaise (and to cheer loudly for the Birds). pic.twitter.com/3DNPtfUN1Y  Paige Gross (@By_paigegross) February 4, 2018

Friel said it was Rev. James DeGrassa's idea to dedicate Sunday's Mass to the Philly team. He lead the congregation singing hymns "Fly Like a Bird" and "On Eagle's Wings."

Some of the church's lighting had also been swapped out in favor of green lightbulbs.

Special lightbulbs swathed the church's alter in green.

Most parishioners wore Eagles shirts, sweatshirts or jerseys. But those who dressed up for church made sure to still represent their team.

Those who dressed up for church made sure to still represent the Eagles in Mass. pic.twitter.com/hxecybFive  Paige Gross (@By_paigegross) February 4, 2018

Church volunteer Stephanie Anie, who was wearing an Eagles shirt to bless the throats of parishioners, said she's been attending Resurrection of our Lord Parish since 1985. Her husband, one of the world's biggest Eagles fans, she said, died in January.

"But he's up there and he's going to make sure we win today," she said.

Marrisa Rivera, Carlos Perez, Nestor Plaza, Fina Perez and Maribelle Rivera wore Eagles attire to Mass Sunday.

Maribell Rivera said she'll be watching at home, too, with friends and family. She predicted fans will go crazy -- win or lose.



"But we will win," she said with confidence. "We will."

Paige Gross may be reached at pgross@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @By_paigegross. Find NJ.com on Facebook.A recent sweep of victories over New Jersey towns that discriminated against Muslims is a sharp retort to President Trump's inciting of intolerance.



This is still America, after all, where the law protects all religious faiths. So far, Muslims are three for three in a string of test cases over their right to build their own spaces to pray. The score for discriminatory townships: Zero.



Even in a climate of rising anti-Islam rhetoric, vandalized mosques and other hate crimes, local officials are learning that bigotry doesn't pay.

Bayonne settles lawsuit with Muslim group, clearing the way for mosque



First there was Bridgewater, which shelled out $7.75 million for blocking a mosque out of what a federal judge called "anti-Muslim bias." Then there was neighboring Bernards, which settled a similar lawsuit for $3.25 million.

Now, Bayonne is avoiding a long and costly legal battle by settling for $400,000. Its insurer will pay this money to a Muslim group blocked from building the city's first mosque, and pending a sign-off from a local board, it will finally begin renovating an old warehouse into a place of worship.



Towns all over the state are seeing that discriminating against mosques under the guise of land use issues comes with a hefty price tag. Do they really want to sink millions into this?



The lawyers leading these cases are Adeel Mangi, an Oxford and Harvard law grad, and Muhammad Faridi, who worked his way through law school as a cabbie. Their law firm donated all their attorneys' fees in the Bernards case to charities including scholarships for Muslim American law students.

Bayonne's last chance to fix its mosque mistake | Editorial



"Municipalities that give in to local hatred and treat Muslims unequally should know that they will be held accountable and will face the full weight of the law," they warned this week.



Politically, Bernards still hasn't gotten the message. Even after costing taxpayers millions, local officials just appointed one of the mosque-blockers, John Carpenter, as mayor - and among the first things he did was kick a doctor off a local health board to make room for a supporter.



Nick Xu has no health experience and was actually interested in serving on the "Deer Management Advisory Committee." In a loopy tirade, he claimed the mosque complaint - backed by a federal ruling and Justice Department-mandated reforms - was part of a "systematic plot" by Muslims to make money.



When we contacted him Friday, he denied being anti-Muslim, while reiterating that this is all about "Muslim supremacy," and that "we are living in a deep state." What qualifies him for this health board, he said, is that "I'm a patient."



In reality, only one party is in this for money: The Thomas More Law Center. This is a group of out-of-state wingnuts that filed frivolous lawsuits on behalf of mosque opponents in Bernards. Their suits stand little chance, but garner publicity that drives up donations.



It's a racket, fueled by those who believe our majority-Christian nation is a victim of secret Islamic indoctrination. The center raises almost $1.9 million annually, and its leader, Scott Thompson - who rants that "Muslims are not arriving on American shores to assimilate but to conquer" - makes $216,000.



When asked about this, Kate Oliveri, a lawyer with TMLC, said, indisputably, "Mr. Thompson's statements are his statements."



Michael Hrycak, a Westfield-based attorney, claims to know nothing about TMLC's anti-Muslim views, while working pro-bono on at least two of its cases.

He and Oliveri are now suing two middle school social studies instructors for teaching about Islam, the world's second largest religion, on behalf of Libby Hilsenrath, a mother who complained the Chatham school district was trying to indoctrinate her kid.



The attempts to harass and intimidate Muslims continue, as will the crazy screeds. But no matter how much money they raise or power they hold, the bigots keep losing the argument.

Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion. Follow on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and find NJ.com Opinion on Facebook.Though the legislative and executive are co-equal branches of government under our state constitution, there's a big difference between them when it comes to access for us journalists.

The governor tends to speak to the media only in formal press conferences. His responses tend to be brief and somewhat circumspect.

But when it comes to the Senate President, any one of us can just walk up, stick a voice recorder in his face, and let him say what's on his mind.

I did so with Steve Sweeney last week after a legislative session. The result was quite illuminating when it comes to the differences in governing philosophy he has with his fellow Democrat, Gov. Phil Murphy.

Our new governor is in a tough spot when it comes to taxes. Murphy ran on a platform of increasing the state's top tax rate. But Donald Trump beat him to the punch.

The Trump "tax cuts" actually represented a big hike in federal income taxes for high-income residents of states like New Jersey with high "SALT" - state and local - tax bills.

New Jersey homeowners who were deducting $30,000, $40,000 or even more against federal taxes last year will find that deduction capped at a mere $10,000 from now on.

Now imagine you were trying to sell a house with that sort of tax bill attached to it.

Sweeney has thought about that quite a bit. The Senate President is an ironworker by trade and he likes construction of all sorts. He told me he's talked to a lot of builders of higher-priced homes about the new tax reform's effect on them.

"Because of what happened, right now they're not going to get what they're asking," he said. "Who's going to buy a house knowing it's going to drop in value? They're not going to jump in until they see how much it drops."

Sweeney projected the decrease in home values at 7.4 percent. That's in the range projected by most mainstream economists. Some say prices could drop even further.

"I've talked to builders that say they can't find anybody to buy those homes anymore with prices in the seven figures," he said. "One builder told me for every three of those homes they might have one buyer."

It will take some time to see just how this all shakes out, said Sweeney. But in the meantime it poses a real problem for law-makers.

"If property values are going to drop by 7.4 percent, you have to either raise taxes or reduce municipal or country government by 7.4 percent," he said.

It's hard to fault that logic. But Murphy campaigned on a platform of increasing the size of government. He proposed raising taxes to pay for that expansion, but any such tax hike would first have to get by Sweeney.

During the campaign, Sweeney said he would back Murphy's call for an increase in the so-called "millionaire's tax." But Trump's tax package makes that untenable, he said.

"I never thought they would do what they did, but they did it," he said of Trump's fellow Republicans in Congress. "And now we gotta deal with it. What I'm saying is the last stop is gonna be a tax increase for me."

Of course, a tax increase was the first stop for Murphy. It still is, according to his few public statements on the topic.

But unlike Murphy, who is a newcomer to politics, Sweeney's been around long enough to remember the first "millionaire's tax" - a hike in the top rate from 6.37 to 8.97 percent. That was enacted under Gov. McGreevey in 2004 and remains in effect.

"Everyone says, 'Go after the millionaires' and we did," he said.

But Trump got to them first this time around.

"I'm not inclined in this point in time to talk of any conversation of raising taxes until we get our house in order," said Sweeney. "It's time to have a real talk with the public. For me, I'm really excited about this."

Somehow I suspect the new governor is not quite as excited. He has a little over a month to put together his budget for Fiscal 2019, which begins July 1.

It would be great fun to hear him hold forth on just how he's going to put that budget together in a post-Trump era.

But in Murphy's defense, I suspect he's too busy to talk right now.Gov. Phil Murphy used Atlantic City as a backdrop last week for restarting a wind-energy program that was enthusiastically started -- then later sidelined -- by former Gov. Chris Christie.

Although the wind-power project would be located in the ocean near Atlantic City, officials in Gloucester County have been hoping for a payoff closer to home. It was to Paulsboro that Christie traveled during his first year in office, 2010, for a big ceremony to sign the Offshore Wind Development Act. The spot was a former BP fuel tank facility that was envisioned as a manufacturing hub for components of the wind turbines for the offshore installation.

The bipartisan announcement went hand in hand with the development of the Port of Paulsboro, and specifically its marine terminal. Cheers all around!

The port facility opened last year, but turbine building wasn't part of the muted fanfare. The Christie administration had quietly cast its evil eye toward the offshore effort, blaming alleged technical and financial problems with private developers' proposals. But most neutral observers blamed Christie's eye on the Republican presidential nomination. Wind and other renewable energy does not go hand in hand with national GOP cries of "Drill, baby drill!" and "Beautiful, clean coal!"

So, the state abandoned for all intents and purposes the Offshore Wind Development Act. It mandates that wind power eventually generate a measurable percentage of New Jersey's electrical power, and pledged up to $100 million in tax credits to build the turbines in Paulsboro. Plans were scuttled even though developers were eager to submit proposals for the offshore wind farm, and one state-rejected demonstration plan qualified for a $47 million federal grant in 2014. It called for five turbines to generate 25 megawatts of power, enough for 10,000 homes.

All of this makes Murphy's planned reboot especially welcome. Although news accounts of his announcement didn't specifically mention Paulsboro's role, state Senate President Stephen Sweeney, D-Gloucester, whose district includes the port, said this of the delay: "It's been eight years of torture."

Could that be because initial numbers might show the revenue generated by the port isn't justifying all of the public money expended to develop it? Perhaps. But having turbine manufacturing located in Paulsboro, as the law originally designated, is a no-brainer for the bottom line and for good jobs.

Murphy's ambitious goal is for 1.5 million homes to be powered by offshore wind by 2030. This might be tilting at windmills, as the phrase goes, but more renewables are in our future, and all of South Jersey stands to gain.

Send a letter to the editor of South Jersey Times at sjletters@njadvancemedia.com

Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion. Follow on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and find NJ.com Opinion on Facebook.According to a new poll conducted by Farleigh Dickinson University, 42% of New Jerseyans lonely enough to answer the phone and talk to a stranger approve of legalizing marijuana for recreational use. Pardon the word play, but I thought it'd be higher.

Governor Phil Murphy ran on making recreational marijuana legal with the notion that a bill legalizing the devil's weed would fly through the legislature in the first 100 days of his administration. The citizens would rejoice, giggle a lot and eat some Funnyuns while the tax revenue from the newly legalized controlled substance enriched the state treasury to the tune of $300 million plus annually. Turns out legalizing weed isn't as big a no-brainer as he thought.

The effort to legalize recreational marijuana has run up against opposition from religious leaders, conservative legislators and even from within the governor's own party. Some, like attorney general Jeff Sessions consider pot to be just as bad a s heroin. Those people are obviously delusional so lets ignore them and deal with the folks who have genuine concerns.

There is overwhelming support for medical marijuana and the governor has already made moves to improve upon the draconian restrictions placed upon the program by former governor Christie. There is also overwhelming support for at the very least decriminalizing pot. Instead of throwing a disproportionate number of young black men in jail for possession these folks would like to see it reduced to something akin to a traffic ticket. I say why stop there. If we can all agree the possession of marijuana should be decriminalized lets not attempt to legislate morality by keeping the pot economy underground. Legalize it, regulate it, tax it and lets move on with our lives.So, where is the rulebook that says your marinade should strictly have onions, garlic and salt, period?

Why not challenge your taste buds a little more one of these days and throw in some rosemary, thyme, oregano and  yes, some chillies!

Then, things will qualify to be called truly spicy. You dont like spicy? Fine, even when yours is one of those sensitive guts, there are many ways to turn things on their head by not being outright predictable and eye-rollingly boring.

This is not the foodie column; still Sex Talk, alright

All Im saying is, your spouse could really appreciate it if you placed at least just one foot outside that box you have locked yourself up in so tightly. Times change. Believe it or not, even sex trends change and it is up to you to download the latest software best suited for your marriage. It cannot be same old, same old, forever.

In some unfortunate cases, it is this search for the so-called spice of life  variety  that drives those with weaker wills into infidelity.

Others will not cheat on their spouses, but will suffer in silence, come up with countless excuses as to why they have to take a rain check on the sex  again  as they hope God performs a miracle in their sex lives soon!

One wife said the high school sweetheart she married when they were both at university believes that 20 years on, they should actually be removing some of the spices from their already dismal sex recipe, instead of adding new ones as she had suggested.

I dont know how to make him understand that we were younger back then; even two ducks quacking were enough to make us reach for each other with eagerness, she said. But now it takes more work. I tell him to be open to some more naughtiness and experiments, but he will hear none of it.

The husbands constant answer is: Those things are for kids, naawe!

Many spouses out there want to try out new positions that are not missionary style, but their partners-in-crime always have a rejoinder to shoot down those suggestions: Ah! That position does not look good on my boobs and stretch marks. Woman, are you trying to break my back? Now, which malaya is putting these silly ideas in your brain? I could go on and on.

It is not too late to introduce a regular, scheduled date night in your marriage. One husband rebuked his wife for suggesting they spend Shs 40,000 on a low-key date night, when that money can buy irish potatoes for the entire family for a week!

Technically that was true, but he never stopped to consider that his marriage needed that occasional value addition.

Be open to your spouses suggestions that will make a potentially monotonous state of affairs have healthy bursts of sexual excitement. As long as those suggestions do not go against your faith, your God or even heartfelt principles.

For example, a marriage counsellor with a religious organisation in Kampala once told me she is appalled by the number of wives who come to her weekly for advice on how to handle husbands pestering them for anal sex.

But there are things that would be mutually enjoyable without shredding everything you once held dear on a spiritual or moral level.

Talk about and act out each others doable fantasies. Use foods such as chocolate in bed, in safe but playful, sexy ways.

There are sex toys even for the most conservative of you. When people talk about sex toys, many immediately think about erotic, battery-powered contraptions.

But even a blindfold used to temporarily block one sense in order to enhance others, qualifies as using a sex toy. Get out of your box and, once more, allow yourself and your spouse to enjoy all the aspects of being married.

carol@observer.ugAs their guests for last week's first State of the Union speech by Donald Trump, the Oregon Democrats in Congress invited Dreamers, undocumented immigrants brought here as children whose legal status now ends March 8.

The atmosphere turned out to be less than hospitable.

In fact, the last time guests were treated like this was in "Game of Thrones."

Trump spent much of the speech warning of the dangers of immigration, referring to undocumented immigrants in terms of MS-13, the Salvadoran drug gang.

He boasted repeatedly of his love for Dreamers -- "He had a real chance to reach out," commented Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley. "He said he had a big heart for them." But then the president moved instead to what Merkley calls an election strategy of "ginning up the fear factor, and becoming the MS-13 president."

And now the fate of 800,000 Dreamers, including 11,000 Oregonians, who grew up in the United States and typically know no other country, seems increasingly murky.

The president's refusal to reach a deal to protect the Dreamers had recently led to a funding cliff that briefly shut the government down. That was despite overwhelming support for Dreamers in public opinion polls, including among Republicans. Last month, Merkley was among the leaders of the 18 Senate Democrats who voted against a continuing resolution reopening the government for another three weeks -- which, in a time of complete budget collapse, is how we now fund the functioning of the United States.

Merkley explained that since negotiations never take place until a few days before the funding runs out, he saw no reason to renew funding for more than a few days, and start negotiations immediately. The renewed funding for the government runs out again this Thursday, and Merkley says he'll again try for a very short renewal, although he admits another shutdown is unlikely.

Part of the deal that ended the shutdown was a promise by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to allow a Senate vote on a Dreamer protection bill, including chances for amendments from both parties. Merkley notes that McConnell has made promises before, including about the Dreamers, and that his promises are not exactly negotiable currency.

(In fact, it seems that a McConnell promise and $1,000 will get you into a fund-raising dinner.)

"We'll see if that happens," says Merkley about the vote. In any event, "I'm skeptical we can get 60 votes."

Not because there isn't an immigration deal that could get 60 votes; one actually exists, devised by a bipartisan group of senators, which the president first pledged to support and then rejected. Merkley also cites a warning from House Speaker Paul Ryan to McConnell not to pass a funding bill with a Dreamer protection attached.

(Ryan has to worry about hardline anti-immigration Republican House members who make Trump look like the Statue of Liberty. One of them, Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, responded to Democrats' inviting Dreamers to the speech by calling for any undocumented immigrant entering the Capitol to be arrested and deported.)

Tuesday night, Trump stressed the dangers of immigration, linking protection for the Dreamers to $25 billion for a southern border wall, and to ending two other immigration programs: the visa lottery and family reunification, which he calls "chain migration." Trump charged that "under the current broken system, a single immigrant can bring in virtually unlimited numbers of distant relatives," a statement that was not only hostile but, like his praise of "beautiful clean coal," transparently untrue.

Speaking for the Democratic senators, Merkley warns, "I don't think those two things get through without a fight," pointing out that family reunification "has been part of our immigration policy forever." He would support "a significant expansion in border security," although noting that spending happens in annual votes, not in a 15-year, $25 billion "slush fund."

Since the speech, Trump has repeated his hostile line on immigration, as both the next government funding vote and the March 8 deadline on Dreamers come closer -- and the prospect of a deal gets further away.

"Last night was a turning point for me," Merkley mused bleakly Wednesday afternoon. "I was more optimistic before."

"It was painful for us thinking of everything," he recalled about the Oregon Democrats listening to the speech. "It was painful thinking of our guests in the balcony."

Among a blizzard of discouraging messages Tuesday evening, Oregon Democrats got another one:

When Donald Trump is the attraction, be careful who you invite.

Trying for an uplifting note in the evening, the president declared, "Americans are dreamers, too."

But maybe Dreamers can't be Americans.

David Sarasohn's column appears on the first and third Sundays of the month. He blogs at davidsarasohn.com.Regarding the Jan. 30 letter from Chris Parrish, "End the Trump hatred," I'd like to remind the letter writer that our commander in chief has made hatred and insults the norm now.

He spews his hatred on war veterans, the mentally challenged, Mexico and other countries with a non-majority-white populace, news media, American Indians, women and the list goes on.

I've felt incredulity and embarrassment -- not hatred -- nearly every day since before his inauguration when I read his tweets.

You seem to think less government is a good thing for our country even though the parts of our government President Donald Trump is taking away protect people and our environment. We do not have any more security since he's been in office, especially when looking at his contentious relationship with North Korea.

You say you respected former President Barack Obama even though you did not agree with his policies. Except for about four months of the Democrats running Congress under him, the Republicans voted against each of his bills, even though passing some would have had great benefit for the American people.

You sound like a reasonable person, but this current administration is leading the way in terms of hatred.

-- Rhonda Cartan, WashougalSeemingly in a matter of seconds, the situation outside Zippy's Pizza in Yamhill spiraled out of control.

On Nov. 24, the day after Thanksgiving, waitress Danielle Keenan-Holverson and another Zippy's employee were trying to convince a patron they feared was intoxicated not to drive home. The patron became combative, another man stepped into help, and in the melee Keenan-Holverson, then 35-weeks pregnant, was punched in the head.

"A scuffle started and from there it went from just an argument to a fist fight to 'I have a gun' and a shot fired within five seconds maybe," she said.

From across the street, David Trivelpiece, then 27, and two of his friends heard the screams and gunfire. Trivelpiece ran toward the shots to confront the gunman.

He was struck in the neck by a bullet that remains there today.

The story was big news in Yamhill County, not only because this kind of thing is rare in a town of 1,100 people, but because David and his family are well-known in the community.

Between text messages and phone calls, word spread quickly that Trivelpiece was in critical condition at OHSU Hospital. The alleged gunman, Richard Mershon, 67, was also from Yamhill and a regular at Zippy's. He's now facing charges of assault and attempted murder.

"It was unbelievable," said David's father, Wes Trivelpiece. "I couldn't believe it. And once (I learned) where it was at, I couldn't believe it even more."

David Trivelpiece, left, and Angel Mendoza during a benefit dinner for Trivelpiece's recovery. Trivelpiece was shot in the neck the day after Thanksgiving while acting as a good Samaritan in Yamhill. (Photo Courtesy of Mary Starrett)

But in the days and months since the tragedy, something amazing happened. The community has rallied around David with donation jars and bingo fundraisers. His fellow employees at A-1 Logging donated their sick time to him. Most impressively, last weekend, a community dinner and auction raised more than $38,000 for expenses related to his medical care and recovery.

Linda Smith and Kathie Jensen, friends of the Trivelpieces, organized the event.

"We knew that David would have a long path to recovery," Jensen said. "We just felt that there was something that needed to be done."

Wes Trivelpiece said even with insurance, co-pays alone are costing the family about $600 a month. The fundraiser will give David, his wife Kassie and their 2-year-old daughter some breathing room, he said, an assurance that the bills will be paid while they take time to heal.

"I got no words for it," Wes Trivelpiece said. "I'm totally amazed and grateful for the support everyone's given him. ... I wish none of this happened and we wouldn't know everybody would come together, but it did and they did and we're grateful for it."

The doctors, he said, couldn't tell them what the future holds for David, who suffered partial paralysis from his injury.

"He can walk with a cane and it's not really pretty to watch, but it's only been a little over two months," he said. Recovery, the doctors said, "is an individual thing and it's a matter of time."

Last Saturday, about 300 people packed the American Legion Hall in nearby Carlton for the benefit dinner, raffle and auction. Items donated were what you might expect from a logging town  a hand-carved throwing ax, fishing trips, a lodge stay  but also included wine, jewelry and gift baskets.

"To have something so tragic happen, and turn around and see how positive the community has made this awful experience, it's meant everything to them," said David's sister, Jessica Claussen.

The top item auctioned off was a Stihl chainsaw, probably worth about $1,100, that sold for $4,150. It was purchased by David's boss, Larry Heesacker, owner of A-1 Logging.

Friday afternoon, David Trivelpiece was in Heesacker's office, using his cane, already trying to come back to work. He's a long way from being able to do his old job, but he might be able to put in a few hours a week answering phones and dispatching trucks.

"He's a valued employee," Heesacker said. "I thought he was going to be a superstar for me, and I'm betting that he comes back because of his determination."

Heesacker said his company is picking up the $5,000 deductible on Trivelpiece's insurance and continues to raise money for him.

"There's no program helping him yet," Heesacker said. "This is a big hole in our system."

He compared Trivelpiece's actions to the three good Samaritans who intervened when a man was threating girls on a Portland MAX train, or the men who stopped an armed terrorist on a train en route to Paris.

"It's that level, that's the way I see it," Heesacker said. "Two or three people were struggling with this guy, and after the shots were fired ... David ran in."

A week and a half after the shooting, Keenan-Holverson gave birth to her son, Levi. He came early, but both mother and son are doing well. She called David a hero.

"He ran up, he heard somebody crying for help desperately, and he was there," she said. "I have no idea what could have happened. Standing at the scene, looking back at exactly where I had fallen and the point where David had gotten shot, I was able to see the blood on the ground and realize I was literally two feet away from being in David's position."

That his son jumped into action doesn't surprise Wes Trivelpiece.

"He's a very good kid," he said. "I told him that when he was growing up. I told him your life is going to be way easier if you're good than if you're bad."

In this case, David did not choose the easier path.

But it's a path made easier with the help of a community.

Donations are still be taken for the family at https://www.gofundme.com/rdmcq-davids-healing-fund.

-- Samantha Swindler

@editorswindler / 503-294-4031

sswindler@oregonian.comIOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) -- Republicans who control a majority of the nation's statehouses are considering a wide range of abortion legislation that could test the government's legal ability to restrict a woman's right to terminate pregnancy.



The Mississippi House passed a bill Friday that would make the state the only one to ban all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. In Missouri, lawmakers heard testimony earlier in the week on a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks.



The Ohio House is expected to consider bills, already passed in the Senate, that would prohibit the most common type of procedure used to end pregnancies after 13 weeks and require that fetal remains be buried or cremated.



Abortion is a perennial hot button issue in statehouses across the country. Republican-controlled states have passed hundreds of bills since 2011 restricting access to the procedure while Democratic-led states have taken steps in the other direction.



The early weeks of this year's state legislative sessions have seen a flurry of activity around the issue. It comes as activists on both sides say they expect the U.S. Supreme Court to soon consider a question that remains unclear: How far can states go in restricting abortion in the interest of preserving and promoting fetal life?



The state bills debated since the start of the year "are all tests designed to see how far government power to legislate on behalf of a fetus can reach," said Jessica Mason Pieklo, who has been tracking legislation as the senior legal analyst for Rewire, a website that promotes views supporting abortion rights.



She said the outcome will determine whether states can legally ban abortion after a specific time period and outlaw specific medical procedures. Advocates for abortion rights say those strategies undermine the Supreme Court's 1973 ruling that women have the right to terminate pregnancies until a fetus is viable.



In Utah, critics have warned that a pending bill to prevent doctors from performing abortions on the basis of a Down syndrome diagnosis is unconstitutional. But its co-sponsor, Republican state Sen. Curt Bramble, said he is willing to defend the bill in court because its goal is to protect unborn children.



"There are times if the Supreme Court got it wrong, it is appropriate to push back," said Bramble, an accountant from Provo.



The anti-abortion bills have drawn opposition from women who say they have made the excruciating choice to terminate a pregnancy, often after discovering serious fetal abnormalities.



"A 20-week abortion ban sounds OK, but if that gets passed, what's next -- 18 weeks, 15 weeks? At what point does it make abortion truly illegal?" said Robin Utz of St. Louis, 38, who submitted testimony this week against the Missouri bill. "It's terrifying and it's willfully ignorant."



Utz recounted terminating her pregnancy in its 21st week in November 2016, after learning her daughter would be born with a fatal kidney disease if she survived birth. She said doctors told her that dilation and evacuation, the most common abortion procedure in the second trimester, was the safest way to terminate the pregnancy.



Undeterred by such stories, the National Right to Life Committee and its allies have been pushing for state laws that ban abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy and outlaw dilation and evacuation. Supporters of both measures argue that fetuses are capable of feeling pain after 20 weeks and call the procedure "dismemberment abortion."



Several court challenges to both types of laws are underway, with federal appeals courts considering the "dismemberment abortion" bans approved last year in Texas and Arkansas. The Kansas Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on the first-in-the-nation ban passed in that state three years ago.



Ingrid Duran, director of state legislation at the National Right to Life Committee, said the model state laws drafted by her group are aimed at U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, a swing vote who wrote the court's 2007 opinion upholding a federal ban on a procedure critics call partial-birth abortion.



She said the court could use similar reasoning to prohibit dilation and evacuation and noted it has never considered whether states have an interest in protecting fetuses from pain.



"We did draft these laws with the bigger picture in mind," Duran said.



The shifted focus comes after the court dealt the anti-abortion movement a blow in 2016 by ruling that strict Texas regulations on abortion clinics and doctors were an undue burden on abortion access and unconstitutional.



Anti-abortion groups hope President Donald Trump will be able to nominate one or more justices to the Supreme Court following last year's confirmation of Neil Gorsuch, potentially making the court more conservative on the issue for decades to come.



In the meantime, some of them are cautioning their allies not to go too far.



Duran said the proposed 15-week ban in Mississippi, which now goes to the state Senate, caught her by surprise. She noted that prior state laws banning abortion after 12 weeks or once a heartbeat was detected have been found unconstitutional.



In South Carolina this past week, state senators tabled a bill that would have banned most abortions to give lawmakers more time to study the consequences. Also last week, a legislative committee in Tennessee amended a bill to remove language that would have outlawed abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detectable, which is usually around six weeks. The bill's sponsor, Republican Rep. Micah Van Huss, said he would be back.



"I will not stop fighting for the lives of babies until abortion is abolished in this state," he said.

By Ryan J. Folet, Associated Press. AP reporters Julie Carr Smyth in Columbus, Ohio, and Brady McCombs in Salt Lake City, Utah, contributed.Patna: Reacting to Shatrughan Sinha's jab at his party's disastrous result in the Rajasthan special election, singer-turned-politician and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Babul Supriyo on Saturday fired back at the actor-turned-politician saying it was about time Sinha gave 'triple talaq' to BJP, a party that he hates so much.

"I will ask Shatrughan Sinha if he hates the BJP so much, why doesn't he give 'triple talaq' to the party? Why do you come to the Parliament and create a situation when your own party members are forced to say 'khamosh' (silent) to you? Give 'triple talaq' and leave the BJP," Supriyo said.

Earlier, following the defeat of the BJP in Rajasthan special elections, Sinha had tweeted that Rajasthan had become the 'first state to give triple talaq' to the bJP.

"Breaking news with record-breaking disastrous results for ruling party - Rajasthan becomes first state to give BJP triple talaq. Ajmer: Talaq, Alwar: Talaq, Mandalgarh: Talaq. Our opponents winning the elections with record margins, giving our party a jolt," the MP from Patna Saheb who is at odds with his own party since Narendra Modi became the Prime Minister in 2014, had tweeted.

Sinha also urged his party members to 'do introspection, shed arrogance, and wake up'. Last week he also joined Rashtra Manch, a 'non-political' forum launched by fellow disgruntled BJP leader and former Union Minister Yashwant Sinha to discuss pressing issues faced by the nation.Authorities of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi, have for the purpose of providing sufficient intern accommodation for female students taken a bold decision to convert two male halls into mixed halls.



The two halls to be converted are Unity Hall and the University Hall popularly known as 'Katanga'



Spokesperson for the University, Kwame Yeboah Junior in an interview with CITI FM news indicated that from the university's decision, it is to provide accommodation for more female students in the university therefore the move to change the male halls into mixed ones.



However, mixed reactions greeted the dean of students, Professor William Gariba when he officially announced to students that the unity hall and Katanga, strictly male halls will be altered into mixed halls beginning next academic year.



This announcement has caused some students to threaten to go on demonstration if the decision taken by authorities is not rescinded.



While authorities of the school say the conversion of the two male halls is to increase the number of female students admitted into residential facilities on campus, in order to achieve gender equality per the international standards, rumours have it that the authorities have taken that swift move to curb the long standing clashes between the two main halls which sometimes turn bloody.



The University Hall was named to commemorate the accession of the Kumasi College of Technology to full University status on 22nd August, 1961. It is an all male Hall. The main hall has 198 rooms excluding flats, and the annex has 95 rooms. It is popularly known as" KATANGA".



Facilities include Games room, A Gym, Chapel, Internet Cafe, A mini market, Communication centre, Barbering Salon, kitchen that serves food etc.



Unity Hall is the largest hall with an original accommodation capacity of 448 rooms but presently have 36 extra flats. It is an all-male hall with modern facilities and nicknamed The Twin Towers". Members are known as "Continentals".



Facilities include a modern internet cafe, Communication & Business centre, Basket ball court, Games room, A Boutique & Gift Shop, Barbering Salon, kitchen that serves food and a Shopping mall with a well stocked Supermarket.

Unity and KATANGA Bad Blood

The Vice Chancellor of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) Professor Otoo Ellis in 2014 threatened to convert the two male halls of the University into mixed halls.



According to Professor Otoo Ellis, the leadership of the University will be forced to embark on this quest if students of these halls break any more rules of the University.



In recent years, both halls have developed bad blood against each other which has resulted in some unnecessary casualties on few occasions.



For a rivalry which seemed healthy and friendly in previous years, many fear to involve themselves in any of their activities because it turns violent anytime they meet.



These practices have not only affected only them but other persons and social activities in the University.



On two occasions, the annual debate competition by the National Union of Ghana Students have truncated because of the two.



Notable was a clash between the two halls that led to the rustication and arrests of some students.



Leaders of these halls were subsequently denied of graduation as a result.

Source: Elizabeth Semiheva Bedi/Peacefmonline.com









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Featured VideoThe President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, says Africa has the resources and capacity to finance access to quality education of its citizens, and also promote the interests of the continent.



According to President Akufo-Addo, We cannot depend on other people to finance the education on our continent. I am saying that not to turn my back or to be ungrateful to all these important or noble people who have committed themselves to helping, no. But, if we make our policy dependent on other people, when their policy changes, we will suffer. But, if we make the policy for ourselves, then it means that, at all times, we will be in control of our own destiny.



President Akufo-Addo made this known on Friday, 2nd February, 2018, when he led the Ghanaian delegation to the 3rd International Conference on the Replenishment of the Funds of the Global Partnership for Education, at the invitation of their Excellencies, M. Macky Sall, President of the Republic of Senegal, and M. Emmanuel Macron, President of the French Republic.



Reiterating his belief that there is an abundance of resources on the continent to finance the development of Africa, President Akufo-Addo stated that the resources can be put to good use by eliminating corruption in public life; having more intelligent arrangements for those who want to exploit the resources on the continent; and preventing the flight of capital out of the Continent.



Thabo Mbekis Commission that looked at the illicit flows of capital out of Africa, has estimated that for every year, in the last ten years, $50 billion goes out of Africa through illicit means. Can you imagine what those monies, if we had our eyes open, and we were not complicit in that illicit outflow, would mean for the capacity of our nations? he asked.



The challenge, therefore, confronting Africa, the President opined, is how we can organise ourselves to make sure that the wealth, the huge wealth of this great continent, at least, in the first time in modern history, is used on behalf on the peoples of the continent, and not those outside.



President Akufo-Addo was confident that if we are able to close that gap, we will come here to Dakar to talk about education, and not the funding of education by others. We will be talking about the quality of our education, the changes we need to make to our curricula, and the emphasis we have to place on our history and sociology.



He continued, So that, I am not misunderstood, all those who have been making the pledges, it is all good. But, I think it is extremely important for us to get our whole mind set right. We have within us the capacity to develop and promote the interest of our continent ourselves. Lets do it.



Importance of Education



Touching on the importance of education to the advancement of the continent, President Akufo-Addo stated that the paradox of Africa having the youngest population, and being the richest continent on the planet, but with the worst living conditions can only be broken by education.



He indicated that we are going to have to make sure that every young child, boy and girl, has access to education. Not only do they have access to education, but they have access to an education that will allow them to be able to address the challenges of the 21st century.



Narrating the experience of Ghana, President Akufo-Addo stated that the country is determined to open opportunities for everybody.



So, in the last 5 years, before my government came, every year, over 100,000 young Ghanaian students were unable to transition from Junior High School to Senior High School, largely because of money. Many of them fully qualified, but their parents were unable to support their higher education. We felt that at this stage in the history of our country, the Ghanaian State should take on that responsibility. So, as from September past, Senior High School education in the public school system has been made free, he said.



The President continued, What it has done is that the figures have revered. 90,000 more students entered senior school this year than the year before. It is the first step in ensuring that the educational system in our country, from kindergarten through primary to secondary, and ultimately through University, are open for everybody.



In confronting the question of the quality of education that will prepare the young population of Africa for the life of the 21st century, he indicated that it is only a greater focus on Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, which will guarantee the future of the continent.



We have seen that in the development of the economies of Asia, in China, India, Japan, and Korea. That is the way forward, to be able to make the transition from poor to prosperity, the President added.



President Akufo-Addo was accompanied to the Conference by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Hon. Shirley Ayorkor Botchway MP; the Minister for Education, Hon. Dr. Matthew Opoku Prempeh; and officials of the Presidency, Foreign and Education Ministries.





Source: Peacefmonline.com









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Featured VideoThe Western Regional Minister, Dr Kwaku Afriyie has reiterated governments plan to construct 20 new technical and vocational institutes across the country.



This, he said would provide employable skills and training to the youth to enable them create their own jobs.



He said this in a speech read on his behalf at the launch of "Skills and Technical Education Programme (STEP)/Technical and Vocation Education Training (TVET) project" organised by the Western Youth Network For Development (WYNED) in Takoradi.



The aim of the launch is to address the shortfall of students in choosing TVET programmes in basic schools.



The launch was attended by traditional authorities, heads of departments, representatives from GES and GNPC as well as other Stakeholders.



Dr Afriyie hinted that the government was considering a bill to re-align all TVET institutions across the country under the Ministry of Education.



A skill development fund is to be set-up to aid skills acquisition with the goal to assist and provide industries with requisite power needs, he added.



According to him, the government was also considering the revamping of all the existing Technical and Vocational institutions to help enhance the quality and standards of Vocation in particular to develop global competitive workforce.



Mrs Barbara Ayisi, the Deputy Minister of Education who launched the project indicated that, TVET was in the heart of the government and would be given the needed attention to enhance acquisition of skills for industrialisation.



She pointed out that the reason for the government to re-align TVET under the Ministry of Education was to have an effective teaching and learning and the needed skills which in turn would help the youth develop entrepreneurial skills in setting up small scale industries.



Nana Kwesi Agyeman, Omanhene of Lower Dixcove, who presided over the programme appealed to the government to take a keen interest in TVET and therefore advised Ghanaians to have a change of attitude towards TVET, nobody wants his ward to attend technical school because they will be regarded as not doing well students.

Source: GNA









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Featured VideoThe Ashanti Regional Security Council (REGSEC), has deployed a combined team of the police and military to restore order at Ahwiaa near Kumasi.



This is to bring sanity to the area, and also stem the wanton destruction of property, following violent clash between some youth groups in the area on Saturday morning.



A visit to the area by the Ghana News Agency (GNA) saw all major roads leading to the area blocked as security personnel patrolled some of the streets to stop further aggression by the irate youth.



Economic and transportation activities had since also been halted as residents had taken cover in their houses.



Mr Vasco Brenyah, Assemblyman for Ahwiaa, told Journalists that the pandemonium was triggered by a misunderstanding between some youth indigenes of the area and their Zongo counterparts.



This was after some of the Zongo youth were prevented from taking part in a social gatherings organised by some of the natives on Friday evening.



The Regional Police Public Relations Directorate has, meanwhile, confirmed the arrest of four young men believed to have been part of the mayhem, and currently assisting with police investigations.



Those who sustained various forms of injuries were also said to be receiving treatment at the hospital.

Source: GNA









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Featured VideoMr Dennis Amfo Sefah, a member of the Tema West branch of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) has called on NDC communicators and other opposition members to eat the humble pie by apologising to Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia.



I told you so; the NDC and other opposition members have been lying all along about the health status of the Vice President. They said that Dr. Bawumia had been paralysed by stroke, where is the evidence? These people who claimed that they were in comfortable lead in 2016 are never to be trusted.



Mr Sefah who was speaking in an interview with the Ghana News Agency in Accra said he had maintained that their opponents had nothing to offer than spewing falsehood to create fear and panic in the country.



Following his earlier dismissal of rumours by the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) to the effect that Dr. Bawumia had suffered a debilitating stroke he told the GNA that he was vindicated for holding to that claim even in the midst of opposition.



Mr Sefah who is popularly known as Nana Boakye said: Now that their wicked speculations have been proven to be lies, I hope they will exercise humility and apologise to Dr Bawumia.

Source: GNA









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Featured VideoMember of Parliament for Bolga Central, Isaac Adongo has described the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta as the biggest risk to Ghanas financial market.



His comments come in the wake of the Minoritys demand for the resignation of the Finance Minister on the basis of the findings made against him in the report of the Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justices (CHRAJ) report on the 2.25 billion dollars bond.



The Bolga Central MP said the Minister poses a great threat to the gains made by the country in putting in place strong financial market regulations.



Until you get rid of Hon. Ken Ofori-Atta he would destroy everything that Ghana has stood for in the capital market over the last couple of decades, he alleged.



Isaac Adongo said this has become necessary because of the actions of the Finance minister.



The CHRAJ Report is very clear that the Public Financial Management Act, which is in the bosom of the Minister Finance in fact it is the primary document that the Minister of Finance is supposed to respect in the efficient financial governance of this country, he has disregarded and breached it.



It says that the Bank of Ghanas own regulation and procedure almost every single one of them was sidestepped in order to issue this bond, he explained.



He also referred to questions raised about the Ministers asset declaration form as captured in the CHRAJ report to further question the Ministers suitability for office.



He filed his asset declaration form and made sure that even those companies that he registered in Ghana that Ghanaians know, he didnt indicate them; we know that Hon. Ken Ofori Atta is reported to have interests in companies in even tax havens.



You read the Paradise papers; this is a man whose has offshore bank accounts in Caymen Islands and yet even those companies in Ghana, he failed to disclose them, he noted.



Isaac Adongo also claimed the Finance Minister is still continuing with the violation that has landed him in hot waters.



Even when people have filed a petition against him, Ken Ofori-Atta now intensifies this singular dishonourable conduct, he bemoaned.



In September, Ken went on the market and issued another tap issue, what you call sole sourcing of bonds to his cronies for 2.87 billion; it wasnt on the issuance calendar, it was just advertised one day and the next day by five hours they are done.



In October, when Ken had asked the bank of Ghana to issue the issuance calendar on the 7th of October, by the 10th of October just three days after that Ken appeared and said that he needed another 3.27 billion to be issued on a top or sole source which was not even in his issuance calendar.



He added: in just November this year, Ken again went to the market and said he wanted to issue 5.5 billion on a sole source.



In total as we if you add the liquidity management that he borrowed in June, we are dealing with 21 billion Ghana cedis of sole sourcing of bonds under Ken Ofori Atta, he alleged.



He further questioned: if this is not the most dangerous person to Ghanas financial future, who else is?

Source: radiogold905









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Featured VideoHello there! I'm Penny, author of Penniless Foodie in the Wild , an adaptable cookbook for frugal people like myself who like to eat great food. I'm a single mom of four who loves to blog about how to have the best life possible while living on a relatively low income. I love frugal travel, gluten free cooking, and standing up for things I am passionate about, like mental health and awareness of abuse.I'm always happy to receive emails from readers at pennilessparenting@yahoo.comCAYCE, S.C. (AP) -- An Amtrak passenger train slammed into a freight train parked on a side track in South Carolina early Sunday, killing two Amtrak employees and injuring more than 110 people, authorities said. It was the third deadly wreck involving Amtrak in less than two months.

Amtrak's Silver Star was on its way from New York to Miami with eight crew members and about 140 passengers around 2:45 a.m. when it plowed into the CSX train at an estimated 59 mph, Gov. Henry McMaster said. The wreck took place around a switchyard about 10 miles (16 kilometers) south of Columbia.

The governor said investigators have yet to determine how the Amtrak train ended up on that stretch of track.

"The CSX was on the track it was supposed to be on," McMaster said.

The National Transportation Safety Board sent investigators.

McMaster said 116 people were taken to four hospitals. The main trauma hospital in the area had three patients in critical or serious condition, with the rest treated for minor injuries such as cuts, bruises and whiplash, said Dr. Steve Shelton, Palmetto Health director of emergency preparedness.

Drone footage showed the locomotives of both trains crumpled, the Amtrak engine on its side. One car in the middle of the Amtrak train was snapped in half, forming a V off to the side of the tracks.

"It's a horrible thing to see, to understand the force involved," McMaster said after touring the scene.

Many passengers were asleep with the train began shaking violently and then slammed to a halt, passenger Derek Pettaway told CBS.

"You knew we'd hit something or we'd derailed," he said.

Elliot Smith told The State newspaper of Columbia that he was staying with a friend when they heard what sounded like a propane tank exploding.

"The sound was so loud, you instantly knew it was bad," he said. Smith said he and his friend saw passengers limping along the tracks, while others tried to get everyone out of the cars.

Amtrak officials gathered up luggage and other belongings and within hours put passengers aboard buses to their destinations. Before being sent on their way, those who were not hurt were taken to a shelter, and local businesses provided coffee and breakfast.

"We know they are shaken up quite a bit. We know this is like nothing else they have ever been through. So we wanted to get them out of the cold, get them out of the weather -- get them to a warm place," sheriff's spokesman Adam Myrick said.

On Wednesday, a chartered Amtrak train carrying Republican members of Congress to a strategy retreat slammed into a garbage truck at a crossing in rural Virginia, killing one person in the truck and injuring six others.

And on Dec. 18, an Amtrak train ran off the rails along a curve during its inaugural run on a route south of Tacoma, Washington, killing three people and injuring dozens. It was going nearly 80 mph, more than twice the speed limit.

By Meg Kinnard, Associated PressA video depicting the sexual assault of a child is going viral on social media as users share it in hopes of catching the perpetrator, but law enforcement has a message.

Stop sharing the video. And don't click on it, either, because it may be malware that will send the video out to all of your contacts.

The video appears to have originated in Alabama and is under investigation by authorities there, PennLive's sister site, AL.com, is reporting.

PennLive also received the video through a Facebook message and reported it to the Hampden Township police without opening the file.

Authorities in Alabama say people are sharing and "liking" the video with the hopes of the perpetrator being caught, but they are not only furthering its spread on the web, they are committing a crime, according to WHNT 19 of Alabama.

Locally, Officer Josh Pressel of the Hampden Township Police Department said if someone receives this or similar videos, they should contact their police department.

"Don't forward it to anybody. Not family members, friends, other agencies or the news," Pressel said. "Any distribution of pornography depicting children is a crime."

Even if it's well intentioned to catch the perpetrator, sharing the video is still considered to be the dissemination of child pornography, he said.

He could not comment on the specific video that was sent to PennLive because that case is under a preliminary investigation.

But Pressler said the FBI has become involved, and this may be more than a case of users sharing the video. They may be sending it to others without knowing it.

"It looks like this may be malware sent through social media, and if a user clicks on the video, it may be sent to all of their contacts," he said.

Knowledge of the video is so prevalent that Alabama investigators have received calls about it from as far away as France. According to reports, Colorado Springs Police Department issued a warning about the video, as well as police in Chicago.

This post has been updated to include additional information.The television images were worth several thousand words.

Republican strategist Charlie Gerow (PennLive file)

As President Donald Trump delivered his State of the Union Address last Tuesday night, chock full of good news and optimism, there sat Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi looking like she'd bitten into a lemon.

Within camera view were other Democratic leaders and the Congressional Black Caucus with the same dour look minus the pucker.

It was a stunning contrast to the other side of the aisle where hope and optimism were reflected in the expressions and demeanor of Republican Members and leaders.

What made the visual images of the State of the Union Address so compelling were the moments where the Democrats couldn't seem to put their hands together.

It's easy to understand that it's tough to be the minority party at a State of the Union speech. You're required to watch and listen as your political opponents enjoy the spotlight and tumultuous applause of most of official Washington.

You cant expect the minority party to stand and cheer every word the president utters. But shouldn't we all be able to witness the unity of our nation over things like references to our great Capitol, "In God We Trust," standing for the national anthem or even news that our economy is producing millions of new jobs.

It's hard to imagine why the Congressional Black Caucus couldn't, at least, "politely applaud" the fact that unemployment, and African American and Hispanic unemployment in particular, are at all time lows.

What more than 45 million Americans witnessed last Tuesday night was a Washington, DC elite group of Democratic "leaders" continuing to project their only message: resistance to Donald J. Trump.

There's one big problem for those Democrats. It'd disconnected from much of their traditional base. To be sure there are those among them that cheer glum demeanors and dark words. But many rank-and-file Democrats are either put off or simply mystified by such displays.

Across the Rust Belt, where Donald Trump's "inside straight" won him the presidency, are working Democrats who cheer news that their paychecks are bigger this week.

They understand and approve regulatory reforms that eliminate job crushing over-regulation. And they don't view $50 a week more in take-home pay or a $1,000 bonus as "crumbs."

These folks were moved to tears and applause by the litany of stories President Trump shared on Tuesday night.

They connect with Corey Adams, the Ohio welder who's going to use his extra money from tax cuts for his two daughters' education.

They feel the pain of the parents of Nina Mickens and Kayla Cuevas, two teenagers murdered by MS-13 gang members. They are moved by the sight of baby "Hope", adopted by an Albuquerque cop and his wife from a homeless mother with an opioid addiction. They stand and cheer when Si Seong-ho waves the crutches on which he escaped the torture of North Koreans.

Their disconnect with what they saw from their purported leaders in Congress is an emerging story.

Some Democrats have already figured out that the far-left "resistance" of Nancy Pelosi and her allies isn't working politically.

In the special election being held here in Pennsylvania next month, the Democratic candidate is running on a pledge not to vote for Nancy Pelosi should he get to Congress.

Elsewhere Democratic consultants are cringing over the thought of pictures of Nancy Pelosi at the State of the Union being juxtaposed next to their candidates in last fall's pivotal mid-term elections.

Before November, 2016 the media chattered incessantly about what the Republican Party would look like if Donald Trump lost. Their sometimes joyful predications about a badly fractured party with no message to put things together can now be applied to the national Democrats.

Their fractures were on full display in the post speech responses. The "official" response featured Joe Kennedy III delivering a somewhat angry lecture on income inequality.

There were several others, ranging from further left to really further left. For the second straight year, Bernie Sanders eschewed the official response to deliver his own message of a new socialism. Then again, Bernie isn't really a Democrat, or is he?

None of their rhetoric is the stuff which connects with those Democrats and Independents they need to reach.

Working-class folks understand what it takes to create more jobs, produce bigger paychecks and allow them to keep more of what they earn. They instinctively understand that when their budget gets bigger and government's gets smaller that they're better off. They're patriotic and optimistic. They're hopeful and trying hard to create a future for their kids that's better than the life they've enjoyed.

They applaud "In God We Trust," stand for the national anthem and are delighted to take a few "crumbs" in the form of a bigger paycheck or a better job.

They want to be part of "A New American Moment." They're among the 75 percent who approved of President Trump's State of the Union Address.

PennLive Opinion contributor Charlie Gerow is CEO of Quantum Communications in Harrisburg. His "Donkeys & Elephants" column appears weekly opposite progressive commentator Kirstin Snow.FILE - In this Friday, Oct. 23, 2015 file photo, Rev. Pat Robertson poses a question to a Republican presidential candidate during a forum at Regent University in Virginia Beach, Va. The Christian Broadcasting Network, which Robertson founded, says he was rushed to the nearest stroke center Friday, Feb. 2, 2018 after a family member recognized the onset of stroke symptoms, and the 87-year-old Robertson is alert and expected to make a full recovery. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)Costco continues to open stores at a pace of 20 to 25 a year. Read more

SEATTLE  By most measures, 35-year-old Costco Wholesale is thriving.

Its sales and profits are surging. Traffic to its stores, an important indicator of the health of the business, grew 5.9 percent in the last quarter, the fastest clip in at least a decade. Costco members  whose annual fees make the company profitable  remain fiercely loyal, renewing at a rate of 87 percent even after fees were raised.

But will a new generation of shoppers accustomed to online buying and home delivery join its parents in the cavernous aisles?

The Issaquah-based company continues to build. It remains on pace to open from 20 to 25 new stores a year, and is establishing toeholds in new international markets, including its first store in China, under construction in Shanghai and scheduled to open in April 2019.

Meanwhile, Sam's Club  Walmart's wholesale club, once viewed as Costco's principal rival  announced last month it is closing 63 stores, including three in New Jersey but none in Philadelphia.

Costco's stock remains near its all-time high of $199.88, closing on Friday at $190.99.

After hearing about Costco's performance and prospects from CEO Craig Jelinek at the company's annual shareholders' meeting in Bellevue this week, at least a few people in the decidedly gray-haired crowd had big questions about the future.

How will the world's second-largest retailer adapt to changing shopping habits and appeal to a younger generation, and what is the company doing to contend with online sellers, such as Amazon, now viewed by some as Costco's chief competition?

Jelinek  who also took questions from an octogenarian who struggled to find his car in Costco's vast lots, and others having trouble lifting large quantities of bottled water and kitty litter  addressed them head on.

Reports that millennials are not joining Costco are "not accurate," Jelinek said, noting that the generation represents over 40 percent of its new-member sign-ups. (Company representatives declined to say how many of its current 90.3 million cardholders are in the millennial demographic.)

That said, they've yet to become Costco's best customers.

"They don't spend the money like the boomers do," Jelinek said. "But they are signing up, and we're hopeful that as long as boy meets girl, buys house, that will continue to go through their life cycle."

Costcos online strategy

The company is making moves to better cater to shoppers whose expectations about retail were formed in the time of Amazon. But in doing so, Costco wants to preserve the "treasure hunt" aspect of its main cash-and-carry business that has been fundamental to its success.

"We want to sell stuff online, but we also want to bring people into our Costcos," Jelinek said. "When people say, 'I hate you guys, I came in to buy four things and I spent $400,' that's what we like."

Costco is using its stores to drive online purchasing. Showcase areas in the stores let shoppers see and touch the online wares. They can purchase them on the spot for later home delivery from salespeople outfitted with iPads.

Costco operates e-commerce sites in six markets, and Jelinek said the company plans to expand in the coming two to three years to Australia, Japan, and China. That would put it in competition with Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group. (Costco first dipped a toe in China in 2014 with an online storefront on Alibaba's Tmall platform.)

While the physical stores remain the company's focus, Costco is expanding its home-delivery options. In doing so, it's leveraging its 17 Business Centers  stores geared toward small-business owners, with merchandise in even larger lots than the consumer-focused warehouse stores  as fulfillment centers for two-day home delivery of nonperishable items.

"This has started out much stronger than we anticipated, and we're going to continue to grow this business," Jelinek said.

Through a partnership with Instacart, people can order Costco goods, including fresh items, for same-day delivery.

Even as it expands delivery options, Costco is experimenting with ways to drive its online buyers back into stores.

In November, Costco began testing a system to allow customers to pick up high-value items ordered online, such as jewelry and laptops, in the warehouses. This eliminates the risk of front-porch theft, and generates another trip to Costco, where the treasure hunt can continue.

"There's a method to this madness," Jelinek said.

Costco's e-commerce business grew 40 percent during the holidays, he said, but also noted that those figures represent "only 5 percent of our business."Richard Nixon  who people are talking about a lot these days, for some reason  was a complicated man. As a politician, he played to win and bent the rules to the breaking point and arguably beyond, to the point of alleged treason in his 1968 campaign and turning to dirty tricks to win reelection in 1972, capped by a cover-up and a constitutional crisis. But even Nixon had his limits, and clung to some nagging respect for democratic norms.

In choosing to resign in August 1974 rather than fight an impeachment battle over his Watergate scandal to the bitter end, Nixon told the nation that "to leave office before my term is completed is abhorrent to every instinct in my body. But as president, I must put the interest of America first." Even more notable was what happened 14 years earlier, when some Republican leaders pleaded with Nixon to demand a recount and contest his narrow loss to John F. Kennedy in the 1960 presidential election, suggesting that irregularities in Richard Daley's corrupt Chicago and lost votes in one or two other states could change the outcome. But Nixon conceded the race and never publicly challenged the result, telling a journalist "our country cannot afford the agony of a constitutional crisis."

That simply wouldn't have happened in 2018's Republican Party, where Nixon probably would have been dismissed as a low-energy wuss. The take-no-prisoners approach to politics has been hardening for years  remember the "Brooks Brothers Riot" and some of the other shenanigans during the 2000 election, which actually did go to a recount?  but it reached its epitome in the arrival of Donald Trump. Schooled in the mobbed-up rumble-tumble of New York politics in the 1980s and especially by the McCarthyite attorney Roy Cohn, Trump learned to never concede one inch, to threaten to sue or actually sue anyone who criticized him or beat him out for a job, and  entering politics  to label every negative article against him as "fake news" and rampage against every slight, real or perceived.

Trump's shamelessness  and his willingness as president to put the interest of "Trump" first, rather than America  has never been more brazen than the past week. The drama over the Nunes memo  a giant nothingburger that actually makes Team Trump look worse on the issue of alleged collusion with Russia's 2016 election meddling, but which riles up the 37 Percent watching slanted coverage of it on Fox News  is not worth more than one sentence of my time or yours. But Trump's willingness to fire or pressure anyone at the FBI or the Justice Department investigating that collusion or a growing cover-up, his unending attacks on journalists and other democratic institutions, and his demands of unwavering loyalty from Republicans in Congress needed to check these abuses, combine to pose a threat to American democracy that is without precedent. As the New York Times noted in an analysis on Sunday, "The president has engaged in a scorched-earth assault on the pillars of the criminal justice system in a way that no other occupant of the White House has done."

But attacking the pillars of U.S. government is a slippery slope. When the president of the United States goes after our basic institutions and gets away with it, it inspires others  and now that political cancer is spreading to our home state of Pennsylvania. The issue here is what Republicans are willing to do to cling to the political power that's exercised through their control of the Legislature in Harrisburg and their current dominance in the congressional delegation in Washington  amid voting trends that have been mixed but trending Democratic for statewide offices such as governor, other row offices, and top judicial races.

We got a taste of how far Republicans were willing to go in 2012 when lawmakers and then-Gov. Tom Corbett tried to enact a voter-ID law that could have made it harder for non-whites and other groups that lean Democratic to cast ballots and that rising GOP Rep. Mike Turzai, who now is speaker of the house, admitted was crafted to help then-nominee Mitt Romney win Pennsylvania. (He didn't, and the law was largely struck down.)

But in legislative races, Pennsylvania Republicans still had their ace in the hole: gerrymandering. The map drawn by lawmakers in 2011-12 with Corbett's approval has been described as one of the most warped district maps in America, creating Rorschach test absurdities like the Seventh Congressional District in Delaware County and far beyond, and making the state's delegation in the U.S. House  13 Republicans, five Democrats  slanted far more to the GOP than what one might expect from statewide voting patterns. Activists eventually filed suit, arguing the congressional gerrymander is so extreme and so partisan that it violates the Pennsylvania Constitution. Last month, the state Supreme Court, in a landmark ruling, agreed and gave lawmakers a tight schedule to redraw the map ahead of the May primary.

That's when Pennsylvania Republicans found their Inner Trump.

Last week, Pennsylvania State Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati stated that he simply won't comply with a related order from the state's highest court to turn over voter data related to congressional districts, claiming that the court lacks jurisdiction and thus triggering our own constitutional crisis right here in the Keystone State, to run in tandem with the bigger ones that Trump is provoking in Washington.

But that's not all: At the very moment that the president and his allies were publicly attacking the ethics of the FBI and Justice Department in the nation's capital, local Republicans were inspired to go after the integrity of the elected justices who dared rule against them. Pennsylvania's GOP leaders are now pushing to remove one of the justices, David Wecht, because of comments he'd made in 2015 that didn't address this specific case but did criticize gerrymandering. There's talk Republicans may move against a second justice who voted for the new map.

It's a scorched-earth policy  does that phrase sound familiar?  intended to undermine and ignore an entire branch of government rather than comply with the rule of law. Somewhere down there, Joe McCarthy and Roy Cohn are looking up and smiling. All of this is cascading toward the U.S. Supreme Court, which  at the urging of Republican bigwigs from around the country  is weighing the unprecedented move of stepping in and overruling the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on its interpretation of the Pennsylvania Constitution. That would allow new justice Neil Gorsuch, who only reached the bench because Republicans defied all democratic norms and precedents  stop me if you see a pattern here  to flex his judicial muscles in a case eagerly watched by Republicans who engineered the Gorsuch coup.

Meanwhile, a host of overwhelmingly Republican states like Kansas, Texas and Utah are supporting the Pennsylvania GOP's case at the U.S. Supreme Court with legal briefs  which reveals the panic in Republican circles that what's happening here will expose and ruin the secret sauce behind conservative dominance of American politics in recent years. I don't know about you, but I resent someone from Kansas trying to tell me who I can, or can't, vote for here in the state where I live. But the guy from Kansas doesn't care about that principle. He just wants to win.

And that's where we're at these days. The conservative movement has already pushed democracy to the brink with voter ID, gerrymandering and other tactics intended to keep citizens from voting and limit the true impact of the votes that actually are cast. And now that this house of cards is in danger of toppling, we are seeing an autocratic-style war waged on the integrity of a key branch of government. That this is happening in Pennsylvania is just one more sign of the ways that Trumpism and creeping authoritarianism corrode American values. People who care about democracy and the rule of law should fight to keep this madness from infecting our own state.Tahjir Smith, the 4-year-old who authorities say was beaten to death on Jan. 22 by his mother and her boyfriend in Willow Grove. Read more

Tahjir Smith loved ice cream  no matter the time of day, no matter the occasion.

The 4-year-old was enthralled by cartoons, especially PAW Patrol, a Nickelodeon show about puppy first responders.

"He was always happy when he was around me," said his father, Mark Anthony Johnson. "He had a regular child's life."

Tahjir was smart, too, and obedient. On the rare occasion he misbehaved, Johnson said, Tahjir fessed up immediately.

On Jan. 22, Montgomery County authorities say, a stuttering Tahjir displayed that honesty when he told his mother he had spilled his breakfast cereal.

Later that day, in the back bedroom of a Willow Grove home, police say, the child was beaten to death by his mother, Lisa Smith, and her boyfriend, Keiff King, as punishment. According to charging documents, the couple struck Tahjir's head, torso, and bare buttocks with their hands and a shoe. When he became unresponsive, they placed him in the shower, underneath hot water, saying his punishment was not over.

Smith, 19, and King, 26, were arrested, accused of attempted first-degree murder, pending a coroner's report determining cause and manner of death. For the last two weeks, they have been held at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility.

Elsewhere, as family and friends prepared to bury Tahjir over the weekend, they grappled with a heart-wrenching question: How did this happen?

Authorities noted shoe tread marks on the child's body and a burn near his shoulder. The coroner's initial exam found old rib fractures and a displaced rib, and Smith told authorities it was not the first time the couple had struck Tahjir, according to charging documents.

In King's past, there was at least one warning sign.

In 2016, he was arrested in Philadelphia for allegedly repeatedly punching a woman in the face while she was holding their 1-year-old son. According to court records, the charges were dropped after the woman failed to appear in court. She did not return calls seeking comment. A spokesman for the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office declined to comment.

Philadelphia's Department of Human Services said it could not disclose whether Smith or King had been reported to or in contact with the agency, citing confidentiality laws.

In Montgomery County, the Office of Children and Youth Services said it had no reports of child abuse pertaining to either person.

Johnson, for his part, said he saw no signs his son was in harm's way.

"If anything was going on, they had him petrified," said Johnson, 21, of North Philadelphia. "He didn't say anything to me."

While Smith had custody of Tahjir, Johnson said he saw his son often, sometimes several times a week.

Johnson didn't know much about Smith's Willow Grove life, he said, or about King, her boyfriend of a year.

"It wasn't my business who he was," Johnson said. He had never been to the Lukens Avenue home where they lived with King's family.

From afar, the single-story home looks tidy. Bright blue shutters. Blue-and-white-patterned front door. Bikes in the driveway.

Upon closer examination, the drawn blinds were hanging crooked and torn. A couple of pieces of white siding lay on the front stoop. The mailbox was askew on its post.

Inside, authorities said, they found the home "deplorable" and roach-infested.

Knocks at the door there last week went unanswered. So did a note left for anyone who may still live there. At least one relative, King's 18-year-old cousin, Ishmael Powell, was in the home at the time of Tahjir's final beating, and told authorities he heard Tahjir crying and the sound of a hand hitting skin, according to charging documents.

Neighbor Stephen Lyles, who lived catty-corner to the couple, said the residents of that home kept to themselves. Until Tahjir's death, he hadn't known who lived there.

On Jan. 23, Johnson left work at his construction job, took a shower, and was getting ready for bed when he received a text with a link to a news article.

Tahjir was dead, the article read.

At first, Johnson said, he thought it was some cruel joke.

After reading the details, he said, "I don't even remember too much." He called an Uber to Abington Hospital. But Tahjir was no longer there. The news articles came out a day after the boy's death.

"That was my guy," Johnson said. "I wish I had been around him more than I was."

Johnson, who met Smith when they were growing up in West Philadelphia, said he last saw Tahjir two weeks before he died. Recently, Tahjir had been splitting time between Willow Grove and his maternal aunt's house in Southwest Philadelphia.

Johnson described Lisa Smith as a quiet person, who was at times difficult to read. The two primarily communicated through Smith's sister.

Johnson said he had learned a few weeks ago that Smith was pregnant with King's child. Smith told authorities she was six months pregnant, according to charging documents.

In prison, King "was very upset that a young child lost his life," his attorney Jeremy-Evan Alva said.

Alva said he could not disclose details of their initial conversation, citing attorney-client privilege, and declined to discuss possible defense strategies. He said he did not yet know much about King, but he knew his client had young children of his own.

The Montgomery County Coroner's Office said it could not release any more findings until a final report is complete. King and Smith await preliminary hearings, which are set for Feb. 15.

Johnson said he had not decided whether he will attend future court appearances for Smith and King.

The message he has for her would not be fit to print.

"I've got something to say on a personal note," Johnson said, but "ain't no words going to bring my child back."A 51-year-old man was fatally shot inside a building in the 5700 block of North 19th Street late Saturday, police said, and a woman, 33, was taken into custody.

Police said the man, who was shot once in the head, was taken to Albert Einstein Medical Center, where he died about an hour after the incident.

They said a gun was recovered, but did not provide identities of the victim or suspect or additional details.Three children of Carmela Apolonio Hernandez  Yoselin, 11, left; Keyri, 13; and Fidel, 15  smile as they make their way out of the Church of the Advocate to attend public school in Philadelphia. The family entered church sanctuary to avoid deportation. Read more

Bruce Beyer says claiming sanctuary in a church can be a powerful protest tactic, guaranteed to generate lots of publicity.

But nobody should think that moving into a church  as a Mexican family of five has done in Philadelphia, to avoid deportation  will ultimately offer much of a shield.

It didn't help him.

In August 1968, Beyer and other Vietnam War draft resisters and activists took sanctuary in the Unitarian Universalist Church of Buffalo. After 10 days, a small army of city police, federal marshals, and FBI agents raided the church, thrashed anyone they could reach, and arrested the young men, who would go on trial as the "Buffalo Nine."

Beyer, then 19, was sentenced to three years in prison for assaulting a federal officer, resisting arrest, and refusing induction.

"The walls of the church don't protect you," said Beyer, now a 69-year-old retired stagehand living in Buffalo. "It's symbolic, and nothing more."

Today, amid escalating immigration enforcement under the Trump administration, churches have become a central theater of resistance here and across the county.

The number of undocumented immigrants living in sanctuary nationwide jumped from five to 42 in the last two years. Since Trump's election, the churches, synagogues, and mosques ready to offer haven has surged from 400 to 1,110, according to a new report by Church World Service, a Christian coalition that assists immigrants and tracks sanctuary cases.

More people are taking sanctuary today than at any time since the 1980s, the study said.

That includes five in North Carolina, four in Colorado, four in New Mexico, and three each in Illinois, Massachusetts, Ohio, Texas, and Utah.

Carmela Apolonio Hernandez and her four children, aged 9 to 15, have lived inside the Church of the Advocate in North Philadelphia since mid-December. All were ordered to be deported to Mexico, but Hernandez, 36, says that could get her family killed by the same gangsters who murdered her brother and two nephews.

She made fresh headlines last month by deciding to send her children out of the church each day to attend public school  a risky challenge to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE. So far, none of the children has been detained.

ICE guidelines say agents should avoid taking action at "sensitive locations," which include schools, hospitals, and churches. But arrests have been made immediately outside those places, and no law formally blocks authorities from entering a church.

Instead, people in sanctuary depend on an intimation of security offered by a concept that goes back to the Bible and its "six cities of refuge." It ran through the societies of ancient Greece and Rome, and became widely known through Victor Hugo's 1831 novel, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame  and later in the animated Disney movie of the same name.

Today, in this country, a single factor drives people into sanctuary: the threat of imminent deportation. Moving into a church is the ultimate all-or-nothing play, destined to end in freedom or deportation.

"With immigration law, being here counts," said Philadelphia attorney John Vandenberg, chair of the local chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. "What I mean by that is, there are many forms of relief available to a person in the U.S. that could be discovered, or could be developed. Once you leave, that diminishes."

Sanctuary generally doesn't happen quietly. It happens loudly, in front of TV cameras and crowds. And that's on purpose.

Advocates seek the attention as a way to raise awareness of the circumstances surrounding a particular person or family  but also to build a broader public challenge to government policy.

The publicity alerts ICE to the exact location of a target, but it also ensures the agency would pay a price in public relations for dragging someone out of a church. The prevalence of cellphone cameras means authorities can't take action without people finding out.

But sanctuary isn't easy. Usually, once someone steps inside a church, there is no stepping out. It's assumed that ICE agents are watching, either in person or by remote camera.

It's stressful to stay within the same walls, the same limited space, day after day. Hernandez and her children occupy a room in the church basement, with mattresses on the floor and a microwave oven in a corner.

"I didn't realize how hard it would be," she said in an interview. "But when I look at my children I get a lot of strength. They are what keep me going."

It could be a long stay.

In Philadelphia, Javier Flores Garcia left the Arch Street United Methodist Church in October after almost a year inside, having been granted "deferred action" to await a visa.

The hardest part, he said on the day he left, was the monotony. He painted almost all the church interior and volunteered for any job he could do, trying to keep busy.

"Sanctuary isn't the goal," said Kristin Kumpf, director of human migration and mobility at the American Friends Service Committee in Washington. "It's an opportunity to keep families together temporarily, while we're fighting that person's case and fighting the system."

That means battling an administration whose immigration-enforcement arms have grown more aggressive. People who were granted stays of deportation under the Obama administration have been detained and deported at what they expected to be routine check-ins with ICE.

Late last month, ICE formalized a policy that sends agents to make arrests in courthouses, ignoring advocacy groups that say those actions frighten away crime victims and witnesses. The directive said agents will enter courthouses only to nab specific targets  gang members and criminals, but also people with deportation orders.

"I wait every day to hear they've gone into a church," said Judith McDaniel, an attorney who teaches law and social change at the University of Arizona in Tucson. "The publicity, the community support, are the only defenses we have."

Many people think authorities should enforce the law  period.

Groups like the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) in Washington say sanctuary seeks to thwart federal law and block legally sworn police from carrying out their duties. A church setting doesn't exempt anyone from the law, FAIR officials say, and religious leaders who harbor undocumented immigrants could face charges.

That's no empty warning.

In the 1980s, the federal government prosecuted 18 priests, nuns, and lay people it accused of aiding undocumented migrants fleeing civil wars in El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala. Eight were found guilty of smuggling immigrants, though most received suspended sentences or house arrest.

At the time, McDaniel belonged to a sanctuary congregation in Albany, N.Y., and helped drive Central American border-crossers to safety in Canada.

"I don't think anyone backed off, even after the convictions," she said.

Moral convictions against the Vietnam War led University of Buffalo students into the Unitarian church, a local landmark designed by Edward Austin Kent, who died aboard the Titanic.

The first days of sanctuary were kind of a party, as scores of students gathered outside, lying on the grass and enjoying the summer sun. Judy Collins showed up to sing protest songs.

The calm didn't last. On Aug. 19, 1968, Jerry Gross, 22, held a protest sign as he stood lookout at the front door.

Now a 73-year-old, well-known Oregon artist who goes by Jerry Ross, he recalled that police used a bullhorn to tell the resisters they had five minutes to surrender  then rushed the church two minutes later.

"This idea of a sanctuary, I have very little faith that can protect anybody," Ross said. "I think the idea is great, the thought is great, it's a socially responsible way to respond.  But in reality, unless you have some kind of force to prevent attacks, there's no way you can prevent them from coming.""You want me to do what?" "Where's your compassion?" "What a waste of resources!" "I have an obligation to help people stay healthy."

These are conflicting responses I imagine nurses and health-care professionals may have when asked to provide care at safe injection sites, places where people can use drugs under medical supervision. There aren't any such sites right now. But the City of Philadelphia announced that it will encourage setting them up. Should health-care professionals participate? It's a dilemma wrought with ethical, moral, legal, and regulatory issues and more questions than answers. As a nurse, I can understand and appreciate both sides.

I have been trying to educate myself on this subject for the last year, after the teenage son of a family friend died from a heroin overdose. Would the existence of a safe injection site have prevented his death? I don't know.

On one side of the issue, these sites address a staggering public health issue, serve a good purpose, provide a safe space for drug users, help avoid/lessen overdoses and deaths, reduce transmission of infectious diseases, offer counseling and help to get off drugs. Conversely, there is concern that such sites would proliferate predatory practices of drug dealers selling near the sites. In addition, there is the law, drug possession and use is illegal, as is the presence of nurses and health-care professionals when people are injecting themselves with heroin.

In deciding whether to support or work in safe injection sites, nurses must consider the code of ethics by which they are bound and the dilemma posed by the desire to do both  ensure their patient's best interest while preserving their own professional integrity. How can I supervise drug injections and live with myself?

According to the code of ethics, nurses must take appropriate action when they see illegal practices that place the best interests of patients in jeopardy. However, safe injection sites, even if their legality is at issue, provide a service that may be in the best interest of the individual. Nurses must be mindful of competing moral demands and conflicting values in collaborating for human rights in complex, extreme, or extraordinary practice settings. How do I take nursing students to safe injection sites for clinical experience and also teach them about a culture of health and safety, and the American Nurses Association Code of Ethics? What happens when a nurse executive asks a roomful of nurses to supervise heroin injections?

Each individual will need to decide whether to support safe injection sites on his or her own. There needs to be debate and discourse among students, faculty, and health professionals, many of whom are likely to struggle in evaluating this extraordinary situation.

So where do I come down? Yes, safe injection sites shelter an illegal activity and are not regulated. But, in my view, it would help lessen senseless overdoses and deaths  and perhaps get people into treatment. The common denominator for sites is the code of ethics provision on integrating social justice. It speaks of a shared responsibility among all nurses and health professionals to shape health care locally and nationally and take action to influence leaders, government agencies, legislators, and professional organizations.

It's a tough call. But I can live with safe injection sites for one basic reason: I think they will save lives. And as a nurse, that's what I'm all about.

Philadelphia's recent decision to encourage such sites to combat the opioid crisis signifies a watershed moment for health and social policy and the role of nurses and health professionals in addressing the city's and nation's opioid crisis. And it offers an option for drug users and promise to break the cycle for their family and friends.

Beth Ann Swan is a professor at Jefferson College of Nursing and was dean of the nursing school from 2011 to 2016.1.1k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard

House Speaker Paul Ryan once again proved that he has no self-awareness or grasp on reality after posting a tweet on Saturday touting a secretarys $1.50 weekly raise, which he credited the GOP tax bill for.

Ryan shared an AP Business News article on workers receiving slightly higher salaries after the Republican tax overhaul and quoted one section of the story, conveniently leaving out the part where the womans raise amounted to $78 a year: A secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, said she was pleasantly surprised her pay went up $1.50 a week  she said [that] will more than cover her Costco membership for the year.

Paul Ryan deleted this tweet celebrating that a woman got a $75.00 raise (for the entire year) out of the tax bill when his friends in the GOP got multi-million dollar raises. Ryan himself was paid $500,000 by the Koch brothers the day after the #TaxScam passed. pic.twitter.com/9UInV4wOkP  Kaivan Shroff (@KaivanShroff) February 3, 2018

Ryan was immediately roasted by the internet, which led to him deleting the post, but of course, thousands of screenshots of the it still exist, and people are still calling him out for not bothering to mention the obscene amount of money the Republican tax plan puts into wealthy hands  including his own.

In the coming year, the richest 1% will get $51,000 tax break, and this is set to grow in the subsequent years. Low-income Americans, on the other hand, will only see their taxes increase over time.1.6k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard

The number two Democrat in the Senate, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) warned that if Trump has broken the law, he will be held accountable, which means that impeachment is coming.

Video of Durbin on CNNs State Of The Union:

Sen. Dick Durbin warns Trump that Democrats will hold him accountable if he has violated the law. pic.twitter.com/WVGKxqZsrZ  Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) February 4, 2018

Jake Tapper asked Durbin what Democrats might do if Trump is found to have broken the law.

Durbin answered, Well, I dont want to predict that. I think thats too hypothetical. We understand what the constitution says. We must do, and that is hold everyone in the United States, including the president of the United States accountable if they have violated the law. No one including the president is above the law.

With Democrats poised to take back the House, impeachment is a real possability

Impeachment charges would originate in the House and be voted on in the Senate. There are only two steps missing from impeachment becoming real. Democrats need to win back the House, and Trump has to have been found to have broken the law. Once those criteria are met, judging from Durbins comments, impeachment will happen.

Dick Durbin isnt some backbencher in Congress. He is the number two Democrat in the Senate and party to the thinking of Pelosi and Schumer.

There is only one constitutional way that presidents are held accountable for breaking the law, and that is impeachment. Durbin didnt dance with hypotheticals. He drew a straight line. If Trump broke the law, he is going to be impeached. Trump has few allies among Republicans in the Senate, so when the Russia scandal hits the fan, it is possible that the votes will be there to remove him from office.

Trumps fate hinges on the findings of Robert Mueller.25  2021 - 200     

       

  ,  Cookies        .          cookies.



Despite the best efforts of the shiftless Adam Schiff to keep the lid on the source of the dodgy Steele dossier, we know now that the Clinton presidential campaign paid for the Kremlin-aided smear job on Donald Trump before the election. Thanks to the reporting of Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes we also know that the Clinton campaign continued to extract value from the dossier after the election. Clinton and her operatives used it to frame her humiliating loss as a Russian conspiracy to steal the election. Allen and Parnes revealed:

Within 24 hours of her concession speech, [campaign chair John Podesta and manager Robby Mook] assembled her communications team at the Brooklyn headquarters to engineer the case that the election wasnt entirely on the up-and-up. For a couple of hours, with Shake Shack containers littering the room, they went over the script they would pitch to the press and the public. Already, Russian hacking was the centerpiece of the argument.

The plan was to push journalists to cover how Russian hacking was the major unreported story of the campaign, and it succeeded  as Paul Sperry put it in his excellent New York Post column on the subject  to a fare-thee-well. After the election, coverage of the fabricated scandal of Russian collusion was relentless and made a critical contribution to the congressional investigations that followed.

When President Trump fired then FBI Director James Comey, Comey had an inspired idea. He would strategically leak memos of his conversations with President Trump to his friend Daniel Richman at Columbia Law School. Richman in turn was to read the memos to New York Times reporter Michael Schmidt. If all went according to plan, the resulting story was to lead to the appointment of Special Counsel to investigate all things Trump (video below).

All went according to plan. Comey is a sophisticated Washington operator who has moved for a long time in rarefied law enforcement circles. He knew roughly everyone in the small world from which the Special Counsel would be drawn. When Rod Rosenstein appointed Comeys friend and brother in arms Robert Mueller as Special Counsel, Comey was home free to ascend Mount Olympus and pronounce his deep thoughts via Twitter.Przepraszamy!

Ogoszenie na stanowisku:

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Jezeli poszukujesz pracy w branzy Informatyka / Telekomunikacja, zajrzyj tutaj: Praca Informatyka / Telekomunikacja

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Inne oferty, ktore mogy byc w kregu Twoich zainteresowan:NEW DELHI, February 4, 2018 /PRNewswire/ --

Exciting rewards for the shortlisted winners



Honor, Huawei's Smartphone e-brand for digital natives, announced that it will bring back the second season of the hunt for the 'Face of Honor'. The winning faces will be facilitated with exciting rewards.



'Face of Honor' is an initiative where the brand encourages the youth to showcase their stories. With this, they aim to see aspiring talent from across the country sending in their entries. The contest would be at providing the young aspiring models and divas a chance to showcase their style and fashion game with others on the digital platform.



P. Sanjeev, VP -Sales, Consumer Business Group, Honor India commented: "Honor is a brand for the brave and this is one such initiative, where we aim at encouraging the youth to pursue their talent to the fullest. With this journey, we aim to bring to life the dreams of our tech-savvy millennials."



The brand will be sharing the details on the contest very soon.



About Honor:

Honor is a leading smartphone e-brand under the Huawei Group. In line with its slogan, "For the Brave", the brand was created to meet the needs of digital natives through internet-optimized products that offer superior user experiences, inspire action, foster creativity and empower the young to achieve their dreams. In doing this, Honor has set itself apart by showcasing its own bravery to do things differently and to take the steps needed to usher in the latest technologies and innovations for its customers. Honor led the online smartphone market with a global shipment value of 2.5 billion USD to become the number 1 online smartphone brand, as per International Data Corporation (IDC) in Q1 2017. Huawei's Consumer Business Group, comprising of its dual brands Huawei and Honor, shipped 139 million smartphones globally in 2016 and reported an increase of 44% in its annual revenue. For more information please visit: www.hihonor.com/in

Huawei- Hotline number: 1800 209 6555 | 9 am - 9 pm | All days open, except public holidays

Huawei website: http://consumer.huawei.com/in

Huawei service website: [email protected]

Contact information





Huawei Media Contact:

Priyanka Seth | [email protected]

Ritwik Sharma | [email protected]



FleishmanHillard India Contact:

Prateek Sharma | 9971476254 |

[email protected]

SOURCE HonorISLAMABAD: A one-minute silence would be observe across Pakistan on Monday at 10:00am to mark Kashmir Solidarity Day for paying tributes to the people of Jammu and Kashmir for their struggle against the decades-long Indian occupation in the disputed region.

Mass rallies, symposium, peace walks conventions and meetings would also be held across the country to draw world attention towards the plight of the oppressed Kashmiri people, said a govt press release here on Sunday.If you were looking for the Charlestown Democratic Town Committee website and ended up here, try this





Got news tips, gossip, suggestions, complaints?E-mail us: progressivecharlestown@gmail.com We strive to avoid errors in our articles. Our correction policy can be found hereWashington, Feb 1 : The US has urged Poland to rethink its Holocaust Bill, which includes prison sentence for use of the term "Polish concentration camp", before it can be passed by the Polish Senate on Thursday.

The bill is particularly focused on journalists, since artists and academics are an exception and will not be persecuted, and will apply to all Polish citizens and foreigners "regardless of the laws in force at the place where the act was committed," according to the text.

"We encourage Poland to reevaluate the legislation in light of its potential impact on the principle of free speech and on our ability to be effective partners," US State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert said in a statement on Wednesday.

For decades, the Polish authorities have been trying to convey the message that they were victims of the Holocaust, not its perpetrators.

Foreign media's use of the expression "Polish concentration camps" to refer to Auschwitz, a notorious extermination centre located in Poland but opened and operated by the Nazi occupiers during the World War II, usually triggers denunciations from the Polish government.

The controversial draft legislation has exasperated the Israeli authorities, who consider, as they have said, that it "will not help further the exposure of historical truth and may harm freedom of research, as well as prevent discussion of the historical message and legacy of World War II."

The Polish Senate has backed, without any changes, a bill amending the law on the Institute of National Remembrance - Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation, after it was already passed by the Sejm (lower house) on January 26, Efe news reported.

The US has already voiced its concern about the "repercussions" that the bill "could have on Poland's strategic interests and relationships, including with the US and Israel".

The US, though recognises the fact that "the history of the Holocaust is painful and complex," and said it understands "that phrases such as 'Polish death camps' are inaccurate, misleading, and hurtful."Bhubaneswar, Feb 1 : The Orissa High Court on Thursday granted conditional bail to Trinamool Congress (TMC) MP Tapas Pal, who was arrested in the Rose Valley chit fund scam.

The court directed the TMC leader to also deposit Rs 1 crore with a bank, furnish two sureties of Rs 2 lakh each, and surrender his passport to the case Investigating Officer.

Pal was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on December 30, 2016, in connection with the scam in Kolkata.

The court directed the TMC MP to cooperate with the investigating agency as and when required.

After his arrest, Pal was brought to Bhubaneswar for further questioning.

He was lodged in Jharpara jail here. He was admitted to a private hospital after his health deteriorated thereafter.New Delhi, Feb 1 : Remembering Kalpana Chawla -- the first Indian-born woman in space -- on the 15th Anniversary of the Columbia Accident, Union Minister of Science and Technology Harsh Vardhan on Thursday said that Chawla is an inspiration as she defied all traditions to reach the sky.

In 2003, on the morning of February 1, space shuttle Columbia broke up just 16 minutes from landing on Earth, killing the seven astronauts of the STS-107 mission.

"In remembrance of #KalpanaChawla, who died this day in 2003 alongwith 6 crew members of #SpaceShuttleColumbia. An idol for every Indian, especially girls," Vardhan said in a tweet.

"Kalpana, born in a conservative society, broke several traditions to become the first Indian-born Woman Astronaut in space," he added.

Earlier this week, addressing the nation in his first Mann Ki Baat radio show of 2018, Prime Minister Narendra Modi remembered Chawla and said she gave out a valuable message to all Indians, especially young girls.

"...Her message is, 'Nothing is impossible for women, if they have a strong will'," Modi said.

According to NASA, a piece of foam, falling from the external tank during launch, had opened a hole in one of the shuttle's wings, leading to the breakup of the orbiter upon re-entry.

"Today the entire NASA Family pauses to reflect on the legacy and memory of our colleagues who have lost their lives advancing the frontiers of exploration. We owe them a deep debt of gratitude and respect," NASA's Acting Administrator Robert Lightfoot said in a statement on NASA's annual Day of Remembrance on January 25.

"The crews exemplified a pioneering spirit that helped us get where we are today, and we will carry that spirit forward in advancing tomorrow's missions. Those crews, and all of the men and women who have lost their lives extending the bounds of our capabilities while working for NASA, will not be forgotten," he said.

The US agency also paid tributes to the crews of space shuttle Columbia, as well as Apollo 1 and Challenger.

Born in Karnal, India, on July 1, 1961, Chawla who was the youngest of four children, graduated from Tagore School, Karnal, India, in 1976.

After completing her Bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering from Punjab Engineering College, she went on to become an aerospace engineer and an FAA Certified Flight Instructor.

Chawla served as Flight Engineer and Mission Specialist 2 for STS-107 and became the second Indian person to fly in space after astronaut Rakesh Sharma.

The 16-day flight on the STS-107 Columbia, was a dedicated science and research mission. Working 24 hours a day, in two alternating shifts, the crew successfully conducted approximately 80 experiments.Juba, Feb 4 : South Sudan has recalled its ambassador to the US, after the American government imposed an arms embargo on the East African nation, presidential spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny has said.

Ateny on Saturday said Garang Diing Akuong has been recalled for further consultations without giving details. The South Sudanese envoy was deployed to Washington in May 2015, Xinhua news agency reported.

"This is routine for any country to recall its ambassador for further consultations. It may not be related to the arms embargo," Ateny told Xinhua by phone.

The Donald Trump administration on Friday announced arms embargo on South Sudan and urged the UN Security Council to enforce a global arms ban on South Sudan.

The US also called on the African Union (AU) and the East African regional bloc, Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) to consider sanctions measures against those who undermine the peace process.

South Sudan has been embroiled in four years of conflict that has taken a devastating toll on the people, creating one of the fastest growing refugee crises in the world.

A peace deal signed in August 2015 between the rival leaders under UN pressure led to the establishment of a transitional unity government in April 2016, but was shattered by renewed fighting in July 2016.Warsaw, Feb 4 : Online video sharing service YouTube has apologised for a translation error that misrepresented Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki by suggesting that Nazi German death camps "were Polish", the media reported.

Polish Press Agency reported on Saturday that YouTube apologised for the error caused by "automatic translation", according to Xinhua.

Morawiecki made a public TV address on Thursday about a controversial anti-defamation bill, outlawing historically inaccurate use of the term "Polish death camps" among other provisions.

As part of his speech, Morawiecki declared: "The camps in which millions of Jews were murdered were not Polish. That truth must be protected because it is part of the truth of the Holocaust." However, YouTube's automatic translation software rendered the sentence as: "Camps where millions of Jews were murdered were Polish."

"The mistake was caused by automatic translation on YouTube, for which we apologise," Adam Malczak, the service's press representative, wrote in a mail in reply to a question by Bloomberg News.

Overnight between Wednesday and Thursday, Polish senators voted 57 to 23 in favour of the controversial anti-defamation bill. The legislation is now pending the final approval of the president.

The bill proposes to jail or fine a person who blames Poland or the Poles for Nazi crimes against humanity which were committed in Nazi-occupied Poland during World War II. The bill also prohibits phrases such as "Polish death camps."

About six million Jews were killed by the Nazis in World War II, and many of them in the death camp of Auschwitz and other death camps in Poland.

The new legislation has already sparked an uproar in Israel.Ankara, Feb 4 : Turkish border guards are firing at the Syrians who attempt to flee the violence and seek refuge in Turkey, an official of the Human Rights Watch said.

"Syrian asylum seekers leaving the brutality of Idlib province in northwest Syria are being forced back with bullets and abuse," CNN quoted Lama Fakih, Deputy Director Human Rights Watch's Middle East and North Africa division, as saying on Saturday.

About 247,000 Syrians were displaced to the border area from December 15 to January 15, according to the United Nations.

"As fighting in Idlib and Afrin displaces thousands more, the number of Syrians trapped along the border willing to risk their lives to reach Turkey is only likely to increase," Fakih said.

Despite the fact that Turkey accommodates more Syrian refugees than any other country in the world, hosting around 3.5 million, Human Rights Watch said: "Turkey's generous hosting of large numbers of Syrians does not absolve it of its responsibility to help those seeking protection at its borders."

The accusation against the Turkish border guards comes amid rising tensions along the Turkey-Syria border as Turkey's military has moved into northern Syria.

Turkey's incursion has opened up another front in the Syrian conflict which is now in its seventh year.

Of the 16 Syrian refugees who were smuggled into Turkey last year, 13 said that Turkish border guards shot at them and other asylum seekers as they tried to flee Syria.New Delhi, Feb 4 : The fate of five Pakistani nationals, languishing in a jail in the national capital, is uncertain as Pakistan has refused to accept that they are its citizens.

According to highly placed sources, the Pakistani nationals were arrested at different points of time, and charged under the Official Secrets Act, among other things. They are keen to return to their country and lead a normal life, but Pakistan is refusing to accept them as its citizens in order to "hide its anti-India terror activities and agenda from the global arena".

The five suspected Pakistani spies have been waiting for deportation for the past one year to five years, even after their family members have acknowledged they are Pakistani citizens, the sources told IANS.

The Foreigner Regional Registration Offices (FRRO) department of Delhi Police has been waiting to deport the five men, who were arrested for their alleged involvement in spying inside India between 2007 to 2015.

They have completed their prison terms in Lampur prison, located in outer Delhi's Narela.

Officials from the FRRO have approached the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi several times and sent numerous letters along with proof of their citizenship, "but they have been turned down every time", the sources added. "The High Commission has not confirmed their identities and, as a result, these Pakistani nationals have no choice but to remain in prison," the source told IANS.

IANS managed to access their names, addresses, and charges under which the men have been jailed in India. Three of them belong to Karachi and two are from Pakistan's Punjab province.

A senior official told IANS, "They are suspected spies and came to India to execute operations. They are trained as spies in terrorist camps in Pakistan used by the ISI against India for secret intelligence operations, and other terror operations."

"They have been identified as Mohammad Hassan, a resident of Pakistan's Punjab, who was arrested by the Special Cell of Delhi Police on October 8, 2012; Mohammad Kamir, a resident of Lahore, who was arrested from Delhi Gate in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh; Abdul Jaffar, who was arrested in 2009 under the Official Secrets Act; Mohammad Hanim, who was arrested in 2012; and Mohammad Idris, who was arrested from Uttar Pradesh's Kanpur. The last three are all from Karachi in Pakistan," the officer said.

"We want to release them from jail and deport them to Pakistan as they have already served their sentences or jail terms, but we cannot free them in India which is a risk and against protocol. We are also waiting for when the Pakistan High Commission will accept them as its nationals. They are all praying to God for a miracle and eagerly waiting to meet their family members," the officer said.

(Sanjeev Pal can be contacted at sanjeev.p@ians.in)Chandigarh, Feb 4 : With Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's scheduled visit to the Sikh holy city of Amritsar in Punjab just over a fortnight away, it is still not clear whether Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh will play host to the visiting dignitary or not.

Trudeau is visiting India from February 17 to 23 at the invitation of his India counterpart, Narendra Modi, with stops at Agra, Amritsar, Ahmedabad, Mumbai and New Delhi.

Trudeau's Amritsar visit to the Golden Temple, the holiest of Sikh shrines, carries a political message to a huge constituency back home in Canada with a big Punjabi, especially Sikh, population settled there.

While Trudeau will be feted by the central and state governments in New Delhi and other places, there is uncertainty on whether Amarinder Singh will hold a meeting with Trudeau or play host during the Amritsar visit.

"There is nothing so far," Amarinder's media adviser Raveen Thukral told IANS here when asked about the status of Amarinder receiving or hosting the Canadian Prime Minister in Amritsar.

Well-placed sources in the Punjab government say that the Chief Minister will have to go by the protocol issued by the Centre since Trudeau will be on a state visit. Punjab has a strong Canadian connection with hundreds of thousands of immigrants settled there and thousands of students from Punjab going to Canada annually.

Amarinder had publicly refused to meet Canada's first Sikh Defence Minister, Harjit Singh Sajjan, who was born in Punjab's Hoshiarpur district, when he visited the state last April.

The Amarinder government had cold-shouldered Sajjan, the first Sikh to be the Defence Minister of a Western country, as he visited various places in Punjab. No minister or senior officer of the Punjab government either went to welcome Sajjan or even accompany him during the visit.

Amarinder had accused Sajjan and other ministers of Punjabi origin in the Trudeau government of links to radical elements demanding a separate Sikh state of Khalistan.

Amarinder made it clear that he "would not meet any Khalistani sympathisers".

"Not only Sajjan, but other ministers and MPs, including Navdeep Bains, Amarjit Sohi, Sukh Dhaiwal, Darshan Kang, Raj Grewal, Harinder Malhi, Roby Sahota, Jagmeet Singh and Randeep Sari, are well known for their leanings towards the Khalistani movement," Amarinder had said last year.

The reasons for Amarinder's annoyance with the Canadian government are apparent.

In April 2016, he had shot off an angry letter to protest the Canadian government's denial of permission for his interactive meetings with Punjabis in the cities of Toronto and Vancouver. He was forced to cancel his political rallies following objections raised by Sikh hardliners with the Canadian government.

Amarinder, who was not the Chief Minister at the time, had protested the Canadian government's "gag order" on him. The Canadian government had officially raised its objection to Amarinder's visit through the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), a human rights advocacy group with radical leanings, had lodged a complaint with the Canadian government through a law firm against the election activities planned by Amarinder Singh.

Trying to cash in on the cold vibes between the Amarinder and Trudeau governments, the Punjab unit of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has sought a meeting with Trudeau during his visit to felicitate him.

Canadian authorities are attaching great importance to the Trudeau visit.

"Canada greatly values its strong relationship with India. This visit reflects the high level of priority that Prime Minister Trudeau places on this strategic partnership. Prime Minister Trudeau's visit builds on visits by 11 Cabinet Ministers in the past 18 months," Canadian High Commissioner Nadir Patel said recently.

Trudeau, who took office in November 2015, inducted four ministers of Punjabi-origin in his government.

Canada is home to a large Indian diaspora, as approximately 3.6 per cent of Canadians are of Indian heritage and India is Canada's second-largest source of immigrants. The majority of the immigrants are from Punjab.

Canada is also a leading education destination for Indian students, with approximately 124,000 Indians holding valid Canadian study permits last year.

(Jaideep Sarin can be contacted at jaideep.s@ians.in)4 provinces to hold maiden assembly meetings today

Preparations are in full swing for convening the historic provincial assemblies in provinces 2, 5, 6 and 7 on Sunday.Bhubaneswar, Feb 4 : Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Sunday alleged that the Odisha government was trying to destroy evidence in the gang rape and subsequent suicide of a Class 9 girl in Kunduli area of Koraput district.

"The Odisha government has failed to give justice to the minor girl. It is trying to destroy the evidence in the gang rape and suicide incident," Pradhan told the media here.

Claiming that the state government was fully responsible for the suicide of the rape victim, he reiterated the demand for a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the incident.

Pradhan said if the state government had no confidence in the CBI it could also go for a court-monitored inquiry by a Special Investigation Team (SIT).

The minor, who was allegedly gang raped by security personnel in October last year, committed suicide on January 22.

Pradhan said even 100 days after the gang rape incident and two weeks after the suicide of the victim, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had not yet reviewed the matter.

"Why are you silent, Chief Minister, on the issue even after 100 days passed? We want a reply from you over the incident."

The minister alleged that the girl has left a suicide note stating that some top police officials were involved in suppressing the case.

"The suicide note was destroyed to suppress facts. The suicide note must be brought under the purview of the inquiry," he said.

Pradhan alleged that the state police chief offered her Rs 90,000 to keep mum about the rape and she was put in a hospital for treatment of mental disorder while she was mentally sound.

"The state government is fully responsible for the suicide. As the judicial probe ordered by this government in many earlier cases have not yielded any result, the Kunduli incident should be probed by the CBI immediately," Pradhan said.

On the other hand, Biju Janata Dal (BJD) spokesperson Pratap Deb said the BJP was politicising the issue.Mumbai, Feb 4 : Actress Tamannaah Bhatia says it was when she started doing Hindi films that she was trying to figure out who she really is, and fashion helped her to discover herself.

"When I started working and started doing Hindi films, that was when I was really trying to figure out who I really am. That discovery gradually happened through fashion," Tamannaah told IANS in an interview.

"Fashion is a great medium to express who really you are as a person. It is not something I have woken up and known about. I think I can confidently say that now I don't feel I am working too hard for it," she added.

The actress, who has featured in films like "Himmatwala", "Baahubali: The Beginning", "Baahubali 2: The Conclusion" and "Tutak Tutak Tutiya", is an established name in southern cinema. One of her much-anticipated projects currently is the remake of Kangana Ranaut's "Queen".

Talking about paying heed to the fashion police, she said she used to to do that initially.

"I think that helped me. I am thankful to the criticism because I wouldn't have got better if I hadn't got the criticism. However harsh they might sound sometimes, it did help me," said the actress, who is excited about her new projects.

"I am doing lot of south Indian films. I have just completed a Telugu film. It (my schedule) is jam-packed but I enjoy doing films. Being an actor, facing the camera, playing different characters... Because now is the time (for heroines) as different parts are written for women.

"All the films I am doing are very female-centric, their subjects are female-centric. It's a great time to be doing such movies because the scope is there," said the actress.

She was a showstopper here for designer Ashwini Reddy at Lakme Fashion Week (LFW) summer-Resort 2018, and wore a delicately embroidered, ruffled blouse teamed with a bright red skirt embellished with gold work and a champagne coloured dupatta.

The designer showcased a collection titled 'Tilottama'. It was a refreshing, edgy, modern take on couture fashion.

Inspired by the celestial beauty of Apsaras, the angels of light from Hindu mythology, this collection was a reflection of the divine feminine. Elegant, delicate and yet traditional, the silhouettes seen on the catwalk were modern renditions of traditional Indian wear that ranged from fusion to bridal ensembles.

One of the highlights of this collection was the use of textures, by mixing fabrics like silks, organza, lycra, brocade, nets, woven textiles, organza and chiffon to add an almost whimsical flair to the designs. The colour palette encompassed a wide range of shades like blues, yellows, greens, pinks, reds, golds, ivory tones, greys, and was perfectly suited to the needs of any trendsetter.

(Nivedita is in Mumbai at the invitation of the LFW organisers. She can be contacted at nivedita.s@ians.in)Bhubaneswar, Feb 4 : Actor-turned-Trinamool Congress MP Tapas Paul, who was granted conditional bail by the Orissa High Court three days ago, left for his hometown Kolkata on Sunday, 13 months after his arrest.

Arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on December 30, 2016 in connection with the multi crore rupee Rose Valley Chit Fund scam, he had been taken to Bhubaneswar for further questioning.

Pal, who was admitted to a private hospital from CBI custody for the last few months, claimed he had done nothing wrong and said his party was with him all along.

"I did not do anything wrong. I hope no one has to go through what I have gone through for the last 13 months. My party was always with me," said Pal, who was released from the hospital on Saturday night.

The popular Bengali actor also said he wants to get back to acting after his recovery.

"I am not well. But I am very happy that I am going back to my own people. I want to resume acting, may be after taking rest for a month or so," he said.

The Orissa High Court granted conditional bail to Pal on Thursday while directing him to deposit Rs 1 crore with a bank, furnish two sureties of Rs 2 lakh each, and surrender his passport to the case's Investigating Officer.Centurion, Feb 4 : India produced a dominant performance to thrash South Africa by nine wickets in the second One-Day International (ODI) at the SuperSport Park here on Sunday.

Opting to field first, the Indians rode on career best figures from wrist spinners Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav to bundle out South Africa for a mere 118 runs.

This was the lowest ever ODI total at this venue. India now lead the six-match series 2-0.

Chahal returned figures of 5/22 while Yadav notched up 3/20 to justify India skipper Virat Kohli's decision to field first on winning the toss.

Fast bowlers Jasprit Bumrah and Bhuvneshwar Kumar bagged a wicket each.

Jean-Paul Duminy and Khaya Zondo were the highest scorers for the Proteas with 25 runs each.

Such was the domination of the Indian bowlers that only five South African batsmen managed to reach double figures.

South Africa were off to a slow start with Hashim Amla (23) and Quinton de Kock (20) producing an opening stand of 39 runs before the former nicked one from Bhuvneshwar to Mahendra Singh Dhoni behind the stumps.

The hosts then lost three wickets in quick succession as de Kock, Aiden Markram and David Miller were sent back in consecutive overs.

Chahal dismissed de Kock when the left-hander miscued an attempted pull off the last ball of the 13th over, only to find Hardik Pandya at deep square leg.

Markram played another poor shot off the opening ball of the very next over to hand Kuldeep his first wicket of the day.

Kuldeep dismissed David Miller later in the same over to leave the hosts struggling at 51/4.

With their entire top order back in the pavilion by the 14th over, the Proteas could never really recover from there.

Duminy and Zondo tried to steady the innings but both fell prey to Chahal who was proving to be unplayable at times.

The South African lower order could not put up much of a resistance as the hosts folded up their innings in just 32.2 overs.

In reply, Kohli and Shikhar Dhawan added 93 runs between them as the visitors romped to victory with 177 balls still to go.

Dhawan remained unbeaten on 51 runs off 56 balls while Kohli was not out on 46.

Pacer Kagiso Rabada's dismissal of opener Rohit Sharma in the fourth over was the only success the South African bowlers managed on the day.

Brief scores:

India: 119/1 in 20.3 overs (Shikhar Dhawan 51 n.o., Virat Kohli 46 n.o.) vs South Africa: 118 in 32.2 overs (Jean-Paul Duminy 25, Khaya Zondo 25; Yuzvendra Chahal 5/22, Kuldeep Yadav 3/20).Agartala, Feb 4 : Terror activities in northeast India have been checked due to Bangladesh's great help and support while rail links and bus services between the two countries facilitated travel of the region's people to other parts of India via the neighbour without any much trouble, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said here on Sunday.

"Bangladesh's immense help and support facilitated India to tame the terrorist activities in northeastern states. Our relation with Bangladesh now at best place," he said while addressing election rallies here.

He said that with his Bharatiya Janata Party-led (BJP) central government's establishment of new rail links with Bangladesh and introducing bus services through that country facilitated the people of northeastern states to go to other parts of India avoiding the problematic journey through mountainous terrain of the region and saving them huge time, costs and problems.

Reiterating that the Narendra Modi government is very sensitive towards the development of northeast India, Rajnath Singh said that to further develop the transportation between India and other parts of the world, New Delhi and Dhaka had signed a trans-Asia rail agreement.

"Various international agencies after conducting surveys confirmed that BJP is the only party in India which boosts country's development in real terms. India now turned into a fastest growing country in the world."

Due to the good governance of the Modi government, India got the best place in various international fora and platforms, he said.

Coming down heavily on the Left Front government's "non-performance", the BJP leader said the Tripura government is now providing salaries and allowances to the government employees at par with the recommendations of the 4th Pay Commission and promised if his party wins, these would be raised at par with what the 7th Pay Commission has recommended.

"National conviction rate of various crimes is 47 per cent and in Tripura this is only 22 per cent. Women are not at all secured in Left-ruled Tripura," he said adding that the union government has given Rs 25,000 crore to Tripura during the past few years but Rs 2,400 rpt Rs 2, 400 crore has remained unspent and the Left Front government is alleging that the centre is depriving it of funds.

"While the national per capita icome is Rs 1.13 lakh, Tripura's per capita income is Rs 78,000. Even after 25-years uninterrupted rule of Left government, 66 per cent people remained below poverty line with no ability to purchase a bi-cycle," he added.

Union Information and Broadcasting and Textile Minister Smriti Irani also addressed election rallies in Kailashahar in northern Tripura, where she hit out at the Left Front government for its "failure and mis-governance, growing crime against women and unemployment".

Polling for the 60-seat Tripura assembly will be held on February 18 and counting of votes will take place on March 3.Melbourne, Feb 4 : The Australian government on Sunday ruled out financing for the railway project to link the Adani Group's proposed $12 billion Carmichael coal mine project in Australia to a port.

In an interview to Sky News, Assistant Minister for Vocational Education Karen Andrews said the federal government will not grant the (Australian) $900 million concessional loan sought by Adanis to build a rail line to to link to port the Carmichael mine project that has become controversial owing to environmental concerns.

"Let's be clear, though, given the position that the Labor state government took to the last election and their election, there won't be financing from the federal government," Andrews said, although "all the approvals are already in place for the Adani mine".

Referring to federal financing for the rail link, she said: "No it won't be proceeding. For there to be money available from the Naif (Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility), that would require the support from the Queensland Labor government".

Andrews also said that the advice to refuse federal financing had been given by the country's Resource Minister Matt Canavan.

Australian and foreign banks have been unwilling to grant loans for the Carmichael coal mine, railway and port integrated project in the state of Queensland, which is opposed by environmentalists.

In December, the newly-elected Queensland government vetoed the Australian $900 million federal government loan sought for the project in line with a promise made in its election manifesto Last year, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and China Construction Bank said in separate statements they were not working on the project, for which Adani is seeking $1.5 billion financing.

The Adanis are one of the most highly leveraged in India, with group companies accounting for total debt of more than Rs 75,000 crore as of March 2017.Tehran, Feb 4 : Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Sunday vowed to boost the Islamic republic's deterrent military power despite the pressure from the US and its allies.

Iran will never seek others' permission to reinforce its military capabilities and will continue its efforts to develop defence power within the framework of law and religious principles, Rouhani said at the opening ceremony for a defence museum, Xinhua news agency reported.

"We should be ready to counter the threats against the nation," he said, adding that "our nation and officials will not negotiate with anyone to this end".

Rouhani stressed that Iran will continue to boost its defence power proportional to the potential threats to its security.

However, weapons of mass destruction have no place in Iran's military doctrine, he added.

Meanwhile, a senior Iranian military commander said that the missile depots of the country are protected against the enemies' attacks, Tasnim news agency reported.

The underground missile facilities of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) are invulnerable to all sorts of hostile attacks, IRGC Lieutenant Commander Brigadier General Hossein Salami was quoted as saying.

According to Xinhua news, he said there are lots of missile sites at the IRGC's disposal in Iran, which are very safe from the enemies' conventional and unconventional offensives.

At the time of an enemy attack, numerous missiles of various types could be fired at once from various places, given the type of threats, he added.

Pointing to advances in the drone industry, Salami stated that the missile power is only a portion of Iran's defence capabilities.

The IRGC has detailed information about the US military capabilities and bases around the country, he said, adding that Iran considers the regional countries as being within the range of its strategic security.

The US and its regional allies have repeatedly expressed concerns about Iran's missile programme, threatening to take measures to deal with it.

But Tehran rejects the charges, insisting that it is only for deterrent purposes.Pyongyang, Feb 4 : North Korea's supreme leader Kim Jong-un took a midnight ride through the streets of Pyongyang on one of the city's new trolley buses, media reports said on Sunday.

Kim Jong-un, who was accompanied by wife Ri Sol-ju and senior officials from the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, reportedly praised the homegrown electric bus as comfortable and reliable, Efe news reported quoting state news agency KCNA.

He was also pleased with its speed and suspension, the report added.

Kim had earlier inspected the bus during a trip to the Pyongyang Trolley Bus Factory.Istanbul, Feb 5 : Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said 935 terrorists have been "neutralised" since Turkey launched a military offensive against Syria's Afrin held by Kurdish militia, on January 20.

"Of course, we also have martyrs," the President told reporters on Sunday here prior to his departure for the Vatican for a visit, Xinhua news agency reported.

Turkey lost eight soldiers on Saturday, including five killed after their tank was hit by the Kurdish militia known as the People's Protection Units (YPG), marking the deadliest day for the Turkish troops since they started the so-called Operation Olive Branch along with the rebel Free Syrian Army.

Erdogan said an investigation had been launched into the attack, including trying to determine which countries supplied the weaponry being used by the YPG, considered by Ankara as a terror group.

"We have some estimations," he said. "When it is finalised, we will share it with the whole world."

Ankara has been infuriated with US training and arming of the YPG as a reliable force in the fight against the Islamic State, and threatened to move on militarily against YPG-held Manbij in northern Syria, where US special operation forces are based.Welcome Guest! You Are Here:Against lingerie feminism

An op-ed titled Lingerie and feminism published on January 21 in this paper tried to show positive interlinkages between the lingerie industry, liberated female sexuality and promotion of feminist values.Following the release of the controversial memo spearheaded by Rep. Devin Nunes on alleged misconduct by the Justice Department and the FBI, Democrats came out on the offensive against this weekend, calling the memo "reckless" and a "political hit job."

Rep. Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, reiterated his opposition to the claims made in the memo on ABC's " target="_blank"This Week" Sunday.

"The interest wasn't oversight," Schiff told host George Stephanopoulos. "The interest was a political hit job on the FBI in the service of the president."

The memo, released Friday, purports to show that the FBI and the Department of Justice bypassed protocol to improperly surveil former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. While Republicans said the document promotes transparency and holds the government accountable, Democrats and top intelligence and law enforcement officials have warned that it contains a host of inaccuracies and omissions that mischaracterize the intelligence community's work.

On Sunday, Schiff argued that not only does the memo not vindicate President Donald Trump in the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election and the Trump campaign's possible cooperation  it proves the probe is legitimate.

"What the memo indicates is the investigation didn't begin with Carter Page, it actually began with George Papadopoulos, someone who was a foreign policy adviser for candidate Trump and someone who was meeting secretly with the Russians and talking about the stolen Clinton e-mails," Schiff said.

"So quite to the contrary, even this very flawed memo demonstrates what the origin of the investigation was and that origin involved the issue of collusion," he added.

A chorus of dissent

Other Democrats joined Schiff to deride the memo and shoot down Trump's claims that it cleared him in the Russia investigation.

When asked whether the memo did indeed support Trump's position, another top Democrat, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, replied: "Of course it does not."

"The fact that the Republicans in the House refused to allow a minority report, the Democratic response to their memo, is an indication that this  they're just bound and determined to continue to find ways to absolve this president from any responsibility," Durbin told Jake Tapper on CNN's "State of the Union."

Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee had drafted their own memo explaining why Nunes' memo was inaccurate, but the Republicans on the committee blocked its release. The committee is going to take up the Democrats' memo on Monday to reconsider its release, according to Reuters.

Democratic Rep. Jim Himes took issue with the accuracy of the memo, and intelligence officials' warnings against releasing it.

"If there was a vetting process on the Nunes memo, that's news to me," Himes told Tapper. "And if the vetting process did occur, we know what the FBI and the Department of Justice said about the release of this memo. They said, do not do it; it would be extraordinarily reckless."

Himes seemed to be echoing Sen. Mark Warner, who criticized the "reckless" release on Friday, saying it "demonstrates an astonishing disregard for the truth."

Sen. Tim Kaine, the 2016 Democratic vice presidential candidate, pointed to widespread disapproval of the memo's release among experts.

"Law enforcement opposes this. The intelligence community opposes this. Even many Republicans oppose this," Kaine tweeted on Friday. "This is dangerous territory, it disrespects law enforcement, and it's an alarming partisan attack on efforts to investigate hostile foreign interference in our democracy."

Warning against a constitutional crisis

Rep. Jerry Nadler, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said Nunes and other House Republicans were "part and parcel to an organized effort to obstruct" the Russia investigation.

Nadler, like Schiff, had read the underlying classified documents on which the memo bases its claims, and stood with other Democrats saying the memo omits crucial details of the narrative it presents. Nadler issued a six-page rebuttal to the memo on Saturday outlining why he believes it is "deliberately misleading."

Schiff has said he's worried Trump would use the memo to fire Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who is accused of extending a surveillance warrant based on a largely unverified dossier connecting Trump and Russia.

"I'm very concerned about it," Schiff told CNN on Friday. "There's no telling what this president is capable of."

Durbin cautioned against the ramifications firing Rosenstein could create.

"This would be an extreme event and one that I say with some caution could create a constitutional crisis in this country," Durbin told Tapper on Sunday. "The question at that moment is whether or not the majority Republicans in the House and the Senate will stand up for the rule of law and the Constitution if the president takes that extreme position."

The White House has denied claims that it has any intentions to fire Rosenstein. But when asked by reporters on Friday whether he would fire the deputy attorney general, Trump refused to give a clear answer.Sekina Abam, 27, said it can be difficult for women in Ghana to avoid discrimination when wearing the Islamic headscarf known as the hijab. Muslims make up 18 percent of the population.

She and her 32-year-old sister Nefisa found that many hijab options sold in the markets of the capital, Accra, came from outside the country. None came in the vibrant print fabrics for which Ghana is internationally known.

I said to myself, Why not come up with something from myself that will meet the hijab rules while using African prints? she recalled.

Now she and her sister share a workshop where they turn out colorful headscarves and flowing, conservative dresses. Sekina is in charge of the clothing line known as Libaas Hilaan that includes everything from casual wear to special occasion apparel, while Nefisa directs the Nefeesah Hijab brand.

Hijabs sell between 30 ($6.50) and 100 ($22) Ghana cedis, while dresses and abayas can sell for as much as 850 cedis. To meet the steady demand for their product after five years, the sisters are now helped by their mother and two other workers.

For the Abam sisters, the struggle is to find the right balance between fashion and Islam, being mindful of tradition while making something that younger women will feel comfortable wearing on the streets of Accra.

A woman naturally wants to look beautiful, and coming from an African setting where is Islam is minimal like in Ghana here, its difficult for her to wear black or something that is print-less, design-less, Sekina said. She wants to fit in but she also wants to try to obey God a bit. So I decided to come up with these designs that would meet such needs.

READ MORE: Christable Ekeh shares sexy pictures of herself in floral bikini

The idea is to make it easy for our Muslim sisters and mothers to wear their hijab so that they will be always motivated to wear the hijab, Nefisa added.Welcome to the Pulse Community! We will now be sending you a daily newsletter on news, entertainment and more. Also join us across all of our other channels - we love to be connected!Thabo Mbekis Commission that looked at the illicit flows of capital out of Africa, has estimated that for every year, in the last ten years, $50 billion goes out of Africa through illicit means," he said.

He quizzed: "Can you imagine what those monies, if we had our eyes open, and we were not complicit in that illicit outflow, would mean for the capacity of our nations?

READ MORE: BOG cautions public over use of bitcoin in GhanaREAD MORE: Autopsy report reveals Kumasi SHS tutor died by hanging

A Metropolitan Police statement said murder detectives have commenced investigation into the stabbing incident.

The police said they were called at approximately 01:28hrs on Saturday, 3 February, to St Mary's Close, N17 to reports of a stabbing.

"Officers attended along with London Ambulance Service and London's Air Ambulance and found a 22-year-old man suffering from fatal stab injuries," the statement said.

"His next of kin are aware. A post-mortem examination will be scheduled in due course.

"The Homicide and Major Crime Command are investigating," the statement added.

"I am keen to hear from anyone who was in the vicinity of Kemble Road and St Mary's Close in the early hours of Saturday morning," DCI Andrew Packer, who is leading the investigation said.READ MORE: Three armed robbers sentenced to 90 years in prison

A combined police and military team have been dispatched to the area to restore law and order.

The cause of the violent clash is unknown, however, it is believed that the rivalry between the two groups has been on since 1999.

The rivalry is said to between the Ashanti and Zongo youths in the area.

A certain misunderstanding between Asante line boys and Zongo line boys. It is just a certain group of young boys. We dont know how this came about but it has been happening since 1999," the Assembly Member for the Ahwiaa-Anyinam electoral area, Brenya Vasco, told Accra based Citi FM.

"Weve not seen any such conflict over the years but it is just yesterday it happened again, he added.

The joint security is said to have arrested some of the perpetrators in the confusion, which is said to be the fourth in the area.

READ MORE: Autopsy report reveals Kumasi SHS tutor died by hangingMedia reports keep a running "best of" list of his outbursts and one-liners, not least of which his tale of bonding with a rat in prison.

But as a ruling looms in the first trial over the November massacres that left 130 people dead, families of the victims say his comic antics have only deepened their anguish.

"The past few days we've been watching a spectacle. I won't deny it: I've smiled, I've laughed as well. And I'm a little bit ashamed of myself," said Helena Christidis, one of the lawyers for the nearly 690 plaintiffs in the case.

She is far from alone: Bendaoud's quips -- interspersed with insults and threats -- have made him a social media sensation.

The courtroom has been packed during the trial, requiring a giant screen to be set up in the hall outside for those who can't get a seat.

"How dare you wear that robe?" he told one lawyer. "Careful what you're saying... I'm going to come find you at your office," he warned another.

"I haven't left my cell in 14 months: In my place, other people would have cut their testicles off," he told the judge by way of apologising for an outburst.

And during nearly two weeks of questioning he has steadfastly denied knowing he had rented an apartment to senior Islamic State jihadist Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the suspected coordinator of the attacks, and his accomplice Chakib Akrouh.

"I found him suspicious but not a terrorist," he said.

'Not here to see a show'

Bendaoud, a 31-year-old drug dealer with a long criminal record, said he had previously rented the grubby flat to Eastern European gangsters without asking questions.

But prosecutors say Bendaoud and Mohamed Soumah had to have known they were offering shelter to jihadists on the run at the flat in Saint-Denis north of Paris just days after the suicide bombings at the Stade de France stadium and the shootings at the Bataclan concert hall and at nearby restaurants and cafes.

They claim in particular that Bendaoud spoke by telephone with Hasna Aitboulahcen for three minutes while she was hiding in bushes with Abaaoud and Akroun.

Aitboulahcen, a cousin of Abaaoud's, was the brother of Youssef Aitboulahcen, the third defendant at the trial, who is accused of failing to alert the police about a terror plot.

Anti-terror police killed Abaaoud, Akrouh and Hasna Aitboulahcen in a ferocious assault on Bendaoud's flat on November 18, five days after the attacks.

For relatives of the victims, Bendaoud's apparent lack of curiosity about the men at a time when the country was on lockdown in the hunt for the fugitives, coupled with his behaviour in the courtroom, only add insult to injury.

"I was outraged to hear laughter during these debates," said Patrick, whose daughter Nathalie was killed at the Bataclan.

"I'm not laughing. I'm not here to see a show."

Lawyers for the plaintiffs are to make their final arguments Monday, and a ruling is expected toward the end of this week.

Bendaoud and Soumah are facing six years in prison, while Aitboulahcen faces five years.

Their trial comes as Salah Abdeslam, the only surviving suspect in the attacks, goes on trial in Belgium on Monday over a shootout in Brussels that led to his capture.

Prosecutors say the trial is expected to yield clues about the attack for which the Islamic State group claimed responsibility.All croaked

Humans have misused frogs to the point of severely depleting their numbersThe OAP just took to Instagram to share the story of a chain of disappointments that ended up saving her life.

ALSO READ: Actor recounts how sister escaped death by the whiskers

According to her, she had gone out with her family to apply for their permanent voter's card (PVC) but were met with one delay of the other.

From the registration itself to car battery issues, everything that could go wrong went wrong. That is until she started feeling dizzy and passed out.

Waking up in the hospital, Daala was told that her blood pressure had been very low and if they had left the premises of the Ikoyi club where they had gone to register for their PVC, she may have died.

Read the full story below:

Presently, Daala who is a graduate of Mass Communication from the University of Lagos, works with Ovation TV. She used to be a VJ for Hip TV and prior to that, she worked with Dynamix TV.

ALSO READ: Singer arrested by SARS officersThe UK Guardian reports that Haastrup has accused the King's College hospital of rushing to kill his brain-damaged son by switching off life-support before he has had the chance to appeal in court.

The grieving father says his son, Isaiah has the right to appeal the ruling of the high court that says it was in the boys best interests for treatment to be withdrawn.

Why are you in a rush to kill him? Wait. Once you kill him, thats the end. You cant bring him back, he said.

The court's decision as delivered by Justice MacDonald said Isaiah is in a low level of consciousness, cannot move or breathe independently and is connected to a ventilator.

Isaiah's sad condition

Isaiah, it was reported, suffered catastrophic brain damage due to being deprived of oxygen at birth. He has since been surviving with the aid of a ventilator, a life-support machine in the King's College hospital, London.

Court refuses permission to appeal

Isaiah's father and his mother, Takesha Thomas, had indicated their wish to see treatment and life support continue.

Hence, Isaiah's parents had indicated their wished to appeal Justice McDonald's judgment but the judge reportedly refused permission to appeal saying there were not strong grounds for appeal nor a strong likelihood of success.

The judge also went ahead to order doctors to continue treatment of Isaiah until 2pm on Friday, February 2, 2018 to allow Isaiahs father to make an application directly to the court of appeal.

Lack of funds have seen Haastrup representing his son in court

As a result of the family's financial inability to engage the services of a lawyer, Haastrup, who is a trained lawyer, took it upon himself to represent his son.

Haastrup told The Guardian that the family did not have legal aid and could not afford legal representation.

Sadly, Haastrup, who said he was ill with flu missed the 2pm deadline to make an appeal on Friday, February 2, 2018.

In any event, he said, he understood the law allowed him 14 days in which to lodge an appeal, which would not expire until February 12, 2018.

Haastrup also said he was drawing up a formal application for permission to submit his appeal this week, which can only be granted if there are errors in law or fact in the original judgment.

NHS to withdraw Isaiah from Ventilator

The Kings College hospital NHS foundation trust had on Friday afternoon informed Haastrup that as the deadline had expired, it was now lawful for the trust to withdraw Isaiahs ventilation and provide him with palliative care only, and therefore treatment would be withdrawn on Monday, February 5, 2018.

A spokesman for the trust said: This is an extremely difficult time for Isaiahs parents but we cannot comment on Mr Haastrups appeal  that is a matter for Mr Haastrup. The decision handed down on Monday 29th January, following a three-day hearing, ruled that it was in Isaiahs best interests to transfer him to palliative care. We are trying to engage with the family regarding Isaiahs transfer and will continue to offer them our support.

Haastrup still fighting to stop the order with an appeal

On Saturday, February 3, 2018, Haastrup had reportedly made a telephone application to an appeal court judge for an extension to the stay.

Haastrup claimed the judge allegedly told him: Go and grieve, go and grieve. Let him die, after hearing details of the appeal.

A sad and grieving Haastrup makes a final appeal saying: What I am saying to them is hold off for a few days. Lets find out what the court of appeal says. What is wrong with that? I dont think the public will say it is wrong for that to happen.According to a report by Premium Times, the sad occurrence was confirmed by the Nigerian Community in South Africa.

Emeka Ezinteje, Secretary of the Nigerian Union in South Africa confirmed that the incident was due to a business dispute.

We have received a report that at 3.00am on Saturday, Ekweghiariri Chidi Isaac, 34, a native of Ehime in Isiala Mbano Local Government of Imo and Nzechukwu Alabuche, 35, from Azia in Anambra were stabbed to death by one Sunday from Awgbu in Anambra.

The incident occurred at Rossetinville, South of Johannesburg.

We understand that there was a business dispute between them, that made the assailant to stab the victims to death, Ezinteje said.

ALSO READ: Nigerian man stabbed to death over house rent in SA

He said that the union had reported the incident to the Nigerian mission and the South African police.

The assailant is on the run while the police have commenced investigation into the incident.

The union condemns the killing of any Nigerian and will partner with relevant government agencies to ensure that justice is done in the case, Mr. Ezinteje said.Instablog9ja reports that the young man whose identity is yet to be revealed is alleged to have beaten and raped two students, which eventually led to his arrest.

ALSO READ: Another notorious serial rapist arrested in Lagos

The account reveals that the young man used some sort of charm on both known victims, noting that they only realised their locations at a time when it was impossible to escape.

One of the victims account reveals that she only remembered using the atm with the suspect.

The next thing she remembered was being inside the suspect's car at the Distance Learning Institute in Unilag, where he beat her mercilessly and raped her.

He also wiped off the blood with her pant which he took with him, along with her bra.

He, however, denies being a ritualist although he has allegedly admitted to both rape incidences.

ALSO READ: Police arrest 3 suspects for allegedly raping minor

The suspect was finally arrested after reportedly dropping off his girlfriend at Fagunwa hostel on campus and is currently being held in police custody.SaharaReporters reports that the houses situated at 7 and 8 Whittaker Street, Belgravia, London are said to be up for investigation under Britains new law, Unexplained Wealth Orders, which became effective on Wednesday, January 31, 2018.

According to Transparency International UK, the two house were listed in Land Registry documents as being owned by Landfield International Developments Limited and Renocon Property Development Limited.

The controversial properties

The two London houses suspected to be properties of Senator Saraki are described by UK leading property outfit, Zoopla as choice properties.

Based on current market estimates by Zoopla, the properties are worth a combined total of around 15 million.

According to the property outfit website, 7 Whittaker Street, is aterraced house, Freehold, 4 Bedrooms, 5 Bathrooms and 2 Receps while 8 Whittaker Street, is a terraced house with share of freehold, 4 Bedrooms, 5 Bathrooms and 2 Receps.

It was further noted that the value range for the houses is between 8,211,000 - 9,914,000 each while rental goes for between 29,000 - 35,150 pcm.

ALSO READ: I have been vindicated with Court of Appeal verdict - Saraki

The Saraki connection

Though the Senate President's name didn't appear as the owners of the properties on the UK Land Registry documents but the companies that own the properties are controlled by the Sarakis.

According to data released as part of the Panama Papers, Landfield International Developments Limited and Renocon Property Development Limited were controlled by former First Lady of Kwara state and wife of the Senate President, Toyin Saraki and one of the Senator's personal aides.

However, none of these offshore holdings were reported in Sarakis official asset declarations with the Senate President insisting he had declared all his assets correctly and in accordance with Nigerian legislation.

Saraki had been charged by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in 2015 for false assets declaration when he was Kwara state governor.

The Senate President was cleared of all charges with the panel citing the prosecution's failure to prove the allegations.

ALSO READ: FG files appeal against Senate President's CCT victory

Other Assets owned by world leaders listed for probe in UK

Aside the two houses on Whittaker street, other assets have been listed for probe by Transparency International.

A 18m property at Kenwood Gate, Hampstead, owned by the First Family of

Flats 138A and 138B at 4 Whitehall Court, London, valued at 11.4million and linked with

A 1m property in Guildford linked with

Two apartments at Park Lane, said to be owned by former Pakistani prime minister,

What is Unexplained Wealth Orders UWOs?

As explained by the Britain law, the Unexplained Wealth Orders (UWOs) are a new investigative power designed to help law enforcement act on corrupt assets.

The Orders, are particularly useful where there is no realistic prospect of cooperation or conviction in the country of origin, but there are sufficient grounds for suspicion that an asset has been acquired with the proceeds of corruption.

After an application from an enforcement authority[1], a high court judge can give notice of a UWO only if she is satisfied that the respondent is likely to be the owner of suspicious wealth beyond his means, and if all of the following tests are met:

The UWO requires the respondent to explain how he lawfully acquired his assets. If he fails to respond or gives an inadequate response then this extra information can be used in a separate civil recovery process (an existing measure under the Proceeds of Crime Act) if law enforcement has gathered sufficient evidence.

Ben Wallace, Security and Economic Crime Minister said the U.K. estimates that around 90 billion ($127 billion, 102 billion euros) of illegal funds are laundered through Britain every year.The Chairperson, Board of Trustees (BoT) of the foundation, Mrs Adedoyin Ibikunle, told journalists while distributing the items in Kabba, that the gesture was to lessen the suffering of the widows living in abject poverty.

Ibikunle noted that the United Nation (UN) placed emphasis on empowerment of women, especially widows, adding that women empowerment was critical for the eradication of poverty in society.

It is estimated that 115 million widows worldwide live in extreme poverty along with their children. Therefore, giving adequate attention to our widows is long overdue, especially the vulnerable ones.

It is my humble belief that this occasion will mark a turning point in the life of our widows and bring succor to them through empowerment and various skills acquisition programmes, she said.

She said that the foundation had on Dec 23, 2017, distributed relief items including food stuff worth N12 million to about 2,000 widows in Yagba Federal Constituency.

The chairperson said the gesture would cut across the seven local government areas in Kogi West.

Ibikunle added that the foundation would also embark on free medical treatment for the vulnerable in the area in April, in collaboration with its US partners.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that chairperson is an aspirant for the Kogi West Senatorial District seat on the platform of the APC for the 2019 general elections.

The state Commissioner for Women Affairs, Mrs Bolanle Amupitan, commended the foundation for the gesture, saying the initiative would complement the State Governments efforts in alleviating the suffering of the people.

She enjoined the women to register and get their PVCs in order to vote during the 2019 general.Tatari-Shekwo made the call in an interview with NAN on Sunday in Lafia.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the president is scheduled to visit the state on Tuesday.

Tatari-Shekwo noted that this was first time Buhari would be visiting the state since he became president.

You can see that work is going on seriously in Lafia, the state capital, and other major towns and this shows the significance attached to this visit.

People across all the 13 local government areas of the state are very happy, ready and waiting for the day to give the president good reception he said.

He said APC in the state was proud of the achievements of the president in the areas of security, fight against corruption, agriculture and infrastructure, among others.

He also commended Gov. Umaru Al-Makura for his achievement in infrastructural development.

The chairman also appealed to the citizens to be peaceful during the visit and avoid anything that would lead to breakdown of law and order.Mr Chukwuemeka Ezeh, Head of EEDC Communication department disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Awka on Sunday.

Ezeh said the cut in power supply which had lasted about five weeks was not primarily the fault of EEDC but that of TCN.

He said that it was not as a result of decaying power distribution infrastructure under the EEDC area of operation as alleged.

The power outage experienced at Awka is as a result of a breaker fault at the TCN Station, Awka.

This affected supply to our Agu Awka Injection Substation, which feeds Awka and other neighbouring towns.

It is important to stress that this is not EEDC fault, but that of TCN, however, effort is on by TCN to address the issue.

As part of our maintenance policy, we carry out periodic maintenance of equipment and installations across our network, he said.

Ezeh also said that the EEDC had spent over N10 billion to give prepaid meters to its customers.

According to him, EEDC inherited no fewer than 700, 000 customers that needed pre-paid meters.

He said that it was not true that the EEDC was reluctant to issue meters to its customers so as to continue to bill by estimation but was pursuing metering in its corporate interest.

It is part of our responsibilities to meter our customers and this we are already doing; metering is a process and gradually everyone will be given.

It pays our organisation to meter our customers, but we need both time and fund to accomplish this task.

The management of EEDC has expressed its commitment to metering by expending over N10 billion on this project, and we are deploying smart meters.

It is important to note that with over 700,000 inherited unmetered customers, there is no way all will be metered at once; but there is a conscious move by the management of EEDC to meter its customers, we are appealing to customers to exercise patience as meter will get to everyone.

Customers who have been metered should desist from bypassing these meters when they are installed at their premises, he said.

Meanwhile, some of electricity consumers had decried the quality of services of EEDC, saying it was dismal and retarding businesses and quality of life.

Mr Jude Nwanna said the EEDC should endeavor to give all its customers prepaid meters s and stop making them pay for darkness through estimated billing method.

Nwanna said his landlord paid for prepaid meters for his block of flats about three years ago but had not received them .

He said that businesses in the area were virtually running on generators and were paying for diesel and Disco for electricity, adding that some had closed shop because of the cost of operation.

Chief Bright Nwangwu, chairman of Sabrud Consortium, said that there was a company that produces prepaid meter in Nigeria which has the capacity to help achieve full metering to customers in the shortest possible time.

We appeal to the Federal Government to allow prepaid meter manufacturing firms to sell directly to local customers.

Estimated billing is a crime in advanced countries, it should be discouraged here; selling prepaid meters directly to customers will eliminate the practice.The Commission has been very patient with her but she may be declared wanted if she continues this hide and seek game, an EFCC source was quoted as saying.

It was also reported that Oduah, who said she fired by ex-President Goodluck Jonathan because ex-minister of petroleum, Diezani Alison Madueke was envious of her, may be declared wanted if she continues to be evasive.

Oduah's recent excuse for not honouring EFCC's invitation

According to the report, Oduah had been invited thrice in the last seven months over the alleged N9.4billion contract only for her to fail to turn up on each occasion.

An EFCC source was quoted as saying: She was invited on three different occasions to report for interview on the 13th June, 2017, 29th June 2017 and 13th November 2017 but she failed to honour any of the invitations.

Rather than appear to face a panel that was raised by the EFCC to interrogate her, Oduah, through a letter dated January 5, 2018, informed the commission that she would honour the invite on January 29, 2018.

The letter was duly acknowledged by the commission and just as the investigators were looking forward to her arrival, Oduah played a fast one on the EFCC with another letter indicating that she would no longer be available on January 29.

She cited an invitation by the Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu to accompany him to London where he was scheduled to deliver a lecture at the House of Commons on January 25.

Oduah stated that her next convenient date to honour your invitation is 19th February, 2018.

The N9.4billion contract in Aviation ministry

The anti-graft agency is investigating alleged improprieties in the execution and awarding of a contract for the procurement and installation of security equipment in 22 airports across the country.

The contract was awarded while Oduah served as Nigeria's Aviation ministry under ex-President Goodluck Jonathan between July 4, 2011 and February 12, 2014.

ALSO READ: Stella Oduah says Nigeria yet to maximise women potential in nation-building

It was further reported that the serving Senator has been invited in respect of an investigation into the N9, 443,549,531.25 contract awarded to I-Sec Security Nigeria Limited.

An EFCC source was quoted as saying: There were issues surrounding the contract, including alleged non-execution of the project in some airports, abandonment of the contract in a few ones, diversion of part of the contract sum and suspected case of money laundering.

These are allegations she is expected to respond to in order to clear the air on the security contract. She is only expected to explain her roles.

Meanwhile, Senator Oduah is currently locked in a legal battle with Sterling bank over her company's alleged indebtedness.Ortom made the statement while reacting to the IG's speech when he met Senate committee on police affairs on Friday, February 2, 2018.

If the inspector-general of police, Mr. Idris, is not competent to help bring an end to the invasion and killing of innocent people in Benue and other states by herdsmen, the noble thing to do is to resign instead of twisting facts to suit his objective, Ortom said.

Idris had told the senate committee that the anti-grazing law should be suspendeduntil ranches are put in place saying the law has worsened the clashes between herdsmen and farmers.

ALSO READ: Police IG says Benue should suspend anti-grazing law

Police IG is on a mission to mislead Nigerians - Ortom

In a statement by Terver Akase, media aide to the governor, Ortom was quoted as saying that the police IG is on a mission to mislead the country.

The governor said Idris statement on grazing law shows he is not on the side of innocent Nigerians.

If truly the IGP said what was widely reported by the media, our conclusion is that he is a clear case of a man who is either on a mission to mislead the nation or is complicit in the attacks on Benue communities and the killing of many people by terror herdsmen.

Continuing, Ortom said: With his latest demand that the ranching law of Benue be suspended, it is now clear where the loyalty and interest of the inspector-general of police lies  certainly not with innocent Nigerians.

Little wonder herdsmen still proudly carry out sophisticated weapons and willfully terrorise innocent people in the state without being arrested," the statement read.

IG refused to relocate to Benue as instructed by President Buhari - Ortom

The Benue state governor also noted that he is surprised that contrary to President Buhari's directive that the Police boss should relocate to Benue pending the resolution of the conflict between farmers and herdsmen, the IGP only spent a day in the state.

He said: We wish to place it on record that contrary to the directive by President Muhammadu Buhari that the IGP should relocate to Benue to ensure that the killings stop, the IGP spent only one day in Benue and left for a destination where only he can tell. No one has seen him in Benue since that day.

Benue now has nearly 100,000 internally displaced persons in seven camps established by the state government. We therefore find IG Idris statement as a mockery and a shameful dance on the graves of those killed in the state by herdsmen."

IGP expresses worry over armed militias across Benue

Meanwhile the IGP has been quoted as saying that about 100 people have been arrested in connection with Benue killings.

He reportedly said the suspects have been charged to court.

The IGP also expressed worry over the presence of armed militias across the state, adding that the police would need resources for effective performance.ABC News(WASHINGTON) -- The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee said he thinks its very possible that staff members of GOP Committee Chair Devin Nunes worked with the White House and coordinated the whole effort to declassify and release a GOP memo alleging abuses of government surveillance powers at the FBI and Justice Department.



I think it's very possible his staff worked with the White House and coordinated the whole effort with the White House, Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff of California told ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos on This Week Sunday.



Stephanopoulos asked if such an allegation of coordination could be used to claim an attempt to obstruct justice in the Russia investigation.



Schiff replied, "I don't know whether members of Congress can be part of an obstruction case. ... But the presidents use of this, the presidents decision, for example, Im going to release the memo even though the FBI says its inaccurate, even though the Department of Justice says its reckless -- that could be evidence of the presidents intent to interfere with the investigation."



Nunes, a Republican from California, asserted in a Fox News interview Friday that there was no coordination between his committee and the Trump administration.



Fox News' Bret Baier asked Nunes on Friday, "Did you or anyone on your committee coordinate in any way with President Trump or the administration on the release of this memo? Or with the structure of this memo?" The congressman responded, "No." Nunes added that his committee began investigating possible abuse of surveillance powers by the intelligence community months ago, in the summer of 2017.



On This Week Sunday, Stephanopoulos asked Schiff about Nunes' denial. The Democratic representative noted that the Republican chairman had not made the same assertion about there being no coordination while in committee.



There's a reason, I think, he wouldn't answer that question in committee, Schiff said.



Schiff said the release of the memo looks so much like this earlier effort, which we know was coordinated with the White House by the same chairman."



Schiff was referring to when Nunes was on White House grounds on March 21 to view information related to surveillance connected to the Russia probe.



The four-page memo alleging abuses of government surveillance powers was written by Republican staff of the House Intelligence Committee. The memo was made public after Trump declassified the document and despite the FBI's expressing "grave concerns" about its release.

Copyright  2018, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.Badi MP hopes to uplift her community

Uma Devi Badi of Kailali district has become first ever member of parliament from her community after the Nepali Congress elected her to the Province 7 assembly under the proportional representation category.The Commanding Officer, FOB, Captain Yusuf Idris, disclosed this to newsman on Sunday.

Idris also said that on Saturday his men seized 62 drums of automotive gas oil which were being moved in a wooden boat from Rivers into Akwa Ibom waterway around 5:30 a. m.

According to him, four suspected hoodlums, Nsidebe Monday, 26; David Etim, 31; Oto Bassey, 29, and Benjamin Abia, 40, were apprehended over the illegal bunkering of AGO.

The Commanding Officer said the Nigerian Navy under the present leadership would not relent till the Nigerian waterways are rid of all criminal elements.

He added that his operating base had continued to live up to expectation by the arrests and seizures its officers made in one week.

If you can remember, on Tuesday and Friday, we handed over smuggled bags of rice to the Nigerian Customs Service.

And during that handling over, I made a promise that the Nigerian Navy under the present leadership will not relent till our waterway is rid of all illegality.

Im sure we have lived up to our promise because this week alone, we had made three arrests. We will continue to make more arrests and seizure as long as the criminals are not willing to stop their illegal activities, he said.

He said that the operating base on Friday also seized 271 bags of illegally imported rice from Cameroon during a routine sea patrol at Parrot Island in Mbo LGA around 5:30 a. m.

The commander handed over the products and the suspects to the Comptroller, Eastern Marine Command, Nigeria Customs Service, Mr Ajiya Masaya and to the Divisional Officer in charge of Mbo Division, Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps, Mr James Udeme.

Idris, after he had handed over the suspects and the items to the sister security agencies , assured Nigerians that the Nigerian Navy would continue to follow up every bit of the matter to see that justice is done to the Nigerian state.

He said, I urge you to please take these products and make sure that you follow up for further investigation and possibly prosecution as the Nigerian Navy after handing over will continue to follow up all the cases.

We will follow up not only this one that we have handed over to you but also those handed iver to other agencies.

We will continue to follow up to ensure that justice is done to the Nigerian state so that the country will get to the level of the economic prosperity which she is destined to have.

Mr Majiya Masaya of the Nigeria Customs Service in his response thanked the Nigerian Navy for cooperating with the Nigeria Custom Service to curb the menace of smuggling in the country.

He appealed to Nigerians to help expose the activities of smugglers by giving useful information to security agencies that could lead to the arrest of suspects.

Precisely four days ago, we were here to take delivery of 759 bags of rice recovered from smugglers. Now we have taken delivery of another 271 bags of rice.

We have often said that curbing smuggling is not always the duty of customs alone; our sister security agencies can also help us.

Stop smuggling, engage in legitimate business; if you dont know it, approach any customs formation, it is our own duty to educate you.

We have what is called trade facilitation. Come to our office, we will advise you on what to import and what not to import, he said.

One of the suspects, Nsidebe Monday, told newsman that they arrived Akwa Ibom from Ifoko in Rivers, where they bought the product at N7,000 per drum.The theatre commander, operation Lafiya Dole, Major General Rogers Nicholas, made this known on Saturday, February 3, 2018 in Maiduguri, Borno State.

We have broken the heart and soul of Shekaus group, taking over the camp and its environs," Nicholas boasted while inaugurating the Nigeria-Cameroun Military joint mission.

ALSO READ: Army says Boko haram leader is in terrible state of health

Nicholas also disclosed that troops under the operation DEEP PUNCH II had on Friday, February 2, 2018, dislodged and occupied the insurgents tactical ground Camp Zairo.

My soldiers are in the heart of Boko Haram enclave that is Camp Zairo. The gallant troops have taken total control of Sambisa forest.

They are on the run and we are pursuing them to wherever they go. This time around there is no place for escape anywhere.

ALSO READ: Buhari needs to be more honest about Boko Haram 'defeat'

We had earlier asked those of them that want to surrender to do so and we are still asking them to come out and surrender otherwise they are going to meet it the hard way, he said.

Nicholas used the opportunity to call on the insurgents and abducted persons in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops, promising that they would not be harmed or killed.

Boko Haram members are fleeing their hideouts

Earlier in the week, the Nigerian Army said that Boko Haram members are fleeing their hideouts in the North-East.

The the Director of Army Public Relations, Brig.-Gen Sani Usman, who made this known, also called on Nigerians to report any suspicious movements to security agencies.

Usman said that the terrorists are on the run, adding that they are might hide in nearby communities.

The Army spokesman also said Evidently, the fleeing terrorists will want to take cover and begin to filter into isolated communities."Okorocha made the announcement during the annual Nigerian army west Africa social activities programme.

I will like to announce to you that we have abolished the sales and smoking of Indian hemp and other illicit hard drugs in the state, this has made our youths useless and led them to crime and all other related criminal offences," he said.

The governor further said to further enforce the ban by his government, the Nigerian army and other security agencies should join hands to eradicate sale or smoking of Indian hemp as well as other illicit hard drugs in the state.

ALSO READ: Okorocha says it is better to steal than smoke Indian hemp

"I want to use this medium to appeal to all security operatives in the state especially the army to help enforce these directives so we can help our youths, Okorocha said.

Governor Okorocha warned that anyone caught disobeying the directives will be made to face the wrath of the law.

Okorocha expresses dislike for Indian hemp smokers

On January 28, 2018, Governor Okorocha, in a video released online, said he said that armed robbers are better than people who smoke and sell weed.

He said You all know what the law says about Marijuana(weed)? Weed has killed my Children in Imo state. Anybody selling weed or consuming it, that persons house will be demolished.

Where we are now, it is better for someone to be an Armed Robber than to Smoke weed, Okorocha further said.

OBJ calls for decriminalization of marijuana

In January 2018, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who is the chairman of the West Africa Drugs Commission, recently called for the decriminalization of marijuana.

The former President also suggested that counselling should be adopted.

While speaking with BBC Newsday, Obasanjo, who is the chairman of the West Africa Drugs Commission and a signatory to the report said:

It is essentially a call for what we call decriminalization. If a young man tries to experiment with a wrap of marijuana for instance & because of that we put him in jail" he said.

I was in prison as a political prisoner & I interacted with these people, some of them just for being caught with a wrap of Marijuana, theyre put in jail. They came out of jail more hardened, more hardened criminals than when they went in. Whereas, if they have been treated as they should be treated & if they need attention, theyll be given attention.

They will be looked after, given a clean needle like its been done in some parts of Africa already. Harm reduction & safe places where they can listen to people, they can get attention, they can get counsel. This is the sort of thing we are talking about." further said Obasanjo.

Legalization of marijuana in Africa

Lesotho recently became the first African country to grant a marijuana license it announced in September 2017.

This move makes sense for Lesotho which has a population of just 2 million people. It is landlocked and surrounded by its more famous neighbour South Africa.

Cannabis is the main cash crop of Lesotho. It's climate and vegetation create the perfect conditions for the growth of cannabis. As a matter of fact, most of the marijuana in South Africa is gotten from Lesotho.

This move by Lesotho signals the growth of marijuana in Africa. A decade ago, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) released a report on "Cannabis In Africa".

In the report, 38 million Africans within the ages of 18-64 use marijuana. This number would have surely increased by 2017.

What is the decriminalization of marijuana?

If marijuana is decriminalised, it would mean relaxing or entirely lifting the heavy sanctions placed on the use of the drug by our nation's laws.Babangida denied asking Nigerians not to vote for President Buhari in 2019 saying the statement is not only untrue, it is in its entirety, but an inaccurate representation of his view of the state of Nigeria.

The brief denial reads: "My attention has been drawn to a report making rounds especially online in which I was quoted as advising Nigerians not to vote for President Muhammadu Buhari in the coming 2019 election.

Not only is the said statement untrue, it is in its entirety, an inaccurate representation of my view of the state of our dear Nation."

ALSO READ: Babangida says Buhari should not re-contest in 2019

I know how to reach Buhari if need be - Babangida

Continuing, Babangida said if he needs to communicate with President Buhari he knows the right channel to go through as a former President.

"As a former President and an elder statesman, I have existing communication channels through which I reach out to President Muhammadu Buhari on topical issues of national importance, should there be the need so to do.

The media, both online or mainstream and indeed the unsuspecting public are advised to disregard such false reports," he said.

Babangida authorised the statement - Afegbua

Babangida's denial of the statement allegedly approved by him and released by his spokesman, Kassim Afegbua, has taken a new twist.

Afegbua insisted that the statement as authorised by Babangida stands when he appeared on Sunday Politics, a programme on Channels TV on Sunday, February 4, 2018.

I have been doing this job for about 14 years now. And I have never issued a statement on behalf of the former head of state and he gave a rebuttal. I got authorisation and commitment from him before I issued the statement. It has been in process, he said.

ALSO READ: Read full text of Babangida's advice to Buhari

Afegbua further said: He has called me to say that the statement still stands.

Of course, you know IBB is for everyone. People want to love him more than he loves himself. People want to appreciate him more than he appreciates himself. People want to play the role of IBB.

So when the statement was released, some of his friends saw it and they felt we were trying to put the former president on a collision course with the president. So, they went and did a statement to deny that.

But I have since spoken to him; he called me and said, that statement stands. The kernel of that statement should inform public discourse and not necessarily people personalising it as if it were to be against the sitting president.

So, the statement stands and I have since communicated to all the media houses that they should respect that statement as coming from IBB. It did not emanate from my head. We sat down, we discussed and articulated them, he said.

Babangida overthrew Buhari in 1985

In 1985, retired General Babangida was the Chief of Army Staff and a member of the Supreme Military Council (SMC) under the administration of Major General Muhammadu Buhari.In a recent statement, Babangida asked Nigerians to co-operate with the President until his tenure ends and collectively prepare the way for new generation leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country.

"We need to cooperate with President Muhammadu Buhari to complete his term of office on May 29th, 2019 and collectively prepare the way for new generation leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country," Babangida said.

In a press statement by Babangida's spokesman, by Kassim Afegbua, on Sunday, February 4, 2018, Babangida said it was time to sacrifice personal ambition for the national interest.

Babangida said: In the fullness of our present realities, we need to cooperate with President Muhammadu Buhari to complete his term of office on May 29th, 2019 and collectively prepare the way for new generation leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country. While offering this advice, I speak as a stakeholder, former president, concerned Nigerian and a patriot who desires to see new paradigms in our shared commitment to get this country running.

ALSO READ: Obasanjo attacks Buhari, asks him to step down in 2019

While saying this also, I do not intend to deny President Buhari his inalienable right to vote and be voted for, but there comes a time in the life of a nation, when personal ambition should not override national interest. This is the time for us to reinvent the will and tap into the resourcefulness of the younger generation, stimulate their entrepreneurial initiatives and provoke a conduce environment to grow national economy both at the micro and macro levels.

The next election in 2019 therefore presents us a unique opportunity to reinvent the will and provoke fresh leadership that would immediately begin the process of healing the wounds in the land and ensuring that the wishes and aspirations of the people are realized in building and sustaining national cohesion and consensus, he said.

Buhari has performed below expectation - Obasanjo

Babangida's statement is coming on the heels of aletter by ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo advising Buhari not to seek re-election.

Obasanjo attacked President Buhari's performance and asked him not to seek reelection in 2019 for the good of the country.

The former president made his feelings about Buhari's administration known in a 13-page statement released on Tuesday, January, 23, 2018.

In the statement titled, "The Way Out: A Clarion Call for Coalition for Nigeria Movement", Obasanjo pointed out major failings of the Buhari administration, particularly in the area of economic prosperity.

He said the president has performed below the expectations of Nigerians and asked him to take a backseat in 2019 and help the nation from the sidelines while someone else takes over.

Tunde Bakare, Rev Mbaka have criticised Buhari's performance

Ex-Military President Babangida won't be the first to criticise the performances of President Muhammadu Buhari or advised him not to re-contest in 2019.

Catholic priest, Rev Mbaka and Buhari's one time running mate, Tunde Bakare have at different times criticised Buhari's leadership.

Tunde Bakare on Sunday, January 28, 2018, said the person currently running the affairs of Nigeria is not the Buhari he knew. He went ahead to say Buhari's administration was not what Nigerians hoped for, hence, tagged it a disappointment.

Mbaka on his part said the president is in a horrible bondage and will be voted out by Nigerians come 2019.

Babangida denies statement

Hours after Babangida's statement was released by his media aide, Kassim Afegbua, a terse statement has emerged denying the statement as the position of the ex-military president's media aide.

The statement denied that Babangida asked Nigerians not to vote for President Buhari in 2019 saying the statement is not only untrue, it is in its entirety, but an inaccurate representation of his view of the state of Nigeria.

Babangida overthrew Buhari in 1985

In 1985, retired General Babangida was the Chief of Army Staff and a member of the Supreme Military Council (SMC) under the administration of Major General Muhammadu Buhari.The Guardian reports that the preacher, who once said President Buhari's administration has been a disappointment, made this known at a townhall meeting in London, on Saturday, February 3, 2018.

The presidents health has improvedhe has a right to contest again if he wishes, Bakare reportedly said.

Bakare, who ran with Buhari as a vice presidential candidate in 2011, was also said to have commended ex-President Goodluck Jonathan for conceding the election after a peace deal had been brokered.

The aspiring presidential candidate also said he was happy that Buhari had embraced the need for restructuring while urging the federal government to restructure the country by encouraging each geo-political zone to develop.

ALSO READ: The problem with Pastor Tunde Bakare's presidency declaration

This is not the Buhari I know - Bakare

Speaking on Channels TV on Sunday, January 28, 2018, Bakare said the person currently running the affairs of Nigeria is not the Buhari he knew.

He said, "no matter how you look at it, this is not the government we all hoped for. This is not what we thought the government that promised change in the beginning will perform so woefully. Any right thinking Nigerian will agree with that. They could have done better than what they have done so far. They themselves know that.

"I once did a video, 'The Buhari I know', and I meant every word I said in that video. I hope I will not be pushed to do a video of the Buhari I didn't know".

The man of God further said, "I had no reason at the time I ran with him to ever believe he was nepotic. There was no reason because he did say to me he will assemble the best and the brightest from the East, West, North and South of our country to fix the nation. But when I read what Obasanjo wrote, and I saw the list of key appointments made, one would begin to think whether they just put the things on his table to sign or is this just what he did deliberately. That is food for thought".

Tunde Bakare on restructuring

Bakare said with restructuring, Nigeria can leapfrog within 10 years the phases of industrialisation to become a global industrial powerhouse comprised of six geo-economic zones.

The north-central zone can optimise its mechanised agricultural potential and harness the Rivers Niger and the Benue not just for irrigation but also for hydroponic farming.

It can become a centre of world-class cattle ranching that will quell the menace of herdsmen attacks and also incubate allied opportunities such as meat, milk and leather processing.

The zone can then transit into heavy industries, including steel manufacturing and auto-manufacturing, while also harnessing the rivers as inland waterways and tourist attractions.

Similarly, the North-west zone can harness its vast arable land by deploying land-enhancing technologies for mechanised agriculture and cattle ranching, while also becoming Africas defence manufacturing hub.

With these arrangements, the zone will be providing sufficient competitive impetus to revive its historical potential as a central hub in Africas textile industry.

The North East will have the opportunity to redefine its identity from being a hotbed of insurgency to becoming a hub for cattle ranching, pharmaceutical and construction industries and its unique mineral resources such as clay, limestone and gypsum.

The south-west can revive the vision of the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, it will not just resuscitate its vast industrial and agro-allied manufacturing potential; it can become a global centre for warehousing and world-class sea and airports.

Lagos state can consolidate its position as the African hub of global finance. Nigeria owes this region the urgent activation of the pragmatic approach to restructuring.

This approach will see the zone progressively obtaining autonomy over these resources such that it can house a cluster of refineries and petrochemical industries.

Earlier in 2018, Bakare announced that God instructed him to run president but he did not specify whether he would run in 2019.Sunday's head-to-head showdown is a rerun of the 2013 vote that saw Anastasiades cruise into office amid a financial meltdown in the Greek-majority European Union member.

But, with last week's losing candidates refusing to back either hopeful and apathy rising, it looks set to be closer -- even though the former lawyer remains favourite to secure a second and final five-year term.

"I warmly appeal to every citizen, do not abandon the right to choose who will be the next president," Anastasiades said as he voted in his home town Limassol.

"To abstain is like letting someone else decide for you."

After making his choice on Sunday, Malas insisted "today is the day that young people decide on their future", and pledged support for those still suffering from the economic crisis.

At a polling station in Nicosia the focus was firmly on reunification efforts and the economy.

"I voted for Anastasiades as I think he is the perfect choice to run the country at this time," petrol station owner George Souglis, 73, told AFP.

"In the future he will continue to do a lot on the economy and Cyprus problem."

Not everyone appeared so convinced by the incumbent.

"We need a change," said Nikolas Petros, 67, who had to close his business due to the economic troubles.

"In politics, especially the Cyprus issue, it has just been promises, promises. On the economy we have had too many problems."

Reunification efforts

As always, the nearly 44-year division of the eastern Mediterranean island between the internationally recognised Republic of Cyprus in the south and a Turkish-backed statelet in the north looms large.

Anastasiades, 71, has pledged fresh talks with Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci despite the acrimonious collapse last July of UN-backed negotiations that came closer than ever to sealing a deal.

Dovish former health minister Malas, 50, is one of the loudest proponents for finally reunifying the island and has slammed his opponent for not doing enough to reach an agreement.

The first-round success of the candidates seen as most keen on a deal has sparked hope that progress can be made.

But there remain major obstacles, including over the future of some 40,000 Turkish troops in the north, and deep scepticism that Nicosia or a nationalist government in Ankara are willing to compromise.

"The wider political framework in which this president comes to power is not conducive for a settlement," said University of Nicosia professor Hubert Faustmann.

Economic battle

This time around the economy has been a dominant issue for the roughly 550,000-strong Greek Cypriot electorate as the island recovers from a 2013 financial crisis.

Anastasiades has claimed credit for an impressive recovery since agreeing a harsh 10-billion euro (more than $12-billion) bailout just weeks after taking power.

But major challenges remain despite record numbers of tourists.

The economy is still smaller than before 2013, employment remains around 11 percent and banks are awash with bad loans.

AKEL -- the left-wing party backing Malas -- was in charge ahead of the crisis and is widely held responsible for tanking the economy.

After a lacklustre race, no candidate has captured the imagination of voters -- especially young Greek Cypriots.

There was a record low turnout of just over 71 percent in the first round.

After the first three hours of voting Sunday 10.9 percent of registered voters had cast their ballots.Babangida listed points that prove President Muhammadu Buhari should not run for power in 2019, as well as highlighting his worries in security areas of the country.

Babangida's advice, which is coming after Obasanjo's 13-page strongly worded letter, has been the topic for discourse amongst politicians and President's loyalists.

Here are 10 key points out of many from Babangida's letter:

1. In the fullness of our present realities, we need to cooperate with President Muhammadu Buhari to complete his term of office on May 29th, 2019 and collectively prepare the way for new generation leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country.

2. While saying this also, I do not intend to deny President Buhari his inalienable right to vote and be voted for, but there comes a time in the life of a nation, when personal ambition should not override national interest.

3. In the past few months also, I have taken time to reflect on a number of issues plaguing the country. I get frightened by their dimensions. I get worried by their colourations. I get perplexed by their gory themes. From Southern Kaduna to Taraba state, from Benue state to Rivers, from Edo state to Zamfara, it has been a theatre of blood with cake of crimson. In Dansadau in Zamfara state recently, North-West of Nigeria, over 200 souls were wasted for no justifiable reason. The pogrom in Benue state has left me wondering if truly this is the same country some of us fought to keep together.

ALSO READ: Babangida says Buhari should not re-contest in 2019

4. I am alarmed by the amount of blood-letting across the land. Nigeria is now being described as a land where blood flows like river, where tears have refused to dry up. Almost on a daily basis, we are both mourning and grieving, and often times left helpless by the sophistication of crimes.

5. The Boko Haram challenge has remained unabated even though there has been commendable effort by government to maximally downgrade them. I will professionally advise that the battle be taken to the inner fortress of Sambisa Forest rather than responding to the insurgents ambushes from time to time.

6. In 2019 and beyond, we should come to a national consensus that we need new breed leadership with requisite capacity to manage our diversities and jump-start a process of launching the country on the super highway of technology-driven leadership in line with the dynamics of modern governance.

7. I am particularly enamored that Nigerians are becoming more and more conscious of their rights; and their ability to speak truth to power and interrogate those elected to represent them without fear of arrest and harassment. These are part of the ennobling principles of representative democracy.

8. Modern leadership is not just about fighting corruption, it is about plugging the leakages and building systems that will militate against corruption. Accountability in leadership should flow from copious examples. It goes beyond mere sloganeering.

9. When the ruling party campaigned with the change mantra, I had thought they would device new methods, provoke new initiatives and proffer new ways to addressing some of our developmental problems. By now, in line with her manifesto, one would have thought that the APC will give fillip to the idea of devolution of powers and tinker with processes that would strengthen and reform the various sectors of the economy.

ALSO READ: Read full text of Babangida's advice to Buhari

10. We need new ways and new approaches in our political order. We need a national rebirth. We need a rebranded Nigeria and rebranded politics. It is not so much for the people, but for the institutions that are put in place to promote our political engagements. We must strengthen the one man one vote mantra.

Babangida denies statement

Hours after Babangida's statement was released by his media aide, Kassim Afegbua, a terse statement has emerged denying the statement as the position of the ex-military president's media aide.

The statement denied that Babangida asked Nigerians not to vote for President Buhari in 2019 saying the statement is not only untrue, it is in its entirety, but an inaccurate representation of his view of the state of Nigeria.

Babangida overthrew Buhari in 1985

In 1985, retired General Babangida was the Chief of Army Staff and a member of the Supreme Military Council (SMC) under the administration of Major General Muhammadu Buhari.Nnaji told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday in Enugu that the country is not getting it right on its pursuit for advancement in science and technology.

The former minister, who was speaking on the low capacity of the country to produce artisans, technicians, technologists and scientists, said if well trained, they could invent things to solve local technical or engineering challenges.

He said although the educational system had gone bad, there were a few states making efforts to revamp the educational sector in their states.

In primary school, this is where the whole thing starts; you need to have teachers that can read and write and do arithmetic properly and not teachers that will be teaching children incorrect grammar.

I can tell you that the ugly development is like the prevailing situation now in many state schools.This needs to be corrected.

In teachers training colleges, many of the teachers and people who go there somehow think coming out with certificate is all they need and not learning about teaching, he said.

Nnaji, who is a Professor of Robotic Engineering and Physics, said that a typical Nigerian child has high intelligent quotient but the process of impacting the knowledge had been a problem over the years.The official cabinet agenda says ministers will hear a motion to designate the 15-year-old outpost as a "new community" which will have the necessary building permits and a state budget.

Some 50 families live in the outpost.

Rabbi Raziel Shevah was shot dead near Havat Gilad, where he lived, on January 9.

The following week, Israeli troops searching for his attackers shot dead what they described as a Palestinian suspect in the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank, about 35 kilometres (22 miles) north of Havat Gilad.

They did not, however, catch the man considered to have led the attack on Shevah, 22-year-old Ahmed Jarrar.

The manhunt continued on Saturday with a raid on the village of Burqin. In clashes that erupted there, soldiers shot dead a teenager identified by the Palestinian health ministry as Ahmad Abu Obeid, 19.

At Shevah's funeral, there were calls for "revenge" during a speech by Education Minister Naftali Bennett of the far-right Jewish Home party.

Bennett responded by saying that the only revenge should be in building more settlements, and Netanyahu said Sunday that was one of the planks of his policy.

"Anyone who thinks that through the abominable murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, they would break our spirits... is making a bitter mistake," he said.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and major obstacles to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

But Israel differentiates between settlements it has approved and those it has not.CIAA puts on hold its inquiry into Ncell dividend repatriation

The Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority has halted its probe into the decision of the Nepal Rastra Bank to let Ncell, a private telecom operator, to repatriate its dividend.Myanmar denies the allegation, saying it launched a proportionate crackdown on Rohingya rebels, but has blocked reporters and UN investigators from independently accessing the conflict zone.

On Saturday government media reported that Rakhine state authorities had refuted a recent Associated Press investigation that said testimony from Rohingya refugees and time-stamped cell phone videos revealed the existence of five previously unreported mass graves in Rakhine's Gu Dar Pyin village.

After an inspection of the village, a team of officials, police and locals "refuted the AP report," said the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar.

"The villagers reiterated they had not heard of any massacres near their village," it added.

However, authorities said there had been deadly clashes between security forces and Rohingya militants in the village on August 28, several days after the sweeping military crackdown was launched.

Nineteen "terrorists" were killed in the violence and buried, according to the report, which did not elaborate on the location or nature of the graves.

Myanmar's government spokesperson could not be reached for comment.

Myanmar has overwhelmingly denied any wrongdoing in the Rakhine crackdown, despite a flood of testimony from refugees describing security forces murdering civilians, committing mass rape and torching Rohingya villages to the ground.

Last month the army made a rare admission that four members of the security forces helped kill 10 Rohingya militant suspects on September 2 and left their bodies in a hastily dug pit.But this year is different, and state lawmakers could vote in the coming weeks to give the bridge a less controversial name.

And it all may be because of two new factors in the equation: a bit of legal detective work and the Girl Scouts, hundreds of whom are planning to descend on the Capitol this week to argue that the bridge should celebrate Juliette Gordon Low, the Savannah native who founded their organization.

The Scouts will hold a milk-and-cookies reception at the Capitol on Tuesday, when Ron Stephens, a Republican state representative from Savannah, is expected to introduce a proposal to name the bridge for Low.

In a region known for painful battles over monuments to controversial historical figures, even the persuasive power of Tagalongs and Thin Mints might not win the day, though, except for a recently uncovered quirk of history.

It seems that lawyers have found no proof in state records that the formalities of naming the bridge were ever completed. So, technically, it may not have been the Eugene Talmadge Memorial Bridge in the first place.

Talmadges white supremacist views and staunch segregationism make for a troubling legacy. For example, he vowed to purge the state university system of any employee who supported Negroes in the same schools with white folks in Georgia, a stand that helped cost the states white colleges their accreditation.

He staged an electoral comeback with a pledge to restore all-white primary elections. He used martial law to wage political turf battles, and he was implicated in corruption.

None of that stopped the state from naming a bridge over the Savannah River for Talmadge, a Democrat, in the 1950s, when his son Herman Talmadge was governor.

By the 1980s, that cantilever-truss bridge was posing problems for large new container ships headed for the Port of Savannah.

So the state replaced it in 1991 with the cable-stayed bridge that appears in so many postcards and snapshots today  and kept on using the Talmadge name, perhaps out of no more than habit.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.Other battle-hardened militants, some with training in chemical weapons, are defecting to al-Qaidas branch in Syria. Others are paying smugglers tens of thousands of dollars to spirit them across the border to Turkey, with an eventual goal of returning home to European countries.

The sobering assessments come despite a concerted effort to encircle and annihilate  as Defense Secretary Jim Mattis put it  Islamic State fighters in Raqqa, the groups self-proclaimed capital, which fell in the fall, and pursue other insurgents who fled south into the Euphrates River Valley toward the border with Iraq.

ISIS fighters are fleeing Syria and Iraq, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said in remarks in Washington last week, using an acronym for Islamic State. Jihadis are going underground, dispersing to other safe havens, including on the internet, and returning to their home countries.

Gen. Paul J. Selva, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters last week that the remaining Islamic State leadership, even while on the run, still had fairly robust communications with its shadowy network of fighters now on the lam.

While President Donald Trump highlighted the liberation of almost all of the Islamic States territory in Iraq and Syria in his State of the Union address last week, U.S. military and intelligence officials say the group is still able to inspire and enable followers to carry out attacks. Trump seemed to acknowledge this in his speech, noting, There is much more work to be done.

Analysts say they are also seeing signs that Islamic State fighters are adopting guerrilla tactics to terrorize civilians.

The group is transitioning into an underground organization that places more weight on asymmetric tactics, like suicide bombings against soft targets in government-secured areas like Baghdad, said Otso Iho, a senior analyst at Janes Terrorism and Insurgency Center at IHS Markit in London.

Iho cited an attack by two suicide bombers in Baghdad last month that killed three dozen people and injured 90 more. The attack took place in a busy Baghdad square where day laborers gather to look for work.

Estimates of how many fighters may have escaped into the deserts of Syria or Iraq and beyond are difficult to pin down, but U.S. and other Western intelligence and counterterrorism analysts with access to classified assessments put the number in the low thousands. Many are traveling with spouses and children who are likely to have been radicalized during more than three years of Islamic State control of the region and could pose security risks as well, analysts say.

In December, Col. Ryan Dillon, chief spokesman for the U.S.-led military campaign in Iraq and Syria, said in a briefing with Pentagon reporters: Syrian regime commanders in eastern Syria suggest that ISIS fighters from the Middle Euphrates River Valley may have slipped through porous Syrian and Russian defenses to arrive in areas near Damascus.

Asked late last month by The New York Times about indications that as many as 1,000 fighters and family members had fled the Euphrates River area just in recent days, Dillons command replied in a statement: We know that the Syrian regime has given ISIS the leeway to travel through their area of operations, but we cannot confirm any alleged incidents or operations that are taking place outside our area of operations.

The U.S. military is concerned that a Turkish offensive against the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces in Afrin, in northern Syria, has worsened the problem. The SDF has been working with the Americans in former Islamic State-held areas to interdict fleeing jihadis, but those efforts have been greatly reduced as the Kurds have shifted resources to reinforce Afrin.

Mustafa Balli, a spokesman for the Syrian Democratic Forces headquarters, blamed the Turkish assault on Afrin for what he said was the Islamic States resurgence.

Since this invasion of Afrin by Turkey, ISIS is getting stronger in the south, he said. The battle against ISIS in the south, and the Turks in Afrin, is the same battle. The Turks want to give another chance to ISIS to grow again. Before the Turkish invasion, we were very close to finishing ISIS.

Some 40,000 fighters from more than 120 countries poured into the battles in Syria and Iraq over the past four years, U.S. and other Western officials say. While thousands died on the battlefield, officials say many thousands more probably survived to slip away to conflicts in Libya, Yemen or the Philippines, or have gone into hiding in countries like Turkey. About 295 Americans are believed to have traveled to Iraq or Syria, or tried to, U.S. officials said.

Of more than 5,000 Europeans who joined those ranks, as many as 1,500 have returned home, including many women and children, and most of the rest are dead or still fighting, according to Gilles de Kerchove, the European Unions top counterterrorism official.

The thought that these foreign fighters who have participated in this fight now for over two years will quietly leave Syria and return to their jobs as shopkeepers in Paris, in Brussels, in Copenhagen, is ludicrous, said Selva. Thats a very compelling problem.

Still, the number of Islamic State fighters returning home to Europe and North Africa has been much smaller than anticipated, counterterrorism officials say.

That is in part because the Trump administration intensified its focus on preventing fighters from seeping out of Raqqa and Mosul, their former stronghold in Iraq, and more militants fought to the death than expected. Hundreds also surrendered in Raqqa.

Hundreds of others have been captured and are being held by U.S.-backed Kurdish militias in northern Syria, raising fears among U.S. military officials of potentially creating a breeding ground for extremists  repeating a key security mistake of the Iraq War.

But the new assessments, bolstered by reports from analysts and smugglers in the region, suggest that Islamic State fighters are fleeing to more hospitable parts of Syria and Iraq, or to third countries where they can lie low.

Beyond the recent suicide bombings in Baghdad, a major U.S. airstrike last month demonstrates the Islamic States continued resiliency and threat, military officials said.

Armed Reaper drones and Navy F/A-18 fighters from the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt carried out a strike on Jan. 20 in Al Shafah, Syria, in the Euphrates River Valley, that killed about 150 fighters, the U.S. military said.

The strike, one of the largest single aerial assaults against the Islamic State in three years, was based on intelligence collected over about a week. The strike hit two large buildings that were used as a command headquarters and a media distribution center, military officials said.

The size and concentration of fighters took U.S. officials by surprise. The ISIS headquarters contained a heavy concentration of ISIS fighters who appear to have been massing for movement, Maj. Gen. James B. Jarrard, commanding general for Special Operations forces in Iraq and Syria, said in a statement.

ISIS continues to demonstrate the ability to mass large numbers in its attempt to retain a stronghold in Syria, the U.S.-led command in Iraq said in the same statement.

Ahmad Ramadan, head of the Euphrates Center Against Violence and Terrorism in Istanbul, said that the Islamic State was still present in many villages east of the Euphrates River  the informal demarcation line between Russian-backed Syrian troops to the west and U.S.-backed Syrian militias to the east. ISIS nowadays are spreading all over Syria, he said via Facebook chat.

Government and independent analysts in Syria and in Washington, including the Institute for the Study of War, said there was a thriving trade in smuggling Islamic State fighters across the border into Turkey, where intelligence officials believe they are linking with clandestine cells.

According to the independent British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, senior Islamic State operatives from Raqqa and Deir el-Zour, in the Euphrates River Valley, have paid bribes of $20,000 to $30,000 for safe passage into Turkey.

I smuggled about 50 ISIS fighters into Turkey, said Abu Omar, a smuggler between Syria and Turkey, adding that they were a mix of Syrian and foreign fighters, often disguised in womens clothes to help elude Turkish border patrols.

Abu Omar added that the number of fleeing Islamic State fighters and senior leaders, including many foreigners, increased over the summer when the U.S.-backed offensive against Raqqa began.

I was really shocked when I saw them, he said in a WhatsApp message. They were wearing cool clothes, classic jeans with many necklaces, trying to disguise as much as they can. They hid their passports in their boots. They were completely shaved; you never guess they are ISIS. They didnt speak any Arabic, few words.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.Congress deputes leaders to oversee provincial works

In a temporary arrangement to mobilise the partys provincial structures and to make preparations for the National Assembly elections, the Nepali Congress has deputed Central Working Committee members as its central representatives to the seven provinces.The history of British steam ended fifty years ago on Saturday, August 11, 1968. The curtain went down on the history when a special Fifteen Guinea Special railtour ran over the Settle and Carlisle line.

The special involved no less than four steam locomotives. Black five No. 45110 worked the first leg from Liverpool Lime Street to Manchester Victoria. No. 70013 Oliver Cromwell took over for the run to Carlisle via the S&C. From there 44871 and 44781 provided the traction back to Manchester, where No. 45110 topped the train for the return to Liverpool.

After this, modernisation began with diesel and electric traction now fuelling Britains railway.

To mark the occasion, Pathfinder Tours has arranged to run two trains. The Settle & Carlisle Golden Express is the first train. It will run on the 11th August 2018, the very day the Fifteen Guinea Special ran. The second train will run August 15th.

On the 11th August 2018, the railtour will depart Bristol Temple Meads (diesel hauled) and will call at Bristol Parkway, Cam and Dursley, Cheltenham, Bromsgrove and after tackling the Lickey, Birmingham New Street, Stafford, and Crewe.

Tornado will change over from the diesel haulage part way through the railtour at Preston to tackle the climb to Carlisle.

For timings, fares and more information, see our events page hereProperty details:

Hay Pa #1 - Hassayampa River Features Access - By Foot or Truck Acreage - 20 Acres Water - 3-4 Months Each Year Address City: Walnut Grove/Wilhoit State/county: Arizona Country: United States This Unpatented Mining claim is Located right on the Hassayampa River. You are surrounded by pine trees, scrub oak, mountains, washes and streams. The Access to this claim is very easy! it is only about 50-100 feet off Forest Service Road 72 heading east out of Wilhoit which is about 10 miles from Prescott....

Price: $ 1,950 City: Prescott Type: Unpatented Mining Claim State/Province: Arizona Seller State of Residence: Arizona Location: 863**, Prescott, Arizona

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Read Entire Auction Before Bidding Read Entire Auction Before Bidding. Read TERMS and CONDITIONS. Read Before Bid! This is a CASH SALE! Not for Payments! No Minimum! No Reserve! High Bid Wins This Auction! County Delinquent Tax Sale Mineral Rights on 43.33 Acres, Santa Rosa, Florida Panhandle. (see pics & county info for details) About 43.33 acres of subsurface rights (mineral rights only - land is not included) by Milton, in Santa Rosa County Florida, in a Major Oil Field Area! This is for a li...

Price: $ 355 Seller State of Residence: Florida Property Address: Shell Rd @ 30.614408,-87.077355 State/Province: Florida City: Milton Type: Acreage Zoning: Mineral Rights Zip/Postal Code: 32583 Location: , Fl

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DESCRIPTION: 0.18 Acres of Vacant Land in Apache County, AZ. Parcel number: 107-35-209 Legal Descriptions : CONCHO LAKELAND UNIT 6 Block: 7 Lot: 3 Property Owners Association: none Annual property taxes $7.42 Parcel size: 0.18 Acre(s) GPS Coordinates: 34.303608, -109.625854 Address: County Rd 3540, Concho, AZ 85924 What can you do on/near property? Reside, Camp, dirt activities (bike, atv, etc) Access to property: County Rd 3540 Annual property taxes: $7.42 Title is free and clear Please contact...

Price: $ 199 State/Province: Arizona Seller State of Residence: Nevada Zip/Postal Code: 85924 Property Address: County Rd 3540, Concho, AZ City: Concho Zoning: Agricultural Residential Type: Recreational, Acreage Location: 859**, Concho, Arizona

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0.78 acre in Williams Arizona. Great for second or vacation home. No HOA fees. This is rural land, no utilities. It's about a 20 min drive to downtown Williams,It;s a short drive to the airport, hospital, and grand canyon. You can loo up the property on google earth and Zillow has extensive maps and resent sales. the APN or parcel number is 50305087A the address 181 E Vassar Ave Williams AZ 86046feel free to contact me with questions.. If youve been looking for property with many flexible use...

Price: $ 2,500 State/Province: Arizona Seller State of Residence: Arizona Zip/Postal Code: 86046 Property Address: 181 E Vassar ave Williams AZ 86046 Zoning: rural Type: Homesite, Lot Location: 860**, Williams, Arizona

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We're sorry, this article is not currently availableReality TV World is now available on the all-new Google News app and website. Click here to visit our Google News page, and then click FOLLOW to add us as a news source!Dolakha hosts national festival dedicated to conservation of owls

Owls are one of the highly vulnerable species of bird in the country with an estimated 2,000 being illegally trafficked from Nepal every year, a study has found.Dress code for Province 2 MPs

An all party meeting called by the office of Governor of Province 2 on Thursday has passed a dress code for lawmakers.First Provincial Assembly meeting begins in 4 provinces

The first Provincial Assembly meeting began in four provinces on Sunday.The change in policy for the three companies, from listing to merger, shows the level of discomfort within the government about their ability to take on the expanded load for insurance coverage with their current financial strength, including the massive premium and claim settlement cover under the proposed universal health coverage plan announced in Budget 2018.

Illustration: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com

The governments announcement in the Union Budget on Thursday to merge three State-owned general insurance companies -- National Insurance, Oriental Insurance and United India Insurance -- has caught the sector regulator Insurance Regulatory Development Authority of India (IRDAI) by surprise.

In the Budget for FY16, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had announced plans to list the three companies on the bourses. Thursdays announcement reverses the position.

The change in policy for the three companies, even as they were caught off-guard, shows the level of discomfort within the government about their ability to take on the expanded load for insurance coverage in the economy with their current financial strength.

One of those responsibilities will be to provide the massive premium and claim settlement cover under the proposed universal health coverage plan announced in Budget 2018.

In the pecking order of general insurance companies in India, New India Assurance is the runaway leader.

While United India and National Insurance occupy the second and third slots, respectively, in terms of gross premium generated, Oriental has slipped behind ICICI Lombard to occupy the fifth place, according to the IRDAI data for up to December 2017.

These State-owned companies will have to take on the bulk of the business in the biggest takeaway from the Budget FY19.

Their current market share of non-life business is just below 30 per cent.

Yet none of these three companies is financially healthy to take on the role.

According to the standards set by the IRDAI, the companies have to maintain a solvency ratio of 1.5.

The ratio measures to what extent an insurance company has capital to meet claims from all the business it has covered.

But all the three companies have slipped below the prudent limit set by the watchdog.

It is one of the reasons the three have not been able to approach the markets for public listing.

A lower-than-prescribed ratio means the company should not underwrite fresh business.

R Chandrasekharan, secretary general of the General Insurance Council, the umbrella body of the sector, said the move would help consolidation in the sector.

The market has grown big with lots of entities. It is not necessary for the government companies to compete among themselves to guide the market.

"Merger and subsequent listing would help.

National Insurance has just returned to a higher-than-prescribed level in FY17.

The only exception is New India (set up by Tata group till nationalisation in 1972).

It is the outlier among the State-owned general insurance companies, with a solvency ratio of 2.22.

But it too has not caught the markets attention after listing.

While its shares opened at Rs 667.95 on Friday, the price slipped by over 2 per cent since then on the NSE to close at Rs 653.05.

An official said the sustained weakness of these companies made the finance ministry change its stance about the appropriate policy for them to adopt.

The plans for listing have consequently been dropped.

The ministry was also quite hamstrung on the level of consultations it could hold with the regulator in the run-up to the Budget on the subject.

T S Vijayan, chairman of the IRDAI, retires in February, and the government is expected to announce his successor soon.

Vijayan does not enjoy the best of equations with the government and has been sidelined from key decisions.

It is understood that the plans for universal health insurance coverage did not go through his office.

The finance ministry has in any case kept the operation of the mega social insurance schemes -- Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana and Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana or the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana -- out of the ambit of regulations of the IRDAI.

In FY 17, the general insurers have collected total premium of Rs 1.27 lakh crore against Rs 96,400 crore in FY16.

The premium of the government-mandated insurance schemes is about a quarter of this pie.

So, the level of exclusion for the sector regulator is unprecedented for any other sector in India.

Chairmen of two of the State-owned companies have said they were not in the loop about the health insurance schemes.

No representatives from the general insurance company were called for the pre-Budget meeting of the finance minister and the banks and financial institutions held in December 2017.

One of the biggest challenges for the three companies in the merger process would be to get their IT systems to harmonise with each other.

Unlike the State Bank of Indias associate banks, which had long ago moved to the same IT platform, these companies have entirely different systems.

Work on getting those in the three insurance companies to sync with each other will have to predate other aspects of integration.India's most wanted terrorist Dawood Ibrahim has been reportedly linked to a series of properties across the United Kingdom, according to a UK media report.

The UK newspaper compared the details from documents prepared by Indian authorities related to the records held by UK's Companies House, Land Registry and the Panama Papers.

The documents also alleged that Ibrahim's right-hand man Muhammed Iqbal 'Mirchi' Memon amassed huge properties in the UK, such as hotels, mansions and houses in South-East England.

Memon, also a suspect in the 1993 Mumbai attacks, had sought refuge in London after the blasts and attempts to extradite him to India had failed.

Memon held at least 11 company directorships in tiling, construction and lettings firms in the UK before he died in 2013 after suffering a heart attack.

He had consistently denied his involvement in Ibrahim's cartel.

Ibrahim, who has an Interpol red corner notice against him, has been on the UK Treasury sanctions list for the last many years with three addresses registered in Pakistan.

The UK law has extended its recovery powers to cover "politically exposed persons", from non-European Union (EU) countries.

The financial sanctions in the UK prohibit the transfer of funds to a sanctioned country and target asset freezes on individuals.

Individuals who are caught or suspected in any involvement in bribery or corruption with unaccounted wealth should give a genuine explanation on the source of the property, else they will be heavily fined or sent to jail or both.

According to the UK government's estimates, about 90 billion pounds in unaccounted wealth is laundered in the country every year.Continuing its probe into covert activities of Lashkar-e-Tayiba, the National Investigation Agency has arrested a man hailing Bihar in the national capital, its official spokesman said in New Delhi on Sunday.

Alam is the fourth person to be arrested by the NIA in the case which was registered in December last year following the arrest of Abdul Nayeem Sheikh, a resident of Maharashtra.

The accused was produced before a designated court which remanded him in two days' police custody, the spokesman said.

Besides Sheikh and Alam, the other two arrested in the case are Dhannu Raja, a resident of Gopalganj in Bihar, and Touseef Ahmed Malik, a resident of Pulwama in Jammu and Kashmir.

According to the NIA spokesman, Alam had facilitated and provided logistic, financial support and shelter to Shaikh, who was an active cadre of LeT, a proscribed terrorist organisation, and visited and established bases in Bihar, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir on the advice of his handler based in Pakistan.

Mahfooz also facilitated raising, receiving and collecting fund by Shaikh through International Money Transfer Services such as Western Union Money Transfer by providing his identity documents. These funds were to be later used for carrying out terrorist activities by Shaikh Abdul Nayeem, the NIA spokesman said.

His interrogation led to raids by the NIA at various places in Uttar Pradesh's Muzaffarnagar on two Hawala operators Dinesh Garg and Adesh Kumar Jain, the spokesman said.

During the search of the shop and residence of Garg, the NIA team seized around Rs 15 Lakh in cash, two currency note counting machines, one Indian-made pistol with ammunition, one laptop, four mobile phones, and various documents.

The recoveries made from the residence and shop of Jain includes cash (Indian currency) Rs 32.84 lakh, one Chinese-made pistol with ammunition, some documents containing mobile numbers of associates, currency notes of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, USA, Japan, Thailand, Oman, and electronic devices including two laptops and three mobile phones.

The names of these two hawala operators had surfaced in the chain of terror financing channel of the LeT module being investigated by the NIA, the spokesman said.

The case started after the arrest of Sheikh, a resident of Aurangabad, from Lucknow in November last year and during investigation it was found that he had spent some time in trouble-torn south Kashmir and taken pictures of some Army installations, officials said.

The central security agencies, which interrogated Sheikh at length, had told the investigators about his accomplice, Tauseef Ahmed Malik, in Pulwama district of south Kashmir. He was placed under arrest by the NIA on December 9.

During interrogation, Sheikh disclosed that he had stayed in Pulwama, moved to various places with the help of Malik and even photographed some Army and para-military camps, the officials claimed.

Sheikh, who was wanted in connection with a 2014 terror case and had been on the run, told investigators that some important power projects and railway tracks in the valley were surveyed, they said.

He had also visited some places in Himachal Pradesh, especially Kasol, which is frequented by Israeli nationals visiting India, according to the officials.

Security agencies have claimed that Sheikh was roped in for a recce mission similar to that undertaken by David Headley, a Pakistan-American, who is at present serving a prison sentence of 35 years at a US jail for his involvement in terror activities and the 26/11 Mumbai attacks of 2008.IMAGE: Prime Minister Narendra Modi addresses a rally in Bengaluru. Photograph: Shailendra Bhojak/PTI Photo

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday redefined what he means by the term 'TOP' priority of the National Democratic Alliance government led by him.

TOP means Tomato, Onion and Potato, he said at a public rally to mark the culmination of Karnataka BJP's 'Parivarthana Yatra' that crisscrossed the entire state covering all the 224 assembly constituencies.

Modi said, "Those growing vegetables and fruits are among our top priority. When I say TOP, I mean whichever part of the country you go, three vegetables are very much visible -- Tomato, Onion and Potato."

"That's why I call TOP Priority. T for Tomato, O for Onion and P for potato, that makes TOP priority."

He explained that these three TOP staples found across the country symbolised his government's initiative called 'Operation Greens' to improve the living condition of farmers.

Keeping these growers in mind, Operation Greens has been announced in the budget, he said.

Just as AMUL enhanced farmers' income, Operation Greens would prove beneficial for vegetable growers, the prime minister said.

He assured farmers that BJP state president B S Yeddyurappa would earmark Rs 1 lakh crore to improve the irrigation system in Karnataka if he becomes the chief minister after the assembly elections.

Tearing into the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka, Modi chided it for setting "new records" in corruption and asserted that the countdown for its exit has begun.

"The Congress government is at the exit gate," Modi said, as he mounted an all-out attack on the Congress rule, dubbing it a "10 per cent commission government" and saying criminals were ruling the roost under it.

Students sell pakodas near Modi's rally venue in B'luru A group of college students, donning degree robes and selling 'pakodas' to passers-by in a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's remarks over job creation, were whisked away by the police, hours before the PM's rally in Bengaluru. The students appeared near the Mehkri Circle, a few metres away from Palace Ground where Modi was scheduled to address the rally, in protest against his recent remarks linking pakoda selling and job creation. On being asked about inadequate job creation in the last four years in a recent interview to a news channel, the prime minister had said that a person selling pakodas outside their (channel's) television studio and earning Rs 200 a day should also be perceived as 'employed'. The young students sold 'Modi Pakodas', 'Amit Shah Pakoda' and 'Dr Yeddy Pakodas', a reference to Karnataka BJP chief Yeddyurappa, to those passing by, including the BJP workers and visitors on their way to the rally. The police later removed the degree robes of the protesting students and took them into custody. Photograph: ANI

Modi also referred to the spate of killings of BJP and Hindu activists, an issue the party has brought to the focal point of its discourse, saying, "ease of doing murders" was being discussed in the state while his government talked about ease of doing business.

Slamming the government on the law and order front, Modi said, "instead of the rule of law, the criminals are ruling the roost."

The BJP had ruled the state from 2008 to 2013, marked by internal squabbles that saw three chief ministers, including B S Yeddyurappa, who quit on graft charge.

The BJP has set a target to win 150-plus seats for the coming polls.

Karnataka is the second major state after Punjab where the Congress is ruling, with the BJP going all out to unseat it in the assembly polls as part of its "Congress Mukht Bharat" mission.

Asserting that there was a "saffron wave" in the state, Modi said people of Karnataka had decided to make the state Congress free and to get rid of Congress culture.

"The Congress government is a 10 per cent government,where no work happens without paying a commission of 10 per cent.It is a matter of shame if this becomes the identity of a government," he said.

Charging that the state "is setting new records in corruption," Modi said, "Congress free government means freedom from dynastic rule, nepotism, corruption and loot."

He also referred to the IT raids at the residences of two state ministers recently and that a raid on a senior Congress leader revealed Benami property and said "there are steel mafia, sand mafia and transfer mafia' in the state."

"Some people hatched a conspiracy to pocket crores of rupees in the name of building a steel bridge. Due to public outrage and BJP's protest, the project was dropped,"Modi said.

He was referring to a steel bridge project in the city at a major traffic junction, which was scrapped after public protest.

Referring to a spate of killings of activists of BJP and Sangh Parivar, he said a number of workers associated with BJP and its affiliated organisations have been murdered.

"It is an assault on the social fabric. I appeal to the people of Karnataka to vote against the government which attacks the social fabric of the state."

Modi said, "I am seeing that Karnataka has decided to free Karnataka from Congress. To free from Congress' culture, from society, from public life, from politics."

The Congress had "ruined" the society, culture and politics, he said, adding, "I can see that the BJP government in Karnataka is not far away."

While referring to the law and order situation, Modi said on the one hand, BJP at the Centre was trying to take India forward, while on the other in Karnataka "there is such a government that there is a reverse flow."

He said criminals are ruling the roost in Bengaluru.

"In Bengaluru also criminal elements have caused worry to the common man. You might have felt this," he said.

Modi said "in the whole world there is discussion about ease of doing business and there are efforts in that direction. Our government is making efforts for the ease of doing business and talking about ease of living."

"But with the Congress government in Karnataka, here there are discussions regarding ease of doing murders," he said.

The BJP government means only development while the Congress government means corruption, appeasement, casteism and nepotism, Modi said.

Accusing the Congress of practising "appeasement politics" on the issue of triple talaq, Modi said, "Congress' vote bank politics has once again come before Muslim women to take away their rights."

"The Congress is trying to hang a bill related to triple talaq", he said, also pointing to Congress opposition to grant constitutional status to the OBC commission.

"To take the country to new heights we want to take everyone together and move forward..... Hundreds of lotuses will bloom in Karnataka from the sludge that is spread by Congress. I have confidence that BJP will get a resounding victory," Modi said in Kannada.The two senior most leaders of the Communist Party of India-Marxist are at the loggerhead over alliance or adjustment with the Congress.

With cracks appearing in the Communist Party of India-Marxist over the issue of going for an adjustment with the Congress to counter the Bharatiya Janata Party, the leadership is trying to walk a middle path to avoid a likely split in the party in the next party congress.

The CPI-M central committee meeting in Kolkata on January 21 had voted against a draft political resolution, pitched by its General Secretary Sitaram Yechury proposing alliance with the Congress.

The party had adopted a draft resolution favoured by those supporting politburo member Prakash Karat ruling out any form of electoral alliance or adjustment with the Congress.

"The difference within the party, especially between two senior most leaders is sending out a wrong message about the party in public. We need to solve this urgently," CPI-M politburo member Hannan Mollah told PTI.

According to CPI-M sources, the leadership is trying to take a middle path where both the warring factions can be brought to peace by "adopting a political resolution" which can have a "window for some sort of adjustments" with secular forces including the Congress.

A senior CPI-M leader said the ongoing battle of ideas within the party can be termed as a fight between "pragmatic" CPI-M represented by Yechury and "dogmatic" CPI-M represented by Karat.

The cracks within the party came out in the open when Yechury openly stated that he had expressed his desire to quit his post, a claim denied by Karat.

Yechury along with a large section of leaders from Bengal have been vocal about the adjustment with Congress to stop the BJP.

But his political line has been vehemently opposed by Karat, known as a hardliner in the party.

Former CPI-M central committee member and Lok Sabha speaker Somnath Chatterjee felt that the decision of not going for an adjustment with the Congress will prove to be another blunder in the future.

"I feel very sad after seeing what is happening. The party has committed many blunders from not allowing Jyoti Basu to become Prime Minister in 1996, to not joining the government in 2004. This will be another blunder," he said.

"We have a clear understanding about the menace of the BJP. The Tripura unit is also having a taste of the BJP's divisive politics. But despite attacks of the RSS, the Kerala unit is yet to understand the magnitude of the threat the BJP poses," a CPI-M central committee member said on condition of anonymity.

Although the CPI-M is divided over adjustment with the Congress, its allies like the CPI is in favour of broader unity of secular forces including the Congress.

"We feel that there should be broader unity of secular and democratic forces including the Congress to stop the march of the BJP," CPI leader D Raja said.

Other Left allies the RSP and the Forward Bloc are yet to take a call on this issue.

Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh had criticised the CPI-M for adopting a draft political resolution ruling out adjustment with the Congress.

"The BJP is the biggest threat the country is presently facing and all the secular and democratic forces should unite with the Congress to counter it," Ramesh had told PTI.

Congress appeals Karat to drop 'no alliance' line

Maharashtra Congress chief Ashok Chavan has appealed to Karat to reconsider his resolution of "no alliance" with the party in the larger interest of the country ahead of the Left party's general session in April.

Appealing to Karat to do a rethink on his resolution of "no alliance and no cooperation" with the Congress, Chavan said "any prick lines with the Congress can always be sorted out".

In a move aimed at consolidating anti-BJP parties ahead of 2019 polls, Chavan also asked Bharip Bahujan Mahasangh president and Dalit leader Prakash Ambedkar to drop his anti-Congress pitch while dubbing him as an "erudite leader of the Dalits after B R Ambedkar".

In a blog on Saturday, Chavan said it was "flummoxing " that when comrade Yechury and comrade Raja walked shoulder to shoulder with other opposition leaders in the "save the Constitution" march, the Congress became "untouchable" for comrade Karat at this critical juncture.

Chavan was referring to the march which was held in south Mumbai on January 26 and was attended by Left leaders, Janata Dal-United rebel Sharad Yadav, National Conference's Omar Abdullah, Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar and others.

"I can only pray that he (Karat) does a rethink before his party's general session in April, where his resolution will be ratified or rejected, in the larger interest of the country. Any prick lines with the Congress can always be sorted out," the former chief minister said.

He also took an apparent jibe at Ramdas Athawale, the Union minister of state for social justice in the NDA government.

"Prakash Ambedkar is emerging as an erudite leader of the Dalits after Babasaheb Ambedkar. He is astute, educated, sophisticated and presentable.

"It is these qualities that make him stand apart from those who claim to be champions of the Dalit cause but have fallen for allurement and largesse of BJP," Chavan said.

Athawale's RPI-A has the largest following among the Dalits in Maharashtra who are divided in various factions.

"I have personally witnessed how they lost their trustworthiness and are being hated by the Dalit community. This is the time when Prakashji needs as many friends as possible across the political spectrum to consolidate his position," Chavan said.

He also showered praises on Prakash Ambedkar, the grandson of B R Ambedkar, but expressed dissatisfaction over his decision of staying away from the march.

He said the march was not the occasion to display the "discomfort" Prakash Ambedkar had with certain leaders.

"It (the march) was an expression of disenchantment with current rulers and solidarity with the Constitution. Why shy away from shaking hands with the Congress to begin with," he said.

"I'm sure Prakash Karat and Prakash Ambedkar are both bright enough to distinguish who the real enemy is and how any rigid stance may eventually help the monster grow," the Nanded MP said.

Today, we are witnessing what can be described as butchering of innocent people on the false notions of nationalism, he alleged.

"Disastrous economic policies and immature financial decisions have wrecked havoc on the life of workers farmers and lower middle class," Chavan said.

In a bid to reach larger constituency, Chavan said the "religious supremacy" was thrust upon the country.

He alleged that the unchecked arrogance of the current dispensation had reached its peak and religious supremacy was being thrust upon the country.

Minorities and Dalits were being treated as secondary citizens and even ministers were saying that they had assumed power to alter India's secular constitution, Chavan said.

The Congress is trying to bring together opposition parties on a wider anti-BJP platform in a bid to pose a formidable challenge to the saffron party in the 2019 elections.

Image: Senior Communist leaders Debabrata Biswas, Sitaram Yechury, A B Bardhan, D Raja and Prakash Karat during a rally in New Delhi in July, 2008. Photograph: Adnan Abidi/ReutersGyawali says Modi will visit Nepal after Oli takes helm of govt

CPN-UML Secretary Pradip Gyawali claimed Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Nepal soon after party Chairman KP Sharma Oli becomes the countrys next prime minister.Indian national arrested for possession of drugs

Police on Sunday arrested an Indian national along with illegal drugs at Nagdhunga.TORRINGTON  Prime Time House, Inc. recently hired Christina Emery as Executive Director to lead the agency in its mission to support adults living with mental illness in Northwest Connecticut.

I speak for the entire board of directors when I express how fortunate we feel that Christina is the new executive director of Prime Time House, said board president Susan Rea, in a written statement. She is a seasoned leader who believes in collaboration, has strong ties to the Torrington community, and is sensitive to the challenges faced by our members and our organization. We are confident that she will move our organization forward in the years to come.

Emery brings extensive leadership experience including non-profit, government, economic development and entrepreneurial enterprise to the position. Emery comes to Prime Time House from The Arc of Litchfield County (LARC), in Torrington where she served as secretary, vice president and president of the board before accepting the position of Director of Development in 2012.

I am committed to advocating on behalf of our most vulnerable citizens to ensure they are able to fully participate in the community, Emery said in the statement. It is a privilege to join Prime Time House as we collaborate with others to promote awareness of mental illness and help our members lead productive and independent lives.

Emery formerly served as a Selectman for the Town of Harwinton; as Interim Executive Director for the Torrington Development Corporation; and as Director of Economic Development for the City of Torrington. Emery has served her community in a variety of volunteer positions including board member for the Torrington Development Corporation, volunteer for the United Way of Northwest Connecticut, and a member of the Government Relations Committee for the NW CT Chamber of Commerce.

Emery earned a bachelor of arts degree in economics and management from Simmons College and a masters degree in public policy from Trinity College. She also attended the Washington Semester Program in Economic Policy at American University.

Prime Time House, Inc. is a nonprofit human service agency that provides community based rehabilitation services to people who suffer with severe mental illnesses. Helping people lead more productive lives through education, employment and safe, decent and affordable housing is its mission. Prime Time House has served 19 communities in Litchfield County since 1988.

Palmer appointed Dymax director of business development

TORRINGTON  Dymax Corporation is pleased to announce the appointment of Robert Palmer as the new Director, Business Development - Electronics, Global. While reporting to Dymax Business Development Officer, Jason Maupin, Palmer will be responsible for leading the global business development and product leadership efforts through the development of new strategic global accounts, market segments, and application areas in the electronics market.

Recently, Palmer was director of Global Marketing for Henkel located in Irvine, CA - where he was responsible for the global Industrial Electronics business. Having spent the past 20 years in the electronics market, Palmer has held a variety of business management roles throughout his career across a broad range of electronics segments with a focus on driving innovation, developing strategy, and delivering sales/profit growth.

Dymax Corporation develops innovative oligomer, adhesive, coating, dispensing, and light-curing systems for applications in a wide range of markets including aerospace, appliance, automotive, electronics, industrial, medical device, and metal finishing. For additional information, visit www.dymax.com.

DAmico receives advanced surgery permit

TORRINGTON - Jennifer A. DAmico, D.P.M., fellowship-trained surgical podiatrist of Litchfield Hills Orthopedic Associates, has recently been granted an advanced ankle surgery permit by the State of Connecticut Department of Public Health.

This new surgery permit enables DAmico to expand her services to include a wider variety of advanced techniques and procedures to treat injuries and conditions of the foot and ankle. She sees patients at the practices locations in Torrington and Bristol.

With the advanced ankle surgery permit from the State of Connecticut Department of Public Health, DAmico will be able to perform ankle fracture fixation, ankle fusion, ankle arthroscopy and other advanced ankle procedures. Prerequisites include the completion of a three-year, Council on Podiatric Medical Education-accredited residency program in podiatric medicine and surgery and satisfactory documentation of prior training and experience in standard or advanced midfoot, rearfoot and ankle procedures.

It is an honor to earn this privilege and be able to expand the scope of my practice, DAmico said in a written statement. As a podiatric surgeon, I am dedicated to continually advancing my knowledge and skills in order to offer the latest foot and ankle procedures and the highest level of care so I can help my patients get back on their feet.

To learn more about the practice and its doctors, visit www.LHOA.com.

Colebrook Preservation Society receives foundation grant

COLEBROOK - The Colebrook Preservation Society (CPS) recently received a $24,000 grant from the Draper Foundation Fund, a fund of the Northwest Connecticut Community Foundation, to pay for work on the restoration of the Colebrook Store, owned by the non-profit CPS.

We are deeply grateful to the Draper Foundation Fund for its continuing support of the stores restoration, said Ed Lord, president of CPS, in a written statement. This year especially, we had an urgent need for funding to replace the stores failed septic system, making the grant that much more important and timely.

Lord noted that the stores restoration is nearly complete. The work would not have been possible without the help of the Draper Foundation and other significant support from members of the community, and the CPS board, he said. The sense of purpose and community exhibited during the past three years of restoring the store has been incredible.

To date, $250,000 has been invested in the store, including its purchase, for stabilization of the foundation, new roof, new cooking range exhaust system, new windows, new siding, paint, interior renovations, including a public bathroom, insulation, shoring up the flooring system, and exterior excavation and stonework, among other work.

The last significant piece of the restoration was the unexpected need to replace the stores septic system, which failed in November and added more than $35,000 in costs. The Draper money, timely support from the community and the cooperation of the town made the new system possible before the hard winter set in.

The Colebrook store is located at the intersection of 183 and 182A in Colebrooks historical district. Tax deductible donations are welcome and can be sent to The Colebrook Preservation Society, P.O. Box 24, Colebrook, CT 06021.

Geer Village has new staff members

CANAAN  The Board of Directors and Kevin OConnell, CEO of Geer Village are excited to introduce some new staff members.

Robert Powers of Winsted is now the Administrator of Geer Village Nursing and Rehabilitation Center. After beginning his career in Sales and Project Management, Powers returned to school to receive his graduate certificate in Long Term Healthcare Management from UCONN. He began his Administrator in Training Internship at Geer in 2014 and since then has gained a vast amount of experience in Nursing and Rehabilitation Administration. Powers can be reached at (860) 824-3868 or rpowers@geercares.org

Kevin OConnell previously acted as both the Nursing Administrator and the CEO of Geer. He will continue as CEO and lead the Geer Village Lodge, the Assisted Living Residence. He can be reached at (860) 824-2638 or koconnell@geercares.org

Mark Kovitch, CPA of Bristol is now the Chief Financial Office for Geer Village Senior Community. For the past 16 years, Mark was the CFO for Key Human Services, a multi-state nonprofit agency providing community support programs for disabled people. Prior, Mark worked for private Accounting Firms. Mark is a member of the Greater Hartford Legal Aid Foundation as well as the American Institute of CPAs, Connecticut Society of CPAs and the National Society of Accountants. Mark can be reached at (860) 824-3860 or mkovitch@geercares.org

Mark replaces Bob Cimini as CFO, who has semi-retired but will stay on part time to ensure a smooth transition and assist with special projects.

Brian J. Sullivan of Southbury is Geers new Transportation Manager. In this newly created position, Brian will be responsible to oversee all the transportation that Geer provides. Brian has spent much of his career in the aviation business managing small airports with shuttle services. Additionally, Brian has managed construction projects in a multi-state area. Brian can be reached at (860) 453-4202 or bsullivan@geercares.org

Winvian receives states only AAA Five Diamond designation

MORRIS  For the 8th consecutive year, Winvian of Morris has earned a Five Diamond Award for its unusual 113-acre property with 19 cottages featuring varying themes. The property joins nine other properties in the state  with five in Litchfield, New Haven, and Fairfield Counties  that AAA has recognized for world-class service, facilities, and amenities.

Attaining a AAA Four or Five Diamond rating is an accomplishment that signifies meticulous attention to detail, creativity in enhancing comfort, outstanding service and memorable guest experiences. Such properties undergo a number of checks including in-person inspections, anonymous overnight stays and finally a review by a panel of experts to ensure credibility.

The newest addition Connecticuts ring of Diamond properties is The Madison Beach Hotel, Curio Collection by Hilton. The elegant spa resort at 94 West Wharf Road, Madison, overlooks Connecticut southeastern shoreline.

These Connecticut properties are truly the best of the best and were quite fortunate to have five Diamonds right here in our own AAA backyard, said Fran Mayko, AAA Northeasts spokesman. And were quite fortunate to have five of the nine Diamonds right in AAA Northeasts backyard. AAA Northeast serves members in Litchfield, Fairfield, and New Haven Counties.

In addition to Winvian and The Madison Beach Hotel, other Diamond properties in AAA Northeasts territory include The Homestead Inn, Greenwich, that has earned a Four Diamond for 14 consecutive years; Delamar Southport, for 7 years; Hyatt Regency - Greenwich, for 6 years; and The Mayflower Grace, Washington, for 3 years.

Other properties in the rest of the state, outside AAA Northeast territory include: Mohegan Sun, Uncasville for 16 consecutive years; Saybrook Point Inn & Spa, Old Saybrook, 16 years; Grand Pequot Tower at Foxwoods, 15 years; and The Fox Tower at Foxwoods, 9 years.

Each year, AAA inspectors visit nearly 28,000 establishments across the United States, Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean, using the Diamond rating system to guide AAA members when choosing places to stay and eat. Of that number, just 0.4% receives the prestigious Five Diamond Award; while 6% receive a Four Diamond. Currently, 121 properties in the US, Canada, and the Caribbean hold the coveted Five Diamond rating and 1,676 hotels hold the Four Diamond rating.

Riverton Self Storage is also U-Haul dealer

RIVERTON  U-Haul Company of Connecticut recently announced that Riverton Self Storage has signed on as a U-Haul neighborhood dealer to serve the Riverton community.

Riverton Self Storage at 2 School St. will offer U-Haul trucks, trailers, towing equipment, moving supplies and in-store pick-up for boxes.

The arrival of U-Haul Truck Share 24/7 is revolutionizing the moving industry through its more convenient, more secure way to pick up and return a truck. U-Haul live verification technology allows rental transactions to be carried out entirely on a smartphone at any hour - day or night. There are no membership fees. Simply visit uhaul.com to create an online account.

Normal business hours are 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Wednesday and Friday and 8:30 a.m.-3 p.m. Saturday. After-hours drop-off is available for customer convenience. Reserve U-Haul products at this dealer location by calling 860-469-4438 or visiting https://www.uhaul.com.

Riverton Self Storage owner Brian Riva said he is proud to team with the industry leader in do-it-yourself moving and self-storage to better meet the demands of Litchfield County.

At Riverton Self Storage, take your picture in front of a U-Haul product, send it in and your face could land on the side of a U-Haul truck. Upload your photo through Instagram using #uhaulfamous, or go to www.uhaulfamous.com to submit photos and learn more.Kalanki underpass will be ready in 5 months

The 800-metre underpass, which is currently being built between Khasibazaar and Bafal Chowk along the Ring Road, is expected to come into operation within five months, according to project officials.HARTFORD  Representatives from the Northwest Corner in Connecticut will join community leaders from across the country at Capitol Hill on Wednesday, Feb. 7 to meet with U.S. Senators and representatives from nearly 50 states to educate them about critical substance abuse issues.

These Congressional meetings were scheduled as a part of CADCAs (Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America) 28th Annual National Leadership Forum, the nations largest training event for substance abuse prevention and treatment professionals.

We are so excited to have the opportunity to head to Capitol Hill and share our concerns and data with our Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Chris Murphy (D-CT). said Christina Khounsombath from the McCall Center for Behavioral Health in Torrington, and an active member of the Northwest Corner Prevention Network, in a written statement. I plan to return to our community reenergized and ready to continue to advance our prevention advocacy efforts.

Capitol Hill Day is a vital opportunity for forum attendees to communicate directly with their representatives to educate them about the successes and challenges facing our field and reiterate what legislators can do to advance prevention efforts, said Gen. Arthur T. Dean, CADCA Chairman & CEO. We are bringing the boots on the ground to Upper Senate Park and Capitol Hill with the knowledge of what communities are facing every day in this drug crisis and partnering with our nations legislators for prevention.

Capitol Hill Day kicks off with a plenary session and roundtable discussion followed by a rally at Upper Senate Park, intended to raise awareness about the importance and impact of substance use prevention generally and community coalitions specifically in reducing the pipeline to addiction. Several distinguished members of Congress will provide remarks at each event. The day concludes with Congressional appointments for Forum attendees to interact directly with Senate and Congressional representatives. CADCAs National Leadership Forum is a four-day event packed with opportunities to learn the latest strategies to address substance abuse and hear from nationally-known prevention experts, federal administrators, and concerned policymakers. Forum brings together attendees representing coalitions from all regions of the country and internationally, government leaders, youth, prevention specialists, addiction treatment professionals, addiction recovery advocates, researchers, educators, law enforcement professionals, and faith-based leaders. It is the largest training event for the prevention field.

The Northwest Corner Prevention Network (NCPN) is a group of volunteers dedicated to working with youth and families in Region One to end underage drinking and drug use. NCPN focuses on changing social and family norms along with educating youth on the dangers of these behaviors. The Network began in 2010 with a mission to achieve, increase and support developmental assets in Region One youth and promote healthy communities. NCPN, whose members represent agencies, businesses, schools, prevention professionals, churches, law enforcement, students and parents, meets monthly to develop programs, promote community education, and increase public awareness. The Network sponsors many events throughout the year to raise awareness about substance use prevention.

Upcoming events for this year include: the second annual Wellness Fair on April 6 at Housatonic Valley Regional High School from 1:30-5:30 p.m., a panel discussion to address the opioid epidemic in the Northwest Corner on April 13, 6 p.m. at Housatonic Regional Valley High School, and Drug Take Back Day on April 28 from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. at the North Canaan Barracks and Kent Town Hall.

NCPN is also sponsoring the John Morello Dirt Presentation on May 10, 2018 for the northwest corner community at Housatonic Regional Valley High School. For information or to get involved with the coalition, reach NCPN at ncpncoalition@gmail.com or call Christina at 860-496-2139 , or Lesly at 860-927-1003.

NCPN is supported by the Housatonic Valley Coalition Against Substance Abuse, Inc, and partners with McCall Center for Behavioral Health to receive coalition enhancement funding from The Foundation for Community Health and the Northwest Corner Fund of the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation. The mission of the coalition is work with youth and families in Region One to end underage drinking and drug use, by changing social and family norms along with educating youth on the dangers of these behaviors.

The mission of CADCA (Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America) is to strengthen the capacity of community coalitions to create and maintain safe, healthy and drug-free communities globally. This is accomplished by providing technical assistance and training, public policy advocacy, media strategies and marketing programs, training and special events.

Litchfield sets kindergarten registration dates

LITCHFIELD  Kindergarten registration for the school year 2018-19 will be held on Monday, Feb. 5 and continue through Friday, Feb. 9.

Children living in Litchfield, Bantam and Northfield who will be five years old on or before Jan. 1, 2019 are eligible for kindergarten for the 2018-2019 school year. To register, the following must be presented: A birth certificate verifying your childs date of birth; a record of immunizations; proof of residency, Homeowner - copy of deed to your Bantam/Litchfield/Northfield home or a fully executed (signed) contract for your home. Leasing/Renting with a signed lease - copy of your signed lease. Leasing/Renting without a signed lease - notarized affidavit of landlord-lessee of home; a copy of a valid CT drivers license for the parent/guardian indicating the address where the child resides; two current utility bills (land line telephone, water, electric, gas, oil or cable television NOT cellphone. If you have a child already enrolled in Center School, you do not need to provide proof of residency.

All others must provide proof of residency at the time of registration. Registrations will not be accepted unless you have these forms with you. Register Feb. 5-9 at Center School any time between the hours of 9:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m.

Ready, Set, Grow program offered in Litchfield

LITCHFIELD  Litchfield Public Schools invite the families of children eligible for kindergarten for the 2018-19 academic school year to this springs Ready, Set, Grow program. The program aims to inform parents and guardians about kindergarten expectations in language arts, math, and fine/gross motor skills as well as strategies to use at home to support this learning.

This opportunity includes a parent information session followed by engaging family and student workshops. Children living in Litchfield, Northfield, and Bantam who will be five years old on or before Jan. 1, 2019 are eligible for Kindergarten for the 2018-19 school year and are encouraged to attend. The first Ready, Set, Grow informational meeting for parents and guardians will be held on Monday, Feb. 5, with a snow date of Feb. 12, at 6:30 p.m. in the Center School Gym. Registration is not required to attend this informational meeting. Additional workshops will be held on March 5, April 2, and May 7 at 6 p.m. for children and their parents/guardians. Registration will be required for these workshops. Visit www.litchfieldschools.org to register.Featured

The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) has released additional details regarding the expansion of the COVID Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) program, a federal disaster relief loan designed to better serve and support small business communities still reeling from the pandemic.Law Ministry puts IBN-Energy Ministry dispute to rest

The Law Ministry has resolved the long-standing dispute between the Energy Ministry and the Investment Board Nepal (IBN) over authority to issue licence to large hydropower projects with an installed capacity of 500MW or more.Locals protest Tilathi Koiladi rural municipality Chairmans decision to change name, centre

Locals of Tilathi Koiladi Rural Municipality in Saptari district have resorted to protest against the decision made by the council meeting of the rural municipality to change the name and centre of the Rural Municipality on Sunday.A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.Nepali origin British Army officer promoted to Lieutenant Colonel

A British Gurkha officer of Nepali origin has been promoted to the post of Lieutenant Colonel, sixth ranked officer in the army.NMA reminds govt to honour past agreements

The Nepal Medical Association (NMA) has warned of a stern protest if the government fails to implement agreements signed with them in the past.Report: Yemen Army, committees conduct attacks against aggression forces on Saturday [04/February/2018]



SANAA, Feb. 4 (Saba)  Yemen army and popular forces have launched military operations, including artillery, missiles and snipping attacks against US-baked Saudi-led aggression coalition soldiers and its mercenaries over Saturday, according to military reports combined by Saba News Agency on Sunday.



In Najran border province, artillery shelling targeted Saudi army's gatherings and fortifications in Sudais and Shurfah sites.



Also in Shurfa site, a Saudi solder was sniped.

Furthermore, a Saudi-paid mercenaries' military vehicle was bombed by an explosive device in Boqea desert.



In east desert of Boqea, an infiltration of mercenaries was foiled under ongoing air cover, two military vehicle loaded with mercenaries were destroyed and dozens of them were killed and wounded in an explosive device bombed amid their gatherings.



Also in Boqea desert, artillery force of the army shelled gathering of mercenaries in front of Khadhraa crossing, killing and wounding dozens.



In border province of Jizan, a Saudi soldier was shot dead in southern Hametha village, two others sniped in Muanag and northern Hamedha villages, and three soldiers were shot dead in Qewa village and Faridha site.



Also in Jizan, a Saudi military vehicle was smashed by an explosive device in Hamedha and a bulldozer was damaged in Khafaqa by artillery shells while saudi soldiers' gatherings were targeted by artillery in Muanaq village and in Ghawia school.



In Asir border Saudi province, an offensive operation was carried out upon mercenaries sites in Khazan and Qanaseen hills, killing and wounding dozens.

Artillery shells were fired toward gatherings and sites of Saudi army and its militias in front of Alab rossing and Hanjer censorship of Asir



In Taiz province, a military vehicle was burned and another destroyed by artillery in Moazea district.

In west coast of Taiz, an explosive device destroyed a military vehicle, loaded with mercenaris, killing all its crew.



In Moaza district, an unique attack was waged on mercenaries' sites north of khaled camp, killing and injuring dozens, while a mercenaries' military armored was burned in the west of Khaled camp.



Also in Taiz, Katyusha rockets were fired toward mercenaries' gatherings and sites northeast Yakhtal, and artillery shelling targeted other gatherings in Salw district, causing huge causalities.



In Yemen province of Jawf, mercenaries' gatherings were fired by artillery in Utemah district.



In Khub-washaaf district, a military vehicle, loaded with mercenaries, was bombed by an explosive device in Khalifain front, killing all its crew.



In Dhalea province, Two of mercenaries were killed, including a commander of the Air Defense Battalion of 83th Brigade, while sfve of Saudi-paid mercenaries were injured by an explosive device in Qataba city.



In Medi district of Hajjah province, artillery shelling targeted gatherings of mrcenaries north of Medi desert.



In Marib province, Yemen army and popular committees fired Katyusha rockets toward Saudi-paid mrcenaries' sites in Mas camp.





Writing by Sameera al-Mahdi, Editing by Zak

SabaPolish and politics

Nepali Congress cannot rise from the ashes of the election defeat by evoking such simple mantras as boot polish abhi subediThanks for reading!

You have read your allocation of articles. Sign in for free to read more articles below:People talk about working the land all the time.

They speak about making lots of money from the plantation.

What they dont tell you is that it is a lot of hard work.

Ask Fuipani Teo from the villages of Vaitele and Leusoalii and he will tell you its easier said than done.

I think if people had other options they would not resort to the plantation, he said. Because its hard work, you get burnt from the sun, you get sick when it rains and it takes lots of patience to develop a plantation.

The 55-year-old is a farmer.

But it wasnt by choice.

This is always the case with families like us where no one works. The plantation is our way of survival. We have to do it.

If youre unemployed, then you have no choice. Your money will come from the plantation. It can also be your source of food.

My family and I have been working this plantation for a long time.

We have been on this land for years now and this is our only source of income because no one works.

Getting money is a struggle.

We struggle because there is a lot of competition with the crops we sell. Everyone is selling the same thing mostly taro.

The money we earn is usually $50 per day which is not enough for our basic needs.

But he is grateful.

My plantation provides us with food. When were in need of money then we just sell some banana on the side of the road. The important thing for us is having enough bananas to sell so that we can earn money for our childrens school.

Fuipani lives with his five children.

The hardest thing we face every day is having to carry our stuff down the main road in the sun. It is also the same when its raining.

Fuipanis goal is to develop a better house for his family.

Im not ashamed to tell you about our house, he said. As you can see, living in this house is hard. We barely fit inside but we still are coping. Lucky we get to have water and electricity.WASHINGTON (AP)  President Donald Trump's abrupt announcement Tuesday that he will suspend U.S. military drills in South Korea appeared to catch the Pentagon and the Seoul government flat-footed, and it contradicted a pillar of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis's campaign to make U.S. troops more combat-ready.

During a news conference following his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Trump pushed his unconventional approach even further by calling annual U.S.-South Korean military exercises "provocative." He also said he'd like to remove all 28,500 U.S. troops stationed in the South, although he made clear this was an option for the future, not a part of current negotiations.

The U.S. has stationed combat troops in South Korea since the end of the 1950-53 war and has used them in a variety of drills designed to sharpen skills and test troops' ability to operate effectively with their South Korean partners.

The next scheduled major exercise, known as Ulchi Freedom Guardian and involving tens of thousands of troops, normally is held in August.

"We will be stopping the war games, which will save us a tremendous amount of money, unless and until we see the future negotiation is not going along like it should," Trump said in Singapore. "But we'll be saving a tremendous amount of money. Plus, I think it's very provocative." In a later interview with the Voice of America, Trump said the North Koreas were "very happy" about his decision to freeze the exercises "because it is so provocative."

In the wake of Trump's unexpected, almost offhand comments to reporters, the Pentagon said it was consulting with the White House and others but was silent on whether Ulchi Freedom Guardian will proceed. Mattis's chief spokeswoman, Dana W. White, told reporters he was "in full alignment" with Trump and had been consulted in advance on all aspects of the Singapore talks.

"There were no surprises," she said.

If Mattis was aware that Trump was going to announce a suspension of military exercises, he apparently did not share that information with the South Koreans or with the military organization most directly affected: U.S. Forces Korea.

That U.S. command said it had "received no updated guidance on the execution or cessation of training exercises."

The South Korean government also appeared caught off guard. Seoul's presidential office told The Associated Press that it was trying to parse Trump's comments. The South Korean military seemed similarly surprised.

"At this current point, there is a need to discern the exact meaning and intent of President Trump's comments," Seoul's Defense Ministry said, adding that there have been no discussions yet with Washington on modifying drills set for August.

Trump's remarks contradicted decades of assertions by U.S. administrations that military exercises in South Korea are defensive and essential to ensuring that allied forces are ready at a moment's notice to fight the North. A favored U.S. slogan in South Korea is "ready to fight tonight."

Mattis often says his number one priority as Pentagon chief is to improve what he calls the "lethality" of the military, which includes making troops better equipped, trained and prepared for a full range of combat. In his view, preparedness equates to more effective deterrence -- persuading potential adversaries they cannot win and thus should not attack.

Trump's statement was portrayed by critics as an unreciprocated concession.

"Stopping the joint exercises has been a long-term goal for North Korea and China," two Asia analysts, Victor Cha and Sue Mi Terry, wrote in a summit assessment for the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "Trump delivered it while getting nothing in return beyond the same generalities that North Korea has been offering since the early 1990s."

Even some Republicans in Congress seemed uneasy about this. Rep. Ed Royce of California, who is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, applauded Trump for pursuing peace through diplomacy, but he also said Kim had "gained much" Tuesday, "including an apparent promise" from Trump to suspend military drills.

Trump also seemed annoyed that U.S. bomber aircraft make six-plus hour flights from the Pacific island of Guam to the Korean peninsula as part of its exercise routine.

"Six and a half hours  that's a long time for these big massive planes to be flying to South Korea to practice and then drop bombs all over the place, and then go back to Guam," Trump said. "I know a lot about airplanes; it's very expensive."

North Korea regularly calls the military exercises provocative preparations for a northward invasion, and many of the scariest standoffs in recent years on the Korean Peninsula have happened when the drills were being staged.

Moon Seong Mook, a former South Korean military official, said Trump's comments on the drills confirmed what many in South Korea had feared all along  that North Korea would attempt to drive a wedge between Washington and Seoul and gain substantial concessions from an unconventional U.S. president who thinks much less of the traditional alliance than his predecessors.

"The American military presence in South Korea wouldn't mean much if the militaries don't practice through joint drills," said Moon, now a senior analyst for the Seoul-based Korea Research Institute for National Strategy.Think a minuteA 58-year-old man was sharing his memories of his father.

He said his father had been a workaholic who was always busy with work and his own personal interests.

He never came to his sons sports games or activities.

In fact, the son said his dad almost never spoke to him.

By the time the son was 18 years old, in his last year of school, hed become a very good football player. When his team qualified for the championship, he begged his father to finally come see him play this one time; so his dad promised hed be there.

On the day of the championship, the son was on the field warming up just before the game when he saw his dad come into the stadium with two other men. Then, just before the game started, his dad left with his friends and never returned.

Its now been 40 years since that day, yet this 58-year-old son says the painful rejection and disappointment he felt as a teenager is still very real.

When his father recently died at age 83, he stood alone next to his dads coffin at the funeral home and said: Dad, we could have shared so much love and good times together, but I never knew you.

Thinking back on this mans childhood, and especially that day of the football game, I wonder what that father thought was more important than being there for his son.

Was his time with business associates more important than caring and being interested in the success of his own son? That father let the years go by without doing his job at home. He failed in his most important responsibility as a father.

A father has tremendous power and influence in the lives of his children. Studies have shown that the number one cause of troubled boys and young men is that they had fathers who didnt really care. They didnt spend time with their sons so they werent close to them.

There are millions of invisible fathers like this.

But No man stands as tall, as when he stoops down to help his son. How about you? Do you need to give more time and attention to your children? Its never too late to change. Why not ask Jesus Christ to forgive you for your failures as a father? Then ask Him to help change you so you can become the caring, loving father your children need.

Just Think a MinuteDurbarmarg Gang Rape: Process on to suspend Inspector

The Nepal Police Headquarters on Saturday inititated the process to suspend Inspector Laxman Singh Thakuri of the Metropolitan Police Circle, Durbarmarg, who had forced a rape victim to settle the case with the perpetrators.A high level delegation from Thailand is in Samoa to explore potential trade and investment opportunities with members of the local community.

Among the groups they have met with is the Samoa Association of Manufacturers and Exporters (S.A.M.E).

On Tuesday, the group met with S.A.M.Es President, Tautaituasivi Tagaloa Wilson and member companies. They discussed trade opportunities, private sector cooperation, investment opportunities and private sector development.

The Thailand delegation is led by Ambassador Maris Sangiampongsa. Samoas Ambassador to New Zealand, Leasi Tommy Scanlan was also present during the meeting.

Thailand hosted a six S.A.M.E member delegation last year where they visited various manufacturing and export enterprises there.

President Tautaituasivi said one of the initiatives S.A.M.E launched following the visit to Thailand was the development of the S.A.M.E-Samoa Export Plan 2016-2020, which was launched in December 2016.

The Export Plan highlighted key areas the Samoa Exporters will be targeting  including Fisheries/Agriculture Export value added items; Export Services .

The Thailand delegation requested from S.A.M.E champion products and companies- that Thailand can assist through Technical assistance.

The S.A.M.E President- pointed to the Samoa Export plan- as the connection between Samoan Exporters and 80% of the Samoan population which by and large depend on the land & sea for their livelihoods.

S.A.M.Es membership has an increasing interest in learning from trade and private sector developments in Thailand, especially in the areas trade, export development, agro-tourism and Investment.

Opportunities to link exporters to other countries in the Pacific to grow their markets and attract interest from Asian Investors were also discussed.

A leading Thailand manufacturer and export of biodegradable plastics also made a presentation to the Samoan exporters and gained significant interest in the use of biodegradable packaging for all locally manufactured products going into the future.The crime figures of today in Samoa are alarming. And with so many threats facing our children today, living in a village without working street lights makes those threats far more serious.

According to Malaesilia Natia from the village of Vaiee, their village has been having trouble with the street lights for a few years now.

Aged 69 and currently residing in New Zealand, Malaesilia says that this has been an ongoing problem and every time he visits he sees the danger the children go through at night time.

My family is doing well right now but the only issue we have is with the street lights, he explained to the Village Voice.

There are streetlights that are not working right now. The streetlights in front of our house and along the road has dead light bulb and it has been this way for a while.

We are very concerned about the safety of the children because it is very dark at night time. Its been like this for three years now and no one has come down to fix it.

Its very dangerous for our children because they love to wander around at night time.

Other than the issue with the street lights, Malaesilia is very fond of the village life.

I would like to take this opportunity to express how great life is out here in the village and how there are not many issues within all families, he said.

Its no wonder why many tourists want to come from overseas to enjoy our beautiful Samoa. Samoa is simply beautiful.

There have been many changes since I last came here, almost every family has a western style house which shows how well they are doing. It looks very nice to me.

Malaesilia also noticed so many developments over the years as he visited Samoa.

I see so many changes everywhere as well as familiar sights, he said.

Back then we never had power in this area; we also didnt have any water pipes in the houses. Samoas standard has been raised a lot over the years which is really good for us.

Thats one of the biggest changes we have noticed and that is what everyone who resides overseas notices when they come back after a long time.

Samoa has developed a lot. Its a very good sight for us and it makes us really want to come back to Samoa. Even the education has improved a lot in the village areas.

He also says that the cost of living is understandable because business needs to make profit to move forward.

The cost of goods fluctuates, he said.

I think the cost of living is pretty decent right now because even the businesses needs to move forward which means they need to make profit.

If we drop the prices then they will suffer.Compassion and humbleness are two virtues that best describe the life of the late Joachim (Joe) Hans Keil, the second son of William and Violet Keil.

Born on May 11, 1944 Joe was the epitome of a great leader and family man, serving the people of Samoa and his family with random acts of kindness until he was called to rest on August 31, 2018.

Not only was he seen as a great politician, entrepreneur, and a aircraft pilot, he touched the hearts of even the ordinary people with his generous act of kindness.

The acts of kindness and the number of ordinary lives that he touched makes him a nominee for the Samoa Observer People of the Year 2018.

Joe was the Minister of Transport and later Minister of Trade and Tourism in the Samoan Government after successfully running for Parliament representing the individual voters roll in February 1988. He represented Samoa internationally at the United Nations, European Union, and other international forums and served 23 years in Parliament, before retiring from politics in 2011.

In March 1996, his family opened the first McDonalds Family Restaurant in Samoa, along with his father and the Schwenke family. They established TV3 in 2006, and it was the first privately owned TV station in the country.

Some key programmes that were broadcasted included Samoan idol, young stars singing competition, the national spelling bee competition and the Eight Days of Christmas.

The former politician was also involved in preserving the cultural and historical legacies of Samoa through the Samoa Historical and Cultural Trust, which he founded, and was also its chairman and main financier.

After completing his flight training at Spartan School of Aeronautics in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Joe returned to Samoa in 1970 to begin his flying career with Air Samoa and then Polynesian Airlines.

The aircraft he flew were the Cessnas, Britten Norman Islander, the Douglas DC3, the Hawker Siddely 748, and the Boeing 737.

The late philanthropist was one of the founders of Walk for Life, which was established to help those in need.

Joes act of kindness started at a very early age, helping others and providing for his family.

He lived a normal childhood life, growing up on a cocoa and coconut plantation at Lotopa, which belonged to his grandfather.

They lived in a big old house on the river bank, and he roamed their plantation eating fruits like esi, mangoes, vi, coconuts, sugar cane. Their home had its benefits  he learned how to swim at a very young age.

Joe attended Leifiifi Primary School and together with his cousins, they would walk to and from school every day, because there were no buses and a few cars on the road.

At the age of eight, his mother took the brothers to attend school in New Zealand. He joined a mens choir and also volunteered to help build the L.D.S. temple in Hamilton.

At the age of nine, he worked a newspaper route and whatever money he earned was given to his granny Hazel. He completed two years of his secondary school studies at CCWS, Pesega.

While doing his flight training in the United States, in 1967, he was called on an L.D.S. mission to Samoa and served under Pres, which allowed him the opportunity to travel around Samoa and know the people, understand the customs, and traditions and learnt to speak the language fluently.

Joe married Celine in 1971 and they have four children, three girls  Violette, Bella and Katrina - and Nathan.

His favourite hobbies are reading, swimming with his son, who is now 33 years old. After having dedicated his life to Samoa and its development, Joe lived a quiet life of reading, researching into Samoan history and the European involvement, and collecting the history of the Keil family.Flash flooding in some low-lying areas in Samoa can be attributed to the increase in development over the years.

This was highlighted in a recent survey conducted by SkyEye Samoa with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (M.N.R.E.) and United Nations Development Programme (U.N.D.P.).

The results from the survey will be presented by SkyEye to U.N.D.P. and M.N.R.E. next week.

SkyEyes Chief Executive Officer, Faasootauloa Sam Saili, told the Samoa Observer that what they discovered in their survey compared to three years ago is shocking.

There has been a lot of change in terms of development such as human settlement, roads and infrastructure, especially in the upper catchment area, he said.

Seeing and analyzing the data collected, SkyEye can now understand why there has been a flashflood just two weeks ago because the water catchment areas are not catching the water anymore. This is because of the human and infrastructure development."

Pretty much when it rains in the mountains, water just comes straight down. Theres no longer the healthy forest there that usually catches the water and keeps it, so thats what we understand when that flash flooding happened.

Faasootauloa said the need to identify the cause and possible solutions to flash flooding after Tropical Cyclone Gita was paramount.

After cyclone Gita, there was a lot of flooding and there was a concern for what its like in the water catchment areas, especially the upper catchment areas where the water source for Apia urban area is sourced from, Faasootauloa said.

The issue is it is very difficult to actually access these areas because there are mostly no roads there and then theres also difficulty to view it, to try and get an actual evidence of what the area looks like at the moment, especially after the cyclone.

So the M.N.R.E. and U.N.D.P. contacted us whether we can survey all these areas so that they can actually get detailed analysis of whats going on.

According to Faasootauloa, M.N.R.E. carried out a similar survey three years ago, which was funded by Australian Aid.

They wanted to know what is there compared to three years ago, because three years ago, the M.N.R.E. got a grant from Australian Aid and the Australian Aid were able to survey the whole of Samoa using a technology called lidar, which is a very advanced technology for surveying areas, he said.

So M.N.R.E. has the information about the topology of Samoa from three years ago, but they want to get an update compared to three years later.

Thats what we did. M.N.R.E. was kind enough to give us the area that we were surveying in form of lidar so that we can compare the data that we got from our U.A.V. or drones mapping that we did.

Faasootauloa said the areas they surveyed included Tiavi, Malololelei, Afulilo Vailima, Papauta all the way to Vaisigano and the area of the mountain included Malololelei, coming down to Moamoa all the way to the ocean.

The mapping took us more than a month because it is a very big area, very remote area. We surveyed all the area where catchment area of water starts from, so it starts from all the way up the mountain where the water source starts from.

We surveyed quite a huge area. Its not just the urban area but it starts all the way from the top down to the coast, so that we have a holistic view of how the whole area is.

He explained their concern is that when it rains in the upper catchment, the low lying areas are going to flood.

We believe thats why the Vaisigano, the Vaimoso River that runs just behind our office gets flooded.

The outside of our office got flooded, lucky the foundation was high enough, but everywhere else outside was flooded, so we do have a personal stake in it as well.

Thats why we are pushing this project and making sure that we give every single recommendation and evidence as possible for the decision makers to hopefully make the right decision before trying to reverse how the upper water catchment has been devastated over the past three years.

Faasootauloa added M.N.R.E. has a lot of well-developed policies but the issue is getting the evidence to enforce those policies.

Weve had preliminary discussions with M.N.R.E. and theyre very excited with the information that weve gathered so far.

We are bringing in some environment experts as well for this project. It is not part of the terms of reference but we believe its required because it is one thing to have the data but using it in the best way possible and thats where the environmental experts come in.

So people like James Atherton, hes worked in this area. He has done so many advisements and recommendations in the past years, so he knows this area very well but now we have the data for him and a few other experts to actually prove what they were advising years ago thats now come to fruition because those are advice werent taken into account.

Faasootauloa mentioned theyve recommended a few areas that needs improvement.

Some of the recommendations that we provided is looking at areas that have been devastated in the past three years to pinpoint those areas for forest rehabilitation, so encourage reforestation.

In Australia, they have this problem as well, but they have used other methods to try and address it. One of these methodologies is using weeds, planting weed close to the river to try and absorb water. There are specific kinds of weed that grow really fast because if youre talking about trees, itll take years for them to mature, but for weed they can grow within a month. So thats one of the things we are looking at.

Also we are looking at areas where it looks like a bottle neck because we were able to identify areas that were like a bottle neck where there are multiple river streams coming together and that area we need to focus on, either do a river flow adjustment or look at ways to try and make sure that when it rains, theres not a bottle neck there that allows water to keep rising, especially if there are logs there, creating a dam and then it bursts, causing flash flooding.

M.N.R.E. is doing dredging of certain parts of the river whenever they get funding and we have identified more areas now that needs it periodically.

Faasootauloa mentioned the technology they used is called photogramic, so its part of the technology that is known as remote sensing. Its not just about taking photos, the drones and information we get is X, Y and Z coordinates so we can build a 3D map, so thats one of the things that we are doing with this project.

We are building are 3D map of the whole area we are capturing so that we can look at it from different angles, so whoever is doing the decision making, they can look at the whole area in 3D model.

If you are looking at an area from a different angle, it will give you different information. So instead of just one layer, this is a 3D layer version of it.

The issue that we experienced was the weather, especially when we got to the high mountain area because the clouds were always and issue, so we couldnt fly. The issue was also accessing certain properties because some people didnt want their properties to be surveyed and that was unfortunate, so we had to find another way around.

It took us three weeks to analyse and process the data that we collected because the amount of data we collected from drones were looking at terabytes of data. The team, my brother and niece were up almost 24/7 to process and analyse the data because we had a deadline.

Compared to the lidar data that M.N.R.E. provided, that was also a big hurdle because M.N.R.E.s data had different perimeters than what we did, so we had to adjust both to try and meet.

The biggest benefit is putting the two data together and you can see clearly what it was three years ago and what it is today. Visually, you can just see what the difference is and the changes.

Faasootauloa acknowledges M.N.R.E. and U.N.D.P. for looking at a local company and having the trust in a local company to carry out such advanced project.

We hope to build this partnership and trust in using local resources.In another bid to quell criticism that its platform is overrun with misinformation, YouTube said Friday that it would start labeling news broadcasters videos that receive at least some government or public funding.

The move comes a year after the Office of the Director of National Intelligence detailed how Russian state broadcaster RT racked up hundreds of millions of views on YouTube promoting Kremlin propaganda.

YouTube yanked RT from its list of premium channels marketed to advertisers in October amid growing congressional pressure. The Russian broadcaster, which produced a wealth of reports critical of Hillary Clinton and promoted the viewpoints of figures such as Julian Assange, was the first news organization to surpass 1 billion views on YouTube in 2013.

RT did not respond to a request for comment.

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In addition to RT, state and public broadcasters such as PBS and New China TV will see notices directly below their videos, above even their titles, YouTube said.

Links to the broadcasters Wikipedia pages will also be included below their videos.

PBS said it was misleading for YouTube to include the broadcaster in the initiative, saying it suggested the U.S. government had influence over its editorial content.

PBS and its member stations receive a small percentage of funding from the federal government; the majority of funding comes from private donations, the broadcaster said in an emailed statement. More importantly, PBS is an independent, private, not-for-profit corporation, not a state broadcaster. YouTubes proposed labeling could wrongly imply that the government has influence over PBS content, which is prohibited by statute.

PBS said it was conducting discussions with YouTube to address its concerns.

Its impossible to know if such disclosures would have limited RTs influence in the past, experts say. But they still welcomed YouTubes move as a way to improve media literacy.

Its a small but not insignificant step, said Bret Schafer, an analyst at the German Marshall Funds Alliance for Securing Democracy, which tracks Russian influence networks over social media.

The connection between RT and the content it publishes on YouTube has often been less than transparent, he added. This, in theory, would help solve that problem.

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YouTube, which is owned by Googles parent company, Alphabet Inc., is resistant to legal oversight of its content. But it has made efforts to police its platform after a year in which the company was criticized for surfacing conspiracy theories, hoaxes and inappropriate content directed at children.

Starting last year, the company said it tweaked its algorithm to ensure more established news sources surfaced in search results in the wake of breaking news. The change was made after a slew of conspiracy theories surfaced on YouTube moments after the Las Vegas mass shooting in October.

News is an important and growing vertical for us and we want to be sure to get it right, wrote Geoff Samek, senior product manager for YouTube News in a blog post Friday.

Google, like Facebook and Twitter, is slowly coming to grips with its role in the Russian campaign to influence the 2016 presidential election. Forced to testify on Capitol Hill, the tech giants have since pledged to promote more trusted news sources and have disclosed more data on Russian-controlled accounts.

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The three companies would much rather stay out of the business of editorial oversight. Doing so could bring them closer to being labeled media companies rather than platforms  a critical distinction that largely absolves them of liability over the content and activities that appear on their products.

By promoting transparency measures instead, the firms can argue its up to their users to decide what to watch and read.

The principle here is to provide more information to our users, and let our users make the judgment themselves, as opposed to us being in the business of providing any sort of editorial judgment on any of these things ourselves, Neal Mohan, YouTubes chief product officer, told the Wall Street Journal.

Facebook announced last month that it would let its users determine which news sources are trustworthy. The social network had previously employed curators to cherry-pick news for its users, a strategy that was abandoned after the company was accused of omitting conservative viewpoints.

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Editorial judgment could be more trouble than its worth, in the eyes of Silicon Valley. Deciding whats acceptable content is fraught with risk during todays political climate  and ever harder now that news sites that previously would have been dismissed outright, such as Alex Jones Infowars, have gained mainstream notoriety.

But transparency alone wont stop the spread of propaganda and misinformation given the complexity of policing platforms with billions of users accessible to almost anyone in the world.

The nature of an open platform means we never know what trends or moments are going to arise next, wrote YouTubes Chief Executive Susan Wojcicki in a blog post Thursday addressing the rash of objectionable material on her platform.

Data compiled by the Alliance for Securing Democracy show Russias influence campaign remains active on social media.

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The group says Russian-linked influence networks on Twitter continue to promote hashtags such as #releasethememo, a reference to the House Intelligence Committees controversial memo on the Russia inquiry disclosed to the public Friday.

david.pierson@latimes.com

Follow me @dhpierson on Twitter

UPDATES:

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2:55 p.m.: This article was updated with a comment from PBS.

This article was originally published at 11:35 a.m.Nine months out from Election Day in Escondido, three races are already heating up.

Mayor Sam Abed has been hard at work fundraising for his bid for a third term as has challenger Paul McNamara, a retired Marine Corps colonel who announced his candidacy last summer.

Two City Council seats will also be contested with one of them featuring the same opponents: incumbent Ed Gallo and Consuelo Martinez. Gallo defeated Martinez by just 69 votes in 2014. District 1 is in the center of the city and is the district designed as a Latino-majority area to satisfy the threat of a lawsuit under the California Voting Rights Act.

Incumbent John Masson is running for re-election in District 2, the northern and northwestern part of the city, and is being challenged by a political newcomer, Vanessa Valenzuela, a 30-year resident of the city who filed papers to form a campaign committee on Friday.

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Abed, as of Dec. 31, has raised $117,100, more than $53,000 of which was cash already on hand, for his campaign and has spent only $5,739. McNamara has raised $32,153, of which $10,000 was a loan to himself. He has spent more than $22,000, most for political consultation work.

Abed this past week said his fundraising lead means people are pleased with the job he is doing.

The strong, early financial support of my campaign is a clear endorsement of my leadership and a strong indication that the residents and businesses in Escondido appreciate the positive direction our city is headed, he said.

McNamara said Abed has a lot of high-end donors, many from outside the city who dont represent the will of the people. The people who are donating to me in much smaller amounts are people who live here, he said.

McNamara acknowledged that it will be hard to defeat an incumbent with a lot of name recognition, but he said he is encouraged by the reception he is getting as people get to know him.

Abed said all of his donations come from people who either live or do business in the city. He said he fully expects to be re-elected and says McNamara is aligning himself with extreme left-leaning supporters and advisers, which he doesnt believe will help McNamaras campaign in the end.

In the District 1 race, Gallo had not raised any money for his campaign as of the end of 2017, but listed a bit more than $10,000 as a beginning balance. Martinez had raised $4,870 as of Dec. 31.

Gallo said he expects the race will be tight again, saying perhaps this time hell win by 75 votes. Martinez said she is encouraged by the enthusiasm of her supporters in the district and is confident of a victory this time.

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In District 2, Masson had raised more than $24,000 while Valenzuela, who has just begun her campaign, has raised under $1,300, almost all of which is her own money.

Contributing to Abed and Massons re-election campaigns are the developers of Safari Highlands Ranch LLC, a subsidiary of Concordia Homes, which gave the maximum of $4,100 to each candidate in December.

Sometime this year, most likely in the summer, the City Council will be asked to approve Concordias 550-luxury home development planned for the hills above the San Diego Zoos Safari Park. If approved, it would be the largest residential housing project to be built in the city in decades.

Part of the plan would be for the city to annex the 1,098 acres of vacant land where the project would be built in the San Pasqual Valley into Escondido. Councilwoman Olga Diaz has made it clear for several years she will vote against the development, calling it urban sprawl, which means the votes of three of the remaining four members of the council will be needed for approval.

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In 2016, Safari Highlands Ranch LLC gave $4,100 to Councilman Mike Morascos successful re-election campaign, and several people associated with Concordia also gave generously to Abeds unsuccessful campaign that year for county supervisor.

At the time, Morasco said he let all donors know that regardless of donations, my perspective, my opinions and the way I vote will never be altered.

Abed and Masson said their votes cant be bought and Gallo said he would not have a problem if Safari Highlands Ranch wanted to give his campaign money, as well. Abed and Masson pointed out that New Urban West contributed to their campaigns four years ago, yet both men recently voted against the developers proposal to build 380 homes on the shuttered Escondido Country Club land. The project was approved by a 3-2 vote.

McNamara said if he was in office he would not take money from the development company because I think that would make it seem like you were being influenced by Safari Highlands advocates.

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Valenzuela also said she thinks its ethically wrong to take money from a developer who has a project pending before the council. Martinez agreed.

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jharry.jones@sduniontribune.com; 760/529-4931; Twitter: @jharryjonesIn todays Back Story, Union-Tribune staff writer John Wilkens discusses his feature about Larry Dunmire, a nearly homeless man in San Diego.

Q: How did this story come about?

A: Larry Dunmire sent us a long e-mail in November after I wrote an article about local homeless-service providers trying to improve the way they collect and share data. His email had the subject line Societys lost souls, and in it he mentioned some of his efforts to stay off the streets and the futility he was feeling.

He also outlined his background as a travel journalist and his desire to find a job  maybe, he suggested, with the Union-Tribune.

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Q: Did he want you to do a story about him?

A: No. He wanted to show us some of the magazine work hed done and talk about some freelance ideas he had. He talked first with John McCutchen, our director of photography and video, and then with Mark Platte, the enterprise editor, and then with me.

The more we discussed Dunmire around the office, the more we thought he might make a good story himself.

Q: How so?

A: People sometimes see our homeless population as static  the same men and women shuffling in and out of the same shelters, sleeping on the same sidewalks, panhandling on the same corners. But its a fairly fluid group.

In the fiscal year that ended on Sept. 30, about 13,000 homeless people entered the system of care here for the first time in five years. About the same number exited the system  into permanent or temporary housing, into jails, hospitals or substance-abuse facilities, or back onto the street.

So who are the people on the verge of homelessness? Dunmire seemed like an interesting case study.

Q: Interesting in what ways?

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A: He used to live a lifestyle that many people would find exciting and glamorous: traveling to exotic places to take photographs and write stories. He did it for a long time, with apparent success. A couple of his former bosses speak highly of his work ethic.

His descent was fueled in large part by his reluctance to embrace change in his industry, a factor not uncommon to a lot of people in Americas rapidly evolving workplaces.

And he doesnt fit the stereotypes we regularly attach to someone fighting homelessness. He doesnt have a criminal record. He doesnt have drug or alcohol problems. Hes college educated, at one of Californias best-known private universities.

But he is also, in his own words, damaged goods. He has depression and anxiety. He might be in trouble with Social Security over a GoFundMe campaign he started for himself. He flits from desperation to optimism in a heartbeat.

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Hes constantly thinking up projects to propel himself away from homelessness: writing a play, developing a new kind of advertising campaign, photographing skyscrapers. He wants out of his current situation and cant seem to figure out how to do it.

Q: Is that what finally convinced him to let you write about him?

A: A little bit. Hes hoping someone might read the story and offer him a job, or a place to live, or some other way up and out.

He is  again, using his own words  embarrassed and humiliated to find himself where he is. But he also thinks there are important lessons in his story for other people, the main one being this: Homelessness can happen to anyone.

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john.wilkens@sduniontribune.comNot much scares Glenn Quillin. Ever since the Carlsbad retiree had to bail out of an airplane with a dead engine in 1931, hes had a taste for thrill rides.

On Saturday, he celebrated his 102nd birthday by setting the Guinness World Record for the oldest person to ride a zip line.

This years aerial adventure, accomplished at the La Jolla Zip Zoom park in Pauma Valley, was simply the latest daredevil stunt for Quillin. He marked his 100th birthday in January 2016 with a tandem skydive in Jamul.

Theres always a lot of anticipation when you log one of these new adventures, and I felt very comfortable along the way, he said afterward. Its a great location and the people were wonderful.

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Chad Gutierrez, who manages La Jolla Zip Zoom, said he was amazed at Quillins bravery. The mountainside attraction has three extreme zip lines, where passengers in helmets and harnesses travel at speeds up to 50 mph at distances up to 2,700 feet and a vertical drop of as much as 800 feet.

Hes been having a blast, Gutierrez said, just as Quillin was heading down the mountain for his third and final ride Saturday afternoon. Hes braver than most of the people who come out here. Weve had people quit on the first one, and he couldnt wait to do them all.

Once certified by the Guinness World Records organization, Quillin will own the record held by a 90-year-old, according to Quillins grandson Mike Welch, who organized both the skydiving and zip-lining adventures.

Hes always had an adventurous spirit and he loves doing things that make peoples jaws drop, Welch said. They had suggested that he skip one of the shorter runs today and take a rest, but he wanted to do them all. He just charged through it all and enjoyed the whole thing.

Quillin was raised in Illinois but has lived in California for most of his life. During World War II, he worked on the Manhattan Project in New Mexico supervising a mechanical engineering team that supported the radiation labs. He went on to work for Hughes Aircraft for many years in Los Angeles and owned a real estate business with his wife, who passed away in 2010.

He has lived in the Carlsbad By The Sea retirement community since 1998, where he stays fit by visiting the gym several days a week.

Hes busier than I am, Welch said of his grandpa. When I want to visit him I have to make sure to check his calendar because hes got so much going on.

Quillins colorful life is the subject of a new play, The Price of Peace, by Oceanside actor/playwright Lance Arthur Smith. It premiered in December in a new play festival at New Village Arts in Carlsbad. Smith said he sees Quillin as a hero.

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He is, he absolutely is, Smith said. Hes extraordinary. Hes a cool cat  I like him a lot.

Quillin is already looking ahead to his next big adventure. A hot-air balloon ride is on the list, along with one more skydive.

Welch said that the Guinness World Record for the oldest skydiver is 102, so he and Quillin are hoping to break that record next January when Quillin turns 103.

I have my eye on that airplane, Quillin said. I wouldnt mind doing that again, not one bit.

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pam.kragen@sduniontribune.comWelded in Alabama, crewed by sailors from across the nation and named for a Midwestern metropolis, the Navys newest warship came to life during a Saturday morning commissioning celebration at San Diegos Broadway Pier.

In a maritime ceremony that dates back centuries, the littoral combat ship Omahas sponsor  Nebraska philanthropist Susie Buffett  summoned the 69 officers and crew to man the vessel and bring her to life, an order that triggered guns and gadgets to whirl and spin as if a metal beast had drawn first breath.

Boasting a large flight deck for manned and unmanned aircraft, a shallow draft, powerful water jet engines and a sleek silver-gray trimaran hull, the Omaha is designed to nuzzle into the shoals peppering the vast expanses of the Western Pacific, stealthily sinking enemy warships before they can find it.

Its the sixth Independence-class vessel to enter the Navy and the fourth warship to be named after Omaha, a nod to both the largest city in Nebraska and nearby Offutt Air Force Base, headquarters of U.S. Strategic Command and Americas nuclear strike force.

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Navy officials have pointed to the Omaha as proof that a littoral combat ship program  dogged for a decade by cost overruns, technological glitches and questions about how it would survive a fight  had righted itself and would help America project power against rising rivals such as Russia and China.

In his keynote address, Medal of Honor recipient Bob Kerrey  a Navy SEAL who became a governor and senator for Nebraska  echoed their optimism, saying this ship should give you confidence that the American political and national security system can produce high tech weapons of war.

At a time when so many Americans are yielding to the siren song of cynicism, saying that the system doesnt work, the system did produce this boat and it wasnt easy, said Kerrey.

There were setbacks, he continued. There were skeptics. There were opponents. There were people who said to give it up. All the technology in this ship didnt exist when the project began. The Navys needs changed and the design had to change as consequence.

A Democrat, Kerrey stood on the Broadway Pier next to powerful Republicans, including Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts and U.S. Rep. Don Bacon, a retired Air Force brigadier general who now represents Omaha in Congress, plus President Donald Trumps Navy secretary Richard V. Spencer.

With an audience blooming to more than 1,200 people as well wishers flocked to the pier to listen to the speeches, Spencer said that the brass were giving the 18-month Pacific Ocean deployment of the Omahas sister ship Coronado straight As after it returned to San Diego on Dec. 5.

This is a terrific platform that youll see more and more of going forth and demonstrating peace through presence, said Spencer, a former Marine aviator.

In front of him in the audience sat Ray Mabus, the former Democrat governor of Mississippi who championed the embattled LCS program as President Barack Obamas Navy secretary  often in spite of criticism from lawmakers such as Arizonas John McCain, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee who called it a $12.4 billion boondoggle.

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Missing from the ceremony, however, was Navy Vice Adm. Tom Rowden, the former commander of Coronado-based Naval Surface Forces who is widely credited with fixing the LCS program over the past two years.

He announced on Jan. 18 that he was exiting his post early after an internal Navy probe blamed him in part for a string of mishaps in the Western Pacific involving the warships John S. McCain, Fitzgerald, Lake Champlain and Antietam last year.

After the commissioning ceremony, Adm. Scott Swift, a San Diego native who commands the U.S. Pacific Fleet, praised him.

Were not a garrison force, Swift said. Were out on the leading edge of where Americas national interests are. So when we bring in a new concept  which is really what LCS was  theres a lot of stewardship thats required to bring that concept into the Navy.

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(Vice) Adm. Rowden was certainly key in that. Several of the speakers mentioned how LCS has continued to grow into what it is today. I think its safe to say that it will continue to grow and change as the region changes and as we learn to integrate this ship into the fleet.

And I think (Vice) Adm. Rowden is justifiably very proud of his role in making the Omaha as we see it today a reality.

In their speeches, both Swift and Rowdens replacement, Vice Adm. Richard Brown, hinted at how the Navy would employ the Omaha in a 100 million-square-mile waterway stretching from the Arctic to India, home to 36 nations  five declared nuclear powers  and half of the globes population.

While the vessel is slated to undergo months of outfitting as a surface vessel armed with anti-ship missiles, sister littoral combat ships will become submarine hunters or minesweepers. While some will feature traditional hulls and propellers, others will sport the trimaran design and water jets that allow the Omaha to enter shallow waters destroyers and cruisers cant approach.

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Shes tailor-made for the dynamic and congested sea lanes and straits and archipelagos of the Pacific, said Brown, the former skipper of the destroyer The Sullivans, cruiser Gettysburg and Carrier Strike Group 11. She provides flexible options and unparalleled tactical advantages.

Omahas adaptability is like no other in our Navy, with a large hangar bay, large flight deck and integrated networks and combat systems will allow her to rapidly change missions, operate manned and unmanned vehicles and install new capabilities in the future, such as over-the-horizon anti-ship missiles.

And if called into battle, Brown said the Omaha and other LCS ships must fight and win.

A career aviator, Swift described the importance of American maritime power in the Pacific, saying that trading nations had built their prosperity upon the peace created by the presence of warships like the Omaha.

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He pointed to a new era of competition in both the Pacific and Indian Oceans that pitted rivals willing to use all elements of their national power to isolate, cow and coerce neighbors while undermining a system of international laws that had ensured global stability since the end of World War II.

With this background, coupled with the vastness and diversity of the Indo-Pacific in mind, and in the context of great power competition, its clear that we cannot be a one-size-fits-all Navy, said Swift. Rather, we need to field an array of capabilities across all spectra of power and domains to enhance regional partnerships, deter aggression and if needed, as (Vice) Adm. Brown said, win that conflict.

While the Navy projects the construction of 32 littoral combat ships, Pentagon planners also have proposed procuring new guided-missile frigate, designated as the FFG(X), beginning in 2020.

The goal is to build a 355-ship Navy, up from the 280 vessels capable of being deployed today, with a focus on the Pacific Rim.

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Military Videos  On Now D-Day paratrooper from Coronado jumps again in France  at age 96 On Now Remembering war's fallen, one name at a time On Now In Ramona, an airplane and an aviator provide living lessons on World War II 1:43 On Now Video: Navy's newest vessel sails into San Diego and a new future in surface warfare On Now Video: U.S. Navy files homicide charges over warship collisions On Now Stopping Marine hazing On Now Video: U.S. Navy Air Crew Grounded After Creating Vulgar Sky Drawing On Now Navy says Asia Pacific ship collisions were avoidable On Now Hundreds of recruits get sick at Marine boot camp On Now Cutler Dawson Talks Navy Federal

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cprine@sduniontribune.comProvince 2 sugarcane farmers defy odds

Sugarcane farms in Province 2 may have been negatively affected by the lack of labour, aging farmers, payment disputes, unfavourable climate and a delay of mechanisation, but sugarcane output has been on increasing trend.To hear one of the most passionate arguments on behalf of young U.S. immigrant dreamers, look south of the border.

Vicente Fox, the former president of Mexico, has become known as an antagonist of President Donald Trump, using combative and profane language to rail against the presidents character and his positions on binational issues, from plans to extend the border wall to restrictionist policies on immigration.

But Fox took a much different tone in making an eloquent appeal on behalf of people granted temporary legal residency under former President Barack Obamas Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals program.

The so-called dreamers were brought to the United States as children, and because Trump rescinded the DACA program, they are threatened with deportation beginning March 5.

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We would love to have them

Fox, while urging they be allowed to remain, suggested DACA recipients would be a prize for any nation, particularly his.

Heres what he said in a video thats been widely circulated on social media:

If you dont want DACA here, we will take them all in Mexico. We would love to have them in Mexico, said Fox, becoming animated as he spoke. I mean, imagine kids with a university degree with the knowledge that very few have. With the capacity and the skills they have developed in themselves.

We would love to have them in Mexico, but we respect their will to be ... in the United States. We respect that they love their families and they want to stay.

But if not, please DACA . . . come back to Mexico. We will have a future for you...

Congress and congressmen, if you have a piece of brain like this (he puts his left thumb and forefinger close together), if you understand value and economy, if you understand assets and human capital, keep DACA. I mean, you invested so much. You have such a rich, great talent.

Keep them here, you already have invested. And if not, I mean, its criminal.

Those kids were grown here, they love the United States. They love this nation. They love the spirit and the values of the founding fathers. They dont even know about their own nation, their own country.

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They are Americans. The only thing they need is this approval.

The human factor is key. So destroying the dreams of one million people is criminal.

He didnt forget Trump

Now, Fox being Fox, he did take the opportunity to criticize Trump, though in a more subdued manner than usual. In the middle of his plea to protect the dreamers, he talked about what makes great leaders, invoking the names of Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and Gandhi.

Thats exactly the attribute Senor Trump does not have, he said.

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Trump proposed creating a path to citizenship for DACA recipients and others during his State of the Union address Tuesday. But it was in the context of his four pillars plan that also would require funding for the border wall, scrapping the lottery visa system and vastly restricting the family immigration program.

Trump framed the need for an immigration overhaul, as he always does, out of concern about crime and gangs. That link has been widely challenged, with data showing immigrants commit less crime than U.S.-born citizens.

DACA recipients are offended by his tactic.

What were asking for is not much, Pedro Aguilar, a 28-year old DACA recipient, told the Union-Tribunes Kate Morrissey after the speech. I think by demonizing us, he really does a disservice to America. Were here to improve the lives of everyone.

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Highly employed, educated

Polls have shown between 70 percent and nearly 90 percent of Americans say dreamers should be allowed to stay in the U.S.

Some surveys show that more than 90 percent of DACA recipients are employed or in school. The claim that theyre taking jobs from native-born Americans, as espoused by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, just doesnt hold up.

There may be individual instances of that, but nothing that causes a blip in the job market.

There is no evidence of that, Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moodys Analytics, said about Sessions statement. Repealing DACA is particularly wrongheaded as economic policy.

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Its no small irony that dreamers are exactly the kind of immigrants Trump says he wants to come to the U.S.: educated, skilled, employed.

OK, so theyre not from Norway.

But the quality of the people or the morality play about whether they should stay or go really has little to do with how things will go down.

DACA recipients are a bargaining chip, pure and simple.Trump has stated his price for allowing them to stay.

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He has the upper hand. Union-Tribune editorial writer Chris Reed recently wrote an insightful piece pointing out that while DACA has strong support among Democrats, polls show they are open to and in some cases supportive of restrictions on immigration.

Democrats also have supported tougher border security in the past, even building walls.

Letting DACA recipients get kicked out of the country to block policies a lot of people dont find so objectionable would create political problems for Democratic leaders in Congress.

In any event, whether dreamers get banished to lands that are foreign to them will depend not on the merits of the people or the program, but on largely unrelated matters.

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It might not seem fair, but thats the way of Washington. Thats where the human capital Fox spoke of is viewed as political capital.

Tweet of the Week

Goes to Matt Strabone (@MattStrabone), candidate for county Assessor/Recorder/Clerk, for honesty in his political deception on the night of the State of the Union address.

Hello! Im not watching, but I AM shamelessly using the #SOTU hashtag to get you to look at my campaign for an incredibly obscure local office (links to his website)A young San Diego woman is suing her former pastor, alleging he duped her into having sex in the guise of sexual healing therapy, while he alleges in his own lawsuit that she made private, graphic communications between them public as revenge when he ended their consensual relationship.

The two lawsuits were filed Jan. 16 in San Diego Superior Court, with both acknowledging their sexual relationship lasted about a year, from the fall of 2016 until October 2017.

Amy McClanahan and John Wright filed their separate suits anonymously, using only their initials as plaintiffs, but they each gave the others full name as defendants.

McClanahan, now 24, went on camera for an interview with 10 News that was aired Friday night. She said she was doing so out of concern for other women.

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She told an interviewer that Wright singled her out because, I was in a very vulnerable status.

Her lawsuit alleges sexual battery, rape, gender violence and sexual harassment, as well as negligent supervision of Wright, who was then a pastor of the English-language congregation at Mid-City Church of the Nazarene, which is also named in the lawsuit.

No one answered phone calls to the church Saturday, and Wrights name does not appear on the churchs website along with other staff.

Wright also taught at Point Loma Nazarene University as a theology professor. The university is not named in McClanahans lawsuit.

When asked on Saturday about the allegations against Wright, a university spokeswoman said that a complaint against a faculty member was filed in November and the school hired outside experts to investigate the complaint rather than conduct an internal probe.

She did not name the faculty member and said she was prohibited by law from discussing further details. The complaint was made under Title IX, a federal civil law that prohibits sex discrimination in education programs.

McClanahans lawsuit states that they met in 2014 and she attended Wrights church, where she confided that she had been the victim of childhood sexual abuse by a family member and suffered from Post-traumatic Stress Disorder as a result.

Wrights wife also was a pastor at the Nazarene church at that time.

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McClanahan alleges that he offered to help heal her PTSD, and by 2016, was meeting with her privately, where they progressed from holding hands to kissing to having sex, according to the lawsuit.

In his own lawsuit, Wright declares the sex was consensual and that they exchanged nude photos of themselves over Skype, as well as graphic emails and texts that expressed their love for each other.

He and his wife are suing McClanahan for alleged illegal recording of confidential information and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Wright alleges that she agreed to keep their relationship secret, and when she asked him in October to have an open dating relationship, he said he wanted to end their sexual contact, his lawsuit states.

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He further alleges that McClanahan illegally recorded a screen shot photograph of his genitalia without his permission and later threatened his wife with making the photo public. McClanahan also is alleged to have made a secret recording when she talked to Wrights wife about the sexual relationship with her husband, his lawsuit says.

Wrights Los Angeles attorney, Alec Rose, said in an email Saturday that his only comment on the McClanahan lawsuit is that it has no legal merit whatsoever. My clients and I will litigate in court, not in the public media. Anything my clients and I have to say about these matters will be stated in court as testimony, legal argument, or written briefs.

McClanahan says in her lawsuit that she had accepted the pastors offer to help her PTSD as a mentor, but in reality Wright was a predator who recognized plaintiffs vulnerability and took that opportunity to groom and coerce her into a sexual relationship.

In her television interview, McClanahan said, He would say it was healing for me, healing my past trauma. I foolishly believed him.

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Wright and his wife sought temporary domestic violence restraining orders against McClanahan in December, alleging she caused several public disruptions. McClanahan also filed for a restraining order against Wright, alleging he threatened to use force on her.

McClanahans attorney, Dan Gilleon, said Saturday that she has graduated from college and wants to work as a pediatric nurse. She has been staying with her parents in Sacramento while undergoing psychological therapy, he said.

Staff writer Kristina Davis contributed to this report.

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pauline.repard@sduniontribune

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Twitter: @pdrepardCITY COUNCILS

CARLSBAD

The Carlsbad City Council met in special session Thursday to discuss and provide feedback to city staff on potential changes to the Carlsbad Municipal Code Chapters relating to the citys boards, committees and commissions. Staff was directed to return with a draft of the revised chapters.

DEL MAR

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The Del Mar City Council met in closed session Monday to discuss the city managers evaluation.

SCHOOL DISTRICTS

CARDIFF

The Cardiff School District board met Thursday for a special workshop with the architectural firm Studio E to discuss developments to the Cardiff School Schematic Design.

DEL MAR

The Del Mar Union School District board scheduled a special workshop Tuesday with educator and author George Couros.

OCEANSIDE

The Oceanside Unified School District board met Tuesday for a board showcase of student learning at its middle and high schools. The board then went into closed session to discuss the superintendents position. The board also met in closed session later in the day to discuss personnel, labor negotiations and litigation. In regular session afterward, the board approved single plans for student achievement.

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SOLANA BEACH

The Solana Beach School District board met in special closed session Wednesday to discuss labor negotiations.

VISTA

The Vista Unified School District board met Thursday and rescheduled a governance workshop. Study sessions were held on transportation and magnet school procedures.

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laura.groch@sduniontribune.comTwo adults and a child suffered smoke inhalation and some pets died at a house fire in Oak Park Saturday afternoon, officials said.

Investigators werent able to determine what sparked the blaze that caused an estimated $250,000 in damage to the house on Grape Street near 54th Street.

The residents noticed fire and smoke in the house and got out about 2 p.m., San Diego Fire-Rescue Department spokeswoman Monica Munoz said.

The first engine crew got there within two minutes. The fire was burning at the back of the house and spreading fast, Munoz said.

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Firefighters kept the flames from getting into the attic and next door homes, and had the fire knocked down by 2:30 p.m., she said. The fire did burn part of a wooden fence between houses.

The two adults and the child were taken to hospitals for treatment of smoke inhalation.

Deputy Fire Chief Kelly Zombro told reporters that some pets in the backyard did not survive. He did not have information on what kind of animals they were, or how many.

pauline.repard@sduniontribune

Twitter: @pdrepardThe legal team that represented former District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis in her effort to protect her $268,800 annual pension in case she wins her race for county Board of Supervisors was paid thousands of dollars by the Dumanis campaign, newly filed election reports show.

The Bonnie Dumanis for Supervisor 2018 committee paid Best Best & Krieger almost $2,500 last year, according to the filing  the same period during which the firm represented her in an effort to make sure county pension officials keep sending her benefit checks even if she takes office at the county again.

Dumanis campaign consultant, Jason Roe, said his client does not plan to accept the supervisors annual salary of about $172,000  and never did. He said Dumanis hired the attorneys to make sure there were no pension rules requiring her to accept a supervisor salary on top of her retirement benefit.

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Roe did not respond to questions about why campaign funds were used to pay the law firm that performed the legal work. Typically, legal work concerning a candidates personal finances is not a campaign expense.

Dumanis new 167-page election filing lists hundreds of contributors, along with expenses paid to date, debts that are still due to be paid and other campaign-finance details.

In addition to the $2,480 the Dumanis campaign paid Best Best & Krieger, the new filing notes that the campaign still owes the firm $3,103 for professional services rendered.

Roe issued a news release Thursday announcing that Dumanis had outraised all of her opponents on the June 5 ballot.

Judge Bonnie Dumanis raised $310,485 in the first finance reporting period since she joined the race for county Board of Supervisors D4  more than any other candidate, Roe said, using the title Dumanis held before serving as district attorney for 15 years. Dumanis entered the race months after the other candidates but was still able to raise more money from a more diverse coalition of donors than the others.

The San Diego Union-Tribune reported on Monday that Dumanis hired the lawyers to communicate with the San Diego County Employees Retirement Association to safeguard her monthly pension benefits if she wins her campaign.

In a year of back-and-forth between Dumanis, her attorneys and the pension system, the public records reviewed by the newspaper show no indication that Dumanis intended to waive her Board of Supervisors salary, should she be elected.

The documents seem to be predicated on the assumption that she would receive both a supervisor salary and a pension from her service as prosecutor. Retirement officials repeatedly frame the issue in terms of double-dipping, or receiving a salary and a pension at the same time.

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Still, Roe insisted Dumanis intention was always to waive the supervisor salary.

Subsequent to reporting for that first story, Roe has provided documentation from Dumanis for her position.

One example is an email sent from Dumanis to one of her private attorneys on Aug. 22, 2017, saying, As I mentioned to you I want to find a way to continue my retirement and take absolutely nothing more from the county.

He also provided a single paragraph of a letter from the same attorney to Dumanis on Aug. 31, 2017, with the header factual background and containing the sentence, You have shared that, if elected, you intend to waive receipt of any compensation and benefits.

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The remainder of the letter was not released.

Both documents are private communications between Dumanis and her attorney. The Union-Tribune has requested from pension officials any and all public records that would show Dumanis communicated to them her intention to waive any supervisorial salary.

One recent document that Roe provided was an email from retirement board attorney Elaine Reagan dated Jan. 31, to Dumanis. The subject line: Your question.

The text of the email reads, Bonnie, I wanted to confirm that the only question you asked SDCERA was: If elected to the Board of Supervisors, could you waive the right to receive a salary in that position, and continue to receive your SDCERA retirement benefit? Regards, Elaine.

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jeff.mcdonald@sduniontribune.com (619) 293-1708 @sdutMcDonald

Thank you for reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading.Provincial parliaments, govt agencies understaffed

Ministry of General Administration (MoGA) had assigned 15 officials from administration and law group at Province 3 to run the Provincial Assembly (PA) meeting coordinating with those deployed from Federal Parliament Secretariat (FPS).Swarajs visit ill-timed: Bhattarai

Naya Shakti Party Nepal coordinator Baburam Bhattarai has remarked that the recent visit to Kathmandu by External Affairs Minister of India Sushma Swaraj was ill-timed.Willing to work with new govt, says US official

A senior United States official has said that the US is looking forward to working with the new government in Nepal in the countrys quest for development and prosperity.El Mercurio de Valparaiso on Sunday cited Panama President Juan Carlos Varela's comments about the potential for promoting cruise tourism to the Southern Cone during the Central American leader's visit last April.

The story mentioned the possibility of six- or seven-day cruises between Panama and ports in Colombia, Peru and Chile (and, presumably, Ecuador), as part of a study to be undertaken by the Panama Maritime Authority, according to its administrator, Jorge Barakat Pitty.

And El Mercurio noted a high-level Chilean delegation from Grupo de Empresas Navieras, led by chairman Jose Manual Urenda, held meetings in January with senior Panamanian government authorities. These included a visit to the Amador terminal construction site and talks about how the company, through its Agencias Universales SA (Agunsa), would be interested in participating in a tender to operate the Amador terminal.

Agunsa handles cruise calls at Manta, Ecuador, where it's investing in a new terminal and port improvements, and in Valparaiso, via the Valparaiso Terminal de Pasajeros (VTP), where the agency has proposed the construction of a finger pier where cruise ships would have priority.

This plan was recently presented to the Port Company of Valparaiso for consideration as a solution to cargo vessel berthing conflicts which have caused many cruise lines to send their ships to nearby San Antonio's Puerto Central instead.

Speaking to El Mercurio, VTP general manager Juan Esteban Bilbao hailed the promotion of Pacific itineraries by the Panamanian government as a great step that complements the future cruise infrastructure at Amador, Manta and Valparaiso.Press Release

February 4, 2018 De Lima proposes higher fines vs falsified entries in civil registry Opposition Senator Leila M. de Lima has filed a measure seeking to impose stiff fines and heavy penalties for failure to register and/or falsify entries for birth, marriage and death certificates in civil registry. De Lima has filed Senate Bill No. (SBN) 1665 amending Section 9 of Presidential Decree (P.D.) No. 651, which mandates the immediate registration of births and deaths, and civil status, and penalties for violation of the said provision. "It is [an] affront to our way of life to intentionally fail to register or falsify the entries in civil registries," she said. "P.D. No. 651 was enacted specifically to preserve the integrity of our civil registry, which is one of the most essential components of our bureaucracy and governance, but it has undergone zero amendment or updating," she explained. Under Section 9 of P.D. No. 651, any person required under this decree to report for registration any fact concerning his or her civil status and who fails to do so, or who deliberately makes false statements in the birth or death form and presents the same for registration, shall pay a fine of not less than ?500 nor more than ?1,000. Likewise, any person who violates any rule or regulation which may be issued pursuant to this decree and any local public health officer who fails to perform his duties as provided for in this decree, or violates any rule or regulation which may be issued pursuant to this decree, shall also pay the abovementioned fine. Under SBN 1665, De Lima proposed to increase the penalty for failure to register or falsification of the civil status per persons with a fine ranging from ?40,000 to ?1,200,000--which is the corresponding range of fines on correctional penalties under the Revised Penal Code (RPC) pursuant to Republic Act (R.A.) No. 10951. "As a country, we need to be able to properly document our citizens in order to ensure that everyone will be accounted for and thus have access to all the blessings of democracy," De Lima said. The former justice secretary noted early this year, Congress enacted R.A. No. 10951, which adjusted that the penalties and fines imposed under the RPC to ensure that the level of punishment will remain commensurate to the crimes. De Lima underscored the need for separate legislation to adjust the penalties under P.D. No. 651 to the current levels imposed under the RPC.Press Release

February 4, 2018 Trillanes calls for probe on Duterte bank accounts Following President Rodrigo Duterte's challenge to Congress to investigate his alleged ill-gotten wealth, Senator Antonio "Sonny" F. Trillanes IV will file a resolution on Monday to formally ask the Senate to start the said investigation. Trillanes' proposed resolution seeks to look into bank documents under the name of President Rodrigo Duterte and Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio showing their undisclosed 'covered transactions,' or transactions exceeding Php 500,000.00, which may have violated the Anti-Money Laundering Act (AMLA). "President Duterte must address this issue squarely once and for all and stop fooling the Filipino people. If he has nothing to hide, he should bare it all and sign the waiver. On the contrary, he has been dilly-dallying in his statements, and instead has been bluffing the people by publicly ordering AMLC to investigate his alleged bank accounts, although we all know that AMLC would not do it unless he signs a waiver on bank secrecy," Trillanes pointed out. Trillanes added: "And now, despite Duterte's continued denial of existence of his alleged undeclared wealth, he suspended Overall Deputy Ombudsman Melcor Carandang for supposedly releasing his bank documents from AMLC. What is there to leak when they deny such documents being released by AMLC?" In the proposed resolution, Trillanes particularly noted the report made by Vera Files that President Rodrigo Duterte and Davao Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio failed to fully disclose in their Statements of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth their joint deposits and investments, which exceeded Php100 million, under the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI). According to Vera Files' report, the transactions in their bank accounts included a P48.17 million placement in 2006 that grew to P55.13 million by 2013; a P40.55 million investment in 2009 that stood at P41.72 million in 2013; about $220,000, roughly P10 million, from 2006 to 2012; the purchase of P80 million in insurance policies in 2014; and a P16.85 million investment which begun in 2014. Trillanes first raised the issue of President Duterte's ill-gotten wealth in April 2016 and filed a plunder complaint against him before the Ombudsman in the same year. "With this resolution, I am accepting President Duterte's challenge to investigate his alleged ill-gotten wealth to once and for all reveal the truth on this issue. The public wants to know the truth and it's in the hands of the Senate to uncover it," Trillanes further noted.1. Yes. COVID-19 can only be stopped through vaccinations. A mandate is needed.

2. Yes. This is a major step, but were facing a national emergency. It is a justifiable move.

3. No. The government is right to promote vaccinations, but not to require them.

4. No. This is government overreach and legally questionable. A mandate is wrong.

5. Unsure. Its in the publics interest, but mandates infringe on individuals rights.

Vote

View ResultsSince starting service in August, the North Bays new commuter rail service has survived a fire that stopped at its tracks, given thousands of free rides to help fire victims and has had to fight to collect promised federal funding for a new extension to Larkspur.

In short, SMART has been on something of a wild ride in its nearly six months of hauling passengers between Santa Rosa and San Rafael.

Yet the service has still managed to meet or exceed ridership and revenue projections, and start work on that Larkspur extension, which will bring the trains riders to within a short walk to the Golden Gate Ferry to San Francisco.

But Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transits biggest achievement may be that the passenger rail service, the first in the North Bay in 60 years, seems to have won over skeptics and critics, who are now calling for more service and more stations.

Its only been six months, said Randy Rentschler, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, but I think this shows that theres a need for more than just a highway in that corridor. SMART has the opportunity to be a really great alternative.

Now Playing: Aboard+the+SMART+train+between+San+Rafael+and+Santa+Rosa Video: SFChronicle

Aboard the gray and green trains Thursday, commuters, sightseers and day-trippers raved about the service, especially the opportunity it provides to avoid Highway 101s torturous traffic.

I love it, said Jennifer Romo Dowd, 40, a meeting planner who lives in Sebastapol and since October has commuted on the train between Cotati and downtown San Rafael. Theyre on time, theyre comfortable, theres beer and wine, and the Wi-Fi works most of the time. Its a great alternative to driving.

SMARTs trains make 17 round trips between San Rafael and Santa Rosa on weekdays and five each way on weekends and holidays. The trains are diesel-fueled and self-powered, meaning they arent pulled by locomotives.

Most consist of two cars, one with a restroom, the other with a cafe that serves snacks and beverages, including locally produced beers and wines. But higher-than-anticipated ridership on some trains, including a larger-than-expected number of passengers who bring bicycles aboard, prompted SMART to add a third car to 14 weekday trains, most of which run during the morning and evening commutes.

SMART has carried more than 310,000 passengers since its start, said Jeanne Mariani-Belding, an agency spokeswoman. Thats slightly ahead of projections, despite the steep drop in the days after the North Bay fires and fluctuations that vary with the weather. When it rains, fewer bike riders commute, and when its warm and sunny, day-trippers and sightseers show up in larger numbers.

It has not been a typical six months, Mariani-Belding said. We had wildfires, we had limited service, we had free rides, we had the holidays. Our ridership fluctuates, and its going to take a while to level out.

SMART is also running ahead of revenue projections, meaning passengers are taking longer rides that expected. SMART had predicted it would collect $68,000 in fares each week but is averaging about $76,000 even with the free rides.

Scott Strazzante/The Chronicle

The busiest stations are Petaluma, downtown Santa Rosa, downtown San Rafael and Sonoma County Airport. The most popular destinations are downtown San Rafael, downtown Santa Rosa, Marin Civic Center and Petaluma.

Thursdays passengers, many of them occasional or first-time riders, said they were eager to see more trains, extended hours and the opening of promised extensions south to Larkspur and north to Windsor, Healdsburg and Cloverdale.

Im not a commuter; I do this for fun, said Sally Mayer, 61, of Novato, who rides SMART to meet friends for lunch. Wed really like to take it to downtown Santa Rosa for dinner. We have some favorite places there. But the last train back leaves at 7 p.m.

The 2.2-mile Larkspur extension, considered crucial to attracting San Francisco-bound commuters, started last summer but faces funding challenges, including uncertainty over $22.5 million in federal money promised in 2016 but delayed by the Trump administration.

Farhad Mansourian, SMARTs general manager, said he recently met with Jane Williams, head of the Federal Transit Administration, in San Francisco and is optimistic the funds are coming soon. Bay Area transportation officials feared a repeat of the spring 2017 fight Caltrain had to wage to get promised federal money for electrification.

Things are taking a little bit longer than usual, Mansourian said Friday, but as of today, our target date is early March.

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SMART expects to run trains to Larkspur by the end of 2019.

Extensions northward will take longer. SMART plans to make it to Cloverdale, but the next anticipated stop 3 miles north of the current end-of-the-line Sonoma County Airport Station in Windsor lacks funding, although the plans have been drawn up and the environmental studies are completed. Even so, Mariani-Belding said the extension could be completed as soon as 2021.

State transportation officials are also interested in seeing SMART eventually run east along Highway 37 using existing rails to Fairfield. The agency has applied for a grant to study the feasibility.

SMARTs biggest challenge, exacerbated by the Tubbs Fire, which stopped right at its tracks near the Santa Rosa North Station, is hiring and retaining train operators and conductors scared off by the Bay Areas high price of housing. The SMART board recently approved hiring more people to run the trains, but it can be tough to pay them enough.

As soon as were able to hire new people, Mansourian said, wed like to add more service, including earlier service on weekends and filling some of the gaps in our schedule.

While SMART is off to a promising start, he said much work remains.

Its a fantastic beginning, Mansourian said, but look at it this way: Were like a startup. Were not done.

Michael Cabanatuan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mcabanatuan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ctuanAfter a seemingly endless procession of bulldozers and carpentry crews grinding through the streets day after month after year, reconstruction of the San Bruno neighborhood that vanished in flames when a Pacific Gas and Electric Co. pipeline exploded more than seven years ago is almost done.

The key word is almost. For those just starting to rebuild after the worst wildfire disaster in Californias history  the blazes that rampaged through the Wine Country in October  San Brunos example is sobering.

Consider: Theres still one house to be built in San Brunos Crestmoor neighborhood. A community park on the spot where members of two families perished is yet to be completed. Street signs are still missing, and roads have yet to be repaved.

In Wine Country? Theyre still scooping ashes out of devastated lots.

The difference in scale is, of course, huge. The San Bruno blast of Sept. 9, 2010, killed eight people, destroyed 38 homes and left 17 more houses badly damaged. The October blazes killed 45 people in Sonoma, Napa, Mendocino and Yuba counties and incinerated 8,889 homes, commercial structures and outbuildings.

But the challenges for the people involved, and for replacing destroyed property, are similar. Those who have been slogging along in San Bruno predict a 10-year ordeal before life in the Wine Country burn region starts to feel normal again.

All I can say to anyone up north is get ready, because its going to be a long, long haul, said Jim Ruane, San Brunos mayor when the shoddily tended PG&E pipeline exploded in the most destructive natural-gas blast in U.S. history. They seem to be doing a good job of cleaning up and getting right on it up there, but here we are in San Bruno about 7 years later  and were still finishing.

Theres no handbook on this, said Ruane, who helped oversee the rebuilding plans and battles with PG&E for millions of dollars in compensation to the city and victims before retiring from his post in November. You cant go to the Page 52, Column 3 and say, OK, this is what we do.

The best you can do is feel your way through it. It will be hard. But they should know in the North Bay that they will recover and be stronger for it.

Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Hillsborough, spent years fighting PG&E over the blast alongside Ruane and other leaders. Her advice to those suffering in the North Bay is to call on their elected leaders and every level of government, demand action, and dont give up.

That means pushing for public meetings  she held nearly a dozen town hall sessions on the blast  to strategize on everything from government aid and lawsuits to insurance payouts.

Push insurance companies to do the right thing, Speier said. Embarrassing them when they dont is good.

At one point, Speier and several San Bruno survivors said, she had to pressure the IRS not to tax victims settlement money.

Recovery in the North Bay? I think its a decadelong process, Speier said. So find a way to take this horrible experience and turn it into something positive, because thats how youll get through this.

In San Brunos case, city officials and residents counted carving money out of PG&E as one of those positives. The utility gave the city $50 million toward rebuilding the neighborhood and $68 million in restitution money thats being routed through a foundation for community improvements such as a new public pool, and paid more than $500 million in claims settlements to families that suffered losses.

In the North Bay, investigators havent determined what caused the wind-whipped October conflagrations, but one possibility is that PG&E electrical lines were blown or knocked over. Many North Bay residents have sued the utility, Sonoma Countys Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to sue, and the company suspended dividends on its common stock in December out of concerns that it might be held liable for more than $9 billion in damages.

All but 12 of the 38 families burned out by the San Bruno explosion eventually came back to Crestmoor. The dozen that never returned included all the families who lost loved ones in the blast.

The first ones to move in, a year after the fire, were Bob and Nancy Hensel. Their advice to those who lost their homes in the Wine Country disaster: Strap in for a rough ride.

Its a lot of work building a house, said Bob Hensel, who is 80 and had lived at his Fairmont Drive home since 1972. Getting bids, going through the plans, getting approvals, it all takes time.

And we were lucky  wed just done work on the house a few years before, so all the plans were at my sons house and we didnt have to have them drawn up from scratch.

Perhaps most aggravating, he said, was trying to remember all the belongings that turned into smoking debris. Insurance companies required a detailed inventory of every item lost before cutting checks for those items, and it was an amazing headache, Hensel said.

Couches, chairs, even the handles on cabinets and a cheese grater  everything had to be listed, and for a long time afterward we were always going, Oh shoot, we used to have one of those, and wed forgotten to put it in the list, Hensel said.

In the end, he and his wife assembled two 8-inch-thick binders with 3,600 items to replace, right down to a $5.29 magnifying glass.

Most insurance companies have relaxed that inventory requirement for losses in last years wildfires, according to the state Insurance Department. Speier said the inventory mandate should have been eliminated altogether: Its just wrong. They went through hell once, and they dont need to do it again.

Across the street from the Hensels, Carolyn Gray, 75, often looks out the second-floor window of her reconstructed home at the bare spot where a memorial park will go in. She can see the slowly rising house down the block on Glenview Drive. And she still marvels that she managed to scramble fast enough with husband Charlie, now 86, on the day of the explosion to escape.

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The ranch home where theyd raised a family and lived for 43 years disappeared in flames, along with the RV in their driveway, as they fled in their car with their dog. They rebuilt within three years, but it was only in the past year or so that the quiet, 1950s-vintage neighborhood has felt like something Gray recognizes as normal.

The streets still dont have signs, so Gray tends to get neighbors mail. She wishes the repaving was already done. And the clanking and dust of reconstruction drove her to distraction until it finally settled down.

But she and Charlie were able to reconstruct their house with a few things theyd never gotten around to before the blast  better drainage in the backyard, heated floors, a more spacious second floor. It took a lot of wrangling with their insurance company  we negotiated with PG&E for another $200,000 to make up the shortfall for rebuilding, she said  and the aggravation of permits and going over construction plans seemed never-ending. But they got what they wanted.

Her favorite spot now is the large room on the second floor that she made into her quilting center, with a wide desk and plenty of places for supplies. The sun streams in pretty much all day through the window there, and now when she gazes at the once-again peaceful neighborhood she can remember something other than horror.

My advice for anyone who came through a fire: Build something into your house that makes you happy, she said, lines easing on her forehead as she stared out the window. My quilting room, this is it for me. This is my replacement for what we went through.

For Rene Morales, whose 20-year-old daughter, Jessica Morales, died in the blast, healing has come several ways. One is through creating her Gas Pipe Safety First nonprofit organization, which advocates for stiffer pipeline regulation  it helps channel my sorrow and anger, she said.

Another is in helping create, with other survivors, the memorial park that is sprouting across the street from Grays house. Built on the former home lots of the Greig and Bullis families, which lost a total of five members to the flames, the grassy park will overlook a tree-studded canyon and feature a rock wall with seats dedicated to those who died.

Any mention of the fire will be low-key, like the only other memorial to the blast victims  a hard-to-find sculpture in the corner of the main city park  because thats how the survivors wanted it.

Anything bigger probably would have brought a more depressing feel to the area, Morales said. We all know the history of what happened, and we dont need to be reminded of it in a big way all the time. The way this park is designed, it gives you a sense that you are up above and looking down. Its a symbolic feeling of freedom.

It feels right, she said. Its pretty. And its been a long time in coming.

Kevin Fagan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kfagan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @KevinChronThe Moscone Convention Center parking garage would be redeveloped into a 320-foot tower with at least 650 hotel rooms and at least 100 affordable housing units under a plan being put forward by the city.

Directors of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, which owns the property, will vote Tuesday on issuing a request for proposals to build a multiuse complex at 255 Third St., currently a 732-space garage. The site, just under an acre, is bordered by Clementina Street to the south and Kaplan Lane to the east.

The garage, which is 53 percent occupied during peak parking hours, generates $2.3 million annually for the city. Under the plan, the transportation authority will retain ownership and negotiate a 65-year ground lease with the selected development team.

The project is part of a broader city push to create affordable housing on public land. Over the past few years, the San Francisco Unified School District and City College of San Francisco have made underutilized parcels available for housing development.

We are trying to be creative in the use of the citys limited land, to see what property can be put to a higher and better use, said Daniel Adams, deputy director of the Mayors Office of Housing and Community Development. The public benefits of taking a single-use site like a parking lot and converting it to multiple uses, including housing, are multifaceted.

While developers frequently combine high-end condos and luxury hotels  both the St. Regis and Four Seasons in San Francisco are examples of this  the Third Street project would mark the first time a hotel is combined with below-market-rate residential units.

It would also fill what San Francisco Travel says is a pressing need: a mega hotel next to the convention center.

The effort comes as the citys hotels are booming. The citywide hotel occupancy rate was 83.8 percent as of July 2017, well above the national average of 66 percent. In particular, the city lacks big hotels: Currently 70 percent of the citys hotels have 200 rooms or fewer, requiring conventions to often book rooms across 20 hotels. In the case of the largest Moscone events, as many as 100 hotels are needed.

We think this is a welcome development for San Francisco, said Cassandra Costello, vice president for public policy for San Francisco Travel. It will not only support the convention market but also create hotel jobs and affordable housing, something that will benefit workers in the hospitality industry.

While there would not be dedicated parking for the hotel or the housing, would-be developers will be required to include two alternatives: one that includes a garage with between 200 and 300 parking spaces and one that ditches the garage altogether.

In May, Todco, a nonprofit housing owner in the South of Market, wrote a letter expressing concern about the development of the Moscone Center Garage Site, including project design, minimum level of housing affordability, community process, and contribution toward community facilities.

Todco President John Elberling said that he is satisfied with the projects progress since then. Carving sites for affordable housing out of big new projects is a strategy we should be increasingly using, he said. We desperately need affordable housing sites in SoMa, everywhere and anywhere we can find them.

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Todd Rufo, director of the citys economic development office, said the project represents an innovative way to use public land to achieve two critical needs for SoMa and the city.

The hotel, will help San Francisco remain a top tourist destination and support the growing demand for convention business at Moscone Center, while also providing high-quality permanent jobs for our workforce, he said.

The hotel will employ about 400 full-time workers, according to the city.

The proposed project comes as the city is working on rezoning a swath of South of Market a block west of the Moscone garage site. That effort, which is expected to be completed this year, has prompted property owners to submit applications to build more than a dozen major developments, including nine hotels. All the hotels in the pipeline are significantly smaller than the one planned for the Moscone garage.

Peter Cohen, co-director of the Council Of Community Housing Organizations, said the Moscone garage project, while not part of the Central SoMa rezoning, should not be seen as an isolated outlier. And he said his group will advocate for more housing units.

A hundred units is a pretty modest number in the citys core, he said. That is going to be a gem of a site, so why not max it out in terms of units if we can make it work.

J.K. Dineen is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jdineen@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @sfjkdineenOne reason progressive supervisors gave for terminating London Breed as San Franciscos acting mayor was that she was too close to tech billionaires like Ron Conway  so its interesting to note that Breeds replacement, Mark Farrell, has counted Conway as an investor in his venture capital firm since 2011.

A spokesman for Conway confirmed hes an investor in Thayer Ventures, where Farrell was a managing director until his swearing-in as mayor Jan. 23.

Thayer Ventures website describes it as an investment fund specializing in technology companies that work with travel and hospitality firms.

Neither Conways spokesman nor a spokeswoman for the mayors office, Deirdre Hussey, would comment on the Farrell-Conway business ties. However, we learned from sources that Conway initially invested $100,000 in the firms Quest Hospitality Ventures fund. According to Thayers website, the fund has 11 companies in its portfolio, and it closed to new investors on June 30, 2011  six months after Farrell was sworn in as the supervisor from District Two.

In 2012, Conway bought into a second Quest fund featuring 13 companies, were told, although the amount of money he invested is unknown. (Conway is also on the nominating committee of the Chronicles Visionary of the Year award.)

Under the City Charter, mayors are barred from engaging in outside business. To comply, Farrell signed papers late Friday declaring he is on full leave of absence from Thayer Ventures and will have no role in company decision-making while he is mayor. Hes not a candidate in the June 5 election.

Breed, of course, is a candidate. Conway has contributed to her supervisorial campaigns, which was enough for progressive supervisors to vote her out of Room 200.

Supervisors Aaron Peskin and Hillary Ronen were especially vocal about their desire to oust Breed, the first African American woman to serve as mayor, and install Farrell. Peskin said the vote was not so much about elevating one white man as sending a message to another white man  a tech titan billionaire named Ron Conway  that San Francisco cant be bought.

Ronen called Conway the citys version of the Koch brothers  someone who throws his billions of dollars around to threaten candidates.

Is there hypocrisy? Yes, Ronen said Friday of her vote for Farrell.

She said she would have preferred a different interim mayor, but that her biggest priority was the long game  ensuring that Breed didnt have the advantage of incumbency going into the election.

Ronen, who has not endorsed anyone in the June contest, said the city needs someone who is independent  not only from Ron Conway, but from people who have had undue influence over the policy direction of the city for the last two or three mayoral administrations.

So sue: Retired UC Berkeley linguist George Lakoff is being dragged into a legal fight over comments he made about possible Russian influence on Donald Trumps 2016 presidential campaign.

Lakoff was slapped with a libel and slander suit by Irakly Ike Kaveladze  a Georgian American businessman who attended a highly scrutinized Trump Tower meeting in June 2016 between members of Trumps inner circle and Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya. She was allegedly dangling dirt to Team Trump about Hillary Clinton.

The suit Kaveladze filed last week in Orange County Superior Court stemmed from an interview Lakoff gave to MSNBCs Chuck Todd, in which Lakoff called Kaveladze the major person who has been responsible for money laundering from Russia and other post-Soviet countries.

Kaveladzes suit calls that accusation baseless and scurrilous.

Kaveladzes legal team includes Scott Balber, who represented Trump in a suit he filed against Bill Maher in 2013 after the comedian promised to give $5 million to charity if Trump could prove he wasnt the spawn of his mother having sex with an orangutan. Trump eventually dropped the suit.

Lakoffs lawyer, Travis LeBlanc, promised a vigorous defense, saying Californias free-speech laws protect individuals like Dr. Lakoff from being forced to engage in costly litigation of frivolous claims.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

Safety alert: Look for sparks to fly at Tuesdays Oakland City Council meeting, when some of Councilwoman Desley Brooks colleagues intend to take action that her allies see as retaliation for that pricey shove she delivered to former Black Panther leader Elaine Brown.

The 74-year-old Brown sued over the 2015 incident at a barbecue restaurant, claiming elder abuse, and a jury agreed  leveling a $3.75 million judgment against the city last month.

On Tuesday, Councilwomen Annie Campbell Washington and Lynette Gibson McElhaney  both of whom have had their share of run-ins with Brooks  will seek a rule change to give council President Larry Reid the authority to make committee assignment changes at will.

McElhaney says its something she has long pushed for, but others believe the real intent is to remove Brooks from her plum assignment as chair of the Public Safety Committee. Reid has signed on as a co-sponsor.

They asked me to, he said.

Brooks allies, led by Oakland Post Publisher Paul Cobb, are expected to pack the chambers to fight the proposal. Cobb did not respond to our requests for comment.

Its going to get ugly, Reid predicted.

San Francisco Chronicle columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross appear Sundays, Mondays and Wednesdays. Matier can be seen on the KPIX-TV morning and evening news. He can be heard on KCBS radio Monday through Friday at 7:50 a.m. and 5:50 p.m. Got a tip? Call (415) 777-8815, or email matierandross@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @matierandrossFor all the hype, the not-so-secret Nunes memo will rank in historical significance right up there with the opening of Al Capones vault.

The lead-up was entertaining, but ultimately theres not much to see.

For you youngsters, Capones supposed secret vault was discovered beneath a Chicago hotel in the 1980s. Geraldo Rivera got wind of it and had it opened in a live TV special, hoping to find untold loot and the earthly remains of the gangsters enemies. Imagine his disappointment when what turned up instead were a few empty bottles.

At least the ratings were good. Outside of Washington, the memo controversy played to a mostly empty house.

Clear away the smoke, and what you had was a one-sided investigative document engineered by Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Tulare, written by GOP staffers and edited by the Trump White House.

In other words, a press release.

At its most shocking, the House Intelligence Committees memo may indicate that the FBI got played by a former British intelligence official with political motives, who supplied half-baked tips that contributed to the feds decision to conduct surveillance of a Team Trump campaign official.

I can understand why the FBI wanted the memo deep-sixed. Even if it left out some context and contradictory conclusions, as Democrats suggested, its not flattering to the agency.

What I cant understand is why the Democrats fell into Nunes trap by treating the memos release as something akin to the Pentagon Papers. Rather than feeding into the stupidity, they should have calmly dismissed it as Republican propaganda and said nothing further.

Most people in the real world dont care one way or the other about the memo, mainly because its central allegation is impossibly nuanced  bad intelligence led to a secret court warrant to spy on someone who may have been involved in some unspecified way in Russian interference in the 2016 election.

Getting in a fight over that is like screaming back at some nut on the sidewalk who screams at you. The smart thing is to keep walking. Yell back, and all the world sees is two loons shouting at each other.

How is that a win?

The memo did inspire one good line. A guy came up to me at the Fairmont on Friday and said, You know why it took so long to release the Nunes memo? They had to lose all the words with more than three syllables so Trump would understand it.

Losing patience: After years of compassion, could it be that San Franciscans have had their fill of homeless people on the street?

I witnessed two incidents in two days last week in which people were screaming at someone splayed out on the sidewalk. Both happened on Mission Street, and in both instances the screamers were well-dressed women.

In the first case, a woman wanted to know why the homeless person was lying there. It was a decidedly one-sided conversation  clearly, the ranters target wasnt listening. To my ears, it sounded like the woman just wanted to vent.

In the second incident, two women were shouting at a couple of guys running what looked like a bike chop shop near Second and Mission.

You stole those bicycles, one yelled as she pointed to the remains of several bikes. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

Its going to be interesting to hear how the mayoral candidates running to shake up City Hall plan to deal with what people are seeing every day.

Whos that guy? Donald Trump went out of his way to sound presidential for his first State of the Union address and succeeded in putting half the country to sleep.

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There were no off-the-cuff attacks, no Caesar-like self-praise. Just an overly long bedtime story.

Afterward, many news outlets dutifully did a fact-check on the speech, and concluded it was riddled with misrepresentations and misstatements.

So what else is new?

Not that the Democratic response was much better. Typical of the current ineffectiveness of the national party, there were five separate responses, with no common theme or connection between them.

The one that got the most attention came from Rep. Joe Kennedy III, D-Mass., and it was marred by what appeared to be melting Vaseline on his face.

Young Joe should get a new makeup artist and maybe a new speechwriter as well. He appeared to be talking mainly to Bernie Sanders fans, whose national significance is dwarfed by their estimation of their national significance.

Tuning out: My trip to the Grammy Awards ceremony in New York wasnt nearly as exciting as the trips Ive taken to L.A. when the Grammys were held there.

Not because of the location, but because of the music.

Yes, Im older, as my grandkids say. But I was seated at the same table as Gladys Knight, and while I may be old, I bet everyone reading this knows Midnight Train to Georgia.

Ask someone to sing a Jay-Z tune. Good luck.

Want to sound off? Email: wbrown@sfchronicle.com1 Environment accord: New Jerseys new Democratic governor ordered the state to rejoin a regional environmental pact on Monday, reversing a decision by former Republican Gov. Chris Christie. Gov. Phil Murphy signed an executive order to put the state back in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. The RGGI is a cap-and-trade program of nine New England and mid-Atlantic states whose aim is to reduce carbon emissions from power plants. The money it raises is distributed to participating states to finance clean energy programs.

2 Molestation case: An 18-year-old man from Jeffersonville, Ind., has been returned to jail after 22 additional child molestation counts were filed against him alleging he assaulted 17 children while working at a YMCA and as an elementary school teaching assistant. Michael Begin Jr. was incarcerated Monday after a judge increased his bond to $100,000 from the $10,000 he posted after being initially charged in October with two counts of child molestation. Begins attorney entered a plea of not guilty for him. The children range in age from 3 to 7.Retired UC Berkeley linguist George Lakoff is being dragged into a legal fight over comments he made about possible Russian influence on Donald Trumps 2016 presidential campaign.

Lakoff was slapped with a libel and slander suit by Irakly Ike Kaveladze  a Georgian American businessman who attended a highly scrutinized Trump Tower meeting in June 2016 between members of Trumps inner circle and Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya. She was allegedly dangling dirt to Team Trump about Hillary Clinton.

The suit Kaveladze filed last week in Orange County Superior Court stemmed from an interview Lakoff gave to MSNBCs Chuck Todd, in which Lakoff called Kaveladze the major person who has been responsible for money laundering from Russia and other post-Soviet countries.

Kaveladzes suit calls that accusation baseless and scurrilous.

Kaveladzes legal team includes Scott Balber, who represented Trump in a suit he filed against Bill Maher in 2013 after the comedian promised to give $5 million to charity if Trump could prove he wasnt the spawn of his mother having sex with an orangutan. Trump eventually dropped the suit.

Lakoffs lawyer, Travis LeBlanc, promised a vigorous defense, saying Californias free-speech laws protect individuals like Dr. Lakoff from being forced to engage in costly litigation of frivolous claims.

Safety alert: Look for sparks to fly at Tuesdays Oakland City Council meeting, when some of Councilwoman Desley Brooks colleagues intend to take action that her allies see as retaliation for that pricey shove she delivered to former Black Panther leader Elaine Brown.

The 72-year-old Brown sued over the 2015 incident at a barbecue restaurant, claiming elder abuse, and a jury agreed  leveling a $3.75 million judgment against the city last month.

On Tuesday, Councilwomen Anne Campbell Washington and Lynette Gibson McElhaney  both of whom have had their share of run-ins with Brooks  will seek a rule change to give council President Larry Reid the authority to make committee assignment changes at will.

McElhaney says its something she has long pushed for, but others believe the real intent is to remove Brooks from her plum assignment as chair of the Public Safety Committee. Reid has signed on as a co-sponsor.

They asked me to, he said.

Brooks allies, led by Oakland Post Publisher Paul Cobb, are expected to pack the chambers to fight the proposal. Neither he nor Cobb responded to our requests for comment.

Its going to get ugly, Reid predicted.

San Francisco Chronicle columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross appear Sundays, Mondays and Wednesdays. Matier can be seen on the KPIX TV morning and evening news. He can also be heard on KCBS radio Monday through Friday at 7:50 a.m. and 5:50 p.m. Got a tip? Call (415) 777-8815, or email matierandross@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @matierandrossSACRAMENTO  Its been nearly three years since an oil pipeline ruptured in Santa Barbara County, coating 7 miles of beaches with crude oil and killing dolphins, birds and sea lions.

Area parks and fisheries have since reopened. The pipeline has not, and the company that owns it is under criminal indictment. But the financial impacts of the 2015 Refugio oil spill continue to wash up in California.

The latest example: State lawmakers are considering an unprecedented request to spend more than $100 million in taxpayer money to dismantle two offshore oil-drilling facilities  a platform connected to the ruptured pipeline and a manufactured island in nearby Ventura County  because the oil companies that were leasing the sites went bankrupt last year.

Just because they decided to walk away doesnt mean that we can walk away, said state Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson, D-Santa Barbara. So right now the state is holding the bag.

Its too soon to say whether the situation is an aberration or a sign of things to come. California has a long history as a major oil-producing state, but has more recently embraced environmental policies that require a shift away from petroleum.

The Southern California coast is dotted with 31 oil platforms and artificial islands, some of which date to the 1950s and are in poor condition. The state expects many to be decommissioned in the coming decades as they reach the end of their productive lives.

Oil companies accept responsibility to plug wells and return the ocean to its natural state when they enter into leases with the state to drill. The current proposal for taxpayers to foot the bill illustrates what happens when the companies cant do it.

State officials are asking for $50.5 million to plug and abandon wells at Rincon Island in Ventura County, whose owner declared bankruptcy after being charged with numerous safety violations and a state of disrepair. And they are seeking $58 million to shutter the rig known as Platform Holly in Santa Barbara County, which has been idle since the pipeline owned by Plains All American Pipeline ruptured in 2015 and then shut down, leading Venoco, the company that was leasing the platform, to go bankrupt.

In both cases, those costs would cover just the first phase of dismantling  the projects would require more money for the decommissioning stage, probably beginning in 2020.

California is staring at the enormous cost of shuttering these rigs as the federal government proposes expanding offshore drilling. Its an epic philosophical clash: The Democratic-led state government has advanced policies to promote clean energy and reduce the use of petroleum, including a ban on new leases to drill in state waters. On the other hand, the Trump administration has embraced the fossil fuel economy and begun the process of opening the U.S. coastline to oil and gas drilling in federal waters.

The federal government is holding public meetings in each state where it seeks to expand offshore drilling. Californias will be on Thursday in Sacramento.

The state controls waters for the first 3 miles from the coast. While it cant control what happens in federal waters beyond that, it can thwart expansion there by making it difficult to transport oil through the state waters that lead to the shore.

For environmentalists, the newly revealed state cost of decommissioning oil platforms when the responsible companies go bankrupt is reason to be wary.

Its the most clear example of the cost that is passed on to taxpayers, said Marce Gutierrez-Graudins, director of Azul, an ocean conservation advocacy group in San Francisco. This is a very direct line of how an oil spill is literally costing us, still, years later.

The request for public funds to close up the drilling sites is laid out in a 10-page document from the State Lands Commission, the agency charged with managing oil and gas resources. It describes potentially dire consequences of leaving the facilities in the ocean: Failure to secure and properly plug and abandon the ... wells could result in significant harms to public health and safety, and damage to the marine and coastal environment.

The deteriorating rigs could cause oil spills or emit lethal levels of poisonous gas, the document says  creating a major financial and legal risk because the state government would be liable.

Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts.

It is vital to take immediate steps to mitigate the potential harms from the facilities, the State Lands Commission argues.

The money requested  $108.5 million over three years  is a small fraction of the $190 billion state budget Gov. Jerry Brown has proposed for new fiscal year. But its nearly as much as the state spends to educate 10,000 schoolchildren for a year.

This is serious stuff. Thats why weve requested these dollars from the state  not because we dont think theyd be better used for other purposes, but because we have to, said Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who chairs the State Lands Commission.

In the absence of those investments, the spill costs and the cleanup costs would be so staggering, he said.

Newsom, a Democrat who is running for governor, said hes confident that the state will eventually get reimbursed. Its seeking payment through bankruptcy court from Venoco, the company that leased Platform Holly most recently, and also pursuing reimbursement from ExxonMobil, which leased the platform until 1997.

Venoco declined to comment. ExxonMobil disputes how much responsibility it bears, but a company spokeswoman said it will continue to work closely with California officials.

The final determination of liability and financial responsibility has yet to be settled, spokeswoman Julie King said.

Laurel Rosenhall is a reporter with CALmatters, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics. An unabridged version of this story is available at www.calmatters.org.When five Democratic mayoral candidates were asked Saturday whether they had ever suffered the myriad frustrations of being victim of a car break-in, all five hands went into the air.

So did the hands of many of those who packed into an auditorium at the San Francisco Main Library on the balmy weekend afternoon for a mayoral forum hosted by the United Democratic Club. The event was moderated by The Chronicles editorial page director, John Diaz, and featured all but one Democratic candidate, Michelle Bravo, who declined to participate.

San Franciscos recent epidemic of car break-ins was one of the many city issues the candidates briskly moved through, along with homelessness, traffic congestion and the citys current political climate.

Despite the wide range of topics, the candidates did little to separate themselves politically, with some audience members remarking after the forum that theyd be content with any one of the five candidates serving as mayor. Every candidate supported San Franciscos status as a sanctuary city, and all were in general agreement about the need to address traffic congestion by reforming the citys relationships with widely used ride-hailing services Uber and Lyft.

All but one mayoral hopeful was in favor of supplying law enforcement officials with more resources to investigate and prosecute break-ins.

Currently, these criminals are acting with impunity. They just know theyll get away with it. There must be consequences, said Mark Leno, a former state senator. Supervisor Jane Kim recommended creating a centralized investigative unit within the citys Police Department and enlisting community volunteers to patrol the streets. London Breed, president of the Board of Supervisors, said we need more beat officers on the street, and we need to be able to prosecute the people who are doing this.

Attorney Angela Alioto, a former supervisor, also supported hiring more patrol officers and providing stricter penalties for convicted thieves.

Amy Farah Weiss, a housing and homelessness advocate, recommended a gentler touch, suggesting the city work to address the economic, the social, the racial injustice that she sees as motivating people to commit crimes out of desperation.

When it came to the citys homeless crisis, Kim and Leno focused on cracking down on illegal evictions.

We need to do the work to stop unfair evictions and continue San Franciscos work of increasing rent subsidies so people at risk of being evicted are able to stay in their homes, Kim said. She also supported building more Navigation Centers.

Leno said he also favored reforming the citys network of assistance programs to reduce the hurdles facing people in need of services.

Weiss, leaning on her experience as a homeless advocate, plugged a transitional shelter program shes been championing that would create temporary villages where people can live once their tenure at a shelter or hospital has ended.

Alioto, touting her role as the point person for homelessness during her time as a supervisor, said all roads out of homelessness must lead to permanent, supportive housing. She called for changes to programs that bring people off the streets only temporarily.

Breed said that during her brief stint as the citys acting mayor after the surprise death of Mayor Ed Lee in December, she began working with a constellation of city departments to develop a plan of action to work on these tent encampments.

There was also a general consensus among the candidates that the City Charter should be tweaked to prevent someone from serving as a supervisor, board president and mayor all at the same time. Breed served in such a role until the board installed Supervisor Mark Farrell as mayor Jan. 23 in a deeply contentious vote.

When it came time for Breed to respond, she said the time had come to move past political discord and focus on the issues important to city residents.

What happened in the past is unfortunate, but it happened, Breed said. We have to be bigger than that. San Franciscans are counting on us to do so.

Dominic Fracassa is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: dfracassa@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @DominicFracassaThe path to citizenship for Baudelio Burciaga began 12 years ago when, at 19 years old, he left Zacatecas, Mexico, for Oakland, seeking political asylum as a gay man.

Five years ago, he got a green card. Saturday, he stood outside a City College of San Francisco classroom holding a completed naturalization form, ready to submit it after one final review.

Ive been waiting ... for this day, Burciaga said.

He was one of more than 150 people who attended the free citizenship workshop hosted by the SF Pathways to Citizenship Initiative to assist those navigating the costly and sometimes complicated route to becoming a U.S. citizen.

The citys Office of Civic Engagement and Immigrant Affairs funds the workshop, which takes applicants through a four- to five-step process that lasts at least two hours. People often arrive early in the morning before the event begins, said Adrienne Pon, executive director of the immigrant affairs office.

WATCH: Bay Area residents rally for immigrants amid ICE crackdown (story continues below)

All these good people coming here sometimes stand in line for hours, Pon said. Theyre so eager to become citizens.

Volunteers set up rooms at City Colleges Multiuse Building to serve as different stations for each leg of the process. Translators on site offered help in the most common languages applicants use: Mandarin, Cantonese, Spanish, Tagalog, Arabic, Vietnamese and Russian.

After registration, applicants go through screening to determine whether they meet basic eligibility requirements  like holding a green card for at least five years. If anything complicates their case, they meet with attorneys for one-on-one consultations. If not, they go straight to filling out a 21-page N-400 naturalization form.

The form takes at least an hour to complete and costs about $780 to file, said Jamie Richardson, a spokeswoman for the citys immigration affairs office. People on public benefits are eligible for a fee waiver, but the steep price still deters many people from applying, she said.

Those who opt to complete the form at the workshop have the application reviewed by attorneys offering pro bono services at the event, then volunteers help them send it off to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. It takes from six months to a year for the agency to process the forms.

A lot of folks dont know how complicated naturalization and the immigration system is, Richardson said. Its an intimidating process.

Mayor Mark Farrell stopped by, walking through each station and shaking hands with volunteers as he asked about their work. Farrell said he has vivid memories of his mom, a German immigrant, taking her naturalization oath around the time he graduated from college.

Our city is made up of immigrants, he said. Especially in the face of the anti-immigrant rhetoric we see coming out of Washington, D.C., now its so important, I think,  as leaders, as volunteers, as professionals on the ground  that we emphasize that San Francisco will stay strong and stand with our immigrant community.

This particular workshop has run for five years, and sometimes the people who obtain citizenship afterward come back to lend a hand.

Raymund Borres, now a workshop volunteer, earned his citizenship after going through the workshop himself. He said he started volunteering to familiarize himself with the process before applying for citizenship four or five years ago. Now, he keeps coming back to help others fill out forms and help translate for fellow natives of the Philippines.

You feel grateful and you want to give back, he said.

Everyone has their own journey to citizenship. For himself and his wife, he said, it took 20 years to get a green card, all in the hopes of reuniting with his father-in-law, a World War II vet living in San Francisco who was feeling lonely without his children. They moved to San Francisco six years ago. By the time they received citizenship, his wifes father was in his 90s, Borres said.

It was his wifes dream to move to America to be with her father again, Borres said, so it became his dream, too.

Theres a story behind each person that finally takes the oath, he said. Its a final milestone of a really long journey.

Jenna Lyons is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jlyons@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JennaJournoRon Chapple/Getty Image

A man was struck and killed by a large truck in Union City around 10:40 a.m. Saturday while crossing the intersection of Mission Boulevard and Lafayette Avenue on foot, according to the Union City Police Department.

Police arrived to find the man seriously injured and unconscious. He was transported to Eden Medical Center, where he later died.There's never been a cheaper time for Bay Area travelers to get to Rome. That's because major carriers are deeply discounting fares to Rome to fight back against Norwegian Air.

On Tuesday, Norwegian Air launches nonstops between Oakland and Rome-- the first nonstops we've ever seen between the two cities.

TravelSkills with Chris McGinnis sponsored by See More Collapse

Clearly, that has put a bee in the bonnet of US and European carriers operating across the Bay at San Francisco International.

A quick look at fares this weekend on Google Flights shows Swiss, Lufthansa and United offering one-stop flights from SFO to Rome for as little as $422 round trip. That's super cheap! And the deals are good now through May. Best of all, they include March which makes it a perfect place for a spring break trip!

From Oakland, Norwegian will fly three times a week nonstop to Rome, Fiumicino using a Boeing 787 Dreamliner. Fares clock in at around $400 and these nonstops (about 12 hours) shave a lot of time off the competing one-stops (14-15 hours total). But keep in mind that Norwegian has more fees than major carriers.

Note: Fares available on Google Flights on Sunday, Feb 3 and subject to change.

Will you go to Europe this year? If so, be sure you've read this post first!

Get fare updates like this fromTravelSkills via email twice per week. Sign up here

Chris McGinnis is the founder of TravelSkills.com. The author is solely responsible for the content above, and it is used here by permission. You can reach Chris at chris@travelskills.com or on Twitter @cjmcginnis.WASHINGTON  Hours after her friend and colleague at the Republican National Committee had been accused of sexual misconduct, Ronna McDaniel was on the phone with President Trump for a difficult conversation.

Casino magnate Steve Wynn, the RNCs finance chairman and a mutual friend, had to step aside, she explained to a man who also has faced accusations of sexual misconduct but refused to be derailed by them. McDaniel, Trumps choice for RNC chairwoman a year ago, says the president listened and ultimately agreed. Wynn had to go.

Theres a personal element to this, that Steve is a friend, she said in an interview. But the allegations were serious. The president took them seriously. We needed to move forward.

McDaniel has proved a shrewd navigator of the presidents swirling currents, but not a sycophant. And shes kept Trumps confidence in a way other top advisers havent, certainly by posting a robust financial bottom line for the party but also by being candid with him in private and discreet when shes disagreed.

McDaniel now readies for her biggest test as chairwoman: protecting congressional majorities in the November elections while facing political headwinds fanned by the presidents low approval ratings and  more immediately  fallout from her finance lieutenants departure.

My job is to be truthful, she said. My job is to share with him my recommendation.

She added: We may have a dialogue about it. We may disagree. But ultimately Im going to support the president.

Ive lasted a year, she said with a chuckle. Im still here.

McDaniels place in the circle of trust wasnt necessarily expected. A niece of one of Trumps fiercest Republican critics during the presidential campaign  2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney  McDaniel has sought to establish a political identity separate from her famous family.

She recently dropped Romney from her name in RNC communications and her Twitter handle. Trump had ribbed her about her name during the campaign, but the change was a nod to her husband and to signal her independence, aides and confidants said.

Before Wynns resignation Jan. 27 over claims published in the Wall Street Journal that he sexually harassed several women, McDaniel had largely steered clear of the drama that has ensnared the White House.

The Wynn allegations came as a blow. Not only had Wynn helped raised more than $107 million for Trumps inauguration last year, he had also denied the accusations.

But it wasnt the first difficult conversation Trump and McDaniel have had in their year working together.

In December, McDaniel argued to Trump that the RNC should not resume spending money on Roy Moores special Alabama Senate campaign a month after she cut ties with it, with Trumps consent, over allegations that Moore had sexually assaulted teenage girls decades ago.

But Trump reversed her decision to cut financial ties with Moore when Moores poll numbers somewhat rebounded and he appeared to still have a chance of keeping the seat in Republican hands in a narrowly divided Senate. Moore lost.

There are times when shes going to walk the line with what the president demands, said Ron Kaufman, a veteran Republican National Committeeman from Massachusetts. I think she understands that.

Although McDaniel is from a long line of prominent Republicans, including her grandfather former Michigan Gov. George Romney, she owes her new post solely to Trump.

As Michigan GOP chairwoman in 2016, McDaniel impressed Trump over Washington-based operatives bucking for the RNC post.

Neutral through the 2016 primaries, McDaniel later supported Trump  no small thing to the loyalty-driven Trump, given her uncles criticisms of him.

She was at Trumps side in working-class Macomb County outside Detroit days before the election and watched him carry Michigan.

One reason she seems to connect with Trump is because she reflects what it is to be a Trump voter, said Margaret Metcalf, the Republican National Committeewoman from Guam.

Gregarious in public, McDaniel is a fierce fundraiser behind the scenes, boasting $132.5 million raised in 2017, the most of any party in a post-election year.

She shuttles between Washington and her home in Northville outside Detroit, meets weekly with Trump and his political team in the Oval Office, and talks to Trump by phone at least weekly. She often spends six hours a day fundraising.

Some party members have complained that shes been less accessible than predecessor Reince Priebus, who lavished attention on members. But she has a higher-priority constituent: the president.

Its not glamorous. Its a grind, said Mark Shields, Priebus chief of staff. Its to raise money and to support the president. And Ronnas a machine.

Still, McDaniel has injected personal ideals into sensitive national debate. Shes just done it carefully.

Without criticizing Trump, McDaniel insisted in August, over some quiet protests, that the RNC pass a resolution condemning white supremacist groups after violence at a demonstration in Charlottesville, Va. Trump had condemned the groups, only to say later there was blame on both sides of the deadly clash.

While praising Trump for his condemnation, McDaniel added during an ABC interview, I dont think comparing blame in this situation works.

With a light touch, McDaniel insisted the RNC speak up, without publicly crossing Trump, said Mississippi RNC committeeman Henry Barbour.

I think it speaks to her leadership, Barbour said. And sometimes that means leading in a way its clear shes taking her own path and not just following.

Thomas Beaumont is an Associated Press writer.WASHINGTON  Democratic and Republican lawmakers said Sunday that a GOP-produced congressional memo on FBI surveillance powers did not clear President Trump in the Russia investigation, and they expressed hope that special counsel Robert Muellers work would continue without interference.

The top Democrat on the Republican-led House Intelligence Committee that released the memo called it a political hit job and questioned whether GOP Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Tulare, the committee chairman, had coordinated with the White House in drafting it.

The goal here is to undermine the FBI, discredit the FBI, discredit the Mueller investigation, do the presidents bidding, said Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank. I think its very possible his staff worked with the White House.

Nunes has for months faced criticism about his close ties to the White House. He had previously apologized for sharing with the White House secret intelligence intercepts related to a probe of Russian election interference before talking to committee members. When asked during a committee meeting in late January whether he had coordinated the memo with the White House, he at first said as far as I know, no, then refused to answer when asked whether his staff members had communicated with the White House.

The memo, released Friday, alleges misconduct on the part of the FBI and the Justice Department in obtaining a warrant under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to monitor former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser Carter Page and his ties to Russia. Specifically, it takes aim at the FBIs use of information from former British spy Christopher Steele, who compiled a dossier containing allegations of ties between Trump, his associates and Russia.

Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah, said the memo doesnt end the need for the Mueller investigation.

I think it would be a mistake for anyone to suggest that the special counsel shouldnt complete his work. I support his work. ... This memo has frankly nothing at all to do with the special counsel, said Stewart, a member of the House Intelligence Committee.

Denying a political motive, Republican committee members defended the release of the GOP memo as appropriate. Saying it did not vindicate Trump, as the president asserted Saturday, they signaled the possible release of a dissenting memo from Democrats in the coming weeks and said the GOP memo would have no impact on Muellers investigation.

Rep. Will Hurd, R-Texas, said he had opposed the release of Democrats memo last week on national security grounds but fully expected a fresh vote on the matter after Democrats make revisions.

The information wasnt ready to go, and so we decided to release ours, he said. People can criticize that  that decision, but I think providing oversight and shining a light on these issues is important.

Schiff and Hurd spoke on ABCs This Week. Stewart spoke on Fox News Sunday.

Hope Yen is an Associated Press writer.RALEIGH, N.C.  A renewed version of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.s campaign to lift poor people is holding its first national mobilization, with actions planned Monday in 32 states and the nations capital.

Poor people, clergy and activists in the Poor Peoples Campaign plan to deliver letters to politicians in state Capitol buildings demanding that leaders confront a systemic racism that they say is evidenced in voter suppression laws and poverty that hurts minorities, women and children and a large number of whites.

Among those who have signed on to the campaign is the Rev. John Mendez, pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, who recalled protesting in New York City in the 1960s. Ive been waiting for almost 50 years for this to actually happen, said Mendez.

The campaign, led by the Revs. William Barber of North Carolina and Liz Theoharis of New York, officially began Dec. 4, 50 years after King started the first Poor Peoples Campaign. King was assassinated a few months later.

The letters to politicians call for a new course in government. Our faith traditions and state and federal constitutions all testify to the immorality of an economy that leaves out the poor, yet our political discourse consistently ignores the 140 million poor and low-income people in America, the letter reads.

Barber, who will be among the group that delivers letters to the office of House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said the campaign is building toward a season of direct action and civil disobedience that continues through June 21, the anniversary of the murders of three civil rights workers in 1964 in Philadelphia, Miss.

On Feb. 12  the 50th anniversary of the sanitation workers strike that brought King to Memphis, where he was assassinated  fast-food cooks and cashiers plan to walk off their jobs in Memphis to support higher wages and union rights. Protesters plan to march from Clayborn Temple to Memphis City Hall, the same route the sanitation workers took.

U.S. Census figures show that the poverty rate among blacks was 22 percent in 2016, while it was almost 9 percent among whites. But in sheer numbers, almost 17.5 million white people are classified as living in poverty, compared to 8.7 million blacks.

Martha Waggoner is an Associated Press writer.CHANDLER, Ariz.  An Arizona man who sold ammunition to the gunman who carried out the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history has been charged with manufacturing armor-piercing bullets, according to court documents.

Unfired armor-piercing bullets found inside the Las Vegas hotel room where Stephen Paddock began the Oct. 1 attack had the fingerprints of ammunition dealer Douglas Haig, according to a criminal complaint filed Friday in federal court in Phoenix. It says Haig didnt have a license to manufacture armor-piercing ammunition.

Haig has acknowledged selling 720 rounds of tracer ammunition to Paddock in the weeks before the shooting that killed 58 people. Tracer bullets contain a pyrotechnic charge that illuminates the path of fired bullets so shooters can see whether their aim is correct.

The criminal charge involves another type of ammunition  armor-piercing bullets.

The documents dont say if any ammunition tied to Paddock was used in the attack. Las Vegas police wouldnt say whether armor-piercing bullets were used in the shooting but referred to a preliminary report saying some rifle magazines were loaded with armor-piercing ammunition.

Haig, a 55-year-old aerospace engineer who sold ammunition as a hobby for about 25 years, was charged shortly before holding a news conference where he said he didnt notice anything suspicious when he sold the tracer rounds to Paddock.

Haig told investigators that when Paddock bought the ammunition at his home in suburban Phoenix, Paddock went to his car to get gloves and put them on before taking the box from Haig, the complaint said.

I had no contribution to what Paddock did, Haig said, adding that there was nothing unusual about the type or quantity of ammunition the shooter bought. I had no way to see into his mind.

The two armor-piercing bullets found in Paddocks hotel room with Haigs fingerprints had an incendiary capsule on their noses, the documents said. A forensic analysis of those two bullets had tool marks consistent with the equipment in Haigs backyard workshop, according to the complaint.

It also alleges that FBI agents searching Haigs home on Oct. 19 found armor-piercing ammunition.

Haig appeared in court and was released under the condition he not possess guns or ammunition. If convicted, he could face up to five years in prison and a fine as high as $250,000.

Haig and his business partner, whose name wasnt provided, sold 40 to 50 rounds of incendiary rounds to Paddock in late August at a Las Vegas gun show, according to the complaint.

The next month, Haig said he met Paddock at a Phoenix gun show and that he was well-dressed and polite.

He didnt have the quantity of tracer ammunition on hand that Paddock was seeking, so Paddock contacted him several days later and lined up a sale at Haigs home.

Haig said he was shocked and sickened when a federal agent informed him of the massacre 11 hours after it unfolded.

Haig arose in the investigation when a box with his name and address was found in the Mandalay Bay hotel suite where Paddock opened fire.

Jacques Billeaud is an Associated Press writer.WASHINGTON  Even before hed read the memo, President Trump seized on what it could mean.

The president first learned of the House Intelligence Committee document last month from some Republican allies in Congress and he watched it take hold in the conservative media, including on some of his favorite Fox News programs, according to seven White House officials and outside advisers.

The classified memo sent to the Oval Office by the committees majority Republicans asserted that the FBI and Justice Department abused their surveillance powers to monitor the communications of a onetime Trump campaign associate. Trump told confidants in recent days that he believed the memo would validate his concerns that the deep state  an alleged shadowy network of powerful entrenched federal and military interests  had conspired to undermine the legitimacy of his presidency, according to one outside adviser.

That adviser and the others spoke on condition of anonymity.

Trumps decision to authorize the memos public disclosure was extraordinary, yet part of a recent pattern. Like few of his predecessors, Trump has delivered repeated broadsides against intelligence and law enforcement agencies, working in tandem with some conservatives to lay the groundwork to either dismiss or discredit special counsel Robert Mueller, who is leading the Russia investigation.

This memo totally vindicates Trump in probe, the president tweeted Saturday from Florida, where he was spending the weekend. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their (sic) was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!

Trump had dismissed forceful pleas from the FBI director, Christopher Wray, and the second-ranking Justice Department official, Rod Rosenstein, to keep the memo under wraps. They said the four-page document was inaccurate and lacked critical context, and they made their views known in a remarkable public statement objecting to its release. Democrats said the memo, which disclosed material about one of the most tightly held national security processes, selectively used Republican talking points in an effort to smear law enforcement.

Trump, however, was undeterred.

Early last week, aides briefed him on the never-before-used-process that the House would follow to release the classified memo. Lawyers at the White House and Capitol Hill worried about making dangerous missteps.

Trump told allies he believed the memo would reinforce his belief that accusations of collusion between his 2016 campaign and Russian officials were false and part of the conspiracy to discredit his victory. And the president signaled that he would approve the memos public disclosure if the House committee voted to pursue that course.

Several aides cautioned that the memo did not contain convincing evidence of a conspiracy, while others urged him to black out sections on intelligence-gathering methods, according to a White House official. Other advisers, inside and outside the West Wing, questioned why his administration had allowed the memo to become the dominant talking point during the week when he gave his first State of the Union address, overshadowing the well-received speech.

But those worries, as well as fears that the disclosure could lead to retaliatory leaks from the Justice Department, did not hold sway in the Oval Office. Trump made clear to aides he was intent on seeing the memo released as soon as possible.

White House officials with concerns resigned themselves to the memos release. Trump put his chief of staff, John Kelly, in charge of making that happen, and Kelly called Justice Department officials multiple times to upbraid them for criticizing the likely disclosure.

While many in Congress, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., denied that the release of the memo undermined the FBI or Muellers investigation, Trump seemed to acknowledge that the memo was explicitly political.

The top Leadership and Investigators of the FBI and the Justice Department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of Democrats and against Republicans  something which would have been unthinkable just a short time ago, the president tweeted on Friday.

Trump has complained bitterly about Rosenstein, who is overseeing Muellers inquiry after Attorney General Jeff Sessions stepped aside. Rosenstein appointed Mueller as special counsel after Trump fired James Comey as FBI director last May.

Trump would not say on Friday whether the memo made him more likely or not to fire Rosenstein. You figure that one out, he told reporters.

Later, two White House officials said Trump was not considering parting ways with Rosenstein, at least for the moment. But the memos release and Trumps penchant for keeping Justice Department officials on their toes were just the latest signs that the president intends to keep the agency on a short leash.

Trump first asked Comey for loyalty before firing him. He repeatedly berated Sessions, publicly and privately, after the attorney generals decision to withdraw from the Russia investigation, and railed about what he perceived as insufficient loyalty while urging the Justice Department to reopen its investigation into Hillary Clintons emails. He reportedly asked the FBIs No. 2 leader, Andrew McCabe, which presidential candidate McCabe voted for in 2016 and targeted the deputy director for attack in the weeks before McCabe announced a sudden departure from the bureau.

Trump also has taken his cues from conservative media and latched onto to a number of stories  including anti-Trump text messages by FBI agents  to distract from the Russia investigation and call into question the integrity of Muellers work.

Jonathan Lemire and Zeke Miller are Associated Press writers.NEW YORK  Actress Uma Thurman accused disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein of forcing himself on her sexually years ago in a London hotel room. Weinstein, through his attorney, acknowledged making an awkward pass but denied any physical assault and suggested the possibility of legal action over her comments.

Thurmans allegations against Weinstein, who has been accused of rape, assault or other sexual misconduct by scores of women, had been widely anticipated since she hinted late last year that she had a story to tell but wanted to wait until she was less angry. Her story came in an interview with New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd.Deb Ferrara was attending a funeral when Rex, her 18-month old dog, snuck out of the house on Thursday. Her brother, who had been the only person home, noticed the pup had taken off runningsomething he loved to do, only usually protected by a leash.

In a panic, he enlisted the help of neighbors and policemen to find the dog, but to no avail. It had been a few hours since Rex's departure when Ferrara returned to her home in Vacaville; she immediately set out on a three-hour car search for her beloved dog. They spent most of their time in the car togetherhim lounging in the backseat as she crocheted. Recent retirement and living in solitude meant all of her attention was spent on Rex.

"He was my constant little companion," she said. "I went to all the places I knew he was familiar with, and at 7 p.m., I came home, turned on the porch light hoping he would find his way home, hoping I would hear him barking."

An hour later, she received a phone call. The voice on the other line introduced herself as Monica. She asked Ferrara if she owned a little white dog.

"I got excited because I thought she had found him," Ferrara said. "And then she had to clarify to me that he was no longer with us."

Story continues below.

Monica Anderson and her fiance, Erik Gow, had been driving along I-80 when they saw someone driving a blue Prius toss Rex out of the window. The couple pulled over to help him, but before they could do so, he was hit by another car.

"They had his legs tied so he couldn't get off the freeway," Ferrara said.

The couple told Fox40 that the dog's legs were tied with plastic. The location they found him at was close to where Rex livedjust the other side of the freeway.

"When she pulled up, seeing her cryit broke our hearts," Anderson and Gow told Fox40.

Ferrara said she'd never bonded with another dog like she had with Rex. She met him when he was just a couple days old and got him when he turned eight weeks old. The backseat of her car looked like a "playpen"  it was his second home.

"He doesn't deserve to have died this way," she said. "No animal deserves to be hurt like this."

The Vacaville Police Department said they had no further information at this time.

Read Annie Vainshtein's latest stories here. Send her news tips at avainshtein@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @annievainThe Alisal Community School in Salinas was honored on Wednesday during the regular meeting of the Alisal Union School District Board of Trustees for "excellent work happening in the community," a school district spokeswoman said.

Bright Futures Education Partnership of Monterey County recognized the Alisal Community School for the academic progress of their students, according to spokeswoman Claudia Melendez.All lanes are blocked on southbound Interstate Highway 280 just south of 11th Street in San Jose due to a traffic collision this morning, according to California Highway Patrol officials.

The collision was reported at 2:07 a.m. and involved a BMW sedan and another sedan. The BMW sustained major front damage and the other sedan sustained major rear damage, CHP officials said.PETALUMA (BCN)

Motorists in Petaluma should avoid Frates Road between Lakeville Highway and Calle Ranchero because a downed light pole is blocking traffic lanes, police said this morning.

The light pole in the road will cause traffic backups until city crews are able to remove it, according to police. Drivers should take alternate routes until further notice, police said.FREMONT (BCN)

Fremont police are asking for help finding a man who went missing late this afternoon after he hiked Mission Peak.

Thomas Roberts, 28, was last seen at 4:45 p.m. near the intersection of Mission Boulevard and Pine Street near Richter Field.

Police described Roberts as 6 feet 2 inches tall and 235 pounds with short brown hair, brown eyes and a brown, trimmed goatee-style beard.

Roberts was wearing a red San Francisco 49ers T-shirt and blue jeans.

Anyone with information that can help police locate Roberts safely is asked to call the Police Department or 911.BENICIA (BCN)

Officers arrested three people and allegedly seized weapons, methamphetamines, drug paraphernalia and other items in Benicia Thursday after a four-month-long investigation, police said.

The investigation was of an illegal gambling business in the 2000 block of Columbus Parkway where people could allegedly gamble on computers that ran slot machine-style games.

Benicia detectives and agents with the California Department of Justice served arrest and search warrants at the business and at someone's home, police said.

Michael Phillips, 21, of El Sobrante, was arrested on suspicion of bookmaking, illegal gambling device, conspiracy and unlawful possession of a firearm and ammunition, police said.

Cynthia Powell, 57, of El Sobrante, was arrested on suspicion of bookmaking, illegal gambling device, conspiracy and other offenses, according to police.

Kenneth Nielsen, 64, of El Sobrante, was arrested on suspicion of being felon in possession of a gun and being felon in possession of ammunition, police said.PETALUMA (BCN)

Petaluma motorists no longer need to avoid Frates Road between Lakeville Highway and Calle Ranchero because a light pole that was blocking the road has been removed, police said.

A light pole earlier fell across traffic lanes, but is no longer blocking the lanes, according to police.

The roadway on Frates Rd between Lakeville and Calle is now clear and traffic is flowing normally, police said.HONG KONG  The video shows students at the female morality school in northeastern China getting up at 4:30 a.m. to scrub floors and being taught not to resist if their husbands beat them.

Shot with a hidden camera and posted on a popular Chinese video website, it sparked a storm of criticism of the school and highlighted complaints that the status of women is deteriorating under the rule of a Communist Party that promised them equality.

In the recording, students at the Fushun Traditional Culture School were shown being told to put aside career aspirations and, in one instructors words, shut your mouths and do more housework. One group of students was shown practicing bowing to apologize to their husbands.

Dont fight back when beaten. Dont talk back when scolded. And, no matter what, dont get divorced, a female teacher says in the post on Pear Video, a Beijing online platform for short videos.

Women should just stay at the bottom level of the society and not aspire for more, another teacher says.

Such schools appear to be growing in popularity, though it is unclear how many China has, according to researchers and womens rights activists.

Their emergence reflects the erosion in the status of women since the launch of economic reforms in the 1980s that reduced the ruling partys focus on social equality, said Feng Yuan, a prominent womens rights activist. Archaic ideas about gender equality still have a market in todays society, she said.

Deng Xichan, a 21-year-old nurse, said she and her mother attended a female morality institute in the southern city of Changsha, enticed by its offer of free classes and lodging.

Students were taught to obey men because it would bring their children good fortune and that sex before marriage would bring bad luck, Deng said. Every evening, she was required to bow in front of a statue of Confucius and participate in group confessions, she said.

Many of the students truly believed that their life was hard because they had premarital sex, or because they cheated on someone, so they would kowtow and confess, Deng said.

At many of the programs, students are closed off from the outside world  and from each other.

The front door was locked, and our phones and cash were taken away from us, said a woman in her 20s who attended a seven-day course in the northwestern city of Yinchuan. We were also not allowed to chat with each other, so all you can do is bear with it.

The Fushun school was founded in 2011 by an ex-convict who had served time for murder and was approved by local authorities as a public welfare organization, according to Chinese news reports. It charged no tuition and was supported by students donations. The school had more than 200 volunteer workers and took in as many as 40 students for each 20-day female virtue course, according to an online report by the Yangcheng Evening News, a major local newspaper.

After the video came out in November, hundreds of people criticized the school on Internet message boards and blogs, prompting an investigation. The school was shut down in December, according to the official Xinhua News Agency. The local education bureau concluded it violated socialist core values and called for similar programs to be investigated.

The Fushun school and several others across China contacted by the Associated Press refused requests for comment.

The Communist Party came to power in 1949 promising to improve the status of women, who then-leader, Mao Zedong, famously declared hold up half the sky.

By many measures, the status of women improved after the revolution. They gained access to jobs and education and, on paper at least, were legal equals in many ways.

Activists say the decline in womens status that began with the economic reforms of the 1980s accelerated as the party set aside leftist politics as a unifying message for the country and instead promoted more traditional, male-dominated Confucian beliefs.

The gulf between the sexes is especially pronounced at the highest levels of politics: The ruling partys Standing Committee, the inner circle of power, has never had a female member. In the next tier, a single woman sits in the larger 25-member Politburo.

The state-run All-China Womens Federation rejected the activists assertions that the party has promoted male-dominated beliefs.

We deplore and are dissatisfied by such a view that misrepresents reality, the group said in a faxed response to questions. It said 551 women delegates attended the partys twice-a-decade national congress last year, an increase of 30 places, making up nearly a quarter of the total.

Still, in a 2011 survey the federation also found womens wages were on average two-thirds lower than mens. And the share of women in the labor force dropped to 61 percent last year from 72 percent 20 years ago, according to the World Bank.

Party leaders are worried China is producing too few children to support its aging population, said Leta Hong-Fincher, a sociologist and author of Betraying Big Brother: The Rise of Chinas Feminist Resistance, due out this year. The government launched a propaganda campaign referring to single, overeducated women over 30 as leftover to stigmatize women into returning home, getting married and having babies, Hong-Fincher said.

The easing in 2016 of Chinas one-child policy, which now allows couples to have two children, has only put more pressure on women to raise families instead of working, Hong-Fincher said.

Yi-Ling Liu is an Associated Press writer.JERUSALEM  Israel said Sunday it plans to legalize an isolated West Bank outpost in response to the shooting death of one of its residents last month.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his weekly Cabinet meeting that his government will recognize Havat Gilad to allow the continuing of normal life there.

Whoever thought that through the reprehensible murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, that our spirit can be broken and we can be weakened is making a bitter mistake, Netanyahu said.

Last month, Rabbi Raziel Shevah, 35, was fatally shot from a passing vehicle as he drove near his home in the unauthorized settlement outpost near the Palestinian city of Nablus. The Israeli military is still searching the area for suspects.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, in the 1967 Mideast war, areas the Palestinians want for a future state. Israel has established about 120 West Bank settlements, which it considers legal. In addition, about 100 settlement outposts have been constructed without official approval, but Israel generally tolerates them. Most of the international community considers all Jewish West Bank settlements illegal.

Havat Gilad, a community of a few hundred Israelis, is among the rogue outposts and is located deep inside the West Bank, away from areas Israel expects to keep under any peace deal with the Palestinians. Critics see their expansion as complicating peace efforts.

Anti-settlement group Peace Now called the effort to legalize the outpost a cynical exploitation of the murder.

Meanwhile, Israel on Sunday demolished a two-classroom school in a Bedouin community in the West Bank, saying the EU-funded structure was built illegally without proper permits and that it was in a precarious condition. The school served nearly 30 third- and fourth-grade students who were moved to a nearby guesthouse and barbershop to continue classes.

A statement from Cogat, the Israeli defense body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, said the demolition came after a challenge in Israels Supreme Court was overruled.

The demolition took place near the settlement of Maaleh Adumim, in the 60 percent of the West Bank known as Area C that remains under full Israeli control. Israel has imposed severe restrictions on Palestinian development in the area, home to dozens of Israeli settlements.

The EU funds the construction of many homes, schools and other structures in the area and says the projects are needed for humanitarian reasons and economic development.UNITED NATIONS  North Korea is flouting U.N. sanctions on oil and gas, engaging in prohibited ballistic missile cooperation with Syria and Myanmar, and illegally exporting commodities that brought in nearly $200 million in just nine months last year, according to U.N. experts.

The experts said Pyongyang is still able to access the global financial system through deceptive practices combined with critical deficiencies in the implementation of financial sanctions.

And it continues to engage in widespread conventional arms deals and cyber operations to steal military secrets, the panel said.

The experts report to the U.N. Security Council, obtained by the Associated Press, said North Korean diplomats continue to play a key role in the countrys prohibited programs.

The council has imposed increasingly tougher sanctions against North Korea in response to its nuclear and ballistic missile tests. The latest resolution in December  in response to the launch of a ballistic missile that Pyongyang says is capable of reaching anywhere on the U.S. mainland  sharply lowered limits on North Koreas refined oil imports and authorized the inspection and seizure of ships suspected of smuggling banned items including coal and oil to and from the country.

U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley said sanctions now ban well over 90 percent of North Koreas exports reported in 2016.

But the panel of experts said the expansion of U.N. sanctions hasnt been matched by the political will, international coordination, and allocation of resources to implement them.

This year could represent a critical window of opportunity before a potential miscalculation with disastrous implications for international peace and security, the experts said.

According to the report, the panel investigated North Koreas ongoing ballistic missile cooperation with Syria and Myanmar.

It also investigated illegal ship-to-ship transfers of oil comprising a multimillion-dollar business that is driving an international network of brokers and ship charterers as well as unwitting global commodity trading companies and oil suppliers.

The report said North Korea exported coal to China, Malaysia, South Korea, Russia and Vietnam in 2017 in violation of sanctions.

Edith M. Lederer is an Associated Press writer.ATHENS  Well over 100,000 protesters from across Greece converged Sunday on Athens main square to protest a potential compromise in a dispute with neighboring Macedonia over the former Yugoslav republics official name.

Hundreds of chartered buses brought protesters in from around the country to the Greek capital, while more people arrived on ferries from the islands. Traffic was blocked throughout the city center and three major subway stops were closed.

Chanting Hands off Macedonia! and Macedonia belongs to Greece! the protesters gathered in Syntagma Square in front of parliament, many waving flags bearing the Star of Vergina, the emblem of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia.

Police officials estimated attendance at 140,000. Organizers, who claimed 1.5 million were at the rally, used a crane to raise a huge Greek flag over the square.

We are trying to show the politicians ... that they must not give up the name Macedonia, said 55-year-old protester Manos Georgiou.

About 700 left-wing and anarchist protesters set up a counterdemonstration nearby, bearing banners calling for Balkan unity. Dozens of riot police were deployed to keep the two demonstrations separate.

Suspected far-right supporters attempted to attack the counterdemonstration, but were prevented by police who used stun grenades and tear gas to hold them back. The far-rightists responded by throwing rocks at police.

The name dispute broke out after Macedonia gained independence from Yugoslavia in 1991. The country is recognized by international institutions as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, even though about 130 countries refer to it simply as Macedonia. Many Greeks refer to it by the name of its capital, Skopje.

Greece argues use of the name implies territorial claims on its own province of Macedonia, home of one of the most famous ancient Greeks, Alexander the Great. Officials in Skopje counter that their country has been known as Macedonia for a long time.

Composer and former minister Mikis Theodorakis, 92, the keynote speaker at the rally, repeated the controversial claim that Greeces neighbor wants to expand into Greek territory.

Using the name Macedonia as a vehicle and twisting historical events to a ridiculous extent, they actually seek to expand their borders at the expense of ours, Theodorakis said.

Rejecting any compromise on Greeces part, Theodorakis called for a referendum on the issue.

The squabble has prevented Macedonia from joining NATO, to which Greece already belongs. The left-led governments in both countries have pledged to seek a solution this year, and have been holding talks with U.N. negotiator Matthew Nimetz.

The most likely solution will be to add a modifier such as new or north to the republics name. But the proposals have caused protests in both countries.

Elena Becatoros is an Associated Press writer.Blog Archive September 2021 (4) August 2021 (8) July 2021 (9) June 2021 (4) May 2021 (12) April 2021 (14) March 2021 (18) February 2021 (16) January 2021 (20) December 2020 (17) November 2020 (12) October 2020 (16) September 2020 (13) August 2020 (16) July 2020 (11) June 2020 (3) May 2020 (13) April 2020 (9) March 2020 (17) February 2020 (17) January 2020 (17) December 2019 (19) November 2019 (22) October 2019 (27) September 2019 (23) August 2019 (20) July 2019 (23) June 2019 (24) May 2019 (22) April 2019 (26) March 2019 (22) February 2019 (20) January 2019 (21) December 2018 (26) November 2018 (19) October 2018 (26) September 2018 (24) August 2018 (22) July 2018 (28) June 2018 (23) May 2018 (23) April 2018 (25) March 2018 (24) February 2018 (21) January 2018 (29) December 2017 (26) November 2017 (21) October 2017 (24) September 2017 (23) August 2017 (25) July 2017 (27) June 2017 (25) May 2017 (23) April 2017 (20) March 2017 (20) February 2017 (21) January 2017 (22) December 2016 (23) November 2016 (21) October 2016 (21) September 2016 (21) August 2016 (22) July 2016 (24) June 2016 (26) May 2016 (26) April 2016 (27) March 2016 (29) February 2016 (25) January 2016 (26) December 2015 (28) November 2015 (27) October 2015 (29) September 2015 (23) August 2015 (25) July 2015 (19) June 2015 (17) May 2015 (15) April 2015 (19) March 2015 (19) February 2015 (16) January 2015 (21) December 2014 (16) November 2014 (20) October 2014 (22) September 2014 (20) August 2014 (24) July 2014 (27) June 2014 (26) May 2014 (27) April 2014 (20) March 2014 (25) February 2014 (19) January 2014 (23) December 2013 (24) November 2013 (19) October 2013 (22) September 2013 (20) August 2013 (21) July 2013 (17) June 2013 (16) May 2013 (14) April 2013 (19) March 2013 (16) February 2013 (12) January 2013 (14) December 2012 (20) November 2012 (17) October 2012 (14) September 2012 (14) August 2012 (20) July 2012 (15) June 2012 (15) May 2012 (17) April 2012 (16) March 2012 (6) February 2012 (7) January 2012 (6) December 2011 (12) November 2011 (14) October 2011 (16) September 2011 (9) August 2011 (12) July 2011 (8) June 2011 (11) May 2011 (11) April 2011 (11) March 2011 (10) February 2011 (12) January 2011 (17) December 2010 (16) November 2010 (10) October 2010 (21) September 2010 (21) August 2010 (24) July 2010 (36) June 2010 (19) May 2010 (14) April 2010 (15) March 2010 (13) February 2010 (6) January 2010 (3)New Zealands relationship with China was on show at China Construction Banks opening of a local branch, the first overseas lender approved under the Reserve Banks dual-registration rules.

The opening attracted group chair Tian Guoli, an alternate member of the 19th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, who was appointed to head the countrys second-biggest lender last October. CCB opened a New Zealand subsidiary in 2014, but by also operating a local branch it can access funding from its Chinese parent more easily which can then be lent domestically.

Held at CCB New Zealands head office in Auckland on Friday, the event was emceed by local chair and former Prime Minister Jenny Shipley and attracted Cabinet ministers Grant Robertson and Phil Twyford, former Prime Minister and ANZ Bank New Zealand chair John Key, MPs Raymond Huo and Jian Yang, Chinese Consul General Xu Erwen, and Zhang Fan on behalf of the Chinese Embassy.

Robertson made much of New Zealands four firsts with China in being the first developed nation to recognise China as a market economy, support its accession to the World Trade Organisation, and begin and complete a free-trade agreement.

The opening of this branch is also a sign of the continuing strength of the bilateral trade and investment relationship between New Zealand and China, he said.

New Zealands economic interests have become increasingly aligned with China, with government figures recently confirming China is still the countrys biggest trading partner, while at the same time maintaining traditional security ties with fellow Five Eyes nations: the UK, the US, Canada and Australia.

Xu said CCBs dual-registration was a mark of the depth of cooperation between the two countries, which was upgraded to a comprehensive and strategic partnership after President Xi Jinpings visit in 2014, while Zhang noted there were real opportunities for the bilateral relationship with leaders of both nations attaching great importance to it.

CCBs New Zealand loan book has almost tripled over the past year with $1.45 billion of loans and advances as at Sept. 30, up from $522.9 million a year earlier.

Tian said the new branch will enhance the lenders local business, helping Chinese enterprises invest in New Zealand, but also by offering broader services domestically.

The Chinese economy is entering a new phase where fast growth will be replaced by quality growth, he said. In this process, I see more opportunities for Chinese cooperation with New Zealand.

Robertson reiterated the governments plans to invest heavily in infrastructure, name-checking housing, transport and tourism as areas in need of capital, and having directed the room of bankers to Twyford, who holds the ministerial warrants for housing and transport.

We dont expect to be the only people doing that - the private sector does have a crucial role to play in both investing and building the infrastructure New Zealand needs and I genuinely appreciate China Construction Banks interest in these efforts, he said.

(BusinessDesk)

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STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Some might say disco is dead -- but for loyal Pastels fans, legends never die.

And yes, there are a lot of local dance music enthusiasts who take weekly revivals of this Brooklyn-born disco that seriously. Over 200 of them, actually, are making sure it stays alive.

Every Friday and Saturday night starting at 9:30 p.m., Prestige Events transforms Z-Two restaurant into an all-night dance party at 2925 Veteran's Road in Charleston.

For diehard Pastels fans, it's like having a family reunion every weekend.

On Saturday night, a high-tempo, upbeat crowd of those mostly 40-and-up -- whom I like to say are "fabulously mature" (we don't use the "O" word here) showed off their boogie skills on a multi-colored dance floor.

When the doors opened at 9:30 p.m., I was immediately skeptical: The room was full of wallflowers -- with only one brave blondie swaying her hips on the dance floor.

But in the blink of an eye, one person led to five people on the dance floor and the next minute five people lead to 50.

By 11 p.m., moving from one side of the room to another became increasingly difficult, but not once did I feel claustrophobic. It was spacious, well-lit and the music stayed at a decent volume: That's all you can really ask of a worth-while dance spot.

Those who can remember everything about Pastels -- from the beams of neon light illuminating every corner of the room to the scent of alcohol and hairspray that roamed through the air -- appreciate the ode to their Brooklyn base. Those who are new to the disco scene -- hey, better late than never, no? -- can learn to jam like the all stars.

FLASHBACK TO BAY RIDGE: By those who adored it most, Pastels Night Club is described as a dance and drink spot with rich heritage. The original Pastels stood at 802 64th St. in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. Its heyday was the '80s, when Madonna lookalikes roamed the Earth and girls just wanted to have fun with Cyndi Lauper.

"It's one of those names, that, when you say 'Pastels,' you see people who are 70 or 80 be like 'OMG!'" said Diane Gattullo, a noted borough personality and author who serves as a celebrity bartender in Charleston on most weekends.

"It invokes a lot of emotion and it's so positive," she added.

Pastels was a safe haven for house music fanatics and they took their eccentric -- but open -- presence in the New York City nightlife scene with pride.

The club closed its doors in 1997, leaving many a disco diva without a dance floor. Until Z-Two came along. The revival weekends, thanks to a blessing from Pastels original owners, were born from a need to have a place to dance and let loose on Staten Island.

MARKING THE BIG 4-O: This year marks the 40th anniversary of the original Pastels, which means they'll have to party harder than ever before.

"The music is what really keeps [people] coming back," bar manager Philip Leszna said. "That's where the nostalgia comes from. They want to hear and dance to what they heard back then and see some of the people they've seen before."

Whoever said you can't come home again clearly hasn't seen this Saturday night crowd. The smiles and laughs captured in these stills from the high-volume evening are proof enough that in an ever-changing time, its a comfort to kick it back to the classics.

"Hey! I want to come out to this place so I can take all the drunk Snapchats," said every millennial ever when I broadcast via Facebook Live last night.

That's all well and good -- but if you're thinking of going to the DJ booth to request Cardi B, you might as well say you think bellbottoms are tacky; you'll be met with the same attitude.

"There is a barrier where the music changes and you want to keep it with the people that know this stuff," said Ralph D'Agostino aka "Ralphie Dee," an original Pastels DJ. "Anything after the 2000s became kinda diluted and watered down. It wasn't the same."

GROWNS UPS KNOW HOW ACT: Another note-worthy factor of this underestimated area of music is its purity. Hey, I'm sure Pastels has it's hectic moments, but for the most part, everyone there genuinely wants to have a good time. No bar fights. No breaking of glass and trashing the place. Just good vibes, good drinks and good folks.

And, boy, do these guys and gals know how to dance. I broke a sweat by just trying to capture them in action.

The bottom line is: They don't make 'em like this anymore. Let's try to keep this dance spot around for another 40 years, please?STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Police are canvassing the area for a man who allegedly attempted an abduction in Stapleton Saturday night, according to an NYPD spokesman.

At approximately 3:46 p.m., NYPD units were called to the apartment buildings at 180 Broad St. where a man reportedly attempted to abduct an individual inside the dwelling, said the spokesman.

The spokesman was unable to confirm the age or gender of the alleged victim.

Police transmissions originally described the alleged attacker as a Hispanic male, between 20 and 30 years old, wearing a gray hoodie and black pants.

The alleged suspect fled the scene following the struggle, according to police transmissions.

Multiple NYPD vehicles were stationed in front of the apartment complex as investigators interviewed local business owners along Broad Street.

No arrests have been made at this time and the investigation is ongoing, added the spokesman.STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.-- Police have arrested a 46-year-old man accused of attempting to pull an 11-year-old girl whom he didn't know into the stairwell of a Stapleton apartment building.

Michael Gordon, of Wall Street in St. George, faces charges of kidnapping, assault and endangering the welfare of a child in connection with the alleged incident reported to police at about 3:46 p.m. on Saturday.

Gordon is accused of grabbing the girl around the waist near a stairwell inside 180 Broad Street, then fled on foot after the the girl was able to break free, police said.

Gordon, who has 22 prior arrests, was picked up at about noon and questioned inside of the 120th precinct headquarters in St. George, before police issued charges at about 2:49 p.m., according to police sources.

Gordon is also accused of trying to abduct a 9-year-old girl who was with the elder girl, according to a New York Post report.

He's been arrested several times dating back to 1989, but none for attempted kidnapping, sources said.STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- An early morning phone call quickly turned into a terrifying situation for one Staten Island mother who says she was told her daughter was being held hostage.

Police confirmed that they are investigating an aggravated harassment report relating to an elaborate kidnapping hoax that was made in the 122nd Precinct.

Anne Marie Grillasca of Midland Beach claims she received a call just before 10 a.m. Saturday morning demanding a $600 ransom for the safe return of her daughter, whom they identified by name.

"The person on the phone said that he had my daughter and was holding her hostage," Grillasca told the Advance.

According to Grillasca, the phony kidnappers had a recording of what sounded like her daughter's voice, begging them to "please stop" as they appeared to torture her.

Grillasca claims she was told that the kidnappers had already killed her daughter's boyfriend and not to hang up the phone or that they would kill her daughter as well.

"They told me to remain calm and that if I didn't then they would kill her," said Grillasca.

The kidnappers asked that Grillasca meet them at Staten Island University Hospital where they would be waiting in a blue van to exchange the money for the safe return of her daughter, according to Grillasca.

Terrified to hang up the phone, Grillasca posted to Facebook, imploring her friends to call the police to address the ongoing situation.

"I've never been so terrified in my whole life. It was rather elaborate for a prank or a hoax," Grillasca said.

Grillasca decided against going to the hospital, instead deciding to walk to the 122 Precinct stationhouse in New Dorp to report the call.

While en route to the stationhouse, Grillasca's 24-year-old daughter, who had seen her mother's post on Facebook, contacted her to alert that she had not been taken hostage, according to Grillasca.

Grillasca claims that she then returned home and promptly called the police, who arrived shortly after, allowing her to file an official police report.

According to Grillasca, an officer told her this wasn't the first time the telephone number, which had a Westchester area code, was used for such a scam.

The NYPD spokesman could not confirm that account at this time.There's guaranteed be a fair amount of nervous giggling at the starting line, but it's easy to run along Lake Burley Griffin in your undies when you know it's for a good cause.

The annual Cupid's Undie Run is on again in Canberra on Sunday February 18, with hundreds expected to strip down to their underwear to raise money for the Children's Tumour Foundation (CTF).

Hundreds of brave Canberrans stripped down to their undies for last year's event.

It's as easy as putting on your runners and some underwear and heading to the Southern Cross Yacht Club at 10am to take part in the fun run. Cupid's Undie Run takes place in 17 locations across Australia and will this year raise funds to promote awareness of genetic disorder Neurofibromatosis (NF.)

Despite being relatively unknown, NF affects more than 10,000 Australians and that figure is on the rise. The disorder causes tumours to form in the brain, spinal cord and nerves and at this point in time there is no cure.The Black Tower Squad has joined the dark side to raise money for charity. The Canberra-based squad is part of a worldwide Star Wars costuming organisation, the 501st Legion, that spends time raising money for charity. Darth Vader Jason Feldner (centre) and imperial officers Matt Mulcahy and Tegan Smith are members of Canberra's Black Tower Squad. Credit:Karleen Minney Black Tower Squad commander Mick Ferris said the volunteer-based group builds film-accurate costumes for costumed charity and volunteer work as well as Star Wars-related events. "The 501st Legion is an international fan-based organisation dedicated to the construction and wearing of screen-accurate replicas of Imperial Stormtrooper armor, Sith Lords, Clone Troopers, bounty hunters, and other villains from the Star Wars universe," he said.

The organisation has over 10,000 members worldwide, with around 40 members in Canberra. The Black Tower Squad named itself after Canberra's Black Mountain and Telstra Tower. They 'kit-up' for local charity events such as the MS Walk and Fun Run and Relay for Life, as well as smaller community events. They've even made appearances at private parties and weddings - including one Canberra wedding where the bride walked down the aisle to Darth Vader's Imperial March - and the Special Kids Christmas and Dream night at Taronga Zoo in Sydney. Mr Ferris said while the Black Tower Squad doesn't charge for appearances at events, donations to the Black Dog Institute are appreciated. He said although the group is not officially connected with the Walt Disney Company or Lucasfilm LLC, the 501st Legion is Lucasfilm's preferred costuming organisation.The Great Barrier Reef is in "deep trouble" as climate change and other threats mount, hindering the ability of corals to rebound from natural events, a senior scientist with the reef's Marine Park Authority said.

Unprecedented back-to-back mass coral bleachings resulted in 29 per cent of the shallow water corals dying in the summer of 2015-16 and a further 20 per cent last summer, David Wachenfeld, director of recovery at the authority, said.

Marine scientist Taylor Simpkins holds up a crown of thorns starfish near the North Opal Reef off the coast of Port Douglas. Credit:Jason SOuth

Fortunately, "there's no prediction of substantial mass bleachings at this point" for this summer. Still, February - typically the worst month for heat stress on corals - "is going to be a slightly nervous month" for scientists, Dr Wachenfeld said.

The roughly 50-per cent death rate for the corals excludes damage done last March by Cyclone Debbie, which tore into the northern end of the southern section of the Great Barrier Reef - an area largely spared from the bleaching events.The citizenship fiasco will dominate Federal Parliament's return in 2018 as the government and opposition seek to damage each other with calls for more High Court referrals, potentially triggering a fresh wave of byelections.

While the government will push the case for its company tax cuts and Labor will attempt to shift the focus to cost of living pressures and stagnant wage growth, the citizenship saga that has battered both sides shows no signs of abating.

With Labor MP David Feeney resigning over his UK dual citizenship last week - prompting the byelection contest in his Melbourne seat of Batman - the spotlight has fallen back on other MPs under lingering doubt.

The Turnbull government argues Queensland Labor MP Susan Lamb is even now still a British citizen, given it appears she never successfully renounced a claim to citizenship by descent through her parents.

However it remains unclear whether the government will use its restored majority in the lower house to refer Ms Lamb - or fellow lower house Labor backbenchers Justine Keay and Josh Wilson - to the High Court for judgement.Malcolm Turnbull says heads must roll over the "unbelievable act of negligence" that saw his department accidentally leak hundreds of sensitive and classified Cabinet documents.

In his strongest comments yet on the embarrassing bungle that came to light last week, Mr Turnbull says the "shocking failure" will be fully investigated and the people responsible will be held accountable.

'It beggars belief': Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

The ABC obtained the documents after they were accidentally sold off inside a locked filing cabinet at a used government furniture shop in Canberra. The new owner found the documents inside when he used a drill to force open the drawers.

The national broadcaster published a series of reports based on the documents - which were meant to remain sealed for 20 years - that revealed the inner workings of previous Labor and Coalition governments.First Harry and Meghan, then Eugenie and Jack, now Australia may be set to get our own version of a royal wedding in the coming months.

Considering breakfast TV stars are the closest thing we have to legitimate royalty in the Antipodes (especially when the likes of Cate Blanchett, Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman are out of town), speculation is mounting that Today's Karl Stefanovic is engaged to his shoe designer girlfriend Jasmine Yarbrough.

Karl Stefanovic and Jasmine Yarlbrough made a public appearance as a couple at Derby Day last year. Credit:SDP Media

The clues, in the form of a diamond ring with more carats than Tasmania has hectares, started dropping on social media last week when Stefanovic marked his partner's 30-something birthday.

The Gold Logie winner posted a photo of Yarbrough embracing two small children with the caption "Happy birthday beauty".The Queensland Opposition Leader has described mobile phones as the "weapon of choice for bullies", calling for talks on banning mobile phones in Queensland schools.

Deb Frecklington proposed discussions with stakeholders regarding a mobile phone ban during school hours.

The premier held an urgent government roundtable discussion on Monday to discuss ways to combat cyberbullying. Credit:Bloomberg

This is all about getting our kids more active and encouraging them to interact face-to-face, instead of behind screens," Ms Frecklington said.

As a community, we all need to help our kids develop social skills and understand the risks of online content.Were on our hands and knees in a thicket of seagrass and mangroves on Phillip Islands east coast on a bright, sunny day, hunting for what at first glance looks like old rubbish.

Dr Stacey Trevathan-Tackett, Nicolas hebert and Giuditta Bonetti spent the day digging. Credit:Joe Armao

Dr Stacey Trevathan-Tackett, hair pulled back away from the mud, digs a chunk of brown earth out with her trowel, and crumbles it in her fingers.

There, she points to it. A patch of black, like wet coffee beans. This is a giveaway. Its a sign of anaerobic decomposition. The bacteria get this big meal of carbon, so they go nuts.

She crumbles the lump with her hand, and out comes a teabag.Childcare workers have asked families to back a nation-wide strike in March that will see hundreds of early learning centres close in a bid to raise the industry's low award wages.

The industry's latest campaign, launched on Sunday, calls for families to support a "big walk-off" in March  and where possible keep children under five at home to allow workers to participate in the strike.

The strike, which will occur on March 27, will be the industry's third national walk-off in 12 months.

The latest strike comes after the federal government failed to meet an industry-set deadline to increase wages by February 1.One person is dead after a two-vehicle crash on the M1 through Helensvale, which has closed two northbound lanes and created heavy congestion on Sunday.

While the motorway reopened just before 3.30pm and delays quickly cleared, drivers heading to Brisbane had already been stuck in more than six kilometres of gridlock during the afternoon.

Northbound congestion on the M1 stretched back about six kilometres by 12.30pm. Credit:Department of Transport and Main Roads

Police believe a motorist was inspecting their broken-down vehicle in a northbound emergency lane, when another vehicle rear-ended it. The person in the emergency lane has died.

The incident happened just before 11.30am, about a kilometre north of the Smith Street on-ramp and two lanes were closed while the Forensic Crash Unit investigated.About $16 million worth of opium resin was allegedly seized as it was on its way to Melbourne hidden in an asphalt-compacting machine.

The Australian Border Force detected the 12.4-kilogram package being imported from Turkey in an air-cargo consignment on January 9.

A poppy bulb in Mexico lanced to extract the sap, used to make opium, and heroin. Credit:Reuters

The ABF allegedly found the suspected drugs concealed in the baseplate of the machine.

Police delivered the package to a St Albans address and two men allegedly accepted the delivery and loaded the consignment into a vehicle before driving to a house in Burnside Heights.Choreographer Luke O'Connor and members of the public who will dance to mark 50 years since the release of Joan Lindsay's famous novel. Credit:Luis Enrique Ascui

You've read the book, and seen the movie, now do the flash mob dance to one of our most loved stories, Picnic at Hanging Rock.

If youre tired of running to the top of the rock formation, yelling Miranda! Miranda! the Shire of Macedon Ranges has come up with a new way to experience the landmark near Woodend. In an event to (belatedly) mark the 50th anniversary of Joan Lindsays famous 1967 novel, which inspired the 1975 movie, more than 1000 people are expected to do a dance routine, called Too Many Mirandas.

Women, and blokes too, are invited to the Rocks East Paddock on February 24, to dance in white boater hats and white flowing dresses with pink sashes as bewildered kangaroos look on. It will be videoed for YouTube.

Performance company Asking For Trouble have invented moves such as Climbing the Rock (imitating touching rocks with your hands as you walk between them); and The Edith Scream (looking down as you hold your hands to your ears and scream).Police are questioning a man over an incident in Melbourne's outer east that has left in a woman in hospital with severe burns.

Emergency services were called to a home in Boronia Avenue in Cranbourne just after 6.30pm after neighbours reportedly heard a blood-curdling scream.

A 29-year-old Cranbourne man is assisting police with their enquiries.

A 22-year old Cranbourne woman sustained severe burns and was taken by ambulance to hospital in a serious condition.

Neighbour Daniel McCreedy said he could smell smoke and petrol at the scene.It seems all the luck was south of the river over the weekend, with two lucky WA locals taking home just over half-a-million each in Saturday night's Oz Lotto draw.

Lotterywest has revealed the WA tickets were two of eight division one prize winners sold nationally, and have taken out $513,902.85 each.

The tickers remain unclaimed.

The winning numbers were 23, 11, 24, 13, 27, 12, with supplementary numbers 31 and 22.

The tickets were sold at Palmyra Supa News and Kenwick Village News, and are currently unclaimed.Luba Kuzovnikova is the artistic director for Pikene pa Broen, a Kirkenes art organization that focuses on cross-border exchange. Credit:Ksenia Ivanova On Friday, a Moscow judge extended Berg's jail term for an additional three months as Russia's investigation of him continues. After the hearing, as Norwegian journalists lobbed questions at him, Berg gripped the bars of his courtroom cage and insisted he had been trapped. "I feel really misused," Berg said, referring to unidentified people in Norway who his lawyers say gave him the envelopes to mail. "I have been fighting against hate and anger." A Norwegian tunnel in Kirkenes, near the border with Russia. Credit:Ksenia Ivanova For now, the only thing that seems clear is that not even Kirkenes - liberated by the Soviets from the Nazis in 1944 and part of a Russia-Norway visa-free zone - can escape the confrontation between Russia and the West. Schoolteacher Robert Nesje realised that last weekend when he was keeping the time at a friendly Russian-Norwegian swim meet and thought of his close friend Berg imprisoned at the same moment in Moscow's high-security Lefortovo Prison.

"That's kind of absurd. That's kind of unreal," Nesje said. "We feel that the Cold War is coming back." I have been fighting against hate and anger. Frode Berg Driving south and east out of Kirkenes, travellers leave a prim Scandinavian town where a hotel serves $220 crab dinners and arrive in the Russian town of Nikel, where smoke billows out of a huge nickel plant and a bust of Lenin still stands sentry. The region's coordinator for international affairs, Tatiana Bazanova, said Berg participated "everywhere and in everything" when it came to cross-border projects and that his case could cast a shadow on all of them. "If he was truly a spy," Bazanova said, "it would turn out that all our cooperation is a cover for various operations. Then people might say that I'm undercover." Berg came to Kirkenes - on the front line of the original Cold War - as a military officer in 1975. Weekly, he drilled in preparation for a Soviet invasion, training in the use of defensive fire on tanks and helicopters, he recalled in an interview last year for an art project about the border region.

He switched to the border commission in 1990, and in the ensuing quarter-century lived Western hopes for a closer relationship with Russia. He went out on joint patrols with Russian counterparts and ate and fished with them after meetings. He helped arrange an annual ski race for Russians, Finns and Norwegians passing through the normally off-limits border strip. After he retired in 2014, he joined the board of a Kirkenes art organisation, Pikene pa Broen, that focuses on cross-border exchange. The efforts of Berg and others pushing for closer ties paid off. Russian fishing and oil firms flocked to the Kirkenes port and shipyards, and Russian shoppers sought out cheap diapers and other Western goods. An agreement allowing visa-free travel for residents near the border came into force in 2012. Border crossings surged from around 2000 a year in 1990 to a high of 320,000 in 2013. Daily buses now run between Kirkenes and Russia's northern port city of Murmansk. Travellers wind past Russian military bases hidden in the hills and snow-sheathed barbed-wire fences that, in late January, are bathed in the pink light of the Arctic afternoon. "I'm not afraid of Russia," Berg said in the interview. "I know the history. I know the Russians very well. And I have no problem with them." According to the official line in Moscow, it was all a lie.

"Can such a good-hearted European pensioner be a spy?" asked a December report about Berg on Russian state television. "An investigation by Russian intelligence shows that this is very much possible." Berg's version of the story, according to his lawyers, is that an Oslo acquaintance introduced him to another Norwegian who asked him to take 3000 (AU$4700) in cash to Moscow in December and send it to someone named Natalia. On December 5, when Berg was on his way to the post office with the cash, Russian authorities arrested him. Berg's Norwegian lawyer, Brynjulf Risnes, is trying to find out whether the men who sent him were spies, and if so for whom. They could have been connected to Norwegian intelligence, he says, or they may have been part of a Russian plan to entrap Berg and provoke an international incident. "When Russia's leadership's ties with one of its neighbours worsen, the FSB reacts by seeking to open a spy case related to that country," said Berg's Russian lawyer, Ilya Novikov, referring to Russia's security agency, which is investigating Berg. Novikov said that even though his client maintains his innocence, Berg's best hope was to be traded for Russian spies in custody in the West. A Norwegian Foreign Ministry spokesman said that diplomats were working to safeguard Berg's interests but that he wasn't at liberty to discuss details of the case because of Norwegian confidentiality rules.

The lawyers say Berg denies knowing that the envelopes he was carrying contained spy instructions. They say that the FSB has accused Berg of being merely a one-way courier, who learned no Russian secrets. But the Russian state news media said Berg stole secrets on Russia's Northern Fleet and suggested that pretty much any foreigner who takes a great interest in Russia cannot be trusted. Russian counterintelligence agents should keep an eye out for foreigners who "are too passionately in favour of developing relations with Russia," a national-security expert interviewed on state television said about the Berg case. Relations between Russia and Norway, a founding NATO member, have grown more tense as Europe's Far North has re-emerged as a strategic focal point. About 300 US Marines arrived in central Norway early last year for winter-warfare training. The Berg case marks the first time since at least the Russian Revolution that a Norwegian has been arrested for espionage in Russia, according to Lars Rowe, a Russia specialist at the Fridtjof Nansen Institute outside Oslo. He said the arrest would deal a blow to the country's efforts of "strengthening and preserving whatever can be saved in regional cooperation in the north." "For 25 years, we have been working systematically to bring people together. This takes people more apart," said Lars Georg Fordal, head of the Norwegian Barents Secretariat, which finances Russian cooperation projects. "Even during the Cold War, nothing like this was actually happening."Nicosia: Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades won a second five-year term on Sunday as voters gave a thumbs-up to his record in containing an economic meltdown in 2013 and conducting abortive peace talks with the Turkish Cypriots.

With all votes counted, the conservative had 56 per cent of the vote against 44 per cent for the leftist-backed Stavros Malas.

Anastasiades, 71, steered the Cypriot economy to recovery after it was plunged into crisis in 2013, days after he was first elected, by its exposure to debt-racked Greece and by fiscal slippage under a previous left-wing administration.

Nicos Anastasiades waves to his supporters after he voted in the presidential elections in southern coastal city of Limassol, Cyprus, on Sunday. Credit:AP

Cyprus emerged from a bailout program from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund in 2016. Unlike other austerity programs, the Cyprus model put most of the painful measures up front, including recapitalising banks by seizing uninsured deposits, a so-called "bail-in" - used in the euro zone for the first time.Abu Nuwar, West Bank: Israeli authorities on Sunday tore down two EU-funded classrooms that were part of a school for Bedouins in the occupied West Bank because they said they were built illegally.

Palestinians condemned the move.

Bedouin children stand amid the rubble of two classrooms demolished by Israeli authorities in the village of Abu Nuwar. Credit:Mahmoud Illean

Israeli authorities say such demolitions carry out court rulings against unauthorised building by Palestinians. Palestinians see it as part of a broader move to seize land for potential Jewish settlement expansion.

The two classrooms, which stood separately from the rest of the hilltop school, were demolished early in the morning by a work crew while Israeli security officers closed off the area, according to residents of the Palestinian village Abu Nuwar.In November, the Egyptian affiliate of the Islamic State launched a brazen attack in which nearly 40 gunmen stormed the al-Rawdah mosque in Egypt's sparsely populated Sinai, killing more than 300 worshipers.

An Israeli Air Force F-15 plane in flight during a graduation ceremony for new pilots in 2016 Credit:AP

The airstrikes by Israeli planes are conducted with the support of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, who has led an often brutal campaign inside Egypt to wipe out the jihadist groups but has struggled to defeat them.

Washington: Unmarked Israeli warplanes and helicopters have carried out dozens of covert attacks against the Islamic State and other terrorist groups inside the Egyptian Sinai in recent years, said two former senior US officials.

The terrorist group first came to widespread public attention for its suspected role in the downing of a Russian airliner in 2015, in which 224 people were killed. Egypt's military has struggled for years to destroy the group, which briefly seized control of the northern Sinai town of Sheikh Zuweid and has launched dozens of attacks on soldiers, police and Coptic Christian churches.

The covert alliance between Egypt and Israel on counterterrorism shows how the rise of the Islamic State and other jihadist groups have helped forge quiet partnerships between Israel and its longtime Arab adversaries.

Israeli security officials say their regional security concerns increasingly align with those of the Persian Gulf states. In 2016, Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon said Israeli officials were secretly meeting with counterparts from the gulf in "closed rooms" united against a common "bad guy" - Iran.

A former US official described the covert counterterrorism alliance between Israel and Egypt as a "big deal" but said that in recent years, counterterrorism relationships have become "a little bit insulated from ups and downs" of the region's tumultuous politics.

"The public perception of those two countries and how they relate is not in sync with how they work together privately on counterterrorism," said the former official, who was granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive alliance.PHILIPSBURG:--- Seven owners of one-man businesses on Sint Maarten will appear in the Court of First Instance of Sint Maarten on 6 and 7 February 2018. It is the Emerald-case regarding evading income and turnover tax.

These suspicions are the result of the Emerald-investigation, an investigation by the anti-corruption unit (TBO, Team Bestrijding Ondermijning) into fraud and corruption in the port of Sint Maarten. It has been found that the companies that are on trial in (in particular) the years 2012-2016 have been paid for approximately 8 million dollars for activities that would have been carried out for the benefit of the Port. These payments were not reported by the companies to the tax authorities. That is punishable by law.

According to calculations by the tax authorities of Sint Maarten, the country has lost more than 6 million (Antillean) guilders in tax revenue.

In addition, the investigation showed strong indications that the activities, for which the companies were paid by the port, were never performed at all, but that false invoices were used. The businesses that have been summoned are not being prosecuted for this. But this fraudulent context means that this is not about simple tax evasion.

The accused suspects include a member of the Sint Maarten Parliament (MP) and a police officer.

A large part of the invoices paid by the port concerned clean and clean-up work. The TBO is, in the aftermath of hurricane Irma, focused on corruption and signs of fraud. As is known, the Dutch government has made 7 million euros available for cleaning work on Sint Maarten after Irma; these funds are distributed through the UNDP. With these criminal cases, the Public Prosecution Service also wants to signal that fraud and corruption cannot be tolerated.

The Emerald-investigation also investigates the main suspects, M.M., CEO of the Port Authority and O.A., owner of the company that provides security in the port. This case is in the meantime being prepared by the TBO. In that context, witnesses have now been heard by the examining magistrate.

Public Prosecutor's Office Press ReleasePHILIPSBURG:--- The House of Parliament will sit in a plenary public session on February 5, 2018. The Minister of Public Health, Social Development and Labor will be present.

The plenary public meeting which was adjourned on December 11, 2017 will be reconvened on Monday at 10.00 hrs in the General Assembly Chamber of the House at Wilhelminastraat #1 in Philipsburg.

The agenda point is:

Ontwerp van Landsverordening tot wijziging van het Burgerlijk Wetboek en enkele andere landsverordeningen in verband met de vervanging van de zevende titel A van Boek 7A door een nieuwe titel 10 van Boek 7 regelende voorschriften voor arbeidsovereenkomsten. (Draft of National Ordinance amending the Civil Code and some other national ordinances in connection with the replacement of the seventh title A of Book 7A with a new title 10 of Book 7 regulations for employment contracts).

Members of the public are invited to the House of Parliament to attend parliamentary deliberations.

The House of Parliament is located across from the Court House in Philipsburg.

The parliamentary session will be carried live on St. Maarten Cable TV Channel 120, via Pearl Radio FM 98.1, SXMGOV Radio 107.9 FM, video live stream via the internet www.pearlfmradio.sx, www.sxmparliament.org and also Parliament FB page: Parliament of Sint Maarten.PHILIPSBURG:--- The House of Parliament will sit in an urgent Central Committee meeting on Monday, February 5, 2018.

The Central Committee meeting is scheduled for 14.00 hrs in the General Assembly Chamber of the House at Wilhelminastraat #1 in Philipsburg. The minister of Tourism, Economic Affairs, Traffic and Telecommunication will be present.

The agenda point is:

Status and situation around the dismissal of the workers at St. Maarten Cable TV and the predicament of the subscribers of said company (IS/309/2017-2018 dated February 1, 2018)

This meeting was requested by MP P.F.M. Geerlings, MP S.M. Bijlani and MP T.E. Leonard.

Members of the public are invited to the House of Parliament to attend parliamentary deliberations.

The House of Parliament is located across from the Court House in Philipsburg.

The parliamentary session will be carried live on St. Maarten Cable TV Channel 120, via SXM GOV radio FM 107.9, via Pearl Radio FM 98.1, the audio via the Internet www.sxmparliament.org, www.pearlfmradio.com and Parliaments Facebook page: Parliament of Sint Maarten.There's a 'super blue blood Moon' on the rise



Los Angeles, Jan 31 (AFP) Jan 31, 2018



Stargazers across large swaths of the globe -- from the streets of Los Angeles to the slopes of a smoldering Philippine volcano -- had the chance to witness a rare "super blue blood Moon" Wednesday, when Earth's shadow bathed our satellite in a coppery hue.

The celestial show was the result of the Sun, Earth, and Moon lining up perfectly for a lunar eclipse just as the Moon is near its closest orbit point to Earth, making it appear "super" large.

It is the second full Moon within the same month, a phenomenon called a "blue" Moon which has nothing to do with its color.

The "blood" in the name comes from the reddish brown color the Moon takes on when Earth enters between it and the sun, cutting off the light rays that usually brighten the lunar surface.

The eclipse began around 3:45 am (1145 GMT), as a black shadow began to devour one corner of the gray-white Moon.

An hour later, the lunar surface was plunged into darkness, known as totality.

Then, rusty tones began to sheath the Moon, reflecting the light of all the sunrises and sunsets on Earth at the same moment.

There were gasps of delight at that moment in a school in the Philippines town on Guinobatan where some of the 90,000 people who have fled the erupting Mount Mayon volcano were sheltering.

There they were treated to a double-spectacle -- a supermoon eclipse rising over a mountain spewing ash and lava.

"It's huge and bright. It's exciting to see. God created this beautiful moon and the volcano," farmer Jose Almesolano, 75, told AFP.



- Ominous signs -



On the other side of the Pacific thousands were gathering at Los Angeles' Griffith Observatory, which opened its doors at 3:30 am (1130 GMT) to a crowd expected to reach 2,000.

Some had waited in line since 10:00 pm the night before, hoping for a choice viewing spot, many science buffs bringing their own telescopes to set up on the lawn.

The extreme east of Africa, the Middle East and Asia, Russia, Australia and New Zealand could enjoy the spectacle on Wednesday night, weather depending, as the Moon rose there.

But most of South America, Africa and Europe, where the alignment occurs in the middle of the day, missed out on the show.

In the Indonesian capital Jakarta, several thousand people lined up at the planetarium to catch a glimpse of the rare event on one of its telescopes.

"I was watching the news on TV and then came here immediately," Yami, who like many Indonesian goes by one name, told local media.

In Nepal, where the super moon was just visible in the hazy polluted night sky over Kathmandu, the celestial phenomenon was greeted with more caution as an ominous sign.

Local newspapers there had printed warnings telling citizens not to eat, drink, sleep or even go to the toilet during the lunar eclipse, citing Hindu customs.



- Next one -



NASA trained its telescopes and instruments on its Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter on the Moon to measure the effect of the temperature drop during the one-hour-16-minute eclipse.

Seeing what happens when the surface of the Moon cools quickly will help scientists "understand some of the characteristics of the regolith -- the mixture of soil and loose rocks on the surface -- and how it changes over time," the US space agency said in a statement.

The last "super blue blood Moon" occurred on December 30, 1982, when it was seen in Europe, Africa and western Asia.

For North America, the last time was in 1866.



If you missed this one, the next blue Moon total lunar eclipse will happen on December 31, 2028, though it won't be quite as large since it will not be as close to Earth.

Another will occur on January 31, 2037.

"The red color during a lunar eclipse is very distinctive and it's a rare treat to be able to see a blood red Moon," said Brian Rachford, associate professor of physics at the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.

"One of the great things about a lunar eclipse is you also don't need any special equipment to see it. Anyone can go outside and look at the Moon."

burs/ksh/jmParadise lost: 'Anote's Ark' shows Kiribati on the brink



Park City, United States, Feb 1 (AFP) Feb 01, 2018



With its pristine sands, glistening saltwater flats and gently swaying palms, Kiribati ought to be a tropical paradise -- but this precarious slice of heaven on Earth is living on borrowed time.

The low-lying Pacific nation of 33 atolls and reef islands is facing the unstoppable rise of the sea and will be gone before long, making its people the world's first nation of climate change refugees.

"I've been trying to communicate to the international community that we have a problem. It's a small part of the larger challenge on climate change, but our case is more immediate," former Kiribati president and climate activist Anote Tong tells AFP.

"We're at the bottom end of the spectrum, where we are the most vulnerable. We are on the front line. Before anyone else is affected, we will be."

Tong, who ruled the isolated nation for 12 years until completing his third term in 2016, is the focus of "Anote's Ark," a new film documenting the plight of Kiribati's 110,000 inhabitants and the struggle for the survival of 4,000 years of Kiribati culture.

Documentarian Matthieu Rytz follows Tong in the later years of his presidency as he travels the world pointing out that his homeland lies barely two meters (6.5 feet) above sea level and the islets are facing an emergency.



- 'Incredible story' -



"They are most likely to be uninhabitable well within the century, before they disappear," Tong told AFP at the Sundance Film Festival in the US state of Utah, where "Anote's Ark" had its world premiere last week.

"Already we have had communities who had to relocate because the village, the community they used to have, is no longer there.

"We have communities where the seawater has broken into the freshwater pond and destroyed food crops."

"Anote's Ark" is the first feature film directed by Rytz, a Canadian photographer who was exposed to the plight of the islanders and persuaded Tong to be part of a film.

The documentary follows the statesman on his journey through international halls of power leading up to the 2015 Paris Climate Conference.

"It was an incredible story -- a head of state who knows he won't have a state within a generation," Rytz told AFP.

The filmmaker was clear from the beginning that he didn't want to make just another climate change movie following politicians or celebrities at summits around the world.

Instead he weaves Tong's campaign into the wider story of the people of Kiribati, and we meet Sermery Tiare, a young mother of six who decides to relocate to New Zealand with her family.

Tong, 65, has developed a string of attention-grabbing schemes designed to help his people cope when their homeland is swamped.

Among those strategies is the construction of floating islands, anchored to the sea, that could sustain up to 30,000 people for a century.



- 'Huge disaster' -



In reality, the project -- complete with skyscrapers and resort facilities -- would cost hundreds of billions of dollars, and Tong understands they will not become reality anytime soon, if at all.

Other options include constructing sea walls, as well as "land reclamation" and the building of artificial islands using sand dredged from the seabed.

During his tenure, Tong bought 2,000 hectares (5,000 acres) of farmland in Fiji, a bigger Pacific Island nation, partly as an investment but also as a possible new home.

He has also pioneered the concept of "migration with dignity" -- training islanders mostly used to a fishing lifestyle to give them useful skills in their lives as climate change refugees.

"The science is pretty categorical. It doesn't take a lot of intelligence to know that based on the projections put forward by the (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) we have a huge disaster coming up," Tong told AFP.

"We cannot wish it away. And even if the possibility of that coming up is five percent, we cannot remain complacent."

He describes US President Donald Trump's announcement that he intended to withdraw the US from the 2015 Paris climate accord on limiting global warming as initially "extremely disappointing."

He added, however, that he was heartened by reaffirmations of commitment to the agreement at the state, industry and civil society level.

"Governments have a limited ability to address this because governments are led by politicians," he said.

"Politicians are more concerned about the next election than the next generation."Russia launches 11 space satellites 'without glitch'



Moscow, Feb 1 (AFP) Feb 01, 2018



Russia on Thursday successfully launched 11 satellites from its Vostochny cosmodrome, in the third rocket liftoff from the new spaceport, the space agency said.

The country's first orbital launch of 2018 came after a similar liftoff from the cosmodrome in eastern Russia ended in embarrassment, with officials losing contact with a string of satellites last November.

Lifting off as scheduled earlier Thursday, the Soyuz rocket carried two Russian Earth monitoring satellites as its primary payload and nine US and German piggyback satellites.

During its mission the Fregat upper-stage rocket performed a complex sequence, forming several orbits for the delivery of the satellites, the Roscosmos space agency said.

"In accordance with the flight programme, the Fregat upper-stage placed into orbit space vehicles of main and secondary payloads," the space agency said in a statement.

Both the Soyuz rocket and the upper stage "performed without a glitch," the statement added.

Dmitry Rogozin, the deputy prime minister in charge of space, said contact with Russia's Kanopus-V earth monitoring satellites had been established.

"Thank you everyone," the official tweeted.

The second liftoff from the Vostochny cosmodrome ended in failure last November when Russian officials lost contact with a weather satellite hours after its launch.

Apart from the Meteor weather satellite contact had been lost with 18 payloads from institutions and companies in Canada, the United States, Japan, Germany, Sweden and Norway.

The glitch was a fresh embarrassment for the country's once-proud space industry which has suffered a series of setbacks over recent years

Officials blamed the accident on a programming error.

Thursday's launch had been initially planned for last December, but was postponed due to the November accident.

In late December, Russia lost contact with Angola's first national telecoms satellite launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan but several days later officials said they had restored communication.

The inaugural launch from Vostochny spaceport took place in April 2016, with President Vladimir Putin overseeing the takeoff.

It represented a major development for the country's space sector, with the new cosmodrome touted to mark a rebirth of the industry.Russia to start offering spacewalks for tourists



Moscow, Feb 1 (AFP) Feb 01, 2018



Russia is planning to send paying tourists on the International Space Station out on spacewalks for the first time, an official from the country's space industry said Thursday.

"We are discussing the possibility of sending tourists on spacewalks," Vladimir Solntsev, the head of Russian space company Energia, told Russian tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda.

"Market analysts have confirmed this: wealthy people are ready to pay money for this," Solntsev told the paper.

He said the cost of such a trip could be around $100 million (80 million euros), "possibly less for the first tourist".

The tourists will be able to "go out on a spacewalk and make a film, (or) a video clip".

Energia, which was behind the launch of the first man in space Yuri Gagarin in 1961, is currently building a new module dubbed NEM-2 to transport tourists to the International Space Station (ISS).

Solntsev said the NEM-2, the name of which is still to be confirmed, will accommodate four to six people. It will be fitted with "comfortable" cabins, two toilets and internet access.

"It should be launched in 2019," he said.

"Basically it will be comfortable, as much as that is possible in space," the space official was quoted as saying.

He added that American aircraft manufacturer Boeing was interested in becoming a partner in the project.

Five to six tourists a year will be able to take a space trip lasting up to 10 days, Solntsev said.

Space tourism is a developing sector currently dominated by Western companies, such as the US-based Virgin Galactic, which unveiled its commercial SpaceShipTwo in 2016.

Russia sent Canadian founder of the Cirque du Soleil, Guy Laliberte, into space in 2009. The billionaire spent two weeks on the ISS.

Iranian-American entrepreneur Anousheh Ansari became the first female space tourist in 2006.

oc/am/dl

BOEINGApple delivers record profit, seeks to allay iPhone X fears



San Francisco, Feb 2 (AFP) Feb 02, 2018



Apple on Thursday said its earnings in the final three months of last year set new records, with sales of its flagship iPhone X topping its expectations.

The California-based technology giant reported that profit climbed to $20 billion on revenue that increased 13 percent to $88.3 billion during the period.

"We're thrilled to report the biggest quarter in Apple's history, with broad-based growth that included the highest revenue ever from a new iPhone lineup," said Apple chief executive Tim Cook.

"iPhone X surpassed our expectations and has been our top-selling iPhone every week since it shipped in November."

However, Apple reported that overall iPhone sales in the quarter of 77.3 million were about a million fewer than the same period a year earlier.

But iPhone revenues rose 13 percent from a year ago, suggesting its newer models were gaining traction.

The earnings -- for the first quarter of Apple's financial year -- come amid concerns over weak demand for the newest and most expensive iPhone X, the 10th anniversary edition of the iconic smartphone.

Revenue growth from iPhone sales rose in all regions, and it was the top-selling smartphone overall in mainland China, according to Cook.

"It was a stellar quarter for iPhone," Cook said.

"iPhone X was the most popular."

Apple also forecast revenue of between $60 billion and $62 billion in the current quarter, an outlook less rosy than analysts had expected.

Apple shares dipped and then rose more than three percent to $173.40 in after-market trades that followed release of the earnings figures.



- Spotlight off iPhone -



Despite Apple's spectacular trajectory in the decade since the introduction of the iPhone, the California technology titan is facing challenges on whether it can continue growth.

Apple's image has been bruised by revelations that it updated its mobile software to slow the performance of old iPhones as batteries weaken from age.

While the iPhone delivered the bulk of revenues, $61.6 billion in the quarter, the key segment of services saw revenue growth of 18 percent to $8.5 billion.

The "other product" segment which includes the Apple Watch and Apple TV, increased 36 percent to $5.5 billion.

Cook spent much of an earnings call with analysts playing up increasing revenue from Apple services, digital content, subscriptions, and products other than iPhones.

The number of Apple devices being used in the world as of January is at an all-time high of 1.3 billion, the ranks having grown 30 percent during the past two years, according to Apple.

"That number speaks to the strength of the product; the loyalty of the customer, the strength of the ecosystem; it also obviously fuels the services business," Cook said.

While iPhone sales are at the heart of Apple's money-making machine, the company has taken to spotlighting revenue from the App Store, iCloud, Apple Music, iTunes and other content and services people tap into using its devices.



- Where's the wow? -



Neil Saunders, managing director of research firm GlobalData Retail, saw "worrying trends" behind Apple's record-breaking quarterly earnings.

The number of iPhones sold declined, and people overall seem to be waiting longer to upgrade to new smartphones, the analyst noted. He saw the slowdown in iPhone sales as a sign that Apple isn't coming up with the kind of innovations that "wow" consumers.

"We believe that the clear blue water that once existed between Apple and rivals is much diminished," Saunders said.

"The company has time to reopen the gap, but to do so, it needs to pull something new and unique out of its hat sooner, rather than later."

Apple said its cash pile grew to $285 billion, with much of that stashed overseas.

The company said last month it would bring back most of its profits from abroad to take advantage of a favorable tax rate in legislation approved by Congress last year.

The repatriation will result in a tax bill of about $38 billion, but also would free up big chunks of money for investment.

gc/itPlan to protect Indonesian peatlands with aerial mapping wins $1m



Jakarta, Feb 2 (AFP) Feb 02, 2018



A plan to use satellite imagery and aerial mapping to protect Indonesia's peatlands -- a vast carbon sink and source of much of the country's greenhouse emissions -- was awarded a $1 million prize on Friday.

The cutting-edge technology will be used by authorities to clamp down on illegal clearance of the land for plantations, helping to prevent a repeat of annual forest fires that plague the region while also reducing the country's carbon footprint.

The government, with the support of international partners, came up with the idea of a competition two years ago to help achieve its commitments under the Paris Agreement on climate change.

The winning entry from the International Peat Mapping Team was recognised by the judges for offering "the most accurate, timely and cost-effective methodology for mapping peatlands".

Bambang Setiadi, an Indonesian member of the winning team, told reporters that Indonesia has the largest tropical peatland area in the world.

"We need technology to measure the depth of peat domes and water levels," said Setiadi, whose team also included scientists from Indonesia, Germany and the Netherlands.

Peatlands are fragile ecosystems formed over thousands of years by the accumulation of dense wet plant material.

When drained or cleared by fire to make way for commercial plantations, such as for palm oil or pulpwood, the carbon is released into the atmosphere.

In 2015, Indonesia experienced its most serious fires in some years, worsened by dry weather caused by an El Nino phenomenon, and cloaked large stretches of Southeast Asia in choking smog for weeks.

A moratorium on conversions of new peatlands was established in 2011 to improve management and reduce fires.

But poor spatial data and overlapping forestry maps are a major hindrance for authorities trying to enforce regulations governing them.

Indonesia's geospatial agency, which oversaw the internationally funded competition, said the new mapping technology would be deployed this year.

The winning technology combines satellite and aerial LiDAR mapping with on-the-ground measurements to find the depth and extent of wetlands and peat bogs.China orders microblog companies to ramp up censorship



Beijing, Feb 2 (AFP) Feb 02, 2018



China Friday ordered the country's microblog operators to establish mechanisms to remove false information, in the latest move by authorities to tighten policing of the web.

The Cyberspace Administration of China said the Twitter-like microblog platforms have allowed the spread of pornographic, vulgar and fraudulent content.

In addition to making sure to remove such content, companies should also keep a copy of what users post for at least six months, the CAC said in an online statement.

"Microblogging service providers shall play an active role in promoting economic development and serving the general public by promoting the core values of socialism," it said.

The statement did not go into any detail on what any new mechanisms should include.

China tightly controls the internet through a censorship system known as the "Great Firewall" and closely monitors social media networks for sensitive content.

Regulations in force since 2000 say websites are responsible for "ensuring the legality of any information" posted on their platforms.

China's leading microblogging website by far, Sina Weibo, already uses automated scans and censorship teams to remove inappropriate content, but has not disclosed how many employees are involved in the work.

Last month, popular news aggregation app Jinri Toutiao announced it would hire 2,000 more "content reviewers" after authorities shut it down for 24 hours in December over alleged breaches of regulations.

New regulations that came into force last June require online platforms to get a licence to post news reports or commentary about the government, economy, military, foreign affairs, and social issues.Devin Nunes, House intel chairman in eye of US 'memo' storm



Washington, Feb 2 (AFP) Feb 02, 2018



US congressman Devin Nunes, at the heart of a dramatic tug of war over a classified memo, is a staunch Donald Trump supporter, a young Republican who defends the president at all costs.

His aggressive pursuit of allegations of misconduct by the FBI and Department of Justice amid an escalating Trump-Russia scandal has led Democrats to accuse him of seeking to discredit the investigations, while some fellow Republicans have taken swipes at him as a graceless "Inspector Clouseau" sleuth.

The California lawmaker, 44 years old and in his eighth term in Congress, served on Trump's presidential transition team.

He has written a memo that he says outlines "surveillance abuses" at the agencies but that Democrats -- and some Republican critics -- charge is a political smear.

Trump declassified the memo on Friday.

The Justice Department had warned it would be "extraordinarily reckless" to do so, and the FBI expressed similar concerns.

Critics say it contains material that could give the president cover to fire officials such as Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein or even special prosecutor Robert Mueller.

As the memo became public, Nunes insisted he was serving the public good.

"The American people have a right to know when officials in crucial institutions are abusing their authority for political purposes," he said in a statement, adding that he hoped the committee's actions "will shine a light on this alarming series of events so we can make reforms" to government institutions.

Democratic leaders have fumed over Nunes's handling of the case, and accuse him of altering the memo itself after his committee voted along party lines to release it and before it was presented to the White House for review.

On Thursday, an outraged House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said Nunes had been "deliberately dishonest" about the document and the changes he made, and demanded Speaker Paul Ryan remove Nunes from his powerful post.

Ryan called the demand a "political distraction."

He insisted the fracas over the memo would not discredit Mueller's Trump-Russia probe or the country's top law-enforcement departments.

"This memo is not an indictment of the FBI, of the Department of Justice," Ryan said. "It does not impugn the Mueller investigation, or the deputy attorney general."



- White House 'agent' -



But several critics have blasted Nunes as a Trump lapdog.

"Nunes is an agent of the White House instead of an independent investigator," House Democrat Mike Quigley, a member of the intelligence panel, told CNN.

Nunes has been in a hot spotlight for much of the past year.

In March, two months into Trump's term, he made a trip to the White House to inspect classified executive documents that he said showed that American citizens were being improperly "unmasked" in intelligence reports.

He then briefed the president on what he had discovered, raising alarms in some quarters that he was actually warning Trump about elements of the investigation into Russian interference in the US election and possible coordination between Trump and Moscow.

The issue caused such a furor that Nunes was forced to step down from his role heading the intelligence committee's Russia probe, although he maintained his committee chairmanship.

Republican Senator Lindsey Graham expressed alarm at the time about Nunes suggesting impropriety about surveilling the Trump campaign.

"He's gone off on a lark by himself, sort of an Inspector Clouseau investigation here," he said, referring to a movie character seen as an incompetent bungler.

Democrat Adam Schiff, blasted Nunes for seeking to release a memo "that cherry-picks facts, ignores others and smears the FBI and the Justice Department."

Nunes has raised eyebrows on other fronts. During a California drought in 2014 when then-president Barack Obama met with farmers in Fresno, near Nunes's district, the lawmaker scoffed that "global warming is nonsense."Amazon patents could enable worker monitoring via wristband



San Francisco, Feb 2 (AFP) Feb 02, 2018



Amazon has received patents for electronic systems that could enable warehouse monitoring through electronic pulses that guide employees by location.

The patent filings, first reported this week by the news site Geekwire, come amid concerns over workplace conditions for the company, which has seen rapid growth in its warehouses or "fulfillment centers" key to its logistics.

The publicly available patent documents show how wrist-worn devices could deliver ultrasonic pulses that could direct employees to the location of bins for packages being sought.

"Ultrasonic tracking of a worker's hands may be used to monitor performance of assigned tasks," according to one of the documents.

"The ultrasonic unit is configured to be worn by a user in proximity to the user's hand and to periodically emit ultrasonic sound pulses... The management module monitors performance of an assigned task based on the identified inventory bin."

In a statement to AFP, Amazon said it files numerous patents on new technologies that may or may not be implemented.

"The speculation about this patent is misguided," the Amazon statement said.

"Every day at companies around the world, employees use handheld scanners to check inventory and fulfill orders. This idea, if implemented in the future, would improve the process for our fulfillment associates. By moving equipment to associates' wrists, we could free up their hands from scanners and their eyes from computer screens."

Any deployment of such systems would likely trigger a backlash over labor conditions and heighten fears over workplace surveillance.

In the patent document, Amazon said the system is designed to help with "time-consuming acts" to locate items in warehouses.

Amazon's growth has been fueled by technologies that help it speed shipments to enable deliveries in one or two days. It has invested heavily in automated technology and robotics.

On Thursday, Amazon reported its quarterly profit doubled to $1.9 billion, compared with $749 million a year earlier.

In 2015, a New York Times article described Amazon's workplace culture as a "hurtful," Darwinian setting in which employees were pitted against one another to the point of tears to improve productivity.

At the time, Amazon chief executive and founder Jeff Bezos said he did not recognize what he called the depiction of "a soulless, dystopian workplace."YouTube labels state-sponsored news as rules tighten



San Francisco, Feb 2 (AFP) Feb 02, 2018



YouTube on Friday began labeling news broadcasts that get government money as it vowed to be stricter about content at the globally popular online video-sharing service.

A feature being rolled out in the US displays notices below videos uploaded by news broadcasters which receive government or public money, according to a blog post by YouTube News senior product manager Geoff Samek.

"Our goal is to equip users with additional information to help them better understand the sources of news content that they choose to watch on YouTube," Samek said

"News is an important vertical for us and we want to be sure to get it right."

The move is likely to affect videos from services such as Russia-backed RT, which critics call a propaganda outlet for Moscow, but others as well.

The blog post included a screen shot with a disclaimer about the US government-funded Radio Free Asia. The flagging may also apply to state-chartered news organizations such as the BBC and AFP, and US-based public broadcasters.

Notices displayed with state-sponsored news broadcasts will include links to Wikipedia online encyclopedia so viewers can find out more about agencies behind the reports, according to Samek.

The feature is nascent and will be refined based on feedback from users.

YouTube made a series of changes last year intended to "better surface authoritative news," according to Samek.

YouTube priorities for this year include tightening and better enforcing rules at the service, according to chief executive Susan Wojcicki.

"The same creativity and unpredictability that makes YouTube so rewarding can also lead to unfortunate events where we need to take a clear, informed, and principled stance," Wojcicki said in an online post.

"We realize we have a serious social responsibility to get these emerging policy issues right."

Solutions being worked on include enhanced software smarts and more human review of videos uploaded to YouTube, according to Wojcicki.

The number of workers at YouTube and Google focused on content that might violate policies was to increase to more than 10,000.

"We're also currently developing policies that would lead to consequences if a creator does something egregious that causes significant harm to our community as a whole," Wojcicki said.

YouTube last month announced ramped-up rules regarding when it will run ads with videos as it scrambled to quell concerns by brands about being paired with troublesome content.

YouTube late last year pulled 150,000 videos of children after lewd comments about them were posted by viewers.Hawaii fires warning officer who sent missile alert



Washington, Jan 30 (AFP) Jan 30, 2018



The administrator of Hawaii's Emergency Management Agency has resigned and an officer with a track record of "poor performance" has been fired after triggering mass panic with a false alert of a ballistic missile headed for the Pacific islands, officials said Tuesday.

The Pacific archipelago, already on edge over the threat posed by North Korea, was terrorized by the erroneous alert, which was sent out by phone to residents and tourists and remained uncorrected for nearly 40 minutes.

Another employee of the state agency, which is responsible for notifying the public of threats to their safety, has been suspended, Major General Joe Logan, the state adjutant general, told reporters in Hawaii.

HEMA administrator Vern Miyagi resigned on Tuesday to take responsibility for the January 13 incident, Logan said, and the emergency warning officer who sent out the alert of an imminent ballistic missile attack was fired on Friday.

A state investigative report released on Tuesday said that the fired employee had been a "source of concern" for 10 years because of his "poor performance."

"He is unable to comprehend the situation at hand and has confused real life events and drills on at least two separate occasions," the report said.

In a separate report, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) said the officer claimed he believed the threat was real and had not heard a phrase stating that it was an exercise.

At the same time, the report said, the sentence "This is not a drill" was included in the recorded message which prompted the officer to issue the alert.

Mobile phones across the Pacific islands received the emergency alert around 8:07 am and it was also transmitted by television and radio stations.

"In the minutes that followed, panic-stricken citizens called their families to say what they believed were their last words, and some even resorted to jumping into manholes to find shelter," FCC chairman Ajit Pai said in a statement accompanying the report.

The erroneous message came amid tensions with North Korea, which has tested rockets powerful enough to reach the United States, though it is unclear whether they are yet able to deliver nuclear payloads.



- 'Exercise, exercise, exercise' -



It took the authorities 38 minutes to send out a message cancelling the false alert and the FCC also looked into why it took so long to do so.

The FCC and state investigators blamed the mistake on a combination of human error, insufficient management controls and poor computer software.

It began, the FCC report said, with a decision by the overnight-shift supervisor to conduct an unannounced drill when the day shift arrived at 8:00 am.

The overnight-shift supervisor informed the day-shift supervisor of the plan but the day-shift supervisor understood the drill was for the overnight workers ending their shift not for his arriving staff.

"As a result, the day shift supervisor was not in the proper location to supervise the day shift warning officers when the ballistic missile defense drill was initiated," the FCC report said.

It said the overnight-shift supervisor called the day-shift warning officers at 8:05 am pretending to be from US Pacific Command.

A recorded message was played over the phone which began and ended with the words "exercise, exercise, exercise."

The message, however, also included the phrase "This is not a drill" used for an actual live ballistic missile alert, the report said.

Three day-shift warning officers listened to the recording on speakerphone and one of them "believed that the missile threat was real" and issued a live alert at 8:07 am after hearing the sentence "This is not a drill," it said.

The officer declined to be interviewed by the FCC but said in a written statement to HEMA that he did not hear the phrase "exercise, exercise, exercise."

"Other warning officers who heard the recording in the watch center report that they knew that the erroneous incoming message did not indicate a real missile threat, but was supposed to indicate the beginning of an exercise," the report said.

"Because we've not been able to interview the day shift warning officer who transmitted the false alert, we're not in a position to fully evaluate the credibility of their assertion that they believed there was an actual missile threat and intentionally sent the live alert (as opposed to believing that it was a drill and accidentally sending out the live alert)," it added.

The FCC was also critical of HEMA's failure to develop "standard procedures" to cancel a false alert and said "the error was worsened by the delay in authoritatively correcting the misinformation."

In the future, the FCC said, supervisors will receive advance notice of all drills and two warning officers will validate alerts instead of one.Trump says North Korea could 'very soon' threaten US soil



Washington, Jan 31 (AFP) Jan 31, 2018



US President Donald Trump warned Tuesday that the North Korean regime is very close to developing a long-range, nuclear-armed missile that could threaten American cities.

"North Korea's reckless pursuit of nuclear missiles could very soon threaten our homeland. We are waging a campaign of maximum pressure to prevent that from ever happening," Trump said.Russia casts doubt over evidence of Iran-made missiles to Yemen



United Nations, United States, Jan 31 (AFP) Jan 31, 2018



Russia on Wednesday dismissed evidence presented by the United States and UN experts that Iran had supplied missiles to Yemen's Huthi rebels as inconclusive, signaling it would oppose a bid to slap sanctions on Tehran.

Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said it was unclear whether missiles and weaponry used by the rebels were Iranian-made or whether they were shipped before the arms embargo on Yemen was imposed in 2015, casting doubt over the findings of a UN panel of experts.

"Iran is vehemently denying it is supplying anything to Yemen," Nebenzia told two reporters.

"Yemen hosts a pile of weapons from the old days. Many countries were competing to supply weapons to Yemen during the time of president Saleh, so I cannot give you anything conclusive," he said.

Ali Abdullah Saleh was Yemen's leader 1990-2012. He was killed in December by his erstwhile Huthi rebel allies.

Asked whether the case had been made for action against Iran, the ambassador answered "no."

Nebenzia joined UN Security Council ambassadors on a visit to Washington this week to inspect debris from missiles that the United States says were supplied by Iran to the Huthis.

The ambassadors had lunch with President Donald Trump, who urged the council to take steps to counter "Iran's destabilizing activities" in the Middle East.

A recent report by the panel of experts bolstered the US claims when it concluded that Iran had violated the arms embargo on Yemen by failing to block supplies of missiles to the rebels.

The Trump administration has said it will seek action at the Security Council against Iran, although it has yet to specify what those measures might be.

"If there is something we will see. How can we pass judgment prematurely before we know what it is about," Nebenzia said.

Russia has the power to block sanctions by resorting to its veto power as one of the five permanent Security Council members along with Britain, France, China and the United States.

US Ambassador Nikki Haley last month presented the missile fragments as "undeniable" evidence that a ballistic missile fired by Yemen's Huthi rebels at Saudi Arabia in November was Iranian-made.Russia casts doubt over evidence of Iran missiles to Yemen



United Nations, United States, Jan 31 (AFP) Jan 31, 2018



Russia on Wednesday dismissed evidence presented by the United States and UN experts that Iran had supplied missiles to Yemen's Huthi rebels as inconclusive, signaling it would oppose a bid to slap sanctions on Tehran.

Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said it was unclear whether missiles and weaponry used by the rebels were sent by Iran or whether they were shipped before the arms embargo on Yemen was imposed in 2015, casting doubt over the findings of a UN panel of experts.

"Iran is vehemently denying it is supplying anything to Yemen," Nebenzia told two reporters.

"Yemen hosts a pile of weapons from the old days. Many countries were competing to supply weapons to Yemen during the time of president Saleh, so I cannot give you anything conclusive."

Ali Abdullah Saleh, who ruled Yemen from 1990 to 2012, was killed in December by his erstwhile Huthi rebel allies.

Asked whether the case had been made for action against Iran, the ambassador answered "no."

Nebenzia joined UN Security Council ambassadors on a visit to Washington this week to inspect debris from missiles that the United States says were supplied by Iran to the Huthis.

The ambassadors had lunch with President Donald Trump, who urged the council to take steps to counter "Iran's destabilizing activities" in the Middle East.



- Lack of evidence -



A recent report by the UN panel of experts bolstered the US claims when it concluded that Iran had violated the arms embargo on Yemen by failing to block missile supplies to the rebels.

The Trump administration has said it will seek action at the Security Council against Iran, although it has yet to specify what those measures may be.

"If there is something we will see. How can we pass judgment prematurely before we know what it is about," Nebenzia said.

Russia has the power to block sanctions by resorting to its veto power as one of the five permanent Security Council members along with Britain, China, France and the United States.

Last month, US Ambassador Nikki Haley presented the missile fragments as "undeniable" evidence that Iran had fabricated a ballistic missile fired by Yemen's Huthi rebels at Saudi Arabia in November.

Kazakh Ambassador Kairat Umarov, this month's council president who also traveled to Washington to inspect the missile debris, said there was no strong evidence of a supply route from Iran to the Huthis.

"It would be good of course to have very conclusive evidence to say how this kind of armaments appeared in Yemen, because at this point in time, there is no information about that," Umarov told reporters.

"We understand that this was produced in Iran, but (there is) no information on how it was sent to Yemen."Test of US-Japanese missile interceptor fails again



Washington, Jan 31 (AFP) Jan 31, 2018



A test of a US missile interceptor failed in Hawaii on Wednesday, a defense official said, marking the second such unsuccessful attempt in less than a year.

The test using the Aegis Ashore system occurred at the Pacific Missile Range Facility on the island of Kauai, Missile Defense Agency spokesman Mark Wright said in a statement.

Wright said the test was of an SM-3 Block IIA missile, made by arms giant Raytheon and designed to intercept intermediate-range ballistic missiles.

A defense official told AFP the test was a failure and investigators have opened a probe.

Wednesday's failure comes after another unsuccessful test in June of the missile, which is being jointly developed by the United States and Japan.

A test firing in February 2017 was successful.

According to the MDA, America has so far spent about $2.2 billion on the system and Japan about $1 billion.

According to Raytheon, the Block IIA missile is still in testing but is on track for deployment at sea and on land in Poland this year.

The failure comes amid heighted tensions over North Korea's ballistic missile program.

Hawaii is on edge after its Emergency Management Agency triggered mass panic with a false alert of a ballistic missile headed for the Pacific islands.2 Turkish soldiers killed in PKK attack from Iraq: report



Ankara, Feb 1 (AFP) Feb 01, 2018



Two Turkish soldiers were killed on Thursday in Turkey's southeast after a missile attack by Kurdish militants in northern Iraq, local media reported.

Two other soldiers were wounded after the missile hit close to a military base in Hakkari province, the private Dogan news agency said.

The agency blamed the attack on the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has been waging an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984.

Since then, over 40,000 people have been killed.

The PKK is blacklisted as a terror organisation by Ankara and its Western allies.

The deaths come a day after the army said one Turkish soldier was killed in an attack by the "separatist terrorist organisation" -- Turkey's official term for the PKK -- in the eastern province of Agri.

Following the collapse of a two-year ceasefire in 2015, fighting has intensified between Turkish security forces and the PKK in the southeast.

The Turkish military regularly conducts air raids against PKK militants who have bases in the Qandil mountain area of Iraq.

Turkish ground troops also sometimes stage incursions into the area.

Ankara on January 20 launched a cross-border operation in northern Syria against a Syrian Kurdish militia which Ankara says is a "terrorist" offshoot of the PKK.Book culture returns to Iraq's post-jihadist Mosul



Mosul, Iraq, Feb 3 (AFP) Feb 03, 2018



Literary cafes, poetry readings and pavement bookstalls -- Mosul's cultural scene is back in business, months after Iraqi forces ousted the Islamic State group from the city following three years of jihadist rule.

At the "Book Forum" cafe, men and women, young and old, sit passionately debating literature, music, politics and history.

Drinking tea, coffee and juice, some smoke nargileh water pipes while an oud player takes the stage to accompany a poet about to read from his work.

Opposite, the only wall not covered with bookshelves is instead host to a gallery of portraits -- medieval Iraqi poet Al-Mutanabbi is pictured alongside Palestinian Mahmoud Darwish and a series of abstract paintings.

A few months ago, opening a mixed-gender literary cafe in Iraq's second city would have been unthinkable -- punishable by flogging or death under IS rule.

But with the jihadists gone, Fahd Sabah and his partner have set about realising their dream.

"While we lived under the yoke of IS, I told myself that it was an absolute must to open this place," Sabah said. "There was a need to inform people, to enlighten minds, to bring new ideas."

Like many young graduates in Iraq, the 30-year-old engineer had few prospects of finding employment.

So as soon as the jihadists were driven out of Mosul, he set about finding a venue and preparing to open a cafe, putting his savings into the venture. Within a month, it was up and running.

It was worth the sacrifice, he said. His project aims to create "a new consciousness to overcome this terrible period and the damage left by the war".



- 'Reforming spirits' -



Iraqis are renowned in the Arab world for their literary culture. Mosul, capital of Nineveh province and sitting at the crossroads of ancient trading routes, long boasted a parade of booksellers along its famous Al-Nujaifi Street.

But IS methodically destroyed and burned books and destroyed libraries.

After the jihadists were evicted six months ago, a handful of activists set up the "Book Pavement" market outside the city's battle-scarred university.

Ali Najam, 23, comes every Friday to scour the stalls of second-hand booksellers next to the concrete carcass of a building disemboweled by bombs.

Today, he has picked up an English edition of "Love in the Age of Cholera" by Colombian Nobel Laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

"People badly need culture and to build their consciousness after the hardships they went through," Najam said.

"There's a need to rebuild people's spirits, which is even more important than rebuilding the houses and the city."

Yunis Mohammad, a 33-year-old writer, said that despite the destruction, "Mosul will be rebuilt thanks to the brains of its young people, its intellectuals".

Abdelmonim al-Amir, head of Nineveh province's writers' union, said he wants the world, which associates Mosul with "blood, destruction and desolation", to know that the city has another face.

"Inhabitants and artists must make the human, cultural and academic dimensions of Mosul shine," he said.

So far, everything is being done on limited means, in a city devastated by war, crippled by unemployment and held back by the slow pace of reconstruction.

"The public authorities in charge of culture must now do their duty," said writer Hamed al-Zubaidi.

Hind Ahmed, a 31-year-old engineer, said the mission was important to Iraq, which in December announced the "liberation" of the country and the "end of the war" against IS.

"Now the land has been liberated we must free minds and ideas," she said, dressed in a white veil dotted with butterflies over a beige coat.

Iraqis must "give everyone the opportunity to participate," she added. "Men and women."Two more Turkish soldiers killed in Syria offensive: army



Ankara, Feb 3 (AFP) Feb 03, 2018



Two more Turkish soldiers were killed Saturday in Turkey's offensive against Kurdish militia inside Syria, the army said, bringing to nine the number killed so far in the incursion.

Turkey on January 20 launched the "Olive Branch" operation against Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia which Ankara sees as a terror group and a threat to Turkish territory.

The Turkish army and allied Ankara-backed Syrian rebel forces are seeking to oust the YPG from its western border stronghold of Afrin but the operation so far has been marked by fierce clashes.

The army said that one of the soldiers was killed in a clash and another on the border area, without giving further details.

In a separate statement, it added a Turkish army tank had been hit in an attack.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday the Turkish army and Ankara-backed rebels had suffered 25 fatalities between them in the operation so far.

Meanwhile, seven civilians have been killed in mortar fire on the Turkish side of the border that Ankara blames on the YPG.

Ankara says that hundreds of YPG fighters have been killed in the operation so far but it is not possible to verify this.

Turkey says the YPG is an offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.

But the YPG has been working closely with the United States to fight the Islamic State extremist group in Syria.

The offensive by Washington's fellow NATO member Ankara on a US-allied force has even raised fears of a military confrontation between two alliance powers.Three more Turkish soldiers killed in Syria offensive: army



Ankara, Feb 3 (AFP) Feb 03, 2018



Three more Turkish soldiers were killed Saturday in Turkey's offensive against Kurdish militia inside Syria, including one in an attack on a tank, the army said.

The latest clashes brought to 10 the number of Turkish troops killed so far in operation "Olive Branch", launched by Turkey on January 20 against Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia seen by Ankara as a terror group.

The Turkish army and allied Ankara-backed Syrian rebel forces are seeking to oust the YPG from its western border stronghold of Afrin but the operation so far has been marked by fierce clashes.

The army said that one of the soldiers was killed in a clash and another on the border area, without giving further details.

In a separate statement, it added a Turkish army tank had been hit in another attack, killing one serviceman and wounding another.

In retaliation, Turkish war planes carried out air strikes on the area from where the attack was carried out, destroying shelters and munitions dumps, it added.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday the Turkish army and Ankara-backed rebels had suffered 25 fatalities between them in the operation so far.

Meanwhile, seven civilians have been killed in mortar fire on the Turkish side of the border that Ankara blames on the YPG.

Ankara says that major progress has been made in the operation, with hundreds of YPG fighters killed so far although it is not possible to verify these figures.

Erdogan said in a speech Saturday that the Turkish forces were beginning to take mountain positions and would now head towards Afrin itself. "There is not much to go," he said.

Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin meanwhile told journalists in Istanbul that the operation was going as planned but there was no timetable for its duration and it would "continue until we clear all those areas."

But analysts and monitors say Turkey so far has taken control of limited clumps of territory around the border without yet approaching near Afrin town.

Turkey says the YPG is an offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.

But the YPG has been working closely with the United States to fight the Islamic State extremist group in Syria.

The offensive by Washington's fellow NATO member Ankara on a US-allied force has even raised fears of a military confrontation between two alliance powers.Syria rebels down Russian plane, pilot killed: monitor



Beirut, Feb 3 (AFP) Feb 03, 2018



A Russian pilot was killed Saturday after his warplane went down over Syria's northwest province of Idlib and he clashed with Islamists on the ground, Russia's defence ministry and a monitor said.

"The pilot was killed as he fought Islamist rebels who had shot down his plane and were taking him captive," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights chief Rami Abdel Rahman.

According to the British-based monitor, the Sukhoi 25 was shot down over the town of Maasran in Idlib and the pilot came down in a parachute.

He then clashed with rebels and was killed.

Abdel Rahman could not immediately confirm which hardline factions were involved, but said the jihadist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is active in the area.

Russia's army also confirmed the pilot's death, but there was no immediate claim of responsibility from rebel factions in Syria.

Troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad launched a fierce offensive on Idlib in late December, with backing by Russian warplanes.

"There have been dozens of Russian air strikes in the area over the past 24 hours. This plane was also carrying out raids there," said Abdel Rahman.

Opposition factions have shot Syrian regime planes in the past, but downing Russian warplanes is much rarer.

In August 2016, a Russian military helicopter was shot down over Syria and all five people on board were killed.

Moscow began conducting air strikes in Syria in September 2015.

Two months later, Turkey shot down a Russian warplane, leading to the worst crisis in ties between the two countries since the end of the Cold War.Seven Turkish soldiers die in Syria, including five in tank attack



Ankara, Feb 3 (AFP) Feb 03, 2018



Seven Turkish soldiers were killed Saturday in Turkey's offensive against Kurdish militia inside Syria, including five who died in a single attack on a tank, the army said.

The losses marked the highest toll in one day for the Turkish military in operation "Olive Branch", launched on January 20 against Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia seen by Ankara as a terror group.

The attack on the tank, details of which were not disclosed, was also the single deadliest attack on the military of the offensive so far.

The latest clashes brought to 14 the number of Turkish troops killed so far in operation.

The Turkish army and allied Ankara-backed Syrian rebel forces are seeking to oust the YPG from its western border stronghold of Afrin but the operation so far has been marked by fierce clashes.

The army said that one of the soldiers was killed in a clash and another on the border area, without giving further details.

In a later statement, it added a Turkish army tank had been hit in another attack, killing all five servicemen inside.

A previous statement said one serviceman was killed and another wounded in that attack.

In retaliation, Turkish war planes carried out air strikes on the area from where the attack was carried out, destroying shelters and munitions dumps, it added.



- Operation going 'as planned' -



President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday the Turkish army and Ankara-backed rebels had suffered 25 fatalities between them in the operation so far.

Meanwhile, seven civilians have been killed in mortar fire on the Turkish side of the border that Ankara blames on the YPG.

Ankara says that major progress has been made in the 15-day operation, with almost 900 YPG fighters killed so far although it is not possible to verify these figures.

Erdogan said in a speech Saturday that the Turkish forces were beginning to take mountain positions and would now head towards Afrin itself. "There is not much to go," he said.

Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin meanwhile told journalists in Istanbul that the operation was going as planned but there was no timetable for its duration and it would "continue until we clear all those areas".

But analysts and monitors say Turkey so far has taken control of limited clumps of territory around the border without yet approaching near Afrin town.

Turkey says the YPG is an offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.

But the YPG has been working closely with the United States to fight the Islamic State extremist group in Syria.

The offensive by Washington's fellow NATO member Ankara on a US-allied force has even raised fears of a military confrontation between two alliance powers.Russia plane downed over Syria, pilot killed in clash



Beirut, Feb 3 (AFP) Feb 03, 2018



A Russian pilot was killed Saturday after his warplane was downed over Syria's northwest province of Idlib and he clashed with Islamists on the ground, Russia's defence ministry and a monitor said.

"The pilot was killed as he fought Islamist rebels who had shot down his plane and were taking him captive," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights chief Rami Abdel Rahman.

According to the British-based monitor, the Sukhoi 25 was shot down over the town of Maasran in Idlib and the pilot came down in a parachute.

He then clashed with rebels and was killed.

Abdel Rahman could not immediately clarify which hardline factions were involved, but said the jihadist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is active in the area.

Russia also confirmed the pilot's death, but there was no immediate claim of responsibility from rebel factions in Syria.

"A Russian Su-25 aircraft crashed during a flight over the Idlib de-escalation zone. The pilot had enough time to announce he had ejected into the zone," the defence ministry said.

It said the area was "under the control of Al-Nusra Front fighters", the former Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda that makes up the bulk of the HTC.

"The pilot was killed in fighting against terrorists," it said, quoted by Russian agencies.



- 'Dozens' of strikes -



Troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad launched a fierce offensive on Idlib in late December, with backing by Russian warplanes.

"There have been dozens of Russian air strikes in the area over the past 24 hours. This plane was also carrying out raids there," said Abdel Rahman.

Opposition factions have shot Syrian regime planes in the past, but downing Russian warplanes is much rarer.

In August 2016, a Russian military helicopter was shot down over Syria and all five people on board were killed.

Moscow began conducting air strikes in Syria in September 2015.

Two months later, Turkey shot down a Russian warplane, leading to the worst crisis in ties between the two countries since the end of the Cold War.

Russia's intervention has swung the nearly seven-year conflict firmly in the favour of Moscow's long-time ally Assad.

Russia has been looking to still the fighting that has left some 340,000 people dead since 2011 with a major diplomatic push since the start of last year.

It agreed with fellow regime backer Iran and rebel supporter Turkey to set up four "de-escalation" zones around Syria, including in Idlib on the border with Turkey.Russian pilot killed after plane downed over Syria



Saraqib, Syria, Feb 4 (AFP) Feb 04, 2018



A Russian pilot was killed Saturday in fighting with Islamists after his warplane was downed over northwest Syria, Russia's defence ministry and a monitor said.

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a powerful jihadist-dominated alliance said, on an affiliated media channel it had shot down the plane but made no mention of the pilot.

"We were able to bring down the Russian warplane with a shoulder-fired missile above Saraqib in Idlib this afternoon," said Mahmoud al-Turkmani who, according to the statement, heads HTS's "air defence brigade."

He said the attack was in retaliation for a ferocious bombing campaign by Russian warplanes over Idlib.

HTS, which is dominated by Al-Qaeda's former affiliate in Syria, controls Idlib and has sought to fight back a ferocious Russian-backed assault by Syrian government troops.

An AFP correspondent who arrived at the crash site on Saturday saw what appeared to be the charred remains of the plane, including a wing with a red star still visible.

Firefighters arrived to put out flames that had been spewing dark smoke into the wintry Syrian sky.

The Russian defence ministry confirmed that the Su-25 aircraft was shot down over Idlib province and said the pilot was killed "in fighting against terrorists."



- 'Killed fighting' -



"A Russian Su-25 aircraft crashed during a flight over the Idlib de-escalation zone. The pilot had enough time to announce he had ejected into the zone," the defence ministry said.

"The pilot was killed in fighting against terrorists," it said, quoted by Russian agencies.

It added that "according to preliminary reports, the plane was shot down by a portable anti-aircraft missile system."

The US State Department said it was "deeply concerned" at reports of such a weapon being used.

Spokeswoman Heather Nauert told AFP the solution is a return to United Nations-led talks in Geneva and for "Russia to live up to its commitments in that regards."

Washington has more than 2,000 troops inside Syria working with anti-Jihadist Kurdish and Arab fighters, and flies air strikes against the Islamists.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the jet was downed near the town of Saraqib in Idlib and the pilot parachuted to the ground.

He was killed clashing with rebels as they tried to take him hostage, said the Britain-based Observatory.

"There have been dozens of Russian air strikes in the area over the past 24 hours. This plane was also carrying out raids there," said Abdel Rahman.

The Observatory said 20 people, including eight children, were killed on Saturday during a bombardment on Saraqib and surrounding villages.

Syria's uprising broke out in 2011 with protests against Assad's rule but has since morphed into a complex war drawing in global powers.

Moscow began conducting air strikes in Syria in September 2015, and its intervention has swung the nearly seven-year conflict firmly in the favour of its ally in Damascus.

Opposition factions have shot down Syrian regime planes in the past, but the downing of Russian aircraft is much rarer.

Turkey shot down a Russian warplane in November 2015, leading to the worst crisis in ties between the two countries since the end of the Cold War

In August 2016, a Russian military helicopter was shot down over Syria, killing all five people on board.



- Deadly fire on Turkish tank -



Russia has been spearheading a more than year-long diplomatic push to try to freeze the fighting in coordination with fellow regime ally Iran and rebel backer Turkey.

Ankara has supported an array of rebel groups to fight Syria's government, the Islamic State jihadist group, and Kurdish militia that it has blacklisted as "terrorists."

On January 20, Turkey and allied rebel fighters began an offensive on the Syrian enclave of Afrin, held by the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG).

Seven Turkish soldiers were killed on Saturday as part of the assault, including five who died in a single attack on a tank, the Turkish army said.

The losses mark the highest toll in a single day for the Turkish army in operation "Olive Branch."

The Observatory has also counted 104 allied rebels and 102 YPG fighters killed since the offensive began, as well as 68 civilians.

Ankara has denied targeting civilians as part of its Afrin offensive.

Mourners on Saturday gathered in Afrin to commemorate victims of the operation, including female fighter Barin Kobani whose badly mutilated body appeared in a shocking video earlier this week.

The footage sparked accusations by her family and Kurdish officials that she was "defiled" by Turkish-backed rebels.

The opposition's government-in-exile said Saturday it had opened an investigation into the matter.

Thousands of people protested on Saturday in France against Turkey's operation "Olive Branch," gathering in Strasbourg and Paris to condemn the assault.Netanyahu says will 'defend ourselves' after report of Sinai strikes



Jerusalem, Feb 4 (AFP) Feb 04, 2018



Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday Israel would "do whatever is necessary to defend ourselves" after a report its military has carried out dozens of air strikes against jihadists in Egypt's Sinai.

Netanyahu did not address the New York Times report published Saturday, commenting only generally on Israel's stance. Israel's military also declined to comment.

The report, citing current and former US and British officials, said Israeli forces had carried out more than 100 airstrikes in Egypt over the course of more than two years with Cairo's approval.

Using unmarked drones, helicopters and jets, the strikes in northern Sinai just over the border with Israel have targeted jihadists linked with the Islamic State group, it said.

Speaking at the start of a cabinet meeting, Netanyahu referred to recent meetings with US President Donald Trump, European leaders and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"As I also made it clear to President Trump and afterwards to European leaders and President Putin, our presence here is the main element in the Middle East blocking the spread of radical Islam, led by Iran and Islamic State, which also threaten all other elements in the world," he said.

"We are not bent on war, but we will do whatever is necessary to defend ourselves."

IS-linked militants have waged a deadly insurgency in the Sinai against Egyptian security forces, and Israeli officials have watched the violence with concern.

Egypt and Jordan are the only two Arab nations with peace treaties with Israel, but relations remain sensitive due to hostility toward the Jewish state among their populations.

While there have long been suggestions of behind-the-scenes military and intelligence cooperation between Egypt and Israel, officials from both countries rarely comment publicly on them.

Netanyahu has repeatedly spoken of improving ties with Arab nations in recent months without providing details, with many analysts saying their shared concern over Iran and IS jihadists has drawn them closer together.France freezes assets of DR Congo general over civilian 'massacres'



Paris, Feb 4 (AFP) Feb 04, 2018



France has frozen the financial assets of a Congolese general placed on the UN's sanctions list for supporting a massacre of civilians by a suspected militia in 2014 and 2015, according to a notice published Sunday.

The government will freeze the "funds and financial resources" in France belonging to General Muhindo Akili Mundos, an ally of President Joseph Kabila, as well as those of three chiefs of other militia groups.

The notice did not say how much money or other assets they currently have in France.

The United Nations imposed sanctions on the general on Friday over the killings of at least 400 civilians in the Beni region of the Democratic Republic of Congo by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a Ugandan Islamist group, from August 2014 to June 2015.

The UN's peacekeeping mission in the country said Mundos, the commander of the Congolese army's operations against the militia, "recruited and equipped ex-combatants from local armed groups to participate in extrajudicial executions and massacres by the Allied Democratic Forces".

The three militia leaders on the sanctions list include Guidon Shimiray Mwissa, from the NDC-R militia, who is accused of recruiting "child soldiers".

Lucien Nzambamwita (also known as Andre Kalume), a military leader from the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), and Gedeon Kyungu, who is "implicated in serious human rights abuses", are also on the list.

The UN says the four men "pose a threat to the peace, stability, and security of the DRC".Europe must brake mounting nuclear arms race: Germany



Frankfurt am Main, Feb 4 (AFP) Feb 04, 2018



Europe must lead the way in pushing for nuclear disarmament after Washington proposed upgrading and expanding the United States' nuclear arsenal, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said Sunday.

"As in the times of the Cold War, we in Europe are especially endangered" by "a renewed nuclear arms race", Gabriel said.

"That is why precisely we in Europe must begin new initiatives for arms control and disarmament."

Gabriel was responding to a so-called Nuclear Posture Review released Friday by the Pentagon that details the US military's vision of nuclear threats and its response in the coming decades.

Upgrading the US arsenal and complementing massive "strategic" bombs with smaller "tactical" weapons was "aimed at making use of nuclear weapons less likely", President Donald Trump said in a statement.

American nuclear planners believe potential adversaries abroad, especially Russia, assume America would never use its existing arsenal as the effects would be too devastating and provoke globally catastrophic retaliation.

"The US and NATO require a wider range of credible low-yield nuclear options" to deter Russia from using its own smaller nuclear weapons, Greg Weaver, the deputy director of strategic capabilities for the military's Joint Staff, told reporters Friday.

Gabriel acknowledged that Russia's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine had led to a "dramatic loss of trust towards Russia" in Europe as well as Washington, and that "signs that Russia is re-arming, not only conventionally but with nuclear weapons, are obvious".

But instead of developing new weapons, Germany's top diplomat called for "existing arms control treaties to be upheld unconditionally".

Berlin would press "with its allies and partners" for further worldwide disarmament, he said.

"Our long-term aim must continue to be a world without nuclear weapons," Gabriel continued -- the stated aim of US nuclear policy under former president Barack Obama.

Historically a close US ally and key NATO member, nuclear weapons were a divisive issue in Germany's Cold War politics.

Berlin does not have its own arsenal, but the Pentagon maintained nuclear warheads in Germany as part of a gigantic military presence designed to deter Soviet invasion of western Europe.

The issue has been rediscovered by frontline politicians in the wake of Trump's election.

Martin Schulz, a failed challenger to Chancellor Angela Merkel in elections last September, called during the campaign for remaining American bombs to be removed from Germany.

The German response to the US nuclear review comes on the heels of condemnations from Russia, China, North Korea and Iran.London, Feb 4, 2018 (SPS) -The Western Sahara Research Watch (WSRW) said it was deeply shocked by the rogue behaviour of the European Commission, which negotiate with Rabat a new trade agreement that includes SADRs products.

The European Commission shows blatant disregard for the judgment the Court of Justice and for obstructing the UN peace efforts in Western Sahara as it continues negotiations with Morocco a new agreement that includes the resources of occupied Sahrawi territories, affirmed WSRW Representative Morten Nielson.

Europe should be guided by the rule of law and moral rectitude, not cynicism and recklessness," stated Morten quoted in a communique released by WSRW this week.

Reportedly, the Commission had stressed it was committed to comply with the judgment and was keen to consult various stakeholders, including Saharawi civil society and even the Front Polisario. That appears now to have been misleading and behind the scenes, the Commission was finalizing the deal, affirmed Nielson.

This is an insult to the European Parliament and to the Court of Justice (EPCJ) , stressed Nielsen.

Besides, said that from the very inception of the negotiations with Morocco, the Commissions approach to the decision of the EU Court has fallen short of basic EU standards of accountable and transparent trade negotiations.

The Commission has seemingly not consulted anyone, irrespective of them being the Polisario Front and the Sahrawi civil society. No steps appear to have been taken by the EU Commission, nor the EEAS, to obtain the consent of the representation of the Western Sahara people and the Polisario Front, stated Nielsen.

Other countries have legal trade agreements with Morocco that explicitly do not apply to Western Sahara. The EU, under French pressure, is reluctant to follow that route, said the WSRW representative. (SPS)





The organisation recommended to all companies established in the EU to measure the considerable legal, moral and financial risks related to doing business with occupied Western Sahara and to require from the EU institutions effective guarantees against such risks. (SPS)

062/SPS/APS



STAMFORD  Josh Sette is a popular musician in the area. He is a teacher at Rogers International School, performs music for local plays and musicals.

Sette, who is my cousin, has remained in the area after graduating from Stamford High more than 10 years ago. He has remained involved with Stamford Public Schools as an elementary music teacher and frequent member of various orchestra ensembles for drama productions.

I've been playing music for 29 years now, Sette said. Time flies. I've been playing for Stamford High on and off since I first joined the band in fall 1998. Continuing with that, I also joined jazz band, Madrigals, and played for the school plays.

Sette went to college in Boston and then at Western Connecticut State University. After about nine years away, Sette returned to Stamford High with his musical talents.

SHS fine arts completely shaped who I am as a person. Band, jazz band, drama and Madrigals were what I ate and breathed, and seemingly every moment of my high school career could be directly traced to at least one of the four, he said. So I'm extremely grateful that I'm in the position to be able to come back and keep giving to the programs that gave me so much growing up.

Sette said he enjoys watching people go through the same inspiration and growth process he did while at Stamford High.

Two of my best friends now run the drama and band programs respectively, so it's wonderful to collaborate with them, he said. It's also cool to know that I met them through those same programs 18 years ago. And finally, being a teacher affords me the opportunity to teach some wonderfully talented students, and playing for the SHS shows allows me to continue seeing them grow firsthand as artists as well as people.

Christian Tarzia is a Stamford High student and writer for the schools newspaper, The Round Table.Remembering 9/11: Ogden exhibit gives students detailed glimpse of tragedy

OGDEN  The 9/11 attacks may be seared in the memories of those alive at the time. Those born later are also well aware of what happened. "They've always had teachers that talk about it. They hold a moment of silence," said Kylie White, a history teacher at Bonneville High School in Washington Terrace. Still, living in the moment when the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, occurred and learning about them after the fact are very different things. "It's something we know happened, but it's something we don't fully understand," said Cache Littrell, a Bonneville High School ...An artist's impression of how the next generation of train would look at Stratford station.

A PROJECT consortium that was set up by Stratford-based Transport Design International Ltd (TDI) has been given 2.75million by the Department for Transport to develop the next generation of trains.

TDI will work with Axiom Rail, Cummins and the University of Warwick over the next 18 months to design and build a demonstrator Very Light Rail (VLR) vehicle.

It is the second phase of the consortiums project, which back in 2016 saw it draw up a concept design for the Revolution railcar, as it has been named, as well as a fully tested diesel-electric hybrid propulsion system. It was funded by a 1million grant from the Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB).

The vehicle has been designed to run on segregated lines on short routes and offer a low-cost, environmentally-friendly and efficient transport service.

Initial tests will be carried out at the Rail Technology Centre in Long Marston before further tests on the West Midlands rail network in 2019.

They will cost significantly less than 1million with a number of UK routes already identified for first passenger services.

Martin Pemberton, managing director of TDI, said: The UK rail industry is in urgent need of vehicles which are lighter, more energy efficient and cheaper to purchase and operate.

Meanwhile, rural and suburban communities around the country are eager for more efficient, better connected public transport services for their local areas, which do not rely solely on conventional road-going solutions such as buses.

A new type of rail vehicle is needed, especially for short routes where operating traditional heavy rail or tram solutions is uneconomic.

The emerging VLR sector aims to remedy this, by harnessing technology from the automotive sector to create hybrid or all-electric self-propelled vehicles which are lightweight, energy efficient, cheap to manufacture and operate and targeted at the needs of communities.

TDI won the prestigious Global Light Rail Award for Outstanding Engineering Achievement 2016 for a similar-sized vehicle, self-powered by a diesel-electric generator that it designed and built with Alcester-based Severn Lamb for a private customer in Konya, Turkey.Its a miniature world with every possible weather condition under the sun. From cloudy days to rain and thunder storms - its the future of New Zealand.

The exhibition Future Island is a very detailed story about New Zealands past, present and future, and is designed as a navigational experience told through 55 architectural projects on hundreds of cloud-like islands.

Tauranga Art Gallery exhibition manager Duane Moyle says the piece has several models, such as cows, figures and buildings, and projections of looped weather that show the diversity of our architecture and the exciting possibilities for architectural adventure in our fast-changing world.

The islands also range in size, and are made from a range of materials and textures, such as 3D printing, balsa wood, paper and card.

Probably one of the most spectacular projections is one that projects onto the island and shows a fantasy historic development of a certain landform, where people inhabit it and build on it, says Duane.

Then at one point the sea levels rise and wipe everything out, so its an interesting look at mans influence on the landscape.

The thinking behind using the islands as supports for the models was obviously based around New Zealand being an island nation, where we have lots of little islands but are also part of the Pacific Islands.

In previous colonial thinking we were an outpost of the British Empire, but I think its important for us to realise that we are a unique place, and while that may seem isolated from a lot of other societies, we still have our own thing going on here.

We are pushing the boundaries in many different disciplines.

The pieces were produced by a creative team led by Charles Walker of AUT and Kathy Waghorn of the University of Auckland, and were New Zealands official entry in the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale.

Since then the exhibition has been featured in several galleries across the country.

Future Island will be held from now until March 18 at Tauranga Art Gallery, 108 Willow Street before heading to Waikato Museum.A dramatic week of weather in New Zealand draws to a close today with yet more rain for northern parts of the North Island and the west coast of the South Island.

The week started with hot and humid conditions for most as temperature records fell at a number of stations.

Wellington broke the record for its hottest ever month with a blistering 20.4C average temperature.

The heat wave conditions early in the week were dramatically brought to an end when ex-tropical cyclone Fehi moved over the country on Thursday.

Strong winds and heavy rainfall battered the country with Banks Peninsula recording a wind gust of 137km/h and 250mm of rain falling on Mount Taranaki. Over the course of the event 12 severe weather warnings and seven watches were issued by MetService right across the country, with Fehi making its presence felt for all.

As for today, an active low pressure system which caused significant rainfall in the Auckland region on Saturday has now moved north, with a heavy rainfall watch in place for the Northland region, south of the Bay of Islands.

We could see localised downpours of 35mm/hr with some heavy and possibly thundery showers in Northland this afternoon, says MetService meteorologist James Millward.

Yesterday the same system caused significant impacts across Auckland with the Waitakere ranges getting hit the hardest with one weather station reporting 43.5mm of rainfall in just one hour.

The South Island will not miss out on the wet weather today either as a series of fronts move up the island and there is a risk of thunderstorms along the west coast into the evening. As these fronts track up the country onto the north island, more wet weather is in store for Monday, but Waitangi Day will see a marked improvement with a south-westerly flow developing across the country.

After the main front passes through on Monday, a ridge establishes itself over New Zealand. This will bring much more settled conditions for Waitangi Day right across the country with some isolated showers around, but plenty of sunshine on offer too.

Auckland looks set for a high temperature of 24C, whilst Wellington can expect 22C and Christchurch 18C.Campaigners in the Eastern Bay of Plenty are appealing for locals to make their submissions against a potential water bottling operation in the region.

Save our Water Otakiri spokesperson, Maureen Fraser says locals need to stand against it.

The water bottling industry is flawed and New Zealanders need to stand against it. Bottling New Zealands pure artesian groundwater, for nothing, and producing an obscene amount of waste is not acceptable.

The call comes as Chinese owned company Nongfu, trading as Creswell Enterprises in New Zealand, has applied to the Bay of Plenty Regional Council to expand Otakiri Springs water-bottling operation from two million to 580 million litres per year.

Save our Water Otakiri is questioning whether water allocations should be made by the Regional Council based on computer-based aquifer modelling, which has led to over allocation in Havelock North, Rakaia and Gisborne.

Otakiri Springs proposed new production line will fill 154,000 bottles per hour, 24 hours per day 365 days per year.

This level of production equates to over 3.5m bottles per day or 1.35b bottles each year, says Maureen.

Even if the company makes just one cent per bottle, it will make an obscene profit - $1.35b dollars per year - from New Zealands free natural resource, she adds.

According to Nongfus promotional material, most of its product will be shipped to China. China does not currently recycle plastic due to a worldwide waste-plastic glut.

Nongfu also proposes discharging storm water and treated waste water into local drains. Treated waste-water will include traces of Nitric Acid, Hydrochloric Acid (as an alternate to Nitric Acid), Peracetic Acid, Sodium Hypochlorite, Sodium Bisulphate and Sodium Hydroxide.

The company also wants to undertake various activities within the Tarawera River stop bank zone, such as installing a filtration zone, road and swale; these could undermine stopbank function, which causes great concern to residents affected by the recent Edgecumbe floods.

Maureen says the companys proposed storm water holding pond is half the size it should be.

During heavy rainfall events, site and building run-off and wastewater will fill local drains and ultimately enter the Tarawera Western Drain, Awaiti Drain and Omeheu Canals, which flooded nearby properties in the April 6 event last year.

She says the community considers the companys proposed activities are unacceptable given the increased risk of flooding and drought on The Plains.

Climate change experts predict more extreme heavy rainfall and drought events will occur in the Bay of Plenty.

Our early summer drought is likely to happen more often and for longer  well be crying out for good quality drinking, stock and irrigation water yet we are polluting our surface water and giving away safe water to a foreign-owned company. It defies good sense.

The company gained support locally from some iwi, Whakatane Mayor Tony Bonne and Whakatane District Council management based on provision of 50 new jobs.

However, Business and Economic Research Limited, which wrote the report predicting the 50 jobs, also predicted some 200 jobs for the Blue Springs water bottling plant near Putaruru; South Waikato District Council Staff research found that the actual number of new jobs would be just eight.

This benefit is a drop in the ocean compared with the environmental and social harm associated with this activity.

Today at 5pm marks the final date for submissions on the proposed expansion of Otakiri Springs water bottling plant by Chinese owned company Nongfu (Creswell Enterprises).

Submission forms can be accessed on the Bay of Plenty Regional Council website under Notified Consents.An end could be in sight for the TECT cheque for local Trustpower customers, and opinion in the community is divided over the issue.

TECT trustees recently put forward a proposal to consumers offering an initial $2500 pay out, plus five more years of cheques at $360 each.

From January 1 2023, TECT consumers would then cease to receive future cheque payments, with all dividends from the trust used for charitable projects.

Andrew Campbell, whos been a Trustpower customer for more than 20 years, calls the $2500 offer a cynical ploy.

The TECT cheque is, for me, an annual reminder of the evils of central governments propensity to meddle with things that dont need fixing.

TECT is the governments acknowledgement that its electrical reforms were, for Tauranga residents, the theft of a boutique power scheme locally funded and operated.

He plans to vote against it, at present, as hes suspicious of the motivation.

I may yet change my mind.

He adds if the proposal goes through, he will re-examine his power supply options.

Kathy Sellars only joined Trustpower two years ago, after deliberating over whether the TECT cheque would negate the higher base cost of being with the company.

If it wasnt for the cheque I would not have moved from Mercury, who are cheaper and have really good prepay discounts.

She says she enjoys having internet and power with one company, but would definitely look into other options if the cheque was taken away.

Other customers say they will vote for the proposal, although not all would switch power companies, citing the charitable contributions made by TECT as a reason to stay with Trustpower (from whom TECT receives the dividends with which they fund charities).

Tauranga Mayor Greg Brownless says people should research their options carefully.

The TECT cheques create a lot of goodwill for Trustpower, because people think it comes from Trustpower directly, when TECT is in fact a quarter shareholder.

What I really like is its up to people to decide. They should look at how they benefit, and how the community benefits, and vote accordingly.

A household of three-to-four people using 600 kilowatt hours over 30 days would pay $218.03 with Trustpower  just under $9 more than nearest competitor Genesis, and significantly more than cheapest provider Electric Kiwi, which is estimated to be as cheap as $163.13 for the same electricity usage.Update: Syracuse police shoot suspect after he fires at officers on South Side

Update: South Salina Street is closed, between West Pleasant and West Ostrander avenues, while police continue to investigate a shooting Sunday afternoon.

SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Syracuse police are at the scene of a shooting Sunday afternoon on the city's South Side.

Someone called the Onondaga County 911 Center at 2:12 p.m. to report the shooting at West Ostrander Avenue and Cannon Street.

Syracuse firefighters and American Medical Response ambulance crews were called to the scene at 2:24 p.m. -- 12 minutes after police responded, according to 911. Police have not yet commented on the shooting and dispatchers could not say why the ambulance was sent after police.

The shooting happened three blocks from McKinley-Brighton Elementary School.

Police have hung yellow "Do Not Cross" tape around the shooting scene. The police tape surrounds several blocks along South Salina Street; the access to Interstate 81 also is closed from Salina Street at West Calthrop Avenue.

South Salina Street is closed, between West Pleasant and West Ostrander avenues, while police continue to investigate the shooting.

A man shoveling his yard at South Salina Street and West Ostrander Avenue around the time of the shooting said he heard at least three gun shots.

An employee at the Express Lane Mart, at 3226 S. Salina St., said he heard gunshots too, but wasn't sure how many.

The Syracuse Police Department's mobile crime scene lab and at least a dozen police officers remain at the scene at 4:15 p.m.

Check back for updates.

Reporter Patrick Lohmann contributed to this report.SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Syracuse police Sunday morning released the mugshots of two sisters arrested after a fight that sent both to the hospital, then to jail this weekend.

Nathalie Pizarro, 18, and her 28-year-old sister, Jerryka Pizarro-Lopez, both of Syracuse, were charged with second-degree assault, a felony, and fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon, a misdemeanor. Pizarro-Lopez also was charged with criminal obstruction of breathing, a misdemeanor.

Here's what police say happened:

Officers were called to Upstate University Hospital at 1:10 p.m. Saturday for a report of someone who had been stabbed.

When they arrived, they met with Pizarro-Lopez, who had a non-life threatening stab wound to the left side of her torso.

Pizarro-Lopez told officers she was at her home, at 103 Light Court, when she and her sister started fighting. During the fight, the younger sister struck the older sister in the head with a frying pan, according to Pizarro-Lopez's statement to police. Pizarro-Lopez then told officers her younger sister stabbed her with a kitchen knife.

Pizarro-Lopez did not call 911 to report the stabbing, and was instead transported to the hospital in a private vehicle, police said.

Officers then went to the home on Light Court to continue to investigate. When they arrived, the younger sister was there. Pizarro told police that during the fight, her older sister choked her and she was having trouble breathing.

Pizarro also told officers Pizarro-Lopez struck her in the head with a frying pan during the fight.

Pizarro was taken to Crouse Hospital for treatment. Her injuries also were not life-threatening, police spokesman Sgt. Richard Helterline said in a news release.

Pizarro-Lopez was released from Upstate University Hospital and sent to the Onondaga County Justice Center, jail records show. She remained in jail without bail Sunday morning.

Pizarro also was expected to be sent to jail after she received medical treatment, police have said. However, there is no record of her in jail yet Sunday morning, according to the justice center inmate lookup.SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Syracuse police shot a suspect who fired at them Sunday afternoon on the city's South Side, police spokeswoman Sgt. Julie Shulsky said in a news release.

Officers were called to the area of West Ostrander Avenue and Cannon Street at 2:12 p.m. for a complaint of a "suspicious person with a weapon," Shulsky said in a news release.

Police searched the area and found the suspect in the 3300 block of South Salina Street.

"The suspect fired several shots at the uniformed police officers," Shulsky said in the release. "Officers discharged their duty weapons in response to the suspect's actions, striking the suspect with at least one round."

The suspect ran after being shot, police said.

Officers chased the suspect and took him into custody, police said. Police also say they recovered the suspect's weapon.

No officer was injured in the incident, police said.

Officers began first-aid until American Medical Response (AMR) ambulance crews arrived, Shulsky said in the release.

AMR ambulance then transported the suspect to Upstate University Hospital, where he is being treated for non-life threatening injuries, police said.

Shortly after the shooting, a nonprofit group that supports officers involved in "critical incidents" posted on Facebook that Syracuse police had shot a suspect.

"A Syracuse Police Department officer was not hurt and was forced to shoot a suspect, who is expected to survive," the Badge of Honor Association Facebook post said. "Information is very limited at this time as it is still and active event. As we get more we will post."

Syracuse police expect to release the names of the officers involved in the shooting in 72 hours, Shulsky said.

Moe Abdul, 15, was helping his relatives at the Express Lane Mart, at 3226 S. Salina St. when he said he heard "at least 10" gunshots. Later, police came into the shop to ask for surveillance video.

The store's boss turned the video over to police, and Abdul said he watched over officers' shoulders as it played inside the store. The video showed a man running north on the east side of South Salina Street and officers driving behind him.

The man then darted east along the road heading toward Interstate 81. There, he ducked behind the fence that stands along the backyards of homes on South Salina Street. Abdul said he did not see any guns fired on the video provided to police.

"They said they brought him back from behind the fence and got him in custody," Abdul said.

Badge Of Honor Association President Justin Collins, a Rochester police sergeant, said he had heard there was a shooting in Syracuse on Sunday, but he did not have any details of what happened.

Badge Of Honor Association is a team of about 40 volunteer police officers and civilians from western and Central New York, Collins said. Many of the volunteers have experienced "critical incidents," such as police-involved shootings, accidents, or they, too, have put their lives on the line to help others, he said.

"It's not like what you see on TV," Collins said. "These are stressful situations officers go through and they need support."

The nonprofit formed 11 years ago to put in place a support system for police officers involved in critical incidents in western and Central New York. The group also helps the children of fallen officers, Collins said.

"The Badge of Honor Association asks that you keep the officer in your thoughts and prayers as they recover from this critical incident," the Facebook post read.

-- Syracuse.com reporter Patrick Lohmann contributed to this story.Welcome, DISH customer! Please note that we cannot save your viewing history due to an arrangement with DISH.

Watchlist and resume progress features have been disabled.

ACCEPTIt always takes a while before Samsung releases its own custom version of the latest Android software, and Oreo is no exception. But while it takes its time, the features included in the final build are often worth the wait.

Samsung Galaxy S8 owners are closing in on an official Oreo update, as Samsung officially closed the beta program last month. Now, ahead of the rollout of the final, stable version, users are getting another look at the new features included on top of Oreo, which are part of Samsung's custom Samsung Experience 9.0 software, used to go by the name TouchWiz.

Standard fare are features included in Oreo, including picture-in-picture mode, an improved notifications system, and others. But Samsung has also added a lot of new things exclusive to its handsets, which is highlighted in a detailed infographic, as first reported by SamMobile.

Samsung Experience 9.0: Keyboard

First things first: the keyboard, which is getting a new shortcut toolbar just above the main layout, including a button to add GIFs to any message. Users can also opt for a high-contrast keyboard if they want. Finally, the keyboard settings have been simplified for easier configuration.

Samsung Experience 9.0: Finder

Samsung has revamped the Finder on the Apps screen, which now gives quicker and more relevant search results regardless if the user is looking for an app, a contact, a file, or basically anything stored in their phone they want to dig up.

Samsung Experience 9.0: Bixby Briefing

Bixby has been revamped with briefing features. It's now able to update its users with a rundown of the weather once the alarm rings, plus change the background music and colors to suit the overall mood of any given weather.

Samsung Experience 9.0: Color Lens

Color Lens, a new feature, helps people who find difficulty reading text against a white background. It allows users to change the color of their screen to make reading text easier, Samsung explains in the infographic.

Samsung Experience 9.0: Dual Messenger

Dual Messenger allows users to have two accounts and use them simultaneously under the same messaging app on their phone, though these accounts are completely separate.

There are still a lot more features detailed in the infographic that are not here, so make sure to check SamMobile for the full list of additions included in Samsung Experience 9.0. Android Oreo should be rolling out to most recent Samsung devices in the coming months.

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.The Alliance Church in Zimbabwe (ACZ) is celebrating the achievement of one of its own, Pastor Munyaradzi Chidarikire, who recently graduated from the University of the Free State (UFS) with a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree with Specialisation in Psychology of Education.Though many people are pursuing tertiary education to the furthest limits possible, the story of Chidarikire is made unique due to the time it took him to complete his doctorate, a record 16 months, as well as the odds he overcame towards that feat.Chidarikire was born and bred in Masvingo where he did his primary education at Dikwindi and Vurombo before proceeding to Ndarama Secondary School.After secondary school, he failed to go to Victoria High School for his 'A' levels because his parents could not afford the fees; his father having been retrenched from the now mothballed Cold Storage Company (CSC).He had also completed his secondary education with the aid of the social welfare department but despite these challenges, and many others, Chidarikire is now a proud holder of a doctorate degree which he attained on full scholarship.Titled, 'A peer counselling strategy for alleviating drug abuse in Zimbabwean rural learning ecologies', his 465 page thesis explores the drug abuse phenomena among adolescent learners."I have nobody to thank except God for guiding me through a long journey which could otherwise have been impossible," said Chidarikire.It indeed could otherwise have been an impossible mission for a man from the most humble of backgrounds, somebody who had to defer his 'A' level dreams simply because he could not raise a few Zim dollars for school fees.He enrolled with UFS in February 2016 for his Ph.D. and had submitted his final dissertation by June 2017, shocking his supervisor as well as the board and literally throwing them into a quandary as to what to do with him.Totally befuddled, they debated on whether to let him graduate with the 2017 class or not, now that he had completed all the required work in less than half the maximum given time."My supervisor finally carried the day after successfully defending me. He told them that the work I had submitted was high quality work so they finally agreed to let me graduate. As I speak, many of my peers are still sweating it out in the early chapters of their dissertations," said Chidarikire.He credits total commitment and hard work for the larger than life story of his academic success, saying he would at times sit on the desk for up to 18 hours to work on his project.Chidarikire's academic journey began in 1999 when he, with the facilitation of Alliance Church in Zimbabwe's Bishop Charles Josiya, got a scholarship through the Swedish Alliance Church to study theology at Phumelela Bible College in Mpumalanga, South Africa.He finished the three-year course in 2001, emerging as the best student of his class and graduating with a Licentiate, instead of the ordinary Certificate in Ministerial Theology.He came back home in 2003 and started helping with pastoral work at the church's assemblies in such places as Mashava and Mucheke before enrolling for a one-year course with the Apostolic Faith Mission (AFM)'s Living Waters Bible College where he met great inspirational personalities including Olivia Charamba.In 2005, he enrolled with the Zimbabwe Open University (Zou) for a Bachelor of Science (BSc) Honours in Counselling and graduated in 2010 with a 2:1 degree class. At this time, he concurrently had enrolled with Masvingo Polytechnic for a Certificate in Further Education and Training, later deciding to continue with the studies up to diploma level. On graduating with a Diploma in Further Education and Training in 2008, he was named best student.Being passionate about contributing to the fight against the scourge of HIV and Aids, which was wreaking havoc in all communities including the church, Chidarikire enrolled with the University of South Africa (Unisa) in 2008 for a certificate in HIV and Aids Counselling."The Alliance Church already had HIV and Aids programmes of its own. My motive, therefore, was to complement those efforts. I wanted to be an advocate in that regard, so that I could talk from a point of knowledge and not from a point of assumptions," Chidarikire said.Besides offering pastoral counselling to his own flock, he engaged Red Cross and became embedded in its programmes as a peer educator, training orphaned children to become peer counsellors themselves."It was at this stage that I became aware of the perverted nature of our society, having met some of the most sickening cases of child sexual abuse perpetrated by people whom we normally regard as respectable leaders in society," said Chidarikire.Courtesy of a programme which had just been introduced by the new Great Zimbabwe University (GZU) Vice Chancellor Professor Rungano Zvobgo, Chidarikire, whose wife Jane works for the university, was able to enroll for his Master's in Educational Psychology and graduated in 2014 with a distinction. Prof Zvobgo introduced a scheme allowing GZU employees, their spouses and children to study at highly subsidised tuition, with the university paying 70 percent of the costs."After Master's, I applied with University of the Free State for a Ph.D. and I was accepted. Wits (University of the Witwatersrand) had also accepted me but they had offered only a 30 percent scholarship so I weighed my options," said Chidarikire.By this time, he was already lecturing at Phumelela Bible College, adding to his huge portfolio of responsibilities as a husband, father, pastor and having been involved in church administration work since 2014.At the moment, Chidarikire has returned to GZU to pursue a Bachelor of Education (B.Ed.) Honours Specialising in Educational Psychology."I am strongly convinced that career guidance should begin from as early as grade zero if children are to make the right choices in their studies. I lacked that guidance for the better part of my life and that explains why I am now back to study for an honours when I have a Ph.D. I shifted from one area to the other so I am now working to streamline my qualifications so that I can become an expert in one clear academic field. I advise parents to make sure their children maintain one area of study up to doctorate level so as to enhance their chances of finding employment," said Chidarikire.He advised his colleagues in the clergy to continue exploiting the vast potential of education to save souls while serving both the spiritual and physiological needs of believers.educationPurchases made via links on our site may earn us an affiliate commissionMan dies from possible illness 12 hours after being booked into Assumption Parish jail on DWIKids can be nasty. That's why Belconnen woman Sarah likes to ensure her five daughters head back to school with clean uniforms, shiny shoes and, when possible, new backpacks.

But it doesn't come cheap. Sarah said she spent more than $1000 getting each of her children through the gates of their public schools - and dropping so much money straight after Christmas isn't easy for the single mum, who works two jobs and studies part-time.

Belconnen family Indigo, 5, Sarah, Lily, 10, Ashlyn, 9, and Sophie, 7. Credit:Sitthixay Ditthavong

"All school kids deserve to be able to have new shoes  it's not like they're getting given a holiday," she said.

"Every child deserves to go to school and feel comfortable."Grab your coffee or a cuppa and find out what's making news.

We're in for a sunny day with a top of 29 degrees.

Hello and welcome to another week, Canberra.

Pupils and students across the ACT have returned to school but some families are doing it tougher than others.

Belconnen mother Sarah knows kids can be nasty and likes to ensure her five daughters head through the gates with clean uniforms and shiny shoes. But it doesn't come cheap.

Sarah's family is among about 1000 ACT households supported by The Smith Family.

You can read Emily Baker's story here.

Higher land tax for foreignersCharities warn Canberrans are being forced over the border into Queanbeyan as a housing affordability "crisis" hits the capital.

In 2010, housing advocate Penny Leemhuis was told it would be at least 14 years before the ACT government could find a public housing property for her.

Housing advocate Penny Leemhuis at home in her social housing unit in Queanbeyan, where she moved 18 months ago after a long search for affordable accomodation in Canberra. Credit:Jamila Toderas

Renting rooms here and there from acquaintances in the capital, she eventually took her name off the ACT list and put it down for a NSW property.

Within 18 months, she had moved into her new unit in Queanbeyan.A Canberra man who police shot in the neck has joined his family in backing calls for an independent investigation into the Taser death of Anthony Caristo.

Jonathan Crowley was 34 and in the midst of a psychotic episode when, in the early afternoon of December 11, 2001, a senior constable shot him in the neck.

Police shooting victim Jonathan Crowley, with his pet Australian budgie Sunshine. Credit:Dion Georgopoulos

Police had been called to the suburban street in Chapman because the man was behaving erratically and waving a bamboo kendo stick. He became aggressive towards police.

He landed blows on one police officer before another officer shot Jonathan in the neck. The bullet fractured his spine and rendered him quadriplegic.Fidel Angel Castro Diaz-Balart, a nuclear physicist who was the oldest son of former Cuban president Fidel Castro, had died aged 68. Castro Diaz-Balart, who had been treated for depression for several months, took his own life, according to a report in the newspaper Granma. He had been undergoing outpatient treatment after being hospitalised.

Bearing a close resemblance to his father, Castro Diaz-Balart, known as Fidelito, was the only son of the president and his first wife, Mirta Diaz-Balart. At the time of his death, he was a science adviser to Cuba's Council of State and vice-president of the Academy of Sciences of Cuba.

Fidel Castro Diaz-Balart, during the presentation of his father's book Our Duty is to Fight, in Havana, Cuba, 2012. Credit:Franklin Reyes

Castro Diaz-Balart played a prominent role in efforts to develop nuclear energy on the island. He was the executive secretary of Cuba's Atomic Energy Commission from 1980 to 1992 and was in charge of a project to build a nuclear power plant at Juragua.

Construction on the plant was suspended in 1992 after funding dried up with the collapse of the Soviet Union. By 2000, the project was abandoned. Castro Diaz-Balart remained a champion of nuclear energy, making the case for its growth in developing countries in a 2002 essay in the International Atomic Energy Agency Bulletin. "Widespread understanding is the key to popular acceptance," he wrote.Australian households could be paying as much as $430 more for electricity by the end of next year unless wholesale gas prices are brought under control, according to a new report that warns the Turnbull government's energy policies are falling short.

Policy analysts at the McKell Institute have for the first time modelled the impact of wholesale gas prices on household power bills in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland - finding consumers are already paying between $100 and $200 more than what the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission considers reasonable.

Using the ACCC's figures - and taking into account the government's current gas policy settings - McKell's modelling finds households in NSW could be paying $434.08 more for electricity on average by the end of 2019. Households in Queensland are heading for a $312.92 price rise and Victorians could be paying $254.09 more.

The figures are based on the current forecast price and consumption trends, without a significant reduction in wholesale prices.With Question Time wrapped up and both parties off maneuvering for the week ahead, myself, Alex Ellinghausen and Dominic Lorrimer will be signing off on the blog for today.

Key take outs:

New Liberal Senator Jim Molan has landed in controversy in his first day in office, after it was revealed he had shared several race-hate videos.

has landed in controversy in his first day in office, after it was revealed he had shared several race-hate videos. The rising cost of living is the issue that will define debate in Question Time until either company tax cuts get passed or wages start to show signs of life.

is the issue that will define debate in Question Time until either company tax cuts get passed or wages start to show signs of life. And as long as there are questions over dual-citizenship, it will continue to be a distraction.

We lost a giant of the craft on Saturday.

Today, The Age's former political editor Michael Gordon was remembered by Malcolm Turnbull, Bill Shorten and all his colleagues in the press gallery.

You can read some of the many tributes to him here.

Thanks for joining us.Which means their eldest child, Blue Ivy, who just turned six, accompanied her parents to the show. (Their eight-month-old twins, Rumi and Sir, were presumably under close supervision at home, possibly nibbling on perfectly geometrical cheese squares and organic plums shipped in direct from France, while displaying for their nannies what a perfect pull-up looks like).

In 2017, it was Beyonce who was nominated for her magnum opus, Lemonade, but this year it was Jay Z's turn for his album, 444, which was ostensibly a reply to Lemonade, which was ostensibly a chronology of Jay Z's cheating.

In case you missed it, the Grammys were on Monday. The award show is not so much about recognising talent, as recognising glamour, and then bowing down accordingly. Case in point: super power couple, Beyonce Knowles Carter and her husband, Sean, also known as Jay Z.

While the twins remain shrouded in shimmering secrecy, Blue Ivy was front and centre. She is, after all, an integral part of The Carter Family brand; the diffusion line in-waiting, the littlest Emperor; the cornerstone; the living embodiment of Beyonce and Jay Z's reconciliation and renewed commitment to each other. Without her there is no holy triumvirate, no trinity, no brand-extension. Beyonce once sang "nothing real can be threatened" ,and Blue is that reality.

Proof of this may be found in the cameos she's made in her parent's music  a single from the album Beyonce is dedicated to her and called simply, Blue. She has rapped on her father's songs; and appeared in her mother's and her father's music videos.

And it was Blue who stole the show at the Grammys. Wearing all-white, in contrast to her parents black wardrobe and serving a look that is best described as "Intentional Haughtiness" the six-year-old divided her time between chastising her parents, looking bored, demanding snacks from her mother, exhaling loudly and screwing up her face whenever the camera was on her.

This, it must be said, was a glory to behold. Blue, who was once described by her mother in one word, "fire", provided not just a glimpse into the familial dynamics of pop culture's royal family, but a wide open window on the realities of parenting.

Beyonce Knowles Carter no longer gives interviews. Her website and Instagram account, (which boasts more than 110 million followers) are as tightly curated as the Louvre (with easily as much security).According to a recent study published in the International Journal of Mental Health Addiction, if you take three selfies and day and post them to social media, you may be suffering from a condition called "acute selfitis".

While "selfitis" began as a hoax mental health disorder in 2014, researchers from Thiagarajar School of Management, Madurai, India and the Psychology Department at Nottingham Trent University in the UK decided to take a closer look to test if there was something to selfitis after all.

Is it really about vanity? Or is it about control? Credit:SHUTTERSTOCK

Janarthanan Balakrishnan and Mark D. Griffiths explored the selfie-taking behaviour of 255 university students, asking questions such as: "What compels you to take selfies?", "Do you feel addicted to taking selfies?", and "Do you think that someone can become addicted to taking selfies?"

They then developed a Selfitis Behaviour Scale (SBS) which included "borderline selfitis", for people who take selfies at least three times a day, but don't post, and "chronic selfitis", which is characterised by an "uncontrollable urge to take photos of one's self  posting the photos on social media more than six times a day".Under the new targets, this is meant to increase to 39.9 per cent by 2020. The achievement gap between the most disadvantaged year 5 and 9 students and their peers also grew wider between 2016 and 2017. There was also a drop in the proportion of year 9 students who remained engaged in education until year 12. This dipped to 96.3 per cent, down from 96.6 the previous year. And the proportion of surveyed families who reported high levels of confidence in the government school system dropped from 55 to 51.7 per cent. This is a far cry from the goal of 65.9 per cent by 2025. University of Melbourne laureate professor Dr John Hattie said policies aimed at reaching the targets had not had enough traction in schools.

"I am delighted that we have those targets and there are promising areas but we need to be much more vigilant in terms of making sure schools meet those targets," he said. "We have committed to these targets so lets move them up." Victorian Education Minister James Merlino said he was confident more children would move into the top achievement bands as the government's Education State initiatives rolled out. "Anyone can jump over a low bar  thats not what we are about. These targets are hard to meet because theyre real targets that will see real improvement in what our students achieve at school." He said there were early and exciting improvements, with some of Victoria's lowest-performing students moving into the middle achievement bands.

"It may not be headline grabbing, but its the first step in seeing the long-term improvements we want to achieve." He said changes in the second-year-target figures were not statistically significant and "do not paint a full picture of improvements in the sector". Education is emerging as a key battleground ahead of the November state election. The state opposition recently pledged to review the curriculum if it won government and called for a greater focus on "Australian values" in schools. The oppositions education spokesman, Tim Smith, said the new figures showed that it was time to declutter the curriculum and focus on literacy and numeracy.

"We want to improve student outcomes, instead of weak slogans and a part-time education minister," he said. "The education state slogan is not worth the number plate it is written on." The five and 10-year targets include boosting the number of students achieving excellence in reading, maths, science and the arts, breaking the link between disadvantage and outcomes and improving confidence in the school system. The Grattan Institutes Dr Peter Goss said consistent improvements during the earlier years of school were key to hitting the targets. "For Victoria, Im seeing good signs in reading, but less improvement in numeracy. Much more needs to be done to be improve writing, but that is also true across Australia," he said.

He said change took time and the metrics used to measure progress bounced around from year to year. "This creates a risk of jumping at shadows if a metric slips marginally," he said. "That said, improvement is always better than not, and the government will no doubt be working to understand what is going on where metrics arent improving." Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority chief executive Dr David Howes said that while the best result would be improvements across the board, there were encouraging signs. "The 2017 NAPLAN results show were lifting students out of the bottom three bands in reading and lifting performance in the early years," he said.We bellowed war cries of encouragement as the swell rolled into Woolamai, hitting the sandbank and rearing up into a powerful left.

"Go, Mickey, go!" I would hoot as his thick, yellow board skimmed by and, with his face zinc smeared and shaded by his sun cap (he was surely the daggiest bloke in the water), Michael would rise up and begin gliding  no, he was flying  over the water, his face a study in calm concentration. A man possessed by the waves.

He had that same expression on his face when he sat at his computer, especially on early Friday afternoon as the deadline for his Saturday column loomed. There, he was a man possessed by words, by his craft and by a desire to make a difference.

I spent years eavesdropping on Michael. He had two phone conversations at his desk over and over again. One was with the asylum seekers and refugees stranded on Manus and Nauru. Their groundhog day became Michael's. He patiently recorded their helplessness and indignity and by telling their stories over and over again, he helped many find dignity and agency while exposing the immense human cost of a bipartisan policy.

Michael did this for years, quietly convincing bored editors that the story deserved a run while avoiding what would have been a far easier path in chasing the sexier political yarn of the week. He travelled to the offshore camps, having been the first reporter to visit Nauru in 2005. When journalists were blocked from visiting, he used Skype, letters and scratchy phone lines to communicate. "And what is your message to the Australian public," I heard him calmly ask, time and time again, as the man on the other end cried or pleaded and implored.

The other phone conversation Michael had every week involved him reading his national affairs column to a mysterious mentor to ensure he hadn't missed a beat, or strayed into partisan territory.Sydney's inner and middle-ring neighbourhoods are being sapped of locals who work in essential services including nurses, teachers and police as high house prices alter the make-up of the city's neighbourhoods.

New research has revealed a dramatic slump in the number of key workers living in long-established Sydney regions during the past decade while areas on the urban fringe have experienced significant net gains.

The Parramatta region had the biggest net loss of essential workers between 2006 and 2016 with a decline of 21.4 per cent. Next was the eastern suburbs (-15.2 per cent) followed by Sydney's inner south west (-14.6 per cent), Ryde (-14.2 per cent) and inner west (-11.3 per cent).

During the same period the Southern Highlands, on the extremity of Greater Sydney, experienced a 17 per cent net increase in the number of essential workers living in the region. There were also big net gains in the Hunter Valley (+13.6 per cent) and the Illawarra (+10.5 per cent).The newest recruit to Cory Bernardi's Australian Conservatives party has channelled US President Donald Trump to declare "Canberra is broken" ahead of his tilt to join the ranks of federal parliamentarians.

Lyle Shelton on Saturday stepped down as managing director of the Australian Christian Lobby.

Lyle Shelton announced he has taken on a new role as the Australian Conservatives' federal communications director. Credit:Regi Verghese/AAP

He joined Senator Bernardi on Sunday to announce his new role as the Australian Conservatives' federal communications director - a party spokesman outside the parliamentary ranks.

"After more than a decade living in Canberra, fighting for truth and freedom, I can tell you that Canberra is broken," Mr Shelton told the audience at an event in his hometown of Toowoomba.A man in his 60s has been rushed to hospital after being bitten by a snake on a beach near the Twelve Apostles.

Paramedics were called to Loch Ard Gorge beach in Port Campbell just after 3pm on Sunday, Ambulance Victoria spokesman John Mullen said.

"The man was bitten on his lower leg," he said.

"There was no sign of the snake so we're not sure what type it was.

"The snake had done a runner."Theres no real secret about how to get to a war zone. You catch the Melbourne or Sydney to London flight  the one with all the screaming babies  and disembark in Dubai. Then you catch a bus to Terminal 2 and board a plane to Erbil, Iraq.

Australians dont even need a visa.

We arrived on the morning flight and within minutes of landing , we were standing blinking in the intense light and 45 degree heat of an Iraqi summer. We wanted to get started straight away.

Our ticket to the front line was Halan Ibrahim Shekha, a young, impossibly handsome Kurd with a fondness for romantic music and a tendency to flash the blue steel expression from the movie Zoolander. As war raged on Kurdistans borders, the multi-lingual Halan turned his considerable charm to fixing for the international press.

Travelling the 80km from Erbil to Mosul is a shorter journey than the 13,200km from Sydney or Melbourne to Erbil, but in some ways its a more difficult one.Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull expects the Liberal Party to stay out of the looming byelection in the Melbourne seat of Batman.

Voters in the marginal seat could be going to the polls as early as March 7 to elect a replacement for Labor's Dave Feeney, who resigned on Thursday after falling foul of federal parliament's citizenship fiasco.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull does not think the Liberals will have a candidate in Batman. Credit:Brenton Edwards

Labor sent another clear message on Sunday that it intends to exploit the Turnbull government's unpopularity as ALP front bencher Anthony Albanese dismissed the main challenger for the seat, the Greens, as a "secret society".

Greens candidate Alex Bhathal, who is facing a move by internal party enemies to have her thrown out of the party, has still not spoken publicly, more than four days after Mr Feeney's resignation and three days after Labor announced its candidate, former ACTU President Ged Kearney.The search for a swimmer missing off the Mornington Peninsula has been called off due to fading light.

Search and rescue efforts for the 23-year-old Narre Warren man began about three hours earlier he and his two friends were caught in a rip on Sunday afternoon.

Police believe the missing man and his two friends were swimming about 5.30pm near Portsea when they were swept away.

Two of the men have been found  one of whom was flown to hospital in a serious condition. At 9.30pm on Sunday the 22-year-old man from Cranbourne West remained in a serious but stable condition at the Royal Melbourne Hospital.

The other  a 23-year-old man from Cranbourne  did not require medical treatment.As'ad's Bio

As'ad AbuKhalil, born March 16, 1960. From Tyre, Lebanon, grew up in Beirut. Received his BA and MA from American University of Beirut in pol sc. Came to US in 1983 and received his PhD in comparative government from Georgetown University. Taught at Tufts University, Georgetown University, George Washington University, Colorado College, and Randolph-Macon Woman's College. Served as a Scholar-in-Residence at Middle East Institute in Washington DC. He served as free-lance Middle East consultant for NBC News and ABC News, an experience that only served to increase his disdain for maintream US media. He is now professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus. His favorite food is fried eggplants.Taxpayers could be forced to pay Transurban nearly $2 billion if the state government fails to extend the companys CityLink tolling for an extra 10 years, according to finance services giant JP Morgan.

Some industry experts have warned that the figure may be much higher, suggesting the $1.8 billion estimated would not adequately compensate the ASX-listed company, which is spending $4 billion on the West Gate Tunnel project.

The new tollway project, which links the West Gate Freeway in Spotswood with CityLink in Docklands via a six-lane tunnel under Yarraville, arose from an unsolicited proposal by Transurban, which is paying for the bulk of the $6.7 billion project.

To make the deal worthwhile for Transurban, the government agreed to amend the CityLink concession deed to extend tolling by 10 years to 2045. Analysts estimate 35 per cent of Transurbans earnings come from CityLink.A WA paedophile described as a "misogynist with psychopathic traits" has been denied release from a jail for the fourth time.

Darren Harley West has been behind bars for nearly 14 years after being convicted of raping teenage girls and indecently dealing with a teenage boy.

The WA dangerous sex offender has been denied release for a fourth year running. Credit:Viki Lascaris

The 53-year-old was deemed a dangerous sex offender in 2013 and placed on a continuing detention order.

On Friday the Supreme Court of Western Australia published its decision to refuse West's release from jail after the fourth annual review of his order.A Perth man has been charged in relation to two separate and terrifying attacks on young women in the Armadale area on Saturday evening.

At around 7.55pm, a 16-year-old girl was sitting under a shelter near the Kelmscott Train Station when a man approached her.

The young women have helped police with their investigation.

He allegedly pulled a knife on her, and forced her to walk with him across Streich Avenue.

She was able to break free, and ran back to the train station.US President Donald Trump says a controversial memo attacking federal law enforcement written by congressional Republicans vindicates him in the investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 US presidential election.

Trump's fervent embrace of the memo raised again the prospect that he may use it as justification to fire special counsel Robert Mueller, who is conducting the investigation, or Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who oversees Mueller.

Tweeting from his resort in Palm Beach, Florida, Trump said the memo "totally vindicates" him but added "the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their (sic) was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction." He called the investigation "an American disgrace".

The White House said on Friday there would be no changes at the Justice Department as a result of the memo's conclusions.Ankara: Turkey says it's talking to the Americans. The US says it's talking to the Turks. Politicians and generals in the two countries are in almost constant communication, judging by their public comments.

There's no indication that any of this talk has resolved the fundamental argument that's threatening to bring NATO's two biggest armies into direct conflict in northern Syria.

When Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan launched an offensive there last month against US-backed Kurdish fighters, he started in an area where American troops aren't embedded with their allies.

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan signs a drone at a military airbase in Batman, Turkey, on Saturday. Credit:AP

But he said the operation will soon extend further east, to the town of Manbij, where they are. "We'll press against terrorists without taking into consideration who's next to them," Erdogan said on January 30. Several ministers have made the same point.Monday 05 September, 2016 Reliable information reaching Biafra writers desk has it that the life of Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of the Indi...Being bombarded by funeral-insurance ads is a downside of going to the gym each afternoon. As I watch TV on a running treadmill, every ad break has a promotion for funeral insurance.

Who knew funeral insurance was such big business? Or that late afternoon was the time when people think of the burden of leaving funeral costs to their loved ones? Or that enough people even care if their children pay for a funeral as they inherit their parents wealth.

Funeral-insurance ads are yet another sign of the expanding death-care services market in Australia and New Zealand. Funerals, cremations, coffins, memorials, headstones, insurance and various other death-care services are big business.

Australias death-care industry is estimated at $1.1 billion in FY2017. New Zealands death-care industry is worth about a quarter of that.

Investors rate death-care stocks for four main reasons. First, the key driver of industry revenue  the death rate  is reasonably predictable and defensive. Its a given that most Australians will need thousands of dollars of death-care services when their time is up.

Second, the death rate is rising as the population expands and ages. Deaths in Australia will grow 1.4 per cent per annum over 2016-2025, according to Australian Bureau of Statistics forecasts. Forget about talk of people living longer; for now, a larger, ageing population means more deaths each year.

Third, the death-care industry is fragmented. There are more than 1,200 operators, many of which lack scale and have ageing owners who will want to sell their business and retire within 10 years. Thats an opportunity for cashed-up large firms to buy growth.

Fourth, death-care stocks have rewarded investors and there is a clear valuation benchmark. Market leader Invocare, capitalised at $1.6 billion, has a five-year annualised total return (assuming dividend reinvestment) of 13.4%, Morningstar data shows.

Invocare soared to a 52-week high of $18.15 last year before retreating to $14.76.

ASX now has a second death-care stock after Propel Funeral Partners listed through a $131-million IPO in November 2017. Propels $2.70-issued shares rallied to $3.34.

Chart 1: Propel Funeral Partners

>> BACK TO THE NEWSLETTER: Click here to read other articles from this weeks newsletter

 Tony Featherstone is a former managing editor of BRW, Shares and Personal Investor magazines. The information in this article should not be considered personal advice. It has been prepared without considering your objectives, financial situation or needs. Before acting on information in this article you should consider the appropriateness and accuracy of the information, regarding your objectives, financial situation and needs. Do further research of your own and/or seek personal financial advice from a licensed adviser before making any financial or investment decisions based on this article. All prices and analysis at January 31, 2018.When US automaker General Motors introduced its electrically powered concept car  the Chevrolet Volt  in 2007, the response ranged from excitement to skepticism. The 2010 production launch and its aftermath failed to quiet the naysayers.

Almost a decade later a diminishing number of skeptics remain, despite mounting evidence electric vehicles (EVs) are here to stay.

In mid-January of this year Reuters reported that investments from global automakers in electric vehicles and the batteries that power them stands at $90 billion dollars, with more to come.

There are now six countries on the planet with stated goals of banning sales of internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles by varying dates. Country Year China Not setIndia 2030 The Netherlands 2025Norway 2030United Kingdom 2040France 2050

With every major automobile manufacturer entering the EV race, betting on which ones will be big winners is a risky proposition at best. As an alternative, investors are focusing on the batteries all manufacturers will need for their EVs. Rather than scouring for publicly traded battery manufacturers that suffer from the same risk of losing to a better competitor, many investors are focusing on the metals/minerals needed to construct the Li-Ion batteries. Common sense says all manufacturers will need the key metals.

In this case, common sense may not hold. Although Lithium Ion batteries are the current front-runner in the race to produce the best battery, there are competitive technologies that could displace the Li-Ion battery over time, as well as different metals across the research and development spectrum.

There are three major parts in a Li-Ion battery:

 The anode  made of graphite The electrolyte solution  made of lithium The Cathode  made of different formulations.

In addition to lithium and graphite, the remaining critical minerals go into cathode construction  nickel and cobalt. Cobalt is the hot metal right now. Benchmark Mineral Intelligence predicts that by 2020 75% of lithium-ion battery cathodes will include cobalt.

Couple the demand with scarcity of supply and you have a recipe for steep price increases. Volkswagen, Tesla, and BMW are vying to lock in future supply of the now sought-after metal, further accelerating the price rush.



>> BACK TO THE NEWSLETTER: Click here to read other articles from this weeks newsletterA federal prison in Beaumont that decided Thursday not to evacuate inmates despite a precarious drinking water situation has come under criticism from the men being held inside.

FCI Beaumont, a federal prison that houses 1,812 low security male inmates, said that although the facility's water source was compromised and had intermittent power, it was "adequately maintained with generator backup power when needed. There is an adequate food and water supply for both inmates and staff," the Federal Bureau of Prisons said in a statement Thursday.

Messages from inmates obtained by Chron.com using a prison email system tell a different story.

EMPTY: In Texas gas shortage, man fills garbage cans at pump in Austin

One of those inmates is a 30-something-year-old man being held at Beaumont for possession of a large quantity of cocaine and possession of three firearms. His identity, and the name of the other inmate who provided messages to Chron.com, has been confirmed, but withheld because they fear retaliation from guards for speaking out against the prison. The man's girlfriend Andrea Hasberry said one way the prison could retaliate is by moving him to another facility farther away.

The man described a scene where a fellow inmate passed out Thursday night because of malnutrition; inmates haven't had a warm meal in more than five days, he said. Because of the water shortage, four portable toilets were brought in to service the man's building. No chemicals were placed in the toilets, which have already been "topped off" with waste, the man said.

"Save me Jesus," the man said in an email. "I never thought nothing like this would happen in prison."

SAVED: Stunning photo of coast guard rescuing infant during Harvey





This was a similar story from another 50-something-year-old inmate shared with Chron.com. He was found guilty of fraud. Communication with this inmate was facilitated by his daughter Morgan Owen.

"We are getting two bottles of water a day thus far. Which is obscene," the inmate said Friday morning over email. "We are getting three brown bags of peanut butter and bologna a day. ... Keep pounding the social media sites and call Washington, D.C. for the Texas senators, congressman, and attorney general Jeff Sessions who is actually in charge of us. The more information they get the better."

Hasberry has been using Facebook to raise awareness around conditions in the prison. She has also shared photos of her emails to her boyfriend on Facebook as well, which have received dozens of comments.

"Just because a person made a mistake they don't deserve to be treated as a animal," Hasberry told Chron.com Friday afternoon. "Animals are treated better then those men. They evacuated all those animals and made sure they were safe, why can't they make sure those men in those units are safe, fed, healthy with clean clothes and enough amount of water; they are people too."

HELPING HAND: Houston family takes in 16 strangers and pets displaced by Harvey

When presented with the exact claims brought up by both inmates, the Federal Bureau of Prisons provided Chron.com the following statement Friday afternoon: "[T]he storm impacted the city water supply; however, the FCC (federal correctional complex) has its own reserve of water for emergency situations to adequately operate the FCC. There is ample food and bottled water for inmates and staff."

On Tuesday, rising floodwaters from the Brazos River forced the relocation of an estimated 1,400 convicts from the Jester 3 and Vance prisons in Richmond to the other 100-plus state lockups across Texas.

Owen hopes her father feels some relief very soon.

"My dad has been without running or drinking water today, without AC and with maybe 1300-1500 calories of food all day. That speaks for itself doesn't it?" Owen told Chron.com Friday afternoon.Amazon has received patents for electronic systems that could enable warehouse monitoring through electronic pulses that guide employees by location.

The patent filings, first reported this week by the news site Geekwire, come amid concerns over workplace conditions for the company, which has seen rapid growth in its warehouses or "fulfillment centers" key to its logistics.

The publicly available patent documents show how wrist-worn devices could deliver ultrasonic pulses that could direct employees to the location of bins for packages being sought.

"Ultrasonic tracking of a worker's hands may be used to monitor performance of assigned tasks," according to one of the documents.

"The ultrasonic unit is configured to be worn by a user in proximity to the user's hand and to periodically emit ultrasonic sound pulses... The management module monitors performance of an assigned task based on the identified inventory bin."

In a statement to AFP, Amazon said it files numerous patents on new technologies that may or may not be implemented.

"The speculation about this patent is misguided," the Amazon statement said.

"Every day at companies around the world, employees use handheld scanners to check inventory and fulfill orders. This idea, if implemented in the future, would improve the process for our fulfillment associates. By moving equipment to associates' wrists, we could free up their hands from scanners and their eyes from computer screens."

Read also: Amazon to open first cashierless shop to public on Monday

Any deployment of such systems would likely trigger a backlash over labor conditions and heighten fears over workplace surveillance.

In the patent document, Amazon said the system is designed to help with "time-consuming acts" to locate items in warehouses.

Amazon's growth has been fueled by technologies that help it speed shipments to enable deliveries in one or two days. It has invested heavily in automated technology and robotics.

On Thursday, Amazon reported its quarterly profit doubled to $1.9 billion, compared with $749 million a year earlier.

In 2015, a New York Times article described Amazon's workplace culture as a "hurtful," Darwinian setting in which employees were pitted against one another to the point of tears to improve productivity.

At the time, Amazon chief executive and founder Jeff Bezos said he did not recognize what he called the depiction of "a soulless, dystopian workplace."A boom of e-commerce outlets has become one of the reasons behind state-owned postal service firm PT Pos Indonesia's decision to build a coworking space inside its building, which is located in Pasar Baru, Central Jakarta.

The coworking space is a sign of cooperation between PT Pos Indonesia and EV Hive, ahead of the launch of the iconic philately building in March.

Pupung Purnama, PT Pos Indonesia Jakarta regional 4 head, said the collaboration with EV Hive to build the coworking space is hoped to give a positive impact to the company.

"PT Pos Indonesia has existed since a long time, and now the business has begun to erode with the rapid development of technology," Pupu said recently, as quoted by kompas.com. Nowadays, he said, not many people send private mails anymore. Therefore, the movement within e-commerce is seen as a business development opportunity.

As a state-owned asset that should be utilized for the nation and state, Pupung said it would continue to develop its core business, one of them being the delivery of goods. PT Pos would grow its shipping service center with the development of a door-to-door concept and the addition of service hours.

Read also: Global firms join rush to bet on Indonesia as next start-up frontier

Roderick Purwana, Sinar Mas Digital Ventures (SMDV) managing partner, one of the investors of the coworking space, said economic growth and startups are now quite attractive, as it raises the challenge of building coworking spaces, for example by offering facilities such as free Wi-Fi and coffee.

He said social interaction in coworking space is also considered better for a community or small office than just working in a ruko (shophouse).

"If working in a shophouse, the community would be limited to just that. If in a coworking space, different companies can also build a good collaboration," he said.

The coworking space in PT Pos Indonesia's building could accommodate around 400 people, as reported by kompas.com.

It divides between the open spaces with long tables and personal power points, with those in smaller rooms that could be rented as a private office.

The facilities offered include Wi-Fi, coffee, tea, mineral water and 10 hours of free meetings at other EV Hive branches, of which there are 15.

Carson Lau, EV Hive CEO and cofounder, said the collaboration space is not only used as a workplace, but can also be for other activities such as seminars or other events.

"We want to make this collaboration space like a staging place and where a lot of people get together. This could be a center for young people who want to promote their startup and business," said Carlson. (liz/kes)Hannah felt something was amiss when her fiance kept cancelling date nights due to "overtime work".

After a few months of suspicion, the 30-year-old sales executive engaged a private investigator, who learnt that the man had been spending nights with other women, including an actress, at various hotels.

It was a devastating discovery for Ms Hannah (not her real name), but sadly such cases are not new. Indeed, suspicions among loved ones seem to be on the rise.

Private eyes told The Sunday Times that they are getting more requests from clients who want to check on boyfriends or girlfriends, even before they say "I do".

These "love detectives" saw about 30 to 60 client requests for checks on the dating history of their boyfriends and girlfriends last year, a 10 to 50 per cent jump from five years ago. They have seen a 10 to 30 per cent increase in the number of clients - from housewives to lawyers - checking on their partners from 2012 to last year.

Private eye James Loh, who has been in the business for 16 years, said he handles around 300 matrimonial and family cases a year, 10 to 15 per cent more than five years ago. About 40 of those cases are checks on boyfriends and girlfriends.

"More young people want to consider carefully before jumping into a marriage. They don't want to end up regretting," said Mr Loh, the managing director of International Investigators. He added that there is now an equal number of cases of women and men cheating on their partners - a stark change from five years ago, when men were the main offenders.

Infidelity cases form the bulk of the workload for private investigation agencies, ahead of tracking missing persons and monitoring employee movements. It can cost about $800 to more than $10,000 to hire a private eye, depending on the number of hours agreed upon and whether there are overseas assignments involved.

Investigators find that in 90 per cent of the cases they handle, clients' suspicions about their partners are borne out.

After discovering that their partners have been cheating, many clients have broken down in tears, according to the eight private eyes interviewed. But a few remain eerily calm.

"Clients come to us when they suspect that something is wrong," said Mr Loh, who made a career switch from marketing in 2002.

"It is mental torture for them. They want proof that their partners are cheating."

His firm employs eight investigators, comprising former police and military officers as well as fresh university and polytechnic graduates. He has even received applications from MBA graduates.

Read also: Study uses wearable gadgets to detect when lovers quarrel will occur

But it is not an easy job as it sometimes involves dealing with physical threats, said one investigator who declined to be named.

"If you trail too closely, the target might notice you," he said. "The job also involves a lot of waiting. Some newbies can't take the long hours and they quit after a few days."

Before tailing a target, an investigator maps out the places he or she frequents, including checking the number of exits, and studies the surrounding roads and traffic conditions. Travelling overseas to trail a suspected cheating spouse for days or even weeks is part of the job.

"You are often required to travel at short notice," the investigator said. "Over there, you have to navigate around unfamiliar places discreetly and often with a language barrier."

Their work is complete when they gather good photo and video evidence of individuals hugging or kissing their lovers, or spending the night at a hotel or an apartment.

Getting injured is also part and parcel of the job, with many investigators reporting bruises, scrapes and sprains in pursuit of a suspected cheat.

But some have suffered far more serious injuries. SG Investigators founder David Kang, who has been in the business for more than 15 years, fractured his pelvis last year after his motorbike skidded as he was trailing a target.

"There are real risks. The actual job is different from the movies," said Mr Kang, 54, whose agency has nine investigators, including a 21-year-old female student.

Mr Kang admitted that his learning curve was steep, recalling that in his first few cases, his video clips of targets were shaky.

"When I first started, I would worry if the subject knew I was following him. I would get nervous whenever they looked in my general direction," he said.

Private investigators feel that their work could help clients to move on with their lives.

"Ultimately, we hope that clients can decide what to do next," said Mr Kang. "If couples can sit down and talk, maybe there is a chance that their marriage can be salvaged."Tech giant Samsung Electronics said on Feb. 2 that it has inked a partnership with Grab, the largest ride-hailing firm in Southeast Asia, to provide its mobile devices and security solutions.



Under the new partnership, Samsung will offer the Singapore-based ride-sharing service firm tablets and smartphones fitted with its infortainment system and security solution Knox for the Grab vehicles. Customers will be able to book cars on Samsung devices installed in Grabs kiosks at malls, hotels and airports, Samsung said.

The two companies will also run a micro-financing program that allows Grab drivers on a tight budget to purchase Samsung smartphones.



The ride-sharing firm has around 2.3 million drivers and 770 million app downloads and offers ride-sharing services in 186 cities in eight nations, including Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Myanmar.



Southeast Asia is home to the worlds fastest-growing emerging markets, yet many in the smaller towns and cities do not have easy access to the growing digital economy, said Anthony Tan, chief executive of Grab, in a press release.

Read also: Grab to invest $700 million in Indonesia



Samsung also hopes the tie-up will help maintain its competitive edge over rivals, such as Apple, Huawei and Xiaomi, in the market where more people are increasingly using smart devices.



Samsung will be able to expand its business in the region and contribute to the growth of digital economy there through the collaboration, said Lee Sang-chul, chief of Samsungs Southeast Asia and Oceania business.A baby who drank milk produced by the French dairy giant Lactalis has been diagnosed with salmonella in the Spanish Basque country, taking the number of cases in the country this year to two, authorities said Saturday.

"A second case of an infant affected by an infection with salmonella Agona" was detected at the Basurto University Hospital in Bilbao, the Department of Health of the Basque regional government said in a statement.

Lactalis has been engulfed in scandal since December when authorities ordered a massive international recall of the baby milk which made at least 38 babies ill in France and Spain.

The statement said the child consumed "formula milk developed by the French group Lactalis", adding the baby was in "good" state of health, was under medical surveillance but not in hospital.

Another baby who had consumed contaminated Lactalis infant milk had already been identified in the Basque region. His infection with salmonella was confirmed on January 12 by scientists at the Pasteur Institut and Public Health France.

Lactalis announced a few days later the withdrawal in Spain of 37 additional batches of infant food products potentially contaminated with salmonella.

Read also: 83 countries affected by Lactalis salmonella scandal: CEO

In December it withdrew all products manufactured from February 15, 2017 at the Craon plant in western France, where salmonella contamination had been detected.

The products concerned in Spain are mainly powdered milk and cereals of the Damira, Sanutri and Puleva brands, sold exclusively in pharmacies.

Lactalis has been the target of heavy criticism after it emerged that the company's own tests found salmonella at the factory in Craon, but it did not sound the alarm because it had not detected the bacteria in the milk itself.

The company is facing several lawsuits over the outbreak, and police raided the group's headquarters in Laval, western France, earlier this year.

It recalled 12 million packages of the affected baby milk, under brands including Picot, Milumel and Celia, across 83 countries.

Salmonella causes fever and diarrhoea in infants, along with vomiting in some cases, which can lead to babies being hospitalised for dehydration.

According to French health authorities, all of the babies sickened by salmonella-tainted milk made a good recovery.A billion-dollar trial pitting Alphabet-owned autonomous driving unit Waymo against Uber starts Monday, in what could be a blockbuster case between two technology giants over alleged theft of trade secrets.

The San Francisco courtroom battle will take place as Waymo and Uber race to perfect self-driving cars that people could summon for rides as desired in a turn away from car ownership.

The list of witnesses who might be called to testify includes ousted Uber chief Travis Kalanick as well as Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

The trial stems from a lawsuit filed last year by Waymo -- previously known as the Google car unit -- which claimed former manager Anthony Levandowski took a trove of technical data with him when he left to launch a competing venture that went on to become Otto and was later acquired by Uber.

Levandowski is expected to be called to the stand at trial before federal judge William Alsup.

Uber last year confirmed that it fired Levandowski just ahead of a date set by a judge for the San Francisco-based ridesharing titan to return files taken from Waymo.

- 'Unjust enrichment' -

Waymo's lawsuit contends that Levandowski in December 2015 downloaded thousands of files from a highly confidential design server to a laptop and took the data with him to the startup.

During hearings last year, the judge said that Waymo "supplied a compelling record that Levandowski pilfered over 14,000 files from Waymo," and that Uber knew or should have known about the theft.

A key, however, will be for Waymo to prove to jurors that any swiped secrets actually made it to Uber.

Alsup begrudgingly delayed the start of trial twice, most recently to look into whether Uber connived to hide evidence.

Waymo argues in the lawsuit that a "calculated theft" of its technology netted Otto a buyout of more than $500 million and enabled Uber to revive a stalled self-driving car program.

The Alphabet unit is seeking damages of at least $1 billion.

Read also: Uber plots expansion in Japan, Singapore amid talks of retreat

Levandowski, a co-founder of Otto, headed Uber's efforts to develop self-driving technology for personal driving, delivery and trucking.

Waymo will need to convince jurors that data taken was actually trade secrets; that Uber used or disclosed what it learned, and that the ride-sharing company was "unjustly enriched" as a result.

The eight supposed trade secrets at issue in the trial have not been revealed in court.

Waymo is set to begin calling witnesses on Monday after both sides present opening remarks to the four-woman, six-man jury. The trial is expected to take about three weeks.

- Shifting gears -

The courtroom drama is playing out as Uber's new chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi strives to get the company on course and prepare for a stock market debut in 2019.

Khosrowshahi's stated goal is to shift Uber to a responsible course after a period of market traction at any price.

Even as Uber has seen unprecedented growth by expanding to dozens of countries, it has been hurt by missteps including allegations of executive misconduct, a toxic work atmosphere and potentially unethical competitive practices.

Japanese telecommunications giant SoftBank in January finished buying a 15 percent stake in Uber. The investment is part of an effort by Uber to move past a series of scandals, reform its board structure and diminish the role of Uber co-founder Kalanick.

Meanwhile, Waymo is striving for a lead in autonomous ridesharing, which involves major automakers, technology developers and services such as Uber and Lyft.

Waymo recently announced it was ordering "thousands" of vehicles from Fiat Chrysler for the expansion of its autonomous ride-hailing service across several US cities.TheJakartaPost

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Linkedin The Jakarta Post Jakarta  Sun, February 4, 2018 17:24 1316 2c798a31c212039f000dc5df9c3e2409 1 Business airport-train,Soekarno-Hatta-airport-train,soekarno-hatta-airport,railink Free

Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi has pledged to cut the travel time of the airport train connecting Sudirman Baru Station, South Jakarta, and Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in Banten to 38 minutes from the current 55 minutes.

Budi said the travel time would be shortened by intensifying train operations at the Batu Ceper Station in Tangerang, Banten, which often sees a surge of commuters boarding the train.

We will intensify departures from the Batu Ceper Station. There will be a lot of commuters using the train, so traffic congestion can be reduced, he said on Saturday.

The airport train, which was launched in December, is operated by PT Railink, the subsidiary of state-owned airport operator PT Angkasa Pura II and state-owned railway operator KAI.

A one-way ticket to and from Sudirman Baru Station  also known as BNI City Station  now costs Rp 70,000 (US$5.22), while single trips to and from Batu Ceper Station are Rp 35,000.

However, KAI plans to raise its fare for the Sudirman Baru-Soekarno Hatta route to Rp 100,000 per trip.

Passengers can purchase tickets at machines available at the aforementioned stations or through the Railink app. (ami/gda)For Balinese dance maestro Ayu Bulantrisna Djelantik, life is about prayer, love and dance.

Ayu, 70, is compiling a photographic biography about her dancing career spanning over half a century.

While working on the book, she admits her only regret: Why didnt I ask for the autograph of Sukarno?

Growing up in Peliatan village, Ubud, Ayu was one of president Sukarnos most beloved child dancers.

As a child, she was often invited to dance at Tampaksiring Palace in Bali, especially when the president hosted state guests, such as Thailands revered king Bhumibol Adulyadej, Vietnamese prime minister Ho Chi Minh and emperor of Japan Hirohito.

The title of the book is Dance...Share this article Whatsapp

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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Mon, February 5 2018

A property buyer on a reclaimed islet off the northern coast of Jakarta was detained on Friday after the developer of Islets C and D, PT Kapuk Naga Indah, reported her for defamation.



Jakarta Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. Argo Yuwono confirmed the arrest, saying the suspect, Lucia, would undergo confinement for 20 days, starting on Friday.



The dispute reportedly started in a meeting between Kapuk Naga Indah and property buyers on Dec. 9, 2017. Commotion erupted when buyers questioned the status of their permits and rights for their paid for properties.



After a recording of the meeting went viral on social media, Agung Sedayu Group, as Kapuk Naga Indahs parent company, filed a police report through its lawyer, Lenny Marlina, on Dec.11.



Meanwhile, Lucia, who had paid for two units, argued that while she indeed said the developers are irresponsible, s...Share this article Whatsapp

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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Mon, February 5 2018

A student, Rifaldi Giant Hartanto, died from multiple stab wounds after reportedly getting involved in a brawl in Kemayoran on Saturday night. Rifaldi ,along with classmates identified as DH, RD, RV and MF, allegedly attacked a rival group in Johar Baru, Central Jakarta, at 3:30 a.m.



Rifaldi got caught and couldnt escape the scene, Kemayoran Polices crime unit chief, Adj. Comr. Iswantara, told tribunnews.com recently.



He bled severely and died when taken to Cempaka Putih Islamic Hospital.



Another victim from Johar Baru, Riki Fajar, who died from severe wounds on his face and leg, was taken to Cipto Mangunkusumo Hospital.

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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Mon, February 5 2018

The Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI) has criticized the government for banning three BBC Indonesia journalists from reporting on a measles and malnutrition outbreak in Papuas Asmat regency because of the tweets posted by one of them.



Australian journalist reporting for BBC Indonesia, Rebecca Henschke, was told to leave Papua after she posted several tweets criticizing the provision of aid. She posted a picture, showing boxes of food and drinks on a dock, captioned This is the aid coming in for severely malnourished children in Papua  instant noodles, super sweet soft drinks and biscuits.



The Indonesian Military (TNI), which is taking part in the health mission in Asmat, claimed that what she wrote did not reflect the truth. In the photo, [the food and drinks] were not humanitarian aid, but products sold by merchants and accidentally placed [on th...Share this article Whatsapp

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Linkedin (The Jakarta Post)  Mon, February 5 2018

The Mahakam, one of Indonesias mightiest rivers, is home to endangered freshwater dolphins in Kalimantan. Conservation group Rare Aquatic Species of Indonesia (RASI) estimates their number at 80. Pollution from the mining industry and logging has been largely blamed for their endangerment. The Jakarta Post correspondent in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, Nurni Sulaiman, recently joined researchers and activists on a three-week trip along the Mahakam River to monitor the animals degrading habitat and conservation effort...Share this article Whatsapp

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Linkedin Wahyoe Boediwardhana (The Jakarta Post) Surabaya/Jakarta  Mon, February 5 2018

Violence at schools has put educational institutions in the spotlight in recent years for their failure to create a safe environment.



However, a recent incident in Madura, East Java, has shown the deadly consequences of school violence for authority figures.



A 27-year-old art teacher died on Thursday, allegedly after receiving a blow to the back of his neck from a student. The teacher, Ahmad Budi Cahyono, died in Dr Soetomo Hospital in Surabaya aft...In 1891, Nicholas II made a grand voyage across what was then the Russian Empire on what was called The Tsars Train. The potentate ventured from the imperial capital of Saint Petersburg to Vladivostok, on the frozen rim of Siberia, more than 9,000 kilometers away.

The same route, now known as the Trans-Siberia Railroad, exists today, with branch lines that allow journeys to destinations as far as China and Mongolia.

All aboard

Lake Baikal, from the Trans-Siberia Express (Lernidee Erlebnisreisen/File)

Unlike Tsar Nicholas II, I would begin by voyage in Moscow, where I landed at Domodedovo Airport in October. First pro tip: Dress warmly: the temperature was about -3 degrees! Used to tropical weather, I was chilled, wearing only a thin jacket, winter hat and hand-knit gloves.

Two months before leaving for Russia, I had purchased my tickets, spending US$285 for an 87-hour passage from Moscow to Irkutsk on the Trans-Siberia Railway and $200 for the 22-hour journey from Irkutsk to Ulaanbaatar, the Mongolian capital. Purchase can also be made in Moscow, or via websites such as russianrail.com or expresstorussia.com, which will deliver tickets to your hotel.

Before departing, I stopped at a supermarket. Three days on a train traveling second class meant I had to lay in a supply of food and sundries, such as instant noodles, flip flops for the shower and five cans of beer. (Second pro tip: Russian Rail officers say that you cant bring more than five cans on the train.

Lake Baikal (Lernidee Erlebnisreisen/File)

I was at Moscow Yaroslavskaya Station, which forms a rail terminus shared with Kazansky and Leningradsky Stations, about three hours before departure, as suggested. Each car of my train had from six to nine (quite clean) passenger compartments, a toilet/shower room and an officer space.

In my second-class compartment, towels, blankets, mattresses and pillows were neatly stacked. There was ample space for four to sleep, two on upper berths, which folded away during the daytime, and two on lower berths. We left Moscow just before midnight, starting my Siberian adventure.

Read also: 'The Hunger Games' comes to life in Siberia

Crossing the Taiga

The steppes as viewed from the train (Lernidee Erlebnisreisen/File)

Almost half a day later, I was greeted by sunshine through the window. I looked at the passing landscape, reminded of Paulo Coelhos description of his trip on the Trans-Siberia Railroad in his book, Aleph. The sub-arctic forests that the Russians call taiga slipped by, as did small villages full of beautiful wooden houses with windows painted in bright colors. Despite how sleepy I was, I whispered to myself not to close my eyes. It was too precious to miss the beauty in front of my eyes.

We stopped in Kazan, about 800 kilometers from Moscow. The train would make 11 stops on the way to Irkutsk. If I could, I would have gotten off in every city as we made our way east. However, time constraints meant I would be riding the rails another 4,000-or-so kilometers before disembarking. After Kazan, the view was filled by forests of birch, Russias national tree, whose white trunks gave off an impression both cold and mystic. Russian folklore is full of tales of spirits in the woods. Its easy to see why.

An archer takes aim in Mongolia (Lernidee Erlebnisreisen/File)

Day One turned into Day Two. I whiled away time talking with fellow travelers in the hallway. Sometimes, I stood in quiet by the window for long periods, indulging in the beautiful scenery. While there was a dining car at the end of my train, I also found it easy to get boiling water for tea, coffee and instant noodles from a spigot near the staff compartment. Compartments offer sockets to keep gadgets charged. Every car has a toilet/shower room, but make arrangements with staff before showering, as that part of the room is not open 24 hours a day.

In Irkutsk

Lake Baikal, from the Trans-Siberia Express (Lernidee Erlebnisreisen/File)

On Day Three, we reached Irkutsk and the alluring beauty of Lake Baikal. We were now more than 5,000 kilometers east of Moscow. Although the temperature was 1, the sun shone brightly and I was excited to explore this Siberian city of more than a half million. The tourist board makes it easy, with green sidewalk lines the sidewalk leading you to various statues, monuments and places of interest.

Lake Baikal is in the town of Listvyanka and just a two-hour jaunt from the city. I booked a car and driver for $100. Known as the Galapagos of Russia, Lake Baikal is home to more than 1,700 species of plants and animals. Had I arrived after December and before the Russian spring, the lake, which spans more than 31,000 square kilometers, would have been frozen over.

All aboard: departing from Moscow (Lernidee Erlebnisreisen/File)

I made an easy trek overland for about an hour to reach one of the hills overlooking Lake Baikal. It was vast, looking very much like an ocean, and was lapped by small waves. Descending to the village, I visited the market in search of omul, a local delicacy of smoked fish that has a soft, sweet meat surrounded by thick fat to ward off the cold.

Read also: Moscow unveils $240m park with tundra, ice cave

On to Mongolia

Lake Baikal, from the Trans-Siberia Express (Lernidee Erlebnisreisen/File)

In Irkutsk, I boarded the Trans-Mongolia Railroad. I watched the sunrise over Lake Baikal as we departed at 5 a.m. Several hours later, I could still see the lake. We arrived at Ulan Ude, about 100 kilometers south of Irkutsk. The city, 600 meters above sea level, sits at the base of a mountain and is divided by the Ude River. The scenery began to change, with wild horses running in front of rolling hills and yellow savannah.

Two-hundred-fifty-three kilometers from Ulan Ude, we neared the Russia-Mongolia border at Naushki Station, where there was a wait of several hours while passports were checked. We continued for a half hour to Sukhbaatar for a longer inspection by Mongolian border guards. (Third pro tip: No pictures at Sukhbaatar. The guards are said to confiscate cameras if you do.)

After switching trains, the traveler can venture south to Ulan Ude (Lernidee Erlebnisreisen/File)

It took eight hours to reach Darkhan, the second largest city in Mongolia, where we stopped for a half hour before the last 200-or-so-kilometers to Ulaanbaatar, my final destination.

But that is another story. As others slept, I took the journal out of my bag and ticked Traveling across Siberia to Mongolia off my bucket list.The city of Semarang in Central Java is host to numerous interesting destinations, including many that can be visited at night.

Below are some the places that are best visited during the night in Semarang as compiled by kompas.com:

Lapangan Pancasila

A post shared by REDI EKA PUTRA  (@redi_able) on Feb 2, 2018 at 7:15am PST

Lapangan Pancasila (Pancasila Field) or more popularly known as Simpang Lima Semarang is especially crowded in the evening. Situated in the city center, it serves as the city's icon as well as a must-visit location for first-time tourists.

Other than watching the city traffic and marveling at the surrounding buildings, you can also rent a decorative bicycle or ride on a decorative becak (pedicab) to circle the area.

Kota Lama Semarang

A post shared by Safitri Echa (@echaayank) on Jan 30, 2018 at 5:13am PST

Also alive during the night, Semarang's Old Town is home to colonial-era heritage buildings that serve as an interesting photo backdrop. The surrounding lamps make it an even more beautiful site to enjoy, similar to the charms of European cities in the evening.

Read also: Four eye-catching spots to see in Semarang

Tugu Muda Park

A post shared by Dion bin Jalil (@dion_annafis) on Oct 12, 2016 at 5:05am PDT

The park is located in the city center, right in front of the famous Lawang Sewu, which is why it is very popular among tourists even after hours.

The Tugu Muda monument changes colors and is the icon of this neat park, which also provides Wi-Fi coverage.

Tabanas Park

A post shared by Hind (@hindradman) on Nov 25, 2017 at 6:37am PST

Situated on higher ground on Jl. Setiabudi, Ngesrep, Banyumanik, this place is convenient for those seeking to enjoy a view of Semarang from above.

It also hosts several cafes, perfect for spending some quality time while dining with friends and family. (kes)The Palembang city administration in South Sumatra launched two new tourist destinations on Sunday, namely Tepian Sekanak Bersolek and Kampung Mural Gudang Bonjiet.

The city's Tourism Agency head Isnaini Madani said the two spots were part of Palembang's 13 highlighted tourist destinations prepared to welcome the 2018 Asian Games in August.

"Following its popularity on social media, now Tepian Sekanak Bersolek and Kampung Mural Gudang Bonjiet have officially become tourist destinations to welcome both domestic and foreign tourists," said Isnaini as quoted by Antara on Sunday.

Read also: Garuda to open direct flight from Makassar to Palembang

The development of the two places, which feature colorful images and patterns, is said to be the result of a collaboration with PT ICI Paint Indonesia in South Sumatra as part of its corporate social responsibility program.

"Employees of Palembang city's Public Works Agency and student volunteers worked together to paint the destinations," added Isnaini.

Tepian Sekanak Bersolek is said to be a pilot project as the city administration seeks to beautify all rivers across Palembang. "We are targeting to make all river areas prettier, but considering the current budget we will focus on Sekanak River first." (kes)Reading is traditionally a solitary activity, which might make it a less than popular way to celebrate Valentine's Day. But maybe you're going to spending The Most Romantic Day of the Year by yourself. Maybe your SO is miles away, working or simply not available. Or maybe you're both bookworms and reading together is your idea of heaven.

Whatever your reasons there is never a bad one for picking up a book. We've put together a list of ten romantic reads you may not have come across before and which might make Valentine's Day 2018 your best one yet.

Persuasion, by Jane Austen

We're starting off classically, but with a slightly more unusual choice than many of these lists. Persuasion is the last full novel Jane Austen wrote before she died, and was the first (alongside Northanger Abbey) to be published under her name. Unlike her earlier romances, this one concentrates on lost love: the heroine, Anne Elliot, once broke off her engagement to Captain Wentworth as her family and friends disapproved. When he reappears in her life, this 27-year-old old maid has some serious decisions to make. Much more mature and thoughtful than Pride and Prejudice, it still offers the same delicious gossip, intrigue and amusing characters and, of course, romance galore!

Attachments, by Rainbow Rowell

In a much more modern move, this 2011 novel is told via e-mails, as an epistolary novel for the 21st century. Lincoln O'Neill's job is to read company e-mails and issue warnings for inappropriate usage. Instead, he finds himself drawn into the friendship between Jennifer and Beth and falls head over heels for the latter. In an age where we might first become aware of somebody via their social media, this poses the ultimate question: how on earth do you explain your Facestalking in a way that doesn't make you seem like a creeper?

The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets, by Eva Rice

This book has it all: romance, rock n roll, rambling country mansions and really good dialogue. Set in 1950s England, the main characters are Penelope Wallace's eccentric family and friends, from her beautiful but vague mother to ambitious but distracted brother. This is one to be read with tea and cakes and a slick of red lipstick either on your lips or on your collar, entirely up to you!

The Truth About Forever, by Sarah Dessen

Sarah Dessen's books are always a pleasure, but this one gives us the wonderful Macy and Wes, who bond over catering jobs and games of 'truth'. It's not without its heartache, in the death of Macy's father before the book begins, and her inability to connect with her mother, but the strength of the friendships she builds with Wes and his friends makes this a truly memorable and romantic book.

A Little Life, by Hanya Yanagihara

At over 800 pages, this isnat one to be approached lightly. Its subject matter is also pretty heavy going, from self-harm and abuse, to identity issues and suicides. I know a it doesnat sound especially romantic. However, if youare somebody who likes the tortured love of films and plays such as Rent, this book should appeal to you. Four college friends try to make a name for themselves in New York, but everything always comes back to one question: is Jude okay? The answer is, most definitely not, but the agony and the ecstasy of this is really worth your time.

The Notebook, by Nicholas Sparks

If long reads put you off, this is much quicker, lighter and frothier, and you probably already know the story. True, it's devoid of Ryan Gosling and Rachel MacAdams, but it has its own strengths. Sparks has almost written two love stories here: the tale the narrator tells, and that between himself and his wife. Even the hardest of hearts will be affected by the ending of this, and then you can watch the film again afterwards!

The Unexpected Everything, by Morgan Matson

Another great YA novel. Andie's summer is turned upside down when her father steps back from his political career and her pre-med summer programme is cancelled. She's left at a loose end and takes the only job she can find: dog walking. Through this, she has the most unexpected summer she could ever have imagined, meeting new people, learning new skills, and finding out who she really is. At 500 pages, it's a hefty chunk of book, but it is so readable that you'll fly through them.

Reader, I Married Him, edited by Tracy Chevalier

Twenty-one modern female writers have contributed stories to this anthology, which takes the iconic line 'Reader, I married him' from Jane Eyre and interprets it as they see fit. The beauty of short stories is that you can never become bored, and that you can dip in and out as you see fit - which might make this the perfect book for Valentine's Day. It's also a great opportunity to come across some new writers which might spur you on to investigate their other work.

The Rosie Project, by Graeme Simsion

Don Tillman lives his life according to strict routines and he sees no reason why he shouldn't apply the same logic to finding a wife. He develops a questionnaire to try to find the perfect life partner, but he soon finds out that life doesn't really work like that. Rosie, for example, is definitely not the right girl, but he soon finds himself heavily involved in helping her to find her father. This is a reminder that love isn't neat and simple: it's messy, unpredictable, unexpected and confusing, but also wonderful. This is an incredibly funny and touching book - a must-read.

The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern

If you haven't come across this novel before, go and find a copy now. It's hard to say exactly what makes this such a great book - in fact, it's hard to really describe the book at all. It has been compared to Harry Potter and Twilight due to its mixture of romance and fantasy, but the non-linear narrative makes this feel much more adult and literary. The Circus of Dreams is a wandering circus which only appears between sunset and sunrise, and in the dark of the night, apprentices Celia and Marco are used to settle an ancient grudge - seriously, just read this!Both are female beauty icons, and both tweeted problematic tweets about the GazaIsrael conflict in 2014. And that is where the similarity ends.

Wonder Woman actress Gal Gadot hardly needs an introduction. Shes a brand ambassador for Revlon and the face of Gucci Bamboo fragrance. She has a strong social media presence, with 15.9m followers on Instagram and 1.62m followers on Twitter . Shes been described as the ultimate badass for breaking gender barriers as Wonder Woman.

Amena Khan is a beauty blogger. She has almost 400,000 subscribers on YouTube and her videos have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times. Her Instagram presence is even more impressive, with 577,000 followers, and she has become a fashion icon for hijab-wearing women. She shot to national and international fame when she first appeared in a LOreal advert for their signature True Match foundation . Her most recent campaign saw her appear in a LOreal shampoo advert in her hijab, in what was described as a game-changing campaign. So far so good.

But following the emergence of several tweets posted by Khan condemning Israels military action in Gaza in 2014, the beauty icon has been accused of being anti-Israel and she quickly resigned from the campaign. Her carefully drafted resignation statement was clearly intended to swiftly but respectfully distance her comments from the LOreal inclusivity campaign. But some have questioned why that relationship ended  and who really ended it.

Gadot also tweeted during the same 2014 military assault on Gaza in support of the Israeli army, in which she once served. Gadot has not faced similar censure for this, despite the fact that the United Nations Independent Commission of Inquiry on the 2014 Gaza conflict found that the conduct of both parties amounted to violating multiple international laws.

When Gadots tweets emerged, she was accused of supporting the killing of civilians  and the Wonder Woman film was widely boycotted in countries such as Lebanon, Jordan and Tunisia. But Gadot did not feel pressure to resign from any beauty campaigns as a result of her political views.

This article is not about Gaza, it is about the rights of each women to voice an opinion. So from a feminist perspective, how do their positions compare?

Intersectionality explained

Feminism is a broad concept and encompasses many schools of thought. In todays modern and global society, there is a need to take an intersectional approach

Such an approach acknowledges that not all women are the same and not all women suffer from the same discriminations. A white upper-middle class woman is not going to face the same discriminations as a black working-class woman, for example. The white middle-class woman may face discrimination through unequal pay for equal labour as compared with men. But the black working-class woman may face the same issue, while also facing racist discrimination which may result in her not even being interviewed for the job to begin with. Despite both being women, they are not treated in the same way.

Each woman has a number of characteristics which intersect and in some cases may lead to greater discrimination. The 2010 Equality Act , which protects against discrimination on the grounds of sex, unfortunately does not extend its protection to intersectional characteristics. This is a major shortcoming in the legislation.

In the 1980s, the current director of SOAS, Valeria Amos, accused white feminists of ignoring the particular struggles faced by black women  including racism  and instead prioritising issues which would benefit a small number of white middle-class women, such as equal pay and job sharing. Almost 35 years later, has much changed? The difference in treatment experienced by Khan and Gadot in response to their opposite positions on a political issue suggests not.

Gadot is a beautiful white woman, who is portrayed as a strong soldier, an Amazon of Greek mythology. Khan on the other hand is a beautiful Asian Muslim woman who wears the hijab. Research shows that Muslim women face significant discrimination. The unemployment rate for Muslims in the UK is more than double that of any other group, and hijab wearing Muslim women in particular experience greater discrimination  65% of unemployed Muslims are women. So L'Oreals inclusivity campaign was much needed.

Unequal treatment

For such women, the characteristics of being female, non-white and Muslim intersect to lead to added discrimination compared with that faced by white women on the whole. This is not recognised by the law. Yet the far-reaching consequences of this can be seen starkly in the treatment faced by Amena Khan and Gal Gadot. Khans quick exit from the LOreal campaign suggests that she is not entitled to hold a political view on the war in Gaza in 2014. Gadot, on the other hand, faced no such repercussions for airing her views, suggesting she is entitled.

Was the problem that Khans comments were indefensible, or that they could not be identified with by L'Oreals demographic? Is it that this group do not share some or all of Khans character traits  being Muslim, being Asian, being a mother? These are traits which are fundamental to her identity and no doubt influence her opinions and life choices  just as having pets and commuting to work would have an impact on a womans views on animal cruelty, train fares and equal pay. Both views are valid and valuable. For L'Oreal, a truly inclusive campaign means taking account of the existence of all this diversity.Kendallville, IN (46755)

Today

Sun and clouds mixed. High 87F. Winds WSW at 10 to 20 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy this evening with more clouds for overnight. Low 64F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph.Mr. Chief Justice and Members of the Supreme Court Bench

Representatives of the Executive and Legislative Branches of Government

Members of the Diplomatic Corp

The President and Members of the Bar

Members of the Clergy

Members of the Press

Mr. President of the Trial Judges Association and members of the Association

Judicial employees

Other Distinguished ladies and gentlemen

Let me first express my gratitude to His Honor Roosevelt Z. Willie, President of the National Association of the Trial Judges of Liberia and officers of this association of great men and women for doing me such a great honor by selecting me, amongst my learned colleagues to be the Guest Speaker at the 7th National Trial Judges Conference. However, my appreciation of this great honor is challenged by the fact that you have restricted me to speak on the theme: THE ROLE OF JUDGES IN THE SUSTENANCE OF PEACE. I consider this topic to be a very difficult one at this time in the history of our country and the level of conflicts in many parts of the world today.

Permit me, Your Honors, lest I be held in contempt, to modify the topic given me by confining my speech to Liberia, in order to avoid being broad. Therefore, by your permission, I will speak to you on the modified topic: THE ROLE OF JUDGES IN THE SUSTENANCE OF PEACE IN LIBERIA. The role of judges is to interpret the laws of Liberia, as directed by article 20(b) of the Constitution of Liberia, without sale, denial or delay. In the performance of this role by judges and magistrates, the right to life, liberty, property, security of the person and privileges are protected. Also, in the performance of their role as interpreters of the law, a person or group of persons may be sentenced to life or lose their properties.

The decisions that magistrates and judges make, therefore, have life-changing effects on the parties that appear before them. The duty that magistrates and judges perform in society is the most sacred, of all the duties performed by the functionaries of government in our system of government. How can the performance of such a role sustain peace in Liberia? In order to answer this question, it is important too, first deal with some of the challenges that judges and magistrates face in the performance of their function.

The first challenge is that judges and magistrates work in a branch of government that does not control the national budget of the country. So, what can judges and magistrates do to keep the peace? In order for judges and magistrates to have the logistics to function, the Legislature and the Executive must agree in the budget preparation and approval processes to look with favor on the request of the judiciary for budgetary support. This is often difficult because the Legislature and Executive Branches of Government are controlled by politicians and for politicians to keep their job, unlike judges, they must rely on the approval of the citizens of Liberia on each Election Day. These politicians in the Legislature and Executive branches, therefore, often allocate more money for the building of roads, clinics, schools and other development initiatives that the people can see. The interpretation of the law, as very important as it is to sustaining peace and harmony, is not a concrete thing that anyone can see. It is not quantifiable or easily measurable. No presidential or legislative candidate can easily win election on a platform that emphasizes what he or she will do for judges upon taking office. This is one challenge for judges.



The second challenge that judges face is their dependence on the Executive Branch of Government for their security and the execution of their judgments and orders. As provided by the Constitution of Liberia, the execution of a courts order and judgments are done by a Sheriff, an officer of the Executive Branch. Also, the prison where judges commit accused persons and convicts are controlled by the Executive Branch of Government. Therefore, when the executive decides not to admit anyone who has been committed to jail by a judge or to execute orders and judgments of the courts, there is nothing that judges can do.

The President of Liberia can direct a sheriff not to execute an order or judgment of a court and there is nothing that the court can do about it. Such action by the President is an obstruction of justice and undermines the rule of law. Yet, there is nothing that a judge can do about it. Such arbitrary action was, once, taken by President William V. S. Tubman in 1971, who in fact was an associate justice of the Supreme Court before becoming the President of Liberia. In the case: Ghoussalny v Nelson et al reported in 20 LLR 591, decided in 1972, President William V. S. Tubman, not wanting the judgment of the Civil Law Court to be enforced by the Sheriff of Montserrado County, who at the time was Sheriff P. Edward Nelson, wrote him the following letter instructing him not execute the courts judgment:



"The Executive Mansion "Monrovia" Sir:

"You are hereby commanded not to serve any Writ of Execution or other relevant document emanating from the Civil Law Court in an Action between the L. M. Ericsson Telephone Company and Mr. Arif Ghoussanly until otherwise ordered by the Chief Executive. Fair not at your peril.

Given under my hand this 22nd Day of April 1971

WILLIAM V. S. TUBMAN, President of Liberia.



This letter of the President clearly obstructed justice, undermined the authority of the judge and made him meaningless to the party in whose favor the judgment was being enforced. This action of the President was contrary to the doctrine of separation powers. Although the President was not alive when this matter was decided by the Supreme Court, there was nothing that the Court could have done to him, even if had been alive. Under Liberian Law, the President is immune from judicial proceedings.

Interestingly, such misconduct of a president is not unique to Liberia. A similar action was once taken by a president of the United States of America, President Andrew Jackson. The Supreme Court of the United States in the case: Worcester v. Georgia, decided in 1832, overturned the conviction of Samuel Worcester for being on Native American Land without a license. But President Andrew Jackson was not happy with the Supreme Courts decision. Therefore, he was reluctant to enforce the decision of the Court. Here is what he is quoted to have said, in reaction to the courts decision,  Chief Justice John Marshall has made his decision. Let him enforce it.

Both Presidents Andrew Jackson of the United States and William V. S. Tubman of Liberia were wrong. Under the doctrine of separation of powers, each branch of government is compelled to respect the functions of the other two branches of government. Without that there would be total chaos in government. In order for judges to be effective in the performance of their function, and to play a meaningful role in the sustenance of peace in Liberia, the Executive Branch must cooperate with judges.

The third challenge that judges face is that, unlike members of the Executive and the Legislature, judges cannot go to the press to explain their actions. Most often the press does not report on what happens in the courts. Therefore, the ordinary people tend not to be informed about decisions made by judges. In Liberia, that situation is improving, at least with the deployment of judicial reporters at the Temple of Justice and many parts of the country by the Liberia Broadcasting System and other news organs. The people of Liberia can only be persuaded by what happens in the court if they are informed. Good judgments rendered by judges regarding the right to life, liberty, property, and security of the person have the potential of sustaining the peace. However, if people are not informed about such good judgments they cannot appreciate the work of the court and be guided by it.

In a situation of such challenges, what can judges do to sustain the peace? To answer this question, I asked ordinary people in the streets of Monrovia about the role they think judges can play in Liberia to sustain the peace that we have had for 15 years. I got the following responses: Judges must be honest in deciding cases that come before them; Judges must be neutral and impartial, that is, they must treat all parties before them equally; Judges should avoid being in fraternal organizations like UBF, Masonic Craft, etc, because they could be influenced by the rules and sanctions of such fraternities;  Judges should avoid being chairman or members of boards of any organization because they could make decisions favorable to those organizations; Judges should not be pastors or Imams, because they could favor members of their congregations; judges should not be members of civil society organizations; Judges should refrain from taking bribes no matter how great the temptation; As much as practicable judges should have limited interactions with members of the public; Judges must always be careful about what they say in private conversations with people; Judges must always uphold the dignity of the high office they occupy by the way the conduct themselves in and out of court. When I asked at the Carey Street Atayee Shop known as CENPID on how all of what they were saying about the dos and donts of being a judge could sustain peace, their answer was that if judges conduct themselves in the way they were thinking, then judges will have integrity and with integrity their decisions will be respected by party-litigants and the entire Liberian people. Then they went further, the more party-litigants develop respect for judges, the more they will rely on the courts to resolve all disputes, rather than taking the law into their hands. When most of the Liberian people develop the belief that judges only rely on the law and evidence to decide who is right or wrong in cases that come before them, they will develop more respect for judges and the courts will become trusted tribunals for the peaceful resolution of disputes. I agree with them. It is important to note that the views expressed by the ordinary people that I randomly interviewed are somehow reflected in the Judicial Cannons that control the conduct of judges in Liberia.



It is not every dispute in Liberia that is taken to court. Some are taken to community leaders, chiefs, religious leaders and civil society leaders. But when disputes are taken to the courts of our country the parties who appear in court expect to get nothing less than transparent justice, based on evidence and the law.

Of the many suggestions made by the ordinary people that I interviewed, the one advice that I must join them in giving the judges is the one that has to do with the avoidance of accepting bribe. None of the persons that I spoke with presented me evidence against any judge. In fact throughout our judicial history the only case of bribery that was ever brought against a member of the judiciary branch was the one brought against Magistrate Stralatum E. F. Cadogan, of the City of Monrovia in 1890, Cadogan v RL , 1 LLR 523 (1890) . The magistrate was found guilty but the conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court because the evidence showed that a return was not made to the writ of arrest served on the magistrate. Since then, there has been no case of bribery brought against a magistrate or a judge. Most of the reported cases on bribery have been against members of the trial jury. But members of the public continue to hold the view that judges are bribed. This view of the public is, sometimes strengthened by press statements by public figures. For example, the late former Minister of Justice, Jenkins K. Z. B. Scott was held in contempt of Court by the Supreme Court for accusing the judiciary of bribery in the following words,

Public confidence in the Liberian Judicial System is at its lowest ebb ever due to the unprofessional tendency of most judges in the handling of cases; that recent daily reports reaching me from clients of several lawyers speak of lawyers and judges soliciting payments from clients but failing to deliver services. It is easier today in Liberia to prosecute a poor man successfully against government and win the case as a result of the unprofessional practice of most judges, than to convict a rich man in the court of law. Never in recent times has a so-called rich man lost a case before our courts, due to the high rate of monetary and individual interest among lawyers. If funds were available to keep surveillance on jury tampering, bribery, among others, a lot would be discovered involving some well known judges. Judges have a tendency to individualize things; and there are very few professionals in the country today."

Although, there has been no case brought before any of our courts or the Judiciary Inquiry Commission over a period of more than hundred years against any judge or magistrate for bribery, it is important to discuss the issue of bribery in order to advise judges and magistrates to resist all temptations to engage in bribery because bribery undermines the trust and confidence of the public in the integrity of judges and magistrates and thereby make it difficult for judges to play any meaningful role in sustaining the peace.

Bribery is the most deadly and effective means by which public confidence in the integrity of any public servant is eroded. Bribery reduces a public servant such as a judge or magistrate to a mere commodity that can be purchased by the highest bidder. When a judge takes a bribe, whatever little respect the bribe-giver has for him or her immediately vanishes. There is no small bribe. A bribe of one million dollars and a bribe of one dollar have the same grade under our penal law. Bribery is a second-degree felony, irrespective of the amount received or the value of the thing received. It should also be noted that the one who bribes a judge will never keep it secret. When a Liberian man or woman says, Dont worry about that judge; I will take care of him. The notion that is immediately carried is that he or she knows how to influence the judge, most often with money or valuable. If for example, a client tells a lawyer, I met the judge and he said you should go for the assignment, the question that will come to mind is why a client should find it easier to get a judge to agree to issue an assignment in a case than a lawyer. This kind of conduct of a judge erodes public confidence in the justice system. The way to avoid that is to improve on calendaring so that on the basis of first come first serve, without the request of a lawyer or a client, cases can be automatically assigned by clerks of courts, in order to reduce the frequency of ex-party contact with a judge.



Therefore, I recommend that this conference come up with a resolution on how to deal with the suspicion of bribery that hangs over judges and magistrates. I strongly believe that judges and magistrates are properly situated to deal with the menace of bribery. The first step that I suggest for judges and magistrates to take in this direction is to immediately hold in criminal contempt any lawyer or party-litigant who bribes or attempts to bribe a judge or a magistrate, for example, to approve a bond or release a prisoner from jail or perform any other judicial function. Bribery is contemptuous because it tends to undermine the integrity of a judge or a magistrate. A judge or magistrate who is considered to by lawyers and party-litigants to be without integrity cannot sustain the peace.



Not too long ago many judges and magistrates in Ghana were disgraced for accepting bribes and dismissed based on a recording done by a journalist who had a spy video recorder. If it happened in Ghana, it can happen here, too. Judges and magistrates should be careful because times are changing and the world is getting more and more sophisticated. Some judges tend to tell lawyers and party-litigants to leave their phones outside when entering their chambers. What such judges probably do not know is that there are over 12 types of spy video and audio recorders, including, pens, wristwatches, glasses, bracelets, buttons, just to name a few and they are cheap. Also, some are so small that they can hardly be noticed. Therefore, phones are not really the instruments of choice for a person who may want to spy on a judge or a magistrate. THE BEST THING TO DO IS NOT TO ACCEPT A BRIBE. Even, if a judge tells a bribe-giver to deposit his or her bribe money in his or her account, that deposit can be traced by the financial intelligence Unit (FIU). Consequently, the only role that judges and magistrates can play in sustaining the peace is to perform their roles as the priests and priestesses of justice with the highest degree of integrity.

I thank you.

What is your take? Please post your comments below:

President George Forky Klon Jlaleh Gbah Ku GbehTarpeh Manneh Weah

Liberia is lagging behind countries that gained their independence over 100 years after Liberia gained its independence. This is because our leaders do not pay attention to education nor have agenda that will benefit the country in the long-run. The campus of the University of Liberia which appeared to be a friendly zone for President George Manneh Weah during the presidential election, became unsympathetic and rancorous with the burning of tires, chanting battle cries and waving banners expressing their disenchantment with Dr. Ophelia Weeks, President of the University of Liberia and demanding her resignation. We witnessed similar demonstration or go-slow a few months ago at the Tubman University, another public institution of higher learning against the administration of the current president, Dr. Edward Wonkeryor.



Barely two weeks old government is currently faced with a multiplicity of challenges inherited from the past government of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

As was expressed by President George Manneh Weah, in his inaugural address, the country is broke: this explains the daunting challenges ahead in responding to the basic needs of the people in the midst of unmanageable expectations.

According to reports, the protest was triggered by the refusal of Dr. Ophelia Weeks to allow students who had paid their fees into the University accounts to complete their registration and begin classes. It is estimated that around 8,000 students are affected by this decision which began three months ago. The students were seen sloganeering, burning tires and subsequently barricaded the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which has served for the past twelve years as the official office of the President of the Republic of Liberia.



The protest led by the Vanguard Student Unification Party was heard through their president, Deybro, articulating that the student masses are resolved to ensuring that Dr. Weeks resign as her decision to stop 8,000 students from registering is unacceptable and immature.



Given the tense nature of the situation, the Liberia National Police was seen intervening, ensuring that there are law and order. Also seen on the scene were scores of high profile personalities attempting to quite the tension but the students were heard rejecting their intervention and demanding that president George M. Weah (country giant) come and talk to them.

But this is not only unique to the University of Liberia: a few months ago the engineering students of Tubman University went on a go-slow against the incompetent and corrupt administration of Dr. Edward Wonkeryor.



Following the 2005 elections in Liberia, which ushered in a democratically elected government, President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf made efforts to reopen the institution. On July 30, 2009, William V. S. Tubman University was established by an Act of Legislature. Dr. Elizabeth Davis Russell was appointed as the first president of the university. After she left, Dr. Edward Wonkeryor replaced her. But unfortunately for the educational dream of the southeast, he is said to have come with an agenda.

From the onset, he reportedly told residents that Maryland gained independence in the 1800s, whereas Nimba County became independent in 1964, implying that nonetheless the latter is more developed. He continued the rant by saying that Nimba Countys taxpayers pay the bulk of the money to keep the TU afloat, therefore preferential treatments in the form of admission and employment must be given to Nimbaians. Since his arrival, he has been operating in accordance with the agenda. He has two payrolls: one is the actual payroll and the other is the padded payroll sent to the Finance Ministry. Some members of his inner circle receive two salaries, according to news reports. His current salary and benefit exceed $17,000 per month. Currently, Dr. Wonkeryor is in Monrovia and has not returned since the start of the go-slow. Students from other colleges of the university have joined the go-slow and there seems to be no end in sight.

Apparently, Marylanders are caught between a rock and a hard place. From the get-go, they had opposed his appointment because he is neither a native of Maryland nor from the region. Other Marylanders countered that the actions were xenophobic, and the President of Liberia had the authority to appoint whomsoever she/he wants to head a national institution. Dr. Wonkeryor was appointed and confirmed, but his actions since arriving at the institution have vindicated the mistrust of those who doubted his qualification and commitment to higher education in the county. Allegedly, he even enrolled a niece bypassing admissions requirements. Others claim he has the board members of the University (including Dr. Kateh who serves as the chair of the board, leases his properties to the same university, and who was recently appointed by President Weah as Deputy Minister of Health) and some media outfits in his pocket. He claims that former V. P. assured him that he was to become minister of education. He now behaves like an attack dog, attacking any more qualified person that he thinks would have interest in becoming president.

Lastly, whatever the true story is, the Ministry of Education in conjunction with the Maryland County legislative caucus of the Weah administration should investigate the issues raised during that go-slow by the students in the College of Engineering and Technology during their recent demonstration last year. We cannot emphasize enough how essential effective engineering education is to sustainable development in Liberia. The college needs qualified dedicated instructors, and state of the art equipment to meet the challenges facing the nation; such as infrastructural development in roads, communication, sanitation, energy power, water resources, manufacturing, digital technology and a host of technical areas without which the country would continue to lag behind other countries in the ECOWAS sub-region.

Liberian leaders must not behave like we are still in the 1960s: when Presidents Kwame Nkrumah, Kenneth Kaunda and Nassar of Egypt were building dams, Liberia opted to buy Tiger Generators. This is why Liberia is still in the dark. The Weah administration MUST make better choices to move the country forward to justify the confidence reposed in him by the Liberian populace. People in his way who by hook of crooks became heads of the institutions of higher learning MUST go.

What is your take? Please post your comments below:

This Week's Top Football Performers: Two players from top-rated Class 9A De Smet lead the way

De Smet is the No. 1-rated Class 9A team in the state and the undefeated Bulldogs spearhead the list of area performers in Week 4 of the South Dakota high school football season.Thank you for reading!

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remaining of

Thank you for reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading.What's a Flower Bar?

continued

Huey opened the shop in September with her husband, Brett, and their two daughters, Cece and Anna. Though the selection of flowers and plants diminishes in the winter, a collection of buckets is available for customers to choose their own bouquet or have Laura pick one for them. Either way, it's then wrapped in a burlap coffee bag.



In addition to flowers, there's a cafe serving coffee and tea drinks, smoothies, and baked goods from Livonia's Cantoro Italian Market. There's also a large selection of local artisanal gifts: toffee from Novi, tea towels from Wixom, bath bombs from South Lyon, at least four different brands of handmade candles, plus lotions, jewelry, jams, and more. A shelf of brightly colored dog treats is Cece's pet project--she wants to work in a dog rescue organization when she graduates from Wayne State in May.



There aren't many places to sit: when winter came, Huey moved in the shop's only table and chairs from outside, and there isn't room in the crowded interior for more. She anticipates the cafe will do most of its business when people can sit outside in warmer weather.



The building previously housed another flower shop, Bokay's; when the owner left the business in 2014 due to health issues, the Hueys saw a chance to fulfill a longtime dream of a small family business. It took three years to redo the parking lot and interior and persuade Salem Township to rezone the corner. That gave them time to visit other businesses for ideas and merchandise. "We went to every store in Michigan!" laughs Huey.Duma Works is changing the waypeople think about hiring. They are efficiently connecting employers andpotential hires through our mobile platform, we make finding that perfectperson a fun experience, allowing businesses to grow and job seekers to accessnew opportunities. Duma Works is a recruiting platform that fuses traditionalhuman-centered recruiting and an interactive digital process to simplify howgrowing businesses hire top talent on the African continent. Since 2012,hundreds of employers all over East Africa have used DUMA Works to save timeand money when identifying qualified job candidates. They are recruiting for avaluable client, a reputable solarenergy for profit company in Uganda.If anything happens to me, please tell my story. This was...The Trump administration on Friday announced it will continue much of the Obama administrations nuclear weapons policy, but take a more aggressive stance toward Russia. It said Russia must be convinced it would face unacceptably dire costs if it were to threaten even a limited nuclear attack in Europe.

The sweeping review of U.S. nuclear policy does not call for any net increase in strategic nuclear weapons  a position that stands in contrast to President Donald Trumps statement, in a tweet shortly before he took office, that the U.S. must greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability until such time as the world comes to its senses regarding nukes. In his State of the Union address Tuesday, he made no mention of expansion, though he said the arsenal must deter acts of aggression.

A 74-page report summarizing the reviews findings calls North Korea a clear and grave threat to the U.S. and its allies. It asserts that any North Korean nuclear attack against the U.S. or its allies will result in the end of that regime.

It also cast China as a potential nuclear adversary, saying the U.S. arsenal is tailored to prevent Beijing from mistakenly concluding that it could gain advantage by using its nuclear weapons in Asia, or that any use of nuclear weapons, however limited, is acceptable.

The Pentagon-led review of the U.S. nuclear arsenal and the policies that govern it was ordered by Trump a year ago. In a written statement, Trump said U.S. strategy is designed to make use of nuclear weapons less likely. In an apparent reference to the threat of catastrophic cyberattack, he said the U.S. aims to strengthen deterrence of major attacks against the U.S. and its allies, including those that may not come in the form of nuclear weapons.

Known officially as a nuclear posture review, and customarily done at the outset of a new administration, the report drew blistering criticism from arms control groups.

President Trump is embarking on a reckless path  one that will reduce U.S. security both now and in the longer term, said Lisbeth Gronlund, a senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists. She said the administration is blurring the line between nuclear and conventional war-fighting.

The Trump administration concluded that the U.S. should largely follow its predecessors blueprint for modernizing the nuclear arsenal, including new bomber aircraft, submarines and land-based missiles. It also endorsed adhering to existing arms control agreements, including the New START treaty that limits the United States and Russia each to 1,550 strategic nuclear warheads on a maximum of 700 deployed launchers.

The treaty, negotiated under President Barack Obama, entered into force on Feb. 5, 2011, and its weapons limits must be met by Monday. The U.S. says it has been in compliance with the limits since August and it expects the Russians to comply by Mondays deadline. As of Sept. 1, the last date for which official figures are available, Russia was below the launcher limit but slightly above the warhead limit, at 1,561.

Moscow has repeatedly stated its intention to meet those limits on time, and we have no reason to believe that that wont be the case, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Thursday.

The Pentagons nuclear review concluded that while arms control can advance American interests, further progress is difficult to envision, in light of what the U.S. considers Russias aggression in Ukraine and violations of existing arms deals. Administration officials briefed Russian and Chinese officials Friday prior to the reviews public release.

The Trump nuclear doctrine breaks with Obamas in ending his push to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. defense policy. Like Obama, Trump would consider using nuclear weapons only in extreme circumstances, while maintaining a degree of ambiguity about what that means. But Trump sees a fuller deterrent role for these weapons, as reflected in the plan to develop new capabilities to counter Russia in Europe.

The administrations view is that Russian policies and actions are fraught with potential for miscalculation leading to an uncontrolled escalation of conflict in Europe. It specifically points to a Russian doctrine known as escalate to de-escalate, in which Moscow would use or threaten to use smaller-yield nuclear weapons in a limited, conventional conflict in Europe in the belief that doing so would compel the U.S. and NATO to back down.

Recent Russian statements on this evolving nuclear weapons doctrine appear to lower the threshold for Moscows first-use of nuclear weapons, the review said.

The administration proposes a two-step solution.

First, it would modify a small number of existing long-range ballistic missiles carried by Trident strategic submarines to fit them with smaller-yield nuclear warheads. John Rood, the undersecretary of defense for policy, declined to provide an estimate of the cost, saying it would be partially included in the 2019 budget that will be submitted to Congress later this month. He said the missile would be fielded in the near term, but he refused to be more specific.

Second, in the longer term, the administration would develop a nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile  re-establishing a weapon that existed during the Cold War but was retired in 2011 by the Obama administration.

Robert Soofer, a senior nuclear policy official at the Pentagon who helped direct the policy review, said Moscow is likely to push back on the U.S. plan for fielding those two additional weapons.

Im sure they wont respond well, Soofer said Thursday.

The press secretary at the Russian Embassy in Washington, Nikolay Lakhonin, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

(AP)Mexicos foreign relations secretary said Friday that it might come as a surprise but his countrys relationship with the United States today is more fluid and closer than it was with previous U.S. administrations.

Mexico has had well-publicized disagreements with President Donald Trump during the past year over trade, immigration and payment for a proposed border wall. But Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Videgaray said that with the Trump administration, were committed to having a very close communication and that has proven to be a tremendous benefit for the relationship.

It might be surprising to some people, but thats a fact of life, Videgaray said at a joint news conference in Mexico with U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland. The three countries are currently renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement.

Tillersons stop in Mexico kicked off a six-day Latin America trip that will also take him to Panama, Argentina, Peru, Colombia and Jamaica. He was greeted in Mexico City by a handful of protesters holding up signs reading Dreamers, Trumps hostages, and We are workers, not terrorists, not criminals.

The three spoke about security concerns, especially the trafficking in opiates and synthetic opiates like fentanyl that have caused a wave of overdose deaths.

Given the deadly nature of the opioid crisis, we must do more to attack the business model of those who traffic drugs and guns, said Tillerson.

Asked about reports of Russian meddling in Mexicos July 1 presidential elections, Tillerson said we know that Russia has fingerprints on elections around the world  my advice to Mexico would be to pay attention.

The three officials said they also discussed the political and economic crisis in Venezuela and its governments decision to push up presidential elections to April under conditions that opponents say overwhelmingly favor President Nicolas Maduro, who is so far the only candidate.

We shared our concerns for the humanitarian crisis that has unfolded in Venezuela, Tillerson said. We all urge the Maduro regime to return to free, open credible, democratic elections.

Videgaray was quick to note that Mexico has limits on how far it will go in pressuring Venezuela.

Mexico will in no case support any option that implies violence, Videgaray said.

Tillerson said the United States wants to see a peaceful transition.

If President Maduro would return to the Venezuelan constitution, restore the duly elected assembly, dismantle the illegitimate constituent assembly and return to free and fair elections, then hes happy to stay and run in the free and fair elections, Tillerson said. If he wants to step aside and let someone else run in them, thats fine.

Venezuelan officials condemned Tillersons remarks earlier Thursday at the University of Texas. Tillerson said that throughout the course of Latin Americas history it has often been the military which has stepped in to manage a peaceful transition.

That stung the Venezuelan government, whose soldiers have reportedly been going hungry like much of the rest of the population.

Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez went on state television Friday, flanked by a half-dozen military officers in uniform, to denounce Tillersons comments. He said Venezuelas military is united and would never succumb to the influence of a foreign power.

You dont know what you are doing, he said. I invite you to correct yourself.

Venezuelan officials accused Tillerson of using his current trip to increase pressure on governments around the region to join the U.S. in a perverse plan of aggressions against Venezuela.

(AP)Emergency: Daniela OBrien has asthma and a nut allergy

Holidaymakers taking a trip this half term should cast an eye over their travel policies long before they head for the airport.

If they simply buy on price they could find their cover falling woefully short if they need to claim. Industry figures show four in 10 buying single trip insurance opt for the lowest level of cover offered.

The Financial Ombudsman Service, which mediates on complaints between customers and insurers, says buyers must check a policys fine print.

This is because most of the 900 disputes it ruled on in the final quarter of last year centred on misunderstandings over what a policy covered.

One element of cover often misunderstood is the right to financial recompense if a policyholder can no longer travel.

This is where Rebecca Kingsley came unstuck when her policy refused to meet her claim even though she was forced to cancel her holiday through no fault of her own.

Insurance small print was the last thing on Rebeccas mind when she organised a romantic weekend away to Dublin with her longstanding boyfriend.

The 23-year-old wanted to celebrate Valentines Day 2016 in style. She paid for the flights, a hotel and pre-booked tickets to the citys zoo at a total cost of 550.

But a few weeks later her partner dropped the bombshell that their relationship was over. Although upset by the break-up, Rebecca kept a cool head and set out to claim on her travel insurance for the cost of her dashed plans.

Rebecca had purchased a standard single trip travel insurance policy through a price comparison website. But like many travellers she opted for one near the top of the list, indicating it was keenly priced. She paid some 10  but the plan offered no cancellation cover at all.

I HAD A MEDICAL SCARE IN THE US - WITH NO TRAVEL INSURANCE Medical emergencies abroad are expensive  and make up the largest portion of travel insurance payouts. But many holidaymakers with health conditions take the risk of not buying travel cover simply because they are scared off by the high premiums quoted. Daniela OBrien suffers from asthma and a nut allergy. She was so fed up with being quoted sky-high premiums  usually 600 plus  that a couple of years ago she took the risk of travelling to the US without cover. The 33-year-old commercial lawyer, from Prestwich, Greater Manchester, was in San Antonio, Texas, when she suffered a reaction to something she ate and went into anaphylactic shock. She says: My husband called the emergency services while a first aider used my Epipen to inject me. The paramedics wanted to send me to hospital but I was afraid we would not be able to afford the thousands of dollars required on top of the 450 we had to pay the paramedics. My husband sat up all night to make sure I was OK. Recently, Daniela saw a Co-op Insurance travel policy promising cover for people of all ages and health conditions. She says: I want to visit my parents who have bought a house in the Italian lakes so I was looking for European cover. It costs 103 for me and my son Sebastian for an annual plan  and it will cover my health conditions. I was so relieved as I do not want to travel without cover again. Cancer sufferers are being offered reductions in premiums by specialist travel insurer AllClear after it found medical expense claims were lower than expected. A single trip policy to France for a 66-year-old diagnosed with lymphoma in the last five years would now pay 156  12 per cent less. Anyone struggling to find affordable cover can try a specialist broker. Use the British Insurance Brokers Associations Find a Broker service on 0870 950 1790 or visit biba.org.uk.

Research conducted by website GoCompare indicates that some bargain policies do not offer cancellation cover as standard  25 of around 939 single-trip products searched.

It also found that the maximum level of cover offered differs widely, from 500 to 20,000 a person.

Another area to watch is the excess  the amount a policyholder must pay towards each claim. Some insurers charge nothing while others expect policyholders to contribute as much as 250 towards the bill.

When she attempted to recoup the cost of the holiday, Rebecca only received 90 back for her flights  and that was from the airline.

After reading her travel policys wording she discovered she was not covered for cancellation and was left out of pocket by about 450.

She says: I was so annoyed. Not only had my boyfriend broken up with me, I could not change the names on the flight tickets and was definitely not going to travel alone.

'I not only had a broken heart but also lost a lot of money.

Had Rebecca scrolled further down the listings from her online search, she might have picked up superior cover for just a few pounds more.

She plans to do this soon as she is refreshing her plans to visit Dublin. She says: I will be going with a reliable friend this time  and will buy the correct travel insurance to be sure I am covered for any unforeseen situations.

Fiona Macrae, of website Travel Insurance Explained, says: With cheap policies there will be a lot more exclusions on cancellation.

Most standard insurance plans will cover the cost of cancelling a holiday if the policyholder or travelling companion falls seriously ill; a close relative dies; the traveller is called up for jury service; made redundant; or has a problem with their house such as a flood or burglary.

They may also be covered if their passport is stolen within a week of departure (so long as the theft is reported to the authorities). None of these will be covered if they were known before you took out the cover.

The consequences of an airline cancelling flights  as Ryanair did to thousands of passengers last year  would not be covered by most travel policies as it is up to the airline to compensate customers. Airlines should refund the cost of flights or find alternatives. They may also offer additional compensation.

Macrae recommends that a traveller looks for a policy that includes cancellation for any situation beyond reasonable control. She maintains Rebecca would have been covered under such a policy as she had booked her trip in good faith and did not expect to be jilted by her boyfriend.

As few as five per cent of travel policies are thought to include such a clause.

Macrae says: Rebecca could have been covered for this by paying about 5 more for a policy. That is not a lot of money in the context of the cost of a holiday.

Shock: Rebecca cancelled her trip to Dublin when her relationship ended

Providers include Postcard Travel Insurance and Saga. Post Office and Marks & Spencer also offer wider cover than many.

Not all policies will cover the cost of pre-paid excursions such as Rebeccas planned trip to the zoo. It is important to look for this in the small print if they are an important feature of a holiday itinerary.

Even top notch cancellation cover will have restrictions. Policyholders will need to provide evidence to back up any reason for cancelling if requested  and there will be no payout simply because a person no longer feels like going away or cannot afford to take the trip any more.

More than 10 per cent of policies offer a discount to buyers opting out of cancellation cover.

Anders Nilsson, spokesperson for GoCompare, says: Frankly, it would be bonkers to lose that element of cover unless you were buying your insurance close to departure date.

Kevin Pratt, travel expert at product comparison service MoneySuperMarket, says: Holidaymakers should always purchase cover when they book a trip, even if it is months ahead. The cancellation cover kicks in straightaway.Charlie Mullins, the plumber who has made a 75 million fortune from stopcocks and blocked pipes, could be forgiven for retiring to one of his luxury villas on the Costa del Sol after turning 65 at the end of last year.

But instead, the self-made man  who grew up on a council estate and left school at 15 to pursue his passion for plumbing  is about to embark on a new challenge: running to be elected as Mayor of London.

If Mullins wins the 2020 election, he would succeed Labours Sadiq Khan. Im not here knocking him, Mullins insists, before doing just that, bashing Khan for failing to step up to the mark, and criticising him for not having a big enough character.

True blue: But plumbing boss Charlie Mullins says Prime Minister Theresa Mays Cabinet colleagues should oust her

I believe that a businessman is better to be Mayor of London with the knowledge hes got than one of those posh politicians.

Perhaps Khan shouldnt be the only politician watching his back. As a major donor to the Conservative Party and an active anti-Brexit campaigner, Mullins has already established himself as an influential character in national politics. The ambition and self-belief needed for an even higher office are not in short supply.

And unlike Khan, Mullins could not be accused of lacking personality. He is a flamboyant sort, with a Rod Stewart-style spiky hairdo, orange tan, blue suit and blue Pimlico Plumbers tie, neckwear that hints at his political hue.

Sitting back on a black leather sofa, sipping a cup of tea  with three sugars  he is unequivocal. F****** ell, I love Thatcher, he says, breaking off mid-sentence and nodding his head towards his treasured statuette of the late former Prime Minister that is perched on his office fridge.

Such is his passion for the Iron Lady that Mullins instructed his staff to wear black armbands when she died in 2013. Pimlico Plumbers vans, known across the capital for their themed number plates  BOG 1, F1 USH and S1 NKS  were emblazoned with portraits of her on their doors in another act of homage to his heroine.

Mullins set up his company from the basement of an estate agents office in 1979, the same year Thatcher came to power.

He says he was inspired to launch his company by her passion for private enterprise.

Despite his admiration for her and other former Tory grandees, like Dave and George, Mullins is planning to run for London Mayor as an independent candidate  even though his firm has donated 65,000 to the party since 2015.

Perhaps that is because Mullins does not see eye to eye with the partys current leader, Theresa May. Or, in his words: Were not drinking from the same teapot. I dont know what planet shes on.

Mullins and May are not even drinking from the same champagne bottle. Shortly before Christmas he was barred from attending the Tories Black and White fundraising ball, he says, despite offering to buy a table for 15,000, because of his criticism of the leader.

Theresa May had no right, he says, still seething. That money, its not about her. And I was told by some Ministers that they thought she shouldnt have done that.

The incident came shortly after he suggested that if May was a chief executive, she would have been sacked. He also called on her Cabinet colleagues to grow a pair and oust her. Mrs May could have taken some solace from the fact he described Jeremy Corbyn as a t*** on BBC Radio 4 last year.

Driving force: Pimlico Plumbers pulls in revenues of 30 million a year

Nearly 40 years after launch, Pimlico Plumbers has branched out  Mullins now offers electrical, roofing and locksmith services. The firm pulls in revenues of 30 million a year, and employs nearly 500 people.

And Pimlico House  the South London headquarters of his company  is designed in his image. The reception walls are plastered with signed messages from his celebrity clients  Hugh Laurie, Michael McIntyre and Keira Knightley, to name a few. Photographs of Mullins with Theresa May  in happier days  and Prince Charles also hang proudly in the reception.

The office has its own gym and roof terrace. It boasts a life-size model of Prince Charles enjoying a bubble bath, with the Duchess of Cornwall  wearing nothing but a towel  standing alongside him.

Mullins obsessions with all things plumbing have paid off. He is believed to have built up a personal wealth of around 75 million. The father of four, who married his second wife Julie in Las Vegas, has two Bentleys and a 5 million Belgravia home in addition to two villas in the Costa del Sol.

He is also scathing of the Prime Ministers ability to manage people, suggesting she has allowed one colleague in particular to get away with undermining her.

Boris mugs her off every week, dont he? says Mullins, referring to Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson. She needs to be strong and put people in their place. If hed done that at Pimlico, hed be washing vans. Or Id put him in charge of a broom.

Mullins views on Johnson are complicated. As a vocal supporter of the Remain campaign, he recently accused Johnson of talking complete b******* when the latter claimed the UK could save even more than 350 million a week to spend on the NHS after Brexit.

He also feels Johnson lacks common sense  an attribute he intends to put at the centre of his campaign to be London Mayor.

Overall, however, he says he was impressed by Johnsons performance as Mayor of London between 2008 and 2016. I gotta be honest with you, I thought he done a great job, he says. I mean, silly as a********, you know what I mean? But he made changes I believe were for the better  the bikes, the buses.

Mullins is lining up a number of eye-catching policies himself. Free travel for apprentices  which he hopes will reduce crime because people in jobs dont go round stabbing people.

Faster airport expansion, though he doesnt specify where: All it needs is someone to bang a few heads together.

And a solution to the housing crisis: I dont know about building houses, but I do know they cost money. And I do know that if youve got a business guy involved with it, and hes got a good business brain, well find the money from somewhere.

As a blond bombshell with an entrepreneurial background and shoot-from-the-hip manner, Mullins is inevitably attracting comparisons with the businessman who shocked the world after being elected the 45th President of the United States in 2016.

He is keen to reassure Londons voters. Some people are trying to say to me: You think youre becoming a bit of a Donald Trump,  he says. No, I aint. I dont agree with how he carries on.'Reality': Royal Bank of Scotland chairman Howard Davies

Entrepreneurs caught up in RBSs controversial global restructuring group GRG have told how they were bullied by bank staff.

A Financial Conduct Authority report has criticised the lender for insensitive, dismissive and sometimes unduly aggressive behaviour towards smaller clients.

In the case of an entrepreneur who was a foreign national, the FCA report  prepared by analysts Promontory  found there were emails containing mimicry that was disrespectful of the customers nationality.

And when a separate client complained to the bank of cynical and bullying tactics, their relationship manager threatened them with LPA receivership, a form of property bankruptcy.

Another entrepreneur told The Mail on Sunday that GRG boss Derek Sach threatened him with a decade of litigation if he sued the bank.

The customer had been forced to pay a significant sum after RBS slashed the companys overdraft without warning.

The cases echoed with businessman Lawrence Tomlinson, who first raised GRG mistreatment allegations.

He said: The majority of businesses who discussed their experience with me recounted a heavy-handed, rude and intimidating relationship.

Property entrepreneur David Russell, who is suing RBS, said at one stage in his dealings: The [banker] had his feet on the desk, swinging back in his chair. He threw his keys on the desk, which means if you dont like it throw your keys in on the properties.

Alistair Jack, Tory MP for Dumfries and Galloway who ran a self-storage firm, said RBS bankers twice threatened to put him into GRG, on the basis of out-of-date accounts.

He added: Their whole manner was aggressive and threatening.

RBS said it has not seen evidence such behaviour was widespread.

But last week, chairman Howard Davies said of claims that staff had been insensitive and aggressive: To some extent perception is reality.Money down the drain: Britain's biggest Government contractors have lost billions of pounds in value since the summer

Britain's biggest Government contractors have lost billions of pounds in value since the summer amid increasing concerns about their financial stability.

Analysis by The Mail on Sunday shows that the collapse of Carillion and a series of profit warnings from six rival Government outsourcing firms have wiped 7 billion off the value of their shares.

Last week, Capita  the outsourcer that deals with everything from collecting the BBC licence fee to running services for local councils  was the latest to feel the pain after another major profit warning. That forced it to scrap its dividend and draw up plans to raise 700 million through a rights issue.

New chief executive Jon Lewis said the firm was too widely spread across different markets and too focused on acquisitions to drive growth. The companys share price almost halved in one day as investors panicked in the wake of Carillions failure.

Investors, including celebrated fund manager Neil Woodford, who had recommended the stock just two weeks earlier, were unnerved by Lewiss radical action and many hurried to sell their shares.

Capita quickly sought to calm the market and Government fears. But its share price slump is the latest in a string of shocking updates from outsourcers in recent months.

Since July, Capitas share price has slumped nearly 80 per cent, wiping 3.5 billion off its market value.

The collapse of Carillion  which was worth 800 million in the summer  has left its shareholders with nothing. Babcock, the engineering support services firm, has lost 1 billion in value over the same period, while Serco and G4S, both of which run prisons for the Government among other things, have together lost more than 1 billion.

Interserve, a support services firm that works on Government contracts, has lost two-thirds of its value over the same period as it shrank by 230 million.

Kier, the construction firm, has lost nearly 200 million.

The nature of the problems for the main outsourcers Capita, Carillion and Mitie was just poor management, said one City analyst.

If there is anything linking them together, its companies being a little optimistic about some of the accounting. It really comes down to management being able to price contracts properly and being able to have a hold of conservative accounting.

But he added a note of optimism, saying: I dont think any of the other companies are headed in the same direction as Carillion.

However, The Mail on Sunday revealed last month that short-sellers were circling other firms, betting a total of 500 million that their share prices would tumble.

Interserve is the most shorted outsourcer, with 13 per cent of its shares on loan to hedge funds, while 8 per cent of Capitas shares were in the hands of short-sellers.

Cabinet officials met Capitas bosses on Wednesday and moved to play down comparisons with Carillion, which went bust last month.

Outsourcers have become known for booking sales in advance on long-term contracts. Mitie is being investigated by City watchdog the Financial Conduct Authority after restating its accounts for 2016. An internal review found that its accounting was less conservative than that of its rivals.

Last year, Capita also moved to the new accounting standard known as IFRS 15. Sources said contracts were previously booked as revenue earlier than was prudent. Capita is understood to be hatching a plan that could wipe out its 381 million pension deficit.

Lewis, who arrived shortly before Christmas, has already told staff of the plan that will include using some money from the sale of assets.

Capitas directors have also said they plan to raise 700 million in new funds to help shore up the balance sheet.

Investigations into the collapse of Carillion are ongoing.

Its former executives, including former chief executive Richard Howson, face a grilling from MPs on Tuesday over the firms woes.The predator behind the biggest hostile bid for a British company in almost a decade has met with dozens of shareholders in engineering giant GKN.

Melrose Industries bosses, including chief executive Simon Peckham, are understood to have targeted priority shareholders in GKN in a bid to pressure its management into talks.

Midlands-based GKN rejected what it described as Melroses derisory 7.4 billion bid on Thursday.

Defending: Anne Stevens is the new boss of Midlands-based GKN

GKN, led by American Anne Stevens who was thrust into the chief executive seat only last month, must now file details of an updated strategy to fend off Melrose within two weeks.

The predator has offered to shovel 150 million into the disputed 1.1 billion GKN pension deficit, which is likely to put pressure on the targeted firm to follow suit.

GKN launched an attack on Melrose last month arguing that the bid only offers a fake premium to shareholders because of the way it is structured.

There has also been talk of national security concerns. Peckham retorted: Were a UK quoted company run by people whove run a UK quoted company for 30 years. Which bit of the UK national security do you not think wed be interested in?

Bidding: Melrose Industries chief executive Simon Peckham

Speaking to The Mail on Sunday, he said the question for shareholders is: Would you like the Melrose management team  or a slightly reconfigured version of the GKN management team which is partly responsible for getting you to where you are today?One in eight residential care homes in England is failing to meet statutory standards of quality and safety despite some charging more than 220 a day.

The Mail on Sunday has learnt that 2,108 homes have never passed an inspection in four years and have been ordered to make improvements or been threatened with enforcement action or closure.

Dozens of those on this Care Quality Commission blacklist are owned by well-known providers including HC-One, Bupa, Four Seasons, Care UK and Barchester.

Concerned: Andrea Sutcliffe, chief inspector of regulator CQC

Around a quarter of the 16,000 care homes in the UK are currently classed as requiring improvement or inadequate by the CQC.

Failings often centre on a lack of staff which can leave residents unattended for long periods.

Tensions between the regulator and the industry have been rising, with operators more than ready to challenge critical findings, even if few complaints are upheld.

Campaigner Martyn Lewis said: Firms have very little to lose by challenging critical CQC reports.

Some operators on their websites simply downplay critical reports.

Last week, the spat became public when Ideal Care Homes attacked the regulator after failing to prevent publication of a critical report about its Ashworth Grange home, in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire. The CQC had branded it inadequate last September and Ideal had initially held up publication.

Paul Farmer, the firms managing director, said Ideal had sought an injunction because of material inaccuracies in the report.

Andrea Sutcliffe, the CQCs Chief Inspector, has spoken of her concerns, saying: We should not be content that people in vulnerable circumstances cant rely on the care and support we would want our own loved ones to experience.

In addition to requiring improvement and inadequate, the CQC can also award good ratings or even outstanding.

But numerous legal challenges are underway, including from Barchester and HC-One, even though ratings have only been changed in 21 cases out of more than 450.

Sarah Whitebloom is editor at OlderLivingMatters.netProperty mogul Vincent Tchenguiz has lost control of a string of Hilton hotels after the investment vehicles that own them fell into administration with 250 million of debt.

The Iranian-born investor owns ten Hilton-branded properties  including a flagship outlet in Kensington, West London  through a series of investment vehicles.

The hotels are owned through companies under his Zinc Hotels umbrella. They are part of his empire of around 300,000 properties in the UK.

Glamour: Vincent Tchenguiz with sister Lisa, right, and Shadi Ritchie, wife of his pal, investor Bruce Ritchie

US-based Hilton pays rent to Zinc to operate the hotels under its name.

The properties have been on the sale block for around two years, but have not been sold despite attracting wide interest and several bids. The sale process is continuing.

Tchenguiz and his fellow Zinc director Dror Pasher signed off on 250 million of loans in 2014 from the GLAS Trust Corporation Limited.

GLAS is understood to have pulled the plug last month. Zinc Hotels (Holdings) went into administration alongside 24 other companies in the Zinc group.

The administrators, Alix Partners, said the commercial operations of the hotels remain unaffected.

At the peak of the property boom, Tchenguiz, 61, said that he and his younger brother Robert, 57, were both billionaires. The pair were arrested by the Serious Fraud Office in 2011, hours before they were due to host a party aboard their yacht at an annual property fair in the South of France.

The SFO later admitted the investigation, launched in connection with suspected fraud at the bust Icelandic bank Kaupthing, was unlawful.

Shortly after the SFO raid, Vincents property management company, Peverel Group, went into administration. He described it as a direct result of the very public commencement of the SFO investigation.

The brothers were eventually awarded a combined 4.5 million in damages. Vincent also received a settlement from Kaupthing.

Vincent bought a stake in the hotels from Hilton in 2002 and later bought them outright. The prize asset in the group is the 603-bed Hilton hotel in Kensington.

The others are in York, Nottingham, Tewkesbury, Northampton, Croydon, East Midlands Airport, Leeds, Watford and Cobham.

In 2016, he launched a 110 million lawsuit against Hilton, claiming it had let the hotels deteriorate into such poor condition that it breached the leases. It is thought another legal dispute may be on the near horizon between Vincent and Hilton.

Robert and Vincent Tchenguiz were both born in Iran, although they are Iraqi by heritage. Their surname is the Persian for Genghis  the Mongol emperor.

For sale: The tycoons ten Hilton hotels are on the market

Thanks to their jetset lifestyles and lavish parties  such as Roberts 100,000 Louis XIV-themed 40th birthday  their personal lives have attracted as much interest as their business dealings.

Robert dated the model Caprice, before marrying American model and health guru Heather Bird, from whom he is amicably separated. Vincent has never married, but is often seen with a female companion.

Their sister Lisa went through a divorce from South African food and drink entrepreneur Vivian Imerman, who was dubbed The Man from Del Monte after he sold his share of the fruit juice business for 380 million in 1999. She appeared in a BBC 2 documentary, Millionaires Ex-Wives Club, earlier this year.

Vincent Tchenguiz declined to comment.Private members club Soho House is lining up a stock market listing that could value the chain at 1.4 billion.

The business founded by chief executive Nick Jones, has 18 outlets including Soho and Mayfair in London and further afield in Barcelona, Berlin, Malibu and New York.

The original club opened in Greek Street, Soho, in 1995 and the chain now includes bars, hotels, restaurants and cinemas. It was originally established as a home from home for celebrities and those in the media industry but now attracts a wider clientele of globetrotting executives and the wealthy.

Plush: The business founded by Nick Jones, has 18 outlets including Soho and Mayfair in London and further afield in Barcelona (pictured)

Shareholders include US private equity baron Ron Burkle, who owns 60 per cent, restaurateur Richard Caring, and Jones, who is married to Desert Island Discs presenter Kirsty Young.

Jones last month celebrated the reopening of the Soho club inviting his 300 original members and 300 people who have recently signed up. Celebrities included comedian Steve Coogan and TV presenter Gary Lineker.

The company is understood to be mulling a listing on the New York stock exchange. Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan have been appointed as advisers, according to Sky News.

The money raised in the share sale is expected to support further international growth. Soho House declined to comment.A cold-calling claims firm which allegedly bombarded Britons with 200 million phone calls has been raided by Government officials and police.

Officers swooped on the offices of Himaa Group in Nottingham and removed computers after more than 12,000 complaints from the public.

The companys Porsche-driving director, Mian Arshad Mubashar, 32, is suspected of being part of a network of cold-calling kingpins with links to a centre in Pakistan.

Porsche-driving director Arshad Mubashar, director of the Himaa Group, outside his home in Nottingham

Investigators from the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) believe Mubashar and his cronies have made two million cold calls per week since 2015.

Inquiries are ongoing into what would be one of the worst-ever cases of persistent cold-calling in Britain. The firm could be in line for a record fine.

It comes after a company behind 99.5 million nuisance calls was fined a record 400,000 last year.

The latest investigation was launched after large numbers of people complained about receiving calls in which an automated voice said they could claim thousands of pounds in compensation following a car crash. The calls randomly targeted people whether or not they had ever been in an accident.

Officers from the ICO, police and the Claims Management Regulator raided the second-floor office of Himaa Group at Blenheim Court on December 13. The company was established in August 2015 but has yet to file any accounts.

Mubashar was previously a director of a firm called Direct Claims Ltd, which closed in 2012.

Himaa Group are based in this building in Nottingham. Mubashar claims it is delivery company

His wife Valina Arshad, 28, was the director of Claim 4 Compensation Ltd, which was dissolved in 2014. Both list their nationality at Companies House as Pakistani.

Mr Mubashar confirmed his business had been raided when approached at Himaa Groups offices last week by a Mail on Sunday reporter.

But he claimed he was an innocent party, adding: They thought we might be part of a cold-calling operation but we are actually a delivery company. One of my former partners, they were looking for him.

However, he refused to give the mans name. Our reporter also spoke with one of his employees, who said: These people arrived with a warrant and took the computers. I am really not allowed to say who the overall boss is.

ICO group manager Andy Curry said: This is a lengthy and complex inquiry involving several individuals and a network of companies, both in the UK and overseas.

We are hopeful the evidence we are gathering will help put a stop to a group of individuals and companies we believe is responsible for making hundreds of millions of nuisance calls.MBABANE  Extraditing Shan Rethenam from Singapore to face a litany of alleged fraud related charges amounting to E4 billion in Swaziland could have been very difficult.



Extraditing means to hand over a person accused or convicted of a crime to the jurisdiction of the foreign state in which the crime was committed.



Based on the complexities of Singaporean laws, it was going to be a mission nearly impossible to hand over Rethenam to Swaziland.

Rethenam, the former boss of Salgaocar Swaziland, is based in Singapore where the requisition for surrendering fugitives to foreign states is not easy to get  even through a court order.



Investigations into Singaporean law unearthed that Swazilands Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) was expected to answer critical questions or meet stringent requirements before Rethenam could be arrested in Singapore and extradited to the Kingdom of Swaziland.



The first requirement is to ascertain if the charges preferred against the person, in this case Rethenam, did not have some political connotations. For clarity, the Singapore Attorney General was expected to first determine if Rethenam did not commit an offence of a political character in Swaziland.



The political character debacle



Legal eagles close to government told the Times SUNDAY that the difficulty emanates from Singapores definition of political character as it is understood to mean an offence against the law of a foreign State or declared by the Commonwealth.

(1) Sicelo Dzodzo Zikalala/Luthungo, (2) Mbuso Ncaza Nkosi and (3) the unidentified suspects who are the individuals suspected to be on the CCTV footage. (File pics)

MBABANE  He is on the run from the police for allegedly killing someone yet he too professes to hate killers.



Mbuso Ncaza Nkosi, whose picture was released by the Royal Swaziland Police on Friday, has been revealed as the third prime suspect in the murder of businessman Victor Gamedze.



Nkosi, who fled the country after allegedly committing the heinous crime, has a habit of venting his anger at men who abuse women.

He has revealed this side of him through posts he made on his social media site - Facebook where he had been active even yesterday.



A number of individuals, upon seeing that he was active on Facebook, sent him threatening messages and telling him that the long arm of the law would eventually catch up with him.



Judging by his last update, Nkosi is going through a tough time as he posted the message Hard Living on his timeline at around 5pm yesterday.



This led to some of his friends asking him what was wrong.

Whats wrong Mbuso? Injobo ithungelwa ebandla, wrote one of his friends

In one of Nkosis posts, he expressed his madness at women abusers.



I hate guys who kill our lovely and sweet sisters. Just wish all those monsters must rot in hell where they belong, he wrote in one of his posts last year.



Nkosi also revealed on social media that he has a daughter he loved very much. In one of his numerous posts where he complains bitterly about women abusers, he talks about the fact that he wants to ensure that the area he lives in is safe from women beaters and molesters because he too has a daughter.



Although he is wanted in connection with the heinous crime of murder; his Facebook posts reveal a softer side to him.

Im really sick and tired of these cowards who attack woman; if I can find them, hell will break I hv a daughter and Im living in fear of this jecks nxsa.(sic)MBABANE  He was not called a shrewd businessman for nothing. Neither was assassinated businessman Victor Gamedze a wannabe entrepreneur. He was a real time business mogul.



The gunned down Gamedze had businesses, most of which it was not publicly known belonged to him, in nearly every key sector of Swazilands economy.

The Times SUNDAY has been able to get information on almost eight companies in which Gamedze was either the sole owner or a co-director.



One such company is Swayz Marketing (Proprietary) Limited, which Gamedze co-owned with Michelo Shakantu. They both held an equal stake of 500 shares in the company, which was incorporated in terms of the Swaziland Companies Act on September 22, 2017.

The companys core objectives entails carrying on the business of merchandise including but not limited to the distribution of cellular phones and any other gadgets related thereto.



Both Gamedze and Shakantu are co-founders and shareholders of Swazilands second mobile telecommunications operator, Swazi Mobile.

Swayz Marketing also carries on the business of managing and enhancing the business of other companies, providing marketing strategies and advises in business development.



The companys other objective is to purchase, develop, sell, lease, lease to and/or in exchange or otherwise acquire lands, farms, estates, ranches, buildings, lots and any movable or immovable property and any interest therein and rights over the same within Swaziland or elsewhere. Another objective is to do business as may be necessary or incidental to the attainment of the objects of the company.



Serjeant Investments is another company in which Gamedze is owner and co-director with one Lomkhosi Gcinile Yvonne Dlamini.

Serjeant Investments is reportedly the company that owns the state-of-the-art glass house building that houses Swazi Mobile inside the capital citys main street  Gwamile.FINANCIAL

BERKSHIRE BANK

Justin Buchanan joined as vice president, business banking officer for the greater Capital Region. Buchanan previously served as vice president, business banking market manager at Citizens Bank.

Lori Gazzillo was promoted to senior vice president and director of the Berkshire Bank Foundation. Gazzillo previously served as vice president.

HEALTH CARE

SOUTHWESTERN VERMONT MEDICAL CENTER

Martha Roberts joined as a nurse practitioner in the emergency department. Roberts previously worked in the emergency department at INOVA Alexandria Hospital in Virginia.

MEDIA

PATIENT EXPERIENCE PROJECT

Nudrat Zoha joined as a member of the digital team. Zoha previously worked as an associate campaign specialist at Oracle.

NONPROFITS

NORTHERN RIVERS FAMILY OF SERVICES

Claude Peart joined as a home finder for Schenectady County foster families through the Give Hope a Home foster care campaign. Peart previously served as a residential supervisor from 2007 through 2013.

PROFESSIONS

AQUATIC DEVELOPMENT GROUP

Jim Dunn was promoted to president. Dunn, a registered architect with more than 30 years of experience specializing in aquatics, joined in 1988.

HYMAN HAYES ARCHITECTS

David Loucks was promoted to managing partner. Loucks previously served as a principle and has more than 20 years of experience.

Justin Pechar joined as a partner. Pechar, who has more than 20 years of experience, will serve as a principal and director of structural engineering.

GOLDBERG SEGALLA

Kimberly A. Sierra joined as an associate in the workers' compensation practice group. Sierra previously worked at Travelers and focuses on counseling New York-based employers, insurers and third-party administrators through all stages of the workers' compensation litigation process.

WERTIME, RIES & VAN ULLEN PC

Sign up for The Knick  Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter.

Katherine Hentnik was named of counsel. Hentnik has more than 15 years of real estate law experience and focuses her practice on all aspects of residential real estate transactions, including buyer, seller and lender representation.

HINCKLEY ALLEN

Isabelle J. Cantanucci joined as an associate in the construction & public contracts group. Cantanucci's practice will be focused on construction law.

SERVICES

LYFT

Derek Wedgeworth joined as market manager for upstate New York. Wedgeworth, who previously worked at the Howard Hughes Corp., will oversee local operations and growth while liaising with local drivers, passengers and business communities.

THE ADELPHI HOTEL

Helen Watson was promoted to general manager. Watson, who has more than 20 years of experience, previously served as director of rooms.

MOHAWK AMBULANCE SERVICE

Ann DeVost joined as human resource director. DeVost previously worked at Daughters of Sarah Senior Community.

 Jennifer PattersonAMSTERDAM  When Iris Pacheco arrived in Amsterdam from Guanica, Puerto Rico, on Dec. 16, she was most looking forward to taking a bath with warm water.

"The simple, normal things were a luxury to have," she said while reflecting on the living conditions in her hurricane-ravaged hometown. Speaking in Spanish through a translator at Centro Civico's Amsterdam headquarters, she added lights and the internet to her list.

Pacheco is one of 109 Puerto Ricans  50 children and 59 adults  who came to Amsterdam to escape the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, which devastated the island in September. To this day, nearly half a million Puerto Ricans are without electricity, and many do not have access to clean drinking water. But with the help of the local community and Centro Civico, the newly arriving Puerto Ricans are slowly adjusting to their new home.

"In October, we started doing fundraising with St. Mary's Hospital to collect money to send water and stuff for Puerto Rico," said Migdalia Quinones, hotline operator for Centro Civico. "We didn't realize that a lot of people from over there were coming here."

Residents of Puerto Rico had been moving to stay with friends and family in Amsterdam, which has a sizable Hispanic and Latino population  26.2 percent according the 2010 U.S. Census.

Centro Civico and St. Mary's refocused, and St. Mary's ended up donating a portion of the $65,000 raised at a benefit concert in November to aid Puerto Ricans coming to Amsterdam, and sent the other portion to Puerto Rico. Centro Civico uses the money to help new arrivals pay apartment security deposits (the Department of Social Services aids with rent) and for personal expenses like winter clothing and personal care items.

"Right now we're not hopeless like we were in Puerto Rico," said Magdelix Veguilla, who arrived in Amsterdam on Oct. 12. She switched between English and Spanish as she spoke. "At least now I have a job, I have money, food and a house."

The roof of her home in Caguas blew off during the hurricane, rendering it unlivable.

In the first two months after coming to Amsterdam, she applied for jobs at Walmart, Target, hospitals and more before being hired by Centro Civico a month ago to help clients apply for Developmental Disabilities services. She and her husband are among people from six of the 42 displaced families Centro Civico works with that have found jobs since arriving.

When asked what else they had been looking forward to here, a room of five Puerto Ricans  all of whom lost their homes in the storm  answered in unison: trabajo, work. All of them had been laid off from their jobs in Puerto Rico after the hurricane.

"About two weeks ago some of them were calling me crying because they have the apartment security deposit and first month's rent, but they don't have a job," Quinones said.

After Quinones received the despairing phone calls, Ladan Alomar, executive director of Centro Civico, reached out to a local Price Chopper manager to see if he could help find jobs for the families. On Friday, he came to Centro Civico to interview applicants for jobs at the grocery chain's Rotterdam warehouse, for which Centro Civico will be providing transportation.

"I have bills to pay in Puerto Rico, and the banks there weren't providing money," said Mariemma Santa of Manati. (When she later got up to leave the room for a job interview, she was trailed by a chorus of buena suerte  good luck.)

"One time I waited in line at the bank for four and a half hours, and they told me all I could get was $50," Alba Pacheco, Iris' sister, added. The pair and their mother are staying with their sister, Rosa, who has lived in Amsterdam for nearly three years.

"Our houses are destroyed, but we still have to pay gas and electric and water," Iris said. "They try to make adjustments and compromise, but their adjustments were just what we normally spend."

Aside from concerns about jobs, the individuals have faced other apprehensions and adjustments since arriving in Amsterdam.

Iris was nervous because she doesn't speak English, but the hardest thing for her was leaving two of her children  a 17-year-old son and 22-year-old daughter  behind in Puerto Rico. All of them miss their friends. Iris' 17-year-old daughter, who did come with her to Amsterdam, is upset she didn't get to go to her senior prom in Puerto Rico, for which she already had a date and a dress. Plus she's having difficulty adjusting to the new culture and school.

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The cold has been another particularly difficult adjustment.

How to help Centro Civico is accepting material and monetary donations for displaced Puerto Rican families. They are currently in particular need of furniture. To donate clothes, furniture and other items, call Centro Civico at 518.842.3762. For monetary donations, visit www.centrocivico.org. See More Collapse

"My mom has been turning the heat up to like 100 degrees," said Rosa. "She refuses to go outside because it's too cold."

Quinones, however, is worried about a more serious adjustment the new arrivals may experience: discrimination.

"All of them are thinking because they are part of the U.S. they're not going to suffer here, they're going to live better here than over there," she said. "But it's not like that. Some of them because the language or culture or tradition are going to receive discrimination and it is hard for them."

At this point, the group is looking forward to establishing their own independence again.

"There's a saying in Spanish that after three days the body starts to smell," said Veguilla, who explained her concern about becoming a burden on the Puerto Rican family she and her husband are staying with in Amsterdam. "I'm grateful to have a job and have people helping me. But when I get my own place, my own car, that's going to be the moment I'm going to be released and enjoying stuff."

At the end of the day, they're happy and grateful to be in Amsterdam, and most of them plan on making their move permanent.

Iris, Rosa and Alba said they were impressed with the efficient operation of doctors' appointments and medicine prescriptions. Veguilla is happy that she gets health care benefits with her job. Jose Santiago, who arrived from Salinas on Jan. 9 and is staying with his niece, said he is comfortable here.

"I came from something very horrific," he said. "But I'm good with being here."

Then, in English, he said: "I like it."Two days after burying his daughter, Fred Scheidt sat down at his kitchen table and emptied her purse.

His eyes immediately went to a supermarket receipt and a phone number written in Katie's handwriting.

"The evidence that poured out of that purse was off the rails," said Scheidt, who had lost his 30-year-old daughter to a heroin overdose the week before. "I sent a text to the investigator: 'I looked through Katie's purse. We need to talk.'"

That moment on Oct. 11, 2014 would start a voracious quest by a grieving father, who was also a retired State Police sergeant, to find the person who gave Katie the drugs that ended her life on the bathroom floor of her Saratoga Springs apartment.

His investigation, which included help from Katie's brother and stepmother, led to a former classmate of Katie's, who would later be indicted by a federal grand jury for distribution of a controlled substance with death resulting. Matthew P. Charo, 36, ultimately pleaded guilty to heroin trafficking and is serving a 10-year sentence at a federal prison in New Jersey.

More than 3,500 people die from heroin or opioid-related overdoses each year in New York, but their cases rarely end like Katie's.

New York has been slower than other states to try the tactic of punishment-as-deterrent in the battle against opioid addiction. There is no state law that allows a dealer to face a homicide charge in overdose death, and the Democratic-controlled state Assembly has not supported bills that would create such a law. Federal prosecutors have secured indictments against dealers like Charo, but U.S. attorneys must review each case to see if there is enough evidence to pursue it. Given the sheer number of overdose deaths, prosecutions of those who provided the fatal drugs are not common.

Vigorous prosecution is also controversial because many of the low-level dealers implicated are addicts themselves.

Scheidt agrees that prevention and treatment are essential. But three years ago, he felt that every day his daughter's dealer was out there was another day a parent could lose their child.

"The price is too great for any type of person to suffer the loss I've suffered," he said. "We have to be able to help other people in the same way."

Deadly overdoses

New York has not seen the rate of overdose deaths experienced in other states like West Virginia, Ohio and New Hampshire, but the problem is escalating.

Fatalities from heroin and other opioids increased more than 50 percent in New York from 2,300 in 2014 to 3,638 in 2016, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Other states with high death tolls have already passed legislation that allows dealers to be charged with a form of homicide.

But New York politicians have generally resisted that tactic, instead attacking the crisis by offering more recovery services, suing prescription drugmakers and attempting to reduce the number of opioids prescribed by doctors.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo's heroin task force last year provided 25 recommendations to address the opioid crisis  none of which mentioned law enforcement or steeper punishments.

Prescription painkillers that contain hydrocodone or oxycodone, which can be highly addictive, have become a gateway into what has become the cheaper, more available opioid on the street, heroin.

In Suffolk County, where the number of opioid-related deaths  316 in 2016 - is the highest of any county outside of New York City, prosecutors have begun trying to get indictments for dealers under state manslaughter charges. But other district attorneys say it's difficult to prove a dealer intentionally caused someone's death under the manslaughter statute.

"The person has to be on notice for some reason that there's a problem with their product," Schenectady County District Attorney Robert Carney said. "I don't see how you could prove recklessness  which is to be aware of the risk and intentionally disregard it."

His office won a manslaughter conviction in 2014 for a Schenectady man who had given fentanyl patches, an opioid that can be 10,000 times stronger than morphine, to his girlfriend in 2008. But in that case, Carney said the burden of proof was met because the man attempted to treat the girlfriend himself for hours after her fatal overdose, instead of calling 911.

Colonie resident Patty Farrell, a former Albany police officer, has championed a state bill for the last four years that would provide a possible homicide charge in opioid deaths  with a good Samaritan clause attached that would grant leniency to those who supplied the drugs but immediately sought help for the victim. The proposed law is named after her 18-year-old daughter, Laree, who she found dead in her bedroom from a heroin overdose in 2013.

"These dealers prey on addicts. It's just as simple as that," Farrell said. "They're lining their pockets while they're killing people."

Greene County had one of the highest rates of opioid deaths, at 25 per 100,000 people, in upstate New York in 2016. Sheriff Greg Seeley said his deputies often administer Narcan, the overdose treatment drug, at the same address multiple times in the same week.

"I'll go any avenue we have to go after these people," Seeley said. "I am totally convinced if we don't go after (dealers), this will continue."

But those working in prevention and recovery push back against that notion, saying they don't want to return to the days of using prison as a way to handle drug addiction.

In sentencing documents filed in Matthew Charo's case last year, his defense attorneys argued that Charo was himself an addict who hoped to get into a treatment program once he reached federal prison.

"The line between dealer and user is almost nonexistent," said Keith Brown, the Albany-based director of health and harm reduction at the Katal Center for Health Equity and Justice in New York City. Brown advocates for providing accessible drug replacement therapy, like buprenorphine, and decriminalizing drug use in America. "To think (arrests) are going to solve a psycho-social issue? We really need to reevaluate that."

Searching for clues

A 2002 Saratoga Springs High School graduate, Katie-Lynn Scheidt had taken college courses, became a certified nurse's aide and was a devoted caretaker to her grandmother. But around 2011, she was struggling with a heroin addiction that started with a doctor's prescription for pain pills, Fred Scheidt said.

In October 2014, she had left a treatment center in Glens Falls and was waiting to go into another in Saratoga County. A week before her death, Katie showed her father a picture of a beautiful young girl she knew, who she thought was in recovery  but who had suddenly died of an overdose. At the time, Fred Scheidt said he took the story to mean his daughter understood the danger of using again. But he now thinks Katie feared she would soon end up the same way.

Opioid overdose deaths are still relatively rare in Saratoga County, with seven reported in 2016. Schenectady County had the most  29  in the Capital Region that year.

Katie came home around 10 p.m. on Oct. 2, 2014, to an apartment she shared with her boyfriend. At around 5 a.m. the next morning, he found her dead.

Katie-Lynn Scheidt overdosed on heroin in early October 2014. The man who sold it to her was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison. (Courtesy Fredrick Scheidt) Katie-Lynn Scheidt overdosed on heroin in early October 2014. The man who sold it to her was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison. (Courtesy Fredrick Scheidt) Image 1 of / 86 Caption Close Saratoga County ex-cop avenges daughter's death 1 / 86 Back to Gallery

Fred Scheidt said he had to lean on the Saratoga Springs Police Department to get them interested in investigating who supplied Katie with the heroin. The department denies that characterization.

"Any suggestion that the Saratoga Springs Police or our state and federal law enforcement colleagues conducted an inefficient, unprofessional investigation, or were unwilling to do so, is in my view, simply not accurate," Saratoga Springs Police Chief Gregory Veitch wrote in a statement to the Times Union.

Fred Scheidt, who has his own private investigations firm, knew from the receipt in Katie's purse that she bought a drink at a Price Chopper on Route 50 the night before she died. Katie also told her boyfriend that she had bumped into someone she knew from her high school named "Matt," and that she rode a bus to Schenectady with him.

Police had called the handwritten number in Katie's purse and spoke to someone who said their name was Matt, and gave what sounded like the last name "Shirro."

Katie's stepmother, Shannon Scheidt, had been going through yearbooks looking for teenagers named "Matt." One night lying awake in bed, she realized that the name "Shirro" might be spelled in a way she hadn't considered. At 1:30 in the morning, she went downstairs and started flipping through yearbooks again, and put a sticky note next to Matt Charo's picture. When Fred Scheidt woke up, she asked him, "Do you think this could be him?"

The dealer is found

In December 2014, Saratoga Springs police obtained camera footage from CDTA of buses that traveled between Saratoga Springs and Schenectady the night before Katie's death and allowed Scheidt to go through the tapes. Watching them on Christmas morning at his Greenfield home, he saw Katie sitting with a man who looked like the teen in the yearbook photo.

Scheidt had been communicating through phone calls, texts and emails with investigators, providing them with information and urging them to push forward in the case.

The U.S. attorney's office in Albany took on the investigation, in part because Charo was associating with another suspect the FBI was interested in, the Scheidt family said.

Throughout 2015, Fred, Katie's stepmother, Katie's brother, and her biological mother also helped by monitoring Charo at his usual Saratoga Springs dealing spots when investigators wanted to keep tabs on him. Katie's biological mother, Eve Cascone, took a photo of Charo during the summer of 2015, when she saw him at a vigil for opioid victims held in Congress Park.

"One of the things it showed (investigators) was we weren't going to go away," Fred Scheidt said of his family's efforts.

Ultimately, investigators interviewed Charo. And when presented with the evidence  which included charges to Katie's EBT food stamp card that Charo traded to buy the heroin from another dealer  Charo pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Albany last year.

Making a federal case

U.S. attorneys are pursuing criminal indictments against opioid dealers under a federal charge that was created three decades ago in response to the crack-cocaine epidemic.

In August, a Syracuse man was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison for selling fentanyl-laced heroin to a pregnant woman who died  the same batch that almost killed the dealer himself two days earlier. The Albany U.S. attorney's office also has pending cases against two other dealers. One of the defendants sold heroin and fentanyl to two different Columbia County residents who died within a few weeks of each other in July 2016; the other case involves a man who died from a heroin overdose in Plattsburgh in January 2016.

When asked about Fred Scheidt's influence in having federal prosecutors take his daughter's case, acting U.S. Attorney Grant C. Jaquith said in a written statement that "the identity and status of a victim's relatives are not considered."

Jaquith provided assurances his office has the current resources to review overdose cases that have been referred from local enforcement agencies. He said prosecutors recognize prevention is the best way to protect public health and safety. But, Jaquith added, "Vigorous enforcement is essential to bring appropriate punishment to those who play Russian roulette with the lives of their customers, as well as to reduce the flow of heroin and other dangerous opioids, deter prospective drug dealers who learn of the high potential penalties, and spread information about the severe harm these drugs cause."

Fred Scheidt said he has since spoken to a handful of other parents who want to know how to get law enforcement to pursue their children's overdose deaths. He said he was lucky that as an ex-cop he knew who to call, and what kind of evidence to push for.

"We know every case doesn't result in a successful outcome," he said. "But if you do nothing, nothing is going to happen."

Lauren Stanforth can be reached at lstanforth@timesunion.com or 518-454-5697.

Digital presentation by Emily Masters.

Visalia, Calif.

As Washington was abuzz Friday over the release of a classified memo, Democrats and Republicans were up in arms over its allegations. And right in the middle was Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., the memo's chief architect.

Here in his home district, a conservative farming region in California's Central Valley, Nunes remains wildly popular and his constituents, by and large, greeted the memo, and their congressman's role at the center of it, with a collective shrug. The memo, which has incited a political firestorm, accused the FBI and Justice Department of abusing their surveillance powers at the start of the investigation into possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia.

Instead, everyone wanted to talk about water, or more precisely, the lack of it.

"He listens, and he really took on the water issue, which is a big fight here," said Tom Pinkham, 47, a plum farmer.

And speaking of water, Pinkham, a Republican, said of Nunes: "No one thinks for one second that he's carrying water for Trump. He's for less government. A no BS guy. That's it."

In this district, Nunes is more closely associated with campaigning for farmers on water issues than anything to do with Russia  pushing for more dams and trying to get more water from Northern California in the face of a shortage that many fear could turn into another drought.

His efforts have largely failed to solve the problem, which his Republican constituents here blame on environmentalists and Democrats in Sacramento, California's capital.

Many people interviewed here Friday were unaware of the memo and the stir it had caused in Washington, or not concerned with it.

"The more information the better," Pinkham said over lunch at Philly's, a cheesesteak restaurant. "The whole thing stinks. I'm not a fan of big government," he said.

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Based in the heart of the heavily agricultural Central Valley, Nunes' district includes miles of farmland, but also parts of suburban Fresno County. Latinos slightly outnumber whites in total population, but that does not necessarily reflect the electorate makeup.

Democrats have made California a prime target in their efforts to recapture Republican seats in the coming midterm elections.

Nunes represents a solidly Republican part of the state and is not on that list: He won re-election in 2016 with a lopsided 67 percent of the vote. That said, Democrats have become increasingly optimistic about making strong showings across California this year, given President Donald Trump's unpopularity. And they have suggested that Nunes might be in their cross-hairs, in no small part because of his role as House Intelligence Committee chair and the contention by Democrats that he is misusing that post to block actions in the Russia probe on Trump's behalf.

Not everyone supports Nunes, and The Fresno Bee, in an editorial, called Nunes "Trump's stooge," for pushing for release of the classified memo.

The editorial said "he (Nunes) certainly isn't representing his Central Valley constituents or Californians, who care much more about health care, jobs and, yes, protecting Dreamers than about the latest conspiracy theory."Washington

President Donald Trump on Saturday claimed complete vindication from a congressional memo that alleges the FBI abused its surveillance powers during the investigation into his campaign's possible Russia ties. But the memo also includes revelations that might complicate efforts by Trump and his allies to undermine special counsel Robert Mueller's inquiry.

The four-page document released Friday contends that the FBI, when it applied for a surveillance warrant on a one-time Trump campaign associate, relied excessively on an ex-British spy whose opposition research was funded by Democrats. At the same time, the memo confirms that the investigation into potential Trump links to Russia actually began several months earlier, and was "triggered" by information involving a different campaign aide.

Christopher Steele, the former spy who compiled the allegations, acknowledged having strong anti-Trump sentiments. But he also was a "longtime FBI source" with a credible track record, according to the memo from the House Intelligence Committee chairman, Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., and his staff.

The warrant authorizing the FBI to monitor the communications of former campaign adviser Carter Page was not a one-time request, but was approved by a judge on four occasions, the memo says, and even signed off on by the second-ranking official at the Justice Department, Rod Rosenstein, whom Trump appointed as deputy attorney general.

Trump, however, tweeted from Florida, where he was spending the weekend, that the memo puts him in the clear.

"This memo totally vindicates 'Trump' in probe," he said. "But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their (sic) was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!"

The underlying materials that served as the basis for the warrant application were not made public in the memo. As a result, the document only further intensified a partisan battle over how to interpret the actions of the FBI and Justice Department during the early stages of the counterintelligence investigation that Mueller later inherited.

Some Republicans are citing the memo, released over the objections of the FBI and Justice Department, in their arguments that the Mueller investigation is politically tainted.

A closer read presents a far more nuanced picture.

"Having decided to cherry-pick, the Nunes team picked a bunch of the wrong cherries for its own narrative," Matthew Waxman, a Columbia University professor and former Bush administration official, wrote in an email.

The memo's central allegation is that agents and prosecutors, in applying in October 2016 to monitor Page's communications, failed to tell a judge that the opposition research that provided grounds for the FBI's suspicion had been partially funded by Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee.

Page had stopped advising the campaign sometime around the end of that summer.

Republicans say a judge should have known that "political actors" were involved in allegations that led the Justice Department to believe Page might be an agent of a foreign power  an accusation he has consistently and strenuously denied.

Steele's research, according to the memo, "formed an essential part" of the warrant application. But it's unclear how much or what information Steele collected made it into the application, or how much has been corroborated. Steele was working for Fusion GPS, a firm initially hired by the conservative Washington Free Beacon to do opposition research on Trump. Steele didn't begin work on the project until after Democratic groups took over the funding.

The FBI this week expressed "grave concerns" about the memo and called it inaccurate and incomplete. Democrats said it was a set of cherry-picked claims aimed at smearing law enforcement and that releasing the memo would damage law enforcement and intelligence work.

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For one, Democrats said Friday that it was misleading and incorrect to say a judge was not told of the potential political motivations of the people paying for Steele's research.

Beyond that, though, the memo confirms the FBI's counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign began in July 2016, months before the surveillance warrant was sought, and was "triggered" by information concerning campaign aide George Papadopoulos. He pleaded guilty last year to lying to the FBI and is cooperating with Mueller's investigation.

The timing makes clear that other Trump associates beyond Page, who was part of the election effort for only a short period and was not in Trump's inner circle, had generated law enforcement scrutiny. The memo also omits that Page had been on the FBI's radar a few years earlier as part of a separate counterintelligence investigation into Russian influence.

The memo focuses on Page, but Democrats on the House committee said "this ignores the inconvenient fact that the investigation did not begin with, or arise from Christopher Steele or the dossier, and that the investigation would persist on the basis of wholly independent evidence had Christopher Steele never entered the picture."

Other details in the memo could also challenge Republican claims of bias. The warrant requested was renewed on three additional occasions, meaning that judges approved it four times. One of the Justice Department officials who signed off on it was Rosenstein, a Trump appointee.

Trump, who lambasted the FBI and Justice Department on Twitter, was asked if he was more likely to fire Rosenstein and if he still had confidence in the official. The president simply said, "You figure that one out."

The memo had been classified because it deals with warrants obtained from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The White House declassified it Friday and sent it to Nunes for immediate release.

That disclosure is extraordinary because it involves details about surveillance of Americans, national security information the government regards as among its most highly classified. The release is likely to further escalate the conflict between the White House and Trump's law enforcement leaders.

Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray had personally lobbied against the memo's disclosure, arguing it could set a dangerous precedent.

The memo's release also comes amid an effort by Trump and congressional Republicans to discredit Mueller's investigation.Few leads in teen's slaying at KCK laundromat December Htoo was killed at a laundromat in December. The case remains unsolved with few leads.

The slaughter of a beloved and innocent local youngster has't inspired community to come forward with information . . . And now authorities ask the public for help in solving this tragic crime. Checkit:Solving Kansas City Teacher Crisis

Downtown Luxury Life Stays Losing

Heating concerns at renovated high-rise apartment complex in KC continue Heating concerns at newly redeveloped high-rise apartments in downtown Kansas City continue. Earlier this week we told you about tenants having issues with their HVAC system at Commerce Tower. Some residents say their windows ice over on really cold nights. It's a widespread issue in the building.

Urban Core Leadership Burnout

Alvin Brooks' daughter, family escape house fire safely The home of Estelle Brooks, daughter of Alvin Brooks, a Kansas City civic leader, was gutted Saturday by a fast moving fire the forced the family to escape quickly from the burning home in the 7000 block of Ewing. Estelle Brooks, her daughter Shanita Pardue and a young grandson escaped unharmed.

Big Robbery Charges Against JoCo Lady

Woman charged in Johnson County with stealing more than $100,000 worth of jewelry A woman has been charged in Johnson County with stealing more than $100,000 worth of jewelry.

Show-Me Nasty Jeff City Politics

Harassment claims at Missouri capitol Breaking News JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) - Records obtained by The Associated Press show the Missouri House has dealt with six formal sexual harassment complaints over the past two years, including four involving lawmakers. Those complaints against lawmakers cost more than $22,000 in external legal fees to investigate.

Guv Brownback Retrospective

Gov. Brownback's legacy in Kansas is one of missed opportunity The Obama era changed things in D.C. and, in some way, sowed the seeds for the Trump era. This is not unique to President Obama but confirms a maxim that constituents usually react to one political era with something different in the next. Voters take lessons and act accordingly as they pick the next crop of leaders.

Kansas City Shooting Victim Hard Times

KCK couple searching for help to get wheelchair ramp after shooting paralyzes husband KANSAS CITY, Kan. -- It's a hard life for a KCK husband and wife. Most days it's a struggle just to leave the house. Convicted of aggravated assault, he's now also living as a victim of crime, and his wife is caught in the middle.

For the evening hours we share our love for Brit hottie model Sophie, her Instagram winning and some of the top Kansas City links worth a peek right now. Checkit:And this is thefor tonight . . .The EPIC Kansas City Skyline

Skylines Photography Blog

Kansas Trade Debate

Automakers warn of potential NAFTA withdrawal impact on Kansas Pulling out of a key trade deal may still be on the table, that's according to members of President Donald Trump's cabinet. The North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, is a long-standing partnership between the United State, Canada, and Mexico. The auto industry is asking President Trump to pump the brakes on withdrawal talk.

Show-Me The Welfare/Word Debate

Pill Popper Problem Worsens

Sen. Blunt warns opioid epidemic continues to rise throughout Missouri PLATTE COUNTY, Mo. -- The opioid epidemic is moving closer to Missouri and the metro. That's what senator Roy Blunt told a crowd this afternoon in Platte County. Blunt, a Republican who sits on the Appropriations Committee and chairs the subcommittee on the Department of Health and Human Services, says funding to curtail the addiction epidemic is already up 1,300 percent.

Kansas City Civility Teaching Moment

Engage political foes with civility, says UMKC professor Allan Katz, a professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and head of American Public Forum, spoke on the issues of political discourse and civil dialogue during an event hosted by the League of Women Voters on Saturday at Atonement Lutheran Church in Overland Park. Video by Tammy Ljungblad/The Star.

Local Highway Flip Last Night

Pickup truck pulling camper trailer flips on side after accident KCPD are investigating an accident that involved a pickup truck pulling a large camper trailer.

High Price Of Holding Onto The Past

Royals Rumors: Eric Hosmer not worth eight-year contract The latest report came from Jon Morosi on Wednesday and it basically said Eric Hosmer 's camp were looking for more than seven years for their client. This could explain why Hosmer is still without a team, as maybe the suitors are strongly debating over whether or not Hosmer is worth that kind of deal.

Hottiestarts our morning and provides inspiration as we check some of the top news links for right now. Take a peek:is the song of the day and this is thefor right now . . .Authorities in Johnson County, Kansas, on Wednesday charged 30-year-old Robert Lee Harris with first-degree murder in the death of his wife of 18 months, 38-year-old Tanisha Harris.





Police say officers on Monday responded to the couple's Overland Park, Kansas, apartment about a domestic disturbance and returned when Harris reported that his wife was missing.





He confessed to playing a role in her disappearance during questioning, police say, and her body was later found in Raymore, Missouri.





Actually, this headline gets to the heart of the matter in a much more succinct style . . .

Social media denizens and news agencies across the globe have examined a horrific alleged Kansas City metro faith community murder.This headline sums up the story . . .Deets:Better than that . . . Chatter regarding the case has been lighting up media throughout the world.Thisand offers some insider pix and allegations:On this Sunday morning we wanted to share an alternative view of local faith life giving way to a murder investigation that is ongoing.Developing . . .Tourexpi, turizm haberleri, Reiseburos, tourism news, noticias de turismo, Tourismus Nachrichten,  , travel tourism news, international tourism news, Urlaub, urlaub in der turkei,  , holidays in Turkey,   , global tourism news, dunya turizm, dunya turizm haberleri, Seyahat Acentas,

This site is best viewed with Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0+, at a minimum screen resolution of 1024 x 768.State-owned oil giant Saudi Aramco and Google parent Alphabet, two of the worlds biggest companies, are in talks about jointly building a large technology hub inside the kingdom, said a report citing people familiar with the potential deal.

As part of the potential joint venture, Alphabet would help Aramco, build data centers around Saudi Arabia, the people said. It isnt clear specifically whose data the centers would house or who would control them, reported The Wall Street Journal.

Senior executives at Aramco and Alphabet have been in talks for months on the potential joint venture, these people said.

The talks have included Alphabet Chief Executive Larry Page and have been encouraged by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who is enamoured with Silicon Valley and wants to bring more tech expertise to the kingdom, some of the people said.

Prince Mohammed has been leading the kingdoms plan to take Aramco public.

Still, there are many details to work out, and it is unclear whenor whethersuch a deal will be finalized, stated the WSJ report.

The size of the potential joint venture is unclear, although it could be big enough to become listed on Saudi Arabias stock exchange, it added.

An alliance would help bolster the development of the technology sector in Saudi Arabia, a goal Prince Mohammed has pointed to as a key part of his plan, known as Vision 2030, to wean the kingdom off its reliance on oil.

Alphabets Google is chasing both Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. in the business of renting computing power and storage online, and a joint venture with Aramco would give it a key foothold in Saudi Arabia as it rushes to develop its tech sector, said the report.

None of the three companies have massive data-center complexes, known as regions in industry parlance, in the area, though Amazon has plans to open one in Bahrain and Microsoft has announced it will open two data-center operations in South Africa this year.

Amazon is also close to finalizing a $1 billion deal to build three data centers in Saudi Arabia, people familiar with that deal said. The deal is expected to be announced during a trip to the US by Prince Mohammed early this year.

A data-center region in Saudi Arabia could potentially help Google win business from oil-industry customers that are looking to shift their computing operations to the cloud. The costs for such centers can run into the hundreds of millions of dollars, stated the WSJ report, citing sources.

Most data for the Middle East is piped from Europe, slowing surfing to the most-trafficked websites, which are accessed via long-distance undersea cables, according to a person familiar with the Alphabet-Aramco talks.

Local data serverswhich would store content but also cached memory of personal-navigation data or social-media contentwould speed up access and help the country be more competitive in the digital economy, it added.Dubai Airport Freezone Authority (Dafza) has officially inaugurated the new office of Ireland-based Aerogen, a leading provider of acute care aerosol drug delivery for major hospitals globally, in the free zone.



Dafzas director general Dr Mohammed Al Zarooni was joined by Jim Daly, Irish Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People; Paul Kavanagh, Ambassador of Ireland to the UAE and John Power, Founder and CEO of Aerogen, along with other Irish and Dafza officials, at the event.



The opening is part of Aerogen's continuing expansion efforts across the Middle East  aiming to ensure the availability of high-performance inhaling devices for healthcare providers in the region, said a statement.



According to Dafza, Aerogens new office will serve as a hub for the Middle East to ensure timely delivery of critical healthcare equipment in the region for the treatment of various respiratory illnesses, it said.



The opening follows after Ireland expressed its eagerness to drive in a 40 per cent increase in its exports to the UAE--looking to reach Dh8.61 billion ($2.34 billion) before 2020. In view of this, the inauguration of Aerogens new facilities in Dafza is expected to play a key role in the further consolidation of trade relations between the two countries and to attract more Irish companies to set up businesses in the UAE, it added.



Dr Al Zarooni said: This is an auspicious start for our latest key partner from Ireland, which embodies our freezones commitment to assembling some of the best names in healthcare in Dubai.



The opening of Aerogens new office demonstrates Dafzas strategy to drive in more foreign direct investments (FDI) across various industries, especially in healthcare, and to also provide key support for the country's economic diversification policy through the achievement of Dubai Plan 2021, which has named the development of a global health system as one of its top priorities, he said.



This inauguration provides a timely opportunity for us to celebrate the UAEs blossoming relations with Ireland and share with you how we can help Irish companies achieve their ambitions and grow beyond their expectations, he added.



Dr Al Zarooni continued: We are delighted to include Aerogen among the global members of our elite healthcare fraternity. To date, 45 per cent of our healthcare customers are multinational companies. Moreover, we are confident that our presence at this year's Arab Health will further reinforce our efforts to support the move to position Dubai as a major national and regional treatment centre.



We are excited as well to introduce you to opportunities to benefit from, and complement, the objectives of Dubai Health Strategy 2021 and the overarching UAE Vision 2021 development agenda, which aspires to establish a world-class health system. We highly appreciate Aerogens trust in us as the best place to pursue growth in Dubai, the UAE and the region. We assure you that we will always be within your reach to provide all the necessary support to ensure your success, he concluded.



Power said: We are pleased to announce the opening of our new regional Middle East office in Dubai based in the Dubai Airport Freezone. We have taken the decision to expand our Middle East team and open the Dubai office in order to get closer to our customers and support its growth in the Middle East region.



Our Dubai office is an integral part of our growth strategy and the investment in it demonstrates the companys long-term vision to developing and supporting its customers in the Middle East region. We would like to take this opportunity to thank Dafza for all the help extended to us during the process of establishing our office within their premises, he added.  TradeArabia News ServiceOman-based Mawarid Mining, a leading independent mining firm, is planning a potential investment of up to $100 million in the development of copper deposits in its Block 1 and 2 concessions in North Al Batinah Governorate, said a report.



The two blocks, part of Mawarid Minings portfolio of mineral assets in Oman, were the subject of a joint venture (JV) partnership agreement signed by the company with Minerals Development Oman (MDO), a new national mining investment flagship, added the Oman Daily Observer report.



The JV has committed to assessing and developing the copper reserves potential of the two blocks, it said.



Tariq al Barwani, CEO of Mawarid Mining, a 60 per cent partner in the JV, said that the investments by the partnership will be based on a stage-gate process typical of any project of this kind.



He added that the Stage 1 will entail an investment of around $1 million in exploration, and provided this stage is successful, the company will then make a further investment of $5 million in detailed engineering, detailed design and detailed feasibility.



Al Barwani noted that based on the success of this stage, the company will go into mining operations, and that will include a $50-100 million investment jointly by the partners.The Embassy of Latvia has announced the opening of new external visa application centres in the UAE  in Abu Dhabi and Dubai - in partnership with VFS Global.



The new centres, which are operational from today, were inaugurated by Astra Kurme, ambassador of Latvia to the UAE, and Melvin Duart Dsouza, head of operations - UAE, VFS Global.

The centres will be managed and operated by VFS Global, the worlds largest outsourcing and technology services specialist for diplomatic missions worldwide. Visa applicants from the UAE need not henceforth approach the Embassy of Latvia for their visa requirements as VFS Global is mandated to handle the applications as well as biometric enrolment.



Speaking at the inauguration, Kurme said: It is an important step towards facilitating contacts between people and nations. The possibility to apply and receive visa to visit Latvia will significantly improve tourism and business exchange not only between Latvia and the UAE, but also the whole Gulf region as the embassys consular mandate covers all GCC region.



The VFS Global Latvia visa application centre in Abu Dhabi is located at Level 25, Shining Tower on Mubarak bin Mohammed Street next to Khalidiya Mall. In Dubai, the VFS Global centre is located at Wafi Mall, Level 2, Umm Hurair. Visa applicants from the UAE can direct their queries and appointment requests to the call centre or communicate with the centre at [email protected]



Commenting on the launch, Vinay Malhotra, COO  Middle East & South Asia, VFS Global, said: The new visa centres are opening at a high point in the context of potentially increasing travel requirements from the UAE, be it for leisure, tourism or business purposes. We are honoured to be part of this growing relationship between the two countries and are confident to bring enhanced level of efficiency in services and a seamless, delightful customer experience to the visa applicants from the UAE.



The opening of the visa centres in the UAE follows VFS Global winning the outsource mandate from the Government of Latvia for various countries including in the UK, China, India, Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Lebanon and South Korea.



The VFS Global centres for Latvian Schengen visa applications are managed by professionals who are trained to provide secure and time-efficient processing of entry permit requirements in a friendly ambience. Applicants can also opt for the comfort of a Premium Lounge for more personalised service.



Some of the key features of the centres include convenience in terms of location, automated queue governance for smooth flow of applicants and a dedicated website for easy access to information including visa categories, requirements, check-list and applicable fees. Apart from these, VFS Global staff is well trained in 100 per cent secure handling of passports, documents and personal information. Door-step delivery of passport is also yet another service VFS Global offers. - TradeArabia News ServiceWhat's a Flower Bar?

Pick-your-own bouquets on North Territorial

by Sabine Bickford

From the February, 2018 issue

Flower Bar occupies a small powder-blue house on the diagonal corner of Pontiac Trail and North Territorial. When we stopped by midday on Wednesday, the intersection and parking lot were both deserted, but owner Laura Huey says "the traffic backs up for miles in the morning" with people traveling between Ann Arbor and South Lyon.



Huey opened the shop in September with her husband, Brett, and their two daughters, Cece and Anna. Though the selection of flowers and plants diminishes in the winter, a collection of buckets is available for customers to choose their own bouquet or have Laura pick one for them. Either way, it's then wrapped in a burlap coffee bag.



In addition to flowers, there's a cafe serving coffee and tea drinks, smoothies, and baked goods from Livonia's Cantoro Italian Market. There's also a large selection of local artisanal gifts: toffee from Novi, tea towels from Wixom, bath bombs from South Lyon, at least four different brands of handmade candles, plus lotions, jewelry, jams, and more. A shelf of brightly colored dog treats is Cece's pet project--she wants to work in a dog rescue organization when she graduates from Wayne State in May.



There aren't many places to sit: when winter came, Huey moved in the shop's only table and chairs from outside, and there isn't room in the crowded interior for more. She anticipates the cafe will do most of its business when people can sit outside in warmer weather.



The building previously housed another flower shop, Bokay's; when the owner left the business in 2014 due to health issues, the Hueys saw a chance to fulfill a longtime dream of a small family business. It took three years to redo the parking lot and interior and persuade Salem Township to rezone the corner. That gave them time to visit other businesses for ideas and merchandise. "We went to every store in Michigan!" laughs Huey.



The name came from a class project Cece

...continued below...

/FlowerBarLLC

did where she had to create an idea for a business. She liked the idea of a choose-your-own flower shop, "like a salad bar!" Cece was trained as a barista for her job at the Livonia Courtyard Marriott, and the rest of the family received training from their supplier: Uncommon Coffee Roasters in Saugatuck.Bokay's was beloved by locals. "The community would come in and clean her flower buckets for her, pick her food up for her, get her medicine," Huey says. That goodwill has carried over to the Flower Bar. "I think that's why we get a lot of men that come in," she says.[Originally published in February, 2018.]editorial@tribune.com

GS Paul

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, February 3

A delegation of the Sikh Dharma International from Brazil reached Golden Temple here today. This marks the culmination of their India visit. The delegation includes women as well and they have been actively participating in religious programmes and preaching.

The Brazilian Sikh women, who hold command of the organisation prefix the term Jathedar before their names and are also nominated to the Panj Pyaras to conduct amrit sanchar, said Shanti Kaur Khalsa of the Sikh Dharma International and Dr Gurusangat Kaur Khalsa, head and founder of the Brazilian Association of Friends of Kundalini Yoga (ABAKY) in Belo Horizonte, Brazil.

Shanti Kaur Khalsa, who took amrit sanchar in 70s during the then five high priests visit to America, said there was no gender discrimination in the Sikh religion. Sikh women in Brazil can perform kirtan, path or anything related to rituals without any restriction unlike India. I think, time may bring change here too when there will be on constraint for women to perform such sewa at Golden Temple. We met Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Gurbachan Singh too and apprised him of our view. We also observe the same sanctity and tenets for performing rituals and serving langar, she said.

Dr Gurusangat Kaur Khalsa said, We have a community of more than 300 Sikhs in Brazil, out of which around 10 are amritdharis whereas the rest are sehajdhari Sikhs. Though they are not baptised, they live Sikh lifestyle and dress up in full bana which is very inspiring. We propagate yoga to keep the body fit and divert the youths attention from falling victim to drug abuse or other vices, she said.

While sharing her experience in Amritsar, she said, Seeing the Golden Temple for the first time is a profound and life changing experience for many people. What you see in pictures does not come close to the beauty and majesty of experiencing the Sri Harmandir Sahib.

On the occasion, Pritpal Kaur Khalsa, CEO of 3HO International, said, Sikh Dharma Internationals endeavor is to promote the teaching of our gurus to everyone through visits to holy places in India. Our organisation has earlier undertaken Yatras from UK, US and now from Brazil.

The devotees will return to Brazil on February 6.

Sikh community has prospered all over the globe. This included Brazil, the largest country in South America which is a home of a substantial Sikh sangat. These people were inspired to Sikhism through the teachings of Siri Singh Sahib Bhai Sahib Harbhajan Singh Khalsa Yogi, popularly known as Yogi Bhajan.editorial@tribune.com

Chandigarh, February 4

Doctors at PGI, Chandigarh, have performed the first-ever simultaneous liver and kidney transplant in the premier institute on a terminally ill 40-year-old patient suffering from liver and renal failure.

Lauding his teams feat, PGI Director Prof Jagat Ram said, The team has done it again. This time, it is the simultaneous liver and kidney transplant surgery on a single recipient, one of the most complex and demanding organ transplantations... even the recipient had to be selected very carefully.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

He said so far, the institute has been successfully conducting heart, kidney, pancreas, liver and cornea transplants. With todays commendable initiative, PGI has forayed into simultaneous liver and kidney transplant. A team of over 12 doctors with residents, transplant coordinators, technical and nursing staff conducted the complex operation in over 10 hours.

The accomplishment was made possible because of the donor family of a young girl hailing from Bihar, who was declared brain dead on February 2. She was brought to the PGI in an extremely critical condition on January 25, after being referred here from a hospital near Ludhiana where she was taken after sustaining grievous head injuries in a road accident on January 24.

The family showed unprecedented courage and consented to donate her organs. Her liver and kidneys were used for transplantation at the PGI.

As there was no matching recipient for the heart at PGI, Regional Organ & Tissue Transplant Organisation (ROTTO), National Organ & Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) in Delhi was approached. The heart was allocated to a Delhi hospital for the matching recipient.

Prof Anil K Gupta, MS and HoD, Department of Hospital Administration, PGI, said, Words cannot describe the selfless gesture of the donor family. We are overwhelmed by their spirit of giving.  TNSeditorial@tribune.com

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, February 3

Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Singh Puri today asked the UT Administration to take immediate steps to improve waste processing as only 30 per cent of the total generated waste is getting processed.

The city is lagging in solid waste management with only 30 per cent of the waste generated being processed. The UT needs to take immediate steps to improve waste processing and ensure that 100 per cent waste gets processed, said the minister while addressing mediapersons at the UT guest house, here today.

Puri today reviewed the progress of Centres urban development schemes in Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh.

The waste processing has been an issue for a long time here as Jaypee firm, which has a waste processing plant in Dadu Majra, has failed to process the complete garbage of the city. This further leads to dumping of waste at an open dumping ground, causing inconvenience to residents of Dadu Majra and other neighbouring areas.

He, however, said Chandigarh is a certified ODF city. It has achieved 100 per cent of the mission target for individual household latrine (IHHL) and also 100 per cent door-to-door waste collection.

Besides, there is a lot to be done by the Administration regarding housing projects. Puri shared the UT Administration had indicated a demand for about 12,900 houses under the Pradhan Mantri Aawas Yojana (PMAY). Under the Credit Linked Subsidy Scheme of PMAY (Urban), 35 beneficiaries have availed an interest subsidy of Rs 68 lakh. The Administration has not submitted any proposal and is required to fast-track proposal for about 12,887 houses to saturate its entire demand by 2017-18, he added.

He also shared that no proposal had been received under In-Situ Slum Rehabilitation (ISSR), a component of PMAY (Urban), despite potential for 22,000 slum households (Census 2011). The UT has to expedite grounding of the sanctioned houses and fast-track proposals for additional demands. Further, it was also pointed out that 5,170 houses constructed in under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) and Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY) are still unoccupied and urgent steps must be taken to ensure their occupation.

Rs 196 cr released for city

A total of 70 projects worth Rs 6,214 crore have been approved and Central assistance amounting to Rs 196 crore released for the city. In Chandigarh, six projects costing Rs 56.7 crore have been completed and contracts for 185 crore are under implementation or tendering. In respect of remaining projects costing Rs 5,919 crore, detailed project reports (DPRs) are being prepared. It was urged that projects, which will improve the quality of life for citizens, might be taken up expeditiously.

27 per cent skill training achieved

During the review, the minister also found that the UT has achieved only 27 per cent of the target for skill training of candidates in the current fiscal. Only 16 per cent of these trained persons could be suitably placed. It may strive to impart training in consultation with business and industry to ensure full placement. The state has to complete survey of urban homeless and make provision of shelters for urban homeless expeditiously.laxmi@tribune.com

IN the era of multi-polarity, India needlessly spoilt its ties with Nepal by insisting that its writ prevail over framing the rules for the general elections. It has come second best to China in the Maldives after South Block tried to breathe down Males neck. An opportunity now beckons for India to turn the page with the Indian Ocean island nation after its Supreme Court ordered the freeing of opposition politicians and restoring the cancellation of parliamentary (Majlis) membership of some others. India, like many other interested countries including the US, has been quick to seek compliance.

The interest is understandable because the current regime in the Maldives has been painted as pro-China. This kind of easy labelling does a grave disservice to the state of play in international relations. Even India remains averse, and rightly so, to putting all its strategic eggs in one basket. Former President Mohd Nasheed is the current Indian favourite for the top post in Male. But he was also not averse to cosying up to the Chinese. Nasheed sprang a nasty surprise on India and paved the way for Chinas entry by allowing it to open an embassy in Male the day then PM Manmohan Singh landed there for the SAARC Summit in 2012.

It is unhelpful to paint the current regime as pro-China. The Maldives ensures regular military exercises with India and is perfectly happy outsourcing the monitoring of its exclusive economic zone to the Indian Navys southern command. India must not lose this bipartisan support ever since its military averted a coup attempt in 1987. There are some tricky issues involved in the Supreme Court verdict. The Maldives government must be afforded the space to work out the modalities now that it has telegraphed its intention to honour the verdict. Simultaneously, India needs to rework its compact with the Maldives on the basis of the understanding that the days of exclusivity in inter-state relations are well and truly over. The Maldives has recently assured New Delhi that it will always be India First. It is best not to press it too hard on the basis of apprehensions and suspicions, or worse, in geopolitical arrogance.editorial@tribune.com

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, February 4

With debt relief and assured remunerative price for crops among their major demands, 191 farmers groups from across the country have come together to pressure the Centre for fulfilling its pre-poll promises.

Representatives of the All-India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee (AIKSCC) held a Kisan Mukti Sammelan here today to discuss farm suicides and mull ways to help farmers in distress.

The convener of the committee VM Singh, who is also the president of the Rashtriya Kisan Mazdoor Sangthan, said the death of 6 agitating farmers during police firing at Mandsaur on June 6 last year led to coordination between various farmers groups.

We want the government to fulfil its promises. The Swaminathan report, which was submitted to the government in 2006 and was to be implemented in August 2007, is still pending, Singh told the media.

He distributed copies of The Farmers Freedom from Debt Bill, 2017 and The Farmers (Right to Assured Remunerative Price for Agriculture Produce) Bill, 2017 passed by Kisan Sansad on November 24 last year and said the Bills would be debated in public and introduced as a private member Bill in Parliament.

Yogendra Yadav, founder of Jai Kisan Andolan and president of Swaraj Abhiyan, alleged that Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announcement to raise the minimum support price (MSP) of all crops to at least 1.5 times the production cost was nothing but a farce.

The BJP government is trying to cheat farmers by shifting the goalposts. The Swaminathan report recommended that the MSP should be calculated as 1.5 times of the comprehensive cost (C2), but the BJP government has devised a formula of 1.5 times of the A2 plus FL, Yadav said.

The A2 costs basically cover all paid-out expenses, both in cash and kind, incurred by farmers on seeds, fertilisers, chemicals, hired labour, fuel, irrigation, etc.

The A2+FL cover actual paid-out costs plus an imputed value of unpaid family labour. The C2 costs are more comprehensive, accounting for the rentals and interest forgone on owned land and fixed capital assets, respectively, on top of A2+FL.

Hanan Mollah, eight-time MP from West Bengal and general secretary of All-India Kisan Sabha, alleged that the government waived loans of NPAs running into several lakh crores though these affected 600-700 people, whereas it was not willing to waive small loans of farmers.

Darshan Lal of the Bharatiya Kisan Union (Ektta-Dakaunda); Satyawan, president, All-India Kisan Khet Mazdoor Sangthan; Dr Sunilam of the Kisan Samgharsh Samiti, Madhya Pradesh; and Ruldu Singh, president, All-India Kisan Mahasabha, were present.amansharma@tribunemail.com

Tribune News Service

Jammu, February 4

An Army Captain, three jawans were killed and four other persons were injured on Sunday in heavy shelling by Pakistani troops along Line of Control in Poonch and Rajouri districts of Jammu and Kashmir forcing Indian troops to retaliate, officials said.

Pakistani forces opened unprovoked and heavy firing and shelling along LoC in Bhimbher Gali sector of Rajouri district this evening, a senior army official told PTI.

In the heavy shelling, an officer and three jawans were killed and two others injured, they said, adding that Indian Army was giving a befitting reply as heavy exchanges were on.

The slain soldiers have been identified as: Capt Kapil Kundu who hailed from Ransika village, Pataudi tehsil, Gurugram; Rifleman Ramavatar of Baraka village in Gwalior; Rifleman Subham Singh of Mukand Pur Choudharian village in Kathua and Havildar Roshan Lal of Nicholas village in Samba district.

Earlier today, a 15-year-old girl and a soldier were injured as Pakistani troops violated ceasefire by targeting forward villages and posts along the Line of Control (LoC) in Poonch and Rajouri districts, officials said.

With these casualties, 17 people, including nine security personnel, died and 70 were injured in Pakistani shelling and firing along the LoC and International Border in the Jammu region this year.  With PTI inputseditorial@tribune.com

Vikram Sharma

Tribune News Service

Jammu, February 4

Despite blanket ban, the state government says it has re-employed some retired officials on a case-to-case basis due to administrative exigencies.

This was informed by minister in charge of the General Administrative Department in a written reply to a question raised by Engineer Rashid, MLA, in the Legislative Assembly.

Eleven officials have been re-employed by the state government in various departments and they are drawing salaries, travelling allowances as well as accommodation as per the government rules for the regular employees.

While most of them have been re-employed on salaries as admissible in their respective departments, the others are getting last pay drawn minus pension, including the commuted portion of the pension, if any.

Travelling allowance or accommodation was being provided as per the entitlement and as admissible to the state government employees under rules, the minister in charge said.

However, pursuant to a Cabinet decision dated April 24, 2013, read with government order dated May 7, 2013, a blanket ban was imposed on the re-employment/re-engagement of government officials. Allre-employed/re-engagedin government departments/public sector undertakings/autonomous boards were terminated vide agovernment order dated March 17, 2015.

Besides, the minister in charge said 29 officials were re-appointed in various state commissions, including 11 in the Public Service Commission, two in the State Vigilance Commission, two in the State Information Commission, four in the State Accountability Commission, four in the State Human Rights Commission, three in the Jammu and Kashmir State Commission for Backward Classes and three in the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission.

The salary and allowances to these officials is on a par with the scale and grade as given by the different commissions.

The minister in charge, clarifying on the re-engagement of officials in various commissions, said, So far as various commissions are concerned, retired as well in-service officials are appointed and not re-employed.

He said the method of appointment/eligibility and terms and conditions of appointment viz. salary, allowances, etc was also regulated in terms of provisions of the Act/rules/regulations of such commissions.

Pay and perkseditorial@tribune.com

Dinesh Manhotra

Tribune News Service

Jammu, February 4

The much-awaited panchayat elections in the state are likely to be deferred as the mainstream political groups in the all-party meeting were not unanimous in holding the poll at this point of time.

Opposition parties, however, put the onus on the coalition government to take a final call on the elections, saying that it was the responsibility of the state government to provide security to all candidates.

The majority view in the meeting is against holding the elections at this point of time, Minister for Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Abdul Haq Khan told mediapersons after the meeting. He said all political parties were of the view that the elections must be held to strengthen democratic institutions at the grass-roots level but the majority observed that situation was not conducive.

An all-party meeting chaired by Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti was held here on Sunday evening to discuss and decide on holding the long-pending panchayat poll in the state. Representatives of all mainstream political parties attended the meeting which lasted for over two hours.

The ball is now in the governments court but we have made it clear that the situation is not favourable for holding elections, NC leader and former Minister Ali Mohammad Sagar said after the meeting.

We are ready for elections but those in the government are themselves giving conflicting statements about the security scenario, said Sham Lal Sharma, who led the Congress delegation at the meeting. It is the duty of the state and Central governments to ensure adequate security environment and create a conducive atmosphere, he added.

Sources said the BJP, Congress, Panthers Party and the Jammu and Kashmir Democratic Party Nationalist (JKDPN) headed by Ghulam Hassan Mir were in favour of the elections but other political parties had aired their apprehensions about the security situation in the state. The BJP suggested the elections should be held in a phased manner but that suggestion was opposed by other parties, a source said, adding that the BJP lay emphasis on early elections.

The PDPs representative at the meeting, Rafi Ahmed Mir, said holding elections without taking the security scenario into consideration could prove counter-productive. The panchayat elections, which were due in 2016, have been delayed due to various factors. After the completion of delimitation of panchayats last year, 280 new panchayats and 4,000 panch segments were added to the existing rural bodies.

Prior to the delimitation, there were 4,098 panchayats in the state, including 2,145 in the Kashmir division (including Ladakh region) and 1,953 in Jammu province. Besides, there were 15,767 panch segments in the Kashmir division and 13,635 in the Jammu region.editorial@tribune.com

Dinesh Manhotra

Tribune News Service

Jammu, February 4

The J&K Government has formulated a comprehensive plan to develop Kargil as a tourist destination. Apart from developing the area as an adventure activity centre, the government is making efforts to promote Kargil as a favourite destination for Buddhist and Hindu pilgrims from across the globe.

Once a spot of conflict with Pakistan, Kargil is now going to script a new history by becoming a tourist centre. In the year 2017, nearly 2.75 lakh tourists, including foreigners, visited Ladakh and the aim of the government is to lure more visitors to the peaceful mountainous region.

Kargil came into the prominence during a brief but a high-casualty war between India and Pakistan in the summer of 1999. Around 527 Indians soldiers had attained martyrdom and 1,363 others were injured in the Operation Vijay that was fought in one of the most difficult and inhospitable terrains in the world.

Pilgrim sites, namely Drupti Kund, Matayam Bhim Stone, Buddha Statue at Aapati (Sod), Karchker, Mulbekh and Panikar, Karpokar and Buddhist monasteries at Kargil and Zanskar will be promoted across the world to attract visitors, Minister for Tourism Tassadiq Mufti said.

The government has already set up separate tourism development authorities for Kargil and Zanskar. The Tourism Department has prepared trekking maps and information booklets which are circulated at various tourism events to lure tourists.

The minister said the Tourism Department had conducted a climbing event titled Climbathon in the vicinity of the Nun Kun peak at the height of 23,800 feet in 2016. The survey of Chuling La, Suru La and Bobugla has been carried out by the department to access feasibility of starting adventure activities, the minister said.

The war memorial at Drass is another attraction for tourists from across the country. The memorial has been built in the memory of the fallen heroes of the 1999 Kargil war.editorial@tribune.com

Hollywood directors named Guillermo del Toro the best film director of 2017 for The Shape of Water on Saturday, placing the Mexican filmmaker and the film in a strong position for the movie worlds top honors, the Oscars, in March.

The Directors Guild of America (DGA), the leading industry group representing film and television directors, chose Jordan Peele as best first-time feature film director for the offbeat horror film Get Out, which has four Oscar nominations including best picture and for Peele as best director.

DGA feature film winners have often gone on to claim the best director Oscar and even see their films win best picture.

The Oscar chances for The Shape of Water were also boosted last month when the Producers Guild chose it as the years best film. It was del Toros first DGA win and his first nomination. The Shape of Water scored 13 Oscar nominations last month, the most of any 2017 film and just one shy of the all-time record of 14, including best picture and del Toro as director.

Peele was also nominated by the DGA at its 70th annual honors for best feature film director, as was Greta Gerwig, for Lady Bird.

Gerwig, also an Oscar nominee, would be only the second woman to win the best director Academy Award.

Matthew Heineman was honored as best documentary director for City of Ghosts, a British film about rebels banding together to fight ISIS in Syria.

The Oscars will be handed out in Hollywood on March 4 to producers, directors, actors and actresses in a star-studded television show viewed around the world and among the most-watched TV programs in the United States. In addition to film directors, the DGA also handed out television honors. Reuterseditorial@tribune.com

Amarjot Kaur

On returning to Punjab after eight years, poet, writer and translator Amarjit Chandan describes his observation of the state while calling it flying over Punjab. The pun is directed at the flyovers that have replaced the regions lush green fields. The sight of Punjabs vulgar architecture and its ostentatious lifestyle haunts Amarjit. Reciting some his poems, including Pardes, Lasan, Gunachaur, and Tussi Itthe Kina Chir Rahongay?, at the ongoing MS Randhawa Art and Literature Festival in Punjab Kala Bhawan, Chandan, who edited the Maoist Naxalite movements official publication, Lokyudh, does not want to be boxed up or labelled as a Naxalite poet. I am a poet and thats all that there is to it, he says.

Presently based in London, Amarjit Chandan was born in Nairobi; his father, he says, was a trade union leader in Kenya. Rebellion runs in my blood. My grandfathers brother, Dalip Singh, was the member of Gadar Party, he says. Amarjit has edited and translated over thirty anthologies of poetry, fiction and creative non-fiction by Brecht, Neruda, Ritsos, Hikmet, Vallejo, Cardenal and John Berger in Punjabi. Poets like Brecht, Neruda and John Berger have inspired me greatly. I feel, every poet and writer has a moral obligation to be anti-state, he adds.

Having published five collections of poetry and two books of essays in Punjabi, including Jarhan (Poetry), Phailsufian and Nishani (Essays), Amarjits short sojourn in the city is hosted by Jasdeep Singh who wrote the dialogues for Punjabi film Chauthi Koot. He would otherwise stay at his friend and artist Malkit Singhs house, but Singh passed away on January 19 this year. His death has left a wound that will never heal, he says, after an unusually long pause. Nevertheless, Amarjit returns to the prior course of conversation while sharing that he will be leaving for Pakistan in a few days. I will be giving a talk at Lahore University and will bring forth the subject of reunification of Punjab. In my heart, I have never really accepted Partition, he says. On February 17, Amarjit will also attend Karachi Literature Festival. Two of his books are also published in Farsi script from Lahore, West Punjab. Chandan was one of the ten British poets selected by Andrew Motion, the Poet Laureate, for the National Poetry Day in 2001, and participated in the International Alderburgh Poetry Festival rues the liaison between language and religion in India. Its a pity that in India, language fuses with religion. Urdu is no longer taught in Punjab. In fact, people in Punjab have stopped speaking or writing in Punjabi. I understand that the corporate capitalism has more to do with Punjabs fixation with English, but one must never forget their mother tongue, he opines.

English versions of many of Amarjits poems have appeared in England in various collections and literary magazines. However, to Amarjit, Punjabi literature, especially after 1980, appears grim and apolitical. That creativity flourishes in adversity, Amarjit shares, I was arrested in 1971 for my active participation in the Naxalite movement, and was imprisoned in solitary confinement for two years. Thats when I wrote my prison diary called Kandan. However, Punjabs poetry scene is hitting new lows. Its been happening since Oshoism crept its way into the regions literary circuits some 15 years ago, taking away its sensuality and romanticism.

He is, however, all praise for writer Harman Jeet who wrote Rani Tatt. I commented on his works on a Facebook group we have, called Kitab Trinjan. He reminds me of my early years as a poet. I love his style of writing and the primitive idealism and romantic communism he brings to light with his words. Hes a very promising young poet, he signs off.

Amarjit received the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004 from the Language Department, Government of the Punjab, India; and the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006 from the Panjabis in Britain, All-Party Parliamentary Group, London.

amarjot@tribunemail.compardeepdhull@gmail.com

Karachi, February 4

Forty-seven Indian fishermen have been arrested by Pakistani authorities for allegedly fishing in the countrys territorial waters in the Arabian Sea, according to a maritime official.

The Pakistan Maritime Security Agency (PMSA) yesterday arrested 47 Indian fishermen and seized nine launches for illegally fishing in Pakistani waters, a PMSA spokesperson was quoted as saying by the Express Tribune.

The arrested fishermen were handed over to the Docks police for further proceedings and investigation, it said.

The Indian boats have been confiscated for violating Pakistans coastal territory, the spokesperson said, adding that said PMSA vessels and fast attack boats took part in an open sea operation for the purpose.

On January 19, as many as 17 Indian fishermen had been arrested by the PSMA for allegedly fishing in Pakistans territorial waters. Three boats had also been impounded.

Pakistan had released 292 Indian fishermen as a goodwill gesture in December-January.

Pakistan and India frequently arrest fishermen as there is no clear demarcation of the maritime border in the Arabian Sea and these fishermen do not have boats equipped with the technology to know their precise location.

A number of non-governmental organisations in both India and Pakistan have raised the issue, pressing their governments to release the arrested fishermen without delay. PTIpardeepdhull@gmail.com

Amaravati (Andhra Pradesh), February 4

The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) on Sunday said it would not snap ties with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

The assertion comes amid speculation that the ruling party in Andhra Pradesh might rethink its ties with the BJP in view of its disappointment over allocation of funds to the state in the Union Budget.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

The TDP will not break its alliance with the BJP-led NDA, Party leader and Union minister Y S Chowdary said after a meeting of party MPs and senior leaders with Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu here this afternoon.

Chowdary said they would first raise issues concerning the state with the Centre and try to get them addressed.

If the Centre does not concede to our demands, then we will undertake protest both inside and outside Parliament, he added.

It was all media speculation, Chowdary said, when asked if the TDP was ready for a divorce with the NDA.

Asked if BJP chief Amit Shah had spoken with Naidu, he replied in the negative.

He said Naidu did not speak to Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, the BJPs bickering ally, as some media reports had claimed.

The BJP and the TDP are part of the ruling alliances in Andhra Pradesh and also at the Centre. PTI

Chowdhary, on February 1, had warned that the TDP had three options before it, namely, (1) either try and continue the alliance (2) make their MPs resign and (3) simply terminate an association with the BJP and the NDA.

He had said that the TDP executive would in all probability meet on Sunday to take a final decision on the matter.

Last week, Naidu had issued an ultimatum to the BJP chart its own course if the BJP did not wish to continue with the alliance.

The TDP and the BJP had contested the 2014 elections in alliance and the BJP has two MPs and five MLAs from Andhra Pradesh.

The BJP is reportedly concerned about gaining a toehold in South India. It wants to have allies in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.  Agenciesgspannu7@gmail.com

Shiv Kumar

Tribune News Service

Mumbai, February 4

The body of a former captain in the Indian Army is lying in a Pune morgue after none of his relatives have come forward to claim it, according to police.

Ravindra Kumar Bali, 67, an alumnus of the National Defence Academy at Khadakvasla in Pune, was living on the footpath near the officers mess in Pune Cantonment after his flat was reportedly repossessed by the

bank for non-payment of loans.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

Police said Bali was attacked by two persons who beat him up and smashed his head with a boulder.

He was taken to Sassoon Hospital by passers-by where doctors declared him dead early Friday morning.

According to officials at the Lashkar police station, Bali may have been killed by criminals who extorted money from pavement dwellers.



Balis relatives were traced to Kota in Rajasthan but they were not in touch with him for nearly 30 years, police said.

We were told by some of his relatives that they were not even aware that he was living in Pune, the duty officer at the Lashkar police station said.

The police were also told by Balis relatives that he was married with a daughter and a son but was estranged from his family.

Sources say Bali was in the Army for 18 years though it is not clear under what circumstances he quit the service.

Officials from the Pune Municipal Corporation, which has taken custody of Balis remains, say they will wait for the next few days before deciding on their next course of action.

As a rule unclaimed bodies are disposed off as per the dead persons religion after a photograph of the deceased is taken for the records.



amansharma@tribunemail.com

New Delhi, February 1

India has joined the Ashgabat agreement which envisages setting up of an international transport and transit corridor linking central Asia with the Persian Gulf to significantly ramp up trade and investment.

"Turkmenistan, as depository State of Ashgabat Agreement, informed India today that all the four founding members have consented to the accession of India (to the agreement)," the external affairs ministry said.

Besides Turkmenistan, the other founding members of the agreement are Iran, Oman and Uzbekistan and these countries had signed the pact on April 25, 2011.

"Accession to the Agreement would diversify India's connectivity options with central Asia and have a positive influence on India's trade and commercial ties with the region," the ministry said in a statement.

It said India's accession to the agreement will come into force on Saturday.

After approval of the Union Cabinet, India had deposited the instrument of accession with Turkmenistan in April 2016.  PTIamansharma@tribunemail.com

Smita Sharma

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, February 4

Congress leader Sachin Pilot is beaming with confidence after important win for the party candidates in bypolls to Lok Sabha seats of Ajmer and Alwar and Mandalgarh assembly seat in Rajasthan recently. He will meet party president Rahul Gandhi on Monday along with the winners.

Pilot calls the results a rejection of Vasundhara Rajes caste politics and blamed the Padmaavat row on her. He believes Modi governments pro-farmer budgetary announcements are a symbolic face saving gesture. Pilot also claimed that Rahul Gandhi is leading from the front with support of young as well as party old guard. Excerpts of the interview:

What is the most significant message from this win?

This whole myth about BJP being an election winning machine, propaganda they have done about their might and well-oiled machinery that can take on any challenge, that myth has been put to rest comprehensively now. These elections signify not just blatant rejection of Vasundhara Rajes government but also BJPs policies-whether it is GST, notebandi, agrarian distress.

Was it a surprise that late Sanwar Lal Jats son lost?

Here is the double speak. BJP always blames the Congress for dynasty politics. Sanwar Lalji who is no more, his son is a non-political person. He was given a ticket just because he is son of Sanwar Lal. They also wanted to use caste because his caste would vote for him. Unlike any other CM, Vasundhara Raje for the first time held caste-wise meetings. So she would call Brahmins, Rajputs, Malis, Meenas, Gujjars and so on at separate times. First they tried dividing society along religious lines. Now they are dividing it on caste lines.

But did caste calculations force Congress to maintain silence on Padmaavat row?

Let me make it very clear. As far as I am concerned, anybody, any group, organisation takes law into their own hands, that is unacceptable. The government of the day must take action.

Against Karni Sena too?

Everybody. But who is in power in Rajasthan? BJP. Who is in power at Centre? BJP. I&B Ministry? BJP. Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra -- all BJP governments. You try and do competitive politics and start banning films because you want to get votes of Kshatriya community and government of India which is also BJP remains absolutely silent.

If Vasundhara Raje was so concerned about sentiments of Rajput community when the movie was being made a year and half ago the issue first came up. She could have found the film producers, organisation that was upset, community that was feeling hurt and found a middle ground to settle the issue. When the film was made and Madhya Pradesh banned the film, it became competitive politics. Congress has said anyones sentiments are hurt, we must take cognisance of the fact. But anyone takes law in their own hands that is not acceptable to anyone.

Is Congress unified in Rajasthan or is there a Gehlot faction, a CP Joshi faction?

These three victories belong to the people of Rajasthan and Congress workers who were brave enough to take on the might of the state government. The collective objective of everyone in the party is to ensure that we win the elections.

Would it not help to project a young, dynamic face like you as CM?

There are few aberrations but traditionally Congress Party has not done. We have a parliamentary democracy so elected MLAs will choose their leader along with the AICC. BJP on the other hand has named Raman Singh, Shivraj Singh Chauhan as CM faces for 2018 polls where they are in power. But I asked in Jaipur that why is Vasundhara Raje not the CM face for 2018. There is a deafening silence.

Are you possible CM face of Rajasthan?

My job really was to rebuild the party in Rajasthan. We were given a thrashing and had 21 MLAs only, lowest ever since Independence. Four years later I can draw some satisfaction that our efforts have paid off. It has been the entire team of Congress leadership, young and old who got us here.

Will rural economy focus in budget resonate with voters in 2019?

Their fake love for the farming community has now been aroused because they knew that pushback from agrarian sector is very hard. If they really felt so much for the farming community, four years ago when the first budget was made why were these announcements not made?

They gave two lakh crores of concessions to a few corporate houses then. Now when elections are round the corner, they are making grand announcements with no money to show and no allocations made. This is a face-saving exercise.

Do you see a perceptible change in Congress under Rahul Gandhis leadership? Will opposition rally around it in 2019?

Nationally, the only party that can take on BJP is Congress. We have to work with like-minded parties. As time goes on we will have to find a middle path where we can come together amid state-level competing interests and mount a formidable challenge for 2019. Rahul Gandhi is our party president. He is leading from the front. His aggressive stand and taking on Narendra Modi and his policies have given confidence to people of India and to Congress workers. He has support not just of people like me, but even of so called party old guard.amansharma@tribunemail.com

New Delhi, February 4

The CBI has recovered property documents, bank deposit slips of about Rs 2 crore allegedly related to Delhi minister Satyendar Jain, and companies where he was a director, during searches, the agency sources said.

The documents were recovered during searches at the residences of Delhi Dental Council Registrar Rishiraj, who was arrested yesterday in a separate case, they said.

Rishiraj and N Pradeep Sharma, a lawyer for the council, were arrested last night while allegedly receiving a bribe of Rs 4.7 lakh from a doctor, they said.

Later, during the searches at the residence of Rishiraj, the agency recovered the property documents in Jain's name at Karala village, cheque books in the name of the AAP leader, his wife Poonam and JJITL estate private limited, the agency sources said.

"The CBI has registered a case...on the allegations of demanding bribe from the complainant for getting him favourable order from the Delhi Dental Council and also for extending help in further legal proceedings in his matter," CBI Spokesperson Abhishek Dayal said.

He said the CBI laid a trap and caught the accused while demanding and accepting the bribe from the complainant.

They said IDBI bank slips showing deposits worth Rs 2 crore in the name of Jain's companies in 2011 were also found during the searches.

"...Three property documents including two sale deeds of land measuring 12 Bigha 2 Bishwa and 8 Bigha 17 Bishwa at Karala village, Delhi; one power of attorney for land measuring 14 Bighas in the village were found," CBI spokesperson Abhishek Dayal said in a statement.

He said one deposit slip book of a bank containing counter foils detailing deposits of approximately Rs 2 crore during 2011 in the name of Jain and companies, he was serving as a director at, and in the name of his family members were also recovered.

Besides, 41 cheque books in his name, his wife's name and in the name of a private estate firm were also found, he added.

The CBI also claimed to have recovered half-a-kg gold and Rs 24 lakh cash but it is not clear if these are also linked to Jain, the Delhi minister for Power, PWD and Health, they said.

The sources said the agency will soon be calling the minister for seeking his explanation on recoveries.

The sources said they believe that these documents could have been shifted to the premises of Rishiraj for safe-keeping and to escape the CBI searches in August last year in connection with alleged corruption cases against the minister, they said.

Last year, the agency had booked Jain in case related to disproportionate assets.  PTIamansharma@tribunemail.com

Bengaluru, February 4

In a stinging attack on the Siddaramaiah government on all fronts, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday accused it of setting new records in corruption and asserted that the countdown for its exit has begun.

"The Congress government is at the exit gate," Modi told a huge public rally here, as he took on the Siddaramaiah rule dubbing it a "10 per cent commission government.

Chiding the government on the law and order front, he said, "Instead of the rule of law, the criminals are ruling the roost."

The rally at the sprawling Palace Grounds marked the culmination of the state BJP's 85-day "Parivarthana Yatra" that crisscrossed all 224 assembly constituencies and virtually sounded the bugle for the coming Assembly polls in the state, due early this year.

The BJP has set a 150-plus seats mission.

Read: Students donning degree robes sell pakodas near Modi's rally venue

Asserting that there was a "saffron wave" in the state, Modi said the people of Karnataka had decided to make the state Congress free and to get rid of Congress culture.

"Congress government is a 10 per cent government, where no work happens without paying a commission of 10 per cent. It is a matter of shame if this becomes the identity of a government," he said.

Charging the state with setting new records in corruption, Modi said "Congress-free government means freedom from dynastic rule, nepotism, corruption and loot."

He also referred to the I-T raids at the residences of two state ministers and that a raid on a senior Congress leader revealed Benami property and said, "There are 'Steel Mafia', sand mafia and transfer mafia' in the state."

The Prime Minister said some people hatched a conspiracy to pocket crores of rupees in the name of building a steel bridge.

"Due to public outrage and BJP's protest, the project was dropped," Modi said.

He was referring to a steel bridge project in the city at a major traffic junction, which was scrapped after public protest.

Referring to a spate of killings of activists of BJP and the Sangh Parivar, he said a number of workers associated with BJP and its affiliated organisations have been killed.

"It is an assault on the social fabric. I appeal to the people of Karnataka to vote against the government which attacks the social fabric of the state.

"I am seeing that Karnataka has decided to free the state from Congress. To free from Congress' culture, from society, from public life, from politics."

The Congress had "ruined" the society, culture and politics, he said, adding, "I can see that the BJP government in Karnataka is not far away."

While referring to the law and order situation, Modi said on the one hand, the BJP at the Centre was trying to take India forward, while on the other, in Karnataka "there is such a government that there is a reverse flow.

He said criminals are ruling the roost in Bengaluru. "In Bengaluru also criminal elements have caused worry to the common man. You might have felt this."

Modi said "in the whole world there is discussion about ease of doing business and there are efforts in that direction. Our government is making efforts for the ease of doing business and talking about ease of living.

"But with the Congress government in Karnataka, here there are discussions regarding ease of doing murders." He said the BJP government would take the state in the direction of progress with the motto "Sabka Sath, Sabka Vikas".

The "Parivarthana Yatra" was launched by BJP president Amit Shah on November 2 last year.

According to party leaders, the "Yatra' has traversed over 15,000 km during its journey, aimed at "exposing misdeeds" of the Siddaramaiah government.  PTIsanjiv@tribunemail.com

Tribune News Service

Dehradun, February 4

Uttarakhand Governor K K Paul has stressed that it was important that children in the state show interest in science so as to develop a scientific temper among them that would further the cause of nation building.

The Governor was addressing the gathering after inaugurating the newly built Biodiversity Park at Uttarkhand Council of Science and Technologys Regional Science Centre here yesterday. He said the level of progress of any country was assessed by the level of scientific development in it and thus promotion of science was of paramount importance.

Describing Biodiversity Park as an asset for Uttarakhand, the Governor said the park would greatly help students, researchers and herbal experts in their day-to-day studies. He also held that the Regional Science Centre was an ideal place for the science popularization and inculcating scientific temper among the people of the state

Eminent environmentalist Padma Vibhushan Sunderlal Bahuguna was also present and stressed on the conservation of water in the state. He called for planting species of trees in hill forests that help in conservation of forest.

Director General, Indian Forestry Research and Education Council, Dehradun, Dr S.C. Gairola conveyed his congratulations to the Uttarakhand Council of Science and Technology (UCOST) on the concept of Biodiversity Park. He expressed his interest for some joint venture between UCOST and ICFRE towards the conservation of environment and forest in the state.

National Science Centre, New Delhi D Rama Sharma, Director, asserted that from the day Regional Science Centre came into existence on February 3 last year, it is continuously emerging as a major centre of attraction towards popularisation of science.

Environmentalist stresses on water conservation

Eminent environmentalist Padma Vibhushan Sunderlal Bahuguna has stressed the need to conserve water in the state. He called for planting those species in hill forests that help in conservation of forest.sanjiv@tribunemail.com

Jotirmay Thapliyal

Tribune News Service

Dehradun, February 4

In a state ridden by man-animal conflict, the Uttarakhand Government is contemplating increasing the ex-gratia and other compensation amount provided to wildlife attack victims.

The wildlife authorities have proposed a hike in the ex-gratia amount from the existing Rs 3 lakh to Rs 5 lakh to the families of individuals, who are killed in wildlife attack incidents. Similarly, in the case of permanent disability caused to a human being in a wildlife attack, an amount of Rs 4 lakh will be provided as compensation amount. At present, an amount of Rs 2 lakh is provided to such victims. In the cases of partial disability, hike from existing Rs 1 lakh to Rs 2 lakh has been proposed.

For grievously injured, the compensation amount is proposed to be hiked from Rs 50,000 to Rs 1 lakh. Further, for other injuries the compensation amount is slated to increase from the existing Rs 15,000 to Rs 30,000.

The man-animal conflict has been a big challenge with over 600 persons losing their lives to wildlife since the formation of the state. A little less than 2,000 persons have been injured during the same period. Wildlife particularly leopards and elephants attacking humans have become quite common. Besides human causality, wildlife raiding crops and killing the livestock has also become a regular feature in the state. This has also led to increasing animosity between wildlife and humans. Wild boars, neelgais and monkeys have emerged as problematic species in villages.

Uttarakhand Forest Minister Harak Singh Rawat disclosed that the draft proposal for the hike in ex-gratia and compensation amounts provided to wildlife attack victims which has been prepared will now be put before the Cabinet for final approval. He said hike in these amounts will come as a solace for those, who become victims of wildlife attacks.

Uttarakhand State Wildlife Board has been repeatedly recommending an increase in ex-gratia and compensation for wildlife attack victims. Increasing compensation amount also looks to be an effort to placate growing resentment in general masses towards wildlife life in the state.pardeepdhull@gmail.com

Ankara, February 4

Seven Turkish soldiers were killed in Turkeys offensive against Kurdish militia inside Syria, including five who died in a single attack on a tank, the army said.

The losses marked the highest toll in one day for the Turkish military in operation Olive Branch, launched on January 20 against Syrian Kurdish Peoples Protection Units (YPG) militia seen by Ankara as a terror group.

Yesterdays attack on the tank, details of which were not disclosed, was also the single deadliest attack on the military of the offensive so far.

The latest clashes brought to 14 the number of Turkish troops killed so far in operation.

The Turkish army and allied Ankara-backed Syrian rebel forces are seeking to oust the YPG from its western border stronghold of Afrin but the operation so far has been marked by fierce clashes.

The army said that one of the soldiers was killed in a clash and another on the border area, without giving further details.

In a later statement, it added a Turkish army tank had been hit in another attack, killing all five servicemen inside.

A previous statement said one serviceman was killed and another wounded in that attack.

In retaliation, Turkish war planes carried out air strikes on the area from where the attack was carried out, destroying shelters and munitions dumps, it added.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday the Turkish army and Ankara-backed rebels had suffered 25 fatalities between them in the operation so far.

Meanwhile, seven civilians have been killed in mortar fire on the Turkish side of the border that Ankara blames on the YPG.

Ankara says that major progress has been made in the 15- day operation, with almost 900 YPG fighters killed so far although it is not possible to verify these figures.

Erdogan sought to reassure Frances Emmanuel Macron over the operation, telling the French leader it was aimed against terror elements and that Ankara had no eye on Syrian territory.

Macron had incensed Turkish officials by saying in a newspaper interview last week that France would have a real problem with the campaign if it turned out to be an invasion operation.

During the phone call, the two presidents agreed to work on a diplomatic roadmap in Syria in the coming weeks, the Elysee Palace said in a statement.

Erdogan said in a speech that the Turkish forces were beginning to take mountain positions and would now head towards Afrin itself. There is not much to go, he said.

Erdogans spokesman Ibrahim Kalin meanwhile told journalists in Istanbul that the operation was going as planned but there was no timetable for its duration and it would continue until we clear all those areas.

But analysts and monitors say Turkey so far has taken control of limited clumps of territory around the border without yet approaching Afrin town.

Turkey says the YPG is an offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.

However, the YPG has been working closely with the United States to fight the Islamic State extremist group in Syria.

The offensive by Washingtons fellow NATO member Ankara on a US-allied force has even raised fears of a military confrontation between two alliance powers.  AFPROBINSINGH@TRIBUNE.COM

Male, February 4

The beleaguered Maldives government today ordered police and troops to resist any move by the Supreme Court to arrest or impeach President Abdulla Yameen over his refusal to release political prisoners.

The police detained two opposition lawmakers as they returned to the country today, as the political crisis in the Indian Ocean archipelago nation deepened with its top court pitted against the president.

The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) said its MPs tried to stage a meeting in defiance of a weekend order suspending parliament, but they were pushed back by armed troops.

Security forces have been deployed inside the national parliament-known as the Peoples Majlis-since March last year when Yameen ordered them to evict dissident lawmakers.

The Presidents crackdown on dissent has tarnished the Maldives image as an upmarket holiday paradise and sparked calls from the United Nations and several countries to restore the rule of law in the fledgling democracy.

The Supreme Court on Thursday night ordered the authorities to release nine political dissidents and restore the seats of 12 legislators who had been sacked for defecting from Yameens party.

But the Yameen government has so far refused to comply with the shock ruling, resisting international pressure to respect the decision.

In a national television address today, Attorney General Mohamed Anil remained defiant. Any Supreme Court order to arrest the President would be unconstitutional and illegal, Anil said. So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order.

Atul Keshap, the US ambassador to Sri Lanka and the Maldives, has led international criticism of the Yameen governments refusal to respect court orders.

What security risk prevents the #Maldives #Majlis from meeting tomorrow? Why are MPs pepper sprayed in the streets and arrested on arrival at airport? he tweeted today.

Former president and current opposition leader Mohamed Nasheed described the governments refusal to obey the Supreme Court as a coup. Nasheed, who was controversially convicted of a terrorism charge and jailed for 13 years in 2015, urged police and troops to uphold the constitution. Nasheed, the countrys first democratically elected leader, was toppled in 2012.  AFP

Crisis deepens in archipelago nationgspannu7@gmail.com

Lahore, February 4

A man in Pakistan on Sunday allegedly gunned down three members of his family, including his wife, after they were adamant that his daughter marry a suitor he did not approve of.

Asif Shah shot dead his wife, his daughters Komal, 26, and Rida, 24, and injured his 15-year-old son in Punjab provinces Attock city, the Dawn reported.

The family had received a marriage proposal for Komal, but Asif did not want his elder daughter to get married to the suitor, District Police Officer (DPO) Attock Ibadat Nisar said.

His family members, however, were adamant on her marriage with him. Because of this there were frequent arguments in the household, police said.

When the man saw his family members agree that Komal would marry her suitor against his wishes, he shot his wife and daughters dead.

The firing also left his son seriously injured.

After killing his wife and daughters, Asif fled the scene. Police have formed teams to arrest him. PTIrajivbhatia82@gmail.com

Islamabad, February 4

Thousands of Pashtuns gathered outside the press club in Islamabad and chanted Azadi (Freedom) slogans by highlighting human rights violations against the community.

They undertook a Long March demanding justice for Naqeeb Mahsood, a Pashtun killed in a fake police encounter on January 13 in Karachi.

Police had also put forged charges against Naqeeb with having links with terrorist groups like Jashkar-e-Jhangvi and Islamic State of Syria and Iraq.

The false claim was challenged by the family and relatives of Naqeeb Mahsood and subsequently an inquiry commission was established by the government of Sindh province to investigate the police encounter.

The investigation team has announced Naqeeb innocent and killed in fake police encounter.

Youth from Waziristan started a long march from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on January 26 against the ongoing slow motion Pashtun genocide in Pakistan, human rights violations in FATA and State imposed terrorism and militarism.

Protesters loudly chanted slogans criticizing Pakistans security agencies for harbouring, sheltering and conducting terrorism in FATA and Afghanistan, aimed at de-Pashtunisation and undermining US led war on terror.

The Long March was joined by more than 10,000 Pashtuns from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan provinces.

A protester said, this is a beginning of the movement against the barbarism which this government is committing for the past 15 years in FATA, Waziristan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Today, we have announced that we will not going to face this barbarism anymore.

Another protester said while addressing a gathering, the people of this region are not the terrorists, but this government is a terrorist, which represents the elite class of Punjab.

Several tribal elders from Waziristan also addressed the procession and said Pakistans security forces have been planting landmines and bombs in the area, taking lives of children and animals.

They called on the United Nations and US led international community to take immediate notice of Pakistan sponsored terrorism, human rights violations and slow motion Pashtun genocide in FATA.  ANI.rajivbhatia82@gmail.com

Juba, February 4

South Sudan has recalled its ambassador to the US, after the American government imposed an arms embargo on the East African nation, presidential spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny has said.

Ateny on Saturday said Garang Diing Akuong has been recalled for further consultations without giving details. The South Sudanese envoy was deployed to Washington in May 2015, Xinhua news agency reported.

This is routine for any country to recall its ambassador for further consultations. It may not be related to the arms embargo, Ateny told Xinhua by phone.

The Donald Trump administration on Friday announced arms embargo on South Sudan and urged the UN Security Council to enforce a global arms ban on South Sudan.

The US also called on the African Union (AU) and the East African regional bloc, Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) to consider sanctions measures against those who undermine the peace process.

South Sudan has been embroiled in four years of conflict that has taken a devastating toll on the people, creating one of the fastest growing refugee crises in the world.

A peace deal signed in August 2015 between the rival leaders under UN pressure led to the establishment of a transitional unity government in April 2016, but was shattered by renewed fighting in July 2016.  IANS.A Singapore Airlines plane preparing to take off. (File photo: AFP/Miguel Medina)

Flight SQ879 departed Taiwans Taoyuan International Airport at 5.45pm on Friday (Feb 2) and arrived in Singapore at about 10.35pm, about half an hour later than scheduled, according to flight tracking website Flightaware.com.

An SIA spokesperson confirmed the hoax and said the aircraft "landed uneventfully" at Singapore's Changi Airport. He declined to provide further details.

Taiwanese media reports said a woman called the Taipei police hotline from a payphone, claiming that there was a bomb on SQ879.

The plane, which was scheduled to take off at 5.35pm, was already taxiing on the runway, United Daily News reported. It eventually took off at 6.01pm after authorities determined the threat was a hoax.

The Taipei police are investigating the incident, the report said.Protesters hold a placard portraying Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May during a march in central London calling for an end to the "crisis" in the state-run National Health Service (NHS). (Daniel LEAL-OLIVAS/AFP)

NHS staffing levels have been in crisis for months, an issue made worse by a winter flu outbreak.

The public health service is a highly-emotive political issue, and controversially formed the centre-piece of the succesful pro-Brexit campaign during the 2016 referendum.

Protesters carrying placards reading "NHS not for sale", and "Hands off our NHS", braved the cold and rain to demand that the government pump more money into the system, and roll back the influence of the private sector in the public-funded service.

Hospital campaigner Tamsyn Bacchus demonstrated with a life-size replica vulture and an NHS placard, fearing that the free-at-point-of-use service was moving towards a US style user-pay system.

"I have faith, and so do all these folk here, that it's so important ... when your child is running a high fever, when you need the hospital or a doctor you can get them without worrying about having to pay for it," she told the Press Association.

There are 40,000 vacant nurse posts in England, according to the Royal College of Nursing, with 27 per cent more nurses and midwives leaving the job between 2016 and 2017 than joining.

Numerous doctors have taken to social media in recent weeks to apologise to patients, with one emergency doctor in central England warning of "third-world conditions".

During the 2016 EU referendum, the Leave campaign's battlebus that carried leading figures such as Boris Johnson around the country was emblazoned with the disputed claim that the NHS could receive up to 350 million (US$494 million) extra per week if Britain no longer had to fund the EU.Heidi Klum Displays Her Sexy Body In Bikini Photo Shot For Germany Next Top Model Promo

The former Victorias Secret Angel is in search of her home countrys next top model. However, at 44, Heidi Klum is still giving 20-somethings a run for their money.

In a series of bikini photos shared on her Instagram, the veteran model embraces her toned body poolside in a gorgeous ocean-front mansion. The photos are a behind-the-scenes look at the video promotion for Germanys Next Top Model.

Klum is promoting the new season of Germanys Next Top Model , which she has been the host for the past 13 seasons since it first aired in 2006.

The mother of four looked flawless in neutral-colored two-piece swimsuits, including a white bikini which she teamed with matching strappy heels. She also posed in a black bikini featuring a bandeau top and high-waisted shorts with matching heels.

Klum also took a trip down memory lane. She shared several video clips from the model search contest that started her career 26 years ago in 1992. A fresh-faced Klum is seen talking in her native language alongside two other aspiring models, and the host. After the public votes, it is revealed 18-year-old Klum is the selected winner.

The model captioned the video, This is how it all began for me in 1992. In one week, lets see how it will begin with one lucky girl.

A post shared by Heidi Klum (@heidiklum) on Feb 1, 2018 at 7:32am PST

Source : Yahoo Style







Its been a dozen years since Natalie Portman hosted SNL. Back in 2006, she busily fended off questions about life as Queen Amidala in the Star Wars prequels and played off of her genteel image in a savage rap about her proclivities for drugs, doing dirt, and catching the D. In the intervening years, Portman has kept things serious  playing everything from obsessive ballerina Nina in Black Swan to Jackie Onassis in Jackie  but she pops up in the occasional rom-com or TV comedy. Filming her latest movie, the adaptation of Jeff VanderMeers speculative fiction freakout Annihilation, surely made her ready to do something less than serious. Lets see what shes got up her sleeve for her return this week to Studio 8H.

Fox & Friends Cold Open

During this episode of Fox & Friends, Steve Doocy (Alex Moffat), Ainsley Earhardt (Heidi Gardner), and Brian Kilmeade (Beck Bennett) get down to the business of stroking President Trumps ego. Then the crew chats with Hope Hicks (Cecily Strong), who likens the White House staff to a group of strangers working together to push a beached whale back into the sea. Against all odds, Louis Farrakhan (Chris Redd) comes on to share his gripes about the FBI, and then Trump himself (Alec Baldwin) calls in to get some praise for his State of the Union address. While this open certainly seems accurate, and there are some inspired connections (e.g., the link between Republicans gripes and Farrakhans), theres not a lot of bite to it.

Natalie Portman Monologue

Once Portman reminds the audience that this SNL episode is the last one before the beginning of the Winter Olympics, her monologue is suddenly the subject of color commentary from two Olympics emcees (Kenan Thompson and Kate McKinnon). Theyre charmed by her short program until she tries a joke her 6-year-old made up. It was supposed to be a double-joke joke into a triple applause break, but it made bandleader Lenny Pickett start openly scrolling through Tinder onstage. Leslie Jones comes on to help Portman stick the big finish: Does anyone here like New York City? Its a pretty joyful deconstruction that also skewers those of us who spend way too much time picking these things apart. Ahem, on to the next sketch 

Revolutionary War

Colonial representatives (Bennett, Kyle Mooney) gather in Philadelphia to talk about the progress of the 1775 revolt against England. The patriots of New England have won the Battle of Bunker Hill, and unfortunately show up to boast about it. These patriots (Portman, Gardner, Moffat, Luke Null, and the visiting Rachel Dratch) sound suspiciously like modern-day New England Patriotloving douchebags. (Thats just how we do it in M.A., kid!) A delegation from Philly (Kenan Thompson, Mikey Day, and the visiting Tina Fey) arrives to brag that theyre going to win a battle and then punch police horses. As insults about Boston and Captain Thomas Brady fly, the straitlaced revolutionaries wish there was a way both the New England patriots and the Philadelphia iggles could lose. This is the nights big crowd pleaser, and Fey kills it.

Stranger Things 3

In this preview for the third season of Netflix 80s sci-fi throwback Stranger Things, Eleven (Portman) and Mike (Day) go to a warehouse and meet others who have supernatural abilities. Of course, Eleven is a telekinetic whose nose bleeds when she uses her power. Fourteen (Bennett) starts fires with his mind but throws up in his mouth a little bit when he does it; Nine (Strong) reads minds but farts afterward; one random guy (Luke Null) makes great chili but bleeds from the skull as a result. All the while, the wildly horny Mike is trying to figure out ways to kiss Eleven or do some over the jeans stuff. The rapid-fire succession of jokes and characters works in this one, heightening an idea to absurd places pretty quickly.

Natalies Second Rap

Just as with the setup of the original Natalie Rap, an interviewer (Bennett) asks questions of Portman until she launches into a fierce, foul-mouthed verse. Portman insists that things are different than they were 12 years ago, because shes mature, married, and has a kid now. Then we see the pregnant Portman drown the doctor when her water breaks and point a gun at an innocent bystander until he says nice things about Jar Jar Binks. A singing Viking (Andy Samberg) also croons his love, while the interviewer notes that the rap is almost exactly the same, but with current references. Nevertheless, Portmans steely delivery, nods to Cardi B and trap, and all of the great details about dildos on switchblades make this second round completely worth it.

Weekend Update

Michael Che and Colin Jost consider Trumps State of the Union speech and the declassified Devin Nunes memo in the first half. How useful could the memo be when it cherry-picks information? Jost compares it to a blurb for a Transformers 5 that says It blew my mind  when the full quote is It blew my mind that God allowed this. Che likens Trump, who took credit for low black unemployment numbers, to white women who take credit for Yass, queen. Then French actresses Brigitte Bardot (McKinnon) and Catherine Deneuve (Strong) come on to defend their controversial positions against the #MeToo movement. While Deneuve tries moderation, the older Bardot yells out, Free Harvey Weinstein, and claims that women have breasts only for a man to grab and pull. Strong and McKinnon play well together and make a cogent point, too.

In the second half, Jost tells a joke about Mel Gibsons sequel to Passion of the Christ; it doesnt go over all that well with the audience, but the banter with Che and off-camera ad libs (Nailed it!) are fantastic. Pete Davidson arrives to talk about filming an ad for Dockers, which wasnt easy because the job was asking people on the street to take off their pants during the height of the Weinstein revelations. Davidson is charming, as always. After a couple quick jokes about emotional-support birds, Kenan Thompson comes on as Ches cheery, gullible neighbor Willie. To cheer up everyone about the cold month of February, Willie talks about buying cheap mattresses from the police auction and blow-up dolls for company. The material doesnt work all that well, but Thompson is winning.

Alien Lover

When a Star Trek starship captain (Portman) and her alien crew member Rex (Bennett) retire to the boudoir, the captain assures Rex that she understands all bodies are built differently. Heads up, Rex tells her, My butt is my face and my face is my butt. Then the scaly blue alien flips over, cheeks jiggling as they ask to be spooned and pour a gin and tonic all over their newly revealed face. The captain is sympathetic, but a little turned off. Then Rex pees from what would be their face holes. The premise is fun, but theres something about watching Bennetts butt for half the sketch that doesnt quite pay off. If only they could un-pants him on national TV and put some kind of second face on his butt cheeks!

Nickelodeon Kids Choice Awards Orange Carpet

On the Nickelodeon Kids Choice Awards orange carpet, Dexter Hill (Day) and Allie Jackson (Portman) are ready for fun. After encouraging the kids to scream for the Scream-o-meter, Jackson loses her voice. The Zany Zoom just isnt as much fun when the host has laryngitis. Producers then give Allie a voice amplifier like the kind one might use after a tracheotomy; this only serves to scare the crap out of the kids, as well as Ellen DeGeneres (McKinnon). There are funny specifics here, like handing out an award for Best Actor in a Jumanji Movie, but the what-did-you-say? gag just cant fill an entire sketch.

First Lady

The State of the Union is about to start, and Melania Trump (Strong) cant convince herself to suck it up, get in the car, and go watch it. She wishes she could talk to someone who understood her pain, and suddenly, Jackie Onassis (Portman) arrives to calm her about Donalds affair with Stormy Daniels. In rapid succession, Hillary Clinton (McKinnon), Martha Washington (Bryant), and Michelle Obama (Jones) also stop by to give advice about making a political marriage work. Jackie talks pride; Hillary, sacrifice; Martha, duty; and Michelle boasts about her arms and being president whenever she wants. Though its a fun idea and a great stage picture, the energy in this one feels a little diffuse.

Bunny

As three girlfriends (Strong, Gardner, and Portman) talk about their dating woes, a Carhartt-clad bargoer named Bunny (Bryant) announces that theyre all being too picky. Weirdos who offer foot massages on the train can work wonders on the tootsies! Bunny herself has been busy catfishing guys and munching on carrot. Of course, she understands if theyre distraught about the ubiquity of circumcised penises, but she could take a short sleeve as quick as a turtleneck. Eventually, she lowers the groups standards and walks away with one of her internet dupes. Bunny is a fun, saucy character and its always nice to see Bryant carry her own sketches.

Natalie Portman once again proves herself an adept SNL host, playing it straight or goofy as needed. Her commitment to the rap alone is admirable. Though the cold open isnt particularly inspired, there are excellent sketches at the top of the show, including the great drop-ins from Dratch and Fey. Update is solid, top to bottom, but once that segment is over, the episode drops off a bit. Seems like Olympics broadcasting will take up some airtime for a while; the next announced SNL is March 3 with host Charles Barkley.(ABC News) A Miami-bound Amtrak train appeared to be on the wrong track when it collided with a freight train in South Carolina early Sunday morning, killing two people and injuring 116, authorities said, but officials with the passenger railroad said the freight line controls signalling and dispatch on the tracks.

The two people who died were the train conductor and engineer, the county coroner said.



Authorities investigate the scene of a fatal Amtrak train crash in Cayce, S.C., Feb. 4, 2018. Authorities investigate the scene of a fatal Amtrak train crash in Cayce, S.C., Feb. 4, 2018.

Authorities investigate the scene of a fatal Amtrak train crash in Cayce, S.C., Feb. 4, 2018. Authorities investigate the scene of a fatal Amtrak train crash in Cayce, S.C., Feb. 4, 2018.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster said at a news conference that a CSX freight train appeared to be on a loading track when the Amtrak train with 147 people aboard slammed into it at 2:35 a.m. in Cayce, South Carolina, just east of Columbia.

"It appears that the Amtrak was on the wrong track," McMaster said at the news conference midday Sunday. "They weren't supposed to be meeting right there by the bridge, clearly. And it may be a time factor, but that's what it appears to me. But I defer to those who are experts in that and do have the correct information, but it appears that Amtrak was on the wrong track."

Amtrak officials said in a statement that they are "deeply saddened" by the deaths of its employees and that the agency is cooperating fully with the National Transportation Safety Board in its investigation of the crash.

Asked about the governor's statement that Amtrak appeared to be on the wrong track, the passenger railroad said in its statement, "CSX owns and controls the Columbia Subdivision where the accident occurred. CSX maintains all of the tracks and signal systems.

CSX controls the dispatching of all trains, including directing the signal systems which control the access to sidings and yards."

The crash came just five days after an Amtrak train carrying Republican members of Congress collided with a garbage truck in western Virginia, killing one passenger and injuring several others. Today's wreck was the third fatal Amtrak incident since mid-December.

The two Amtrak employees killed Sunday are 54-year-old Michael Kempf, the train engineer, and 36-year-old Michael Cella, the train conductor, said Margaret Fisher, coroner for Lexington County, South Carolina. Kempf was from Savannah, George, and Cella from Orange Park, Florida, Fisher said.

Both men were in the first car, the engine car, when the collision occurred, the coroner said. She said she spoke on the phone to the wives of both men. "They were very distraught, very shocked, as anyone would be in this situation," the coroner, Fisher, said.

Fisher added that given the size of the trains involved and how many people were aboard the Amtrak, "You would have expected more fatalities."

The more than 100 people injured suffered everything from minor cuts to broken bones, McMaster said.

A passenger told ABC News that he and his wife were in a sleeper car near the back of the train when the crash occurred.

"There was a lot of violent shaking and everything just came to a stop, and I hit my head on the wall," said Derek Pettaway, 33, of the Philadelphia area, who was traveling with his wife, Erin, 32, to Orlando for vacation. "When it was happening, it was quick. You just knew it was not the regular type of movement."

"The cafe car, which was located just in front of our car, was completely folded in half," he said.

Amtrak staff quickly got people off the train, Pettaway said. He said he was taken to a hospital and treated for a bump on his head and whiplash and that his wife was not injured. After he was released from the hospital, he reunited with his wife at a makeshift shelter at a school near where the train crash occurred.

As Amtrak's initial statement on the collision said, "Amtrak Train 91, operating between New York and Miami, came in contact with a CSX freight train at around 2:35 am in Cayce, South Carolina."

The statement continued, "The lead engine derailed, as well as some passenger cars. There were 8 crew members and approximately 139 passengers, with injuries reported. Local authorities are on the scene responding. More information will be provided as available."

CSX said in a statement, "This morning at approximately 2:30 a.m., an incident involving a CSX train and an Amtrak train occurred in Cayce, SC near Dixiana Road and S.R. 26. Reports of injuries have been confirmed. An emergency response plan has been activated to provide full support. Lexington County authorities have been notified and are responding to the incident. Additional information will be made available as details of the incident are confirmed."

A spokesperson for Lexington Medical Center in West Columbia, South Carolina, told ABC News that it received 25 patients with minor injuries. The spokesperson added that Palmetto Health Center also received patients, but the number of patients and the injuries sustained is unclear.

Gov. McMasters said there was a rapid response from numerous emergency crews. He said the National Transportation Safety Board was sending a crew to investigate, and that South Carolina State Police and the FBI were assisting in the investigation.



"I know it's a Sunday morning and a lot of folks are going to church. I'd would asked that they say a prayer for these people," McMaster said.

The NTSB will investigate the incident. The NTSB go team will consist of more than a dozen investigators and support staff. Chairman of the NTSB board Robert Sumwalt will be the board member for the Go Team, an NTSB spokesperson told ABC News.North Alabamas most significant newspaper printing a daily edition is cutting back on its paper editions.

In todays paper, The Decatur Daily announced it wont have print editions on Saturdays and Mondays. Those two days have lower levels of readership.

Today's edition of The Decatur Daily

Clint Shelton, publisher, The Decatur Daily Clint Shelton, publisher, The Decatur Daily Today's edition of The Decatur Daily

The change takes place starting March 5.

Clint Shelton, publisher of The Decatur Daily, wrote, Rest assured that, while the frequency of the print edition is changing, our commitment to covering news, sports, events and stories every day of the week remains a 24/7 priority for our staff and journalists."

Shelton added, "Our dedication to providing trusted local news and information to our community is unwavering. We will continue to report the news as it happens through our many online platforms, including www.decaturdaily.com, our mobile editions and e-Editions.

The Decatur Daily says the change is due to the rising cost of newsprint and the changing habits of its readers.

More readers are turning to the online editions of The Decatur Daily.

The change also applies to The Decatur Dailys sister newspaper, the TimesDaily in Florence.Dewayne Lee Sloan is the second person arrested and charged in the capital murder of Darius Allen. He's being held in the Limestone County jail without bond.

Athens Police tell WAAY 31 they're now investigating how Sloan ties into the murder. Antonio Shalamar Jacobs was arrested and charged as well on Wednesday.

Slaon's neighbor, Robert Brown doesn't know him that well, but Brown said he has helped him out.

"He needed a ride sometimes and he gave him some gas money and I'll give him a ride. He kept trying to work and make some money and doing good by buying birthday presents for his cousins and stuff," said Robert Brown.

Athens Police said they believe Sloan has a criminal record. On Friday WAAY 31 learned the motive behind Darius Allen's murder.

Investigators said they believe Allen's wife and Antonio Jacobs were in a relationship. Allen found out and was upset. Last weekend, someone shot into Jacob's home.

Jacobs blamed Allen for the shooting. On Tuesday, Jacob shot Allen at the corner of Highway 72 and Browns Ferry Street. Allen's minivan then crashed into a utility pole.

Now, investigators are tying together exactly how Sloan was involved. Brown was surprised to learn Sloan could be connected to the murder.

"When he came up on TV, I said that looks like Janell's son. My wife said yeah. But with those mug shot pictures, it's kind of hard to tell. I'm sorry it happened to him and everyone else,"Brown said.

Despite everything, Brown is ready to give Dewayne Sloan a second chance.

"When he gets out and he needs some help, he's welcome to come and see me," Brown said."It would be much easier to work in a civilian capacity and save money and transition than it ever would socially to try and transition in Defence." Mr Wilson joined in January 2013 and left a year and a half later. "In deciding to join the military I did not identify as trans," he said. "I was just a very butch, queer woman. "I went through basic training at ADFA and within a couple of months I quickly realised it was a very binary place. It was very black and white, and I felt really uncomfortable.

"I wasn't allowed the scope to present in a masculine way. Not that there were written rules, but there were unspoken rules. I quickly realised for me to feel comfortable I'd have to transition." Miss Bowley said when she joined the ADF in 2011 she was overcompensating with extreme masculinity. "I was so masculine I was described as the epitome of aggression," Miss Bowley said. "I went so far to prove to everyone and myself that I was masculine." But that changed after she attempted suicide twice.

In April 2014, Miss Bowley told her boss that she'd been seeing a psychiatrist for six months and was going through the gender transition process. Breaking the news The discussion did not go well. "I went on to say I don't expect it to impact my academics in any way, shape or form, or my role within the division," Miss Bowley said. "He turned around and stated, 'wait there'."

Miss Bowley said he returned with two options for her, leave without pay or discharge. Within three days, Miss Bowley said, she was removed from training, university and her division. Mr Wilson's transition wasn't easy either. "I was pretty quickly the subject of the rumour mill at ADFA," Mr Wilson said. "There was social isolation and discrimination, particularly medically. All expenses paid - not at all," he said. Both Miss Bowley and Mr Wilson were medically downgraded against their wishes and despite their physical ability. A spokeswoman for Defence said members who were transitioning gender were not automatically downgraded.

"Some Defence members who present with medical conditions may have their deployable status reclassified whilst undergoing treatment," the spokeswoman said. "This is a duty of care requirement to ensure members are provided with proper support and the opportunity to recover and return to their previous work or a new role within the ADF." Mr Wilson fought an "uphill battle to get anything medically", which was hard, particularly for a person who had large breasts to take part in men's activities. "I was told that a double mastectomy was like if someone became obese they would pay for gastric banding surgery - because it was their fault." Mr Wilson said this was despite the fact he was expected to change in communal areas, and swim with his top off, "because there were expectations that men in the military have to fill, but I couldn't because I'm walking around wearing a binder with large boobs".

"Trans men talk about having breasts is hard for them, well it's only amplified by being in the military, trying to do training, intense physical exercise when you're wearing a really really tight compression vest in the middle of summer." Background In 2010, the Australian Defence Force enacted a policy committing to allowing transgender people to serve. Australian Catholic University associate professor Noah Riseman is studying the history of LGBTI personnel in the military. He said the policy stated full support for members transitioning gender. "You couldn't be openly transgender in the Defence Force until September 2010," Professor Riseman said.

"Before 2010 if you were transgender you couldn't transition, you basically had to suffer in silence with gender dysphoria." But, he said after the policy came into effect, the ADF struggled to know how to deal with transitioning members. He said a policy vacuum until about 2015 meant commanding officers were left to deal with the situations at hand. Professor Riseman said from what he'd heard of the experiences of Mr Wilson and Miss Bowley, the way they were treated was not consistent with the policy in place to support transgender people in the defence force. "The leadership team within Defence talk the talk, but the experiences of these people [Mr Wilson and Miss Bowley] are questioning whether they walk the walk," Professor Riseman said.

However, Professor Riseman said LGBTI ADFA cadets who joined the ranks more recently seemed to be having better experiences with their transition in the defence force. "I do believe the culture is changing for the better. It's not perfect, and no-one is going to pretend it's perfect, but it's improving." The fallout But it happened too late for Mr Wilson. He left the ADF and paid for a double mastectomy himself. He went through the process to file complaints, but said for his own mental health he felt it was best to let it go. Mr Wilson later found out the ADF had been investigating him for allegedly defrauding the government.

"I was only told afterwards that someone under the whistle-blower scheme had placed a complaint saying that I was defrauding the Commonwealth of money to transition," Mr Wilson said. "They decided I wasn't fraudulent." A spokeswoman for the ADF said of the 590 personnel they have investigated for fraud over the past five years, only one was in relation to gender transition. Mr Wilson said after that, he decided to focus on the future and not the past. "I decided to step away from it and focus my energy on other things where I can make a difference."

He enrolled in a bachelor of science at ANU, double majoring in mathematics and statistics. Miss Bowley also left the ADF but continues to suffer from poor mental health due to her experiences during her time there. Institutionalised gender roles Mr Wilson and Miss Bowley said they were ultimately forced to acknowledge their gender dysphoria in the Defence Force, where rigid gender roles have always played a part. Miss Bowley said despite correcting her gender, she felt isolated from both the men and the women.

ANU College of Law associate professor Wayne Morgan, an expert in queer legal theory, said when gender was so rigidly defined, that's when people can start to question their identity. "There are very rigid and defined categories," he said. "You might identify as male but you might say 'hang on a minute, I don't fit all of those'. That's going to lead you to question things." Professor Morgan said strict gender roles - which were institutionalised in the military - caused discrimination. "If we had more fluidity in the concept of what it would be to be male and female I think there would be less discrimination in society," he said.

High-profile transgender advocate and former Defence Force member Cate McGregor has previously said in joining the Army it was to "quell disquiet about my gender". Ms McGregor joined as a cadet, but didn't transition from male to female until she was in her 50s and well into her career. It was her status at the time that helped her transition more smoothly, she said. UNSW Canberra researcher James Connor is examining abuse and bullying in the Australian Defence Force, and said the military "desperately" needs to improve diversity in order to stamp out outdated attitudes and behaviours. "Abusers tend to target people who are considered outsiders, those who don't fit in," Dr Connor said. "Bullying and abuse happens on the basis of people being different, but if everyone is a bit different, then you can't [have that]," he said. "Any organisation that has more diversity does better."

A Defence spokeswoman said the military was committed to creating a safe, supportive and inclusive workplace for all. "Defence won't comment on individual cases but we can advise that there are a range of policies and practices in place that represent a zero-tolerance approach to bullying, homophobia and transphobia," the spokeswoman said. "This is because all Defence personnel, including those with diagnosed health conditions such as gender dysphoria, deserve to be supported and treated with respect. Across the country, and around the globe, these members have served with distinction and Defence is exceptionally proud of the contributions they have made." Mr Wilson, who believes he was the first person to transition while at ADFA, said he hopes the situation has improved since his time there. "It was the scariest thing I've done, to be honest," he said, of coming out while in the defence force.Retail giant Wesfarmers could abort its troubled invasion of the British Isles as soon as June after admitting it made serious mistakes when trying to transplant the successful Bunnings model to the northern hemisphere.

Unveiling a $1 billion writedown of Bunnings UK and Ireland (BUKI) on Monday, Wesfarmers managing director Rob Scott said he would not let the troubled business hang over Wesfarmers for "years and years and years" in the way rival Woolworths was haunted by its disastrous Masters Home Improvement experiment.

"We need to provide some certainty and clarity," Mr Scott said as he announced a review into BUKI's future due back in June and revealed its first half losses would blow out to about $165 million.

Bunnings is expected to run at a $165 million loss this half. Credit:Andrew Quilty

That writedown is greater than the $705 million Wesfarmers paid for the home improvement chain Homebase in 2016, which it planned to convert to the Bunnings brand and format.Anyone following the investigation into the Trump campaign's possible collusion with Russia will learn next to nothing from reading the so-called Nunes memo, and yet its release is significant, if only because it demonstrates how far the Republican Party is willing to debase American democracy in support of Donald Trump, and how weaponised conspiracy-mongering has crept from the fringes to the heart of American politics.

The memo is named for Devin Nunes, the Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee that is ostensibly conducting its own investigation into the Russia allegations. Nunes is a loyal Trump soldier who made his name during the endless Congressional investigations into the Benghazi scandal that found absolutely no wrongdoing on behalf of Hillary Clinton, but nonetheless served its purpose admirably.

Former FBI Director James Comey. Credit:Alex Brandon

"Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was unbeatable, right? But we put together a Benghazi special committee, a select committee. What are her numbers today? Her numbers are dropping," the congressman Kevin McCarthy told Fox News in a moment of inadvertent candour.

Nunes later served on Trump's transition team and since Trump has been in office Nunes has used his position on the House Committee to hamper and discredit the collusion investigations.And while Pecoraro's face is everywhere in print and outdoor campaigns, it's the runway she most relishes. "I like the hype and energy backstage and walking down the runway. It's like a performance," she says. Far less artifice is to be found on her social media, where Pecoraro likes to show her followers her "true self". Pecoraro is valued for her Mediterranean looks and dancer's physique. Credit:Jessica Hromas "They [my fans] are interested in behind the scenes rather than the end product. It also brings a hype to what's going to come," she says.

Pecoraro's older sister is stylist Jess Pecoraro and their mother is a designer, but despite her fashion pedigree, Roberta's path was initially set on a career in dance. "I went to performing arts school. I was there seven days a week but I reached a certain age that I lost a bit of interest and I know how hard it is if you are not committed," she says. Now firmly committed to modelling, Pecoraro said she's noticed positive changes in the industry, especially around issues of body image and health. "The industry is going in the right direction in regards to a healthy look in a model. It's important to look after ourselves, not only physically but mentally, and through our skin. Our best is our healthiest," she says. "Australia has a really healthy idea of what's right and wrong." Roberta Pecoraro in a campaign for Country Road. Credit:Amanda Shadforth

Maticevski un-MAAS-ked One of the most-talked about dresses at Thursday night's MAAS Ball at the Powerhouse Museum was Jesinta Franklin's red and pink number by Toni Matcevski. Not only did the uber ambassador and Marie Claire cover girl post several humorous Instagram stories showing how she had to travel laying down in the car to avoid crushing the creation but the mere fact she wore the Melbourne designer sent plenty of tongues wagging. Crossing the fence ... Jesinta Franklin (centre) wearing Myer designer Toni Maticevski at the MAAS Fashion Ball. Credit:Dominic Lorrimer Of course, Maticevski is Myer's marquee brand, and Franklin was, until December, shackled to David Jones. After the relationship ended around Christmas, Franklin became a free agent as far as the store wars were concerned, meaning she is now free to wear whatever the frock she likes. Franklin went to the ball with her stylist, the aforementioned Jess Pecoraro, whose masterstroke was one of the hottest topics of conversation on the night.

As a postscript, a note to talent: if someone dresses you for an event, make sure you memorise who made it, just like Sophie Monk did at the Arias, when she wore Mariam Seddiq. Model Tahnee Atkinson was bamboozled on the red carpet when asked who she was wearing, leading your columnist to spot "Salvatore Ferragamo" on the button of her tuxedo jacket. Crisis averted. Tahnee Atkinson wearing Salvatore Ferragamo at the MAAS Ball. Credit:Chloe Paul Myer's autumn clearance Speaking of Myer, sadly this is not news about a secret sale but rather a cost-cutting clear-out that saw 50 people shown the door from its Melbourne headquarters around Australia Day.Ride-sharing company Uber came under fire last year for allegedly failing to comply with federal workplace laws amid claims of sham contracting. Credit:Gene J. Puskar The Melburnian accepts work via the platform as a courier, handling assembly work, installs, logistics and difficult furniture removal tasks from apartments and offices across the city. "I've teamed up with a mate and we've got a high-roof van and we do the jobs no-one else wants to do, like removing large furniture from small apartments around corner stairways," Berechree says. Contributing to his own superannuation is the last thing on Berechree's mind, and Airtasker isn't responsible for paying it on his behalf. The 38-year-old admits that meeting his tax liabilities is a far more pressing concern right now. "It's no different to all the years I've done in hospitality, though. I never had any superannuation paid because of sham contracting and dodgy operators," he says.

Both of these gig economy workers are classic examples of the perfect storm brewing in Australia right now. Stark differences Those who are self-employed have always been exempt from compulsory superannuation, but the changing nature of employment means there is now a growing number of gig economy workers and freelancers. Most choose not to make voluntary contributions to super and experts predict that the gap is only going to widen as the gig economy grows. While tax concessions have led to some self-employed saving for retirement through superannuation contributions, average balances have remained relatively low. In 2013-14, the average superannuation account balance for self-employed males was about $155,000, compared with about $386,000 for male wage and salary earners. For women, the difference is just as stark ($86,000 versus $159,000), according to figures from the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia (ASFA).

It estimates that there are about 100,000 workers in Australia who use web-based platforms to obtain work on a regular basis, or about 0.8 per cent of the workforce, however these numbers are set to grow as web-based platforms cater for an increasingly wide variety of industries and professions. The problem is under investigation, with ASFA recently admitting that the case for change is strong. The rise of the gig economy will have potentially profound effects on the nature of work and the relationship between workers and those who engage them, according to ASFA chief executive Dr Martin Fahy. ASFA recently released a discussion paper on the changing nature of work and the implications of this for Australian workers, including their superannuation. The discussion paper suggests a couple of options for adjusting current settings. These include: Extending coverage of the Superannuation Guarantee to independent contractors and the broader group of self-employed workers.

Removing the $450-a-month wages threshold for the SG to be paid to employees.

Of particular concern is where workers are engaged under a contract and have work arrangements resembling those of an employee. These so-called "dependent contractors" don't receive the benefits that employees receive. "In Australia, some platforms with workers who inhabit this legal 'grey area' are showing strong growth in worker numbers. This issue will only become more prevalent," Fahy says. Sham contracting, where an employer attempts to disguise an employment relationship as an independent contracting arrangement to avoid responsibility for SG contributors is also of concern, Fahy says. Meanwhile, ride-sharing company Uber came under fire last year for allegedly failing to comply with federal workplace laws amid claims of sham contracting, prompting the Fair Work Ombudsman to launch an investigation following allegations that Uber had underpaid tens of thousands of drivers by classifying them as independent contractors rather than employees. A different approach

Market research conducted by new industry player gigSuper suggests that 75 per cent of self-employed are not contributing to their super, despite admitting that they know it's important. "And 25 per cent of self-employed workers risk retiring with no superannuation. This is a financial disaster waiting to happen, not just on a personal scale, but nationally," gigSuper co-founder Peter Stanhope says. Gig economy workers will be drawn to the fund because it has built greater flexibility into its product, taking into account the fluctuations in income across the year, Stanhope says. "We've designed a linked non-super investment account where money earmarked for super can be deposited through the year, and transferred into super at the click of a button at the end of financial year. "This means you can get back into the habit of putting money aside for your retirement regularly, but can still access those funds should you need to," Stanhope says.

System undermined The way in which employers engage workers is evolving and superannuation contributions aren't mandatory for gig workers, which is perfectly legal. "However, this is undermining the entire system," says David Kennedy, who owns retirement planning firm Hillross Pacific Advisory. "The majority of gig economy workers and freelancers don't take responsibility for their long-term retirement plans by contributing to superannuation," Kennedy says. Raising awareness of new legislation that allows individuals to make tax deductions as part of an incentive since July 1 last year could encourage individuals to make contributions, he says. He also suggests that the industry watchdog needs to create a sufficient incentive for individuals to contribute regularly to super as part of the solution.

"The financial services sector needs to think through the implications of the disconnect in the way that we engage with this particular workforce, and the affect on long-term savings outcomes that flexible work flow can bring." He urged gig economy workers and freelancers to get into a routine so that a percentage of their income is regularly going towards superannuation. Self-employed super There are two basic ways of making your own super contributions if you're self-employed. 1.If you pay yourself a wage, remember to also send at least 9.5 per cent of your before-tax income to your super fund, or

2.If you pay yourself out of your business revenue, most super funds will let you send a lump sum when you can. You can contribute up to $25,000 a year and receive a tax deduction, or make non-concessional contributions of up to $100,000 a year. There are also provisions to let you play catch-up. Spousal contributions are another provision that gig economy workers and freelancers can consider. On July 1, 2017, the spouse income threshold increased, meaning more people are eligible to claim the tax offset for the 2017-18 and future financial years. You can claim the maximum tax offset of $540 if: You contribute to the eligible super fund of your spouse, whether married or de-facto, and

Your spouse's income is $37,000 or less. For more information about voluntary super contributions, head to the page about contributing extra to super.The Sydney Sixers have claimed consecutive WBBL crowns by crushing the Perth Scorchers by nine wickets in Sunday's final.

Perth Scorchers won the toss at Sunday's WBBL final at Adelaide Oval, but failed to gain traction against a miserly Sixers bowling attack headed by Sarah Coyte.

The Sixers would be tickled pink with that effort. Credit:Hannah Barry

The Scorchers, seeking their first WBBL crown, stumbled mid-innings when they lost four wickets in four consecutive overs.

From 0-23, Perth slumped to 4-41 with their chief runscorers this tournament failing to fire - captain Elyse Villani made 16 and her opening partner Nicole Bolton five.Carter Page, a former foreign policy adviser of US President-elect Donald Trump, speaks at a news conference at RIA Novosti news agency in Moscow in 2016. Credit:AP Here's the problem with the claim that the memo shows that FBI was spying on the campaign: Carter Page was no longer associated with the campaign when the court order was approved. Here's the timeline March 16, 2016: In an interview with The Washington Post, Trump names Page as one of his foreign-policy advisers:

"Well, I hadn't thought of doing it, but if you want I can give you some of the names. . . Walid Phares, who you probably know, PhD, adviser to the House of Representatives caucus, and counterterrorism expert; Carter Page, PhD; George Papadopoulos, he's an energy and oil consultant, excellent guy; the Honorable Joe Schmitz, [former] inspector general at the Department of Defense; [retired] Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg; and I have quite a few more. But that's a group of some of the people that we are dealing with. We have many other people in different aspects of what we do, but that's a representative group." July 7-8: Page attracts attention by travelling to Moscow and delivering a speech harshly critical of US policy toward Russia. He emails campaign officials about "incredible insights" from his trip. August 5: The Trump campaign begins to back away from Page when The Washington Post reports on the unease in both parties caused by Page's remarks in Russia. Asked to comment on Page's public statements and campaign role, Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks said Page was an "informal foreign policy adviser" who "does not speak for Mr. Trump or the campaign." September 23: The Trump campaign denies Page was ever part of the campaign. "Mr Page is not an adviser and has made no contribution to the campaign," campaign spokesperson Jason Miller said. "He's never been part of our campaign. Period." The statement comes as Yahoo News reports that a U.S. intelligence probe was trying to determine if Page had "opened up private communications with senior Russian officials - including talks about the possible lifting of economic sanctions if the Republican nominee becomes president." September 26: Page himself announces he is taking "a leave of absence" from the campaign, saying the reporting on his remarks has created a "distraction."

October 21: Nearly a month after the Trump campaign says Page was never part of the campaign, FBI seeks and receives a FISA court order to begin surveillance on Page. The order is renewed at least three more times over the next year, meaning that the FBI is able to convince the judges that surveillance continues to provide assistance to investigators. The Wall Street Journal reported that all of the judges who approved the orders were appointed by Republicans. February 16, 2017: Trump denies he ever met Page. "I don't think I've ever met him," he told reporters at a news conference. "And he actually said he was a very low-level member of, I think, a committee for a short period of time. I don't think I ever met him. Now, it's possible that I walked into a room and he was sitting there, but I don't think I ever met him. I didn't talk to him, ever." In other words, the surveillance began long after Page had supposedly left the campaign. Trump denies he ever met or spoke to Page. So it's hard to see how a court order on a former campaign adviser - less than three weeks before the election - would constitute spying on the campaign. The memo also discloses that the FBI opened a counterintelligence operation in July because of allegations concerning other Trump adviser, George Papadopoulos. But Papadopoulos was never mentioned in the Steele dossier. He came to attention of the FBI because he had told an Australian diplomat that the Russians had obtained thousands of Clinton's emails. He has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI and is cooperating with the special counsel. Page was interviewed at length by the FBI in March, according to news reports, but that is before Mueller was named special counsel. As far as can be determined, Page is not a major figure in the Mueller probe.Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, a powerful rebel alliance that publicly split from al-Qaida last year, said it had used a man-portable anti-aircraft system to shoot down the Su-25 fighter jet as it flew low over the opposition-held town of Saraqeb.

A photo supplied by the media arm of al-Qaidas branch in Syria shows part of a Russian plane that was shot down by rebel fighters over northwest Idlib province in Syria Credit:Ibaa News Agency/AP

The Russian pilot was killed after he ejected and exchanged gunfire with militants on the ground, the Russian Defense Ministry and a monitoring group said.

Istanbul: Syria's former Al-Qaida affiliate claimed responsibility on Saturday for the downing of a Russian warplane in northern Syria, apparently using a shoulder-launched surface-to-air missile.

That claim was echoed by Russia's Interfax news agency, quoting the Defense Ministry, as well as the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

In the hours after the Russian jet was downed, Moscow also claimed to have killed more than 30 militants in the area, Interfax reported. The agency quoted the defense ministry as saying it used "precision-guided weapons" to carry out the strike, but without giving details.

The incident could raise tensions between Russia and Turkey, which is monitoring a so-called "de-escalation zone" in the northern province of Idlib as part of an agreement made during Syrian peace talks in the Kazakh capital, Astana.

It also raises questions about the source of the apparent MANPADS, a weapon for which Syria's rebels have repeatedly pleaded from their international backers. The United States in particular has been strongly opposed, fearing that anti-aircraft weapons could fall into the hands of the country's extremist groups.

Saraqeb has come under heavy bombardment from Russian and Syrian warplanes in recent days as pro-government forces try to recapture a strategic highway linking Damascus to Aleppo. The White Helmets civil defense group said on Saturday that seven civilians had been killed in at least 25 strikes on largely residential areas, some of them using barrel bombs.Sir, Would someone, anyone, please tell us who are the cretins, one in the FNM the other in the PLP, who approved the obscene amounts of money wasted buying and installing those hideously ugly signs that are now disfiguring our streets on New Providence. Just think of the number of... Read more After Pullout of Afghanistan, US Marks 20 Years Since 9/11NEW RICHMOND  Mingo Central erased an early 6-0 deficit and went on to claim[Read More]WiGBits Headline News Would you like to receive our WiGBits? Signup today!

WiG Entertainment News Would you like to receive our WiG Entertainment News? Signup today!

Digital Issue Would you like to receive our Digital Issue? Signup today!LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WLFI)  Doctors are encouraging adults over 50 to get another shot this year. A virus most commonly developed in childhood can be even worse for adults.



Sarah Kennedy, IU Health Arnett Pharmacist said shingles are extremely painful.

She said if you had the chicken pox growing up, there's a chance the virus is still in your body. Putting you at a higher risk for the adult version, known as shingles.

"It can come back and repeat over and over and over so if you've had shingles once, you can get shingles again...if you've never had shingles then anybody that's been exposed to chicken pox can have the shingles," said Kennedy.

One in three people are at risk of developing shingles.

"It usually presents first as a rash or as a very sore spot, tender spot, it lives in the nerves so it's more like a nerve pain," said Kennedy.

Managing the symptoms isn't easy, that's why Kennedy said prevention is key.

"There hasn't always been a vaccine available," said Kennedy.

A new vaccine called Shingrix is now available for anyone over 50. The vaccination is almost 95 percent effective.

Which is why you may have noticed a rise in advertisement about shingles recently. Kennedy said if you don't get the vaccine and end up developing the virus, contact your health care provider immediately.

"The earlier you get treatment the better," said Kennedy.



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Sorry, the page you requested was not found. If you're having trouble locating a destination on Womenofchina.cn, try visiting the Womenofchina Home pageA judge in Florida allowed the parents of a pregnant 11-year-old girl to move ahead with her marriage to a church deacon who raped the child for many years.

Sherry Johnson of Tampa said that she was only 8-year-old when the church bishop and deacon began having sex with her.

She lived with her mother who was very poor and couldnt give her any lunch money.

Every morning, Johnson when to her aunts house to ask for some money.

Her aunt lived in the same house of the church bishop.

One day, when she was just 8-years-old, the bishop called Johnson into his bedroom.

He put her on his bed and raped her.

Johnson was confused and was not sure what had happened to her.

She went to the bathroom to wash as she saw blood running down her legs.

She told her mother about the abuse but Johnson was called a liar.

For the following three years, she was repeatedly raped by both the church bishop and deacon.

One day, a nurse examined Johnson at school and noticed that the childs abdomen was swollen.

She took some tests and confirmed that Johnson was 7 months pregnant.

Johnsons mother demanded that the deacon marry her daughter.

The three went before several judges but they refused to allow the marriage.

Eventually, they found one judge that approved the child marriage.

According to current state law, there is no minimum age of marriage in cases where the girl is pregnant.

By the time Johnson turned 18 years old, she already had 6 children with the deacon.

Johnson then filed for divorce and moved on with her life.

Johnson is now fighting for a new law that would ban child marriages in the state.A man was jailed for many years and will suffer for the rest of his life after raping a woman who is HIV positive, according to police in Zimbabwe.

Bikita police said that they have arrested 30-year-old Frank Mukwesha after being accused of raping the mentally-challenged woman.

Mukwesha has pleaded guilty to rape.

He was sentenced to serve 15 years in prison.

According to the police investigation, Mukwesha worked at a factory that packaged flour.

One day, when the woman, who was not identified, went to buy flour at the factory, Mukwesha locked the woman in a room.

He proceeded to undress her and touch her body.

Mukwesha then raped her while she tried to push him away.

A week after the attack, when the woman went to get treatment for her HIV, she told a nurse about the attack.

Mukwesha was arrested and he then tested positive for HIV.

During questioning, Mukwesha told police that he did not rape the woman.

He claimed that he loved the woman and they had consensual sex.Parents were shocked to learn that a teacher violated them and their children at the school where he was employed.

52-year-old Brendan Cohen was teaching at Bialik College in Australia when he took upskirt photos of students and their parents.

After the teacher left Bialik College, where he taught for 15 years, to teach at another college, the principal found a hard drive that contained the upskirt photos.

Police were called and the hard drive was handed over to the officers.

According to prosecutors, detectives found more than 80 videos that were recorded under the dresses of women and children.

In addition to those, detectives found videos that had the faces of children photoshopped onto that of adult porn stars. The videos were recorded over a period of 2 years, police said.

The teacher pleaded guilty at the Melbourne Magistrates Court to two charges of making child pornography.

He was sentenced to five months in prison, two years community corrections order, and was banned from teaching.

He was not jailed immediately. Instead, he was freed on bail pending his appeal hearing.Europe's biggest low-cost airline is adding a new destination in the Middle East.

Starting next month, Ryanair will begin flying to Jordan from Cyprus. It's the airline's second destination in the region after it launched flights to Israel last year.

By October, Ryanair will operate 10 routes to Amman, Jordan's capital. In the winter months, it will add four routes to Aqaba, the gateway to many of the country's top tourist destinations such as the Red Sea and the ancient city of Petra.

The airline said it expects to carry about 500,000 people to Jordan every year from cities such as Athens, Brussels, Cologne, Milan, Rome and Warsaw.

Jordan's economy relies heavily on tourism. The industry contributed almost 20% to GDP in 2016, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council, and that is forecast to rise to almost 23% by 2027.

War and instability in neighboring countries such Syria and Iraq have hurt Jordan in the past. It has taken in more than 600,000 refugees from Syria. And in 2015 tourism slumped because of fears of ISIS attacks.

No other European low-cost currently carrier flies to Jordan. Ryanair's British rival, EasyJet stopped flying to Amman in 2014 after three years.

Related: Ryanair offers pilots major cash to keep flying

The Jordanian government hopes the new Ryanair flights will boost growth by spurring more tourism and attracting investment.

"The decision by Ryanair to fly to Jordan sends a loud and clear message about the diversity and the untapped potential of Jordan's tourism," Jordan's tourism minister, Lina Annab, said in a statement on Sunday.

Ryanair said it will be selling seats to Amman in April and May for as little as -20 euros ($25). It expects its new routes will support nearly 350 jobs in Jordan.KNOX COUNTY, Ind. (WTHI)  Two people are dead after a 4-wheeling accident in Knox County. It took place roughly at 1 AM Sunday Morning.

Indiana State Police Sergeant Todd Ringle says the victims were Breezie Mason, 33, and Meaghan Meeks, 32 of Oaktown. He says the vehicle they were riding in drove off an embankment into the Wabash River.

The vehicle was a military Humvee with four total passengers. The other passengers were Kyle Mason, 34, and Cody Meeks, 33. They were the husbands of the two victims.

Ringle says the two women were unable to get out. The two men ran over a mile back to Mason's residence but were unable to get help. Mason grabbed another vehicle to help those trapped while Meeks ran to another nearby residence to call for help.

Multiple law enforcement agencies responded to the scene. Vincennes Township Drivers were dispatched to find the vehicle.

Due to strong currents crews had a difficult time removing the vehicle from the river.

Around 10:30 AM crews located both women and pulled the vehicle from the river.

Indiana State Police and Knox County Coroner Brian Hagen is investigating the incident. They suspect no foul play and autopsies are scheduled for Monday February 5th.

News 10 will continue to follow this story. Well bring you more details as they become available.BICKNELL, Ind. (WTHI)- It has been a long emotional week for the city of Bicknell. It started Monday when First Lieutenant Clayton Cullen was brought home from California.

Since then the Knox County community has paid their respects to the fallen soldier. That included today where everyone gave him one last goodbye.

Cars lined the parking lot of North Knox High School for First Lieutenant Cullen's funeral. Friends, family and fellow service members were there for his final send-off.

They were not alone though. Just like the Knox County community has done all week everyone came out to show their support from the school to the cemetery. Including Bobby Tester who wanted to pay his respects.

"Being in the military doing what he did is from what I understand was a dream of his and of course his mother and father were extremely proud as was the whole community," said Tester.

Firetrucks from all over lined Main Street to pay their respects to Cullen. The city fire department also draped an American flag over the street.

The Indiana Patriot Guard who followed behind the family was happy to see this local support. Rick Williams is a member of the guard who says seeing this support is heartwarming.

"I've done over 40 active duty and KIA funerals and in small towns, this is what you see time and time again, said Williams.

Cullen made his last stop in the Bicknell Memorial Cemetery. Loved ones of this army helicopter pilot filled the cemetery for one last salute and goodbye.

A final send-off for First Lieutenant Clayton Cullen of Bicknell. A man who gave his life to protect ours.Turkey's Prime Minister warned that Kurdish YPG forces will pay "twice as much" following the deaths of seven Turkish soldiers in Syria's Afrin province.

Prime Minister Binali Yildirim made the threat in a tweet Saturday, Turkey's state media said, which marked Turkey's deadliest day in its military operation dubbed "Operation Olive Branch" in northern Syria.

Turkish forces entered the Afrin area in an attempt to drive US-backed, Syrian-Kurdish YPG militia from the area last month.

Five Turkish soldiers were killed when a tank was destroyed by a missile in Sheikh Haruz, northeast of Afrin, Turkish state media reported.

Footage of the attack, released by the militia's media center, showed a speck of light flying across a field, hurling toward a distant target. Moments later, a tank explodes in a powerful ball of orange flames.

Turkish armed forces said a sixth soldier was killed near the border town of Kilis, and another died in an undisclosed location fighting militia forces, Anadolu reported.

'Operation Olive Branch'

Turkey launched "Operation Olive Branch" on January 20 with the aim of ending the US-allied militia control of Afrin and the surrounding region along the Syrian-Turkish border. Turkey has long wanted to establish a safe zone: a 19-mile-wide strip of land in Syria along the border that Turkey helps control.

In Ankara's eyes, Syrian Kurds are virtually indistinguishable from Kurdish separatists in Turkey, a group it has long considered terrorists. The Kurdish YPG control a large chunk of northern Syria, so a safe zone would create a buffer along the border.

The risk to US relations

Turkey's high-stakes incursion in Afrin risks inflaming tensions even further with its NATO ally, the US, which is funding the very group Turkey is trying to defeat, the Kurdish YPG, in the fight against ISIS.

Shortly after their assault began, Turkish forces said they had killed 260 Kurdish and ISIS fighters in the region. The claim can't be independently verified, and CNN has no indication there are ISIS fighters in the area that Turkey is fighting.

Speaking with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan by phone, US President Donald Trump talked tough, saying Turkey's "Operation Olive Branch," targeting the US-backed Kurdish fighters, risked undercutting shared goals in Syria, according to the White House. Trump warned Erdogan against escalating military action in the region. Turkish officials immediately disputed that account of the call, saying the two leaders simply exchanged views on the situation.

Erdogan has also slammed the US plan to back a border protection force for Kurds in northern Syria in an effort to train and equip them to keep ISIS from coming back in, calling the effort "building an army of terror," according to Turkish state media.

A call for cooperation

Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin t old CNN their operation isn't against the Kurds of Afrin or Syria.

"This is an operation against a terrorist network that claims to represent the Kurds, which is far from the truth," he said.

Kalin cited Amnesty International in pointing out that the PYD/YPG has committed war crimes by razing villages and forcibly removing local communities from their native lands.

He said the operation aims to remedy the situation and facilitate the return of Syrian refugees to their country.

"The primary goal of the operation is to clear Syrian territories of all terrorist groups," he explained, saying Turkey has fought against ISIS and cooperated with its allies in eliminating ISIS terrorists. "It is deadly wrong to think that the PKK does not pose a threat to Western countries and therefore should be seen as Turkey's problem."GREENVILLE, Miss. (AP)  Three Mississippi residents have pleaded guilty in the death of a Louisiana man whose remains were found in a field near a casino.

The Delta Democrat-Times reports that the victim, Thomas McIntosh, was last seen in December 2014 at Harlow's Casino Resort and Spa in Greenville, Mississippi.

McIntosh was from Oak Grove, Louisiana, and was reported missing to the West Carroll Parish Sheriff's Department in February 2015. His remains were found that April in Mississippi.

On Wednesday, 36-year-old Christopher Franks pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Two others  38-year-old Trudy Ponder and 26-year-old Parker Huddleston  pleaded guilty to culpable negligence manslaughter and were sentenced to 20 years.

Investigators said McIntosh died after taking illegal drugs with the three outside the casino.NETTLETON, Miss. (WTVA) - A man was struck and killed by a train in Nettleton Sunday.

Monroe County Coroner Alan Gurley says Lee County 911 received the call sometime near 11:45 a.m. about a person struck in Nettleton near the Shell gas station on the Monroe County side of town.

Gurley has identified the man who died as Marconi Mazariegos Perez, 32. The coroner says Perez was living with a friend on Tupelo Avenue in Nettleton but he is actually from Tacana, San Marcos, Guatemala.

Nettleton Police Chief Gary Monaghan says the train's engineer saw that someone was standing on the track. However, the closer the train got, the engineer realized the person wasn't going to move.

"There was no way they (train) could stop," the police chief said.

Perez was killed instantly. Efforts are being made to reach his family in Guatemala.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 02:17:12|Editor: ZD

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MOSCOW, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- A Russian pilot was killed after his plane was shot down by militants in Syria's Province of Idlib, the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement on Saturday.

"A Russian Su-25 aircraft crashed during a flight over the Idlib de-escalation area," the ministry said in the statement.

"The pilot died in a fight with the terrorists," the statement said, adding that preliminary information showed that the plane was downed by use of a man-portable anti-aircraft missile system.

"The Russian center for reconciliation of opposing sides in Syria and the Turkish side overseeing the Idlib de-escalation area are working to bring the Russian pilot's body home," it said.

The pilot had reported earlier that he ejected by parachute in the area, controlled by Nusra Front militants.UN chemical weapons experts, wearing gas masks, hold a plastic bag containing samples from one of the sites of an allegedchemical weapons attack in the Ain Tarma neighbourhood of Damascus, Syria. (Reuters Photo)

DAMASCUS, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- The Syrian Foreign Ministry on Saturday rejected the U.S. claims about the Syrian government using chemical weapons in the war as "lies."

The ministry said in a statement that the U.S. remarks about the use of chemical weapons in the Eastern Ghouta region of the east of the capital Damascus are "false claims."

Such allegations were timed to undermine the efforts to resolve the Syrian war through a peaceful settlement between the Syrians without foreign interventions, it noted.

The Syrian government reaffirms its position against the use of chemical weapons, and Syria has handed over all its chemical arsenals to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the ministry said.

The U.S. and its allies are "desperately" searching for a pretext to target Syria, following the success of the Syrian army in its war against terror-designated militant groups across Syria, it pointed out.

U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis recently threatened Syria with a military action if hard evidence is found to back up the claims of another sarin attack in Syria.

Last month, activists claimed the Syrian forces used chlorine in an attack on the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta countryside of Damascus, causing 21 people to suffer from breathing difficulties.

In April last year, the U.S. struck a military base in central Syria with more than 50 Tomahawk missiles, in retaliation for an alleged chemical attack by the government forces on a rebel-held town in the northwestern province of Idlib.

The Syrian government denied the accusations, saying it's rebels who mounted the attack to frame the government and draw in a military action from the United States.This file photo taken on July 7, 2017 shows US President Donald Trump and Russia's President Vladimir Putin shaking hands during a meeting on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Hamburg, Germany. (AFP PHOTO)

MOSCOW, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- Russia on Saturday rejected Washington's statements made in its 2018 Nuclear Posture Review that Moscow refuses to further decrease its nuclear capabilities.

"While just having a flick through the document, one can notice that its confrontational charge and anti-Russian focus stare in the face," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

"The document's statement that Russia allegedly refuses to further reduce its nuclear capabilities is yet another example of the blatant 'falsification'," the statement said.

The U.S. said in its 2018 Nuclear Posture Review that Russia continues to violate a series of arms control treaties and commitments.

"In the nuclear context, the most significant Russian violation involves a system banned by the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty," said the 74-page U.S. nuclear policy report released on Friday.

"In a broader context, Russia is either rejecting or avoiding its obligations and commitments under numerous agreements, and has rebuffed U.S. efforts to follow the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) with another round of negotiated reductions and to pursue reductions in non-strategic nuclear forces," it added.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said it has nothing in common with the actual state of affairs. "Certainly, we will be compelled to take into consideration the approaches introduced now by Washington and to take necessary steps in order to ensure own security," it noted.

The Russian Foreign Ministry urged the United States to "team up to look for solutions to the problems that have been accumulating in the field of strategic stability."

The U.S. report, which is largely in line with the 2010 review done by the Obama administration, reaffirms commitments to non-proliferation treaties but emphasizes the need to enhance capabilities to match with Russia, showing supports for U.S. nuclear modernization projects.

The review, the first of this kind since 2010, also calls for a "lower-yield" option with less powerful explosive capacity for ballistic and cruise missiles launched from submarines.'

Re-elected Finnish President Sauli Niinisto (L) and his wife Jenni Haukio greet the public from the balcony of the Presidential Palace during presidential inauguration on February 1, 2018 in Helsinki, Finland. (AFP PHOTO/Lehtikuva/Markku Ulander/ Finland OUT)

HELSINKI, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- Finnish President Sauli Niinisto and his spouse Jenni Haukio had a son on Friday evening, one day after he was inaugurated as the president for a second six-year term.

Niinisto announced the birth both on his personal Facebook account and in a press release of the presidential office.

The president thanked for the congratulations the couple has received. The website of the presidential office collapsed for some minutes after the announcement.

Niinisto, now 69, and Jenni Haukio, now 40, got married in 2009. When married, Mrs Haukio chose to keep her surname.

Finnish media started speculation about the child's name. As the parents have different surnames, they have to decide whether the son will be a Niinisto or a Haukio.

The son was born at the Women's Clinic of the Helsinki University Hospital, located in Meilahti, a few kilometers from the official residence of the president. The hospital is currently the only hospital offering birth services in Helsinki.

Niinisto's previous wife Marja-Leena died in an auto crash in 1995. Niinisto has two adult sons from his previous marriage.

The baby is Haukio's first child.

Before the marriage, Haukio worked as the information chief of the Finnish conservative party. Their dating had been known by a very small circle only prior to the wedding.

This is the first time a Finnish president gets offspring while in office.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 07:34:33|Editor: Liangyu

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An Israeli soldier fires a tear gas canister at Palestinian protesters during clashes, during what reportedly was an Israeli search operation in the West Bank village of al-Kufer, near Jenin City, on Feb. 3, 2018. The area sees regular clashes between local Palestinians and Israeli forces over protest against nearby Jewish settlements. (Xinhua/Ayman Nobani)Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 07:20:32|Editor: pengying

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Feng Cuiling (C) discusses work arrangementwith her colleagues at Tianjin University in Tianjin, north China, Dec. 13, 2017. Feng Cuiling, a delegate to the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, is Party secretary of the School of Pharmaceutical Science and Technology of Tianjin University. She is dedicated to system reforming, talents cultivating, faculty improving and discipline building, trying to build a world first-class school. As an educator, Feng exerts every effort in her job to offer the kind of education that satisfies the people. (Xinhua/Shen Hong)Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 07:12:54|Editor: ZD

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TALLINN, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- China-Estonia relations are developing with great potential and boast broad prospects to enhance mutually-beneficial cooperations in various sectors, Chinese Ambassador to Estonia Li Chao said here on Saturday.

Li, who arrived in Tallinn for his term over a week ago, made the remarks at a reception to celebrate the Chinese Lunar New Year or Spring Festival, hailing the positive developing trend of the bilateral ties.

He reviewed the development of the exchanges and cooperations in the fields of politics, trade and business, culture and education, while speaking highly of the contribution of the small but active Chinese community in Estonia to the development of local society and the friendship of the two countries.

The year of 2018 is very important for both China and Estonia, as it's the first year following the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China in 2017 and marks the 40th anniversary of China's reform and opening-up, while Estonia welcomes in 2018 the centenary of its independence, Li pointed out.

The ambassador expects to achieve more tangible results for bilateral cooperations in the future, wishing a prosperous and happy Chinese New Year to all at present.

Participants of the reception were entertained by Chinese dancers from Youth Dance Company of Beijing Dance Academy.

Earlier at the Russian Culture Center in Tallinn, the Chinese performers also presented a 1.5 hour-long Nuo dance to express ancient Chinese people's outlook on life and universe for blessing, good luck and health.

The Chinese ambassador, Estonian former president Arnold Ruutel and his wife, Tallinn Deputy Mayor Vadim Belobrovtsev, and Kalev Kallo, former Chairman of the City Council of Tallinn, were among the several hundred spectators present at the center.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 08:58:40|Editor: Yurou

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By Xinhua writers Li Binian and Liu Huaipi

ZHENGZHOU, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- In a newly built museum, 37-year-old Mu Dongliang is looking at a black and white photo. The building in the photo reminds him of the school he worked for in the 1990s.

"When I started my career as a teacher in 1999, my office was in the building. It was poorly furnished," Mu said.

The school was situated in Muzhuang Village in Zhengzhou, China's central Henan Province.

The village goes back about 600 years and has always been largely farmland. It was not until five years ago that the village turned into a prosperous city with many tall buildings and glittering lights.

The change in Muzhuang show how Zhengzhou has urbanized, with many villages being demolished and renovated.

Now, Mu teaches at a new school built in the village, with state-of-art equipment.

"Not only schools have changed for the better," said Zhao Xinqin, 52.

According to Zhao, Muzhuang Village was on a low-lying area and it bothered the villagers as it often flooded when there was heavy rain.

"We are very happy to move out and live in apartments," she said.

To preserve the history of its villages, the Zhengzhou government built museums dedicated to the former villages.

"When visiting the museum, a different generation has a different feeling," said Zhao.

"For the older generation, the museum is more of a reminder of history. For the younger generation, it brings about nostalgia," she added.

In the museum of the Honghuasi Village, the introduction of the village "firsts" is impressive.

Among all nearby villages, Honghuasi Village was the first to have a bicycle in 1961, to use a tractor in 1971, to own a TV set in 1980 and to purchase an Audi auto in the 1990s.

In 2015, the village was demolished and renamed Honghuasi Community.

"The history of Honghuasi Village dates back to the Tang Dynasty (618-907 A.D.). For the younger generation, the museum and chronicle of the village is a reminder of what it was in the past," said Zheng Guoqing, a local official.

Before the demolition and renovation, Zheng had the village photographed from the sky and had the lives of villagers recorded.

A team of nine was established to compile a chronicle of the village, which was completed in June 2017.

The chronicle, with nearly 200,000 Chinese characters, keeps record of every detail of the village, such as its environment, population and customs. It also includes the biography of famous figure from the village.

"So far, 399 chronicles of villages have been compiled and 78 museums have been built," said Wu Xinyong, deputy director of the Zhengzhou City Construction Office.MOSCOW, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Massive Russian air strikes have killed at least 30 militants in northwest Syria, where a Russian fighter jet was shot down, Russia's Defense Ministry said in a statement Saturday.

A series of high-precision weapon strikes has been delivered in the area controlled by the Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist group, which brought down the Russian Su-25 jet by using a portable anti-aircraft missile system in the Syrian province Idlib, said the statement.

"According to radio intercepts, more than 30 Jabhat al-Nusra militants were killed," said the statement.

Earlier Saturday, the ministry said a pilot survived the fighter jet crash but was later killed in a ground fight with terrorists.

In May 2017, the guarantors of the Syrian ceasefire -- Russia, Iran and Turkey -- agreed to set up the Syrian de-escalation zones in Syria, which includes Idlib province.TRIPOLI, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The rise of world oil prices will save Libya's national economy from deficit, Tariq Al-Jarushi, a member of the Libyan eastern-based House of Representatives, said Saturday.

"The high oil prices will save the Libyan economy from paralysis and disability. After mid-2018, the price of Libyan crude oil will be as high as 90 U.S. dollars per barrel," Al-Jarushi said in a statement.

Al-Jarushi expressed fears over international pressure, which could lead to subversive activities carried out by militia and terrorist organizations against oil fields to prevent Libya from increasing its oil production.

"There are signs that the Libyan economy is recovering. There are countries that are trying to prolong the economic and security crisis in Libya. They may move inside or outside OPEC (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) to limit the rise of Libyan oil prices," he said.

Libya suffered losses over the past four years of more than 140 billion dollars due to repeated closure of oil fields and ports by armed conflicts and low oil prices in the global market.

Oil and gas account for 94 percent of Libya's foreign exchange earnings, the country's main source of income.

Libya boasts oil reserves of 41 billion barrels, perhaps the largest in Africa.

Al-Jarushi pointed out that the vote on a new Central Bank governor, the rise of oil prices, the increase of local currency against foreign currencies, and the drop in the local prices of food and medicine are "indications that do not satisfy some countries hostile to Libya's stability and security," in reference to Qatar, Turkey and Sudan.

On Dec. 19, 2017, the parliament elected Mohamed Abdel-Salam Shoukri as the new governor of the Central Bank of Libya.

The parliament's unilateral appointment of Shoukri was rejected by the Tripoli-based Higher Council of State, calling it a "move doomed to failure."JAKARTA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- A total of four workers were killed Sunday after a crane used for construction of light rapid transport infrastructure collapsed in Indonesia's capital, an official said.

"A crane collapse in East Jakarta this (Sunday) morning," an official of national disaster management agency told Xinhua by phone.

The incident took place at about 05 :00 a.m. Jakarta time in Matraman district, police said.

"Two people were killed on the scene and two other injured persons died in hospital," police chief in East Jakarta Senior Commissioner Yoyon Tono Surya Putra said.

The victims were rushed to nearby Hermina Hospital, according to him.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 10:53:54|Editor: pengying

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People select books on the Cuba's International Book Fair in Havana, Cuba, Feb. 2, 2018. Cuba's International Book Fair 2018 opened here Thursday amid drumroll with China as this year's guest country. (Xinhua/Joaquin Hernandez)

by Raul Menchaca

HAVANA, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- Havana's 27th International Book Fair, which features China as a guest country, Saturday paid homage to "Kwong Wah Po," a Chinese-language newspaper catering to the local Chinese community.

"It's a publication that represents the interests of the Chinese immigrant community in Cuba," Maria Teresa Montes de Oca Choi, a professor who leads studies on China's migrants in Cuba, told Xinhua.

"It presents the cultural, political and active life of these migrants within Cuban society," Montes de Oca said.

A martial arts presentation by students from the Cuban Wushu School kicked off the ceremony in honor of the newspaper, which this year marks its 90th anniversary.

A special edition spotlights the contribution that China's migrants have made to Cuban culture since 1847, when the first 200 workers, or coolies, arrived in search of a better life.

Following the Japanese aggression against China in 1937, the newspaper changed its name to "Salvation of the Homeland," and became a monthly publication due to rising costs. Shortly after, it closed.

The following year, a Chinese daily printed in the United States, "Wah Kiu," donated equipment and printing machinery to get the enterprise going again, this time from Santiago de Cuba, a city located on the easternmost tip of the island country.

It was not until 1944 that the publication adopted its current name, though its criticism of Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek's government following the end of World War II led the Cuban government to crack down on it, and the daily went underground.

After the 1959 Cuban Revolution, the publication was gradually revived. Today it is a four-page tabloid that includes a page in Spanish.

The newspaper is now sponsored by the local Chinese Center of Art and Traditions and the Chung Wah Casino Federation.

Some 600 copies are printed monthly with news on national and international events, and features that promote Cuba-China ties and friendship.

"The fraternal ties go beyond any trade agreement or cultural accord. They are above all, because the cultural symbiosis and fraternity that developed between the Chinese and Cubans was fed by the blood of our liberators and that remains," said Montes de Oca.

The special edition of the publication is being featured at the fair alongside some 300 Chinese book titles by leading authors.

The fair runs through Feb. 11 in Havana, before touring the country and concluding in Santiago de Cuba in May.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 11:03:58|Editor: Yurou

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BUENOS AIRES, Feb. 2 (Xinhua) -- U.S. criticism of Latin America's growing ties with China is unfounded since the bilateral relationship is based on mutual interest and cooperation, Argentine political analyst Paola de Simone has said.

On Thursday, prior to embarking on a trip to five nations in Latin America and the Caribbean -- including Argentina -- U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson accused China of "using economic statecraft to pull the region into its orbit."

"Proof of that is that increasingly more countries in the region are strengthening their ties with Beijing and bolstering their own development," Simone told Xinhua in a recent interview.

The expert, who specializes in international law, said Latin America's ties with China have been diversifying, and are not merely financial and economic in nature.

"Ties with China are expanding in diverse fields, such as trade, culture and economy. Recently, our country (Argentina) succeeded in opening up the Chinese market for beef and lamb. They join wine and other goods that are cropping up in Chinese baskets," she said.

In contrast, U.S. protectionism is making it harder for Latin American countries to export their products to the United States, the analyst said.

With China's help, "our country has been able to modernize its cargo and passenger rail system with Chinese trains," Simone said.

Following two years of contraction in 2015 and 2016, trade volume between China and Latin America and the Caribbean amounted to 247.4 billion U.S. dollars in the first 11 months of 2017, up 22.2 percent year-on-year.

"Ties benefit both sides, which turned out to complement one another with what each provides, from raw materials and agroindustry to investment and technology for infrastructure," said Simone.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 11:19:03|Editor: Yurou

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BUENOS AIRES, Feb. 3 (Xinhua) -- U.S. criticism of Latin America's growing ties with China is unfounded since the bilateral relationship is based on mutual interest and cooperation, Argentine political analyst Paola de Simone has said.

Prior to embarking on a trip to five nations in Latin America and the Caribbean -- including Argentina -- U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson accused China on Thursday of "using economic statecraft to pull the region into its orbit."

The U.S. envoy suggested that China is applying undue pressure, remarks which Simone said were unfounded.

"Proof of that is that increasingly more countries in the region are strengthening their ties with Beijing and bolstering their own development," she told Xinhua in a recent interview.

The expert, who specializes in international law, said Latin America's ties with China have been diversifying, and are not merely financial and economic in nature.

"Ties with China are expanding in diverse fields, such as trade, culture and economy. Recently, our country (Argentina) succeeded in opening up the Chinese market for beef and lamb. They join wine and other goods that are cropping up in Chinese baskets," she said.

In contrast, U.S. protectionism is making it harder for Latin American countries to export their products to the United States, the analyst said.

Argentina, for example, is currently in a lawsuit against the United States over Argentine-produced biodiesel as Washington decided in December to keep the anti-dumping duties effective for another five years. Simone said the tariffs are too high for producers in her country to export their products to the U.S. market.

Tillerson's tour includes stops in Mexico, Argentina, Peru, Colombia and Jamaica. On Monday he will meet with Argentine President Mauricio Macri.

Until this trip, the expert said, the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has by and large ignored Latin America, except for making complaints about cross-border migration from Mexico or slapping the socialist governments of Cuba and Venezuela.

"The United States' objection to China's ties with Latin America is due to the fact that since Trump's arrival, it abandoned the region, an area it used to consider its backyard," she said.

"Given this lack of attention, the Southern Cone (southernmost areas of South America) looked to Europe and China, whose global initiatives, such as the Belt and Road, can lead to development," she added, referring to the Belt and Road Initiative proposed by China to achieve common development by boosting infrastructure construction and interconnectivity, among others.

With China's help, "our country has been able to modernize its cargo and passenger rail system with Chinese trains," Simone said.

Following two years of contraction in 2015 and 2016, trade volume between China and Latin America and the Caribbean amounted to 247.4 billion U.S. dollars in the first 11 months of 2017, up 22.2 percent year-on-year.

"Ties benefit both sides, which turned out to complement one another with what each provides, from raw materials and agroindustry to investment and technology for infrastructure," said Simone.Nuclear| 2018-02-04 11:39:09|Editor: ZD

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WASHINGTON, Feb. 2 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. Defense Ministry on Friday officially published the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), the guiding principle for the future U.S. policy seeking enhanced nuclear deterrent which is already the world's most powerful.

"The United States now faces a more diverse and advanced nuclear-threat environment than ever before, with considerable dynamism in potential adversaries' development and deployment programs for nuclear weapons and delivery systems," the document claimed.

The comprehensive report, which is largely in line with the 2010 review done by the Obama administration, reaffirms commitments to non-proliferation treaties but emphasizes the need to enhance capabilities to match with Russia, showing supports for U.S. nuclear modernization projects.

The review, the first of this kind since 2010, also calls for a "lower-yield" option with less powerful explosive capacity for ballistic and cruise missiles launched from submarines.

The lower-yield weapons would enhance the credibility of the U.S. arsenal, the review claims. It also says that nuclear weapons could be used to respond to "extreme circumstances," including non-nuclear attacks.

Elisabeth Braw, a researcher with the Atlantic Council, said: "While the Nuclear Posture Review may contain no radical departures from the Obama administration's nuclear policy, the public debate is already focusing on the low-yield nuclear weapons."

"The European public will see this as another dangerous Trump policy at an already tense time in the transatlantic relationship," he added.

"The U.S. nuclear arsenal remains the largest and most capable in the world, consisting of thousands of warheads loaded on intercontinental ballistic missiles and submarines-launched ballistic missiles, along with nuclear bombs and cruise missiles carried by long-range bombers," Michael Klare, professor and director of the Five College Program in Peace and World Security Studies, told Xinhua.

"Most of these warheads are of the type that can destroy entire cities, but the U.S. also deploys bombers in Europe that are capable of dropping bombs with lower explosive yields," Klare said, warning that any U.S. nuclear buildup may lead to "a renewed arms race and a more dangerous world."

According to the review, the U.S. will sustain its strategic nuclear triad systems, largely deployed in the 1980s or earlier, until the planned replacement programs are deployed.

The United States currently operates 14 OHIO-class submarines and plans to replace them by the COLUMBIA-class submarines. The COLUMBIA program will deliver a minimum of 12 submarines to replace the current OHIO fleet and is designed to provide required deterrence capabilities for decades, the review says.

The U.S. landbased intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) force consists of 400 single-warhead Minuteman III missiles deployed in underground silos and dispersed across several states.

The United States has also initiated the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD) program to begin the replacement of Minuteman III in 2029. The GBSD program will also modernize the 450 ICBM launch facilities that will support the fielding of 400 ICBMs.

The current U.S. non-strategic nuclear force consists exclusively of a relatively small number of B61 gravity bombs carried by F-15E and allied dual capable aircraft (DCA). The United States is incorporating nuclear capability onto the forward-deployable, nuclear-capable F-35 as a replacement for the current aging DCA.

The review requires an "investment in a credible nuclear deterrent with diverse capabilities," chief Pentagon spokesperson Dana White said one day before its publication.

The review, aligned with the National Defense Strategy and the National Security Strategy, came nearly one year after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing the review. EnditemSource: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 12:14:13|Editor: ZD

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CANBERRA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Australia's Prime Minister has called for public servants responsible for classified government documents falling into the hands of journalists to be fired.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) on Wednesday published a series of documents from the Cabinet of Australia, the inner sanctum of government, after they were found in a locked filing cabinet sold at a second-hand government furniture auction.

All the documents have since been returned to the government after lawyers for both parties negotiated their return.

Martin Parkinson, head of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, on Sunday confirmed that his department was responsible for the breach, saying in a statement that it would have implications for the entire public service.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull told the ABC on Sunday that those responsible should lose their jobs.

"This is a disgraceful, almost unbelievable act of negligence," he said.

"The idea that public servants trusted with highly confidential documents would put them in a safe, lock the safe, lose the keys and then sell the safe without checking what was in it beggars belief.

"We want to see those responsible for this negligence identified and dealt with appropriately."

Just hours after the documents were published, officers from the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), Australia's domestic intelligence agency, entered ABC offices in Canberra and Brisbane to secure the documents in a safe.

The breach has reportedly prompted concerns over Australia's security protocols from the U.S., Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom; fellow members of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance.

The government has moved to reassure its allies that their secrets are safe.

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) is conducting an investigation into how and when the documents were lost by the department.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 12:39:17|Editor: ZD

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MOSCOW, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Massive Russian air strikes have killed at least 30 militants in northwest Syria, where a Russian fighter jet was shot down, Russia's Defense Ministry said in a statement Saturday.

A series of high-precision weapon strikes has been delivered in the area controlled by the Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist group, which brought down the Russian Su-25 jet by using a portable anti-aircraft missile system in the Syrian province Idlib, said the statement.

"According to radio intercepts, more than 30 Jabhat al-Nusra militants were killed," said the statement.

Earlier Saturday, the ministry said a pilot survived the fighter jet crash but was later killed in a ground fight with terrorists.

"The pilot died in a fight with the terrorists," an earlier statement said.

"The Russian center for reconciliation of opposing sides in Syria and the Turkish side overseeing the Idlib de-escalation area are working to bring the Russian pilot's body home," it said.

The incident requires finding out which countries could have equipped the militants with the man-portable air defense system, Yury Shvytkin, the deputy chairman of the Russian lower house's defense committee, was quoted by Sputnik as saying.

In May 2017, the guarantors of the Syrian ceasefire, Russia, Iran and Turkey, agreed to set up the Syrian de-escalation zones in Syria, which includes Idlib province.

In December 2017, the Russian military announced that Syrian troops supported by Russian servicemen have completed the destruction of Islamic State terrorists in the war-torn country.

Later, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the beginning of a partial withdrawal of Russian troops from Syria.

Russia reportedly spent an average of 156 million rubles (2.6 million U.S. dollars) every day in the past few years on military operations against terrorist groups in Syria.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 13:04:19|Editor: Yurou

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QINGDAO, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- China has maintained a sea ice alert for Liaodong Bay in northeast China's Bohai Sea as the ice grew by nearly 5,000 square km daily.

On Saturday, 14,608 square km of sea ice was recorded in Liaodong Bay, increasing 4,727 square km from a day earlier, taking up 47.74 percent of the bay area.

The National Marine Environmental Forecasting Center (NMEFC) of China maintained a blue alert for the sea ice.

According to the center, the declining water temperature in northern sea areas caused by a cold wave in late January has contributed to the expansion of the ice, while the direction of the cold front led to more drifting ice.

The NMEFC forecast that the ice will remain for the next three days.

Experts warn that the quick freezing and de-freezing of sea ice may affect coastal residents and enterprises.

China has a four-tier warning system for sea ice, with red being the most serious, followed by orange, yellow and blue.NEW DELHI, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- India has said it's in touch with Nigeria and Benin, and also set up a 24-hour helpline in Abuja in the wake of fears of hijack of an Indian ship with 22 of its nationals on board.

The ship has been missing in sea off West Africa coast for over 60 hours.

"A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted Saturday night.

"Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy," he added.

Another official has said that the Ministry of Shipping has also contacted its counterparts in Nigeria and Benin to help locate the missing vessel. "But nothing is known at this point of time," he added.

The Panama-registered vessel tanker vessel, owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company, has been carrying gasoline worth nearly 8 million U.S. dollars when it lost contact some three days back.

Anglo Eastern Ship Management has said that the crew's safety is its top priority.

"We regret that contact has been lost with the AE-managed MT Marine Express while at Cotonou, Benin. Last contact was at 03:30 UTC, Feb 1. Authorities have been alerted and are responding," the company tweeted.

The region near Benin, especially the Gulf of Guinea, is known to be pirate-infested, and several ships have been targeted. In January, another ship went missing off the coast of Benin and two days later, it was confirmed to have been hijacked.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 13:14:22|Editor: Yurou

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GUANGZHOU, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Cleaner Huang Xueying has nine cleaning rags and two mops in different colors, as well as several bottles of detergent, among other cleaning supplies.

"Colors are used to distinguish tools used for different purposes," Huang said. "The blue rag is for toilet seats, and the white for mirrors."

Huang, 43, works on the G79 high-speed train from Beijing to the south China city of Guangzhou. The train is among thousands of trains running during the 2018 Spring Festival travel rush, known as "Chunyun," which started Thursday.

Around 390 million passenger trips are expected to be made during the 40-day travel frenzy, up 8.8 percent year on year. The world's largest annual human migration for family reunion puts huge pressure on train workers, especially cleaners.

On older trains, often overloaded during travel rush, lavatories used to be a nightmare. They were often left with muddy floors, dirty squat toilets and waste paper littered everywhere. Passengers would often wait rather than elbow their way to such disgusting lavatories.

The situation has changed as China has upgraded most of its trains. Newer bullet trains are equipped with vacuum toilets and full-time cleaners, such as Huang.

On the eight-hour trip, Huang must check the sanitary conditions, do thorough cleaning, and note records for eight toilets in four carriages every 30 minutes.

"I take more than 22,000 steps every workday," Huang said.

Boxes of air fresheners, and disposable toilet seat covers are installed in every toilet, as are sinks and huge mirrors. Beside the sink, there are single-use combs, liquid soap, hand cream, and plants. Toilets with disabled access and baby-care facilities are also available on trains.

"Everything is sterilized. We want to provide a clean and comfortable toilet environment to make passengers feel at home," said Zhong Zhaoshuang, chief conductor of the train.

The modern vacuum toilet has replaced the former squats, through which excrement was directly discharged outside, said Zeng Guangxiang, a senior railway officer.

Almost all high-speed trains in China have 16 vacuum toilets, allowing excrement to be collected and then treated at certain stations.

According to Zeng, the change has significantly improved sanitary conditions along the route, lowering the concentration of flies and mosquitoes, and effectively preventing the spread of some diseases.

The improvements on trains are part of the broader "toilet revolution" in China.

In 2015, the National Tourism Administration began a three-year "toilet revolution", aiming to install 33,000 new toilets and upgrade another 24,000 existing ones in scenic areas across the country to provide sufficient clean, free, well-managed toilet facilities for the public.

"Clean and without any smell, the toilets on G97 are some of the best I have ever used on trains," said Lan Zhengqiang, a 64-year-old passenger. "Sanitary conditions have greatly improved in Chinese train toilets."

"It's backbreaking work, but serving passengers is our duty," said Huang Xueying. "As long as they are satisfied, everything pays off."Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 13:24:23|Editor: ZD

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by Xinhua writers Fernando Munoz, Zhu Wanjun

BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Ahead of his visit to Latin America, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Thursday that Washington's Monroe Doctrine "clearly has been a success" and "is as relevant today as it was the day it was written" in 1823.

The doctrine was first put forward to drive Europeans away from the region almost two centuries ago. With such an interventionist foreign policy, Washington officially staked out its backyard.

In 2013, then U.S. President Barack Obama announced that the era of the Monroe Doctrine had ended and predicted a new relationship with Latin America featuring equal rights. Today, with Tillerson's remarks, the Trump administration is signaling that it wants to resurrect the obsolete foreign policy.

Over the past year, U.S. President Donald Trump has brandished a big stick against Cuba and Venezuela. His government has abandoned a rapprochement with Cuba and issued a series of sanctions against Venezuela with the purpose of promoting a change of government in the country.

Ever since the doctrine was first formulated, the United States has sought to control and manipulate the region through direct and indirect interventions, and to extract huge resources and wealth from local countries.

To guarantee its almost absolute control over the continent, Washington has, over the past two centuries, carried out a host of military interventions in the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Panama, Cuba, Chile, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Haiti.

Many historians and critics have observed that "Americans" in the phrase "America for the Americans" is limited to "the United States."

The region's excessive dependence on the United States neither brought it prosperity nor security, and this explains why the region has decided to expand its relations, both economic and political ones, to other countries in the world, to reduce such dependence and seek a greater integration into the wider international community.

Also in his speech delivered hours before flying to the region, Tillerson warned Latin American governments of the advance of "predatory" foreign countries. Similarly, over two centuries the Monroe Doctrine aimed to avoid interventions from outside the American continent.

He even labeled China and Russia as "imperial powers" in Latin America. Such blunt lecturing shows that the Trump White House still intends to keep Latin America strictly within its sphere of influence. It is like putting up a big sign that says: "Stay away! I own it."

Also, Tillerson's accusations against China are as ridiculous as they are self-defeating.

But Chinese policies, which promote free trade and globalization, including the Belt and Road Initiative, are now offering welcome alternatives for Latin America.

China is now a major international buyer of Latin American bulk commodities, and imports more and more agricultural and high value-added products from the region. China's investment in and financial cooperation with Latin American countries are in full accordance with commercial rules and local laws and regulations.

While Beijing is trying to help Latin Americans realize their dream of development and prosperity, Washington is becoming more protectionist against the region, and seeking to resurrect a policy born in the age of colonialism.

To Latin Americans and the world, it is becoming increasingly clear which country is really the imperialist power.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 13:24:23|Editor: Yurou

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VIENTIANE, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Laotians are hoping the Laos-China railway will bring more tourists and development opportunities once fully operational, media reports have said.

The project will be completed in 2021, and the railway will have a total length of over 414 km linking the Mohan-Boten border gate in northern Laos and the capital.

"About three years ago, there were more tourists, but now there aren't as many. We are earning less money. So we're looking forward to the train happening," Al Jazeera quoted Keomany Soudachan as saying.

Soudachan works at a handicraft shop in Luang Prabang, the ancient world heritage city known for its unique Lao and French architecture.

One of the Laos-China railway stations is planned to stand outside Luang Prabang, which to some extent encourages locals' aspirations for the development of the local tourism industry.

"Many people in small businesses here survive of the tourism industry, so the project of more visitors spending money is welcomed," Al Jazeera reported Saturday.

Houa Vang, a driver working at the railway construction project, has told Xinhua he expected the railway to bring tangible benefits to his country.

"I wish the China-Laos railway could be completed and put into use as soon as possible. At that time, I can send my son to China for education," Vang said, adding that the project has already brought job opportunities for locals like him.

The five-year construction has a total investment of some 40 billion Chinese yuan (5.8 billion U.S. dollars), 70 percent of which come from Chinese investment and the rest from the Lao side.

The China-Laos railway is the first overseas route connecting with the railway system in China, using Chinese technology, equipment and investment.

The project reflects the accelerating synergy of the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative and Laos' strategy of transforming itself from a "land-locked" country to a "land-linked" one.MAIMANA, Afghanistan, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- At least five Taliban militants including their local commander were killed during the Afghan forces military operation in the northern Faryab province on Saturday, a local official said.

"Security and defense forces launched a military operation in Khawja Sabzposh district Saturday afternoon, as a result five militants were killed and nine villages cleared from insurgents," Sayed Sarwar Hussaini a police spokesman in northern region told Xinhua Sunday.

During the operation a vehicle and five motorbikes used by Taliban insurgents were also destroyed by the security forces.

Taliban militants have yet to make comment.MALE, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Maldivian President Abdulla Yameen has appealed to all citizens to exercise patience and put forward national interest at the present time of crisis, a statement from his Office said Sunday.

Underscoring that the President is Head of State in the Maldives, President Yameen appealed to law enforcement agencies and the Maldivian people, to have faith in the Office towards implementing the recent Supreme Court's ruling, in line with the laws of the nation.

The President also said he is ready to advance the Presidential election due in September, to test his and the opposition's popularity.

Yameen further noted that his administration was currently in consultations with the Supreme Court in order to implement the court's ruling within proper rules and procedure.

He also reiterated that his priority was ensuring peace and stability within the Maldives and its people.

The Maldivian Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the immediate release of all high-profile prisoners, including former President Mohamed Nasheed and former Vice President Ahmed Adeeb.

The court said in a brief statement that the prisoners must be freed until fair trials could be conducted without undue influence.

Since then clashes have erupted in the capital, with opposition supporters calling for the release of the detainees.

Nasheed, who was elected into office in 2008, was ousted in a coup in February 2012.

He was sentenced to 13 years in jail in 2015 on terrorism charges after allegedly ordering the arrest of a judge during his presidency.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 13:49:27|Editor: Yurou

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BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Toyota will recall 181,797 vehicles over an air bag defect in China.

The recall was filed by GAC Toyota Motor and Tianjin FAW Toyota Motor to the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ).

Starting Feb. 10, the company will recall 73,084 New Highlander vehicles manufactured between May 5, 2015 and Feb. 4, 2016, and 98,218 Levin models produced between May 4, 2015 and Feb. 4, 2016, as well as 5,804 Levin hybrid cars produced between Oct. 11, 2015 and Feb. 4, 2016, according to the AQSIQ.

The recall also includes 4,691 Corolla hybrid cars manufactured by Tianjin FAW Toyota Motor between Nov. 21, 2015 and Feb. 2, 2016.

There are concerns that flawed acceleration transducer parts in the air bags of affected vehicles may cause air bags to malfunction, which could pose a threat to safety, according to the statement.

The companies said they would replace the faulty parts for affected car owners for free.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 14:04:30|Editor: Yurou

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BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- With the approval of the State Forestry Administration (SFA), two forest parks in east China's Anhui Province have been upgraded into national parks thanks to their stunning scenery and improving tourism facilities.

The two parks, Laojiashan and Majiaxi, are located in the cities of Mingguang and Xuancheng respectively. They boast rare landforms and valuable tree species.

By the end of 2017, the number of national forest parks had reached 881, covering 12.8 million hectares, or about 1.3 percent of China's total land area.

In 2017, China's forest tourism industry yielded an output of 1.15 trillion yuan (180 billion U.S. dollars).

About 1.39 billion trips were made to forest and wetland parks last year, accounting for around 28 percent of trips made in China, according to the SFA.

Forests have become popular travel destinations in China over the last five years, with revenue rising from 61.8 billion yuan in 2012 to 140 billion yuan in 2017.

The number of trips to forests grew 15.5 percent annually over the past five years to total 4.6 billion, and forest-themed tourism areas increased by about 1,000 sites.

Tourists go to forest parks for relaxation, sports, and adventure.

The booming forest tourism industry has also helped alleviate poverty, adding 3,500 yuan per household on average for about 350,000 poor families each year.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 14:47:31|Editor: ZD

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People taste tea during the 2018 Happy Chinese New Year Toronto Tea Festival in Toronto, Canada, Feb. 3, 2018. With hundreds of teas from around the world, the annual two-day festival draws thousands of attendees to discover the world of tea from the traditional to the trendy in Toronto. (Xinhua/Zou Zheng)MALDIVES, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Maldives government on Sunday revealed an imminent move by the country's top court to have president Abdulla Yameen arrested with the police and army insisting that such an order will not be enforced, local media reported.

Attorney General (AG) Mohamed Anil, seated beside the army and police chief on Sunday morning, told reporters that the government has received information that a Supreme Court order to arrest President Yameen was imminent.

However, the AG labelled the move as "unconstitutional" and said the police and the army would reject any order by the Supreme Court to have the President arrested.

Chief of Defence Force Major General Ahmed Shiyam, quoted by local media, said the army would only act in accordance with the laws and constitution, adding that it would follow the legal advice of the AG.

"The army would not stand by watch while the Maldives goes into a crisis. The army would not obey an unconstitutional order," Shiyam insisted.

The newly appointed Police Chief, Abdulla Nawaz shared the same statement.

Former President Mohamed Nasheed, who is one of the leaders ordered to be released by the Supreme Court last week, vowed to have both the army and police chief arrested after the duo vowed to quash the move by the Supreme Court to have President Yameen arrested.

Maldives has been plunged into a crisis following a Supreme Court ruling on Thursday ordering the release of opposition leaders who were facing criminal charges.

In a brief but dramatic and unexpected statement, the Supreme Court said the prisoners were free until fair trials could be conducted without undue influence.

Since then clashes have erupted across the capital, with opposition supporters clashing with the police.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 14:59:59|Editor: ZD

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Two children pose for a photo during the Tang Paradise Spring Lantern Festival in Xi'an, capital of northwest China's Shaanxi Province, Feb. 3, 2018. The Spring Lantern Festival kicked off Saturday presented over 100 lanterns to the tourists. (Xinhua/Shao Rui)Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 15:14:40|Editor: Zhou Xin

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BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- China will release a three-year plan to fight for cleaner air in 2018, Minister of Environmental Protection Li Ganjie said over the weekend.

By 2020, cities at the prefecture level and above will see more good air days, accounting for 80 percent of the year or about 292 days, Li said at the two-day national environmental protection work conference which concluded Saturday.

Cities below the air quality standards will see their average density of PM 2.5, a key indicator of air pollution, drop by 18 percent compared to 2015 figures, Li said.

Action plans for air pollution control will also be introduced in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and surroundings, the Yangtze River Delta, and other target areas.

China accomplished all the major tasks of its five-year clean air action plan in 2017, but challenges remain. Only 29 percent of 338 Chinese cities met the air quality standards last year, official data showed.

According to Li, the key indicators for battling pollution are sharp decline in emissions of major polluters, overall environmental quality improvement, and improved green growth.

"Winning the blue-sky battle is high on the agenda, while people's happiness about the good weather shall be increased," Li stressed.

China will continue to promote the use of clean energy for heating in northern regions while accelerating the elimination of coal-fired boilers, according to the Ministry of Environmental Protection.

The ministry will launch a supervision campaign to look back on the efforts made in key areas of environmental protection and pollution reduction, Li added.FAIZABAD, Afghanistan, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- At least eight insurgents were confirmed dead as warplanes struck Taliban bastion in Wardoj district of Afghanistan's northern Badakhshan province on Sunday, a local official said.

"The warplanes for the first time over the past two years targeted Taliban main stronghold in Chakaran area of Wardoj district today morning killing eight rebels on the spot and destroying two military vehicles of the group," the official told Xinhua but refused to be identified.

Wardoj district since its fall to the Taliban militants two and half years ago has been regarded as the main base of the armed group in Badakhshan province and the neighboring Takhar and Nuristan regions.

Meantime, Dawlat Mohammad Khawar the governor for Wardoj district, when approached by Xinhua has confirmed the airstrikes, saying several militants were killed and two military vehicles of the insurgents destroyed in the raids.

Taliban militants who control Wardoj district and adjoining areas haven't commented on the report.MALE, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Maldives government on Sunday revealed an imminent move by the country's top court to have president Abdulla Yameen arrested with the police and army insisting that such an order will not be enforced, local media reported.

Attorney General (AG) Mohamed Anil, seated beside the army and police chief on Sunday morning, told reporters that the government has received information that a Supreme Court order to arrest President Yameen was imminent.

However, the AG labelled the move as "unconstitutional" and said the police and the army would reject any order by the Supreme Court to have the President arrested.

Chief of Defense Force Major General Ahmed Shiyam, quoted by local media, said the army would only act in accordance with the laws and constitution, adding that it would follow the legal advice of the AG.

"The army would not stand by watch while the Maldives goes into a crisis. The army would not obey an unconstitutional order," Shiyam insisted.

Newly appointed Police Chief Abdulla Nawaz shared the same statement.

Former President Mohamed Nasheed, one of the leaders ordered to be released by the Supreme Court last week, vowed to have both the army and police chief arrested after the duo said they would quash the move by the Supreme Court to have President Yameen arrested.

Maldives has been plunged into a crisis following a Supreme Court ruling on Thursday ordering the release of opposition leaders who were facing criminal charges.

In a brief but dramatic and unexpected statement, the Supreme Court said the prisoners were free until fair trials could be conducted without undue influence.

Since then clashes have erupted across the capital, with opposition supporters clashing with the police.

The Secretary General of the Maldives Parliament, Ahmed Mohamed also announced his resignation on Sunday amid the ongoing political crisis.

Ahmed Mohamed's resignation comes a day after the parliament announced its decision to cancel its opening Parliament session slated for Monday citing security reasons.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 16:09:52|Editor: Zhou Xin

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BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- China is willing to work with Sri Lanka for the better development of their strategic cooperative partnership featuring sincere mutual help and everlasting friendship, Chinese President Xi Jinping said Sunday.

Xi made the remarks in a message sent to his Sri Lanka counterpart, Maithripala Sirisena, to extend congratulations on the 70 anniversary of the independence of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 16:34:57|Editor: Zhou Xin

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BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Sunday sent a message to his Sri Lankan counterpart, Ranil Wickremesinghe, to congratulate Sri Lanka on the 70th anniversary of the nation's independence from the British colonial rule in 1948.

In his message, Li said China attaches great importance to its relations with Sri Lanka.

Within the framework of the initiative on the construction of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, China wishes to consolidate the traditional friendship with Sri Lanka, strengthen mutual political trust, deepen practical cooperation and push bilateral relations to a new level, said Li.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 16:49:58|Editor: Zhou Xin

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GUANGZHOU, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Yang Shangru picked up a brand new shared car at south China's Guangzhou South Station just seconds after submitting ID card information, paying a deposit, and getting his face scanned.

"I am waiting to take my friend home from the railway station," he said.

Yang, 24, is among the first customers to benefit from the station's "train + car sharing" initiative launched this year for the Spring Festival travel rush, intended to supplement public transportation and even out passenger flow.

"Passengers can pick up a car immediately after they arrive at the station," said Chen Guisheng, senior official with China Railway Guangzhou Group.

The 2018 Spring Festival travel rush, known as Chunyun, started Thursday. The Chinese Lunar New Year falls on Feb. 16 this year.

Millions of Chinese people return to their hometowns to celebrate the week-long holiday. Guangzhou is expected to see more than 5.4 million trips made by train this year, accounting for about 14 percent of total rail transport in China.

In the past, passengers who lived far away or arrived too late to take public transportation had difficulty heading home, which led to the rise of illegal cars and taxis around the station.

"With car sharing, passengers can go home no matter how late they arrive or how far they live," Chen said.

"It can all be done with a mobile app or through the official WeChat account of Guangzhou rail group. Passengers can book a car while on the train before they arrive and can return cars to more than 700 special parking lots in the city," he added.

The station cooperates with four auto companies, including Beijing Automotive Group and Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation. More than 90 percent of the shared cars are new energy vehicles. The station has three parking lots, with over 1,100 parking spaces, and more than 100 charging facilities.

Another 200 charging facilities are being installed and will be put into use by the end of this year, Chen said.

Since the program was launched last Thursday, an average of 500 car sharing orders are received every day, according to the station.

There are three types of shared cars at the station, which cost from 0.5 yuan to 1.2 yuan per minute or from 183 yuan to 435 yuan per day. A deposit of 1,000 yuan (about 158.7 U.S.dollars) to 4,000 yuan is required.

"It usually costs me around 90 yuan to take a cab from the station to my home, about 30 kilometers, but the shared car only costs me 21.5 yuan," said user Zhang Huijuan. "With a coupon, I was surprised to see the final cost of 1.5 yuan."

China gave the nod to car sharing services last August, releasing a guideline to support the country's booming car sharing industry and standardize its development.

Unlike traditional car rental services, car sharing services take advantage of new technology such as global-positioning and mobile Internet.

"High-speed trains plus car sharing can help quickly spread out huge passenger flows during Chunyun, providing convenience to passengers and easing pressure on the rail system," said Shu Jianqiu, professor with the Party School of China Railway Guangzhou Group.MALE, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Maldives army on Sunday surrounded the island's Parliament as opposition lawmakers tried to make way into the premises following the resignation of the Parliamentary Secretary General.

Local media reported that some opposition lawmakers had been allowed to enter the premises, despite the heavy military presence.

The Parliamentary Secretary General Ahmed Mohamed announced his resignation on Sunday morning without citing any specific reasons. The move came after the first parliamentary session for 2018, which was due to be on Monday, was cancelled indefinitely due to security concerns.

The Maldives has been plunged into a fresh round of political turmoil after the Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the immediate release of jailed political leaders including self--exiled former president Mohamed Nasheed.

The Maldivian government on Sunday revealed an imminent move by the country's top court to have President Abdulla Yameen arrested with the police and army insisting that such an order will not be enforced, local media reported.

Attorney General Mohamed Anil, seated beside the army and police chief on Sunday morning, told reporters that the government has received information that a Supreme Court order to arrest President Yameen was imminent.

However, the Attorney General labelled the move as "unconstitutional" and said the police and the army would reject any order by the Supreme Court to have the president arrested.by Pankaj Yadav

NEW DELHI, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Debate has started in Indian political circles as the country goes to the general elections in 2019.

Three days prior to flying to Davos on Jan. 22 to participate in the World Economic Forum, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a TV interview strongly advocated the idea of holding simultaneous elections at the Centre and in all the states.

This, he said, will save a lot of money and also let the politicians focus on works for full five years without being disturbed by elections, which have lately become a round-the-year event in India.

On an average, as many as five Indian states go to polls every year. Whenever the states go to polls, it becomes a slugfest between the ruling and the opposition parties. As all resources are diverted to the polls, governance and development works take a back seat during such times.

For the first 20 years since India gained Independence in 1947, elections were held simultaneously for the parliament and all state legislatures. This was so because the polls held in that era gave a decisive verdict to the then ruling party.

The first four simultaneous elections for Centre and states were held in 1951, 1957, 1962 and 1967. But slowly that trend disappeared and frequent mid-term polls were witnessed.

This trend of holding elections at different times for different states, and the Centre, has been there for almost five decades now. More so since the late 1990s, an era which saw many government changes at the Centre and multiple parliamentary elections held over a span of four years. The government headed by former premier Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 1996 lasted only for 13 days.

Hence comes forth this proposal of holding simultaneous elections in both states and at the Centre. The idea gained significance especially after reiteration by Modi on Jan. 19. Though there are valid arguments cited against the idea too.

Supporting the idea per se, Dr Jaswant Singh, a political analyst in Delhi, said that it's a good idea if implemented.

"Just like in the United States and in other countries where federal and provincial elections are held simultaneously, we can also think of adopting the idea," he said.

Toeing the prime minister's line, senior leader of the country's main ruling party the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Bhupendra Yadav said holding simultaneous elections will ensure "consistency, continuity and governance." But this would need amendment to the country's Constitution and electoral laws.

Presenting a diagonally opposite argument, the country's former Election Commission chief S.Y. Quraishi said the idea of holding simultaneous elections was very much "against the spirit of the Constitution and federalism."

Citing practical difficulties, he said that suppose simultaneous elections are held but the government loses its majority in the parliament, it will be difficult to hold a new set of elections in all the states.

Referring to the famous example of former premier Atal Bihari Vajpayee heading a government for 13 days only in 1996, he asked:"Why should the states suffer for the electoral decisions taken at the Centre?"

National and local issues are different, and holding simultaneous elections is likely to blur judgment, he added.South Sudanese President Salva Kiir Mayardit addresses a press conference in Khartoum, capital of Sudan, on Nov. 2, 2017. South Sudanese President Salva Kiir Mayardit on Thursday denied accusation against his country of supporting armed groups in Sudan. (Xinhua/Mohamed Khidir)

JUBA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- South Sudan has recalled its ambassador to the United States, a day after the American government imposed an arms embargo on the East African nation, presidential spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny said on Saturday.

Ateny, said Garang Diing Akuong has been recalled for further consultations without giving details. The South Sudanese envoy was deployed to Washington in May 2015.

"This is routine for any country to recall its ambassador for further consultations. It may not be related to the arms embargo," Ateny told Xinhua by phone.

The Trump administration on Friday announced arms embargo on South Sudan and urged the UN Security Council to enforce a global arms ban on the world's youngest nation.

The U.S. also called on the African Union (AU) and the East African regional bloc, Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) to consider sanctions measures against those who undermine the peace process.

South Sudan has been embroiled in four years of conflict that has taken a devastating toll on the people, creating one of the fastest growing refugee crises in the world.

A peace deal signed in August 2015 between the rival leaders under UN pressure led to the establishment of a transitional unity government in April 2016, but was shattered by renewed fighting in July 2016.PYONGYANG, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on Sunday denounced the State of the Union address by U.S. President Donald Trump as "an omen of new disaster," after Trump described the DPRK as an adversary in the address.

The whole world is seeing "an omen of new disaster" in Trump's address which asserted "American first" and "unmatched power" based on nuclear arms forcing other countries to submit to the "U.S. chauvinistic interest," a spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was quoted by the official Korean Central News Agency as saying.

The spokesman also accused Trump of "insisting upon 'maximum pressure' against DPRK" and "viciously slandering" the country.

"It is purely a nasty perversity aimed to disturb the advance of inter-Korean relations," he added.

Trump said in his State of the Union address last week that the U.S. government is "waging a campaign of maximum pressure" to prevent the DPRK's pursuit of nuclear missiles from threatening U.S. homeland.

Tension between the two countries has escalated since Trump took in office last year.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 18:35:16|Editor: Zhou Xin

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GUIYANG, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- A ceremony was held Sunday at a military base in southwest China's Guizhou Province to mourn the air force servicemen who lost their lives in a recent military plane crash.

The People's Liberation Army (PLA) air force plane crashed in Guizhou during a training session on Jan. 29. The staff aboard the plane died.

On Friday, they were honored as revolutionary martyrs by the air force of the Southern Theater Command.

The ceremony was attended by military leaders and members of the armed forces, local officials and relatives of the martyrs.

The servicemen who devoted their lives in the accident had previously completed missions in a number of military exercises and combat readiness training. They made important contributions in safeguarding the security of national sovereignty and the interests of national development, according to a statement issued by the air force.

Ensuring flight safety is the common pursuit of air forces all over the world, the statement read.

The PLA air force will continue military training under combat conditions with tough and strict standards and enhance its capability to win wars, according to the statement.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 19:10:21|Editor: Zhou Xin

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BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping's vision to build "a community with shared future for mankind" represents the significant global impact of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, a Brazilian expert on Chinese affairs has said.

"Building such a community means pursuing a world with lasting peace, universal security, openness and tolerance as well as beauty," said Evandro Menezes de Carvalho, former chairman of the Brazilian Law Teaching Association, in a recent interview with Xinhua.

"The new era is not just China's, but can also be the world's," he said.

Xi first introduced the concept of "a community with a shared future for mankind" in 2013. In January 2017, Xi shared his vision at the United Nations Office at Geneva, Switzerland, renewing his call for building a community of shared future and achieving shared, win-win development.

Carvalho, now executive editor-in-chief of the Portuguese version of China Today magazine, said that Xi's concept of "shared future for mankind" will contribute a lot to the building of a better world, along with the Belt and Road Initiative.

"The concept overrides differences of ideology, values, models of civilization and political systems," he said.

"It shows that China seeks to develop a new type of international relationship based on mutual benefit, and to inject energy into the world," Carvalho added.

The West should abandon the Cold War mentality and try to understand socialism with Chinese characteristics from different perspectives based on reality, he said.

"Practice has proved that socialism with Chinese characteristics can successfully eliminate inequality, improve security and protect the environment," he added.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 19:10:21|Editor: pengying

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Sri Lankan military personnel attend the country's 70th Independence Day celebrations in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Feb. 4, 2018. Sri Lanka celebrated its 70th anniversary of Independence Day here on Sunday with grand military parades and attendance of political celebrities. (Xinhua/Pradeep Pathirana)

COLOMBO, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Sri Lanka celebrated its 70th anniversary of Independence Day here on Sunday with grand military parades and attendance of political celebrities.

Sri Lanka tri forces held a colorful grand parade along the Galle Road, close to the Colombo Harbour to celebrate its 70th anniversary of independence from the British colonial rule in 1948.

In his speech, President Maithripala Sirisena said Sri Lanka would gain complete independence only after achieving complete economic and cultural freedom.

The year of 2018 will be a crucial year for Sri Lanka in achieving economic freedom, and the government must ensure the country to achieve its long term goals, said the president.

"We must remember that true freedom does not comprise only of political freedom. As a country, our future successes lie in our commitment to achieving long term goals with firm determination, as we have done in the past," Sirisena said.

He further paid tribute to the patriots who had sacrificed their lives in achieving the country's freedom over the years.

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said that since being elected to power, the government had been consistently focusing on creating the right social and political climate needed to build a society that is indeed free and stable.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 19:45:32|Editor: pengying

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CHONGQING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- A traditional "1,000-meter-long banquet" was held over the weekend in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality as locals welcome the Lunar New Year.

More than 800 tables of delicacies were presented at the banquet along a street that stretches more than a kilometer in Chongqing's Zhongshan Old Town. The food was for the hosts' relatives as well as more than 30,000 tourists.

Residents of the town traditionally hold these banquets to welcome the Spring Festival, which falls on Feb. 16 this year. In the past, the town was a busy port, and locals would prepare food along the street to cater to business people and porters who could not make it home for family gatherings.

In 2005, locals decided to boost local tourism by resuming the tradition. Each year, on weekends before the Spring Festival, families cook their best dishes beside their homes to entertain visitors.

Resident Li Chunmei prepared smoked pig trotters and sausages on Sunday. She prepared 45 tables of food for visiting gourmands.

"Hosting the banquet has always been the busiest day in town," Li said. "Business has been really good."Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 20:05:37|Editor: pengying

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TEHRAN, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- A senior Iranian military commander said that the missile depots of the country are protected against the enemies' attacks, Tasnim news agency reported on Sunday.

The underground missile facilities of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) are invulnerable to all sorts of hostile attacks, IRGC Lieutenant Commander Brigadier General Hossein Salami was quoted as saying.

There are lots of missile cities at the IRGC's disposal in Iran, which are very safe from the enemies' conventional and unconventional offensives, he said.

At the time of enemy's attack, numerous missiles of various types could be fired at once from various places, given the type of threats, he added.

Pointing to advances in the drone industry, Salami stated that the missile power is only a portion of Iran's defense capabilities.

The IRGC has detailed information about the U.S. military capabilities and bases around the country, he said, adding that Iran considers the regional countries as being within the range of its strategic security.

The United States and its regional allies have repeatedly expressed concerns about the missile program of the Islamic republic, but Tehran insists that its missile projects are for deterrent purposes.COLOMBO, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Over 500 prisoners were released under a Presidential Pardon from prisons across Sri Lanka on Sunday to mark the 70th anniversary celebrations of the country's Independence Day.

Prison Department Commissioner H.M.T.N. Upuldeniya said that 544 prisoners serving jail terms for minor offences were released under the pardon based on their behavior during the detention period.

He said prisoners held in several prisons including Anuradhapura in the North Central Province, Kandy in the Central Hills and Colombo were released under the pardon.

Sri Lanka Sunday celebrated its 70th Independence Day anniversary from British colonial rule by holding a grand parade in the capital.KINSHASA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- At least 26 people were killed on Saturday in inter-ethnic fighting in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), according to security sources on site.

The sources said the fighting involved members of the Hema and Lendu community in Ituri province, where a Hema village located a few kilometers from the city of Bunia was attacked.

Sources from the provincial government of Ituri also confirmed the incident, saying that some villagers were killed and several houses were burned during the attack.

Police and soldiers were dispatched to the spot to prevent the spread of violence, which followed days of tension between the two ethnic communities in the region.

The conflicts between Hema and Lendu have made it difficult for the two communities to coexist for several years in the province of Ituri. Between 2001 and 2006, at least 60,000 people died in clashes between the two in Ituri.File photo shows protestors set fire on tires on a street in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Dec. 9, 2011. (Xinhua/Han Bing)

KINSHASA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- At least 26 people were killed on Saturday in inter-ethnic fighting in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), according to security sources on site.

The sources said the fighting involved members of the Hema and Lendu community in Ituri province, where a Hema village located a few kilometers from the city of Bunia was attacked.

Sources from the provincial government of Ituri also confirmed the incident, saying that some villagers were killed and several houses were burned during the attack.

Police and soldiers were dispatched to the spot to prevent the spread of violence, which followed days of tension between the two ethnic communities in the region.

The conflicts between Hema and Lendu have made it difficult for the two communities to coexist for several years in the province of Ituri. Between 2001 and 2006, at least 60,000 people died in clashes between the two in Ituri.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 21:25:55|Editor: pengying

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Leftwing candidate for Cypriot presidency Stavros Malas votes at a polling station in Nicosia, Cyprus, Feb. 4, 2018. Cypriots started voting on Sunday in the runoff presidential election, a replica of the runoff five years ago in which center-right candidate Nicos Anastasiades beat leftist Stavros Malas with a comfortable margin. (Xinhua/PIO)

NICOSIA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Cypriots were voting on Sunday in the runoff presidential election, which analysts say is becoming more complicated compared with the last runoff five years ago.

Although seen as a replica of the runoff five years ago in which center-right candidate Nicos Anastasiades beat leftist Stavros Malas with a comfortable margin of about 57 percent, the version this time is not such easy.

"Thinks are very different this time, because unlike 2013, the two candidates go into the second round without any electoral alliances," Yiannis Mavris, an electoral analyst for state television said.

Under Cypriot law, opinion polls are not allowed one week before election day.

"But even if opinion polls were allowed, it would be close to impossible to catch the trend as the situation changed by the day and most of the undecided voters made up their minds within the last two or three days at the most," Mavris said.

Supported by center-right party Democratic Rally, Anastasiades is seeking a second term. Polls show 35.51 percent of the vote in the first round for Anastasiades compared with 30.24 percent for Malas, who is supported by the left-wing AKEL opposition party.

But the center-of-the-road parties which failed to push their candidate through to the runoff with 25.74 percent of the vote advised their supporters to vote for none of the candidates.

Only two small parties with a share of about 8 percent of the vote called on their supporters to vote for either of the candidates.

"We may even witness a new kind of voting in the runoff in the form of what I call a 'revenge voting', that is casting votes against either of the candidates to avenge for the failure of the center parties candidate to pass through to the runoff," Mavris added.

He noted another further reason of uncertainty, a high number of voters who shunned the polling stations in the first round. Almost one in three voters did not cast a ballot.

"There is no indication whatsoever how many will care to vote in the runoff and how they will behave," said Mavris.

The electoral service said that after four hours of voting, 10.9 percent of voters have cast ballot papers, a little higher than the 10.5 percent in the first round, but lower by just over 1 percent compared with the 2013 runoff.

Anastasiades focused his campaign on economy, which is according to him near melt-down due to high spending and deficit left by the previous left-wing government, in which his rival Malas was a health minister.

Malas focused his campaign on accusing Anastasiades of making the people suffer by accepting an austerity economic program demanded by international lenders and of being incapable of negotiating a Cyprus solution.

Despite the different economic and social policies the two candidates have, they hold remarkably close views on future solution of the Cyprus problem, which is a reunification in a federal, two-community state of Greek and Turkish Cypriots.

Voting stations opened at 6 a.m. local time (0400 GMT) and are scheduled to close at 6 p.m. (1600 GMT).

Exit polls are expected shortly after the closing of electoral stations.

The electoral service said that final results are expected at 7:30 p.m.

The new president will be nominated during a ceremony scheduled for 10 p.m.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 21:30:55|Editor: Zhou Xin

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GUANGZHOU, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- As China pledges to lift more people out of poverty and puts more resources in less developed inland areas, Volvo Group sees opportunities in the country.

The Swedish company, one of the world's leading manufacturers of trucks and construction equipment, has been active in the Chinese mainland for 25 years.

"It's amazing to see the extraordinary development in this country in the past fifteen years," said Claes Svedberg, president of Volvo China Investment Company.

"China is now pushing the better distribution of wealth among people and the development of its inland," said Svedberg, adding that China's emphasis on building infrastructure to support development is "very impressive."

China has pledged to eliminate poverty by 2020. In the past five years, over 55 million people have been lifted out of poverty in the country.

Volvo Group now runs three joint ventures in China covering buses, trucks and construction machines. Svedberg told the media that nearly half of the world's total heavy and medium trucks are sold in China, making it an unparalleled market.

Driven by its booming e-commerce industry, China is also moving fast toward professional logistics and leading innovation in short hauls, such as on-road transportation tractors or electrification of medium and light trucks.

According to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, the country's online retail transaction value hit 7.18 trillion yuan (about 1.14 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2017, up 32.2 percent over 2016.

Svedberg made the remarks during a sustainable development forum hosted by the Volvo Group during the weekend in the southern city of Guangzhou, a stopover city for this year's Volvo Ocean Race, a yacht race around the world.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 21:30:56|Editor: Zhou Xin

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BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- China's banking regulators have imposed a fine of 52.5 million yuan (about 8.33 million U.S. dollars) on 19 banking institutions over a pledge loan fraud case in the country's central Shaanxi and Henan provinces.

These lenders, including local branches of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, were punished for granting loans of up to 19 billion yuan to criminals who illegally used low-purity gold as pledges, the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC) said.

The loan fraud case has exposed "numerous defects" in the internal controls and management of these institutions, which sought business expansion aggressively and blindly, "creating loopholes that criminals can exploit," the regulator said in a statement.

A total of 104 employees in the banking industry were also punished, while 35 criminals involved in the case have been arrested, according to the CBRC.

China has been intensifying regulatory scrutiny on lending activities to rein in financial risks. Only a week ago, 12 banks were fined a total of 295 million yuan over a bill fraud case in the northwestern province of Gansu.TIRANA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Albania deployed hundreds of police and armed forces in different parts of the country on Sunday to help local residents cope with floods and rising risks of possible emergencies.

Heavy rainfalls have caused problems in many zones, especially in the south of Albania where dozens of families had to be evacuated in early hours of Sunday, Albanian civil emergencies department informed.

"The State Police is in full readiness, cooperating and coordinating actions with the Civil Emergencies and for any need and assistance," said a press release from Albanian State Police.

Civil Emergencies Staff started Sunday the evacuation of several families in Novosela, in Vlora district and in Ferras, Lushnja district after their houses were severely hit by floods.

Problems were also reported even in northern city of Shkodra where roads were blocked due to heavy rain and some houses were damaged.

Police officers also worked on opening Tirana-Durres highway which was under water for some hours.

The bad weather in the last two days also caused problems in the country's power grid, which left several zones with blackout.

Albanian power distribution operator informed citizens Sunday that the company was working to repair all defects and guarantee uninterrupted power supply.

Few months ago, Albania was hit by massive floods that caused huge economic damages and paralyzed almost half of the country.SINGAPORE, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Singapore, chairing the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 2018, hosts the annual ASEAN Foreign Ministers' Retreat from Feb. 4 to 6, the city-state's Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Sunday at its official website.

Singapore's Minister for Foreign Affairs Vivian Balakrishnan will chair the Retreat.

The retreat is the first gathering of the ASEAN foreign ministers hosted by Singapore during its 2018 Chairmanship. Singapore's foreign ministry said the retreat will be a useful and timely opportunity for the foreign ministers to discuss the way forward for the ASEAN Community.

It said the foreign ministers will discuss ASEAN's priorities in line with its 2018 themes of "Resilience" and "Innovation." The foreign ministers will also exchange views on regional and international developments.

Singapore plans to make ASEAN and the region more resilient and innovative, and to improve digital connectivity between countries as well as cybersecurity in the region, according to the local media.LAGOS, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Nigerian Army has completely defeated the Boko Haram insurgents in the restive northeast parts of the country, Maj.-Gen. Rogers Nicholas, head of a military operation, said late on Saturday.

Nicholas, the Theater Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, spoke this during the inauguration of the Nigeria-Cameroon Military Joint Mission in Maiduguri, capital of Borno State.

He said the collaboration between the two militaries was critical to the successful completion of the counter-insurgency campaign.

"We share information and intelligence to enable us map out strategies to fight Boko Haram insurgents in our common borders," he said.

Troops under the operation DEEP PUNCH II had on Friday dislodged and occupied the insurgents' tactical ground "Camp Zairo," the military chief told his audience, adding that hundreds of insurgents had surrendered and several others fled their enclave while over 100 civilians were rescued.

"My soldiers are in the heart of Boko Haram enclave that is 'Camp Zairo,' the gallant troops have taken total control of Sambisa Forest," he added.

"We have broken the heart and soul of Shekau's group, taking over the camp and its environs," he said.

"They are on the run and we are pursuing them to wherever they go. This time around there is no place for escape anywhere," Nicholas added.

"We had earlier asked those of them that want to surrender to do so and we are still asking them to come out and surrender otherwise they are going to meet it the hard way," the commander said.

The military chief called on the insurgents and abducted persons in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops, stressing that they would not be harmed or killed.

He revealed that the troops had destroyed insurgents' hideouts, vehicles and ammunition, while hundreds of insurgents surrendered and over 100 civilians were rescued.

According to him, the command would profile the rescued persons for rehabilitation and de-radicalization for reintegration into the society.

While handing over 82 rescued persons to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) in Maiduguri, the military chief called on persons in Boko Haram insurgents' captivity to submit themselves to the troops.

"This is the last phase of the operation; we are asking everybody in Borno State to give cooperation in terms of giving information about fleeing Boko Haram members," he added.

"People need to be vigilant in their localities, if you see any suspected persons, report to the military or security agents," he said.

"As I speak to you now many of them have surrendered and many more will surrender to the troops. The most important thing is that we are treating this people very humane because they are Nigerians," the military chief told his audience.

Nicholas added that the rescued persons including women, children and the aged would undergo medical examinations, rehabilitation and de-radicalization process.

Meanwhile, Rabi Abu-Yasir, wife of Boko Haram's chief physician on Saturday surrendered to the troops of Operation Lafiya Dole, in the ongoing clearance operation to rout out remnants of the insurgents.

Rabi told newsmen that her husband was the medical doctor to the insurgents' leader, Abubakar Shekau.

She said she was rescued on Friday after the troops dislodged the insurgents' enclaves in Sambisa Forest.

Recounting her ordeal, Rabi said unlike her peers, she enjoyed preferential treatment and privileges in view of her position as a wife to the physician.

Rabi lauded the military for the rescue operation and called on the abducted persons still in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 22:16:11|Editor: Zhou Xin

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by Shristi Kafle

JANAKPUR, Nepal, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- When Laxmi Devi Mahara arrived at the Dhanusa Dham municipality office after walking on foot from her village in Sarsarampur, she found herself seated among mainly women as most of the men from the village were either working in neighboring India or in Gulf countries.

Along with her fellow neighbors, she had to wait with her colorful identification card for around two hours for the formal program to begin. When her name called on the stage to receive the flood relief package, she couldn't hide her elation.

Dressed in red-patterned saree with her head covered as with the local tradition, Mahara's face shone after receiving two separate cartons containing non-food items like shawls, blankets, cooking utensils, an insecticide-treated bed net, a clean cooking stove, a water filter and hygiene kits.

Mahara is just one of the many recipients of relief packages distributed under the Chinese post-flood recovery assistance provided to Nepal's southern plain known as the Terai region, which was affected by one of the worst monsoon floods in history last August.

"My mud house collapsed after the flood and all the food items and furniture were damaged. We didn't get much support from our government and were facing a tough time. Amid such a crisis, getting this relief package is a miracle, I am very happy and thankful to China," Mahara told Xinhua in her native language Maithili.

A mother of four children, young Mahara doesn't even know her own age. Her home district Dhanusa, some 200 kilometers away from the capital city of Kathmandu, is often recognized for illiteracy and the tradition of early marriage.

Mahara is the sole breadwinner of her family. She works in fields with other villagers and is paid on a wage basis. Her husband is disabled and had to stay at home.

"Floods come every year, damage our settlement and we have to begin from zero. I wish we had a strong house," she said dejectedly, adding,"My small kids are going to be better in this winter however, with the warm blankets that I received today. I heard China provided them and I'm so grateful."

The relief packages that Mahara and scores of others received, come following China's 4 million U.S. dollars assistance to support the recovery efforts in the country's southern plains vulnerable to floods. The assistance has been provided under the framework of the China South-South Cooperation Assistance Fund.

Before that, the Chinese government provided 1 million U.S. dollars grant assistance to Nepal for disaster relief during the visit of Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang in August last year.

The support has reached more than 31,800 households in seven districts spanning Sunsari, Saptari, Sarlahi, Dhanusha, Mahottari, Rautahat and Parsa located in Provinces 1 and 2.

A post-flood assessment conducted by the government of Nepal found that 1.7 million people were affected by the disaster.

The record rainfall resulted in widespread flooding across 35 districts and claimed the lives of 160 people. More than 40,000 houses were destroyed and 192,000 homes were partially destroyed. The disaster resulted in 21,000 families being displaced.

"As a close neighbor, China can feel the difficulties of Nepal and the Nepali people. I hope the relief packages could be a little help to the flood-affected families to overcome the tough time and with their recovery," Yu Hong, Chinese Ambassador to Nepal, told Xinhua after distributing the materials to locals in the Dhanusa and Mahottari districts.

The ambassador also visited some settlements which have already received the relief packages and learned about the living situation of local people, known as the ethnic Madhesi people.

The distribution program has covered 3,400 households in the Dhanusa district while 5,000 households in the Mahottari district await identification and verification by the newly-elected local government authorities.

The program has been in operation in close coordination with Nepal's Flood Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Project under the National Reconstruction Authority and implemented by UNDP Nepal.

Renauld Meyer, UNDP Country Director, told Xinhua, "After the visit, I found that the flood had caused a lot of damage and some of the villages have been completely wiped out. We are distributing the non-food relief packages to those hardest hit and the most underprivileged communities to restart their normal lives."

Expressing gratitude to the Chinese government for its generous support and partnership with UNDP, Meyer said that it's not just about the relief packages, but the visit of the ambassador herself to the affected community in a remote village signifies Chinese solidarity.

"I hope the disasters are not only responded to but be prevented. We hope to come up with longer term interventions regarding disaster preparedness," he told Xinhua after the distribution of aid in the Loharpatti municipality of the Mahottari district.

Nepal's Terai region is not only vulnerable to disasters like floods, but also struggles in terms of health and education in which poverty stands as the major cause.

According to a report by the Demographic and Health Survey released in November last year, Province 2 is poor in regard to nutrition, teenage pregnancies, family planning, newborn deaths, vaccinations and domestic violence against women, among others.

Ram Chandra Mandal, leader of Province 2, told Xinhua, "Despite the historical significance and rich natural resources, it is unfortunate that our region is dominated by poverty. I hope the Chinese government will continue to help develop this area."Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 22:51:20|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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RAMALLAH, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Palestinian National Authority (PNA) denounced Sunday the demolition of two schoolrooms in a Bedouin community in East Jerusalem by Israel.

PNA Jerusalem Affairs Minister and Jerusalem Governor Adnan Al-Hussaini told Xinhua that the "targeting of the local schoolrooms at Abu Nuwwar Bedouin community in Al-Eizariya town is part of Israel's settlement expansion plans."

He added that it "targets the Palestinian existence and unravels the ugly face of the Israeli occupation."

Israeli forces demolished Sunday morning two schoolrooms for the third and fourth graders at the local school. It is the only school, funded by the European Union, to serve 26 children of the 650-member Bedouin community near East Jerusalem.

Palestinian sources said that the Israeli Civil Administration accompanied Israeli forces to demolish the classrooms.

Community representative Dawood Jahalin said the school was given an injunction order in the past to stop its demolition pending a decision from Israel's Supreme Court.Nigerian soldiers participate in an operation in Nigeria's northeastern state of Borno, March 16, 2016. (Xinhua/Wale Salau)

LAGOS, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Nigerian Army has completely defeated the Boko Haram insurgents in the restive northeast parts of the country, Maj.-Gen. Rogers Nicholas, head of a military operation, said late on Saturday.

Nicholas, the Theater Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, spoke this during the inauguration of the Nigeria-Cameroon Military Joint Mission in Maiduguri, capital of Borno State.

He said the collaboration between the two militaries was critical to the successful completion of the counter-insurgency campaign.

"We share information and intelligence to enable us map out strategies to fight Boko Haram insurgents in our common borders," he said.

Troops under the operation DEEP PUNCH II had on Friday dislodged and occupied the insurgents' tactical ground "Camp Zairo," the military chief told his audience, adding that hundreds of insurgents had surrendered and several others fled their enclave while over 100 civilians were rescued.

"My soldiers are in the heart of Boko Haram enclave that is 'Camp Zairo,' the gallant troops have taken total control of Sambisa Forest," he added.

"We have broken the heart and soul of Shekau's group, taking over the camp and its environs," he said.

"They are on the run and we are pursuing them to wherever they go. This time around there is no place for escape anywhere," Nicholas added.

"We had earlier asked those of them that want to surrender to do so and we are still asking them to come out and surrender otherwise they are going to meet it the hard way," the commander said.

The military chief called on the insurgents and abducted persons in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops, stressing that they would not be harmed or killed.

He revealed that the troops had destroyed insurgents' hideouts, vehicles and ammunition, while hundreds of insurgents surrendered and over 100 civilians were rescued.

According to him, the command would profile the rescued persons for rehabilitation and de-radicalization for reintegration into the society.

While handing over 82 rescued persons to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) in Maiduguri, the military chief called on persons in Boko Haram insurgents' captivity to submit themselves to the troops.

"This is the last phase of the operation; we are asking everybody in Borno State to give cooperation in terms of giving information about fleeing Boko Haram members," he added.

"People need to be vigilant in their localities, if you see any suspected persons, report to the military or security agents," he said.

"As I speak to you now many of them have surrendered and many more will surrender to the troops. The most important thing is that we are treating this people very humane because they are Nigerians," the military chief told his audience.

Nicholas added that the rescued persons including women, children and the aged would undergo medical examinations, rehabilitation and de-radicalization process.

Meanwhile, Rabi Abu-Yasir, wife of Boko Haram's chief physician on Saturday surrendered to the troops of Operation Lafiya Dole, in the ongoing clearance operation to rout out remnants of the insurgents.

Rabi told newsmen that her husband was the medical doctor to the insurgents' leader, Abubakar Shekau.

She said she was rescued on Friday after the troops dislodged the insurgents' enclaves in Sambisa Forest.

Recounting her ordeal, Rabi said unlike her peers, she enjoyed preferential treatment and privileges in view of her position as a wife to the physician.

Rabi lauded the military for the rescue operation and called on the abducted persons still in the bush to come out and surrender to the troops.CAIRO, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Egypt and Sudan are scheduled to hold a high-profile meeting in Cairo on Thursday to discuss ways to improve their ties, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said Sunday.

Foreign ministers and intelligence chiefs of both countries will attend this meeting, Egyptian Foreign Ministry's spokesman Ahmed Abu Zeid said in a statement.

The meeting aims "to discuss the course of bilateral relations and coordinate between the two countries regarding a number of regional issues of mutual interest," Zeid said.

He noted that the meeting will be held under the instructions of Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi and his Sudanese counterpart Omar al-Bashir after their meeting on the sidelines of the recent African Union summit in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia.

The Egyptian-Sudanese relations have been tense over the past few years on various issues, including their differences over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) which Ethiopia is building on the Nile River.

While both Ethiopia and Sudan hope to reap massive benefits from the GERD construction, Egypt is worried that it undermines its 55.5-billion-cubic-meter annual share of the Nile River water.

Egypt and Sudan also have a territorial dispute over the border region of Halayeb and Shalateen, which is currently under Egyptian control.

In May 2017, Bashir accused Egypt of providing military support to the armed rebels in his country, which was strongly denied by Sisi.

In early January, Khartoum recalled its ambassador to Egypt for consultation over "potential security threats" from Egypt and Eritrea following reported military moves in Eritrea's Sawa area near the border with Sudan's state of Kassala.

Sisi has denied that Egypt is conspiring against Sudan or Ethiopia, stressing that his country is keen to build positive relations with all other countries and that the peoples of Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia "need investments not wars."Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 23:21:29|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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GAZA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Dozens of Palestinian children demonstrated in Gaza on Sunday to appeal for international intervention to end the worsening economic crisis in the Israeli-besieged enclave.

As part of a campaign launched by the Coalition of Palestinian Charities in the Gaza Strip entitled "Save Gaza", Palestinian children waved banners condemning the Israeli siege, urging Israel to open Gaza's crossings, and calling for more access to safe drinking water, electricity and decent health care.

Nazih Al-Banna, director of the campaign, told Xinhua that the event "comes in light of the suffering from the Israeli siege, which has worsened the condition of the humanitarian sector."

The Gaza Strip, home to more than 2 million Palestinians, faces severe shortage of basic services due to a power outage for most of the day and pollution of drinking water.

Economic deficiencies are exacerbated by the ongoing internal division between the Islamic Hamas Movement, which controls the Gaza Strip since 2007, and the Palestinian government based in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

Scores of employees of Gaza's cleaning companies recently announced plans to protest for an hour a day, as they have not been paid their salary for four months.

They called on the Palestinian government to fulfil its pledges. There are some 800 cleaners in Gaza's hospitals.

"I could not meet the basic needs of my eight-member family due to unpaid salaries over the past months," Anam al-Taweel, a Gaza cleaner, told Xinhua.

Meanwhile, three hospitals and 10 medical centers have suspended services over an acute fuel shortage in Gaza, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

Gaza hospitals need 450,000 liters of fuel a month to operate their power generators.

Ashraf Al-Qedra, a spokesman for the Palestinian Health Ministry, confirmed to Xinhua that the hospitals had halted all treatments and patients were being transferred to other facilities in the enclave.

"Forty-five per cent of basic medicines and medical supplies are out in the facilities of the ministry and 58 per cent of laboratory supplies and blood banks have been run out," Al-Qedra added.

The spokesman warned of grave health consequences of the fuel crisis on the patients in Gaza.

The Gaza Strip boasts a total of 13 ministry-run hospitals and 54 primary health care centers that account for roughly 95 percent of health services in the coastal enclave.

The chronic energy crisis has forced local authorities to adopt a rotation system, in which power is cut in some parts of the enclave to ensure supply to other areas.

Currently, Israel provides Gaza with 120 megawatts of electricity while Egypt provides 32 megawatts.CAIRO, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Egyptian troops destroyed 16 terrorist hideouts and an ammunition storehouse in central North Sinai province, the Egyptian army announced Sunday.

The military forces also destroyed four acres of marijuana crops in addition to a large amount of marijuana ready for sale, said Egyptian army spokesman Tamer al-Refaay in a statement.

"The forces of the Third Field Army continue their efforts to destroy terrorist and criminal elements in Central Sinai," the statement said.

In late January, the army announced that it destroyed 14 terrorist hideouts in the same part of North Sinai province bordering Israel and the Palestinian Gaza Strip.

North Sinai used to be the center of Egypt's terrorist attacks that killed hundreds of policemen and soldiers following the military's removal of former Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in July 2013.

The attacks later extended to several other provinces including the capital Cairo, and started to target the Coptic minority via church bombings and shootings.

Most of the terror attacks were carried out by the so-called Wilayat Sinai (Sinai state or province), a Sinai-based group affiliated with the Islamic State (IS), a regional terrorist group.

Terrorists even attacked a mosque in North Sinai's Arish city last November, killing at least 310 Muslim worshippers and injuring more than 120 others in the deadliest terror attack and the first against a mosque in Egypt's modern history. No group has yet claimed responsibility for the mosque attack.

Following the mosque attack, Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi ordered the army to restore security and stability in the restive northern part of the Sinai Peninsula within three months.

Egyptian security forces have so far killed hundreds of terrorists and arrested thousands of suspects during the country's anti-terror war declared by Sisi, the army chief then, following Morsi's ouster in 2013.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 23:36:33|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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BEIRUT, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Lebanese army has received the third batch of arms supplied by the U.S. at the port of Beirut, the army's Orientation Directorate said Sunday.

"The eight M2A2 Bradley Fighting vehicles - carriers of armed troops with a gun platform - were delivered Saturday as part of a larger U.S. military assistance program to Lebanon launched last year," it said in a statement.

Under the program, the army will receive a total of 32 such vehicles, in addition to six MD 530G light attack helicopters, six Scan-Eagle unmanned aerial vehicles, as well as communications and night vision devices, it added.

Last year, the Lebanese army received eight Bradley Fighting vehicles and six A-29 Super Tucano light attack aircraft from the United States.

Since the war erupted between Israel and Lebanon's Shiite Hezbollah movement in 2006, the Lebanese army has received U.S. military assistance worth more than 1.5 billion U.S. dollars. The U.S. special forces have also provided training and support to the Lebanese troops.by Maria Spiliopoulou, Valentini Anagnostopoulou

ATHENS, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- A mass demonstration was held on Sunday in front of the Greek parliament to protest against the use of the term "Macedonia" in any resolution of the name row with Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM).

According to the organizers, local cultural clubs, over 1 million protestors joined the rally at the Syntagma square and nearby avenues, waving Greek national flags and chanting "Macedonia is Greece."

Greek police, however, estimated that about 140,000 people participated in the demonstration.

Despite the statistics difference, Sunday's rally is still one of the largest held in central Athens in the recent years.

Similar rallies over the name issue were seen in 1992, one year after FYROM declared independence from Yugoslavia and chose the name Macedonia, which is also the name of a northern Greek province.

Athens worries that the use of the same name by the neighboring state could lead to territorial claims.

As UN-mediated negotiations over the long-standing dispute between the two neighboring countries continue and governments of both sides voice determination to reach a solution during the first half of 2018, Greek protestors were expressing their objection to any compromise by the government on the name issue.

Sunday's protest was the second staged by the same organizers after the Jan. 21 rally in the northern port city of Thessaloniki when 400,000 people, according to the organizers' estimates, peacefully demonstrated. Police gave the turnout at about 100,000.

In both cases, organizers stressed that they were not affiliated with any political party, although among the crowds were opposition parties MPs from the centre-Left to the ultra- Right.

Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis, well known for his music for the film Zorba the Greek, and a symbol of the Greek Left and resistance to military dictatorship four decades ago, was the keynote speaker.

"Throughout my life I fought for the unity of Greek people and I believe that we must face also this united," the 92-year-old artist addressed the crowd.

"We must be vigilant to protect our country's sovereignty... When one safeguards the rights of his country and his people, this is not nationalism, but patriotism," he stressed responding to criticism voiced by some cabinet ministers, scholars and media commentators who branded participants in the rallies as "nationalists".

Theodorakis requested a referendum over the issue. "They are obliged to ask peoples' opinion first," he said.

Seven out of 10 Greeks reject any new name for the neighboring country which will contain the word "Macedonia," according to a survey released this weekend by the Hellenic foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP) think tank.

And about 56 percent of respondents believe that Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras' handling of negotiations is in the wrong direction.

"I have a responsibility towards the country...I will do my best to solve the issue," the Greek prime minister said on Saturday in a meeting with main opposition New Democracy leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis, government sources told Greek national news agency AMNA.

However, the government's argument in favor of a new compound name for FYROM which will include the term "Macedonia" was not welcome by protestors on Syntagma.

"There is only one Macedonia. It has been, it is and it will always be Greek," Katerina told Xinhua.

"These people arrived in the Balkans in the sixth century A.D. How can they be Macedonians?" Konstantinos Dimarakas from Piraeus asked.

"I came here, because I want to support Greece's rights," Maritsa Kokkala said. She traveled from a village in Peloponnese peninsula, some 250 km southwest of Athens.

More than 2,000 buses were chartered to bring demonstrators to Athens from all over Greece, according to the organizers.

About 19,000 policemen had been deployed across the city as part of increased security, measures to maintain order, as a counter demonstration was held near Syntagma by a small group of anti-establishment groups. "No tolerance for nationalism and fascism," read the banners they raised.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-04 23:41:36|Editor: Liangyu

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BEIJING, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- All Chinese cities at the county level or above will disclose safety conditions of drinking water this year as the country makes further efforts in curbing water pollution, the environmental minister said.

Remediation of drinking water sources is listed among the priorities in China's water pollution control for 2018, Minister of Environmental Protection Li Ganjie said at a two-day national environmental protection work conference that concluded over the weekend.

The remediation has made headway in the past five years, with a total of 490 related issues discovered in cities along the Yangtze River Economic Belt settled, according to the minister.

By the end of 2017, 97.7 percent of cities at the prefecture level and above had set up signs and notices to bring attention to drinking water sources, Li said.

Li said that China will work to ensure that over 80 percent of the country's water meets at least the Level III standard by 2020.

To achieve the goal, the Ministry of Environmental Protection will launch supervision of severely-polluted regions, focusing on the treatment of "black odorous water" and drinking water sources.

The ministry will push "black odorous water" remediation in 36 major cities and the Yangtze River Economic Belt this year and improve environmental infrastructure, Li said.

China classifies water quality into six levels, ranging from level I, which is suitable for drinking after minimal treatment, to level VI for water that is severely contaminated.

The government has passed its toughest-ever environmental protection law, and introduced a "river chief" system to protect water resources. Ecological "red lines" will also be drawn in certain regions to strengthen environmental protection, according to earlier planning.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 00:01:40|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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DHAKA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Students of a leading Bangladeshi university Sunday witnessed a great Chinese New Year celebration performance on their campus in capital Dhaka.

Sun Yan, cultural counsellor of the Chinese embassy in Bangladesh, said the event was launched for celebrating the Chinese New Year in Bangladesh.

She hoped all of the guests enjoy the performance and more Bangladeshi people could know more about the Chinese culture through this event.

Students of the participating institutes performed various joyful activities. They sang Chinese songs, performed Chinese kungfu and recited Chinese poems.

Bangladesh Dragon and Lion Dance Association and visiting Jiangdu Spring Drum Art Troupe from China also performed in the event.

Kazi Anis Ahmed, vice president the University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh (ULAB) Board of Trustees, said China is the emerging power of this century.

"We are on the way of global orientation with policies like the Belt and Road Initiative," he added.

Beatrice Kaldun, head and representative at UNESCO Dhaka Office, said the Chinese New Year is a joyous occasion.

The event was organized by the Chinese Embassy in Bangladesh in collaboration with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Dhaka Office, ULAB, several Confucius Institutes in Bangladesh's universities, among others.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 00:06:41|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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ANKARA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Defying the U.S. warnings, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag warned Sunday that Turkish troops will move into Manbij if the Kurdish forces refuse to leave.

If the Kurdish forces of the People's Protection Units (YPG), do not leave Manbij in northern Syria, Turkish troops "will move into Manbij and toward the east of Euphrates," Bozdag told the local channel CNN Turk.

On the possibility of a clash between U.S. and Turkish troops, Bozdag noted that Turkey does not want to clash with U.S. troops in Manbij or anywhere else in Syria, adding that the U.S., a NATO ally for Turkey, needs to show the same sensitivity regarding the issue.

"If U.S. soldiers wear uniforms of (YPG) terrorists and fight with them against the Turkish army, we will not have a chance to make the difference at this point," Bozdag said.

He also warned that Washington needs to tell U.S. soldiers not to face Turkish forces and stay away from the region.

"However, whoever cooperates with terrorists and carries out attacks against Turkish forces will receive the necessary response," he stressed.

Turkey regards the YPG as the Syrian affiliate of the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) that is seeking autonomy in the southeast of Turkey.

Turkish troops launched "Operation Olive Branch" on Jan. 20 in a bid to remove the YPG militia from Syria's northwestern region of Afrin.

The U.S., which has cooperated with the YPG in fighting the terror group Islamic States in the past years, has urged Ankara to limit its military operations in Syria, while warning about the risk of a possible conflict with the U.S. troops based in Manbij if Turkish troops move on to capture the city.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 00:11:43|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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TEHRAN, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Iran's mineral exports to Afghanistan have reached 5.37 million tons since last March, the Financial Tribune reported Sunday.

The total value of the Iranian mineral exports to Afghanistan amounted to 672.9 million U.S. dollars during the Iranian calendar year starting from March 21, 2017, the report said.

Semi-finished steel products had the lion's share of the exports, as they made up 533,358 tons that was worth 230.1 million dollars.

Other major mineral products exported to Afghanistan included ceramic and tile products, which were 875,904 tons with a value of 142.45 million dollars, cement with 3.31 million tons worth 116.5 million dollars, and finished steel products with 38,572 tons worth 65.82 million dollars.

Iran's overall mineral exports to the rest of the world during the nine months stood at 48.66 million tons worth over 6.85 billion dollars.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 00:31:49|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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AMMAN, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Jordan announced Sunday that Europe's biggest low-cost air carrier Ryanair will start flights to the Arab kingdom in March.

The airline is expected to launch 14 new routes to Jordan as of March, Jordanian Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Lina Annab told a press conference.

The first route will be operated from Cyprus' coastal city of Paphos to Jordan's capital Amman in March, followed by nine other routes to Queen Alia Airport, Jordan's largest airport, and four others to King Hussein International Airport in Jordan's Red Sea city of Aqaba, Annab said.

"It is a key development in Jordan's tourism industry and will offer travellers a greater choice and value for money," she added.

Jordan's tourism revenues in 2017 rose by around 12 percent, according to official figures.

Abed Al Razzaq Arabyyat, managing director of Jordan's tourism board, said the launch of the new routes to Jordan from several key markets is essential in bringing tourists to Jordan for longer stays.

The new routes are expected to carry up to 500,000 travellers per year and to create 340 new on-site jobs, Ryanair's Chief Commercial Officer David O'Brien said.BUJUMBURA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza on Sunday warned citizens against disrupting the country's unity.

"Some citizens think that divisions can allow them access to some benefits. I assure them that all their ways are blocked," Nkurunziza in said a message to the nation, ahead of Monday's 27th anniversary of adoption of the Unity Charter.

"I rather advise them to change their behavior," he said.

The anniversary of the adoption of the Unity Charter comes at a time when the east African nation is peaceful and its citizens united.

The president urged Burundians to consolidate unity through strengthening unity within their households. "If households are united, then the country is united."

He also called for citizens' patriotism, saying that when a country moves ahead, so do its citizens.

Burundi adopted the unity charter in a referendum On Feb. 5, 1991, when the country's three main ethnic groups -- Hutu, Tutsi and Twa --agreed to "live in harmony and avoid confrontations."

Despite the adoption of the unity charter, one of the biggest crises broke out in 1993 with the assassination of the first democratically elected Hutu President Melchior Ndadaye, which sparked deadly violence between Hutu and Tutsi groups and a massive forced exile.By Julia Pierrepont III

SANTA BARBARA, the United States, Jan. 4 (Xinhua) -- "The past few months have been some of the hardest for everyone in Santa Barbara. The devastation and the emotional toll it has taken on all of us is not quantifiable..."

Roger Durling, executive director of the Santa Barbara Film Festival, told Xinhua Sunday, on a sunny spring day in the Southern California.

In the wake of the back-to-back tragedies of massive wildfires, floods and mudslides, the beautiful seaside community of Santa Barbara, known as the American Riviera, has been battling for the last month to regain its footing and rise from the ashes.

Though the City of Santa Barbara itself was largely untouched, the neighborhood of Montecito is still reeling from the loss of dozens of homes and 23 lives.

Many assumed that the annual Santa Barbara Film Festival would be yet another casualty. But Santa Barbarans are made of sterner stuff.

In a rousing speech before a packed Opening Night Ceremony audience last Wednesday, Durling promised, "Film has the power to unify us, to make us feel less fragmented as human beings. The events of the past weeks have fragmented this community. We've felt alone. But tonight, and for the next 10 days, we're alone no more."

Emilio Estavez, whose film, "The Public" had its world premier on Opening Night, told Xinhua, "Santa Barbara needs this now more than ever. The film deals with... the people who are struggling and this community knows something about that now in ways no one could have imagined."

He went on to say, "Yet out of this tragedy come miracles...big and small. And this festival is one of the many miracles of this city."

Community and cooperation were strong refrains that ran throughout many of the festival films this year. Multiple Emmy, SAG and Golden Globe Award winner, Alec Baldwin, who co-starred in Estevez's film, told Xinhua, "The direction we have to go in, not just this country but the world, is: we have to share more...we have to make room for everyone."

Three powerful, eye-opening documentaries on climate change and the global environmental crisis also highlighted the theme of social responsibility as they led the call for socio-environmental action:

"Acid Horizon", directed by Ivan Hurzeler, follows Dr. Erik Cordes, a Temple University oceanographic ecologist, and his intelligent analysis of our ocean' s decline into acidity, with coherent potential solutions.

"Living in the Future's Past", narrated by Santa Barbara resident, Jeff Bridges, and directed by Susan Kucera, is a visually stunning look inside the human behavior that motivates societies obsession with energy.

"Metamorphosis" is a 4K visual stunner and a more hopeful than the others, as it takes viewers through a magnificent panoply of breathtaking, planet-wide images from California, the Canary Islands, Vanuatu, Canada's Badlands of Alberta, etc., that prove the powerful resilience of the planet.

With more than 150 films on deck to choose from during the 10-day event, there is literally something for everyone, but a few films of special note were:

"Oh Lucy," a quirky, Asian-centric ode on loneliness and being true to one's self, starring Josh Harnett and Sinobu Terajima, by Japanese director, Atsuko Hirayanagi.

"Scary Mother", the feature debut of Georgian writer/director, Ana Urushadze, and a tightly-written mix of horror, love, humor around a classic dysfunctional family.

"Sunshine That Can Move Mountains," Han Chinese filmmaker, Wang Qiang's, poetic and sensitive take on the introspective life of an itinerant Buddhist monk as he journeys through the vast, rural landscapes of Tibet to reach home.

More than just an ambitious festival that showcases dozens of world and US premieres each year, when needed most, this year's Santa Barbara Film Festival stepped up to become a symbol of hope to the city's strong, vibrant community.

Cathy Murillo, the first female Latina mayor of a major city in California, attributes that to the "healing power of shared culture. The festival is a positive move that helps people in grief move through to catharsis."

A newcomer to City Hall, her first day in office was Jan. 9, the day the skies opened over Santa Barbara and poured death and destruction down upon her community.

With the surrounding hillsides denuded by the largest wildfire in California history, there was nothing to hold the fragile earth in place. Torrential downpours sent a crushing wave of mud and debris over parts of Montecito, killing almost two dozen in their sleep.

"As a mayor in California, I knew there was bound to be a natural disaster on my watch, but I never expected something as biblical as this," said Mayor Mullio ruefully in an exclusive interview with Xinhua on Friday.

"But, we have the best First Responders in the country. City, country, state, all under one incident command, all highly-trained for emergencies just like this."

"But now, after mourning our dead, Santa Barbara is in recovery and rebuilding," she told Xinhua. "Tourism is the lifeblood of Santa Barbara, and will play a large part in supporting our local businesses and getting us back to normal. Santa Barbara is famous for its pristine, coastal beauty. That hasn't changed."

When asked how others could help the city recover, Mayor Murilla said, "For anyone who wants to help Santa Barbara, we invite you to come visit us. Come see our beautiful beaches and clear blue skies. Our delicious restaurants and fine universities. Be part of Santa Barbara again."

Roger Durling had the last word, "The Santa Barbara community built this film festival in 1986. And their love and pride grew it into what it is today. Movies have always had an immeasurable power to heal. As Santa Barbara recovers, we welcome and encourage film lovers and visitors to gather around our strong, beautiful and resilient community."CAIRO, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Egypt's foreign currency reserves exceeded 38.2 billion U.S. dollars by the end of January, the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) said in a statement on Sunday.

The figures declined from 36 billion dollars in January 2011, just before the uprising that ousted former President Hosni Mubarak, to 13.5 billion in February 2013, a few months before the ouster of former Islamist President Mohamed Morsi.

The political instability and relevant security issues led to economic recession and decline of tourism and foreign investments, two major sources for Egypt's foreign currency reserves.

It started to gradually rise under President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, who led Morsi's ouster in response to mass protests, until it hit 37.02 billion dollars by the end of 2017.

Improved security conditions, increasing remittances of Egyptian expatriates, in addition to foreign loans and deposits have refilled the CBE with foreign funds.

Egypt's foreign debts rose to 81 billion dollars, according to a statement from Finance Minister Amr al-Garhy in mid-January.

The foreign debts increased about 42 percent to 79 billion dollars during the 2016-17 fiscal year ending in June 2017, compared with 55.8 billion dollars a year earlier.

A CBE official said in January that Egypt paid off about 30 billion dollars of financial dues and foreign debts in 2017 and the country is committed to paying back more than 12 billion dollars in 2018.

The repayments cover bonds and foreign debts to regional and international banks, deposits and loans from countries like Saudi Arabia, Libya and Turkey, commitments by government bodies to world companies, as well as dues to the Paris Club.

To contain dollar shortage, Egypt started in late 2016 a strict three-year economic reform program including austerity measures, energy subsidy cuts and tax increases, in addition to currency full floatation, although they led to nationwide price hikes.

Egypt's reform program is encouraged by a 12-billion-dollar loan from the International Monetary Fund, half of which has already been delivered to the most populous Arab country.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 02:57:14|Editor: Yurou

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Cypriot incumbent President Nicos Anastasiades (C) waves to supporters after being re-elected in Nicosia, Cyprus, on Feb. 4, 2018. Nicos Anastasiades comfortably won a second term in a runoff election on Sunday against leftist presidential candidate Stavros Malas, according to election results. (Xinhua/Christos Theodorides)

NICOSIA, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Cyprus's incumbent President Nicos Anastasiades comfortably won a second term in a runoff election on Sunday against leftist presidential candidate Stavros Malas, according to election results.

With all ballot papers counted, the electoral service said that Anastasiades garnered 55.99 percent of the vote, with Malas trailing with 44.01 percent.

A presidential palace source said that Malas has called Anastasiades to congratulate him on his re-election.

Sundays' runoff was a repeat of the 2013 runoff in which Anastasiades was elected against Malas.

The electoral service said that 26.03 percent of eligible voters stayed away from polling stations, slightly lower than the first round abstention ratio of 28.13 percent.

Anastasiades cruised to victory on the economic record of his government which turned a ruined economy in 2013 into a dynamic and flourishing one in five years.

Cyprus exited a bailout program from the Eurogroup and the International Monetary Fund in 2016 and has achieved a growth rate of over 4 percent last year, one of the highest in European Union

Anastasiades also promised voters he will seek an early resumption of his stalled negotiations with Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci for the reunification of Cyprus.

Anastasiades, aged 71, is representing Greek Cypriots in the negotiations which collapsed in Switzerland last July, over differences relating to the future of Turkish troops in Cyprus and intervention rights in the eastern Mediterranean island.

Cyprus was partitioned after a Turkish military action in 1974 prompted by a short lived organized by the military rulers of Greece at the time.

United Nations troops forming one of the longest serving peace keeping forces control a buffer zone dividing Greek Cypriots in the south from Turkish Cypriots and Turkish troops in the north.

The divided island became a member of the European Union in 2004 and joined the hard-core inner euro zone group.

Messages of congratulation by EU officials started coming in after official results were announced.

As soon as official results became final, Anastasiades went to his electoral office where he addressed election workers and thousands of his supporters who gathered in the street outside.ROME, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Tight security measures were implemented in the Italian capital on Sunday, as Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan started his 24-hour visit to Vatican and Italy in the evening.

Extra police forces were deployed across the historic center, and a "green zone" was created where all demonstrations would be banned for 48 hours, the police chief's office said in a statement.

Some 3,500 officers would be overall distributed in and around Rome, according to Ansa news agency.

The Interior Ministry also said it ordered a "further tightening of anti-terrorism measures". Bomb disposal checks were carried out on all routes along which the Turkish president's convoy was planned to move across the capital.

The Turkish president was expected to visit Vatican first on Monday morning, meeting with Pope Francis and Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Parolin, local media said.

He would then meet his Italian counterpart, Sergio Mattarella, at the Quirinale presidential palace. Talks with Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni were scheduled at 4 p.m. local time on Monday, the PM's office said in a statement.

Erdogan would address the issue of Jerusalem during his meeting with the Pope, said La Stampa newspaper quoting the Turkish leader. In an interview with the Italian daily ahead of his visit, Erdogan declared the status of Jerusalem was "a central issue for both Muslims and Christians".

He added he felt committed to "protecting the status quo" of Jerusalem, after U.S. President Donald Trump's recent unilateral decision to recognize the city as Israel's capital.

Another priority issue of his visit -- to be addressed with Italian authorities -- was Turkey's accession to the European Union (EU), after decades of unresolved negotiations.

The Turkish leader urged the bloc to "keep its promises". Asked about possible alternatives to a formal entry as a EU member state, Erdogan told La Stampa that his country would seek only a "full membership of the EU". "We will not accept any other solution," he said.

Bilateral talks with Mattarella and Gentiloni would also address cooperation in anti-terrorism and defense, migration, and economic exchanges with Italy, which is Turkey's third largest commercial partner.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 03:27:18|Editor: Liu

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A Syrian refugee child is seen at Zaatari Syrian refugee camp in the Jordanian city of Mafraq near the border with Syria on Sept. 12, 2017. (Xinhua/Mohammad Abu Ghosh)

MOSCOW, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Russia has registered seven ceasefire violations in three Syrian provinces over the last seven hours, the Russian Defense Ministry said Sunday.

The violations were recorded in the provinces of Aleppo (3), Latakia (3) and Homs (1), the ministry said in its daily bulletin.

Turkey has registered five cases of ceasefire breaches in the province of Idlib (1) and Damascus (4) during the same period of time, the document added.

Both Russia and Turkey are guarantors of a nationwide Syrian ceasefire regime which came into force on Dec. 30, 2016.

The total number of settlements that have signed reconciliation agreement is 2,342, the bulletin said.

It also said the situation in the de-escalation zones is assessed as stable.

In May 2017, Russia, Iran and Turkey, mediators for Astana peace talks for a political settlement of the Syrian crisis, agreed to set up four de-escalation zones in Syria, which are guaranteed to be free of battles and airstrikes for six months initially and subject to automatic extensions after that.

According to the document, Syrian civilians have received 2.1 tons of food supplies through a humanitarian action of the Russian reconciliation center over the past 24 hours, and 139 citizens have received medical aid during that period of time.

To date, a total of 2,440 tons of cargo has been delivered to Syria in 1,745 humanitarian operations and medical aid has been provided to 69,810 people altogether, according to the Defense Ministry.People walk on the snow covered Red Square in front of Saint Basil's Cathedral during a heavy snowfall in Moscow on January 31, 2018. (AFP PHOTO)

MOSCOW, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Heavy snowfall hit Moscow for a second day in a row, leaving one dead and five others injured, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Sunday.

The mayor said on Twitter that the casualties were caused by fallen trees and damaged power lines due to the meteorological disaster.

"According to operational data, the number of fallen trees caused by snow and ice exceeded 2,000. The number of injured Muscovites, fortunately, did not increase. All services work in the maximally enhanced mode," Sobyanin said.

The ongoing heavy snowfall, reportedly the worst in six months, has also led to the delay or cancellation of dozens of flights in Moscow. According to the Sputnik news agency, over 100 flights were delayed and over 10 were canceled in major airports in Moscow.

Governor of the Moscow Region Andrei Vorobiev has declared a state of emergency in the region and ordered all traffic management services to work in the emergency mode and clean up the snow on roads to avoid any disastrous situations, said the regional government on Instagram.

Unfavorable weather conditions will remain in the Russian capital until Sunday evening, with potential heavy wet snow and even a snowstorm in certain parts of the city, according to the Russian Emergencies Ministry.A picture taken on February 3, 2018, shows smoke billowing from the site of a downed Sukhoi-25 fighter jet in the the Syrian city of Saraqib, southwest of Aleppo. (AFP PHOTO)

MOSCOW, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Massive Russian air strikes have killed at least 30 militants in northwest Syria, where a Russian fighter jet was shot down, Russia's Defense Ministry said in a statement Saturday.

A series of high-precision weapon strikes has been delivered in the area controlled by the Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist group, which brought down the Russian Su-25 jet by using a portable anti-aircraft missile system in the Syrian province Idlib, said the statement.

"According to radio intercepts, more than 30 Jabhat al-Nusra militants were killed," said the statement.

Earlier Saturday, the ministry said a pilot survived the fighter jet crash but was later killed in a ground fight with terrorists.

"The pilot died in a fight with the terrorists," an earlier statement said.

"The Russian center for reconciliation of opposing sides in Syria and the Turkish side overseeing the Idlib de-escalation area are working to bring the Russian pilot's body home," it said.

The incident requires finding out which countries could have equipped the militants with the man-portable air defense system, Yury Shvytkin, the deputy chairman of the Russian lower house's defense committee, was quoted by Sputnik as saying.

In May 2017, the guarantors of the Syrian ceasefire, Russia, Iran and Turkey, agreed to set up the Syrian de-escalation zones in Syria, which includes Idlib province.

In December 2017, the Russian military announced that Syrian troops supported by Russian servicemen have completed the destruction of Islamic State terrorists in the war-torn country.

Later, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the beginning of a partial withdrawal of Russian troops from Syria.

Russia reportedly spent an average of 156 million rubles (2.6 million U.S. dollars) every day in the past few years on military operations against terrorist groups in Syria.A Syrian refugee child is seen at Zaatari Syrian refugee camp in the Jordanian city of Mafraq near the border with Syria on Sept. 12, 2017. (Xinhua/Mohammad Abu Ghosh)

MOSCOW, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Russia has registered seven ceasefire violations in three Syrian provinces over the last seven hours, the Russian Defense Ministry said Sunday.

The violations were recorded in the provinces of Aleppo (3), Latakia (3) and Homs (1), the ministry said in its daily bulletin.Turkey has registered five cases of ceasefire breaches in the province of Idlib (1) and Damascus (4) during the same period of time, the document added.

Both Russia and Turkey are guarantors of a nationwide Syrian ceasefire regime which came into force on Dec. 30, 2016.

The total number of settlements that have signed reconciliation agreement is 2,342, the bulletin said.

It also said the situation in the de-escalation zones is assessed as stable.

In May 2017, Russia, Iran and Turkey, mediators for Astana peace talks for a political settlement of the Syrian crisis, agreed to set up four de-escalation zones in Syria, which are guaranteed to be free of battles and airstrikes for six months initially and subject to automatic extensions after that.

According to the document, Syrian civilians have received 2.1 tons of food supplies through a humanitarian action of the Russian reconciliation center over the past 24 hours, and 139 citizens have received medical aid during that period of time.

To date, a total of 2,440 tons of cargo has been delivered to Syria in 1,745 humanitarian operations and medical aid has been provided to 69,810 people altogether, according to the Defense Ministry.Sorry, this news has been deleted.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 05:27:34|Editor: Yurou

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Costa Rica's President candidate Antonio Alvarez of the National Liberation Party shows his ballot during the Presidential elections in San Jose, Costa Rica, on Feb. 4, 2018. Costa Rica's President Luis Guillermo Solis on Sunday urged eligible voters to go to the polls to "express the opinion of the citizenry" in the general elections. (Xinhua/Kent Gilbert)

SAN JOSE, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Costa Rica's President Luis Guillermo Solis on Sunday urged eligible voters to go to the polls to "express the opinion of the citizenry" in the general elections.

"Go out and vote," Solis said as he cast his ballot at a local school in downtown San Jose at 7:30 a.m.

Voting "is very important to keeping our civic life vibrant and strong," said Solis, adding "we must express the opinion of the citizenry, whatever it may be."

In addition to a new president, Costa Ricans are voting for two vice presidents and 57 members of the Legislative Assembly.

None of the four leading presidential candidates is expected to garner the minimum 40 percent of the votes needed to win the first round, making an April 1 runoff likely.

In a devoutly Catholic country grappling with the issue of whether or not to legalize same-sex marriage, evangelical pastor Fabricio Alvarado surged ahead in popularity in January with his outspoken stance against the measure.

The other three top candidates are Antonio Alvarez of the National Liberation Party (PLN), Carlos Alvarado of the ruling Citizens' Action Party (PAC) and Juan Diego Castro of the National Integration Party (PIN).

Solis' term ends in May.TRIPOLI, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Libya's UN-backed Prime Minister Fayez Serraj on Sunday condemned the attack by armed groups on displaced families of Tawergha near the city of Bani Walid, some 180 km southwest of the capital Tripoli.

"Head of the Presidential Council of the Government of National Accord strongly condemns the intimidation towards Tawerghan families by armed groups near Gararat Al-Gatf area, in an attempt to undermine the reconciliation agreement between Misurata and Touragha cities," Serraj said in a statement.

"These groups have been and continue to fight efforts of the Libyans to achieve consensus," Serraj said, noting that support would continue for the implementation of the reconciliation agreement.

"The Presidential Council praises the efforts of the Misurata Municipal Council, the local Council of Tawergha, and the reconciliation and elders committees of both cities, who continue to work to secure the return of the people of Tawergha," the statement added.

Local media reported that armed groups attacked a temporary camp for the Tawargha refugees near the village of Gararat Al-Gatf of Bani Walid, where they burned families' tents, beat some of them, and stole some of their vehicles.

The groups are suspected of belonging to Misurata Military Council, which refuses the return of the Tawerghans to their city.

On Dec. 26, 2017, Serraj announced that Feb. 1 would be the date for the return of Tawerghans to their city, which they fled several years ago.

However, the return was halted after armed groups from Misurata denied their entry into the town, despite the fact that the two neighboring cities signed a UN-sponsored reconciliation agreement in August 2016.

During the 2011 uprising, some residents of Tawergha allied with the forces of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi against the rebels of the nearby city of Misurata.

After Gaddafi's regime was toppled, those residents, accused by Misuratans of actively participating in the fighting against them, fled their homes to other cities in Libya. Since then, they have been internally displaced.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 06:47:45|Editor: Yurou

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by Gerardo Laborde

MONTEVIDEO, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Uruguay and China celebrated 30 years of diplomatic ties with an evening of traditional Chinese music, dance and acrobatics at the prestigious Sodre National Auditorium in the capital Montevideo.

Uruguay's ex-president Jose Mujica (2010-2015) and current Vice President Lucia Topolansky, as well as China's ambassador Dong Xiaojun, were among the guests of honor at the gala, which featured the Hangzhou Artistic Group.

The cultural extravaganza was also attended by Education Minister Maria Julia Munoz, who delivered a heartfelt message from President Tabare Vazquez, and Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Ariel Bergamino, along with members of the diplomatic corps and the Uruguayan and Chinese community.

"These past 30 years have presented a very fertile path that has led to today's excellent level of ties between the two countries," Bergamino told Xinhua, referring to the Feb. 3 anniversary.

"Uruguay and China even have a strategic partnership established in 2016, on the occasion of President Tabare Vazquez's trip to China," said Bergamino.

Through the bilateral partnership, "we are working to further perfect" the relationship "in all its facets: trade, cooperation and culture," the diplomat said.

Bergamino also underscored the importance of high-level exchange in bolstering bilateral ties.

"Chinese Foreign Affairs Minister Wang Yi's recent visit to Uruguay was an excellent opportunity to fine tune relations and outline a pathway for (joint) work for the rest of the year," he said.

Anniversary "celebrations are going to take place throughout the year with cultural exchanges such as this by the Hangzhou Artistic Group," said Bargamino, adding Uruguayan cultural events are scheduled to take place in China in 2018, as are more high-level exchanges.

Via his education minister, President Vazquez said he was sorry he "couldn't be there in person," but that "the recollections of his experiences during his visit to China were still very vibrant."

Those memories "have stimulated and spread to the entire government team and the whole Uruguayan nation, to continue strengthening the ties of friendship, cooperation and mutual benefit between our countries," Vazquez said in his message.

The "expression of our fruitful relationship is the strategic partnership reached in 2016" and that "today propels us towards a higher stage, for which we are working," the president said.

Uruguay and China enjoy "a multidimensional and dynamic partnership, and this cultural event is a manifestation of that," the president added.

Ambassador Dong, in turn, hailed "the significant progress" the two have made in strengthening ties, and said the relationship "has a brilliant outlook."

The Hangzhou troupe is set to hold a series of performances in Uruguay as part of the anniversary celebrations and festivities marking the Chinese New Year.HANAU, Germany, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- A gala featuring songs and dances was held on Sunday evening in the western German town of Hanau where 600 people celebrated the upcoming Spring Festival, or the Chinese Lunar New Year.

The performance, presented by local arts association Huaxing, was a combination of elements of Chinese traditional culture and western culture, so that audience could enjoy not only traditional Chinese opera, kung fu, classical dancing, Qipao fashion show, but also symphony and pop dancing on the same stage.

"We're fortune that we can celebrate the 'new year' twice in Hanau," said Juergen Scheuermann, Chairman of Hanau Taizhou Friendship Association, before the performance started.

He added that the performance brought younger people both from China and Hanau together, so that "we could expect deepened friendship between Chinese and German".

Chinese diplomat Tang Liwen, on behalf of the Chinese Consulate General in Frankfurt, said that it had been the second year that overseas Chinese celebrated Chinese lunar New Year together with German friends in Hanau, the birthplace of well-known fairy tales authors Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm, or Brothers Grimm.

Tang appreciated the contribution made by overseas Chinese to prompting friendly exchanges between China and Germany.Source: Xinhua| 2018-02-05 07:14:07|Editor: Liangyu

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Li Yuanmin (2nd L) talks with young people, in Gaimai Village of Yining County, northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, Nov. 21, 2017. Li Yuanmin, a delegate to the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC), served as village secretary of the party. She has put great effort in propagating party's route, guideline and policy to folks in the remote village, after returning from the party congress. She believed that her work could connect the small village directly to Beijing, which will benefit the future development of the village. (Xinhua/Gao Jing)Some 12 million years ago, land near the Idaho border cracked open and out poured the last in a series of colossal eruptions that sent layers of lava rolling across Central Washington.

Today, the remnants of that last eruption are again on the move.

In the millions of years since that time, ridges have risen across Central Washington, and that long-ago hardened lava now sits atop Rattlesnake Ridge, where it is slowly sliding toward the Valley floor.

Among those who took an early interest in the Rattlesnake Ridge slide is Stephen Reidel, an adjunct geology professor at Washington State Universitys Tri-Cities campus. Reidel grew up in Ohio, but after college moved west, where hes been studying the areas geology for more than 30 years.

I got out west as quickly as possible, he said. Most of the people from the universities out here came from back east to get out and see some real geology.

Theres such a great variety of different types of geology, you really cant beat it, he said. Theres nothing else like it; just a lot of spectacular geology.

How spectacular? Consider this: The lava that came pouring out starting some 17 million years ago is 2 miles thick in places. The eruptions took place over a roughly 5 million-year period. Thousands and thousands of years passed between eruptions. The layers would cool. Life would resume. Plants and animals would thrive. Then another layer of lava would come rolling across the landscape. Trapped between lava flows would be interbeds of soil, rocks and occasionally an animal unlucky enough to have been overtaken by an eruption of lava  the mold of a rhinoceros can be found in the basalt near Lower Grand Coulee.

Rattlesnake Ridge is composed of roughly five layers of solidified lava known as basalt. The formations, from top to bottom, are Pomona, Umatilla, Priest Rapids, Rosa and Frenchman Springs.

The Pomona  the formation thats sliding  is about 150 feet thick. Below it is an earlier lava flow known as the Umatilla formation. Between the two is an interbed thats allowing the Pomona to slide.

Imagine you take those two layers (of lava) and spray some Crisco between them and rub them together, Reidel said. Thats whats happening here.

Understanding Central Washingtons geology is key to knowing how the deadly 2014 Oso slide northwest of Everett was a very different situation, said Dave Norman, a geologist with the state Department of Natural Resources.

That 15 million-cubic-yard slide, considered the deadliest in state history, killed 43 people and destroyed 36 homes.

Rattlesnake Ridges basalt is dark, fine-grained and incredibly dense. Sedimentary rocks  which formed the majority of the Oso slide  are created when sand, mud and pebbles cement together in water. They are soft and comparatively brittle, which meant when the Oso slide began, the land broke apart more easily and moved far faster than a basalt slide would.

The slide that most closely resembles the Rattlesnake Ridge slide is the Toppenish Ridge landslide, according to Charlie Hammond, a geologist with Cornforth Consultants, a Portland-based geotechnical firm hired to monitor the Rattlesnake Ridge slide by the operators of a quarry at the base of the slide. Visible along the north face of Toppenish Ridge, southeast of Toppenish, the slide sent debris more than a quarter-mile across the Valley floor thousands of years ago.

Hammond said that slide also appears to have been a basalt flow resting atop an interbed. But what made that slide bigger and move father, he said, was the ridges steepness.

The Rattlesnake Ridge slide is on a roughly 15-degree angle, while the Toppenish Ridge slide fell at as much as a 25-degree angle, Hammond said.

Most geologists now believe the Rattlesnake Ridge slide will creep downhill for years, if not decades, and wont be devastatingly large and fast.

Another area landslide many compare the Rattlesnake slide to is the one Yakima County saw in 2009, where an estimated 10 million cubic yards of rocks and dirt fell off a hillside north of Nile on State Route 410.

That slide buried nearly a half-mile of highway and pushed the Naches River out of its banks. No injuries were reported, but several homes were destroyed or damaged beyond repair.

But Norman and Hammond cautioned against drawing parallels between the two, saying there are more dissimilarities than similarities. Groundwater pressure may have been a factor, and that slide, too, fell at a much steeper angle, they said.Thank you for reading!

Please log in, or sign up for a new account and purchase a subscription to continue reading.Get in on the grant action: Find out how APS can help your organizationCoun Perez reiterates warning to barangay leaders involved in drugs

07 Aug 2017 Hits:37 Comments(0)

Liga ng mga Barangay President, Councilor Jerry Perez yesterday reiterated his warning to all barangay officials from using or selling drugs. Perez said he is closely monitoring the activities of all the barangay officials and vowed sanctions against erring leaders. Aqui gane na mio barangay ya quita ya iyo na puesto cunel dos barangay leaders quien mas temprano ya sale positivo na...BENGALURU: The call for Bengaluru bandh over the Mahadayi water dispute issue was on Saturday withdrawn after the Karnataka High Court called the shutdown as "unconstitutional".

The call for bandh was given by former MLA and Kannada activist Vatal Nagaraj, along with the support of other organisations to seeking the intervention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Mahadayi water dispute.

Making its stand clear while dismissing the call for bandh, the court had directed the state government and other agencies to take ensure that day-to-day life of people does not take a hit due to the "unconstitutional" call.

The bandh was called on a day when the Prime Minister will be in Bengaluru to address a rally.

While the bandh has been called off, the protestors said that they will be observing the day as 'Black Day'.

Earlier, the same protestors had called for Karnataka bandh when Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Amit Shah's visited the state last week. The BJP has been alleging the hand of Congress in the shutdowns which had been called on the days when Amit Shah and PM Modi were to be in the state.

However, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah denied the charges as baseless. "I am not so cheap to back a bandh opposing PMs visit, he had claimed.Patna: Though the Nitish Kumar-led Janata Dal-United government is desperately trying to take Bihar out from the 'dark ages', a fresh report from the state's police is sure to give a cultural shock to those who think that situation has improved in Bihar.

A report from Bihar Police claims that more than 3,400 youths were kidnapped for forced marriage, locally known as "Pakadua Vivah" in Bihar in the year 2017.

"Pakadua Vivah is rampant in Bihar. About 3,405 youths have been kidnapped for forced marriage in the state, '' the report stated.

''In most of the cases, 'Pakadua Vivah' was solemnised at gunpoint or threats to their life and their families," a senior Bihar Police official was quoted as saying by IANS.

Last month, the 'forced marriage of 'pakadua vivah' of an engineer in a village in Patna grabbed national headlines when he refused to keep his newly-wed wife after he was abducted and forced to marry at gunpoint.

According to the official data, about 3,070 youths were kidnapped for 'pakadua vivah' in the state in 2016, 3,000 in 2015 and 2,526 in 2014.

"In all such cases, either the youths and or parents were forced at gunpoint to give their consent for 'pakadua vivah'," the official said.

Going by the police records, at least nine cases of 'pakadua vivah' are registered daily in the state.

Taking the number of increasing 'pakadua vivah' seriously, the state police has asked all the district Superintendents of Police to be on the alert to check such incidents in the coming marriage season, known as "lagan" beginning this month.

Mahender Yadav, an activist working in flood-prone Koshi region in northern Bihar, said kidnapping for 'pakadua vivah' is nothing unusual in the state. It has been reported for years. "What is alarming is that its number is increasing".

Many like him agree that 'pakadua vivah' is an old social problem in Bihar due to the demand for dowry.

A National Crime Records Bureau Report 2015 - which is the most recent official figure available - confirms that Bihar is at the top in the country when it comes to the abduction of above 18-year-old males.

The number of abducted males in Bihar in the 18 to 30 age-group was 1,096 in 2015. The state alone accounted for nearly 17 per cent of the national figure in the category.

(With IANS inputs)New Delhi: After directing two coming-of-age movies such as, Wake Up Sid and Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani, filmmaker Ayan Mukerji will helm the fantasy adventure series, Brahmastra . The movie is backed by Karan Johar's Dharma Productions and stars Amitabh Bachchan, Ranbir Kapoor and Alia Bhatt in pivotal roles.

There is a lot of excitement regarding the film and megastar Amitabh Bachchan took to Instagram to share a photograph with the director and Ranbir. Mr Bachchan also confirmed that the movie will go on floors next month. He wrote- ''Ranbir Kapoor, Ayan and yours truly at look test for BRAHMASTRA .. cool .. shoot starts next month .. with Alia too .. a joy to be with this incredible young generation..

Here is Big B's Instagram post:

A post shared by Amitabh Bachchan (@amitabhbachchan) on Feb 3, 2018 at 8:56pm PST

Namit Malhotra, co-producer of the film was earlier quoted as saying, We aspire to create something homegrown that can match Hollywood standards. We can't be penny-pinching with the scale. Hollywood has moved from dramas and rom-coms to big scale films, which makes more money eventually. India too is getting there. We will shoot it the regular way and then convert it into 3D. The visual effects and conversion quality will be superlative.

He added, The films will progress from establishing the characters to the protagonist achieving his goal. Ayan's vision will strike a chord with everyone, from the ages of six to 60. In terms of concept, it doesn't share any similarities with other Bollywood superhero films, like Krrish (2006). The title itself conveys that the story is rooted in our cultural heritage.New Delhi: Director of the Famous Hollywood film, 'The Mask', Chuck Russell is directing action-adventure film, 'Junglee'. The movie stars 'Commando' actor Vidyut Jammwal.

This isn't the first time that stars from the Hindi Film industry are collaborating with Hollywood. Actors like Priyanka Chopra and Deepika Padukone are absolutely rocking the Hollywood world.

Taran Adarsh took to Twitter and shared an exclusive picture from the action-adventure film and wrote-

Here's an EXCLUSIVE pic from the action-adventure film #Junglee... Stars Vidyut Jammwal... Hollywood director Chuck Russell [#TheMask, #ScorpionKing] tells a unique story of a family and their relationship with elephants.

Here's an EXCLUSIVE pic from the action-adventure film #Junglee... Stars Vidyut Jammwal... Hollywood director Chuck Russell [#TheMask, #ScorpionKing] tells a unique story of a family and their relationship with elephants. pic.twitter.com/Ig6V9WN0F2  taran adarsh (@taran_adarsh) February 3, 2018

The film revolves around Ashwath, born and brought up in the jungles of Kerala. Much to his animal-activist father's disappointment, Ashwath goes on to become a big-shot veterinarian in the big city of Mumbai.

When Ashwath returns to Kerala after years he decides to expose and fight against the elephant poaching racket in the country.

The movie is slated to release on October 19, 2018 and is produced by Junglee Pictures.

(With PTI Inputs)New Delhi: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Sunday several documents allegedly linked to various properties of Delhi government minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Satyendar Jain.

According to PTI, several documents, chequebooks showing transactions worth crores belonging to the AAP leader were recovered during searches at the residences of a Delhi Dental Council official and a lawyer.

The documents were recovered from a bank locker by the CBI officials in connection with a probe into a case unrelated to Satyendra Jain.

However, in light of the recovery, the central probe agency is likely to question Jain in the days to come.

Jain is already facing corruption and money laundering charges in at least three cases.

Just ahead of the civic polls in Delhi, the CBI had registered a preliminary enquiry against Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain in connection with a money laundering case.

Jain was allegedly involved in money laundering to the tune of Rs 4.63 crore while serving as a public servant during 2015-16 through Prayas Info Solutions Private Limited, Akinchand Developers Private Limited and Managalyatan Projects Private Limited.

The allegations against Jain also include purported money laundering to the tune of Rs 11.78 crore during 2010-12 through these companies and Indometal Impex Pvt Limited.

The matter was referred to the CBI by the Income Tax Department under the new Benami Transactions Prohibitions Act.

The minister and his AAP had categorically dismissed the allegation, terming it as a political vendetta.

Delhi's sacked Water Minister Kapil Mishra had earlier claimed that he saw Satyendar Jain handing Rs 2 crore in cash to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.

The allegation triggered a political crisis for the Aam Aadmi Party, which swept to power in Delhi on an anti-corruption plank.

The BJP called for police action against Kejriwal and the Congress pressed for a CBI probe.

AAP later termed Mishra's allegations as "absurd".

Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said that Mishra offered no evidence to support his claims.

He was later removed from the Delhi Cabinet and the party.NEW DELHI: A 26-year-old man in Delhi has been apprehended for allegedly killing his wife and hiding her body in a bed box. The incident took place in the Capital's Tughlaqabad Extension.

The body was discovered on January 29, which is over two weeks after she was killed. According to the police, the woman, identified as 30-year-old Maria Masih alias Savitri Mehra, was murdered on January 11.

HUSBAND HAD KILLED MARIA:

26yr-old Physio Suresh arrested by PS Govindpuri #SouthEastDistrict for #murder of 30yr-old wife Maria on Jan11. Body found hidden in bedbox in #Tughlaqabad Ext home after 18 days. Had killed Maria to live with village wife Lata. @CPDelhi @DelhiPolice pic.twitter.com/268iWUUS62  DCP South East Delhi (@DCPSEastDelhi) February 3, 2018

The accused, Suresh Singh is a physiotherapist and hails from Uttarakhand. He married twice and killed Maria to stay with his first wife Lata Singh. Singh was reportedly married to both the women at the same time.

During interrogation, Singh revealed that he met Masih in 2012 through Facebook and a year later, they started living together in Dehradun.

In 2015, Singh got married to Lata and after about two weeks he tied the knot with Maria, who changed her name to Savitri. Media reports suggest that Singh relocated to Delhi in 2017 and decided to live with Lata, leaving Maria for good.

Coming under pressure from Maria to leave Lata, Singh planned to kill the former. On Thursday, Singh was nabbed from his village Bageshwar.NEW DELHI: Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday met the family of Delhi-based professional photographer Ankit Saxena who was stabbed to death allegedly by the family of his Muslim girlfriend. The CM said that the government will try to take strict action against the culprits.

"Spoke to Ankit's father. Whatever happened must be condemned. The Delhi government will ensure that the best lawyer is hired in the case so that Ankit gets justice and culprits are brought to book," he tweeted.

                                                         Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) February 4, 2018

Kejriwal's reaction comes a day after Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari questioned the "silence" of the Chief Minister over the death. "It is sad to see such incidents in the national capital. The silence of the chief minister and several NGOs in the matter indicates that these people speak on issues only when it suits their political interests," Tiwari had charged.

The Delhi BJP chief had met Saxena's family on Saturday and said that the party will be making arrangements for the treatment of Saxena's mother, who was injured in the attack on her son.

The Delhi unit of the BJP has also demanded a compensation from the Kejriwal government for Ankit's family.

23-year-old Ankit was stabbed to death allegedly by the family of his Muslim girlfriend on Friday. The police later arrested the woman's mother, father, brother and uncle in connection with the murder.

Ankit had been in a relationship with 20-year-old Shehzadi for the last three years. The two began dating while they were neighbours. The girl's family was however against the match.KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan President Ashraf Ghani on Friday accused neighboring Pakistan of failing to move against the Taliban and pledged a new security plan for Kabul after hundreds of people were killed and wounded in two deadly attacks on the capital last month.





Afghanistan has long accused Pakistan of aiding terrorists by giving shelter and aid to leaders of the Taliban insurgency, a charge denied by Pakistan, which points to the thousands of its own citizens killed by militant violence over the years.





We are waiting for Pakistan to act, Ghani said in a televised address after weekly prayers, in which he accused Pakistan of being the Taliban center.





Pakistans embassy in Kabul said on Thursday that officials in Islamabad were assessing the evidence presented during a visit by Afghan Interior Minister Wais Barmak and the head of the NDS intelligence service, Masoom Stanekzai. It said Pakistan had given no commitment to take any action.

-



The International Lake Ontario-St. Lawrence River Board, which is part of the International Joint Commission, announced last week that maximum outflows continue. But water levels for Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence remain high.

The board said that at the beginning of January, the lake's water level had dropped 3.7 feet below its 2017 high. That's a record for the largest drop from June through the end of December. But the lake level rose again due to warmer temperatures, more rain and snowmelt, according to the board.

As of Jan. 30, the lake level reached 245.77 feet. The lake is about a foot above its average for this time of year.

Without revealing specifics, Cuomo said he has directed the Basil Seggos, commissioner of the state Department of Environmental Conservation, and Roger Parrino, who heads the Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services, to "develop a series of aggressive strategies" that would help the International Joint Commission manage high water levels along the lake and river.

"We appreciate the willingness and ability the (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) demonstrated following Superstorm Sandy," Cuomo wrote. "I urge you and the new leadership at USACE show that same willingness to assist New Yorkers along the southern shores of Lake Ontario and Lake Erie."

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 1 Angry 2Guwahati: The first-ever global investors' summit in Assam has seen investment commitments to the tune of nearly Rs 70,000 crore in various sectors, including petroleum, telecom, health and tourism, Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said today.

"It is a very good beginning. The response of the investors are very exciting and encouraging. I believe the investment commitments will make Assam a better economy," Sonowal told PTI here.

Nearly 200 initial pacts worth nearly Rs 70,000 crore were signed at the Advantage Assam summit, he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the two-day event yesterday. Bhutanese PM Tshering Tobgay, several Union ministers, chief ministers of neighbouring Arunachal Pradesh and Manipur, ambassadors and high commissioners of 16 countries, RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani, Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekharan attended the meet.

The chief minister said oil major ONGC committed Rs 13,000 crore investment in the state, another oil PSU Oil India Ltd pledged an investment of Rs 10,000 crore. Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Numaligarh Refinery Ltd planning to invest Rs 3,432 crore and Rs 3,410 crore, respectively.

Among private players, RIL chairman and MD Mukesh Ambani has announced an investment of Rs 2,500 crore in Assam in various sectors, including retail, petroleum, telecom, tourism and sports, creating jobs for at least 80,000 people over the next three years.

The Tata Trusts will invest Rs 2,000 crore to implement a cancer care programme jointly with the Assam government in 17 centres across 15 districts of the state from next year, the project will see an investment of around Rs 2,000 crore.

Indo-UK Institute of Health will be investing Rs 2,700 crore, while Century Ply has shared plans of investing Rs 2,100 crore.

Spicejet chief Ajay Singh has announced the plans of Rs 1,250 crore investment in Assam through seaplanes to boost the tourism sector besides?connecting Lakhimpur and Jorhat under the recently launched central government scheme 'Udaan'.

Infinity Group will be investing Rs 1,000 crore in an IT park and real estate project in Guwahati, the Medanta Group proposed Rs 500 crore investment in the healthcare sector and Dalmia Bharat Cement announced an investment to the tune of Rs 1,100 crore.

Sonowal said the investments will provide ample employment opportunities to the youth of the state. "We hope that Assam will be the gateway for India to connect ASEAN countries," he said.

Media advisor to the chief minister, Hrishikesh Goswami, said tourism, which is one of the key focus areas of the government, saw an investment proposal to the tune of Rs 736 crore and infrastructure sector saw a total investment proposal worth Rs 2,347 crore.

Other major companies announcing investments in Assam are BPCL (Rs 350 crore), Essel Infraprojects (Rs 6,000 crore), Star Cement (Rs 2,100 crore), Infinity Infotech Parks (Rs 1,000 crore) and Mahindra Holidays and Resorts India (Rs 400 crore).

The Assam government has identified 12 focus sectors for the summit, including agriculture and food processing, handloom-textile-handicrafts, logistics, river transport-port township, IT-ITeS, pharmaceutical-medical equipment, plastics-petrochemicals and power.

Assam has hosted its first global investors' summit to showcase its manufacturing opportunities and geostrategic advantages to foreign and domestic investors. The summit aimed at highlighting Assam's geostrategic advantages and core competencies in different sectors along with the policy initiatives taken by the state government.New Delhi: Rechristening of the apex indirect tax policy-making body CBEC to Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) is likely to happen by April after the budgetary exercise gets Parliament nod.

With excise duty, service tax, alongside nearly a dozen other central and state levies being subsumed in the Goods and Services Tax (GST) rolled out from July 1, the ambit of the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) has widened.

In his budget speech for 2018-19, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said with the rollout of GST the name of CBEC would be changed to CBIC. "Through Finance Bill 2018, we are amending the Central Boards of Revenue (CBR) Act, 1963, as well as the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017, replacing CBEC with CBIC," a government official told PTI.

The official said since the CBR Act provides for constitution of separate boards of revenue for direct taxes and excise and customs, the name of CBEC has to be replaced with CBIC in the Act.

Also, the Central GST Act mention CBEC, but the Integrated GST (IGST) and the Union Territory GST (UTGST) talks of only 'Board' without elaborating. "Once the amendments are cleared by Parliament, the government will notify the changed name of CBIC," the official said.

The Finance Bill is likely to get Parliament approval in the second leg of Budget which is slated to begin on March 5 and end on April 6.

The official said that while the name of some departments within CBEC like NACIN, DGGSTI, is in line with the new work profile of the Board, the name change of CBEC was delayed as a couple of amendments had to be carried out through the Finance Bill.

The National Academy of Customs, Indirect Taxes & Narcotics (NACIN) is the premier training institute and is under the administrative control of CBEC. Besides, the Directorate General of Central Excise Intelligence (DGCEI) has already been renamed as the Directorate General of Goods and Services Tax Intelligence (DGGSTI).

Besides, the Directorate General of Analytics and Risk Management (DGARM) was set up last year to provide analysis of data relating to customs, excise and GST. The re-organisation of field formations of the CBEC for implementation of GST, and its renaming to CBIC was approved by Jaitley in March last year.

GST was introduced from July 1, 2017. With legislative approval not in place for change of name, CBEC has been notifying all rules and provisions of the new indirect tax regime.

As per the reorganisation plan, the proposed CBIC will supervise the work of all its field formations and directorates and assist the government in policymaking in relation to GST, while continuing central excise levy and Customs functions.

The CBIC will have 21 zones and GST Taxpayer Services Commissionerates.MUMBAI: Union Minister Giriraj Singh on Sunday expressed hope that the Sunnis too will now extend their support to the construction of a grand Ram Temple in Ayodhya, just as the Shiyas did.

The BJP leader from Bihar said that every Indian is a descendant of Ram and both the Hindus and the Muslims will build the temple in Ayodhya together.

The BJP leader was speaking at the inauguration of the 25th Rashtriya Kavi Sammelan in Thane.

"Shias gave their support for Ram Temple, Sunnis must lend their support too. Every Indian is descendant of Ram. Hindus & Muslims will come together to build the temple. If Ram Temple is not built in India where else will that be? Pakistan?" Singh said.

The Supreme Court began its final hearing in the centuries-old Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute on December 5, 2017. The case, which was back in the news recently after Art of Living founder Ravi Shankar's mediation, has the history that dates back to the 15th century.

In November, last year, the Uttar Pradesh Shia Central Waqf Board had submitted before the Supreme Court a proposal for settlement of the decades-old dispute over the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid site, saying a temple can be built in Ayodhya and the mosque could be raised in Lucknow.

The mosque originally dates back to 1528.

It was built in Ayodhya by Mir Baqi  a commander of Mughal emperor Babur  from where it gets the name Babri Masjid.

However, a report by the Archaeological Survey of India suggested the existence of a 10th-century temple at the site.

In his address at the meeting, the minister also pointed out that the rising population is the major hindrance to country's development.

"I've been posting on social media every day. Rise in population is the biggest hindrance to development. In China, 11 children are born every minute & in India, the number is 29. 18% of world's population is in India," he added.

Singh further said, "UN said if this isn't brought under check, in future, 1 out of 10 people won't have access to potable water. So it's dangerous both to social harmony & development. Social harmony gets fractured wherever Hindu population drops."

(With agency inputs)A quick glance at the top news of the day:

1. IND v SA, 2nd ODI: Yuzvendra Chahal maiden five-for stuns South Africa as India take 2-0 lead

Yuzvendra Chahal took his maiden five-for in ODIs as India thrashed South Africa by nine wickets in the second encounter of the six-match rubber at Centurion's SuperSport Park on Sunday. Read full report

2. In Bengaluru, PM Narendra Modi vows to make Karnataka 'Congress-free'

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday came down heavily on the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka over lack of development, political murders and appeasement politics. Read full report

3. Delhi photographer death: Will ensure maximum punishment for culprits, says Arvind Kejriwal

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday met the family of Delhi-based professional photographer Ankit Saxena who was stabbed to death allegedly by the family of his Muslim girlfriend. Read full report

4. Pakistan violates ceasefire in J&K's Poonch; 15-year-old girl, jawan injured in heavy shelling

The Pakistani troops on Sunday initiated "unprovoked and indiscriminate" firing across the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir's Poonch sector on Sunday, forcing the security forces to retaliate strongly. Read full report

5. Booking train ticket to be easier, Railways to set up more PRS counters across country

Booking a train ticket would soon be easier as the Indian Railways is preparing to set up Passenger Reservation System (PRS) counters at Post Offices across the country. Read full reportAgartala: India wanted peaceful relations with Pakistan, but its forces have been told that if one bullet comes from across the border, they should fire countless bullets to retaliate, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said here on Saturday night.

"I have given standing orders to our forces to shoot limitless bullets to retaliate a single fire on our territory by the Pakistani forces," he said at an election rally at Barjala on the state capital`s outskirts.

"As our neighbour, we do not want to attack Pakistan first. We want to live in peace and harmony with our all neighbours. But, most, unfortunately, Pakistan is trying to tear down Jammu and Kashmir and continue attacks on our forces and Indian territory," he added.

Hitting out at the Left Front government, Rajnath Singh said that during its 25-year uninterrupted rule, it did nothing for the development of Tripura, economic prosperity of the state and to remove huge poverty and unemployment.

"During CPI-M`s 35 years rule in West Bengal, they ruined that state, and if the Left parties after the February 18 assembly polls are allowed to rule Tripura further, they would destroy the future of the state and its people," he alleged.

He said that only his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) can develop the country and the northeastern states including Tripura.

"BJP and its allies are now ruling 19 states in India. Why are so many states under BJP and its allies` governance? Because people of these states trust BJP and people sincerely believe that only BJP can remove their pverty and provide jobs to the youth."

Rajnath Singh said that Tripura has huge natural resources and if BJP comes to power in the state, it would make this northeastern state a number one state in India.

"You have given scope to the Left parties in Tripura many times, give scope to BJP once this time to rule for genuine development of the state with all-round growth of all sections of people," he said.New Delhi: Booking a train ticket would soon be easier as the Indian Railways is preparing to set up Passenger Reservation System (PRS) counters at Post Offices across the country.

This was announced by Minister of State (MoS) for Railways Rajen Gohain in Rajya Sabha recently.

PRS counters at Post offices are being opened based on technical and commercial feasibility where there are no Railway Reservation Counters in nearby areas. the MoS Railways said in a written reply to a question related to the functioning of the IRCTC website on Friday.

For opening PRS counters, the Indian Railways has also signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Department of Posts, the minister said.

At present, PRS counters are available at nearly 280 post offices all over India.

Online booking of reserved tickets on the official website of Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation  www.irctc.co.in  has become very popular.

Reportedly, about 65 per cent of total reserved tickets are now booked online.

At present, the highest number of Passenger Reservation System counters at the post offices are available in Karnataka (44), followed by Maharashtra (36), Andhra Pradesh (24) and Uttar Pradesh (23). However, there are very few PRS counters in Sikkim (0), followed by Mizoram (1) and Meghalaya (2).

The announcement on setting up of more PRS counters came days after Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, in his Union Budget 2018 speech on Thursday, announced a capital expenditure of Rs 1.48 lakh crore for the expansion and modernisation of the Indian Railways.

'Strengthening the railway network and enhancing Indian Railways carrying capacity has been a major focus of the Government. Railways Capex for the year 2018-19 has been pegged at Rs 1,48,528 crore, '' the FM said.

Addressing the lawmakers, FM Jaitley said that ''most of this money will be spent on capacity expansion'' while also stating that this remains one of the most important priorities for Indian Railways right now.

The Finance Minister also set a target of doubling 18,000 km of lines and said that gauge conversion is currently underway to eliminate capacity constraints.

Outlining the other priorities of the Narendra Modi government for the improvement of Indian Railways, FM Jaitley highlighted that new world-class train sets are being manufactured, dedicated freight corridors are coming up and electrification is being taken up as a priority task.

Indian Railways is expected to explore other avenues to raise funding for its ambitious projects, such as conversion to broad gauge and signalling automation and electrification, FM Jaitely said as part of his Union Budget speech in Parliament.

While stating that the safety of passengers remains a top priority for the government, Arun Jaitley said that all railways stations and trains will have Wi-Fi and CCTVs progressively.

''Wi-fi and CCTVs will be progressively provided in all trains and there will be escalators at stations with 25,000- plus footfall,'' the FM said.

The minister also pointed out that 600 stations have been earmarked for modernisation by the railways.

The focus will also be on a suburban rail network in Mumbai and Bangalore, he added.

(With PTI inputs)New Delhi: Expressing concern over increasing number of child rapes in Delhi, Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) Chairperson Swati Maliwal wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday seeking death penalty for those who rape minors.

In her letter which comes after an eight-month-old girl was raped here last week, she demanded that "a system should be created" where those who rape a girl child should be given a death sentence.

"I want to divert your attention towards the incident where an eight-month-old girl was raped. This little girl is suffering and fighting for her life at AIIMS," she said.

The DCW chairperson said in the past two years, she has written numerous letters to Modi -- all of which have gone unanswered. "It is not only the rape of these children but it is my rape. I have written to you earlier many times but you choose not to reply. Sir, you are a ray of hope for all the girls including me. You have the responsibility for providing safety and security to these women and girls."

Maliwal recently announced a one-month Satyagraha to protest against the rape case and demanded implementation of strict laws to curb crime rate against women in Delhi. "I am on a 30-day Satyagrah since the last four days. I will not go to my home during these days but will work in office in the day time, and in the night I will go to different places for inspection and will do double work.

"I am doing this satyagrah to wake up this sleeping system. I expect some contribution from your side in this cause. I request you to meet the eight-month-old girl," she said.

Bengaluru: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday came down heavily on the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka over lack of development, political murders and appeasement politics.

The Prime Minister also appealed to the voters to vote for BJP under 'farmer's son' BS Yeddyurappa to usher the southern state into a new era of development.

PM Modi said this while addressing a mega rally at the Palace Grounds in Bengaluru, which was attended by over one lakh people.

Today's rally marked the end of BJP's 90-day old "Nava Karnataka Nirmana Parivartana Yatra", which aims at bringing the saffron party back in the southern state on the planks of development.

Named "Nava Karnataka Nirmana Parivartana Yatra" (journey to build a new Karnataka), the rally across 224 assembly constituencies of the state was flagged off on November 2 by BJP president Amit Shah.

Seeking the support of the dominant 'Kannadigas', the PM took a pledge to make Karnataka a Congress-free state.

''With your support, the Bharatiya Janata Party will make sure Karnataka is Congress-free after the upcoming elections, '' the PM said.

PM Modi began his speech by saying the "the countdown for the Congress to be dispelled from the state has begun.''

''We will make sure that Karnataka is Congress-free in the days to come," he said.

"The BJP will take Karnataka to new heights on the path of development," he added.

The PM attacked the Congress government here for poor development, political murders and its politics of appeasement.

During his speech, the PM said that while the world is talking about ''ease of doing business'', the state is gaining notoriety for ''ease of murdering'' rivals.

In an attempt to please the people at the rally, the Prime Minister delivered the first few lines of his address in Kannada.

Having landed at the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) Airport in the afternoon, the Prime Minister was flown to the venue in a chopper.

Thousands of youth and IT professionals from the city, along with several farmers and citizens from across the state, attended the event at the sprawling Palace Grounds.

Flagged off by BJP chief Amit Shah, the "Nava Karnataka Nirmana Parivartana Yatra" (journey to build a new Karnataka) was conducted across 224 assembly constituencies of the state.

The rally, to bring the BJP back to power in the southern state on the plank of transforming it through development, was led by its state unit president and former chief minister BS Yeddyurappa and the party's other state leaders.

Union Ministers Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal who are in-charge of the BJP poll campaign in Karnataka, Ananth Kumar, DV Sadananda Gowda and Ananthkumar Hegde who hail from the state, were also present at the event.

Elaborate security arrangements were also put in place by the state administration to prevent any untoward incident.

Legislative assembly elections in Karnataka are due in April-May.

The BJP came to power on its own for the first time in 2008 but lost to the Congress after five years in the May 2013 election.

(With Agency inputs)Jammu: Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday visited the Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir and interacted with soldiers guarding the border with China.

Sitharaman, who arrived at Thoise in Ladakh, "was briefed on the operational preparedness of the forward areas, following which she visited the highest post in Daulat Beg Oldie (DBO) sector and Chushul along the Indo-China border in Eastern Ladakh and interacted with the troops."

"This was the first ever visit of Raksha Mantri to DBO sector and to one of the highest posts in Eastern Ladakh. She was flown in an Army Aviation ALH helicopter," a statement from the Udhampur-based Northern Command of the Indian Army said.

Today visited some eastern Ladakh posts - DBO and Chushul sectors. pic.twitter.com/uz4YrHvEXM  Nirmala Sitharaman (@nsitharaman) February 3, 2018

Altitude, adverse weather conditions notwithstanding, our brave warriors keep their motivation high. @DefenceMinIndia @adgpi pic.twitter.com/Db1c0Ewb2w  Nirmala Sitharaman (@nsitharaman) February 3, 2018

Smt @nsitharaman visited the highest post in Dault Beg Oldie (DBO) sector & Chushul along the Indo-China border in Eastern Ladakh. She was briefed about the operational preparedness of the forward areas. 1/2 pic.twitter.com/VIh6r80QuM  Raksha Mantri (@DefenceMinIndia) February 3, 2018

Smt @nsitharaman also had an open interaction with soldiers & complimented them for their steadfastness & dedication despite the harsh climate & terrain. 2/2@NorthernComd_IA pic.twitter.com/8UbP4EfxMr  Raksha Mantri (@DefenceMinIndia) February 3, 2018

Daulat Beg Oldie is situated at a height of 16,700 feet in eastern Ladakh, where the temperature plummets as low as -55C in winters in the area.

In her interaction with the troops, the Minister "complimented them for their steadfastness and dedication despite the harsh climate and terrain", the statement added.

"Her visit has further boosted the morale of the troops deployed at these extremely difficult snow-covered locations in Ladakh," it further said.

(With IANS inputs)

New Delhi: Here's what's making headlines on Sunday:

Army told to shoot countless bullets to retaliate a single fire from Pakistani forces: Rajnath Singh

India wanted peaceful relations with Pakistan, but forces have been told that if one bullet comes from across the border, they should fire countless bullets to retaliate, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said on Saturday night. Read more.

UP Minister calls Kasganj violence a minor incident, says no need to pay heed

While the situation remains volatile in Kasganj in Uttar Pradesh in view of the communal clashes that took place, Uttar Pradesh minister Satyadev Pachauri has called the violence a "minor incident". Read more

Oil tanker with 22 Indians goes missing off West African coast

An oil tanker with 22 Indians onboard is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea. Read more.

PM Narendra Modi to address massive rally in Bengaluru on Sunday

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a massive BJP rally in Bengaluru on Sunday that marks the conclusion of the party's 90-day Nava Nirman Parivarthan yatra across poll-bound Karnataka. Read more.

Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman visits forward posts in Ladakh

Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday visited the Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir and interacted with soldiers guarding the border with China. Read more.

Donald Trump says Republican memo vindicates him in Russia probe

US President Donald Trump has said that a controversial memo attacking federal law enforcement written by congressional Republicans vindicates him in the investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 US presidential election. Read more.

Lakme Fashion Week: Sushmita Sen walks to the tunes of Umrao Jaan

Former beauty queen Sushmita Sen was a delight to watch when she regally floated down the ramp on 'Umrao Jaan' hit song 'In aankhon ki masti' wearing a lehenga, glittering choli and diaphanous dual dupattas by brand Kotwara by Meera and Muzaffar Ali at Lakme Fashion Week Summer/Resort 2018. Read more.

Dakar/Mumbai: A ship carrying 22 Indian crew and 13,500 tons of gasoline went missing in the piracy-plagued waters off the Benin coast in the Gulf of Guinea near West Africa, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said on Sunday.

The Marine Express tanker, managed by Hong Kong-based Anglo-Eastern, was last seen on Friday in Benin`s waters at 3:30 am GMT after which contact was lost, an Anglo Eastern spokesperson told news agency Reuters.

The cause of the loss of communication was unknown and a search was underway, conducted with help from Nigerian and Beninese authorities, Anglo-Eastern said.

"We regret that contact has been lost with the vessel, which was the Cotonou Anchorage in Benin, West Africa," the spokesperson said.

We regret that contact has been lost with the AE-managed MT Marine Express while at Cotonou, Benin. Last contact was at 03:30 UTC, Feb 1. Authorities have been alerted and are responding. Our top priority is the safety of the crew, whose families have been contacted. Updates TBA.  Anglo-Eastern (@angloeasterngrp) February 2, 2018

Earlier, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar had tweeted, A merchant vessel Marine Express [oil tanker], owned by the Mumbai-based Anglo-Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals on board, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.  Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) February 3, 2018

Minister of External Affairs Sushma Swaraj also said on Twitter that 22 Indian nationals were onboard. The minister further said that we are making "all-out efforts" in coordination with Nigerian and Benin naval authorities to trace the missing ship.

Merchant Ship Marine Express with 22 Indian nationals is missing off the Coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea. We are making all out efforts in coordination with Nigerian and Benin naval authorities to trace the missing ship. We have set up a Helpline no.(+234)9070343860.  Sushma Swaraj (@SushmaSwaraj) February 4, 2018

Piracy-related issues were a decade ago focused on the east African coast, particularly Somalia`s unpoliced waters. But the Gulf of Guinea threat has increased.

Ships in the area were the target of a series of piracy-related incidents last year, according to a January report by the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), which highlighted the waters off West Africa as an area of growing concern.

There were ten incidents of kidnapping involving 65 crew members in or around Nigerian waters, the IMB said. Globally 16 vessels reported being fired upon, seven of which were in the Gulf of Guinea.

According to the IMB, on January 10, a company lost communication with its tanker anchored in Cotonou. After a six-day search, the tanker and crew were found safely in Lagos after the tanker owner negotiated with the hijackers, IMB said.

(With agency inputs)New Delhi: An oil tanker with 22 Indians onboard is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea. Indian authorities based in Nigeria have sought the country's help in locating the missing oil tanker.

"A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo-Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea," Ministry of External Affairs tweeted.

"Our mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860," the MEA said another tweet.

A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.  Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) February 3, 2018

Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860  Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) February 3, 2018

The owners of the tanker, which was loaded with gas oil, have urged the Directorate General of Shipping in Mumbai to get in touch with their counterparts in Nigeria and Benin to carry out search operations for the merchant ship.

We regret that contact has been lost with the AE-managed MT Marine Express while at Cotonou, Benin. Last contact was at 03:30 UTC, Feb 1. Authorities have been alerted and are responding. Our top priority is the safety of the crew, whose families have been contacted. Updates TBA.  Anglo-Eastern (@angloeasterngrp) February 2, 2018

According to reports, MT Marine Express carrying 13,500 tonnes of gasoline vanished from West Africa and a possibility of hijack is high.

Meanwhile, Nigerian authorities have alerted all boats to look out for the missing tanker ship and if sighted to report to the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) Anti-Piracy Reporting Centre immediately in London.

(With ANI inputs)New Delhi: Ahead of the Assembly elections in Nagaland, Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Sunday took on Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the Naga peace accord.

"August 2015, Mr Modi claims to create history by signing the NAGA accord. February 2018, Naga accord is still nowhere to be found. Modi ji is the first ever Indian PM whose words don't mean anything," he tweeted.

August 2015, Mr Modi claims to create history by signing the NAGA accord. Feb 2018, Naga Accord is still nowhere to be found. Modi ji is the first ever Indian PM whose words don't mean anything. #CantFindTheAccord  Office of RG (@OfficeOfRG) February 4, 2018

The official Twitter handle of the Congress also tweeted:

In 2015, PM Modi took credit for the so called 'historic' Naga accord. We haven't heard anything of it 3 years on. Is there even an accord? The people of India have a right to know what has been agreed to. #CantFindTheAccord pic.twitter.com/C40hbAWoWL  Congress (@INCIndia) February 4, 2018

On August 4, 2015, the Centre had inked a historic peace accord with Naga militant group NSCN(IM) in a bid to end insurgency in the northeastern state. The landmark peace agreement was signed in the presence of PM Modi at his official residence, 7, Race Course Road.

Thuingaleng Muivah had signed the peace accord with the government on behalf of the Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isaac-Muivah).

The signing of the peace pact was the culmination of many rounds of negotiations that spanned 16 years with the first breakthrough in 1997 when the ceasefire agreement was sealed.

T Muivah, general secretary of the NSCN (IM), was one of the key leaders who had spearheaded the rebel movement in Nagaland.

Meanwhile, the BJP on Saturday forged an alliance with newly floated Nationalist Democratic People's Party (NDPP) led by former chief minister Neiphiu Rio for the February 27, 2018, Assembly poll in the state.

It dumped its 15-year-old alliance partner, the ruling Naga People's Front (NPF).

NDPP will contest 40 of the 60 seats in the state Assembly while the BJP would field candidates in the remaining 20 seats. BJP is the only party till date to announce that it will contest the election.

Eleven parties including the ruling Naga People's Front on January 29, 2018, had decided not to contest the polls, agreeing to the demand of tribal bodies and civil society groups to resolve the protracted Naga political problem first.

Later, the BJP announced it would contest the polls.

(With Agency inputs)AMARAVATI: A key decision on the ties between Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is likely to be taken in the meeting between Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu and TDP members that is currently underway in Amaravati

Naidu is upset with the allocation of funds for the state in the Union Budget 2018 despite its request for additional funds.

Ahead of the TDP Parliamentary Board meeting, party leader K Rammohan Rao said: "We are discussing the Budget. A political alliance is different and development of the state is different."

Another party MP P. Ravindra Babu confirmed that the CM is not happy with the funds allocated to the state. "Whatever the CM decides, we will stand by it. We are not happy with the BJP budget, not happy with the budget allotted to AP," the TDP MP said.

The TDP is BJP's biggest ally in the South. The two parties had fought the 2014 elections in alliance where the TDP had emerged as the second largest party in the NDA in terms of seats won.

After Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announced the Budget on February 1, several TDP leaders had suggested that the party should break away from the alliance.

Naidu had reportedly expressed "serious displeasure" over the budget and had said that the Centre ignored the state. "Bengaluru, Mumbai and Ahmedabad got a substantial allocation for various projects but none of our projects, including the Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam Metro rail, got anything," he was quoted to have said at the meeting.

"At the time of the state bifurcation, I was the only one who demanded equal treatment to both the states. Though gross injustice was done to Andhra on account of bifurcation, I aligned with the BJP only because having good relations with the Centre could undo the injustice," Naidu apparently told the TDP leaders.Bengaluru: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a massive BJP rally in Bengaluru on Sunday that marks the conclusion of the party's 90-day Nava Nirman Parivarthan yatra across poll-bound Karnataka.

PM @narendramodi ji will grace the #ParivartanaYatre rally on 4th of February, 2018 at Palace Ground, Bengaluru. Time: 2.00 PM. Please attend the rally in large numbers. #ModiInBengaluru pic.twitter.com/SwG2XCwoea  BJP Karnataka (@BJP4Karnataka) January 29, 2018

On behalf of the people of Karnataka, I take this opportunity to welcome Honb'le PM Shri @narendramodi ji to Bengaluru. Looking forward to it!#ModiInBengaluru #ParivartanaYatre pic.twitter.com/Eawf1Z8GJV  B.S. Yeddyurappa (@BSYBJP) February 4, 2018

Though PM Modi was scheduled to address the rally on January 28, 2018, on the conclusion of the three-month yatra that began in Bengaluru on November 1, 2017, it was put off to February 4, owing to his pre-occupation with other engagements.

"As the budget session of Parliament was beginning on January 29 and the Union Budget was to be presented on February 1, PM Modi could not attend the rally on last Sunday as he was busy then," a party official was quoted as saying by IANS.

Elaborate security arrangements have been made for the rally at the sprawling venue in the city centre where the party is expecting at least one lakh people to attend.

"We have invited thousands of youth, especially techies and executives of IT and biotech companies in the city to personally listen to PM Modi's speech though it will also be telecast live on news channels and available on YouTube," asserted the official.

The party's state unit has opened an online registration and is using the social media, including Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp to personally invite the youth, techies, educated class and prominent citizens to the venue, assuring them of seating arrangements.

"About 30,000 people from across the city have responded, expressing interest in attending the rally and listen to PM Modi's speech. We hope most of them will turn up as elaborate parking facility has been made for their vehicles at the venue," added the official.

In the run-up to the state election, due in late April and early May 2018, the BJP conducted the yatra, crisscrossing nearly all the 224 constituencies of the Assembly across the state after its national president Amit Shah flagged it off.

The yatra was led by its state unit president and former Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa and party's other state leaders.

Besides Shah, party's central ministers Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal who are in-charge of the BJP poll campaign in Karnataka, Ananth Kumar, DV Sadananda Gowda and Ananthkumar Hegde who hail from the state and the party's all-state leaders will participate in the rally and address the public.

(With IANS inputs)New Delhi: Delhi Metro services on the 8.7-km stretch between Yamuna Bank and Vaishali stations were affected this afternoon today due to track maintenance work on the Blue Line.

The planned exercise started at 12:30 pm and took nearly two hours for completion.

"Train services between Yamuna Bank and Vaishali Metro stations of Blue Line ran on the single line during the work, so the services were delayed today," a DMRC official said.

"As a result, train services were provided on up the line (from Vaishali towards Yamuna Bank) on this section at a frequency of around 15 minutes instead of 7 minutes as per the Sunday timetable, leading to stacking up of commuters on platforms," he said.

Many commuters complained of trains halting at a station for 20 minutes on the stretch. "It was quite chaotic at Vaishali Metro station and some fellow commuters were so exasperated they complained to the ground staff too," said an office-goer, who requested anonymity.

The DMRC said the maintenance work was carried out on the downline of this section (Yamuna Bank to Vaishali) during non-peak hours (from 12:30-02:30 pm) so as to minimise the effect.

The track work was undertaken during the daytime, and not in the night when the trains are kept off track for five to six hours, due to "ambient temperature constraints", the DMRC had said in an advisory issued on Friday.

"Additional Customer Facilitation Agents (CFAs) and security staff were deployed for crowd management and other necessary assistance to commuters at important stations of Yamuna Bank and Anand Vihar," the DMRC said.

Train services on the majority of the section of Blue Line i.e, from Dwarka Sec 21 to Noida City Centre ran as per the normal schedule.

(With PTI inputs)MUMBAI: In a relief for the non-veg loving students studying at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT-B), the institute has clarified that there is no food restriction that is being put in place in the campus.

"IIT Bombay clarifies that the Institute has not banned non-veg food in the campus, as reported by few publications. A letter was issued to the caterer of a cafeteria atop Civil Engineering Dept. for purely health and safety reasons as he was serving stale food," a statement by IIT PRO said.

As per a few reports, the institute had told students and mess authorities that non-veg had been strictly banned and would not even be served in the cafeteria.

The report had said that the decision was taken after students in the institute raised objections over "serving of non-veg food, including egg items."

Reports had quoted a circular which had said that "no lunch and dinner party orders allowed for other departments and such services and orders are banned. Lunch services are also not permitted. The cafeteria authorities should provide the list of vegetarian items to a committee for a review, and no cooking is allowed in the cafeteria."AGARTALA: BJP National General Secretary Ram Madhav on Sunday hit out at Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar saying that he runs a corrupt government and his job should be taken away.

"You have to get rid of poverty and unemployment. Only one man should stay unemployed - Manik Sarkar, take away his job. He runs a corrupt govt. He runs a violent govt," he said.

Addressing a gathering in Agartala, Madhav said that the state is tolerating the misrule of the Marxist party since the last 25 years.

"You are tolerating the misrule of this marxist party since 25 years, I salute you for your tolerance," he added.

Taking a dig at the ruling Marxist party in Tripura, the BJP leader said, "It is time to do away with the govt which left you poor, devoid of development, a govt which couldn't protect the women of its state."

The northeastern state of Tripura is going to polls on February 18 while the counting of votes will be done on March 3.

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI-M) has a strong foothold in Tripura and is in power for the past 25 years.

The incumbent Chief Minister Manik Sarkar is at the helm for the past 19 years. He held the term for the fourth time after the party swept away the 2013 assembly elections.

In the last polls in 2013, the CPI (M) managed to bag an overwhelming majority with 51 seats, while the rest was shared by the Trinamool Congress (TMC) and the Congress party.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which did not win even a single seat in the last polls, has been working hard to overthrow the CPI (M) rule this time. Six Congress MLAs, who first joined the Trinamool Congress (TMC), switched over to the BJP in August last year.

Apart from this, there are three major tribal parties in Tripura- the Indigenous People's Front of Tripura (IPFT), Indigenous Nationalist Party of Tripura (INPT) and National Conference of Tripura (NCT).New Delhi: While everyone is talking about Sanjay Leela Bhansali for giving the audience a larger than life cinematic experience with his latest flick 'Padmaavat', megastar Amitabh Bachchan got nostalgic about the filmmaker's 'Black' that was released on this day 13 years ago.

On the completion of 13 years of the film, Big B on Sunday took to Twitter to share a letter written by none other but his idol Dilip Kumar years ago. He also shared his experience of working with Bhansali and how it still haunts him.

"T 2604 - 13 Years of BLACK .. and the greatest compliment from my idol Dilip Saheb, Dilip Kumar - Yusuf Khan ! .. the history of the Indian Film Industry shall always be referred to as .. before Dilip Kumar; and after Dilip Kumar ..," Big B wrote.

T 2604 - 13 Years of BLACK .. and the greatest compliment from my idol Dilip Saheb, Dilip Kumar - Yusuf Khan ! .. the history of the Indian Film Industry shall always be referred to as '.. before Dilip Kumar; and after Dilip Kumar ..' pic.twitter.com/QEhnGiSpvh  Amitabh Bachchan (@SrBachchan) February 4, 2018

In the letter, Dilip wrote, "My Dear Amitabh: With tears of pride in her eyes Saira handed over the print out of your eloquent tribute to my work in your blog. I read it once, then again and again. As you yourself would be keenly aware, we actors are completely oblivious of ourselves and our surroundings while we perform and, even when we watch our work in the rushes shown to us, our senses and vision are trained to detect shortcomings more than accomplishments. That's the only way we may know to improve and render performances that come close to our satisfaction. And it is always the audience who have the absolute right to acclaim or reject our work, however hard we may have worked to achieve perfection and excellence.

I am certainly privileged to know from your affectionate compliments that someone as knowledgeable and competent as you have liked my work. Yes, now that you have reminded me, I can recall the scenes that brought us together before the cameras for Shakti. I should say the respect and admiration are mutual. Not just Shakti, your work in several films I have watched has been world class and inimitable.

In recent times, I can remember Black and, if I remember right, Saira and I were at a loss for words at the premiere night, after the curtain came down, to express our myriad feelings of admiration for your outstanding performance. It is a pity the film missed the Oscar nomination. If any Indian actor, in my personal opinion, deserves the worlds most coveted award, it is you. I have heard so much about Paa which we didn't catch up. You know how Saira is - she would never see me die in my films and she could not muster the courage to see your death scene in Paa.

Thank you, Amitabh, for your warm love and good wishes. May God keep you, Jaya and your family happy always."

Directed by Bhansali, 'Black' released on February 4, 2005 and revolved around a blind and deaf girl, who lives life to the fullest. The role was played by Rani Mukerji. Amitabh played an Alzheimer's patient in the film who was also the tutor to Rani's character.

The film was a commercial success and turned out to be the second highest-grossing Bollywood film worldwide in 2005.

He shared candid pictures from that year and tweeted, " And the accolades for the film Black and the recognition never ever fades...humbled honoured and blessed...national award and many others...'

T 2604 - 13 YEARS of my film 'BLACK' .. an incredible experience ! still haunts me in extraordinary memory and detail of working with the genius of SLB .. the Bhansali !!__ pic.twitter.com/7488TCqPhE  Amitabh Bachchan (@SrBachchan) February 4, 2018

T 2604 - .. and the accolades for the film BLACK and the recognition never ever fades .. humbled honoured and blessed .. national award and many others .. Salman and Hollywood actor, too .. and the family at the National Awards .. they the best pic.twitter.com/1WBjNbqTdc  Amitabh Bachchan (@SrBachchan) February 4, 2018

Amitabh swept several awards for his role in the movie, including a national award for Best Actor.Mumbai: Kriti Sanon is working with Diljit Dosanjh for the first time in 'Arjun Patiala', and the actor wonders how the 'Udta Punjab' star is able to transforms himself into a character that is completely contradicting to his real shy self.

"I have met him few times and we are yet to start shooting for the film. We had our workshop in January.

"He is quite shy as a person but the moment camera is on he transforms himself. I don't know how he does it. He is a very fantastic and talented actor," she told PTI.

The film will be directed by Dinesh Vijan and the story is about the characters of Kriti and Diljit falling in love with each other as they go through a number of hilarious situations that would crop up due to their height difference.

As the title 'Arjun Patiala' suggests, the film is set in Punjab and Kriti said, "It is more about Patiala peg, the largest peg, it is like larger than life. It is more to do with Patiala peg than the city."

The 'Dilwale' actor is playing a journalist, who is smart and outspoken, while Diljit is portraying the role of a small town guy in the film.

"She is a journalist more in a criminal zone... I am doing something for the first time. The dialogues are funny, different and spicy. The film is going to be in Hindi language but there will be a Punjabi dialect," she added.

Meanwhile, there have been reports about Kriti teaming up with director duo Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK for a thriller film 'Farzi' but the actor sought to put rumours to rest.

"There are stories that are half true or not true that kind of a thing, so I don't want to complicate it further. I have technically signed 'Arjun Patiala' and have said yes to one more film, which is not 'Farzi'," she clarified.

When prodded further, the 27-year-old actor says, "Every film has its own destiny and it will happen when it is to happen."New Delhi: Disha Patani is known to be right with her fashion choice and the actress has made sure to appear stunning in front of the camera. However, recently she lashed out at a television news channel for calling her ugly.

A news channel picked up an old school photo of the actor and criticised her look in the picture. The website tweeted two images of the actress, one being a recent picture and the other being the school days picture and made a comparison between the two.

"Can you believe how ugly Disha Patani looked once, see the contrast," it wrote, besides sharing a link to the article.

When Disha came across the tweet, she lashed out against the website for calling her 'ugly' and questioned if she should have been all decked up while heading to her school. "You are absolutely right @news24tvchannel ! shouldve worn a beautiful gown and done up my hair n make up nicely before heading to my 7th std class. #sorryforbeinganuglychild. P.s. you couldnt get a better breaking news than that?," she wrote.

Twitteratti too came in support of the actress and condemned the word 'ugly' used against her.

On the work front, Disha is all set to be seen in Baaghi 2 alongside Tiger Shroff.KANPUR: While the situation remains volatile in Kasganj in Uttar Pradesh in view of the communal clashes that took place last week, Uttar Pradesh minister Satyadev Pachauri has stoked a controversy by calling the violence a "minor incident".

"Such minor incidents happen often... everywhere. There is no need to pay much heed," he said.

Holding district authorities responsible for the incident, the minister said steps measures should have been taking in anticipation. "Officials should have taken strict steps to check lawbreakers before the situation took a turn for the worse," he added.

Earlier, UP Minister SP Shahi had said that undue importance was being given to the incident. "It is wrong to give undue importance to any issue. A small incident has happened. An unfortunate incident happened with two people. The government is serious about the matter, it is taking action. The atmosphere of the state should not be vitiated by comparing it to Kashmir," he had said.

However, Uttar Pradesh Governor Ram Naik had termed the clashes as a "blot" on the state. Describing the clashes as 'shameful', he said: "Whatever happened in Kasganj was not good. The incident there is a blot on UP. The government is probing the incident. It should initiate effective measures to ensure that such incidents are not repeated."

The Governor had asked the state authorities to initiate measures to ensure such incidents did not recur.Male: Maldivian Army have on Sunday been placed on high alert as President Abdulla Yameen refused to accept Supreme Court order to reinstate opposition leaders.

Maldives Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed rejected review petition filed on behalf of the government by Prosecutor General saying that the government should implement the order first before seeking review.

Meanwhile, CJ Saeed claimed that he has been getting anonymous threat calls. Armed forces and the police have barricaded the SC's premises in Male and there is a high probability of a showdown.

Earlier in the day, the beleaguered Maldives government ordered police and troops to reject any move by the Supreme Court to arrest or impeach President Abdulla Yameen over his refusal to release political prisoners.

On Saturday, agitators in the Maldivian capital had opened the gate of Maafushi Prison, where the 12 parliamentary members have been kept in detention, but did not enter inside.

The prison officers came in their riot gears and tried to control the agitators. Later, the National Defence Force also came in their riot gears.

Protests continued in the Maldivian capital as President Abdulla Yameen refused to follow the Maldivian Supreme Court's ruling to release key political prisoners and reinstate the 12 parliamentary members.

This decision has pushed the island nation into a crisis with the likelihood of emergency being declared, as Yameen has got the first session of parliament of 2018 (scheduled for February 5) cancelled, sensing that the opposition will be in majority because of the apex court order.

On Thursday, the Supreme Court had acquitted former Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed and former Maldivian Vice President Ahmed Adeeb along with 12 other parliamentary members.

The court had ordered the immediate release of high-profile prisoners and held that "the prisoners were free until fair trials could be conducted without undue influence".

(With agency inputs)The beleaguered Maldives government Sunday ordered police and troops to reject any move by the Supreme Court to arrest or impeach President Abdulla Yameen over his refusal to release political prisoners.

The tiny tourist archipelago has been plunged into a political crisis pitting the country`s top court against Yameen, whose crackdown on dissent has tarnished the nation`s image as an upmarket holiday paradise.

On Thursday -- in a move that surprised many -- judges ordered authorities to release nine political dissidents and restore the seats of 12 legislators who had been sacked for defecting from Yameen`s party, ruling the cases were politically motivated.

But the Yameen government has so far refused, shuttering parliament and resisting international calls to comply.

In a national television address on Sunday Attorney General Mohamed Anil said the government remained defiant.

"Any Supreme Court order to arrest the president would be unconstitutional and illegal. So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order," Anil said.

The reinstatement of the dozen legislators gave the opposition a majority in the 85-member assembly, and it can now potentially impeach Yameen.

However the authorities shut parliament indefinitely on Saturday to avert such a move. Yameen also sacked two police chiefs after the court`s decision.

The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party -- led by the country`s first democratically-elected president Mohamed Nasheed -- has urged the government to respect the top court`s decision, fearing any refusal might trigger unrest in the nation of 340,000 Sunni Muslims.

The Maldivian government said Friday it had concerns about releasing those convicted for "terrorism, corruption, embezzlement, and treason".

The United Nations, Australia, Britain, Canada, India and the United States welcomed the court`s decision as a move towards restoring democracy in the politically troubled Indian Ocean nation.

Nasheed was barred from contesting any election in the Maldives after a controversial 2015 terrorism conviction which was internationally criticised as politically motivated. He lives abroad after travelling out of the country in 2016 on prison leave for medical treatment.Ankara: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday sought to reassure France's Emmanuel Macron over the operation of the Turkish army inside Syria, telling the French leader it was aimed against "terror elements" and that Ankara had no eye on Syrian territory.

Turkey on January 20 launched the "Olive Branch" operation against Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia which Ankara sees as a terror group and a threat to Turkey.

Macron had incensed Turkish officials by saying in a newspaper interview last week that France would have a "real problem" with the campaign if it turned out to be an "invasion operation".

Turkey's Western allies do not classify the YPG as a terror group and have worked closely with its fighters in the battle against Islamic State (IS) jihadists.

But in telephone talks, Erdogan told Macron that Turkey had "no eye on the territory of another country", the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.

He added that the operation was "aimed at purging" the area of Afrin in northern Syria of "terror elements" such as the YPG.

Erdogan has sought to build a strong relationship with Macron despite rocky ties with the EU, visiting Paris in January for talks.

But after Macron's remarks last week, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu responded that France had no right "to give us lessons" on a cross-border offensive, pointing to France's own colonial history.Charleston, S.C: An Amtrak passenger train collided with a CSX Corp freight train near South Carolina`s state capital on Sunday, killing at least two people on board and injuring at least 70 in the railroad`s third fatal crash in as many months.

Amtrak Train 91 was carrying 139 passengers and eight crew members to Miami from New York when it hit the freight train at about 2:35 am local time (0735 GMT) and derailed, injuring at least half its passengers, the railroad said in a statement. "The lead engine was derailed, as well as some passenger cars," the statement said.

The passenger train`s locomotive was lying on its side, and the first car was bent and also derailed, although it remained upright, according to images from the scene in the small city of Cayce, South Carolina. At least four cars of the freight train were crumpled, looking like crushed tin foil, but remained on the tracks.

The passenger train was part of Amtrak` Silver Star Service, and the wreck occurred about 5 miles (8 km) southwest of the state`s capital, Columbia. Local media said some 5,000 gallons fuel leaked as a result of the collision.

"The injuries range from cuts and bruises to severely broken bones," said Derrec Becker, public information officer for South Carolina Emergency Management Division. "All the injured have been transported to local hospitals."

The Lexington County Sheriff`s Department said a shelter for passengers was set up at a nearby middle school. Everyone was off the train, and the Red Cross was assisting them, the department said on its website.

Amtrak and sheriff`s department officials were not immediately available for comment. Representatives from the National Transportation Safety Board were headed to the scene, officials said.

In December, three people were killed when an Amtrak passenger train derailed in Washington state. In late January, an Amtrak train carrying Republican members of the US Congress killed one person in a garbage truck with which it collided in Virginia.Open source

The militants fired the positions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the area of Donbas conflicy three times today. As a result of these actions, one serviceman was wounded by the enemy and another one was injured. This is reported by the press center of the Donbas conflict headquarters in Facebook.



"Russian-occupation groups continue to carry out fire provocations against Ukrainian defenders, using weapons that should have been withdrawn from the line of contact for a long time ... In general, since the beginning of the day, 3 shellings of our positions by illegal armed groups have been recorded. As a consequence of these criminal actions one soldier of Ukrainian forces was wounded, another one - was injured, "the report said.



At the same time it is specified that in the Donetsk direction militants violated the Minsk agreements near Kamyanka, firing at the positions of the Armed Forces from 120-mm mortars. In the Azov region militants used rocket-propelled grenade launchers to attack our strong points near Vodyane, and in the Luhansk direction they fired from small arms near Zaitseve settlement.



Related: No violations during mass actions in Kyiv today, - capital's police



Related: Russia asks Ukraine to open four polling stations for its presidential electionsThe Federal Minister for Foreign Affairs said that there was no doubt that first of all the Germans are responsible for concentration camps and the individual collaborationists dont change anything

Open source

Germany isnt trying to shift even a part of blame for mass murders of Jews onto Poland, but the only way to reconciliation is through reviewing ones own history, as German Minister for Foreign Affairs Sigmar Gabriel said in a statement, commenting on the amendments that the Polish Parliament made in the law on the Institute of National Remembrance.

We are convinced that only a thorough review of ones own history can bring to a reconciliation. This means that the people who had to go through the unbearable suffering of Holocaust can speak about these sufferings openly and without restrictions, the German minister said.

He assured Poland that any falsification of history and the term Polish concentration camps meet the decisive condemnation in German society.

Gabriel also noted that a comprehensive analysis of the German history and its responsibility is an eternal moral duty for the Germans, taking into account the crimes committed by Germans and Germany, including in Poland.

He said there was no doubt who is responsible for death camps and who exploited and killed millions of Jews there - these were Germans. This organized mass murder was started by our country and no one else, and the individual collaborationists dont change anything.

He also said that for 15 years he was organizing trips to the memorials in former concentration camps in Auschwitz and Majdanek and it was clear that these were German concentration camps, which were there not by an accident.



As we reported earlier, On Friday, Jan. 26, the Sejm of Poland has adopted the amendment to the law on the Institute of National Memory, which bans the so-called Bandera ideology. The bill envisages criminal penalty for publicly accusing Poland of crimes committed during Holocaust, of helping Nazi Germany, of military crimes or crimes against humanity. The bill forbids to use the phrase Polish death camp when describing concentration camps that were on the territory of Poland. Any citizen of the country, including foreigners that breached the law will have to pay a fine or imprisoned for up to three years.

Amendments to the bill also provide for criminal liability for the denial of the Volyn tragedy and propaganda of "Bandera ideology". The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry expressed concern over the adoption of this document. The international community criticized it as "denying the Holocaust and depicting Ukrainians in an unattractive light." Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that he was categorically against the adoption of this law.112 Agency

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine received a request from the Russian Federation to open four polling stations on the territory of Ukraine for the presidential elections in Russia in March this year, Interfax-Ukraine reports with reference to the response of the diplomatic department to the request.



"The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine received an appeal from the Russian embassy in Ukraine regarding the holding of the election of Russian president on March 18, 2018 and organization of the polling stations for the citizens of Russian Federation who live in Ukraine, ... The appeal is now being considered by the agencies involved," the Foreign Ministry reported.



It is clarified that the request concerns the opening of polling stations in the premises of the Russian Embassy in Ukraine (Kyiv) and the general consulates of the Russian Federation in Lviv, Odesa, Kharkiv.



We recall, presidential elections in Russia are scheduled for March 18, 2018. The current Russian President Vladimir Putin also intends to participate in them.

Related: Defense Ministry of Russia reports retaliatory strike after crash of Su-25 in Syria

Related: German right-populist deputies arrived in occupied CrimeaAt the meeting of the Intergovernmental Negotiations on Security Council Reform, Ukraine said the procedure of veto has to be reformed

Open source

Reforming the UN Security Council is vital and requires, first of all, the change of the veto procedure, as Ukrainian delegation said at the informal meeting of the Intergovernmental Negotiations on Security Council Reform, according to the missions statement.

In the process of negotiations special emphasis should be paid to such issues as the veto right and working methods of the Council, the mission noted.

Apart from that, in the past two years of Ukraines participation in the UNSC, it noted a few institutional shortcomings of the Council.Moreover, as a country under attack from its neighbour we also feel first-hand consequences of the Councils embedded flaws, Ukrainian mission says.

Consequently, the veto right means that just one delegation can render the Council completely paralyzed in situations when the Councils action is badly needed. There have been way too many instances of such abuses of the veto right in recent years.

Ukraines mission also drew attention to other challenges of reforming the Council. One of them is the requirement to have a consensual document before the negotiations actually started. Consensus is something that you reach in the end of the negotiations, not something that is there before the negotiations. Lets start negotiating and work on reaching consensus on the substance.

In conclusion, I hope that this year we will finally start negotiating a text leading us all towards a common goal of having a reformed Security Council, the mission concluded.According to radio intercepts, as a result of the attack, more than 30 militants of "Jabhat-al-Nusra" were killed

Open source

The Russian military struck with a high-precision weapon on militants, who shot down a Russian Su-25 plane in Syria. This was reported in the Ministry of Defense of Russia, informs Interfax.



It is noted that, according to radio intercepts, more than 30 "Jabhat-al-Nusra" militants were killed as a result of the attack.



"In the area controlled by the terrorist group" Jabhat-al-Nusra "in the province of Idlib, from where the missile of a portable anti-aircraft missile system was launched on a Russian Su-25, a group strike with precision weapons was inflicted," the Russian Defense Ministry said.



It was reported that a Russian Su-25 was shot down in Syria. The pilot of the plane catapulted, but later in the Ministry of Defense reported his death.

Also earlier we informed that pilot of the Russian Su-25 who died after his aircraft was downed in Syria turned out to be a former Ukrainian pilot from occupied Simferopol (Crimea), major Roman Filipov, as Novaya gazeta informs sourcing Russian Defence Ministry.

The media says that Nabludatel published a letter that was allegedly found on the body of the pilot. His name was mentioned there.

At the same time, a group of independent investigators Conflict Intelligence Team found photos of the documents and personal weapons that were found on his body. They said that based on the used clips of the weapons, the pilot shot back at someone and was killed on land.ISIS Reuters

The terrorist group "Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham" claimed responsibility for the Russian Su-25 plane shot down in Syria. This is reported on its website by the SITE group, which monitors the information activity of extremists.



Note that the plane crashed over one of the so-called "de-escalation zones" in Idlib province near the city of Sarakib.



Earlier it was reported that the region where the plane crashed is controlled by fighters of the former Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda. This group was known as "Jabhat al Nusra," but is now known as "Hayat Tahrir al-Sham."



The pilot of the plane managed to catapult, but was killed in a shootout with local militants.



Russian media referring to sources in the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation report that the deceased Su-25 pilot was the former Ukrainian pilot from the occupied Simferopol (Crimea), Major Roman Filippov, but later it became known that before the annexation of Crimea, Filippov served in Russia, and was not a former Ukrainian pilot.

Related: Prosecutor's Office of Crimea checks Ukrainian ex-official's involvement in annexation of peninsula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!)We've detected that JavaScript is not enabled in your browser.

You must enable JavaScript to use craigslist.Now that it is fully apparent, to all who have the ability to pay some modicum of attention, that Imposter President Biden has extreme cognitive issues, in addition to being an inveterate liar: Can OUR Republic continue with this Executive Office that has completely failed, so many times, on far too many issues here at this early date in this abysmal presidency?

No, Joseph R. Biden is completely unqualified, morally and cognitively, to represent real Americans, and lead this Republic of disparate peoples.

Yes, Joseph R. Biden has started whispering again, even softer now than before; so, I know he still cares, plus, OUR media will soon stop reporting on Afghanistan in favor of OUR Socialist issues.This bill will ensure that only convicted criminals-and not innocent Alabamians-lose their property to forfeiture. No one acquitted in criminal court should lose his or her cash, car, or home in civil court.

A law enforcement agency shall not refer, transfer, or otherwise relinquish possession of property seized under state law to a federal agency by way of adoption of the seized property or other means by the federal agency for the purpose of the property's forfeiture under the federal Controlled Substances Act.

A law enforcement agency or participant in a task force with the federal government or other multijurisdictional collaboration with the federal government shall not accept payment of any kind or distribution of forfeiture proceeds or property resulting from a joint task force with the federal government or other multijurisdictional collaboration with the federal government unless the aggregate net equity value of the property or currency forfeited in a case exceeds one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000), excluding the value of contraband.

Civil asset forfeiture is inherently unjust, as I've explained many times in the past ( here here , and here ). Why? Because it empowers law enforcement agencies to confiscate property from people who have never been charged with, let alone convicted of, a crime. It also violates due process and property rights and perverts the proper relationship between the police and the public by turning the former into predators and the latter into their prey.As I've also noted many times, when it comes to protecting its citizens from this kind of abuse, North Carolina has always been a leader. That's because under our state laws a criminal conviction is almost always required before property can be forfeited. It's also because under our state constitution forfeiture proceeds may not be retained by the agency that makes the seizure but must, instead, be used forLast week, Alabama State Senator Arthur Orr, a Republican, introduced SB 213 , "The Alabama Forfeiture Accountability and Integrity Reform (FAIR) Act." If enacted, the bill will propel Alabama past North Carolina and establish it as the clear leader when it comes to asset forfeiture law. Alabama's existing asset forfeiture regime, which makes extensive use of civil forfeiture, is one of the worst in the country. SB 213 would repeal that forfeiture regime in its entirety and replace it with a new regime that eschews civil asset forfeiture altogether.As it has with other bills in other states, the Institute for Justice helped draft the Alabama bill. In a press release following the bill's introduction, Senior Legislative Counsel Lee McGrath said:While North Carolina's asset forfeiture regime is very good, if SB 213 passes Alabama's asset forfeiture regime will be even better, which is something we in North Carolina should probably take note of. However, from our point of view, the most noteworthy thing about SB 213 isn't what it does to protect Alabama's citizens from asset forfeiture abuse under state law; it's what it does to ensure that state and local law enforcement agencies can't use federal law to circumvent that protection. As I explained in a recent Spotlight, North Carolina's existing laws do nothing to curtail circumvention, and, we a result, we rank among the worst states in the country in that regard. It therefore behooves all of us, but especially the members of our legislature, to take a good look at the measures that are under consideration in Alabama.State and local law enforcement agencies use two kinds of federal asset sharing programs to circumvent state forfeiture laws. The most commonly used is the so-called "adoption" program, under which state and local law enforcement agencies are permitted to process seized assets in federal courts under federal law and then have the bulk of the proceeds (typically 80 percent) returned to them for their own use. Virtually all adoptions are processed under federal drug law, and SB 213 simply bans such adoptions outright:Circumvention of state asset forfeiture laws also occurs when state and local law enforcement agencies work with federal law enforcement agencies in joint task forces. When a joint task force seizes property and processes it under federal law, some of the proceeds are typically returned to the participating state and local agencies to reward them for their part in the operation.Because joint task forces play a potentially valuable role in law enforcement, reformers have been reluctant to ban them outright. Instead, the usual approach is to reduce the risk of abuse by making abuse unprofitable. Here's how SB 213 accomplishes that goal:According to the Institute for Justice, only about 5 percent of joint task force operations involve seizures that exceed the $100,000 threshold, and abuse is relatively unlikely in such large, multi-agency operations. By removing the incentive for abuse in the other 95 percent of cases, this provision ensures that state and local law enforcement agencies will only participate in joint task force operations that are justified by public safety considerations alone.It remains to be seen whether the Alabama legislature will approve SB 213. It's worth noting, however, that 24 states and the District of Columbia have enacted asset forfeiture reforms in recent years, and, in eight of those jurisdictions, the reform measures have included anti-circumvention provisions. To repeat what I said in a previous Legal Update We should study what these other states have done and incorporate the best features into an anti-circumvention law of our own.Do Charlotte's Charter Schools Segregate?

Jenn Ayscue of The Civil Rights Project at UCLA and UNC Charlotte researchers Amy Hawn Nelson, Roslyn Arlin Mickelson, Jason Giersch, and Martha Cecilia Bottia published a report this week titled " Charters as a Driver of Resegregation ." After reading the report, I'm not convinced.The authors bill the report as an exploration of the direct and indirect causes of resegregation using the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools (CMS) as a case study. They argue that the direct cause of resegregation is theThe indirect cause is the "political activism of suburban parents who threatened a middle-class exodus from CMS to the charter sector if new assignment boundaries did not honor their current neighborhood school assignments." According to the report, both factors inhibit the ability of the school board and central office staff to create school assignments that are sensitive to racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic demographics of students. In other words, the issue is exit and voice.The terms "exit" and "voice" are a reference to Albert Hirschman's 1970 book, Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States . Hirschman argued that exit and voice were rational responses to a decline in quality or dissatisfaction with a product or service. In the case of CMS, parents who are concerned about the academic quality of their school or object to aspects of the curriculum have a choice to leave the district to enroll in a private, home, or charter school or voice their concerns with school leaders in the hope that it will persuade them to change. Those who are loyal to the district consider neither (at least publicly).As the title of the study implies, the authors examine only one type of exit, the move to charter schools. It is an unusual decision of their part, considering that the number of home and private school students in Mecklenburg County is more than double the number of charter students. According to the logic of their argument, the departure of middle-class and academically proficient white and Asian students for home and private schools would be just as responsible, if not more so, for resegregation than charter schools.But the argument holds less weight when you examine charter enrollment trends. In 2016, Mecklenburg charter schools became majority minority, that is, nonwhite students outnumber white students. Last year, 54 percent of charter students in the county were nonwhite, compared to 46 percent white. This is a stark contrast to 2013 when the percentage of white students reached 56 percent. As new charter schools opened, nonwhite students began flocking to the schools. Between 2013 and 2017, the percentage of nonwhite students in charters increased by 127 percent, while the increase in white enrollment was only 54 percent. (See Notes 1 and 2.)While some of these charter schools are "racially imbalanced," it is partly due to the opening of new charters that serve disadvantaged students, which unfortunately come largely from nonwhite populations. The decision of nonwhite parents to choose a racially or ethnically homogenous charter school is a rational decision because they perceive that the charter has advantages that the district schools do not, such as safety, stability, proximity, and academic rigor. A school with a lack of racial, ethnic, or socioeconomic diversity may be an acceptable trade-off for nonwhite parents who prioritize other factors. Yet, for the researchers, the exit of nonwhite students appears to be less problematic than the exit of white students to charter schools.Moving on to the issue of indirect influence or voice, the researchers fail to describe the attitudes, motivations, and political activism of the white suburban parents who object to changes to CMS's attendance zones. They write about two voices - the mayor of Matthews and CMS school board member Rhonda Lennon - but it is not clear how representative they are of white suburban parents. It is a mistake to generalize, without survey results or some other type of data, that the mayor and school board member are in lock-step with their constituents on the issue.And even if those in the white suburbs spoke in a unified voice, it is not clear from the report that school leaders made only modest changes to the assignment plan due to their advocacy. In other words, how do we know if there is a causal relationship here? The researchers assume that school leaders settled on a less aggressive assignment plan due to white suburban parents' political activism (and the threat of exit). A more likely explanation is that the final assignment plan was based on multiple considerations after listening to multiple constituencies.Most importantly, school leaders must have known that white suburban parents in Mecklenburg County can't actually follow through on their threat to exit for charter schools en masse. That is because charter schools in the area have unforgiving wait lists with thousands of parents vying for handfuls of seats. Families in the suburbs are stuck unless they opt for home or private education, which are sectors excluded from this report.If school assignment is based on the address of the student, some degree of racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic segregation will occur. If the researchers want CMS to create a system of diverse schools, they should start by allowing district students to select their schools, rather than hope that school leaders will gerrymander attendance zones. And if school leaders want white suburban parents to remain in CMS schools, they will address their concerns and cultivate trust and loyalty among the group threatening to exit the system. Studies that blame them for the resegregating the district's schools is probably not the best way to do this.My focus on race and ethnicity, rather than socioeconomic status, is intentional. Researchers often use the percentage of students participating in the National Free and Reduced Lunch (FRL) program as a proxy for the share of disadvantaged students. But it is an inaccurate measure. Some charter schools do not participate in the program, so the percentage of disadvantaged students may be underestimated for charters. Charter schools aside, researchers acknowledge that FRL percentages do not accurately capture the socioeconomic status of students in school districts. As Michael Harwell of the University of Minnesota notes in a new report, "researchers generally agree that FRL is a poor SES [socioeconomic status] measure, since it fails to validly reflect access to financial resources, shows reduced levels of participation as students age, and misclassifies, on average, approximately 20% of students."These figures do not include enrollment in the state's two virtual charter schools. They also do not account for students who cross county lines to attend charter schools. Finally, Asian students are included in the "nonwhite" category.Hometown Strong will work with local leaders to stimulate economies and help businesses thrive in North Carolina's rural communities by focusing on projects such as infrastructure improvements, broadband access and workforce training.

Through existing new partnerships with local leaders from government, business, non-profit organizations, the philanthropic community and others. Hometown Strong will seek to leverage state and local resources to help complete local development projects, convene conversations between state and local agencies and identify long-term projects that can encourage prosperity in local communities.

Amid little fanfare, yesterday Governor Cooper's announced his new Hometown Strong initiative to help rural North Carolina communities.According to a news release from the Governor's office:And just how will this effort work?Translation: Hometown Strong will work to ensure local communities are harnessing all the federal, state and private resources they can to plan and develop projects.Cooper says Hometown Strong is anti-bureaucracy. How is that the case when it the major goal of the program is to ensure communities are accessing all the available government and private programs.A News and Observer article on the subject noted Hometown Strong has a staff of "just two so far" implying the staff will likely grow. Cooper named Prior Gibson and Mary Penney Kelley to lead the program and will pay them $148,000 and $18,000 respectively.You have to wonder how such an initiative will really help rural communities - especially when there are already many government and private programs focused on same problems. A quick google search of rural North Carolina programs pulls up a treasure trove of efforts: The NC Rural Center, The Rural Economic Development Division of the Department of Commerce, Golden Leaf Foundation, The Rural Infrastructure Authority, Office of Rural Health, The NC Main Street and Rural Planning Center. Rural Economic Development and Workforce Solutions in the Department of Commerce. Rural Life Center and Rural Health Information Technology. There's more but I trust you get the point.Suffice it to say concern over rural communities and economic development is not a new concern. However, building another bureaucracy to help rural areas access more government programs, is.We all share a commitment to a North Carolina where rural areas are healthy and thriving economically. Making another bureaucracy won't make that a reality.The good news is that we already know proven ways to help rural communities. Ending state incentive programs to attract corporations, reducing taxes and regulation will do much to help Main Street. Moreover, policies that strengthen the family like school choice can give children access to better educational opportunities while also nurturing economic growth (see here and here ).And we don't need to create another bureaucracy.Excerpted from Lawrence "Mike" Scrugg's book, The Un-Civil War: Shattering the Historical Myths (Chapter 7: "The First Thirteenth Amendment"). 2011, Universal Media (Charlotte, NC) - with some additions and commentary by Diane RufinoMike Scrugg's book, THE UN-CIVIL WAR, is an excellent book - an excellent reflection on the causes, treatment, and aftermath of the Civil War. I am posting this excerpt, which is the entire seventh chapter of the book ("The First Thirteenth Amendment') for the primary purpose of introducing you to this book and encouraging you to purchase it and read it.Ludwell H. Johnson used the words The American Illiad in the subtitle for his comprehensive book on the American "civil war," entitled NORTH AGAINST SOUTH. The Iliad analogy is very appropriate for two reasons. First, the war was a traumatic, bloody, and nation-changing event. The enormous casualties and destruction alone would sear its battles, personalities, and tales of heroism into America's memory. Second, what most Americans know about the causes of the war is pious myth.Most Americans are at least vaguely aware that the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution passed by Congress and approved by the States in December 1865 following the "civil war" abolished slavery. But this was actually the second 13th Amendment. The US House of Representatives had passed, with the required 2/3 majority, a 13th amendment on February 28, 1861. This same amendment was passed by the US Senate on March 2, 1861. It was then send to the States for final approval. As per Article V of the Constitution. 3/4 of the States must approve the amendment before it can officially become part of, and hence "amend," the Constitution. Two days after the Senate's approval of the amendment, the newly-elected president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, promised to support it in his inaugural speech.But what was this first 13th Amendment and what became of it? Here is the wording:."The first 13th Amendment would have forever prohibited any Constitutional change that interfered with slavery in any state!Lincoln endorsed this amendment, which would have permanently engraved slavery into the Constitution by two statements in his inaugural address: First, self-quoting what he had written earlier to New York Tribune editor, Horace Greeley: "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."Later in the speech, he specifically promised to support this first 13th Amendment with these words: "."In other words, Lincoln had no problem with an amendment which would have prohibited the federal government from interfering with slavery in the States! In addition, he felt the Constitution already prohibited the federal government from interfering with slavery in the States !!!The reason for this first 13th Amendment was, of course, to reassure the Southern States that were threatening to leave the Union that there was not and never would be any danger of Congressional or federal interference with slavery in the States. [Remember that by the time the Senate approved the amendment, seven Southern States had already seceded from the Union - South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Texas]. The slavery question was a concern to the Southern States, of course. The South had an agrarian society and its economy was supported by the exporting of its crops. The Northern States had gradually phased out slavery, but then again, there had been but a few slaves in the North. Phasing out slavery in the North was a much less daunting social and economic endeavor. It would be an enormous undertaking in the South. The calls of radical abolitionists in the North for immediate abolition of slavery regardless of the economic cost to the South and heedless of the hardship it would suddenly inflict on the slaves themselves, though not really a prevalent Northern sentiment, was a worry to the South. Slavery was by no means universally popular in the South, and many Southern States and individual Southerners were already struggling with how they might phase out the institution of slavery without devastating the Southern economy. But Southern States preferred to handle the slavery question when, if, and however they saw fit. Like Lincoln and many other political leaders in the North, the South considered how to handle the slavery question to be the Constitutional right of each State respectively.Slavery was an issue that caused tensions between North and South, but it was by no means the only issue. If slavery was the only crucial issue, the South had no reason to secede. The first 13th Amendment would have guaranteed the question in their favor.But there were other important issues to the South... more important ones. One enormous issue was the question of the protective tariffs and in particular, the Morrill Tariff that had been passed by the predominantly Northern Congress with the support of only one Southern congressman. It was passed by the Senate and signed by President Buchanan only two days before Lincoln took office, and Lincoln pledged to support it. The Morrill Tariff, like others in the past, was a severe economic hardship to the agricultural South (in particular to South Carolina and the Gulf States), but a protective benefit for the industrial North - for its manufacturers. To make matters worse, most of the revenue was collected at Southern ports but subsequently used to the benefit of Northern States. In other words, the South was being plundered for the benefit of the South. To look at it a different way, the federal government, which was supposed to be a common government for ALL the States, to serve their interests equally, was effecting policy to benefit only one section of the country, while knowingly and intentionally harming another. Southern States were furious over this tariff, which had just been raised from an average under 20% to an average which would reach 47% (and would affect more items). The Morrill Tariff was part of Lincoln's and the Republican Party's campaign platform. In fact, Lincoln further endorsed the Tariff in his inaugural speech and strongly implied that even if the South seceded, the tax would be collected by the Union Navy at Southern ports.There were other issues as well. North and South had developed different views of government. The South favored the limited and decentralized federal government of the Constitution, but the North was strongly tending towards a powerful centralized government. Early in the years of the American republic, the South and especially Virginia had dominated national politics. But massive waves of immigration to Northern manufacturing States now made them much more populous and politically dominant. Between 1845 and 1855 more than 1.5 million Irish adults and children alone emigrated to America (because of the great potato famine). And then there was the outright hostility and even violence towards the South. John Brown and his sons butchered 5 pro-slavery settlers in Kansas and then led a raid on Harpers Ferry. The radical abolitionists exhibited unmitigated hatred of all things southern and continued to aggravate tensions.The first 13th Amendment became a moot issue, though, after the firing on Fort Sumter and then Lincoln's call for 75,000 troops to invade the South. The outbreak of the "civil war" that would claim the lives of over 620,000 Union and Confederate soldiers and as many as 50,000 Southern civilians effectively cancelled the first 13th Amendment.On March 2, 1861, the same day the first 13th Amendment was passed by the Senate, another Amendment to the Constitution was also proposed. This amendment would have outlawed secession. This is a good indication that most of Congress indeed realized that the right of secession was implied when the Constitution was originally ratified by the States and effectively reinforced by the 10th Amendment. If that wasn't so, why would they attempt to outlaw it? something that In fact, textbooks used at West Point for years before the war had explained the validity of the right of secession.Indeed. most members of Congress understood each State had a fundamental right to secede (as the colonies did from Great Britain in declaring their independence). Lincoln himself, at one time, believed the same. As a junior representative from Illinois, Lincoln addressed Congress on the Mexican-American War, asserting that the US should take only that portion of the Texas territory that represents the desire of the people to secede from Mexico (and not the additional 500,000 square miles of land from Mexico it was seeking - territory comprising Arizona, New Mexico, and California; otherwise, the US would be imperialistic). On January 1848, he spoke these words: "Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable - a most sacred right - a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world." [http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/the-war-with-mexico-speech-in-the-united-states-house-of-representatives/ ]Yet, when the Southern States actually exercised this fundamental of sovereign states' rights and left the Union, Lincoln had a change of heart. All of a sudden, he no longer recognized secession as an "inherent" or "natural" sovereign right. And this was a problem, because he was the president and as it always seems to be, the views of the president become the views of the government. In his first Inaugural Address, he articulated his "new understanding" of the right of secession:"I hold that in contemplation of universal law and of the Constitution the Union of these States is perpetual. Perpetuity is implied, if not expressed, in the fundamental law of all national governments. It is safe to assert that no government proper ever had a provision in its organic law for its own termination. Continue to execute all the express provisions of our National Constitution, and the Union will endure forever, it being impossible to destroy it except by some action not provided for in the instrument itself."Again, if the United States be not a government proper, but an association of States in the nature of contract merely, can it, as a contract, be peaceably unmade by less than all the parties who made it? One party to a contract may violate it--break it, so to speak--but does it not require all to lawfully rescind it? Descending from these general principles, we find the proposition that in legal contemplation the Union is perpetual confirmed by the history of the Union itself. The Union is much older than the Constitution. It was formed, in fact, by the Articles of Association in 1774. It was matured and continued by the Declaration of Independence in 1776. It was further matured, and the faith of all the then thirteen States expressly plighted and engaged that it should be perpetual, by the Articles of Confederation in 1778. And finally, in 1787, one of the declared objects for ordaining and establishing the Constitution was "to form a more perfect Union." (First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861; http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/lincoln1.asp ]The notion of a States' right of secession - to withdraw from the Union - HAD to be dispelled and de-legitimized if Lincoln was to be able to claim power to preserve the Union and then make good on that promise. There could be no rightful exercise of federal power to force the States to remain together when the States possessed (reserved) the supreme sovereign power, restated by the 10th Amendment, to withdraw from the Union.On July 22, 1861, the now Northern only Congress passed a joint resolution ("The Crittenden-Johnson Resolutions on the Objects of the War, 1861") defining the federal government's goals in the war:"Resolved.. That the present deplorable civil war has been forced upon the country by the dis-unionists of the Southern States now in revolt against the constitutional Government and in arms around the capital; that in this national emergency Congress, banishing all feelings of mere passion or resentment, will recollect only its duty to the whole country; That this war is not being prosecuted upon our part in any spirit of oppression, not for any purpose of conquest or subjugation, nor purpose of overthrowing or interfering with the rights or established institutions of those States, but to defend and maintain the supremacy of the Constitution and all laws made in pursuance thereof and to preserve the Union, with all the dignity, equality, and rights of the several States unimpaired; and that as soon as these objects are accomplished the war ought to cease."In other words, the Northern Congress stated in that resolution that preserving the Union and NOT interfering with the institution of slavery was the purpose of the war.Later, on August 22, 1861, Lincoln explained his thinking on the war to editor, Horace Greeley, an abolitionist:"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and it is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some an leaving others alone, I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps save the Union."Nearly two years into the war, in September 1862, Lincoln found it expedient to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. This proclamation actually freed no slaves in any territory under Union control. It was done primarily as a war measure. Lincoln hoped that the Proclamation would encourage slave uprisings in the South, thus causing Confederate troops to be diverted. The overwhelming majority of the slaves, however, proved remarkably loyal to the families of their Southern masters, most of which were away in the Confederate Army. Some say that it was also to please the anti-slavery British and thus keep them from coming into the war on the side of the South. The British did not come into the war on the side of the South, but they were also not so stupid as to e fooled by this ruse. The North, after all, imposed the protective tariffs on the South, which had harmed trade with Great Britain. Though the Proclamation had disappointing military results, and only made the British more skeptical of Northern intentions, it did please those radical abolitionists who did not seem to mind the hypocrisy of a document that did not free a single slave in Southern territory occupied by the Union Army. After a period of discontent in the North and in the Union Army over the Proclamation, the abolition of slavery began to be used to bolster the moral purpose of the war. Ever since then, it has been a prime propaganda tool justifying and glorifying the war as a just and noble and moral cause.However, as can easily be seen in the first 13th Amendment, Lincoln's speeches, and Congressional resolutions, slavery cannot be said to have been the cause of the war. It was an issue causing much tension, but it was not the cause of the war. These tensions are very much misunderstood today. Contrary to current misinformed public opinion, most Northern objections to slavery were not really of a high moral tone. Many Northern States, such as Lincoln's Illinois, severely restricted the possibility of any Blacks, free or slave, taking up residence within their borders. Ohio and Indiana even prohibited free Blacks from even entering their states. Northern attitudes towards Blacks that drove much of the "Free State vs. Slave State" controversy can best be summarized by an October 16, 1854 quote by Abraham Lincoln himself:"Whether slavery shall go into Nebraska, or other new territories, is not a matter of exclusive concern to the people who may go there. The whole nation is interested that the best use shall be made of these territories. We want them for the homes of free white people. This they cannot be, to any considerable extent, if slavery shall be planted with them."A common, but practical solution of what to do with the emancipated slaves was colonization (repatriation). That meant sending them back to Africa or to Central America. Lincoln himself was strongly in favor of colonization. Lincoln was a great admirer of Senator Henry Clay, who first proposed the colonization solution in 1827. Lincoln frequently stated his advocacy of colonization and spoke to black pastors and leaders about it, and on December 1, 1862, in a message to Congress, stated: "."This was undoubtedly spoken to reassure Northern politicians who were uneasy with the possible migratory consequences of the Emancipation Proclamation.Lincoln opposed slavery and was in favor of gradual, compensated emancipation and colonization. But he obviously considered the Union (preserved) and Northern business interests a much higher priority than eliminating slavery. To his credit, he recognized and hated the dangerous fanaticism of the radical abolitionists. But all the current and post-war talk (propaganda) about the war being a noble crusade to free the slaves and of Lincoln being the great Emancipator is a shameless fraud.Preserving the Union was the principal purpose stated by the North. That might be called noble - if using violence, killing 620,000 young men, killing women and children (civilians), starving families by killing livestock and scorching the land, and forcing states to bear a subservient and exploited status in an unwanted and, to them, an unprofitable Union at gunpoint can be called 'noble." The North had more than just territory in mind when it said it wanted to preserve the Union. Loss of the Southern States would mean loss of most of the tax revenue, of which over 90% came from the tariff duties that were paid by the South States and so burdened them. They would also have to compete with the South's proposed free-trade policies, which would have wreaked economic havoc on the North, just as the protective tariff had wreaked economic havoc on the South. The South would have gained economically by independence, whereas the North would have lost considerably both in tax revenues and in trade.The real reason Lincoln sought to preserve the Union was to preserve the ability of the federal government to continue collecting tariff revenue from the Southern States. He admitted as much when he was sworn in as president. Referring back to the section of his first Inaugural Address above where he dispelled the right of the States to secede from the Union, he continued:"It follows from these views that no State upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void, and that acts of violence within any State or States against the authority of the United States are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances.I therefore consider that in view of the Constitution and the laws the Union is unbroken, and to the extent of my ability, I shall take care, as the Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the States. Doing this I deem to be only a simple duty on my part, and I shall perform it...... I trust this will not be regarded as a menace, but only as the declared purpose of the Union that it will constitutionally defend and maintain itself. In doing this there needs to be no bloodshed or violence, and there shall be none unless it be forced upon the national authority. The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the Government and to collect the duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary for these objects, there will be no invasion, no using of force against or among the people anywhere."Notice that when he spoke the words "the declared purpose of the Union that it will constitutionally defend and maintain itself" he is really declaring that the federal government has as its primary purpose the obligation to ensure its preservation. This is in absolute, direct contradiction to the cherished principles of the Declaration of Independence.Despite the tension that divided the South from the North, beginning in 1828, over the protective tariffs (recall the Nullification Crisis which nearly precipitated secession in 1832) and the concerns of South Carolina over Lincoln's (and the Republican Party's) platform in the 1860 presidential election, Lincoln chose to ignore such concerns in his Inaugural Address. He said: "."The so-called "Civil War" was not really a civil war after all. A civil war implies that both sections of the "same country" were fighting for control of the same government. The South had seceded from that government; it wanted nothing more to do with it. Two names for the war are fare more appropriate: For the South, it was the "War for Southern Independence" and for the North, it was the "War to Prevent Southern Independence." It was not a glorious crusade to free slaves. Unfortunately, most Americans today accept the pious fraud that the "Civil War" was all about ending slavery. The first 13th Amendment, however, provides shattering documentary evidence disproving that cherished humbug.To Purchase THE UN-CIVIL WAR: AmazonNews / National

by Staff Reporter

The extraordinary is happening behind the scenes: former President Robert Mugabe could be in the process of shaping an opposition political party that could feature his ex-deputy Dr Joice Mujuru and his wife, Mrs Grace Mugabe, among its leading lights.Insiders privy to developments say a meeting last week between the Mugabes and Dr Mujuru was the first step towards creation of an opposition coalition largely populated by G40 cabalists who have been in disarray since the November 2017 Operation Restore Legacy ended their ambition of grabbing the reins of power.The cabalists have been circulating a "consultation points" document in a bid to rally support for the fledgling project, which the ruling Zanu-PF says will not cause them any sleepless nights ahead of national elections constitutionally scheduled for this year.Among other things, the document wants to build consensus around possible postponement of the elections while a "transitional authority" holds State power.They also want Sadc or the African Union to deploy military troops in Zimbabwe to pave way for their "transitional authority"  something highly unlikely seeing as the continental bloc's Summit just two weeks ago welcomed President Emmerson Mnangagwa as one of its two newest members, along with Liberia's President George Weah.Last week, ex-President Mugabe reportedly apologised to Dr Mujuru  who leads the National People's Party  for sacking her as his deputy in 2014. He is said to have given his blessing to the creation of an opposition political party that will bring together G40 and the NPP.It is understood he advised Dr Mujuru to work with sacked ministers Jonathan Moyo, Patrick Zhuwao, Edgar Mbwembwe and Paddy Zhanda, among others.Former Member of Parliament Dr Daniel Shumba and ex-Zanu-PF Harare Youth League chair Mr Jim Kunaka are also said to be in the mix.The Sunday Mail understands Dr Mujuru was scheduled to fly to Cape Town, South Africa at the weekend to thrash out the scheme with her new-found buddies.Dr Mujuru, Prof Moyo and Messrs Zhuwao and Zhanda could not be reached for comment.Mr Mbwembwe tried to distance himself from it all saying, "I have been out of Harare for more than a week, doing my constituency work. I don't know anything about what you are talking about. Maybe you guys in Harare can give me details of what is transpiring."Mr Kunaka said: "I am not aware of the new political party project. There could be some people with a hidden agenda. I don't play hide-and-seek. I do things in the open."Earlier, Dr Mujuru had told a Washington-based radio station: "I went to speak to (Mugabe). . . He invited me there himself. If you were to be invited by VaMugabe would you say no?"She said the former leader wanted them to "work well together".Intelligence sources said all indications were that the G40 cabal still had a grip on Mugabe's decision-making through Mrs Mugabe."The initial plan was to have Grace lead the party, but then the name Joice Mujuru came up as a compromise because Grace's political activities are still fresh in the minds of the nation."'New Patriotic Front' has been brandished as a possible brand because the idea is to make it appear that this project is indigenous and Pan-African."A document has been crafted to that effect; to extol the virtues of Zimbabwe's heroes because that is how a people comes together, around its heroes and myths. They will try to push forward the names of national heroes, which is where Mujuru comes in, even as they try to put back on track what is largely a self-serving agenda to grab power at all costs."Dr Mujuru was married to national hero General Solomon Mujuru.Another source said, "Mujuru is just a pawn in this game which is tailored to upstage President Mnangagwa's administration. Why is Jonathan suddenly posting positive comments about Mujuru, whose intellectual capacity he has long questioned and whose leadership he has always disparaged? Why is he calling the meeting (between the Mugabes and Dr Mujuru) 'game-changing'?"These guys are going around saying they have bought 300 vehicles that will be used for campaigns. That's not true. Some of the vehicles in question were purchased when (Ignatius) Chombo was still (Home Affairs) Minister and these were for chiefs. They are trying to create an impression that they are organised and well-funded when that is not the case."Zanu-PF Politburo member and war veterans chair Victor Matemadanda said the G40 cabal was free to form a political party as the Constitution provides for such rights."One thing people like Zhuwao should not forget is that Zimbabwe is in a mess right now because of his uncle (cde Mugabe) and the cabal that made Zimbabweans suffer because of corruption and neglecting developmental issues."Every Zimbabwean is battling economic hardships. It won't be easy to forgive G40. Imbwa ikadzingwa mumusha inoyenda kunohukura iri kunze kwemusha yakatarisa mumusha, but ikawona kuti vanhu vandiramba, inofuratira yotarisa musango yoenda ichihukura nesango. That is exactly what Zhuwao and his team are doing."Zanu-PF National Secretary for Youth Affairs Pupurai Togarepi said the ruling party was ready for all comers."As far as we are concerned, this is a grouping of misguided elements who are all failures. Zanu-PF is too strong and as the Youth League we are not bothered. We should not lose sleep over (them). We are waiting for them and in elections we will show them what we are made of," said Togarepi.A political analyst said G40's intention was to dilute Zanu-PF's vote and block President Mnangagwa from getting 50 percent-plus-one of ballots needed to make him a first round winner of the Presidential race."The Zhuwawos and Jonathans know that they will not win any election. They are just making noise in the hope of splitting the vote," he said.Political analyst Mr Godwin Mureriwa weighed in, "Mugabe engaging Mujuru is a sign of desperation. He is trying to seek relevance and also trying to use tribal Zezuru politics but Zimbabweans are not that foolish. What Mugabe must know is that Zimbabweans are tired of him and nobody wants him to be involved in our politics again."They know that President Mnangagwa has the of the majority of the people of Zimbabwe, who are behind him because he is working hard to improve the economy."Other citizens, too, are not amused with the evolving project.Harare resident Miss Blessing Nyengera said, "What makes them think we can gracefully accept Grace Mugabe back in our lives? No one in his or her right senses can trully associate himself/herself with G40 given the way they made us suffer as they looted the country's resources for their own benefit."Mr Tendai Ngwerume of Chitungwiza added: "The country is moving in the right direction under the new dispensation. A lot of positive changes are already in progress under President Emmerson Mnangagwa. What makes G40 think we have forgotten their cruelty?"But it is not just about G40, Mrs Mugabe or Dr Mujuru: Mugabe himself could  hypothetically  stand as the envisaged project's Presidential candidate.Constitutional law expert Professor Lovemore Madhuku explained: "Former President Mugabe served one term and he can still contest an election although I don't see that happening. He still enjoys his rights to take part in any political process; the law is very clear on that."Section 103 of the Constitution says, "The President and Vice-Presidents, and any former President or Vice President, must not, directly or indirectly, hold any other public office or be employed by anyone else while they are in office or are receiving a pension from the State as former President or Vice President, as the case may be."However, such a move could see Mugabe lose the goodwill he has enjoyed from President Mnangagwa's administration, which has largely sought to treat him with dignity as a former Head of State despite his last years in office being hijacked by the G40 cabal's machinations.News / Press Release

by ZCGG

The Zimbabwe Campaign For Good Governance calls on the government not to intervene and interfere with the management right to manage enterprises. On Friday the 2nd of February 2018, the government through Minister of Home Affairs Dr Obert Mpofu intervened in a labour dispute at Hwange Colliery. That is not the role of government later alone the Ministry of Home Affairs.Although the government is the major Shareholder in Hwange Colliery, it has an interest role only. The Company is run by a management team under the oversight of a fully constituted Board. All Labour disputes should be resolved in terms of the Labour Act Chapter 28.01. The Act has a dispute settlement procedure that should be followed. Government intervention in labour matters is setting a wrong precedent as well as sending a bad message to potential investors.We should not go back to the 1980 culture of excessive government interference in labour matters. All worker grievances should be left in the hands of management, trade unions, NECs and workers committees and not politicians.The government must lead by example in promoting good governance in both public and private affairs.INFORMATION - ZCGGSignificant progress was made on reforms to make the country more prosperous, democratic, and transparent, but more improvements are needed.

Ukraine is ranked last among 44 countries in the Europe region, and its overall score is below the regional and world averages.

"Ukraine's economic freedom score is 51.9, making its economy the 150th freest in the 2018 Index [of Economic Freedom]. Its overall score has increased by 3.8 points, reflecting improvements in eight of the 12 economic freedom indicators and particularly significant improvements in monetary freedom and investment freedom," according to the research conducted by The Heritage Foundation (the United States).

Read alsoBig Mac index shows Ukraine's hryvnia undervalued by 69%  The Economist"Ukraine's oligarch-dominated economy had already slowed before Russia's 2014 occupation of Crimea and ongoing aggression in the eastern part of the country badly damaged economic growth. Significant progress was made on reforms to make the country more prosperous, democratic, and transparent, but more improvements are needed, including fighting corruption, developing capital markets, privatizing state-owned enterprises, and improving the legislative framework and the rule of law. Public enthusiasm for Western reforms has waned, however, as economic stagnation continues," the research said.

According to the research, the momentum for business reform has stalled, and political instability continues to compound regulatory uncertainty in commercial transactions. Ukraine has a well-educated and skilled labor force, but the labor code is outmoded and not enforced consistently. The government has reduced energy subsidies and is ending some special tax breaks for agriculture.

"Property rights are protected under Ukrainian law, and mortgages and liens are recorded. There are serious issues regarding corruption in the judiciary, one of the country's weakest and least trusted public institutions. Judges are largely seen as protectors of business and other powerful sources of influence. Corruption remains a serious problem for Ukraine, and progress on increasing accountability is quite slow," it said.

The rating is topped by Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland, Australia, and Ireland.

The Index of Economic Freedom is an annual guide published by The Heritage Foundation, Washington's No. 1 think tank. The Index covers 12 freedoms  from property rights to financial freedom  in 186 countries.

The Heritage Foundation measures economic freedom based on 12 quantitative and qualitative factors, grouped into four broad categories, or pillars, of economic freedom: the rule of law (property rights, government integrity, judicial effectiveness); the government size (government spending, tax burden, fiscal health); regulatory efficiency (business freedom, labor freedom, monetary freedom), and open markets (trade freedom, investment freedom, financial freedom).

Each of the twelve economic freedoms within these categories is graded on a scale of 0 to 100. A country's overall score is derived by averaging these twelve economic freedoms, with equal weight being given to each.Responding to reports that at least six young human rights defenders, have been detained in coordinated arrests across Iran on 1 February, Amnesty International has called for their immediate release.

These human rights defenders must be released immediately and unconditionally  they have committed no crime and have been arrested purely because of their human rights work. We are extremely concerned that these individuals are now at risk of torture or other ill-treatment., said Magdalena Mughrabi, Deputy Middle East and North Africa Director at Amnesty International.

The six activists are Shima Babaei and her husband Dariush Zand, Saeed Eghbali, Leila Farjami, Mahmoud Masoumi and Behnam Mousivand

Earlier, Huma Rights Activists News Agency, HRANA had reported, the Islamic Republics intelligence agents detained at least five civil rights activists Thursday, February 1, in Tehran, Behbahan and Kermanshah.

Later, after hours of detention and interrogation, another human rights activist, Laila Faraji was set free on the same day, reported HRANA.

Based on the latest reports, the Intelligence Ministry agents stormed into the houses of Shima Babaei and Leila Faraji and confiscated their belongings.

The reason behind the recent detentions is not clear yet.

Reportedly, civil rights activist, Behnam Moussivand was violently detained last Thursday at his fathers residence.

According to Ms. Mughrabi, The coordinated nature of these arrests confirms our grave concerns about the grim reality for those defending human rights in Iran today, where peaceful activism is repressed and criminalized by the authorities. These people are prisoners of conscience, detained solely for peacefully defending human rights.

Furthermore, Ms. Mughrabi noted, These arrests are only the latest episode in a long crackdown on any form of human rights work in Iran, intended to wipe out the rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly in the country. We urge the Iranian authorities to stop this attack on human rights defenders and allow them to work in a safe environment without fear of reprisals.An increasing number of young women have been hoisting their headscarves on sticks in the streets of Tehran and other major Iranian cities all this week in protest to mandatory veil regulations.

Here are five points about the kind of dress code and veil requirement the fundamentalists have imposed not only on Iranian women, but also on foreign female diplomats visiting Iran.

Veiled women, a majority or a minority?

Islamists and religious intellectuals have always portrayed hijab as something most Iranians want. There has been no study or opinion poll to support this.

Portraying hijab as something demanded by the Iranian society is obviously a distortion of reality. Even before the establishment of the Islamic republic there was no proof to suggest that a majority of the society want hijab for women.

Women are not free in the Islamic Republic to wear what they like. Meanwhile, there is no freedom of expression or reliable polling agency to explore the facts about hijab.

Mandatory or legal?

Islamic republic officials portray hijab as a legal matter although no law can violate individuals freedom even if they are part of a minority.

Hijab did not become mandatory based on law. It was based on use of force against women and was imposed by Baseej militia and vigilante groups branded as Hezbollah. Hijab became mandatory by use of violence and based on suppression of women and was then given a legal facade, not vice versa.

The first mandatory hijab law was passed in 1983 by the Iranian parliament. An addendum was added to the law in 1996. In fact, the legislation was first introduced after more than four years of suppression of women by beating and threatening them of dismissal from workplace and univerities.

How did women dress before the 1979 revolution

Many women who worked for the Iranian government already used head scarves before the Islamic Republic decided to force it on them. Nevertheless, there were problems.

In March 1979, it was not easy to talk about a dress code or hijab. A lot of women did not have head scarves at schools and offices immediately after the February 1979 revolution. Women in hijab were a minority, wrote President Hassan Rouhani in his memoir.

I was tasked to make hijab compulsory in the offices that were part of the army. First I told the women at the office of the Joint Chief of Staff to come to work with hijab. Some of them objected to the idea, but I stood firm. Then I made the hijab mandatory across the armed forces gradually, although I told them they did not necessarily need the head to toe black cover (chador), Rouhani continued.

Many women who could not cope with hijab, left their work place for good. Womens share in the overall workforce shrank from 11.1 percent in 1976 to 6.8 percent in 1986.

Required by Shariah

Many Iranian clerics believe they are enforcing the Shariah while imposing hijab on women. This is also a distortion of reality.

Many Muslim scholars believe that neither in the Koran, nor in Shariah hijab is mandatory for non-Muslims and non-believers. For those who are Muslim and true believers, hijab is not mandatory either. It is a matter between the individual woman and God.

Khamenei's human rights and forced hijab

Irans Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in June 2004: Our position about human rights is not defensive. It is offensive. We should not worry if Americans or Zionists say that human rights are violated in the Islamic republic. Your position about women should not be defensive either. You should have an offensive position. They protest that our women in Iran should wear compulsory hijab. In the West, it is mandatory for women not to cover their hair.

Khamenei attempts to portray the West as a place where not covering ones hair is a must for women. This is baseless. Khamenei has distorted reality in three ways:

What Khamenei ignores is that no one in the West has asked why Iranian women wear hijab, not wearing hijab is not mandatory in the West, and most important of all: No Iranian woman has relinquished her right to dress how she likes to Khamenei.

No matter how leaders of the Islamic Republic try to portray their insistence on forcing a dress code, veil and hijab pose one of the most complicated problems for Islamists. They dug a hole for themselves and are trying hard to climb out.

The opinions expressed in the article are not necessarily those of Radio FradaAli Younesi, President Hassan Rouhanis special assistant for ethnic groups and religious minorities affairs, says the main objective of recent protests in Iran was to topple the Rouhani administration.

In an interview with centrist daily Arman, which was published on Saturday February 3, Younesi, a former intelligence minister under reformist President Mohammad Khatami, alleged that the protests were engineered by those who lost the presidential race against Rouhani in May 2017. But he offered other hypotheses too.

The speculations appear to be part of Iranian officials trying to explain what drove the protests that spread to over 100 cities and small towns across Iran in late December 2017 and early January.

Younesi further alleged that former hardline President Mahmud Ahmadinejad and his aides had played a key part in engineering the protests and paved the way for the unrests by undermining the authority of the regime.

During the months before the unrest, an embattled Ahmadinejad, who was not allowed to run for president in 2017, and his aides attempted to disclose flaws in the regime and widespread corruption in the Iranian Judiciary after his vice-presidents, his chief of staff and a few other aides were summoned to court on charges of financial corruption.

Yet in another part of the interview, Younesi charged that Irans state-run broadcaster, some Friday prayer leaders and government institutions have had an undeniable part in triggering the unrests that aimed to topple the Rouhani administration.

Apparently, Younesi was alluding to Mashhads outspoken Friday prayer leader, hardline Ayatollah Ahmad Alamolhoda and the superintendent of the citys wealthy holy shrine Ebrahim Raisi, the underdog in the 2017 presidential race. Earlier, Vice-President Eshaq Jahangiri had also accused the same individuals of organizing the first demonstration. Alamolhoda later rejected the allegations.

Younesi did not even spare reformists, adding that he was not happy with the lower strata of the reform camp that trended a hash tag(I regret voting for Rouhani) in social media expressing their frustration with the Rouhani administrations inefficiency in dealing with the countrys problems.

Finding it hard to acknowledge that protesters were angry about widespread financial corruption and mismanagement among other things, desperate soul searching has also given rise to other hypotheses and conspiracy theories voiced by regime bigwigs about the intentions and perpetrators of the unrest.

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and some other officials have accused Saudi Arabia, the US, and Israel of organizing the protests, while Expediency Council Secretary and former IRGC commander Mohsen Rezai came up with an outlandish idea about the involvement of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussains brother-in-law.

Iraqi, Israeli and US officials have refuted all such claims. This comes while MP Mahmoud Sadeqi has quoted intelligence officials as saying that no foreign elements have been involved in the unrest.

While accusing each other or one or more foreign states for organizing the protests, Iranian officials appear to still be in a state of denial about the shortcomings that led to dissatisfaction, frustration and unrest.

In the meantime, latest official figures indicate that at least five thousand protesters were arrested during the unrest. Reportedly, at least six have died in custody.For the second time in less than two weeks, plainclothesmen affiliated with the intelligence organs have swarmed a street in Tehran, where the leader of Gonabadi dervishes, Nour Ali Tabandehs residence is located.

A website affiliated with dervishes of Gonabadi denomination, said, the intelligence and security agents surrounded Dr. Nour Ali Tabandehs residence on Saturday night in Pasdaran district, north of the capital, Tehran.

Many Gonabadi dervishes rushed to the location to force the plainclothesmen and intelligence agents out, Majzooban-e Noor website reported.

After 7:00 am on Sunday morning, clashes took place between the supporters of Tabandeh and security and Baseej forces.

Images and footages circulated on social media show a motorbike and a damaged vehicle left in the area. One video clip shows dervishes setting fire to one or more motorbikes used by security personnel.

Kasra Nouri, a journalist and Majzooban-i Nours reporter, told Radio Farda, agents affiliated with the police, Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) and its Baseej force, stormed the area at 7 am Sunday and battered the dervishes in front of Dr. Tabandehs residence.

The dervishes, according Kasra Nouri, had no option other than resist, calling for their fellows for help.

Soon, there were fierce clashes between the two sides, forcing regular police and other authorities, including the district Police commander, IRGC General Massoud Mossadegh to personally interfere.

The commander, according to Kasra Nouri, promised to legally follow-up the reasons behind the deployment of intelligence agents at the area.

We are particularly worried about the presence of plainclothesmen and IRGCs intelligence and security agents surrounding Dr. Tabandehs residence, dervishes insisted.

However, nothing was done to disperse the plainclothesmen and IRGC agents. Therefore, dervishes affirmed that they will stay there until those agents and rogue elements are withdrawn.

It is not yet clear whether Tabandeh, who used to live near London, was present at his residence in Tehran when the clashes broke out.

However, a taped message by Tabandeh was circulated in social media on Sunday, February 4, calling for peace and order.

Lambasting what he described as provocative behavior, the 90-year old leader of Gonabadi dervishes has noted in his voice message, Lots of work has been done for keeping peace in the country, though at the expense of getting beaten on our heads; yet, the country is calm, anyway. Do not disturb it [the peace] in vain. There is nobody threatening my life or my house. They want a show off. This is a wrong approach.

Meanwhile, based on the latest reports, tension around Tabandeh's house dissipated late on Sunday night, as security and plainclothes agents were withdrawn.

Tabandeh, a France educated lawyer, was appointed as the Qutb (Pivot) of Gonabadi dervishes replacing his father, Mahboob Ali Shah who died in 1996.

Dervishes are members of a Muslim (specifically Sufi) religious order who have taken vows of poverty and austerity. Dervishes first appeared in the 12th century; they were noted for their wild or ecstatic rituals and were known as dancing, whirling, or howling dervishes according to the practice of their order.

There are various orders of dervishes, almost all of which trace their origins to various Muslim saints and teachers, especially first Shiites Imam Ali bin Abi Talib. Dervishes spread into North Africa, Afghanistan, Balkans, Caucasus, India, Iran, Pakistan, Tajikistan and Turkey.Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

Trend:

Military units of the armed forces of Armenia violated ceasefire 130 times throughout the day, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said Feb. 4.

Armenias armed forces were using heavy machine guns.

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.Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

Trend:

Moscow (Vnukovo airport) - Baku is delayed due to unfavorable weather conditions, the Heydar Aliyev International Airport told Trend.

The plane was supposed to land in Baku at 23:30. "The plane left with a delay and will land at the Baku airport at 00:40," the airport said.

At 22:00 local time, more than 200 flights were delayed at Moscow airports, 17 more flights were canceled.Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

By Anvar Mammadov  Trend:

Azerbaijan's PASHA Bank focuses on active implementation of digital tools in 2018, Taleh Kazimov, chief executive officer and chairman of the bank's board, said in an interview with Trend.

He said that the new development strategy of the bank, covering 2018-2020, is based on the transition to the digital banking and the development of online channels for rendering services.

"First of all, for us 2018 will become the year of business transformation, the year of transition to the active implementation of digital tools," he said. "As for specific goals, by the end of the strategic period we expect that no less than 90 percent of all client operations will be carried out through digital channels."

"The current year for PASHA Bank will be also a year of expansion of activity in the retail segment, where the bank plans to continue to render high-quality services for the holders of payroll cards," Kazimov said.

"At the same time, while continuing to focus on the servicing of the corporate sector, we plan to bring the volume of the loan portfolio up to 1.3-1.4 billion manats and the total assets of the bank to 4.3 billion manats in 2018" he said. "Of course, these are quite ambitious, but very realistic goals, taking into account the experience of PASHA Bank team and the availability of highly professional expertise."

PASHA Bank has been operating in Azerbaijan since 2007.

PASHA Bank renders a range of corporate banking services, including issuance of loans, operations in the securities market, assets management, and treasury services.

(1.7001 AZN = $1 on Feb. 1)Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

By Azad Hasanli  Trend:

The UK Government allocated some 1.3 billion worth of funds within a framework of implementation of Oil & Gas High Value Campaign (HVC) in Azerbaijan in 20162017.

The data was provided in the renewed "Overseas Business Risk  Azerbaijan" report of the Department for International Trade of the UK Government (DIT), which is aimed at providing the businesses willing to operate in Azerbaijan with necessary information.

The HVC programme identifies large scale overseas projects and aims to provide an intensive level of support to help UK businesses win contracts in and around these opportunities.

The report noted that oil and gas is by far the largest sector in Azerbaijan and therefore currently attracts the most DIT attention.

"Azerbaijan is the second most successful country where DIT HVC is implemented," the report said.

Since October 2015, to support the HVC, DIT, together with the Ministry of Economy, BP and SOCAR, runs the UK/Azerbaijan Partnership Programme to promote and support collaboration between UK and Azerbaijani companies in the oil and gas sector.

To date, this Programme has been responsible for some 65 partnerships and is set to continue for the next 3 to 5 years.

The report touches on the current partnership between BP and the Government of Azerbaijan. On Sep. 14, 2017, BP, together with SOCAR, signed the extension of the Azeri Chirag Guneshli PSA Agreement until 2050. This agreement will lead to significant new business in the oil and gas sector in Azerbaijan for resident and new UK companies. Other major contracts are in the pipeline.

Outside of oil and gas, DIT is looking to diversify into other sectors including healthcare, mining, renewable energy, agri-business, tourism and education.

According to the State Customs Committee of Azerbaijan the trade turnover with the UK reached $281.1 million last year. Export of Azeri goods to the UK grossed to $41.2 million for the covered period.

---

Follow the author on Twitter: @AzadHasanliUzbekistan has introduced a visa-free regime for 30 days from the date of entry into the country for citizens of seven countries and a simplified procedure for issuing tourist visas for citizens of 39 states, Uzdaily reported.

President Shavkat Mirziyoyev has signed a decree On additional organizational measures to create favorable conditions for development of tourism potential of the Republic of Uzbekistan.

Under the decree, from Feb.10 2018, citizens of Israel, Indonesia, the Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Turkey and Japan can visit Uzbekistan without visas for the period of 30 days.

From Feb.1 2018, Uzbekistan introduced a simplified procedure for issuing tourist visas for citizens of 39 countries. The list includes countries of the European Union, East Asia and the Middle East, as well as India, Canada, New Zealand and the United States.

Citizens of these country now should not submit tourist voucher or invitation letter from legal entity or individual to receive visa. Consular offices of Uzbekistan will issue visas for citizens of these countries within two working days, not counting the day of acceptation of documents.Prime Minister of Kyrgyzstan Sapar Isakov met in Almaty with leading international experts in the field of digital transformation and representatives of the World Bank, the press service of the Kyrgyz Government reported.

The meeting was attended by managing vice president of Gatrner Andrea Di Mayo, Technology Adviser of the Government of Great Britain, Digital -5 Coordinator Liam Maxwell, World Bank IT and Electronics Director Danil Kerimi, Regional Director of the World Bank, IDC Regional Director for Central Asia, Azerbaijan and Mongolia, Andrey Beklemishev, global leader in digital strategy of the World Bank Randeep Sudan.

Sapar Isakov spoke about the main stages of the implementation of the Taza Koom Program and the first results and plans for digitalization of the country.

Randeep Sudan said that Taza Koom Program implementing in the republic and its goals are impressive.

"This is a very good initiative on the part of the Government of the country. Now it is necessary to find the most innovative solutions to all projects within the framework of Taza Koom. Kyrgyzstan should become an effective platform for large IT companies in implementing their innovative solutions," the expert said.

Andrey Beklemishev said that IDC is ready to share the best world practices and provide the necessary assistance in the field of information technology.

"In Kyrgyzstan, all projects are implementing very quickly, including in the promotion of digital programs. This is very gratifying," he said.

In turn, Liam Maxwell added that digitalization gives a clear economic effect and contributes a great deal to the openness and transparency of public administration and society as a whole, contributing to the increase of people's trust in the authorities.

"Kyrgyzstan should make progress in small steps, concentrating on the result," technology advisor to the British Government said.

During the meeting, the side also discussed the issues of cooperation in the field of information technologies, world experience in digitalization and other key directions in this area, and reforms in the customs and tax spheres.Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

By Khalid Kazimov  Trend:

Iranian Energy Minister Reza Ardakanian has called for increasing the prices of water and electricity in order to save the energy resources.

With the low prices of water, we cannot expect the farmers to spend money on saving the water, he told IRNA.

He further said that the country should organize the economy in the coming years in a way to deal with the shortcoming in water.

The Iranian government pays huge subsidies on water. According to the report, the country spends about 10,000 rials ($0.25) on per meter cubic of water but the consumers pay only 4,200 rials ($0.1) for it.

On the other hand, the government supplies per kilowatt/hour of power at 700 rials ($0.175) but it spends 1000 rials ($0.025) for the generation of it.Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

By Khalid Kazimov  Trend:

Iranian Oil Ministry plans to lodge a complaint against Pakistan over its failure to meet commitments on extending the Iran-Pakistan joint pipeline.

Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh has said that according to the ministry, the country should go to court over the issue, IRNA news agency reported.

The long-awaited Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline project (also called Peace pipeline) worth $7.5 billion has been postponed due to Pakistans failure to fulfill its obligations under an agreement reached earlier.

The 2,700 kilometer-long pipeline is meant to deliver gas from Irans southern zone of Asalouyeh to Pakistan.

Iran has already completed the construction of its section of the pipeline from the South Pars field to Pakistani border. Pakistani section of the pipeline is still not ready and Islamabad explains the delay by the lack of funds.

Iran is planning to export 1.5 million cubic meters (mcm) of natural gas per day to the country.Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

By Khalid Kazimov  Trend:

Iranian intelligence ministry has announced that its forces have seized 2,869 kilos of drugs in the southeastern province of Sistan and Balouchestan.

The ministrys announcement described the drug consignment as the biggest shipment of captured drugs over the recent years.

The report added that the shipment was trafficked into Iran from a foreign country, without naming it.

The ministry said that the traffickers carried out the shipment in two Toyota vehicles.Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

By Fatih Karimov  Trend:

Iran has cancelled its first FLNG deal with Norwegian Hemla following the criticism by some Iranian MPs.

In a press conference in Tehran Feb. 4, Irans oil minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh announced that the deal is cancelled following the some criticism regarding the contract terms.

In October 2017, the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) signed first ever contract to export natural gas from of LNG (liquefied natural gas) with the Norwegian firm following months of negotiations.

Under the contract, Irans natural gas was planned to be converted to LNG in a floating LNG vessel (FLNG), belonging to Belgium's Exmar.

Based on the deal, the European firm was to purchase 200 million standard cubic feet of flared gas from offshore oilfields near Kharg Island over a period of up to 15 years. In its first phase, the site was projected to produce 500 metric tons of LNG and 200 tons of LPG per year.

Earlier, in December 2017, Asadollah Gharekhani, the parliaments energy committee spokesman, said that a joint committee has been formed between Oil Ministry and the parliaments energy committee in order to explore the issue.

The critics were accusing the Iranian oil ministry of signing a deal against the countrys national interests and setting an unacceptably low price for gas sell to the Norwegian side.Tehran, Iran, Feb. 4

By Kamyar Eghbalnejad  Trend:

The value of loans allocated by the Export Development Bank of Iran over the current fiscal year (starting March 20) has experienced a huge growth.

The value of the allocated loans has increased by 52 percent as compared to the same time of last year, Ali Salehabadi, CEO of Export Development Bank of Iran, told reporters on Feb. 4.

He also added that the number of loans has increased by 13.4 percent to reach 2,200.

This is while the volume of deposits in Export Development Bank has increased by 76 percent to hit 2.4 trillion rials (about $726 million).

The Iranian banking system paid 4,036.6 trillion rials (some $110 billion based on official exchange rate of $1 to 36,550 rials) in loans during the first nine months of the current fiscal year.

According to the latest report by the Central Bank of Iran, the figure indicates a rise by 5.5 percent as compared to the same period of the preceding year.

Only 9.4 percent of the loans by banks were allocated to establish new units (379.85 trillion rials), while 4.6 percent of the assets were for development, and 2.7 percent were for repairs.

The highest value of the paid loans went to service sector (39.8 percent), followed by industry and mining sectors (29.3 percent), commerce (14 percent), housing (8.8 percent) and agriculture (8 percent).Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4

By Khalid Kazimov  Trend:

Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh has dismissed the claims on an agreement between Tehran and Moscow to barter oil for Russian fighter aircraft.

He added that the cooperation with Russia is merely restricted to the industry of oil and gas, IRNA news agency reported.

Back in 2014, the sides launched negotiations on plans for exporting Irans oil to Russia.

Under an initial agreement, Russia was expected to buy up to 500,000 b/d of oil in return for Russian equipment and commodities.

This major oil deal, estimated to be worth $1.5 billion a month, was subject to modifications. The two countries finally agreed on 100,000 b/d, largely down from the previous figure.Police in Ankang county, Northwest China's Shaanxi Province have broken up an online gun-selling gang, seizing 53 suspects together with 38 imitation guns and some 30,000 bullets, China Central Television (CCTV) reported on Saturday, Global Times reports.



Ankang local police conducted a 13-month-long investigation after receiving a lead that an Internet user going by "Xuge" became engaged in the gun trading business online at the beginning of 2017, said the report.



Police found out that the suspect, surnamed Xu, would distribute gun parts to his customers under the guise of optical instruments and galvanized wires through a parcel delivery service in Ankang, and arrested him as he was on his way to making a delivery order.



Xu's accomplice, surnamed Feng, was also later arrested. Police found out they had been delivering packages to more than 20 cities across the country in the past year.



The police set up a special investigation squad for the case and visited 28 provinces over 13 months as they sought to uncover the supply line for the illegal arm trade and the customers.



"We eventually seized 53 suspects and raided two gun-producing dens, seizing 38 guns and more than 30,000 bullets," Cai Jiangang, a police officer at the Xuyang county police station, told the media.



According to the Article 125 of the China's Criminal Law, whoever illegally manufactures, trades, transports, mails, or stocks up guns, ammunition, or explosives faces not less than three years but not more than 10 years of fixed-term imprisonment; or not less than 10 years of imprisonment, life imprisonment, or death if the consequences are serious.Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades defeated left-wing challenger Stavros Malas in a run-off election on Sunday to secure a second five-year term, final results showed, Reuters reported.

The conservative won 55.9 percent of the vote with 95 percent of votes counted and Malas called to congratulate him, state television said.

Anastasiades, 71, has taken credit for steering the Cypriot economy to recovery after it was plunged into crisis in 2013 by its exposure to debt-wracked Greece and fiscal slippage under a former left-wing administration.

Cyprus emerged from a bailout program from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund in 2016. The bailout included recapitalising Cypriot banks through seizing uninsured deposits, a so-called bail-in which was the first time it was implemented in the euro zone.

The veteran conservative was catapulted into the spotlight to handling that crisis days after winning the Cypriot election in February 2013.

As leader of the divided islands Greek Cypriot community, he also oversaw peace talks with estranged Turkish Cypriots.

Cyprus was split in a Turkish invasion in 1974 after a brief Greek-inspired coup, and the EU member state hosts one of the worlds longest serving peacekeeping forces with Greek Cypriots in the south, and Turkish Cypriots in the north.US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Sunday that the United States is continuing to consider restricting the sale of oil from Venezuela and that officials are analyzing the impact of potential oil sanctions on business interests, according to Reuters.

Venezuelas crude oil sales to the United States in 2017 were the lowest since 1991, according to Thomson Reuters trade flows data, hurt by US financial sanctions on the OPEC nation.A total of 94 rockets were fired by the PYD/PKK terrorist group since the beginning of Turkeys Operation Olive Branch in Syrias Afrin, Turkish Prime Minister Yildirim said Sunday, Anadolu reported.

Sixty rockets targeted the Hatay province and 34 landed in the Kilis province, both bordering Syria, Yildirim said during a visit to the Kilis governors office.

Seven civilians have been martyred, 113 people have been injured, Yildirim added.

Without giving any names, Yildirim criticized certain allies for smearing the operation instead of supporting it.

Yildirim said: I have something to say to those who are spreading smear campaigns. You are our ally in NATO and we are working together in various fields

If this alliance is to persist, you will ignore words of looters, and accredit the words of Turkey, a trustworthy friend, Yildirim said.

On Jan. 20, the Turkish army launched Operation Olive Branch to remove PYD/PKK and Daesh terrorists from Afrin. According to the Turkish General Staff, the operation aims to establish security and stability along Turkeys borders and the region as well as protect Syrians from terrorist oppression and cruelty.

The operation is being carried out under the framework of Turkey's rights based on international law, UN Security Council resolutions, its self-defense rights under the UN Charter, and respect for Syria's territorial integrity.

The military has said only terror targets are being destroyed and "utmost care" is being taken to avoid harming civilians.The United States did not equip partner forces in Syria with surface-to-air weapons, Pentagon spokesman Eric Pahon told Sputnik.

"Alongside by, with, and through our partners in Syria, the United States remains focused on the fight against ISIS [Daesh]. The US has not equipped any partner forces in Syria with surface-to-air weapons and has no intention to do so in the future. Our operations are geographically focused on ongoing combat operations against ISIS [Daesh] in eastern Syria. We will assess the validity of these claims to ensure the safety of our coalition partners. I refer you to the Russian government for information regarding this incident," Pahon said.

Meanwhile, terrorrist group Tahrir al-Sham released a post on social media quoting a commander in charge of its air raids as saying one of its militants had hit Russian SU-25 during an "air raid" over the city of Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib.

Earlier on in the day, the Russian Defense Ministry revealed that Russias Su-25 was downed in Syrias Idlib province from a man-portable air-defense system (MANPAD). According to the ministry, the pilot ejected from the aircraft but was killed by militants on the ground.KYODO NEWS - Feb 4, 2018 - 11:26 | All, Feature

A former American pro wrestler who was popular in Japan in the 1960s and 1970s was awarded one of the country's highest honors in a ceremony in Buffalo, New York, on Saturday.

Richard Beyer, 87, once known by the ring name "The Destroyer," received the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Rays from Reiichiro Takahashi, the Japanese consul general in New York. Wearing a suit and a mask, an item integral to his wrestling persona in his heyday, Beyer expressed his gratitude.

In a press conference following the event, Beyer said although Japan was a World War II enemy when he was in high school, he became a big fan of the country after traveling there.

He came to Japan for the first time in 1963 to wrestle in Tokyo with Rikidozan, a postwar wrestling legend in Japan who hailed from an area that is now part of North Korea. The televised bout garnered an incredibly high 64 percent rating and sparked an unprecedented wrestling boom in Japan.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Beyer taught physical education in Akron, New York, and promoted exchanges between young Japanese and American wrestlers.

Beyer said he hopes to visit Japan for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and while there spend some time teaching amateur Japanese wrestlers.KYODO NEWS - Feb 5, 2018 - 14:23 | Sports, World, All, News

North Korea's ceremonial leader Kim Yong Nam will head a delegation of three high-level officials and an 18-member entourage for the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics starting later this week, South Korea's Unification Ministry has said.

The ministry's Sunday night announcement was followed by a report by the North's official Korean Central News Agency on Monday morning that a high-level delegation led by Kim, president of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly, will "soon visit" South Korea to attend Friday's Olympic opening ceremony.

A source close to the South Korean presidential office said Seoul is studying whether President Moon Jae In should hold a meeting with Kim. The North Korean delegation will visit the South for three days from Friday, according to the ministry.

A South Korean presidential spokesman told reporters on Monday that South Korea welcomes the delegation's visit, saying Kim will be the highest-level North Korean official ever to visit South Korea.

Kim's planned visit to the South reflects North Korea's "resolve for an improvement of relations between the South and the North and a successful hosting of the Olympics, and has shown a serious and sincere attitude," spokesman Kim Eui Kyeom said.

South Korea is ready to greet the North Korean delegation "in a warm and earnest manner" and will prepare for various opportunities of communication with the North Koreans, including high-level governmental talks, Kim Eui Kyeom said.

Yonhap News Agency, quoting experts, said North Korea seems to want to break its diplomatic isolation by sending its ceremonial leader to the Feb. 9-25 games, where global leaders, including U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, will gather.

With the North failing to have informed the South of details of other delegation members, attention in the South is focused on whether Choe Ryong Hae, Pyongyang's de facto No. 2 official and a vice chairman of the North Korean ruling party's central committee, or other high-ranking officials will be included in the delegation, according to Yonhap.

In a related development, the Unification Ministry said Monday that the North has proposed sending an art troupe to South Korea this week on a cargo and passenger ship for performances to mark the Winter Olympics.

Ministry spokesman Baik Tae Hyun told reporters North Korea notified the South on Sunday that it plans to send the 140-member Samjiyon art troupe on the Mangyongbong-92 on Tuesday and use it as accommodation for the group.

While the South has banned North Korean ships from entering South Korean ports under its sanctions against the North over its nuclear and missile programs, the spokesman said the South is considering making an exception for the Olympics.

He added South Korea will also hold consultations with the United States and other countries to make the North Korean ship's entry not subject to U.N. sanctions imposed on North Korea.

The two Koreas have agreed on the art troupe's performances in South Korea to celebrate the Winter Games.

An advance team to do preparatory work for the art troupe's performances is scheduled to arrive in South Korea via a western land route on Monday, Baik said.

North and South Korea held their first official talks in more than two years last month after the North's leader, Kim Jong Un, struck a conciliatory note on relations with the South in his New Year's address.

North Korea has since agreed to send athletes, a cheering squad, a taekwondo demonstration team, an art troupe and high-ranking officials to the South.

At the games, North and South Korea will march together under one flag in the opening ceremony and field a unified women's ice hockey team.KYODO NEWS - Feb 4, 2018 - 09:01 | All, World

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will ask the United States and South Korea to conduct a planned joint military drill after the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics without scaling it down so as to keep pressuring North Korea to give up its nuclear and missile development, a Japanese government source said Saturday.

The matter will be discussed when U.S. Vice President Mike Pence meets with Abe in Tokyo before heading to the opening ceremony of the Olympics, and they are expected to agree on the need to conduct the drill as normal, the source said.

Abe and Pence will convey their shared view to South Korean President Moon Jae In when they hold talks in Pyeongchang, according to the source.

The United States and South Korea have agreed to delay annual joint military exercises until after the Feb. 9 to 25 games and the March 9 to 18 Winter Paralympics in South Korea.

North Korea, which plans to send athletes, cheerleaders and officials to the Olympics, has opposed the drills, describing them as preparations for invasion.

Signs of easing tensions have emerged on the peninsula since North Korean leader Kim Jong Un struck a conciliatory note on relations with South Korea in his New Year's address amid tensions over Pyongyang's continued development of nuclear and ballistic weapons.

Abe has been calling on the international community to maximize pressure on Pyongyang and reject dialogues unless the reclusive state ends provocations and shows actions toward denuclearization.KYODO NEWS - Feb 5, 2018 - 00:13 | All, Japan

An independent newcomer backed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government defeated the anti-U.S. base incumbent in the Nago mayoral election Sunday, an outcome which could give impetus to the central government's controversial plan to transfer an air base to the southern Japan city.

Taketoyo Toguchi's victory in a two-man race against Susumu Inamine is also expected to deliver a blow to the anti-base campaign of Okinawa Gov. Takeshi Onaga whose term will expire in late 2018.

Toguchi, a 56-year-old former Nago city assembly member known to be supportive of the base transfer, sought to divert voters' attention from the base issue and promised measures to spur the sluggish local economy during the election campaign.

On the base transfer issue, Toguchi told reporters after the election he will "closely monitor" the progress of a lawsuit Okinawa Prefecture has filed against the central government to block the U.S. base relocation.

A senior lawmaker of Abe's Liberal Democratic Party said voters apparently welcomed Toguchi's pledge to focus on improving the local economy.

"We have gained momentum toward the Okinawa gubernatorial election later this year," the lawmaker said.

The latest election is seen as a prelude to the Okinawa gubernatorial election, a crucial test for Onaga who was elected in November 2014 on a platform of opposing the plan to relocate U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma.

Inamine, 72, also an independent, has campaigned against the Futenma transfer to a coastal area of Nago from another part of the island prefecture, gaining support from the Okinawa governor and most opposition parties.

Inamine told reporters he did his best in drawing voters' attention to the problem of allowing the base construction, but Toguchi "evaded the issue."

Onaga, who monitored the progress of vote counting with Inamine's supporters, did not clearly say how the election outcome would affect his stance on the base issue.

"I would like to consult (people concerned)," he said without elaborating on his plan for the gubernatorial election.

Takashi Shinohara, the head of the election campaign committee at the Democratic Party which backed Inamine, said the party takes the outcome seriously and will "use the experience for the future."

Toguchi garnered 20,389 votes while Inamine gained 16,931, according to the local election committee. Turnout was 76.92 percent, up slightly from 76.71 percent in the 2014 election.

Okinawa hosts the bulk of U.S. military facilities. Accidents involving U.S. military aircraft and crimes involving U.S. personnel have angered Okinawa residents, but gaining more economic support from the central government has also been a key issue in local elections in the prefecture.

Onaga has resorted to various measures, including legal actions, to stop the central government from transferring the Futenma base from a crowded residential area of Ginowan to the less populated Henoko coastal area of Nago. The move has slowed progress, but construction work to build a new facility in the Henoko area is now under way.

People in Nago have been divided over the issue, with some tired of the continuing clashes between the central and local governments, which have left the issue stalled.

Experts say Toguchi's win reflects voters' high expectations for measures to prop up the local economy and does not necessarily suggest that more Nago residents are willing to accept the base transfer.

It is the sixth mayoral election for Nago citizens since Henoko emerged as the destination for the relocation after the Japanese and U.S. governments agreed on the return of the land for the Futenma base in 1996. Inamine is serving his second four-year term as mayor.

The central government has maintained that the current relocation plan is "the only solution" for removing the dangers posed by the Futenma base, which is situated close to schools and homes, without undermining the perceived deterrence provided by American troops under the Japan-U.S. alliance.Recent undervalued companies based on their current market price include Stamford Land and Pacific Century Regional Developments. Smart investors can make money from this discrepancy by buying these shares, because they believe the current market prices will eventually move towards their true value. If youre looking for capital gains in your next investment, I suggest you take a look at my list of potentially undervalued stocks.

Stamford Land Corporation Ltd (SGX:H07)

Stamford Land Corporation Ltd, an investment holding company, owns, operates, and manages luxury hotels in Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand. Stamford Land was formed in 1935 and with the companys market capitalisation at SGD SGD445.01M, we can put it in the small-cap stocks category.

H07s shares are currently hovering at around -58% beneath its intrinsic value of $1.22, at a price of $0.52, based on my discounted cash flow model. This price and value mismatch indicates a potential opportunity to buy the stock at a low price. Also, H07s PE ratio is trading at 10.8x while its hospitality peer level trades at 27x, meaning that relative to its comparable set of companies, you can buy H07s shares at a cheaper price. H07 is also strong financially, with current assets covering liabilities in the near term and over the long run. Its debt-to-equity ratio of 61% has been diminishing for the last couple of years signalling H07s capacity to reduce its debt obligations year on year. More on Stamford Land here.

SGX:H07 PE PEG Gauge Feb 4th 18

Pacific Century Regional Developments Limited (SGX:P15)

Pacific Century Regional Developments Limited, an investment holding company, provides business management and consultancy services primarily in Singapore, Hong Kong, and India. Pacific Century Regional Developments was founded in 1963 and with the companys market capitalisation at SGD SGD980.40M, we can put it in the small-cap group.

P15s shares are now trading at -36% lower than its real value of $0.58, at the market price of $0.37, based on my discounted cash flow model. This price and value mismatch indicates a potential opportunity to buy the stock at a low price. Whats even more appeal is that P15s PE ratio is trading at around 9.1x while its diversified financial peer level trades at 18.1x, implying that relative to its competitors, P15s shares can be purchased for a lower price. P15 is also in great financial shape, with short-term assets covering liabilities in the near future as well as in the long run.

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More detail on Pacific Century Regional Developments here.

SGX:P15 PE PEG Gauge Feb 4th 18

Tai Sin Electric Limited (SGX:500)

Tai Sin Electric Limited, together with its subsidiaries, designs, develops, manufactures, and trades in cable and wire products. Started in 1980, and run by CEO Boon Hock Lim, the company now has 1,000 employees and with the companys market cap sitting at SGD SGD178.56M, it falls under the small-cap category.

500s stock is now floating at around -26% beneath its intrinsic level of $0.55, at a price tag of $0.41, based on its expected future cash flows. The mismatch signals a potential chance to invest in 500 at a discounted price. Also, 500s PE ratio is currently around 10.8x while its electrical peer level trades at 20.8x, suggesting that relative to its peers, you can purchase 500s stock for a lower price right now. 500 is also in good financial health, as current assets can cover liabilities in the near term and over the long run. The stocks debt-to equity ratio of 9% has been dropping over the past couple of years indicating 500s ability to pay down its debt. Dig deeper into Tai Sin Electric here.

SGX:500 PE PEG Gauge Feb 4th 18

For more financially sound, undervalued companies to add to your portfolio, you can use our free platform to explore our interactive list of undervalued stocks.

To help readers see pass the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price sensitive company announcements.



The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned.The markets are in the red going into the weekend, with investors wary ahead of next weeks testimony to Congress that will likely lead to a shift in the U.S regulatory landscape, which will probably be adopted by other key jurisdictions.

It was another tough week for Bitcoin, with the cryptomarket continuing to unravel through to Fridays close.

Investor sentiment has been knocked though the last few weeks, as market concern over the prospect of a material shift in government and regulator sentiment towards the cryptomarkets pulled the cryptos deep into the red.

For the week, Bitcoin slid 24.93% from Mondays opening $11,685.58 to Fridays $8,771.91 close, with the only good news for the market being Bitcoins recovery from a week low $7,625.25 hit midway through Fridays session.

Through the week, negative news included both the Chairman of the SEC and CFTC being called to give testimony to the Senate on Tuesday.

For prospective Bitcoin investors, news of a widening ban on the use of credit cards to purchase cryptocurrencies on the exchanges has also hit hard, with JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America announcing that they will ban the purchase of Cryptocurrencies starting from the weekend.

The news follows the ban by South Korean banks earlier in the month and, with investors having been hit with heavy losses this month, raising concerns amongst the larger banks that credit card defaults could see an increase should the cryptomarkets continue to slide. Banks have also raised concerns over credit card and identity theft supporting the purchase of cryptocurrencies.

The latest move makes it all the more challenging for investors to gain access to the cryptomarkets, with credit card purchases being among the most efficient ways in which to purchase cryptocurrencies to date.

Banks have yet to ban the use of debit cards, while Citibank is also reportedly reviewing its credit card policy.

Get Into Cryptocurrency Trading Today

The moves by the larger banks were certainly expected and we will likely see other banks follow suit in the coming weeks, with banks not only concerned with credit risk, but also wanting to avoid falling foul of regulators that have been heavy handed on financial institutions since the Global Financial Crisis.

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Following a 2.65% fall on Friday, the markets looked to have steadied through the early part of the weekend, with Bitcoin recovering from an intraday low $8,170.71 to sit at $8,641.55, a 2.23% fall for the day.

For the day rest of the weekend, with Cboe Bitcoin Futures February contract closing out the week at $8,520, any material upside will likely be limited, with the only positive for investors through the weekend being an end to the slide seen through the last week.

The cryptomarket landscape is about to change and if regulators have their way, the level of oversight will be along similar lines to the more mature asset classes, which will ultimately push out the dirty money and criminal activity associated with the cryptocurrencies and exchanges.

Talks of Bitcoin having bottomed out at current levels may be a little premature however, with Tuesdays testimony the next step in the cryptomarket road to mainstream, with the markets likely to go through a Darwinism period of the survival of the fittest.

While Bitcoins dominance has picked up through the week, now sitting at 35.2%, we will expect the dominance to ease as the markets find some stability, with Bitcoins transaction times and fees a continued concern for Bitcoins future prospects.

Buy & Sell Cryptocurrency Instantly

This article was originally posted on FX Empire

More From FXEMPIRE:Looking to add potential meaningful upside to your portfolio, but unsure where to start? Stocks such as China Everbright Greentech and HKBN are considered to be high growth in terms of how much theyre expected to earn and return to shareholders, according to the market. Below Ive put together a list of great potential investments for you to consider adding to your portfolio if growth is a dimension you would like to firm up.

China Everbright Greentech Limited (SEHK:1257)

China Everbright Greentech Limited owns and operates biomass power generation facility. Established in 2006, and now run by Xiaodong Qian, the company provides employment to 1,500 people and with the companys market cap sitting at HKD HK$14.83B, it falls under the large-cap group.

1257s projected future profit growth is a robust 23.80%, with an underlying 97.32% growth from its revenues expected over the upcoming years. An affirming signal is when net income increase is supported by top-line growth. Since net income isnt artificially inflated by one-off initiatives such as cost-cutting, we know this profit growth is more likely to be sustainable. This prospective profitability should trickle down to shareholders, with analysts expecting the company to generate a positive return on equity of 14.50%. 1257 ticks the boxes for high-growth generation on all levels of line items, which makes it an appealing stock to dig into deeper. Thinking of investing in 1257? I recommend researching its fundamentals here.

SEHK:1257 Future Profit Feb 3rd 18

HKBN Ltd. provides telecommunication services to residential and enterprise markets in Hong Kong. Formed in 1992, and currently headed by CEO Chu Kwong Yeung, the company currently employs 2,888 people and with the market cap of HKD HK$9.90B, it falls under the mid-cap stocks category.

1310 is expected to deliver an extremely high earnings growth over the next couple of years of 32.81%, driven by a positive double-digit revenue growth of 28.43% and cost-cutting initiatives. It appears that 1310s profitability may be sustainable as the fundamental push is top-line expansion rather than unmaintainable cost-cutting activities. We see this bottom-line expansion directly benefiting shareholders, with expected return on equity coming in at a notable 73.29%. 1310s impressive outlook on all aspects makes it a worthy company to spend more time to understand. Interested to learn more about 1310? Take a look at its other fundamentals here.

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SEHK:1310 Future Profit Feb 3rd 18

AAG Energy Holdings Limited (SEHK:2686)

AAG Energy Holdings Limited engages in the exploration, development, production, and sale of coalbed methane in the Peoples Republic of China. Formed in 1994, and now run by Jing Li, the company currently employs 673 people and with the companys market cap sitting at HKD HK$3.90B, it falls under the mid-cap group.

Driven by exceptional sales, which is expected to more than double over the next few years, 2686 is expected to deliver an excellent earnings growth of 75.34%. An affirming signal is when net income increase is supported by top-line growth. Since net income isnt artificially inflated by one-off initiatives such as cost-cutting, we know this profit growth is more likely to be sustainable. We see this bottom-line expansion directly benefiting shareholders, with expected positive return on equity of 12.05%. 2686 ticks the boxes for high-growth generation on all levels of line items, which makes it an appealing stock to dig into deeper. Interested to learn more about 2686? I recommend researching its fundamentals here.

SEHK:2686 Future Profit Feb 3rd 18

For more financially robust companies with high growth potential to enhance your portfolio, use our free platform to explore our interactive list of these stocks.

To help readers see pass the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price sensitive company announcements.



The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned.As Newsweek reported, photos appearing on Twitter suggest China is currently testing a ship-mounted hypersonic railgun. Also known as an electromagnetic railgun, the superweapon has been pursued by various nationsincluding the United Statesbut never known to be fully tested and deployed.

In the way that cannons use gunpowder to launch a projectile, railguns use electromagnetic energy, essentially giving them the speed of a cannon with the range of a missile, according to Popular Science. The rail part refers to the weapon utilizing two rails with a powerful electromagnetic field generated in between. The guns armature, meaning an electricity-conducting device made out of metal, shoots the projectile out through the field between the two rails, according to Popular Mechanics.

Trending: North Korea Violated U.N. Sanctions To Earn $200 Million from Prohibited Exports, Report Finds

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The nature of the photos hadnt been officially confirmed as of press time, but they appear to show the Chinese naval ship Haiyang Shan docked in Wuhan, the capital of Chinas Hubei province. China has been quietly moving its railgun technology forward for some time now, according to a separate report by Popular Science. Such a weapon would have the potential to shoot aircraft and missiles out of the sky, so the prospect of another country beating us to the punch has captured a lot of attention since the images began to circulate.

There isnt really a known defense mechanism against a railgun shot at high Mach numbers, Justin Bronk, a combat technology researcher at the Royal United Services Institute in the United Kingdom, told New Scientist. Its too fast and too small for current anti-ship missile and anti-aircraft defense systems....If they can get it integrated as a major component into their future fleet arsenal, it will give them a really significant edge over the U.S. Navy."

Don't miss: Joe Scarborough Says Trump Is 'Scared To Death' Of Investigation By Mueller Who Will 'Outwit' Him

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The United States Navy has been developing its own railgun technology for almost a decade now, according to New Scientist. While the U.S. system would be land based, as opposed to mounted on a Navy landing craft as the Chinese railgun appears to be, its a formidable weapon nonetheless.

The U.S. Navys railgun can fire a projectile at a speed of more than 4,500 miles per hour, which corresponds roughly to Mach 6. Its goal is to exceed a projectile range of 100 miles, which would mean that, power-wise, each shot would expend the same amount of energy needed to power about 19,000 homes, according to Popular Mechanics.

While the Navy has a working prototype, plans to install such a prototype on a U.S. naval ship in 2016 were ultimately put on hold due to lack of funding, and have remained more or less stalled since then, according to Popular Science. The U.S. government had poured $500 billion into the project.

This article was first written by Newsweek

More from NewsweekThe Clorox Company CLX posted robust second-quarter fiscal 2018 earnings per share which beat estimates, while revenues lagged the same. Notably, earnings marked the fifth straight quarterly beat, while sales missed estimates for after two consecutive beats.



Q2 Highlights



Quarterly earnings from continuing operations of $1.77 per share jumped 55% year over year and surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.22. Results primarily gained from solid sales and lower effective tax rate, offset by fall in gross margin.

Clorox Company (The) Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise

Clorox Company (The) Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise | Clorox Company (The) Quote

Net sales of $1,416 million advanced nearly 0.7% year over year, but lagged the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1,430 million. The top-line growth was driven by improvement across the International, Lifestyle and Cleaning segments, backed by increased prices. This was partly offset by unfavorable mix.



Clorox witnessed significant pressure on gross margin, which contracted 170 basis points (bps) to 43% in the quarter. Lower margins can be attributed to elevated input costs associated with commodities and further contraction of the transportation market. Additionally, results were hurt by strategic investments in growth and cost savings initiatives, slightly mitigated by benefits of cost savings.



Revenue by Segment



Sales in the Cleaning segment improved 1% to $472 million, mainly driven by strength in Home Care with higher shipments of Clorox disinfecting wipes, along with the launch of Scentiva branded products. This was partly offset by fall in Professional Products business, particularly due to the sale of Aplicare business in August 2017 and unfavorable mix within the segment.



Household sales declined 3% to $410 million due to lower volumes in the Bags & Wraps, Cat Litter and Charcoal businesses, partly negated by double-digit gains in the Digestive Health business due to strength in the e-commerce channel.



Sales at the Lifestyle segment improved 3% to $268 million driven by strength in Water Filtration, which witnessed double-digit volume growth, alongside the launch new Brita Long Last filters and Brita Stream pitchers. Top-line growth also reflected the benefits of improved sales in the Natural Personal Care business.



In the International business segment, sales grew 4% to $266 million on the back of improved pricing. Volumes remained flat as gains in Canada were offset by decline in certain Asian and Latin American countries.



Financials



Clorox ended the quarter with cash and cash equivalents of $489 million, and long-term debt of $1,788 million. In first six months of fiscal 2018, the company generated $322 million of net cash from continuing operations.



Looking Ahead



Following the second-quarter results, the company reiterated sales guidance for fiscal 2018, while it raised the earnings per share view to include the benefits of the new tax reform.



The company continues to expect fiscal 2018 sales growth in a range of 1-3%. The guidance includes nearly 1 percentage point reduction in the fiscal year related to the Aplicare divestiture. It also reflects an estimated 3 percentage point gain from product innovation.



Gross margin is now estimated to decline modestly due to elevated input costs associated with commodities and tightening of the transportation market. This compares with the earlier guidance of being down slightly.



The company now envisions effective tax rate of 23-24% for fiscal 2018 compared with 32-33% guided earlier. In the long term, the company expects effective tax rate in the mid-20s range.



Consequently, the company now anticipates fiscal 2018 earnings from continuing operations to range from $6.17-$6.37 per share, up from the previous guidance of $5.47-$5.67 per share. The company expects fiscal 2018 earnings per share to include 70-75 cents per share gain from the new tax reform, which will be partly offset by lower gross margin.



Clorox currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Shares of Clorox increased 9.5% in the last three months, outperforming the industrys growth of 1.5%.

Story continues





Interested in Consumer Staples Space? Check these 3 Hot Picks



Better-ranked stocks in the consumer staples sector include The Boston Beer Co. Inc. SAM, Service Corporation International SCI and Ollie's Bargain Outlet Holdings Inc. OLLI, all sporting a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.



Boston Beer, with long-term EPS growth rate of 5%, has increased 10% in the last three months.



Service Corporation has increased 11.9% in the last three months. Moreover, the company has a long-term earnings growth rate of 11.6%.



Ollie's Bargain, with long-term EPS growth rate of 23.5%, has grown 24.2% in last three months.



Breaking News: Cryptocurrencies Now Bigger than Visa



The total market cap of all cryptos recently surpassed $700 billion  more than a 3,800% increase in the previous 12 months. Theyre now bigger than Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and even Visa! The new asset class may expand even more rapidly in 2018 as new investors continue pouring in and Wall Street becomes increasingly involved.



Zacks has just named 4 companies that enable investors to take advantage of the explosive growth of cryptocurrencies via the stock market.



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To read this article on Zacks.com click here.Some early buyers of Teslas electric Semi freight truck will collaborate with the automaker to build their own charging stations, according to a new report.

Anheuser-Busch, PepsiCo, and United Parcel Service will build private charging stations on their own sites, Reuters reported Friday, in partnerships with Tesla whose terms are still being negotiated.

Though details are still scarce, the arrangements seem to make imminent sense from Teslas perspective. The Semi, announced in November of last year, will have different charging needs than Teslas cars, both in terms of power and space. That means the company needs a new, parallel charging network to service them. But its facing down a cash crunch, making this a bad time to commit to a nationwide or even regional network buildout.

Get Data Sheet, Fortunes technology newsletter.

But many of the Semis early adopters are short-haul operators, and told Reuters they will use the Semi to deliver loads along shorter, likely relatively fixed routes. That makes the commitment to building their own infrastructure sensible  especially since some of the companies also said they might consider opening the facilities to other users in the future. That could make these private stations anchors in the network of Megachargers Tesla will need to build to make its truck viable for smaller customers and over longer distances.

Tesla has said Semi deliveries will begin in late 2019.A logo of Exxon Mobil is displayed on a monitor above the floor of the New York Stock Exchange shortly after the opening bell in New York, U.S., December 5, 2017. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

By Ernest Scheyder

HOUSTON (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N), the world's largest publicly-traded oil producer, posted a lower-than-expected quarterly profit on Friday due to falling production and weakness in its chemical and refining operations, sending shares down 2.8 percent in premarket trading.

The rare earnings miss from Exxon comes as the company tries to bolster reserves around the world while also cementing its position as one of the largest producers of oil and natural gas in the United States.

Even though oil prices have jumped from last year's lows, helping Exxon's production operations, the company's refining and chemical arms struggled in the quarter, especially outside the United States.

Irving, Texas-based Exxon said earlier this week it would triple its Permian shale production to about 600,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day by 2025, part of a plan to invest $50 billion in the United States thanks to tax reform signed by U.S. President Donald Trump.[nL2N1PP1LV] [nL2N1PO1N4]

"The impact of tax reform on our earnings reflects the magnitude of our historic investment in the U.S. and strengthens our commitment to further grow our business here," Chief Executive Darren Woods said in a statement.

Exxon posted fourth-quarter net income of $8.4 billion, or $1.97 per share, compared to $1.7 billion, or 41 cents per share, in the year-ago quarter.

The company saw a $5.9-billion non-cash benefit related to recent U.S. tax reform to revalue deferred taxes. Without the tax reform accounting changes, Exxon would have lost money in the United States.

Excluding that tax change and other one-time items, Exxon earned 88 cents per share. By that measure, analysts expected earnings of $1.04 per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Production fell 3 percent to 4 million barrels of oil equivalent per day, with the only output gains in the company's portfolio coming from the United States.

Throughput at the company's refineries - a measurement of how much volume they processed - fell 4 percent.

Exxon is slated to hold its annual investor day on March 7 in New York.

(Reporting by Ernest Scheyder; Editing by Nick Zieminski)By Ernest Scheyder HOUSTON (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp said on Friday that it expects global oil demand to drop sharply by 2040 if regulations aimed at limiting the impact of greenhouse gas emissions on climate are fully implemented. Under this scenario, Exxon projected world oil consumption will drop 0.4 percent annually to 2040 to about 78 million barrels per day (bpd). That is about 25 percent below current levels, which the U.S. Energy Information Administration puts at 98 million bpd. The findings were contained in a report produced after Exxon's shareholders supported a climate-impact resolution last year and Exxon's board approved a plan to analyze the effects. Exxon's climate-impact report comes roughly three years after almost 200 nations met in Paris to set a goal of limiting the rise in the world's average surface temperatures. President Donald Trump has since pulled the United States out of the Paris climate accord, and it was unclear whether Paris accord policies would be fully implemented around the world. The study added weight to arguments that laws and regulations to limit the rise in global temperatures to below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) from pre-industrial levels will succeed in curbing fossil fuel consumption. But Exxon stopped short of laying out how efforts to limit carbon emissions could impact its business, data long sought by some shareholders. In a separate report published on Friday that did not take into account climate legislation, Exxon forecast population growth will drive oil demand higher by about 20 percent by 2040. Exxon's study saw demand for natural gas, considered a cleaner-burning fuel than oil, growing 0.5 percent per year to about 445 billion cubic feet per day under the same scenario. Demand for power generated by solar panels, wind turbines and other renewable sources is expected to rise 4.5 percent annually through 2040 under this scenario, Exxon said. The report followed years of pressure by investors and environmental activists urging the company to describe the potential impact of a warming climate on its operations. Last year, their climate-impact resolution was backed by 62 percent of shares voted at Exxon's annual meeting. The report came the same day that Exxon posted quarterly results that disappointed Wall Street, sending its shares down more than 5 percent. While sponsors of the shareholder resolution applauded Exxon on Friday for being more transparent than in years past, there was still frustration that the company did not disclose how climate policies would affect its finances. "That is the meat that we're missing in the sandwich here," said Tracey Rembert of Christian Brothers Investment Services, a co-sponsor of the climate-impact resolution. A spokesman for New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, who oversees state pension funds and was a resolution sponsor, said via e-mail: "We are looking at Exxon's report closely and look forward to discussing it with the company in the coming days." SECOND REPORT Exxon on Friday also published its annual outlook for energy demand. In that report, the company does not take into account a scenario to limit temperature rise and projects energy supply and demand rising for the foreseeable future. The report said global carbon dioxide emissions are likely to peak by 2040, at about 10 percent above 2016 levels, as consumption shifts to lower-emission natural gas, renewables and nuclear. "It's a dual challenge  we need to meet society's growing need for energy while addressing the risks of climate change," Exxon Chief Executive Darren Woods said in a press release. (Reporting by Ernest Scheyder; Additional reporting by Ross Kerber in Boston; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)ExxonMobil Corporation XOM posted lower-than-expected results in fourth-quarter 2017, thanks to lower refinery throughput. This was partially offset by higher liquid price realizations.

The company reported adjusted earnings of 88 cents per share, which missed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.06. Also, the bottom line fell from the year-ago quarter level of 90 cents.

Total revenues in the quarter increased to $66,515 million from $56,399 million a year ago. However, the top line failed to beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $74,444 million.

Operational Performance

Upstream: Quarterly earnings  excluding U.S. tax reform and impairments  were $2.5 billion, reflecting an improvement of $1 billion from the year-ago quarter. Increased price realizations from liquids drove the upside.

Production averaged 3.991 million barrels of oil-equivalent per day (MMBOE/d), lower than 4.121 MMBOE/d in the year-ago quarter.

Liquid production fell year over year to 2.251 million barrels per day. However, natural gas production was 10.441 MMCF/d (millions of cubic feet per day), up from 10.424 MMCF/d in the year-ago period.

Downstream: The segment recorded profits  excluding U.S. tax reform and impairments  of $952 million. The figure is $289 million lower than the October-December quarter of 2016. Last year, the segment reported higher profit owing to proceeds from the sale of the retail unit in Canada.

ExxonMobil's refinery throughput averaged 4.2 million barrels per day (MMB/D), down almost 5% from the year-earlier level.

Chemical: After excluding U.S. tax reform, this unit contributed saw a $63-million rise in earnings from the prior-year quarter.

Financials

During the quarter under review, ExxonMobil generated cash flow of $8.8 billion from operations and asset divestments. The energy giant returned $3.3 billion to shareholders through dividends. Capital and exploration spending surged more than 100% year over year to almost $7.6 billion.

Story continues

Q4 Price Performance

In fourth-quarter 2017, ExxonMobil gained 2% compared with the industrys 6.6% rally.

Key Development

On Jan 30, ExxonMobil announced its intention to boost production from Permian Basin in West Texas and New Mexico. The company is willing to produce more than 600,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day within 2025 from the basin.

Over the long term, ExxonMobil is expected to allocate as much as $2 billion for developing midstream infrastructure related to transportation activities. This development will support the companys operations in the Permian Basin.

Zacks Rank & Key Picks

ExxonMobil has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). A few better-ranked players in the energy sector are Statoil ASA STO, Pioneer Natural Resources Company PXD and Cabot Oil & Gas COG. All these stocks sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Headquartered in Stavanger, Norway, Statoil is a major international integrated energy player. The company is expected to witness year-over-year earnings growth of 17.1% for 2018.

Headquartered in Irving, TX, Pioneer Natural Resources is an upstream energy firm. The company delivered an average positive earnings surprise of 67.6% for the preceding four quarters.

Headquartered in Houston, TX, Cabot is also an upstream energy company. The firm will likely see year-over-year earnings growth of 128.4% in 2018.

Breaking News: Cryptocurrencies Now Bigger than Visa

The total market cap of all cryptos recently surpassed $700 billion  more than a 3,800% increase in the previous 12 months. Theyre now bigger than Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and even Visa! The new asset class may expand even more rapidly in 2018 as new investors continue pouring in and Wall Street becomes increasingly involved.

Zacks has just named 4 companies that enable investors to take advantage of the explosive growth of cryptocurrencies via the stock market.

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Zacks Investment ResearchJ.P. Morgan Chase (JPM), Bank of America (BAC) and Citigroup said Friday they are no longer allowing customers to buy cryptocurrencies using credit cards.

"At this time, we are not processing cryptocurrency purchases using credit cards, due to the volatility and risk involved," a J.P. Morgan Chase spokesperson said in a statement to CNBC. "We will review the issue as the market evolves."

The news came as bitcoin (Exchange:BTC.CB=) has more than halved in value from an all-time high above $19,000 hit in mid-December. The high-flying digital currency had rallied 2,000 percent in just 12 months to reach that record. But bitcoin has tumbled in the last few weeks, briefly falling below $8,000 Friday for the first time since late November. Other cryptocurrencies have also fallen in the last few weeks after soaring, sometimes even far more than bitcoin, last year.

A Bank of America spokesperson also said in an email that the bank has decided to decline credit card purchases of cryptocurrencies. Citigroup said in a statement that it has "made the decision to no longer permit credit card purchases of cryptocurrency. We will continue to review our policy as this market evolves." Just last week, Chase said it was allowing customers to buy cryptocurrencies with its credit cards, while Bank of America and Citigroup said they were reviewing policies that allow customers to buy bitcoin with credit cards.

Earlier in January, Capital One Financial (COF) said it has decided to ban cryptocurrency purchases with its cards. Discover Financial Services (DFS) has effectively prohibited cryptocurrency purchases with its credit cards since 2015. Several major retail-facing companies have made it easier for consumers to buy bitcoin in the last few months.

On Wednesday, Jack Dorsey's payments company Square (SQ) announced that most users of its Cash app can now trade bitcoin. Meanwhile, stock trading app Robinhood is rolling out bitcoin and ethereum trading this month in five states. Coinbase, the leading U.S. marketplace for buying major cryptocurrencies, announced in mid-October it was rolling out instant purchases of up to $25,000 worth of bitcoin, ethereum (Exchange:ETH.CB=) and litecoin (Exchange:LTC.CB=) from U.S. bank accounts.



More From CNBCFeb 4 (Reuters) - An Amtrak train traveling in South Carolina collided with a CSX freight train on Sunday, killing two people and injuring at least 50, CNN and other media reported.

The train with 139 passengers and eight crew members was traveling between New York and Miami when it hit the other train and derailed near Columbia, South Carolina, Amtrak officials told local media.

The collision happened about 2.30 A.M. (0730 GMT), according to local media. (Reporting by Rich McKay; Editing by Adrian Croft)NEW DELHI, Feb 3 (Reuters) - Benchmark palm oil prices in Malaysia are expected to trade between 2,500-2,700 ringgit ($644-$695) per tonne until August, leading vegetable oils analyst Dorab Mistry told an industry conference in New Delhi on Saturday.

Malaysia's 2018 palm oil output was likely to be at 21 million tonnes, Mistry added in his video address at the conference. ($1 = 3.8850 ringgit) (Reporting by Mayank Bhardwaj; Editing by Himani Sarkar)Meghan Markle

Ben Birchall - WPA Pool/Getty Images

Meghan Markle will become a member of the British royal family, which commands a fortune over $500 million, on May 19.

Markle will remain a US citizen for at least five years and will still have to pay taxes to the IRS on any income earned.

If Markle accepts an allowance or other form of "income" in the UK exceeding $104,100, she will have to pay US taxes on that money.

Meghan Markle will soon become the newest member of the British royal family, which commands a fortune over $500 million. But romping in their riches may cost her extra.

Markle and Prince Harry will wed on May 19 at St. George's Chapel in Windsor and begin a carriage procession immediately after the ceremony. Though Markle will likely obtain the title of Duchess, she won't become a UK citizen for years.

As the Washington Post first reported back in November, Markle could "cause tax headaches" and create some "mundane hurdles" for the royal family.

Markle is a citizen of the United States and is purportedly living in the UK on a family visa, according to the BBC. As the fiancee of a British citizen  Prince Harry  Markle will have to marry within six months of obtaining the visa to maintain her status.

Markle's family visa will be effective in 2.5-year increments and she won't be granted permanent residency until she's lived in the UK for five years. After that, she can finally apply for UK citizenship and potentially become a dual citizen of the US and the UK.

If she becomes a dual US/UK citizen, Markle will have to continue filing her taxes each year with the IRS. If she has more than $300,000 in assets at any point during the year, she will have to file a specific form that details foreign assets, which could include foreign trusts, subjecting the royal family "to outside scrutiny," according to the Post.

All the while, the "Suits" actress will be paying taxes to the IRS on any income she makes  regardless of where she earns it.

Story continues

"US citizens, green card holders, and permanent residents are required to file tax returns with the IRS every year no matter where they reside," Avani Ramnani, director of financial planning and wealth management at Francis Financial, told Business Insider.

"This is a special tax return called the expatriate tax return," she said. "US citizens, including Meghan Markle, get taxed on international income earned outside the US."

But Markle may qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion, Ramnani said, which in 2018 waives taxes on the first $104,100 of income earned in the residing country. But that doesn't include income from investments.

Meghan Markle Prince Harry

AP Photo/Matt Dunham

Since the age of 21, Prince Harry and Prince William have been receiving a $450,000 a year investment profit from their late mother's estate, which they pay taxes on to the UK government. They, and Kate Middleton, also receive an annual seven-figure allowance from their father, Prince Charles, which is used to cover expenses like travel and wardrobe.

"The key for Meghan and her advisors would be to figure out what type of income she will be getting," Ramnani said. "Will this income be from the investments of a trust, or 'wages' for any work that she does, or any other type of income? Sometimes, getting one form of income is more advantageous than another."

Markle may also qualify for a foreign tax credit, which allows tax on any income exceeding $104,100 to be reduced depending on the amount of taxes paid in the expat's country of residence. But, Ramnani said, "this credit may not be dollar-for-dollar as there are a lot of factors that come into play."

There's another US tax provision called the foreign housing exclusion, which gives the taxpayer an additional deduction or credit for living expenses abroad. It does not include "expenses that are lavish or extravagant under the circumstances."

Nottingham Cottage, the future homestead of Markle and Prince Harry, is located on the sprawling grounds of Kensington Palace, and would probably be considered lavish.

Related Video: Meghan Markle on the Responsiblity That Comes With Fame

NOW WATCH: Kate Middleton fed one of the world's last one-horned rhinos by hand

See Also:

SEE ALSO: Prince Harry poached Kate Middleton's and Prince William's communications officer to become Meghan Markle's new assistant

DON'T MISS: Meghan Markle has proved her dominance over the 'Kate effect'  and it's worth $677 millionLike many who follow and analyze the market, I like turning my analysis of current trends into predictions of what could happen in the future. In each of the past two years, I've outlined some rather bold predictions for the oil market. In both cases, I correctly called one trend, came close on a second call, and totally missed the third. What I learned from that review is that I got the macro trends right and came close to calling the price of oil but whiffed on my M&A guess.

That's leading me to refine my approach this year by focusing on the macro and oil price trends that I've been most successful at predicting and forget about calling the next M&A deal. With that background, here are my three bold predictions for the oil market this year.

The sun setting behind an oil pump.

Image source: Getty Images.

OPEC gets hooked on higher high oil prices and decides to keep cooperating

In late 2016, OPEC joined forces with several non-member nations in a coordinated effort to reduce their oil supplies by 1.8 million barrels per day for six months starting in January 2017. The partners extended that agreement a few months later and recently agreed to stick with the plan for all of 2018. While it took a while for the strategy to kick in, crude prices have been off to the races in recent months:

WTI Crude Oil Spot Price Chart

WTI Crude Oil Spot Price data by YCharts

With crude rising so sharply, some analysts believe that OPEC might end the agreement early, potentially gradually adding supplies back to the market later this year. But instead of talking about how to exit this deal, recent comments from top oil officials suggest they're thinking about continued cooperation.

"We should not limit our efforts to 2018," top Saudi oil official Khalid al-Falih told reporters earlier in January. "We need to be talking about a longer framework for cooperation." Russia seems to agree that "the world's two biggest oil producing and exporting countries can continue their cooperation for the good of the crude industry, for the good of stability," according to its energy minister, Alexander Novak.

Story continues

I think that after a few brutal years, OPEC and non-member nations like Russia will want to reap the windfall of higher oil prices for as long as they can, which is why I predict that these groups will extend their cooperation into 2019. While it might not be at the same rate, I don't see them walking away from what's working.

Shale drillers go on a buying binge, but not on what you'd expect

The rapid rise in crude prices over the past few months has been a boon to U.S. shale drillers. Many had already pushed their cost down so they could run well on $50 oil. However, with crude now in the mid-$60s, these companies are beginning to produce a gusher of cash flow.

Many analysts expect them to spend that cash on boosting output even further. However, that doesn't seem to be the plan in most cases. The early indications are that oil companies intend on sticking with their strategy to spend within the cash flow they can generate at around $50 oil this year. That means most will produce a boatload of free cash flow. For example, at $50 a barrel, Anadarko Petroleum (NYSE: APC) will generate enough cash flow to spend what's necessary to increase its oil production at a 10% to 14% annual clip over the next three years. Meanwhile, at $60 oil, it could achieve that growth rate while generating about $1 billion in free cash flow per year. While Anadarko could plow that cash into more wells, the company seems increasingly likely to return that money to shareholders through a higher dividend and additional stock repurchases.

It's not the only one, since a growing number of U.S. oil companies have decided to return excess cash to shareholders with a buyback. I believe that trend will accelerate in 2018, and I think stronger shale drillers will use the bulk of their oil-fueled windfall to buy back stock.

Drilling rig at sunset.

Image source: Getty Images.

Crude confounds expectations and touches $80 a barrel

Most analysts believe that oil prices have come too far, too fast. The International Energy Agency, for example, doesn't think 2018 will be a happy year for oil prices, expecting crude to dip in the first half of the year. The U.S. Energy Information Administration, meanwhile, forecasts that oil will be in the mid-$50s this year. The driving force behind those predictions is a view that U.S. oil producers will ramp up their drilling efforts and unleash a torrent of production that will push down oil prices.

However, as I noted in my last prediction, I don't think this will happen. As a result, the oil market should remain tightly balanced this year, which should continue nudging crude prices higher until an unexpected supply disruption sends it soaring. While it's anyone's guess which of the many potential disruptions will be the catalyst, I expect that something will drive oil to $80 this year.

Rocket fuel for oil stocks

If I'm right, this year could be an excellent one for oil stocks. That's because my view is that rising oil prices will provide producers with a gusher of cash flow that they'll use to buy back shares. If that happens, it should send their stock prices soaring. That's certainly what has happened with Anadarko since it unveiled its buyback plans in September, with shares up 35% since then, and could happen with peers that follow in its footsteps.

More From The Motley Fool

Matthew DiLallo has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.President Donald Trump has refused to rule out firing Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.

Asked in the Oval Office whether he would axe the Justice Department official, Mr Trump said with a scowl to reporters: You figure that one out.

The Presidents comment came after he approved the release of a memo alleging surveillance abuses by FBI officials investigating potential collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. The controversial document was crafted by the staff of Devin Nunes, the Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

Hours after Mr Trump spoke, a White House spokesman said there have been no discussions or considerations about firing Mr Rosenstein.

Democrats have called the four-page Nunes memo a shameful effort to discredit the FBI, the Justice Department and Special Counsel Robert Muellers probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

The premise of the Nunes memo is that the FBI and DOJ corruptly sought a [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] warrant on a former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, Carter Page, and deliberately misled the court as part of a systematic abuse of the FISA process, the Democrats said in a statement.

None of this is true, they added. The FBI had good reason to be concerned about Carter Page and would have been derelict in its responsibility to protect the country had it not sought a FISA warrant.

But Mr Trump has suggested the memo shows political bias at the FBI that tainted the investigation into his campaign. The President has repeatedly said there was no collusion between his campaign advisers and the Russian government.

A lot of people should be ashamed of themselves and much worse than that, Mr Trump told reporters at the White House.

The memo states that Mr Rosenstein signed off on at least one FISA application to surveil Mr Page.

The FBI and its director, Christopher Wray, raised issues over the memo, with the bureau issuing a rare public statement on Wednesday declaring it had grave concerns about the accuracy of the classified document.

Story continues

Since Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from all matters related to the Russia investigation, Mr Rosenstein has been overseeing the Russia probe for the Justice Department.

Last May, the Deputy Attorney General appointed Robert Mueller as special counsel to head the federal investigation after Mr Trump made the controversial move to fire FBI Director James Comey, who had been running the bureaus inquiry.

Democrats from the House and Senate sent a letter to Mr Trump on Friday warning him against using the Nunes memo as a pretext to fire Mr Rosenstein or Mr Mueller.

Firing Rod Rosenstein, DOJ (Department of Justice) leadership, or Bob Mueller could result in a constitutional crisis of the kind not seen since the Saturday night massacre, the Democrats wrote, referring to President Richard Nixons firing of the Watergate scandal special prosecutor in the 1970s.

There has already been speculation for months over whether Mr Trump would fire Mr Mueller.

Also on Friday, Mr Sessions went off-script during remarks about human trafficking to praise his deputy. He declared that Mr Rosenstein - along with Rachel Brand, the current No 3 at the Justice Department  both represent the kind of quality and leadership that we want in the department.By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON, Feb 2 (Reuters) - The U.S. Justice Department is seeking "substantial" civil fines from Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV after the government filed suit accusing the company of illegally using software that led to excess emissions in 104,000 U.S. diesel vehicles sold since 2014, a person briefed on the matter said Friday.

Bloomberg News reported Friday that the Justice Department sent Fiat Chrysler lawyers a Jan. 27 settlement offer that included requiring the company to offset excess pollution and take steps to prevent future excess emissions.

A person briefed on the matter confirmed the letter included language that a settlement "must include very substantial civil penalties."

At a discussion in Washington last week between the Justice Department and Fiat Chrysler overseen by court-appointed settlement adviser Ken Feinberg, no specific figures were discussed, two people briefed on the talks said. Another round of settlement talks is set for late this month.

Feinberg and Fiat Chrysler declined to comment.

In July, Fiat Chrysler won approval from federal and California regulators to sell 2017 model year diesel vehicles after it came under scrutiny for alleged excess emissions in older diesel models.

To resolve the excess pollution issue, Fiat Chrysler lawyer Robert Giuffra said in December at a court hearing the company remains confident it can use updated emissions software in the 2017 vehicles as the basis of a fix to address agencies concerns over 2014-2016 diesel vehicles.

The Justice Department said in December that company testing on the proposed fix began on Dec. 17 and would take about three months. The government will then have 30 days to review the results and expects to make a determination by the end of April.

Regulators have said Fiat Chrysler diesel vehicles had undisclosed emissions controls that allowed vehicles to emit excess pollution during normal driving. The company has denied wrongdoing, saying there was never an attempt to create software to cheat emissions rules.

Fiat Chryslers emissions case came after Volkswagen AGs diesel emissions scandal prompted increased industry scrutiny. (Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)A new collaboration between the University of Washington and Pacific Northwest National Lab will support the development of new materials for a wide spectrum of applications. (PNNL via YouTube)

The University of Washington and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory are joining forces on a new research venture that spans 200 miles to advance the frontiers of materials science.

The venture  known as the Northwest Institute for Materials Physics, Chemistry and Technology, or NW IMPACT  will be co-located at UWs campus in Seattle and PNNLs campus in Richland, Wash. Eventually, NW IMPACT will involve at least 20 joint UW-PNNL appointments for existing researchers, and at least 20 UW graduate students in UW-PNNL collaborations.

UW President Ana Mari Cauce and PNNL Director Steven Ashby formally launched the program on Wednesday during a ceremony at the Richland campus.

This partnership holds enormous potential for innovations in materials science that could lead to major changes in our lives and the world, said Cauce.

Ashby said the science of making new materials is vital to a wide range of advancements, many of which we have yet to imagine.

The institutes co-leaders are UW chemist David Ginger, chief scientist at the universitys Clean Energy Institute; and Jim De Yoreo, PNNLs chief scientist for materials synthesis and simulation across scales. Eventually, a permanent institute director will be hired.

NW IMPACT will provide two-year seed grants to institute-affiliated researchers in a range of focus areas, including:

Materials for energy conversion and storage , which can be applied to more efficient solar cells, batteries and power storage systems for wearable electronics, implantable medical devices and other applications.

Quantum materials , such as ultrathin semiconductors or other materials that can harness the rules of quantum mechanics at subatomic-level precision for applications in quantum computing, telecommunications and beyond.

Materials for water separation and utilization , which include processes to make water purification and ocean desalination methods faster, cheaper and more energy-efficient.

Biomimetic materials, which are synthetic materials inspired by the structures and design principles of biological molecules and materials within our cells  including proteins and DNA. These materials could be applicable in medical settings for implantable devices or tissue engineering, and for self-assembled protein-like scaffolds in industrial settings.

The deadline for receiving the first round of research proposals is Feb. 26.

Story continues

Although UW and PNNL are geographically separated, they have a long history of collaboration on programs such as PNNLs Materials Synthesis and Simulations Across Scales Initiative, the PNNL-led Battery 500 consortium and the UW-based Materials Research Science and Engineering Center.

More from GeekWire:By Lisa Baertlein

(Reuters) - Starbucks Corp <SBUX.O> has too many stores and its prices are too high, Wall Street analysts are starting to agree, as they seek to explain the company's cooling U.S. growth.

The Seattle-based chain now has more U.S. locations than McDonald's Corp <MCD.N> but it has been struggling for more than a year to lure the traffic needed to deliver the robust growth investors expect.

Executives last week warned that 2018 same-store sales growth would be at the low end of its forecast. Starbucks reported a 2 percent U.S. quarterly same-store sales gain that fell short of expectations on flat holiday traffic. Two years ago, those sales jumped 9 percent. [nL2N1PK21T]

Starbucks has offered a laundry list of reasons for the deceleration in its domestic business, including weak retail traffic, changes to its rewards program, bottlenecks from a crush of mobile orders, and holiday merchandise and drink specials that failed to "resonate" with customers.

Executives concede that Starbucks' U.S. afternoon business has dragged down results in its most important market.

Still, they say that Starbucks - which had 14,163 U.S. locations at year-end, 25 percent more than five years ago and 127 more than McDonald's - is not cannibalizing its own sales or losing share in a market crowded with coffee sellers ranging from independent cafes to fast-food chains and convenience stores.

Analysts disagree. After a recent analysis of restaurant industry trends, retail traffic and other factors, Bernstein analyst Sara Senatore solidified her view that "excess unit growth, at a time when Starbucks is reaching a more mature stage of growth, is the root cause" of the company's domestic woes.

"Rather than a litany of excuses, we believe this is best explained by overcapacity in the industry," said John Zolidis, president of Quo Vadis Capital, a Paris-based boutique research firm. "Starbucks is contributing to the problem by opening new units."

Story continues

Credit Suisse analyst Jason West said the brew of stepped-up competition combined with Starbucks' recent opening of roughly 700 U.S. stores a year, weighs on its "ability to re-accelerate growth."

Starbucks said on Friday its new cafes perform well and bring more business to all nearby coffee shops, not just its own.

Proliferation of stores is not Starbucks' only problem, according to analysts. Zolidis also sees another troubling sign: "We believe the company has raised prices too much."

Starbucks on average is increasing prices 1 to 2 percent on an annual basis, while offering discounts through its rewards program, spokesman Reggie Borges said.

Maxim Group analyst Stephen Anderson, who tracks coffee prices in 10 markets in the U.S. Northeast, including New York, Boston and Washington, said that McDonald's - now selling $1 coffee and $2 small espresso drinks - has kept prices mostly flat for the last two years.

Anderson said that Dunkin' Donuts, owned by Dunkin' Brands Group Inc <DNKN.O>, has raised prices by roughly 1 percent per year, while Starbucks has increased prices by about 3.5 percent each year. The analyst added that the rivals may be peeling off some of Starbucks' less-affluent customers.

(Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles; editing by Bill Rigby, Lisa Shumaker and Cynthia Osterman)SEATTLE, Feb. 01, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- BGIS, a leading global real estate and facility management service provider, announced today that it has acquired Critical Solutions Group and Critical Power Testing and Maintenance (CSG), a specialist provider of services for the data center market, including commissioning, design support, consulting and load bank services. Headquartered in Boston, CSG provides data center services throughout the United States, Canada and Europe to numerous clients across the financial, construction, technology, telecommunication and data services sectors.



Acquiring CSG further builds upon the success BGIS has enjoyed for over 25 years. We will continue to provide leading organizations in the telecom, financial services and government sectors with the very best facilities management services the industry has to offer. This deal is a tremendous opportunity for our clients to have access to additional scale, knowledge and expertise in critical environments, enabling continued innovation and value creation for their respective businesses, said Gord Hicks, Chief Executive Officer.

CSG is a member of the U.S. Green Building Council and offers a complete range of services for data centers of all sizes. CSGs data center services include commissioning, design support, consulting project management and load bank services. Their diverse experience in design, operation and management of data centers enables them to cover every phase of a data center through its life-cycle.

For over 10 years, CSG has proudly built a reputation for operational excellence and technical expertise within the data center services industry. We view this acquisition by BGIS as an excellent opportunity to build our business globally, while continuing to provide the service excellence CSGs clients have come to expect, says Robert DiFazio, President, CSG.

We are very excited about this acquisition. In 2016, we expanded in the U.S. through McKinstry FMS and created one of the largest data center and critical environment facility management companies in North America. Our acquisition of CSG deepens our expertise in the area of critical environments and creates an industry first capability of an end-to-end commissioning to stable operations, says Brian Fellows, President, U.S. Operations, BGIS.

With this acquisition, BGIS continues to execute on its strategy to be the leading technically-focused real estate and facilities management services provider across the globe.

For more information contact:

Amanda Kusick, Director, Marketing & Communications

amanda.kusick@bgis.com

About BGIS

BGIS is a leading provider of real estate management services, including facilities management, project delivery services, energy and sustainability solutions, building performance management, workplace advisory and management, and real estate services. With a combined team of over 7,000 team members globally, BGIS inspires better business performance across its clients' real estate portfolios by developing and implementing real estate and facilities management strategies. Globally, BGIS manages over 320 million square feet of client portfolios across 30,000+ locations in North America, Europe, Middle East, Australia and Asia.

Further information is available at www.bgis.com

BGIS is a subsidiary of Brookfield Business Partners, a business services and industrial company focused on owning and operating high-quality businesses that benefit from barriers to entry and/or low cost production. Brookfield Business Partners is listed on the New York and Toronto stock exchanges (NYSE:BBU) (TSX:BBU.UN).

About Critical Solutions Group

Critical Solutions Group, a service-disabled, veteran-owned small business, is a Boston-based data center professional service company. They are a provider of data center services, including commissioning, data center consulting, maintenance and training.

Their primary mission is to become a trusted partner to every client, delivering results using their proven experience to implement solutions that are tailored to fit every need and every budget. All of their comprehensive solutions are designed to keep a clients data center running smoothly, allowing them to manage their business effectively and increasing productivity.



Headquartered in Boston, CSG provides data center services throughout the United States, Canada and Europe.



Further information is available at www.critical2u.comlary301254M7 wrote:

25yr M Taiwanese (no U.S citizenship)

Graduated in 2016 from University of Washington ( age 23)

Worked 1 yr in U.S before I leave for Taiwan because my OPT was done.

Serving 1-year mandatory substitute military service in Taiwan (will finish my service on 08/21/17 )



My extracurricular activities "heavily" fell in my senior year of college in the U.S where I did

280+ hospital clinical floor volunteer at Swedish Medical Center in Seattle

Board member of Seattle King County Free Clinic (only student on board back then)

Local non-profit work within Greater Seattle Area

: mentor 30+ high school kids and helped out with their college application/scholarships

community food program assistant

-------------



My current plan is to take the GMAT in a few months and start to find work in Taiwan.

I plan to work 2 - 3 years before I apply MBA in the U.S.



My question is, would my extracurricular activities in college count by the time I apply?

or, will I need to continue to seek new opportunities in the next 2 - 3 years?



Targeted GMAT score: 730 +

Targeted School: Top 10 MBALBS MiM vs LSE Global MiM vs HEC-Yale M2M? [ #permalink

Hi all, I'm in the fortunate position of having to choose between these three programs. They are all stellar but it is a difficult decision for me for various reasons. They are:

LBS MiM (1 year)

LSE Global MiM (2 years)

HEC-Yale Double Degree (2 years) in Management + Global Business and Society



Few facts about me

-I'm looking to do consulting in London after the Masters, but would be open to opportunities in the US should those open up from Yale SOM.

-Non-EU citizen, making it preferable to be in London for study to find jobs

- limited consulting/business experience, thus leaning toward a 2-year program to build that during the breaks for internships.

-Particularly conscious about brand name because my UK undergrad institution is a non-target. I understand that LBS travels far but probably not as well known in Asia-Pacific (where I'm from) compared to LSE. HEC even less so than LBS. Yale is Yale, but SOM is (supposedly) not as well regarded as LBS?



As you can see it's a pretty difficult decision. LBS would probably be the best choice if not for my limited business experience which may hinder any job hunt in the UK (thus warranting a 2 year degree). Between LSE and HEC-Yale, the latter probably has the better program (more practical) and gives exposure to two international environments. But LSE has great brand value and is in London, plus allows for a CEMS Double degree / MBA exchange also.



Any advice would be really appreciated!It's possible that many donors are holding out until the nomination process is settled. But even when Balter and Messenger were the only candidates in the race they weren't raising huge sums of money.

The fundraising numbers may lead to questions about whether Democrats can compete in NY-24. Political forecasters will use those figures to declare the race Katko's to lose. (A few prominent political prognosticators have the NY-24 race in the "likely Republican" column.)

But Democrats could pick up a few pointers from Buerkle's path to victory in 2010.

Buerkle knew she wasn't going to raise as much money as Maffei. Throughout her campaign, she stressed that she would take a grassroots approach. One tool she utilized in that campaign and her re-election bid: town hall meetings. She held public forums in all corners of the district. She believed that was one of the best ways to engage voters on the issues. It also provided her with an opportunity to criticize Maffei for not being accessible to his constituents.Image: Google Maps

Kabul, Feb 4 (IBNS): At least two women were killed in a roadside blast in Afghanistan, reports said.

The incident took place in the country's Ghazni province on Sunday morning.

According to officials, the incident took place after a civilian hit an improvised explosive device.

Additionally, another five people, including three children, were wounded in the incident.

So far, no group has claimed responsibility.



Image: Google MapsThe protests originated in response to the current economic situation in Iran coupled with a lkac of social and political freedoms. Over 70 percent of Iranians live under the poverty line, according to a report published by Iran Focus.

While the new round of protests advance, many attendees fAear for their safety after the large number of arrests that occurred in the previous weeks. Over 8,000 protesters remain in prison to date, according to Maryam Rajavi, the president-elect of the National Council of Resistance in Iran, in a video statement she released during a press conference at the Council of Europe. Every day we hear of a new prisoner killed under torture while officials claim they have committed suicide, she says. The regime must announce the names of all those arrested and all those killed under torture. They must account for those missing and if they have been murdered, the regime must announce where they have been buried.

Many protesters have gone missing and the assumption is that theyve been illegally detained, said Ali Reza, an Iranian activist in France, in a recent interview. Intelligence agents put pressure on their families not to speak to press, and out of fear they just keep quiet.

Sepideh Farah Abadi, 29, and her family, have been detained for over three weeks without access to a lawyer. Abadi was arrested on January 2, during protests in Tehran. Intelligence agents threatened her extended family, warning them that speaking to media wouldnt be safe, according to an unnamed source inside Iran.

Sina Ghanbari, 23, was one of the protesters who died while being held in Tehrans Evin prison. Authorities claim that Ghanbari committed suicide, but activists have disputed this claim and believe that prisoners are being force fed pills that cause bodily harm.

At least five protesters who were detained have reportedly died while in custody, according to a report released by Amnesty International. Relatives of those detained have reported that, theyve been unsuccessful in obtaining information about their loved ones and have faced intimidation and threats by authorities, says the report.

Freedom of speech is a universal human right. The families of those illegally detained in Iran should be free to speak to press without fear of reprisal.

In response to the thousands of detained protesters, a social media campaign has emerged using the hashtag #FreeAllProtesters. The movement has spread across the Twitterverse, with people from Washington to Rome uploading their photos to Twitter with a sign requesting the immediate release of those arrested during the protests in Iran.

Violet Rusu is a freelance journalist in Toronto and campaigner for freedom of expression, press freedoms, whistleblower protection, and minority rights.Protesters demand Poroshenko's impeachment, a new parliamentary election and the formation of a new government in Ukraine.

Supporters of leader of the New Forces Movement in Ukraine and ex-president of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili have participated in a "March for the Future" in Kyiv to demand Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko's impeachment and announce rallies across Ukraine scheduled for February 18.

Read alsoRally against rally: Drinking coffee on Khreshchatyk (Photos)Marchers walked from Kyiv's Shevchenko Park along Volodymyrska Street to Mykhailivska Square, then along Mykhailivska Street to Yevropeiska Square.

Over 4,000 people took part in the event, an UNIAN correspondent said.

Organizers of the "March for the Future" stated that the rally is the launch of a campaign to demand the "dismantling of the system." The protesters' major demand is the Ukrainian president's impeachment, to be followed by a parliamentary election and the formation of a new government.

The participants in the rally adopted a resolution to announce nationwide rallies in Ukraine on February 18, an UNIAN correspondent said.

The document was read out by Member of Parliament and member of the New Forces Movement Yuriy Derevyanko from the stage on Yevropeiska Square.

"At noon on February 18, 2018, we'll come to the Maidan in Kyiv, to squares in all Ukrainian regions, cities and towns, and there will be millions of us," Derevyanko said.

The protesters also called on Poroshenko to come to Kyiv's Maidan Nezalezhnosti, or Independence Square, on February 18 to hear an impeachment announcement.

Saakashvili, Member of Parliament Yehor Sobolev and other politicians took part in the Sunday event.The state of California is making a new move in the dispute over abortion in the United States. In January, state lawmakers voted to require all 34 public universities in California to offer students medication to induce abortion. In order to become law, the bill will need to be approved by the Assembly.

A medication abortion permits a woman to force a miscarriage by taking two pills within the first 10 weeks of becoming pregnant. Since the option came available to women in the U.S. in 2000, medical abortions have become more common as a way to end a pregnancy. Today, they account for more than 20 percent of U.S. abortions, says the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The World Health Organization (WHO) reports medication abortions are also increasing worldwide, both as legal and secret measures. The WHO says the number of medical abortions has likely contributed to lower rates of secret abortions that result in injury and death to women.

But few U.S. colleges provide medication abortions. And none of Californias public universities currently offers them. The latest move to require University of California and California State schools to offer the service has introduced another point of debate in an already severely disputed issue.

Why is the move controversial?

Abortion has been legal in the U.S. since the 1973 Supreme Court decision called Roe versus Wade. But that decision also says that states can make some restrictions on abortion. For example, many states require women seeking abortions to wait a certain number of weeks or to have an ultrasound  a medical test that allows them to see inside their uterus.

And regardless of national or state laws, public and political opinions about abortion in the U.S. remain sharply divided.

Opponents of the California state senate decision include the Students for Life of America. The group aims to end abortion not only on campuses, but across the country.

A spokesperson for the group, Kristi Hamrick, told VOA over email: There are no educational goals that will be met by expanding a universitys mandate to include ending pre-born life. Hamrick adds that schools should be concerned with students safety; yet, the president of the Students for Life group says medication abortions bring dangerous risks to women.

Another group, the California Catholic Conference, says the proposed law does not really respect a persons decision to continue a pregnancy. Ned Dolejsi is the executive director of the group. He told VOA, They [supporters] are not there to honor the life-affirming and life-giving choices that our faith would support. Theyre all-in on encouraging a young woman to have an abortion.

The California Family Council said the state had gone too far in this case, and even some California State University officials expressed concern about the details of the proposal. A spokesperson for the CSU chancellors office says the requirement will impose high costs for insurance, safety measures, medical training, and 24-hour support for medical emergencies.

Supporters see benefits

But people who support the bill see many benefits. Senator Connie Leyva wrote the bill. She said that, for women seeking an abortion, acting quickly is important. Providing the medication on campus will ensure that women do not need a car or will have to miss class to find a doctor. And the student clinic will accept a students health insurance plan.

Leyva said, I firmly believe that all students should be able to decide what to do with their own bodies and when to factor a family into their life. After all, women do not lose the constitutional right to end a pregnancy simply because they are a college student.

If the bill to require medication abortions on California public universities passes, a group of private donors plans to help fund the effort. They say they will pay for up to $20 million in startup costs, including equipment and training for the staff.

We believe that if they just learned what was required and were trained that they would realize that its very straightforward and a huge, huge value to their patients, said Dr. Ruth Shaber. Shaber leads the Tara Foundation, one of the promised donors.

The bills sponsors estimate that between 19 and 32 students on California campuses would seek a medication abortion each month.

Im Susan Shand.

Kelly Jean Kelly wrote this story for VOA Learning English with additional reporting from Jonathan Cooper of the Associated Press. Hai Do was the editor.

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Words in This Story

miscarriage - n. a condition when a pregnancy ends and does not result in the birth of a live baby

uterus - n. the organ in women and some female animals in which babies develop before birth

mandate - n. an official order to do something

all-in - adj. allowing almost anythingVaccines. Popular sports drinks. Computers.

Each one of these subjects is different from the others. But all three have something in common: they were all invented by researchers working at a college or university.

Scientific invention and cultural exploration have been connected with higher education institutions for hundreds of years.

Victoria McGovern says this is because colleges and universities would be limiting themselves if they only taught existing knowledge. McGovern is a senior program officer with the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, an organization that supports medical research in the United States and Canada.

McGovern argues that the search for new knowledge is what leads to greater discoveries and better education.

Its a very good idea to connect the discovery of new things to the teaching of new students, she told VOA, because you dont want people who come out of their education thinking that the world around them is full of solved problems. You want people to come out of an education excited about solving problems themselves.

But she notes that research costs money and most colleges and universities do not have a lot of extra money for that purpose. Most schools have limited budgets and many competing goals and needs.

So a big part of being a researcher at a college or university is asking for financial support from other places, McGovern says. Such places include private companies and organizations like hers, as well as local and national governments.

The National Institutes of Health, or NIH, is one example. The NIH is the main government agency in the U.S. that supports medical and public health research. The NIH provides about $32 billion a year for health research.

Researchers must apply for this financial support by writing a grant proposal explaining the goals and processes involved in their work. McGovern says the application process for grant money is highly competitive. It can be very difficult for some researchers, especially those who are not skilled at expressing themselves in writing.

In day to day life, you get too busyto think about the big picture, McGovern said. How often do you, in your personal life, say Heres what I want to be doing exactly one year from now? When you write a grant, thats what youre talking about.

McGovern added: Its hard for individuals, sometimes, to tell whether what theyve written down is the best writing that they could have done.

Kristine Kulage argues that it is now more difficult than ever for university researchers to get funding. Kulage is the director of research and scholarly development at the Columbia University School of Nursing in New York City.

She has been working in university research for 20 years. She says that the grant application process has only gotten longer and more complex.

Kulage told VOA, Researchers dont have time to conduct their research, write their grants and learn how to use all of these new systems through which they have to submit their grants.

She said in addition to all those responsibilities, researchers must make sure they are compliant with regulations.

There are so many rules nowIt takes individuals who are now trained as research administrators to know what those rules areAnd know whether or not the rules are being followed, she said.

Kulage suggests that schools now must do more to support their researchers if they want to successfully earn grant money. Last November, she published a study of what happened when Columbias School of Nursing chose to better support its researchers.

The report studied how, between 2012 and 2016, the school chose to invest $127,000 in the creation of a support system. This system includes employing administrators to complete necessary application documents, freeing researchers to spend more time on their research.

The system also provides a review process in which researchers go through several steps before they submit a grant proposal. First, researchers must write a short, clear description of the aims of their project. Researchers often have difficulty explaining their work to people with no special knowledge of the subject matter, Kulage said. So, Columbia administrators with no involvement in the research read the description and offer criticism.

Other researchers also review the description to offer their ideas about whether or not the goals of the research can be reached.

Finally, after changes are made to the proposal, administrators and other researchers meet with the grant writers. They then hold a review meeting similar to what the grant-writers will face once they have submitted their proposal.

Normally, the group offering the grant will meet with the proposal writers and ask them questions. They expect the writers to defend their proposal.

In this practice meeting, the grant writers get a chance to think about their project more and better prepare their defense of it.

Kulage says the efforts of Columbias Schools of Nursing had clear results. Over the five years studied, the proposals that went through the review process were about twice as likely to be accepted as those that did not. The Columbia School of Nursings investment of $127,000 led to $3 million in grant funding.

McGovern and Kulage both agree that applying for research funding alone is very difficult. So, even having one other person read a proposal and give their opinions can be very important to its success.

Kulage admits that large companies carry out a lot of research and development. But their research usually relates to success in their industry. University researchers are different. They have the freedom to take risks on possibly unpopular ideas.

Those risks can often lead to important discoveries that colleges and universities have a responsibility to share with the world, she says.

Im Pete Musto. And Im Susan Shand.

Pete Musto reported this for VOA Learning English. Mario Ritter was the editor. We want to hear from you. In what ways do universities in your country support their own researchers? How complex is applying for a research grant? Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.

_____________________________________________________________

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Words in This Story

institution(s)  n. an established organization

apply  v. to ask formally for something, such as a job, admission to a school or a loan, usually in writing

grant  n. an amount of money that is given to someone by a government or a company to be used for a particular purpose, such as scientific research

funding  n. an amount of money that is used for a special purpose

conduct  v. to plan and do something, such as an activity

submit  v. to give a document, proposal, or piece of writing to someone so that it can be considered or approved

compliant  adj. agreeing with a set of rules, standards, or requirements

regulation(s)  n. an official rule or law that says how something should be done

review  n. an act of carefully looking at or examining the quality or condition of something or someone

practice  n. a regular occasion at which you do something again and again in order to become better at itActor Helen Mirren says her new film Winchester is not a horror movie, but a ghost story. She says the film has foreign roots and also something very American: an understanding of the emotional suffering caused by gun deaths.

Mirren plays Sarah Winchester, a real-life 19th-century woman. She became very rich from the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. Her husband set up the company in 1866.

The business manufactured the Winchester repeating rifle. It enabled users to fire at a target more rapidly than other weapons.

In the film, Sarah Winchester believes she is frightened by the spirits of those killed by the powerful guns.

"It's a ghost story, hopefully in the tradition, the very grand tradition, of Japanese ghost stories, ghost films," Mirren told the Associated Press. "You know, the Japanese love ghost stories and have great belief in the power of the ancestor spirits, of the ancestors, as many cultures do."



Part of the film was shot at Winchester's mansion in San Jose, California. She moved there after the death of her husband in 1881. Now known as the "Winchester Mystery House," it is a popular stop for visitors. The house has more than 160 rooms, 10,000 windows, 2,000 doors and 40 staircases.

Winchester was said to continually add rooms to the home to try to trick the ghosts she believed were haunting her.

"There are many theories why she did this,'' Mirren said. "And one of the theories we explore in the film. She was trying to placate the ghosts of the people who'd been killed by the Winchester rifle. She felt their deaths very strongly. She felt responsible."

However, Mirren said the film is not trying to make any general statements about whether individuals should own guns.



She suggested the movie is more about the moral responsibility business owners might face.

"The issue is more putting the question mark or the weight of moral decision upon the people who make a fortune from making arms  whether they're guns, bombs, grenades ... or whatever it is, Mirren said.

Winchester opened February 2 in the United States. Starring opposite Mirren is actor Jason Clarke as Doctor Eric Price. Price is a specialist in treating mental disorders.

Im Caty Weaver.

Caty Weaver adapted this story for Learning English based on AP news reports. George Grow was the editor.

Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.

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Words in This Story

ghost  n. the soul of a dead person thought of as living in an unseen world or as appearing to living people

rapidly  adv. happening in a short amount of time : happening quickly

mansion  n. a large and impressive house: the large house of a wealthy person

placate  v. to cause (someone) to feel less angry about something

fortune  n. a great amount of money or possessionsAlmost 60 million young people who live in countries affected by conflict or natural disaster are illiterate, the United Nations Childrens Fund or UNICEF, said this week.

More investment in education is needed, UNICEF said, to fight the crisis.

Nearly 30 percent of people between the ages of 15 and 19 living in "emergency countries" cannot read or write. UNICEF has found that illiteracy is a bigger problem among girls and young women. Thirty-three percent of girls have not learned even the basics of reading. The same is true of 24 percent of boys living in emergency countries.

UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore said the numbers are a clear reminder of the tragic effects that crises can have on a childs education and their future.

UNICEF is calling for more financial support for education programs, especially during humanitarian crises. It said only 3.6 percent of humanitarian money is used for the education of young people living in emergency situations. That makes education one of the least supported areas of humanitarian aid.

The agencys yearly Humanitarian Action for Children appeal began on Tuesday. It called for $900 million for countries damaged by man-made and natural disasters. The money would be used on programs such as accelerated learning, teacher training, school rebuilding and on school supplies.

UNICEF also proposed that governments provide young children with early-learning opportunities and illiterate young people with specially designed education programs.

The findings are based on the U.N. Educational, Science and Cultural Organization, or UNESCO, literacy data on 27 emergency countries.

The countries with the highest illiteracy rates among people between the ages of 15 and 24 are Niger (76-percent), Chad (69-percent), South Sudan (68-percent), and the Central African Republic (64-percent).

UNICEF released the new data just before the start of the two-day Global Partnership for Education Replenishment Conference in Dakar, Senegal. The conference is designed to raise money to give all children and youth the opportunity to learn.

Im Phil Dierking.

Wayne Lee originally wrote this story for VOANEws.com. Phil Dierking adapted this story for VOA Learning English. Ashley Thompson was the editor.

How are illiteracy rates among children in your country? We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.

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Words in This Story

accelerate - v. to move faster

advocacy - n. the act or process of supporting a cause or proposal

humanitarian - n. a person who works to make other people's lives better

illiterate - adj. not knowing how to read or write

stability - n. the quality or state of something that is not easily changed or likely to changeNow, Words and Their Stories, a weekly program from VOA Learning English.

Today we will be talking about a hated but misunderstood animal  the rat.

The sight of a rat might frighten you. Or it might make you sick to your stomach.

Well, perhaps not everyone.

In some countries, dishes made with rat meat can be rare and sometimes pricey -- what we call a delicacy.

Plus, rats are useful. With their extreme sense of smell, people can train giant rats to find land mines and even tuberculosis.

But do these things make people love rats?

No. For the most part, rats are not beloved animals.

For starters, they're not cute. They have pointed noses and long, thin tails. They can eat and damage crops. And the world has long blamed rats for spreading diseases, like the Bubonic plague in Europe during the 14th century. It does not help your reputation when you are accused of killing at least one-third of the population of an entire continent.

But, perhaps we shouldnt be so quick to judge.

Scientists now think that it was most likely not rats, but another rodent, the gerbil, that caused the Bubonic plague. They suspect that gerbils traveled to Europe from Asia, some along the Silk Road that traders used. But these animals were not carrying spices and silk, but rather disease.

Today, however, gerbils are pets in many American homes. Teachers sometimes keep them in classrooms for students to care for. Rats, not so much.

Such is the difficult life of an unwanted, misunderstood animal.

So, scientists can debate the role of rats in spreading disease. But the fact that rats have a really bad reputation in American English is not debatable. Its the truth. None of our rat expressions means anything good.

The simplest way we use this word is to simply say, Rats! Americans often use this expression when something goes wrong. The term is common and polite -- unlike some of our other expressions we might use when we are angry.

As we said earlier, rats may have a good sense of smell. But smelling a rat isnt good. When we say, I smell a rat! we suspect that something is wrong. If you feel that someone has betrayed you, you can say that you smell a rat.

A pack rat is not good, either. This is a person who keeps useless things. And worse, they live with all the stuff they have collected.

So, calling someone a "rat" is never an expression of respect or affection. When describing people, a rat is someone who is not loyal or cannot be trusted. A rat snitches on someone to an authority figure  a parent, a teacher, a police officer.

As a verb, the word "rat" isn't good either.

To rat on someone means to betray a loved one, friend or someone else you know. When you rat on someone, you tell on them.

Let's say you know that your brother ate the last piece of cake when he wasn't supposed to. You rat on him to your parents. Or maybe you rat on a colleague at work. Ratting on people, or tattling on them, will not win you friends. It just makes you a rat. Or worse -- a rat fink.

The words tattling and tattletales are often used for children. But ratting someone out or snitching on them can be for any age.

No matter what your age, nobody likes to be called a rat, a snitch or a tattletale. However, it is a little different when the police are involved.

Let's say you have information about a crime. When the police begin asking questions, you decide to keep that information to yourself. You may feel you don't want to rat on someone else.

However, nobody would blame you for sharing information with the police if it helps them catch a criminal. Well, another criminal might not approve. Most criminals have a different code of conduct among themselves: You don't rat on fellow criminals to the police.

In old police television shows and movies, you may hear one criminal criticize another who snitched to the police. They may say, "You dirty rat!"

You would not say that a hardened, possibly violent criminal tattled on another ... unless you were trying to be funny.

So, when using the word rat in English know that the meaning is never a good one. But in life, maybe we should take another look at rats and give them a chance.

And that brings us to the end of this Words and Their Stories.

Do rats have a good reputation in your country? Please tell us! It would be nice to know there is a place on this planet where saying "Rats!" is a good thing.

I'm Anna Matteo.

"You won't tell me where you've been. Whiskey running down your chin. I smell a rat, baby. I smell a rat, baby. You better watch out. I smell a rat, baby."

Anna Matteo wrote this story for VOA Learning English. George Grow was the editor. The song at the end is Willie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton singing "I Smell a Rat."

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Words in This Story

delicacy  n. a food that people like to eat because it is special or rare

tuberculosis  n. a serious disease that mainly affects the lungs : also called TB

reputation  n. overall quality or character as seen or judged by people in general

pet  n. a domesticated animal kept for pleasure rather than utility

polite  adj. having or showing good manners or respect for other people

betray  v. to hurt (someone who trusts you, such as a friend or relative) by not giving help or by doing something morally wrong

snitch  v. to tell someone in authority (such as the police or a teacher) about something wrong that someone has done

authority  n. the power to give orders or make decisions : the power or right to direct or control someone or something

code of conduct  n. an agreement on rules of behavior for the members of that group or organizationWall Street analysts have given iShares MSCI Sweden ETF a "N/A" rating, but there may be better buying opportunities in the stock market. Some of MarketBeat's past winning trading ideas have resulted in 5-15% weekly gains. MarketBeat just released five new stock ideas, but iShares MSCI Sweden ETF wasn't one of them. MarketBeat thinks these five companies may be even better buys.

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Z.o.o., Celgene Sro [Czech Republic], Celgene Summit Investment Co, Celgene Switzerland Holding Sarl, Celgene Switzerland II LLC, Celgene Switzerland Investment Sarl, Celgene Switzerland LLC, Celgene Switzerland Sarl, Celgene Tri A Holdings Ltd., Celgene Tri Sarl, Celgene UK Distribution Limited, Celgene UK Holdings Limited, Celgene UK Manufacturing II Limited, Celgene UK Manufacturing III Limited, Celgene UK Manufacturing Limited, Celgene d.o.o., Celgene sro [Slovakia], Celmed LLC, Celmed Ltd., ConvaTec Divestiture, Cormorant Pharmaceuticals, Cormorant Pharmaceuticals AB, Crosp Ltd., Delinia Inc., Deuteria Pharmaceuticals Inc., DuPont Pharmaceuticals, E. R. Squibb & Sons Inter-American Corporation, E. R. Squibb & Sons L.L.C., E. R. Squibb & Sons Limited, EWI Corporation, EngMab Sarl, F-star Alpha, FermaVir Pharmaceuticals L.L.C., FermaVir Research L.L.C., Flexus Biosciences, Flexus Biosciences Inc., Forbius, Galecto Biotech, GenPharm International L.L.C., Gloucester Pharmaceuticals LLC, Grove Insurance Company Ltd., Heyden Farmaceutica Portuguesa Limitada, IFM Therapeutics, Impact Biomedicines Inc., Inhibitex, Inhibitex L.L.C., Innate Tumor Immunity Inc., JuMP Holdings LLC, Juno Therapeutics GmbH, Juno Therapeutics Inc., Kosan Biosciences, Kosan Biosciences Incorporated, Linson Investments Limited, Mead Johnson (Manufacturing) Jamaica Limited, Mead Johnson Jamaica Ltd., Medarex, Morris Avenue Investment II LLC, Morris Avenue Investment LLC, MyoKardia, O.o.o. Bristol-Myers Squibb, Oy Bristol-Myers Squibb (Finland) AB, Padlock Therapeutics, Padlock Therapeutics Inc., Pharmion LLC, Princeton Pharmaceutical Products Inc., Receptos LLC, Receptos Services LLC, RedoxTherapies Inc., Route 22 Real Estate Holding Corporation, SPV A Holdings ULC, Seamair Insurance DAC, Signal Pharmaceuticals LLC, Sino-American Shanghai Squibb Pharmaceuticals Limited, Societe Francaise de Complements Alimentaires(S.O.F.C.A.), Squibb Middle East S.A., Summit West Celgene LLC, Swords Laboratories, VentiRx Pharmaceuticals Inc., Westwood-Intrafin SA, Westwood-Squibb Pharmaceuticals Inc., X-Body Inc., ZymoGenetics, ZymoGenetics Inc., ZymoGenetics LLC, ZymoGenetics Paymaster LLC, iPierian, and iPierian Inc..JPMorgan Chase & Co. is a financial holding company. It provides financial and investment banking services. The firm offers a range of investment banking products and services in all capital markets, including advising on corporate strategy and structure, capital raising in equity and debt markets, risk management, market making in cash securities and derivative instruments, and brokerage and research. It operates through the following segments: Consumer and Community Banking, Corporate and Investment Bank, Commercial Banking, and Asset and Wealth Management. The Consumer and Community Banking segment serves consumers and businesses through personal service at bank branches and through automated teller machine, online, mobile, and telephone banking. The Corporate and Investment Bank segment offers a suite of investment banking, market-making, prime brokerage, and treasury and securities products and services to a global client base of corporations, investors, financial institutions, government and municipal entities. The Commercial Banking segment delivers services to U.S. and its multinational clients, including corporations, municipalities, financial institutions, and non profit

Read MoreGoldman Sachs Group, Inc. engages in global investment banking, securities, and investment management, which provides financial services. It operates through the following business segments: Investment Banking, Global Markets, Asset Management, and Consumer & Wealth Management. The Investment Banking segment serves public and private sector clients around the world and provides financial advisory services, help companies raise capital to strengthen and grow their businesses and provide financing to corporate clients. The Global Markets segment serves its clients who buy and sell financial products, funding and manage risk. The Asset Management segment provides investment services to help clients preserve and grow their financial assets. The Consumer & Wealth Management segment helps clients to achieve their individual financial goals by providing a wealth advisory and banking services. The company was founded by Marcus Goldman in 1869 and is headquartered in New York, NY.

Read MoreThe Toronto-Dominion Bank, together with its subsidiaries, provides various personal and commercial banking products and services in Canada and the United States. It operates through three segments: Canadian Retail, U.S. Retail, and Wholesale Banking. The company offers personal deposits, such as chequing, savings, and investment products; financing, investment, cash management, international trade, and day-to-day banking services to businesses; and financing options to customers at point of sale for automotive and recreational vehicle purchases through auto dealer network. It also provides credit cards; real estate secured lending; auto finance; consumer lending; point-of-sale payment solutions for large and small businesses; wealth and asset management products, private banking, investment advisory, and trust services to retail and institutional clients; and property and casualty insurance, as well as life and health insurance products. The company also provides capital markets, and corporate and investment banking services, including underwriting and distribution of new debt and equity issues; advice on strategic acquisitions and divestitures; and trading, funding, and investment services to companies, governments, and institutions. It offers its products and services under the TD Bank and America's Most Convenient Bank brand names. The company operates through a network of 1,085 branches, 3,440 automated teller machines, and 1,223 stores, as well as offers telephone, digital, and mobile banking services. The Toronto-Dominion Bank was founded in 1855 and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada.

Read MoreCHANDLER, Ariz.  An ammunition dealer who had been named a person of interest in connection with the Las Vegas mass shooting was charged in a Nevada federal court Friday with manufacturing armor-piercing bullets. The charges came on the same day that the dealer, Douglas Haig, held a news conference to say he was innocent and had only briefly met the gunman, Stephen Paddock, when Mr. Paddock bought 720 rounds of ammunition from him in September.

Investigators said they had found Mr. Haigs fingerprints on unfired armor-piercing ammunition inside the hotel room Mr. Paddock used as his shooting perch. Mr. Haig, 55, did not have the license needed to manufacture such ammunition, according to the charges filed by federal authorities.

Mr. Haig said he met Mr. Paddock briefly last fall at a gun show in Phoenix, about a month before the shooting. Mr. Paddock then came to Mr. Haigs home in Mesa, Ariz., to buy 720 rounds of tracer ammunition, which leaves behind a trail of light when it is used. Mr. Paddock asked for a box to carry the rounds to his car and Mr. Haig gave him a used box that included his name and address. That was their only transaction, he said.

The name and address on the box is what led investigators to Mr. Haig.

Federal investigators said that Mr. Haig told them that he made reload ammunition, essentially creating new bullets from used cartridges, but told them that he did not sell them. But investigators found that two of the unfired armor-piercing bullets found in Mr. Paddocks hotel room had been created by Mr. Haig.The Kenyan government is defying a court order to put four private television stations back on the air, escalating a week of political tensions and raising concerns about its respect for the rule of law.

Government officials disconnected the stations, CitizenTV, InooroTV, KTN and NTV, during live broadcasts on Tuesday morning from an opposition gathering in Nairobi, the capital. President Uhuru Kenyatta had warned the owners of the stations against broadcasting the event.

On Thursday, the Milimani High Court, a lower-level court, issued an order requiring the Communications Authority of Kenya to restore the stations with immediate effect. By Friday evening, the government still had not complied.

The government has not explained its apparent defiance. But Mwenda Njoka, a spokesman for the ministry of interior, which is named in the order, suggested that the government could appeal because, he said, its representatives had not been present at the court hearing where the order was issued.Most Germans are still brainwashed by the political correctness that has run amok  the current degree of Gleichschaltung in Germany may surpass the levels from the Nazi epoch. However, whole regions start to emerge where majorities are disapproving of the multicultural policies. They're mostly located in East Germany and Bavaria.



Cottbus, a city of 100,000 people Southeast from Berlin, 100 km from Bohemia, and 10 km from Poland is a great example. It's been considered a cultural center of Sorbs, a Slavic nation that has been largely assimilated to Germany and culturally disappeared. In 13671445, the city belonged to the Lands of the Bohemian Crown  so was under Prague. We still use a nice Czech name for that city, Chotebuz (Khotyebooz, literally Wake-your-spouse), which is ready for the liberation of the city by the Czech military sometime in a foreseeable future (we use Czech names for a majority of the important German cities) and its reincorporation into Czechia.



I really need to promote these imperial plans at some moments because almost no one is doing this important job in my country. ;-)









Top Czech daily MF DNES (YF TODAY, YF stands for Youth Front  it evolved from the official daily of the Socialist Union of Youth; the addition of "today" was a trick by which the editors collectively stole and spontaneously privatized the whole infrastructure by the daily by formally establishing a new daily LOL, those were funny times after 1989) currently owned by PM Babis's trust brought us a very frank and insightful report from Cottbus which was praised by most readers.



A quick translation is added below. I don't have time to streamline the English, I hope that it will be comprehensible enough.









"Are we still in Germany?" inhabitants of Cottbus are asking after the attacks (CZ)



Fear, anger, and despair took over after recent attacks among the young Syrian and German folks in 100,000-people city of Cottbus, the second largest city in the Bundesland of Brandenburg. The degree of tension in the atmosphere of Cottbus was being investigated by female reporters of YF TODAY who came there.



[Video, see the original page]



The situation deteriorated at the very end of 2017 and early 2018 after a series of confrontations and attacks placing the incoming young Syrian men and the local teenagers against each other.



At the end of 2017, a young Syrian man murdered a female pensioner, in January, three Syrian teenagers attacked an older married couple. Once the woman entered a shop, they demanded her to express the respect towards them and to allow them to enter before her. When her husband was defending her, they threatened him with a knife.



On January 23rd, Syrian folks attacked a German man in front of the Blechen-Caree mall and they cut his face. Another brawl followed on the same day.



Four days later, 18-year-old Syrian attacked cops who had to act on a private celebration and a few hours later, the police had to solve the conflict in which aliens used a pepper spray against a German man and they disappeared.



That's a list of violent acts from Cottbus as they were reported by some German media.



"I am not scared but as long as the migrants will have knives in their pockets, no one can do anything about it," a man in the outfit of a worker explains, using hand gestures, who didn't want to reveal his name, just like everyone else whom we have interviewed.



Courts have to solve the attacks, mayor says



"Only economic migrants are coming here now, they want the money. Those who were escaping the war could have been coming some 5 years ago. After I work for 38 years, I get a painfully modest pension while they get everything now and without any effort. And all of this is being done by the black devil of the CDU," another German whom we asked added, referring to Chancellor Angela Merkel.



The mayor of Cottbus, Holger Klech, sharply denounced the attacks by the Syrian refugees in the middle of January. However, he's been silent since that time. He hasn't responded to YF TODAY's requests for an interview, either.



"There exist people who clearly cannot learn our order, our laws, our rules and values. That must be solved by the courts," he simply stated in a text posted on the municipal website.



One can't say that the German courts don't know what to do with the migrants but it takes some time for the punishing verdicts to be announced.



On Monday, according to the rbb24 radio, a 40-year-old Syrian man who came to Germany in 2015 was sentenced to 8 years in prison for attacking the female owner of a hairdresser saloon, shortly after he came to Germany, after she offered him a job. Last June, a Chechen man was sentenced to 13 years in prison because he cut his wife's throat.



We are incompatible cultures, a young man says



"We're simply incompatible cultures and no one can change this fact. When police accidentally confiscates their knives, they immediately buy new ones. How can the society defend itself against that?" a man is angrily asking near the Netto shop on the city border.



However, the attacks were mostly localized to the historical center of the city, mostly close to the Blechen-Caree mall mentioned above. It's enough to walk in this area and you can see the aliens everywhere. According to the official statistics, Cottbus hosts 8,000 aliens. About 1/2 of them are from Syria who came in the last 3 years. In 2 years, the percentage of aliens grew from 2% to 8.5%.



"Our city's capacity is already depleted. In the evening, I am unbelievably frightened to walk home from the work. And when I don't have to, I don't go anywhere," a young woman on the square told YF TODAY. She was just going to her workplace.



"Ms Merkel keeps on saying that Germany can manage that. But already 8,000 migrants are living here. That's simply impossible to manage. After all, I believe that the number is higher. That's despite the fact that Cottbus urgently needs money to repair lots of things. Just look around," her older colleague added. According to the Brandenburg media, Cottbus' debt is some 240 million.



Even the police is pointing out the dangers of the attempted integration of the aliens.



"The number of attacks, robberies, and blackmail is going up. Since 2015, the number of these crimes has increased by a factor of 10 or so. Last year, we have recorded about 100 of such acts," the police spokeman Torsten Wend informed.



The situation helps neo-Nazis



These events have the other side of the coin as well  the neo-Nazi movement is getting stronger. Their rallies attract an increasing number of participants. The last protest rally, one on last Sunday, attracted 1,500 angry Germans to the downtown.



Brawls and an attack against journalists couldn't have been avoided. "I don't like neo-Nazis but they're being strengthened by the government policies that overlook the German people. These days, they've been downgraded to 2nd class citizens," an 18-year-old Cottbus student told YF TODAY.



And that's why, aside from the attacks by the migrants, the police must also work on their safety against the German extremists. For example, a student from Egypt was murdered. On the New Year's Eve, three Afghan men were beaten.



Last year, the city hall asked the government of Brandenburg to stop the import of additional migrants to the city. The regional Brandenburg government complied but only after the violence in January.



"Temporarily. But what is going to be next? The government doesn't realize what it's doing. The rules for the asylum must be clearly defined. The government is only retreating and violates our laws when it even allows bigamy to the incoming people. Are we still in Germany?" a young Cottbus man is screaming on the pedestrian's zone.



According to his girlfriend from Berlin, the integration is just a chimera. "It's enough to look around. Migrants only live in their closed communities, they don't talk to Germans. Even their children only play with themselves on the playgrounds," his girlfriend was arguing.



My family will arrive, I need an apartment, a Syrian man demands



On the pedestrian zone near the Blechen-Caree mall, you can really see just groups of Syrian people who talk to themselves. Meters away, you may see women with scarfs and baby carriages, others are shopping with their kids.



"We are satisfied, we don't have any problems," a Syrian man whom we asked responded in nice German



He may have memorized that sentence because he couldn't understand the following conversation too well. That was also the case of his two friends who were sitting with him on the pedestrian's area.



"I know about the brawls between aliens and Germans from my friends. It's no good. We're not in Germany to cause problems," a Syrian man argued. He doesn't want to stay in Cottbus because he doesn't like the place much.



It was the same with another Syrian man whose German skills were solid. "We've been hear for half a year and when I learn the language well, I want a job. That can't be found in this town. I also have a wife who takes care of our 1-year-old son," a man said.



"I have a question for you. In one month, my family will arrive. Could you find an apartment for me?" his friend asked us. He didn't stop his requests after we have assured him several times that we were from Bohemia. "How can you help me? I need housing for my family," he insisted.



Meanwhile, a streetcar came in front of the mall. In the front part of the vehicle, there were lots of Germans. The rear of the tram was left empty. You could find two expanded men on the seats who were holding unspecified bottles and were blocking the lane. Germans were using different doors to get in and get out.



None of them works, local people are complaining



Even though a larger number of state policemen were supposed to arrive to the city after the January 23rd attacks, the editors of YF TODAY haven't met a single one in the streets during several hours. Only one police officer who was inserting a report about a fine behind the windshield wiper for breaching the time limit for parking.



It makes no sense to reproduce a long sequence of complaints by the locals, with one exception: "Have you seen how many aliens  migrants are working in the city? Have you seen a single one?" an older married coupled was asking. No, you haven't seen any. In the shops, bakeries, or small fast food or refreshment shops, none could have been found.



"In most cases, they can't read and write and they can't learn the language even after five years. Without German, they can't find work and their wives can't even leave the house. Whole families live just from the welfare. And are Germans supposed to pay for that? On top of that, they have lots of children and the authorities are consolidating their families. For example, their children are getting bikes from assorted organizations while the kids from poor German families get nothing," a female pensioner complained.



According to a married couple, Germany is making a big step in the negative direction by its pro-migration policies. "When East Germans, or even you Czechs, used to emigrate to West Berlin or capitalist Germany, they had to spend up to two years in the collection camp, before they learned the language, found the housing, and a job," an older man remembered the past.



"These migrants don't have to do anything of the sort. The government should say how many available jobs exist in the country and that should determine how many aliens may be accepted  and it should be aliens whose lives are really threatened. It's necessary to help others but this is too much," the senior man concluded.Local Uber drivers are set to launch a new bid to become recognised as employees of the company.

The move follows the Labour Court overturning a ruling from the CCMA which found that local Uber drivers were the employees of Uber South Africa.

Judge Andre van Niekerk overturned the ruling, as the employment claim was made against Uber Technologies SA  where it should have been made against Uber BV in the Netherlands, he said.

According to the City Press, a new CCMA hearing will take place and the drivers representatives will start a fresh legal case.

There is also a consideration to approach the CCMA in terms of a section in the Labour Relations Act which permits a worker to be jointly employed by two employers, stated the report.

This could apply in the commonplace arrangement in which large Uber partners command fleets of cars and hire drivers to drive them, stated the City Press.

Another strategy is to challenge the legitimacy of the contracts drivers sign with Uber, stating they are not employees.

Uber has stated its relationship with drivers is a contractual one, and it acts as a business facilitator for independent drivers, rather than being their employer.France refuses to recognize Taliban's government in Afghanistan

1 new case of coronavirus reported in Karabakh

Pope Francis arrives in Hungary for lightning visit

FBI releases first declassified document related to investigation of 9/11 terrorist attacks

Armenia opposition MP Armen Charchyan diagnosed with pneumonia, is in critical condition

Elections for chairman of Armenia Chamber of Advocates kicks off

Armenia parliament's opposition factions nominate candidate for member of Public Services Regulatory Commission

Japan FM to attend UN General Assembly's 76th Session

3 missiles dropped near Erbil International Airport

Pyotr Movsesyan, father of hero of 44-day Karabakh war, dies

453 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia

Armenia ruling party presents candidates for Council of Elders ahead of elections in Gyumri

Swedish couple not allowed to name son Vladimir Putin

Group of female students in Kabul hold rally in support of Taliban

Azerbaijan, Turkey, Pakistan special forces to hold military exercises in Baku

Armenia FM, Kazakhstan ambassador discuss Karabakh peace process

Armenia PM, extra-parliamentary forces leaders hold 2nd meeting of consultative assembly

Those who link Armenia ex-President Kocharyan with crimes have long been known as liars, says his office coordinator

Armenia Special Investigation Service issues statement regarding media report

Artsakh defense minister, Defense Army commander dismissed

Russia-based analyst: Situation volatile in South Caucasus

US envoy to Armenia says they do not consider Karabakh conflict to be resolved

Fire breaks out at large South Africa power plant

Belgium new ambassador presents copy of credentials to Armenia FM

Armenia 2nd president Kocharyan receives official invitation from Russia ruling party leadership

Tribute paid at US embassy in Armenia (PHOTOS)

Lebanon reaches agreement on new government

5 new cases of coronavirus reported in Karabakh

Parliament speaker: Armenia has joined global agenda of counterterrorism, making the world more secure

Armenia Ambassador Makunts briefs US Congresswoman Speier on Artsakh situation

Past: Armenia ex-President Kocharyan invited to Moscow

731 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia

Biden calls for US national unity on eve of 20th anniversary of 9/11

Armenia soldier wounded during Gegharkunik Province shootout with Azerbaijan discharged from hospital

Afghanistan leaderships overthrow contributed to US troops withdrawal from country, says NATO chief

Newspaper: Tashir Group to buy Armenia Airlines?

Newspaper: Controversial draft on media to be put on upcoming agenda of Armenia parliament

Armenia ex-President Sargsyan's lawsuit against pro-government MP Sukiasyan accepted for court proceedings

His Holiness Karekin II grants Armenian Church's St. Sahak-St. Mesrop Order to Baroness Caroline Cox

Armenia Syunik Province governor on photo showing Azerbaijani police station set up in Vorotan section of border

Republican Party of Armenia to run in local self-government elections, to nominate candidate in Gyumri

Egypt PM: Diplomatic ties with Turkey could be restored this year

US, South Korea, Japan to meet over North Korea nuclear standoff

Lavrov states conditions for Russia's recognition of the Taliban

Armenia Parliament Speaker meets with President of Austria's National Council Wolfgang Sobotka

Lebanon to hold parliamentary elections on May 8, 2022

Rustam Muradov introduces new Commander of Russian peacekeeping contingent in Karabakh to Azerbaijan MOD

Armenia Ambassador meets with members of Armenian community of Ukraine

Armenia Special Investigation Service rejects institution of criminal case regarding opposition MPs incidents

Opposition "Armenia" bloc: Government must subsidize expenses while making testing for COVID-19 mandatory

Taliban execute brother of Afghanistan's former vice-president

Lebanon President signs decree on formation of new Cabinet

Armenia government officials take oaths of office at presidential residence

Digest: Self-government elections to be held in Armenia, EC removes Armenia from safe countries list

Karabakh Ombudsman meets with NGOs' representatives in Yerevan, discusses status of displaced persons

Armenian army's General Staff holds meeting-consultation with lawyers of military formations and garrisons

Russia to not attend Taliban government inauguration

Another 7 Diaspora Armenians to start working for Armenia government

Armenia legislature to convene special session on September 24

Armenia Migration Service chief in Vienna, discusses readmission cooperation with Austria

Armenia justice minister discusses need for constitutional reforms with civil society representatives

David Babayan to Karekin II: Artsakh has always felt Armenian Apostolic Churchs support

168.am: Another ridiculous explanation by Armenia Special Investigation Service head?

Mayor of Armenias Goris to remain in custody

Armenian official discusses opportunities for exports of foods and alcoholic drinks to Poland

Dollar goes down in Armenia

Prosperous Armenia Party to not run in October 17 local elections

Armenia President meets with outgoing Ambassador of France

Armenia Security Council holds session chaired by PM

Armenia Investigative Committee chairman meets with Russian and Belarusian counterparts

Shooting on Iran-Azerbaijan border

Armenia's enlarged Geghamasar community head: Fires are put out at this moment

Berlin hosts meeting of Armenia-Germany governmental commission on financial, technical cooperation

Armenia parliament shall pass decisions useful for protection of Artsakh peoples rights, says majority faction MP

Kishan Dan Deval: India ready to continue cooperation with Armenia

Armenia ruling faction again thwarts opposition initiative to set up parliament committee on Artsakh issue

Muradov: Decision will be made in future on extending Russia peacekeepers presence in Nagorno-Karabakh

Opposition Armenia Faction MP: Relations with Karabakh need to be at another level

Civil Aviation Committee: No coronavirus-related restrictions at the moment on Armenia citizens entering EU

Former Portuguese President Jorge Sampaio dies aged 82The militants of the Kurdish Peoples Self-Defense Forces (SNA) on Sunday launched an attack on the Turkish armed forces that are positioned on the Jandaris hills to the north of Afrin, Syria, and they are trying to regain control of this area.

According to the Kurdish Firat News Agency (ANF), the Kurdish forces on Saturday drove the adversary back from Bulbul village, where there were fierce battles for 48 hours, reported TASS news agency of Russia.Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday stated that Russia had accepted Turkeys proposals regarding the purchase of the S-400 air defense systems, reported TASS news agency of Russia.

Russia agreed to Ankara [proposals regarding] both in the price and the deadlines for the supply of anti-missile complexes, as well as in the establishment and transfer of a joint production of technology, he said.

In the presidents words, however, Turkey plans to manufacture its own missile defense systems.US Life Expectancy Just DroppedAgain

What we can do to stop the trend

The United States gross domestic product is at an all-time high. Unfortunately, U.S. life expectancy is not.

Life expectancy has fallen for the second time in two yearsfrom a high of 78.9 years in 2014 to 78.6 years in 2016. And it fell across the boardfor men and women, whites, blacks, and Hispanics. Statistics show that thousands were preventable, premature deaths.

Life expectancy is not supposed to fall in countries that are this rich, spend this much on health, and pride themselves on taking care of each other. As a demographer working in a school of public health, I am astounded by the complacency at the loss of so many Americans in the prime of life.

Where can we turn for leadership? What can each of us do about the crisis? Public health has answers. The modern practice of public health is about building community coalitions to support many simultaneous strategies across different sectors. The public health problems of the 20th century were not solved by magic bullets; it took massive social change and political enlightenment. It will take nothing less in the 21st century.

Life Expectancy Through History

Between 1880 and 1945, U.S. life expectancy rose from 40 to 65 years old. And, until 2014, life expectancy continued to rise. In high-income countries in Western Europe and Asiasuch as Korea, Singapore, and Francelife expectancy has advanced well above 80.

But the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that the death count for Americans under 65 rose by 20,566 between 2015 and 2016. Based on population growth alone, one would have expected only 6,131 additional deaths. The other 14,435 Americans died prematurely of causes that could have prevented.

The extra American funerals were for people dying in their 20s, 30s, 40s, and 50s. Their death certificates list mostly overdoses from opioids and other substances, cirrhosis, suicide, and homicide.

The Role of Public Health

Public health is the profession devoted to identifying health threats, notifying the community and securing solutions from both private and public sectors. Bacteria in the milk supply? Unsafe vehicles? Insufficient vitamins? Public health professionals have sounded the alarm and spurred effective countermeasures. Their professional tools include epidemiology, communications, economics, law and, most importantly, political coalitions.

However, modern scourges like addiction, suicide, and despair do not have easy solutions. We know partial remedies include funding addiction treatment, more access to the overdose antidote naloxone, better prescribing patterns and drug enforcement. None is sufficient alone. No single measure addresses the long pipeline that generates addiction in the first place.

Community vulnerability to diseases of despair like suicide and addiction comes from a failure of social solidarity. Sociologists regularly observe an inverse relationship between suicide rates and national markers for social trust. Public health can bring us together to tackle our current nemesis.

Public Health 3.0

Were already seeing how potential solutions to these problems can take shape.

In 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services introduced a new strategic blueprint called Public Health 3.0. The plan asks for the nations public health officials to gather citizens, local businesses, hospitals, schools, and other government agencies to understand and respond to modern health threats. The core of the strategy has been asking for health officers to become conveners and facilitators of local solutions.

In Wilkes County, North Carolina, a Public Health 3.0-type approach to the opioid epidemic just finished its 10th year. Known as Project Lazarus, the communitys initiatives led to a nine percent reduction in mortality. The county got pharmacists and health professionals to train health care providers on diversion, forgery, and better pain management. They were able to engage their hospital emergency departments in new pain management policies. They expanded the availability of drug rehabilitation, promoted naloxone rescue kits, and mapped out safe pill drop locations.

The critical foundation for all of this activity was an ongoing set of coalition meetings for citizens, health directors, school superintendents, sheriffs, hospital leaders, and mental health professionals. Leadership and energy came from both the government and the private sector.

Public Health 3.0 has been hard to pull off, even though it doesnt require a major federal initiative. The public health workforce has a comfort zone in crunching numbers and running programs to control one disease at a time. Health departments raise much of their funds by writing disease-focused grants to state and federal agencies. There is scarce time or priority for the effort to convene communities. Few grants anywhere pay for the hard work of rallying citizens. Nevertheless, health officers do community organizing because there is no better way to prevent disease.

We already have public health professionals in every American state and county. Its time for this profession to rise to the challenge of engaging not just the government, but all citizens in unifying communities to address the growing despair that has afflicted our minds and bodies.

David Bishai is a professor of health economics at Johns Hopkins University. This article was originally published on The Conversation.Home | News | General | Military rescues 84, captures Boko Harams weapons

At least 84 people have been rescued and heavy military weapons recovered from Boko Haram fighters by Nigerian army.



The Army said on Saturday that the breakthrough was recorded during an operation in Borno State.

A total of 84 persons held hostage by the insurgents at Camp Zairo were rescued by the troops and have been handed over to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA).

The Theatre Commander of Operation Lafiya Dole, Major General Rogers Nicholas, that some of the women rescued were found to be pregnant while the children among them looked malnourished.

The 84 persons were flown by the Air Component of the Operation Lafiya Dole to Maiduguri, the state capital after being freed from the heavily guarded camp.

Major General Rogers Nicholas, who handed the victims over to SEMA, said most of them are tasting freedom for the first time in about three years after their abduction.

The Nigerian Army has revealed another breakthrough recorded during an operation in which a military tank and other weapons were recovered from the Boko Haram terrorists in Borno State.

A total of 84 persons held hostage by the insurgents at Camp Zairo were rescued by the troops and have been handed over to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA).

The Theatre Commander of Operation Lafiya Dole, Major General Rogers Nicholas, disclosed this on Saturday to reporters in the state.

According to him, some of the women rescued were found to be pregnant while the children among them looked malnourished.

The 84 persons were flown by the Air Component of the Operation Lafiya Dole to Maiduguri, the state capital after being freed from the heavily guarded camp.

Major General Rogers Nicholas, who handed the victims over to SEMA, said most of them are tasting freedom for the first time in about three years after their abduction.

At least 26 Boko Haram members surrendered to the military authorities in Damboa Local Government Area of Borno State earlier in the week.

The repentant terrorists were paraded on Friday in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital after they were quizzed by the military.

They were said to have surrendered last week and turned over their arms and ammunition including RPGs, after which they were taken to Maiduguri for deradicalizsation.

More than 2300 fighters have surrendered in the last 13 months following intensive military action and seizure of the Sambisa forest, the main enclave of the insurgents.

More than 25,000 people have been killed in the insurgency since 2009 and at least 2.4 million Nigerians displaced in the northeast states of Adamawa, Yobe and Borno.

Meanwhile, the Army has confirmed it would conduct more exercises in 2018 to assist civil authorities to deal with internal security challenges in parts of the country.

The Chief of Army Staff, Lt.-Gen. Tukur Buratai, said on Friday after leading troops on a 15km Route March.

Buratai said exercises `Harbin Kunama III, Crocodile Smile III and Egwu Eke Dance III would also be conducted in 2018.

Exercise Harbin Kunama I and II were conducted in 2016 and 2017, respectively, to deal with the menace of cattle rustling and herdsmen/farmers clashes in parts of North-West and North-Central.

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Loading...Home | News | General | The President we have versus the President we need (3)

By Dele Sobowale

In my first coming, all our refineries were working. Port Harcourt used to refine 60,000 barrels per day, and was later upgraded to 100,000 barrels per day. Kaduna and Warri were also workingwe used to satisfy the demand of the local market. We equally exported 100,000 barrels of refined petrol  President Buhari while receiving delegation from Eni.

Like most statements coming out of Aso Rock and Federal Government agencies, it was a typical half-truth released as history. Perhaps Buhari was out of the country when Professor Kole Omotosho published the story of the fuel crisis in 1977 and Buharis promise to end it then  without success. I also hope the President realizes that there are at least three million Nigerians alive today who remembered the history of the glorious past he sought to tell.

Furthermore, he stopped abruptly in the 1970s; made no mention of his second coming in 1984-5  by which time the refineries which were constructed under his watch had inexplicably started to exhibit signs of old age after only ten to fifteen years in service. Fuel scarcity had returned in 1984-5 just as in 1977. This is his third stage appearance.

Perhaps Buhari would like to answer two simple questions. Must a presidential candidate in Nigeria in 2015 need to be told that the two primary problems he must solve are related to regular power and fuel supply? With almost three years gone in his four year term, does he really expect Nigerians to forgive him his trespasses against them in 2018 on account of fairy tales told about achievements in 1977? For God sake more than half of his fellow citizens were not even alive then. It is all very well to say that things will be better in the long run. But, Nigerians like anybody else dont live in the long run. They live now; they need fuel and power right now and they have waited for almost three years and things are going from bad to worse.

One of the reasons we are in this mess as a nation is because the military, starting with that self-righteous, self-admiring and ungrateful former President  Obasanjo  had roped our Federal Republic into a unitary political structure which has saddled the FG with more responsibilities than any other FG in any federation in the world. And, if we have to point to one cardinal reason every single one of the Heads of State  civilian or military  has failed it would have to be the untenable political structure which the military foisted on us.

Great nations have achieved their greatness by having leaders who are a step or two ahead of their people  or at least are not too far behind when dramatic shifts are occurring in the polity. Buhari was at first uninterested in restructuring because it serves his personal purpose to have four more years running Nigeria as it is. So, he is against it; then he reluctantly agreed to establish a committee to advise him on the matter. It is clear that given that 2018 is an election year that nothing will come out of that committee report. Buhari just wants to buy time; to deceive Nigerians that he is serious about restructuring. He will forget the whole thing once in for the second term.

By contrast, we have other leaders, even Northern leaders, who have exhibited the flexibility of mind-set required to rule a multi-ethnic, multi-religious and multi-interest country like Nigeria. They are also younger, better educated and more respectful of the rights of all Nigerias ethnic groups. Permit me to bring some excerpts from a publication which I came across recently.

RESTRUCTURING AS A PATHWAY TO UNITY AND DEVELOPMENT  The Atiku Abubakar Files.

None of us is as great as all of us. We must look beyond our individual ambitions and interests. It [restructuring] is about country and its current and future citizens. Place that statement side by side with that of a leader who is telling fairy tales about a glorious past.

One of the consequences of excessive centralization and the military rule that facilitated it is that the Nigerian President is the most powerful president in the world. It would have been well if we can always have self-less sages as presidents. But, all we have experienced since the 1979 Constitution are rapacious individuals awarding oil wells to friends (including girl friends) and getting us into Halliburton, Siemens scandals, 52 pieces of luggage unchecked and Mainagate.

Nigerians are comings. The struggle for these reforms (electoral) is not about any one individual or group whether or not they have aspired to or are aspiring to political office. Centralisation of power in Nigeria has created in our Presidents the same feeling expressed by Louis XIV, 1638-1715, King of France who declared LEtat Cest moi or I am the State. Once in Aso Rock, they treat Nigerians including state governors as their servants at best, or slaves at worst. A Nigerian President took five months to select his cabinet and still has not appointed board members for most agencies. Can Trump or Macron get away with that?

We must begin to think differently, think big and come out of our comfort zones so the world would not continue to leave us behind. Let us ask ourselves: when in the last three years have we heard that sort of appeal? Great leaders challenge their people to reach for the moon; not to wallow in the blame game; not to spend almost three years lamenting what they inherited but charting the way forward.

There will be more from Atikus fascinating book which provides us with a new sort of leader to compare with what we have now.

Now I must turn to another aspect of the qualities of leadership which is currently in short supply in Aso Rock.

Leadership is the ability to define issues without aggravating problems.

Warren Bennis, in THE UNCONSCIOUS CONSPIRACY.

Herdsmen/farmers/communities murderous conflicts would have been regarded a national disaster if the President and some of his top officials have handled it well. But, they failed woefully. A former President of France cut short an official visit abroad to attend the funeral of six people killed by terrorists. The President of Nigeria was absent when seventy-seven (77) of his Fellow Countrymen were slaughtered by people he still refuses to recognize as terrorists  even though the entire world recognizes them as such. And, when the state governor and leaders of Benue were invited to Aso Rock, it was to be told to accommodate foreigners in their mist. There was no condolence message to the families, no promise of compensation.

The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development in the same government has revealed plans by the FG to establish Cow Colonies in all the thirty-six states of Nigeria. Mr Audu Ogbeh must be the only educated adult in Nigeria who seems not to understand that the FG owns no land anywhere in Nigeria. More to the point, the Minister is totally illogical when he asserts that the colonies dont mean that the FG will take land from others to give to herdsmen. One question will expose the deceit. Who will give up the land and who will use it?

The South South Summit on restructuring, penultimate Saturday, well attended (I was there) has already said no. The entire South will also reject the idea. Benue and Taraba already passed anti-grazing laws and might not go along. With more than half of the states rejecting the policy, one can only wonder how the FG intends to implement it without use of force.

Ogbeh has hastily put the wagon before the horse. Chaos is certain

OBASANJO IN SLICES  1

Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue. De La Rochefoucauld.

Once again, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, (aka OBJ) was in the news after sending another poison pen letter to his latest successor in office. Reading the letter, as well as previous letters written to Shagari, Babagida and later Jonathan it would be difficult not to come away with the impression that OBJ was a saint. Yet the only reason the man is walking free in Nigeria is because none of his successors had taken the trouble to read my book PDP: CORRUPTION INCORPORATED. It is all about the grand larceny committed by OBJs administration. By 2007close to N8tn was already missing from the Federation account.

Chapter one referred to N10b taken without NASS approval; Chapter 4 summarises series of illegal withdrawal of fund totaling over N1 trillion; Chapter 5 listed large scale embezzlement of public funds allegedly involving the Nigeria Police, Nigerian Customs Service; Halliburton; Aviation funds; Siemens and Julius Berger; NPA; Chapter 6 told how the PDTF was monumentally raided resulting in a Senate committee indictment of the President; page 223 revealed mismanagement of N200 billion Ecological Fund; and in page 290 $2billion block sold for $5 million etc.

The man keeps talking because none of his successors had the guts to prosecute him

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Loading...Home | News | General | Friends murdered in cold blood, schools crippled, life in camp worse than hell  Child survivors of Benue killings

BY PETER DURU, MAKURDI

Benue State has, in the last four weeks, been in sombre mood, no thanks to the killings in parts of the state, particularly in Guma and Logo local government areas, by suspected herdsmen.

*Some of the displaced children

Since the outbreak of the crisis in January, close to 100 persons, including pregnant women, children and the elderly, have been murdered in cold blood even as the figure keeps rising.

The development has also left close to 100,000 persons displaced in the various communities of the two local government areas badly hit by the crisis.

About half of the displaced persons are children who have been confined to the Internally Displaced Persons, IDP, camps located at Ugba, Anyii, Daudu, Gbajimba and Agan.

The affected children have had to cope in the most dehumanizing environment in the camps that lack basic facilities.

A journey to some of the camps revealed mind-boggling stories.

Apart from being exposed to environmental hazards there, there was the fear that the close to 50,000 children may contract communicable diseases, while some of them were already malnourished. Besides, close to 25,000 of the children, who are of school age, may have their education disrupted. The situation is made worse by the destruction of virtually all the educational facilities and schools in the affected communities.

It is indeed a sad story capable of creating a generation of children who might find it difficult to pick up the broken pieces of their lives if urgent steps are not taken to end the Benue herdsmen/local farmers crisis.

Speaking on the development, Donald Anundu, 55, and a father of seven, said he fled his home at Yelwata in Guma local government area, with his family after suspected herdsmen raided the community, killing 11 persons including four children.

I had to run with my family to this (Agan village) camp to secure my children and wife, he said.

Two of my children are in secondary school while others are in primary school but, since the beginning of the crisis, they have not been to school because some the schools have been razed and/or destroyed.

As things are, I cannot tell when we will go back to our community not to talk of when the children will go back to school.

*Another group of the displaced children

No more school  Nine-year-old

Also narrating his ordeal, nine-year-old Mkorshima Ioryange, a primary three pupil of LGEA Primary School, Uke Torkula village in Guma local government area, said he could no longer go to school because some of my friends were killed in cold blood by people who attacked our community and my parents ran with us to this place.

He added, Every morning, I wake up to tell my parents that I want to go to school but my mother always tells me that they are still killing people in our village and that, if we go back, we would be killed like my friends.

Please tell government to stop the killings and arrest the people who killed my friends so that we can go back to school.

Mkorshimas account of the crisis and the fate that befell the over 50,000 children housed in the six camps located in the two local government areas affected by the crisis tells the story of the school age children in the camps.

On her part, 60-year-old Mrs. Ugbihi Gbakaan, a widow, who claimed to have fled Atule village, Umenge in Guma local government area in the heat of the crisis, said she escaped with her seven children and six grandchildren to take refuge at the Daudu camp because the village was sacked after 15 residents were slaughtered by suspected herdsmen during the raid of January 2.

I am here with all my children and grandchildren because our community is no longer safe especially after about 15 of our people were killed in the new years day attack, she told Sunday Vanguard

The attackers also burnt the schools in our community and I dont really know if my children and grandchildren will go back to school soon because there are no more schools in our village and you know that it will be difficult for us to have them attend school in another village.

But the most important thing is that we have to be alive before talking of education, because a dead person does not go to school. So it is life before any other thing.

However, my worry at the moment is that the facilities at the camp have been over-stretched; children defecate openly; food is not sufficient because the refugee situation is beyond the state government which means that so many things are lacking and the rations we get are hardly enough.

The implication in the IDP camps is that children are falling sick and the efforts of the state government cannot help the situation because it is overwhelming. My fear is that we may soon start recording deaths of children if nothing is done very fast by the federal government.

And government should stop these killings and destruction of property to enable us move on with our lives and also help our children get good education to enable them become useful to themselves because, without education, the children have no future and you know what that means.

Teachers killed

Speaking on the issue, the Senior Special Assistant to Benue State Governor on State Emergency, Mr. Vincent Tsea, said the state government had been overwhelmed by the situation.

Tsea said, The fact of the matter is that over half of the close to100, 000 Internally Displaced Persons arising from the crisis are children. And over 50 per cent of the children are of school age who can no more attend school.

In fact, most of the communities have had their schools destroyed; so even if they go back today, there will be no school structures in most of the communities where these children would attend school.

The implication is that most of them will be out of school until something urgent is done to rehabilitate the affected schools to enable the children continue their education.

Moreover some of the teachers have lost their lives to the crisis and we must also start thinking of how to replace those valuable hands.

Monumental crisis

On his part, the Executive Chairman of Benue State Universal Education Board, Dr. Philip Tachin, lamented that the devastation had crippled education in Logo and Guma local governments.

We have a monumental crisis in the educational sector in both local governments and it has become a source of worry for every discerning mind in the state, Tachin said

The situation is certainly beyond the state government because taking care of close to 100,000 displaced persons at this critical time is a Herculean task.

I am also worried because we have lost our schools though I cannot readily give you the figure right now because the security situation would not allow you to have a precise figure. But from what we have gathered so far from the affected persons, we might be talking of about 90 schools that have been destroyed.

In her account, the Chairperson, Benue Non-Governmental Network, BENGONET, Rural Development Initiative, Mrs. Rachel Ityonzughul, said the situation was overwhelming.

Speaking on the condition of the children in the camps, Ityonzughul said, We have so far recorded a case of a malnourished child who was taken to hospital and has been discharged after treatment, but I must tell you that the situation in the camps is overwhelming and requires urgent intervention by well-meaning Nigerians and organizations.

On his part, the President of Benue Youths Forum, Comrade Terrence Kuanum, disclosed that over 81 schools had been destroyed in the latest attacks on communities in the state since the beginning of the year.

Meanwhile, Governor Samuel Ortom has solicited support from the federal government, public spirited individuals, organizations as well as the international community in tackling the humanitarian challenges associated with the crisis.

The governor, who spoke after visiting three of the IDP camps in Makurdi and Guma local government areas, maintained that influx into the camps across the state had increased the population to about 100, 000.

He directed Commissioners in the Ministries of Health and Water Resources to deploy more staff to the camps and also ensure adequate water supply.

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Loading...Home | News | General | Katsina state government to employ 54 doctors, 600 nurses

- Governor Aminu Masari of Katsina state says medical trips are being reduced to the minimal level due to the administrations investments in the health sector

- He states that his administration has further boosted health care delivery with the newly installed computer tomography CT scan and other medical equipment at the Amadi Rimi Special medical centre

- Katsina state government allocates 5,300 hectares of land for cattle colony

Governor Aminu Masari of Katsina state has announced plans to employ 54 doctors, 600 nurses para-medical officers as well as auxiliary staff for its hospitals across the state.

The governor who made the disclosure at the weekend, noted that the employment of the medical staff was to enhance the health care delivery in the state, Daily Trust reports.

READ ALSO: 5 governors who may lose their seats in 2019

Masari said medical trips are being reduced to the minimal level due to the administrations investments in the health sector.

He said his administration has further boosted health care delivery with the newly installed computer tomography CT scan and other medical equipment at the Amadi Rimi Special medical centre.

Meanwhile, as opinions continue to vary over the best solution to the crises between herdsmen and farmers in Nigeria, the Katsina state government has reportedly allocated 5,300 hectares of its land for cattle colonies.

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The land, according to Daily Trust, is located at Gurbin Baure, Jibia Local Government Area of the state.

The development, the report said, was confirmed by Abba Yakubu Abdallah, the special adviser to the government on Agriculture, who spoke with newsmen.

He said Governor Bello Masari-led administration supports the programme.

N1,500 for health of Nigerians on NAIJ.com TV

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Loading...Home | News | General | Elongation of NDDC board tenure: APC frowns, tells President Buhari what to do

- President Buhari has been advised to dissolve the board of the NDDC as its tenure has expired

- The Ondo state chapter of the APC said the tenure of the board expired in December 2017

- The party added that any extension of the tenure of the board is unconstitutional

The All Progressives Congress in Ondo state has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to dissolve the board of Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) following the expiration of its tenure in December.

The state publicity secretary, Abayomi Adesanya, made the call in a statement in Lagos on Sunday, February 4, NAN reports.

The party said that the tenure of the board had expired in December after a four-year term.

Adesanya said it frowned at surreptitious moves by some powerful persons at the presidency to elongate the tenure of the board beyond the December 8, 2017 term.

READ ALSO: 2019: Combined forces of Obasanjo and Kwankwaso cannot stop Buhari - Presidential aide

Any extension of the tenure of the board is unconstitutional and an attempt to give Cross River and Akwa-Ibom states undue advantage of serving for continuous period of six years as chairman and managing director, respectively, to the detriment of other member states.

For the fact that it is the turn of Ondo State, as the fifth highest oil producing state in the country, to produce the next Managing Director of NDDC, President Muhammadu Buhari must compensate the people of Ondo State for their commitment to the Party (APC) and the victory of the President in the 2015 presidential election.

It is on record that of all the nine oil producing states in Nigeria, it was only in Ondo state that President Muhammadu Buhari had an overwhelming victory in the 2015 Presidential election and we have not been so compensated, the party said.

Adesanya, therefore, called on the president to, as matter of urgency, dissolve the NDDC board and appoint loyal and committed members of the party as chairman from Delta State and managing director from Ondo state.

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NAIJ.com earlier reported that the paramount ruler of Opokuma clan in Kolokuma/ Opokuma Local Government Area of Bayelsa state, His Majesty, King Okpoitari Diongoli, Opuokun IV, Ibedaowei of Opokuma, wrote an open letter to President Buhari over the dissolution of the present board of the NDDC.

The monarch stated that the tenure of the current board has elapsed and it was time to make way for a new board.

He called on the Buhari-led government to be guided by the Act establishing the NDDC.

Meet Sunny Ofehe, the new face of Niger Delta development - on NAIJ.com TV

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Loading...Home | News | General | Dangotes daughter Fatima set to wed ex-police IGs Pilot son Jamil

Beautiful daughter of Nigerian billionaire Fatima Dangote is set to walk down the aisle with ex-police IG, Abubakars pilot son Jamil.

The wedding which is about to bring two notable families together is is reportedly scheduled to hold in March 2018.

Capitalng reports that nuptial ceremony between Dangotes daughter and former Police Chiefs son, promises to be the mother of all weddings.

Aliko Dangote and his three daughters, Halima, Fatima and Sadia. Photo credit: Instagram

Read the interesting report below:

READ ALSO: Photos from the traditional wedding of Charly Boy's daughter, Adaeze

The prospect of Fatima Dangotes wedding to Jamil Abubakar is delicious, like the luscious little apples that grow in the orchards of Winesburg.

The forthcoming union of the daughter of Africas richest billionaire, Aliko Dangote and the pilot son of former Inspector General (IG) of Police, MD Abubakar, promises to be the mother of all weddings.

It is a marriage made in heaven and signed to be actualised on earth, according to friends and family of the couple. Besides the apparent love and unwavering loyalty of the duo to each other, friends and family enthuse that there couldnt be a greater match of equals and beloveds; from the moment Fatimas courtship began by her beau, Jamil, families and friends of the duo embarked on fervent prayers, hoping that their attraction and love withstand the test of time.

The details are both in the telling and the seeing in respect of Fatima and Jamils budding love; the magnetism binds them resonates very loudly and exhilaratingly, arousing feelings of envy and desire among friends and family, wishing that they are blessed with something similar.

Fatima and Jamil have a lot working for them; both their fathers are filthy rich and eager to fulfil their ultimate yearnings and they are equally blessed with towering grace, humility and desire to unite in a lifetime of love and commitment.

Thus as the wedding bells toll for the couple, their families are planning to spare no expense in giving them the treat of a grand wedding celebration.

Trust Aliko, about five presidents in the world and all the past presidents of Nigeria are billed to attend his daughters weddding. Likewise, worlds renowned billionaire philanthropist and Microsoft boss, Bill Gate, has confirmed his intent to attend the wedding in March at the prestigious Eko Hotel, Lagos.

Unlike the wedding of Dangotes first daughter, Halima to Bello in Kano city few years ago, Halimas forthcoming wedding promises to be star-studded.

READ ALSO: Actor Funky Mallam marries for the second time

NAIJ.com looks forward to the promising wedding even as we say a huge congratulations to both families.

Is it a big deal for a guy to have a side chick? - on NAIJ.com TV

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Loading...Home | News | General | Modern leadership is not just about 'fighting' corruption and 8 other takeaways from IBB's 'special statement' to Buhari

Less than two weeks after former president Olusegun Obasanjo wrote an open letter to President Muhammadu Buhari asking him not to seek reelection in 2019, a former military president has followed suit.

Ibrahim Babangida who overthrew Buhari in 1985 and ruled till 1993, urged the president to complete his first term and allow a new generation of leaders to take control of the nations affairs in 2019.

He gave this advice in a statement issued in Abuja on Sunday, February 4, through his media aide, Prince Kassim Afegbua.

The former president, however, asked Nigerians to co-operate with the president until his tenure ends but vote for a new generation of leaders in 2019.

Babangida has asked Nigerians to co-operate with President Muhammadu Buhari until his tenure ends. Photo Credit: Twitter

NAIJ.com has gathered nine takeaways from Babangida's statement.

1. Enough of this analogue system

In 2019 and beyond, we should come to a national consensus that we need new breed leadership with requisite capacity to manage our diversities and jump-start a process of launching the country on the super highway of technology-driven leadership in line with the dynamics of modern governance. It is short of saying enough of this analogue system. Lets give way for digital leadership orientation with all the trappings of consultative, constructive, communicative, interactive and utility-driven approach where everyone has a role to play in the process of enthroning accountability and transparency in governance.

2. Boko Haram challenge remains unabated

I am alarmed by the amount of blood-letting across the land. Nigeria is now being described as a land where blood flows like river, where tears have refused to dry up. Almost on a daily basis, we are both mourning and grieving, and often times left helpless by the sophistication of crimes. The Boko Haram challenge has remained unabated even though there has been commendable effort by government to maximally downgrade them. I will professionally advise that the battle be taken to the inner fortress of Sambisa Forest rather than responding to the insurgents ambushes from time to time.

READ ALSO: FG fully committed to creating new jobs - Lai Mohammed

3. Nigerians should cooperate with President Buhari till his tenure expires in 2019

In the fullness of our present realities, we need to cooperate with President Muhammadu Buhari to complete his term of office on May 29th, 2019 and collectively prepare the way for new generation leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country.

4. There comes a time one needs to step down

I do not intend to deny President Buhari his inalienable right to vote and be voted for, but there comes a time in the life of a nation, when personal ambition should not override national interest. This is the time for us to reinvent the will and tap into the resourcefulness of the younger generation, stimulate their entrepreneurial initiatives and provoke a conduce environment to grow national economy both at the micro and macro levels.

5. Vote out Buhari and enthrone younger blood

I have not written an open letter to the President, I have just shared my thoughts with fellow compatriots on the need to enthrone younger blood into the mainstream of our political leadership starting from 2019.

6. On corruption

Modern leadership is not just about fighting corruption, it is about plugging the leakages and building systems that will militate against corruption.

READ ALSO: Where is the promised change? - IBB urges Buhari to step down in 2019

7. On herdsmen crisis

The unchecked activities of the herdsmen have continued to raise doubt on the capacity of this government to handle with dispatch, security concerns that continue to threaten our dear nation; suic*de bombings, kidnappings, armed banditry, ethnic clashes and other divisive tendencies. We need to bring different actors to the roundtable.

8. Where is the change?

When the ruling party campaigned with the change mantra, I had thought they would device new methods, provoke new initiatives and proffer new ways to addressing some of our developmental problems. By now, in line with her manifesto, one would have thought that the APC will give fillip to the idea of devolution of powers and tinker with processes that would strengthen and reform the various sectors of the economy.

We are still experiencing huge infrastructural deficit across the country and one had thought the APC-led federal government would behave differently from their counterparts in previous administrations. I am hesitant to ask; where is the promised change?

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9. The way forward

The search for that new breed leadership must start now as we prepare for 2019 election.

The next election in 2019 therefore presents us a unique opportunity to reinvent the will and provoke fresh leadership that would immediately begin the process of healing the wounds in the land and ensuring that the wishes and aspirations of the people are realized in building and sustaining national cohesion and consensus.

Meanwhile, the national leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and former governor of Lagos state, Bola Tinubu, on Thursday, February 1, accused former president Olusegun Obasanjo of playing politics with his open letter to President Buhari.

He insisted that Obasanjo could have used other better ways of communicating his observations about the Buharis administration other than open letter if not politically motivated. Read more:

What would you do differently if you were Nigeria's president? - on NAIJ.com TV

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Loading...Home | News | General | Thugs attack APC members in Cross River as party chieftain declares for governor

- Suspected thugs reportedly attacked a gathering of the All Progressives Congress in Obudu, Cross River state

- The thugs were said to have disrupted the gathering where a stalwart of the party was billed to declare his governorship ambition

- Among those reportedly wounded was the chairman of APC in Abi local government area, Romanus Egbonyi

A gathering of the All Progressives Congress in Obudu, Cross River state, where a stalwart of the party, Venatius Ikem, was expected to announce his intention to run for the governorship of the state in 2019, was reportedly attacked and disrupted by suspected thugs.

READ ALSO: Where is the promised change? - IBB urges Buhari to step down in 2019

The APC secretariat which was the venue of the gathering, was vandalised by the thugs that were said to be loyalists of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the state, Premium Times reports.

NAIJ.com gathered that they destroyed the partys billboards, canopies, chairs, and public address system. It was learnt that the thugs chased the APC supporters out of the venue. The incident was said to have happened around 12 pm on Friday, February 2.

According to Ikem, the thugs came back a second time when the APC leaders and the partys supporters went back to continue with the event.

He said: Immediately we got there again and entered the secretariat and started chanting the party slogan so that we could start the programme, they came back. Apparently, they were monitoring us. They started attacking us again.

They broke all the glasses and everything they could see in the party secretariat. They beat up people. Several people were taken to hospital.

The APC stalwart said that his governorship ambition was eventually declared at a private residence around the area.

He added: We can identify those who led the attack. They were not masked, they are our towns boys. Many of them are appointees of the governor. We have their names. In fact, we have a video of what happened.

APC chairman in Obudu corroborated Ikem's claims, adding that he had advised the party supporters not to attack back in order to avoid the escalation of violence.

It was reported that the chairman of APC in Abi local government area, Romanus Egbonyi, was among those wounded in the attack.

Egbonyi condemned the attack as being unfair to the APC which he said has been law-abiding in the state.

He said: I want to say that this will not deter us at all. We all came here to witness the formal declaration of Barr Venatius Ikem and got attacked as you all have witnessed.

If the powers that be in the state are confident of themselves, why do they have to descend so low to attack us in our own premises?

The divisional police officer in Obudu confirmed the attack.

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Meanwhile, NAIJ.com previously reported that Chief Joseph Alake, a political leader of the All Progressives Congress in Efon-Alaaye, Ekiti state, was attacked by some political thugs.

According to Alake who disclosed this at the political stakeholders meeting organised by law enforcement agencies and the Independent National Electoral Commission in Ado-Ekiti, the thugs stormed his residence at about 11 am.

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Loading...Home | News | General | We cannot guarantee the safety of oil installations in Niger Delta - Ex-militants issue warning to FG

- Ex-militants under the federal government amnesty programme are not happy over reports of plans to discontinue the programme

- The leader and chairman, Amnesty Phase 11 in Delta state, Ambassador (Chief) Kingsley Muturu said the safety of oil installations in the Niger Delta cannot be guaranteed if this happens

- He called for the relocation of oil facilities from the region

Some former militants have opposed reported plans by the federal government to terminate the Presidential Amnesty Programme in 2018.

The ex-militants under the federal government amnesty programme advised the government against making such a provocative move, Daily Trust reports.

Ex-militant leader and chairman, Amnesty Phase 11 in Delta state, Ambassador (Chief) Kingsley Muturu, said the objectives the initiative is far from being achieved.

He advised that before such action is taken, the federal government needs to first ensure the relocation of multinational oil companies and facilities to other regions.

Muturu said: The ideal of peace and deserved development of the Niger Delta for which Late President Musa Umar YarAdua laudably offered and implemented the Amnesty programme remain far from being achieved.

With the groundswell of anger in the land, we wish to humbly serve notice that we cannot guarantee the safety of oil installations in the Niger Delta. Accordingly, before terminating the PAP, we advise the federal government to kindly relocate all oil facilities from the Niger Delta region to another safer haven.

"This advice is intended to avert consequences of military deployment by the FG which unfortunately believes more in physical force to spill innocent blood of people of the oil-bearing communities in the Niger Delta.

READ ALSO: 2019: 9 takeaways from IBB's 'special statement' to Buhari

The creek ex-warlord who was conferred with ambassador of peace title by his people, claimed that Gen Paul Boroh, the special adviser to the president on Niger Delta and coordinator of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, was arm-twisted by agents of the federal government to the detriment of Niger Deltans.

According to him, the amnesty programme has suffered declining fortunes under Boroh.

He also alleged that politicians and bad advisers were preventing Gen Boroh from meeting with leaders of the militants so they could offer suggestions for continuity.

With recent denials of Niger Deltans in educational programmes of the PAP, is the FG not orchestrating the denial of Niger Deltans from the prospect of being in the commanding heights of political and economic decision making in the Nigerian nation that has so held us down?

It is disheartening that even those interested in agricultural training, whose training were supposed to last longer were reduced to two week training or less. The implication is that they were not trained at all while the vendors (contractors) of such programmes smile to the banks with huge amounts.

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"We had thought that an amnesty programme that is progressively better sponsored, not terminated, would take the wind off the sail of those still bent on vandalism as a means of agitation, he lamented.

NAIJ.com reported earlier that some former Niger Delta militant leaders, on Thursday, February 1, raised the alarm that powerful northerners have allegedly taken over the Presidential Amnesty Programme.

The leaders alleged that the northerners swapped names of ex-agitators captured in the programme with Hausa/Fulani names as benefactors at most of the training institutions.

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Loading...Home | News | General | How Buharis re-election will guarantee Igbo presidency in 2023 - Buhari Support Organisation

- The BSO commends President Buhari for giving a befitting burial to Alex Ekwueme who served the country meritoriously as vice-president and in other capacities

- The group thanks the president for renaming the Federal University in Ebonyi state after the late elder statesman

- APC chieftain, Orji Uzor Kalu, urges people of the southeast to support President Buhari and his re-election bid in 2019

The Buhari Support Organisation, Enugu state chapter, has urged people of the southeast to show appreciation to President Muhammadu Buhari for the befitting burial he gave second republic vice-president, Alex Ekwueme, by supporting his re-election bid.

The group in a statement on Sunday, February 4, by its publicity secretary, Chibueze Eze, maintained that voting Buhari for a second term in 2019 will guarantee a president of Igbo extraction in 2023, the Punch reports.

READ ALSO: 5 governors who may lose their seats in 2019

The BSO commended the president for giving a befitting burial to Alex Ekwueme who served the country meritoriously as vice-president and in other capacities.

It thanked Buhari for renaming the Federal University in Ebonyi state after the late elder statesman, to immortalise him.

We thank President Muhammadu Buhari for not only giving Ekwueme a befitting burial, but for also flying him to London for medical attention and capping it with renaming the Federal University in Ebonyi State after him, the BSO said.

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Meanwhile, a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Orji Uzor Kalu, has expressed optimism that someone of Igbo descent would be president in 2023 after President Muhammadu Buharis second term.

Kalu also stated that it is possible for him to be in Aso Rock if he is alive and in good health as he understands Nigerias macro and micro economics.

The former governor of Abia state made the statement when speaking at the burial of former vice president, Alex Ekwueme.

Kalu who urged the Igbo to support Buhari and his re-election to achieve the dream, said an Igbo president will emerge in 2023, and not 2019 when many Igbo would have loved it to happen.

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Loading...Home | News | General | 2019: Babagana Kingibes noodles flood market

By Dirisu Yakubu

ABUJA-Less than a week after denying nursing a Presidential ambition, branded noodles bearing the name and portrait of former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Ambassador Babagana Kingibe, have made their way to the Nigerian market.

Kingibe, in an advertorial in some major national dailies last Thursday, dismissed media reports linking him with the 2019 Presidential election.

2019: Kingibes noodles flood market

In the said advertorial, Kingibe had said he Neither produced nor authorised anybody to produce campaign posters on his behalf.

A source close to Kingibe said the former SGF believes hes been singled out for vilification by his political detractors.

Some Directors of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) had written to the House of Representatives Committee on Security and National Intelligence, alleging that Kingibe who headed the Federal Government panel that reviewed the Operational, technical and administrative structure of NIA, following the discovery of $43 million of the agency at a Lagos apartment, recommended the appointment of Ahmed Rufai Abubakar, as Director General of the agency.

There is a chance that Abubakars appointment will culminate in the retirement of some of the directors if the agency.

This much was stated in the advertorial by the ex-SGF when he noted that The phantom allegations and pasting of posters are striking to be coincidental. This is a miscalculated attempt to malign and defame me.

The source who sought an audience with the President early last week following the appearance of the posters , added that Kingibe elected to take paid advert in some national dailies as a means of pledging his loyalty to the Commander-in-Chief.

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Loading...Home | News | General | Lagosians react differently to whom should make first move in relationship proposals

Mixed reactions have greeted the belief in some quarters that ladies can first make relationship proposals to men.

Some Lagosians on Sunday told newsmen in separate interviews in Lagos that such a move was ungodly and morally wrong while others applauded it.

Miss Stephanie Ezeani, an akccountant with a private audit firm, told newsmen that culturally, it was wrong for a woman to propose to a man.

Ezeani said that it was not normal to say that a lady paid her husbands groom price.

Nigerian youths

She explained that the man would always be the head of house, while the woman as the necks hold support her husband.

So it is the mans responsibility to lead in the family upkeep and the woman to support.

It is always morally right for the man to propose first in this part of the world, considering our culture, she said.

Mrs Adijat Olawale, creator of Aniks Clothing and a fashion critic condemned the belief saying that it was against her religion as a Muslim to propose to a man.

Olawale said that proposing to a man decreases the value and respect of a woman before the man she claimed to love.

She explained that apart from the religious angle, Nigeria men were not operating on the same level with men in the western world.

She said that they in the advanced work might not see anything wrong in the ladys decision to walk up to a man and proposed a relationship.

Furthermore, such step could be misinterpreted by families and friends as desperation on the part of the lady.

However, Mr Oluwaseyi Allison, an engineer with a private firm, Caststones Construction Company, told NAN that there was nothing wrong in a lady taking the first move.

Allison explained that God created men and women equal, adding that both sexes could propose to one another as long as they both love each other.

He, however, advised that if a lady should propose to the man in public, the man should not walk out on the lady to save her from embarrassment.

It takes special guts for a lady to propose to a man. We should applaud such ladies.

However, proposing to a man does not mean wedding immediately; it just means 100 per cent commitment from the lady.

And if they are both serious about the relationship, wedding should not be a problem to them,  he said.

A physician, Dr Gideon Ogundeyi, said that he could not see reasons why his girlfriend could not propose first if they both understand each other well.

I am what she wants; that she is proposing does not make me recessive or her being dominant in the union.

That does not mean shes going to pick up my responsibilities or me neglecting my duties as the man, he said.

Ogundeyi noted that for the lady to propose to her man only confirms her bravery and boldness.

As a matter of fact, these are attributes my lady must possess. She, taking the bold step, will make me appreciate her more, the physician said.

It is the man that should see you and tell you he wants you as his babe or girlfriend. Not the lady walking up to him to toast him,  he said.

A cleric, Pastor Ifeoluwa Enitan of Christ Ambassador Ministry, Surulere, Lagos, admonished singles to always wait on God for their own partners.

Even the Bible says and I quote, he who finds a wife finds a good thing not she who finds a husband; therefore a man finds his woman and not vice-versa, Enitan said.

NAN

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Loading...Home | News | General | Buharis govt is a colossal failure  Secondus

By Festus Ahon

ASABA-NATIONAL Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Prince Uche Secondus, Sunday said they are working with the fear of God to return to power in 2019, insisting that the Coalition for Nigeria Movement was not a threat to the party.

National Chairman Peoples Democratic Party, Prince Uche Sekondus

Secondus who stated this while fielding questions from newsmen at the Asaba Airport to hold meetings with PDP Governors and stakeholders in Asaba, said they have began the process to reclaim government at the central in 2019.

The National Chairman who was flanked by Governor Ifeanyi Okowa, his deputy, Mr Kingsley Otuaro, Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Chief Sheriff Oborevwori, Senator Ighoyota Amori and other top government functionaries and party faithful, said they would mobilized their people enough and get them ready for the 2019 general election.

On what the party was doing to check imposition of candidates, he said: We have vowed not to repeat the old order and we have reassured our leadership and our people that we will devolve power down to the states so that they can take responsibilities and make sure that whatever names that have submitted would not be changed.

On what they are doing to check defection of his members to the APC, Secondus whose chartered aircraft touched ground in Asaba at exactly 3:33 pm, said; I believe that those who left the party would soon come back. There is fear in the country, and very soon, you will see political Tsunami that even the ruling party would be coming en-mass to PDP.

On whether the Coalition for Nigeria Movement portends danger for PDP in 2019, he said

the new coalition will never be a threat because we are a solid political party founded by our founding fathers. We are solid on the ground, and I believe that they are a threat to the other parties and not our party.

Speaking further, Secondus said; the Buharis administration is a colossal failure, and the entire country is aware of this, adding that We are in Asaba to talk to our people over mobilizing the grassroots.

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Loading...Home | News | General | PDP reacts to IBBs declaration on Buhari, says it is time to rescue Nigeria from collapse

- The PDP says IBBs declaration on Buhari vindicates its position on the current administration and the APC

- The party states that it is repositioned and opened to serve as the epicenter of the much desired new broad-based political engagement for all Nigerians

- It calls on leaders across board to join forces with the PDP to return the nation to its pride of place as a thriving economy and a truly democratic nation come 2019

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has described a statement credited to Ibrahim Babangida urging President Muhammadu Buhari not seek a re-election in 2019 is an indication that Nigerians across divides have reached a consensus against the All Progressives Congress (APC) administration.

The party in a statement on Sunday, February 4, by its national publicity secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, said the fact that Babangidas declaration is coming on the heels of similar declaration by former president Olusegun Obasanjo, was a vindicated its s position on the current administration and the APC.

The PDP said it was repositioned and open to serve as the epicenter of the much desired new broad-based political engagement of all Nigerians from their aspirations irrespective of creed, tribe or class.

READ ALSO: Nigerian army rescues 84, captures Boko Harams weapons

It called on leaders across board to join forces with it to return the nation to its pride of place as a thriving economy and a truly democratic nation come 2019.

Read the full statement from the PDP below:

"The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has described the declaration by former President Ibrahim Babangida that President Muhammadu Buhari should not seek a re-election in 2019 as apt and yet another pointer to the fact that Nigerians across divides have reached a consensus against President Buhari and his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC).

"This is just as the party commended the former military President for admonishing the APC's attempt to use its phony restructuring agenda as a decoy for wooing voters ahead of 2019 election.

"The party said General Babangidas position on the need for a dynamic, nationalistic and development-driven leadership is a direct reflection of the feeling and aspirations of Nigerians and completely captures the direction of the repositioned PDP for a better Nigeria.

"PDP National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, in a statement on Sunday said the fact that General Babangidas declaration on President Buhari is coming on the heels of similar declaration by former President Olusegun Obasanjo, has further vindicated PDPs position on the misrule of the Buhari administration and the APC.

"The PDP further described as an understatement, General Babangidas reflection that the Buhari administration and its APC has polluted the nations leadership actuality adding that it is not unmindful of the yearnings of Nigerians to use the platform of the repositioned PDP to propagate a new coalition that would return the much desired new atmosphere in the polity by producing the president that will acceptable to the majority of Nigerians.

"It is now obvious to all that the time has come for all Nigerians to jettison all personal interests and divisive tendencies and rally forces under a truly national platform as now embodied in the PDP to rescue our dear nation from total collapse.

"In line with the new consensus for the election of a truly Nigerian President in 2019, the repositioned PDP is completely open as the epicenter of the much desired new broad-based political engagement of all Nigerians in their aspirations irrespective of creed, tribe or class.

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"The repositioned PDP presents that credible platform, re-engineered with best democratic standards for unhindered accommodation of all interests from all parts of the country in our collective search for a new beginning.

"We therefore urge all Nigerians, particularly our leaders across board, to join forces with the PDP to once again return the nation to its pride of place as a thriving economy and a truly democratic nation come 2019."

NAIJ.com had earlier reported that former military president Ibrahim Babangida said it is time for Nigeria to reinvent the will and tap into the resourcefulness of the younger generation.

He called on Nigerians to cooperate with President Muhammadu Buhari to complete his tenure and collectively work towards preparing the way for new generation leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country.

This was contained in a special press statement released on Sunday, February 4, by Kassim Afegbua, his spokesman. His statement is coming not long after former president Olusegun Obasanjo in the same vein, asked Buhari not to seek re-election.

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Loading...Home | News | General | IBB clarifies reported vote out Buhari in 2019 statement

- Former military president, Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida, urges Nigerians to cooperate with Buhari to complete his term of office on May 29, 2019

- He accuses some Nigerians of eroding democracy by antics of hate speeches under the guise of religion, tribal or self imposed mentorship

- Group urges southeast to support Buharis re-election

Former military president, Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida, has denied statement credited to him in the media that he asked Nigerians to vote out President Muhammadu Buhari in 2019.

Babangida made the denial on Sunday, February 4, when making clarification about an earlier statement where he was said to have urged Nigerians to cooperate with Buhari to complete his term of office on May 29, 2019 and collectively prepare the way for new generation leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country.

In making the clarification, he described himself as a realist who believes that all issues in a democratic atmosphere should be sincerely discussed and resolved in the spirit of give and take. He said has always been an advocate of the objective that freedom can only be achieved through democracy, Daily Trust reports.

READ ALSO: Nigerian army rescues 84, captures Boko Harams weapons

The former military president, however stated that some people were using the freedom as an avenue for eroding democracy through the antics of hate speeches under the guise of religion, tribal or self imposed mentorship. He warned that such trend of pitching political class and the people was unhealthy and skewed.

Read IBBs full statement below:

"Distinguished Members of the Fourth estate of the realm.

It has been drawn to my attention a press statement on the State of the nation, particularly 2019 general elections and beyond.

Let me categorically state that as former President and Statesman, I have unfettered channel of communication with the highest authorities without sensational public correspondence, therefore those views expressed over there are personal views of the writer.

However, with due respect to individual opinion and constitutional rights, it is worrisome that Political events and civil unrest in many part of the country, has raised many questions on the governance and unity. Indeed 2018 is inundated with seasons of literatures on the corporate existence of this country. Many of such literatures have shown concerns of the corporate existence of Nigeria beyond 2019 general elections.

It will be recalled, that in my message to this year's Armed Forces Remembrance Day, I specifically expressed the dire need for proactive measures to stop farmers/herders clashes in the middle belt, Cattle rustling, armed robbery, Kidnapping, gangsterism and Cultism. Our security agencies have to step up surveillance with more efforts on intelligence gathering for maximum success.

Recent happenings and utterances by political gladiators is alarming and not in the interest of common man that is already overstretched and apparently living from hand to mouth due to precarious economic conditions. Despite all these challenges, I am optimistic that the political actors will play within the ambits of political norms and decorum to ameliorate the problems facing our society now.

I am a realist that believes in all issues in a democratic atmosphere are sincerely discussed and resolved in the spirit of give and take. Since after my military years that metamorphosed to the only Military President in the history of Nigeria and my civilian life, I always have one clear objective that freedom can only be achieved through democracy. Some people find this freedom as an avenue for eroding democracy by antics of hate speeches under the guise of religion, tribal or self imposed mentorship. This trend of pitching political class and the people is unhealthy and skewed.

The clamour for re-alignment of governance in the country as we are approaching 2019 election year is a welcome development only if the agitations are genuinely channeled through legislation and total supremacy of the constitution . Any attempt outside this circle of democratic tenants is deceptive and divisive idea capable of plunging our political journey into disarray.

Our present political parties and their structures need parameter pillars that will make them more strong with unique ideologies. However, our present political parties need surgical operation that will fusion them in to a reasonable numbers. I have been an advocate of two party systems but in our present reality in Nigeria, our political parties can fusion into strong political association/party that can form a formidable opposition to a ruling party.

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As students of history, we are aware that many advanced democracies have two distinct ideological political parties, with a handful of smaller political parties that serve as buffer whenever any of the known political parties derailed or became unpopular. I still believe in two party systems as the best option for Nigeria.

It is high time that, we dialogue more on any issue in order to have a political solution on any problem affecting us. It is sad that, Nigeria had its fare share of conflicts, and we cannot continue to fall back to those dark years of bloodshed.

As a people, now is the time to come together to address all Communal conflicts and criminality under any guise to further unite the country in line with the vision of our founding fathers so that as a nation, we can forge ahead in the task of building a more prosperous nation.

Signed:

"General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida GCFR, former military president and commander in-chirt of Nigerian armed forces"

Meanwhile, Prince Kassim Afegbua, the spokesperson to Babangida sent a statement to NAIJ.com saying that that earlier comments by the former military president stands.

"Please this is to affirm that the earlier statement issued and signed by me on behalf of General IBB stands. We regret the mixup in a rebuttal issued to contradict the statement. The statement stands," Afegbua stated.

In other news, the Buhari Support Organisation, Enugu state chapter, has urged people of the southeast to show appreciation to President Muhammadu Buhari for the befitting burial he gave second republic vice-president, Alex Ekwueme, by supporting his re-election bid.

The group in a statement on Sunday, February 4, by its publicity secretary, Chibueze Eze, maintained that voting Buhari for a second term in 2019 will guarantee a president of Igbo extraction in 2023, the Punch reports.

The BSO commended the president for giving a befitting burial to Alex Ekwueme who served the country meritoriously as vice-president and in other capacities.

It thanked Buhari for renaming the Federal University in Ebonyi state after the late elder statesman, to immortalise him.

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Loading...Home | News | General | Murder of 18-year-old white girl allegedly by Nigerian asylum seeker triggers shooting spree in Italy

- A gunman who went on a shooting spree in a town in Italy reportedly told investigators that the murder of a teenage white girl triggered the rampage

- He said that he decided to go on a shooting spree as soon as he heard of the murder of Pamela Mastropietro who was allegedly killed by a Nigerian asylum seeker`

- The gunman, identified as Luca Traini was arrested by police in the central square, Piazza della Vittoria

A lone gunman went on a shooting spree in a town in Italy on Saturday, February 3, shooting black migrants in apparent revenge for the brutal murder of a teenage white girl, Pamela Mastropietro, which was allegedly carried out by a Nigerian asylum seeker, Innocent Oseghale.

READ ALSO: Nigerian army rescues 84, captures Boko Harams weapons

The shaven-headed man, identified as Luca Traini, drove around the central Italian town of Macerata in a dark Alfa Romeo, opening fire with a pistol, The Telegraph reports.

NAIJ.com gathered that he wounded at least four and as many as six people, all said to be African migrants. One of them was left in a critical condition.

It was learnt that Traini eventually got out of his car and ran towards the towns war memorial, reportedly shouting Viva lItalia or long live Italy.

He was said to have made a fascist salute. He was arrested by police in the central square, Piazza della Vittoria.

Daily newspaper, Corriere della Sera, quoted Traini's confessional statement to investigators: I was driving to the gym when I heard on the radio about the 18-year-old girl. Instinctively I turned around, I went home, I opened the safe and took the pistol and decided to kill them all.

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Meanwhile, NAIJ.com previously reported that a Nigerian national, Innocent Oseghale, had been charged with the murder of an Italian woman, Pamela Mastropietro, an 18-year-old whose dismembered body was found on Wednesday, January 31, in two suitcases dumped in the countryside outside Pollenza.

Oseghale, 29, was said to "appear confused and not very clear" during questioning in which he denied the charges on Thursday, February 1.

He reportedly continued to deny the charges and tried to accuse two other people who police have cleared.

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Loading...Home | News | General | NGO inaugurates Mobile Cancer Centres to screen and treat cancers

Four pilot Mobile Cancer Centres (MCC) were on Sunday, in Lagos inaugurated by the National Cancer Prevention Programme (NCPP), an initiative of Mass Medical Mission, a non-governmental organisation.

A representative of the organisation, Dr Abia Nzelu, who is also, the project coordinator of the event, said that the MCC was the first of its kind anywhere in the world to screen and treat for cancers.

Nzelu is also, the Executive Secretary, Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy Nigeria, an NGO.

According to her, the advantages of MCC is to improve access to health facilities by people in the grassroots and it is cost effective.

The MCC is focused on screening and treating cancer, however, it aims to have a comprehensive approach to the prevention of cancer.

To prevent cancer, we need to prevent the risk factors that lead to it. For instance, liver cancer; the major risk factor is hepatitis B and C.

By preventing hepatitis, we will be preventing 80 percent of liver cancer.

So, we are having a comprehensive approach so that when we get to the community, everybody benefits maximally,  she said.

She said that statistics had shown that Nigeria had the seventh lowest life expectancy in the world.

This, she said, was due to stress and poor health maintenance culture by Nigerians.

Nigerians do not take care of their health and as a result, a lot of people die in ignorance,

World Cancer Day is to create awareness about the disease so that more people will be aware and get screened,  Nzelu said.

Also, the Coordinator, Dr Kin Egwuchim, said that the MCC would benefit Nigerians who could not travel abroad for treatment.

Egwuchim said, We have four pilot mobile centres that are being launched today, we are going to have more than 37 because there are some states that have many communities.

The MCC has facilities that can screen and treat for breast lumps, cervical cancers, colon cancers at their early stages.

Every community will be reached; the aim is to reduce incidents of cancer and cancer-related diseases.

A roster will be drawn to show when the MCCs will be reaching out so that members of the public will know when and where to go for screening.  Egwuchim said.

He urged the media to partner with the organisation in creating more awareness on the need for people to go for screening.

He also urged well-meaning Nigerians to emulate those who had supported the cost of acquiring the MCCs.

We want people to support the organisation towards fighting the scourge of cancer in Nigeria,  he said.

Newsmen report that the MCC offers free screening and treatment for cancers in their early stages including prostate, cervical, breast, colon, ovarian cancers.

Other screenings include diabetes, hepatitis, kidney and eye screening.

The World Cancer Day is marked annually on Feb. 4 with the 2018 theme, We can. I can.

NAN

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Loading...Annually, Continuums across the country conduct point-in-time counts of both sheltered and unsheltered homeless populations within their service areas on a single day. CSCAA participated in Cayuga Countys count on Jan. 24. The counts are used as a planning tool to inform local programming and allocation of funds across the continuum.

CSCAA secured Continuum funding to operate a 16-bed Rapid Re-Housing Program in Cayuga County that started Oct. 1. Funds are used to provide extended case management, supportive services and rental assistance to homeless participants for up to 24 months. Longterm support is provided by CSCAA in order to reduce the likelihood of homeless recidivism. The agency also contracts with the Cayuga County Department of Social Services to assist homeless families with locating and obtaining permanent housing through case management. In 2017, the program served 111 families, of which 73 obtained permanent housing.

Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}}Officials break ground for the Cameleon Center in Silay City, Negros Occidental, a place for abused children. It is the second center of its kind in the country after one built in Passi City, Iloilo

A center for sexually abused girls and disadvantaged children will soon rise in Silay City, Negros Occidental. The organization behind the initiative, Cameleon Association, recently joined its partnersthe local government of Silay and BDO Foundation, among othersin a groundbreaking ceremony marking the start of construction of the Cameleon Center. Silay City, led by Mayor Mark Golez, facilitated the donation of an 8,000-square-meter property to Cameleon Association. The Cameleon Center to be built on the property in Bonbon Village in Barangay E. Lopez, will serve as a home for girls, where they can also study, undergo therapy, receive counselling and rebuild their lives. BDO Foundations involvement in this project started in 2016 when it forged a partnership with Cameleon Association, an international non-profit organization that operates a similar center in Passi City, Iloilo. The groundbreaking ceremony was made special by the blessing officiated by His Excellency Bishop Patricio Buzon of the Diocese of Bacolod.The event was led by Mayor Golez, Cameleon Association founder Laurence Ligier, BDO Foundation president Mario Deriquito, BDO Foundation program director Rose Espinosa, Zonta Club of Makati Ayala president Rita Dy, and Zonta Club of Makati and Environs president Mita Rufino. They were joined by other local government officials and stakeholders.The CAMELEON Center will be a source of hope for abused children who will be housed there. It will be a place for people who, at a young age, already experienced the cruelties of misguided grownups, Deriquito remarked. This center will also serve as an affirmation that the community cares for our children and is doing everything to help them bounce back and build productive lives. BDO Foundations support for the CAMELEON Center is in line with the foundations advocacy to address the needs of marginalized members of society. The foundation fully supports CAMELEONs efforts to promote the dignity of children, the rehabilitation of abused girls and the protection of their human rights. A non-governmental organization that helps victims of abuse, CAMELEON Association enables the protection, personal reconstruction, rehabilitation and reintegration of mistreated children, sexually abused girls and survivors of incest in the Philippines. It extends educational assistance, healthcare and professional integration for disadvantaged youths and their families. Founded in 1997, the NGO has offices in France, Switzerland and Luxembourg as well as partnerships in Belgium, Andorra and the United States.OMG, there were SOOOOO many posts about this ugly motherfucker. I had completely forgotten about him.

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Seriously. ONTD back then was Pete Doherty, Girls Aloud, and Katie Price. I had no clue who any of them were. Then the Britney/Paris/Lindsay drama really ramped up.

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Yeah, I didn't know any of them, either! All the Little Mix/Fifth Harmony posts from the last couple years remind me of the Girls Aloud posts.



Let's just keep ONTD free of Stavros Nachos, the guy with the saggy balls and Paris Hilton.

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lol i remember people commenting shit like "um this isn't ONTD_UK why is this here?"

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I'd stay in a hotel run by The B-52's

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Kate Pierson co-owns a B&B in the Catskills



https://lazymeadow.com Well youre in luckKate Pierson co-owns a B&B in the Catskills

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omg I love it lol

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omg i wanna vacation here

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Love Shack, bb?

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omg YES!!

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i remember when kate was dating him. he was so fucking gross.

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hey they admit it's shabby! LOL

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lmao right? i read margate & was like, tf...

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i feel like that hotel would never be clean

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How in hell is Pete Doherty still alive?

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Idk. I did a quick search to see if he was clean now and found he tried sneaking heroin into an Italian hotel this past August :(

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Jesus Christ.

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damn

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damn thats sad

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Mte

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I was thinking the same thing

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this band and its endless self-mythologizing will never not make me rme

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Lol this is precious

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Car boot sales are a magical place for kids.

Back in the day my mum would give me 5 for it and I'd buy a ton of toys AND A HOT DOG!

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Oh man The Libertines meant everything to me as a teenager. I was obsessed. I still love their music a lot but I'm glad I stopped romanticising them (Pete in particular) like I used to.

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Same. I still like some of their new songs but I don't care much for them. Altho I used to really like the friendship between Pete and Carl, I realize Pete was/is toxic and didn't mind when they were separate. But I would loved to have seen them back in the days and hearing the good old days live

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tbh I dont think I romanticized the band but I loved their music sm as a teen (I still like to listen to them lol)

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Wow. This is taking me back. As awful as it sounds, I am surprised Pete Doherty is still alive.



I would stay at Tokio Hotel's hotel. I know fuck all about them, but they have hotel in their name so consider me sold.

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they're missing out on being a hotel samethey're missing out on being a hotel #brand

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Didn't this piece of shit introduce Amy Winehouse to heroin?

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no that was her shitty bf blake afaik

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The Albion Rooms - a creative residential hub for music, poetry and art



and heroin use, I'm sure

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We both know I'm not going to do that, Pete

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lmaoooooooooo. i love the libertines, but i would never. what a mess.

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LinkHe looks the type.

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Male? mhm agreed.

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LOL yep. He got that crazy eye to him. And you know he had "cola" on repeat.

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nnnn oop

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Trash white men.



Media doesnt like reporting on their criminal activities

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HIS NAME IS MIkE HuNT REALLY NOW???

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LMAO

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Michael HunT-e



Catch ha if u can, workin on ha tanMichael HunT-e

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Slow down babehhh

And don't act crazyyyyahhh

Don't you know you can look all you want but you just can't touch? (Just can't touch no)

So slow down babehhh (Hey)

I'm not your lady (I belong to mehhh)

Boy you're never gonna get it from me, say, coz I'm with someoneeeeeahhwhoaaaaa



Slow it downnnnnahhh

Slow it downnnnnwhoaaaa

Oh ooh whoaaaa *taps fingers on red *









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Omg there's another gif of a blonde singer belting out tunes cept it ain't xtina but its driving me nuts figuring out who. She's like....singing in a dark room and has like a dark blue shirt????

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Mike Hunt and he looks like a penis. The irony!

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LMAO I feel like I've met a Michael Hunt before



Edited at 2018-02-04 05:51 am (UTC)

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i just caught that



so sad

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love me hate me

say what you want about me

but all of the boys and all of the girls

are begging to mike hunt

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I once got a package delivered to my house for "Mike Hunt" and I thought someone was pulling a weird prank on me. Then I noticed the address was wrong and learned someone else on the block was actually named Mike Hunt.

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It can't be real thoooo

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Came in here to make sure someone said this lol.

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Edited at 2018-02-04 01:19 pm (UTC)

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mike hunt tastes like pepsi cola

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Ew this creep



I'm always surprised she's still so open to speaking and interacting with fans in person after her concerts.

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mte omg

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Sucks that these sickos take this as an opportunity and ruin the whole thing. She doesnt have to stop by and say hi, but she does.

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Fucking creep. I'm so glad they caught him.

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Jeez, that sounds scary

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Holy shit that is so frightening

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Omgggg awful. Im glad shes safe.



I just got my ticket to see her in a week and a half and am SO excited!

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of course it was florida

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come on down to Florida, I've got something for ya

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omg

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Why are her fans always like this

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How scary! So glad shes safe. Arielle Kebbels sister is currently missing I hope shes found safe as well

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I had a dream about this a month ago, except the man was successful and after a long police chase he drove his car off a bridge with him and Lana in it. And the man was Logan Paul. 

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JFC. I stg Lana and Taylor get the most stalkers.

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Makes sense for Taylor but the level of Lana's fame vs her stalker situations seems like an extreme ratio.

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Men are obsessed with her.

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I feel like its her wounded, vulnerable aesthetic that attracts crazies

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I would legit be terrified to be Taylor Swift

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Im glad shes safe

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I'm glad they thwarted the attack. The location and details make me think of Christina Grimmie :(

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LinkI am so so happy for Reed Morano

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Mte

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a huevo! a huevo!

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Are there any other award shows before the Oscars this month?



We already had that one where people just sit in a room for two hours and go "because I'm an actor".

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The BAFTAs are the only major precursor award left. I'm not sure if they're televised in the US (feels like something BBC America would take care of), though they are in the UK.

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Ah, well I can quietly pull for God's Own Country there.

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I just saw that yesterday and I loved it. See, parents, this is what happens to your kids when you don't hug them.



I'm also extremely happy it addressed anti-Romani sentiment in Europe, which is every-fucking-where and no one seems to think is a problem. "No, see, they're actually BORN evil. It's not prejudice when it's all true. They also steal your children and cook them on a spit. Absolutely true story, my friend's uncle's Nan saw it."

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... although, actually, I was thinking of another one. Like, five other ones.



Can we just have her be in all award shows anyway?







(The triple threat of the Golden Globes thru the SAG, lay me dying ) I'm sad that Lupita Nyong'o isn't doing the award circuit this year, because I remember her BAFTA dress for TYaS was glorious, glorious... although, actually, I was thinking of another one. Like, five other ones.Can we just have her be in all award shows anyway?(The triple threat of the Golden Globes thru the SAG, lay me dying )

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That green dress looks simple, yet she looks stunning wearing it.

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She's always wearing the coolest and most beautiful things. I still love that dress from the Oscars.

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The show is broadcast on television on BBC America and online I think soon afterwards!

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Theyre the day before the oscars (so the 3rd?)

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Like other people said the BAFTAs and the Indie Spirit Awards but there are also some guild awards that haven't happened yet. The Guild awards aren't televised but celebs will go and there will be pics.

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I gotta start watching Veep one of these days, I guess -- or do I?

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Everything already seems locked for the Oscars and its boring as fuck. Give me at least one surprise (Queen of subtle/beautiful acting Metcalf yanking that Oscar from Janney, please).

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Picture is likely to remain up in the air until it's announced, as all of the major contenders are stats-breakers in some way. I also have no idea what will happen in Original Screenplay, among the Big Eight categories.

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I hope Reed gets some good work. I was looking at her IMDB the other day and its like some Blake Lively movie... sis is too good for that.

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It's an action movie for a major studio though. It's gonna open a lot of doors for her.

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I love Anne of Green Gables and was initially so excited for Anne with An E but each episode was worse than the one before it and ultimately it was a huge mess.

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i do love they had matthew be played by the actor who played jasper in the original avonlea/road to avonlea series.

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I really liked the casting for Matthew, Marilla, and Anne. It's a shame the show wasn't better.

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Heh, I'm a big fan, conversely. It's quite tonally different from the books, and at times overshoots the mark on its "realistic" aesthetic, but it's a damn good tearjerker.

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I watched CMBYN last night. Idk there were parts that I liked (the final phone call, the girlfriend's last scene, etc.) but the film as a whole just did not enchant me. It's not that I have to like the character but Elio was not a character I could give a fuck about until the end of his and Oliver's affair.

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fuck guillermo del toro

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LinkIm sorry that this person is going through this but who is she? OP, mention of a notable role is always preferred in these cases, as well as a summary with bullets. Thx

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Arielle is an actress. She's been in Vampire Diaries, 90210 (reboot), The Grudge and I think she has a small part in the latest Fifty Shades movie.

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She was one of the girls in John Tucker Must Die.

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Or you can....you know, google it.

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She was Dean's girlfriend/wife in Gilmore Girls, also had a main role in Midnight, Texas.

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She played Dean's (Jared Padalecki) wife on "Gilmore Girls" for instance. Then she played Stefan's (Paul Wesley) best friend on "The Vampire Diaries". Other roles on "90210" (reboot) and "UnREAL" amongst others. Right now she's on that NBC show "Midnight, Texas"  it's based on novels by the Charlaine Harris who also wrote "True Blood".

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the notable roles OP threw in there are such weirdly random choices lol



She was in American Pie Band Camp and the mean girl in Aquamarine

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I know this is your schtick and normally I love it but it feels cruel on a post like this.

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Mte. There's a time to hang it up unless this is their regular personality.

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Im not sure how telling the OP how to make her post more relevant and therefore effective is cruel. I dont care for OPs style but I didnt even notice this was her post before I replied.

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aw man i hope she and her pup are found safely. <3

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I really hope they find them both safe! And I'm a little confused - if the dog's chipped, why can't they track her that way?

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Most chips aren't GPS tracked, they're just scannable so you get the owner's info when the dog is found.

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Ah, that makes sense. Thanks!

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A chip is just a thing you put under their skin that can be scanned at a vet. It has contact info for the owner but it doesn't work like a tracking device.

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https://instagram.com/p/Bewzh-pAdqb And oh God, Kim Cattrall's brother is missing too

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Wow thats horrible. I hope hes found & is safe!

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god, and it must be freezing there.

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That's awful, I hope both are found safe soon.

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oh man :( hope he's found safe

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This is so scary and I hope they find him.

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what the fuck is happening

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I hope they find them safe!



Apparently Kim Cattrall's brother is missing too. :((

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Good to know to avoid that area while apartment hunting lol

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What state is it in?

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It's LA, CA



Edited at 2018-02-04 08:48 pm (UTC)

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These types of things always make me so anxious. I can't imagine how her family is feeling right now. I hope they are found safe.

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Oh gosh I hope they find them soon and theyre ok!  I cant imagine what it must be like for a family member to go missing.

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I saw this come up on my feed a couple of times, that's horrible, I can't imagine going through a loved one being missing.

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That's scary :( I hope she's found.

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oh shit :( I hope her and the dog are found safe and sound.

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Her name looked familiar and I remembered she was one of the leads in John Tucker Must Die.



I really hope her sister is found :( this is awful

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This is terrifying. Hopefully she and her dog are okay and are found soon.

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She looks a hard 32.



I hope she is found safe and soon. A couple articles said she went missing after a fire broke out at her home. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5348985/Arielle-Kebbels-Sister-Julia-missing-Los-Angeles.html She looks a hard 32.I hope she is found safe and soon.

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Arielle is 32. I believe her sister is older.

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Oh no. She might have amnesia or something as a result of the fire. I hope she didn't perish in the fire...

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Ooooh, despite obviously doing some weird stuff to her face Arielle looks familiar now. K..now I know who she is.

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"a hard 32" in a post about her going missing good fucking lord when do some ppl stop

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MTE

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Hmmm. I wonder if she's intentionally disappeared and set the fire herself to throw people off?

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Francois tweeted about Arielle's sister asking people to keep an eye out.

Kim Catrall's brother too? Jesus

This reminds me of when Greg Ellis went missing

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Who is Francois?

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Her co-star in Midnight Texas. He was on the Borgias too.

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LinkCancer cells have traditionally been studied in petri dishes and on microscope slides. Researchers have now developed a 3-D model to analyze the complexities of cancer cells in an environment that more closely mimics the human body. Credit: Dr. Cecil Fox, Public Domain

Every day, roughly 100 billion new cells are created inside the human body. These cells join trillions of older cells to form the tissues and organs we rely on to stay alive. Sometimes when a cell is created, a mutation occurs within its DNA, transforming the cell into something defective and potentially dangerous to the body's internal environment. Usually, a cell will recognize its own defects and quickly terminate itself.

But sometimes, instead of eliminating itself, the mutated cell replicates, forming a tumor that could break apart, metastasize (i.e. migrate), and invade other parts of the bodyoftentimes through the bloodstream. Fortunately, Carnegie Mellon University's Professor of Mechanical Engineering Philip LeDuc, in collaboration with Ph.D. student James Li Wan and Dr. Carola Neumann, a breast cancer researcher from the University of Pittsburgh, developed a patient-oriented model scientists can use to better understandand eventually stopcancer cell migration.

According to LeDuc, this project began because of the growing interest researchers have shown in the relationship between physical science and cancer. Since tumors are actually physical masses, both biochemical and physical means can affect cancer cells and tumors. After considering the connection between these two topics, LeDuc, Neumann, and Wan turned their attention to metastasis and cancer cell analysis. Through their collaboration, they were able to develop a more accurate and relevant way to study cancer cells.

Although cell analysis traditionally occurs in a plastic petri dish, the research team created a 3-D model that more accurately reflects the physiological conditions of an organism. With this model, scientists can uncover and analyze the complexities of cancer cells in an environment that more closely mimics the human body.

"Biology has been studied by putting cells inside of petri dishes for decades," says LeDuc. "But the question is, can you make systems that are more physiologically relevant? We're using microfluidic and microfabrication approaches to create three dimensional systems because cells exist in three dimensional tissuesthey don't naturally reside in a 2-D petri dish."

Typically, microfluidic systemssystems that transfer liquids at the microscopic levelare made of plastic, but since LeDuc, Neumann, and Wan were searching for a more physiologically relevant system, they created their microfluidic system using collagen, the most predominant protein in the human body.

"As Phil said, we traditionally grow cells in plastic and work with them in petri dishes," says Neumann, an associate professor of pharmacology and chemical biology at the University of Pittsburgh. "But nowhere in your body do you have plastic. Having a 3-D system that mimics physiological conditions is a much better way to get faster and more relevant results."

Each microfluidic device created by the team contains two key components: a set of parallel channels that mimic traditional blood vessels and a concentration of cancer cells that are embedded in the collagen.

Once a device is constructed, the channels are injected with a chemical stimulant that diffuses into the surrounding collagen. As molecules from the stimulant move further away from the channels, a biomolecular gradient is created. This gradient prompts the embedded cancer cells to moveoften back toward the simulated blood vessel channels.

In a patient, if cancer cells enter the bloodstream, they metastasize and can form secondary cancer tumors. According to LeDuc and Neumann, most patients with solid tumors usually die from metastasisnot from the primary tumor itselfwhich is why scientists must figure out how to stop metastasis from occurring in the first place.

Metastasizing cancer cells have acquired the ability to move from the primary tumor into the blood or lymph systema process that requires cancer cells to migrate and remodel the tumor tissue to invade other parts of the body. So, in order to stop metastasis, scientists need to understand which factors support cancer cell mobility and tissue remodeling. This is why the 3-D system developed by LeDuc, Neumann, and Wan is so important.

"Cancer is an extremely heterogeneous disease, which means that not only do cancer cells differ from patient to patient, they vary even within one tumor," says Neumann. "The same is true for metastases. Depending on their location in the body, each additional secondary tumor is different as well."

To determine the best treatment for each patient, LeDuc, Neumann, and Wan believe that researchers will eventually be able to use their system to examine tumors from individual cancer patients. This process would ultimately help make cancer treatment more personalized and effective.

"Our model could potentially serve as a patient-specific model," says Wan, who conducted the lab experiments and analyzed the results for this study. "And that's very important because cancer is different in each patient, which makes it hard to cure."

Ideally, the 3-D system developed by LeDuc, Neumann, and Wan will give researchers and scientists the tools they need to stop cancer cells from metastasizing in every patient.

"At the end of the day, the tumor that's sitting there and doing nothingthat's okay," says LeDuc. "But as soon as it goes metastatic, everything breaks loose. We hope that our system will help stop metastasis and improve patient outcome in the long run."

The team's research paper, titled "Mimicking Embedded Vasculature Structure for 3-D Cancer on a Chip Approaches through Micromilling," was published in Scientific Reports. In addition to Philip LeDuc, Carola Neumann, and James Li Wan, mechanical engineering Ph.D. student Jonelle Yu, mechanical engineering Professor Burak Ozdoganlar (Carnegie Mellon University), and postdoctoral fellow Dr. John Skoko (University of Pittsburgh) contributed to this study.

Explore further Researchers discover specific tumor environment that triggers cells to metastasize

More information: "Mimicking Embedded Vasculature Structure for 3D Cancer on a Chip Approaches through Micromilling," Scientific Reports Volume 7, Article number: 16724 (2017) Journal information: Scientific Reports "Mimicking Embedded Vasculature Structure for 3D Cancer on a Chip Approaches through Micromilling,"Volume 7, Article number: 16724 (2017) DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-16458-3The Iraqi army launched a combing operation in Anbars deserts towards the Saudi borders to clear the area of remaining ISIS elements.

Iraq announced the end of IS in Iraq last December after a military offensive that ousted the terrorist group from its strongholds in predominantly Sunni areas.

The operation aims to chase Daesh remnants in the western desert and destroy their positions and hideouts, Anbar Operations Commander Maj. Gen. Mahmoud al-Falahi told the media.

He said tribal fighters and US-led coalition warplanes were taking part in the offensive.

Meanwhile, Iraqs Joint Operations Command said that the forces were conducting an operation based on accurate intelligence about the presence of a terrorist leader, Karim Afat Ali al-Samirmd, in one of houses in [Anbars] al-Baghdadi District to meet with a terrorist cell.

The vast Anbar desert areas in the province are the last refuge of the ISIS militants in Iraq after troops and paramilitaries ousted them from both valleys and all urban areas.Were sorry

An error occurred while processing your request. The page you are looking for on this website is unavailable, has moved, or does not exist. We recently migrated content to collinsaerospace.com, and we encourage you to visit that site to find the product or service you are looking for.2018 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #5

Posted on 4 February 2018 by John Hartz

Story of the Week... El Nino/La Nina Update... Toon of the Week... Video of the Week... Reports of Note... Coming Soon on SkS... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review... 97 Hours of Consensus...

Story of the Week...

Why Climate Deniers Target Women

Climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe has suffered sexist attacks from climate change deniers. Source: Katharine Hayhoe

Harassment is no stranger to the reporters, researchers and policymakers who work on climate change, but it is particularly severe for the women in those fields.

Canadian environment minister Catherine McKenna was labeled climate Barbie by the right-wing political blog The Rebel Media. Kait Parker of the Weather Channel suffered attacks from Breitbart News, which dismissed her forceful and lucid explanation of climate science as an argument from a pretty girl. Emily Atkin, who covers climate and energy for The New Republic, also has endured sexist barbs from Breitbart, which said she had kitty claws, and Rush Limbaugh, who called her an infobabe. In similar fashion, climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe earned the moniker climate babe from Limbaugh.

Certainly, sexist attacks are not unique to climate science, journalism or advocacy, but research into public understanding of climate change reveals an important link between sexism and climate denial??support for the existing social hierarchy.

Why Climate Deniers Target Women by Jeremy Deaton, Climate Nexus, Feb 2, 2018

El Nino/La Nina Update

More U.S. drought in a second-year La Nina?

Currently, we are fully immersed in the second winter of a double-dip La Nina. Although it will take some time before we can see how this event stacked up with past events, you might have noticed that it has been quite dry over much of the U.S. this winter, with drought expanding across several regions, particularly in the south. Being the big ENSO fans that you are, you might have asked yourself, are these conditions typical in the second winter of a double-dip La Nina? And are there any differences in how the atmosphere responds to La Nina in the second winter relative to the first? Well if either of those questions ever crossed your mind, then youre in luck!

A recent study (1) led by Dr. Yuko Okumura of the University of Texas at Austin addressed how the impacts of La Nina may change from the first winter to the second for double-dip La Ninas like this one. Spoiler alert: Dr. Okumura and colleagues found evidence that U.S. drought and the North Pacific atmospheric circulation anomalies strengthen in the second winter of a double-dip La Nina. With that out of the way, lets take a closer look at what they found.

More U.S. drought in a second-year La Nina? by Nat Johnson, ENSO Blog, NOAA's Climate.gov, Feb 1, 2018

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The superstorms and wildfires of 2017 cost a record-breaking $306 billion. As the Trump administration has sought to reverse environmental rules, is the federal government prepared to address even stronger storms? Is the U.S. Ready for More Billion-Dollar Storms? by Deborah Acosta, Climate Change, New York Times, Jan 29, 2018

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"I think that the debate is happening around the world. It's not a debate, though, in the science community. There's no debate at all there. The scientists know that human influences are creating greenhouse gases and these are warming the earth. And other things are  other human impacts, such as changing the earth's surface, paving over things and the like is also having an effect on the earth. So there's no debate there in the science community."

High resolution JPEG (1024 pixels wide)There was a time when former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page didnt try to hide his ties to Russia. Time reports that Page bragged about being an adviser to the Kremlin in a 2013 letter that at the very least suggests there were plenty of reasons for law enforcement officials to suspect he could have ties with the Russian government.

Over the past half year, I have had the privilege to serve as an informal advisor to the staff of the Kremlin in preparation for their Presidency of the G-20 Summit next month, where energy issues will be a prominent point on the agenda, Page reportedly says in the letter, according to Time. Page wrote those words as part of a dispute with an academic press over edits to a manuscript that he had submitted for publication.

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The recently declassified memo from Republican lawmaker Devin Nunes claims the FBI relied on Democratic-funded research to obtain a warrant to put him Page under surveillance.

Yet the letter seems to undermine the claim that there was no reason to put Page under surveillance besides the research carried out by a former Birtish intelligence agent. Page told Time that he sat in on and contributed to a few roundtable discussions with people from around the world between January and September 2013.

It was in 2013 that the FBI interviewed Page on his contact with the Russians amid suspicion that the Kremlin was trying to recruit him. In subsequent years, Page complained that the FBI would not leave him alone. But the letter to the academic publisher was not the first time Pages work and contacts with Moscow were brought to the spotlight. In 2008, the U.S. Embassy in Turkmenistan sent a cable to the State Department noting that Page had met with government officials in the country.

Knowing all these contacts it isnt exactly surprising that Page had a markedly different view on U.S. relations with Russia than other scholars. He wanted to make the argument that we needed to look more positively at Russias economic reforms and Russias relationship with Central Asia, the editor who received the letter said. I didnt think it was so weird, it was just contradictory to most mainstream Russian specialists views.Physical education teacher Karen Smith is on paid administrative leave from the Boulder Valley School District as police investigate allegations that she assaulted a student who refused to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Police officers went to the Angevine Middle School at about noon on Thursday following a report of a teacher assaulting a child. Although police confirmed the reports that they are investigating the alleged assault on a student who refused to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance they did not detail what the reported action entailed.

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The schools principal, Mike Medina, sent a letter to parents Thursday evening notifying them there had been an incident involving the 20-year veteran of the school district but didnt reveal any details of the alleged incident. We believe in due process and therefore ask that everyone respect Ms. Smiths privacy at this time, Medina said.

The Boulder Valley School District allows students to sit or stand during the pledge.

A parent waiting to pick up her child at the school on Friday told the local CBS affiliate that Smith is a strict teacher but had never heard of an issue. Two other parents said the story has been blown out of proportion.It would have been difficult for House Speaker Paul Ryan to seem more out of touch with the financial realities of the middle class if he tried. As part of his campaign to convince the public that the GOPs tax cut isnt just for the rich, Ryan took to Twitter to celebrate a story of a secretary who saw a $1.50 weekly increase in her paycheck, touting it as an example of the broad benefits of the measure.

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A secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, said she was pleasantly surprised her pay went up $1.50 a week  she said [that] will more than cover her Costco membership for the year, Ryan posted on Twitter, linking to an Associated Press report about how workers are seeing increases in their paychecks due to the tax cuts. A basic Costco membership costs $60 a year and the high school secretary, Julia Ketchum, will see her pay rise by $78 a year.

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It didnt take long for Democrats and social media users in general to pile on against Ryan, characterizing the tweet as a prime example of how the Republican leadership has no idea what it takes for lower income families to make ends meet. That tweet about the $1.50 a week is not a PR mistake, Democratic Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii wrote on Twitter. It is really what they think.

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That tweet about the $1.50 a week is not a PR mistake. It is really what they think.  Brian Schatz (@brianschatz) February 3, 2018

Ignoring a cardinal rule of social media, Ryan deleted the tweet, ensuring that it would suddenly get lots more attention as screenshots started spreading like wildfire. Paul Ryan deleted his embarrassing tweet of a blatant admission because he and Republicans dont want you to know the truth: the #GOPTaxScam is a gift to corporate America and the top 1% at your expense, Rep. Nancy Pelosi tweeted.

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Paul Ryan deleted his embarrassing tweet of a blatant admission because he and Republicans dont want you to know the truth: the #GOPTaxScam is a gift to corporate America and the top 1% at your expense.



He also doesnt want you to know he got $500.000.00 from the Koch family. pic.twitter.com/ENXxASfAMP  Nancy Pelosi (@TeamPelosi) February 3, 2018

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Randy Bryce, a Democrat who is seeking to unseat Ryan used the tweet in a fundraising plea for people to pitch in $1.50 to his campaign. Moments ago, @PRyan deleted this tweet after we told him just how out of touch he was, Bryce wrote. Show Paul Ryan what you think of his tax bill.

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Moments ago, @PRyan deleted this tweet after we told him just how out of touch he was. Show Paul Ryan what you think of his tax bill. Chip in $1.50 now to help us repeal and replace Ryan permanently this November.https://t.co/c3Fii4Q0Jn  Randy Bryce (@IronStache) February 3, 2018

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Rep. Eric Swalwell wondered if Ryan had told the secretary how much the paychecks of the 1% went up a week while former Obama staffer Jon Favreu wrote that Ryan received $500,000 from the Koch brothers as a thank you for the tax cut, which would probably cover the cost of buying a Costco.

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Did you tell her how much the paychecks of the 1% went up a week? Or that hers could have gone up a lot more if you had given them a lot less? #GOPTaxScam https://t.co/X7YBcdAzTH  Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) February 3, 2018

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As a thank you for passing a $1 trillion corporate tax cut, Paul Ryan received $500,000 in campaign contributions from the Koch brothers, which would probably cover the cost of buying a Costco. https://t.co/piiWqzOEGo  Jon Favreau (@jonfavs) February 3, 2018

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Others on social media took photos of $1.50 to show just how measly it is while others expressed shock that the House speaker would really think it was worth it to highlight a workers paycheck going up by $0.21 per day. The Washington Posts Christopher Ingraham pointed out that the additional $78 a year that the secretary is earning is less than Paul Ryan makes in one hour (roughly $108) as Speaker of the House.

[holding back tears]



Paul Ryan.................



thank you. pic.twitter.com/gQwYeY2RpR  Chris Jackson (@ChrisCJackson) February 3, 2018

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Extremely late to the dunk party on this but $1.50 a week works out to $78 a year, which is less than Paul Ryan makes in one hour (roughly $108) as Speaker of the House  Christopher Ingraham (@_cingraham) February 3, 2018

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Its unclear exactly why Ryan thought the example of the secretary was a good one to highlight considering the same AP article he linked to has other examples of workers who received increases of far more than $1.50 a week.

AdvertisementPresident Donald Trump took to Twitter Saturday morning to show off about his latest approval rating, which is the highest it has been in nearly a year. The commander in chief pointed to the number to suggest his political support is higher now than it was when he won the presidency. But the truth of the matter is the presidents approval ratings are still on average far lower than those of his predecessor.

Rasmussen just announced that my approval rating jumped to 49%, a far better number than I had in winning the Election, and higher than certain sacred cows, Trump wrote on Twitter. The commander in chief never clarifies who he means by sacred cows. In Trumps world, these numbers are no exception: Other Trump polls are way up also. So why does the media refuse to write this? Oh well, someday!

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Rasmussen just announced that my approval rating jumped to 49%, a far better number than I had in winning the Election, and higher than certain sacred cows. Other Trump polls are way up also. So why does the media refuse to write this? Oh well, someday!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 3, 2018

The commander in chief also retweeted his son, Eric Trump, who linked to a Daily Mail story about his fathers approval ratings with the hashtag #MakeAmericaGreatAgain.

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The president was referring to the latest daily tracking poll by Rasmussen, the conservative-leaning outfit that usually gives higher numbers for Trumps approval rating than other daily tracking polls. The Friday Rasmussen poll found that 49 percent of likely U.S. voters approve of the presidents job performance, a four-point jump from the Feb. 1 survey. That is significantly higher than the latest data from Gallup, which showed Trumps approval rating at 38 percent on Jan. 28.

The last time Rasmussen reported such a good number for the president was on June 16, when it said 50 percent of likely voters approved of the presidents job performance.

The Rasmussen poll also says 49 percent of likely voters disapprove of the presidents job performance. Rasmussen is the only pollster that has a tie in the approve vs disapprove comparison with all others showing higher numbers in the disapprove column. According to the Real Clear Politics Average, 41.9 percent approve of the job the president is doing, while 54.2 percent disapprove.Turkey Friday rejected placement of Hamas Chief on the US blacklist of terrorists, calling the Islamist movement an important reality of the Palestinian political life.

It is obvious that this decision, which overlooks the fact that Hamas is an important reality of Palestinian political life, cannot make any contribution to the just, comprehensive and lasting settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, foreign ministry spokesman, Hami Aksoy said in a written statement.

We also hope that the decision will not have a negative impact on our countrys humanitarian assistance and economic development activities towards Gaza.

US State Department Wednesday issued a statement announcing the blacklisting of Ismail Haniyeh, the overall leader of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas. The State Department based Haniyehs appearance on the list on his links with Hamas, which itself has been on the US blacklist since 2007.

Haniyeh is also charged for the death of 17 American citizens.

The US decision bans the 55-year old leader to enter the American territory, and freezes his assets in the US if any.

The decision came following President Trumps December recognition of Jerusalem as capital of Israel and amid ongoing efforts to unify rival Palestinians factions.

The Islamist movement swiftly rejected the US listing of its leader on the terror list, the New Arab reports.

As if we Palestinians require a certificate of good conduct from America, said the movement spokesman Hussam Badran.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was among the leading vocal Muslim leaders who condemned Trumps unilateral move.Cenovus Energy Inc., together with its subsidiaries, develops, produces, and markets crude oil, natural gas liquids, and natural gas in Canada, the United States and the Asia Pacific region. The company operates through Oil Sands, Conventional, and Refining and Marketing segments. The Oil Sands segment develops and produces bitumen in northeast Alberta. Its bitumen assets include Foster Creek, Christina Lake, and Narrows Lake, as well as other projects in the early stages of development. The Conventional segment holds assets primarily located in Elmworth-Wapiti, Kaybob-Edson, and Clearwater operating areas of British Columbia and Alberta, as well as various interests in natural gas processing facilities. The Refining and Marketing segment transports and sells crude oil, natural gas, and NGLs. This segment owns a 50% ownership in Wood River and Borger refineries located in the United States; and owns and operates a crude-by-rail terminal in Alberta. Cenovus Energy Inc. was founded in 2009 and is headquartered in Calgary, Canada.

Read MoreMarkWest Energy Partners, L.P. (MarkWest) is a master limited partnership engaged in the gathering, processing and transportation of natural gas; the gathering, transportation, fractionation, storage and marketing of natural gas liquids (NGLs), and the gathering and transportation of crude oil. The Company operates in four segments: Marcellus, Utica, Northeast and Southwest. The Marcellus segment provides integrated natural gas midstream services in southwestern Pennsylvania and northern West Virginia. The Company's MarkWest Utica EMG provides gathering, processing, fractionation and marketing services. The Northeast segment assets include the Kenova, Boldman, Cobb, Kermit and Langley natural gas processing complexes, an NGL pipeline and the Siloam fractionation facility. The Company owns a system that consists of natural gas gathering pipelines, centralized compressor stations, two natural gas processing complexes and two NGL pipelines.

Read MoreSwiss academic Tariq Ramadan, professor of contemporary Islamic studies at the University of Oxford, has been indicted by a French prosecutor after being taken in custody on rape charges.

Two women filed rape charges against Ramadan at a French court. The claims against Ramadan, a Swiss citizen whose grandfather founded Egypts Muslim Brotherhood movement, emerged in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal in the United States.

Ramadan has denied the allegations and filed a complaint for slander against the author Henda Ayari, one of his accusers.

In October, Ayari, 40, who heads the womens organization Les Liberatrices, filed a complaint with prosecutors in Rouen, France, alleging rape, sexual violence, harassment and intimidation by Ramadan. She said she was assaulted by him in a Paris hotel room in 2012.

Tariq Ramadan teaches at the Faculty of Theology and Religion at the University of Oxford. The 55-year-old is also a government advisor on extremism.Ormat Technologies, Inc. operates as a holding company. The firm engages in the provision of geothermal and recovered energy power business. It operates through the following segments: Electricity, Product and Energy Storage. The Electricity segment focuses in the sale of electricity from the company's power plants pursuant to PPAs. The Product segment involves in the manufacture, including design and development, of turbines and power units for the supply of electrical energy and in the associated construction of power plants utilizing the power units manufactured by the company to supply energy from geothermal fields and other alternative energy sources. The Energy Storage segment consists of battery energy storage systems as a service and management of curtailable customer loads under contracts with U.S. retail energy providers and directly with large commercial and industrial customers. The company was founded in 1965 and is headquartered in Reno, NV.

Read MoreConocoPhillips engages in the exploration, production, transportation and marketing of crude oil, bitumen, natural gas, natural gas liquids, and liquefied natural gas on a worldwide basis. It operates through the following geographical segments: Alaska; Lower 48; Canada; Europe, Middle East and North Africa; Asia Pacific; and Other International. The Alaska segment primarily explores for produces, transports and markets crude oil, natural gas and natural gas liquids. The Lower 48 segment consists of operations in the U.S. and the Gulf of Mexico. The Canada segment is comprised of oil sands development in the Athabasca Region of northeastern Alberta and a liquids-rich unconventional play in western Canada. The Europe, Middle East and North Africa segment consists of operations and exploration activities in Norway, the United Kingdom and Libya. The Asia Pacific segment has explorations and product operations in China, Indonesia, Malaysia and Australia. The Other International segment handles exploration activities in Columbia and Argentina. The company was founded in 1875 and is headquartered in Houston, TX.

Read MoreSRC Energy Inc., an oil and natural gas company, engages in the acquisition, exploration, development, and production of oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids primarily in the Denver-Julesburg Basin of Colorado. As of December 31, 2018, it had net proved oil and natural gas reserves of 88 million barrels of oil and condensate, 771.9 billion cubic feet of natural gas, and 89.1 million barrels of natural gas liquids; and operated 985 net producing wells, as well as had 95,200 gross and 86,200 net acres under lease in the Wattenberg Field. The company was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in Denver, Colorado.

Read MoreThe Boeing Co. is an aerospace company, which engages in the manufacture of commercial jetliners and defense, space and security systems. It operates through the following segments: Commercial Airplanes; Defense, Space and Security; Global Services; and Boeing Capital. The Commercial Airplanes segment includes the development, production, and market of commercial jet aircraft and provides fleet support services, principally to the commercial airline industry worldwide. The Defense, Space and Security segment refers to the research, development, production and modification of manned and unmanned military aircraft and weapons systems for global strike, including fighter and combat rotorcraft aircraft and missile systems; global mobility, including tanker, rotorcraft and tilt-rotor aircraft; and airborne surveillance and reconnaissance, including command and control, battle management and airborne anti-submarine aircraft. The Global Services segment provides services to commercial and defense customers. The Boeing Capital segment seeks to ensure that Boeing customers have the financing they need to buy and take delivery of their Boeing product and manages overall financing exposure. T

Read MoreTurkey has suffered the deadliest day since the launch of the Olive Branch Operation to crush the Kurdish militias in Afrin. Eight Turkish soldiers died in the military campaign including five who died in a single attack on a tank, Turkeys army has said.

The assault on a Turkish tank on Saturday, details of which were not disclosed, was also the single deadliest attack on the Turkish military of the offensive that aims at destroying the Kurdish YPG fighters, labeled by Turkey a terrorist group affiliated to the PKK fighters.

The total death toll for Turkish troops since the launch of the operation on January 20 now stands at 13 proving no easy victory for the Turkish army in the face of the battle-hardened Kurdish troops.

A Syrian Kurdish health official said on Saturday that 150 civilians had been killed and 300 wounded since the start of the Turkish operation.

Turkey has vowed to continue the operation and expand it eastwards towards the area of Manbij with the aim of pushing the YPG fighters east of the Euphrates river.

In the YPG front, 900 Kurdish fighters were so far killed media reports said although it is not possible to verify the figures.

Thousands of people have been displaced by the Turkish-led offensive that also involves about 10,000 Syrian rebels of the Free Syrian Army (FSA).Tableau Software, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides business analytics software products. It offers Tableau Desktop, a self-service, powerful analytics product with data; Tableau Server, a business intelligence platform for organizations; Tableau Online, a hosted software-as-a-service version of Tableau Server; Tableau Prep, a data preparation product for combining, shaping, and cleaning data; and Tableau Public, a cloud-based platform for analyzing and sharing public data. In addition, it offers Visual Query Language (VizQL) for databases, which is a computer language for describing pictures of data, including graphs, charts, maps, time series, and tables of visualizations; Live Query Engine that interprets abstract queries generated by VizQL into syntax understandable by database systems; and Hyper, an in-memory data engine technology that helps customers to analyze a range of data sets by evaluating analytical queries directly in the transactional database. Further, the company provides support, maintenance, training, and professional services. It serves organizations in various industries, including business services, energy and telecommunications, financial services, life sciences and healthcare, manufacturing and technology, media and entertainment, public sector, and education, as well as retail, consumer, and distribution industries. The company sells its products directly, as well as through indirect sales channels, such as technology vendors, resellers, original equipment manufacturers, independent software vendor, and distributors in the United States, Canada, and internationally. Tableau Software, Inc. was founded in 2003 and is headquartered in Seattle, Washington.

Read MoreSyrian rebels shot down a Russian warplane and killed its pilot on the ground after he ejected from the plane, Russias defense ministry and Syrian rebels said.

The SU-25 came down in Syrias northern Idlib province that has seen heavy air strikes and fighting on the ground between government forces backed by Russia and Iran, and rebels who oppose President Bashar al-Assad.

Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, a powerful rebel alliance that publicly split from al-Qaida last year, claimed responsibility for downing the Russian jet saying that it had used a man-portable antiaircraft system to shoot down the Su-25 fighter jet as it flew low over the opposition-held town of Saraqeb.

The rebels released footage on social media that purported to show the wreckage of the plane and the body of the pilot surrounded by fighters.

The area where the plane was shot down is controlled by several different rebel groups including Free Syrian Army (FSA) and Turkish backed forces as well as Tharir al-Sham.

TASS news agency quoted the Russian Defense Ministry as saying Moscow retaliated with a strike from an undisclosed high-precision weapon that killed more than 30 militants in an area of Idlib province where the plane was downed.

The US State Department said it had seen reports about the incident and allegations that the United States provided missiles to groups in Syria.

The United States has never provided MANPAD missiles to any group in Syria, and we are deeply concerned that such weapons are being used, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said.

With the help of Russian forces, the Syrian government has managed to take back much of the country held by rebels. The regime has launched an offensive to retake Idlib, the only province that has come under full rebel control in the nearly 7-year-old conflict.Issues of concern to people who live in the west: property rights, water rights, endangered species, livestock grazing, energy production, wilderness and western agriculture. Plus a few items on western history, western literature and the sport of rodeo... Frank DuBois served as the NM Secretary of Agriculture from 1988 to 2003. DuBois is a former legislative assistant to a U.S. Senator, a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Interior, and is the founder of the DuBois Rodeo Scholarship.A Vietnamese traveler has been startled to find out that his personal information, including the highly confidential credit account number, had been leaked after making reservations via hotel booking sites.

Users of popular hotel booking sites including Booking.com and Agoda are now concerned over the safety of their personal information after a shocking discovery of a local vacationer.

Vu Hien, a resident of Ho Chi Minh City, recalled the incident in mid-January, when he booked a hotel for his trip to Phu Quoc, a famous tourist island off the southern province of Kien Giang, via Agoda.

After choosing the room, Hien was required to enter his visa account number as confirmation, although he opted to pay at the hotel.

Believing that Agoda would safeguard and encrypt users credit card information as the website promises, Hien followed the instruction without hesitation.

I chose to pay at the hotel. The money in my account was insufficient to pay for the room, the man added.

Everything seemed to be completely fine until Hien checked-in at his resort, when the receptionist took out the piece of paper containing the information of his reservation.

The vacationer glanced at the paper and noticed the important data of his credit card, including the card number, name of the holder, verification code (CVC), and expiration date.

The resort employee later told Hien that the information was provided by Booking.com.

It is extremely risky to disclose such confidential details, Hien stated, adding that bad people could take advantage of the carelessness.

It is also difficult to determine who is to blame if something goes wrong, he said.

With such information, anyone can use my credit account to pay for their online purchases," Hien asserted.

It is understandable that credit card information is necessary to make online hotel reservation, he remarked, adding that Agoda or other booking sites are responsible for safeguarding those details.

Replying to Hiens complaint email, a representative from Agoda stated the site has been cooperating with its sister company, Booking.com, adding that both firms offer credit card details to their partners to guarantee the booking.

According to the agreement, the information will not be leaked to unauthorized parties or no action will be taken that compromises the security of users credit accounts, the representative continued.

A director of a travel agent stated that credit card information is mandatory to make sure that the reservation is real.

If customers do not show up or have enough cash, the payment will be made via the provided credit account.

During an interview with Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper, a representative from Booking.com asserted that customers information provided to partner hotels is secured with two-factor authentication.

The hotels are responsible to follow their business protocol which is designed to protect users' personal information.

In rare cases where our partners do not comply with the protocol, such as this one, we will carry out a prompt investigation, the representative stated.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!A street decorated with frescos in Hanoi was made available to the public on Friday as an artistic welcome to the Vietnamese Lunar New Year, also known as Tet, which begins in the middle of this month.

Beautiful murals, colorful and monochromatic, have covered the walls along a portion of Phung Hung Street, more than one kilometer long, in Hoan Kiem District.

The works of art are jointly produced by Korean and Vietnamese artists, who embarked on the Phung Hung fresco project on January 3.

Phung Hung Street leads to Dong Xuan (literally translated as Springfield), one of the capitals largest markets; and runs parallel to a railway viaduct that comprises 127 arches of nearly equal length, on which the mural paintings materialize.

Meant to capture the soul of an age-old Hanoi steeped in Vietnamese history and culture, 17 frescos depict local royal sites and commercial towns.

Wall murals of stationery shops, trams, vendors shouldering a pole hanging baskets of food, and feudal scholars penning calligraphy evoke poignant memories in Hanoi residents collective imagination.

Tourists and locals flocked to the destination for an eye feast and photos during the first day of the Phung Hung Street paintings display.

The local government has also commissioned decorative patterns on a number of road-side electric cubicles at the intersection of Phan Chu Trinh Street with Ly Thuong Kiet Street in the same district.

Some other streets in the area are expected to receive frescos in the foreseeable future.

A close-up of one of the painted roses. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Roses brighten up electrical cubicles in Hanoi. Photo: Tuoi Tre

A close-up view of the painting on one of the cubicles in Hanoi. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Road-side electrical cubicles adorned with still-lifes. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Electrical cubicles in new painting clothes at the crossroad between Phan Chu Trinh and Ly Thuong Kiet, in Hoan Kiem District, Hanoi. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Visitors stroll along Phung Hung Street to enjoy its frescos. Photo: Tuoi Tre

A fresco of a street vendor. Photo: Tuoi Tre

A fresco of a feudal scholar giving calligraphy. Photo: Tuoi Tre

A fresco showing street-side stalls of handicrafts in Hanoi. Photo: Tuoi Tre

A black-and-white fresco of Vietnamese women in ao dai, the countrys traditional outfit. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Children in red, a theme color of Tet, pose for photos with a vendor fresco in the background. Photo: Tuoi Tre

A different tram mural. Photo: Tuoi Tre

A mural of a past tram in Hanoi. Photo: Tuoi Tre

A fresco of an old-style home in Hanoi. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Frescos reminiscent of a quaint version Hanoi. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!A probe by Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper has revealed that many stolen dogs in the southern Vietnamese province of Binh Duong have been transported to a secret facility where they would be turned into dog meat.

Undercover Tuoi Tre reporters have infiltrated a dog theft ring and a venue where stolen dogs become meat in Binh Duong.

On one evening, a man named Phu, about 25, was taking a stroll along several streets in Binh Duong on his motorbike when he spotted a dog, weighing around 10 kilograms, in front of a house.

Phu gave the canine a piece of poisonous food, which caused the animal to collapse on the ground.

As the thief tried to take the dog away, the owners found out and called for help.

Phu had no choice but to leave the pet and fled the scene.

The correspondents later discovered that Phu is one of the dog thieves who work for Binh, above 40, owner of a secret dog meat facility in My Phuoc Ward, Ben Cat Town.

At the venue, Phu asserted that humans would not be harmed when consuming the meat of dogs that were killed with poison.

The canines are dead the moment they taste the toxin. They do not have a chance to swallow it, the man explained as he prepared several small bags of dog poison.

A thief carries a dog that was killed with poison in Binh Duong Province. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Huy, 26, another subordinate of Binh, stated he had been a freelance dog thief for a few years before working for Binh some months ago.

Huy is often scolded for failing to capture the dogs after poisoning them.

The man attributed his failure to the interference of local police officers.

Dog poisoning is not always a successful method due to different reasons, Huy elaborated, adding that taser is much more effective.

The electrified weapon is often used during long-distance hunts in Dau Tieng District or neighboring Ho Chi Minh City, when Huy usually travels with another ring member in a rented car.

The automobile is leased at VND500,000 [US$22] a night, he added.

Sitting on their vehicle, the dog thieves can simply taser a dog from a maximum distance of five meters.

With this approach, Huy and his partner can easily steal 30 to 40 dogs a night.

After delivering the animal to Binh and another facility in Thuan An Town, the pair can pocket dozens of millions of dong (VND10 million = $440).

A man wraps food around a small bag of dog poison. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Lucrative business

Dogs that are killed by poisoning or taser are processed for meat at Binhs venue, before being sold to diners on Ngo Quyen Street in Binh Duong.

Huy said that Binh bought stolen canines at VND40,000 ($1.76) per kilogram and resold them to his clients at VND70,000 ($3) per kilogram.

He also runs several dog meat stalls along Ngo Quyen Street, which offer the raw meat at VND100,000 ($4.4) a kilogram.

According to Binh, his dog thieves can earn a lot of money, but also have to spend quite a lot on their preparations.

Car renting can cost VND18 million [$792.6] a month, Binh said.

They often act in pairs, gathering at least 400 kilograms of dogs, which earn them about VND16 million [$704.6] every night, he added.

The man also shared some insight into his dog poison, which is a rare substance and can be purchased in Ho Chi Minh City.

The toxin is wrapped inside small plastic bags. When tearing the bag off after the first bite, a dog will immediately be poisoned, Binh elaborated.

No one can tell if the dogs were killed with poison, not even experienced dog meat eaters, he continued.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!Memo to TV networks everywhere we have one week to go and already viewers are not happy: Racism on My Kitchen Rules, scheduling complaints over Big Bash, and Anthony Mundine sitting down for the national anthem on Im a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here.

Last night MKR descended into insults across the table between Victorian friends Roula & Rachael and NSW sisters Jess & Emma.

What began as a blunt assessment of Roula & Rachaels earlier instant restaurant led to a heated discussion and various insults including cow / plastic / fat / fake / ugly / bitch with some leaving the table and other contestants saying rivalry had gone too far.

But before Vietnamese mums Kim & Suong cooked in their Secret Lantern instant restaurant, contestant Jess said, Were definitely hoping theres no domestic pets on the menu tonight. It was a race to the bottom.

Australias Race Discrimination Commissioner Tim Soutphommasane tweeted, Disappointing to see a racist joke on prime time TV  this stuff is not acceptable. Lets not give racism any encouragement or licence.

On social media viewers said the comment should never have made the final edit.

Disappointing to see a racist joke on prime time TV  this stuff is not acceptable. Lets not give racism any encouragement or licence #mkr https://t.co/rlp9iXBtJR  Tim Soutphommasane (@timsout) February 4, 2018

Incredibly disappointed at that racist comment just aired on #mkr. That should never have left the edit suite #poorform  Andrea Matthews  (@andreamatthews) February 4, 2018

https://twitter.com/Money_Bennett/status/960065927554347008

As disgusting as domestic pets comment was, I'm even more disgusted that the editing/production team allowed this to go to air. It is racist filth and blatant viewer baiting. What is wrong with you #MKR ?I feel the need to apologise to Kim and Suong on behalf of disgusted viewers  Azzie (@azziegogo) February 4, 2018

https://twitter.com/jiehyunglo/status/960076922909700096

You know what? Watching really racist, mean women fight amongst themselves is nowhere near as entertaining as I thought it would be #mkr  Nakkiah Lui (@nakkiahlui) February 4, 2018

Oh my gosh! Did I just hear Jess and Emma say I hope there is no domestic pets on the table? That is not okay! #racist #MKR #TeamKim&Suong  Carly and Tresne (@CarlyandTresne) February 4, 2018

But MKR was not alone in copping viewer anger last night.

Everywhere other than Perth, TEN viewers were told to watch the Adelaide Strikers trophy presentation on ONE so that Im a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here could bring Danny Green into the jungle. That led to more social media complaints that a major sport event was being shafted for Reality TV nonsense.

Meanwhile some viewers were divided over Anthony Mundine sitting during Shannon Nolls singing of the National Anthem in a mock boxing ring challenge with Danny Green. Mundine expressed concern over its history with Indigenous Australians, which drew some support from his castmates, whilst some viewers felt producers had set him up, knowing his views already.

As summer viewing begins its final week, Sport has proven to be the biggest drawcard but also a lightning rod for viewer backlash.

Australian Open viewers let rip at Seven for too many ads whilst they missed play, whilst Davis Cup viewers on Saturday were told to switch to a multichannel when the News began, only to discover another programme screening for some 15 minutes.US drama Madam Secretary returns to TEN this week with S4E8 The Fourth Estate.

This episode aired in the US in November.

Secretary of State Elizabeth McCord and her staff must work closely with the Mexican government to extradite a Mexican cartel leader to a United States prison in an effort to diminish the opioid drug crisis in the country.

But after the prisoner escapes during the transport, and a journalist who secured an exclusive interview with him while on the run is found murdered, Elizabeths urgency to find the leader escalates.

Will Elizabeth and her team be able to locate and apprehend the prisoner before anyone else is killed or will he disappear from the authorities forever?

9:30pm Wednesday on TEN.No techs please, were skittish, screamed the headline on John Collingridges Inside the City column for the Sunday Times, with the author claiming that British tech darlings had become an endangered species.

He noted that many of them get gobbled up but massive offshore multinationals once they achieve any prominent size, such as with ARM Holdings and its mega deal with SoftBank.

Cardiff-based semiconductor firm IQE was looking to be the next big technology play, Collingridge claimed, with the firm having meandered along from its 1988 founding through its share float in 2000, until its shares went through the roof last year amid rumours its chips were making their way into the next generation of iPhones.

Despite Apple suppliers being roundly discouraged from confirming whether they are a part of the supply chain, IQEs silence amid the storm of rumours all but confirmed it for the market.

Its shares almost quintuples between January and November, with the companys valuation reaching almost 1.4bn - all for a firm that reported rather modest adjusted profits of 22.1m on revenue of 132.7m in 2016.

That gargantuan rise did not go unnoticed by short sellers, with the vultures circling in the most recent six months amid market concerns that sales figures for Apples expensive iPhone X would disappoint.

At the end of last week, 21% of IQEs shares were out on loan according to data from Markit - with the measure used as a proxy for short interest.

The company is not a stranger to attracting perhaps the unwanted kind of attention, Collingridge noted, with chief executive Drew Nelson borrowing 1.9m cash through a share pledging facility in 2014.

He bought back the shares for a huge gain in September last year.

But on Friday, a quiet short-selling firm run by former research analyst Matt Earl - ShadowFall Capital and Research - attempted to go in for the kill, publishing a note claiming that IQE was reliant on two joint ventures for the bulk of its profits - one venture in Cardiff and another one in Singapore.

ShadowFall said 42% of the companys 2015 profits and 30% in 2016 came from the operations, before writing that its relationship with the ventures was a somewhat circular state of affairs, with the only customer appearing to be IQE itself.

The short seller pointed out that losses had been backing up at the ventrues, which could make for a convenient situation where IQE books the profits and the joint ventures retain the losses.

Without the cash from the two operations, IQE would have reported negative cash flow on its sheets in 2016.

The attack had the desired effect, adding to a recent sell-off in IQE shares, which fell 3.3% to 104.4p on Friday - a valuation of 788m.

Earl has pedigree, Collingridge wrote, noting that he called out social housing company Connaught before its collapse, and was persistent in his criticism of Mitie before its profit warnings in 2016 and 2017.

His warning on IQE is worth heeding. It is one tech darling Id give a wide berth. Avoid.

Over in the Mail on Sunday, Joanne Hart went back to the papers old favourite for her Midas column - its so-called Dogs of the Footsie.

The papers Dogs of the Footsie portfolio tracks the ten highest-yielding stocks in the FTSE 100 index, looking at prospective yields and reassessing its portfolio every few months.

In light of the recent Carillion collapse, Hart was keen to look at the supposedly increasing trend for government to meddle with the private sector, saying there had been a distinct change in sentiment and performance in the portfolio since the last look-in back in July.

Back then, Hart said the dogs were comfortably outperforming the FTSE 100, having doubled in value between 2010 and 2017.

The portfolio in July consisted of oil majors BP and Royal Dutch Shell, house builders Barratt Developments and Taylor Wimpey, utilities Centrica and SSE, insurer Direct Line, moneylender Provident Financial, as well as Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Mail.

Since then, oil prices have risen around 50% with the oil majors following along - BP is now around 10% higher with Shell up almost 14%.

Both companies were dropping out of the dogs, Hart said, as dividend yields had fallen as the share prices rose.

The other two leavers - Provident Financial and Royal Mail - were being booted due to the fact neither were in the FTSE 100 any longer.

Providents shares have sunk to 715p from 2086p in July, while Royal Mail enjoyed a rise to 508p from 397p after the company settled a long-running union dispute.

Joining the dogs in those four stocks places were insurer Admiral Group, BT, cigarette roller Imperial Brands and Marks & Spencer - all due to recent falls in share prices, resulting in improved yields.

Hart said the poor performance of the four was due to individual, self-inflicted problems, although they were also compounded by regulatory uncertainty, slowing economic growth and structural social shifts.

Looking at Admiral, its shares had fallen to 1854p from 2022p, with much of the decline following disappointing interim numbers last summer.

Those were in part affected by a government-imposed change in the way personal injury payments are calculated following motor accidents - a formula which Hart said was roundly criticised for being unnecessarily harsh.

Following the outcry, a consultation was launched and now new legislation is due - although it was unclear when or what that would entail.

BT was down to 250p from 310p since the summer, and itself released disappointing numbers on Friday, with revenue off 3% to 5.97bn in the December quarter - below market expectations.

The company was facing its own pension deficit, concerns about the cost of Premier League broadcasting rights, and most prominently fierce criticism of its Openreach division, which operates the primary broadband network in the UK.

Ofcom was circling the division, with increased regulation almost an inevitability.

At Imperial Brands, shares were down to 2858p from 3429p since July, as tobacco consumption continues to fall in high-value developed markets and as governments continued to legislate to make it harder to purchase and consume cigarettes.

M&S, meanwhile, was still in its multi-year rut, as it continued to try and refresh itself out of the stale, safe, middle-England image it had fallen into - a situation not assisted by the slowing economy.

Looking at the remaining six dogs, Hart noted that they had also all fallen or moved sideways since July.

Centrica was down to 129p from 201p after a profit warning in July, and amid whispers from Westminster about capped energy prices, while SSE was also off, falling to 1262p from 1395p.

Pressure on house prices, particularly in the lucrative south east market, was not having as big an effect as one might expect on housebuilders as a continued lack of homes helped to shore up profits.

While both Barratt and Taylor Wimpey were still expected to pay special dividends on top of their ordinary distributions this year, Hart warned such generosity could be unsustainable in the long run.

In July, the Dogs of the Footsie portfolio was worth 21.292, but it had now fallen to 19,482, while the FTSE 100 had risen since the summer.

A nominal 10,000 invested in the index in March 2012 was now worth 12,580, compared to 12,455 in July.

That meant the dogs were still beating the wider index, but the gap was narrowing, with lacklustre performance from the pups - the portfolios newcomers - the main culprit.

Hart said investors could take some comfort from dividend yields, however, with nine of the 10 now over 6% and four above 7% - significantly higher than on government bonds or bank savings rates, Hart pointed out.

Looking ahead, some of these dividend promises may come under pressure, Hart wrote.

For now, the dogs disappointing share price performances underline the challenges that British firms face in todays troubled economic and political environment.For picture posts from 2010 and earlier, see the Earlier Picture Posts PageCountries and political parties need to uphold the spirit of solidarity, community responsibilityWall Street analysts have given CGI Group a "Buy" rating, but there may be better buying opportunities in the stock market. Some of MarketBeat's past winning trading ideas have resulted in 5-15% weekly gains. MarketBeat just released five new stock ideas, but CGI Group wasn't one of them. MarketBeat thinks these five companies may be even better buys.

View MarketBeat's top stock picks here.PAA Natural Gas Storage, L.P. is engaged in the business of acquisition, development, ownership, operation and commercial management of natural gas storage facilities. As of December 31, 2012, the Company owned and operated three natural gas storage facilities located in Louisiana, Mississippi and Michigan. The Company also leases storage capacity and pipelines transportation capacity from third parties. The Company provides natural gas storage services to a mix of customers, including local gas distribution company's liquefied natural gas (LNG), electric utilities, pipelines, direct industrial users, electric power generators, marketers, producers, LNG exporters and affiliates of such entities. In December 31, 2013, Plains All American Pipeline, L.P. (Plains) completed the merger of PAA Natural Gas Storage, L.P with a wholly owned subsidiary of Plains, with Plains surviving the merger as a wholly owned subsidiary of PAA.

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De R.L., Gasoducto GasAndes Argentina S.A., Gasoducto GasAndes S.A., Gener Argentina S.A., Gener Blue Water Ltd., Genergia Power Ltd., Georgia Solar Holdings LLC, Georgia Solar Parent LLC, Global Energy Holdings C.V., Goller Enerji Uretim Ltd. Sti., Gray Springs Vista Solar LLC, Greenwich Solar 1 LLC, Guacolda Energy S.A., Guaimbe I Parque Solar S.A., Guaimbe II Parque Solar S.A., Guaimbe III Parque Solar S.A., Guaimbe IV Parque Solar S.A., Guaimbe Solar Holding S.A., Guaimbe V Parque Solar S.A., Health and Welfare Benefit Plans LLC, Hipotecaria San Miguel Limitada de Capital Variable, Hipotecaria Santa Ana Limitada de Capital Variable, INVERSIONES NUEVA VENTANAS S.A., IPALCO Enterprises Inc., Indianapolis Power & Light Company, Indimento Inversiones S.L., Instituto AES Brasil, InterAndes S.A., Inversiones Cachagua SpA, Inversiones Energia Renovable Limitada, Inversiones LK SpA, Inversiones Termoenergia de Chile Ltda., Inversiones Zapallar Limitada, Inversora de San Nicolas S.A., Itabo III S.R.L., Jemeiwaa KaI S.A.S., Johnstown Solar 1 LLC, KA Energy OOD, KMR Power Company, Kazincbarcikai Iparteruletfejleszt Kft., Kings Rooftop PV LLC, La Plata I Empreendimentos Ltda., La Plata II Ltd., La Plata III C.V., Lane Ave Solar LLC, Lemoore PV 1 LLC, MFP CO Holdings II LLC, MFP CO Holdings LLC, MFP CO I LLC, MFP CO II LLC, MFP CO III LLC, MFP CO Parent LLC, MM Solar Holdings I LLC, MM Solar Parent LLC, MSP Master Tenant I LLC, MSP Master Tenant II LLC, MacGregor Park Inc., Manteca PV 1 LLC, Maple Solar LLC, Maui 17-2 LLC, Mauka FIT Twenty LLC, Mercury Cayman Co II Ltda Agencia en Chile, Mercury Chile Co. II Ltd., Mercury Chile Holdco Ltd., Mercury Chile I Limitada, Mercury Chile II Limitada, Miami Valley Insurance Company, Miami Valley Lighting LLC, Mid-America Capital Resources Inc., Middletown Solar 1 LLC, Mong Duong Finance Holdings B.V., Motor EV LLC, Mountain Minerals LLC, Mountain View Power Partners IV LLC, Mountain View Power Partners LLC, Murcia Generation Holdings B.V., NY RNM Project1 LLC, NY RNM Project1A LLC, NY RNM Project2 LLC, NY RNM Project3 LLC, NY RNM Project4 LLC, Na Pua Makani Power Partners LLC, New Caribbean Investments SRL, Norgener Inversiones SpA, Norgener Renovables SpA, Norgener S.A., Nova Energia Holding S.A., Novus Barre Town Solar LLC, Nurenergoservice LLP, Oahu SPE 101-14 LLC, Oahu SPE 101-19 LLC, Oahu SPE 101-2 LLC, Oahu SPE 101-33 LLC, Oahu SPE 101-4 LLC, Oahu SPE 101-9 LLC, Odisha Power Generation Corporation Limited, Omega SpA, PARQUE EOLICO NOLANA SpA, PARQUE EOLICO TOPOLOA SpA, Parque Eolico Beata SRL, Parque Eolico Litueche SpA, Parque Eolico Campo Lindo SpA, Parque Eolico Los Cururos SpA, Parque Eolico Victoria SpA, Punta del Sol SpA, Quebrada Seca SpA, RMR Solar LLC, RT52 Walden Solar 1 LLC, Ransomville Solar 1 LLC, Remittance Processing Services LLC, Rep Office of AES Silk Road in Almaty, Rep Office of AES Silk Road in Tajikstan Republic, Richmond Solar Power 1 LLC, River Street Solar 1 LLC, Riverside Canal Power Company, Rosamond Solar LLC, Ryan Road Solar LLC, SD Solar I LLC, SEPV Imperial LLC, San Bernardino Solar LLC, Scituate Solar I LLC, Scottsdale Solar Holdings LLC, SeaWest Asset Management Services LLC, SeaWest Energy Project Associates LLC, SeaWest Properties LLC, SeaWest Wyoming LLC, Shazia S.R.L., Simple Energy Inc., Solar Access America LLC, Solar Access CA LLC, Solar Access California LLC, Southern Electric Brazil Participacoes Ltda., Store Heat and Produce Energy Inc., Stow Solar I LLC, Sudbury Ervin GMC Solar LLC, SunE Solar XVII Project5 LLC, SunE SunHoldings4 LLC, T&T Power Holdings I SRL, T&T Power Holdings II Ltd., TEG Business Trust, TEG/TEP Management LLC, TEP Business Trust, Tau Power BV, Tecnoma Energia Solar S.L., TermoAndes S.A., Termoelectrica Penoles S. de R.L. de C.V., Termoelectrica del Golfo S. de R.L. de C.V., Terneuzen Cogen B.V., The AES Barry Foundation, The Dayton Power and Light Company, Thermo Fuels Company Inc., Tozer Road Solar LLC, USVI Solar I LLC, University Solar LLC, Vientos Neuquinos I S.A., Village of Waterbury Solar I LLC, W. Orange RD Solar LLC, West Brookfield Boston Post Road Solar LLC, West Street Solar 1 LLC, Western Solar Parent LLC, Wilbur Woods Solar LLC, Wildwood Trust, Williamsburg East Street Solar LLC, Winchendon Ash Street Solar 1 LLC, Winchendon Lincoln Avenue Solar 1 LLC, Winchendon Lincoln Avenue Solar 2 LLC, Your Energy Holdings Limited, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-001 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-003 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-006 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-007 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-008 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-011 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-014 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-017 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-023 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-024 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-038 LLC, ZPD-PT Solar Project 2017-044 LLC, sPower, and sPower OpCo A Blocker LLC.The following companies are subsidiares of The Procter & Gamble: "Procter & Gamble Services" LLC, "Procter & Gamble" LLC, Agile Pursuits, Agile Pursuits Franchising, Arbora, Arbora & Ausonia, Arborinvest, Billie, Braun (Shanghai) Co., Braun GmbH, Braun-Gillette Immobilien GmbH & Co. KG, Celtic Insurance Company, Compania Procter & Gamble Mexico, Compania Quimica S.A., Corporativo Procter & Gamble, Cosmetic Products Pty. Ltd., Detergent Products B.V., Detergent Products SARL, Detergenti S.A., Eurocos Cosmetic GmbH, FPG Oleochemicals Sdn. Bhd., Fameccanica Data S.p.A., Fameccanica Industria e Comercio Do Brasil LTDA., Fameccanica Machinery (Shanghai) Co., Fater S.p.A., Fountain Square Music Publishing Co., Gillette (China) Ltd., Gillette (Shanghai) Ltd., Gillette Aesop Ltd., Gillette Australia Pty. Ltd., Gillette Canada Holdings, Gillette Commercial Operations North America, Gillette Diversified Operations Pvt. Ltd., Gillette Egypt S.A.E., Gillette Group UK Ltd, Gillette Gruppe Deutschland GmbH & Co. oHG, Gillette Holding Company LLC, Gillette Holding GmbH, Gillette India Limited, Gillette Industries Ltd., Gillette International B.V., Gillette Latin America Holding B.V., Gillette Management LLC, Gillette Nova Scotia Company, Gillette Pakistan Limited, Gillette Poland International Sp. z.o.o., Gillette Poland S.A., Gillette U.K. Limited, Gillette del Uruguay, Giorgio Beverly Hills Inc., Hyginett KFT, Industries Marocaines Modernes SA, LLC "Procter & Gamble Novomoskovsk", LLL "Procter & Gamble Distributorskaya Compania", Laboratorios Vicks, Liberty Street Music Publishing Company, Limited Liability Company 'Procter & Gamble Trading Ukraine', Limited Liability Company with foreign investments Procter & and Gamble Ukraine, MDVIP, MERCK KGAA NPV, Marcvenca Inversiones, Modern Industries Company - Dammam, Modern Products Company - Jeddah, New Chapter, New Chapter Canada Inc., Olay LLC, Oral-B Laboratories, P&G Distribution Morocco SAS, P&G Hair Care Holding, P&G Industrial Peru S.R.L., P&G Innovation Godo Kaisha, P&G Israel M.D.O. Ltd., P&G K.K., P&G Northeast Asia Pte. Ltd., P&G Prestige Godo Kaisha, P&G Prestige Service GmbH, P&G South African Trading (Pty.) Ltd., PGT Health Care (Zhejiang) Limited, PGT Healthcare LLP, PPI ZAO, PT Procter & Gamble Home Products Indonesia, PT Procter & Gamble Operations Indonesia, Phase II Holdings Corporation, Procter & Gamble (Chengdu) Ltd., Procter & Gamble (China) Ltd., Procter & Gamble (China) Sales Co. Ltd., Procter & Gamble (East Africa) Limited, Procter & Gamble (Egypt) Manufacturing Company, Procter & Gamble (Enterprise Fund) Limited, Procter & Gamble (Guangzhou) Consumer Products Co. Ltd., Procter & Gamble (Guangzhou) Enterprise Management Service Company Limited, Procter & Gamble (Guangzhou) Ltd., Procter & Gamble (Health & Beauty Care) Limited, Procter & Gamble (Jiangsu) Ltd. China, Procter & Gamble (L&CP) Limited, Procter & Gamble (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Procter & Gamble (Manufacturing) Ireland Limited, Procter & Gamble (Shanghai) International Trade Company Ltd., Procter & Gamble (Singapore) Pte. Ltd., Procter & Gamble Acquisition GmbH, Procter & Gamble Administration GmbH, Procter & Gamble Algeria EURL, Procter & Gamble Amazon Holding B.V., Procter & Gamble Amiens S.A.S., Procter & Gamble Argentina SRL, Procter & Gamble Asia Pte. Ltd., Procter & Gamble Australia Proprietary Limited, Procter & Gamble Azerbaijan Services LLC, Procter & Gamble Bangladesh Private Ltd., Procter & Gamble Blois S.A.S., Procter & Gamble Brazil Holdings B.V., Procter & Gamble Bulgaria EOOD, Procter & Gamble Business Services Canada Company, Procter & Gamble Canada Holding B.V., Procter & Gamble Chile , Procter & Gamble Chile Limitada, Procter & Gamble Colombia Ltda., Procter & Gamble Commercial LLC, Procter & Gamble Commercial de Cuba S.A., Procter & Gamble Czech Republic s.r.o., Procter & Gamble DS Polska Sp. z o.o., Procter & Gamble Danmark ApS, Procter & Gamble Detergent (Beijing) Ltd., Procter & Gamble Deuttschland GmbH, Procter & Gamble Distributing (Philippines) Inc., Procter & Gamble Distributing New Zealand Limited, Procter & Gamble Distribution Company (Europe) BVBA, Procter & Gamble Distribution S.R.L., Procter & Gamble Eastern Europe, Procter & Gamble Ecuador Cia. Ltda., Procter & Gamble Egypt, Procter & Gamble Egypt Distribution, Procter & Gamble Egypt Holding, Procter & Gamble Egypt Supplies, Procter & Gamble Energy Company LLC, Procter & Gamble Espana, Procter & Gamble Europe SA, Procter & Gamble Export Operations SARL, Procter & Gamble Exportadora e Importadora Ltda., Procter & Gamble Exports, Procter & Gamble Fabricacao e Comercio Ltda., Procter & Gamble Far East, Procter & Gamble Finance (U.K.) Ltd., Procter & Gamble Finance Holding Ltd., Procter & Gamble Finance Management S.a.r.l., Procter & Gamble Financial Investments LLP, Procter & Gamble Financial Services Ltd., Procter & Gamble Financial Services S.a.r.l., Procter & Gamble Finland OY, Procter & Gamble France S.A.S., Procter & Gamble Germany GmbH, Procter & Gamble Germany GmbH & Co. Operations oHG, Procter & Gamble GmbH, Procter & Gamble Grundstucks-und Vermogensverwaltungs GmbH & Co. KG, Procter & Gamble Gulf FZE, Procter & Gamble Hair Care, Procter & Gamble Hellas Ltd., Procter & Gamble Holding (Thailand) Limited, Procter & Gamble Holding France S.A.S., Procter & Gamble Holding GmbH, Procter & Gamble Holding S.r.l., Procter & Gamble Holdings (UK) Ltd., Procter & Gamble Home Products Private Limited, Procter & Gamble Hong Kong Limited, Procter & Gamble Hungary Wholesale Trading Partnership (KKT), Procter & Gamble Hygiene & Health Care Limited, Procter & Gamble Inc., Procter & Gamble India Holdings, Procter & Gamble Indochina Limited Company, Procter & Gamble Industrial - 2012 C.A., Procter & Gamble Industrial Colombia Ltda., Procter & Gamble Industrial S.C.A., Procter & Gamble Industrial e Comercial Ltda., Procter & Gamble Interamericas de Costa Rica, Procter & Gamble Interamericas de Guatemala, Procter & Gamble Interamericas de Panama, Procter & Gamble International Operations Pte. Ltd., Procter & Gamble International Operations SA, Procter & Gamble International Operations SA-ROHQ, Procter & Gamble International S.a.r.l., Procter & Gamble Investment Company (UK) Ltd., Procter & Gamble Investment GmbH, Procter & Gamble Italia, Procter & Gamble Japan K.K., Procter & Gamble Kazakhstan Distribution LLP, Procter & Gamble Kazakhstan LLP, Procter & Gamble Korea, Procter & Gamble Korea S&D Co., Procter & Gamble Lanka Private Ltd. Sri Lanka, Procter & Gamble Leasing LLC, Procter & Gamble Levant S.A.L., Procter & Gamble Limited, Procter & Gamble Manufacturing (Thailand) Limited, Procter & Gamble Manufacturing (Tianjin) Co. Ltd., Procter & Gamble Manufacturing Belgium N.V., Procter & Gamble Manufacturing Berlin GmbH, Procter & Gamble Manufacturing GmbH, Procter & Gamble Manufacturing Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., Procter & Gamble Manufacturing SA (Pty) Ltd, Procter & Gamble Marketing Romania SRL, Procter & Gamble Marketing and Services doo, Procter & Gamble Maroc SA, Procter & Gamble Mataro, Procter & Gamble Mexico Holding B.V., Procter & Gamble Mexico Inc., Procter & Gamble Middle East FZE, Procter & Gamble Nederland B.V., Procter & Gamble Netherlands Investments B.V., Procter & Gamble Netherlands Services B.V., Procter & Gamble Nigeria Limited, Procter & Gamble Nordic, Procter & Gamble Norge AS, Procter & Gamble Operations Polska Sp. z o.o., Procter & Gamble Overseas India B.V., Procter & Gamble Overseas Ltd., Procter & Gamble Pakistan (Private) Limited, Procter & Gamble Partnership LLP, Procter & Gamble Peru S.R.L., Procter & Gamble Pharmaceuticals France SAS, Procter & Gamble Philippines, Procter & Gamble Polska Sp. z o.o, Procter & Gamble Portugal - Produtos De Consumo, Procter & Gamble Product Supply (U.K.) Limited U.K., Procter & Gamble Production GmbH, Procter & Gamble Productions, Procter & Gamble Productos de Consumo, Procter & Gamble RHD, Procter & Gamble RSC Regional Service Company Ltd., Procter & Gamble Retail Services BVBA, Procter & Gamble S.r.l., Procter & Gamble SA (Pty) Ltd, Procter & Gamble Satis ve Dagitim Ltd. Sti., Procter & Gamble Seine S.A.S., Procter & Gamble Service GmbH, Procter & Gamble Services (Switzerland) SA, Procter & Gamble Services Company N.V., Procter & Gamble Services Ltd., Procter & Gamble Share Incentive Plan Trustee Ltd., Procter & Gamble South America Holding B.V., Procter & Gamble Spol. s.r.o. (Ltd.), Procter & Gamble Sports and Social Club Ltd., Procter & Gamble Sverige AB, Procter & Gamble Switzerland SARL, Procter & Gamble Taiwan Limited, Procter & Gamble Taiwan Sales Company Limited, Procter & Gamble Technical Centres Limited, Procter & Gamble Technology (Beijing) Co., Procter & Gamble Trading (Thailand) Limited, Procter & Gamble Tuketim Mallari Sanayii A.S., Procter & Gamble UK, Procter & Gamble UK Group Holdings Ltd, Procter & Gamble UK Parent Company Ltd., Procter & Gamble Universal Holding B.V., Procter & Gamble Verwaltungs GmbH, Procter & Gamble Vietnam, Procter & Gamble d.o.o. za trgovinu, Procter & Gamble de Venezuela S.C.A., Procter & Gamble de Venezuela S.R.L., Procter & Gamble do Brasil S/A, Procter & Gamble do Brazil, Procter & Gamble do Nordeste S/A, Procter & Gamble-Rakona s.r.o., Progam Realty & Development Corporation, Redmond Products, Richardson-Vicks Real Estate Inc., Richardson-Vicks do Brasil Quimica e Farmaceutica Ltda, Riverfront Music Publishing Co., Rosemount LLC, SPD Development Company Limited, SPD Swiss Precision Diagnostics GmbH, Scannon S.A.S., Series Acquisition B.V., Shulton, Surfac S.R.L., Sycamore Productions, TAOS - FL, TAOS Retail, Tambrands Inc., Temple Trees Impex & Investment Private Limited, The Art of Shaving - FL, The Dover Wipes Company, The Gillette Company, The Gillette Company LLC, The Gillette co., The Procter & Gamble Distributing LLC, The Procter & Gamble GBS Company, The Procter & Gamble Global Finance Company, The Procter & Gamble Manufacturing Company, The Procter & Gamble Paper Products Company, The Procter & Gamble U.S. Business Services Company, This is L., US CD LLC, Vidal Sassoon (Shanghai) Academy, Vidal Sassoon Co., WEBA Betriebsrenten-Verwaltungsgesellschaft mbH, Walker & Company Brands, and iMFLUX Inc..I flew into Oman in the late afternoon on a Saturday as the sun was going down. I am still getting used to the routine of arriving in a new country: immigration (where they check my passport and I buy a tourist visa), baggage claim, customs, finding an ATM to get some local cash, then getting a taxi to wherever I am staying.

I made a decision about my travel to stay in non-chain accommodations whenever possible. I wanted to travel like a local for the local experience, and support local businesses. The Internet has made booking accommodations easier all over the world. I used the Hostelworld app, AirBnB, Hotels.com and a straightforward Google search for accommodations near where I want to stay, in order to have a choice. I found some local websites and a multinational overseas service called Agoda, which produced a couple of very good deals and, so far, has been reliable.The following companies are subsidiares of Dover: ALMATEC Maschinenbau GmbH, Accelerated Production Systems, Advansor A/S, Advansor Dover International (Poland) sp. z o.o, Alfred Fueling Systems Holdco Ltd., Alfred Fueling Systems Inc., Alfred Fueling Systems Intermediate Holdco Ltd., All-Flo Pump Company Limited business, Anman LLC, Anthony Equity Holdings Inc., Anthony Holdings Inc., Anthony Inc., Anthony International Foreign Sales Corp., Anthony International Holding Company, Anthony Mexico Holdings LLC, Anthony North Holdco Inc., Anthony Specialty Glass LLC, Anthony TemperBent GP LLC, Automatik Grundstucksverwaltung GmbH & Co. KG, Automatik Plastics Machinery (Taiwan) Ltd., Automatik Plastics Machinery Sdn. Bhd., BSC Filters Limited, Background2 Limited, Belanger Inc., Belvac Middle East FZE, Belvac Production Machinery Inc., BlitzRotary GmbH, Butler Engineering and Marketing S.P.A., CEP Liquidation LLC, CP Formation LLC, CPC, CPC Europe Inc., CPI Products Inc., Caldera, Caldera Inc., Canada Organization & Development LLC, Chief Automotive Technologies (Shanghai) Trading Company Ltd., Chippewa Square Captive Insurance Company, Colder Products Company GmbH, Colder Products Company LTD, Cook Compression BV, Cook Compression LLC, Cook Compression Limited, Cook-MFS Inc., DD1 Inc., DDI Properties Inc., DE-STA-CO Benelux B.V., DE-STA-CO FRANCE, DE-STA-CO Shanghai Co. Ltd., DFH Corporation, DSR BZ Holdings LLC, De Sta Co (Asia) Company Limited, De-Sta-Co Cylinders Inc., DeStaCo Europe GmbH, Delaware Capital Formation Inc., Delaware Capital Holdings Inc., Destaco Ema Industria e Comercio Ltda., Dover (China) Investment Co. Ltd. , Dover (Schweiz) Holding GmbH, Dover (Shanghai) Industrial Co. Ltd., Dover (Shenzhen) Industrial Equipment Manufacturing Co. Ltd., Dover (Suzhou) Industrial Equipment Manufacturing Co. Ltd., Dover Asia Trading Private Ltd., Dover Australia Holdings Pty Limited, Dover Business Services EMEA Limited, Dover Business Services LLC, Dover Business Services Philippines Corporation, Dover CLP Formation Limited Partnership, Dover CR spol s r.o., Dover Canada Finance LP, Dover Canada Holdings ULC, Dover Canada Operations ULC, Dover Corporation Regional Headquarters, Dover DEI Services Inc., Dover Denmark Holdings ApS, Dover EMEA FZCO, Dover Energy, Dover Energy UK Ltd, Dover Engineered Systems Inc., Dover Engineered Systems UK Ltd, Dover Europe Inc., Dover Europe Sarl, Dover Fluids Inc., Dover Fluids UK Ltd, Dover France Holdings S.A.S., Dover France Participations SAS, Dover France Technologies, Dover Fueling Solutions UK Limited, Dover Germany GmbH, Dover Global Holdings LLC, Dover Global Trading Pte. Ltd., Dover Holdings de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Dover India Pvt. Ltd., Dover Intercompany Services UK Limited, Dover International B.V., Dover International Operations Inc., Dover International Ventures Inc., Dover International Ventures Tunisia S.a.r.l., Dover International ithalat ihracat ve Pazarlama Limited Sirketi, Dover Italy Holdings S.r.l., Dover Luxembourg Finance Sarl, Dover Luxembourg Participations Sarl, Dover Luxembourg S.a.r.l., Dover Luxembourg Services Sarl, Dover Operations South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Dover Overseas Ventures Inc., Dover Refrigeration & Food Equipment Inc., Dover Refrigeration & Food Equipment UK Ltd, Dover Resources International de Mexico S. de R.L. C.V., Dover Solutions Colombia SAS, Dover Southeast Asia (Thailand) Ltd., Dover Spain Holdings S.L., Dover UK Pensions Limited, Dover WSCR Holding LLC, Dover WSCR LLC, Dover do Brasil Ltda., Dow-Key Microwave Corporation, Dressor Wayne Data Technology (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Dressor Wayne Fuel Equipment (Shanghai) Co. Ltd, EOA Systems Inc., Ebs-Ray Holdings Pty Ltd, Ebs-Ray Industries Pty. Ltd., Ebs-Ray Pumps Pty. Ltd., Em-tec GmbH, Ettlinger Kunststoffmaschinen GmbH, Ettlinger Management Inc., Ettlinger North America LP, Ettlinger Vertrieb und Service GmbH & Co. KG, Ettlinger Verwaltungs-GmbH, Fairbanks Environmental Limited, Ferguson CO. S.A., Fibrelite Composites Limited, Fibresec Holdings Limited, Fibresec Limited, Finder, Finder Oriental (Beijing) Trading Co. Ltd, Finder Pompe S.R.L., Finder United Saudi Arabia Company, GAL LLC, GIIER LLC, Gala Industries Asia Limited, Gala Industries Incorporated, Gala Kunststoff-und Kautschukmaschinen GmbH, Guangdong Tokheim LIYUAN Oil Industry Technology Limited Company, Highland Park Insurance Company, Hill PHOENIX Inc., Hill PHOENIX WIC LLC, Hill Phoenix Costa Rica Sociedad De Responsabilidad Limitada, Hill Phoenix El Salvador Limitada de Capital Variable, Hill Phoenix Guatemala Sociedad Anonima, Hill Phoenix Honduras Sociedad Anonima, Hill Phoenix Nicaragua Sociedad Anonima, Hill Phoenix de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Hiltap Fittings Ltd., Hydro Systems, Hydro Systems Europe Ltd., Hydronova Australia-NZ Pty Ltd, Industrial Motion Control LLC, Inpro/Seal LLC, International Trade and Equipment B.V., JK Group SPA, JK Group USA Inc., K&L Microwave DR Inc., K&L Microwave Inc., K. S. Boca Inc., KPS (Beijing) Petroleum Equipment Trading Co Ltd., KPS Asia Sdn. Bhd., KPS Fueling Solutions Sdn. Bhd., KPS Hong Kong Holding Limited, KPS UK Limited, KS Formation Inc., KS Liquidation Inc., KSLP Liquidation L.P., Kiian Digital (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Knappco LLC, Lianyngang Jump Petroleum and Chemical Machinery Co. Ltd., Liquip, Liquip International Pty Limited, MARKEM FZ SA, MARKEM Holdings Inc., MARKEM International Inc., MARKEM S.A. de C.V., MARKEM Tag Inc., MARKEM UK Holdings 1 Unlimited, MARKEM UK Holdings 2 Limited, MIP Holdings Inc., MS Printing Solutions S.R.L., Maag Automatik GmbH, Maag Automatik Inc., Maag Automatik Plastics Machinery (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Maag Automatik Srl, Maag Pump Systems (US) Inc., Maag Pump Systems AG, Maag Pump Systems SAS, Marathon Equipment Company (Delaware), Markem Imaje Center of Competencies Spain S.L.U., Markem-Imaje, Markem-Imaje (China) Co. Limited, Markem-Imaje A/S, Markem-Imaje AB, Markem-Imaje AG, Markem-Imaje AS, Markem-Imaje Application Innovation Center Sarl, Markem-Imaje B.V., Markem-Imaje CSAT GmbH, Markem-Imaje Co. Ltd., Markem-Imaje GmbH, Markem-Imaje Holding, Markem-Imaje Identificacao de Produtos Ltda., Markem-Imaje Inc., Markem-Imaje India Private Limited, Markem-Imaje Industries, Markem-Imaje Industries Limited, Markem-Imaje KK, Markem-Imaje LLC, Markem-Imaje Limited, Markem-Imaje Ltd., Markem-Imaje N.V., Markem-Imaje Oy, Markem-Imaje Pty Ltd, Markem-Imaje S.A., Markem-Imaje S.A. de C.V., Markem-Imaje S.r.l. a socio unico, Markem-Imaje SAS, Markem-Imaje Sdn Bhd, Markem-Imaje Software Development Centre Pvt. Ltd., Markem-Imaje Spain S.A.U, Markem-Imaje Unipessoal Lda (Portugal), Markpoint Holding AB, Midland Manufacturing LLC, Mouvex, Neptune Chemical Pump Company, Northern Lights (Nevada) Inc., Northern Lights Funding LP, Northern Lights Investments LLC, Nova Controls Inc., OK International (UK) Ltd., OK International Holdings Inc., OK International Inc., OPW Engineered Systems Inc., OPW Fluid Transfer Group Europe B.V., OPW Fluids Group Inc., OPW France, OPW Fuel Management Systems Inc., OPW Fueling Components (SuZhou) Co. Ltd., OPW Fueling Components LLC, OPW Iberia Sociedad Limitada, OPW Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., OPW Slovakia s.r.o., OPW Sweden AB, Officine Meccaniche Sirio S.R.L., PDQ Manufacturing Inc., PISCES by OPW Inc., PSG (Shanghai) Co. Ltd, PSG (Tianjin) Co. Ltd., PSG Worldwide Inc., Petro Vend Sp. z o.o., Pike Machine Products Inc., Piston OPW Inc., Pole/Zero Acquisition Inc., Precision Brasil Equipamentos E Servicos Para Postos De Combustiveis Ltda., Precision Service - Servicos De Manutencao E Instalacao De Postos De Abastecimento De Combustivel Ltda., Pump Management Services Co. LLC, RAV Equipment U.S.A. Inc., RAV Equipos Espana S.L., RAV France, Rav Equipment UK Limited, Ravaglioli Deutschland GmbH, Ravaglioli S.P.A., Reduction Engineering GmbH, Revod Corporation, Revod Finance Ireland Limited, Revod Luxembourg S.a.r.l., Revod SAS, Revod Sweden AB, Robohand Inc., Rosario Handel B.V., Rotary Lift Consolidated (Haimen) Co. Ltd, SE Liquidation LLC, SWEP A.G., SWEP Germany GmbH, SWEP Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., SWEP North America Inc., SWEP Slovakia s.r.o., SWEP Technology (Suzhou) Co. Ltd., Scheer Pelletizing Systems & Machinery (Shanghai) Co. Ltd, Scheer Taiwan Machinery Co. Ltd., Seabiscuit Motorsports Inc., Simmons Sirvey Corporation, So. Cal. Soft-Pak Incorporated, Solaris Laser S.A., Space S.R.L., Start Italiana Petrol Cihazlari Sanayi Ticaret Anonim Sirketi, Start Italiana S.R.L., Swep Energy Oy, Swep International A.B., Swep Japan K.K., Sys-Tech Solutions Inc., TQC Quantium Quality S.A. de C.V., TTSI III Inc., TWG Canada Consolidated Inc., TXHI LLC, Tartan Textile Services Inc., The Curotto-Can LLC, The Heil Co., Tokheim Belgium, Tokheim China Company Limited, Tokheim GmbH, Tokheim Group, Tokheim Guardian Venture Sdn. Bhd, Tokheim Hengshan Technologies (Guangzhou) Co. Ltd., Tokheim Holding, Tokheim Holding B.V., Tokheim India Private Limited, Tokheim Netherlands B.V., Tokheim Sofitam Applications, Trans - Logistic Group S.R.L., Tulsa Winch Inc., Unified Brands Inc., Val TemperBent Glass L.P., Vectron Frequency Devices (Shanghai) Co. Ltd, Vehicle Service Group LLC, Vos Food Store Equipment Ltd., Warn Automotive LLC, Waukesha Bearings, Waukesha Bearings Limited, Waukesha Bearings Russia LLC, Wayne Fuel Management UK Ltd., Wayne Fueling Systems (Rus) Limited Liability Company, Wayne Fueling Systems Australia Pty Ltd, Wayne Fueling Systems Canada ULC, Wayne Fueling Systems Deutschland GmbH, Wayne Fueling Systems Italia S.R.L., Wayne Fueling Systems LLC, Wayne Fueling Systems Ltd., Wayne Fueling Systems Pte. Ltd., Wayne Fueling Systems Sweden AB, Wayne Fueling Systems UK Holdco Ltd., Wayne Industria e Comercio Ltda., Wei Li Pump Shanghai Co. LTD., WellMark, and Wilden Pump and Engineering LLC.First game at Dacotah Bank Stadium draws 5,867 fans as Northern wins

Northern State University had a capacity crowd Saturday at it's first home game at the Dacotah Bank Stadium.Prev 1 of 6 Next

Cirque du Soleil has a reputation for being on the cutting edge when it comes to performing arts.

Whether its flying through the air with ease or being flexible enough to balance on one hand, the organization has a winning formula.

What Fabrice Lemire enjoys about the company is that it always takes risks.

The artistic director has his hands full with one of Cirque du Soleils newest productions, Crystal  A Breakthrough Ice Experience.

The show will begin its five-day, seven-performance stint at the Santa Ana Star Center in Rio Rancho on Wednesay, Feb. 7.

Lemire says the production is quite different because of its use of ice.

The element of ice is new to all of us, he says. Its been about learning how to tame the new element. We continue to understand it better.

The show had previews in October and had its world premiere on Dec. 21 in Montreal.

The story follows Crystal, a misfit with her head in the clouds, a dreamer looking for something more in her life.

One day, feeling misunderstood and out of sync with the world, she ventures out onto a frozen pond and falls through the ice.

In this underwater world of her own imagination, she has a vision: She sees a reflection of herself  her alter ego  that guides her, showing her a distorted version of her life.

Her reflection tries to wake her up to her own genius and creativity. Through her writing, Crystal releases the potential of her hidden talent and transforms the world around her with stroke of her pen. Having summoned the strength to face reality, Crystal ultimately breaks through the ice, stronger than ever.

Lemire says the show is about looking at things from fresh angles, peeking through the veneer of everyday life, reframing ones daily reality to see what one might have missed.

Sometimes the only way to appreciate things is to look at them sideways, he says. Discovering ones individuality and uniqueness requires venturing out on thin ice.

One of the biggest obstacles for Lemire and the crew was finding the right performers to complement the show.

As for many other shows, there were waves of auditions.

The first wave attracted plenty of artists, because they wanted to see what the production was about, he says. Our acrobats had to learn how to skate. And our skaters had to be open to acrobats. We worked at finding the performer who is open-minded and doesnt mind being 25 feet in the air.

Because its a traveling show, Lemire says, there are plenty of moving pieces.

And with 89 members touring, it can be tricky.

With each venue, there are different problems we work through, he says. The backstage area is where we have to change quickly and move the scenes around.

Lemire says the music of Crystal is cinematic in scope while supporting the narrative and pulsing to the rhythm of the action on, below, and above the ice.

There are sweeping, atmospheric and romantic soundscapes, and the score moves from grand orchestral sounds to klezmer-style chamber music to melodic folk and rock-tinged beats.

Cover versions of well-known pop songs were specifically recorded for the show, he says, which is a first for Cirque du Soleil.Prev 1 of 4 Next

The ghosts of Duchamp and OKeeffe haunt Ciel Bergmans paintings, forming the maps and tributaries of an artists life.

The Linens gathers 48 acrylic paintings by the late Santa Fe artist in a never-exhibited series at the Center for Contemporary Art Tank Garage through April 29.

The exhibition spans the minimal aesthetic that defined Bergmans Spiritual Guide Maps (the exhibitions original title) to bolder explorations of feminism and sexuality from 1970 to 1977. The series would jump-start her career, leading to a place in the 1975 Whitney Biennial and multiple teaching and gallery offers.

Bergman grew up in the Bay Area, married at 19 and moved to Germany at the time of the building of the Berlin wall. She visited as many European museums as she could, discovering the work and criticism of Marcel Duchamp, who would influence her for the rest of her life. Duchamp was a French-American painter, sculptor and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, conceptual art and dada, surrealisms precursor. Dada questioned longtime assumptions about art.

He was a huge critic of painting, curator Angie Rizzo said. He was the father of postmodernism. She was trying to figure out why she painted if painting was dead. A lot of critics and artists were rebelling against it.

Bergman struggled to distill her work, suppressing all signifying imagery in favor of contemplation. By 1973, symbols begin to creep into the Guide Maps, and the paintings grew progressively less empty.

The stark midseriesPoetry Plagued by Comprehension, 1974, plays with contradiction.

It is about how sometimes a poem is more powerful if you dont understand it, Rizzo said. I really love that piece because of the simplicity of the composition.

In 1972, Bergman traveled to New Mexico to visit OKeeffe. Their five-hour conversation changed her life.

It was one of the most influential experiences for Ciel, Rizzo said. I think she saw herself in OKeeffe.

So much so that the artist built a studio at the base of OKeeffes beloved Cerro Pedernal in 1994. She moved to Santa Fe in 2006.

With its ragged dapples and blotches of color accenting X and Y shapes, Debriefing with Rrose (1974) references Duchamps female alter ego Rrose Selavy.

He did a whole photo series in character, in drag, Rizzo said. Shes playing with feminism and the balancing of the sexes. She was a single mom focusing on her art career.

The letters might refer to chromosomes or map coordinates. An X appears in blue as if it were an X marking the location of treasure on a pirates map, while portholes dot the surface.

Photodocumentation of Tools Used in the Performing the Fifth Ascent (Black Tool), 1976, resolves the series in a metaphor for both Bergmans life and career. The artist based the piece on the book Mount Analogue by Rene Daumal.

Its an allegory of reaching a peak of yourself and how its impossible to get to the summit, Rizzo said. You have to jump into the darkness. I see it as a metaphor for what The Linens did for her career.

Bergmans work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Oakland Museum of California, among others.

She died of lung cancer in 2017.The weather has been warm, and Frank Leto aims to make it hotter.

Leto is behind the coming Carnaval Fever 2018, which takes place on Friday, Feb. 9, and Saturday, Feb. 10, at the National Hispanic Cultural Center.

Carnaval Fever, its a great name, he says with a laugh. The fever part of it is suggesting that things are heating up. Were hoping that the event is going to be contagious.

Leto and his wife, Pilar, put in the time for the event. It takes about a year to plan, and each year, there is a new theme.

As you can see, the theme for this year is kind of medical, he says. In between the music and dancing, there will be some actors dressed as doctors who will be on stage speaking with the crowd.

Letos wife runs Odara Dance Ensemble, which has participated in the event for nearly 20 years.

For the past 12 years, the event has been held at the NHCC.

Weve found a home for the event and the community continues to support us, he says. There are about 45 performers altogether.

Leto says bringing the Carnaval activities to New Mexico is a treat for him because it gives locals a glimpse into another culture.

Carnaval, also known as Mardi Gras, which is celebrated in Brazil, Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago and New Orleans, involves a public celebration and a parade. Festivalgoers wear masks and elaborate costumes.

My wife and I actually met at a Carnaval celebration in San Francisco, he says. We look forward to putting on this event every year. Its been an amazing time for the both of us.

The music will be performed by Leto and his band.

In fact, Leto will premiere a song he wrote for the event, Your Health is Your Wealth.

With the event, we want to give people the opportunity to get away from the stress of daily life, he says. Come to the show, enjoy music and dance the night away.The Sumner and Dene gallery is hosting the The Wild Bunch, with work by Reg Loving, Mary Moore Bailey, Dan Garrett, David Snow, Jeannie Sellmer and David Zaintz, with guest artist Anne Kirk, through Feb. 24.

If youre expecting a shootout with Butch Cassidy and Elzy Lay (the Sundance Kid) defending themselves against the Bolivian cavalry, this is not the show for you. The only pistol-packing painting in The Wild Bunch is Push-Pull of the Picture Plane, a 2016 piece by Reg Loving, who is more poet than train robber.

In Anubis-Mesa Prieta Loving takes the viewer halfway around the world with an ancient Egyptian deity connected with a Southwestern dark mesa. Loving is not an artist who stands still in one locale.

Bailey is punching up her palette without changing hues by applying a light coat of varnish to her otherwise matte acrylic paintings. Her latest work has a bit of extra pizzazz.

My favorite is her art historical Wheres Waldo? takeoff Looking for Van Goghs Chair, an insouciant patterned composition filled with bits and pieces of his red chair. Her work is a joy to behold as well as an homage to countless folk traditions.

Garrett is a three-dimensional sculptor who also works on relief paintings that become cube-like structures. His latest work is very strong and colorful, with a touch of playfulness. Though his work is abstract, there are references to living forms among his dynamically designed compositions.

Another sculptor/painter is metalworker Snow, who is in transition toward a new direction in his metal-clad compositions. For years, Snow has used paints and acids to add organic shapes to his otherwise geometric abstractions.

However, his latest work includes literally depicted plant and leaf forms in paint and metal that not only enliven his designs but make his work far more approachable for viewers. This represents a major breakthrough for a dedicated geometric artist who has heretofore relied upon metallic patinaed surfaces to soften his stark compositional structures.

Sellmer has grown by leaps and bounds over the past decade in terms of fully realizing her abstract landscape paintings. All I can say is wow while viewing her tough but accessible work in this exhibition. Sellmer has arrived at a very high place with a visual vocabulary to match her skill set.

Her compositional structures are perfectly balanced, and her palette is jaw-droppingly broad-spectrum.

Zaintz is a highly skilled painter who can pretty much make any kind of imagery. In this show, he seems to be coasting through an experimental series of monolithic minimalist works.

In Persuasion Zaintz takes a bigger bite with more complexity and spatial play. He, like Hans Hoffman, is using the push-pull of color planes to build upon the picture plane. Zaintz may be challenging Loving in the push and pull of competitive picture making, which may be persuading Lovings revolver bearing all-hat-no-cattle-cowboy to take dead-aim at Zaintzs painting.

Guest artist Kirk is having a great time at the easel in her plus-and-circle series of new paintings. One of my favorites is Once It Snapped It Was All She Could Think of a true dynamic painting with force lines and other elements so lauded by my own advanced painting instructor, Lilla Katzen. Kirk has achieved relaxation while working on designs that are difficult to pull off.

This is an excellent choice of artists who are all breaking through to higher levels of achievement. Two thumbs up.K-9s, felines  and now, peacocks.

Airlines that have begun talking about tightening restrictions on a proliferating array of emotional support animals on commercial flights may have found their case bolstered this week after a picture of a peacock that was reportedly denied a seat aboard a United Airlines flight traveled far and wide.

The Jet Set, a travel-focused television show based in Washington, posted the photo on Facebook of the resplendent blue-and-green bird, saying that the emotional-support peacock had been denied boarding on a flight at Newark International Airport.

United Airlines confirmed that the exotic animal was barred from the plane Saturday because it did not meet guidelines for a number of reasons, including its weight and size.

We explained this to the customer on three separate occasions before they arrived at the airport, an airline spokeswoman said in a statement Tuesday to The Washington Post.

The peacocks owner, who was identified by the Associated Press as Ventiko, a photographer and performance artist in New York, told the news agency that she bought the bird its own ticket.

The peacock, named Dexter, appears to have its own Instagram account, showing the bird in one photo perched atop a luggage cart at the airport. Spent 6 hours trying to get on my flight to LA (after following all required protocol), the post read. Tomorrow my human friends are going to drive me cross country!

In response to Jet Sets Facebook post, many people criticized passengers decisions to bring such animals on planes.

On Thursday, United announced that it would change its policies for emotional-support animals effective March 1, a shift it had been considering since late last year.

Federal guidelines specify that airlines must permit passengers with disabilities to board with trained service animals or emotional-support animals of many stripes, regardless of the animals potential to offend or annoy others on the plane. But airlines have some latitude to deny boarding to certain unusual service animals, including snakes and other reptiles, ferrets, rodents and spiders, and can prevent them from boarding if the animal poses a threat to the safety of others.

Uniteds new policy comes on the heels of dramatic increases in the number of passengers flying with comfort animals. About 76,000 flew last year, nearly double the 43,000 in 2016, United spokesman Charlie Hobart told USA Today. Uniteds new rules are similar to those recently implemented by Delta Air Lines. Delta airline will now require notes from a veterinarian confirming that an animal is in good health and that it is properly trained for public settings, to avoid problems during the flight.

The change was hailed by the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, the largest flight-attendant union. The airlines increased requirements for emotional-support animals will reduce fraud and protect the legitimate need of animal assistance for passengers with disabilities and veterans, Sara Nelson, the groups international president told USA Today. This is about maintaining safety, health and security for passengers and crew, while ensuring accessibility for those who need it.

American Airlines is reviewing its policies after the number of comfort animals on its flights increased by 15 percent last year, and the Department of Transportation is mulling new guidelines as well, according to USA Today.

The Washington Post reported this month that Delta, too, has seen large increases in the numbers of passengers with service or comfort animals in recent years. The Department of Transportation does not collect data on the number of service and support animals on flights, but disability-related complaints that it tracks related to service animals nearly quadrupled between 2012 and 2016.

Those statistics have added to the perception among airlines and some disability-rights advocates that some people use federal law to fraudulently bring pets into airplane cabins. Passengers traveling with animals for emotional support can be required to provide recent documentation from a mental-health professional for their pets, but the documents are easily forged or obtained from websites that provide questionnaire-style exams.

Stories abound of scenes seemingly out of a parody movie: A diapered duck wandering around an airline aisle, or a flight attendant being asked to administer oxygen to a dog that its owner claimed was having an anxiety attack midflight.

Karin Brulliard contributed to this report, which has been updated.WASHINGTON  In the 109 years of the FBIs existence, it has repeatedly come under fire for abuses of power, privacy or civil rights. From Red Scares to recording and threatening to expose the private conduct of Martin Luther King Jr. to benefiting from bulk surveillance in the digital age, the FBI is accustomed to intense criticism.

What is so unusual about the current moment, say current and former law enforcement officials, is the source of the attacks.

The bureau is under fire not from those on the left but rather conservatives who have long been the agencys biggest supporters, as well as the president who handpicked the FBIs leader.

Republican critics charge that the birth of the investigation into possible coordination between the Trump campaign and agents of the Russian government was fatally infected by the political bias of senior FBI officials  and President Donald Trump tweeted Saturday that the release of a memo on the issue totally vindicates Trump. 

Bureau officials say the accusations in the document produced by House Republicans are inaccurate and  more damaging in the long term  corrode the agencys ability to remain independent and do its job.

One law enforcement official summed it up bluntly: Theres a lot of anger. The irony is its a conservative-leaning organization, and its being trashed by conservatives. At first it was just perplexing. Now theres anger, because its not going away.

On Friday, FBI Director Christopher Wray sent a video message to those he leads, urging them to keep calm and tackle hard.

Youve all been through a lot in these past nine months, and I know thats been unsettling, to say the least. And the past few days havent done much to calm those waters, Wray said. So I want to make sure that you know where I stand, and what I want us to do.

Most FBI agents see their mission as fundamentally nonpolitical  ferreting out wrongdoing, even when that occurs inside political campaigns or government.

For decades, the FBI has been trusted to investigate corruption inside the government, even at the highest levels, including the White House. In the 1970s, the FBIs probe of the Watergate break-in led to the resignation of President Richard M. Nixon. In the late 1990s, President Bill Clinton came to detest then-director Louis Freeh, but their distrust did not lead to withering public attacks from the president himself.

After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the agency was retooled to focus primarily on preventing terrorism, and public confidence in its work grew. In the past two years, however, the probe of Hillary Clintons use of a private email server while she was secretary of state and a separate Russia investigation are testing whether the FBI can maintain the trust of Congress, the courts and the country.

Wrays vision for leading the agency out of its current predicament is a return to the type of low-profile management favored by former FBI director Robert Mueller III, according to several people who have spoken to him about the current challenges.

Wrays predecessor, James Comey, was fired by Trump in May amid the ratcheting tensions of a criminal probe into the presidents former national security adviser, Michael Flynn. At the time, Trump called Comey a showboat and a grandstander.

It makes sense, then, that his successor would want to keep his head down.

Wrays defenders say there is a more strategic reason for the new directors approach  by relying on long-standing law enforcement policies and procedures, he believes the FBI can navigate through the current political storms and get back to a position of widespread trust across the political spectrum, according to people familiar with his thinking.

Following established process is important, one person said. Process can protect us.

That approach, though, is a subtle rejection of some of Comeys most controversial decisions. Comey famously held a news conference in July 2016 to announce he would not recommend any criminal charges in the probe of Clintons use of a private email server when she was secretary of state. Then in October of that year, less than two weeks before the presidential election, he sent a letter to Congress informing them that the FBI was investigating new emails in the case.

Both moves were significant departures from normal Justice Department procedure, and Clinton and her supporters blame Comey for costing her the election.

Comeys firing shocked the FBIs workforce. In the aftermath, many employees posted pictures of him at their desks or other workspaces.

In some offices, youd go in and it was just, Comey, Comey, Comey everywhere, said one law enforcement official. Theres still a lot of that, but not as much.

The public attacks from the president have diminished morale inside the FBI, according to current and former officials. Among themselves, senior officials and rank and file frequently debate the best way forward. Several law enforcement officials said they agreed with Wrays low-key approach, as a means of what one called getting back to Muellers FBI.

That is a sentiment not without irony because Mueller is now the special counsel leading the Russia investigation so despised by the president and his allies. On Saturday in his tweet, Trump said the Russia Witch Hunt goes on and on . . . This is an American disgrace!

Others express doubts about emulating Muellers detached approach, worried that Wrays calculation not to publicly spar with the president may lead to a gradual erosion of the bureaus reputation and clout. One law enforcement official expressed worry that they might not be able to return to an earlier era because, as he put it, this Pandoras box of politics has been opened, and we may never get rid of it.

A HuffPost/YouGov poll last month found that 51 percent of the public say they have a fair amount of trust in the FBI  down 12 points from 2015. Most of that drop was driven by Republicans and independents, the poll found.

The #ReleaseTheMemo campaign  a GOP effort to make public the four-page document produced by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., alleging surveillance abuses by the FBI  is just the latest salvo in an escalating war on the credibility of federal law enforcement. On Friday, over Wrays objection, Trump authorized the release of the Nunes memo and declared, A lot of people should be ashamed of themselves and much worse than that.

The document  which Democrats said lacked appropriate context and seemed to be a pretext for conservatives to discredit the investigation into Trump  alleged the FBI misled the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in obtaining a secret warrant to monitor former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

That was because, Republicans alleged, the bureau did not tell the court that they were relying in part on information they had received from an ex-British spy who was working for an opposition research firm hired by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee. Officials familiar with the matter, though, said the court that approved the warrant was aware some information in the request was funded by a political entity, even if that entity was not specifically named.

Thats it? Comey tweeted after the memo was released Friday. Dishonest and misleading memo wrecked the House intel committee, destroyed trust with Intelligence Community, damaged relationship with FISA court, and inexcusably exposed classified investigation of an American citizen. For what? DOJ & FBI must keep doing their jobs.

Trumps attacks on the Justice Department and the bureau are not new. He has called his own attorney general beleaguered and claimed the bureaus reputation was in tatters. But in recent weeks, his claims have been magnified by Republicans on Capitol Hill and buttressed by the release of materials that call into question the actions of some agents.

Late last month, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., said on Fox News there was evidence of corruption  more than bias but corruption  at the highest levels of the FBI, and pointed to texts between two key officials who were once assigned to both the Clinton and Trump probes suggesting a secret society at the FBI. Those messages about a secret society are now widely seen to be a joke, but that has not diminished Republicans fervor about what they see as malfeasance in federal law enforcement.

Next came days of wrangling over whether the memo should be released, with the Justice Department and Republicans trading barbs over whether the document might harm national security and if it was accurate. Trump ultimately sided with Hill Republicans, even over the advice of his own FBI director.

The Justice Department typically has a unique role in an administration: While it seeks to implement the presidents policy goals as a part of the executive branch, it conducts criminal investigations independently and without regard to the will of the chief executive. Trump has defied that norm. He asked Comey for a vow of loyalty, then inquired with Andrew McCabe, who replaced Comey after Trump fired him, for whom he voted.

The presidents approach has scrambled old alliances and created some odd new ones.

Privacy advocates  whose mission often centers on trying to rein in what they view as the FBIs overbroad and unchecked surveillance powers  have found themselves defending the agency in the current fight, saying the GOPs claims of privacy abuses lack a factual foundation.

For a long time weve had a concern about the process for obtaining surveillance, a warrant to surveil an American citizen, and abuses in that process, said Christopher Anders, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Unions Washington Legislative Office. And with Congressman Nunes memo raising concerns that there were abuses in that process, of course thats something that would concern us. The memo itself, though, doesnt prove the case. It doesnt have the kind of evidence in it that you would need to see to say that there was an abuse of that authority.

Ron Hosko, a former FBI assistant director, said some of the presidents behavior toward the Justice Department and the FBI might do lasting damage. While the president might now feel he wants the bureau under his firm control, Hosko said, he might regret that if a like-minded president took office and ordered investigations of Trump or his family.

The battle is incredible, and whos riding to the defense of the FBI? The Democrats, said Hosko. It just makes no sense.

Current and former law enforcement officials expect the struggle for control of the FBI to intensify.

Republicans feel the White House is under siege and have suspicions that the FBI was not playing fair, said one former senior Justice Department official. Republicans think this is just part of the war they are fighting.WASHINGTON  Republican leaders open defiance last week of the FBI over the release of a hotly disputed memo revealed how the GOP, which has long positioned itself as the party of law and order, has become an adversary of federal law enforcement as the party continues its quest to protect President Donald Trump from the Russia investigation.

The FBI, the Justice Department and other agencies are now under concerted assault by Republicans, facing allegations of corruption and conspiracy that have quickly moved from the fringes of the right into the mainstream of the GOP.

Republicans in Congress insist that their efforts are meant to fulfill their duty to provide oversight of the executive branch and root out suspected bias. But critics say their campaign  to cleanse the FBI, in the words of House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis.,  has been clearly orchestrated to safeguard the president and undercut the Russia probe, which includes an examination of whether Trump or his associates have sought to obstruct justice.

Its an extraordinary moment, said Steve Schmidt, a strategist on George W. Bushs and John McCains presidential campaigns who opposes Trump. The party has become completely unmoored from things that it held as close to sacred until very recently, including a fidelity to the countrys security institutions.

The GOP offensive has raised doubts among millions of Americans about the independence and integrity of federal law enforcement agencies, which have not been caught in a political maelstrom of this magnitude since the Watergate scandal almost five decades ago.

Tensions reached a boil last week when Trump approved the publication of the then-classified memo, which was authored by Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee chaired by Devin Nunes, R-Calif., one of the presidents most loyal allies. The release came despite intense opposition from law enforcement and intelligence officials, who said that the document was full of errors and omissions and that disclosing it was extraordinarily reckless to national security.

The memo alleges that senior FBI and Justice officials abused their power and used a contested dossier on Trump to secure a warrant from a foreign-intelligence court to wiretap Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser.

The president claimed Saturday on Twitter that this memo totally vindicates Trump in probe. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on . . . This is an American disgrace!

The FBI, Democrats and some Republicans expressed alarm following days of unsuccessful appeals to Trump and Ryan to halt the release of a memo they say is incomplete and deeply misleading  and that they say sets a dangerous precedent.

The document is part of long-standing efforts by Trump to influence or derail the Russia probe, including his firing in the spring of FBI Director James Comey; his abandoned order in the summer to get rid of special counsel Robert Mueller III; and his continued consideration behind the scenes of removing others including Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who has ultimate authority over the investigation. Trump has told advisers in recent days that he was hopeful the memos release would pave the way for further shake-ups at Justice, including the firing of Rosenstein.

Confidence in the FBI has simultaneously declined among Republican voters. A Gallup survey in December 2017 found that 49 percent of Republicans thought the FBI was doing an excellent or good job, down from 62 percent in 2014. Among Democrats, 69 percent approved of the FBIs performance, up from 60 percent in 2014.

Amid the tumult, rank-and-file conservatives and a chorus of Trump boosters in the media plunged ahead with the onslaught.

We take no joy in this, said Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., who advocated the memos release and has suggested top law enforcement leaders be jailed for their alleged misdeeds. We didnt weave into the [party] platform last time that we are now against DOJ and the FBI. Wed rather be trashing Obamacare than trashing the FBI. But we have a job to do.

But with Republicans fearful of a shellacking in falls midterm elections, vulnerable House incumbents are growing concerned that their partys positioning carries unpredictable risks.

Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., a freshman representing suburban Philadelphia and a former FBI agent, said he is telling my colleagues to be very careful on how they proceed here. But he acknowledges that his voice alone will not suddenly turn around the partys message.

There are unfortunately some people who are trying to judge an entire institution by a few bad actors, Fitzpatrick said. The FBI is an amazing organization that I love with all my heart, and we need to balance our calls for transparency with the need for confidentiality in covert operations.

Former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani, a Trump ally and onetime prosecutor who is close to some FBI officials, said his party must be careful.

Republicans could be clearer, whether these issues turn out to be legitimate or not, that their focus is on the leadership at the time of the FBI  not the agents, Giuliani said. There are tremendous worries about conduct that deserve attention, but make sure to stay on that.

Most striking to some Republicans has been the conduct of Ryan, who is widely respected within the party and casts himself as a pillar of traditional conservatism.

While Ryan has maintained that Muellers investigation should continue its course, he has strongly supported Nunes and questioned whether civil liberties were violated. Addressing the Nunes memo, Ryan told a small gathering of television anchors last week, Let it all out, get it all out there. Cleanse the organization, according to Fox News. The speaker added, I think we should disclose all this stuff. Its the best disinfectant.

On Friday, shortly after the document was declassified, Ryan said he was glad  although he cautioned his party in a statement to not use this memo to impugn the integrity of the justice system.

Ryans approach reflects that of much of the GOP leadership in Congress, which has labored to assure conservative hard-liners such as Gaetz that their grievances about the FBI are being heard.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has had little to say about the House memo other than to tell reporters he thinks Ryan is handling this just right.

Only a few elected Republicans have spoken negatively about the memos release. Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., a member of the Senate leadership, said Nunes should have shared it first with Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr, R-N.C., and incorporated the concerns of FBI Director Christopher Wray. Sens. McCain and Jeff Flake, Arizona Republicans who have been critical of Trump, both opposed making the document public.

If we continue to undermine our own rule of law, we are doing [Russian President Vladimir] Putins job for him, McCain said in a statement Friday.

Mark Salter, a longtime McCain confidant and adviser, said the GOP has largely reached a stage where nothing is more important than politics  everything is tribal, about winning.

Republicans have clashed with federal law enforcement agencies before, particularly under Democratic presidents, from the FBIs 1993 siege of a religious groups compound in Waco, Texas, to an uproar during President Barack Obamas first term over a firearms sting operation dubbed Fast and Furious.

The recent, more expansive GOP distrust can be traced back to the 2016 campaign. Giuliani recalls traveling with Trump and together grousing about Comey and then-attorney general Loretta Lynch, among others, whom they saw as unfairly sympathetic to Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee who was under FBI investigation for her use of a private email server while she was secretary of state.

I still dont know how the hell she got away with it, Giuliani said. She was treated extraordinarily by Jim Comey and the FBI. At least, that was my impression.

The perception of bias was fueled by media commentary on the right, including on Fox News, and a series of incidents that provided fodder to partisans, such as Lynchs private meeting with former president Bill Clinton on an airport tarmac in Phoenix.

This has all been building for a while, said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., a member of the House Intelligence Committee with deep ties to law enforcement. You go back to 2016, there were serious errors made by certain people in the FBI and at Justice. Lynch on the tarmac, Comey deciding to not prosecute Hillary, and we still dont have the full story of what happened that October.

The upheaval over the memo comes amid an emerging power shift in the party that is tilting the GOP toward skepticism: Libertarian-leaning Republicans averse to expanding U.S. warrantless surveillance programs are increasingly vocal and are winning converts.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., have established themselves as leaders of the bloc, and other players on the right have embraced WikiLeaks and groups that have argued for dismantling what some Trump supporters call the deep state, a conspiratorial reference to the intelligence community and law enforcement as entrenched actors with self-interested motives.

Trump has encouraged that perspective even as he has formally supported a bill to expand surveillance powers, tweeting inaccurately and without evidence about being wiretapped by the Obama administration. In January, a measure to scale back surveillance powers was defeated in the House, although 58 Republicans joined 125 Democrats in supporting it.

At the center of last weeks eruption over declassifying the Nunes document has been a group of about 70 House members who have been rallying to release the memo during closed Republican conference meetings and on social media. They also have been speaking to talk radio and conservative websites to share fierce criticism of Rosenstein, Wray and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, among others.

GOP pollster Frank Luntz, who is close with party leaders, explained the dynamic: An average Republican voters inclination is to trust law and order. If the police say theyre guilty, a Republican assumes they are. . . . But because so much of life has been politicized, you have this crosscurrent of an internal desire to support these institutions and the feeling that the people who occupy them are not doing their jobs correctly.

Schmidt had a less charitable explanation, citing a list of conspiratorial beliefs that have been taken up over the years by the far right.

It represents the mainstreaming of a strain of conservatism that comes from a place of paranoia and conspiracy, Schmidt said. Many Republican leaders, he argued, are now the equivalent of the Lyndon LaRouche people in the parking lot of the supermarket handing out fliers, shouting conspiracies.

Among Democrats, there is unease about the GOPs turn, as well as lingering concerns of their own.

Many Clinton supporters continue to believe that the FBI improperly handled her probe, and some blame Comeys late October 2016 letter to Congress reopening the email investigation for her loss.

Lanny Davis, a longtime member of Clintons political orbit, is publishing a book Tuesday titled, The Unmaking of the President 2016: How FBI Director James Comey Cost Hillary Clinton the Presidency.

The headline for Davis column in The Hill newspaper last week: Deep state existed in 16  but it elected Trump.

  

The Washington Posts Scott Clement contributed to this report.Archaeologists have spent more than a century traipsing through the Guatemalan jungle, Indiana Jones-style, searching through dense vegetation to learn what they could about the Maya civilization that was one of the dominant societies in Mesoamerica for centuries.

But the latest discovery  one archaeologists are calling a game changer  didnt even require a can of bug spray.

Scientists using high-tech, airplane-based lidar mapping tools have discovered tens of thousands of structures constructed by the Maya: defense works, houses, buildings, industrial-size agricultural fields, even new pyramids. The findings, announced Thursday, are already reshaping long-held views about the size and scope of the Maya civilization.

This world, which was lost to this jungle, is all of a sudden revealed in the data, said Albert Yu-Min Lin, an engineer and National Geographic explorer who worked on a television special about the new find. And what you thought was this massively understood, studied civilization is all of a sudden brand new again, he told the New York Times

Thomas Garrison, an archaeologist at Ithaca College who led the project, called it monumental: This is a game changer, he told NPR. It changes the base level at which we do Maya archaeology.

The findings were announced by Guatemalas Mayan Heritage and Nature Foundation, which has been working with the lidar system alongside a group of European and U.S. archaeologists.

The lidar system fires rapid laser pulses at surfaces  sometimes as many as 150,000 pulses per second  and measures how long it takes that light to return to sophisticated measuring equipment.

Doing that over and over again lets scientists create a topographical map of sorts. Months of computer modeling allowed the researchers to virtually strip away half a million acres of jungle that has grown over the ruins. Whats left is a surprisingly clear picture of how a 10th-century Maya would see the landscape.

Scientists used similar scans to unearth a network of ancient cities in Angkor, the heart of the Khmer empire in Cambodia that includes the famed Angkor Wat, according to the Times. Lidar has the potential to unearth civilizations even in the densest jungles of Brazil.

And Garrison said the lidar data can be used in other fields.

We dont use about 92 percent of the lidar data. We just throw it out to make our maps, he told The Washington Post. But there is incredibly valuable information in that forestry data. Youre just seeing the archaeology part because thats what we focused on, but that data can be used to determine how jungles recover from forest fires, whats the carbon footprint.

Still, that 8 percent of data was as astonishing as it was humbling, he said.

The planes that shot lidar pulses at pieces of the Guatemalan jungle did so in a matter of days, Garrison said. It unearthed Maya structures researchers had literally walked over before, including a temple they thought was a hill.

There was this fortress in our area, Garrison told The Washington Post. In 2010, I was within 150 feet of this thing, which would have been a massive discovery in 2010.

Using the data, researchers have been able to refine their thoughts about Maya civilization.

According to the Associated Press, researchers now believe that as many as 10 million people may have lived in the area known as the Maya Lowlands  two or three times as many as scientists had thought. And because all those people needed to eat, in some areas, 95 percent of available land was drained  including areas that have not been farmed since the Maya fell.

Their agriculture is much more intensive and therefore sustainable than we thought, and they were cultivating every inch of the land, Francisco Estrada-Belli, a research assistant professor at Tulane University, told the AP.

During the Maya classic period, which stretched from A.D. 250 to 900, the civilization covered an area twice the size of medieval England, according to National Geographic, and was much more densely populated.

Most people had been comfortable with population estimates of around 5 million, said Estrada-Belli, who directs a multidisciplinary archaeological project at Holmul, Guatemala. With this new data, its no longer unreasonable to think that there were 10 to 15 million people there  including many living in low-lying, swampy areas that many of us had thought uninhabitable.

Lidar revealed a previously undetected structure that Garrison said cant be called anything other than a Maya fortress.

That and other newly discovered fortresses indicate that the Maya may have been involved in more conflict  even outright warfare  than previously believed, and at earlier points in history.

While weve known that the Maya practiced warfare, we havent see this investment in warlike things, Garrison said. Here we have these features at the beginning of the apex of their civilization. Thats really interesting. What role does warfare play in society? Is it actually a catalyst for growth and development?

Researchers also have a newfound way of thinking about the jungle: as both impediment and preserver.

The remains of other cultures have been destroyed by generation upon generation of farming. But after the Maya abandoned their empire in A.D. 900, the jungle grew over abandoned fields and structures.

It hid them but also helped to conserve them.

In this, the jungle, which has hindered us in our discovery efforts for so long, has actually worked as this great preservative tool of the impact the culture had across the landscape, Garrison said.YouTube users in the United States will soon see a new label pinned to videos published by news outlets that receive government funding.

The popular video service said Friday that the new notices are intended to help audiences better understand their sources of news, and they come amid a U.S. government crackdown on a Russian-funded news organization that the U.S. intelligence community has characterized as a propaganda outlet for the Kremlin.

YouTubes decision to flag state-backed media is the latest example of Silicon Valleys struggle to contend with the spread of disinformation across social media, a tactic exploited by foreign operatives during and after the 2016 presidential election. It also highlights the increasing challenges giant communications platforms face as they assume regulatory responsibilities in facilitating and policing the global public square.

News is an important and growing vertical for us, and we want to be sure to get it right, helping to grow news and support news publishers on YouTube in a responsible way, Geoff Samek, senior product manager for YouTube News, said in a blog post. This work follows a series of changes we made throughout 2017 to better surface authoritative news content.

But PBS, a U.S. public broadcaster, says YouTubes decision is misguided. Labeling PBS a publicly funded broadcaster is both vague and misleading, a spokesman told The Washington Post is a statement. PBS and its member stations receive a small percentage of funding from the federal government; the majority of funding comes from private donations. More importantly, PBS is an independent, private, not-for-profit corporation, not a state broadcaster. YouTubes proposed labeling could wrongly imply that the government has influence over PBS content, which is prohibited by statute. If YouTubes intent is to create clarity and better understanding, this is a step in the wrong direction.

PBS added that it continues to discuss the issue with YouTube.

When asked to address the criticism leveled by PBS and to offer further details, Google, YouTubes parent company, referred The Post back to Sameks blog post.

Were rolling out this feature to viewers in the U.S. for now, and we dont expect it to be perfect, YouTubes Samek wrote. We plan to improve and expand the feature over time.

YouTube did not disclose a list of posters affected by the new labels. But in the blog post, the company included an example of a flagged video from Radio Free Asia, a nonprofit news organization funded by the Broadcasting Board of Governors, a U.S. government agency, whose stated mission is to inform, engage, and connect people around the world in support of freedom and democracy. The sample notice on the YouTube video stated RFA is funded in whole or in part by the American government.

The notices will appear below the video but above the videos title, YouTube said; the label also will include a link to the publishers Wikipedia page. On a Web page offering additional details about the labels, YouTube said that the notice is not a comment by YouTube on the publishers or videos editorial direction or a governments editorial influence. The state-funded labels will not be displayed in YouTube search results, and they will not affect any video features or change the criteria for enabling advertisements on videos, YouTube said.

YouTubes move arrives as Facebook, Twitter and Google were attacked by lawmakers for not doing enough to prevent foreign meddling on their networks during the election. In contentious congressional hearings last year, members of Congress also pressed Google on its relationship with the Russian-backed news outlet RT, formerly known as Russia Today, which the U.S. intelligence community had concluded is a propaganda platform for Moscow. RT did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In November, Eric Schmidt, the former executive chairman of Googles parent, Alphabet, said that the company would de-rank RT and another Russian government-affiliated news outlet, Sputnik, in its search results in an effort to curb misleading and exploitative content. Schmidt added that the company does not want to ban the outlets, and Google later clarified that the company does not re-rank individual websites.

Google is not the only tech giant to have taken action against Russian-affiliated media. In October, Twitter banned RT and Sputnik from advertising on its platform, citing the U.S. intelligence assessment.

The thorny issue over state-backed media playing out on tech platforms is part of a broader conflict between the U.S. and Russian governments. Russian President Vladimir Putin recently signed into law new measures that will allow authorities to force any foreign media organization to register as a foreign agent. The policy, enacted in retaliation after RT was forced to register under a similar statute in the United States, could entangle U.S. news bureaus abroad and may lead Moscow to enact further censorship rules.Albuquerque Police arrested two men they say abducted a woman in Kansas and took her for a cross-country trip to steal identities with card skimmers.

According to court documents, 23-year-old Neville Atkins is charged with kidnapping and Malek Banks, 19, is charged with disorderly conduct and possession.

Although the men were arrested separately, Banks on Friday night and Atkins on Saturday morning, police say they both brought a Kansas woman to New Mexico against her will.

Police were dispatched to the Imperial Hotel, at 701 Central NE, Friday night after a police officer out of Kansas requested a welfare check on a woman staying there, according to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court.

Police say officers found Atkins, with Erica Hughes, in a room at the hotel.

Hughes told police Atkins and Banks recruited her over the internet to make some money and the three met at a hotel in Wichita, Kan. two days ago.

They told her how they use card readers and skimmers to fraudulently use the victims bank and credit cards, which they had been doing in Kansas, an officer wrote.

Police say when Hughes told the two men she wasnt interested in doing that they forced her into a car and drove to Oklahoma City.

Hughes told police Banks and Atkins claimed they were going to take her to Las Vegas, Nev., to make more money with the card readers.

Police say the three then took an Amtrak train from Oklahoma City to Albuquerque, where they were kicked off the train after one of the men became belligerent.

Once in Albuquerque, Hughes contacted her sister through Facebook and her sister called police to report the kidnapping Friday night, according to the complaint.

Police say when officers found the trio across from a Circle K on Lomas, Atkins told Hughes he would kill her and her family if she told them anything.

Hughes was afraid for her personal safety and didnt disclose any information to those officers, according to police.

Police say Banks was arrested during that interaction after officers witnessed him threatening Hughes and then found a marble sized baggie of marijuana on him, according to a separate criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court.

Hughes told police after the officers left with Banks in handcuffs, Atkins threatened her again.

Police say while Atkins was in the hotel shower Saturday morning, Hughes called a detective in Kansas and told them what happened.

Inside the hotel room, officers found a card reader and thumb drives, according to the complaint.

During questioning, Atkins denied the credit card fraud allegations and told police the two men had not taken Hughes against her will.

While Atkins is still in jail, Banks was released earlier Saturday after pleading no contest to disorderly conduct, according to court documents.

It is not clear why Banks was not charged with kidnapping or if he will be rearrested.

A spokesman for Albuquerque Police couldnt be reached for comment Saturday night.This legislative session stands in stark contrast to the budget crisis we faced this time last year  we have more revenues and have worked to fund agencies at the appropriate levels. But, there is a much more important underlying issue at hand: New Mexicos reliance on the volatile prices of oil and gas. Oil and gas has been our revenue foundation, but clearly diversification of our economic base is needed.

With such a volatile market driving our economy, we will move forward with caution. Were working on both sides of the aisle on a responsible budget that will meet the needs of communities across the state. The estimates project that we have an additional $157.9 million in recurring revenue. This new financial outlook is an opportunity to put New Mexico back on track. Well move forward cautiously, investing in education, programs to address crime, and economic development  but with the understanding that we need to diversify and grow our economy so we dont end up in the same position as last year.

In the community that I grew up in, which sits between Gallup and Albuquerque, we knew all too well how the booms and busts of one industry can affect a community. There were times when one day we had security and jobs and the next it was all gone. When I was appointed the chair of the House Appropriations Committee last year, I came in knowing that well be managing those booms and busts and that it would call for us to be light on our feet. I also came in with the goal to change that volatile cycle for our communities.

This year were looking at putting New Mexico back on track by funding agencies that had to undergo cuts the last few years. We will invest in the infrastructure that will make our communities viable candidates for business and job growth. Well invest in our workforce and job training so New Mexicans have opportunity to get ahead. Last, but certainly not least, were going to make our communities safer by making sure our public safety system, including our police departments, corrections facilities and full judiciary system, have the resources they need to address crime.

Our bipartisan budget also focuses on the specific needs of our Native American communities. By funding the Indian Education Fund, the Native American Health Center and the Tribal College Dual Credit Program, well be expanding opportunities and ensuring basic services are being provided.

Finally, this new revenue allows us to save for tomorrow. Until we are set with new revenue streams from numerous industries, we must keep reserves at a level that provides security for the future. Were keeping more than 10 percent of our spending in reserves to protect our schools, small towns and programs that serve our kids from budget cuts.

Our $6.32 billion budget will kick off a multi-year process to ensure New Mexico is on a solid economic footing. These steps will help our state move toward a more diverse economy with high-paying jobs and support that will empower local communities to thrive.Copyright  2018 Albuquerque Journal

Last summers violent protests over the fate of Confederate statues in Charlottesville, Va., reverberated across the country, sparking debate about how modern America should reckon with controversial public reminders of its past.

The topic was already a familiar one at the University of New Mexico.

Critics have long derided the Three Peoples murals at Zimmerman Library as racist in their various depictions of Native Americans, Hispanics and Anglos. Kenneth Adams 1939 artwork was defaced multiple times in the 1970s, triggered a wave of debate in the 1990s, and more recently led library staff and faculty to complain about a hostile work environment.

By perpetuating stereotypes and not accurately depicting the true diversity of New Mexicos peoples and cultures, the mural stands both as a distortion of history and a dubious projection of the University of New Mexicos character and mission, library employees wrote in a 2016 letter to the dean of libraries.

That background, combined with the current national discourse, prompted UNM to turn the question  How should UNM address the Zimmerman murals?  into an academic exercise. It launched a three-credit, interdisciplinary class for the spring semester to examine the situation from a variety of angles and make recommendations to the administration.

We wanted the university to do what universities do  study the issue and have informed debate, said Alex Lubin, an American studies professor and UNMs interim associate provost for faculty development. He teaches the course with Kymberly Pinder, an art history professor and the College of Fine Arts dean.

Pinder has taught a course on the history of mural-making for years, and she used that as a base for this more issue-specific class. More than 30 speakers have agreed to participate.

The course will cover subjects like historic preservation, free speech, New Deal art, Native and Chicano representation, restorative justice and the UNM process for making change. Former students who protested the murals decades ago will also lend their perspective.

Pinder said the murals question is multifaceted.

Its easy to make this all about racial conflicts and cultural sensitivities, but I think its also about public art, she said, adding that such work evolves over time to serve its community. Neither the art nor the university should be static  or can be.

UNM listed the class across multiple disciplines, and it has drawn students from art history, studio art, Native American studies, Chicana/o studies, American studies and more.

More than 40 attend the class in person and about 25 more take the online version. All lectures are open to the public and are also filmed and posted online.

Pinder said she will divide the students into groups that will each develop proposals for the murals. Experts will review recommendations and help students hone them before sending them to UNMs leadership for consideration.

Pinder said students learned early in the semester that changes could require several levels of approval, including perhaps entities outside UNM. She said she wanted them to understand the nuances and limitations to make the most informed cases possible.

It really is collaborative problem-solving, and thats what were supposed to be training our students to do in almost every class, Pinder said.

Lubin has also formed a task force with representatives from across campus to address the situation. He said that group may also come up with recommendations.

Through the years, some people have called for the murals removal. Others have said UNM should formally recognize critics concerns with a nearby plaque or new mural.

Other options include simply covering them with plywood or different art, Lubin said. Pinder said some preservationists want them to stay as is.

Most students did not enroll in the class with a specific position regarding the murals fate, Lubin said. A poll the first day of class revealed that about half had never even seen them.

But some students already know they want the murals removed.

Jennifer Marley, a Native American studies major enrolled in the class, said removal is her long-term objective, although she would like to see something else done in the interim  perhaps projecting something else over the The Three Peoples.

I like the idea of projection but also dont want to give up on having them eradicated completely. Id like to push for getting that process started regardless of how many years it would take, said Marley, who was also involved in the recent campaign for UNM to abolish its official seal.

Pinder said she is not aware of any other university tackling a similar issue this way, and those she has talked to from outside UNM have described it as an innovative approach.

Lubin said it could serve as a model for other institutions grappling with controversial artwork or monuments.

This is where I think we are ahead of the curve, he said. We are using all of the tools of a research university to (foster an) informed discussion and debate, rather that just appointing a task force that makes a decision.LAS CRUCES  Kendall Jenner  the 22-year-old model, reality TV star and member of the Kardashian-Jenner dynasty  stars in a recently released fashion campaign for a high-end Italian clothing brand that was shot at White Sands National Monument.

Images of the campaign were released on social media last week by Missoni, the Italian brand known for its colorful knitwear designs.

Shot by photographer Harley Weir, the campaign features Jenner striking poses throughout the monuments world-famous white gypsum sand dunes while wearing clothing  including a full-length, see-through caftan and oversized hat  from Missonis spring 2018 collection.

In one post on Instagram, Missoni praised the White Sands for its unique scenery.

In a separate post, the brands creative director, Angela Missoni, captioned one of the campaign images with the message: where my dreams came true! #newmexico.

Jenner also posted two images from the campaign on her Instagram and Twitter accounts  but did not mention White Sands or New Mexico.

More than 2.7 million followers on Instagram liked one of the images showing Jenner posing underneath a billowing fabric piece by artist Rachel Hayes.

It is at least the second time in the past year that White Sands National Monument has served as the backdrop for high-fashion luminaries.

Last year, Brad Pitt was featured in GQ magazine as part of a profile that included photographs of the actor shot in White Sands and Carlsbad Caverns National Monument.Copyright  2018 Albuquerque Journal

SANTA FE  A complex regulatory bill aimed at setting a new energy course for New Mexico  and the state largest utility  hit a roadblock Saturday in its first Senate committee.

The Senate Conservation Committee voted 5-4 to table the legislation, though the panels chairman, Sen. Joseph Cervantes, D-Las Cruces, said after casting the decisive vote that hes open to bringing it back during the 30-day session, which ends Feb. 15.

This is a very confusing piece of legislation thats been changing all the time, Cervantes said.

Sen. Jacob Candelaria, D-Albuquerque, one of the bills sponsors, said minor technical disagreements should not derail the bill. He also said hes still hopeful it can win approval.

This bill is so close to making history, Candelaria told the Journal after Saturdays vote. We need to put party aside and do whats right for New Mexico this session.

The measure, Senate Bill 47, would allow the Public Service Company of New Mexico to recoup its investment in abandoned coal plants by issuing low-interest bonds that would be paid off by customers over a 20-year period.

It would also require PNM to procure 50 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2030 and would create a $19 million economic development fund for San Juan County, where coal plants are located.

Those provisions were added to the bill after hours of closed-door negotiations over the past week, but environmental groups said the legislation still doesnt go far enough.

We have the highest expectations when it comes to the future of the Four Corners area and the energy future of our entire state, and PNMs proposal continues to fall short, said Ben Shelton, the legislative director for Conservation Voters New Mexico.

Meanwhile, other critics of the legislation described it as a bailout for PNM, a charge supporters fiercely contested.

The bill is being supported by an unusual coalition of labor and business groups  including the Greater Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce  that describe it as crucial to providing long-term economic security.

Farmington Mayor Tommy Roberts also testified during Saturdays hearing, saying, Were asking for help  and Im not ashamed to ask for that help.

He said energy-reliant San Juan County has already had a population decrease in recent years, due in part to a slowdown in the natural gas industry.

In essence, the framework of the proposed legislation would make it easier for PNM to recover what it originally anticipated earning from the San Juan Generating Station near Farmington, which it now hopes to close in 2022.

PNM also has a smaller ownership stake in the nearby Four Corners Power Plant, which the utility is considering an early withdrawal from in 2031.

Several individuals who spoke against the legislation said the proposal should be reviewed by the five-member New Mexico Public Regulation Commission, which typically regulates utilities. One PRC Commissioner, Cynthia Hall of Albuquerque, even showed up for Saturdays hearing to testify the bill would undermine the commissions authority.

But Gerard Ortiz, PNM vice president for regulatory affairs and economic development, said any order allowing the utility to recover less than 100 percent of its investment would probably be appealed.

Now, with just 11 days left in this years session, supporters of the legislation will have to race against the clock to try to come up with legislation that could win approval of the Senate Conservation Committee and make it to Gov. Susana Martinezs desk.

And some lawmakers suggested it might be wise to just wait until 2019.

This is far too complex an issue for us to be addressing in a 30-day session, said Sen. Bill Soules of Las Cruces, one of five Democrats to vote in favor of tabling the bill.

Sen. Richard Martinez, D-Espanola, joined three Senate Republicans in voting against the motion.A deadlock in crafting the nations budget has put the health care of thousands of New Mexico residents at risk, health officials told Sen. Tom Udall on Saturday.

Udall held a roundtable discussion on Saturday morning at the Indian Pueblo Culture Center with officials from tribal and community health care providers who are facing having to cut back on services if federal funding for their programs is thinned.

The reason this is important is for me to hear whats happening on the ground, Udall said in an interview after the meeting. The stories we heard show that this would be devastating, the cuts to these programs.

The Community Health Centers Program and the Special Diabetes Program for Indians are both at risk, and that risk comes at a time when the programs have steadily built momentum, said Eileen Goode, the CEO of the New Mexico Primary Care Association. Funding for both programs expired at the end of September and they have received temporary funding, which will run out next month.

Its very scary to think that as were building that up, the funding overall for the health centers is going away, she said.

More than 325,000 people receive health care from 180 community health centers throughout the state, the vast majority of which are in rural or frontier areas. There are 29 diabetes prevention and management programs for pueblos and tribes throughout the state that are funded through the special diabetes program.

Warlance Foster, a health official on the Navajo Nation, said diabetes on Indian reservations can harm entire families. He shared a story of a relative who, despite being a successful high school and college cross country runner, developed diabetes and ultimately had to have a foot amputated.

Were not asking for millions of dollars so we can live large, he said during the roundtable. This is a quality of life issue.

Jenny Metzler, the executive director of Health Care for the Homeless in Albuquerque, said the funding that is at risk represents about 25 percent of the agencys operating budget. The agency treats about 4,500 people, but would potentially have to drop that number to under 3,000 people if they lose the federal funds. They would also lose the benefits of being a federal-qualified health center, which provides them training and other opportunities.

We wouldnt be able to function  if we didnt get those benefits, she said.LAS CRUCES, N.M.  A Carlsbad woman has pleaded not guilty to federal wire fraud charges in connection with an $800,000 embezzlement scheme.

Prosecutors say 54-year-old Lori Whitaker was arraigned Friday at the federal courthouse in Las Cruces.

She was released pending trial, which hasnt been scheduled.

Whitaker is facing a 75-count indictment charging her with perpetrating a scheme to defraud her former employer over a two-year period.

Whitaker was an office manager for the Otis Mutual Domestic Water Consumers and Sewage Works Association.

The non-profit association provides potable water and a wastewater system to more than 4,300 people in Otis, New Mexico.

Whitaker allegedly transmitted funds between March 2015 and February 2017 as part of a scheme to defraud the association.

Prosecutors say the 75 wired transactions ranged from $416 to nearly $16,000.Would you like to receive breaking news notifications from The Post and Courier?

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Please enable notifications in your browser and reload the page.For the first time since the year 2000, a sitting US president arrived at the Swiss Alps town of Davos to take part in the World Economic Forum. But more than his mere participation, President Donald Trump shocked European and other guests by the statements he made there.

Referring to the Palestinian refusal to meet with Vice President Mike Pence Jan. 22, Trump attacked Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, stating, They disrespected us a week ago by not allowing our great vice president to see them. Even more dramatic and significant was Trumps reiterated threat to cut US financial assistance to the Palestinians. He said, Money is not going to them unless they sit down and negotiate peace. Trump echoed former threats by his administration to slash funding by $65 million for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.

This last threat was supposed to coerce Palestinian leadership into negotiations with Israel on a US peace plan. It will, of course, have the opposite effect, and it will harm the livelihood of Palestinians in refugee camps. The Palestinian leadership suspects that after having taken Israels position on the issue of Jerusalem, Trump is now planning to fully endorse Israel against the Palestinians right of return. A senior PLO official close to the Palestinian president told Al-Monitor that Abbas is reaching out on two levels to his Arab partners, including Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. He hopes to solicit alternative funds for the refugees and also to garner Arab support against a Benjamin Netanyahu-modeled peace plan by the US administration.

The official assessed that the outline of Trumps plan has been orchestrated by his envoys Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt in cooperation with Netanyahu.

The plan would apparently be a Palestinian state with limited sovereignty on approximately half of the West Bank. The Palestinian state would include the Gaza Strip and possibly extend into the Sinai Peninsula, should the Egyptians agree. The Palestinian capital should be in Abu Dis in the vicinity of Jerusalem. Other East Jerusalem neighborhoods will also come under Palestinian rule. Main Israeli settlements will stay in place, protected by the Israeli army. According to this outline described by the Palestinian source, there will be no right of return for Palestinian refugees. The United States will offer the Palestinian state significant economic assistance.

The PLO official added that this proposed plan is a dream come true for Netanyahu. In fact, it resembles Education Minister Naftali Bennetts plans of annexing West Bank Area C (currently under Israeli control) and uniting Jerusalem. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the Palestinian source said, There is not and will not be a Palestinian who would accept such plans as basis for negotiations. These US positions result from pressure by American evangelist and Jewish communities in order to enhance Trumps chances to be re-elected in the 2020 elections.

A senior European Union official close to High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini told Al-Monitor that leaders of European member states are highly alarmed by Trumps apparent radicalization on Middle Eastern issues. This is true concerning issues other than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. French President Emmanuel Macron has taken the role of building bridges of understanding with Trump, foremost on the Iran nuclear agreement. But in this case, too, Trump is leaning to pull the United States out of the agreement unless it is significantly changed. Paris fears that with time this may jeopardize the balance that is holding the agreement together. In such a setup, international trade with Iran would continue without Tehran feeling obliged to keep its part on canceling its development of nuclear arms.

As aforementioned, Brussels is highly concerned about the Palestinian issue. Abbas is obviously cornered and weakened. The winner in this situation is Hamas, mainly in the West Bank. The EU is aware of a growing rapprochement between Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran. The official said that if this trend continues, a cycle of violence with Israel involving pro-Iran forces in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria cannot be ruled out.

The EU at the highest levels intends to intervene with the Trump administration realists, specifically national security adviser H.R. McMaster, Secretary of Defense James Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

A Senior Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs official told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity that the prime minister feels vindicated in his policies on the Palestinian and Iranian issues, and he will continue to pressure for changes in the Iran agreement and for a diplomatic boycott of Abbas.

Indeed, with time, Netanyahus policies are largely becoming self-fulfilling prophecies.AMMAN, Jordan  Bashir Nader, a 55-year-old Iraqi, lives with his family in al-Hashmi al-Shamali neighborhood in Jordans capital, Amman. Nader fled the city of Samarra in 2016 to escape the Islamic State (IS) and Shiite militias who targeted the Mandaean community.

Mandaeism is an independent religion, and its followers claim it is the oldest monotheistic religion. Its followers revere Adam, Adam's son Seth, Noah's son Shem, Abraham and John the Baptist, who is the last of their prophets.

Naders family immigrated to Jordan looking for asylum, as did 2,500 other Mandaeans. In Jordan, more than 95% of the population follows Sunni Islam; the next biggest religion is Christianity, which dropped from 12% of the population in 1956 to less than 4% in 2012 (the latest available statistics) due to immigration, according to Kamel Abu Jaber. the head of the Royal Institute for Inter-Faith Studies.

The suffering of Mandaeans began in 2014 when IS took over Samarra in southern Iraq, an area where adherents of this religion are concentrated. They were faced with two choices: death or converting to Islam as IS considered them infidels, Nader told Al-Monitor.

Nader added, Amid terror, murders and the captivity of women, we fled through the dirt road from Maryam neighborhood in Samarra to al-Suwaira in Wasit province, which is controlled by Shiite militias and the Popular Mobilization Units, in search of safety.

But the situation was not much better. The family of seven was threatened with murder and forced by Shiite militias to pay large sums of money to spare their lives. The militias killed many Mandaeans, most of whom worked in jewelry making, in al-Suwaira.

The family had little choice but to seek asylum outside Iraq, just like thousands of Mandaean families who escaped religious persecution and chose asylum in Jordan in 2016. They were officially registered at the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Jordan in the hope of getting the chance to migrate to a third country.

Naders family does not get any medical or financial aid from the UNHCR, although agency spokesman Mohammad Hawari told Al-Monitor, The UNHCR does not discriminate between refugees based on their religion or origins. The aid is distributed depending on the neediest of families.

After evaluating his situation, the UNHCR concluded that other, less fortunate people deserved the aid more than Nader's family.

Nader and his family live in a modest house. Their economic situation is bad because he was wounded by shrapnel in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War; this has prevented him from working. Jordanian labor laws were also closing in on his children and on all Iraqi refugees in general. They were treated as migrant workers, unlike Syrian refugees who receive facilitated issuance of work permits.

The family relies on aid from its fellow Mandaeans, but the economic situation is not the only challenge. Karima, Nader's wife, said, Mandaeans are forbidden from practicing their religious rituals comfortably, as Jordanian authorities prohibited them from doing so, especially when it comes to performing baptisms at river banks or water pools.

Nader said, When we came to Jordan, the sect leader baptized people in the running water in Wadi Shuaib [18 miles west of Amman]. But the Jordanian authorities forbade him from performing the religious rituals. Out of fear for our lives, we took our practices home and did what we could.

Jordan only recognizes Islam and Christianity as religions in the kingdom. In 2014, the government changed the name of the non-Muslim sects law to the 2014 Council on Christian Denominations Law. The law did not mention any other religious minorities in the kingdom despite the presence of groups such as the Druze and Bahais.

Taghreed al-Daghami, a lawyer who prepared the study Freedom of Belief and Rights of Unrecognized Religious Minorities in Jordan in 2012, said, Chapter 2 of the Jordanian Constitution prohibits discrimination between Jordanians. As per the constitutional text: Jordanians shall be equal before the law. There shall be no discrimination between them in regard to their rights and duties on grounds of race, language or religion.

Daghami told Al-Monitor that Article 14 of the Jordanian Constitution states, The State shall safeguard the free exercise of all forms of worship and religious rites in accordance with the customs observed in the Kingdom, unless such is inconsistent with public order or morality. But, she added, This article is limited to the recognized religions in Jordan and does not guarantee the right to belief; only the right to practicing rituals.

Daghami said the Jordanian Constitution does not include any article that explicitly talks about the freedom of belief. Only Muslims and Christians can talk about their religion and practice their rituals openly. Other religions, such as the Bahai faith, cannot do the same. She said, Jordan has to respect the rituals of other religions, even for non-Jordanians, because it ratified several international agreements and charters such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. All these agreements guarantee the respect of the right to belief and to ritual practices.

Although Jordan is committed to these international charters, Ram, a young Mandaean who preferred not to provide his full name, keeps his religious identity a secret in front of his neighbors and friends in al-Hashmi al-Shamali neighborhood in Jordan. He told Al-Monitor, I introduce myself as an Iraqi Christian to avoid any embarrassing questions. Jordanians do not know anything about the Mandaean beliefs. I pray and celebrate religious occasions at home because I cannot do that in public.

Mandaeans are afraid to go back to Iraq because of the power militias have gained there. Instead, the Mandaeans live in asylum, under tough economic conditions, hoping for better days when the UNHCR takes them to a Western country where they can practice their religion freely.Android P may feature native support for call recording, as suggested by a number of commits recently discovered in the main repository of the Android Open Source Project. Some code added to AOSP by Googles engineers references the existence of a call recording tone that would presumably be played once users press the corresponding button in order to start recording their conversation. The tone itself is said to be of the 1,400Hz variety, meaning people of all ages should be able to hear it without any issues, with one of the commits referring to it revealing that its meant to be played every 15 seconds while the conversation is being recorded, presumably as to remind the person who didnt initiate the recording that its still participating in one.

Should Google move forward with implementing the feature into a vanilla version of Android, it will likely change its terms of use so as to account for relevant laws across the world. Recording a phone call without notifying the other party of your activity and receiving their consent isnt admissible as court evidence in certain parts of the United States, with similar legislation being applicable in a number of other countries. One of the newly discovered commits suggests that the feature is presently pending regulatory compliance requirements but doesnt elaborate on the matter, though Google will most likely opt for a solution that will have Android users acknowledge that theyre aware native call recording support must be used in accordance with applicable laws as part of the operating systems general terms of use. Wireless carriers who modify Android-powered smartphones before selling them will also be able to turn off the tone should they wish to do so, with that option presumably being meant to account for territories in which two-party consent is mandatory.

Another reference to the functionality indicates Google is planning to make it available to third-party developers, suggesting the tech will be offered as part of an application programming interface (API). Certain Android devices such as the ones from OnePlus already support native call recording but Alphabets subsidiary never signaled such a feature may be in the works for the stock version of its operating system. Android P is widely expected to be identified by the version number 9.0 and its first developer preview is close to being finalized, according to recent reports.Australia will launch its first 5G service in 2019, with wireless carrier Optus pledging to start the rollout of the next generation of connectivity early next year. The Sydney-based telecom giant is planning to prioritize key metro areas with its upcoming offering that will be delivered in the form of a 5G fixed wireless access solution. The company said its previous trials suggested its customers can expect speeds that are up to 15 times faster than what the current infrastructure allows, noting that its most recent 5G New Radio test reached 2Gbps peak download speeds through an experimental FWA device.

5G FWA is essentially a broadband alternative that would replace traditional wired modems with fully wireless ones, effectively allowing for all-in-one routers that dont just create Wi-Fi networks between local devices but also connect them to the Internet as directly as smartphones communicate with the World Wide Web. As such, the technology isnt a true mobile service since its still limited to a physical location with required equipment but many telecom companies are describing it as the first step toward fully wireless 5G. Optus is one of them, claiming its 5G FWA service will provide its customers with palpable effects of the wireless revolution that the industry has been touting for years now. The firm called the upcoming launch of the network a historical [sic] milestone and one that will eventually lead to entirely mobile 5G. The fixed wireless service set to be deployed in early 2019 will likely utilize both millimeter-wave and C-band spectrum, as suggested by the companys recent trials. Optus already started rolling out certain 4.5G technologies over the course of 2017 and is expected to continue doing so going forward, propelled by the fact that the 3GPP recently finalized its first comprehensive 5G NR standard  Release 15 in Lisbon, Portugal.

5G FWA hasnt been actively pursued by all wireless carriers in the United States, though Verizon is seeking to deploy one such solution in partnership with Samsung in the second half of the year. All four national carriers in the U.S. are planning to commence mobile 5G rollouts next year and should offer nationwide coverage by 2020.Googles new Home Max smart speaker appeared briefly on the companys search homepage and in the new tab page in Chrome yesterday, February 2, in an advertisement. That may not seem surprising on the surface since Google is, after all, an advertising company first and foremost. However, it is actually a bit unusual for the search giant to openly advertise its own products, or any products at all, on its homepage  let alone on the page which opens when a user selects a new tab in the Chrome browser. Rather than deliberately trying to direct consumers to itself from the outset, the company ordinarily leaves it to the consumer to discover its products via a search query related to its products or in advertisements provided by those searches. The advertisement only appeared for around a day but is no longer seen on the site, as of this writing.

The advertising itself was not exactly subtle but also didnt appear to be too forced. Inserted below the usual branding, search box, and subsequent buttons, it was comprised of just a few words  which read Meet Google Home Max. Now in stock. The products name in that message consisted of a link which redirected to the official Google Store listing for Google Home Max. This is not the first time the company has chosen to use the popularity of its search engine to get the word out about a new product. So it isnt necessarily the appearance of the advertisement itself that is noteworthy. Instead, whats interesting is that the advertisement only appeared for a very short period of time and theres no immediately discernable reason the search giant chose to put the advertisement up, to begin with. It has been speculated that the ad is in response to the launch of Apples Home competitor  namely, the Home Pod. That may have something to do with it since Google Home Max actually launched back in December. With that said, and with consideration for how short the timeframe for Googles ad was, that may not be the best or only explanation. Unfortunately, theres no way to know for sure.

Whatever the case, it certainly makes sense that Google would want to advertise its newest Assistant-enabled speaker as much as possible. It may not be the most affordable of such speakers. It is undoubtedly among the best available, despite some flaws, at offering premium, high-volume sound and engineered to adapt to its surroundings.If new reports out of China are anything to go by, previous rumors about a Nokia 8 Sirocco speculated to launch at MWC 2018 may have greatly underestimated the handset. Of course, it bears mention that this is still a rumor and that there may not even be a Nokia 8 Sirocco revealed at the Barcelona tech gathering. However, if it turns out to be accurate, Nokias new smartphone would be quite a bit more powerful than previously expected. Prior to these new reports, the new HMD-made, Nokia-branded flagship may arrive touting Qualcomms Snapdragon 845 SoC. Whats more, it has now been suggested by unnamed sources that the device will feature a full 6GB of RAM on board to back up that chipset.

Unfortunately, theres no information thats been put forward with regard to how much storage the device will ship with but the rumors dont stop there. Beyond featuring the latest top-of-the-line SoC, the reports suggest that the Nokia 8 Sirocco will be ruggedized to IP67 standards for waterproofing and dust-proofing. It is also said to feature a Zeiss certified 12-megapixel and 13-megapixel dual camera arrangement on the back, as well as a front-facing 5-megapixel selfie camera.The hardware itself, the reports claim, will be driven by a reasonably-sized 3250mAh battery to be charged via USB Type-C or wirelessly. Moreover, this will definitely be a flagship, if rumors hold true, with a price point set at right around the $800 mark. For comparison, the Nokia 8 Sirocco had previously been reported to bring that same level of RAM, but to only feature last years flagship SoC, the Snapdragon 835. That seemed a bit unusual for a device that is supposed to go above and beyond the original Nokia 8, so it may just be that the rumors thus far are only partially correct. Aside from the SoC and RAM, those rumors had hinted at a 5.5-inch OLED display and 128GB of onboard storage.

Of course, it goes without saying that the rumors could ultimately not pan out or that a combination of key aspects of the leaks so far would be more accurate. With that said, it is known that Finland-based HMDs goal is to announce at least a few surprises at the event and that those most likely wont be anything to do with its other technology-based products. Aside from the new rumor, the company is expected to unveil the Nokia 7 Plus, Nokia 1, and an engraved E71. None of those has been confirmed yet either, in the meantime. Thankfully, MWC 2018 is not too far away  running from February 26 to March 1  so it may not be much longer before the world is in on the companys secret projects.LG Electronics did not agree to a class-action settlement over widespread bootlooping issues with some of its smartphones earlier this month, according to law firm Girard Gibbs LLP which filed for litigation against the company last year. While the matter has ultimately been resolved as originally reported, the attorneys representing the plaintiffs issued a comment to clarify the case never received class-action status, so the settlement itself isnt class-action in nature, i.e. it cannot benefit the vast majority of the millions of people who purchased one of the Android devices that were the subject of the lawsuit. Instead, only several hundreds of consumers who participated in the litigation targeting the bootlooping issues of the LG G4, G5, V10, V20, and the Nexus 5X are legally entitled to the $700 rebate toward the purchase of a new LG phone or $425 in damages.

Girard Gibbs also revealed that LG agreed to extend the warranty of the affected devices to 30 months from their date of purchase, using that as the basis for the rebate and compensation it offered. Those who havent participated in the lawsuit but have a bootlooping device from the company thats been targeted by the litigation are recommended to contact LG directly and see if theyre able to be compensated by the firms customer service department or receive a replacement unit in light of recent developments but must be aware the company isnt legally compelled to comply with their requests. If that fails, Girard Gibbs says new complainants are welcomed to contact it, indicating that an identical lawsuit with another roster of plaintiffs may be in the works.

The law firm filed to have the litigation classified as being class-action in nature on request of a Los Angeles-based federal court, though the move itself only allowed it to continue pursuing individual arbitrations against the South Korean tech giant on behalf of its clients. While its class-action request wasnt approved, its existence is likely what led to numerous media outlets reporting the settlement as such, prompting people who havent participated in bringing the case to court to think that theyre still able to join the settlement as they would be if it was defined as a class-action one. LG has been accused of delivering a number of devices with high bootlooping rates in recent times but none of its 2017 offerings exhibited similar problems. The term bootloop refers to an unusable smartphone state that has the device being stuck on its operating system boot screen, being unable to load up the OS  Android, in LGs case  thats powering it.The Galaxy S9 may be approximately $140 costlier in certain European markets, TechRadar reports, citing a source from the smartphone industry in the United Kingdom. British consumers can expect the smaller Galaxy S9 to start at 789 ($1,114), 100 more than the Galaxy S8, according to the insider. No details for the larger Galaxy S9 Plus have been provided, though the handset is likely to be treated to a similar price hike and start at approximately 889 ($1,255). The report is in line with recent rumors about Samsungs upcoming flagship duo being its most expensive one to date, with the South Korean original equipment manufacturer reportedly planning price increases on a global level. Based on the previously leaked information and the newly provided one, the 5.8-inch Galaxy S9 may start at around $850 in the United States, whereas the 6.2-inch Galaxy S9 Plus could surpass the $1,000 mark.

Its presently unclear whether Samsung will attempt to justify the price increase if one ends up happening, especially in the context of the Galaxy S9 thats expected to be extremely similar to its predecessor, with its only two major improvements being a new system-on-chip and a camera with a variable aperture, albeit one that still relies on a 12-megapixel sensor of a comparable pixel size. Its possible that the Seoul-based tech giant is simply testing the market response and is prepared to drop the price of its upcoming Android flagship series if its pre-order period doesnt end up being as successful as the one of the Galaxy S8 lineup. Despite consistent price increases, Samsungs Galaxy S-branded devices remain the most successful Android smartphones in the world, with tens of millions of units being sold on an annual basis.

The larger Galaxy S9 Plus is said to be more worthy of a higher price tag, with its base model being rumored to start at 6GB of RAM and 128GB of internal flash memory, in addition to featuring a dual-camera setup using the same variable-aperture lens found on the Galaxy S9 but also an extra 12-megapixel sensor mounted behind fixed-aperture glass. The two Android 8.0 Oreo-powered smartphones are scheduled to be officially announced on February 25 and should begin retailing in mid-March.Tesla negotiated a deal to begin selling some of its products at Home Depot retail stores this week. No, the American hardware and home DIY chain will not be selling vehicles. Known primarily for its luxury design electric cars, Tesla, Inc. also builds other environmentally savvy gadgets. The Palo Alto tech company also designs and manufactures solar panels for homeowners and businesses to purchase. Home Depot offers a variety of retail goods to consumers for yard and home improvement, so marketing quality solar panels makes sense. Home Depots decision to begin selling Tesla products indicates that the retailer intends to remain relevant with technological advances. Reportedly, Lowes representatives are in talks with Tesla about selling similar products as well.

Solar panels are not the only products to be featured at Home Depot locations. The electric car company will also be displaying and selling its new Powerwall home batteries. The Powerwall batteries are one of only a handful of products available on Teslas website. Designed primarily to run as an electric generator if a house loses power, the Powerwall batteries can be charged via solar panels. If a housing unit loses power, much like a gas generator, the Powerwall system kicks in and can provide up to seven days of power from a single unit. Teslas solar panels, too, use the same uniform design that makes its other commodities enticing: simple, effective, and new. The solar panels are flat, relatively hidden from view when installed on a rooftop, and do not require moving parts. Also soon to be available by Tesla are its new solar roof pieces, which look surprisingly like standard shingles. These products are slightly transparent to allow light to beam through them to permit an underneath receiving solar panel to soak up sun rays. Converting electricity to battery power helps keep users homes active and safe to essential services in the event of an outage.

The Elon Musk-founded Tesla, Inc. is expected to begin rolling out the new products for real life presentations. Tesla resolved to staff each retail location with its own employees who are experienced in relevant demonstrations for interested customers. In doing so, Tesla will ensure its products are adequately and accurately pitched to consumers. Eight hundred locations will reportedly be staffed with the product experts, though products by Tesla are not cheap to purchase: a typical home could cost an average of $50,000 to purchase an adequate system.Due diligence in M&A deals will be supported by an artificial intelligence solution at Bird & Bird following a successful two-office trial.The firm will use the Luminance solution to accelerate and enhance contract review, learning from the law firms experience as its used. Trials were recently completed at the firms London and Stockholm offices.We identified a clear opportunity within the firm to reduce the time and resources spent on manual document review in due diligence, explained Marten Willamo, partner and Nordic Head of Corporate at Bird & Bird.Luminances ability to expose potential issues and anomalies within documentation  as well as easily adapt to new projects and languages  will help us get to the vital work of analysis, much faster, added Willamo.Luminance received financial backing from Slaughter & May in a funding round last year and its customer base includes Australias Gilbert + Tobin, New Zealands Chapman Tripp, and Singapores WongPartnership.With increasing numbers of elite global firms like Bird & Bird signing up to use Luminance, its becoming clear that artificial intelligence is no longer a choice  its simply the way large-scale contract review is now done, said Emily Foges, CEO of Luminance.Adam Foreman has joined Corrs Chambers Westgarth in Sydney as a partner in the corporate practice.He joins the firm from Clayton Utz, where he has been for 11 years since graduating at the University of Sydney ; including 8 years as a senior associate and 8 months as special counsel.Foreman has a long track record of working on transactions in the financial services sector and has also worked with several companies in the media sector.He also has experience in insolvency and restructuring matters which will enable him to provide additional support to the team of 5 partners who joined Corrs recently from Henry Davis York The expansion of Lawyers on Demand has continued this year with the addition of a German office.Its the firms 10th office following openings in Dubai last year and is the firms first location in mainland Europe. It means LOD now has offices in Asia Pacific, the US, Middle East and Europe including 4 in Australia.The firm recently celebrated the 10th anniversary of its London-based business which included its merger with Asia Pacifics AdventBalance, itself a tie-up between Sinagpores Advent and Australias Balance Legal.Although LODs office is new for Germany, it already has several German companies using its services around the world.The Silverado in question is the 3500HD configured with double rear wheels and Duramax engine, and the competition comes in the form of the Ford Super Duty. Thats how General Motors describes the Blue Ovals truck in this drag race, omitting valuable information such as the drivetrain configuration.All things considered, the F-Series Super Duty could be specified with 2X4 and the 6.2-liter flex-fuel engine with two valves per cylinder, not the Power Stroke turbo diesel that fits the heavy-duty pickup much better. Even if General Motors did the drag race with similarly-specced trucks, Ford loyalists will find it hard to grasp the Silverado HD finished first.As a brief refresher, the 6.7-liter Power Stroke V8 delivers 450 horsepower and 935 pound-feet of torque on full song. Ford claims it is best-in-class. Which is correct bearing in mind the L5P Duramax V8 has less ponies (445 horsepower) and torque (910 pound-feet).The truth of the matter is, the third-generation Silverado is not as advanced as the thirteenth-generation F-Series with the 2018 facelift. Another area where the Ford Motor Company has the upper hand is construction, with emphasis on the military-grade aluminum alloys the Blue Oval uses to make the F-150 and Super Duty.With the light-duty Silverado all new from the ground up for the 2019 model year, its a matter of time until Chevrolet catches up with Ford in the heavy-duty segment. And just as it is the case right now, the two model lines will be as different as their customers are. On that note, Ram Truck is also putting the finishing touches on the all-new generation of the HD.AWD

4WD

The boxy-shaped people carrier has seating for eight adults, and if it appears that it looks like a van, thats because it is one deep down inside. Bearing in mind the Delica we know entered production in 2007 at the automakers Nagoya plant in Japan, it is about damn time for a redesign.Our carparazzi caught what appears to be a production-ready prototype testing in Northern Europe in the coldest weather imaginable, and from the looks of it, not much has changed in terms of utility. The most obvious difference over the previous Delica is the front end, which screams Xpander through every pore. Not bad for a multi-purpose vehicle, right?An alternative to larger SUVs and crossovers, the 2019 Mitsubishi Delica will be offered as standard with S-(Super All Wheel Control), the automakers full-time four-wheel-drive system. Front-wheel-drive wont be available at all as per our sources, which is interesting, to say the least.A newly-developed 2.2-liter turbo diesel is expected to be offered, with 170 horsepower at its disposal and torque in the ballpark of 400 Nm. Transmission choices remain a mystery at this point, though the most likely contender is a torque-converter auto with six forward speeds.Being part of the Renault-Nissan alliance since 2016, Mitsubishi Motors looks forward to a future based on in-group synergies. Five all-new models are confirmed to launch by 2020 as part of the Drive for Growth business plan , in addition to six facelifts for current-generation models.Sport utility,, and plug-in hybrid vehicles are high on the automakers priorities list, with lots of know-how and technical solutions to come from alliance partners Renault and Nissan. Think the Mirage and Pajero , which are expected to share their platforms, engines, and transmissions with the Renault Clio and Nissan Patrol, respectively.EV

The vehicle presented on Thursday at the NordicSummit in Oslo is based on the TX six-seater, which entered operation in London last week. For Norway, some adaptations had to be made, as the cabbies in the country are used to driving on the correct side of the road (left, of course).The electric taxi uses a battery electric powertrain coupled with a small petrol generator to help the car not run out of power in the middle of a fare. LVEC says that its vehicle is good for 640 km (400 miles), only 128km (80 miles) of them in all-electric mode.To ensure significant fuel savings for drivers, a key part of encouraging them to make the transition to a range-extended electric vehicle, LEVC has combined our eCity technology with a lightweight aluminum-bonded structure. This extends vehicle range and significantly reduces fuel costs for drivers and operators, says LVEC.When out of juice, the cab can be charged to full capacity within 20 minutes on a rapid charger, two hours with a fast charger and a lengthy ten hours on a trickle charger.LVEC was until recently known as The London Taxi Corporation. It is owned, just like Volvo, by Chinese group Geely, which was the main driving force behind the producer turning electric. Back in 2016, word was the Chinese were planning to produce 36,000 vehicles each year and send them on the streets as taxis. Electric ones, obviously.Currently, NASA is working on other projects, whose results we probably won't live to see: it plans more robots for Mars, it's working on the James Webb Space Telescope, will try and touch the Sun with the Parker Solar Probe and, a time long from now, will send humans out into the Solar System.While NASA dreams, back at home, on planet Earth, Russia, China and a handful of companies have taken the lead. They are servicing the International Space Station (ISS), they are sending America's and other countries' satellites into space, and some are even planning to land on the Moon.Being a private company, SpaceX (Space Exploration Technologies Corporation, as it officially named) has not had access to the vast resources of entire countries, like China. It's advancements in developing a fully reusable launch rocket have been astonishing.In 2008, the so-called Falcon 1 became the first privately funded liquid-propellant rocket to reach orbit. In 2010 the Dragon was the first privately funded spacecraft to be launched, to orbit the planet and to be recovered. SpaceX was the first private company to supply the ISS in 2012, and there have been nine other missions to the space station flown by SpaceX since. It was the first to manage to land an orbital rocket in 2009, the Falcon 9, and it has now been tasked by NASA to develop a human-rated Dragon shuttle for future ISS astronauts.And now this. The Falcon Heavy, the most powerful operational rocket in the world by a factor of two. To be launched for the first time on February 6th, its destination is planet Mars.Falcon Heavy is a reusable launch system. One that utilizes the three Falcon 9 nine-engine cores with 27 Merlin engines, capable of generating more than 5 million pounds of thrust at liftoff. As SpaceX says, that's roughly the equivalent of eighteen 747 aircraft starting their engines at the same time.All those engine cores are called Stage 1. The side cores, (NASA calls them boosters) are connected at the base and the top of the center cores liquid oxygen tank. After liftoff, those boosters will separate.The second stage comprises a Falcon 9-sourced Merlin engine that will be used to deliver payloads into a variety of orbits including low Earth, geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO) and geosynchronous orbit (GSO), after the main engines cut off and the first-stage cores separate.SpaceX is working on technologies which will help them recover all parts of the rocket. The Falcon 9, on which the Heavy is based, proved its worth in both land and sea landings.This, in turn, might significantly lower the price-per-launch of space missions. Since 2013, launch prices are below $2,200/kg thanks to the efforts made by SpaceX, among others.Falcon Heavy was designed from the start to carry humans into space and hurdle them towards the ultimate goals of near-term space-exploration: the return to the Moon and the first human landing on Mars. Both are goals set by state-run space agencies as well, so why should private attempts be looked at differently?First off, being private means that you are, at least in theory, safe from political meddling, changes of heart in the country's leadership and so on. Secondly, you can dedicate all your resources to the task at hand, leaving no opportunity buried. After all, a private company wants to make money, so undertaking a space-oriented work is not a whim of the moment.Elon Musk's exuberance when it comes to his space goals is unparalleled. Aside from the Falcon project, he also has some other tricks up his sleeve: he already presented his Moon base and Martian city projects.What sets Musk apart from other dreamers is that he usually puts his money where his mouth is. As a CEO, he may not be the best there is. But as a dreamer, and a doer, it's a significant possibility that future generations to remember him as the one that managed to take humanity to the stars.Just imagine how the world will be like if Musk's rockets manage to land on Mars.The U.S. Air Force has narrowed the field in the competition for its new light attack aircraft to just two, the AT-6 Wolverine and A-29 Super Tucano, eliminating the Textron Scorpion and L-3 Longsword, a militarized Air Tractor 802 aerial application aircraft. Its also canceled plans to test the aircraft in combat. Rather than do a combat demonstration, we have decided to work closely with industry to experiment with maintenance, data networking and sensors with the two most promising light attack aircraft  the AT-6 Wolverine and the A-29 Super Tucano, Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson said. This will let us gather the data needed for a rapid procurement.

The Air Force hopes the winner of the competition will be able to help out in close support roles in anti-terrorism and counter-insurgent roles now undertaken by much more expensive platforms like the A-10 and F-16. The new aircraft will also make it easier to cooperate with allies in the fight against terrorism because many of the countries on the front lines cant afford the jets the U.S. flies.Boeing is reportedly considering creating a new company with Embraer to produce small airliners. The proposed deal would exclude Embraers defense business, which Brazil considers an essential element of its national sovereignty. Its not clear if Embraers business aircraft business would be part of the deal with Boeing. Embraer confirmed the talks in a securities filing and it also said there had been no formal proposal from Boeing. News of a proposed arrangement between Boeing and Embraer emerged shortly after Airbus and Bombardier announced their partnership on the CSeries airliner.

The dynamics of the Airbus/Bombardier deal changed when Bombardier unexpectedly won its International Trade Commission case against punishing tariffs imposed by the U.S. Commerce Department. The CSeries partnership was seen as a way to circumvent the tariffs by building CSeries for the U.S. market at Airbuss Mobile, Alabama, plant. Boeings overtures to Embraer are now seen as a means of rejoining the bottom end of the airliner market, which Embraer currently dominates.By Trend:

The US co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group for the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict's resolution, Andrew Schofer, arrived in Baku for the talks with the country's authorities that are scheduled for the next week, a diplomatic source told Trend.

The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group Igor Popov (Russia) and Stefan Visconti (France) will visit Baku on Feb. 6. The diplomats will meet with Azerbaijani officials on Feb. 7.

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.

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President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has congratulated President of Sri Lanka Maithripala Sirisena.

"On behalf of the people of Azerbaijan and on my own behalf, I extend my cordial congratulations to you and the people of your country on the occasion of the national holiday of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka - Independence Day," President Aliyev said in his congratulatory letter.

"On this remarkable day, I wish you the best of health, success in your activities, and the friendly people of Sri Lanka peace and prosperity," added the head of state.

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Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron discussed Turkeys ongoing Operation Olive Branch in Syrias northwestern region of Afrin over the phone, Turkish media reported.

Erdogan and Macron also exchanged views on bilateral relations and on the outcome of the Syrian National Dialogue Congress held in the Russian coastal city of Sochi this past week.

Erdogan shared information about Operation Olive Branch and informed Macron about the cross-border rocket attacks perpetrated by the terrorist PYD/PKK oraganization on Turkey's bordering Hatay and Kilis provinces.

During the conversation, Erdogan said Turkey does not have any design on any countrys territory and added the operation was aimed at clearing PYD/PKK, YPG and Daesh terrorists from Afrin.

The leaders agreed to keep close contact oreagarding regional issues, particularly on the political process in Syria.

On Jan. 20, the Turkish Armed Forces, together with the Free Syrian Army, launched the Operation Olive Branch in Afrin, Syria.

F-16 fighters of the Turkish Air Force are involved in the operation, inflicting strikes on the positions of PYD/YPG on the Syrian-Turkish border.By Trend:

The wholesale prices of various types of domestically produced rice have dropped by at least 10 percent in the country.

Aliakbar Mehrfard, an Iranian deputy minister of agriculture, has said the prices of domestic rice have dropped between 10 and 18 percent compared to the same time of last year, ISNA news agency reported.

Saying that a further fall in the prices would implicit damage on the farmers, he added that the ministry in order to provide support for the domestic farmers has decided to purchase the product.

Iranian farmers provide about two third of the countrys required rice and about 30 percent of the product is imported.

The decline in the prices has appeared in a situation that the production costs have jumped by ten percent, the official said.

Iran imported about one million tons of rice over the first half of the current fiscal year (starting March 20).

While various types of home-grown rice range in price from 80,000 rials to 150,000 rials, the prices of imported rice stand at about 80,000 rials.

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Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAzNew York City-based Mount Sinai Health System opened Mount Sinai Doctors Palm Beach (Fla.) focused on bringing primary care, cardiology, gastroenterology and ophthalmology services to the area.

Here's what you should know:

1. Gonzalo Loveday, MD, will serve as the practice's medical director. It'll be serviced by nine other physicians.

2. The practice will cater to patients who frequently travel between New York City and Palm Beach.

3. The expansion is part of Mount Sinai's attempt to grow its national healthcare presence.

4. Mount Sinai Health Network President Arthur Klien, MD, said, "The staff and clinical leadership at Mount Sinai Doctors Palm Beach have been carefully chosen from a large pool of national applicants and are dedicated to providing comprehensive, highest-quality care to their patients. We are proud to provide the resources of our nationally and internationally recognized academic health care system to benefit the residents and businesses of Palm Beach County."According to reports, an actress was shot dead by three gunmen after she refused to go with them for a private event in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Reports say, 25-year-old, Sumbul Khan was shot multiple times at her house. The three gunmen have been identified and the police are searching for them.Gerry Adams has backed outstanding Jeremy Corbyn to become prime minister at the next general election.

The Sinn Fein president steps down next weekend after 50 years in politics when a special party conference, or ard fheis, ratifies his successor, Mary Lou McDonald.

The Labour leader has said he wanted the Troubles bombings and shootings to stop, but refused to single out the IRA for condemnation.

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Mr Adams told BBC Ones The Andrew Marr show: I would like to see Jeremy in that position (PM) for the benefit of people in Britain, leaving Ireland out of it.

I think Jeremy is an outstanding politician and I hope my endorsement of him is not used against him in the time ahead.

He and (former London Mayor) Ken Livingstone and others kept faith and they were the people who said, when others said no, talk.

They were the people who were open to conversation about how to deal with conflict and how to get conflict resolution processes.

aHang on! Youare not in the driveras seat for another weeka, says I to Mary Lou. pic.twitter.com/A3A0m7v7C2  Gerry Adams (@GerryAdamsSF) February 1, 2018

Mr Corbyn and shadow chancellor John McDonnell have faced scrutiny over their association with Irish republicans.

Before the IRA ceasefire, they controversially met Sinn Fein a number of times in Westminster during the 1990s.

During a wide-ranging interview, Mr Adams reiterated his position that Northern Ireland should enjoy special status within the EU after Brexit.

He said former prime minister Tony Blair enjoyed an opportunity on a plate in his handling of the Northern Ireland peace process, which produced the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and largely ended decades of violence.

Mr Adams, who represents the border county of Louth in the Irish Dail parliament, said he told Mr Blair not to invade Iraq in 2003.

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We said to him, look at the Irish experience, dont go in there.

He said nobody could stand over the killing of children or civilians during the IRAs campaign, but it was different if it was soldiers versus soldiers.

The outgoing political leader, who for decades defended republican violence but was instrumental in its cessation, reflected on the awfulness and horror of war.

He said: I would wish that no one had been killed or injured in the course of the conflict.

We were able to come to an alternative. When you come forward with an alternative sensible people will embrace that alternative.The DUP slammed the actions of a Sinn Fein MLA who removed a wheel clamp on his car with bolt cutters as "symptomatic of a wider pattern of behaviour."

Gerry Kelly, the party's policing spokesman, was caught on camera as he bent down to lift a set of bolt cutters before removing the clamp after an early morning gym session.

On the driver's window of the car is a large sign which says "Stop" warning of the clamp.

The footage obtained by the Belfast Telegraph was captured on Friday by workmen as they passed through the narrow street just behind the art gallery.

The incident has been reported to the PSNI.

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DUP's Deputy leader Nigel Dodds has asked what action Sinn Fein will take against Mr Kelly.

The North Belfast MP said: "The Gerry Kelly incident is symptomatic of a wider pattern of behaviour by leading Sinn Fein figures.

"They regard themselves as not being bound by the same rules as the rest of the society.

"They preach respect but show little or no respect for people, rules or laws which they disagree with."

Stating that Sinn Fein had failed miserably over the Barry McElduff scandal, Mr Dodds asked: "Will Gerry Adams, Mary Lou McDonald or Michelle O'Neill finally take action when we have their policing spokesperson act like this?

"This is another significant test for the Sinn Fein leadership. Nobody's holding their breath."

Earlier TUV leader Jim Allister called for the north Belfast MLA's resignation.

"He had no right to remove the clamp and must not get away with it," he said.

Ulster Unionist MLA Roy Beggs said Mr Kelly has set an appalling example and should be gone.

Mr Beggs said: "Gerry Kelly's actions demonstrate contempt for private property and a contempt lack of respect for rules that apply to the rest of Northern Ireland.

"What if everyone ignored yellow lines? Does Gerry think that he is special and above the rules that apply to you and me?

"This is a public representative who sits on the Policing Board but seemingly drives around with a set of bolt cutters available to remove unwanted clamps."

The east Antrim MLA added: "It seems that being in possession of a Royal Pardon has made Gerry Kelly believe that he is truly untouchable. He should do the decent thing and resign.

"If this was to happen in any other part of the United Kingdom or indeed the Republic, the relevant politician would be gone. Instead Gerry Kelly is arrogant and shameless."

On Saturday night, a Sinn Fein spokesperson confirmed Mr Kelly removed the car clamp with bolt cutters.

"Gerry Kelly MLA returned to his car after an early morning gym session to find that his car had been made immobile by a clamp just after 7.20 am," a statement said.

"He removed the clamp from the front wheel. He left the device nearby and drove off to pre-arranged meetings.

"His solicitor is dealing with the matter and he will be making no further comment at this time."

A PSNI spokesperson has said: "Police in north Belfast received a report of criminal damage in the Exchange Street area of Belfast at around 2.20pm on Friday February 2.

"It is believed that damage was caused to the wheel-clamp of a car."Sinn Feins leadership faces a significant test after the republican partys policing spokesman apparently removed a clamp from his car, the DUP said.

Police have been notified of alleged criminal damage after Gerry Kelly was filmed appearing to use bolt cutters on the device.

He removed it after finding his vehicle had been immobilised while he was at a gym in Belfast city centre on Friday morning, the party said.

Gerry Kelly sets an appalling example and should be gone - Beggs



Ulster Unionist MLA, Roy Beggs, has condemned... https://t.co/JJZD9Y1MlO  N&W BELFAST UUP (@NWBUUP) February 4, 2018

The private parking firm that controls the area outside the Metropolitan Arts Centre (MAC) near St Annes Cathedral reported the matter to police.

DUP deputy leader Nigel Dodds said he was not holding his breath waiting for action from Sinn Feins leadership.

They preach respect but show little or no respect for people, rules or laws which they disagree with.

They preach equality but, to them, some are more equal than others.

It is the latest row to hit Sinn Fein after its West Tyrone MP Barry McElduff resigned under pressure after posting a tweet with a loaf of Kingsmill bread on his head on the anniversary of the republican Kingsmill massacre in 1976.

Mr Dodds added: This is another significant test for the Sinn Fein leadership.

A Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) statement said police in north Belfast received a report of criminal damage in the Exchange Street area of Belfast at around 2.20pm on Friday.

It is believed that damage was caused to the wheel-clamp of a car.

Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) leader Jim Allister called for the Northern Ireland Assembly member to resign and the police to take action.

It must be demonstrated he is not above the law, he said.

A spokesman for parking firm PEA told the Belfast Telegraph: PEA is aware of this incident and has reported the matter to the PSNI (Police Service Northern Ireland) as we do in all such cases.

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Social media footage appears to show Mr Kelly kneeling down to remove the orange device from the vehicles right-hand wheel, before resting it against a nearby wall.

A pair of bolt cutters appear to be lying beside the wheel.

A Sinn Fein spokesman said: Yesterday, Friday 2 February, Gerry Kelly MLA returned to his car after an early morning gym session to find that his car had been made immobile by a clamp just after 7.20am.

He removed the clamp from the front wheel. He left the device nearby and drove off to pre-arranged meetings.

His solicitor is dealing with the matter and he will be making no further comment at this time.International Trade Secretary Liam Fox has exposed fresh tensions at the top of the Government over Brexit after insisting Britain could not be involved in any customs union with the EU.

Speaking in Shanghai on the final day of Theresa Mays trade mission to China, Dr Fox said remaining in a customs union with the EU after Brexit would prevent Britain pursuing other trading opportunities around the world.

In contrast, the Prime Minister appeared to leave the door open to some form of customs agreement with the remaining EU27  although she stressed that she wanted to strike free trade deals with other countries too.

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In an interview with Sky News Mrs May was asked whether the 9 billion-worth of deals struck during her three-day trip showed it was possible to increase trade with countries like China without a free trade agreement and that the UK could therefore remain very closely aligned with the EU, and a customs union too.

She replied: What I want to do is ensure that we have got the best possible trade arrangements with China and with other countries around the world once we have left the European Union.

I do want to do those free trade agreements. There is more trade that we can do even before we get to those free trade agreements.

A Downing Street spokesman later confirmed the Prime Minister had an open mind when it comes to these negotiations.

However, in an interview with Bloomberg TV, Dr Fox said one of the reasons for Britain leaving was that it would no longer be bound by EU external tariffs when it came to negotiating trade deals with other countries.

It is very difficult to see how being in a customs union is compatible with having an independent trade policy because we would therefore be dependent on what the EU negotiated in terms of its trading policies and wed be following behind that, he said.

We have to be outside of that to take advantage of those growing markets. One of the reasons we are leaving the European Union is to take control and thats not possible with a common external tariff.

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Downing Street has rejected a report in the Financial Times that ministers are privately considering a customs union arrangement for post-Brexit trade in goods in order to avoid disruption to exports  something which Brexiteers believe would hamstring efforts to strike free trade agreements with global giants such as the US and China.

Speaking in Shanghai, Mrs May suggested it would not be necessary to choose between the two, telling the BBC: I dont believe that those are the alternatives.

What the British people voted for is for us to take back control of our money, our borders and our laws and thats exactly what we are going to do.

We also want to ensure that we can trade across borders.

The Prime Minister was welcomed to the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing for a tea ceremony with President Xi #PMinChina pic.twitter.com/8v6SuRv2HD  UK Prime Minister (@10DowningStreet) February 1, 2018

Mrs May has repeatedly said that Brexit will mean leaving the existing EU single market and customs union arrangements. The customs union currently frees members from tariffs when trading with one another but requires them to observe a common external tariff regime and not to strike deals with third countries.

The Prime Minister said her goal in upcoming talks on the future relationship with Europe was an arrangement for trading with the EU which is going to be good for trade between the UK and EU and good for jobs in Britain.

She told the BBC: It means a free trade agreement with the EU. We are now starting to negotiate that free trade agreement with the EU.

We want that to enable trade to take place on as frictionless and tariff free a basis as possible across our borders, but we also want to be signing trade deals in the rest of the world, like here in China.The Queen on her way to church on Sunday (Joe Giddens/PA)

The Queen and Theresa May both attended church services on Sunday morning.

The Duke of Edinburgh accompanied the Queen to St Peter and Paul Church in West Newton, Norfolk, while the Prime Minister was joined by her husband Philip.

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Well wishers turned out to greet the Queen and Philip.

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But Theresa May had fun with an enthusiastic dog as she left a service near her constituency.

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The Prime Minister didnt seem too phased by rumours of a plot to oust her in a Brexiteer coup as she played fetch with a black and white border collie named Blitz.

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A Defence Ministry statement said Chinas nuclear arsenal is the minimum level required for security. It pledged never to be the first to use nuclear weapons under any circumstances.

The sweeping US nuclear strategy review issued on Friday said Washington wants to prevent Beijing from mistakenly concluding that any use of nuclear weapons, however limited, is acceptable.

The Chinese side expresses firm opposition to the report, said a ministry spokesman, Ren Guoqiang.

We hope the US will abandon a Cold War mentality and earnestly shoulder its special and prior responsibility for its own nuclear disarmament, said Mr Ren.

The ruling Communist Partys military wing, the Peoples Liberation Army, has the worlds fifth-largest nuclear arsenal, with 300 warheads, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. The United States and Russia each have about 7,000 warheads, or about 20 times as many as Beijing.

Beijing has rattled Japan, South Korea and Southeast Asian governments with increasingly assertive gestures and belligerent comments aimed at enforcing its claims to disputed islands and swathes of ocean.

In December, China sent bombers and fighter planes to fly around Taiwan, the self-ruled island the communist mainland claims as its territory. The warplanes flew near South Korean and Japanese air space, prompting Japan to dispatch fighter jets to intercept them.

The Defence Ministry statement said global peace and development are irreversible trends and called on Washington to work with Beijing to jointly safeguard peace, stability and prosperity in this region and the world.

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President Donald Trumps nuclear doctrine breaks with his predecessor, Barack Obama, by ending a push to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in US military policy.

In a written statement, Mr Trump on Friday said US strategy is designed to make use of nuclear weapons less likely. But arms control group criticised it as reckless.

Fridays report endorsed adhering to US arms control agreements, including the New START treaty that limits the United States and Russia each to 1,550 strategic nuclear warheads on a maximum of 700 deployed launchers.

The US government said it has been in compliance since August and expects Moscow to comply by the deadline, which is Monday.Chancellor Angela Merkels conservatives and the centre-left Social Democrats have embarked on a final push for an agreement on a new German government, though negotiators appeared likely to need one more day.

The effort to put together a governing coalition is already post-Second World War Germanys longest and will not finish with these talks.

A deal will require approval in a ballot of the Social Democrats members, many of whom are sceptical about renewing the alliance that has governed Germany since 2013 after a disastrous election result in September.

Mrs Merkels Christian Democratic Union, its Bavaria-only sister, the Christian Social Union, and the Social Democrats set Sunday as a deadline to wrap up negotiations, though they have budgeted two extra days as a precaution.

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The three parties have agreed and come closer on many points in recent days, but there are still issues to discuss  particularly on questions of social policy, Social Democrat leader Martin Schulz told reporters as he arrived at the talks.

Those include labour and health policy questions that are a priority for his party.

I am still interested in making quick progress, but we want to give Germany a stable government, and a stable government involves a durable coalition deal that is agreeable to all, he said. So, in the end, we must take the time that we need to create such a stable foundation.

Mrs Merkel said important points had to be cleared up. We know what task we have and are trying to do justice to it, she said.

News agency dpa reported later on Sunday, citing unidentified participants, that the negotiations would have to continue on Monday.

Senior Social Democrat lawmaker Hubertus Heil told ARD television that a few central sticking points remain. If we cant do it tonight, we will continue tomorrow, because the problems have to be solved, he said.

Mrs Merkels attempt to put together a government with two smaller parties collapsed in November.

Mr Schulz, who had previously ruled out renewing the grand coalition of Germanys biggest parties, then reversed course but still faces resistance from parts of his party.

Failure to reach an agreement, or a deals rejection by Social Democrat members, would leave a minority government under Mrs Merkel or a new election as the only viable governing options.A screenshot from the video Come out of Your Corner shows Pastor Steven Furtick and radio personality Charlamagne Tha God talking inside a Berkeley Middle School classroom.A company in Cork is looking for new recruits and is offering perks with a difference.

Eventbrite in Cork is looking to hire staff, with food, travel and wellbeing bonuses up for grabs.Detectives are investigating a report of an aggravated burglary at a house in the Arbour Street area of Belfast yesterday afternoon.

Three men forced their way into the house, shortly after 2pm, armed with knives and a crowbar.Outgoing Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams has given a wide ranging interview to the BBC's Andrew Marr.

The interview, filmed in Dundalk, was shown this morning.

In the wide ranging interview Mr Adams described Brexit as a disaster and disastrous for the island of Ireland.

Brexit is disastrous for the people of Ireland  President of Sinn Fein @GerryAdamsSF tells #marr pic.twitter.com/ARsrR30dEJ  The Andrew Marr Show (@MarrShow) February 4, 2018

Mr Adams went on to say the British government was "not at all clear" about what it wanted its future relationship with the European Union to be.

"They are arguing that theyre going to leave the Customs Union and they going to leave the Single Market and that will end up a complete disaster for people here on the island of Ireland".

Mr Adams reiterated his hopes for a special designated status for the North within the EU, and said he believed it was "doable".

Mr Adams also said he still believes a deal would be reached in the political talks in Northern Ireland aimed at restoring devolution in the North.

The Sinn Fein president steps down next weekend after 50 years in politics when a special party Ard Fheis which will ratify his successor, Mary Lou McDonald.

In the wide ranging interview the outgoing Sinn Fein President also explained why he never joined the IRA and said he "had never distanced himself from the IRA"

Why did you not join the IRA? @AndrewMarr9 asks @GerryAdamsSF #marr



"I've never distanced myself from the IRA" pic.twitter.com/rnQSlgVmno  The Andrew Marr Show (@MarrShow) February 4, 2018

Mr Adams also reflected on the "awfulness and horror of war".

He said: "I would wish that no one had been killed or injured in the course of the conflict.

"We were able to come to an alternative. When you come forward with an alternative sensible people will embrace that alternative."

The long time Sinn Fein activist went on to say he would like to see Jeremy Corbyn as British Prime Minister for the sake of British people before suggesting he hoped any endorsement from him had not ruined his chances.

"I would like to see Jeremy in that position (PM) for the benefit of people in Britain, leaving Ireland out of it.

"I think Jeremy is an outstanding politician and I hope my endorsement of him is not used against him in the time ahead.

He and (former London Mayor) Ken Livingstone and others kept faith and they were the people who said, when others said no, talk.

"They were the people who were open to conversation about how to deal with conflict and how to get conflict resolution processes."

Watch the full interview below.The disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Wenstein says he's considering legal action against the latest claims facing him.

Actress Uma Thurmann says he assaulted her in a London hotel room 25 years ago.

Mr Weinstein says he is "stunned and saddened" by the allegation and denies any wrongdoing.

Yesterday Kill Bill star Uma Thurman alleged Weinstein assaulted her.

The US actress, 47, claimed the disgraced film producer assaulted her following the release of Weinstein-funded Pulp Fiction in a London hotel room, and also recalled a second incident in which it is alleged he threatened to derail her career.

She told the New York Times Weinstein tried to push her down and shove himself on top of her and attempted to expose himself.

Weinstein (PA)

I was doing anything I could to get the train back on the track. My track. Not his track.

Thurman said she told Kill Bill and Pulp Fiction director, and close friend of Weinstein, Quentin Tarantino about the alleged incident and the film maker confronted Weinstein at the Cannes Film Festival in 2001.

Hours later The Miramax co-founder apologised to Thurman, she said.

I just walked away stunned, like ok, well theres my half-assed apology, Thurman says.

Following the first alleged assault, she said Weinstein sent her flowers, with a note telling her she had great instincts.

It followed a previous meeting in a Paris hotel room where he stripped to his bathrobe during a discussion about a script, while a later incident left Thurman shaken after he allegedly threatened her career  according to friend and make-up artist Ilona Harman who had met her after the meeting.

The revelations come after she previously suggested on social media she had a Weinstein story to tell in the wake of dozens of allegations against the movie mogul, including from some of Hollywoods biggest stars

The New York Times article includes comments from Weinstein through a spokesman admitting he had propositioned Thurman but denied threatening her career.

Mr. Weinstein acknowledges making a pass at Ms. Thurman in England after misreading her signals in Paris, the spokesman said in a statement to the Times.

He immediately apologised.

Thurman also accuses Tarantino of nearly killing her in the article, as she opened up about an incident from the set of Kill Bill in which she crashed a car during filming.

She had objected to getting in the deathbox car, she said, but Tarantino insisted.

When I came back from the hospital in a neck brace with my knees damaged and a large massive egg on my head and a concussion, I wanted to see the car and I was very upset.

Quentin and I had an enormous fight, and I accused him of trying to kill me. And he was very angry at that, I guess understandably, because he didnt feel he had tried to kill me.

Harvey assaulted me but that didnt kill me, she added.

On Friday Bafta officially terminated Weinstein over a slew of allegations against him. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which votes for the Oscars, also voted to strip Weinstein of his lifetime membership.

Police in the UK are investigating a number of sexual assault allegations against the former Hollywood heavyweight.

Bafta will hold its annual film awards on February 18 where stars are expected to wear black in honour of the Times Up movement for gender equality and in solidarity with the victims of sexual harassment and assault.

Weinstein and Tarantino have been contacted for comment.

- Press Association and Digital DeskA crash between an Amtrak passenger train and a CSX freight train in South Carolina has left at least two people dead and about 70 people injured.'Sex and the City' actress Kim Cattrall has made pleas on social media, after her bother went missing.

Christopher Cattrall was last seen at his Canadian home on January 30th.The plain fact that neither side has enough committed supporters to guarantee it election means victory goes to the party that attracts more of the uncommitted voters in the middle.

But that's truer of the way they behave than of the policies they espouse on some key issues.

Though the two sides like to paint every election as a clear choice between good (us) and evil (them), many voters have concluded all politicians are the same  liars and cheats.

Even if we don't end up having a federal election this year, rest assured, it will feel like a year-long campaign. But whenever it occurs, it's likely to determine the fate of neo-liberalism, aka "bizonomics".

This has long been a factor encouraging both sides away from extremes of left or right and towards the more moderate, "sensible centre". They've retained only enough pro-business or pro-worker positions to keep their voting, donating and polling-booth-staffing "base" motivated, as well as to provide some product differentiation.

The standard approach of recent decades has been for each side to seek to neutralise those issues where the other side is perceived by voters to have the advantage, by saying "me too", while trying to highlight those issues where it has the perceived advantage over its opponents.

Polling released last week by Essential, shows the Liberals' great perceived strengths are national security and terrorism, and management of the economy, whereas Labor's strengths are (in ascending order) education, health, housing affordability, the environment, industrial relations and climate change.

Note that almost all the contentious issues are economic, broadly defined. Voters see little to distinguish the two sides on population growth and asylum seekers. The government's already pushing hard on national security and terrorism, but Labor will run from any argument over these issues, where it starts well behind in voters' estimations.

Of late, however, the parties have departed from the standard script. Realising he lacked the charisma to get away with mimicking Tony Abbott's virtuoso performance of total negativity against the death-wish Rudd-Gillard-Rudd Labor, Bill Shorten thought he had little to lose by abandoning the small-target strategy of most oppositions, and went to the 2016 election with some relatively daring proposals on tax increases, particularly on restricting negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount.He says while Australia escaped a recession in 2008-09, this time it is going to get hit in real estate and exports to China". "Your stocks will go down," Dent tells Fairfax Media ahead of a planned visit to Australia later this month. "Its going to be the sale of a lifetime. Given Dent and his firm make money from encouraging people to invest and grow their wealth, he isnt telling investors to simply save and pay down their debt. Rather, he wants them to take their gains and invest them in safe assets, albeit with lower returns, such as Treasury bonds in the US, and government bonds in Australia. Take your gains and put them in safe place so when this global crash does occur, you can buy real estate at an unbelievable bargain, he says.

His wait-to-buy theory also applies to bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Again, he warns investors to stay away  for now. Im sitting here in Puerto Rico where a lot of cryptocurrencies are moving for tax advantages, he says. Harry Dent now resides in Puerto Rico, which was recently hit by hurricanes. Credit:AP Bitcoin, he says, isnt big enough to chill the economies around the world, but its the pin that could cause the bubble to pop. Dent believes in the future of blockchain technologies that make financial transactions more efficient, but predicts the winners will be the cryptocurrency equivalents of Amazon that survived and grew despite the dot-com bust.

He suggests Ripple may be one that outlives the impending crash. "Ripple is about people in the US, immigrants, transferring money much more cheaply to relatives in Mexico," he says. "That's a real business." But companies just raising money cheaply from unsophisticated investors through ICOs  those that "just throw something on the net and say, 'we have bitcoin offering, buy it'. This is terrible ... it will burst badly". "If you buy these stocks when bitcoin is at $15,000 or $20,000 youre going to get your ass handed to you," he says. Harry Dent: "If you buy these stocks when bitcoin is at $15,000 or $20,000 youre going to get your ass handed to you". Credit:Chris Ratcliffe

When it comes to the future of the world economy, Dent is even more worried. Central banks worldwide have been printing money to offset what should have been a natural correction to over-leveraging, he says. Global debt  total debt incurred by the household, government, financial and non-financial corporate sectors -rose to a record $233 trillion in the third quarter of 2017, more than $16 trillion higher from end-2016, according to an analysis by the Institute of International Finance. The IIF report also noted record highs for private non-financial sector debt in Canada, France, Hong Kong, Korea, Switzerland, and Turkey, and warned that as a result of this huge debt burden central banks may be reluctant to tighten lending. This bubble has gone on longer than you could imagine with artificial stimulus, with quantitative easing and now tax cuts, Dent says. It will probably burst in the first part of 2018.

The world is in an economic bubble: Harry Dent. Credit:Judy Green He is especially worried for America. While US President Donald Trump is putting himself forward as an economic messiah, saying his tax cuts and infrastructure spending will stimulate jobs and growth, Dent says the tax cuts are just free money and any positive impact will be short-lived. Dent's well-known spending wave theory is that consumer spending is dependent on generational trends and that these trends in turn impact the market value of investments and wider economy. He says spending increases as people age and have children. It peaks at 48, and then slows in down as people approach retirement and work less.

Trump's tax cuts and infrastructure spend, therefore, becomes irrelevant Dent says, since decreased spending by the current generation of US baby boomers will still cause a downturn. US President Donald Trump claims his tax cuts and infrastructure spend will help propel the US economy Credit:AP He also says China is so over-leveraged and so over-invested that its economy will crash, worsening Australias downturn due to real estate price falls. The silver lining for Australia  and its one of few countries in the world that have one according to Dent  is that its underlying demographics are sound. Australias population is growing, propelled by calculated immigration, and the nation will continue making goods and services to service a growing market in Asia.There's a hospital in Australia where one in every six patients suffers a complication, but we don't know what hospital it is. Neither do its patients or the doctors who work there.

"A veil of secrecy" hangs over the hospitals and clinicians that have the highest complication rates and which hospitals are the safest, according to a new report by the Grattan Institute.

A new Grattan report urges government's to publish complication rates that identify the best and worst performing hospitals. Credit:Nicolas Walker

Published on Sunday night, the report also argues that the federal government's narrow definition of 'preventable' adverse events ignores the vast majority of complication rates, distorts the data and lulls some hospitals into a damaging sense of complacency.

The findings expose the fractures in Australian hospitals' safety and quality monitoring, and propose ambitious reforms that could cut adverse event rates by more than one-quarter, the authors say  the equivalent of an additional 250,000 patients leaving hospitals complication-free each year.A man has been charged over the violent robbery of a 74-year-old man at a Brisbane shopping centre, with information from the public leading to the arrest, police say.

It will be alleged the victim went into the toilets at Westfield Chermside about 8am on Sunday morning and was attacked from behind by a man, who tried to snatch a wallet from the victim's back pocket.

CCTV vision of the alleged violent robbery of a 74-year-old man at Westfield Chermside on Sunday. Credit:Queensland Police Service

It will further be alleged a struggle ensued, before the elderly man was pushed to the ground and the thief ran off with the wallet. The victim was not physically injured.

Police released CCTV of the alleged incident later that afternoon and early Monday morning arrested a Sunnybank man, off the back of information from members of the public who saw the vision.Brisbane university students are ditching the dingy share house in favour of luxury living, as the oversaturated housing market drives modern apartment prices down.

With more than 8000 inner-city apartments under construction and due for completion in the next two years, student life is becoming substantially more upmarket.

More than 8000 inner-city apartments are under construction and due for completion by 2020. Credit:Michelle Smith

When Benjamin Gowdies lease ended at his share house in Greenslopes, he was decided he would not be moving into another student house but instead a luxury inner-city apartment.

At 22, Mr Gowdie is a uni student working a part-time job in Queensland Health.Mugshots.com Writing Staff. Jefferson Parish, LA - Malcolm Alexander, 58, (center) has been exonerated of the 1979 rape of a Gretna woman after a flawed identification process and incompetent counsel. He was wrongfully convicted in 1980 of aggravated rape and sentenced to life in Louisiana State Penitentiary (Angola). DNA evidence that was thought to be lost long ago was found and excluded him.

On November 8, 1979, the owner of a new antique store on Whitney Avenue in Gretna was raped. The victim was a white woman who was grabbed from behind in the empty store by a black man and taken to a dark private bathroom in the back of the store where she was raped from behind with a gun held to her head. Accordingly, the victim had an extremely limited view of her attacker, who was behind her for the entirety of the crime. The victim never clearly saw her attackers face.

In February 1980, Alexander had a consensual sexual encounter with a white woman who asked him for money. She later accused him of sexual assault. The police took Alexanders mugshot, then subsequently dropped the case since the allegation was unsubstantiated. Shortly afterwards, Alexanders photo was placed in a photo array that was shown to the rape victim more than four months after she was attacked from behind at gunpoint by a complete stranger.

The victim tentatively identified Alexander as her assailant out of hundreds of photos shown to her. Police placed Alexander in a lineup three days after showing her the mugshot. He was the only man in the lineup whose picture had also been in the photo array. This time the antique store owner was sure that he was her attacker.

Research has shown that multiple identification procedures can contaminate a witnesss memory, causing a witness to become confused about whether he or she recognizes the person from the event or the earlier procedure, while also making the witness more confident in his or her identification.

On December 10, 1980, Alexander had a one day trial that ended in his conviction and a life sentence. He was 21-years-old. A review of the trial transcript reveals that his attorney, Joseph Tosh, who was later disbarred, failed to make an opening statement, did not call any defense witnesses, failed to adequately cross-examine the states witnesses about the identification and presented a closing argument that was a mere four pages of the 87-page transcript. Tosh promised to file an appeal of the verdict; however, he never did.

Alexander has always maintained his innocence of the rape. The Innocence Project New Orleans took up Alexanders case in 1996. Unfortunately, the rape kit and a semen-stained towel evidence had been destroyed four years after his conviction. However, they did not give on proving Alexanders innocence, and in 2013, hair evidence recovered from the location where the rape took place was found at the Jefferson Parish Sheriffs Office Crime Lab.

DNA analysis determined the hairs belonged to neither Alexander nor the victim. This fact, along with the reinvestigation by the Jefferson Parish District Attorneys Office which determined that Alexander did not have competent and effective counsel during his trial, and that his conviction rested heavily on a flawed, unreliable identification procedure was enough for Jefferson Parish Judge June Darensburg to overturn his conviction and exonerate him.

Alexander was released from Jefferson Parish Correctional Center on Monday, January 29, 2018.Almost $30,000 in fines have been dished out to smokers who light up near Queensland bus stops, taxi ranks and ferry terminals.

On September 1, 2016, it became illegal to smoke within five metres of public transport waiting points.

More than 100 Queenslanders have been fined since laws were introduced banning smoking near bus stops, taxi ranks and ferry terminals. Credit:Tamara Voninski

Since then, 117 fines were issued to Queenslanders for the offence, which currently attracts a fine of $252.30.

That was about one fine on average every four days.Columbia: An Amtrak passenger train apparently travelling on the wrong track collided with a parked freight train in South Carolina on Sunday, killing two crew members and injuring at least 116 in the railroad's third fatal crash in as many months.

Amtrak Train 91 was carrying 139 passengers and eight crew members to Miami from New York when it hit the CSX Corp freight train at about 2.35am local time near the state capital and derailed, the railroad said in a statement.

South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster said it appeared that the Amtrak train was on the wrong track when it slammed into the parked CSX freight train, which had no one aboard.

"It's a horrible thing to see, to understand what force was involved," McMaster told a news conference. "The first engine of the freight train was torn up, and the single engine of the passenger train is barely recognisable."Athens: More than 100,000 people gathered in the Greek capital on Sunday to stage the biggest demonstration in decades against the inclusion of the word "Macedonia" in the name of a neighbouring former Yugoslav republic, saying it implies a territorial claim on a northern Greek region.

The rally, drawing around 140,000 people, according to police estimates, was bigger even than most of the numerous demonstrations organised after Greece signed its first international bailout program in 2010, paving the way for years of painful belt-tightening. Still, the demonstration on Sunday appeared to fall far short of the 1 million that organisers said had attended.

Protesters gather during a rally in Athens on Sunday. Credit:AP

Greece and the Republic of Macedonia began United Nations-mediated talks last month to try to settle the 25-year name dispute. Many Greeks argue that its neighbour's use of "Macedonia" suggests a territorial claim to the Greek region of that name, whose capital is Thessaloniki. That city has itself staged protests over the disagreement.

Using this argument, Greece has blocked the Republic of Macedonia's attempts to join NATO and the European Union. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told officials in Skopje, Macedonia's capital, last month that the name dispute with Greece would have to be resolved before the Balkan country could be considered for membership in the alliance.The potential for houses to be sold by older people with little debt to younger borrowers who take out more substantial loans could boost the country's mortgage growth, said JP Morgan analysts.In a recent research note on Australian banks, the analysts said they see few reasons to be positive about mortgage growth in the country, but that there is one area where they see some potential upside: changes in demographics in homeowner ranks.In particular, the potential for houses to be sold by older people with little or no debt, to younger people who take on more meaningful debt loads, they said.However, they were quick to point out that this upside could be offset by lower debt in the investor bucket.The analysts said they see no reason why the trend of slowing mortgage growth will not continue given a number of contributing factors.They cited stretched household balance sheets, slowing house price growth, and general improvement in lending standards putting downward pressure on loan size as all playing a part in the slowdown.Figures released in January put Australian total household liabilities at $2.466trn, an increase of 3% from the June 2017 figure after the Australian Bureau of Statistics revised its data to include SMSF debt.Meanwhile, property prices have continued to fall, with Sydney recording steep declines. Property prices in the city have fallen for a fifth straight month with a 0.9% decline over January amid tighter investment lending rules, data from CoreLogic shows. At the national level, property prices fell 0.3% in January, with annual growth slowing to 3.2%, from 4.3% in December.JP Morgan has revised its forecast for housing loan growth and now expects it to drop to 5% in FY18.For FY19 and FY20, it forecasts growth to decline to approximately 4% and slightly below 4%.We think this profile would satisfy APRAs / RBA s desire for a slowing of household debt, without bringing about a hard landing in the housing market, said the analysts.They noted that this level would also be slightly below nominal GDP.Because of increased regulatory oversight, the analysts said they would not be surprised to see the average LVR of newly originated loans continue to go down slightly in coming years."Turning to the amortisation of the back book, we also think this factor will put downward pressure on loan growth in the next 2-3 years. A reduction in interest-only loans will increase the amortization rate on the portfolio," said the analysts.Related stories:Latest News Westpac CEO on how stretched housing affordability is endangering Aussie property prices "It's at the worst level it's been for some time," CEO tells parliamentary committee

Are mortgage brokers a weak link in the fight against financial crime? With the AUSTRAC risk level now at 'high', here's what brokers need to know about safeguarding themselves and their customers

Former Pepper Group chief Patrick Tuttle has joined mortgage marketplace HashChing's board of directors.Tuttle left Pepper in March 2017 after the company's board decided to consolidate the CEO role, which went to co-group CEO Michael Culhane.Tuttle has more than 30 years of commercial experience and was divisional chief financial officer for a diverse range of businesses at Macquarie Bank before joining Pepper.Pepper delivered record profit growth and succeeded in extensive geographical business expansion under Tuttle's leadership. He headed the company's $5.2bn acquisition of GE Capital's Australian & New Zealand Home Lending business, the largest acquisition of its kind by a privately owned Australian non-bank lender.Id been at Pepper for a significant chunk of my professional career so it was initially a challenge to walk away from but since moving into my role with HashChing I can confidently say I am delighted to be a part of their journey," he said.Having led the Pepper Group during a period of rapid business expansion in both Australia and across a range of international markets, I believe theres a lot of strategic value that I can bring to HashChing."HashChing CEO Mandeep Sodhi said Tuttles knowledge of the industry, both domestically and internationally, would be invaluable in helping the company expand into other verticals and potentially overseas.Patricks leadership experience in the mortgage space will prove invaluable as HashChing embarks on a new period of growth and expansion. Having answered borrowers primary concerns our eyes are set on solving the issues customers dont know they have and improving those which have unnecessarily been accepted as just part of the process, said Sodhi.HashChing has processed more than $15.6bn worth of home loan applications and built a broker network of over 690 vetted professionals.Latest News Westpac CEO on how stretched housing affordability is endangering Aussie property prices "It's at the worst level it's been for some time," CEO tells parliamentary committee

Are mortgage brokers a weak link in the fight against financial crime? With the AUSTRAC risk level now at 'high', here's what brokers need to know about safeguarding themselves and their customers

La Trobe Financial has named industry veteran Mark Simmons as senior manager for client partnerships in its Sydney credit distribution team. The announcement is the latest in a series of appointments the lender is making.



The company said about 35 new appointments are underway to bolster its plans for expansion. A La Trobe spokesperson confirmed to Australian Broker that these will be for broker distribution.



Backed by private equity giant Blackstone, La Trobe is repositioning its business for more residential and commercial loan flows.



Simmons' appointment marks the beginning of what could be a "very large" expansion of La Trobe Financials footprint in the market, following its recent 80% acquisition by Blackstone, said the company.



Blackstone became a majority stakeholder in the lender last December, in a deal that marked its entry into small business mortgage lending in Australia. La Trobe chief executive Greg O'Neill has retained a 20% stake in the company.



La Trobe chief lending officer, Cory Bannister, said the company's target is to expand its presence in the critical Sydney market to make sure it continues to provide the highest levels of service to its mortgage broker partners.



"Marks appointment is testimony to how we see continued growth of our national footprint. We are working from a new base in 2018, having one of Australias broadest product ranges and annual loan originations now running at $6bn p.a.," he said.



Simmons has more than 30 years of experience in financial services, having worked as a broker and for some of Australias major banks and non-bank financial institutions.



"With 230 staff across offices in Melbourne, Sydney, Shanghai and Hong Kong, this non-bank lender is now on a major uplift and expansion path," said the company.



Related stories:

Investment firm takes 80% stake in non-bank

Why you shouldn't fear commercial lending

Dual departures revamp non-bank leadershipOur Promise: Welcome to Care2, the world's largest community for good. Here, you'll find over 45 million like-minded people working towards progress, kindness, and lasting impact.

Care2 Stands Against: bigots, racists, bullies, science deniers, misogynists, gun lobbyists, xenophobes, the willfully ignorant, animal abusers, frackers, and other mean people. If you find yourself aligning with any of those folks, you can move along, nothing to see here.

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You are our people. You Care. We Care2.They have even been the subject of films. In some accidents in nature, it causes fear and bewilderment, but it...For Subscribers Small Business week to celebrate, aid Pueblo businesses

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On August 3, 2017, the Washington Post published an article stating that the majority of Christians (presumably self-professed) believe poverty is "the result of individual failings" or blame "lack of effort." Compared to 29% of non-Christians in the survey conducted with Kaiser Foundation, 46% of all Christians and 53% of white evangelical Protestants said lack of effort is the cause of poverty.

In press releases indicting Christians on the subject, at least two truths are ignored. First is all the good that Christians doand have historically always donein leading the charge to address and redress poverty.

Second is that in addition to meeting immediate needs, a biblical perspective includes helping the poor to nurture their God-given gifts and opportunities to better their circumstances. It's simply obeying the mandate of Matthew 12:31 to "love your neighbor as yourself."

Working With the Stuff of Creation

The Christian response to poverty must begin with the whole person, rooted in a biblical understanding of creation. Dr. Art Lindsley, vice president of theological initiatives at the Institute for Faith, Work, and Economics, spoke with the American Family Association (AFA) Journal about how the Christian worldview informs issues such as poverty.

"People are made in God's image to use their creativity to develop the potential of creation," he said. "Only God created something out of nothing, but we are called to create something out of somethingto take the stuff of creation and use our creativity with respect to it."

Work is valuable not just as a means of creating wealth or satisfying one's needs. Work unleashes the worthy and important contributions that every person is created to make for the good of society and personal well-being.

An Empty Heart

"Poverty is not just a lack of money or a lack of food," Lindsley added. "Poverty is often associated with a lack of hope. In the book For the Least of These, Peter Greer with Hope International tells about asking various poor people in Rwanda what poverty felt like or how they experienced it. Some of the things mentioned were: Poverty is an empty heart. Not knowing your abilities and strengths. Not being able to make progress. Isolation. No hope or belief in yourself. Broken relationships. Not knowing God. ... Only one item on the list was about not having enough money or enough to eat."

In Love Your Neighbor, IFWE's Kathryn Feliciano writes, "To put it simply, poverty is a lack of options."

"Poverty creates a depression of the human spirit that desperately needs to be addressedas well as providing food and drink and that kind of thing," Lindsley told AFAJ. "That is where a belief in creation, and the worth and dignity of people, relate to the idea of work. People need to be free to use their gifts that God has given them to move forward in life. When people are not able to do that, it causes real problems."

Two Kinds of Poor

Granted, the compassionate Christian must discern that poverty arises from various causes.

"There are the unrighteous poor; a lot of passages in Proverbs speak on laziness and the sluggard," Lindsley said. "But there are also the righteous poor. People may be poor because of violence, corruption, high taxes, or too many government regulationspeople who are poor through no fault of their own. And that needs to be acknowledged fully."

There will always be the widowed, the orphaned, the disabled, the handicapped, and the elderlyand so there will always be need for Christian charity for those who truly are limited by their circumstances as to what they can contribute to their own livelihood. But there will never be cause to neglect the acknowledgment and nourishment of each person's human dignity, even if we desire to simply put food in their mouths.

Long-term Good

Just as there is more than one cause for poverty, there are many ways to address it. The Chalmers Center (chalmers.org) says that while the symptoms of poverty may involve lack of food, clothing, or shelter, there are three different levels at which to respond to poverty:

Reliefoffer immediate aid for those truly unable to help themselves, as in a natural disaster, medical emergency, or personal trauma.

Rehabilitationhelp people return to pre-crisis conditions of their lives.

Developmentassist people working to improve their lives beyond previous experience, recognizing the full potential of their gifts and abilities.

Unfortunately, many approaches to alleviating poverty take the form of relief and end there. A model that ought to be temporary for emergency situations has become the fixed strategy even when, in the long term, it may prove more crippling than helpful.

"You can be doing a good thing and have good intentions," Lindsley added, "but actually hurt people and hurt a long-term solution by doing a temporary good."

Aid sometimes flows too freely and frequently in areas where development or rehabilitation would be best. When people in poverty are inundated with free lunches, free clothing, free construction, and other needs that could be accomplishedat least partiallythrough their own skill and ingenuity, industry suffers, the free market is disrupted, and enterprise becomes unnecessary. Then, the opportunities for people to prosper through their own strengths may be overlooked, and they can be overwhelmed.

"There is a principle in ethics called subsidiarity, which is the idea that groups that are most local are best to address poverty," Lindsley said. "You want to give when there are urgent situations, but you don't want to encourage dependency. Instead, you're looking to the creativity of people and bringing them to specific solutions coming from business or nonprofit[s] to help address concerns."

The Church at Work

Interestingly, about a week prior to the Washington Post article cited above, Barna research pointed out that much of the American public is unaware of all that churches offer to their communities. While the majority may have noticed churches feeding the homeless and clothing the poor, less than a quarter of those surveyed had heard of church members working to offer after-school programs, aid new mothers, tutor school kids, teach English to immigrants, or teach job skills.

Notably, while a few of these activities fit traditional charity models by providing momentary relief for immediate needs, most of them are more in the developmental compartmentbuilding blocks paving the way to a better future. Assisting with job skills, tutoring, or after-school child care works alongside people so they can better utilize and draw upon their own abilities and resources. Instead of remaining in a place where they need handouts, they can build a ladder to climb out of poverty.

Editor's note: This article first appeared in the November 2017 edition of AFA Journal ("Helping Without Hurting") and is reprinted with permission.

This article is copied with permission from the Institute for Faith, Work & Economics (www.tifwe.org). The original article appeared here. IFWE is a Christian research organization committed to advancing biblical and economic principles that help individuals find fulfillment in their work and contribute to a free and flourishing society. Visit https://tifwe.org/subscribe to subscribe to the free IFWE Daily Blog."Mallrats" actor, Jeremy London was arrested in the front yard of his Mississippi home on Friday, Feb. 2, 2018, for domestic violence after a dispute with his wife, Juliet Reeves.

According to TMZ, the 45-year-old was booked on one count of domestic violence simple assault, which is considered a misdemeanor.Scandal is not an exact science. But on a scale of nothingburger (Bret Stephens of the New York Times) to worse than Watergate (GOP congressman Steve King), the information in the House Intelligence Committee FISA Memo comes in at about a solid seven. It now seems very likely the FBI and Department of Justice deceived a FISA court with an uncorroborated piece of Democrat-funded oppo research in order to obtain a warrant to spy on American citizen Carter Page. If, as seems reasonable to conjecture, the broader target turns out to have been the Donald Trump presidential campaign for which Page had recently worked, the needle on the scandal meter will begin to edge up into the red zone.

Lets put it this way: if this sort of thing had gone on under President Trump or even George W. Bush, the Times would have announced the news in front-page headlines so large it would have taken two strong men just to carry the letters to the press room. An enormous collection of Times reportage on the subjectwith a black cover and some title like The Path to Tyrannywould have been on the bookstore shelves within the month.

And yet mainstream journalisms reaction to the memo has so diverged from its past practicesand indeed from the medias usual narrative about its own heroic role in our republicthat it constitutes a sort of meta-scandal within the scandal that in some ways is more dispiriting than the FISA scandal itself.

Americas news centersfrom 42nd Street in Manhattan all the way to 57th Street in Manhattandid everything within their power to suppress, taint, and minimize the impact of the memo, even before they knew what was in it. President Trumps assault on the nations law enforcement apparatus is unlike anything America has seen in modern times, wailed a Times analysis (the papers term of art for front-page editorializing). The memo is the most explicit Republican effort yet to discredit the FBIs investigation into Trump and Russia, reports CNN, increasingly the most trusted name in hysteria.

One CNN commentatorformer CIA guy Phil Muddactually threatened that the memo would set off a vendetta by the Deep State against our elected president: So the FBI people, Im going to tell you, are ticked. And theyre going to be saying . . . If you think you can push us off this because you think you can intimidate the director, youd better think again, Mr. President. Youve been around for 13 months. Weve been around since 1908. I know how this game is going to be played. Were going to win. It was almost as if Mudd were channeling The Onions satirical headline: FBI Warns Republican Memo Could Undermine Faith in Massive, Unaccountable Government Secret Agencies.

All this comes after a solid year of media whining about Trumps criticism of their biased and dishonest coverage of his presidency. The general idea, in the words of one Times op-ed writer, is that the unrelenting attacks on the news media damage American democracy.

But is it Trump who is doing the damage? After all, those of us who still go to the movies have just sat through Steven Spielbergs The Post, a two-hour left-wing talking point about how brave The Washington Post was when it defied President Nixons concerns over national security in order to expose government malfeasance by publishing the Pentagon Papers. Yet noweven before the FISA memo was publishednews outlets, including both CBS and NBC, were highlighting and giving credence to dire warnings that the FISA memo would damage national security and, channeling The Onion again, undermine trust in unchecked law enforcement. After decades of listening to leftists screech about J. Edgar Hoovers unjustified wiretapping, we are suddenly told to believe that a little unjustified FBI wiretapping now and again is a nothingburger.

In short, a press that should on principle raven for every piece of information that might be damning to the powerful of every stripea press that has shown itself willing to publish anonymous anti-Trump leaks that sometimes turned out to be falsehas made it clear that they do not want you to know what they do not want to know themselves.

The truth is both the memo itself and the presss unforgivable lack of curiosity and outrage about the memo are part of a much bigger scandal that has gone further to damage our republic than anything Trump has done or said. The memo represents just one more jigsaw piece in a picture of the Obama administration as a Chicago-style Democratic machine rife with cronyism and abuse of power, a machine to which the media closed its eyes.

We know this. Its not conjecture. We know that Obamas IRS made successful efforts to silence conservative voices during the presidents reelection campaign. After a settlement agreement in Z Streets lawsuit against them, we know that the IRS also targeted Jewish groups that supported Israel. We know that Obama appointed one attorney general who styled himself the presidents wing-man . . . there with my boy (imagine Jeff Sessions saying that), and another who held a secret meeting with Bill Clinton while Hillary Clinton was under investigation. And now we begin to learn that the Obama Justice Department may have colluded with a Democrats campaign to spy on a Republicans. Obama misled us about much of this and more: about the IRS; about when he himself gained knowledge of Hillarys secret email server, a server he used under a pseudonym; about his secret dealings with Iran; and about the effects of his signature health-care bill.

All thisreally a steady stream of deceptions and abuses of powerwhile journalists kowtowed to, flattered, and ultimately raved about the administration being scandal-free. The press sacrificed its credibility with eight years of willful blindness. Those who asked with the ancient Roman poet Juvenal, Who will guard the guardians? were answered by the self-styled heroes of journalistic truth-telling: Not us.

Thats the real scandal here, and its beginning to come out.

Photo: aydinmutlu/iStockThe New York Times has published a lengthy report about actress Uma Thurman, who details several sexual assaults from disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, as well as the unsupportive and physically endangering behavior of "Kill Bill" director Quentin Tarantino.

In the expose, Thurman says that she got to know Weinstein and his wife after starring in Tarantino's 1994 film, "Pulp Fiction." "He used to spend hours talking to me about material and complimenting my mind and validating me," she says. "It possibly made me overlook warning signs. This was my champion."

Afterwards, she says Weinstein made an unwanted advance in a hotel room during an argument, and later "pushed me down. He tried to shove himself on me. He tried to expose himself. He did all kinds of unpleasant things."

Thurman says that she later confronted Weinstein about the incident, but "her memory of the incident abruptly stops there." One of her friends recalled that when Thurman returned, she was "disheveled and so upset and had this blank look," and said that Weinstein threatened to end her career.

In response to the report, Weinstein  who is currently undergoing therapy at a clinic in Arizona  admits that he made an "awkward pass" at Thurman, but denied physical contact, and claims to be "saddened and puzzled" about her accusations.

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Through a representative, he questioned why she  like numerous other women who have accused the powerful media mogul of assault  waited so long to come forward, and released a number of images of himself and Thurman at public events that he believes "demonstrate the strong relationship Mr. Weinstein and Ms. Thurman have had over the years."Kiva Confections medicated blueberries and chocolate bar

The booming market for legal marijuana is creating big opportunities for entrepreneurs catering to the market for alternative pot-based products, like high-end edibles and beauty products. That particular segment is seen by analysts as one of the fastest growing  which got a major boost after California formally legalized recreational weed. Arcview Research estimates the legal cannabis market will soar to nearly $15 billion by 2021, with edibles and ancillary pot-products representing a big part of that boom. With that in mind, CNBC recently took a look at some luxury products carving their own niche in the market for legal weed.

The 'Hermes' of pot

Beboe is a California-based luxury cannabis line that some have called the "Hermes of Marijuana." The company was founded by celebrity tattoo artist Scott Campbell and longtime fashion executive Clement Kwan, and feature key pot economy products like designer vaporizer pens, edible pastilles, and other curios expected to roll out this year.

Beboe Luxury Cannabis Products : Edible Pastilles

Beboe products are sold through 65 stockists across California as well as via full-service medical marijuana delivery. The edible pastilles retail for $25, while the pre-filled vaporizers retail for $60 a piece.

Beboe Luxury Cannabis Products: Sativa and Indica Vaporizers

Weed infused coffee, mints and sweets

Kiva creates cannabis-infused confections that range from chocolate covered espresso beans, medicated mints, and cannabis chocolate bars. The company has a dozen edible offerings and hundreds of dispensaries in California, Arizona, Nevada, and Illinois  and nabbed a "best edible" award at the San Francisco and Los Angeles High Times Cannabis Cup in 2013.

Kiva Confections workers creating a cannabis infused chocolate bar

Kiva products are sold in stores in Arizona, Nevada, California, and Illinois. While prices can vary, the candy bars range from $10-$20, while the Petra mints are about $15; the chocolate covered espresso beans and blueberries between $18-$20.

Kiva Confections worker creating a cannabis infused chocolate bar at the company's factory

The $20 candy bar

Defonce Chocolatier specializes in cannabis chocolate bars with a hip twist: Its products ranging from a White Chocolate Matcha Bar to a Coffee or Mint Flavor. The bars contain about 90 milligrams of THC, but can be broken up into 5 mg servings for consumers looking for easy microdoses.

Defonce Chocolatier White Chocolate, Green Tea Matcha Cannabis Bar

The company boasts an all-natural farming and extraction process, while employees of the company are veterans of big brands like Apple and chocolate maker TCHO. Defonce products are sold in California dispensaries only, and prices per bar range in the $20-$30 range.

Pot, but in a non-pot sort of way

Herb Essntls doesn't sell edibles, but markets a cannabis-infused set of skincare products derived from marijuana. While the products are free of the psychoactive substance THC, the products  which range from lip balm to face creams  all contain oils from the plant.

Herb essntls Cannabis Infused Lip Balm

Herb Essntls products are stocked in shops across the world, including places like New York City, Minneapolis, Austin, Paris, London, Stockholm and Vancouver. They are also sold online through several retailers. Their products are far from cheap: A lip balm retails for $12, the lotion for $48, and moisturizer for $60.Figuring out alimony has always been difficult for divorce lawyers, mediators and couples trying not to be couples. Thanks to the new tax code, it's even tougher. In previous years, the pain of alimony stemmed in large part from each state having its own set of rules. These determined how much alimony payments should be and when such payments should end. "There's not really a cohesive rationale for alimony," said Mary Kay Kisthardt, a professor of law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law. "In any given state, we're not sure what we're trying to do." For the last 75 years, however, one rule was clear: Alimony was deductible for the payer, and the recipient paid income tax on it. The new code delivers a disruption to those who work in divorce  and those who go through it, experts say, by upending this constant in a highly subjective legal arena. Under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, in all divorces after Dec. 31, 2018, alimony will no longer be deductible for the payer, and taxes don't need to be paid on it by the recipient. Lawyers are scrambling to understand and react.

There's not really a cohesive rationale for alimony. Mary Kay Kisthardt professor of law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law

Justin Reckers, a certified divorce financial analyst in California, said judges and lawyers in the state use a certain software to calculate alimony. That system is now unusable. "Those guidelines rely heavily on the tax codes," Reckers said. As a result, he predicts that divorces may become messier. Offering tax relief to alimony payers, he said, often helps to move the negotiations along.

Getty Images

"It's a lost tool for the purpose of settling cases outside of the court system," he said. "You might see more cases go to court now." Tom Leustek, founder of advocacy group New Jersey Alimony Reform, said he was shocked by the change. Soon after the legislation passed, he wrote a report on its potential impact, and sent it to the office of New Jersey Governor-elect Phil Murphy. "The two households created by a divorce simply cannot function as cheaply as the single household of an intact family," it reads. "The present tax structure that helps ameliorate those burdens has now been eliminated."

We can't afford to get divorced without that tax benefit, so we're going to stay together, and I don't mean happily. Ken Neumann Center for Mediation and Training in New York City

Under the old code, a household's income received tax relief through divorce because the higher-paid earner (typically, with the bigger tax bill), is transferring income to the lower-paid spouse, (who often has a less burdensome tax rate). Some people might be less able to afford divorce now, said Ken Neumann, director of the Center for Mediation and Training in New York City. Such couples, he said, could reason: "We can't afford to get divorced without that tax benefit, so we're going to stay together, and I don't mean happily."

Neumann said he'd been receiving calls from confused mediators. "They're asking, 'What's going to happen? Are we going to negotiate differently?' We don't know what the law is," he said.

On the face, it looks like it will benefit women. Ken Neumann

Uncertainty about the new laws is already causing problems. Reckers said alimony recipients have been calling, asking if they should modify their existing alimony agreements to adhere to the new tax code  so they don't have to pay taxes on it anymore. He warned them: don't see this as a windfall. For one, experts say it's still unclear if existing alimony agreements modified in 2019 would be subject to the new rules. Regardless, the changes are likely to bring in less money for the recipient, because the payer will "have less money from which to pay" without the deduction.

Neumann provided a hypothetical example. A man who earns $500,000 a year and is in the top tax bracket is paying his wife $100,000 a year in alimony  but it only costs him roughly $50,000, after the tax break. The ex-wife receives the $100,000, but is left with $75,000 after taxes. Now, Neumann said he could see many cases where the ex-husband will argue that he can only afford $50,000, and the ex-wife would be left with $50,000 a year  or $25,000 less. (The majority of alimony payments are made by men, although the percentage by women has been growing). "On the face, it looks like [the new law] will benefit women," Neumann said. "[But] she's going to take the biggest hit."

You used to be able to give people some idea. Now, we don't really know. Heidi Webb founder of Consilium Divorce ConsultationsIn this image from video, train cars are smashed and derailed Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018 near Cayce. S.C. The crash left multiple people dead and dozens of people injured.

An Amtrak train traveling in South Carolina collided with a CSX freight train on Sunday, killing two people and injuring at least 70.

The train with 139 passengers and eight crew members was traveling between New York and Miami when it hit the other train and derailed near Columbia, South Carolina, Amtrak officials said.

"Amtrak Train 91, operating between New York and Miami, came in contact with a CSX freight train at around 2:35 am in Cayce, South Carolina," Amtrak said in a statement to media.

"Local authorities are on the scene responding."

TWEET

The derailment happened near Charleston Highway and Pine Ridge Road.

Lexington Country's Sheriff Department confirmed the deaths and injuries.

TWEET

The department then confirmed that all the passengers were off the train.

Later on Sunday during a press conference, Harrison Cahill, the public information officer for the County of Lexington, confirmed that two people were dead, but said at least 70 had been transported to hospitals for injuries. These injuries ranged from small scratches to broken bones.

Cahill also said that around 5,000 gallons of fuel had been spilled and is being secured.

A reporter from local news network wis10 tweeted pictures of the crash.

TWEETBrexit 1) Rees-Mogg marches on May over hard Brexit

Prime Minister told not to let Hammond ruin Brexit  Sunday Telegraph

MP repeats claim that the Treasury is fiddling the figures  Mail on Sunday

Attacks on civil service worthy of 1930s Germany  The Observer

Sticking with EU regulations could cost 240 billion per year  Sun on Sunday

My experience tells me we need to leave the Customs Union

Tory Brexit cheerleader Jacob Rees-Mogg last night warned Theresa May she would be making a grave error if she failed to deliver the hard Brexit he favours. And he failed to kill off claims that he could replace her in No 10 if she defies his hard-line stance by saying he was flattered by claims he had overtaken Boris Johnson as the leadership frontrunner. He also compared himself to Michael Heseltine, who famously denied planning to challenge Margaret Thatcher  before doing precisely that. According to bookmakers, City tycoon and devout Catholic Mr Rees-Mogg is strong favourite to be the next Tory leader, with his reputation enhanced by his cool response to protesters who disrupted his speech in Bristol.  Mail on Sunday

I want to be clear; I voted to remain in the referendum. But having spent the best part of the last two years travelling the world as Minister of State for Trade and Investment and then Trade Policy, I am in little doubt that the UK can have a bright future if we steer in the right direction. That future is not as a member, full or associate, of the single market. The EUs message is that in order to have free movement of goods, services and capital we must accept free movement of people, the supremacy of the European Court of Justice, and pay our dues. This is not consistent with a vote to leave the EU. The previous chancellor, the Bank of England and big business all warned of the economic consequences of such a move. The majority of voters were not swayed from another course.  Mark Price, Sunday Telegraph

When Brexit fails to deliver it wont be the fault of the Tory right  Nick Cohen, The Observer

Editorial:

May must stand up to the EU bullies  Sunday Telegraph

>Today:

>Yesterday: Henry Newman in Comment: Enough! May must make up her mind on Brexit  or risk the collapse of her negotiating position.

Brexit 3) Johnson says hes ready for a contest

war cabinet meets to discuss Britains future relations with Brussels this week.  Sunday Times

Taking their knives to Mays toga wont end Conservative woes  Andrew Rawnsley, The Observer

Corbyn waits for the drop as Tories push May to the edge  Adam Boulton, Sunday Times

Theresa May will face a coup that would install a dream team of three Brexiteers if she persists with plans to keep Britain in a customs union with the European Union, Tory MPs warned last night. Eurosceptics contacted Boris Johnson, the foreign secretary, on Friday and urged him to agree a pact that would see Michael Gove, the environment secretary, become his deputy prime minister and Jacob Rees-Mogg  the shop steward of the backbench Brexiteers  appointed chancellor if the prime minister is forced out. While encouraging MPs to rally round May, Johnson also told one of the plotters that he would be ready for a future contest. He vowed that the cavalry is coming to block the customs union plan when Mays Brexit

>Yesterday: ToryDiary: Hard lessons for May from leadership contests of the past

Brexit 4) Wallace denies being at the centre of resignation rumours

An ally of Boris Johnson last night denied claims at Westminster that he was considering resigning to trigger a leadership contest against Theresa May. Security Minister Ben Wallace, a former officer in the Scots Guards, was named by a senior party source as being on a watch list held by Tory whips. But last night Mr Wallace protested his loyalty to the Prime Minister, saying: I am doing the job I love. Which in politics is rare. The rows are something I couldnt be less interested in. When asked about the watch list, he said: It isnt the whips who believe that, I know for a fact. It is others. Another Minister on the whips watch list is Defence Minister Tobias Ellwood, who is understood to be frustrated at not being promoted to the Cabinet in Mrs Mays botched reshuffle last month.  Mail on Sunday

Jenkin urges May to channel Thatcher to achieve a clean Brexit  Sun on Sunday

Dorries thinks female voters would take revenge if May is toppled  Mail on Sunday

Comment:

Thatchers not for spurning on Womens Day  Sarah Baxter, Sunday Times

May pledges new law against intimidating a Parliamentary candidate

P

Prime Minister demands an end to abuse of MPs  Sunday Express

The naked truth about the Rees-Mogg heckler  Sunday Times

Tory youth movement plunged into chaos by assault allegation against activist  Mail on Sunday

ublic life is under threat from growing levels of bullying, intimidation and abuse, the Prime Minister will warn this week as she announces a new criminal offence of intimidating a parliamentary candidate. In a speech this week, Theresa May will tell politicians on all sides to take a stand for decency, tolerance and respect, urging MPs it is time we asked ourselves seriously whether we really want it to be like this. She will announce a consultation on a new offence in electoral law of intimidating parliamentary candidates and their campaigners. The current offence of electoral intimidation relates to undue influence on voters.  Sunday Telegraph

Comment:

Masked protesters harmed their cause and changed no minds  Jess Phillips MP, Sun on Sunday

Editorial:

Balaclavas have no place in politics, the hard left must be stopped  Sun on Sunday

>Yesterday: ToryDiary: Student hosts of the Rees-Mogg event give their account of the violence

as she mulls home hubs to revive domestic agenda

Parents at risk of separation could be offered free counselling at a new network of family hubs across the country, under plans being considered by Downing Street. The Prime Ministers aides are working on proposals to help set up specialised centres offering services from breastfeeding advice to relationship support for couples. The hubs are already being pioneered by a handful of councils and dozens of Tory MPs have called on Theresa May to provide funding to help create similar units across the country. The disclosure comes as Mrs Mays aides battle to defy claims that the Prime Minister is failing to set out bold domestic policies amid turmoil over the Governments approach to Brexit.  Sunday Telegraph

Boles urges ministers to loosen planning rules

M

Anger over glut of posh ghost towers planned for London  The Observer

Greening says Tories cannot ignore the young  Sunday Times

MPs warn against cuts to Royal Marines

inisters have been warned not to cop out of a major reform to encourage building and ease the pressure on the housing market, as the Government announced a scaled-back version of a plan pushed by senior Conservatives. Nick Boles, the former planning minister, said proposals to help developers and home owners to extend the height of properties in major cities were not enough without new powers for the extensions to be built without formal planning permission. On Sunday, Sajid Javid, the Housing Secretary, will announce plans to amend planning guidance to encourage councils to look favourably on upward development in densely populated areas.  Sunday Telegraph

Britains renowned Special Forces are under threat from controversial cuts to the Royal Marines, MPs warn today. They fear that reducing the elite infantry corps will weaken the SAS and other Special Forces that recruit heavily from the Marines. In a scathing verdict, the powerful Commons Defence Committee says it would be militarily illiterate to axe up to 2,000 Marines and two amphibious assault ships. The cuts are understood to be under consideration as part of a major review of national military capability MPs also say that talk of major cuts will hit Marines morale and suggest they are being sacrificed by Chancellor Philip Hammonds Treasury. New Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson is fighting the cuts.  Mail on Sunday

Cuts will also damage special forces  Sunday Times

More:

Ministry of Defence in chaos over use of drones outside war zones  The Observer

Senior Tories did not know about Williamsons fling when he bid to be an MP  Sun on Sunday

Labour 1) Momentum plan to hijack democracy review

Corbyn pledges rebirth of municipal socialism in the UK  The Observer

Hard-left activists are demanding all-member votes to elect council leaders in a move that could usher in a wave of Haringey-style purges of traditional Labour councillors in favour of Momentum candidates. Supporters of the hard-left campaign group Momentum are plotting to hijack Labours democracy review to tighten their stranglehold on the party. Its members say the review is an opportunity to fundamentally remake the party by making it more accountable to its hard-left base. A document circulating among Momentum members online calls for co-ordinated submissions to the review demanding all-member votes to elect council leaders and deputy leaders.  Sunday Times

Comment:

Far lefts hounding of a council leader brings back bad memories  Janet Daley, Sunday Telegraph

Labour 2) Harman launching a bid to replace Bercow as Speaker

Veteran MP Harriet Harman is hoping to capitalise on the Pankhurst factor by making a bid to become Commons Speaker, Labour sources say. Amid reports that John Bercow may signal later this year when he will stand down, Labours former deputy leader is understood to be planning to enter the race to succeed him. In the year when Westminster is preparing to mark the centenary of the Suffragette triumph over voting rights for women, feminist Harman would be well placed to win support on both sides of the House. The former Cabinet Minister would be only the second woman to be Speaker, following in the footsteps of Betty Boothroyd who held the post between 1992 and 2000.  Mail on Sunday

Former Labour MP offers to help Chinese firm cash in on Brexit  Sunday Times

Robertson declines as SNP Depute

News in Brief:

Rees-Mogg is the Corbyn of the Conservatives  John Rentoul, Independent on Sunday

The best way to avoid a Tory split is decisive leadership  James Forsyth, The Spectator

Labour must have a positive post-Brexit vision or be damned by workers  Fawzi Ibrahim, Brexit Central

How do you solve a problem like Facebook?  Oliver Wiseman, CapX

Nicola Sturgeon has paid tribute to Angus Robertson after he resigned as SNP deputy leader today. She thanked him for his friendship and service after he said he can no longer fully discharge his mandate after losing his Westminster seat of Moray in a Tory surge eight months ago. Robertson today tweeted: Thanks to all colleagues and constituents over 17 years of public life. Its been a tremendous honour to serve as deputy of Nicola Sturgeon and help transform Scottish politics Robertson said he had a fantastic time moving his country closer to independence and that it was time to look for new opportunities.  Mail on SundayHow would a post Brexit Wales thrive? With the right policies, especially in the rural areas, it would boom like never before.

A couple of months ago, Theresa May announced her Industrial Strategy, Building a Britain fit for the Future, which sets out unashamedly ambitious plans to boost future economic growth and employment across our nation, including a stated aim of tackling regional disparities.

To speed it all up, what about a unified air transport policy that rebuilds and renews the forgotten former World War Two airfields? Light aircraft can carry businessmen between different parts of the UK much faster than road or rail.

Once the UK is finally liberated from the suffocating EU acquis straitjacket of regulation, one of the first laws to be reviewed might be the Civil Aviation Working Time Regulations 2004 (known as CAWTR) which is tightly bound with the costly and restrictive practices of health and safety.

Our British countryside is littered with deserted airfields, some with derelict hangars and outbuildings. In rebuilding and renewing facilities for the 21st Century, under British laws made for British based companies, the cost of making them viable for businesses would surely be a comparable shilling to the billions normally associated with new railway lines such as HS2, need far less time than a major new road, and arguably considerably less aggravation from local residents than either.

Here in rural, coastal West Wales we are blessed not only with Aberystwyth University in Ceredigion at one end, Fishguard Harbour in Pembrokeshire at the other, and our Cardigan Bay dolphins in the middle, but also West Wales Airport, which was a former Ministry of Defence site known as the Royal Aircraft Establishment. It is situated in the popular tourist destination of Aberporth, Ceredigion, more recently famed for being the first village in the UK to ban plastic.

Further east is the Mid Wales Airport in Welshpool, to the north Hawarden airport in Flintshire and Llanbedr airport in Snowdonia. All of them are a few miles from the English border and major local companies.

In Aberporth, the French aerospace company Thales maintains a busy unit for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Systems. The company announced only in September an increased investment in the UK of 7 million divided between 1 million for a facility in Plymouth and 6 million specifically to our West Wales Airport, which the company says is central its growth (the BBC would of course say Despite Brexit).Michael Quinlan did more to shape the doctrine of deterrence than any other man in post-war Britain. His passion was to reconcile Just War theory with the possession of nuclear weapons. After he retired, he co-wrote, with Charles Guthrie, Just War: The Just War Tradition: Ethics in Modern Warfare. He became director of the Ditchley Institute, a visiting professor at Kings College London, and a senior consultant at the International Institute of Strategic Studies. He also conducted a review of MI5 and MI6. His job earlier? He was a civil servant, becoming Permament Secretary at the Ministry of Defence, having served earlier there as Deputy Under-Secretary (Policy), during the late 1970s and early 1980s, when the fashion in Labour swung towards unilateral nuclear disarmament.

Sir Michael is a useful introduction to the question  made so topical by current debate about the Customs Union  of whether civil servants have political views. He is far from being an exception to the rule. Charles Farr, formerly Director General of the Office for Security and Counter Terrorism, had a take, when in post, on how government should deal with non-violent extremists. It wasnt always the same as that of Ministers, and he was over-ruled in one case, that of Zakir Naik, who he believed should be allowed to enter the country, under certain conditions. The institutional view of the Foreign Office swung from being sceptical of the European project to enthusiastic about it. If you want to know the details, read the account of no less pro-EU a figure than Hugo Young, the former Guardian political commentator. The key personnel are listed in it. He called his book, in a title with two meanings, This Blessed Plot.

That civil servants have an interest in policy is not at all a bad thing. After all, they would not be able to give solid advice on how to implement it if they did not. Neither can they be neutral, strictly speaking. We all approach political decisions, or others, with preconceptions that are so much a guide to our thinking that we scarcely notice theyre even there  believing, for example, that state has a duty to the severely disabled, the destitute, and vulnerable children. If anything, the policy capacity of individual departments is too weak: we need more civil servants like Michael Quinlan, not fewer. Nor are they under an absolute obligation to do what Ministers tell them, any more than the rest of us are with our employers. If a civil servant cannot reconcile his orders with his conscience, then he should resign, which is preferable to whistle-blowing unless the instance is scandalous.

But if civil servants are not bound to governments by a moral obligation, they are by a professional one. If theyre not prepared to quit, they must get on, after putting their case, with doing whatever it is that Ministers ask them to do. And while civil servants cannot be neutral, they must be impartial  prepared, for example, to implement the Governments policy of leaving the Customs Union. (We will explore tomorrow the tortuous difference between staying in the Customs Union, which the Prime Minister ruled out in her Lancaster House speech, and staying in a Customs Union, which she did not.) In broad terms, much of the criticism of the civil service in this regard has been unfair. There is no uniform view. The Department for International Trade, for example, will favour leaving the Customs Union, if only because the Common Commercial Policy, an integral part of it, is incompatible with controlling our own trade policy.

The Treasury has a different take. It is determined to stay in the Customs Union, as Charles Grant of the Centre for European Reform put it. (Those interested in the controversial business of what else he said at last years Conservative conference can hear it here.) As Mark Wallace pointed out on this site last week, its latest push at trying to change the Prime Ministers policy is straight out of the Project Fear playbook. There is not much more to be said about it. If the Treasury cant forecast the coming year correctly  readers will remember its assertion that a vote for Brexit would push our economy into a recession  how on earth can it know what will happen in 15 years time? They came on in the same old way, and were driven off in the same old way, said Wellington. He was describing Waterloo, but his words also apply to the Treasurys discredited studies, or should do.

However, the question about those forecasts isnt, strictly speaking, whether the Treasury has an institutional view. It is, rather, whether civil servants would have gone to work on them had they not been given an instruction to do so  or at least a nod of aquiescence. Civil servants may strain in one direction rather than the other, and they may advise Ministers along those lines. But it is unusual for them to take the initiative without the consent of politicians. The most natural course to take in this instance is to apply Hammonds Razor, which at least one senior Minister has already done in private, just as it is to ask who gained most from the leak. We look set to find out this week whether May will stick to her Lancaster House policy, or carry out the manoeuvre that her only female predecessor so disliked  a U-turn.

Civil servants sometimes brief that attacks on those who cant answer for themselves is unfair. This defence is weakened by those senior ones who leave office and get down and dirty on social media. Theres no intrinsic reason why Simon Fraser or Nick Macpherson, say, shouldnt tweet away to their hearts content. They should be as free to do so as everyone else. But bits of what they send out wont reinforce confidence in civil service neutrality. None the less, old truths hold. Margaret Thatcher said: advisers advise but Ministers decide. She was right. If you dont like what the Treasury is up to, dont blame its staff. Get a new Chancellor. If you dont approve of the Foreign Offices take on the EU, get new departments (as the Prime Minister has done). If you dont like what the Government is up to, dont blame naked civil servants, who cant speak for themselves. Blame Ministers in emperors new clothes.The Samie/Siri conundrum is just the latest in a string of confusions that have followed me my whole life. One of my favorite name game complications haunted me in the middle school when my foreign language teacher could not pronounce my name to save her life. I was either Say-me or Saw-me. My friends told me I needed to correct her, but it never helped, so I decided it was easier to respond to any name she called me that started with an S and ended with an ee.

In my 33 years, Ive been Sally, Sandy, and Saddie as well as other S names like Sarah and even Samuel. Thats become my best quirk of my name. People dont know who to expect when all they have is my name. Is Samie a man or woman? Ive been getting mail addressed to Mr. Samie Hartley for years. Just comes with the territory.

But for a brief period I was taking the error to heart and collecting all the mail I received for Mr. Hartley and writing back to these organizations to correct them. I wrote to a man running for state assembly, asking him how he expected to get my vote if he didnt even know if I was male or female. He showed up on my doorstep two weeks later to apologize. Turns out he really did want my vote.Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) announced the launch of the MIT Intelligence Quest, an initiative to discover the foundations of human intelligence and drive the development of technological tools that can positively influence virtually every aspect of society.

The announcement was first made in a letter MIT President L. Rafael Reif sent to the Institute community.

At a time of rapid advances in intelligence research across many disciplines, the Intelligence QuestMIT IQis intended to encourage researchers to investigate the societal implications of their work as they pursue hard problems lying beyond the current horizon of what is known. Some of these advances may be foundational in nature, involving new insight into human intelligence, and new methods to allow machines to learn effectively. Others may be practical tools for use in a wide array of research endeavors, such as disease diagnosis, drug discovery, materials and manufacturing design, automated systems, synthetic biology, and finance.

"Today we set out to answer two big questions," Reif said. "How does human intelligence work, in engineering terms? And how can we use that deep grasp of human intelligence to build wiser and more useful machines, to the benefit of society?"

The core and the bridge

MIT is leading this work through two linked entities within MIT IQ. One of them, "The Core," is designed to advance the science and engineering of both human and machine intelligence. A key output of this work will be machine-learning algorithms. At the same time, MIT IQ seeks to advance our understanding of human intelligence by using insights from computer science.

The second entity, "The Bridge" will be dedicated to the application of MIT discoveries in natural and artificial intelligence to all disciplines, and it will host state-of-the-art tools from industry and research labs worldwide.

The Bridge will provide a variety of assets to the MIT community, including intelligence technologies, platforms, and infrastructure; education for students, faculty, and staff about AI tools; rich and unique data sets; technical support; and specialized hardware.

Along with developing and advancing the technologies of intelligence, MIT IQ researchers will also investigate the societal and ethical implications of advanced analytical and predictive tools. There are already active projects and groups at the Institute investigating autonomous systems, media and information quality, labor markets and the work of the future, innovation and the digital economy, and the role of AI in the legal system.

In all its activities, MIT IQ is intended to take advantage ofand strengthenthe Institutes culture of collaboration. MIT IQ will connect and amplify existing excellence across labs and centers already engaged in intelligence research. It will also establish shared, central spaces conducive to group work, and its resources will directly support research.

"Our quest is meant to power world-changing possibilities," said Anantha Chandrakasan, dean of the MIT School of Engineering and Vannevar Bush Professor of electrical engineering and computer science. Chandrakasan, in collaboration with Provost Martin Schmidt and all four of MITs other school deans, has led the development and establishment of MIT IQ.

"We imagine preventing deaths from cancer by using deep learning for early detection and personalized treatment," Chandrakasan continued. "We imagine artificial intelligence in sync with, complementing, and assisting our own intelligence. And we imagine every scientist and engineer having access to human-intelligence-inspired algorithms that open new avenues of discovery in their fields. Researchers across our campus want to push the boundaries of whats possible."

The fruits of research

MIT IQ will also provide a platform for long-term research, encouraging the foundational advances of the future. At the same time, MIT professors and researchers may develop technologies with near-term value, leading to new kinds of collaborations with existing companies-and also to new companies.

Some such entrepreneurial efforts could be supported by The Engine, an Institute initiative launched in October 2016 to support startup companies pursuing particularly ambitious goals.

Other innovations stemming from MIT IQ could be absorbed into the innovation ecosystem surrounding the Institutein Kendall Square, Cambridge, and the Boston metropolitan area. MIT is located in close proximity to a world-leading nexus of biotechnology and medical-device research and development, as well as a cluster of leading-edge technology firms that study and deploy machine intelligence.

MIT also has roots in centers of innovation elsewhere in the United States and around the world, through faculty research projects, institutional and industry collaborations, and the activities and leadership of its alumni. MIT IQ will seek to connect to innovative companies and individuals who share MITs passion for work in intelligence.

Eric Schmidt, former executive chairman of Alphabet, has helped MIT form the vision for MIT IQ. "Imagine the good that can be done by putting novel machine-learning tools in the hands of those who can make great use of them," he said. "MIT IQ can become a fount of exciting new capabilities."

"I am thrilled by todays news," Reif said. "Drawing on MITs deep strengths and signature values, culture, and history, MIT IQ promises to make important contributions to understanding the nature of intelligence, and to harnessing it to make a better world."CORNWALL, Ontario  Princess Elsa, Snow White, and Cinderella made a special appearance at the Cornwall Civic Centre last Sunday, February 4th of 2018, for the 4th annual Kinette Cornwall Princess Ball.

This year the ball sold out with more than 220 guests, and an estimated 6000$ raised by the group for the Boys and Girls Club and cystic fibrosis.

Princesses from all over gathered to raise funds by providing children with a number of events such as face painting, a carriage photo booth, and of course ballroom dancing.

The Cornwall Kinette club has continued to grow the event since its conception in 2014 and already has plans for 2019.

Melodie Lemoeligou with the Kinette club helped organize the event and has next years ball scheduled.

I am just so excited by the faces of the little kids when their names are announced at the door, and they see all the magic. Thats what is; all about the kids, said Lemoeligou.

With most of the guests and volunteers dressing as their favourite Disney characters it was like a scene from a fairy tale.

The Kinette club is a service club that has been in Cornwall for 75 years and made up most of the volunteer staff helping with the event.

Its a fun day and a lot of work, but fun work! said Sue Caron, a life member with the Kinette Club of Cornwall.

Caron dressed as one of the fairy godmothers from Cinderella while many of the princes and princesses were played local high school students.

The Kinette Club of Cornwall has their date said for next years ball and is already selling tickets so be sure to book ahead.Royal Caribbean International's Spectrum of the Seas is taking shape block by block, as the engine room block (pictured above) was recently moved in preparation for transport to Meyer Werft.

The blocks of Royal Caribbean's Quantum-class ship are built in Neptun Werft (Rostock, Germany) and transferred via hydraulics onto a pontoon, which will travel down the Ems River to the Meyer Werft shipyard in Papenburg, Germany, according to a statement.

Designed for the Chinese cruise market, the Spectrum of the Seas enters service in 2019.

Video:Quark Expeditions has announced its summer 2019 program in the Arctic, including sailings to five regions: Greenland, Canadas High Arctic, the Northwest Passage and the North Pole.

In addition to the expedition team that sails on each trip, the off-ship experience is enhanced by Quarks collection of so-called Adventure Options, the company said, in a prepared statement.

This season, two kayak experiences are offered including Sea Kayaking, a program for experienced kayakers and Paddling Excursions, a new optionthat offers beginner paddlers, with no prior kayaking experience, the opportunity to go for an hour-long paddle.

Paddling Excursions are guided from stable, sit-on-top kayaks, and groups are limited to 10 paddlers at a time, the company said.

Theme voyages include a photography voyage to the North Pole; and Polar Bear conservation trips to Spitsbergen, the North Pole and the Northwest Passage.

Other voyages range from an "Introduction to Spitsbergen" itinerary to a "Greenland Explorer" trip.Gene J. Puskar / Associated Press

A few weeks after airing plans to close stores in Waterbury and Manchester as part of a bankruptcy reorganization, Toys R Us has given the outlets a reprieve.

As reported by WFSB, a tandem Toys R Us and Babies R Us store in Waterbury will remain open, as well as a Babies R Us store in Manchester. The company is pushing ahead with plans to shutter stores in Newington and North Haven as part of a wave of closures nationally that was originally to have numbered more than 180 in all.BRIDGEPORT  Local debt-collection attorney Juda Epstein is under scrutiny from the City Council for his role in helping recover late sewer fees for Bridgeports Water Pollution Control Authority.

But complaints about Epstein  and what he charges delinquent homeowners whose late sewer bills he handles for the city  go back years.

Bridgeports legal department told Hearst Connecticut Media last week that it conducted a quiet review of Epsteins practice in 2011.

It was an impromptu audit, recalled Deputy City Attorney John Bohannon, who in 2011 was a consultant for then-Mayor Bill Finchs administration. I called Jay (Epstein), (and) said, Pull 20 files, lets take a look. 

Bohannon said Epstein was cooperative and provided copies of demands for payment, receipts and other paperwork.

My conclusion was there was no evidence of any impropriety, Bohannon said, adding, Jay was highly effective in what he did resolving the debt and had documentation and a good rationale for what he had done.

Bohannon said his one recommendation was for Epstein to change his demand letters to better explain the legal costs that were being passed on to residents. Bohannan said Epstein followed through on that suggestion.

Bohannon, along with City Attorney R. Christopher Meyer and Mark Anastasi  who held Meyers job in 2011 and continues to work in Bridgeports law department  last week discussed prior complaints against Epstein.

Hearst obtained a copy of a 2009 letter from private attorney Jonathan Klein to Anastasi that accused Epstein of trying to gouge homeowners for a large unearned fee. Hearst asked the law department what had been done about it.

This is his standard, routine practice, wrote Klein, who when contacted by Hearst authenticated the letter. Many homeowners would be able to bring their (Water Pollution Control Authority) accounts current if it were not for the fact that Jays attempts at profiteering prevent the resolution of their cases.

Anastasi said last week that he never received Kleins 2009 letter, but that the law department met with Klein in 2011 about his concerns with Epsteins fees. Anastasi emphasized that did not mean Klein had not sent the letter in 2009.

The law department in 2011 had been contacted by another attorney about Epstein  Edwin Farrow. Bohannon and Anastasi met with Farrow, who suggested they contact Klein. Bohannon later conducted his audit of some of Epsteins files.

Epstein said in an interview last week that he was shocked to learn of Kleins letter and its allegations.

I didnt know about it and Im obviously disheartened by it, Epstein said. Its untrue.

Disputed hours

But Klein continues to have concerns about Epstein. He forwarded to Hearst an email exchange with Epstein from October 2014. Epstein was trying to get Kleins client, House of God Ministries, to pay its delinquent sewer fees. According to a payment demand from Epstein, he was seeking $3,190 in attorneys fees awarded by the court.

When unpaid sewer fee cases get as far as a courtroom, attorneys handling the collection for the city and the WPCA submit a request for fees to the presiding judge. But according to the payment demand from Epstein that Klein provided Hearst, Epstein also wanted House of God to pay $5,652 in additional attorneys fees.

Klein sought more details, and Epstein responded with a detailed breakdown of how many minutes had been spent, at $175 per hour, on activities related to the House of God case from late January through early October 2014. Epstein wrote to Klein that he had worked for 32 hours and 30 minutes on the file.

Here we go again, Klein countered in an email to Epstein. Why am I not surprised? Twenty seven minutes to review a 2-page, double spaced memo? Thirty three minutes to review a 3-page doubled-spaced memo? Eighteen minutes to read a 2-line email?

Klein also argued that Epstein did not differentiate his work from that of his staff, but Epsteins $175 hourly rate was applied across the board.

I have 24.6 hours of time in this file, Klein wrote Epstein. And I know I worked at least as hard as you did and probably put more time into this case than you. How about trimming your time to 24.6 hours, too?

Epstein offered to reduce his fee by $1,000 if the House of Gods debts were paid within a week.

Epstein said last week that it is not unusual for collection attorneys to accrue additional fees after a judge has signed off on them if the debts are not immediately paid and there is more legal work to be done.

The work doesnt stop, he said.

Room to negotiate

Epstein added that in 2016, he waived $4,500 of court-awarded fees he was owed by the American Legion Post 140 on Stratford Avenue. Hearst previously reported on the American Legions clash with the city and WPCA over unpaid sewer bills.

And Bohannon recalled at least one sewer case in which he successfully asked Epstein to lower his fees.

We have consistently, from day one, worked with each administration to address their particular concerns on a file-by-file basis, Epstein said.

Jay does volume work,  Bohannon said, meaning Epstein has many cases going at once. And to resolve disputes, I believe hell compromise.

Bohannon and Meyer, who became Bridgeports city attorney two years ago, said the law department is looking into establishing fee limits for debt-collection attorneys (the city and WPCA also use Ed Marcus, of Branford). This, Bohannon and Meyer said, should not be viewed as meaning that Epstein or other lawyers are overcharging, but rather that the city believes it can negotiate, because Bridgeport offers plenty of business.

When you give anybody volume  and we give some volume  we have strength of size to mandate fees, Meyer said.

Klein said that could be helpful, but questioned how it would be enforced. And Farrow said he thinks Epsteins fees have remained a problem even after Bohannons 2011 review.

I feel like its a concern that needs to be addressed, and only the city can address it, Farrow said, adding he understands it is a complicated issue.

You dont want to keep attorneys from making reasonable money or give (sewer users) a free-for-all, he said. Bills have to be paid.

Epstein said hes been helping to ensure those bills have been  and that Bridgeports sewer system is kept funded  for over 10 years, under three mayors.

We have collected millions of dollars for the WPCA, which have been a vital part of meeting (its) budgetary demands, he said.NEWTOWN  The police departments patrol cars will each feature a red ribbon for the month of February to raise awareness about heart disease.

The leading cause of death for men and women in the United States is heart disease  but its also one of the most preventable. The Newtown Police Department hopes their ribbons will stir up conversation and encourage residents to schedule regular check-ups with their doctors.The alleged operator of a global spam network was extradited to the United States from Spain to face charges, according to the Department of Justice.

Peter Yuryevich Levashov, 37, of St. Persburg, Russia, has been detained since April 7, 2017, in Spain. He was arrested by authorities in Spain on a criminal complaint and arrest warrant issued by the District of Connecticut.

Levashov also went by the names Petr Levashov, Peter Severa, Petr Severa and Sergey Astakhov.

He was arraigned at 6 p.m. on Friday in Bridgeport.

The Russian national allegedly operated a global network known as Kelihos botnet. The network included tens of thousands of infected computers, that the DOJ said Levashov used to facilitate malicious activities. Among those activities, the DOJ said, was gathering login credentials, distributing bulk spam emails and installing ransomware.

An eight-count indictment explains that the botnet a network of hijacked computers  allowed a third party to control the entire computer network without the consent or knowledge of the computer owners. The DOJ said the network would send out more than 2,5000 unsolicited spam emails on a daily basis.

Using Kelihos botnet, the DOJ said Levashov obtained users email addresses, user names, logins and passwords. Furthermore, the indictment said he spread spam and distributed other malware  like banking Trojans and ransomware.

Levashov is alleged to have controlled and operated the Kelihos botnet which was used to distribute hundreds of millions of fraudulent emails per year, intercept credentials to online and financial accounts belonging to thousands of Americans, and spread ransomware throughout our networks, said Acting Assistant Attorney General Cronan.

The indictment alleged that, for years, Levashov profited from controlling the botnet.

On April 10, 2017, the DOJ announced it had taken action against Kelihos botnet to dismantle the network.

Ten days later, a grand jury in Bridgeport returned an indictment charging Levashov with one count of causing intentional damage to a protected computer, one count of conspiracy, one count of accessing protected computer in furtherance of fraud, one count of wire fraud, one count of threatening to damage a protected computer, one count of aggravated identity theft and two count of fraud in connection with email.Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA engages in the traditional banking businesses of retail banking, asset management, private banking, and wholesale banking. It operates through the following segments: Spain, the United States, Mexico, Turkey, South America, and Rest of Eurasia. The Spain segment includes mainly the banking and insurance business that the group carries out in Spain. The United States segment consists of the financial business activity of BBVA USA in the country and the activity of the branch of BBVA SA in New York. The Mexico segment refers to banking and insurance businesses in this country as well as the activity of its branch in Houston. The Turkey segment reports the activity of Garanti BBVA group that is mainly carried out in this country and, to a lesser extent, in Romania and the Netherlands. The South America segment comprises of operations in n Argentina, Colombia, Peru, Uruguay, and Venezuela. The Rest of Eurasia segment includes the banking business activity carried out by the group in Europe and Asia, excluding Spain. The company was founded in 1857 and is headquartered in Madrid, Spain.

Read MoreDo you have what it takes to be a leader like George Washington? Two new programs at Mount Vernon might help you find out.

"Be Washington," opening February 12, combines 18th-century reenactments with 21st-century technology as participants test their ability to make split-second decisions, tackling four challenges faced by Washington during the Revolutionary War and into his presidency - battle strategies, military pay, America's neutrality, and a tax revolt.

Recently, local home-schoolers ages 8 to 16 previewed "Be Washington." Beyond the "who, when and where" of history, they learned the "why" in Washington's decision-making process.

As events unfold on a 30-foot screen, students at touch-screen consoles choose which advisers to consult and rate their advice. As Mark Lyons, 13, of Alexandria, Virginia, was about to make his decision, new information in the form of dispatches arrived.

"Oh, those dispatches! They changed everything," Mark said. "They showed how the story evolved and the stress that must have been felt."

David Earwood, 9, of Alexandria, said, "I like all the different ways that you get information to help you decide - the big screen story, the advisers and the dispatches made it easier for me to understand and remember the information."

At the end of each 17-minute segment, students have 10 seconds to choose one of three actions to take. Then, they compare their choices to what George Washington did and to what other kids in the group chose.

"I was surprised at how hard it was to make a decision that felt 100 percent right," said Aurora Dennison, 11, of Silver Spring, Maryland. "Getting new information almost made it harder to decide."

Allie Fiul, 14, of Springfield,Virginia, said, "It makes you understand that you can't just act on your own opinions - you need to listen to others."

"I was expecting just another museum exhibit and was so excited to see the touch screens!" said Alex Geyer, 9, of Alexandria, who noticed other special flourishes. "The way the windows change color was really cool and unexpected. It shows how much detail they put into making it feel dramatic." Lightbulbs in the room also flickered like 18th-century candles.

Next was the "Revolutionary War 4-D Experience" movie. While learning more about the why of Washington's actions and strategies, snow, wind and fog brush your face. Flashes from cannon and musket firings whiz around the room as your seat rumbles from the barrage of battle.

Alex said, "The way they show the troops and maps was like they knew exactly what I was thinking next. The snow, the fog and the sound effects make you feel like you're actually there crossing the Delaware" River.

"Washington was confronted by some truly challenging crises, and he used the input of trusted advisers and others to reach the best decisions," said Rob Shenk, who's in charge of Mount Vernon's visitor engagement. "He sought out and weighed differing viewpoints so that all sides could be fully considered. It's our hope that people will be inspired to 'Be Washington' ... or to be better leaders in whatever capacity available."The following companies are subsidiares of Exxon Mobil: AKG Marketing Company Limited, Aera Energy LLC, Al-Jubail Petrochemical Company, Ampolex (Cepu) Pte Ltd, Ancon Insurance Company Inc., Barnett Gathering LLC, Barzan Gas Company Limited, Caspian Pipeline Consortium, Celtic Exploration Ltd., Coral FLNG S.A., Cross Timbers Energy LLC, Ellora Energy Inc., Esmeroon Oil Transporta Imperial Oil Limited, Esso (Thailand) Public Company Limited, Esso Australia Resources Pty Ltd, Esso Deutschland GmbH, Esso Erdgas Beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH, Esso Exploration Angola (Block 15) Limited, Esso Exploration Angola (Block 17) Limited, Esso Exploration and Production Angola (Overseas) Limited, Esso Exploration and Production Chad Inc., Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited, Esso Exploration and Production Nigeria (Deepwater) Limited, Esso Exploration and Production Nigeria (Offshore East) Limited, Esso Exploration and Production Nigeria Limited, Esso Exploration and Production UK Limited, Esso Global Investments Ltd., Esso Italiana S.r.l., Esso Nederland B.V., Esso Norge AS, Esso Petroleum Company Limited, Esso Raffinage, Esso Societe Anonyme Francaise, Exxo Holdings Inc., Exxon Azerbaijan Limited, Exxon Chemical Arabia Inc., Exxon International Finance Company, Exxon Luxembourg Holdings LLC, Exxon Mobile Bay Limited Partnership, Exxon Neftegas Limited, Exxon Overseas Corporation, Exxon Overseas Investment Corporation, ExxonMobil (China) Investment Co. Ltd., ExxonMobil (Taicang) Petroleum Co. Ltd., ExxonMobil Abu Dhabi Offshore Petroleum Company Limited, ExxonMobil Alaska Production Inc., ExxonMobil Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd., ExxonMobil Australia Pty Ltd, ExxonMobil B Resources Company, ExxonMobil Capital Finance Company, ExxonMobil Capital Netherlands B.V., ExxonMobil Central Europe Holding GmbH, ExxonMobil Cepu Limited, ExxonMobil Chemical France, ExxonMobil Chemical Gulf Coast Investments LLC, ExxonMobil Chemical Holland B.V., ExxonMobil Chemical Services (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., ExxonMobil China Petroleum & Petrochemical Company Limited, ExxonMobil Development Africa B.V., ExxonMobil Development Company, ExxonMobil Egypt (S.A.E.), ExxonMobil Exploracao Brasil Ltda., ExxonMobil Exploration and Production Malaysia Inc., ExxonMobil Exploration and Production Norway AS, ExxonMobil Exploration and Production Romania Limited, ExxonMobil Exploration and Production Tanzania Limited, ExxonMobil Finance Company Limited, ExxonMobil Financial Investment Company Limited, ExxonMobil France Holding SAS, ExxonMobil Gas Marketing Europe Limited, ExxonMobil General Finance Company, ExxonMobil Global Services Company, ExxonMobil Golden Pass Surety LLC, ExxonMobil Holding Company Holland LLC, ExxonMobil Holding Norway AS, ExxonMobil Hong Kong Limited, ExxonMobil International Services SARL, ExxonMobil Iraq Limited, ExxonMobil Italiana Gas S.r.l., ExxonMobil Kazakhstan Inc., ExxonMobil Kazakhstan Ventures Inc., ExxonMobil LNG Services B.V., ExxonMobil Lubricants Trading Company, ExxonMobil Oil Corporation, ExxonMobil PNG Limited, ExxonMobil Petroleum & Chemical BVBA, ExxonMobil Petroleum & Chemical Holdings Inc., ExxonMobil Pipeline Company, ExxonMobil Production Deutschland GmbH, ExxonMobil Production Norway Inc., ExxonMobil Qatargas (II) Limited, ExxonMobil Qatargas Inc., ExxonMobil Ras Laffan (III) Limited, ExxonMobil Rasgas Inc., ExxonMobil Research and Engineering Company, ExxonMobil Russia Kara Sea Holdings B.V., ExxonMobil Sales and Supply LLC, ExxonMobil Technology Finance Company, ExxonMobil Ventures Finance Company, ExxonMobil Ventures Funding Ltd., Fujian Refining & Petrochemical Co. Ltd., Golden Pass LNG Terminal Investments LLC, Golden Pass LNG Terminal LLC, Gulf Coast Growth Ventures LLC, Imperial Oil Limited, Imperial Oil Resources Limited, Imperial Oil Resources N.W.T. Limited, Imperial Oil/Petroliere Imperiale, Infineum Italia s.r.I., Infineum Singapore Pte. Ltd., InterOil Corporation, Jurong Aromatics Corporation Pte Ltd, MPM Lubricants, Marine Well Containment Company LLC, Mobil Australia Resources Company Pty Limited, Mobil California Exploration & Producing Asset Company, Mobil Caspian Pipeline Company, Mobil Chemical Products International Inc., Mobil Corporation, Mobil Equatorial Guinea Inc., Mobil Erdgas Verwaltungsgesellschaft mbH, Mobil Exploration & Producing Australia Pty Ltd, Mobil International Petroleum Corporation, Mobil Oil Australia Pty Ltd, Mobil Oil Exploration & Producing Southeast Inc., Mobil Oil New Zealand Limited, Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited, Mobil Producing Texas & New Mexico Inc., Mobil SerLimited, Mobil Venezolana De Petroleos Inc., Mobil Yanbu Petrochemical Company Inc., Mobil Yanbu Refining Company Inc., Mountain Gathering LLC, Mozambique Rovuma Venture S.p.A., Palmetto Transoceanic LLC, Papua New Guinea Liquefied Natural Gas Global Company LDC, Permian Express Partners LLC, Phillips Exploration LLC, Qatar Liquefied Gas Company Limited, Ras Laffan Liquefied Natural Gas Company Limited, Ras Laffan Liquefied Natural Gas Company Limited (II), SPI Limited, Saudi Aramco Mobil Refinery Company Ltd., Saudi Yanbu Petrochemical Co., SeaRiver Maritime Inc., South Hook LNG Terminal Company Limited, Tengizchevroil LLP, Terminale GNL Adriatico S.r.l, Trend Gathering & Treating LLC, Wolverine Pipe Line Company, XH LLC, XTO Delaware Basin LLC, XTO Energy Canada, XTO Energy Inc., and XTO Holdings LLC.One person was transported to the hospital after bystanders pulled him out of a burning vehicle at the intersection of Second and Franklin streets on Saturday afternoon, according to Napa City Fire.

Firefighters were first called to the scene for a medical call. But when they arrived, the vehicle was on fire and the male driver was already being pulled out.

The man was taken to a hospital with injuries unrelated to the fire, firefighters said. The vehicle fire was quickly extinguished.

Additional details were not available.

Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy.MAXIMUS, Inc. engages in the operation of government and human services programs. It operates through the following segments: U.S. Services; U.S. Federal Services; and Outside the U.S. The U.S. Services segment offers a variety of business process services, and appeals and assessments for state, provincial and national government programs. The U.S. Federal Services segment includes process solutions, program management, as well as system and software development, and maintenance services for various United States federal civilian programs. The Outside the U.S segment comprises of national, state, and county human services agencies with a variety of business process services, and related consulting services for welfare-to-work, child support, higher education institutions, and other human services programs. The company was founded by David V. Mastran in 1975 and is headquartered in Reston, VA.

Read MoreThe following companies are subsidiares of SYNNEX: 2117974 Ontario Inc., Administrative Services and Technologies to Enterprises Ltda., Afina Peru S.A.C., Afina S.R.L., Afina Sistemas Informaticos Limitada, Afina Sistemas Informaticos S.L, Afina Sistemas Sociedade Ltda., Afina Venezuela C.A., Afinasis S.A. de C.V., Asset Ohio Fourth Street LLC, BPO Holdco Cooperatief U.A., Beijing Jumeng Technology Development Ltd., Brazil HoldCo Limited, CNX Services Jamaica Limited, Chongqing Jumeng Technologies Development Ltd., ComputerLand Corporation, Comstor Colombia S.A.S., Concentrix (Canada) Limited, Concentrix (Suzhou) Information Consulting Co. Limited, Concentrix Beteiligungen GmbH, Concentrix Brazil Outsourcing of Processes , Concentrix Business Services UK Limited, Concentrix CMG Canada ULC, Concentrix CMG Insurance Services LLC, Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH, Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH Belgium Branch, Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH Greece Branch, Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH Merkezi Almanya Istanbul Merkez Subesi, Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH Netherlands Branch, Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH Netherlands Branch , Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH Russelsheim Switzerland Branch Zug, Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH Spoka z ograniczona odpowiedzialnoscia Oddzia w Polsce, Concentrix CRM Services Germany GmbH Sucursal en Espana, Concentrix CRM Services Hungary Kft, Concentrix CRM Services RO S.R.L., Concentrix CRM Services UK Limited, Concentrix CVG (Mauritius) Ltd, Concentrix CVG Brite Voice Systems LLC, Concentrix CVG CMG UK Limited, Concentrix CVG Contact Tunisie S.A.R.L., Concentrix CVG Corporation, Concentrix CVG Customer Management Australia Pty. Ltd., Concentrix CVG Customer Management Delaware LLC, Concentrix CVG Customer Management Group Inc., Concentrix CVG Customer Management Group Inc. Costa Rica Branch, Concentrix CVG Delaware Inc., Concentrix CVG Delaware International Inc., Concentrix CVG Delaware International Inc. French Branch, Concentrix CVG Egypt Limited Liability Company, Concentrix CVG France S.A.R.L., Concentrix CVG Funding Inc., Concentrix CVG Global Services AZ Inc., Concentrix CVG Global Services El Salvador S.A. de C.V., Concentrix CVG Global Services Honduras S.A., Concentrix CVG Global Services Hong Kong Limited, Concentrix CVG Government Solutions LLC, Concentrix CVG Group Limited, Concentrix CVG Group Servicios de Apoyo Informatico S.L., Concentrix CVG Holding LLC, Concentrix CVG Intelligent Contact Limited, Concentrix CVG International Bulgaria EOOD, Concentrix CVG International Holding Ltd., Concentrix CVG International Holding Ltd. Dominican Republic Branch, Concentrix CVG International Sp. Z.o.o., Concentrix CVG Italy S.R.L., Concentrix CVG LLC, Concentrix CVG Learning Solutions LLC, Concentrix CVG Malaysia (Philippines) SDN. BHD. Philippine Branch, Concentrix CVG Malaysia (Phillipines) Sdn. Bhd., Concentrix CVG Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., Concentrix CVG Nicaragua S.A., Concentrix CVG Philippines Inc., Concentrix CVG Pte. Ltd., Concentrix CVG Services Singapore Pte. Ltd., Concentrix CVG Services Singapore Pte. Ltd. ROHQ, Concentrix CVG Singapore Holdings Pte. Ltd., Concentrix CVG Singapore Holdings Pte. Ltd. ROHQ, Concentrix CVG Tunisie BPO S.A.R.L., Concentrix CVG Tunisie S.A.R.L., Concentrix Coop Holdco Limited, Concentrix Corporation, Concentrix Costa Rica S.A., Concentrix Daksh Services India Private Limited, Concentrix Daksh Services Philippines Corporation, Concentrix Digital Services Limited, Concentrix Duisburg GmbH, Concentrix Dusseldorf GmbH, Concentrix Europe Limited, Concentrix Frankfurt a. M. GmbH, Concentrix Free Trade Zone S.A., Concentrix GBS Limited, Concentrix Gera GmbH, Concentrix Global Holdings Inc., Concentrix Global Services GmbH, Concentrix Gmbh, Concentrix HK Limited, Concentrix Halle GmbH, Concentrix Insurance Administration Solutions Corporation, Concentrix International Europe B.V., Concentrix International GmbH, Concentrix International Services Europe B.V., Concentrix Investment Holdings Corporation, Concentrix Investment Holdings Singapore 1 Pte. Ltd, Concentrix Investment Holdings Singapore 2 Pte. Ltd, Concentrix Investment Holdings Singapore 3 Pte. Ltd, Concentrix Investments Europe B.V., Concentrix Ireland Contact Services Limited, Concentrix Ireland Limited, Concentrix Leipzig GmbH, Concentrix Logistics Corporation, Concentrix Management Holding GmbH & Co. KG, Concentrix Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V, Concentrix Munster GmbH, Concentrix New (BVI) Corporation, Concentrix NewHK Limited, Concentrix Nicaragua S.A., Concentrix Osnabruck GmbH, Concentrix Rechenzentrum GmbH, Concentrix Romania S.R.L., Concentrix Schwerin GmbH, Concentrix Service Hungary KFT, Concentrix Services (Colombia) S.A.S., Concentrix Services (Dalian) Co. Ltd., Concentrix Services (Dalian) Co. Ltd. Beijing Branch, Concentrix Services (Dalian) Co. Ltd. Shanghai Branch, Concentrix Services (Germany) GmbH, Concentrix Services (Ireland) Limited, Concentrix Services (Netherlands) B.V., Concentrix Services (New Zealand) Limited, Concentrix Services (Poland) spolka z o.o., Concentrix Services (Saudi Arabia) Corporation LLC, Concentrix Services (Singapore) Pte. Ltd., Concentrix Services (Thailand) Co. Ltd, Concentrix Services (Uruguay) S.A., Concentrix Services Bulgaria EOOD, Concentrix Services Corporation, Concentrix Services Corporation Philippines Branch, Concentrix Services Germany GmbH Sverige filial, Concentrix Services GmbH, Concentrix Services Holdco (Netherlands) B.V., Concentrix Services India Private Limited, Concentrix Services Korea Limited, Concentrix Services Mexico S.A. de C.V., Concentrix Services Philippines Inc., Concentrix Services Portugal Sociedade Unipessoal LDA, Concentrix Services Pty Ltd, Concentrix Services Pty Ltd ROHQ, Concentrix Services Slovakia s.r.o., Concentrix Services Spain S.L.U., Concentrix Services UK Limited, Concentrix Services US Inc., Concentrix Technologies (India) Private Limited, Concentrix Technologies Limited, Concentrix Technologies Services (Canada) Limited, Concentrix Technology FZ-LLC, Concentrix VN Technologies Services Company Limited, Concentrix Verwaltungs GmbH, Concentrix Wismar GmbH, Concentrix Wuppertal GmbH, Convergys, Convergys Customer Management Colombia S.A.S., Convergys Customer Management Group Canada Holding Inc., Convergys Customer Management Group Inc. Philippines Branch, Convergys Customer Management International Inc., Convergys Customer Management International Inc. - Regional Operating Headquarters, Convergys Customer Management Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., Convergys France S.A.R.L. (Mauritius Branch), Convergys Holdings (GB) Limited, Convergys Holdings (UK) Limited, Convergys Hungary Kft., Convergys India Services Private Limited, Convergys International Inc., Convergys International Nordic AB, Convergys Netherlands Investments B.V., Convergys Services Denmark ApS, Convergys Software Service (Beijing) Ltd., Convergys South Africa (Pty) Ltd., CyberLogistics Corporation, Dalian Jumeng Information Services Ltd., Dalian Jumeng Technology Development Ltd., EMJ America Inc., Encore Receivable Management Inc., Encore Receivable Management Inc. Philippines Branch, Foshan Jumeng Information Technology Service Co. Ltd, GLS Software S. de R.L., Guiyang Jumeng Technology Development Ltd., Hyve IT Solutions Israel Ltd, Hyve IT Solutions South Africa (PTY) Ltd., Hyve SNX Solutions Ireland Limited, Hyve Solutions (Taiwan) Corporation, Hyve Solutions Canada Limited, Hyve Solutions China Limited, Hyve Solutions Corporation, Hyve Solutions Europe Limited, Hyve Solutions HK Limited, Hyve Solutions Holding Company Limited, Hyve Solutions India LLP, Hyve Solutions Japan K.K., Hyve Solutions Korea Limited, Hyve Solutions Malaysia SDN.BHD., Hyve Solutions New Zealand Limited, Hyve Solutions Singapore Pte. Ltd, Hyve Solutions US Global Holding Corporation, IBM World Wide Customer Care, Intervoice Acquisition Subsidiary Inc., Intervoice Colombia Ltda., Intervoice GP Inc., Intervoice GmbH, Intervoice LLC Canada Branch, Intervoice LP Inc., Intervoice Limited, Intervoice Limited Partnership, Intervoice do Brasil Comercio Servicos e Participacoes Ltda., Jack Of All Games Inc., Japan Concentrix KK, LATAM HoldCo Limited, Lasting Holdings Corporation, License Online Inc, Minacs, Minacs Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., PT Concentrix Services Indonesia, PT Convergys Customer Management Indonesia, Pegasus Telecom LLC, SCGS (Malaysia) SDN. BHD., SGS Holdings Inc., SGS Tunisie S.A.R.L., SIT Funding Corporation, SYNNEX Canada Limited, SYNNEX Finance Hybrid II LLC, SYNNEX Information Technologies (Beijing) Ltd., SYNNEX Information Technologies (Chengdu) Ltd., SYNNEX Information Technologies (China) Ltd., SYNNEX Japan Corporation, SYNNEX Japan Holdings K.K., SYNNEX Servicios S.A. de C.V., SYNNEX Software Technologies (HK) Limited, SYNNEX de Mexico S.A. de C.V., SYNNEX-Concentrix UK Limited, Sennex Enterprises Limited, Servicios Afinasis S.A. de C.V., Shenzhen Shunrong Telecommunication Technologies Ltd., Shenzhen Shunrong Telecommunication Technologies Ltd. Foshan Branch, Sichuan 86Bridge Information Technology Ltd., Stream Business Process Outsourcing South Africa (Proprietary) Ltd., Stream Florida Inc., Stream Global Services - US Inc., Stream Global Services Danmark ApS, Stream Global Services Inc., Stream Holdings Corporation, Suzhou Ke Wei Xun Information Services Co. Ltd., Tech Data, The Global Email Trustee Limited, Tigerspike Co. Ltd, Tigerspike FZ LLC Rep. Office, Tigerspike FZ-LLC, Tigerspike Holdings Pty Ltd, Tigerspike Inc., Tigerspike Ltd, Tigerspike Products Pte. Ltd., Tigerspike Pte. Ltd., Tigerspike Pty Ltd, Velami Holdings Corporation, Vietnam Concentrix Services Company Limited, VisionMAX, WG-UK Holding Company Limited, WG-US HoldCo Inc, Westcon Brasil Ltda., Westcon CALA Inc., Westcon Canada Systems (WCSI) Inc., Westcon Corporation Ecuador WCE Cia. Ltda, Westcon Group Colombia Limitada, Westcon Group Costa Rica S.A., Westcon Group El Salvador S.A. de C.V., Westcon Group Inc., Westcon Group North America Inc., Westcon Group Panama S.A., Westcon Mexico S.A. de C.V., Westcon-Comstor, Xi'an Jumeng Technologies Development Ltd, and eTelecare Philippines Inc..Two people were killed in a crash involving a freight train and an Amtrak passenger train headed to Miami early Sunday in South Carolina, authorities said.

In addition to the fatalities, at least 70 people were wounded, Lexington County spokesman Harrison Cahill said.

They suffered injuries ranging from scratches to broken bones, Cahill added.

Amtrak Train 91 collided with a CSX freight train at about 2:35 a.m. in Cayce. The lead engine and some passenger cars derailed, Amtrak said in a statement.

The train was traveling between New York and Miami, and had 139 passengers and eight crew members, it added.

All passengers were evacuated off the train Sunday morning, Cahill said.

This is the latest incident involving an Amtrak train in the past few weeks.

In December, an Amtrak train derailed near DuPont in Washington state and hurtled off an overpass onto Interstate 5, killing three people and injuring dozens. The Amtrak engineer on that train told investigators he mistook a signal and braked moments before the deadly crash, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.

Last week, an Amtrak train carrying members of Congress to a Republican retreat in West Virginia struck a truck near Charlottesville, Virginia. Investigators looking into the crash are focusing on the actions of the driver of a truck, a source with knowledge of the investigation told CNN.

Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0Rojas younger sister, Gabriela Rojas, died in childbirth two years ago. Gabriela was a supervisor at Bayview Vineyards and was always a source of motivation for her. Rojas said that, during the competition, it felt like Gabriela was with her.

Rojas has been working in the vineyards for 11 years.

The winner of the mens competition, David Aguilar of Edcora Vineyards, said that he knew he was going to win this year. This was his third year participating in the contest, but the first time he has won.

This year I was not too nervous, Aguilar said. Its difficult having the timers watching you as you work, he said, but this time it didnt bother him. Ive (been) practicing pruning, he said.

Aguilar has been working in the vineyards for four years.

Brenda Gonzalezs husband works with Aguilar, so the whole family was there to watch him win.

Its very fun, Gonzalez said. She was happy that Aguilar won and, she said, she and the children enjoyed the food. Her daughter, Melanie, was busy making wreaths out of freshly cut vines with some of the other children much of the day.Weatherford International plc, an oilfield service company, provides equipment and services for the drilling, evaluation, completion, production, and intervention of oil and natural gas wells worldwide. The company operates in two segments, Western Hemisphere and Eastern Hemisphere. It offers artificial lift systems, including reciprocating rod, progressing cavity pumping, gas, hydraulic, plunger, and hybrid lift systems, as well as related automation and control systems; pressure pumping and reservoir stimulation services, such as acidizing, fracturing and fluid systems, cementing, and coiled-tubing intervention; and drill stem test tools, and surface well testing and multiphase flow measurement services. The company also provides safety, downhole reservoir monitoring, flow control, and multistage fracturing systems, as well as sand-control technologies, and production and isolation packers; liner hangers to suspend a casing string in high-temperature and high-pressure wells; cementing products, including plugs, float and stage equipment, and torque-and-drag reduction technology for zonal isolation; and pre-job planning and installation services. In addition, it offers directional drilling services, and logging and measurement services while drilling; services related to rotary-steerable systems, high-temperature and high-pressure sensors, drilling reamers, and circulation subs; managed pressure drilling, conventional mud-logging, drilling instrumentation, gas analysis, wellsite consultancy, and open hole and cased-hole logging services; reservoir solutions and software products; and intervention and remediation services. Further, the company provides equipment and drilling tools; tubular handling, management, and connection services; equipment rental services; and onshore contract drilling and related services through a fleet of land drilling and workover rigs. Weatherford International plc was incorporated in 1972 and is headquartered in Baar, Switzerland.

Read MoreThe following companies are subsidiares of Eli Lilly and: 1096401 B.C. Unlimited Liability Company, ARMO BioSciences Inc, ARMO Bioscience, Advanced Cardiovascular Systems, Alnara Pharmaceuticals, Alnara Pharmaceuticals Inc., Andean Technical Operations Center, Applied Molecular Evolution Inc., AurKa Pharma, Avid Radiopharmaceuticals, Avid Radiopharmaceuticals Inc., ChemGen, CoLucid Pharmaceuticals, CoLucid Pharmaceuticals Inc., Dermira, Devices for Vascular Intervention(DVI), Disarm Therapeutics, Dista Ilac Ticaret Ltd. Sti., Dista S.A., Dista-Produtos Quimicos & Farmaceuticos LDA, ELCO Dominicana SRL, ELCO Insurance Company Limited, ELCO Management Inc., ELCO for Trade and Marketing S.A.E., ELGO Insurance Company Limited, Elanco Animal Health Ireland Limited, Elanco Switzerland Holding Sarl, Eli Lilly (Malaysia) Sdn. Bhd., Eli Lilly (Philippines) Incorporated, Eli Lilly (S.A.) (Proprietary) Limited, Eli Lilly (Singapore) Pte. Ltd., Eli Lilly (Suisse) S.A., Eli Lilly Asia Inc., Eli Lilly Asia Pacific SSC Sdn Bhd, Eli Lilly Australia Pty. Limited, Eli Lilly B-H d.o.o., Eli Lilly Benelux S.A., Eli Lilly Bienes y Servicios S de RL de CV, Eli Lilly CR s.r.o., Eli Lilly Canada Inc., Eli Lilly Cork Limited, Eli Lilly Danmark A/S, Eli Lilly Egypt for Trading, Eli Lilly European Clinical Trial Services SA, Eli Lilly Export S.A., Eli Lilly Finance S.A., Eli Lilly Ges.m.b.H., Eli Lilly Group Limited, Eli Lilly Holdings Ltd., Eli Lilly Hrvatska d.o.o., Eli Lilly Interamerica Inc., Eli Lilly Interamerica Inc. y Compania Limitada, Eli Lilly International Corporation, Eli Lilly Ireland Holdings Limited, Eli Lilly Israel Ltd., Eli Lilly Italia S.p.A., Eli Lilly Japan K.K., Eli Lilly Kinsale Limited, Eli Lilly Nederland B.V., Eli Lilly Nigeria Ltd., Eli Lilly Norge A.S., Eli Lilly Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd., Eli Lilly Polska Sp.z.o.o. (Ltd.), Eli Lilly Regional Operations GmbH, Eli Lilly Romania SRL, Eli Lilly S.A., Eli Lilly Saudi Arabia Limited, Eli Lilly Services Inc, Eli Lilly Services India Private Limited, Eli Lilly Slovakia s.r.o., Eli Lilly Sweden AB, Eli Lilly Vostok S.A. Geneva, Eli Lilly and Company, Eli Lilly and Company (India) Pvt. Ltd., Eli Lilly and Company (Ireland) Limited, Eli Lilly and Company (N.Z.) Limited, Eli Lilly and Company (Taiwan) Inc., Eli Lilly and Company Limited, Eli Lilly de Centro America S.A., Eli Lilly do Brasil Limitada, Eli Lilly farmacevtska druzba d.o.o., Eli Lilly y Compania de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Eli Lilly y Compania de Venezuela S.A., Glycostasis Inc, Greenfield-Produtos Farmaceuticos Lda., Heart Rhythm Technologies Inc, Hybritech, Hypnion, ICOS Corporation, ImClone GmbH, ImClone LLC, ImClone Systems Holdings Inc., ImClone Systems LLC, Imclone Systems, Irisfarma S.A., Ivy Animal Health, Kinsale Financial Services Unlimited Company, Lilly (Shanghai) Management Co. Ltd, Lilly Asia Ventures Fund I L.P., Lilly Asia Ventures Fund II L.P., Lilly Asian Ventures Fund III L.P., Lilly Cayman Holdings, Lilly China Research and Development Co. Ltd., Lilly Deutschland GmbH, Lilly France S.A.S., Lilly Global Nederland Holdings B.V., Lilly Global Services Inc., Lilly Holding GmbH, Lilly Holdings B.V., Lilly Hungaria KFT, Lilly Japan Financing G.K., Lilly Korea Ltd., Lilly Nederland Finance B.V., Lilly Nederland Finance B.V. - GCC, Lilly Nederland Holding B.V., Lilly Pharma Ltd., Lilly Portugal - Produtos Farmaceuticos Lda., Lilly S.A., Lilly Suzhou Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd., Lilly Trading Co. LTD, Lilly USA LLC, Lilly Ventures Fund I LLC, Lilly del Caribe Inc., Lilly ilac ticaret limited sirketi, Lohmann Animal Health, Loxo Oncology, Lylly Centre for Clinical Pharmacology PTE. LTD., Novartis Animal Health, OY Eli Lilly Finland AB, Origin Medsystems, PT. Eli Lilly Indonesia, Pacific Biotech, Pharmaserve-Lilly S.A.C.I., Physio-Control, SGX Pharmaceuticals, SGX Pharmaceuticals Inc, Spaly Bioquimica S.A., UAB Eli Lilly Lietuva, Valquifarma S.A., and Vital Pharma Productos Farmaceuticos.The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. is an insurance and financial services company. The company provides life insurance, group and employee benefits, automobile and homeowners insurance and business insurance, as well as investment products, annuities, mutual funds, and college savings plans. It operates through the following segments: Commercial Lines, Personal Lines, Property & Casualty Other Operations, Group Benefits and Hartford Funds. The Commercial Lines segment provides workers compensation, property, automobile, liability and umbrella coverage under several different products, primarily throughout the U.S., within its standard commercial lines, which consists of The Hartford's small commercial and middle market lines of business. The Personal Lines segment includes automobile, homeowners and home-based business coverage to individuals across the U.S. The Property & Casualty Other Operations segment includes certain property and casualty operations, currently managed by the company, that have discontinued writing new business and substantially all of the company's asbestos and environmental exposures. The Group Benefits segment offers group life, accident and disabi

Read MoreBank of America Corp. is a bank and financial holding company, which engages in the provision of banking and nonbank financial services. It operates through the following segments: Consumer Banking, Global Wealth and Investment Management, Global Banking, Global Markets, and All Other. The Consumer Banking segment offers credit, banking, and investment products and services to consumers and small businesses. The Global Wealth and Investment Management provides client experience through a network of financial advisors focused on to meet their needs through a full set of investment management, brokerage, banking, and retirement products. The Global Banking segment deals with lending-related products and services, integrated working capital management and treasury solutions to clients, and underwriting and advisory services. The Global Markets segment includes sales and trading services, as well as research, to institutional clients across fixed-income, credit, currency, commodity, and equity businesses. The All Other segment consists of asset and liability management activities, equity investments, non-core mortgage loans and servicing activities, the net impact of periodic revisions

Read MoreAnti-immigration activists have also tried to vilify birthright citizenship through insulting language.

The 14th Amendment provision that anyone born on American soil is automatically a citizen is part of what makes the United States exceptional: Being American is not just about blood. Some, however, have demonized the U.S.-born children of noncitizens as "anchor babies," as if they were part of some nefarious plot to, say, "brown" America.

Of course pro-immigration activists bend language to their ends as well. Perhaps the most significant example of late is the term "Dreamer," which emerged to counter the rhetoric that immigrants in the country illegally are all criminals who bleed the safety net at the expense of honest natives. Dreamer, used to refer to those brought to this country as children, evokes a young person ready to make positive contributions to society despite his or her lack of documentation.

At this point in our history, we should have learned not to fall for rhetoric that collapses processes of change into simple tropes of good and evil. Instead of obsessing over who's worthy to become an American, whatever that means, we need to refocus the immigration debate on how best to include and integrate newcomers. Inclusivity and integration: the very values on which chain migration is based.

Leo R. Chavez is a professor of anthropology at UC Irvine. He wrote this for the Los Angeles Times. American Consumer News, LLC dba MarketBeat 2010-2021. All rights reserved.

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 2021 Market data provided is at least 10-minutes delayed and hosted by Barchart Solutions. Information is provided 'as-is' and solely for informational purposes, not for trading purposes or advice, and is delayed. To see all exchange delays and terms of use please see disclaimer. Fundamental company data provided by Zacks Investment Research.DTE Energy Co. operates as a diversified energy company, which engages in the provision of electricity and natural gas sales, distribution and storage services. It operates through the following segments: Electric, Gas, Non-Utility Operations, and Corporate & Other. The Electric segment engages in the generation, purchase, distribution and sale of electricity to residential, commercial and industrial customers in south-eastern Michigan. The Gas segment engages in the purchase, storage, transportation, distribution and sale of natural gas to residential, commercial and industrial customers throughout Michigan and the sale of storage and transportation capacity. The Non-Utility Operations segment engages in gas storage and pipelines, power and industrial projects, and energy trading. The Corporate & Other includes various holding company activities, holds certain non-utility debt, and holds energy-related investments. The company was founded in January 1995 and is headquartered in Detroit, MI.

Read MoreThe following companies are subsidiares of The Travelers Companies: 10762962 Canada Inc., 350 Market Street LLC, 8527512 Canada Inc., Aetna Life and Casualty Co, American Equity Insurance Company, American Equity Specialty Insurance Company, Aprilgrange Limited, Arch Street North LLC, Auto Hartford Investments LLC, Bayhill Restaurant II Associates, Camperdown Corporation, Constitution State Services LLC, Discover Property & Casualty Insurance Company, Discover Specialty Insurance Company, F&G UK Underwriters Limited, Farmington Casualty Company, Fidelity and Guaranty Insurance Company, Fidelity and Guaranty Insurance Underwriters Inc., First Floridian Auto and Home Insurance Company, Gulf Underwriters Insurance Company, IHP Capital Partners Fund VIII L.P., Northbrook Holdings Inc., Northfield Insurance Company, Northland Casualty Company, Northland Insurance Company, Phoenix UK Investments LLC, SPC Insurance Agency Inc., Select Insurance Company, Simply Business Holdings Inc., Simply Business Inc., St. Paul Fire and Marine Insurance Company, St. Paul Guardian Insurance Company, St. Paul Mercury Insurance Company, St. Paul Protective Insurance Company, St. Paul Surplus Lines Insurance Company, Standard Fire Properties LLC, Standard Fire UK Investments LLC, TCI Global Services Inc., TPC Investments Inc., TPC U.K. Investments LLC, The Automobile Insurance Company of Hartford Connecticut, The Charter Oak Fire Insurance Company, The Dominion of Canada General Insurance Company, The Family Business Institute LLC, The Phoenix Insurance Company, The St. Paul Companies Inc., The Standard Fire Insurance Company, The Travelers Casualty Company, The Travelers Home and Marine Insurance Company, The Travelers Indemnity Company, The Travelers Indemnity Company of America, The Travelers Indemnity Company of Connecticut, The Travelers Lloyds Insurance Company, TravCo Insurance Company, Travelers (Bermuda) Limited, Travelers Brazil Acquisition LLC, Travelers Brazil Holding LLC, Travelers Casualty Company of Connecticut, Travelers Casualty Insurance Company of America, Travelers Casualty UK Investments LLC, Travelers Casualty and Surety Company, Travelers Casualty and Surety Company of America, Travelers Casualty and Surety Company of Europe Limited, Travelers Commercial Casualty Company, Travelers Commercial Insurance Company, Travelers Constitution State Insurance Company, Travelers Distribution Alliance Inc., Travelers Excess and Surplus Lines Company, Travelers Global Inc., Travelers Indemnity U.K. Investments LLC, Travelers Insurance Company Limited, Travelers Insurance Company of Canada, Travelers Insurance Designated Activity Company, Travelers Insurance Group Holdings Inc., Travelers Lloyds of Texas Insurance Company, Travelers London Limited, Travelers MGA Inc., Travelers Management Limited, Travelers Marine LLC, Travelers Participacoes em Seguros Brasil S.A., Travelers Personal Insurance Company, Travelers Personal Security Insurance Company, Travelers Property Casualty Company of America, Travelers Property Casualty Corp., Travelers Property Casualty Insurance Company, Travelers Seguros Brasil S.A., Travelers Syndicate Management Limited, Travelers Texas MGA Inc., Travelers Underwriting Agency Limited, Ultramar Travel Management, United States Fidelity and Guaranty Company, Xbridge Limited, Zensurance Brokers Inc., and Zensurance Inc..First American Financial Corp. operates as an insurance company. It provides title insurance and settlement services to the real estate and mortgage industries. The company operates its business through the following segments: Title Insurance & Services and Specialty Insurance. The Title Insurance & Services segment provides title insurance, escrow, closing services and similar or related financial services domestically and internationally in connection with residential and commercial real estate transactions. It also maintains, manages and provides access to title plant records and images and provides banking, trust and investment advisory services. The Specialty Insurance segment issues property & casualty insurance policies and sells home warranty products. It also provides title plant management services, which include title and other real property records and images, valuation products and services, home warranty products, property and casualty insurance and banking, trust and investment advisory services. First American Financial was founded in January, 2008 and is headquartered in Santa Ana, CA.

Read MoreProving public corruption has never been easy. The demise of the federal government's case against Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., is the latest sign that it's getting more difficult every day.

Federal prosecutors announced Wednesday they will not seek to retry Menendez and his co-defendant, Salomon Melgen, on federal corruption charges. Their trial this past fall ended in November with the jury hung 10 to 2 in favor of acquittal. The government charged that over a seven-year period, Melgen showered Menendez with gifts including private jet travel, luxury vacations and hundreds of thousands of dollars in political contributions. In exchange, prosecutors alleged, Menendez interceded on Melgen's behalf in various disputes he was having with the federal government.

Less than two weeks ago, prosecutors announced their intention to try again. Menendez was gearing up for a new trial that would coincide with his facing a potential re-election fight in November and a new challenger in the New Jersey Democratic primary before that. But then, on Jan. 24, the trial judge acquitted the defendants on seven of the 18 counts in the indictment, ruling that a rational jury could not find them guilty on the evidence presented at trial. Left with a dramatically diminished case, prosecutors threw in the towel.GlaxoSmithKline Plc is a healthcare company, which engages in the research, development, and manufacture of pharmaceutical medicines, vaccines, and consumer healthcare products. It operates through the following segments: Pharmaceuticals; Pharmaceuticals R&D; Vaccines and Consumer Healthcare. The Pharmaceuticals segment focuses on developing medicines in respiratory and infectious diseases, oncology, and immuno-inflammation. The Pharmaceuticals R&D segment focuses on science related to the immune system, the use of human genetics and advanced technologies, and is driven by the multiplier effect of Science x Technology x Culture. The Vaccines segment produces pediatric and adult vaccines to prevent a range of infectious diseases including, hepatitis A and B, diphtheria, tetanus and whooping cough, measles, mumps and rubella, polio, typhoid, influenza, and bacterial meningitis. The Consumer Healthcare segment develops and markets brands in the oral health, pain relief, respiratory, nutrition and gastro intestinal, and skin health categories. The company was founded in 1715 and is headquartered in Middlesex, the United Kingdom.

Read MoreSunTrust Banks, Inc. operates as the holding company for SunTrust Bank that provides various financial services for consumers, businesses, corporations, institutions, and not-for-profit entities in the United States. It operates in two segments, Consumer and Wholesale. The Consumer segment provides deposits and payments; home equity and personal credit lines; auto, student, and other lending products; credit cards; discount/online and full-service brokerage products; professional investment advisory products and services; and trust services, as well as family office solutions. This segment also offers residential mortgage products in the secondary market. The Wholesale segment provides capital markets solutions, including advisory, capital raising, and financial risk management; asset-based financing solutions, such as securitizations, asset-based lending, equipment financing, and structured real estate arrangements; cash management services and auto dealer financing solutions; investment banking solutions; and credit and deposit, fee-based product offering, multi-family agency lending, advisory, commercial mortgage brokerage, and tailored financing and equity investment solutions. This segment also offers treasury and payment solutions, such as operating various electronic and paper payment types, which comprise card, wire transfer, automated clearing house, check, and cash; and provides services clients to manage their accounts online. The company offers its products and services through a network of traditional and in-store branches, automated teller machines, Internet, mobile, and telephone banking channels. As of December 31, 2018, it operated 1,218 full-service banking offices located in Florida, Georgia, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Maryland, South Carolina, and the District of Columbia. SunTrust Banks, Inc. was founded in 1891 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.

Read MoreThe following companies are subsidiares of Humana: 154th Street Medical Plaza, 516-526 West Main Street Condominium Council of Co-Owners, 54th Street Medical Plaza, American Eldercare, American Eldercare of North Florida, Anvita Health, Arcadian Health Plan, Arcadian Management Services, Atlantis Physician Group, CAC Medical Center Holdings, CAC-Florida Medical Centers, CDO 1, CDO 2, CHA HMO, CHA Service Company, Care Partners Home Care, CareNetwork, CarePlus Health, CarePlus Health Plans, Cariten Health Plan Inc., Certify Data Systems, CompBenefits, CompBenefits Company, CompBenefits Corporation, CompBenefits Dental, CompBenefits Direct, CompBenefits Insurance Company, Complex Clinical Management, Concentra Managed Care, Continucare Corporation, Continucare MDHC, Continucare MSO, Continucare Medical Management, Dental Care Plus Management, DentiCare, Emphesys, Emphesys Insurance Company, Enclara Healthcare, FPG, FPG Acquisition Corp., FPG Acquisition Holdings Corp., FPG Senior Services, Family Physicians of Winter Park, Go365, HUM Provider Holdings, HUM-e-FL, Harris Rothenberg International, Health Value Management, Humana Active Outlook, Humana At Home (Dallas), Humana At Home (Houston), Humana At Home (San Antonio), Humana At Home (TLC), Humana At Home 1, Humana Behavioral Health, Humana Benefit Plan of Illinois, Humana Dental Company, Humana Digital Health and Analytics Platform Services, Humana EAP and Work-Life Services of California, Humana Employers Health Plan of Georgia, Humana Government Business, Humana Health Benefit Plan of Louisiana, Humana Health Company of New York, Humana Health Insurance Company of Florida, Humana Health Plan, Humana Health Plan of California, Humana Health Plan of Ohio, Humana Health Plan of Texas, Humana Health Plans of Puerto Rico, Humana Healthcare Research, Humana Inc., Humana Innovation Enterprises, Humana Insurance Company, Humana Insurance Company of Kentucky, Humana Insurance Company of New York, Humana Insurance of Puerto Rico, Humana Management Services of Puerto Rico, Humana MarketPOINT, Humana MarketPOINT of Puerto Rico, Humana Medical Plan, Humana Medical Plan of Michigan, Humana Medical Plan of Pennsylvania, Humana Medical Plan of Utah, Humana Pharmacy, Humana Pharmacy Solutions, Humana Regional Health Plan, Humana Veterans Healthcare Services, Humana WellWorks LLC, Humana Wisconsin Health Organization Insurance Corporation, Humana at Home, HumanaDental, HumanaDental Insurance Company, Humco, Hummingbird Coaching Systems LLC, Independent Care Health Plan, KMG America, Kindred Healthcare, MCCI Group Holdings, MCCI Holdings, MCCI Medical Group, MCCI Specialty, MCCI/Lifetime of Aventura, MD Care, METCARE of Florida, Managed Care Indemnity, Medical Care Consortium Incorporated of Texas, MetCare, Metropolitan Health Networks, Naples Health Care Specialists, North Region Providers, Nursing Solutions, OSF HealthCare, PHP Companies, Partners in Integrated Care, Preferred Health Partnership, Preservation on Main, Primary Care Holdings, Primary Care Holdings II, Primary Care Specialists of the Palm Beaches, RMA Medical Centers of Florida, RMA Medical Group of Florida, ROHC, SeniorBridge, SeniorBridge Family Companies (CT), SeniorBridge Family Companies (FL), SeniorBridge Family Companies (IN), SeniorBridge Family Companies (MO), SeniorBridge Family Companies (NY), SeniorBridge-Florida, Texas Dental Plans, The Dental Concern, Transcend Population Health Management, and Transcend Population Health Management II.American Electric Power Co., Inc. engages in the business of generation, transmission and distribution of electricity. It operates through the following segments: Vertically Integrated Utilities, Transmission & Distribution Utilities, AEP Transmission Holdco and Generation & Marketing. The Vertically Integrated Utilities segment engages in the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity for sale to retail and wholesale customers through assets owned and operated by its subsidiaries. The Transmission & Distribution Utilities segment engages in the business of transmission and distribution of electricity for sale to retail and wholesale customers through assets owned and operated by its subsidiaries. The AEP Transmission Holdco segment engages in the development, construction and operation of transmission facilities through investments in its wholly-owned transmission subsidiaries and joint ventures. The Generation & Marketing segment engages in non-regulated generation and marketing, risk management and retail activities. The company was founded on December 20, 1906 and is headquartered in Columbus, OH.

Read MoreNational Grid plc transmits and distributes electricity and natural gas. It operates through UK Electricity Transmission, UK Gas Transmission, US Regulated, and National Grid Ventures (NGV) and Other segments. The UK Electricity Transmission segment owns and operates electricity transmission networks, which comprise approximately 7,236 kilometers of overhead lines. The UK Gas Transmission segment owns and operates gas transmission systems, as well as third-party independent systems and liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage facilities. The US Regulated segments owns and operates transmission facilities across upstate New York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont; and electricity distribution networks in upstate New York, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. Its assets comprise 14,439 kilometers of overhead lines; an electricity distribution network of approximately 117,498 circuit miles; and a network of approximately 57,551 kilometers of gas pipeline. The NGV and Other segment engages in the energy metering business; transporting renewable energy long distances through its electricity interconnectors; and storing LNG, as well as commercial property and insurance activities in the United Kingdom. The company was founded in 1990 and is headquartered in London, the United Kingdom.

Read MoreThe following companies are subsidiares of Pfizer: AH Robins LLC, AHP Holdings B.V., AHP Manufacturing B.V., Agouron Pharmaceuticals LLC, Alacer, Alpharma Holdings LLC, Alpharma Pharmaceuticals LLC, Alpharma Specialty Pharma LLC, Alpharma USHP LLC, American Food Industries LLC, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Anacor Pharmaceuticals Inc., Angiosyn, Array BioPharma, Ayerst-Wyeth Pharmaceuticals LLC, BIND Therapeutics Inc., BINESA 2002 S.L., Bamboo Therapeutics, Bamboo Therapeutics Inc., Baxter International - Marketed Vaccines, BioRexis, Bioren, Bioren LLC, Blue Whale Re Ltd., C.E. Commercial Holdings C.V., C.E. Commercial Investments C.V., C.P. Pharmaceuticals International C.V., CICL Corporation, COC I Corporation, Catapult Genetics, Coley Pharmaceutical GmbH, Coley Pharmaceutical Group, Coley Pharmaceutical Group Inc., Continental Pharma Inc., Covx, Covx Technologies Ireland Limited, Cyanamid Inter-American Corporation, Cyanamid de Argentina S.A., Cyanamid de Colombia S.A., Distribuidora Mercantil Centro Americana S.A., Encysive Pharmaceuticals, Encysive Pharmaceuticals Inc., Esperion LUV Development Inc., Esperion Therapeutics, Excaliard Pharmaceuticals, Excaliard Pharmaceuticals Inc., Farminova Produtos Farmaceuticos de Inovacao Lda., Farmogene Productos Farmaceuticos Lda, Ferrosan A/S, Ferrosan International A/S, Ferrosan S.R.L., FoldRx Pharmaceuticals Inc., Foldrx Pharmaceuticals, Fort Dodge Manufatura Ltda., G. D. Searle & Co. Limited, G. D. Searle International Capital LLC, G. D. Searle LLC, GI Europe Inc., GI Japan Inc., GenTrac Inc., Genetics Institute LLC, Greenstone LLC, Haptogen Limited, Hospira, Hospira (China) Enterprise Management Co. Ltd., Hospira Adelaide Pty Ltd, Hospira Aseptic Services Limited, Hospira Australia Pty Ltd, Hospira Benelux BVBA, Hospira Chile Limitada, Hospira Deutschland GmbH, Hospira Enterprises B.V., Hospira France SAS, Hospira Healthcare B.V., Hospira Healthcare Corporation, Hospira Healthcare India Private Limited, Hospira Holdings (S.A.) Pty Ltd, Hospira Inc., Hospira Invicta S.A., Hospira Ireland Holdings Unlimited Company, Hospira Ireland Sales Limited, Hospira Japan G.K., Hospira Limited, Hospira Malaysia Sdn Bhd, Hospira NZ Limited, Hospira Nordic AB, Hospira Philippines Inc., Hospira Portugal LDA, Hospira Produtos Hospitalares Ltda., Hospira Pte. Ltd., Hospira Pty Limited, Hospira Puerto Rico LLC, Hospira Singapore Pte Ltd, Hospira UK Limited, Hospira Worldwide LLC, Hospira Zagreb d.o.o., ICAgen, Idun Pharmaceuticals, Industrial Santa Agape S.A., InnoPharma, InnoPharma Inc., International Affiliated Corporation LLC, JMI-Daniels Pharmaceuticals Inc., John Wyeth & Brother Limited, Kiinteisto oy Espoon Pellavaniementie 14, King Pharmaceuticals Holdings LLC, King Pharmaceuticals LLC, King Pharmaceuticals Research and Development LLC, Korea Pharma Holding Company Limited, Laboratoires Pfizer S.A., Laboratorios Parke Davis S.L., Laboratorios Pfizer Ltda., Laboratorios Wyeth LLC, Laboratorios Wyeth S.A., Laboratorios Pfizer Lda., MTG Divestitures LLC, Mayne Pharma IP Holdings (Euro) Pty Ltd, Medivation, Medivation Field Solutions LLC, Medivation LLC, Medivation Neurology LLC, Medivation Prostate Therapeutics LLC, Medivation Services LLC, Medivation Technologies LLC, Meridian Medical Technologies Inc., Meridian Medical Technologies Limited, Monarch Pharmaceuticals LLC, Neusentis Limited, NextWave Pharmaceuticals, NextWave Pharmaceuticals Incorporated, P-D Co. LLC, PAH USA IN8 LLC, PF Americas Holding C.V., PF Asia Manufacturing B.V., PF PR Holdings C.V., PF PRISM C.V., PF PRISM Holdings S.a.r.l., PF Prism S.a.r.l., PFE Holdings G.K., PFE PHAC Holdings 1 LLC, PFE Pfizer Holdings 1 LLC, PFE Wyeth Holdings LLC, PFE Wyeth-Ayerst (Asia) LLC, PHILCO Holdings S.a r.l., PHIVCO Corp., PHIVCO Holdco S.a r.l., PHIVCO Luxembourg S.a r.l., PN Mexico LLC, PT. Pfizer Parke Davis, Parke Davis & Company LLC, Parke Davis Limited, Parke Davis Productos Farmaceuticos Lda, Parke-Davis Manufacturing Corp., Parkedale Pharmaceuticals Inc., Peak Enterprises LLC, Pfizer, Pfizer (China) Research and Development Co. Ltd., Pfizer (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Pfizer (Perth) Pty Limited, Pfizer (Thailand) Limited, Pfizer (Wuhan) Research and Development Co. Ltd., Pfizer AB, Pfizer AG, Pfizer AS, Pfizer Africa & Middle East for Pharmaceuticals Veterinarian Products & Chemicals S.A.E., Pfizer Anti-Infectives AB, Pfizer ApS, Pfizer Asia Manufacturing Pte. Ltd., Pfizer Asia Pacific Pte Ltd., Pfizer Atlantic Holdings S.a.r.l., Pfizer Australia Holdings B.V., Pfizer Australia Holdings Pty Limited, Pfizer Australia Investments Pty. Ltd., Pfizer Australia Pty Limited, Pfizer B.V., Pfizer BH D.o.o., Pfizer Baltic Holdings B.V., Pfizer Biofarmaceutica Sociedade Unipessoal Lda, Pfizer Biologics (Hangzhou) Co. Ltd, Pfizer Biologics Ireland Holdings Limited, Pfizer Biotech Corporation, Pfizer Bolivia S.A., Pfizer Canada Inc., Pfizer CentreSource Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd., Pfizer Chile S.A., Pfizer Cia. Ltda., Pfizer Colombia Spinco I LLC, Pfizer Commercial Holdings Cooperatief U.A., Pfizer Commercial Holdings TRAE Kft., Pfizer Commercial TRAE Trading Kft., Pfizer Consumer Healthcare AB, Pfizer Consumer Healthcare GmbH, Pfizer Consumer Healthcare Ltd., Pfizer Consumer Manufacturing Italy S.r.l., Pfizer Corporation, Pfizer Corporation Austria Gesellschaft m.b.H., Pfizer Corporation Hong Kong Limited, Pfizer Croatia d.o.o., Pfizer Deutschland GmbH, Pfizer Development LP, Pfizer Development Services (UK) Limited, Pfizer Domestic Ventures Limited, Pfizer Dominicana S.R.L, Pfizer ESP Pty Ltd, Pfizer East India B.V., Pfizer Eastern Investments B.V., Pfizer Egypt S.A.E., Pfizer Enterprise Holdings B.V., Pfizer Enterprises LLC, Pfizer Enterprises SARL, Pfizer Europe Finance B.V., Pfizer Export B.V., Pfizer Export Company, Pfizer Export Holding Company B.V, Pfizer Finance Share Service (Dalian) Co. Ltd., Pfizer Financial Services N.V./S.A., Pfizer France International Investments, Pfizer Free Zone Panama S. de R.L., Pfizer GEP S.L., Pfizer Global Holdings B.V., Pfizer Global Supply Japan Inc., Pfizer Global Trading, Pfizer Group Luxembourg Sarl, Pfizer Gulf FZ-LLC, Pfizer H.C.P. Corporation, Pfizer HK Service Company Limited, Pfizer Health AB, Pfizer Health Solutions Inc., Pfizer Healthcare Ireland, Pfizer Hellas A.E., Pfizer Himalaya Holdings Cooperatief U.A., Pfizer Holding France, Pfizer Holding Ventures, Pfizer Holdings Corporation, Pfizer Holdings Europe Unlimited Company, Pfizer Holdings G.K., Pfizer Holdings International Corporation, Pfizer Holdings International Luxembourg (PHIL) Sarl, Pfizer Holdings North America SARL, Pfizer Hungary Holdings TRAE Kft., Pfizer Inc., Pfizer Innovations AB, Pfizer Innovations LLC, Pfizer Innovative Supply Point International BVBA, Pfizer International LLC, Pfizer International Markets Cooperatief U.A., Pfizer International Operations, Pfizer International S. de R.L., Pfizer International Trading (Shanghai) Limited, Pfizer Investment Capital Unlimited Company, Pfizer Investment Co. Ltd., Pfizer Investment Holdings S.a.r.l., Pfizer Ireland Investments Limited, Pfizer Ireland PFE Holding 1 LLC, Pfizer Ireland PFE Holding 2 LLC, Pfizer Ireland Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer Ireland Ventures Unlimited Company, Pfizer Italia S.r.l., Pfizer Italy Group Holding S.r.l., Pfizer Japan Inc., Pfizer LLC, Pfizer Laboratories (Pty) Limited, Pfizer Laboratories Limited, Pfizer Laboratories PFE (Pty) Ltd, Pfizer Leasing Ireland Limited, Pfizer Leasing UK Limited, Pfizer Limitada, Pfizer Limited, Pfizer Luxco Holdings SARL, Pfizer Luxembourg Global Holdings S.a r.l., Pfizer Luxembourg SARL, Pfizer MAP Holding Inc., Pfizer Manufacturing Austria G.m.b.H., Pfizer Manufacturing Belgium N.V., Pfizer Manufacturing Deutschland GmbH, Pfizer Manufacturing Deutschland Grundbesitz GmbH & Co. KG, Pfizer Manufacturing Holdings LLC, Pfizer Manufacturing Ireland Unlimited Company, Pfizer Manufacturing LLC, Pfizer Manufacturing Services, Pfizer Medical Technology Group (Belgium) N.V., Pfizer Medicamentos Genericos e Participacoes Ltda., Pfizer Mexico Luxco SARL, Pfizer Mexico S.A. de C.V., Pfizer Middle East for Pharmaceuticals Animal Health and Chemicals S.A.E., Pfizer New Zealand Limited, Pfizer Norge AS, Pfizer North American Holdings Inc., Pfizer OTC B.V., Pfizer Overseas LLC, Pfizer Oy, Pfizer PFE ApS, Pfizer PFE AsiaPac Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Australia Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Australia Pty Ltd, Pfizer PFE B.V., Pfizer PFE Baltic Holdings B.V., Pfizer PFE Belgium SPRL, Pfizer PFE Brazil Holding S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE CIA. Ltda., Pfizer PFE Chile Holding LLC, Pfizer PFE Colombia Holding Corp., Pfizer PFE Colombia S.A.S, Pfizer PFE Commercial Holdings LLC, Pfizer PFE Croatia Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Eastern Investments B.V., Pfizer PFE Finland Oy, Pfizer PFE France, Pfizer PFE Global Holdings B.V., Pfizer PFE Ireland Pharmaceuticals Holding 1 B.V., Pfizer PFE Italy Holdco 2 S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE Italy Holdco S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE Korlatolt Felelossegu Tarsasag, Pfizer PFE Limited, Pfizer PFE Luxembourg S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE Mexico Holding 3 LLC, Pfizer PFE Netherlands Holding 1 C.V., Pfizer PFE New Zealand, Pfizer PFE New Zealand Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Norway Holding S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE PILSA Holdco S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE Peru Holding LLC, Pfizer PFE Peru S.R.L., Pfizer PFE Pharmaceuticals Israel Holding LLC, Pfizer PFE Pharmaceuticals Israel Ltd., Pfizer PFE Private Limited, Pfizer PFE S.R.L, Pfizer PFE Service Company Holding Cooperatief U.A., Pfizer PFE Singapore Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Singapore Pte. Ltd., Pfizer PFE Spain B.V., Pfizer PFE Spain Holding S.L., Pfizer PFE Sweden Holding 2 S.a.r.l., Pfizer PFE Sweden Holding S.a.r.l., Pfizer PFE Switzerland GmbH, Pfizer PFE Turkey Holding 1 B.V., Pfizer PFE Turkey Holding 2 B.V., Pfizer PFE UK Holding 4 LP, Pfizer PFE US Holdings 1 LLC, Pfizer PFE US Holdings 2 LLC, Pfizer PFE US Holdings 3 LLC, Pfizer PFE US Holdings 4 LLC, Pfizer PFE US Holdings 5 LLC, Pfizer PFE spol. s r.o., Pfizer PFE Ilaclar Anonim Sirketi, Pfizer Pakistan Limited, Pfizer Parke Davis (Thailand) Ltd., Pfizer Parke Davis Inc., Pfizer Parke Davis Sdn. Bhd., Pfizer Pharm Algerie, Pfizer Pharma GmbH, Pfizer Pharma PFE GmbH, Pfizer Pharmaceutical (Wuxi) Co. Ltd., Pfizer Pharmaceutical Trading Limited Liability Company (a/k/a Pfizer Kft. or Pfizer LLC), Pfizer Pharmaceuticals B.V., Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Global B.V., Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Israel Ltd., Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Korea Limited, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals LLC, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Ltd., Pfizer Pigments Inc., Pfizer Polska Sp. z.o.o., Pfizer Private Limited, Pfizer Production LLC, Pfizer Products Inc., Pfizer Products India Private Limited, Pfizer Research (NC) Inc., Pfizer Romania SRL, Pfizer S.A., Pfizer S.A., Pfizer S.A. (Belgium), Pfizer S.A. de C.V., Pfizer S.A.S., Pfizer S.G.P.S. Lda., Pfizer S.L., Pfizer S.R.L., Pfizer SRB d.o.o., Pfizer Saidal Manufacturing, Pfizer Sante Familiale, Pfizer Saudi Limited, Pfizer Seiyaku K.K., Pfizer Service Company BVBA, Pfizer Service Company Ireland Unlimited Company, Pfizer Services 1, Pfizer Services LLC, Pfizer Shared Services Unlimited Company, Pfizer Shareholdings Intermediate SARL, Pfizer Singapore Holding Pte. Ltd., Pfizer Singapore Trading Pte. 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Ltd., Wyeth Pharmaceuticals Company, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals FZ-LLC, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals LLC, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals Limited, Wyeth Puerto Rico Inc., Wyeth S.A.S, Wyeth Subsidiary Illinois Corporation, Wyeth Whitehall Export GmbH, Wyeth Whitehall SARL, Wyeth-Ayerst (Asia) Limited, Wyeth-Ayerst International LLC, and Wyeth-Ayerst Promotions Limited.The requested page is currently unavailable on this server.

Back to [RTHK News Homepage]Idaho Independent Bank, a state-chartered bank, provides commercial banking services to individual and business customers in Idaho. The company offers checking and savings accounts, certificates of deposit, and individual retirement accounts, as well as credit and debit cards; and loans comprising home mortgage loans, construction loans, home equity lines of credit, auto loans, personal lines of credit, business term loans, operating lines of credit, commercial real estate loans, secured personal loans, commercial real estate loans, and small business loans, as well as agricultural equipment loans, farm acquisition loans, and government guaranteed loans. It also provides cash management services, including express deposit, wire transfers, automated clearing house, sweep accounts, imaging, positive pay, and other payment services, as well as merchant services. In addition, the company offers online banking, bill pay, overdraft opt-in/out, e-statements, cashier's check, safe deposit box, and mobile banking services. It operates through three branches in Boise, as well as branches in Coeur d'Alene, Hayden, Meridian, Nampa, Caldwell, Mountain Home, Ketchum, and Star, Idaho. Idaho Independent Bank was founded in 1993 and is based in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.

Read MoreVarian Medical Systems, Inc. designs, manufactures, sells, and services medical devices and software products for treating cancer and other medical conditions worldwide. It operates through Oncology Systems and Proton Solutions segments. The Oncology Systems segment offers hardware and software products for treating cancer with radiotherapy, fixed field intensity-modulated radiation therapy, image-guided radiation therapy, volumetric modulated arc therapy, stereotactic radiosurgery, stereotactic body radiotherapy, artificial intelligence based adaptive radiotherapy, and brachytherapy, as well as quality assurance equipment. Its products include linear accelerators, brachytherapy afterloaders, treatment accessories, and quality assurance software; and information management, treatment planning, image processing, clinical knowledge exchange, patient care management, decision-making support, and practice management software. This segment serves university research and community hospitals, private and governmental institutions, healthcare agencies, physicians' offices, medical oncology practices, radiotherapy centers, and cancer care clinics. The Proton Solutions segment designs, develops, manufactures, sells, and services products and systems for delivering proton therapy for the treatment of cancer. The company has a strategic agreement with McKesson Corp. to supply treatment delivery systems and planning, services, and radiotherapy information system solutions to its U.S. Oncology Network and Vantage Oncology affiliated sites of care; and a strategic partnership with Siemens AG to represent Siemens diagnostic imaging products to radiation oncology clinics in the United States and other select markets. Varian Medical Systems, Inc. was formerly known as Varian Associates, Inc. and changed its name to Varian Medical Systems, Inc. in April 1999. The company was founded in 1948 and is headquartered in Palo Alto, California.

Read MoreCranial bones of three primitive horned dinosaurs have been found in a Lower Cretaceous stratum in Sasayama, Hyogo Prefecture, western Japan, the Museum of Nature and Human Activities said Saturday.

Observing that the ages of the dinosaurs are different, the prefectural museum hopes that the bones can clarify the developmental process of the dinosaur species.

In 2009, fossils discovered in the same layer were confirmed for the first time in the country as skull bones of a horned dinosaur believed to be neoceratops.

This time, a total of 16 bone fossils were found, including upper and lower jaws and dentary bones and backbones 2 millimeters to 9 centimeters in length, the museum said.

The unique lines on the tooth surface suggest the creatures are also neoceratops, from which popular triceratops originated, it said, adding the size difference between the bones indicates the dinosaurs were not the same age.During a search, officials recovered nine crude gold bangles concealed beneath her dress.The bangles weighed 782 grams and were worth Rs 23.75 lakh.

Chennai: About 1.6 kg gold worth Rs 47 lakhs was seized by officials of the Customs air intelligence unit at the City airport in the past four days.

On Friday morning, lady passenger Sneha Rajkumar Karani, who arrived from Dubai by a Dubai Airlines, flight was detained on suspicion.

During a search, officials recovered nine crude gold bangles concealed beneath her dress.The bangles weighed 782 grams and were worth Rs 23.75 lakh.

Another passenger, Kamal Jeet Singh, who arrived on the same flight from Dubai was also detained and during searches, officials recovered one crude gold kada and one crude gold chain, which were concealed beneath his shirt.

Gold weighing 499 grams worth `15 lakh was recovered from him, an official said.Local residents along with the boy's family members staged a protest at the Karawal Nagar Chowk and demanded a probe into the matter. (Photo: ANI/Twitter)

New Delhi: An absconding minor accused in the murder of a class 9 student in the toilet of a school in northeast Delhi was on Saturday apprehended, the police said. This takes the total to four students who have been apprehended in the case.

16-year-old Tusshar died in his school's toilet after a fight with fellow students in northeast Delhi's Karawal Nagar.

After scanning CCTV footage, police apprehended three students of the school and transferred the case registered under Section 304 to 302 (murder).

They found that the boy had got involved in a fight with four students.

The boy fell down after receiving punches during the fight and died later, Ajit K Singla, DCP (northeast) said.

Tusshar was found unconscious by some students in the bathroom and was taken to a hospital. He was later referred to the GTB Hospital where he was declared brought dead, they said.

Though the school administration claimed that he was suffering loose motions, the boy's family alleged that he had a fight with some students and was thrashed, police said.

However, the police said that no injury marks were found on the boy's body.

On the basis of a complaint by the boy's family, a case was registered. The medical board will conduct the post-mortem on Friday, they said.

Police questioned his classmates and the students who had found him in an unconscious state in the bathroom.

Tusshar is a resident of Karawal Nagar.

The family also alleged that school authorities were trying to shield the students he had a fight with.

They alleged that he was beaten up by some students and left to die in the washroom, according to a report in NDTV.

Local residents along with the boy's family members staged a protest at the Karawal Nagar Chowk and demanded a probe into the matter.

This resembles the Pradyuman murder case, where a class 2 student of Gurgaon's Ryan International School was found dead with his throat slit in the school toilet on September 8 last year.

(With agency inputs)Soon after the Budget presentation, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu held a tele-conference with party MPs and instructed them to put pressure on the Central government in Parliament over the injustice done to Andhra Pradesh. (Photo: Twitter)

New Delhi: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national general secretary Ram Madhav on Saturday said that the party and the Centre would soon be extending the olive branch to Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and leader of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) N Chandrababu Naidu to resolve his concerns in a mutually beneficial to both parties.

Responding to Chandrababu Naidu's 'unhappiness' over the Budget allocations to Andhra Pradesh, Madhav said, "There seems to be some kind of unhappiness, we will talk it out. TDP is an old ally of the BJP. We will talk it out with them and will tell them we are committed to the interests of Andhra Pradesh."

Madhav further said, "We at the BJP are committed not only to address the TDP's concerns with regard to the Budget proposals, but also, all other issues of concern that it may have. We will convince Naidu and the TDP not to think of severing their ties with the BJP or the NDA. They are a valuable ally."

Ram Madhav's remarks assume significance as the TDP has called for an "emergency meeting" with party leaders on Sunday. During the meeting, the chief minister is expected to take some decisions regarding the party's alliance with BJP.

Soon after the Budget presentation, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu held a tele-conference with party MPs and instructed them to put pressure on the Central government in Parliament over the injustice done to Andhra Pradesh.

The chief minister said that he was highly disappointed with the Government at the Centre, stating that no funds were alloted for various institutions and projects in the state and also for the construction of APs capital city Amaravati.

He said that various issues including the Polavaram project and the Duggirajupatnam port in Nellore district were ignored in the Budget.

"We are going to declare war. We have three options - one is to try and continue, two is our MPs resign and the third is to end the alliance. We will decide in the meeting with the chief minister on Sunday," TDP parliamentarian TG Venkatesh had told media.

Also Read: Injustice to Andhra in Budget 2018, will declare war: Chandrababu-led TDP

Chandrababu Naidu had last week hinted at breaking alliance with the BJP.

Addressing a press conference in Amaravati at state secretariat, Naidu said, "If the BJP does not want to continue alliance then the TDP will on its own."

Also Read: Will go our own way if alliance not needed: Chandrababu Naidu warns BJP

Meanwhile, ridiculing CM Naidu for expressing displeasure over the Union Budget, YSR Congress president YS Jagan Mohan Reddy said that the TD, being a coalition partner, has to be part of the decisions taken by the NDA.

Addressing a large gathering at south Mopuru in Nellore Rural mandal on Saturday, leader of the Opposition said, Chandrababu Naidu expressing dissatisfaction is a drama as the Budget, before being presented, was approved by the Union Cabinet, in which TD has two ministers. The theatrics of Mr Naidu would not work anymore, however best the media tries to project him.

The Opposition leader said, Naidu backstabbed NTR and he can do the same to Narendra Modi or anyone else when time comes. The Union Budget is a collective decision and TD cannot refrain from taking the blame that the state interests have been ignored.

Calling out to the people to think before casting their votes, Reddy said, "Chandrababu Naidu may promise moon but the people should use your discretion in the ensuing elections".

Also Read: Budget is collective decision, CM playing drama: YS Jagan Mohan Reddy

(With agency inputs)Chennai: Police have seized duplicate watches worth Rs 75 lakh. According to a police source, the duplicate watches of high-end expensive brands like Rado, Rolex, Tissot, Cartier, Seiko and others have been seized from a watch shop in Kasi Chetty lane, Sowcarpet. About 5,000 such watches worth Rs 75 lakh have been seized from the shop by the Elephant Gate police station, the source added.

The raid has been conducted after a specific information and the direction of the city police commissioner, the source said.

The shop has been selling replicas of watches to other small sellers and individual customers. Those watches had been sold for Rs 4,000 to Rs 50,000, the police said.

Following the raid, the police also have arrested shop owner Janav Ram, employees Saravanan, Ganesh and Raji and the case has been handed over to CBCID for further investigation.Chennai: The recruitment which has become one of the major sources of corruption in all state universities has come to the light following the arrest of A.Ganapathy, vice-chancellor of Bharathiar University in Coimbatore, on Saturday.

Educationists allege that the rot is deeper and wider, starting from the vice-chancellors' appointment in which crores of money are allegedly exchanged.

They further alleged that all the universities including Anna University and Madras University have appointed the teaching and non-teaching staff by taking money during the tenures of previous vice-chancellors.

M.Anandakrishnan, former chairman, IIT Kanpur, called the arrest as most welcoming development. Whenever there are complaints of corruption on the part of senior educationists, the people generally tend to ignore it. For the first time, the action has been taken and he was caught red-handed, he said.

He said, The whole thing started when the politicians, sometimes even some chancellors started getting money for the appointment of vice-chancellors. There were ministers and chancellors collecting crores of rupees for appointing vice-chancellors. Even the search committee members were taking money.

Fortunately, that phase is over now. I don't think it is happening anymore. Now, I am happy that they are taking action against residual characters like Bharathiar University VC, he added.

The senior academician further expressed hope that the appointing authorities would ensure that no corrupt persons are appointed as vice-chancellors and no semblance of exchange of money takes place in appointing the VCs and professors

Previously, Anna Univ-ersity Coimbatore VC Radhakrishnan was suspended based on the corruption charge and he was subsequently dismissed.

It is very sad state of affairs in higher education. Bharathiar University is one of the top universities in the country and ranked 28th in NIRF ranking. The action against VC should have been initiated much earlier, said E.Balagurusamy, former Vice-Chancellor, Anna University.

It should be the lesson for everyone who collecting money for appointments. These VCs are collecting money because they already paid for the post. There are other VCs who are equally corrupt and should also be arrested, he demanded.

He said the state government should look into all the appointments made in the last 10 years at Bharathiar University and punish those involved in the corruption.

The previous two VCs of Bharathiar University were more corrupt than Ganapathy, he said He demanded a state level inquiry committee headed by a retired judge of high court to probe the complaints against the vice-chancellors of other universities. The eminent academicians could be the members of the committee.

There are complaints of corruption in other universities like Periyar University and Manonmaniam Sundaranar University in recent times. The former registrar of the Periyar University in Salem and one of the contenders for the post of the vice-chancellor of the university K. Angamuthu committed suicide in December 2017 following a police complaint against him by the university over the missing files.

There were allegations of irregularities against him over the recruitment of staff in 2012-13.

The allegation was he failed to hand over the files relating to recruitment process when he demitted office as registrar. To standardise recruitment process and avoid discrepancies, the higher education department is considering a proposal for centralising the recruitment for universities and colleges in the state.Chennai: The nearly two-year tenure of professor A.Ganapathy as vice-chancellor of Bharathiar University, marred by allegations of irregularities and corruption in recruitments, finally culminated in his arrest on Saturday.

The former head of biotechnology department of Bharathidasan University assumed charge of the vice-chancellor of Bharathiar University, Coimbatore on March 6, 2016. A noted academician who has produced 32 PhD and 42 M.Phil. scholars and published 146 research articles in international journals, he had raised the hope of the academicians that the university will soon rise to new heights under his tenure.

His research papers on tissue culture and genetic engineering of blackgram, cowpea and cucumber have received many international appreciations and awards.

But his tenure was marred by allegations of irregularities in recruiting the faculty members. As soon as the recruitment process for recruiting 80 faculty members started in July 2016, doubts of irregularities surfaced as the administration tried to close the applications well before the scheduled date. Following the controversy, it was extended.

The state government had initiated a vigilance enquiry in April last year which culminated in his arrest.

A section of professors said that the corruption in vice-chancellors' appointment has affected the recruitment in universities in a bad way and Ganapathy's case is the perfect example of how the once renowned researcher in biotechnology, now has allegedly been reduced to a corrupt administrator.

Timeline

March 6, 2016: Professor A.Ganapathy took charge as Vice-Chancellor of Bharathiar University

July 14, 2016: The university has released advertisement to fill 80 assistant professor posts in the university departments and constituent colleges

August 10, 2016: There were allegations that the university administration has blocked the website well before the closing date to prevent more candidates applying for the job. After the issue, the varsity has extended the last date to August 21

November 18, 2016: The VC's office received a fax message from the higher education department instructing it not to proceed with the appointments.

November 22, 2016: The syndicate meeting was convened to ratify the appointments despite the instructions from then higher education secretary A.Karthik asking the university authorities not to ratify the appointments. But, Mr Ganapathy has allegedly switched off his mobile phone and the fax machine

November 28, 2016: In the wake of irregularities in the recruitment of 80 faculty members in Bharathiar University, Registrar (in-charge) P S Mohan was relieved of his duties. The VC had blamed P.S. Mohan, for not informing him of the secretary's note

April 28, 2017: The state government has initiated a vigilance inquiry into the alleged irregularities committed by A. Ganapathy, Vice-Chancellor of Bharathiar University.

February 3, 2018 A.Ganapathy, Vice-Chancellor of Bharathiar University was arrested by DVAC for accepting the bribe from a candidate for appointment to the post of assistant professor.According to reports, the ship vanished from West Africa and a possibility of hijack is high. (Photo: YouTube/Representational)

New Delhi: The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Sunday informed that an oil tanker with 22 Indian nationals onboard is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar in a tweet said, A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo-Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

He informed that the Indian authorities based in Nigeria have sought the countrys help in locating the missing oil tanker.

Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860, he informed in another tweet.

The owners of the tanker, which was loaded with gas oil, have urged the Directorate General of Shipping in Mumbai to get in touch with their counterparts in Nigeria and Benin to carry out search operations for the merchant ship.

According to reports, the ship vanished from West Africa and a possibility of hijack is high. Meanwhile, Nigerian authorities have alerted all boats to look out for the missing tanker ship and if sighted to report to the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) Anti-Piracy Reporting Centre immediately in London.AUBURN  Teresa Ann Raimonte, 62, passed away unexpectedly on Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2018. Terri was a life-long resident of Auburn until recently. She was a 1973 graduate of Auburn High School and a communicant of St. Marys Church. Terri was a warmhearted, caring and loving person. She was always willing to open her door to anyone in need, especially animals. She taught everyone to be kind to one another and always lend a hand in a time of need no matter the circumstance. Teresa was the best mother, sister, daughter and friend to anyone that knew her, but most of all her life has made a lasting impression on all of us.Journalist turned politician and Mysuru-Kodagu BJP MP Pratap Simha was his usual roaring self as he slammed Chief Minister Siddaramaiah for targeting his political opponents using pro-minority outfits like KFD and PFI. He wondered what was the need to withdraw criminal cases against them and alleged that by doing so, Mr Siddaramaiah was indirectly responsible for the murders of pro-Hindu and BJP workers. In an interview with Deccan Chronicle, Mr Simha directed his firepower on the CM, who incidentally hails from Mysuru and asserted that instead of doing good work, he was dividing society. The development of Karnataka and easing Bengaluru traffic would be the main plank of his party in the Assembly elections, he said adding that the 'eclipse' which had darkened the skies of Karnataka in the past five years, would be over in May first week when the BJP forms the new government. Here are excerpts from the interview.

The BJP claims the murders of all Hindus are those of BJP workers. But the Congress asserts they were not all BJP workers. What is the truth?

Prashanth Poojari of Moodbidri, Raju of Mysuru, Pravin Poojari of Kushalnagar, Sharath Madivala of Bantwal, Deepak Rao (BJP social media head) in Surathkal and Santosh of Bengaluru, were all BJP workers. Kuttappa from Madikeri, Rudresh from Bengaluru and Vishwanath from Shivamogga belonged to the Sangh Parivar. They were BJP workers and Hindus. I will ask a question: Have any Congress workers been killed? The Congress ward president's son has killed Santosh, what does this reveal? So many murders have not occurred even in Kerala. In all these cases, KFD and PFI members are involved. Why did they withdraw 175 criminal cases against 1600 KFD and PFI workers? So many murders have occurred after they withdrew cases against rogue elements and religious fanatics.

What is the proof?

The NIA itself has revealed that KFD and PFI workers murdered all of them. Who is Abid Pasha, the accused in the Raju murder case? Haris, the accused in the Pravin Poojari case is a district secretary of KFD, the accused in the Sharath Madivala case is the Chamarajanagar KFD district president. All six accused in the Rudresh murder are office bearers of KFD and workers, and it is the same KFD, PFI or SDPI members who are involved in all the other murders. What more proof is needed?

Congress claims of the 25 murders, only nine are communal and the rest were due to personal rivalry.

Even if a single murder has a communal angle, why did they not initiate action? All the perpetrators are Muslims and all the victims are Hindus. How can it be possible? From Kengal Hanumanthaiah to Dharam Singh, there have been so many Congress Chief Ministers. Why did it not happen during the tenure of previous CMs, why is it happening only now? Jihadis and Marxists kill those who do not approve of their philosophies ruthlessly. Where was the need to withdraw criminal cases against these Jihadis?

So what are you aiming at?

Mr Siddaramaiah is indirectly perpetrating the murders. What else is this? What else is the motive?

Why dont you consider these murders as mere deaths of innocent people? Why do you keep claiming they were Hindu activists and BJP workers?

Whether it is personal rivalry or anything else, it is the duty of the government to protect the common man, whether they have voted for them or not. Has any Congress activist been shot by the PFI or KFD? Where is the personal rivalry, if a Chamarajanagar KFD district president shoots at Sharath Madivala in Bantwal? Where was the personal rivalry in the Kuttappa case in Kodagu? Show me if any Congressmen have died, we will support them too. Why have the perpetrators of the murders of writer M.M. Kalburgi and Journalist Gauri Lankesh not been nabbed? What happened to the investigation? Who is dividing society by making political statements in the name of Lingayats and Veerashaivas?

So you claim the BJP is not involved in religion-based politics?

Show me one example. For his political convenience and to retain power, Siddaramaiah is dividing society. He has mastered the art of divide and rule.

You don't leave the last rites of Hindu activists who are murdered, to their respective families, you insist on taking the body in a procession? Are you provoking communal emotions by doing so?

We are not just a political party, we are a family, so we participate. Where are we provoking communal emotions? Let them stop the series of murders. Should we keep quiet when our activists die? If a Congress worker had died during BJP rule, would they have kept quiet?

There are allegations that Union Minister Anant Kumar Hegde and you are making statements which are hurting the sentiments of people.

I challenge the Congress to prove I have made a provocative statement against any community. Show me a single statement I have made against Muslims or Christians. Why did they stop the Hanuma Jayanthi procession? Was it not peaceful? They bring the Anti-Superstition Bill but sit in a weighing machine to perform tulabara. Is it not superstition?

Congress wants PM Narendra Modi's intervention in the Mahadayi issue. Why are BJP MPs not convincing him?

It was when Manmohan Singh was PM that the Supreme Court constituted the Mahadayi tribunal in 2010. Mrs Sonia Gandhi (former Congress president) said that they would not give a drop of water to Karnataka. When the Congress-led UPA government was in power, there were Congress governments in Goa and Maharashtra too. Why didn't they resolve the row? Is it because they didn't want the BJP to take credit? As per the Inter-State Water Dispute Act 1956, only when all aggrieved parties agree can the PM intervene. So we have convinced the BJP government in Goa and Maharashtra, if Siddaramaiah has an iota of concern for farmers, let him convince his Congress counterparts in those two states.

The CM plans to bring his son into politics in Assembly polls.

No politician of any party should use his clout just to create a political future for his children. If my daughter wants to get into politics, she should do so on her own merit.

Siddaramaiah alleges the BJP government at the Centre is discriminating against Karnataka?

In the recent Union Budget, we have given Rs 17,000 crores for the Bengaluru suburban rail to ease traffic problems in the IT Capital. Why are they not utilising central funds? We developed 10,000 kms of national highways in the state since 2014. The 14th Finance Commission gave Rs 28,000 crore extra to Karnataka while Tamil Nadu got only Rs 24,000 crores. In the entire ten years the Congress led UPA was in power, they gave Rs 1,500 crore for drought relief to the state but in the past four years, our Union government has given Rs 5000 crores. Let them come out with a White Paper so that people know the facts.

What is the BJP's agenda, ahead of the Assembly elections?

Development of Karnataka is our only agenda besides finding a solution for the traffic problems in Bengaluru. We will come to power in May first week and the development process will begin.In its inaugural Terrorism Threat Assessment Report released in 2017, the MHA said ISIS has demonstrated that Singapore is very much on its radar. (Photo: File/Representational)

Singapore: Armed officers patrol a train station where television screens and giant posters warn of the threat from terrorists. Nearby, fake gunmen storm a shopping mall in one of many recent terror attack simulations.

But this is not some war-ravaged country. It is one of the safest in the world, Singapore.

The wealthy island-state has a near-perfect record of keeping its shores free from terror, but as it prepares to host defence ministers from around Southeast Asia this week, it appears to have good reason to have prioritised stopping the spread of terrorism in the region.

The cosmopolitan financial hub, which was second only to Tokyo in The Economist Intelligence Unit's Safe Cities Index in 2017, says it has been the target of terror plots for years, some stemming from its Muslim-majority neighbours, and that it's a matter of 'when' and not 'if' terrorists will strike.

"Singapore continues to face a serious security threat from both homegrown radicalised individuals and foreign terrorists who continue to see Singapore as a prized target," Singapore's Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said in response to e-mailed questions.

Singapore authorities say they have been a target of Islamic extremism since the 1990s, but efforts to deter terrorism have stepped up markedly in recent years with more frequent attacks on Western countries and after ISIS terrorists briefly took over a town in the southern Philippines in 2017.

Raising further concerns about the threat to the island, a Singaporean soldier has featured on a number of ISIS promotional videos, most recently in December where he was filmed executing men alongside other terrorists.

In its inaugural Terrorism Threat Assessment Report released in 2017, the MHA said ISIS has demonstrated that Singapore is "very much on its radar" and that the threat to the country remains "the highest in recent years" - claims that are backed up by security experts.

"Singapore, being known as safe and secure, makes it such a risk target," said Dan Bould, Asia director of crisis management at professional services firm Aon and a former captain in the British army.

"If there's an attack in the Philippines, it may get half an hour in a 24-hour news cycle. An attack in Singapore with all the multicultural individuals operating here, will be within the narrative for a few days at least."

In early 2017, Aon lifted Singapore in the terrorism and political violence category of its annual risk map from negligible to low risk.

Mobile App

The reality is that Singapore has so far escaped the attacks seen in other major world cities like New York, London and Berlin in recent years. That's why it is at the bottom of the 2017 Global Terror Index, with no reported terror-related attacks post 9/11.

But three in four Singaporeans believe that it's only a matter of time before the country experiences a terror attack, a poll by the local newspaper Sunday Times 2017 showed.

Singapore authorities certainly do not want their citizens to be complacent. Everyone, including school children, is encouraged to download a mobile app that alerts them to emergency situations and allows them to send in videos and photos of suspicious events.

The MHA said that as of the end of 2017, more than 1.3 million devices were equipped with the SGSecure app, a large chunk of the population of around 5.6 million.

Simulations of terror attacks - including one just over a week ago where masked gunman stormed a children's activity centre on the resort island of Sentosa - are regular. In January, Singapore's military undertook its biggest mobilisation exercise in more than three decades, including an inter-agency response to the simulation of a gunman at its national stadium.

Authorities said 2017 there was reliable information that ISIS terrorists were considering carrying out an attack in Singapore in the first half of 2016, a threat which they said was countered.

In August 2016, neighbouring Indonesia, which has the world's largest Muslim population, arrested six suspects with links to ISIS who were accused of plotting rocket attacks on Singapore's iconic Marina Bay Sands hotel.

Malaysia, Singapore's northern neighbour which also has a Muslim-majority, and Indonesia say thousands of their citizens sympathise with ISIS and hundreds are believed to have travelled to Syria to join the group. Regional security officials say many are returning home after reverses in the Middle East.

Hardline Approach

Singapore takes a hardline approach to suspected radicals and Bilveer Singh, an adjunct senior fellow at the Rajaratnam School of International Studies, says it is one of the reasons behind its success so far.

The most controversial measure at its disposal is its colonial-era Internal Security Act which allows for suspects to be held for lengthy periods without trial.

The MHA said it currently has 20 people detained under the Act for "terrorism-related" activities, and since 2002 has held close to 90 for such activities.

"ISA is a fantastic deterrent, and so far it has worked," Singh said.

Authorities have also deported scores of foreigners for suspected radicalism in recent years, and in October banned two popular Muslim preachers from Zimbabwe and Malaysia from entering the city-state, saying their views bred intolerance and were a risk to its social harmony.SALT LAKE CITY  Ian Cumming, a ski resort owner, businessman and Democratic donor who formerly lived in Utah, died Friday. He was 77 years old.

Cumming died Friday morning in Jackson, Wyoming, surrounded by his family, Snowbird Ski Resort General Manager Dave Fields said.

Cumming ran Powdr Corp., the private corporation that bought Park City Ski Area more than two decades ago, along with several other ski areas, and had a majority stake in Snowbird.

Cumming later made Jackson his primary residence.

Nathan Rafferty, CEO and president of Ski Utah, called Cumming "a true Utah ski industry icon."

"Our thriving industry wouldn't be where it is today without Ian's vision and leadership," Rafferty said, adding his thoughts were with Cumming's family.

For years, Cumming was a top political donor in Utah, supporting Democratic candidates and causes in the state.

Salt Lake County Mayor Ben McAdams said in a statement: "Utah has lost a great community supporter with the passing of Ian Cumming." McAdams called Cumming a friend and key supporter of Utah's preparations to build and manage venues for the 2002 Winter Olympics.

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jenny Wilson said Cumming was "a self-made successful business leader and philanthropist who contributed greatly to Utah, most recently by ownership of Snowbird."

Wilson said he was known as a sharp business mind with a keen sense of humor who loved his family and community.

"I was deeply saddened to read of Ian Cummings passing," said Patricia Morton, dean of the University of Utah College of Nursing. "Ian and Annette Poulson Cumming have been kind and generous benefactors of the College of Nursing over many years. His deep love for Annette is most evident in his initiative to name the colleges newly renovated building after her at a grand reopening in 2010.

"He will be sorely missed by the College of Nursing family. Our thoughts and prayers are with Annette and the Cumming children and grandchildren at this difficult time."An assortment of opioid-related bills currently before the Legislature strikes the right balance of increasing accountability for drugmakers while educating patients on the risks associated with addictive painkillers and enabling health care providers to better monitor prescription abuses.

Several lawmakers have proposed legislation to better educate those who prescribe narcotics, to make it easier to track evidence of abuse and to more effectively assess the progress of efforts to reduce the risk of addiction and abuse. Taken as a whole, the body of proposed laws demonstrates the Legislature is appropriately aware of the scope of the crisis and is poised to take meaningful strides in addressing the problem that claims more than 300 lives in Utah every year.

Lawmakers are also discussing the merits of joining a parade of states and cities filing lawsuits against drug manufacturers for pushing the prescription of narcotics and understating their dangers. That may eventually prove to be a fruitful path, but it will do nothing in the short term to help those already wrestling with addiction, or prevent others from tumbling into a pattern of abuse. The state is better off concentrating on the steps it can take to increase awareness, reduce the rate of questionable prescriptions and make it easier for law enforcement to track and prosecute diversion of prescription drugs for unlawful use.

One bill before the House would investigate whether funds currently appropriated for treatment programs are being effectively used. Another would encourage physicians to check the states Controlled Substance Database to make sure a patient isnt an abuser. In a similar vein, a separate measure would empower state regulators to monitor prescription patterns by physicians and to confront a provider if he or she has strayed from standard prescription guidelines. Yet another bill would allow law enforcement officers to more easily access the database while investigating cases of alleged diversion of prescription drugs. Previously, authorities were allowed to access the database with little restriction, which led to cases in which people were investigated and sometimes charged without proper cause. Those cases led to the requirement that officers obtain a warrant before checking the data. The current proposal is an effective approach that balances individual privacy rights with the need for police to quickly investigate tips of abuse.

The state has taken a variety of measures in recent years to curb opioid abuse, and data show that the rate of fatal overdoses from prescribed drugs has decreased somewhat. The rate of death from heroin use, however, has remained steady, and there has been a disturbing upsurge in deaths associated with the use of black market opioids such as fentanyl, in which the rate of overdose deaths rose by nearly 80 percent in 2016.

Blame for the problem is shared by many. Accountability needs to land with those who manufacture and distribute the drugs both legally and illegally. Health care providers need to be more acutely aware of the potential for patients to abuse the drugs, and patients should be fully aware of the dangerous path before them should they misuse their prescriptions. The assortment of proposed laws before the current Legislature properly addresses all of those areas in ways that will hopefully chip away at a problem that has brought tragedy to too many families.SALT LAKE CITY  Utah fans of Samoas, Do-si-dos and Thin Mints can now lay in a stash of their favorite Girl Scout treats without having to leave their couches, thanks to a new, web-based sales system launching statewide this year.

Girl Scouts of Utah CEO Janet Frasier said the new website program has been in development for a few years and was successfully piloted in the St. George area in 2017. Now, the digital sales tool is available to all 8,000 Utah Girl Scouts and is aimed at helping Scouts build business and STEM skills through operating what is, essentially, their own online mini-stores. Frasier said launching a Digital Cookie website is optional for members and not intended to be a replacement for traditional door-to-door and neighborhood booth sales efforts.

"We're excited to add this to the learning experience the girls are already getting with their in-person sales," Frasier said. "Digital Cookies adds a much easier option for out-of-area friends and family members to purchase cookies and provides some great exposure to digital sales and all that goes with it.

"This is a national initiative but one very much driven by our girls who are interested in digital tools and always pushing to learn and do more."

Frasier said giving Scouts the experience of setting goals, and working toward them, has always been at the heart of the cookie sales programs and the new online shopping tool grows that realm in a way that keeps it relevant with the evolving digital world.

"We all hear a lot of social commentary focused on how young people are losing goal-setting skills because the internet has created this instant world," Frasier said. "But the Digital Cookie program is actually helping facilitate working toward goals by requiring our girls to tell their stories and share what they're working toward and why it's important."

Sandy Girl Scout Kelly Lopez, 18, said she's working toward a goal of funding some local service projects and that working on her Digital Cookie site has added to what she's learned from door-to-door sales.

"Setting up the page for my Digital Cookie sales was a great experience for me," Lopez said. "I learned some digital skills, got to put a video together and, I think it's added to learning a little about business management."

Gloria Heslop, 14, a Farr West Girl Scout, said she got help from her mom to set up her site and was looking forward to how it will help expand her sales territory.

"My website took two to three hours to build," Heslop said. "Now, it will be a lot easier for friends and family who don't live here to buy their cookies from me."

The Digital Cookie system, Frasier said, underwent rigorous trials to ensure that it worked smoothly and, more importantly, created a safe place for Girl Scouts to do online business.

"The primary concern with the Digital Cookie program, and why it took as long as it do to develop, was creating a safe place for girls to promote cookie sales online," Frasier said.

Safety protocols built into the system require that buyers have an invitation to the site from the Scout host and those invitations all go to an adult parent our guardian for review. Also, Frasier noted the Scouts' sites are not searchable, though buyers who may not know who to purchase cookies from can visit the Girl Scouts of Utah main website to get connected to a Scout in their area.

Last year, Utah Girl Scouts sold 1.5 million boxes of cookies in the Beehive State.SANDY  The findings in a recent audit by the Canyons School District challenges the common assumption that state- and district-required testing devours instructional time.

Those exams consume less than 3 percent of instruction time, according to the audit: 1.2 percent of the school year in elementary schools, 2.7 percent in middle school and 1.7 percent in high school.

By comparison, students spend 12 percent of school time at lunch, 4.5 percent at recess and 27.3 percent on math instruction, the audit found.

Amber Roderick-Landward, Canyons District's instructional supports director, said it is helpful to have data to put the debate in proper context.

"Of course we hear the rhetoric that the public hears from our teachers, from our parents that 'It seems like there's a lot more testing.' We had suspected there really can't be as much as folks are saying because we know what we're requiring," Roderick-Landward said.

"To actually see the numbers, up in front of us, it was very confirming, very exciting," she said.

The past two years, the school district has encouraged teachers to view assessment through a different lens, she said.

"I think testing has this connotation of high-stakes accountability, that it's an event and that for kids, it's really nerve-wracking and for teachers, feeling like they're losing instructional time. We've tried to shift our lens to say assessing is part of teaching and that's what allows us to be agile as instructors by getting that information on a regular basis to be able to adjust our instruction. That's just what good teaching is," Roderick-Landward said.

The audit was performed by Hal Sanderson, the districts research and assessment director. Ninety-six percent of the district's elementary schools and 75 percent of its middle schools responded to a survey that examined published test-taking times and actual experiences.

The audit also outlined time required by state-required assessments for high school students in 2016-17.

The audit applied solely to the Canyons School District. All Utah school districts participate in state year-end assessments, but district-level tests vary in form and scope.

While Canyons District has lower rates of students opting out of state testing, a growing numbers of parents in the district have allowed students to skip the exams, Roderick-Landward said.

Statewide, opt-out rates on the end-of-level Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence tests more than tripled between 2014 and 2017, according to Utah State Board of Education data.

Some critics say the tests are not tied to students' grades so they don't want to put their children through the experience of what some consider stressful "high-stakes testing."

It's one reason Canyons District has attempted to change the conversation about testing, Roderick-Landward said. The consistent message has been to consider testing a verb not a noun, she said.

Opting out of state testing results in less reliable data to guide instructional, training and resource allocation decisions, she said.

It also deprives students of the experience of taking tests, which has greater significance as students move toward high school graduation and face college admissions tests.

"The unintended consequence of that is decreased perseverance and decreased cognitive stamina. We've got to figure out a way to bring those things back. If we're not teaching those skills, then we're doing our students a disservice," Roderick-Landward said.

While the audit determined that students "spend very little time taking assessments when compared to the amount of time they devote to recess, lunch and math instruction," it determined elementary teachers spent more time scoring tests in the 2016-17 school year, the report states.

This was due to the implementation of a new district writing assessment that placed greater demands on teachers' time at the start of the school year.

"By the end of the year, scoring speed improved. In spring 2017, teachers reported spending one to four hours scoring writing assessments. This equates to two to three minutes per student essay. The average scoring time should continue to decline in the 2017-2018 as teachers become more familiar with the rubric and scoring process," the audit said.

The report said elementary teachers were also responsible for scoring the fall Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills math assessment.

"In fall 2016, math scoring took an estimated two to three hours, which was a real concern for teachers. To ease the burden, the Instructional Supports Department implemented new DIBELS math scoring procedures. Scoring is now conducted by a district testing team and supported by a software program developed by Information Technology Department programmers," the report states.Remo D'Souza Posts A Picture Of Salman Khan From Sets Of Race 3

Bollywood stars Salman Khan and Jacqueline Fernandez, who are reuniting in Race 3 after their 2014 hit, Kick, have wrapped up the first schedule of the Remo DSouzas directorial venture in Mumbai. The director took to Twitter to share a sneak peek from the sets and also announce the wrap. The third instalment of Race franchise boasts of an ensemble cast of Salman Khan, Jacqueline Fernandez, Anil Kapoor, Bobby Deol, Saquib Saleem and Daisy Shah.

The star position in this photo has been given to Salman Khans back for that is all we can see of the superstar while Jacquelines face is partially visible. The first schedule of the third instalment of the Race franchise, which began in December last year has come to an end in Mumbai.

Now, Salman Khans back has often been given a star billing in his earlier teaser posters and posters but this is the first time we have spotted it on a wrap schedule photo. Take a look...

The audience would be up for a treat to witness Superstar Salman Khan back in the action avatar post the humongous success of Tiger Zinda Hai.

Taking forward the super hit franchise of Race, the action thriller will feature the blockbuster jodi of Salman Khan and Jacqueline Fernandez for the second time after the success of Kick.

Director Remo DSouza not only announced the wrap of the Mumbai schedule but also hinted at something interesting coming up which is piquing the audiences interest. The filmmaker shared, So we are done with Mumbai schedule:) thank you team #race3 and heres a lil something for you guys. :)))) @beingsalmankhan @jacquelinef143.

The team also shot the title track Allah Duhaai Hai featuring the star cast of the film in its first schedule of the shoot. Impressed by Jacqueline Fernandezs pole dance routine, the makers are also keen on including a pole dance sequence in the film. Remo said in a press release, Jacqueline is a very hard working girl. It is amazing to see what she has accomplished with the pole dance form in such a short span of time. We have all seen glimpses of her pole dance skills hence we decided to include it in Race 3 and take it to the next level. Jacqueline had earlier shared a picture from her pole dance practice.

 @lanaroxy A post shared by Jacqueline Fernandez (@jacquelinef143) on Dec 5, 2017 at 11:52pm PST

Produced by Salman Khan Films and Ramesh Taurani under the banner of Tips Films, Race 3 is directed by Remo Dsouza and will hit theatres on Eid 2018.Vijay Antonys Role As Cop In His Next Is Unique

Music composer-turned-actor Vijay Antony is donning the hat of a cop in his next flick. The actor, who has been known to take up unique roles always chooses quirky scripts and titles. The film is directed by Ganeshaa, who had earlier assisted renowned filmmaker SS. Rajamouli.





Moreover, in a recent interview, Ganeshaa revealed, He is not the regular cop who takes on villains like you see in Tamil cinema. He rather uses his brain to move the coins. This will be a special film in Vijay Antonys career. The film has been titled Thimiru Pudichavan and will have the actor play a very different avatar.





Further, talking about Vijays preparations, the director said that the actor is learning the body language and attitude of a policeman from a real-life inspector. He also revealed that the film will have a unique climax with a Chennai backdrop. Meanwhile, the cinematography is being done by Richard Nathan while Vijay Antony also took out sometime of his busy schedule to edit and compose music.





For latest movie reviews, ratings and trailers, download the Desimartini App.





Source: s3.ap-southeast-1.amazonaws.comWe have used your information to see if you have a subscription with us, but did not find one. Please use the button below to verify an existing account or to purchase a new subscription.Louth IFA Livestock Chairman Peter McEneaney strongly welcomed the trip by Agriculture Minister Michael Creed to Turkey this week on live exports.

He said IFA and Bord Bia visited this market last October and it is clear that there is real potential for increased export,

Based on positive discussions we had with the The Turkish Meat and Milk Board (ESK), it is clear Turkey has an import requirement for 500,000 head of live cattle each year. Ireland could supply up to 100,000 head of this requirement on an annual basis.

Mr McEneaney said the Turkish authorities recognise the high quality of Irish livestock and praised the shipments they had received from Ireland.

He said, Turkey wants to develop the trade with Ireland and it is very important that this is fully facilitated in every way.

The IFA Livestock Chairman said,

We discussed how we can increase supplies from Ireland by matching our seasonal production with the Turkish specification requirements.

"We also discussed various issues around weight, age and quarantine requirements. He said farmers are looking forward to some positive announcements on live exports from the Ministers visit to Turkey this week.

Peter McEneaney said the priority on live exports right now is for Minister Creed to secure full ferry access for our calf exports to EU markets over the coming weeks when the Stena ferry goes into dry dock.

He said Minister Creed is responsible for market access and he has to deliver alternative full ferry access before February 20th until March 19th, which is peak calf export season. With our increased cow numbers, Mr McEneaney believes, the Minister needs to target an additional 100,000 head of live exports this year.Burnout led 42-year-old Emanuel Wenk to completely change his life: he went from working in restaurants to working with animals. He now runs an animal sanctuary in Austria, which is popular among children.

The sanctuary, called Edelweiss, is located in Wildon, in Styria in the southeast of the country. Wenk says its a challenge to run the operation  money can be tight  but it is worth the fight.

swissinfo.ch: Why did you leave Switzerland?

Emanuel Wenk: I left Switzerland in 2001 because I was going to have a baby with an Austrian woman who was a seasonal worker in Switzerland. I wanted to take advantage of my visiting rights and carry out my paternal duties.

The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of swissinfo.ch.

swissinfo.ch: Was it a one-way journey, or do you intend to return to Switzerland one day?

E.W.: I didnt envisage my move to be temporary; my only goal was to be as close as possible to my son. Now a return home is very unlikely. My son is going his own way now, but I have a lot of responsibility towards the animals.

swissinfo.ch: What is your work today? And how did that come about?

E.W.: I worked in tourism and restaurants for years, until I suffered burnout and my life took a different direction, seven years ago. My partner at that time was very fond of animals and we were leasing a farm in Gross St. Florian in western Styria, so that her horse could live with us. After our separation, I didnt want to give up the farm lease, and I took on two ponies from the animal protection agency to keep the grass tidy. These two ponies also served as my therapy and helped me to get over my breakdown.

My burnout led to the foundation of a horse sanctuary. With time, it became a proper animal sanctuary  not just horses but also cows, oxen, pigs and so on. So a real farmyard, but one that exists to protect animals. Unfortunately, I had to leave the farm after three years because of disputes with the lease-holder and differences of opinion. For two years, we  myself and the animals  were homeless. During this time I leased four fields and lived in a caravan, until I could get a lease on a farm in Wildon.

But the purpose of the new farm, the Edelweiss Horse Sanctuary, was not just to save animals, but also to show weekend visitors the effects livestock farming has on us all.

swissinfo.ch: How is the sanctuary going?

E.W.: I am no longer on my own on the farm and there are now a handful of people who are helping out. We have a guest room where people can stay at no cost and food and drink is provided on condition they help out for three to five hours a day. We give school groups lessons in animal protection at the farm. These are very popular because it is something new and the children can have direct contact with the animals. On the whole, it is going well, but unfortunately it is a real headache every month to get the money for the lease together. The number of passive members who give us financial support has climbed (we run the farm as an association). But its still not enough as there are too few donations.

swissinfo.ch: What fascinates you about all these animals?

E.W.: I have always been fascinated by animals. Partly, of course, because of my childhood, as I grew up on a farm in Toggenburg in Canton St Gallen. But now my view of animals is completely different: I see them as living creatures like people, who should not be exploited, abused or killed. And that is what I am putting into practice with this horse sanctuary.

swissinfo.ch: Where do you live now, and what is the life and food like?

E.W.: I live with the animals in Styria, 15 minutes south of Graz, in Wildon. The cuisine is not very different from the cuisine of eastern Switzerland. The climate here is very Mediterranean  it is not unusual for the temperature to climb above 30 degrees Celsius in the summer. There are vineyards, so southern Styria has something of a Tuscan flair.

swissinfo.ch: What is the biggest difference to Switzerland?



E.W.: Certainly the social welfare system. The education system is also rather one-dimensional, unfortunately.

swissinfo.ch: What are your thoughts about Switzerland, as someone living outside it?

E.W.: It is nice to think that the people are really living with direct democracy.

swissinfo.ch: What is the political situation like in Austria after the elections last autumn? Are you interested in the politics of your country of residence?

E.W.: The politicians and parties here have their fingers in every pie and it is difficult to get something running and make it a success without having any contacts in the big parties. In Austria, success isnt based on merit, but on your affiliations.

With issues that transcend party politics, people who do not have much of a clue and/or who are just looking out for themselves often get involved. They dont concern themselves with the issue itself or its value for society at large.

swissinfo.ch: Do you take part in Swiss elections and referendums? By letter, or by e-voting?

E.W.: By letter. I think it is in the nature of the Swiss to register your opinion.

swissinfo.ch: What do you most miss about Switzerland?

E.W.: You have no say in where you are born. But I was lucky enough to grow up in a country that is as colourful and diverse as an Alpine meadow with grasses and flowers. I dont miss anything material about Switzerland. On a human level, I miss a few things: the quality of the handshakes, the practicality, and the openness to new ideas.

Are you a Swiss expatriate? Mark your photos on Instagram #WeAreSwissAbroad.













swissinfo.ch (the interview was conducted in writing)





As it seeks to diversify its tourist emitting markets, Morocco sees enormous opportunities in the Chinese market, which has 130 million tourists traveling abroad annually and spending generously. Morocco has therefore taken a series of incentives to attract 500,000 Chinese tourists by 2020 up from 10,000 in 2015.

Soon after the visa exemption decision was taken during King Mohammed VIs visit to Beijing, the number of Chinese arrivals in Morocco grew 300% in the last quarter of 2016, standing at 40,000 tourists attracted mainly to the cities of Casablanca, Fez and Ouarzazate.

The tourism promotion office will reinforce its presence in China with the aim of adapting the Moroccan offer to the Chinese tourist market, said Moroccos tourism minister Mohamed Sajid following talks with Chinese tourism officials in Beijing.

Reinforcing air links will be Moroccos bridge to increase Chinese tourist arrivals, he said, noting that the national flag carrier, RAM, is planning to open flights to China.

Contacts have been made to explore the possibility for Chinese airlines to fly to Morocco in tandem with the rise of Chinese tourists visiting the Kingdom, he said.

Morocco tried to improve its connectivity with China through establishing partnerships with three key international airlines  Etihad Airways, Turkish Airlines and Air France  with a view to increasing the number of regular flights connecting Chinese cities with Moroccos prime tourist destinations.

Meeting the goal of attracting more Chinese tourists hinges on preparing Moroccan tourist professionals to be up to the expectations of Chinese tourists. In this respect, the tourism promotion office has also signed an agreement with the Confucius Center to train tourist guides to speak mandarin, he added, noting that Mandarin is taught at some Moroccan universities with graduates having prospects to work as tourist guides.

In January 2017, Morocco won the prize of Best Potential Destination 2016 awarded by the Global Times Forum, an annual event held in Beijing by the leading English-speaking media outlet in China, the Global Times.

The Prize is awarded every year to the best destination on the basis of three criteria: visa procedure, tourist attraction rate and tourist satisfaction indicators.The 17-year-old Canadian Shale Wagman was awarded first prize last night at the Prix de Lausanne International Ballet Competition, as well as the artistic prize.

He is one of eight dancers who all receive a scholarship to one of the 72 ballet schools that are partners with the event.

The seven other winners range in age from 15 to 18 and come from South Korea (two dancers), China (two), Brazil, Paraguay and the United States.

The jury, made up of personalities from the world of dance, was headed by Ted Brandsen, artistic director of the HET National Ballet of the Netherlands.

Some 74 candidates competed in this 46th edition of the competition. The jury followed their performance over five days of classes, rehearsals and performances, both classical and contemporary.

The competition was held at the Beaulieu Theatre in Lausanne, on the shores of Geneva, and was also livestreamed online.













ATS-SDA/jc





Thousands protested in Syria's Afrin Sunday as local authorities called on world powers to intervene to halt a Turkish-led assault, accusing Russia of complicity in civilian deaths in the region.

Ankara and allied rebels launched operation Olive Branch on January 20 against the Kurdish Peoples Protection Units (YPG), which Turkey has blacklisted as terrorists.

Afrins local administration  the semi-autonomous government in place since 2013  shot back the accusation on Sunday and urged Moscow to take a firm stand.

We ask the Russian Federation in particular to rescind its support for the Turkish states terrorism against the people of Afrin, it said in a statement.

It bears responsibility for the massacres the fascist Turkish state is carrying out against innocent civilians.

Russia, which intervened militarily in Syrias war in 2015, had troops positioned in Afrin but withdrew them as Turkey launched the assault.

The YPG and Afrin officials say that withdrawal amounted to tacit approval of the Turkish offensive.

Officials on Sunday also called for the United States, European Union, United Nations Security Council and the US-led coalition fighting jihadists to immediately intervene to stop Turkeys aggression.

Ankara says it launched the operation to protect its southern border and insists that it is doing everything it can to avoid civilian casualties.

But the campaign has sparked mass protests, including in Afrin on Sunday.

Thousands of people marched to the sound of drums through central Afrin, holding YPG flags and posters of Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).

Turkey is vehemently opposed to the YPG because of its ties to the PKK, which has waged a three-decade insurgency against Turkish forces.

Were holding the whole world responsible because we fought terrorism on behalf of everyone, but today the world agreed to kill Syrians, said Ali Mahmoud, 45.

Men, women and children thronged main roads in central Afrin for Sundays demonstration, many chanting slogans.

We will not bow our heads to (Turkish President Recep Tayyip) Erdogan, we are not afraid of him and will never fear him, said one protester, Amina Mohammed.

Some demonstrators clutched olive branches, a symbol of Afrin which is known for its abundant olive groves but which are also now associated with the name Turkey gave its offensive.

They named their attack Olive Branch. Its a thorn in their hand, but in our hands, its a gun, said Fikrat Afdal, 33.

At least 68 civilians, including 21 children, have died in Turkish shelling as part of the assault, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

More than 100 pro-Ankara rebels and a similar number of YPG fighters have also died, the British-based monitor says.AUSTIN  Bexar County Elections Administrator Jacquelyn Callanen has received hundreds of vote-by-mail applications that dont specify whether the voters want a Democratic or Republican primary ballot.

Shell have to send them new applications, formally rejecting their primary-election applications and giving them a chance to try again.

It means additional time and expense for her office  and for others around Texas dealing with the same issue  and potential confusion for voters who may not have noticed that there was a primary-election box to check off on their application.

But the incomplete applications arent coming out of nowhere.

They stem from a mail-in ballot push by Gov. Greg Abbotts campaign as the Republican incumbent works to drive up the margin of his expected victory in November.

Abbotts campaign sent voters a number of mail-in ballot applications  his spokesman wouldnt say how many  that didnt have the primary-election box checked, as a partisan mailout typically would.

That was by design, according to Abbotts campaign, which among its efforts is trying to attract voters who may not vote in the GOP primary in a non-presidential year but could be wooed for the general election.

If voters dont check either the Republican or Democratic primary election, they still will be eligible for mail-in ballots for the Nov. 6 general election, assuming they meet other criteria.

But thats not the end of it for local officials who oversee elections.

They have to get a rejection letter because the only election were running right now is the primary. We have to send it to them and say, You didnt put a party on it, said Callanen. What we have to do is send them another application.

Election supervisors cant assume that the voters want a GOP primary ballot just because the application form includes Abbotts campaign logo. Theres a good reason for that, as demonstrated by Callanens experience  a handful of those who sent the Abbott-initiated applications filled in the primary box themselves and requested Democratic ballots.

The Abbott campaigns mail-in ballot drive targets voters who are 65 and older, said campaign spokesman John Wittman. They are among those allowed to vote by mail.

Our campaign is running the most aggressive primary and general election mail-in ballot application drive possible and sent both non-checked and pre-checked applications depending on the modeling, Wittman said. In addition to mail pieces, we are targeting these voters via phone calls and digital ads.

Now is the perfect time to drive up turnout for both elections. We will continue to target these voters throughout the election to ensure the greatest margin of victory for Governor Abbott, Wittman said.

Texas Democratic Party officials took a dim view of the matter, which they discovered after voters sent them the application, concerned that Abbott put his campaign logo on the paperwork that went to clerks. Glen Maxey, the partys vote-by-mail director, emailed county clerks and election administrators around Texas to ensure they know the requirements for handling the applications and that they dont assume voters should get GOP primary ballots because of the Abbott connection.

Abbott has railed about problems with voting by mail, especially about candidates and campaign operatives misleading vulnerable seniors, Maxey said in a statement to the San Antonio Express-News.

Maxey said that what he called a screw up means thousands of seniors applications for the Republican Primary must be rejected, and these voters will have to reapply to vote in the primary. He estimated the cost of the bureaucratic snafu will be thousands of dollars statewide for county election offices.

Abbott will be just fine. He has more than $50 million for his campaign to send endless campaign mailers. Unfortunately, Texas taxpayers dollars will be expended to make up for his campaigns mistakes, Maxey said.

Callanen said it will cost $1 to $1.25 for each rejection letter and application that goes out, including staff time. Howard County Elections Administrator Jodi Duck -- who said she got about 50 to 60 such applications with the Abbott logo and the primary election not filled out - also said it would cost time and postage to process the rejections.

Southern Methodist University political scientist Cal Jillson said the Abbott campaign is soaking up the time and attention of county officials at a busy juncture.

It could create some chaos, Jillson said. They (the Abbott campaign) either didnt think it through, or theyve got their own priorities ahead of the officials who run the elections and the voters who participate in them. 

pfikac@express-news.netPlace Your Advert

Thousands of Active jobseekers are looking for new agricultural positions in 2020. Call us now to discuss the options for advertising your vacancy in our job section.An attempt by the European Union to increase their beef trade offer to 99,000 tonnes from South American countries has been branded "completely unacceptable".

The Latin American trade bloc Mercosur, which includes Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay, is currently in talks with a trade agreement with the EU.

But UK farmers have blasted the talks, who say that the South American countries do not come close to matching the food safety, animal welfare or environmental standards which farmers comply with in the UK and across Europe.

They fear that the big increase in the amount offered by the EU from Mercosur countries with lower welfare standards could put their their livelihoods at stake.

Ulster Farmers Union (UFU) president, Barclay Bell, says that an attempt by the EU to increase their offer on beef to 99,000t in the EU-Mercosur trade talks is "completely unacceptable".

'Conceded far too much'

He said such an agreement would have a "devastating impact" on European beef production and warned that the UK beef industry is also at threat.

The EU Commission has already conceded far too much to the South American bloc, Mr Bell explained.

There seems to be no regard for the impact on food safety standards or the economic impact on European farms. These countries have no interest in adopting European traceability standards.

They do not comply with EU animal welfare standards and Brazil in particular has not dealt appropriately with a huge food fraud incident involving rotten meat.

'Unsustainable'

Mr Bell said the South American countries use "unsustainable" environmental practices in their food production.

Giving the EU's drive for a greener world, the union says it is "incredible" how it is going ahead with the trade proposals.

He said the whole situation "reeks of desperation". Clearly the EU Commission is under pressure to do business no matter what the cost is, Mr Bell added.

The trade deal may benefit other EU industries but the UFU has said these gains should not be at the expense of an industry that is the backbone of rural communities.

Beef production has a crucial role to play economically, environmentally, and socially in the UK and right across Europe. Accepting imports from countries that do not comply with equivalent food production standards is nothing short of irresponsible, the UFU president said.

The UFU has warned the EU-Mercosur negotiations must not set a trend that is considered acceptable by the UK government for any future trade deals.The Labour Party is considering seizing land owned by farmers and landowners for a fraction of its potential price in an effort to build more council houses.

Labour's plans to create a new English Sovereign Land Trust will grant powers to the government to buy land at agricultural prices for housing.

The move has been announced by John Healey, the shadow housing minister. His plans will allow the Trust to buy up large plots of agricultural and industrial land - with compulsory purchase if necessary.

Mr Healey explained that the move would lead to cheaper housing and help free up space for the 100,000 council homes the party has pledged to construct per year.

The CLA, a landowner organisation whose members own or manage more than 10 million acres of rural land across England and Wales, said compulsory purchase of land should be a "last resort".

Small family farms

In a statement, CLA Director of Policy and Advice Christopher Price said it will be small family farms who will "suffer".

The best way to tackle the housing crisis is to remove the massive barriers that still stand in the way of private landowners who want to invest in providing, usually small, housing schemes in rural areas, Mr Price explained.

These include uncertainties of navigating the chaotic and under-resourced planning system and a penal tax system that too often disincentives positive investment.

Compulsory purchase of land should only ever be a last resort and in practice it is far more likely to be small family farms that suffer, not the big players who have far more means to defend themselves.

'Incremental change'

Mr Price said the CLA cannot support another "incremental change" that would make things more "complex and adversarial".

He added: The principle of capturing land value uplifts to fund public benefits from infrastructure investment to environmental benefits or social housing is well understood.

The current system has the means to do this in a number of ways, we would not support yet another incremental change that would merely make things even more complex and adversarial.

We are open to a more fundamental look at these issues, but it must start from the point of view of working with landowners not seeking to forcibly remove their assets at artificial low prices.A farming union has said the "immediate priority" for the government has to be securing a trade agreement with the EU27 that is free from tariff and non-tariff barriers.

NFU Cymru has responded to the publication by the Welsh Government of its paper 'Trade Policy: the issues for Wales'.

As the paper acknowledges, the decisions that will be taken about the UKs future trading relationships with the EU27 and the rest of the world will be significant factors shaping the future prosperity of the British farming industry.

Commenting on the document, NFU Cymru President John Davies said: In my view, nowhere is this more true than in relation to agriculture, with around a third of our lamb crop and around three quarters of Welsh food and drink exports destined for the European market.

Mr Davies said trade has consistently emerged as a top priority for Welsh farmers during the Brexit negotiations.

He said: As far as I am concerned our future trading relationship must be one which gives us the full and unfettered access to the Single Market that we need, and I welcome the fact that the Welsh Government has made this call once again in todays policy paper.

'Shut farmers out'

The imposition of tariffs, under a no-deal scenario would impact lamb exports in particular, and under WTO rates chilled lamb carcasses would attract effective tariff rates as high as 46%

Mr Davies said this would effectively shut farmers out of the European markets.

Whilst there has been much talk of tariff barriers and the detrimental impact that they can have on trade, I was pleased to see the policy document making extensive references to the negative impact that non-tariff barriers can have on trade, particularly in relation to exports of food, he added.

The paper explains that when it comes to food and agricultural produce in particular, non-tariff barriers such as inspections at border posts in order to demonstrate compliance with technical regulations and standards, rule of origin, hygiene, veterinary and phytosanitary controls are all factors which increase costs and hinder trade.

'Lack of clarity'

Mr Davies said: The paper also rightly acknowledges the damaging impact that the lack of clarity on future trade arrangements with the EU is having for business and nowhere is this truer than in agriculture where production cycles can often span a number of years.

That is why we cannot wait much longer for an outline of what our future trading relationship with the EU27 is going to look like, if our members are to start planning for the future.

The NFU Cymru President said that although Brexit may eventually give the UK the freedom to strike its own trade agreements with third countries other than the EU27, speaking as a Welsh farmer, the "immediate priority" for the UK Government has to be on securing a trade agreement with the EU27 that is free from tariff and non-tariff barriers, and encompasses all sectors including agriculture.Clarkson holds meeting with villagers over farm shop traffic

It follows the huge success of Clarkson's FarmComing Back To Ash-Abhis Film..

Reveals a source to DNA, "Abhi-Ash were in talks for a film with Shailesh R Singh. While Abhi was already on board, discussions were on with Ash and her team for the same."

Abhi-Aish Was last Seen Together In Raavan

"The real-life couple would've reunited on screen after eight long years. But the movie has supposedly been put on the back burner. In fact, the project has been pushed ahead indefinitely."

Aishwarya Acts Choosy

The source further added, "Ash is choosy about her projects. She had some issues with the script and wanted a few changes, which had not happened."

Abhi-Aish Signed Another Films

"Meanwhile, she signed another film (the remake of Raat Aur Din'). Abhishek also took up a few movies."

Budget Issue

"Since the whole idea was to get Abhi and Ash together on screen, once she backed out, he too found the whole thing pointless. There were budget issues as well."

Meanwhile, Aishwarya Was Seen Slaying In Australia..

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan was seen in a Gauri & Nainika Bridal Couture'18 black lace and silk gown for a event in Sydney and she looked helluva hawt!

Aishwarya On #MeToo

Aishwarya, who's also considered as one of the most powerful women of India, spoke about the expected positive impact of viral hashtag #MeToo in Australia.

Aishwarya Supports #MeToo

"It has brought out a lot of conversation and sharing', Aishwarya told the The Sunday Telegraph, while talking about the hashtag #MeToo and added, "The good thing is that people are talking. I don't think this needs to restrict itself to one part of the world."

'She's A Beauty With Brain'

She further added, "If a woman feels compromised and she feels the need to share an experience that has completely challenged her sense of being, it is amazing that she comes out, speaks forth about it, and takes the people to task.

This idea does not limit itself to show business or the film industry. It is people discussing it from all walks of life."France is planning to host in 2018 a meeting between the countries of the Maghreb and Europe to examine the means of reinvigorating the Union for the Mediterranean.

The goal was announced by French President Emmanuel Macron in a speech at the Tunisian Parliament last week. He said that the UfM could not tap into its full potential because its vision of the Mediterranean was somewhat larger to encompass conflicts that acted as a hindrance to the Unions action.

In his speech, Macron seemed to seek a much limited vision for the UfM action narrowed to the western Mediterranean. between the northern and southern coasts, there is a history, projects, diaspora and youth that are waiting for action, he said.

If you agree, I would like that France organizes this year a first meeting of the leaders of the civil society, youth, universities of some European countries and the Maghreb countries, he added.

The Union for the Mediterranean is an intergovernmental institution bringing together the 28 European Union Member States and 15 countries from the Southern and Eastern shores of the Mediterranean to promote dialogue and cooperation.

The UfM fell prey to regional tensions and conflicts and its activities were temporary suspended in 2009 at the request of Arab countries rejecting to participate at a meeting attended by Israel.The real slim shady. Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Carter Page, the Russia-linked former Trump campaign adviser at the center of a controversial memo which was declassified on Friday, apparently bragged in a 2013 letter that he was an informal advisor to the Kremlin, according to Time. The letter was sent to an academic press amid a dispute over a manuscript the former energy-industry executive had submitted for publication, per the report.

Over the past half year, I have had the privilege to serve as an informal advisor to the staff of the Kremlin in preparation for their Presidency of the G-20 Summit next month, where energy issues will be a prominent point on the agenda, Page boasted in the August 2013 letter. He now tells Time that he sat in on and contributed to a few roundtable discussions with people from around the world at the time, including a representative from Russia. He also cited a briefing document written by a Russian trade diplomat to back up his claim, and said similar subsequent meetings that year were really plain-vanilla stuff.

Page was put under surveillance in 2016 as part of the FBI investigation into Russias meddling in that years presidential election. In the GOP-written memo released on Friday, one of the several underwhelming accusations lodged at federal law enforcement officials was that they abused their power in obtaining a warrant to begin that surveillance. Indeed, some conservatives who had tried to distance themselves from Page in light of the Russia investigation have now come to his defense, arguing that his civil rights were violated. In fact, Page is more likely just a useful idiot to allies of President Trump looking for ways to discredit the Russia investigation.

The Republican memo, which has been heavily promoted by House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes, claims that the Page FISA warrant application was improper because it cited the infamous Steele dossier without disclosing the political biases of those who created and (partially) paid for it. The dossier alleged that Page had secretly met with a senior Kremlin official in 2016, in part to discuss ways to help the Trump campaign and damage Hillary Clinton. (Page has denied this.)

The Nunes memo does not actually list all the evidence that was used to obtain the warrant to surveil Page, so theres no way of confirming the Steele dossiers importance in the process. Its also not at all clear from the memo reports that the warrant application was actually improper, and memos bias-disclosure contention is already being disputed by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee as well as least one law enforcement official who has seen the original FISA warrant application. (And thats all before considering the fact that law enforcement sources regularly have a bias against the target of an investigation.)

The FISA warrant was also not only approved by a judge the first time, but an additional three times at 90-day intervals, meaning law enforcement officials were able to show probable cause for the better part of a year that Page was acting as an agent of a foreign power. And he was already on the FBIs radar to begin with, since he had been questioned over his relationship with a Russian operative in 2013. Democratic members of the House Intelligence Committee reportedly insist that former deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe, when he testified last year before the House Intelligence Committee, said that 2013 investigation was one of the reasons, in addition to the Steele dossier, that the FBI became suspicious of Page. Now the informal adviser claim has surfaced as well, though its not clear if agents were already aware of it.

Congressman Nunes and others are claiming Page was unfairly targeted. Thats still possible, but no news thats emerged in the last week has made Page look any less worthy of surveillance.Nokia 10 concept renders with penta-lens camera look splendid News oi-Abhinaya Prabhu Check out these impressive Nokia 10 concepts.

By now, we have already come across several rumors and leaks regarding the penta-lens camera smartphone from HMD Global. Though there is no official confirmation regarding the same, it is believed to be the next-generation flagship smartphone from the company - the Nokia 10 that is likely to be unveiled later this year with the Snapdragon 845 SoC. That's not all as there are several leaks showing the revolver-like camera module of the smartphone.

In the meantime, a slew of concept videos has also started making their way to the internet showing us how the Nokia 10 with a penta-lens camera module might look like. We lately came across one such video showing the rear camera setup of the smartphone. Now, another Nokia 10 concept video has been uploaded by Science and Knowledge YouTube channel and it shows the gorgeous front and rear design of the smartphone.

Before we down to the concept renders, it is important to know that there is no official confirmation from HMD Global regarding the Nokia 10. The existing information is based on hearsay and nothing is official. So there is a fair chance for those to not come to reality later this year.

Penta-lens camera The Nokia 10 concept shows the penta-lens camera setup with a revolver-like setup as seen earlier in the leaked schematics. The lenses appear to be encased in a circular ring and below the camera module is a fingerprint sensor. The primary lens is surrounded by the other sensors and it is said that the users can adjust the aperture and focal length on rotating the camera setup. The lens is said to be certified by Carl Zeiss. If this camera setup sees the light of the day, then it will definitely be a sensation in the smartphone industry. Full-screen design From the leaked renders and concept videos, we can infer that the Nokia 10 will arrive with a full-screen design that became mainstream in the last year. The smartphone is said to arrive with a 5.8-inch display with an aspect ratio of 18:9. the display is believed to feature 4K resolution as well that display eye-popping content on the screen. Rumored specs The existing media reports and leaks have suggested that the Nokia 10 will arrive with a Snapdragon 845 SoC. It makes sense as the smartphone was leaked initially as a part of the list of flagship smartphones to be launched with the Snapdragon 845 SoC. The device is believed to be launched with 6GB/8GB RAM, 64GB/128GB storage space, a 3500mAh battery and Android 8.0 Oreo out of the box. Nokia 10 concept video You can watch the Nokia 10 concept video from here.

Best Mobiles in India

Facebook, To stay updated with latest technology news & gadget reviews, follow GizBot on Twitter YouTube and also subscribe to our notification. Allow NotificationsPractical conditions might mean Grand Junction is not best location for BLM headquartersOh, Reince. Photo: Aude Guerrucci-Pool/Getty Images

Reince Priebus, who was unceremoniously ousted as White House chief of staff last summer, went on Meet the Press Sunday morning to affirm that everything he saw during his brief tenure was completely on the level.

Priebus told Chuck Todd that, contrary to a January New York Times report, he never got the sense that the president wanted to fire Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

I never feltthat the president was going to fire the special counsel, Priebus said. Asked by Todd if the president even expressed the desire that Mueller should be fired, Priebus hedged a bit: I think it was very clear from the presidents own words that he was concerned about the conflict of interests the special counsel had.

Priebus then said, somewhat confusingly, I know the difference between Fire that person, why isnt that person gone? to what I read in that New York Times piece.

When Todd asked him of the story was wrong, Priebus said, I didnt think it was right.

Well, that clears everything up.

Priebus, who has continued to cheerlead the president from the sidelines over the last few months, said that I never felt that I was involved in something nefarious, the whole way through from the beginning to the end. You can understand the frustration of the president.

Of course, Priebuss definition of nefarious may vary from the average persons.

Priebus also claimed, with a straight face, that he still thought the infamous Trump Tower meeting in June 2016 was really about Russian adoptions.

Given Priebuss record of truth-telling on Meet the Press, that statement should be taken with an entire shaker of salt.What Is in the Nunes Memo?

By Masood Farivar February 02, 2018

A controversial document prepared by Republican members of Congress accuses U.S. law enforcement officials of abusing their surveillance authorities during the Russia investigation.

The 3-page secret memo, written by Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee, was released Friday after President Donald Trump authorized its declassification.

What the memo alleges

The memo's key allegation is that the U.S. Justice Department and the FBI improperly obtained a series of electronic surveillance warrants on former Trump associate Carter Page as part of the probe into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.

Page served as a foreign policy adviser for the Trump campaign and came under U.S. intelligence suspicion after traveling to Moscow and meeting with Russian officials.

FBI surveillance of foreign spies and other foreign targets in the United States is overseen by a secret court known as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC). To obtain a warrant from the court, the FBI must furnish evidence that the target is a foreign power or an agent of a foreign government.

In Carter's case, the memo alleges, the FBI substantially relied on information from a research dossier compiled by a former British intelligence officer for the election campaign of Trump's rival, Hillary Clinton. The bureau used the information in its initial warrant application in October 2016 after Page had left the campaign as well as three subsequent renewal applications.

The author of the dossier, Christopher Steele, was a longtime FBI source who was paid by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee, via the law firm Perkins Cole and the research firm Fusion GPS, to "obtain derogatory information on Donald Trump's ties to Russia," according to the memo.

Steele is also accused of harboring an anti-Trump bias during the campaign, telling a senior Justice Department official two months before the 2016 election that he "was desperate that Donald Trump not get elected and was passionate about him not being president." Trump has called the dossier's allegations about his personal and financial ties to Russia a "Crooked Hillary Pile of Garbage."

But while the dossier formed an "essential part" of the Page surveillance applications, the memo says, FBI and DOJ officials failed to disclose that the underlying information had been funded by the Democrats "even though the political origins of the Steele dossier were then known to senior DOJ and FBI officials."

The government "had at least four independent opportunities before the FISC to accurately provide an accounting of the relevant facts," the Republicans wrote in the memo. "However, our findings indicate that ... material and relevant information was omitted."

To support their claim that the dossier was central to obtaining the warrants, the Republicans cited December 2017 testimony by former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe that "without the dossier information," no surveillance warrant would have been sought.

Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee who unsuccessfully tried to block the memo's release blasted the document for "serious mischaracterizations."

In a statement, Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the intelligence panel, said the FBI "would have been derelict in its responsibility to protect the country had it not sought a FISA [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] warrant."

What the memo doesn't say

While the memo says the application relied on unsubstantiated information from the Steele dossier, it doesn't say what other pieces of evidence the FBI invoked to obtain the warrants. A FISA warrant application typically contains multiple sources of classified information to establish probable cause that the target of a proposed surveillance works for a foreign government.

Former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said a key question that is left unanswered in the memo is whether other information used in the application was enough to warrant its approval.

"There is a lot of questions raised by the information that I'd like to get answers to," Gonzales told VOA.

Ahead of the memo's public release, Trump tweeted that the "top Leadership and Investigators of the FBI and the Justice Department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of Democrats and against Republicans  something which would have been unthinkable just a short time ago. Rank & File are great people!"

But the memo does not directly accuse the top brass at the FBI and Justice Department of any wrongdoing, though it does say that senior officials, including former FBI Director James Comey, former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, and current Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, all signed off on the Page warrant applications.

Gonzales said that top officials who sign FISA warrant applications don't always get to read every fact included in them.

"You're not necessarily going to know what's not included in the application and nonetheless you go ahead and sign the FISA application," he said.

Gonzales said criticism of the department's top brass can trickle down to its rank and file.

"Whatever one might say about being for the rank and file at the department, the line prosecutors and line investigators, anytime you attack the leadership or the work of the department, it does hurt the morale of the rank and file," he said.

"I'm worried that the public's confidence in the integrity of investigations and prosecutions by the Department of Justice has been eroded," Gonzales said. "I think that's a terrible place to be, quite frankly."

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Trump tweets that GOP memo 'totally vindicates' him in Russian probe

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 06:49PM

US President Donald Trump has defended a recent recent release of once-classified congressional memo on FBI, saying it "totally vindicates" him in an investigation into his presidential campaign's alleged collusion with Russia.

The president took to Twitter on Saturday morning to once again deny any such collusion or obstruction.

"This memo totally vindicates 'Trump' in probe," he wrote. "But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their (sic) was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!"

On Friday, he approved the public release of a memo written by House Intelligence Committee member Devin Nunes that alleges the FBI abused its surveillance authority.

The release of the four-page document prompted senior Democrats to denounce the controversial memo as an inaccurate and misleading portrait intended to undermine the probe. They warned Trump, in a written statement, not to use it as a "pretext" to fire special counsel Robert Mueller or the deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein.

Trump reportedly ordered f Mueller the firing of Mueller in June. Democrats, said in a statement that, the memo release is an attempt to undermine the integrity of Mueller's investigation, warning that such action could trigger a constitutional crisis not seen since the 1970s, when then President Richard Nixon gave orders to fire justice officials involved in the Watergate scandal.

"We write to inform you that we would consider such an unwarranted action as an attempt to obstruct justice in the Russia investigation," the statement said.

The memo's central allegation is that the FBI and US Justice Department had been spying on a former Trump campaign adviser, Carter Page.

GOP memo release sends 'terrible message' to US allies

Former CIA director Leon Panetta also warned that Trump's approval of the congressional memo sends a "terrible message" to US allies to be worry about sharing classified information with Washington.

Panetta, who was discussing the memo release with the CBS News on Friday, described it as an "unprecedented" move, which could have far-reaching effects on Washington's foreign policy.

"All of this sends a terrible message to our allies who are going to worry about sharing classified information that is so easily released as part of this political effort," said the former CIA director.

He also called Trump's move as "a breakdown in the fundamental trust that is important to the institutions of our democracy."

There are currently several investigations into alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, but Trump has consistently denied any ties with Moscow. Analysts, however, say Trump's attempts to hinder the probe, including his attempts to sack Mueller, suggests that he has something big to hide.

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Trump Says Republican Memo on Russia Probe 'Totally Vindicates' Him

By VOA News February 03, 2018

U.S. President Donald Trump said Saturday a disputed Republican memo that alleges FBI investigators abused their powers in their Russia probe "totally vindicates" him, despite a contrarian view held by most Democrats.

"This memo totally vindicates 'Trump' in probe," the president wrote on Twitter Saturday morning. "But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their [sic] was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!"

The U.S. House Intelligence Committee released a memo to the public Friday that outlines allegations by Republican lawmakers that FBI investigators exceeded their authority in their probe of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

The release followed Trump's approval of the declassification of the memo, which was written by the committee's chairman and fellow Republican Rep. Devin Nunes.

A significant part of the document focuses on foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants that permitted FBI surveillance of former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser Carter Page, a businessman with interests in Russia.

There had been concerns about Page's alleged contacts with Russian intelligence agents.

The memo asserts that a dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele was an "essential part" of the FISA application to surveil Page, and that the FBI did not mention the Steele dossier had been funded by then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's campaign and the Democratic National Committee, or that Steele had previously made anti-Trump statements.

Trump, the FBI and the disputed memo

Speaking to reporters Friday at the White House, Trump said the contents of the memo were "terrible."

"I think it's a disgrace, what's going on in this country," he said. "A lot of people should be ashamed of themselves, and much worse than that."

When asked by a reporter whether releasing the memo made it more likely Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein would be fired, Trump replied, "You figure that one out."

Rosenstein supervises the Russia probe and named special counsel Robert Mueller to lead it.

The release of the memo intensified the battle between Trump and his Republican allies in Congress on one side and Democrats and top FBI officials on the other about whether the probe into Russian interference in the presidential election was affected by political bias on the part of investigators.

The FBI on Friday reissued its statement from earlier this week, saying the agency "takes seriously its obligations to the FISA Court and its compliance with procedures overseen by career professionals."

The FBI noted it was given "limited opportunity" to review the document before lawmakers voted to release it.

"As expressed during our initial review, we have grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo's accuracy," the agency said.

Support for the memo

Nunes issued a statement Friday expressing hope that the actions of Intelligence Committee Republicans would "shine a light" on what he called "this alarming series of events."

"The committee has discovered serious violations of the public trust, and the American people have a right to know when officials in crucial institutions are abusing their authority for political purposes," Nunes said. "Our intelligence and law enforcement agencies exist to defend the American people, not to be exploited to target one group on behalf of another."

House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wisconsin released a statement saying the "concern outlined" in the memo is a "legitimate one." He said he supported both the release of Nunes' memo as well as a memo produced by minority Democrats on the committee.

"It is critical that we focus on specific actions and specific actors and not use this memo to impugn the integrity of the justice system and FBI, which continue to serve the American people with honor," Ryan said.

Critics of the memo's release

The Democratic members of the committee issued a statement lambasting Nunes' decision to release his memo, saying it contains "misleading allegations against the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation [and] is a shameful effort to discredit these institutions, undermine the special counsel's ongoing investigation and undercut congressional probes."

"Most destructive of all may be the announcement by Chairman Nunes that he has placed the FBI and DOJ under investigation, impugning and impairing the work of the dedicated professionals trying to keep our country safe," the statement said.

The Democratic statement accused Republicans of setting a "terrible precedent" by releasing classified information they say will do long-term damage to the intelligence community for the purpose of protecting Trump against charges in the Russia probe.

Representative Adam Schiff of California, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, issued a separate statement questioning what he calls "serious mischaracterizations" in the Republican memo.

"The majority suggests that the FBI failed to alert the court as to Mr. Steele's potential political motivations or the political motivations of those who hired him, but this is not accurate," Schiff wrote. "The GOP memo also claims that a Yahoo News article was used to corroborate Steele, but this is not at all why the article was referenced."

Intelligence community reaction

Attorney General Jeff Sessions weighed in on the memo's release Friday, saying he has "great confidence in the men and women of this Department [of Justice]. But no department is perfect."

Former FBI Director James Comey, who headed the agency during the period in question, issued a blistering tweet Friday, calling the Republican memo "dishonest and misleading" and charging that it had "inexcusably exposed [a] classified investigation of an American citizen."

The president of the FBI Agents Association, Thomas O'Connor, defended the rank-and-file officers and their commitment to their work.

"The American people should know that they continue to be well-served by the world's pre-eminent law enforcement agency," he said in a statement. "FBI special agents have not, and will not, allow partisan politics to distract us from our solemn commitment to our mission."

Trump's approval ratings

Trump also promoted on Twitter Saturday the results of a new poll that shows an increase in his approval rating.

"Rasmussen just announced that my approval rating jumped to 49%, a far better number than I had in winning the Election, and higher than certain "sacred cows." Other Trump polls are way up also. So why does the media refuse to write this? Oh well, someday!"

The Rasmussen results show Trump has a higher approval rating than the Real Clear Politics Average, a compilation of findings from eleven national polls (including Rasmussen), of 41.9 percent.

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Iran Jails 'Nuclear Spy' For Six Years

RFE/RL February 04, 2018

Tehran's prosecutor says an unnamed person has been sentenced to six years in prison for relaying information about Iran's nuclear program to a U.S. intelligence agent and a European country.

Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi told judiciary news website Mizan that the Iranian court also ordered the confiscation of the money the convict allegedly received for the information.

Dolatabadi said the alleged spy met the U.S. agent nine times and provided him with information about "nuclear affairs and sanctions."

The convict also provided the information to a European country, the prosecutor added, without providing further details.

In December, Dolatabadi said Iran's Supreme Court had upheld a death sentence against Ahmadreza Djalali, an Iranian-Swedish academic convicted of providing information to Israel about Iran's nuclear and defense plans and personnel.

Djalali, a researcher at Stockholm's Karolinska Institute, has denied the charges.

Iran insists its nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes, while the United States and other countries claim it has been trying to develop nuclear weapons.

U.S. President Donald Trump said last month that he wanted to work with European allies and Congress to fix what he called "disastrous flaws" in the 2015 nuclear accord between Tehran and world powers.

Trump warned that Washington would withdraw from the deal, which curbed Iran's nuclear program in exchange for the easing of crippling international sanctions targeting Tehran, if the terms of the agreement are not strengthened within four months.

Tehran has ruled out any changes in the agreement, while the other signatories -- Britain, France, Germany, China, and Russia -- have closed ranks in support of the accord.

Also on February 4, Iran's judiciary acknowledged that it had granted medical leave to an 81-year-old Iranian-American convicted of "collaborating with the hostile American government."

However, the judiciary sought to downplay any expectation that Baquer Namazi would be put on an indefinite release after his recent surgery to install a pacemaker.

"Like many prisoners who can go on leave, he went on a three-day leave," spokesman Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei said. "When he was out of prison, they requested the leave to be extended for another three days."

"His leave must have come to an end yesterday or today," he added.

Namazi's lawyer Jared Genser said he believed his client would remain on leave until at least February 5.

Baquer Namazi, a retired UNICEF official, and his son Siamak are serving 10-year prison sentences.

A United Nations human rights group and the United States have called for their immediate release.

With reporting by AP and Reuters

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/iran-jails-nuclear spy-six-years/29017635.html

Copyright (c) 2018. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Trump Claims Republican Memo 'Totally Vindicates' Him In Russia Probe

RFE/RL February 04, 2018

U.S. President Donald Trump is claiming that he has been completely vindicated by a Republican-written congressional memo that alleges the FBI abused its surveillance powers during an investigation of the Trump presidential election campaign's possible ties to Russia.

In a Twitter message late on February 3, Trump said: "This memo totally vindicates 'Trump' in probe. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on."

Trump tweeted that there was "no Collusion and there was no Obstruction" of justice by his administration to block the FBI's investigation.

But the memo also includes revelations that could complicate any attempt by Trump and his allies to undermine Justice Department Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating the Kremlin's alleged meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

The memo released on February 2 contends that the FBI, when it applied for a surveillance warrant on a onetime Trump campaign associate, relied excessively on an ex-British spy whose opposition research was funded by Democrats.

But the memo also calls that source a "longtime FBI source" with a credible track record.

It also confirms that the investigation actually began several months earlier, and was "triggered" by information involving a different campaign aide.

The controversial memorandum accuses the FBI and the U.S. Justice Department of being biased.

Republicans on the U.S. House Intelligence Committee released the document just moments after it was declassified by Trump.

The document says its findings "raise concerns with the legitimacy and legality" of the actions of the FBI and Justice Department and "represent a troubling breakdown of legal processes."

The White House said earlier that the memo "raises serious concerns about the integrity of decisions made at the highest levels of the Department of Justice and the FBI."

The FBI on January 31 took the unusual step of publicly opposing the release of the memo, saying it demonstrated "material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo's accuracy."

Democrats say the memo is a selectively edited set of Republican talking points aimed at distracting attention from the committee's own investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Senior Democrats in Congress have warned that Trump could trigger a "constitutional crisis" if he uses the memo as a pretext to fire Mueller.

Democrats also said they hope to release their own memo on February 5.

With reporting by AP, Reuters, AFP, and dpa

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/us-trumps -says-memo-totally-vindicates-him- russia-probe/29017148.html

Copyright (c) 2018. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Claims and Counterclaims Surround Russia Probe Memo

By Ken Bredemeier February 04, 2018

U.S. President Donald Trump is contending that a controversial memo alleging that the FBI abused its power in probing Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election "totally vindicates" him, but that view was challenged Sunday by one of the memo's own authors.

Trump complained in a Saturday Twitter comment that the "Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!"

But Congressman Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, one of the key authors of the Republican memo released by the House Intelligence Committee, told CBS's "Face the Nation" on Sunday that the document does not undermine the months-long investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into the Russian campaign meddling or whether Trump obstructed justice in trying to curb the probe.

The four-page "Nunes memo," named after the House Intelligence panel chairman, Congressman Devin Nunes of California, concluded that the Federal Bureau of Investigation relied excessively on opposition research funded by Democrats in a dossier compiled by a former British spy, Christopher Steele, as its sought approval from a U.S. surveillance court in October 2016 to monitor Carter Page, a Trump campaign adviser, and his links to Russia.

But the memo notes that the FBI investigation that eventually led to Mueller's probe started months earlier, in July 2016, when agents began looking into contacts between another Trump adviser, George Papadopoulos, and Russian operatives. Papadopoulos, as part of Mueller's probe, has pleaded guilty to lying to investigators about his Russian contacts and, pending his sentencing, is cooperating with Mueller's investigation.

Gowdy said in the television interview that "there is a Russia investigation without a [Steele] dossier" because of other Trump campaign links to Russia, including a June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower in New York set up by Trump's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., on the premise that a Russian lawyer would hand over incriminating evidence on Trump's election opponent, Democrat Hillary Clinton. Gowdy said the Steele dossier "also doesn't have anything to do with obstruction of justice."

Another Republican on the Intelligence panel, Congressman Chris Stewart of Utah, told Fox News, "I think it would be a mistake for anyone to suggest the special counsel should not continue his work. This memo, frankly, has nothing to do at all with the special counsel."

Democratic lawmakers opposed to Friday's release of the memo say that as soon as Monday they will seek the Intelligence committee's approval to release their counter interpretation of the classified information underlying the Nunes document. The Democrats contend that the Republican-approved statement "cherry-picks" information and overstates the importance of the Steele dossier in the FBI's effort to win approval from the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court for the monitoring of Page's activities.

Democratic Congressman Jerrold Nadler of New York said the memo released by the Republicans "is a disgrace. House Republicans should be ashamed."

Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer, in a letter Sunday, pushed Trump to approve release of the Democratic response to the Nunes memo, saying Americans should "be allowed to see both sides of the argument and make their own judgments."

Ahead of Trump's approval of release of the Republican-backed House Intelligence panel's memo, the FBI said it had "grave concerns" about its accuracy because of omissions concerning its request to the surveillance court to monitor Page. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who is overseeing the Mueller investigation, also opposed its release.

Rosenstein was one of several Justice Department officials who signed off on the request to the surveillance court to monitor Page, leaving some Trump critics to voice fears that Trump would soon fire Rosenstein.

When asked Friday whether he still had confidence in Rosenstein or was likely to fire him, Trump said, "You figure that one out."

Later, however, White House spokesman Raj Shah, said on Fox News, "Rod Rosenstein's job is not on the line. We expect him to continue his job as deputy attorney general."

FBI, DOJ response

After the memo's release, the FBI on Friday re-issued its statement saying the agency "takes seriously its obligations to the FISA Court and its compliance with procedures overseen by career professionals."

The FBI noted it was given "limited opportunity" to review the document before lawmakers voted to release it. "As expressed during our initial review, we have grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo's accuracy," the agency said.

Nunes issued a statement Friday expressing hope that the actions of Intelligence Committee Republicans would "shine a light" on what he called "this alarming series of events."

"The committee has discovered serious violations of the public trust, and the American people have a right to know when officials in crucial institutions are abusing their authority for political purposes," Nunes said. "Our intelligence and law enforcement agencies exist to defend the American people, not to be exploited to target one group on behalf of another."

Attorney General Jeff Sessions weighed in on the memo's release Friday, saying, he has "great confidence in the men and women of this Department [of Justice]. But no department is perfect."

FBI Director Christopher Wray, who was appointed by Trump, told agency employees Friday that he stood with them. "I stand by our shared determination to do our work independently and by the book," Wray said in a statement to 35,000 FBI staff.

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Unlocking Capacity is Critical to Reform, Shanahan Tells DoD Leaders

By Lisa Ferdinando DoD News, Defense Media Activity

WASHINGTON, Feb. 2, 2018  The Defense Department must restructure to unlock capability and capacity, Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick M. Shanahan told senior defense leaders in the Pentagon this week.

In an all-hands meeting Jan. 31 with general officers, admirals and members of the Senior Executive Service, Shanahan said the department faces myriad of complex, evolving challenges, especially from "great power" regimes that seek to insert "themselves, whether it is economically or militarily" into U.S. interests.

It is imperative, he said, that DoD move to work against those threats. The recently unveiled National Defense Strategy is about growing U.S. capability and capacity against these evolving security challenges, Shanahan said.

The deputy secretary highlighted three focus areas of change in the strategy: finding ways to move resources more quickly in the Joint Staff; supporting the services with better modernization plans; and generating more capability, to include autonomous vehicles and artificial intelligence.

Over the next six months, the department will put into work the priorities and start undertaking the change, he added.

Budget Uncertainty Poses Risk to DoD

In briefing the group on the National Defense Strategy, Shanahan said that the biggest risk was dealing with security challenges in the face of budget uncertainty. But he praised Pentagon leaders for responding to an unprecedented number of natural disasters in the past year, undertaking leadership transition, implementing a new South Asia strategy, and defeating ISIS, all while operating under a congressional budget cap.

"You would think in the midst of all this, resources would be pouring in," the deputy secretary said, pointing to budget uncertainties that include years of continuing resolutions. He said he remains optimistic that the department will receive adequate funding.

New threats from cyber and unmanned aerial vehicles are emerging, he said. Despite the challenges, the defense machine keeps going, and the department is "on track to get resourced properly," Shanahan said.

Getting a Pulse, Shaping the Future

The aim of the all-hands meeting was to start a dialogue and get a pulse on what is happening in the Pentagon, the deputy secretary told standing-room-only crowd in the Pentagon auditorium.

"The perfect outcome of this meeting is that we get better as leaders, because we are the ones who are really going to shape the place today and in the future," he said.

The Pentagon has a world-class workforce, Shanahan said, adding that the "amount of work that people can do in this complex environment is remarkable."

He described his post as deputy to Defense Secretary James N. Mattis as the best job he has ever had.

"I think about why it's the best job I've ever had, and it's really the people," the deputy secretary said, noting remarkable inclusiveness and cohesion among the staff.

Shanahan noted that the audience at the State of the Union "erupted" at the mention of Mattis's name.

"He represents this body here. It's a remarkable team," he said.

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U.S. Department of Defense

Press Operations

News Release

No. NR-033-18 February 02, 2018

Readout From Secretary James N. Mattis' Bilateral Meeting With Ukraine Minister of Defense

Pentagon Chief Spokesperson Dana W. White provided the following readout:

Secretary of Defense James N. Mattis met his Ukrainian counterpart, Minister of Defence Stepan Poltorak, at the Pentagon today.

Secretary Mattis emphasized the value of the U.S.-Ukraine security partnership. He praised Minister Poltorak for his country's sustained courage in the face of Russian aggression, and reiterated U.S. support for Ukrainian defense reform goals. He cited the Law on National Security as an urgent priority, and expressed his hope that the Presidential Administration and Ukraine's parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, take swift action and pass legislation that ensures a solid legal basis for the implementation of defense reforms in support of a secure and democratic Ukraine.

The two leaders pledged to strengthen a lasting partnership between the U.S. and Ukraine built on common security interests and shared principles.

http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/1431943/

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Wake Island Embodies Reality of America as Pacific Power

By Jim Garamone DoD News, Defense Media Activity

WAKE ISLAND, Feb. 3, 2018  By history and by blood, the United States is a Pacific nation and nothing says that better than this remote coral atoll.

To the Greatest Generation, Wake Island was a rallying call. It was the site of the first unsuccessful attack by Japanese forces on Dec. 11, 1941 -- four days after the Japanese fleet devastated Pearl Harbor.

But it has been a strategic possession for the United States since the 19th century, when it was seen as a coaling station and possible site for a trans-Pacific telegraph. Today, it is a 21st-century base crucial to testing of America's ballistic missile defense program. It also is a waystation for the more than 400 military aircraft that stop at the airfield each year to refuel.

This was why Marine Corps Gen. Joe Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stopped at Wake. He is on a trip to Australia and Thailand to hold counterpart visits with close American allies. He will then stop in Guam, where he will meet with U.S. service members based there.

His trip is all part of underscoring America as a Pacific power.

Modern Mission

About 100 personnel are based here, reporting to the Pacific Air Forces Regional Support Center in Alaska. The unit has a large footprint in the Pacific. There are four active-duty airmen at the base and the rest are contractor personnel, said Air Force Capt. Marc Bleha, the current commander.

The base is getting a facelift with new water lines in place and solar panels being installed, Bleha said. "Our mission set is to manage the 400-plus aircraft that come in here per year," Bleha said. "Missile Defense Agency does various types of testing on different platforms. Some of it is live-firing, some of it is imaging. It just depends on what MDA has scheduled. The last live fire, they had [a target from] ATK Orbital  and that was launched from here. [They also had] imaging, which was primarily the Army part of the Missile Defense Agency."

When the agency does come in they bring 50 to 100 people. "It's not that dramatic a change," Breha said. "We're designed to flex in that manner."

History is literally underfoot on the small island. The bunkers that the defenders of Wake fought from still exist. Plaques commemorate the defense of Wake. The airfield tower where President Harry S. Truman met with General of the Army Douglas MacArthur during the Korean War is still there. And as part of the renovation project, engineers hit a 500-pound bomb while digging a trench.

The bomb, the bunkers, the plaques, the tower all serve to remind Bleha of the history of America in the Pacific. The testing of missile defense assets serves to remind him that this continues.

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The memo may be a dud, but Trump is still applauding. Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images

Two days after the release of the Nunes memo, the only people who still consider it a conspiracy-revealing bombshell are, predictably, the same pro-Trump figures and politicians who oversold its importance in the first place. While the memo has generated a lot of media coverage, that attention has mostly focused on how the memo does not prove what House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes, President Trump, and others say it does  and how it supports, rather than invalidates, the rationale behind the investigation into Russias meddling in the 2016 election.

But even if the memo doesnt lay the groundwork for canceling Robert Muellers Russia investigation, as some of its cheerleaders clearly hoped it would, that doesnt mean it wont do lasting damage to the institutions now caught in Trumpworlds covering fire. More specifically, critics have pointed out that the memo will likely harm the credibility and reputation of the FBI and larger U.S. law enforcement bureaucracy. That is surely the point: Trump and his allies object to the scrutiny he has received from the countrys law enforcement institutions, so they are conducting an unprecedented campaign to demonize and discredit those institutions and any conclusions they subsequently make against the president.

The Nunes memo, at its heart, calls into question the fairness of U.S. law enforcement, since it alleges that federal law enforcement officials were able to abuse their power in order to pursue partisan political gains, particularly in the application for a FISA warrant to surveil a former adviser to the Trump campaign, Carter Page.

Speaking with McClatchy, Todd Hinnen, a former acting chief of the Justice Departments national security division, offered a definitive dose of skepticism toward that charge. I would be very, very surprised to learn that the numerous FBI and Department of Justice officials, and likely several judges appointed by Chief Justice John Roberts, had subverted the safeguards of the FISA system and were pursuing a political agenda, he explained. All three branches of government have worked very hard to develop a system of integrity thats subject to safeguards and the rule of law.

That integrity is now under attack. Josh Campbell, a supervisory special agent at the FBI, said in a Friday New York Times op-ed that he was quitting the agency to join the growing chorus of people who believe that the relentless attacks on the bureau undermine not just Americas premier law enforcement agency but also the nations security. (Regulations prevent FBI employees from publicly speaking out on such matters.) These are the stakes as Campbell sees them:

When the F.B.I. knocks on someones door or appeals to the public for assistance in solving crime, the willingness of people to help is directly correlated to their opinion of the agency. When an agent working to stop a terrorist plot attempts to recruit an informant, the agents success in gathering critical intelligence depends on the informants belief that the agent is credible and trustworthy. And, as the former director, James Comey, would frequently say in underscoring the importance of high standards, whether a jury believes an agents testimony depends on whether it has faith in the bureaus honesty and independence. To be effective, the F.B.I. must be believed and must maintain the support of the public it serves.

According to Campbell, individual agents, not the officials targeted by the Trump administration, will suffer the most from the pro-Trump attacks:

The assumption among confused and dismayed F.B.I. employees is that the attacks are meant to soften the blow should the investigation by Mr. Mueller, the special counsel, lead to additional charges. However, these kinds of attacks by powerful people go beyond mere criticism  they could destroy the institution. Although those critics revisionist supporters claim their ire is reserved for institutional leadership and not the rank and file, it is the F.B.I. agent on the street who will be most severely affected as public support for federal law enforcement is sacrificed for partisan gain.

Theres also the concern that agents might become reluctant to report information related to the president in light of these partisan attacks, as former CIA agent Robert Baer suggested during a CNN appearance on Friday. And will a juror who watches a lot of Sean Hannity now be willing to believe an FBI agents testimony in the courtroom?

Indeed, some damage seems to have already been done to the reputation of the FBI in the minds of Republican voters, some of whom are clearly buying into the anti-FBI/Russia investigation spin. A Gallup poll taken in December found that only 49 percent of Republicans thought the Bureau was doing a good job or better, a drop of 13 points from three years ago. The results of a new Axios/SurveyMonkey poll taken on Thursday and Friday paints an even bleaker picture, with only 38 percent of Republicans saying that they currently hold a favorable view of the FBI, and 47 percent holding an unfavorable view.

Theres also the matter of further damaging the credibility of the already controversial FISA process. Even the American Civil Liberties Union, no fan of FISA warrants, has criticized the Nunes memo. Explained the ACLUs Christopher Anders in a statement on Friday, The completeness and accuracy of government representations to the FISA court are longstanding concerns, but the Nunes memo does not contain the facts needed to substantiate its charges.

Those who support FISA warrants, like Just Securitys Jennifer Daskal, are even more concerned:

FISA is an incredibly powerful  and incredibly important  tool that authorizes the gathering of foreign intelligence evidence regarding U.S. citizens and residents pursuant to a court-issued warrant based on probable cause, albeit in situations that are shrouded in secrecy. Its continued vitality depends in significant part on faith that those entrusted to exercise this extraordinary authority do so with ultimate commitment to uncovering truth and abiding by the rule of law. 

[A]n allegation of abuse, in the absence of actual abuse, or even more concerning in a one-sided representation of the facts for purposes of partisan gain, would constitute a dangerous, short-sighted attack on a critically valuable national security tool, in ways that could undercut our national security over the long term.

The Nunes memo and Trumpworlds continuing attacks on the law enforcement apparatus could have repercussions for the dynamic between Congress and the intelligence community as well. Also at Just Security, Julian Sanchez acknowledged that while you never want the relationship between the House Intelligence Committee and the intelligence community to be too cozy, the Nunes memo goes too far:

The Justice Department and FBI were pretty reluctant to hand over sensitive material relevant to an ongoing investigation, and to then see it mined for items to attack the Bureau in a way they clearly regard as misleading and unfair would, obviously, tend to confirm their initial reluctance. Needless to say, you dont want it to be an exercise in pulling teeth whenever House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) needs sensitive material to conduct its oversight responsibilities. If the agencies arent just worried about genuine errors being exposed, but about material being politically repurposes this way, the overseers jobs are predictably going to get a lot harder.

Sanchezs colleague Michael German agreed that the memo has done significant damage to the committees credibility, particularly since the congressional intelligence committees were created to ensure nonpartisan oversight. I think this [memo] puts a dagger into that notion, German explained, which will make it harder for the agencies to share information with them in the future, and harder for the public to accept that they are looking out for our interests rather than their own.

For a broader view of the repercussions, here is what the folks at Lawfare pointed out at the end of their exhaustive analysis of the Nunes memo:

At the end of the day, the most important aspect of the #memo is probably not its contents but the fact that it was written and released at all. Its preparation and public dissemination represent a profound betrayal of the central premise of the intelligence oversight system. That system subjects the intelligence community to detailed congressional oversight, in which the agencies turn over their most sensitive secrets to their overseers in exchange for both a secure environment in which oversight can take place and a promise that overseers will not abuse their access for partisan political purposes. In other words, they receive legitimation when they act in accordance with law and policy. Nunes, the Republican congressional leadership and Trump violated the core of that bargain over the course of the past few weeks. They revealed highly sensitive secrets by way of scoring partisan political points and delegitimizing what appears to have been lawful and appropriate intelligence community activity.

It was a heavy blow to a system that has served this country well for decades, and it is one that will not be forgotten any time soon.

And again, the damage was already being done. President Trump had already said the FBIs reputation was in tatters and the worst in history two months before Nuness memo became a Republican cause celebre. On Saturday, he said the Russia investigation was an American disgrace. Whether or not the damage lasts, or in some way protects Trump from the potential consequences of the Russia investigation, is what remains to be seen. Thanks to this rhetoric, there is a subset of the public that wont believe what comes out of the Mueller investigation, former FBI agent and prosecutor Christopher Hunter told the Times after the Nunes memo landed. That may also be true for GOP senators, or at least arguably true as part of a cover story to protect their president and party. Max Boot outlined that fear in the Washington Post on Saturday:

If special counsel Robert S. Mueller III delivers a scathing report on the president and if Democrats win the House in November, its almost certain the House will vote to impeach. But it takes 67 votes in the Senate to remove a president.

The case against the FBI thats being assembled by Trump and his minions is not designed to convince dispassionate observers. Its only supposed to give the thinnest of cover to true believers  and at least 34 senators  to do what they are predisposed to do anyway, i.e., protect the president at all costs.

In the end, as some are already arguing, Trumps version of the Saturday Night Massacre  referring to the infamous night of Nixon administration resignations which preceded the firing of the Watergate special prosecutor  may already be happening, only in such a slow-motion way as to protect, rather than doom, this president.

In a new Politico magazine piece, Nixon biographer John A. Farrell compared and contrasted the Watergate scandal to the Russia investigation and Trump, and in doing so spoke with James Doyle, who served as the spokesman for Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox. In Doyles opinion, even if Trump triggered a Saturday Night Massacrelike event, times have changed, and because of the confusion around this scandal, the system would probably fail this time around. In other words, the obfuscation by Trump and his allies may have already succeeded.Afghanistan's president hints talks with Taliban possible

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 05:11PM

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has admitted that Kabul would accept talks with certain elements of the Taliban as the government finds itself under mounting public and international pressure to improve security in the wake of recent major acts of terror in the capital.

Ghani said Saturday while addressing a group of clerics in Kabul that those Taliban leaders who avoid bloodshed would be welcome in peace talks with the government. However, he said those responsible for two attacks last month that killed more than 130 people would see no mercy from the government's side.

"Those who accept peace, they will witness that the nation will embrace them," Ghani said, adding, "Those who are responsible for this tragedy and do not want peace, the door of peace is closed to them."

The Afghan president has come under increasing pressure over an attack by the Taliban on January 20, when a hotel was targeted, and the other assault a week later that killed dozens in a crowded market. Many now question his long-running efforts to initiate peace talks with the Taliban.

Ghani's office said in a statement on January 30 that with recent attacks, some elements within the Taliban had crossed the red-line and the government was forced to seek peace on the battlefield. That toughness had its echoes in Ghani's Saturday speech.

"...our commitment to bringing peace does not mean we will sit quietly and won't retaliate," said the Afghan president, adding, "We will dig them out from any hiding holes."

Kabul has been part of a quadrilateral initiative with Pakistan, the United States and China to engage in peace talks with the Taliban. However, efforts have stalled since last year, when news broke of the death of the militant group's founder and long-time leader Mullah Omar.

The rise in attacks by the Taliban over the past months has also raised doubts about the effectiveness of Washington's strategy in Afghanistan some 17 years after the United States and its allies invaded the country under the pretext of war on terror.

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Israel plans vast offensive missile project against Hezbollah: Report

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 07:16AM

The Israeli regime has decided to set up "a vast network" of offensive missile systems that would be targeted against the resistance movement of Hezbollah in Lebanon, Israeli media claim.

Israel's Yedioth Ahronoth paper said on Friday that the Israeli minister of military affairs, Avigdor Liberman, had assigned around 500 million shekels (145 million dollars) to setting up "a vast network of medium-range surface-to-surface missile systems" and "a dedicated corps" to run it in an attempt "to counter Hezbollah."

According to Yedioth Ahronoth, Liberman made the decision after a meeting with Israeli military officials on January 4.

The "initial aspects" of the project are reportedly to be completed by 2020.

Israeli media claim that Hezbollah is in possession of an "arsenal of more than 100,000 short- and medium-range rockets."

Israel waged two all-out wars against Lebanon  in 2000 and 2006  but fell short of its military objectives in both cases in the face of strong resistance by Hezbollah and the Lebanese army.

On Wednesday, Liberman threatened the Lebanese state with another military invasion.

"Lebanon's army and Hezbollah are the same  they will all pay the full price in the event of an escalation," Liberman said. "If a conflict does break out in the north, 'boots on the ground' remains an option."

Lebanese Prime Minister Sa'ad al-Hariri on January 25 called Israel the greatest threat to Lebanon's stability.

"The only threat I see is Israel taking some kind of action against Lebanon, out of a miscalculation," Hariri told an audience at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, back then. "And this is the real threat, I believe. I think the other issues are challenges, yes ... But when Israel decides to launch a war against Lebanon, this is something that is unexplainable."

Joint drills with US

Meanwhile, Israeli media outlets said on Thursday that the United States  Tel Aviv's main ally  had deployed military forces to Israel for biennial joint war games with the Israeli military.

The so-called Juniper Cobra military drills enlisted more than 3,000 forces from the two sides in its last edition in 2016.

The sources said the maneuvers would simulate engagement with the countries lying to the north and south of Israel, including Lebanon.

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IDF Says Hit Hamas Targets in Gaza Strip in Response to Rocket Shelling

Sputnik News

09:50 03.02.2018(updated 09:55 03.02.2018)

TEL AVIV (Sputnik) - The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed on Saturday that its Air Force had hit several Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip in response to a rocket shelling from the enclave.

"Moments ago, in response to the rocket fired at southern Israel earlier this evening, fighter jets struck a Hamas compound composed of two military structures in the southern Gaza Strip. The IDF holds Hamas accountable for all violence emanating from the Gaza Strip," the IDF said on Twitter.

The rocket attack from the Gaza Strip resulted in no casualties. No information about any casualties as a result of Israel's retaliatory fire has been provided yet.

This is the second exchange of fire between Israel and the enclave over the past 24 hours.

Earlier on Saturday, a local resident told Sputnik that the Israeli Air Force had fired several missiles

at two Hamas operated buildings in the city of Rafah. The day before, the IDF said that a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip at Israel had been identified.

Rocket launches from the Gaza Strip have intensified following US President Donald Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel on December 6. The Israeli authorities blame the Hamas movement for rocket attacks, demanding compliance with the ceasefire by all Palestinian factions.

 Sputnik

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UN, African Union voice concern over protracted political crisis in Guinea-Bissau

3 February 2018  The top leaders of the African Union and the United Nations on Saturday expressed concern over the prolonged political crisis in Guinea-Bissau, condemning the recent actions taken by the national authorities to prevent a political party from holding its conference.

"The Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, and the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, express concern over the protracted political crisis in Guinea-Bissau despite the multiple opportunities offered to the main political stakeholders to arrive at a consensual arrangement," said an AU-UN joint statement.

"They condemn the recent actions taken by the national authorities to prevent the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cabo Verde (PAIGC) from convening and holding its Party Congress, including the directive given to national security services to evacuate and shutter the party's headquarters," it added.

Mr. Faki Mahamat and Mr. Guterres called on all relevant authorities to strictly adhere to international human rights and humanitarian law and to immediately remove all restrictions on the right to peaceful assembly, political participation and freedom of speech.

They fully endorsed the recent decisions on Guinea-Bissau taken by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) on 27 January and endorsed by the AU on 29 January.

They also supported the measures being taken by ECOWAS against "political obstructionists" in the country, welcoming the communique issued by the ECOWAS ministerial mission that visited Guinea-Bissau on 31 January and 1 February.

Further, they reiterated their endorsement of the centrality of the Conakry Agreement of 14 October 2016, which, inter alia, provides for the appointment of a consensual Prime Minister, and called on the main political stakeholders to faithfully and urgently implement this Agreement, as well as the ECOWAS Roadmap to which they have all signed up to.

Mr. Faki Mahamat and Mr. Guterres reaffirmed their commitment to continue to closely follow all political developments and to support ECOWAS in its efforts to ensure a swift resolution of the protracted crisis in Guinea-Bissau, and stand ready to employ additional measures, should the situation warrant it.

According to the UN Department of Political Affairs (DPA), Guinea-Bissau has been plagued by chronic political instability since gaining independence in 1974.

The DPA provides support and oversight to the UN Integrated Peacebuilding Office for Guinea-Bissau (UNIOGBIS), a special political mission first established in 1999 following a two-year civil war in the country. Since mid-2016, the Mission is headed by the Secretary-General's Representative, Modibo I. Toure.

The main priorities of UNIOGBIS are to support efforts to consolidate constitutional order, further political dialogue and national reconciliation, encourage security sector reform, and promote respect for human rights and the rule of law.

The mission has provided assistance in several national elections, including during the legislative and presidential elections in April and May 2014, and has again been mandated by the Security Council to work closely with national authorities as well as the United Nations country team in support of the timely conduct of legislative and presidential elections in 2018 and 2019, respectively.

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UN calls on Maldives to respect Supreme Court decision, says 'ready' to help ease political impasse

3 February 2018  Following the Maldives' Supreme Court decision ordering the release of convicted opposition leaders and the reinstatement of 12 parliamentarians, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has expressed the world body's continued readiness to facilitate all-party talks in finding a solution to the Indian Ocean nation's political stalemate.

"The Secretary-General takes note of the important ruling by the Supreme Court" and calls on the Government to respect it, said a statement issued overnight by his Spokesman Stephane Dujarric.

"The Secretary-General reiterates his belief in finding a solution to the political stalemate in the Maldives through all-party talks, which the United Nations continues to stand ready to facilitate," the statement added.

On Friday, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) also urged the Government of the Maldives to fully respect the Supreme Court decision, which also overturned the conviction of former President Mohamed Nasheed and ordered to retry his case.

"We are concerned by what appears to be an initial heavy-handed reaction by security forces in the capital Male against people celebrating the Court's decision," Spokesperson Rupert Colville told reporters at a press briefing in Geneva, Switzerland, urging them to show understanding and restraint, and to act in full accordance with international laws and standards governing the policing of protests and other forms of public assembly.

"We also urge all those celebrating, or protesting, to do so in a peaceful fashion," he added.

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Australia Unveils Plans to Boost Int'l Arms Sales

By Phil Mercer February 03, 2018

Australia has set out an ambitious strategy to become one of the world's top 10 weapons exporters within 10 years. Ministers say the plan will boost global peacekeeping efforts, as well as create thousands of jobs in Australia.

As part of its plan, Canberra wants to sell more of its military technology and hardware, including armored vehicles and surveillance systems. It currently sells about $1.6 billion worth of weapons each year and is ranked 20th in a global list of arms exporters, but it has ambitions to break into the top 10. There will be government grants to help companies boost sales.

Australian Minister for Defense Industry Christopher Pyne says the plan could create tens of thousands of jobs. He says it will also boost international peacekeeping efforts.

"Our primary market is New Zealand, Canada, the U.K. and the United States. That is where the vast majority of our effort will be placed and has been placed. We need a strong alliance with those kinds of countries with the capabilities that we need militarily to ensure that we maintain peace in the world. I do not think anybody would question our role in places like Iraq and Syria most recently," Pyne said.

The plan has been anticipated since mid-2017 when Pyne said he wanted to sell more Australian-made weapons overseas.

At the time the charity World Vision said the policy was "exporting death and profiting from bloodshed."

Aid organizations said the move would not boost global peace efforts, a claim rejected by the Australian government.

Officials have asserted that the "price of liberty is eternal vigilance."

The United States is the world's largest arms exporter, followed by Russia, China, France, Germany and the U.K., according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

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Israel Legalizes Outpost in Response to Recent Murder

By VOA News February 04, 2018

Israel's prime minister says an isolated West Bank outpost will be legalized in response to the recent murder of a rabbi who lived there.

Benjamin Netanyahu said at a Cabinet meeting Sunday that the government "will today regularize the status of Havat Gilad to allow the continuance of normal life there."

The prime minister said that those who try to "break our spirit and weaken us made a grave mistake."

Legalizing the unauthorized outpost, located "deep inside the West Bank," will enable it to receive government building permits and a state budget.

Rabbi Raziel Shevah, a 35-year-old father of six, was shot dead near his Havat Gilad home.

There were calls for revenge at Shevah's funeral during a speech by Education Minister Naftali Bennett who said the only revenge should be the building of more settlements.

Israel does not approve all settlements. The unapproved ones are known as outposts and tend to be populated by hardline religious nationalists who see the entire West Bank as part of Israel.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and major obstacles to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

The anti-settlement Peace Now group says the legalizing of Havat Gilad is a "cynical exploitation" of Shevah's murder.

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Spain Extradites Russian Citizen Accused Of Cybercrimes To U.S.

February 03, 2018

Spain has extradited to the United States a Russian citizen who is accused by U.S. authorities of running massive cybercrime campaigns, including the use of ransomware, scam e-mail distributions, and fraudulent stock promotions.

Spain's National Police said officers handed Pyotr Levashov of St. Petersburg over to U.S. marshals on February 2.

Levashov, 37, who was arrested in April while vacationing with his family in Barcelona, later appeared before a federal judge in Connecticut, where he pleaded not guilty to charges of hacking, wire and e-mail fraud, identity theft, and conspiracy.

Prosecutors say Levashov, 37, operated "Kelihos," a bot network of infected computers used to steal web login credentials, distributed spam e-mails used for fraudulent stock promotions, and installed malicious software on users' computers.

Levashov's lawyers contend that he is innocent and say the case is politically motivated.

Russia has also fought aggressively to get Levashov returned to his home country, and the fight over where he should stand trial was one of several involving Russian hackers detained in different European countries at Washington's request.

Moscow has complained repeatedly about the detention of Russian citizens abroad, accusing U.S. officials of "kidnapping" them.

U.S. authorities say that in seeking detentions abroad, they have acted lawfully to bring suspected criminals to justice.

The extradition was approved in October by Spain's National Court after it rejected a counterextradition request from Moscow.

The Russian Embassy in Washington didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.

Based on reporting by AP, AFP, and Reuters

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/spain-extradites-russian- citizen-cybercrimes-united-states/29016020.html

Copyright (c) 2018. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Japan Successfully Launches World's Smallest Carrier Rocket - JAXA

Sputnik News

12:05 03.02.2018(updated 12:13 03.02.2018)

TOKYO (Sputnik) - Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) on Saturday carried out a successful launch of the world's smallest carrier rocket SS-520-5, according to live broadcast by JAXA.

The liftoff took place from the Uchinoura Space Center at 02:03 p.m. local time (05:03 GMT).

The rocket is set to place into orbit a TRICOM-1R satellite for geological surveillance and communications with a mass of just three kilograms (6.6 pounds) developed at the University of Tokyo. The satellite would be used, in particular, for photographing the Earth's surface.

The SS-520-5 is a three-stage rocket that is a modification of the SS-520 two-stage sounding rocket. The rocket is over 9.5 meters (29.5 feet long), with a diameter of 52 centimeters (1.71 feet) and a total mass of about 2,6 tonnes.

The predecessor of this rocket, SS-520-4 was unsuccessfully launched on January 15, 2017. The transmission of the telemetry data stopped 20 seconds after liftoff and the decision was taken not to send a signal to the second stage of the rocket to turn on the engine. After disabling the first-stage engine, the rocket fell into the ocean.

 Sputnik

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China-Latin America ties based on common interests: Beijing

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 10:07AM

China has denounced as disrespectful the latest US warning to Latin American countries about excessive reliance on economic ties with Beijing, saying economic partnership in the region is "based on common interests and mutual needs."

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying made the comments in a statement on Friday, responding to earlier remarks by US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson who said Beijing was establishing "a foothold in Latin America" and "using economic statecraft to pull the region into its orbit."

"What the United States said is entirely against the truth and displayed disrespect to the vast number of Latin American countries," the statement said, adding that cooperation between China and Latin American countries was based on equality, reciprocity, openness and inclusiveness.

"China is a major international buyer of Latin American bulk commodities, and imports more and more agricultural and high value-added products from the region," Hua said.

The official also stressed that his country's investment in and financial cooperation with Latin American countries were in full accordance with commercial rules and local laws and regulations.

"The development of China-Latin America ties does not target or reject any third party, nor does it affect the interests of third parties in Latin America," he said, expressing hope that relevant countries abandon the outdated concept of zero-sum game and look at the development of China-Latin America relations in an open and inclusive manner.

Tillerson's remarks came this week ahead of his visit to the five Latin American countries of Mexico, Argentina, Peru, Colombia and Jamaica.

The top US diplomat pointed to China, the European Union and Russia and warned Latin American states that the region does not need another imperial power.

Tillerson also slammed Russian arms sales to certain governments in the region, accusing Moscow of helping what he called anti-democratic regimes.

The US is increasingly alarmed as the three major players are beginning to gain a foothold in Latin America, which used to be a major US backyard for decades.

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Police chief Gen Kale Kayihura (L) and Security minister Lt Gen Henry Tumukunde

The confrontational relationship between Police chief Gen Kale Kayihura and Security minister Lt Gen Henry Tumukunde is no secret.

And meeting security chiefs behind closed doors at State House Entebbe last week, President Museveni moved to confront this very vicious public feud between the two men.

It was not a regular security briefing, more so, convened in the wake of an expanded army crackdown on city crime against a backdrop of allegations of police collusion with criminal elements.

During the meeting, Museveni was reportedly interested in knowing why Security minister, Lt Gen Henry Tumukunde, and Inspector General of Police Gen Kale Kayihura continue to fight in public  a conflict some fear is undermining national security.

In what may be the first attempt to confront the Tumukunde-Kayihura hostilities, the president, sources said, wondered why this unrest has not been brought before the National Security Council (NSC).

The NSC is a policy organ sitting Internal Affairs minister Gen Jeje Odongo; Chief of Defence forces Gen David Muhoozi, Kayihura, Tumukunde, Commissioner General of Prisons Johnson Byabashaija and Internal Security Organisation director general Col Frank Bagyenda Kaka.

Others are Joseph Ocwet (External Security Organisation), Col Abel Kandiho (Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence) and Maj Gen Joseph Musanyufu (Army Joint Chief of Staff).

Details of the meeting remain scanty but the executive director of the Uganda Media Centre, Ofwono Opondo, acknowledged in an interview with The Observer that it could have been called, partly to address the feud.

I wouldnt be surprised if the president called a meeting of heads of the security agencies or had a one-on-one with [Tumukunde and Kayihura] because that is the best way of understanding the problem, Opondo said.

The public spat between Kayihura and Tumukunde is completely uncalled for, I cant find a concrete reason why the IGP could not open investigations into accusations against the police, Opondo added.

HISTORY

So, where or when did things unravel between these two bush war veterans?

Most of the bad blood reportedly started flowing as far back as 2005. Kayihura, then a brigadier, led a 50-man force to arrest Brig Tumukunde, accused of making unsavoury political remarks on Radio Ones evening talk show, Spectrum.

At the time, Tumukunde was cultivating a risky reputation as a regime critic from his perch as one of the 10 army MPs. He had spoken critically against plans to scrap presidential term limits from the Constitution.

The dramatic arrest was sanctioned based on a report Kayihura, who was thriving as the blue-eyed military assistant to Museveni, and chief political commissar of the UPDF, had written. Tumukunde was sentenced to a serious reprimand, subjected to the twin humiliation of a lengthy detention at the Kololo officers mess. He was also withdrawn from the cushy position of representing the army in parliament.

That same year (2005), Kayihura was promoted to major general and appointed police chief, an office he has enthusiastically used to brutally clamp down on political opposition to Musevenis presidency.

Ten years later, Tumukunde was back in favour. In 2015, Museveni was assembling forces to counter the unusual leadership challenge presented by his long-time confidant, former prime minister Amama Mbabazi.

Museveni set Tumukunde to work, infiltrating and neutralising Mbabazis considerable networks. His long-held wish to retire from the army was also finally granted in September that year, with a promotion from brigadier to lieutenant general.

In July 2016, a new cabinet was announced in which he was named security minister, a docket that brought a rehabilitated Tumukunde into direct confrontation with the police chief.

On the very day he took office, Tumukunde vowed to crash criminal gangs such as Kifeesi which was said to be collaborating with police.

We defeated terrorism, it was very sophisticated, very organised These general-duty criminals here, baptising themselves good names, I hear kifeesi; I dont know why not ka-faceall those are just skirmishes, an attempt to scare the public, Tumukunde said as his predecessor Mary Karooro Okurut handed over to him in 2016.

He subsequently compiled a dossier that asked pointed questions about Kayihuras countrywide web of so-called crime preventers. Hints were reportedly made about the political possibilities present in such a network being turned into someones campaign vehicle in 2021.

Kayihura was reportedly forced to drive to Entebbe and explain himself to Museveni. In May 2017, Tumukunde asked harder questions about Kayihuras work methods which he blamed for escalating crime, including the infamous Wakiso women serial murders. Some thought Tumukunde was angling for the IGP job but the security minister remained coy.

Im not competing to be the Inspector General of Police; I am not even too sure whether I want to be a policeman, Tumukunde told NBS TV.

The two generals clashed again in September last year at the height of the mysterious murders of women in Nansana and Entebbe. Both men opened parallel investigations into the unexplained murders, forcing a visibly unsettled Kayihura to publicly hit back.

These songs of police this, police that...Kayihura alemeddwa [has failed]. People, okay, Kayihura can be sent to Luzira but I tell you, if you dont address the problems in society, even if you put I dont know who, [but] whoever you put there [IGP], the problems of crime will not be solved, Kayihura said during the 23rd annual general meeting of the Uganda Local Governments Association in Mubende on September 16, 2017.

Tumukunde, however, pressed ahead with his parallel operations, prompting Kayihura to ask parliament to seek an explanation for the perceived public feud from the former director general of ISO.

I have no problem with [Tumukunde] but I dont know how he gets involved in operations; ask him, Kayihura told MPs on January 16.

During the same meeting, Kayihura also accused ISO of collaborating with criminals who the police had prosecuted like Paddy Sserunjogi aka Sobi.

Sobi was in jail, he was convicted of murder, we are investigating how he got out, and those statements he made on TV, Kayihura said.

During the Christmas season, Sobi had addressed journalists and confessed to a series of murders and robberies around Kampala. He alleged that his Kifeesi faction was shielded by elements in the police.

The police violently arrested him on January 14 but released him a day later after ISO, according to Kayihura, demanded he is freed on grounds that Sobi was helping them (ISO) with some investigations. A week later, military intelligence swung into action and snatched Kayihuras blue-eyed boy, Abdallah Kitatta off the streets.

THE CRACKDOWN

For more than a week, the military has now been pursuing mainly members of Boda Boda 2010  a blood-thirsty gang which Gen Kayihura has been praising as a useful appendage of the police.

The crackdown started on January 19. In short order, its leader Abdallah Kitatta and his brother Huzair Kiwalabye were rounded up as the unrelenting military dragnet was cast wide.

Alongside several other crimes, the ruthless brothers are being accused of being either accessories to, or having directly participated in the actual kidnap and vicious killing of Francis Ekalungar, an accountant at Case hospital.

Those in the know say that before the crackdown, Tumukunde held a briefing session in his chambers in Office of the President buildings.

Tumukunde wanted ISO and ESO; two agencies which report directly to him, to lead operations. A list of notorious criminals who the police could not touch because of their alleged closeness to Kayihura was reportedly circulated. But some in the meeting suggested that police should be brought on board since ISO and ESO have no legal mandate to arrest and detain.

There were also questions in regard to detention facilities to be used since the targets were civilians. Others wondered why the operation should be conducted under the cover of darkness. Night operations posed the real risk of friendly fire exchanges with police patrols who would not have been briefed.

Eventually, Tumukunde drafted in military intelligence, an organ he once headed. He also consulted Prime Minister Dr Ruhakana Rugunda who insisted on police involvement in the operation. Rugunda reportedly sought audience with the president who called a meeting in which Tumukunde laid out the nature of operation he intended to conduct.

Tumukunde reportedly explained why he did not want to include the police. Like Rugunda, Museveni too insisted on the involvement of police units, but asked that police deploy officers from upcountry stations. This was based on suspicion that officers in Kampala are already heavily compromised and would alert their underworld acquaintances.

The police had, for instance, indicated that it had failed to get clues on Ekalungars murder but Tumukunde, using his ISO operatives, had gathered enough technical evidence which they withheld from the police, the source said.

Kitatta was arrested three days after Kayihura had praised him before the Defence and Internal Affairs committee of parliament, as a patriotic Ugandan.

Kitatta is a politician; he is only linked to us because he helps us to fight crime. He is a leader of the Boda Boda 2010 [cyclists], they may have weaknesses but they helped us especially during the Walk-to-Work [protests of 2011], Kayihura told the MPs.

Tumukunde had long viewed Kitattas questionable control of the citys boda boda transport industry with suspicion. After all, following the broad daylight killing of former deputy inspector general of police/force spokesman Andrew Felix Kaweesi in March last year, Tumukunde attempted to organise elections for boda boda cyclists in Kampala but Kitatta foiled the plans.

Both Rugunda and Tumukunde couldnt be reached for comment. Interviewed, Julius Mucunguzi, the communication adviser to the premier, said, I really cant say whether the meeting happened or it didnt; you need to speak to the prime minister himself.

sadabkk@observer.ugGerman spy chief: Pyongyang procures missile parts via Berlin embassy

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 11:43PM

Germany's BfV domestic intelligence agency has said that North Korea has been purchasing parts for its missile program via its embassy in Berlin.

BfV head Hans-Georg Maassen made the announcement in a program to be aired on NDR on Monday. Pyongyang is yet to comment on the matter.

"We determined that procurement activities have been carried out from there that are, in our view, done with a view to the missile program and sometimes also for the nuclear program," said Maassen in comments released ahead of the broadcast.

He noted that the purchases were usually so-called dual use goods, which can be utilized for military and civilian activates.

Maassen noted that German authorities usually block such activities, but "We can't guarantee that we can detect and prevent this in all cases."

Pyongyang has defied years of multilateral and bilateral sanctions in relation to its nuclear and missile programs.

The United States and its allies in the West and in Asia engineered tough UN sanctions on North Korea last year when Pyongyang test-fired two missiles in July and then carried out its most powerful nuclear test in August.

However, many said the sanctions would not deter North Korea from pursuing its nuclear and missile program, which Pyongyang insists is part of its defense policy against the United States. Critics have repeatedly warned that sanctions would more affect North Korean people rather than its military and the government.

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Banned North Korean Coal 'Exported To Russia, Elsewhere'

RFE/RL February 03, 2018

A report by the United Nations claims that North Korea shipped banned commodities to a number of countries, including Russia, in 2017, helping it to earn some $200 million in revenue.

A panel of experts said in the report seen by U.S. media on February 2 that Pyongyang had violated UN sanctions by exporting coal, iron, steel, and other commodities barred by the world body.

The report said coal shipments were delivered to Russia, China, Malaysia, South Korea, and Vietnam by ships using "a combination of multiple evasion techniques, routes, and deceptive tactics."

The shipments were made mainly using false paperwork that showed countries such as Russia and China as the origin instead of North Korea, it said.

The UN panel "also investigated cases of ship-to-ship transfers of petroleum products in violation [of UN sanctions]...and found that the network behind these vessels is primarily based in Taiwan Province of China."

Pyongyang "continued to export almost all the commodities prohibited in the resolutions, generating nearly $200 million in revenue between January and September 2017," the report said.

The UN Security Council in 2016 and 2017 adopted a series of resolutions to expand bans on North Korea exports designed to cut off revenue to Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic-missile programs.

The country "is already flouting the most recent resolutions by exploiting global oil supply chains, complicit foreign nationals, offshore company registries, and the international banking system."

The experts also found evidence of military cooperation by North Korea to develop Syria's chemical weapons programs and to provide Burma with ballistic missiles.

The Security Council has imposed sanctions on seven vessels for illegally transferring North Korean coal and petroleum.

North Korea angered the world community by continuing to test its banned nuclear weapons and says the United States is within its missile range.

It has recently made overtures to Seoul and is sending a team to the Winter Olympics in South Korea starting on February 9.

With reporting by AFP, Reuters, and AP

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/north-korea-coal-united-nations- ban-russia-china-nuclear-ballistic/29015923.html

Copyright (c) 2018. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Might US strike North Korea to help GOP in midterm elections?

Iran Press TV

Sun Feb 4, 2018 09:59AM

A US National Security Council (NSC) official has reportedly suggested that a limited preemptive strike on North Korea could help the Republican Party in the upcoming midterm elections -- a claim rebutted by the White House.

The alleged comment, which was sourced from a scathing opinion column published Friday by the South Korean newspaper Hankyoreh, was also tweeted by a Wall Street Journal reporter.

"Indeed, White House National Security Council senior director for Asian affairs Matthew Pottinger was reported as saying in a recent closed-door meeting with US experts on Korean Peninsula issues that a limited strike on the North 'might help in the midterm elections,'" read the English-translated version of the op-ed.

However, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders fired back at the reporter, rejecting the claim by the Korean paper.

The alleged quote first appeared in an earlier article by the Korean newspaper's Washington correspondent, which cites a source as saying that Pottinger's suggestion was implied, and not a direct quote, according to Business Insider.

The Korean op-ed states that Pottinger said something "to the effect" that a limited strike on North Korea might help the Republicans' chances in the midterm elections.

The remarks come as some advisers to President Donald Trump have reportedly suggested limited military action against North Korea to give it a "bloody nose."

A series of advanced missile and nuclear tests by North Korea last year prompted the US and its allies in the region to pile maximum pressure on Pyongyang.

Washington has engineered rounds of international sanctions on North Korea. It has also expanded the scope of its joint military drills with Seoul. Many fear that an all-out war could break out in the region as the North and the US have on a number of occasions threatened each other with nuclear attacks.

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Taliban-claimed bombing kills 11 soldiers in northern Pakistan

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 06:44PM

At least 11 soldiers, including an army officer, have lost their lives and 13 others sustained injuries when an assailant detonated his explosive vest in Pakistan's northern district of Swat, police say.

"The soldiers were playing volleyball in the evening outside the military base... when a  bomber managed to blow himself up," said a local security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, on Saturday, shortly after the terrorist attack was carried out in Kabal area.

The outlawed militant group Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), also known as Pakistani Taliban, in a statement claimed the responsibility for the deadly attack, threatening that Islamabad should "wait for more (attacks)."

Swat is a river valley and an administrative district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. It is locally known as the Switzerland of Pakistan and was once a TTP stronghold from 2007 to 2009, when the Pakistani army launched a large-scale operation against the militants in the picturesque valley, destroying their hideouts within two months.

According to officials, more than 2,000 Taliban militants have so far been driven out of the volatile region.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi denounced the attack in a statement.

"No cowardly attack can deter us in pursuing our struggle against the menace of terrorism to its logical conclusion. We will continue our fight till the last trace is rooted out," the prime minister said.

The last deadly attack conducted by TTP militants in Swat dates back to January 2013, when the militants targeted a religious center and killed 21 worshipers and wounded 70 others.

Despite frequent offensives by the Pakistani army, acts of terror by militants continue to target security forces as well as civilians.

Thousands of Pakistanis have lost their lives in bombings and other militant attacks since 2001, when Pakistan entered into an alliance with the United States in Washington's so-called war on terror.

Thousands more have been displaced by the wave of violence and militancy sweeping the country.



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Deadly Suicide Blast Hits Pakistan Army Unit; 11 Dead

By Ayaz Gul February 03, 2018

A suicide blast in a former militant stronghold in northwestern Pakistan has killed at least 11 soldiers, including one officer, and injured 13 others.

The attack took place Saturday night in an area in the scenic Swat Valley where army officers conduct sporting activities, said an official statement. It gave no further details.

Sources told VOA army officials were playing in a volleyball match when the bomb went off.

A spokesman for the outlawed Pakistani Taliban swiftly claimed responsibility, saying the attack inflicted heavy casualties, though militant casualty tolls are often inflated.

Swat used to be a stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban until 2009 when the army launched a major counterinsurgency offensive and flushed militants from the valley.

Since then peace has returned to the area popular with domestic and foreign tourists, and militant attacks have become extremely rare in the valley known as Pakistan's Switzerland.

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Russian Su-25 aircraft shot down in Syria, pilot shot dead: Defense ministry

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 06:34PM

Russia has confirmed that its Su-25 fighter jet has been shot down in a militant-held area in Syria's northwestern province of Idlib, with its pilot killed in fighting after the incident.

Russia's Defense Ministry said in a statement on Saturday that the incident took place when the Sukhoi warplane was flying over the Idlib de-escalation zone.

Preliminary data showed the jet was downed by a man-portable air-defense system (MANPAD), said the ministry.

It said that the pilot had parachuted down into the area controlled by Jabhat Fateh al-Sham Takfiri terrorist group, formerly known as al-Nusra Front, but was killed during a confrontation with militants from an unspecified group.

Russian military planes targeted the Nusra-controlled area of Idlib, killing more than 30 militants, the ministry said. The Russian military conducted "a massive precision weapon strike on areas controlled by the al-Nusra [terrorist] group," where the Su-25 jet was previously downed by militants, the ministry said.

The statement said the Russian Reconciliation Center for Syria together with Turkey, which was also involved in setting up the Idlib de-escalation zone, are now trying to retrieve the body of the Russian pilot.

Reports from the area say the pilot landed alive but was killed when he resisted being captured by militants.

Idlib fell to foreign-backed militants in 2015. The Syrian army, in cooperation with Russia, launched an anti-terror campaign in October 2017 to liberate the province.

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Moscow denounces 'anti-Russian' nature of new US nuclear policy

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 05:41PM

Russia has lambasted the "bellicose" and "anti-Russian" nature of Washington's new nuclear policy, threatening that Moscow would adopt necessary measures to ensure its own security.

The Russian Foreign Ministry made the comments in a statement released on Saturday, a day after Washington unveiled its Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), a new nuclear arms policy that purportedly aims to revamp the US nuclear arsenal and develop new low-yield atomic weapons.

The policy, which is meant largely to counter Russia, effectively ends efforts under the administration of former President Barack Obama to reduce the size and scope of the US arsenal and minimize the role of nuclear weapons in defense planning, outlining the Pentagon's nuclear ambitions under President Donald Trump.

It is the first time since 2010 that the US military has acknowledged how it foresees nuclear threats in the coming decades. The document said such measures were needed to counter "Russia's non-compliance with the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), its non-strategic nuclear arsenal, and its other destabilizing behaviors."

Elsewhere in the statement, the foreign ministry said it was "deeply disappointed" at the "confrontational charge" of the new US policy toward Moscow.

"We state with regret that the US justifies its policy for a massive buildup of nuclear forces and an alleged increasing role of nuclear weapons in Russia's doctrines," it added.

The statement also said the NPR would certainly compel the Kremlin to take into consideration the newly adopted approaches by the White House and to "take necessary steps in order to ensure own security."

Earlier in the day, Moscow's Ambassador to Washington Anatoly Antonov also accused the United States of using, once again, Russophobia to justify the rise in military spending and the nuclear buildup.

The brandishing of a "Russian threat" comes while NATO member states have significantly increased their military activities near Russia's western borders in recent years. The US-led military alliance has deployed about 4,000 troops, consisting of four battle groups, to Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland, all near Russian borders.

Moscow, realizing the security threat under its nose, has held several military exercises to maintain preparedness, something that has prompted the NATO member states to refer to the drills as signs that Russia has aggressive intentions.

Russia calls NATO's military buildup at its doorstep a threat to its national security and accuses the alliance of fearmongering to justify larger defense expenditure by its members.

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US using Russian threat as pretext for nuclear buildup: Ambassador

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 07:21AM

Moscow's ambassador to Washington says the US has launched a scaremongering campaign against Russia to find a pretext for pumping more dollars into its military industry and building up its nuclear stockpile.

Anatoly Antonov was responding to the newly unveiled US Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), a new nuclear arms policy that aims to revamp US nuclear arsenal and develop new low-yield atomic weapons, the RT reported

"The problem is that the Americans are again using the Russia scare to justify the rise in military spending and the nuclear buildup," Antonov said. "We realize this comes from their desire to inject more money into the military industry sector, we know the price tag is an enormous trillions of dollars."

The NPR classes Russia as a major challenge to the US and affirms efforts initiated under former president Barack Obama to modernize US nuclear ballistic missile submarines, strategic bombers, nuclear air-launched cruise missiles, intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and command and control.

The Pentagon's 74-page review said such measures were needed to counter "Russia's non-compliance with the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), its non-strategic nuclear arsenal, and its other destabilizing behaviors."

Dismissing US allegations that Moscow violated its obligations under the 1987 INF treaty, the Russian senior diplomat said he was convinced the row over its implementation could be resolved by experts.

"I would like to state clearly that, as far as Russian obligations under any international treaties are concerned, we have been implementing them responsibly and accurately," Antonov said. "I want to say that this dialogue should be left to professionals, instead of mass media."

The brandishing of a "Russian threat" comes while NATO member states have significantly increased their military activities near Russia's western borders in recent years.

The US-led military alliance has deployed around 4,000 troops, consisting of four battle groups, to Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland  all near Russian borders  in recent years.

Russia, realizing that security threat under its nose, has held several military drills to maintain preparedness. The NATO countries have then referred to those drills as signs that Russia has aggressive and not defensive intentions.

Moscow calls NATO's military buildup at its doorstep a threat to its national security and accuses the alliance of fearmongering to justify larger defense expenditure by its member states.

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Russia Confirms Warplane Downed Over Syria, Pilot Dead

RFE/RL's Russian Service February 03, 2018

The Russian Defense Ministry has confirmed that an Su-25 close-support military aircraft was shot down over Syria on February 3 and the pilot was killed.

A ministry statement said the pilot ejected from the aircraft but was killed while resisting capture by rebels fighting against the Syrian government. The statement said preliminary evidence indicates the plane was shot down by a shoulder-launched antiaircraft missile.

The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said earlier that rebel forces had shot down an Su-25 in Idlib Province in northwestern Syria.

A jihadist group called Hayat Tahrir al-Sham claimed responsibility for the downing, saying a shoulder-launched missile had been used. The statement on the rebel-affiliated media channel Ibaa did not mention the Russian pilot.

Russian military correspondent Aleksandr Kots posted on social media a video purportedly showing rebel fighters picking over the burning wreckage of an Su-25.

The Russia-based, independent Conflict Intelligence Team posted photographs they say showed the dead body of the pilot and a paper recommending a man named Major Roman Fillipov for a state award that was allegedly filled out by Russian air group commander Lieutenant Colonel Sergei Aksyonov.

Novaya Gazeta quoted an unidentified Defense Ministry source as confirming that the pilot was Filippov. According to the newspaper, he was a Ukrainian pilot from Crimea, the Ukrainian region that Russia annexed in 2014.

Federation Council member Frants Klintsevich, chairman of the Defense and Security Committee, said an investigation would be launched into the circumstances of the downing.

"As I have said before," Klintsevich told Interfax, "I am positive that the militants have [shoulder-launched antiaircraft weapons], and they have been supplied by the Americans via third countries."

Vladimir Shamanov, chairman of the State Duma's Defense Committee, said "there are over 1,000 U.S. instructors in Idlib, so it could be a provocation."

Russia has been conducting military operations in support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad since September 2015.

The February 3 incident was the first time Syrian rebels have shot down a Russian warplane. In July 2016, rebels used a shoulder-launched missile to shoot down a Russian-made Syrian helicopter manned by a Russian crew.

In all, Russia has reported losing four jets and four helicopters during the Syrian campaign, including two jets that crashed while trying to land on the Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier and an Su-24 bomber that was shot down by Turkey in November 2015.

The Su-25 is a single-seat, twin-engine jet designed to provide close air support for troops on the ground.

With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-confirms-warplane -downed-syria-pilot-dead/29016510.html

Copyright (c) 2018. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Terrorists Shot Down Russian Su-25 in Idlib, Russia Airstrikes Attack Zone - MoD

Sputnik News

19:44 03.02.2018(updated 00:28 04.02.2018)

The Russian Ministry of Defense stated that the country's air forces conducted a high-precision group strike in the area controlled by Jabhat Fatah al-Sham militants in Idlib, from where a missile that downed Russian Su-25 aircraft was launched.

"A group strike using precision weapons has been conducted in the area controlled by the Jabhat al-Nusra [Jabhat Fatah al-Sham] terrorist group in Idlib province, from where the missile was launched against the [downed] Russian Su-25 airplane. According to radio intercepts, as a result of the strike, more than 30 militants of Jabhat al-Nusra were destroyed," the report by the Russian Defense Ministry said.

The strike followed the downing of a Russian Su-25 aircraft in the area.

"The plane was flying over the Idlib de-escalation zone," the military stated.

The Defense Ministry revealed that according to preliminary information as to the possible cause of the downing, the plane may have been shot down by a man-portable air-defense system (MANPAD).

The Russian Defense Ministry stated that the pilot managed to eject from the aircraft and survive, but was killed during a subsequent battle with terrorists.

"The pilot reported on a bailout in an area controlled by rebels Jabhat Fatah al-Sham [previously known as al-Nusra Front]. When conducting a fight with terrorists, the pilot died," the Defense Ministry said.

According to the ministry, Russia and Turkey, peace guarantors in Syria's Idlib de-escalation zone, are undertaking all possible efforts to return the body of the killed pilot.

During the two-year-long military operation in Syria, Russia has lost four airplanes and four helicopters. According to Russian Deputy Defense Minister Yury Borisov, modernized Su-25SM ground attack aircraft are being used in Syria.

The Su-25 attack aircraft is designed to destroy small-size mobile and fixed ground objects, as well as low-speed air targets.

The incident took place on the territory controlled by the Jabhat Fatah al-Sham terror group amid an ongoing military operation against them conducted by Syrian forces.

Among various terror groups operating in the area, there is also Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), an umbrella terrorist group spearheaded this year by the former Al-Nusra Front. While some countries, such as the United States, have flagged HTS as a terrorist group, Russian officials continue to refer to the Salafist jihadist terrorist organization by its former Al-Nusra moniker. Al-Nusra was the official Syrian branch of al-Qaeda until 2016, when it ostensibly split from the world's most well-known terrorist network.

 Sputnik

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Reliance Communications has opposed the telecom regulator's directive asking the company to refund unspent balance of mobile subscribers, in the wake of discontinuation of its voice services.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) is, however, of the view that the demand on customer refunds is fully justified as it pertains to premature closure of services by an operator, and therefore, cannot not be equated with general network port outs cases.

A senior Trai official told PTI that since it is the case of a service provider closing services the "customers must get their unspent balance".

"The situation is not similar to general port out by a consumer, where consumer chooses the timing of porting out from one network to another network.

Here, a service provider has closed services and therefore protection of consumer interest is a must" added the official who did not wish to be named.

Reliance Communications (RCom) declined to respond to an email query on the issue.

However, sources familiar with the development said that the service provider has shot off a letter to Trai arguing against the regulator's January 19 directive on refunds.

In the letter, RCom has cited the Mobile Number Portablity Regulations 2009 to highlight that the existing rules mention that the balance amount of talktime at the time of porting "shall lapse", the source pointed out.

"We regret to say that we are unaware of the exact regulation under which a provision exists for refund of balance amount of talk time on a mobile number being ported out for any reason whatsoever... we request authority to withdraw the direction" the source said quoting from RCom's written representation to TRAI.

Meanwhile, RCom is preparing another follow up letter to Trai where it has further argued that there is no precedence of customer refunds being sought in several other cases of operators closing down services in the Indian telecom market.

On January 19, the Trai had directed Reliance Communications (RCom) and Reliance Telecom (RTL) to refund the unused balance of their prepaid customers and security deposits of their post-paid subscribers and report compliance in the coming weeks.

The direction for refund is "pursuant to closure of 2G/GSM, CDMA services and discontinuation of voice services in all the licensed services areas by Reliance Communications Limited (RCL) and Reliance Telecom Limited".

The move comes at a time when RCom has announced plans to sell its spectrum, towers, optical fibre network and other wireless assets to Reliance Jio, the telecom firm of elder brother Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries.

The industry estimates the blockbuster deal to be valued at Rs 24,000- 25,000 crore.Syrian army, allies make new advances against terrorists across country

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 06:03PM

Syrian government forces, backed by allied fighters from popular defense groups, have made fresh territorial gains against foreign-sponsored Takfiri terrorists across the conflict-plagued Arab country.

A Syrian military source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Syria's official news agency, SANA, that Syrian troops and their allies had established full control over the villages of Abyan, Abu al-Qusour and Talal Talihan northeast of the west-central city of Hama, located 213 kilometers north of the capital Damascus.

He added that scores of Daesh terrorists had been killed or injured during the operations.

Syrian army bomb disposal units are now combing the liberated areas for hidden improvised explosive devices and landmines.

Separately, Syrian army units and their allied forces reclaimed the village of Maasran in the northern province of Idlib.

Syrian forces killed and injured a large number of terrorists from the Jabhat Fateh al-Sham Takfiri group, formerly known as al-Nusra Front, in the offensive.

Furthermore, Syrian troops managed to seize a large amount of munitions prepared to be smuggled to foreign-backed militants in the town of Talbiseh, located about 10 kilometers north of Homs.

A Syrian military commander, requesting anonymity, said government forces had ambushed a terrorist group as its members were trying to smuggle the ammunition from Izz al-Din village to Talbiseh town.

Syria has been gripped by foreign-backed militancy since March 2011. The Syrian government says the Israeli regime and its Western and regional allies are aiding Takfiri terrorist groups that are wreaking havoc in the country.

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Tahrir Al-Sham Claims Responsibility for Shooting Down Russian SU-25 - Reports

Sputnik News

22:08 03.02.2018(updated 00:30 04.02.2018)

Terrorist group Tahrir al-Sham, linked to former terrorist Al Qaeda branch in Syria, claims responsibility for shooting down Russian combat jet SU-25 with shoulder-launched anti-aircraft Projectile.

Tahrir al-Sham released a post on social media quoting a commander in charge of its air raids as saying one of its militants had hit Russian SU-25 during an "air raid" over the city of Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib.

Earlier on in the day, Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement that dozens of terrorists were killed as a result of a powerful high precision strike targeting Syria's province of Idlib where Russian SU-25 aircraft was downed.

Russian Su-25 attack aircraft was downed in the Syrian northwestern province of Idlib on Saturday.

"When patrolling the Idlib de-escalation zone, a Russian Su-25 aircraft crashed According to the preliminary information, the jet was shot down from a man-portable air-defense system," Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement, adding that the pilot was killed.

It is noted that the pilot reported that he managed to eject from his plane and landed in an area controlled by Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist group.

"The pilot was killed during a fight with terrorists," the Russian ministry said.

Terrorist group Tahrir al-Sham includes the terrorist group formerly known as the Nusra Front, which served as al Qaeda's Syrian branch, also a terrorist organization.

 Sputnik

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Syria Refutes US Allegations on Chemical Weapons Use Against Rebel-Held E Ghouta

Sputnik News

19:41 03.02.2018(updated 21:24 03.02.2018)

The Syrian Foreign Ministry has responded to the United States' claims of chemical weapons use by the government forces in the clashes with militants in Eatern Ghouta.

The US accusations of chemical weapons use in Eastern Ghouta are groundless, the Syrian Foreign Ministry said adding that Damascus strongly condemned such statements.

"The Foreign Ministry decisively condemns US groundless allegations against the Syrian leadership of chemical weapons use in Eastern Ghouta [in eastern suburbs of Damascus]," the statement read, as quoted by the Syrian state-run SANA news agency.

On January 26, the Syrian opposition White Helmets rescue group operating in militant-held Syrian areas reported that three civilians were killed and many others injured in a suspected chlorine gas attack on Eastern Ghouta. On the same day, US State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert accused the Syrian authorities of staging the attack. Damascus denied the allegations.

However, on February 2, US Secretary of Defense James Mattis says investigators are looking into reports that the Syrian government used sarin gas in recent chemical attacks, but there is no evidence of the gas usage so far.

"We do not have evidence," Mattis told reporters, as quoted by Politico on Friday, adding that it appears chlorine was used in the attacks, but "we are even more concerned about the possibility of sarin use."

Some media reports starting to circulate earlier this week suggested that the Trump administration believes Damascus is developing new chemical weapons.

The Pentagon's statement comes amid the disputes around the report presented by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and by the OPCW-United Nations Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM). The analysis calls Syrian President Bashar Assad is responsible for the use of sarin in the Khan Sheikhoun incident, while the Daesh terrorist organization is responsible for the use of sulfur mustard in Umm Hawsh.

 Sputnik

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Russian MPs vow to investigate origin of MANPAD used in downing jet in Syria

Iran Press TV

Sun Feb 4, 2018 09:05AM

Senior Russian lawmakers have urged the country to probe the origin of the man-portable air-defense system (MANPAD), which was reportedly used by Takfiri terrorists to down a Russian jet over Syria.

Russia's Defense Ministry confirmed in a statement on Saturday that the Su-25 fighter jet had been shot down in Syria's northwestern province of Idlib.

Citing preliminary data it said the jet had been downed by a MANPAD. The pilot had parachuted down into the area controlled by Jabhat Fateh al-Sham Takfiri outfit, formerly known as al-Nusra Front, but was killed during a confrontation with militants from an unspecified group.

Russian military planes retaliated afterwards by targeting the Nusra-controlled area of Idlib and killing more than 30 terrorists.

"Certainly, we will investigate, including a great many things: from the type of the MANPADS to the circumstances of the Su-25 downing," Frants Klintsevich, the first deputy chair of the Russian Federal Council's Defense Committee told Interfax. "The loss of one aircraft is nothing, but politically, it has great significance and far-reaching consequences," he added.

MP Dmitry Sablin, the coordinator of the Russia-Syria parliamentary friendship group, said, "We have information that the MANPADS used to bring down our jet was brought into Syria from a neighboring country several days ago."

"Countries from whose territory weapons arrive, that are then used against Russian servicemen, must understand that this will not go unpunished," he told the agency.

Deputy head of the State Duma's Defense Committee, Yury Shvytkin, told Russia's RIA news agency he was inclined to believe that the "MANPADS origins were linked with Western countries."

A 2017 military spending bill, signed under former US President Barack Obama, allowed supply of such weapons to the militants fighting the Syrian government.

In September 2016, Reuters cited an unnamed US official as saying that Washington "has kept large numbers of such man-portable air defense systems, or MANPADS, out of Syria by uniting Western and Arab allies behind channeling training and infantry weapons" to anti-Damascus militants.

"The Saudis have always thought that the way to get the Russians to back off is what worked in Afghanistan 30 years ago  negating their air power by giving MANPADS to the Mujahideen," it quoted another American official as saying.

Members of the Ansar al-Islam Front were shown in a video posted in November 2016, parading a cache of shoulder-launched anti-aircraft missiles, the first evidence of the weapons being supplied to militants after an expected relaxing of US restrictions.

Russia has been lending aerial support to Syria's counter-terrorism operations since September 2016.

The United States and its allies, including regional ally Saudi Arabia, however, have been backing the militants against Damascus since the onset of the crisis.

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Pentagon: US Has Not Equipped Allies in Syria With Surface-to-Air Weapons

Sputnik News

00:46 04.02.2018

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - Pentagon spokesman Eric Pahon told Sputnik on Saturday, hours after a Russian Su-25 attack aircraft was downed by militants in Syria, that the United States did not equip partner forces in Syria with surface-to-air weapons.

"Alongside by, with, and through our partners in Syria, the United States remains focused on the fight against ISIS [Daesh]. The US has not equipped any partner forces in Syria with surface-to-air weapons and has no intention to do so in the future. Our operations are geographically focused on ongoing combat operations against ISIS [Daesh] in eastern Syria. We will assess the validity of these claims to ensure the safety of our coalition partners. I refer you to the Russian government for information regarding this incident," Pahon said.

Meanwhile, terrorrist group Tahrir al-Sham released a post on social media quoting a commander in charge of its air raids as saying one of its militants had hit Russian SU-25 during an "air raid" over the city of Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib.

Earlier on in the day, the Russian Defense Ministry revealed that Russia's Su-25 was downed in Syria's Idlib province from a man-portable air-defense system (MANPAD). According to the ministry, the pilot ejected from the aircraft but was killed by militants on the ground.

In January, the Al-Masdar News media outlet reported, citing own sources that the US had provided the MANPADS to the Kurds earlier in the month under the agreement between Washington and the YPG. According to the news outlet, the MANPADS have been delivered to the Kurds in the northwestern part of Syria near the town of Afrin.

Meanwhile, an international arms monitor UK-based Conflict Armament Research (CAR) has earlier reported that the US weapons that were covertly provided to Syrian rebel groups were allegedly in the hands of Daesh within two months of their delivery. CAR studied over 40,000 weapons recovered from Daesh since 2014 and found that a majority of them were US arms given or sold to Syrian rebel groups.

In one case, an arsenal including anti-tank weapons switched hands from the US to Syrian rebels to Daesh in only a two month period.

In at least one instance, a US-backed militia is known to have had its weapons seized by Islamic militants. Division 30, Syrian rebels armed and trained by the CIA, were ambushed by the al-Qaeda linked al-Nusra Front in August 2015, the militants seizing their armaments and effectively destroying the group.

Some of the US-trained militants are known to have defected to Daesh or al-Nusra, often bringing their weapons with them.

However, the study was not able to conclude whether or not the rebels willingly gave the weapons to the Islamic militant group or if Daesh stole or captured them.

 Sputnik

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Turkish Opposition Calls for Contacts With Damascus to Ensure Peace in Syria

Sputnik News

21:27 04.02.2018

ANKARA (Sputnik) - Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the leader of the Turkish main opposition Republican People's Party on Sunday called on the country's authorities to re-establish contacts with Damascus for ensuring peace and stabilization of the situation in Syria amid the ongoing Turkish military operation in Afrin.

"Those in power are trying to represent the Turkish Armed Forces' operation in Afrin as a solution taken by their [ruling] party. But it is a fight for Turkey, not for them. They must immediately contact the Syrian government in order to guarantee the territorial integrity of Syria and stop the bloodshed," Kilicdaroglu said at his party's congress after he was re-elected as the party's president.

This time Kilicdaroglu reiterated his stance, as he has already expressed his readiness to establish direct contacts with the Syrian government on January 29.

The opposition leader statement amid the ongoing Turkish military offensive in Kurdish-dominated Afrin launched on January 20.

Explaining its decision to start the operation in the region, Ankara asserted that the advance was aimed at clearing the country's border with Syria from the terrorist presence, referring to the Kurdish formations operating in the area. Turkish operation was primarily targeting the People's Protection Units (YPG), consisting a part of the opposition Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which linked to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). the latter is designated as a terrorist organization in Turkey.

Damascus has expressed its opposition to the Turkish operation, saying that such actions violated Syrian sovereignty.

A few months before the offensive, in November, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared that he did not rule out future cooperation with Damascus against the Kurdish authorities in northern Syria. However, no corresponding talks or meeting have been announced so far.

 Sputnik

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France Plans to Work With Turkey on Syria 'Road Map'

Sputnik News

17:05 04.02.2018

Emmanuel Macron's office announced its decision after the French president discussed Turkey's operation against Kurdish People's Protection Units in Syria with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan during a phone conversation.

"The two presidents agreed to work on a diplomatic road map for Syria in the coming weeks. To that end, discussions between France and Turkey, which both hope for a political solution overseen by the UN, will increase in the coming days," the Elysee Palace said in a statement.

Days after Turkey's campaign kicked-off in the Syrian city of Afrin, President Macron expressed his concerns over offensive and the deteriorating situation in Syria.

"If it turns out that this operation takes a turn other than to fight a potential terrorist threat to the Turkish border and becomes an invasion operation, [then] this becomes a real problem for us," he told Le Figaro.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim was quick to respond to Macron's remarks, saying that the French president had a "flawed understanding" of Ankara's anti-terrorist campaign in Afrin.

"The whole world knows and should know that Turkey does not operate with the mentality of an invader."

While the prime minister's reaction may have seemed harsh, Erdogan, according to the Turkish Anadolu news agency, sought to reassure Macron that Ankara has no eye on Syrian territory.

Since January 20, Turkey has been conducting a military operation, dubbed "Olive Branch," in Syria's Afrin, which is controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces-affiliated and US-backed Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG). Ankara believes the YPG has ties with the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has been waging an armed conflict in Turkey in a bid to seek autonomy for the Kurds in the country.

Damascus has called the operation a violation of the country's sovereignty.

The campaign was launched following the US decision to start training a 30,000-strong border security force in northern Syria, formed mainly from YPG fighters.

 Sputnik

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Al-Qaida-linked Group Claims Responsibility for Shooting Down Russian Warplane

By VOA News February 04, 2018

A Syrian rebel group linked to al-Qaida is claiming responsibility for shooting down a Russian jet near the rebel-held town of Saraqeb, Syria.

Russia's Defense Ministry confirmed the shoot-down on Saturday and said the pilot was killed by rebels after parachuting to the ground.

Syrian monitors and the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the pilot was flying a Russian-made Su-25 jet  a low-flying twin-engine aircraft designed to support ground troops  when the aircraft was damaged. Multiple witnesses on the ground say the pilot was killed after opening fire on rebels trying to capture him.

The rebel group Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) claimed responsibility and posted video of the flaming wreckage on its Ebaa News Agency, where it was monitored by the SITE intelligence service.

HTS is also known as al-Qaida in Syria and contains elements of the former al-Nusra Front, though it claims to be independent from the main body of al-Qaida.

Some reports say this is the first time rebels have shot down a Russian warplane from the ground in Syria.

HTS quoted a rebel commander saying, the shootdown "is the least that could be done to avenge our people, and to let the criminal assailants know that our skies are not a park for them to fly across without paying the price, with permission from Allah the Almighty."

The incident took place in the northwestern province of Idlib, where the jet would have been supporting pro-government Syrian troops attacking Saraqeb.

Syrian government troops have been trying to gain access to a key highway that connects two of Syria's largest cities: Aleppo and Damascus.

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Kurdish forces kill five Turkish soldiers in Afrin: Military

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 07:00PM

Turkey's military says five Turkish soldiers have been killed by Kurdish forces from the People's Protection Units (YPG) in Afrin region in northwest Syria.

The Turkish forces were killed in a YPG attack on a tank, the military said on Saturday.

Turkey has been waging "Operation Olive Branch" against Syria's Afrin region since January 20 in a bid to eliminate the US-backed YPG, which Ankara views as a terror organization and the Syrian branch of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). The latter has been fighting for an autonomous region inside Turkey since 1984.

The YPG forms the backbone of the so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a US-backed anti-Damascus militant group.

Ankara has warned that the Afrin offensive could also expand to the nearby Syrian city of Manbij.

Turkey has also been assisting militants from the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA) to fight against the Kurdish fighters.

The Syrian government has condemned the "brutal Turkish aggression" against Afrin, rejecting Ankara's claim about having informed Damascus of the operation.

In recent days, Turkey has arrested more than 300 people, including politicians, journalists and activists, for social media posts criticizing its military offensive in Afrin.

The Turkish military said in a statement on Tuesday that at least 260 members of the YPG and the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group had been killed in the Afrin operation. The SDF has also claimed to kill dozens of Turkish forces and allied FSA members.

Operation Olive Branch in Afrin region is Turkey's second major military intervention in Syria during the unprecedented foreign-backed militancy that broke out in 2011.

In August 2016, Turkey began a unilateral military intervention in northern Syria, code-named Operation Euphrates Shield, sending tanks and warplanes across the border. Ankara claimed that its military campaign was aimed at pushing Daesh from Turkey's border with Syria and stopping the advance of Kurdish forces, who were themselves fighting Daesh.

Turkey ended its campaign in northern Syria in March 2017, but at the time did not rule out the possibility of yet another act of military offensive inside the Arab country.

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Turkish court gives life imprisonment to nearly two dozen over 2016 botched putsch

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 03:38PM

A court in Turkey has sentenced nearly two dozen people to life imprisonment on charges of involvement in the July 2016 coup attempt, which the Ankara government says was masterminded by the US-based opposition cleric Fethullah Gulen.

The 21 suspects, all military officers, were deployed at an airbase operated by the army's elite Special Forces. They were accused of taking over the base from government forces, and coordinating flights to attack other military bases in the capital Ankara.

Among those sentenced to life were two officers, identified as Halit Kabil and Dursun Varli, who were deployed at the Etimesgut Special Air Regiment Command base.

They allegedly kidnapped an anti-coup officer and held him in another base throughout the putsch bid. The pair also arranged a flight for General Semih Terzi, who was assigned to take over the command center of Special Forces.

Terzi was fatally shot by Omer Halisdemir, an aide to the Special Forces commander.

During the botched putsch, a faction of the Turkish military declared that it had seized control of the country and the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was no more in charge. The attempt was, however, suppressed a few hours later.

Ankara has since accused Gulen of having orchestrated the coup. The opposition figure is also accused of being behind a long-running campaign to topple the government via infiltrating the country's institutions, particularly the army, police and the judiciary.

Additionally, the Ankara government has outlawed his movement, and has branded it as the Fethullah Terrorist Organization (FETO).

Gulen has denounced the "despicable putsch" and reiterated that he had no role in it.

"Accusations against me related to the coup attempt are baseless and politically-motivated slanders," he said in a statement.

The 76-year-old cleric has also called on Ankara to end its "witch hunt" of his followers, a move he said is aimed at "weeding out anyone it deems disloyal to President Erdogan and his regime."

Turkish officials have frequently called on their US counterparts to extradite Gulen, but their demands have not been taken heed of.

Turkey, which remains in a state of emergency since the coup, has been engaged in suppressing the media and opposition groups suspected to have played a role in the failed coup.

Tens of thousands of people have been arrested in Turkey on suspicion of having links to Gulen and the failed coup. More than 110,000 others, including military staff, civil servants and journalists have been sacked or suspended from work over the same accusations.

The international community and rights groups have been highly critical of the Turkish president over the massive dismissals and the crackdown.

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In a textbook case of a late Friday afternoon news dump, Gov. Andrew Cuomo's administration announced, with plenty of self-promotional spin, that it will do what should have been back when Barack Obama was president: Listen to the federal government and remove hundreds of state-funded illegal promotional signs on federal highways.

For two years, the Federal Highway Administration has been directing the state Department of Transportation and state Thruway Authority to remove the 500 "I Love NY" promotional signs that were posted in driver-distracting clusters on interstates. The FHA said the signs failed to comply with safety standards, and it gave New York time to get the issue fixed. But the Cuomo administration, which likes to think of itself as infallible, refused to yield.

Until last week. That's when the FHA said New York will lose $14 million in federal funds if it fails to comply by the end of September.For a company that has been doing something mysterious for the past six to seven years, Magic Leap has raised a lot of funding - no less than $1.9 billion. Its investors include the Alibaba Group, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Google LLC, J.P. Morgan Investment Management, Temasek EDBI, and funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc.

The company is valued at $4.5 billion. Fascinatingly, until recently, the start-up has had no product to show. However, the computer demos have been compelling enough to excite the few VIPs and celebrities who have seen what it is doing. Except for Beyonce, who was apparently bored. Magic Leap is based on the idea whatever is inside the computer is spilling over into the real world. It is similar to the Mixed Reality Microsoft has been talking about and demoing with its HoloLens. "We are adding another dimension to computing where digital respects the physical. And they work together to make life better. Magic Leap One (consisting of a pair of oversized goggles, an external computer and a handheld controller) is built for creators who want to change how we experience the world," says the company's website on the release of a headset meant for developers.

The headset, incidentally, is fairly ugly, but it may not be what the eventual product will be as one of the biggest challenges for Magic Leap is to miniaturise everything for everyday consumer use. To visualise what Magic Leap sees as the next platform in computing, think of how a virtual lamp can be placed in a room, or how the model of the solar system can appear in front of you in full 3D and its workings understood better, or how a jellyfish could be swimming across your ceiling in a fascinating display, or how a miniature of Mount Everest could grow out of a table as you get the facts about it. In other words, the virtual and the real meet seamlessly and realistically to impact everything one does. In a sense, you can also 'pull the web out of the screen'.

Magic Leap says its lightfield photonics generate digital light at different depths and blend seamlessly with natural light to produce lifelike digital objects that coexist in the real world. The technology allows our brain to naturally process digital objects in the same way we do the real-world things, making it comfortable to use the device for a longer period. The headset is called Lightwear, but it has to fit into a whole system of augmented reality. As a result, people can interact with virtual objects.

Rolling Stone reporter was among the few to have seen a Magic Leap demo and describes one experience: "A wall in the room suddenly showed the outline of a door with bright white light shining through it. The door opened, and a woman walked in. She walked up to me, stopping a few feet away, to stand nearby. The level of detail was impressive. Though I wouldn't mistake her for a real person - there was something about her luminescence, her design, that gave her away. While she didn't talk or react to what I was saying, she does have that ability." Scepticism about Magic Leap's project has been fairly widespread with some wondering whether the whole thing is a hoax of sorts. But Magic Leap CEO Rony Abovitz says all the tools will come to developers in 2018.

Breaking Sweat

You are not the only one to be breaking sweat during a workout. A robot does it too. Japanese-made Kengoro and its cousin Kenshiro are the University of Tokyo's way of understanding the human body better.

Researchers built a human-like musculoskeletal nervous system and even a Linux-based brain into the machine and got it to do the sort of movements and exercises people typically do in a workout. That included crunches, neck rolls, squats, push-ups and more. As the robot heats up, it sweats. By design. The emission of fluid is, just as in humans, meant to cool it down. More than the effort and the sweat, however, the engineers think the robots can provide insights into how movement is processed within the body. This, in turn, feeds into other fields such as vehicle testing where a more realistic dummy may be needed, or as an aid to creating better prosthetic limbs.

Considering that the humanoids have everything, from synthetic muscles to brains, they can be put to many uses. There is not much artificial intelligence built into them, though, which may just be a good thing.Turkish 'Olive Branch': General Staff on Results of Offensive in Afrin

Sputnik News

15:10 03.02.2018

ANKARA (Sputnik) - The Turkish Armed Forces have killed 74 more militants of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), and the Daesh terrorist group (banned in Russia) during the military operation in Syria's northern district of Afrin.

"The Turkish Air Force has hit 15 targets, including hideouts, firing points and weapons depots of PYD, YPG and IS terrorist groups during Operation Olive Branch. The aircraft participating in the operation have successfully returned to their bases. At least 74 terrorists were killed, bringing the total number [of killed militants] since the beginning of the operation to 897," the statement obtained by Sputnik read.

The Turkish General Staff commented on the development of the operation saying that the military advance was ongoing as planned.

Turkey's Olive Branch Operation

Ankara started an offensive with the support of the Free Syrian Army forces in the Syrian Kurdish-dominated city of Afrin on January 20, aiming to protect its borders from what they call a "terrorist army," referring to Kurdish militants groups in the area. The operation dubbed Olive Branch primarily targeting the US-backed YPG, which are considered by Ankara to be affiliates of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), designated as a terrorist organization in Turkey and several other countries.

The Kurdish militants, who vowed to protect the Kurdish population from the Turkish army, continue to fight back: on February 2, six rockets from Afrin hit Turkey's southern provinces of Kilis and Hatay, injuring at least 11 people. A day before, another shelling of the center of Turkish Kilis wounded one civilian.

Commenting on the attacks in the Turkish border cities of Reyhanli and Kilis, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim stated that the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) had killed five Turkish citizens and injured over 100 more since the start of the country's military operation in Syria's Afrin district, firing 82 rockets at Turkish border districts with Syria.

Damascus, for their part, have condemned the operation, calling it an assault on Syria's sovereignty. Moscow has repeatedly urged all the parties to exercise restraint and called for respect for Syria's territorial integrity.

However, explaining the mission of the offensive, Ankara stressed that it was not aimed against the Syrian government, calling the territorial integrity of Syria its mutual goal with Damascus.

 Sputnik

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Turkey's Erdogan rejects option of EU partnership, urges full membership

Iran Press TV

Sun Feb 4, 2018 02:42PM

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says his country opposes proposals of a partnership with the European Union, emphasizing that Turkey's full membership of the bloc is the only option.

Erdogan made the comments in an interview with Italy's Stampa newspaper before his departure for Rome on Sunday evening for a day-long visit where he is scheduled to meet his Italian counterpart Sergio Mattarella.

"The EU is blocking access to negotiations and suggests that lack of progress is because of us. It's unfair. Just like it is that other countries are pushing for options other than membership," he said.

The Turkish president urged the EU to "keep its promises" to Ankara and said, "We want full membership. Other options are not satisfactory."

During a joint press conference with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron in Paris on January 5, Erdogan said he is "seriously tired" of waiting for the European Union to decide whether to accept his country as a member of the bloc.

"One cannot permanently implore and wait to be finally included," he said, warning that frustration might tempt Turkey to turn its back on Europe.

The French leader further suggested that Ankara should renounce its ambition to join the EU, adding that the bloc needs to "rethink" the accession process and focus on a possible "partnership" or "cooperation" with Turkey.

Further in his interview with the Italian paper, Erdogan said Ankara has played an "important" role in stemming the flow of migrants to Europe which promoted "security and stability" across the continent.

The country, a small portion of which rests on the Balkan Peninsula in Southeast Europe, took its early efforts to join Europe in the early 1960s and applied for EU membership in 1987. However, the official negotiations of accession to the union began in 2005. The 12-year-long accession talks were effectively halted after Turkey began a massive crackdown on suspects allegedly involved in a July 2016 failed coup against Erdogan.

The EU reacted strongly to Ankara's purging of thousands of people from state organizations and institutions over alleged links to the botched putsch, putting Ankara on a bumpier road.

Furthermore, the EU heavyweight member Germany and some other European countries have been involved in diplomatic brawls with Turkey on several issues, including the country's human rights record, in recent months.

To obtain membership, Turkey has to effectively conclude negotiations on 35 policy chapters that involve reforms and the adoption of European standards. The EU has opened 16 out of the required 35 chapters, but only one of them has so far been concluded.

Turkish Minister for EU Affairs Omer Celik said on January 19 that Ankara would reject any offer of partnership with the EU that falls short of membership, warning that the current situation gave Turkey no reason to maintain its refugee deal with the bloc.

"A privileged partnership or similar approaches, we don't take any of these seriously. Turkey cannot be offered such a thing," Celik told Reuters in an interview.

Erdogan defends Turkey's "Olive Branch" operation in Syria's Afrin

The Turkish president also defended his country's recently-launched military operation in Syria's northwestern region of Afrin.

"The Turkish armed forces are not in Afrin to fight armed Kurdish groups. We don't have problems with the Kurdish Syrians, we are only fighting terrorists, and we have the right to do it," Erdogan said.

The Turkish leader emphasized that Ankara was not seeking territorial gains.

Ankara has been pressing ahead with the so-called Olive Branch operation against militants from the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) in Afrin since January 20.

Ankara considers the US-backed YPG to be a terrorist group and an extension of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which is fighting for independence in Turkey's largely Kurdish southeast since 1984.

The Turkish incursion in Afrin started after the United States said it sought to set up a thousand-strong force in Syria near the Turkish border comprising the so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which is led by the YPG.

Syrian Foreign and Expatriates Ministry said on Thursday that Damascus has complained to the UN about Turkey's military campaign in Afrin, denouncing the operation as "an assault and occupation" of the Syrian territory.

Ankara continues to "spread lies" about its military aggression against Syria and tries to justify the action as an act of self-defense, the ministry said in two letters addressed to the UN chief and the Security Council chairman.

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Report: Trump Nuclear Posture Review Overstates Chinas Nuclear Arsenal Modernization Plans

February 1, 2018

Chinese Arsenal Significantly Smaller, Less Capable Than U.S. Arsenal

WASHINGTON (February 1, 2018)A leaked draft of the Trump administrations Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) misrepresents the status of Chinas nuclear forces, according to a white paper released today by the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS).

China has made slow but steady incremental improvements to its nuclear arsenal, says paper author Gregory Kulacki, China Project manager at the UCS Global Security Program. But the gap between China and the United States is too wide to argue that the United States is lagging behind in any meaningful way. In fact, the exact opposite is true. By any measure, the U.S. arsenal is far superior.

Regardless, the leaked NPR draft erroneously states that the United States needs new nuclear weapons because China is expanding and modernizing its considerable nuclear forces and is pursuing entirely new nuclear capabilities.

Among other things, the paper points out that:

the U.S. arsenal of 4,480 active and reserve nuclear warheads is more than 10 times the size of the Chinese arsenal;

the United States has 400 ground-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, at least four times more than Chinas 75 to 100 ICBMs; and

12 U.S. nuclear-capable submarines currently carry 900 warheads while Chinas four ballistic missile submarines carry none.

There is no evidence that nuclear weapons are becoming more prominent in Chinas military strategy or that China has changed its longstanding no-first-use policy, says Kulacki. Chinese military sources emphatically state that Chinas only security objective with its relatively small nuclear force is to retain the ability to retaliate in the event of a nuclear attack.

If the Trump administration were truly concerned about limiting the size and capability of Chinas nuclear forces, he added, it would ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which China signed in 1996, and negotiate a fissile material control treaty, which China supports. Doing so would cap the size of Chinas nuclear arsenal.

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Trump Nuclear Doctrine Takes Tougher Stance Toward Russia

RFE/RL February 02, 2018

The administration of President Donald Trump wants to revamp the U.S. nuclear arsenal and develop new low-yield atomic weapons, mainly in response to Russian actions in recent years, according to a policy statement released February 2.

The Nuclear Posture Review outlines the Pentagon's nuclear goals under Trump and is the first time since 2010 that the military has spelled out how it foresees nuclear threats in the coming decades.

It says Russia must be persuaded that it would face "unacceptably dire costs" if it were to threaten even a limited nuclear attack in Europe.

"This is a response to Russian expansion of their capability and the nature of their strategy and doctrine," Defense Secretary Jim Mattis wrote in the 75-page summary of the sweeping review, which also highlights U.S. concerns about North Korea, Iran, and China.

The Pentagon-led effort, known officially as a nuclear posture review, is customarily done at the outset of a new administration.

The document specifically points to a Russian doctrine known as "escalate to de-escalate," in which Moscow would use or threaten to use smaller-yield nuclear weapons in a limited conventional conflict in Europe to compel the United States and NATO to back down.

"Recent Russian statements on this evolving nuclear weapons doctrine appear to lower the threshold for Moscow's first-use of nuclear weapons," the review said.

The review recommends a two-step solution.

Modifying "a small number" of existing long-range ballistic missiles carried by Trident strategic submarines to fit them with smaller-yield nuclear warheads would be a first step.

Second, "in the longer term," a nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile would be developed -- bringing back a weapon that existed during the Cold War but was retired in 2011 by the Obama administration.

The review also calls North Korea a "clear and grave threat" to the United States and its allies, and warns that any North Korean nuclear attack against the America or its allies would result in "the end of that regime."

"There is no scenario in which the Kim regime could employ nuclear weapons and survive," it says.

With reporting by AP and AFP

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/trump-nuclear-doctrine- russia-north-korea-iran/29015393.html

Copyright (c) 2018. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Trump's new nuclear strategy draws blistering criticism from arms control experts

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 10:31AM

US arms control groups have condemend the new nuclear weapons strategy announced by administration of President Donald Trump, saying it could raise the risk of nuclear war.

The latest policy was revealed on Friday in a Pentagon policy statement known as the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR).

The new policy, which came largely to counter Russia, effectively ends Obama-era efforts to reduce the size and scope of the US arsenal and minimize the role of nuclear weapons in defense planning.

It also cast China as a potential nuclear adversary, saying the US arsenal is tailored to "prevent Beijing from mistakenly concluding" that it could gain advantage by using its nuclear weapons in Asia, or that "any use of nuclear weapons, however limited, is acceptable."

The report drew blistering criticism from arms control groups, who said the strategy will reduce US and global security.

"President Trump is embarking on a reckless path  one that will reduce US security both now and in the longer term," said Lisbeth Gronlund, a senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

She said the Trump administration is blurring the line between nuclear and conventional war-fighting.

The science advocacy organization also said the new report misrepresents the status of China's nuclear forces.

"The gap between China and the United States is too wide to argue that the United States is lagging behind in any meaningful way. In fact, the exact opposite is true. By any measure, the US arsenal is far superior," the group said in a statement on its website.

"If the Trump administration were truly concerned about limiting the size and capability of China's nuclear forces," he added, "it would ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which China signed in 1996, and negotiate a fissile material control treaty, which China supports. Doing so would cap the size of China's nuclear arsenal."

Barry Blechman, co-founder of the Stimson Center, a nonpartisan anti-nuclear proliferation think tank in Washington, has warned that the US is "on the cusp of a new era of nuclear proliferation."

"This is the great nuclear danger raised by the new" nuclear policy, Blechman added.

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Pentagon unveils nuclear arms policy with focus on Russia

Iran Press TV

Sat Feb 3, 2018 02:06AM

The Pentagon has released a new nuclear arms policy that aims to revamp US nuclear arsenal and develop new low-yield atomic weapons.

The latest policy was revealed on Friday in a Pentagon policy statement known as the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR).

The new thinking, which came largely to counter Russia, effectively ends Obama-era efforts to reduce the size and scope of the US arsenal and minimize the role of nuclear weapons in defense planning.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said in an introductory note that the changes reflect a need to "look reality in the eye" and "see the world as it is, not as we wish it to be."

"This is a response to Russian expansion of their capability and the nature of their strategy and doctrine," Mattis added.

The Pentagon believes Moscow considers US nuclear weapons as too big to be used, meaning they are no longer an effective deterrent; therefore, developing smaller nukes would challenge that presumption.

Although low-yield weapons are smaller, less powerful bombs with a strength below 20 kilotons, they are still devastating.

Low-yield nuclear weapons known as "tactical" nukes can be as destructive as the bombs the US dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II.

The US already has a massive nuclear arsenal which includes 150 B-61 nukes stored across multiple European countries.

Those weapons, which can be configured for low-yield options, would be launchable from submarines or ships, so would not need to be stockpiled in Europe.

"The US and NATO require a wider range of credible low-yield nuclear options to do a very specific thing: to convince the Russian leadership that if they initiate limited nuclear use, in a war with the alliance, our response will deny them the objective they seek and impose costs that far outweigh those benefits they can achieve," said Greg Weaver, the deputy director of strategic capabilities for the military's Joint Staff.

The NPR, the first update to the military's nuclear strategy since 2010, outlines the Pentagon's nuclear ambitions under President Donald Trump, but marks a sobering break from the vision for America's atomic future under his predecessor Barack Obama.

"The strategy develops capabilities aimed at making use of nuclear weapons less likely," Trump said in a statement. "It enhances deterrence of strategic attacks against our Nation, and our allies and partners, that may not come in the form of nuclear weapons."

During his presidential campaign, Trump promised to expand and strengthen US nuclear capabilities, unlike Obama who, during a famous speech in Prague in 2009, called for the elimination of nuclear weapons.

Barry Blechman, co-founder of the Stimson Center, a nonpartisan anti-nuclear proliferation think tank in Washington, has warned that the US is "on the cusp of a new era of nuclear proliferation."

"This is the great nuclear danger raised by the new" nuclear policy, Blechman added.

The US is also considering upgrading its fleet of long-range strategic bombers such as B-2 and B-52 to deploy its arsenal of more than 7,000 nuclear warheads to any target around the world.

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With $60.08 billion foreign direct investment, or FDI, coming in during 2016/17 (an all-time high), India's ability to attract foreign investors is indisputable. The government rightly deserves credit for the policy tweaks - liberalising and simplifying norms for investors - to attract FDI in a big way. These numbers, however, are not reason enough to celebrate. The quality of inflows and their contribution to the growth of the economy, job creation and manufacturing capacities need to be carefully analysed.

Two Delhi-based economists examined the FDI inflow to India over the last three years. The preliminary finding raises concerns that several of these investments will not be able to trigger additional economic growth. Also, it debunks the government's claim that FDI has benefited 'Make in India'. India needs policy measures that can trigger real change.

Joe C. MathewThese are the best offers from our affiliate partners. We may get a commission from qualifying sales.



Haiti - Justice : USA dress our detainees !





In late January, Charge d'Affaires Robin Diallo, accompanied by Nicholas Hilgert, Director of the Office of Narcotics and Enforcement Affairs (INL), of Deputy Director Brooke de Montluzin, formally transferred 202 instructor uniforms to Bernard Elie, Director of the PNH School, and 11,000 prisoner uniforms to Jean Gardy Muscadin, Head of the PNHs Corrections Authority (DAP). The United States is proud to support the PNH with this contribution, valued at approximately $90,000.



The United States is particularly pleased to learn that women will make up 28 percent of the next Promotion Class scheduled to start in February at the PNH School.



Let's recall that the U.S. support to DAP has included the construction of several prison facilities and training for DAP officials.



The United States hopes that Haitis justice sector authorities will take the necessary steps to combat prolonged pretrial detention to alleviate overcrowding in Haitis prison system.



HL/ HaitiLibre





















Haiti - Humanitarian : Donation of $3,6M from Japan for the rice purchase





This week, in response to the request of the Haitian Government, a Grant Agreement for the 2017 Food Assistance Project (KR) of 400 million Yen ( 3.6 million US dollars) was signed during ceremony between the Haitian Chancellor Antonio Rodrigue and the Japanese Ambassador to Haiti Yoshiaki Hatta.



This amount will be used to purchase rice, which will be sold at preferential prices by the Office of Monetization of Development Assistance Programs (BMPAD) in order to stabilize the local market and contribute to the food security of the population. The funds accumulated by the Haitian Government through the sale of rice as a counterpart fund, which will enable it to carry out social projects.



Because of the many major natural hazards that have struck Haiti over the years, causing increased food insecurity among the population, the Japanese Government has decided through this donation, to support the strengthening of food security in Haiti while at the same time accompanying the Haitian Government in its efforts to increase agricultural products through the training of agricultural technicians https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-15985-haiti-agriculture-japan-and-the-dominican-republic-will-help-haitian-farmers.html https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-21250-icihaiti-japan-donation-of-more-than-150-000-bags-of-fertilizer.html



Recall that Japan-Haiti cooperation is made upstream and downstream. Upstream, with the food assistance project which, in the short term, temporarily mitigates the dangerous effects of food insecurity on the most vulnerable. Downstream and with longer-term results, the technical assistance provided through the planter capacity building project set up since 2010 https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-4545-haiti-agriculture-4-7-million-for-farmers.html



See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-23418-haiti-politic-agriculture-health-education-japan-sign-3-donation-contracts.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-23382-haiti-social-donation-of-nearly-6-000-tons-of-rice-from-japan.html

https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-21250-icihaiti-japan-donation-of-more-than-150-000-bags-of-fertilizer.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-15985-haiti-agriculture-japan-and-the-dominican-republic-will-help-haitian-farmers.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-4545-haiti-agriculture-4-7-million-for-farmers.html



HL/ HaitiLibre





















Haiti - Culture : D-1, Carnival of children in the Capital





Thursday the Town Hall of Port-au-Prince thanked all the revelers and DJs who took part in the activities of the 3rd pre-carnival Sunday (January 28th) that it described as a "real success".



The 3 advanced medical posts, reported for this 3rd Sunday, have treated 74 cases (24 light cases and moderated 80 cases). A large part of the people have been treated for excessive drinking. On this last point, the Medical Service of the Port-au-Prince Town Hall warns the population and insists on the danger represented by the excessive consumption of alcoholic beverages.



In addition, the Town Hall noticed the deplorable use of "tchatchas", cultural instrument of the history of the carnival, when some malicious carnivals sharpens the point, transforming it into a real weapon... The Communal Administration recalled once again to the DJ's and animators accompanying them, that the obscene remarks as well as the foreign musics are totally prohibited on the course of the carnival.



Lastly, the Town Hall of Port-au-Prince invites disguised children and their parents on Sunday, February 4 from 2:30 pm to participate in the Carnaval des Enfants (Children Carnival). From Bern Street, a walking band, totally for children, accompanied by jugglers, acrobats and "bef lakay", will ensure the atmosphere and give the children their own experience of the carnival. Note that the course will be closed to traffic from 2:00 pm so that the children's carnival runs smoothly.



HL/ HaitiLibre





















Haiti - News : Zapping...





PetroCaribe the debates are closed in the Senate

"The report on the PetroCaribe issue is no longer in discussion or debate in the Senate. Senators can talk about it anywhere in the media. The file has been transferred to the Superior Court of Accounts and Administrative Disputes (CSC / CA) https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-23446-haiti-flash-senate-transfers-petrocaribe-report-to-csa-ca.html " said Joseph Lambert, the Speaker of the Senate, firmly.



Diasponaval : Packages Carnival for the diaspora

The Ministry of Haitians Living Abroad (MHAVE) presents Diasponaval to allow our compatriots to fully enjoy the 2018 carnival ! This offer designed in collaboration with tourhaiti and destination_haiti also includes excursions to Jacmel and the Cote des Arcadins! More information on www.tourhaiti.net



The Minister Cadet in Dakar

Pierre Josue Agenor Cadet, the Minister of Education at the head of a Haitian delegation participates in the Financing Conference of the Global Partnership for Education (PME) held in Dakar under the Franco-Senegalese presidency and which aims to raise $ 3.1 billion for 2018-2020 to provide 870 million children around the world with quality education. At the end of the Summit where more than 2.3 billion were announced, Haiti has committed to devote at least 20% of its annual budget to education...



To find out more about this Summit (in French) : www.ht.ambafrance.org/Qu-est-ce-que-le-Partenariat-mondial-pour-l-education



"Kanaval Timoun" to PAP

Sunday, February 4 at 2:00 pm the Town Hall of ort-au-Prince invites all the children to come to dance with "Filalang", in addition there will be "Bef lakay", acrobats and jugglers to make the show even more beautiful. Avenue John Brown (Lalue), from Rue Bern to Rue Dufort https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-23462-haiti-culture-d-1-carnival-of-children-in-the-capital.html



PetroCaribe, Youri Latortue denounces

"After so much waste of the PetroCaribe Fund, the Republic of Haiti demands accountability. I denounce the surprise session without the Senators Commissioners, members of the press and the general public," Senator Youri Latortue.



Management of the Journal "lUnion"

The Executive entrusted the interim management of the newspaper "L'Union" to the National Coordinating Council of State and Public Service Media.



HL/ HaitiLibre

















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HelpBy William Schwartz | Published on 2018/02/03

One day director Hong Jae-hee started receiving detailed e-mails from her father about his life. Hong Jae-hee didn't know what to think of this, nor did she particularly care. The relationship between the two was strained, much as it was with the mother, brother, and sister of the family. It was only after her father's death that Hong Jae-hee started to seriously wonder what kind of person her father was, where he had come from, why he was going on all these work trips, and why he seemed to have a grudge against his own family. "My Father's E-mails" details her discovery process.

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It's little surprise, considering that he was born in 1934, that Hong Jae-hee's father was caught up in the Korean War. Well, not directly. He headed south in search of work in 1947, anticipating a return within a few years. Then history happened. He became stuck on the wrong side of the border. Yet opportunity arose in the form of the American military, where he worked for awhile gaining impressive credentials in the process.

This was a solid foundation for a good middle class existence. Hong Jae-hee's father was able to get married and have a family of his own. When local work at home was not available, Hong Jae-hee's father was able to get work overseas- from Vietnam to Saudia Arabia to Australia, all in the name of nationalist economic policy. Hong Jae-hee's father sincerely considered these international outings as the best, most meaningful work of his life.

Yet at home, Hong Jae-hee's father was miserable, and even abusive. The reasons are complex. Explaining and coming to terms with them is the main reason why Hong Jae-hee made "My Father's E-mails" in the first place. Was it his addiction to alcohol? The frequent property takeovers by the South Korean government, that would arbitrarily force him to start over from scratch? The isolation imposed by the Korean War, which meant he would never be able to see his family again?

None of these excuses are really all that convincing, alone or even in concert. Yet the more Hong Jae-hee tries to talk with her family about the man her father was, and starts seeing the edges from this misery along her own memories...well, there's no getting around it. She starts to feel pity. Superficially a cosmopolitan success story, Hong Jae-hee's father felt like no one cared about him. In his own home, Hong Jae-hee was an interloper. Yet adrift, in whatever context, he felt needed. He felt helpful. That's why he kept taking on those foreign jobs.

There were a lot of men like Hong Jae-hee's father, doing their best to try and make South Korea great. A generally optimistic portrayal of one such man features strongly in "Ode to My Father" and its version of history. But in the real world, some of these men had moments of doubt, wondering whether the South Korea they helped to create really was as wonderful as they liked to pretend. Such subconscious indictments likely hurt Hong Jae-hee's father deeper than anyone could have ever guessed.

Review by William Schwartz

"My Father's E-mails" is directed by Hong Jae-hee.Published on 2018/02/04 | Source

South Korean officials inspect an auditorium in Mt. Kumkang in North Korea on Jan. 23. /Yonhap

South Korea will ship about 10,000 liters of diesel to North Korea's Mt. Kumgang resort for a celebration on the eve of the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, a government official here said Sunday.

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But supplying refined oil products like diesel to the North could violate UN Security Council sanctions.

"North Korean officials said that it's hard for them to ensure a stable power supply to the venue for a joint cultural event, because it's a facility built by South Korea'," the government official said. "I think we should ship diesel there".

The government only wants it to power a generator there, but there is a risk that the regime could pilfer it for its own ends.

A UNSC resolution from December limits North Korea's import of refined oil products to 500,000 barrels a year. Ten thousand liters is about 63 barrels.

"It's still early in the new year, so we can avoid controversy over a possible sanctions violation if we report the amount to the UNSC", the official said.

But Section 104 of the U.S.' North Korea Sanctions and Policy Enhancement Act signed by President Donald Trump last August stipulates that he "shall designate any person (or subsidiary or agent) that knowingly" supplies refined petroleum to the North as subject to U.S. sanctions. In other words the U.S. will have to give express permission.

The official said Seoul "will avoid controversy by prior consultation with Washington".India and Israel inked nine MoUs during the recent visit of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. These range from co-operation in cybersecurity and space to film co-production and oil and gas. Last year, the two countries also announced an 'India-Israel Industrial R&D and Technological Innovation Fund'. Business leaders from both countries think bilateral trade can touch $20 billion in the next five years from current $5 billion. While Indian firms hope to tap into Israel's innovation ecosystem and technology, Israeli companies see a potential market here in areas such as agriculture, smart cities, clean energy and water management.

Goutam DasQ: Your success story is too good to be true...

A: The reason we have reached this level is because we are working for people at large. The day I start working to fulfill financial ambitions, set profit and turnover targets, I dont think I will be able to achieve this kind of growth.

When there is business motive there is aggression, oneupmanship and competition. We achieve turnover on the back of our work. Companies work for turnover, our approach is to work hard without having a turnover goal. When the turnover happens we plough that money into our various charitable activities, hospitals and universities.



Q: There have been lot of negative reports on the quality standards of Patanjali...

A: Patanjali's strength is purity and authenticity and our goal is to protect these values. We offer value for money products without compromising on quality. Consumers are not questioning our purity. Had they done so our products would not have sold. This is a conspiracy by competition which is finding it difficult to corner Patanjali through rightful means.

Human error and clerical mistakes are possible. But our intention has never been bad. As I told you, we don't work for turnover, we work to serve the nation.

For most companies this country is a market, but for us this country is our family. I challenge the MNCs to come in the open and debate. Please question us and we will answer. We are answerable.

Q: Where does the money to fund this ambitious growth plan come from?

A: Our business makes enough money which we plough back into the business. Since we complete our projects on time, banks are more than willing to give us loan.

Let me tell you that Patanjali doesnt have too many costs. Despite being the largest shareholder, I dont take a salary back home. I have no financial aspirations. I love to travel by train, enjoy my life working on the fields in my chappal. I don't consider this as any kind of sacrifice, rather I enjoy the simplicity. Patanjali's growth is not of Patanjali per se but of the society, that of swadeshi. For our individual benefit, we haven't taken anything.



Q: Isnt Patanjali too dependent on the persona of you and Baba Ramdev?

A: I dont agree. I only spend 20 per cent of my time on my business. I participate in research, write books, get involved in the hospital and university. I have recently published a book on Ayurveda in 70 languages. I am currently working on a world herbal encyclopaedia and a world yoga encyclopaedia. A businessman will never do all this.

Our philosophy of serving people gives us courage and wisdom. We never had knowledge, experience or a godfather who taught us business. We are learning on the go. One needs confidence and have right intentions and if that is there Patanjali will outlive us. We have an empowered team which runs Patanjali.



Q: So, who are the people behind Patanjali other than you and Baba Ramdev?

A: There is no top MNC from where we haven't hired. We earlier needed experienced people than freshers. Our employees are empowered to take decisions thats how me and Swamiji are able to focus on other things.



Q: How is Patanjali different from other corporates?

A: We work like a family. Our seniors even participate in the cooking process in the canteen's kitchen. You won't find the typical corporate culture. We hire professionals, but when we hire them we tell them about our culture. People want to join us. I have 20,000 odd resumes of people seeking jobs across categories.

People come with a mindset of having 10-20 per cent growth targets.When we say our target is 100 growth they get puzzled. Swamiji has a huge role in counseling and encouraging our talent. We encourage our employees to study Upanishads, Vedas, philosophy of Maharshi Siddhanand, Swami Dayanand, Vivekanand. We follow nationalism and spiritualism, which has nothing to do with religion. Its all about purifying your inner self.For Subscribers It's Defenders Day in Maryland. Do you know why?

It's Defenders Day in Maryland, a state holiday that commemorates the military actions that led to the composition of our national anthem.The green shoots the Congress sees in Rajasthan could be a precursor to the crop it might harvest in the assembly polls later this year. But for the expected to happen, the party will need to iron out competing ambitions within  controlling temperaments, balancing egos in sync with the popular mood.

The conundrum requires quick resolution. For now there arent two but three aspirants to the chief ministerial slot: Ashok Gehlot, Sachin Pilot and Jitendra Singh.

If the Ajmer seat the Congress wrested from the BJP was earlier held by Pilot, Alwar is Singhs erstwhile constituency.

Together with Gehlot, credit is due to them for the partys stellar show in the state which, by most accounts, is a low-hanging fruit for the Congress.

It would help perhaps if the leadership blend is a replication of Punjab, where seasoned campaigner Amarendra Singh led the show with Navjot Sidhu pumping extra energy into the campaign.

That poll-time symbolism has lately been under a cloud in Punjab. But the problem seems containable. In Rajasthan, however, Gehlot does not, unlike Amarendra, belong to a dominant caste. His value is in his amenable persona, pan-Rajasthan appeal and understated social identity.

A Mali (horticulturist) by caste, he poses no societal challenge to other groups: the Gujjars, Meenas, Rajputs and Jats. Muslims in any case are without option. But Gehlots previous tenures as chief minister had him at the receiving end of the Jat anger. Likewise, Sachins Gujjar community is forever uncomfortable with the Meenas and Singhs Rajput clansmen dont see eye to eye with the Jats. These inter-caste complexities demand special care, both in terms of candidate selection and emphasis on individuals while setting up the electoral challenge. In the recent bye-polls, the Congress received the support of Jats and Rajputs.

The big question is whether the tenuous ground-level rapprochement bred by their shared antipathy for chief minister Vasundhara Raje will sustain in the run-up to polls?

The Raje dispensation is dominated by Rajputs but the Padmavat uproar saw the combative community backing the Congress on a rebound. Speculation is also rife that Shri Rajput Karni Sena leader Lokendra Singh Kalvi could hitch on the anti-Raje bandwagon.

He has flirted with the BJP and the Congress in the past. It looks more expedient for him to ally with the Congress this time. If Kalvi does warm up to the Congress, the Rajput vote will consolidate in the partys favour, regardless of his disapprobation in Urban India.

That leaves the Jats. At one time the Congress had in its fold a number of weighty leaders: Ram Nivas Mirdha, Paras Ram Maderna, Sis Ram Ola and Balram Jhakhar. But they all have passed into history. Madernas son Mahipal is in jail in the Bhanwari Devi murder case. Even Col (retd) Sona Ram is with the BJP since 2104. He left the Congress and got elected from Barmer, defeating estranged BJP veteran Jaswant Singh.

The void perhaps can be filled by the likes of Badri Jhakhar, who represents in the state assembly Jodhpurs Bhopalgarh seat associated with Maderna. The Congress faces must be a bouquet of social groups, said Raghu Rathore of the erstwhile Jodhpur royalty: Thatll take care of inter-caste rivalries

But no inclusive bouquet of identities would work without the Congress projecting a chief ministerial face. For Narendra Modis stock hasnt tanked despite widespread disenchantment with Raje  whose replacement at this late stage could be a double-edged weapon. Her ejection, if at all, will not be without intra-BJP tremors.

As for the Congress, one wrong move and itll be chasing a chimera in the Thar.

(vinodsharma@hindustantimes.com)New law in UK to stop corrupt ppl from using Britain as safe haven 04 February, 2018



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Hand Wash and Toiletries in Pakistan And the Role of DUPAS in Reshaping the Industry

Woke Bingo LONDON: The UK government has introduced new rules giving unprecedented powers to law enforcement agencies to crack down on properties and assets amassed through dirty money.



Under the new rules, which are designed to stop corrupt people from using Britain as a safe haven, individuals can be fined and jailed if they make misleading statements.



The order that came into force recently allows authorities to freeze and recover property of more than 50,000 pounds if individuals cannot explain why they own assets worth more than their income and show they have acquired them legally.



It is seen as unprecedented as it  like Pakistans National Accountability Bureau laws  shifts the burden of proof to the property holder instead of the state.



The new law can also be problematic for some Pakistani politicians as the enforcement authorities dont need to show that they actually own the property as properties owned by their associates can also be subject to the new powers.



Another thing that goes against Pakistani politicians is lower threshold as a UWO [Unexplained Wealth Order] made in relation to a non-EEA [European Economic Area] PEP [Politically Exposed Person] would not require suspicion of serious criminality.



Although the British media is looking at the Unexplained Wealth Order (UWO), which came into force on Feb 1, as a weapon to fight corruption by Russian oligarchs having assets in the UK, the new law can have serious implications for Pakistani personalities having properties and assets here.



London-based anti-corruption group Transparency International (TI) says it has identified properties worth 4.4 billion pounds in Britain that should be considered as possible candidates for the new legislation.



It has already prepared a list of five cases which it thinks could be investigated without any delay, including Avenfield House flats case involving former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.



Describing Mr Sharif as the suspected owner of the four Avenfield House flats (16, 16A, 17 and 17A) worth at least eight million pounds, TI noted that the Land Registry documents showed that the four properties were owned by two companies registered in the BVI: Nescoll Limited and Nielsen Limited.



According to information published as part of Panama Papers, these companies were controlled by the former prime minister of Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif. In 2017, Pakistani authorities initiated an investigation into these assets, which found that they were purchased without a mortgage between 1993 and 1995, just after Sharif reported a growth in wealth without any plausible declared source of income. In July 2017, Sharif was removed from the office after the investigation found that he had failed to disclose these properties on his official asset declaration, added TI.



The other cases listed by TI include property called Kenwood Gate, Hamstead Lane, London, that is worth 18m pounds and is allegedly owned by the first family of Azerbaijan; and two flats (138A and 138B), 4 Whitehall Court, London, with approximate value of 11.44m pounds and allegedly owned by Igor Shuvalov, the Russian first deputy prime minister.



It should be mentioned here that Mr Sharif is not the only politician to have links to properties in the UK as media reports and court cases have mentioned many other Pakistani politicians with links to controversial properties and assets and those can be targeted by the new powers given to the British authorities.



The Times published a news item in its Saturday edition linking an Indian underworld don to a portfolio of properties in London and its suburbs.



Documents seen by this newspaper and compiled by the Indian authorities allege that on [Dawood] Ibrahims behalf his right hand man, Muhammed Iqbal Mirchi Memon, also accrued a vast property portfolio across the Midlands and southeast in the UK as well as India, the United Arab Emirates, Spain, Morocco, Turkey, Cyprus and Australia, a report published in the daily said.



The newspaper quoted Misha Glenny, who wrote the McMafia book, as saying that Britain features in his [Ibrahims] criminal world as a place where he can launder money.



He is thought to have property interests in a variety of southern English counties like Essex and Kent. But we cant know for certain because the government has been dragging its heels in legislating to force transparency of the beneficial owners of companies registered in our overseas territories, she said.



Ibrahim, who has an Interpol red notice, was added to the UK Treasury sanctions list and would be a likely target for an unexplained wealth order in relation to the properties, which include hotels, mansions, tower blocks and houses in suburbs in the southeast.



The Times matched details from the Indian dossier to records held by Companies House and the Land Registry, as well as the Panama Papers to form a snapshot of the alleged property portfolio, the report added.



David Green, the outgoing head of the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), one of the government bodies supposed to be using the new powers, called the UWO as an extremely useful tool.



Rachel Davies Teka, head of advocacy, Transparency International UK, said the introduction of UWOs would help combat the fight against dirty money flowing into Britain.



According to a circular issued by the Office of Security and Counter-Terrorism, a UWO requires a person who is reasonably suspected of involvement in, or of being connected to a person involved in, serious crime to explain the nature and extent of their interest in a particular property, and to explain how the property was obtained, where there are reasonable grounds to suspect that the respondents known lawfully obtained income would be insufficient to allow the respondent to obtain the property.



A UWO can also be applied to politicians or officials from outside the European Economic Area [EEA], or those associated with them i.e. Politically Exposed Persons [PEPs], says the circular, adding that a UWO made in relation to a non-EEA PEP would not require suspicion of serious criminality.



The ability to apply for a UWO is limited to those agencies defined as an enforcement authority, namely, the National Crime Agency (NCA), Her Majestys Revenue and Customs (HMRC), the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).



According to the circular, a failure to provide a response to a UWO may give rise to a presumption that the property is recoverable under any subsequent civil recovery action. A person commits an offence if, in purported compliance with a requirement under a UWO, they make a statement that the person knows to be false or misleading in a material way, or recklessly makes a statement that is false or misleading in a material way.



The Unexplained Wealth Order is not seen as part of any kneejerk reaction contemplated by the current government of Theresa May as the relevant government departments were working on it for over two years.



London has long been seen as a favoured destination for corrupt cash and successive governments had been promising action against the use of dirty money in the UK property market.



Former British prime minister David Cameron vowed to expose the use of anonymous shell companies to buy luxury UK properties, often in London.



Foreigners must not be able to buy UK homes with plundered or laundered cash as part of a global effort to defeat corruption, he said during a visit to Singapore in 2015.Heavily inspired by the eyes, artist Dipak Kumar Ghosh has come up with a series of fascinating portraits of famous personalities which he has ventilated on canvas using pencil and charcoal.

Organised at IGNCA, the exhibition titled Eyes Says It All showcases the piercing eyes of eminent personalities like Rabindranath Tagore, Swami Vivekananda, Albert Einstein, Sri Ramakrishna, Mother Teresa, A.P.J Abdul Kalam and more which are always attractive and seeks all the attention.

The theme Eyes have been encircled by many pairs of eyes that reflect various facets of a person, from exuberance to a simple smile, from a profound grief to a mellowed agony, from being exhausted to boredom. His entire work contains a plethora of different subjects.

Portraits, that reflect the different faces and phases of life. Peoples emotions and expressions has affected the artist at a great extent and has lead his focus especially to their eyes as they convey a certain intimacy, a history that nothing else can hold, the artist said.

Talking about his experience, the artist said that every stroke in work of art is important to the bigger picture and the time and effort that he has invested in each and every portrait and sketch and painting of his makes all of them special to him.

He even shared one of his wonderful experiences while portraying the sketches of Osho and Sri Aurobindo. He said: There was a power cut which somehow led to complete darkness in my studio. This is when I noticed the eyes that stared back at me and I could almost feel their presence in the room. The experience was otherworldly and gave me a great sense of satisfaction.

The exhibition was inaugurated on Saturday by former President Pranab Mukherjee who was in all praise about the exhibition.

An artist should have a creative mind, they feast the mind of the living and that is their study. I wish Mr. Ghosh and associates a grand success for this exhibition, Mukherjee said during the inauguration.

The exhibition will continue till February 8.

Follow @htlifeandstyle for moreBollywood actor Swara Bhaskar, who is at the centre of controversies ever since she voiced her opinion against Sanjay Leela Bhansalis Padmaavat, has said it was unfortunate that having a different set of opinions could be seen as dissent and dissent could be passed off as sedition today.

The actor said the problem of intolerance of opinion continued to haunt the country.

Swara had recently criticised Padmaavat director Sanjay Leela Bhansali for glorifying the now-banned archaic jauhar practise in an open letter, for which she received considerable flak on the social media. When asked about the backlash, Swara told PTI, Theres a real problem of intolerance of opinion in India. We see difference of opinion as dissent and dissent as sedition.

The actor today turned showstopper for fashion designer Shaila Khubchandanis label Crow. Dressed in black and grey, Swara walked the ramp with elan.

Swara Bhaskar with fashion designer Shaila Khubchandani at Lakme Fashion Week Summer/Resort 2018 in Mumbai on Feb . (IANS)

Talking about her upcoming film, Veere Di Wedding, she said she is excited about the project. The story has an original feel. Its the story of four girlfriends, friendship, love and life. Lots of fun along the way.

Swara featured in the opening show of the last day at the LFW while her co-star Kareena Kapoor Khan is the grand finale showstopper for Anamika Khanna. Talking about Kareena, the actor said, I love her. Theres no one like her on the ramp at all.

Swara added fashion helps one get the spotlight on oneself without compromising on their identity. Im not an expert. But I think one cannot be fashionable till one is confident and comfortable.

Follow @htshowbiz for moreThe Uttarakhand government has been administering polio drops to children every day at entry points on the Nepal border for the last four years, officials said.

Polio has been eradicated from India in 2014, according to a World Health Organisations report. Since it still exists in our neighbouring countries like Nepal, Bangladesh, Myanmar and Pakistan, polio vaccine is administered at every entry point on the borders as a precautionary measure to check the virus from coming to India, said Dr Rashmi Pant, additional chief medical officer at Champawat.

Even after the eradication of polio, vaccines are given to children in India as a precautionary measure. But on India-Nepal border points, its a everyday affair, even on Sundays and gazetted holidays.

Teams of volunteers, sent by the Uttarakhand department of medical health and family welfare, reach entry points every day to administer polio vaccination to children who cross the border from either side with their parents, officials said.

This (polio vaccination) is administered round the year under a central governments programme with the help of volunteers who get honorarium from the health department, Pant said. A WHO official said 4,64,865 children have been administered vaccination in the last four years at Nepal border entry points.

Dharchula, Jhulaghat, Jailjibi, Tanakpur barrage, Sharda barrage, Garhigoth and Melaghat are among 19 notified entry points in Uttarakhand along the Nepal border. There are also many unnotified entry points along the 1750-km-long border.

Sangeeta Prajapati, a volunteer at Tanankpur barrage in Champawat district, said, Usually more than five dozen children below 5 years are administered polio drops daily, but the number rises during Ma Purnagiri shrine fair during Navratra in March and other festive occasions.

During the fair, thousands of pilgrims visit Bhairav Mandir located at Brahmdev in Nepal, 2 km from the Tanakpur barrage, after offering prayers at Purnagiri shrine situated on a hill.

Though a pulse polio vaccination programme is conducted in my village by the Nepalese health department, I like to get my child administered polio drops at Tanakpur barrage, said Lata Thapa of Brahmdev, who had come to Tanakpur market with her husband and two-year-old child Tanu.

In our village, we have to go to certain points (for polio vaccination); here we get the facility round the year. We avail of the facility whenever we come to Indian market for shopping or for medical care.A south Delhi businessman has been the victim of car thefts four times in the last three years, police said on Sunday as investigators search for his Renault Duster, which was stolen from outside a gym in Lajpat Nagars K block on January 30.

On the first three occasions, the cars were found though the thieves were caught only once. The victim, 50-year-old textile dyer and finisher Deepak Pandoi, is now hoping to be fourth-time lucky.

The cars stolen the first three times were two golden-beige Honda City sedans. He still drives one of them. Deputy commissioner of police (south-east) Chinmoy Biswal said that the first three thefts had been perpetrated in the same neighbourhood in Lajpat Nagars G block.

The series of thefts started on the morning of December 16, 2014. My car cleaner rang the doorbell to say that my car was missing from its regular parking space. I immediately called the police, Pandoi said.

The businessman could not believe his luck when, barely a week later, his former driver called to say that the car was parked at an isolated spot in Greater Kailash. I dont know who stole my car or how it reached Greater Kailash. The police and I were both happy to recover the car, said Pandoi.

But just four months later, on April 10, 2015, Pandois other Honda City got stolen from an empty parking spot in the vicinity.

Once again, it was the cleaner who alerted him to the theft. I followed the drill, got a case registered, and prayed that I would get lucky again, said Pandoi.

He received a call from the police around 10 days later. The thief had abandoned my car outside Peeragarhi police station after being involved in a minor accident, he said.

After almost a year without incident, he discovered that the car was again missing on the morning of February 8, 2016. This time, Pandoi decided to claim insurance after getting an FIR registered. It was about 90 days after the theft  I was about to get my insurance claim  when I got a call from Badarpur police station. They said the car had been found, and that it had been stolen to commit a petty crime, Pandoi said.

This January 30, Pandoi parked his new Duster outside a gym, walked up the stairs, and deposited the car keys at the reception.

The thief was well-dressed, in branded shoes and clothes. He tricked the gym receptionist into looking for the trainer, took the key, and drove away, Pandoi said.

The police said that the thiefs face has been seen on CCTV footage, and efforts are on to identify the suspect. We have put a team of the local police as well as our anti-auto theft squad on the job, said the DCP.

On average, 105 cars are stolen in Delhi every day. But this may be the only case of a person being a victim of car theft four times over a short span.It is important to keep in mind that up to 10% of cancer cases have a hereditary component. This essentially means that despite healthy lifestyle habits, if we have inherited a bad copy of a gene that plays a role in cell renewal, we are always at a greater risk of developing cancer.

Two of the best-known such genes are BRCA1 and BRCA2, which infer a significantly increased risk of getting breast and ovarian cancer if a mutation is present in either of these genes. Scientific and medical research shows that there are several other genes that may cause cancer in a similar manner.

Some gene mutations are responsible for specific cancer types, while others are involved in many types of cancers, complicating the cause and effect scenario significantly. It requires experts in genetics and cancer to shed light on what causes cancer and choosing the right treatment.

Genetic counsellors are trained to understand a patients family history of illnesses, including cancers, and draw up scientifically valid pedigree charts (or a family tree) to map a disease across up to three generations or more. This specialised training uniquely qualifies them to understand a persons family history of a disease like cancer. They are skilled at interpreting this knowledge and can provide accurate predictions of the risks faced by a person who makes use of their services.

Additionally, genetic counsellors can explain the consequences of inheriting bad cancer genes to patients, family members, as well as doctors. Hence, genetic counsellors fill this important information gap by explaining the importance of genetics to families and working with doctors to get the best diagnosis and treatment for patients.

Today, genetic counsellors use their training and experience along with highly sophisticated prediction software to interpret a persons family history. Using this information, they can determine whether a person is at a higher risk of developing cancer in his or her lifetime compared to the average cancer risk of about 1-2% for most cancer types. Once the genetic counsellor is certain that there is a significantly higher risk, he can recommend the appropriate genetic tests.

These tests can identify whether a disease-causing gene mutation is present in a persons DNA or not and allow a genetic counsellor to calculate a persons risk for getting cancer even more accurately.

Inputs from Dr Nitesh Rohatgi, Principal Consultant, Medical Oncology, Max Cancer Center; Dr. Sudhir Borgonha is Chief Medical Officer, Strand Life Sciences.

Follow @htlifeandstyle for moreThe police complaint filed by the forest department last week has failed to deter violators from continuing with unauthorised tree felling inside Mangar forest in the Aravallis, villagers have alleged.

Also known as the sacred grove, Mangar Bani comes within the ambit of the Forest Conservation Act, 1980 and no commercial or non-forest activity is allowed inside the forest. However, despite the prohibition, encroachers continue to make inroads into the forest, villagers claimed.

Som Yadav, a Mangar resident, said that a half acre area, close to the Mangar Bani forest, is being fenced off by pitching poles and as many as 15 trees have already been chopped in the process.

Villagers claimed that the forest guard deputed to keep watch on the forest is mostly away on weekends, clearing the decks for violators to carry out non-forest activities with impunity.

In 2013, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) issued a directive stating that fencing will not be allowed in the Gair Mumkin Pahar (deemed forest) areas of Mangar Bani.

Direct the respondents to withdraw the permission granted for Khasra No. 112//8/2, 9/1, Rakba 08 in Village Manger, district Faridabad, Haryana state. Direct the respondent not to grant any such permission in future. Direct the respondent to do the survey of all non-forest activity on non-forest area. Direct the respondents to restore area to natural state (sic), the NGT order stated.

Haryali, an NGO, had moved a petition with the NGT claiming that the Directorate of Town and Country Planning, Faridabad, had allowed fencing and construction of a Damp Proof Course (DPC) on a one acre plot Khasra No. 112/8/2/,9/1 rakba 8  in Mangar.

Read I Gurgaon lost five times more trees this year

The petitioner claimed that the area in question is classified as Gair Mumkin Pahar in revenue records and has been identified as a recharge zone for groundwater by the Central Ground Water Board (CGWB). It is also considered as a habitat for the wildlife in the Aravallis.

The petitioner said that such non forest activities not only poses a risk to the wildlife inhabiting the Aravallis, but could also result in the fragmentation of the forest.

Forest department officials said that they are looking into the matter. We will visit the area and file a damage report, D Hembram, conservator of forest, South Haryana, said.

Trees in chopping block

January 19, 2017- As many as 60 trees chopped in Raisina forest area, 15 kilometres from Gurgaon

February 20 , 2017 - 200 trees axed in Mangar Bani.

March 27, 2017 - As many as 2,000 trees felled in Chauma village in Sector 111, around 15km away from Gurgaon

June 21, 2017 - More than 10,000 trees chopped over a 52-acre area at Sarai Khajwa village in Faridabad district. The trees were felled to free up space for a group housing project

July 20, 2017 - Around 100 trees chopped over a 3-acre plot in Anangpur, Faridabad

November 18, 2017- Around 60 trees felled on a two acre area near Mangar

November 21, 22, 2017- Six hundred trees chopped over a 52-acre plot in Faridabads Sarai Khawaja

December 24, 2017- Around 100 trees chopped and cleared from a 2-acre area close to Mangar BaniAfter its proposal to make floor cleaners using cow urine, the Uttar Pradesh government has decided to give a push to the use of cow urine in preparing medicines.

The ayurveda department has prepared eight medicines using gau mutra which can prove to be useful in case of liver ailments, joint pain and immunity deficiency, the departments director Dr RR Chaudhary told PTI in Lucknow on Sunday.

The department, which has two pharmacies (in Lucknow and Pilibhit) along with other private units, is preparing ayurvedic medicines using cow urine, cow milk and ghee, he said.

There are eight ayurvedic medical colleges in the state in Banda, Jhansi, Muzaffarnagar, Allahabad, Varanasi, Bareilly, Lucknow and Pilibhit.

In these medical colleges, degree course in ayurvedic medicine is imparted. Along with this, in these medical colleges, everyday thousands of patients come for treatment.

In Lucknow alone, the daily footfall in the OPD of the Ayurveda Hospital is around 700 to 800. If all patients arriving in eight medical colleges are combined together, then the figure reaches thousands, Chaudhary said.

Elaborating on the benefits of ayurveda, the director said, Gau mutra is an integral part of ayurveda, and there are eight medicines, which are made using cow urine and other cow products.

New research shows that cow urine and other cow derivatives can prove to be highly useful. Till now, we have been giving medicines made using cow urine in cases pertaining to liver ailments, joint pain and for boosting immunity. Our endeavour is to expand the ambit of these medicines and use it for curing other ailments and diseases as well, he said.

He said since there are only two government pharmacies in UP, there is comparatively less production at the government level.

However, in the private sector, there are many companies engaged in manufacturing medicines using cow urine, which are supplied to ayurvedic medical colleges of the state, Chaudhary said.

The director said the department is working to open new pharmacies and start post-graduate and MD courses in ayurvedic medical colleges.

In August last year, the Adityanath government had proposed use of cow urine in making floor cleaners.

In July 2017, the Centre set up a 19-member panel, including three members linked to the RSS and VHP, to carry out what it said will be scientifically validated research on cow derivatives including urine, and their benefits, according to an inter-departmental circular and members of the panel.

Headed by Union science and technology minister Harsh Vardhan, the committee was mandated to select projects that can help scientifically validate benefits of panchgavya  the concoction of cow dung, cow urine, milk, curd and ghee  in various spheres such as nutrition, health and agriculture, the circular says.

Named the National Steering Committee, the panel includes secretaries of departments of science and technology, biotechnology, ministry of new and renewable energy, and scientists from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi.

It also has three members of Vigyan Bharti and Gau Vigyan Anusandhan Kendra, outfits affiliated to the RSS and VHP.

According to the government note, former CSIR director RA Mashelkar, known for vigorously campaigning against US patents on turmeric and basmati rice, is a member of the panel.Others include IIT-Delhi director Prof V Ramgopal Rao and Prof VK Vijay of the IITs Centre for Rural Development and Technology.

The government has given the project the acronym SVAROP, which stands for Scientific Validation and Research on Panchagavya, and says it is a national programme that is being conducted by the Department of Science and Technology, Department of Bio-technology, and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) of the Ministry of Science and Technology in collaboration with IIT-Delhi.

The document also says this multi-disciplinary programme will involve participation of other related ministries, government departments, academic institutions, research laboratories, voluntary organisations and others to carry out research and development and also build capacities, and cover five thematic areas including scientific validation of uniqueness of indigenous cows.

It will cover scientific validation of panchagavya for medicines and health, scientific validation of panchagavya and its products for agriculture applications, scientific validation of panchagavya for food and nutrition, the circular said.

Vijay Bhatkar, president of the Delhi-based Vigyan Bharti, an RSS-affiliated science body, is the co-chairman of the committee.

The Adityanath government has also cleared setting up 1000-capacity gaushalas (cow-shelters) in seven districts of the state and 16 urban locations in phase one of a giant project which could see the UP government help build such shelters in every block of the state.

The government will help build these new cow shelters with proper sheds and boundary walls and a committee under the district collector is being set up to maintain them with help of NGOs and public.

Focus is first on the seven districts in Bundelkhand where cows will get shelter in the new cow-shelters.

New cow-shelters in urban areas will result in better sanitation and less incidents of cows dying due to eating plastic.

The UP government is also planning to free up its own land from illegal encroachment to set up these new cow- shelters in safe locations and with full facility for fodder and water.Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modis public rally here, Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Sunday asked him to find time to resolve the inter-state Mahadayi River water row with neighbouring Goa.

Claiming that Karnataka is the number one state in investment and innovation, and highlighting Bengaluru as a start up and innovation hub, Siddaramaiah boasted about having scripted several national firsts across key sectors through a unique model of development.

I welcome PM @narendramodi to Namma Karnataka - the no.1 state in investments, innovation & progressive policies.. Through a unique model of development, we have scripted several national firsts across key sectors, Siddaramaiah said in a tweet.

I am confident that Karnatakas success makes India proud, he said.

@narendramodi, I am glad you are making time to visit the countrys start up & innovation hub, Namma Bengaluru today..On behalf of my people, I urge you to find the time for Karnatakas drinking water needs & help us resolve the #Mahadayi dispute #NammaKarnatakaFirst, he said in another tweet.

Responding to Chief Ministers tweets, state BJP Chief BS Yeddyurappa alleged that Karnataka has scripted several firsts like corruption, farmers suicide and collapse of law and order under Siddaramaiahs regime.

Thanks for the welcome CM @siddaramaiah avare! Yes. Karnataka indeed has scripted several firsts - No.1 Corrupt State, 3,500+ farmer suicides, collapse of law & order, mysterious deaths of officers, transfers of honest officials, crumbling infra of Bengaluru. #KarnatakaTrustsModi, he said in a tweet.

Karnataka has for long been demanding Prime Ministers intervention in resolving the inter state Mahadayi river water sharing dispute by calling a meeting of chief ministers of riparian states that includes Goa and Mahrashtra.

Various Kannada organisations and farmers groups have called for black day today alleging that the prime minister was not heeding to their demand.

Recently Kannada Okkuta, an umbrella organisation of various pro Kannada organisation along with farmers groups, had called for dawn-to-dusk Karnataka bandh on January 25, demanding the prime ministers intervention.

Their plans earlier to observe bandh today also, on the day of prime ministers visit had failed with the Karnataka High Court on Friday issuing the stay on the shut down after terming it as unconstitutional.

Karnataka, which has locked horns with neighbouring Goa on sharing Mahadayi River water, is seeking release of 7.56 tmcft water for the Kalasa-Banduri Nala project.

The project is being undertaken to improve drinking water supply to the twin cities of Hubballi-Dharwad and districts of Belagavi and Gadag.

It involves building barrages across Kalasa and Banduri, tributaries of Mahadayi River, to divert 7.56 tmc ft water to Malaprabha which meets drinking water needs of the region.

Attempts have been made by Karnataka to amicably solve the issue that is also pending before the Mahadayi Water Disputes Tribunal.The century-old Cauvery water dispute between Tamil Nadu and Karnatake could see a final settlement soon as the Supreme Court is expected to give its verdict on the issue any time this month. Ahead of the judgment, the two states are tense with anticipation and apprehension as it will impact the fortunes of millions of farmers on either side.

Passions are running high. In poll-bound Karnataka, the Congress-led government can ill-afford to upset farmers now and in neighbouring Tamil Nadu, the Opposition is mounting a frontal attack on a wobbly AIADMK government.

It is in this scenario that Tamil Nadu chief minister Edapaddi Palaniswami last month sought an audience with his Karnataka counterpart Siddaramaiah to urge him to release 80 thousand million cubic feet (tmcft) of Cauvery water that was due to Tamil Nadu, as per the final award of the Cauvery River Water Disputes Tribunal.

Citing poor storage in its reservoirs and its own irrigation requirements and the drinking water needs of an expanding Bangaluru, Karnataka has allegedly defied the Supreme Court order and refused to release water.

The farmers in the Cauvery delta farming fields here were hoping for a good crop this year after six successive drought years, who desperately need water to save the standing Samba crops (rice grown between August and January), may once again be disappointed.

Siddaramaiah appears to be playing for time and is unlikely to meet EPS before the Supreme Court verdict  citing his preoccupation with state budget slated for February 16.

There will be no meeting before the verdict. We are expecting 470 tmcft of water for Karnataka in the final award as against the 270 tmcft given by the tribunal, says Brajesh Kallappa, the Congress spokesperson from Karnataka.

Karnataka water resources minister MB Patil told mediapersons that Karnataka was not in a position to release any more Cauvery water. Tamil Nadu had already received 113 tmcft so far, which was more than what is stipulated under a distress formula, he added.

Experts say it is not without reason that Tamil Nadu farmers see Karnataka as the villain.

They say that Karnataka has built new dams and reservoirs, de-silted its water bodies and canals and with a political unity of purpose was better prepared for the battle.

Tamil Nadu farmers are crying hoarse for 15 tmcft of water to save the standing samba crop, but the state government is in a bind given the precariously low storage level in the Mettur dam. Thats one reason why chief minister EPS has lobbed the ball in Karnatakas court, but the Opposition in Tamil Nadu is not impressed.

The DMKs working president MK Stalin said the state government should have forced Karnataka through the Centre by taking an all-party delegation to Delhi.

MDMK leader Vaiko charged Prime Minister Narendra Modi with treating Karnataka with kid gloves as he was eyeing votes to capture Karnataka that goes to polls in two months.

What to speak of irrigation, people will not even have drinking water, Vaiko said, painting a dismal picture.

While politicians on either side whip up emotions, some counsel negotiated settlement  farmer to farmer meetings to thrash out a solution in a true give and take spirit.

Kodihalli Chandrashekhar, a farmer leader from southern Karnataka, blamed the politicians for the mess, saying, If farmers on both sides sit down, a solution can be found without any trouble.

Chandrashekhar said that governments were responsible for the spate of suicides by farmers in both states. Industrialists are helped, but not farmers, he rued.

Like Chandrashekhar, S Ranganathan, the 82-year-old general secretary of the Cauvery Delta Farmers Welfare Association and the original petitioner for setting up a Cauvery tribunal in the Supreme Court, calls for a dialogue as well.

He says nearly 80% of the crops in Cauvery delta need water for three more wettings or they will die before being harvested.

Ranganathan says the Cauvery delta is among the most efficient rice-producing fields in the world and it would be better to save Tamil Nadus status as the rice granary of south India, just as it must be ensured that Bengaluru thrived as the IT powerhouse of the country. Karnatakas dry weather and soil quality would be better suited to millets rather than water-guzzling crops like paddy and sugarcane, he adds.

Despite these arguments, battle lines are drawn ahead of the verdict. Karnatakas Mandya region, the epicentre of violent protests by farmers and pro-Kannada groups in 2016, is already tense. The state police has stepped up security in the region.An army officer and three other soldiers were killed and a BSF sub-inspector was injured in Pakistani firing along the Line of Control (LoC) in Tarkundi and Sunderbani areas of Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir on Sunday evening.

An officer in the rank of captain was among those killed in unprovoked and indiscriminate firing by Pakistan army around 3.30pm, confirmed the army in a statement.

Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively and heavy damage has been inflicted on Pakistani Army Posts. However, in the exchange of fire, one officer and three jawans were grievously injured and succumbed to their injuries and attained martyrdom, the statement added.

Martyrdom of Indian Army soldiers will not go in vain. The unprovoked action by Pakistani Army will be given a befitting response, the statement added.

The captain was six days short of his 23rd birthday, the PTI reported quoting a senior army officer.

Captain Kapil Kundu from Ransika village of Gurgaon district would have turned 23 on February 10, the report said.

Sources said the Pakistans border action team (BAT) took part in the attack.The BAT is an amalgam of Pakistan army commandos and Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists formed to inflict heavy casualties on Indian patrols along the Indo-Pak borders.

LoC: One officer and 3 Jawans martyred in Rajouri . Most areas affected due to ceasefire violation, Rajouri deputy commissioner Shahid Iqbal Choudhary posted on his Twitter account late Sunday.

The DC said all 84 schools located within 5km of the LoC from Sunderbani to Manjakote will remain closed for the next three days in view of the continuous ceasefire violation by Pakistan.

The deceased have been identified as captain Kapil Kundu, riflemen Ram Avtar and Shubam Singh and havildar Roshan Lal. BSF lance naik Iqbal Ahmed sustained injuries.

Nine security personnel have been killed in truce violation by the neighbouring country this year.

Earlier in the day, two teenagers and a jawan were injured in the Shahpur sector of Poonch district in the shelling from across the border, a police official said.

(With agency inputs)Pir Hameedud Din Sialvi not happy with Rana Sanaullah meeting, without taking him on board

LAHORE/SARGODHA: The issue of Punjab law ministers controversial remarks about a minority community and the demand of Pir Hameedud Din Sialvi that Rana Sanaullah should appear before a six-member body to clarify his position got further complicated on Saturday following a meeting between the two sides in Model Town which the Pir said was held deceitfully without taking him on board.



In the aftermath of Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharifs visit to Sargodha-based Pir of Sial Sharif, Law Minister Rana Sanaullah finally appeared before a committee on Saturday to clarify his position with regard to his statement.



The meeting was attended by a six-member committee comprising Pir Sialvis nephew MPA Sahibzada Ghulam Nizamuddin, another MPA Maulana Rahmatullah and four others, with the Punjab government represented by MNA Hamza Shahbaz, Rana Sanuallah, Auqaf Minister Zaeem Qadri and Malik Muhammad Ahmad in Model Town.



The members of the committee arrived here a day after the Pir complained in a press conference that after Shahbaz Sharifs Dec 1 visit to his residence neither the chief minister nor Rana Sanuallah contacted his men for a meeting over the issue as per their commitment.



In the meeting I told the participants that a malicious campaign against me was being run at the behest of some unseen forces on this sensitive issue. I have many times clarified the statement attributed to me relating to a minority community in the media and on the assembly floor. Today I reiterated my stance before the (committee) members sent by Sialvi sahib and removed their reservations, Rana Sanaullah told Dawn after the meeting.



He claimed that all misconceptions over the issue had been removed, hoping that the issue had been settled once for all.



Sialvi faced a lot of criticism, especially on social media, for cutting a deal with Shahbaz Sharif after the latter called on the Pir.



There were reports that Pir Sialvi agreed to roll back his protest movement on the issue of Khatem-e-Nabuwat after the chief minister assured him that his son Qasim Sialvi would be either accommodated in the Senate or forthcoming general election.



This issue does not seem to be settled here even after the appearance of Rana Sanuallah before the Sialvis team to clarify his position. As long as Pir Sialvi does not get anything on his plate, like some favour for his son, his reservations will remain there, a source in the PML-N told Dawn.



He said differences had already erupted in the Sialvi family as the PML-N leadership hinted at accommodating either Ghulam Nizamuddin or Qasim Silavi in the coming election. Nizamuddin is a sitting MPA and he played on both sides to resolve the issue. Therefore, the PML-N leadership is happy with his role and is likely to award him ticket for provincial assembly in this years election.



Mr Qasims chances appear slim, the PML-N leader said.



Meanwhile, Pir Sialvi announced parting of ways with his nephew MPA Nizamuddin Sialvi, who he alleged deceitfully took some members of the committee to the Chief Minister House for a meeting without his consent.



Sial Sharif shrine spokesperson Sahibzada Qasim Sialvi said Nizamuddin Sialvi attended the meeting held at the CM House in Model Town without taking Pir Sialvi into confidence.



He said the committee would soon hold a meeting to discuss the issue.



Mr Qasim said all the doors for a dialogue between Sial Sharif and the Punjab government had been closed and the shrine would announce its future strategy in Feb 5 public meeting to be held at Jhang. Mr Shamsur Rehman Mashhadi said it was agreed while constituting the committee that it would meet Law Minister Rana Sanaullah at a third place under his (Mashhadis) chairmanship.



However, he said, the government included three more members -- Hamza Shahbaz, Zaeem Qadri and Malik Ahmed Khan -- into the committee without consulting Pir Sialvi and held a meeting at the CM House without the bodys head and some of its original members.



He said it appeared that the Punjab government was not willing to present the law minister before the committee despite making a commitment thrice in this regardGujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani promises to carry forward Prime Minister Narendra Modis development initiatives more energetically during his second stint at the helm, after the BJP won the assembly elections last December in a state the party has been ruling since 2001.

In an interview to Smriti Kak Ramachandran on Sunday, the chief minister said the BJP is the lone party in recent years to buck anti-incumbency as well as wrest power in states ruled by other parties.

It has been over one month since you assumed office, what are your immediate concerns and what are the issues that top the agenda?

This time I have a full five-year term. I will see to it that the Vikas Yatra (development caravan) that was started by Modiji is implemented properly. We will ensure the Narmada project is completed and coastal economy gets a boost. Employment generation will be a focus area, with stress on manufacturing and service sectors and self-employment. For the middle class, the focus will be on healthcare and education.

With just 99 MLAs in the assembly now, has the party made an assessment of what went wrong?

In the past four years, all state assembly results were a mandate against the incumbent government. This (Gujarat) is the first election where the BJP got another chance. A lot of churning on the social engineering front happened in Gujarat in the past two years; the state was socially-upset over caste issues. Social polarisation led to some loss of seats.

The Congress performed better than the BJP in rural areas.

Every election is contested differently. If the Congresss vote share has gone up in this election, it does not mean it will happen in the next. The Congress could not do what we did to their governments in Maharashtra, Assam, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. We removed them. The Congress could not dislodge the BJP.

Apart from the minorities, Dalits and Patels, farmers and the youth are upset too. How will your government tackle farm distress and unemployment? You are also staring at a water crisis.

More than 80% of the total employment generated in the country is in Gujarat. We are ahead in job creation in manufacturing and service sectors. As for farmers, the shortage of water is for a year. But rabi and kharif crops will get full irrigation. In the past two years, our government has given minimum support price (MSP) for groundnut procurement.

What about meeting the demands of Patidars?

It was an election issue. Hardik (Patel) wanted a truck with the Congress, but it didnt work. Dalit leader Jigneshs (Mewani) win was from a seat that has traditionally been won by the Congress; he did not dislodge a BJP leader from there. He will be exposed now, since it is time to deliver.

The recent Supreme Court judgment on fee regulation is a shot in the arm for your government.

There is a perception that self-financed schools are a law onto themselves. We took the initiative to pass a law to ensure transparency in fee determination and make school managements accountable. We want schools to justify the fees they charge. Those offering more facilities can charge more. That is natural, we dont object. But there has to be some accountability.

We have set up regional committees that will take all aspects, including profit into account and fix fees. Schools can appeal against such committees decision with state-level committees. This model, endorsed by the courts, is worth emulating across India.Tearing into the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on Sunday, chided it for setting new records in corruption and asserted that the countdown for its exit has begun.

Congress government is at the exit gate, Modi said, as he mounted an all-out attack on the Congress rule at a rally in the states capital. He dubbed the government a 10% commission government and saying criminals were ruling the roost.

Modi also referred to the spate of killings of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Hindu activists in the state  an issue the party has brought to the focal point of its discourse  saying, ease of doing murders was being discussed in the state while his government talked about ease of doing business.

The BJP is targeting a win with more than 150 seats for the coming polls. Karnataka is the second major state after Punjab where the Congress is ruling.

Congress government is a 10% government,where no work happens without paying a commission of 10%. It is a matter of shame if this becomes the identity of a government, he said. Asserting that there was a saffron wave in the state, Modi said people of Karnataka had decided to make the state Congress free.

Accusing Congress of practising appeasement politics on the issue of triple talaq, Modi said, Congress is trying to hang a bill related to triple talaq, he said, also pointing to Congress opposition to grant constitutional status to the OBC commission.

The rally at the sprawling Palace Grounds marked the culmination of the state BJPs 85-day Parivarthana Yatra that criss-crossed all the 224 assembly constituencies. The BJP ruled the state from 2008 to 2013.The Ganga may be cleaner today, than it was in 1986, when efforts to first clean the river were launched, with the quality of its water showing an improvement on two out of three key parameters used for measurement, in some stretches across 10 important cities, according to data from the National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) that has been seen by Hindustan Times.

The parameters where the water quality has shown improvement between 1986 and 2017 are dissolved oxygen (DO) and biological oxygen demand (BOD). The third parameter is faecal coliform level, which is crucial to assess if the water is fit for drinking and bathing; this data was not provided by NMCG, which comes under the Union water resources ministry and is spearheading the Rs 20,000 crore Namami Gange program to clean the river.

Interestingly, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB)  the countrys pollution watchdog  measured the water quality against all three parameters and provided the data to NMCG.

Coliforms are a broad class of bacteria found in faeces of humans and animals and their presence may indicate the possible presence of harmful, disease causing organisms.

A report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India on Rejuvenation of Ganga tabled in Parliament last year said that during 2016-17, the total coliform level in Ganga across all the cities of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal that it flowed through, was six to 334 times higher than the prescribed levels.

For better water quality, the DO should be more than 5mg/l and BOD should be less than 3mg/l (as per CPCB fixed standards for outdoor bathing). Along with fecal choliform level, BOD and DO are essential to measure a rivers biological health.

The CPCB data shows that DO level in 10 cities spanning five states through which Ganga flows was more than 5 mg/l in 2017.

These cities were Rishikesh, Haridwar, Garhmukteshwar, Kannauj, Kanpur, Allahabad, Varanasi, Patna, Palta and Uluberia. In majority of the stretches, the DO level varied between 7.7 mg/l and 8.8 mg/l, including Rishikesh were it was 10mg/l. In 1986, the DO measured in Rishikesh was 8.1mg/l.

DO is the level of oxygen dissolved in water and is a crucial parameter in assessing water quality. The lesser its level, the lesser are the chances of survival of aquatic life including fish.

The BOD level  amount of dissolved oxygen needed by aerobic biological organisms to break down organic material present in the water  was found to be less than the permissible level in fewer stretches, including those near Rishikesh, Haridwar, Garhmukteshwar and Patna.

The Ganga flows through five states (Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal) before it reaches the Bay of Bengal.

Our present aim is to achieve bathing standard in Ganga. And the steps initiated so far seems to be bearing result. The DO level was more than 5 mg/l in most places except some stretches of Kanpur. But even here there is improvement. Some species of fishes have been sighted, that also adult ones in the last two year, said a senior ministry official involved with the program who did not want to be identified.

Experts said that its too early to say the water quality of the river is improving. There have been some improvement but again there are fluctuations. There has been no change in waste generation. Efforts are being made to treat the waste by setting up Sewage Treatment Plants (STPs) but it will take time. The fecal coliform level needs improvement, said RM Bhardwaj, senior scientist at CPCB, who is incharge of monitoring the river water quality. Environmental activist MC Mehta agrees: The CAG report tabled last year clearly shows that quality of the river has deteriorated over the years. The CPCB data for DO and BOD does not reflect the true picture, which will be clear only when the figures for fecal coliform is also disclosed.

The ministry official cited in the first instance claimed that in the past few years fecal coliform level has remained the same. Hindustan Times couldnt independently authenticate his claim.

Its a live river. .. In western countries rivers are mainly used for economic purpose. Here its not like this. Ganga is a source of livelihood, faith is attached to it, and people go and bathe there. In Varanasi, on an average 250 to 300 dead bodies are cremated every day on the ghats. On normal days 50,000 people visit Ganga, which goes up during festival, he said.

The CAG report puts the fecal coliform level in 2016-17 in the upstream stretch of the river in Varanasi at 3000 MPN (most probable number)/100ml while downstream it was 46167 MPN/100ml. For bathing purpose coliform level should be 500 MPN/100 ml or less.

The ministry official said that though cleaning of the river is a continuous process, the measures taken by the government in the last few years are slowly showing results. Of the 1109 grossly polluting industries inspected by CPCB between December 2015 and November 2017, 508 were found non-compliant with respect to prescribed effluent discharge standards and were asked to close.

Till November 2017, 93 projects for managing municipal sewage have been sanctioned at a cost of Rs 14,167 crore. Dr Dipankar Saha, former additional director, CPCB said that it is too early to say if the water quality in the river has improved. What we can say at the moment by comparing the BOD and DO figures from 1986 to 2017 is that steps taken by the authorities have started giving a signal that there is uniformity in the water quality and there is no signal of deterioration.The district health department has submitted a complaint in the local court against an illegal skin bank operating on the Dera Sacha Sauda campus in Sirsa.

The complaint was filed by the chief medical officer on the directions of the director general of health service, after a team of the health department found that the Dera management could not produce any documentation or registration of the skin bank under The Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Act, 1994.

During a search operation, a team of the health department found preserved skin at the Shah Satnam hospital. According to documents, the Dera had conducted a surgery and even given skin to a Karnal-based hospital, which is illegal under the provisions of the Act, said deputy chief medical officer Viresh Bhushan.

Bhushan said that it is illegal to sell, donate or transplant skin, if a hospital is not following the proper procedures under the Act.

While revealing that skin banks have an important role in the treatment of patients with burn injuries, non-healing wounds etc, he said, I am not sure why the Dera had opened a skin bank on its campus.

He said that the complaint had been filed on the directions of the director general of health service and the court of the additional chief judicial magistrate will be hearing the case on February 19.

Meanwhile, a senior advocate at the Sirsa court, Rahul Sharma, said, As per the transplantation of human organs and tissues Act, the court can take cognisance only after a complaint is filed by the appropriate authority and, if someone is found guilty, the court can award three years of imprisonment and can also impose a fine.

The complaint comes close on the heels of a chargesheet filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against Dera chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim and two of his followers in a castration case. The dera chief is already serving a 20-year sentence in Rohtaks Sunaria jail for raping two of his women disciples. He is also facing two murder trials.

Dera management mum on the issue

The Dera management, meanwhile, has refused to comment on the issue. When Hindustan Times contacted Prakash Singh, a member of the dera management, he said that he is not a competent authority to comment on the matter.

A doctor, who was working with the skin bank, said,  The hospital at the Dera Sacha Sauda was open on the pattern of Mumbai Skin Bank and the Dera had completed all the formalities required to open the skin bank.India is watching closely the turbulence in the Maldives where a political crisis deepened on Sunday as the government ordered soldiers to scuttle any move by the Supreme Court to arrest or impeach President Abdulla Yameen over his refusal to free imprisoned Opposition leaders.

New Delhi had asked its neighbour to follow the top courts order on Thursday to release all political prisoners, including Yameens main rival and former president Mohamed Nasheed, who is in exile.

In the spirit of democracy and rule of law, it is imperative for all organs of the government of Maldives to respect and abide by the order of the apex court, the Indian foreign ministry said.

We are keeping a close watch on the situation, added an official, who doesnt want to be named.

But as of Sunday, no prisoners had been released while the Indian Ocean archipelago nations attorney general Mohamed Anil said the government has information the Supreme Court is preparing to unseat Yameen but law-enforcement authorities will resist such a move.

We have received information that things might happen that will lead to a national security crisis, he warned.

Nasheed, the nations first democratically elected president, responded angrily on Twitter, saying that Anils comments were tantamount to a coup. Security services must uphold the constitution and serve the Maldivian people, he tweeted.

But the defiant government of the strategically located nation of about 400,000 people prepared for a crackdown and police detained two Opposition lawmakers on Sunday.

More than 100 riot police stood guard outside government offices in Male, including parliament, as well as at Republic Square, a site of protests by opposition activists, although the streets were quiet.

Soldiers guarded parliament and stopped an attempt by lawmakers of the opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) to hold a meeting there. The authorities had shut parliament indefinitely on Saturday to prevent MDP members from gathering there.

President Yameen is facing the biggest threat since he wrested power in 2013 after the Supreme Court quashed charges against Nasheed and nine more political dissidents this week.

The court also ruled that 12 parliamentarians sacked for defecting from Yameens Progressive Party of the Maldives should be reinstated. The return of the dozen lawmakers will put the Opposition in a majority in the 85-member parliament and have enough votes to remove the president. Under Maldivian law, a vote for impeachment removes a president from office.

Lawmakers loyal to former president Nasheed, whom Yameen had defeated in a controversy-marred election, feared a military takeover of the islands to preserve the presidents grip on power.

Yameen has stopped short of saying he will not obey the court order, but his government expressed concerns about releasing those convicted for terrorism, corruption, embezzlement, and treason. The president had been set to run for re-election this year virtually unopposed, but Nasheed said he would mount a fresh challenge for the presidency after the top courts recent order.

Nasheed was sentenced to 13 years in prison after he was convicted of the abduction charge under the Maldives anti-terror laws in a trial that was widely condemned by international rights groups. The conviction barred him contesting elections in the nation, known for its atolls and luxury resorts.

(With agency inputs)Asserting that Kashmir is a part of India and will continue to be so, Union home minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday said Indian forces will fire countless bullets if Pakistan fires one.

As our neighbour, we do not want to attack Pakistan first. We want to live in peace and harmony with all our neighbours. But unfortunately Pakistan is trying to tear down Jammu and Kashmir and continues attacks on our forces and territory.

I have ordered our forces that if one bullet comes from that side, not to think of firing countless bullets at them, Singh said at a poll rally in Barjala in Agartala.

The home minister is on a two-day tour of Tripura to boost BJPs campaign for the February 18 polls.

Lambasting the Marxist government in Tripura, he said it had failed to bring development to the state despite being in power for more than two decades and accused the Left government of 25 years misrule through crime against women, unemployment and corruption.

Like West Bengal was devastated during CPMs 35 years regime, Tripura also witnessed misrule under CPM government for 25 years. So I appeal to the people to give at least once chance to the BJP to allow improvement of the state like other BJP-ruled states, said Singh.

Praising the NDA government, he said people will never bring CPM back to power if they see the good governance in BJP-ruled states.

Singh will start a Vijay Rath Yatra from Durgabari to BT College ground in the city on Sunday where he will address another public meeting.

He will then tour six assembly constituencies as part of his yatra and conclude with another public meeting at Kshudiram Government English School at Jail Ashram Road in Agartala.

(With IANS inputs)Parliamentarians are set to get a 100% hike in basic pay from April this year but abolition of a tax-free travel allowance could reduce the bonanza, especially for MPs representing far-flung constituencies.

In the latest finance bill introduced in Parliament during the presentation of the Union budget on Thursday, finance minister Arun Jaitley proposed enhancing the taxable basic salary of MPs from Rs 50,000 to Rs 1 lakh a month.

But a component of their travel allowance  which is an additional one-fourth of the total airfare  has been scrapped. The Salary, Allowances and Pension of Members of Parliament Act, 1954, says if the journey is performed by air, an amount equal to one and one-fourth of the airfare for each such journey will be reimbursed. The finance bill abolishes this additional one-fourth.

Parliamentarians from southern Indian states or the Northeast may lose more money under this head than their north Indian counterparts as the amount of allowance is proportionate to the price of tickets.

For instance, a one-way Chennai-Delhi business class ticket on Air India costs Rs 24,000, while an Amritsar-Delhi flight is available for Rs 13,000. An MP travelling from Chennai would earn Rs 6,000 as allowance, while his colleague from Punjab would earn Rs 3,250.

And if the MP makes four official trips a month, he will earn at least Rs 2.8 lakh a year. This was in accordance with the one-fourth rule.

We wish to know whether public servants are denied travel allowance when they travel for official work. I wish to point out that MPs dont make pleasure trips to Delhi. They come here for serious work, said Biju Jata Dals Lok Sabha leader Bhartruhari Mahtab, who attends at least two House panel meetings every month.

The government has retained the 34 complimentary tickets issued to MPs for travelling across the country a year. These tickets, usually used for personal travel and party work, dont attract travel allowances.

Government officials said a parliamentarians total monthly pay package may go up from Rs 1.4 lakh to Rs 2.3 lakh. Apart from the hike in basic salary, the constituency allowance is likely to rise from Rs 45,000 to Rs 70,000 and office expenses and secretarial assistance from Rs 45,000 to Rs 60,000, they said.

For parties such as the CPI(M), the travel allowance is what the parliamentarian takes home as their salary is deposited in the partys coffers as cess.

But we have to adjust to the amendments as the additional airfare was an entitlement and not a right, said Mohammad Salim, the partys Lok Sabha leader.A woman on Sunday through a video on Twitter sought police help against torture by her husband, an automobile businessman.

Police said they were looking into the matter and would take necessary action after investigations.

In the video posted on Twitter by filmmaker Ashoke Pandit, the woman, a Khar resident, is seen weeping for help and justice.

I have been tortured both mentally and physically by my husband. He has been torturing me for several years. I have been in the relationship just for the betterment of my children. But this man refuses to do the needful for my living, the woman said in the video.

She further alleged that despite registering an FIR, police have not taken any action against her husband.

Kindly help me, because this man will torture me mentally and end up my life. If I dont get justice I will end up tomorrow in the streets of Khar. Please give me justice, the woman said in the video.

A senior police official said the woman and her husband had a domestic dispute.

The couple has three children and stay in a duplex apartment in Khar. While the husband and two kids stay on the eleventh floor, the woman along with their daughter stay on the 12th floor, the officer said.

He said the woman has recently registered two cases against her husband.

One case was registered for house breaking, while another for criminal intimidation, he said, adding police is probing the matter and whatever action is needed will be taken.Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday visited poll-bound Karnataka at the end of BJPs 90-day rally across the states districts . Elaborate security arrangements were made for the rally at Palace Grounds where at least one lakh people, including IT professionals, were expected to attend the programme.

A group of college students, donning degree robes and selling pakodas to passers-by in a dig at Modis recent remarks on job creation, were whisked away by the police, hours before the PMs rally here.

The young students sold Modi Pakodas, Amit Shah Pakoda and Dr Yeddy Pakodas, a reference to Karnataka BJP chief Yeddyurappa, to those passing by, including the BJP workers and visitors on their way to the rally.

Named Nava Karnataka Nirmana Parivartana Yatre (journey to build a new Karnataka), the rally across 224 assembly constituencies of the state was flagged off on November 2 by BJP president Amit Shah. Assembly elections in the southern state are due in April-May.

The BJP had come to power on its own in the state for the first time in 2008, but lost to Congress in the May 2013 assembly polls.

Here are the highlights:

5.52pm: BJP government means only development. Congress government means corruption, appeasement, and dynasty politics, he says.

5.45pm: PM says, Congress is trying to stall the Triple Talaq bill in Parliament. They are trying to do the same with the OBC Bill as well.

5.41pm: Modi says, There are serious allegations of corruption against Congress leaders. Reports are coming about them demanding commission in several projects. I have been told that Karnataka govt is being recognised as 10% government as no work is possible without 10% commission.

5.38pm: Modi hails Indian teams win in the U-19 World Cup. The prime minister says team coach Rahul Dravids work ethic is the culture of Karnataka. Their head coach Rahul Dravid was a significant factor behind this victory and this cant be denied. He teaches us to work honestly and live for others.

5.35pm: PM says, The world is discussing Ease of doing business, my government talks about Ease of living, but the Congress government of Karnataka talks of Ease of doing murder. Anyone who opposes them ends up losing their life. This is dangerous for democracy and shameful for the state government.

5.26pm: When facilities are provided to villages, migration to cities will go down and the mounting pressure on cities will be released, Modi says.

We are taking various measures and steps to make lives of poor living in remote areas easy, he says.

5.25pm: He says, In this budget, government has made a significant decision so that correct price of crops are given to farmers. If Yeddyurappa, son of a farmer, becomes CM of Karnataka, the projects for farmers will work at its best because Yeddurappa has the farmers best interest at heart.

5.23pm: The prime minister says his government has made farmers who produce fruits and vegetables its top priority. TOP meaning T for Tomato, O for Onions and P for Potatoes.

5.21pm: Modi says, During Congress regime, Karnataka got Rs 73,000 crore. However, we have provisioned Rs 2 lakh crore for it, which is 180% more than what Congress had provided.

My dream is that a person wearing Hawai chappal should be able to travel by air, he says.

5.20pm: The government has set a goal to build more than 9,000 km of National Highway across the nation this year. Under Bharatmala Pariyojana, 35,000 km of roads will be constructed with an investment of Rs 5,25,000, the prime minister says.

5.16pm: Modi says the recent budget has solved one problem of Karnataka. With an investment of Rs 17,000 crores, construction work of 160 km long sub-urban railway network will be started in Bengaluru. 15 lakhs commuters of the city will benefit from it, he says.

5.12pm: PM says, More than 1 crore loans have been sanctioned for the people of Karnataka under Mudra Yojana. Under PM Jan Dhan Yojana, more than 1.16 crore accounts were opened in Karnataka, opening doors of banking for the poor and lower middle class.

He says 1.85 crore free LPG connections has been given in Karnataka and 34 lakh toilets have been made under Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan.

5.11pm: Modi says, There will be chaos in Bengaluru if it doesnt get electricity for a day. However, there are 7 lakhs homes in Karnataka and 4 crores homes in the nation which live in dark even after so many years of independence.

5.09pm: The prime minister asks, Despite receiving a large amount of money from the Centre, have you seen any positive change in Karnataka?

4.59pm: Modi says, Countdown has begun for end of the Congress government in Karnataka. Congress is at the exit gate. It has caused destruction here and Karnataka doesnt need a Congress culture anymore.

4.51pm: Narendra Modi begins his speech at the rally and greets the attendees in Kannada. Loud cheers from the crowd.

4.45pm:

4.33pm: Yeddyurappa felicitates Modi.

4.17pm: PM Modi arrives at the Parivartana Yatra. He is joined on stage by state BJP president BS Yeddyurappa, and Union ministers Piyush Goyal and Prakash Javadekar.

3:00pm: Responding to the CMs tweets, state BJP chief BS Yeddyurappa alleged that Karnataka has scripted several firsts like corruption, farmers suicide and collapse of law and order under Siddaramaiahs regime.

Thanks for the welcome CM @siddaramaiah avare! Yes. Karnataka indeed has scripted several firsts - No.1 Corrupt State, 3,500+ farmer suicides, collapse of law & order, mysterious deaths of officers, transfers of honest officials, crumbling infra of Bengaluru. #KarnatakaTrustsModi https://t.co/TXrdge4hDx  B.S. Yeddyurappa (@BSYBJP) February 4, 2018

2:53pm: Claiming that Karnataka is the number one state in investment and innovation, and highlighting Bengaluru as a startup and innovation hub, Siddaramaiah boasted about having scripted several national firsts across key sectors through a unique model of development.

2:50pm: Ahead of PM Modis public rally, Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah asked him to find time to resolve the inter-state Mahadayi River water row with neighbouring Goa.

.@narendramodi , I am glad you are making time to visit the countrys start up & innovation hub, Namma Bengaluru today.



On behalf of my people, I urge you to find the time for Karnatakas drinking water needs & help us resolve the #Mahadayi dispute. #NammaKarnatakaFirst  Siddaramaiah (@siddaramaiah) February 4, 2018

2:21pm: The city has been turned into a fortress with heightened security for Modis visit. At least 1,000 policemen have been deployed around the venue, with another 1,200 traffic police working to manage the traffic, city police commissioner T Suneel Kumar said.

2:16pm: Union ministers Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal, who are in charge of the BJP poll campaign in Karnataka, and Ananth Kumar, DV Sadananda Gowda and Ananthkumar Hegde, who hail from the state, are expected to take part in the event.

2:15pm: The BJPs state unit had opened an online registry and used social media to personally invite the youth, techies, educated class and prominent citizens to the venue.

2:11pm: Modi is expected to address a BJP rally at Palace Grounds in Bengaluru.

2:00pm:

Today I will address a rally in Bengaluru. I am delighted to have this opportunity to interact with the wonderful people of Karnataka. You can watch the speech live here. https://t.co/aGxemoOQY4  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) February 4, 2018

1.55pm: Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modis visit, pro-Kannada activists demand his intervention in the Mahadayi River dispute.

Karnataka has for long been demanding the PMs intervention in resolving the river water sharing dispute by calling a meeting of chief ministers of riparian states that includes Goa and Mahrashtra.

Karnataka, which has locked horns with neighbouring Goa on sharing Mahadayi River water, is seeking release of 7.56 tmcft water for the Kalasa-Banduri Nala project.

The project is being undertaken to improve drinking water supply to the twin cities of Hubballi-Dharwad and districts of Belagavi and Gadag.

It involves building barrages across Kalasa and Banduri, tributaries of Mahadayi River, to divert 7.56 tmc ft water to Malaprabha which meets drinking water needs of the region.Asias largest brackish water lagoon Chilika Lake in Odisha has just got a fresh lease of life on the back of an ongoing government drive to eliminate illegal prawn farming that was choking one of the worlds finest biodiversity hotspots.

For two decades, greedy businessmen with political connections strung fine-mesh nets hooked to bamboo and wooden sticks that trapped Chilikas famed prawns as well as other marine resources. The illegal prawn farming was slowing killing the sensitive eco-system.

The nets, locally, called gheris, erected for the lucrative culture of Bagda Chingri (local name for tiger prawns), set the cash registers ringing for the businessmen while ruining the livelihood of two lakh traditional fishermen along the Chilika coast.

Now for the first time in two decades, a demolition drive by the Odisha government that began last June seems to have unclogged the lakes waters by tearing up miles of fine mesh nets.

With barge-mounted excavators dredging through the Chilika shoreline for months together, more than 85 per cent of the prawn gheries are now gone.

The lake is breathing free now, said Suresh Mohapatra, additional chief secretary, Odisha forest and environment department, who during his term as district collector of Puri 20 years ago had tried clearing the illegal gheries without much success.

The lake spread across Puri, Ganjam and Khurda districts is among the worlds most amazing biodiversity hotspots having over 300 varieties of fish and over 130 Irrawaddy Dolphins which are now considered endangered species. It also plays host to over 8 lakh migratory birds that fly thousands of miles every year from Siberia and the Caspian Sea.

Fishermen had alleged that since the early 1990s, the lakes ecosystem was being steadily eroded as politicians belonging to Congress and now Biju Janata Dal abetted the local prawn mafia who steadily encroached upon the fertile shoreline and created their own prawn farming ground for breeding tiger prawns that fetch anything between Rs 500 to 1,200 per kg.

But both political parties deny any connection with the prawn mafia.

I categorically deny involvement of any Congressmen in the prawn gheries. In 1999, when I was a minister in Giridhar Gamang cabinet I personally fought against the prawn mafia, said Prasad Harichandan, Odisha Pradesh Congress chief.

BJD spokesperson Sasmit Patra also ruled out his partys involvement saying, As far as I know no BJD leaders are involved.

The shoreline of the lake is the most fertile ground where phytoplanktons (microscopic marine algae), the food for the aquatic grow. As the prawn mafia created their own mini lakes with mesh nets, the prawn juveniles they reared there grew in size devouring most of the phytoplankton resulting in rest of the fisheries starving.

The rising profits due to prawn gheries led to their mushrooming over the lake. From just about 5 sq km in 1989 the gheries spread over 175 sq km till last year. Apart from hampering natural growth of fish, it hindered free flow of water and accelerated the process of silting, said Sushant Nanda, chief executive of Chilika Development Authority.

Though gheries were being cleared earlier, the collusion between local officials and the prawn mafia meant that the mesh nets were up within hours of an official raid.

Frustrated over its failures, the government last year dusted up the 37-year-old Orissa Marine Fishing Regulation Act, 1981 that had a provision of authorizing a government official for clearing the illegal gheries. The government authorized the chief executive of the CDA to clear the gheries with the help of police and other departments.

The demolition team did meet obstacles and at one village of Puri district abutting the lake, the prawn mafia used crude bombs late last year to scare them away. But the demolition drive has had an excellent run so far clearing illegal gheries in over 151 sq km area while officials are on course to clear the rest of the gheries over 25 sq km in about a months time.

Unlike previous years, the mesh nets have not come up again quickly, said a local official.

Local fishermen who had tough time fishing due to the prawn mafia, are overjoyed.

We are also able to fish peacefully. Earlier, henchmen of the prawn mafia used to thrash us if we came near the prawn gheries, Bhikari Jali, a fisherman of Chandraput village of Khurda district said, adding that the fishing catch has gone up in the last 3-4 months. District Fisheries Officer of Khurda, Khetrabsi Behera added that the prawn catches have gone up by 20% in the last few months.

Environmentalists say removal of the gheries has led to a visible change of the lakes ecosystem. We can see sponges in the lake which were not visible earlier. The migratory birds were earlier confined to the Nalabana bird sanctuary, but this year they were spread all over the lake. Besides, the Irrawaddy Dolphins are being spotted in parts of the lake where they were never seen. This would help Chilika get the tag of world heritage site, said environmentalist Biswajit Mohanty.USA announced 2018 Nuclear Posture Review policy

WASHINGTON: The Trump administration on Saturday launched a new nuclear strategy which commits the United States to making new tactical nuclear weapons and retains the option to respond decisively against potential nuclear and non-nuclear threats. The new policy, called the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review, identifies Russia and China as main nuclear adversaries that are developing both strategic and tactical weapons, and warns all state and non-state actors that Washington will hold responsible if terrorists ever get access to a nuclear weapon.



Important to this deterrence is maintaining our capabilities so that the United States can respond decisively across the full spectrum of potential nuclear and non-nuclear scenarios, said US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon.



He did not rule out the possibility of a US response to a nuclear threat, but said that the United States will only consider the use of nuclear weapons in extreme circumstances to defend the vital interests of the United States, its allies and partners.



In a statement issued by his office on Friday evening, US President Donald Trump said the new strategy, also commits to improving efforts to prevent, detect, and respond to nuclear terrorism.



Mr Shannon further explained the US position on this issue at a Pentagon news briefing, saying that the new strategy makes clear that the United States will hold accountable any state or non-state actor that supports terrorist efforts to obtain or employ a nuclear weapon.



He was among half a dozen senior officials from the US departments of defence, state and energy briefed the media on the new policy, which, Mr Shannon said, takes the threat of nuclear terrorism very seriously.



The potential threat of non-state actors getting their hands on a nuclear weapon remains at the front of all of our minds, and we must work to mitigate (this threat) at every opportunity, Mr Shannon said.



The new strategy also commits the US to developing a new batch of smaller nuclear weapons, arguing that these tactical weapons will work as a greater deterrent because enemies might think the US might actually use them.



The new strategy puts Russia and China top on a list of states that pose a nuclear threat to the United States, claiming that both have added new types of nuclear capabilities to their arsenals, increased the salience of nuclear forces in their strategies and plans, and engaged in increasingly aggressive behaviour, including in outer space and cyber space.



North Korea is mentioned as well, as a state that continues its illicit pursuit of nuclear weapons and missile capabilities in direct violation of UN Security Council resolutions.



Iran comes next, which agreed in a pact it signed with the United States and other world powers two years ago to constrain its nuclear programme. But the document claims that despite the agreement, Iran retains the technological capability and much of the capacity necessary to develop a nuclear weapon within one year of a decision to do so.



In his brief statement, President Trump assured the international community that his new policy would make the use of nuclear weapons less likely by enhancing deterrence of strategic attacks against our nation, and our allies and partners.



The strategy also reaffirms our commitment to arms control and nuclear non-proliferation (and) maintains the moratorium on nuclear testing, he added. But Russia disagreed. In a statement issued by his office in Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said he was disappointed with the bellicose nature of the new US nuclear policy.Two women, their sarees slightly hitched up, are wading through the idyllic backwaters in Kadamakudi village on the outskirts of the port city of Kochi to board their catamaran. They are carrying pellets and flakes of fish food.

Later in the day, they will have to feed their fish near the estuary where Keralas backwaters meet the Arabian Sea. They have put up four cages there in the sea to rear 3,000-odd sea bass and red snappers.

K Sreekumar, another farmer, who has returned from the sea after the morning feed, is upbeat. Two weeks ago, he had pocketed over Rs4 lakh by selling fish.

They are among the growing number of farmers in Kerala who have taken up open-cage farming as traditional fishing methods are not yielding good catch.

India has about 7,600km of coastline, but its catch are poor. The annual marine fish landings in the country are about 3.63 million tonnes as against 11.5 million tonnes in China.

Marine experts blame traditional fishing methods and emphasise the need for scientific approaches to increase the yield.

A blue revolution is needed to increase the catch considerably, said Dr A Gopalakrishnan, director of the Central Marine Fish Research Institute (CMFRI), a premier marine research body.

Cage farming is one of the scientific methods identified by the institute to increase the catch.

Cage fishing is an ideal alternative for fishermen. In cage farming, production is at least 70% higher than conventional aquaculture and risk factor is also very low. Moreover, one can do partial harvesting depending on the demand, said Sreekumar who installed 10 cages in backwaters and sea.

Since these cages are installed near the shore, women can also do farming. And seasonal changes wont affect this, said Ajitha, a woman farmer. During monsoons, fishermen usually keep away from deep seas.

To popularise open-cage farming, the CMFRI is planning to train 5,000 fishermen across the country.

Last week, 50 fishermen from Ernakulam and Thrissur districts completed their training. Now at least 150 cages dot the waters along the coastline of Kochi and surrounding areas. Besides Kerala, marine cage farming is also becoming popular in neighbouring Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.

Method adopted

Cages are fabricated using GI pipes (of 6m length, 5m width and 6m depth) and are covered with strong nets. These cages are then floated on water using air balloons or air bags.

Once a cage is installed, fish seeds are deposited and its top is covered to avoid bird preying.

A normal farming span is seven to eight months and a normal cage costs about Rs25,000 and lasts 10 years.

However, not all fish varieties can be grown within the cage. Species like cobia, sea bass, snappers, mullet, lobster and pearl spot are suitable for this.

For cage farming, selection of sites is very important. Nature of the sea and other environmental aspects are to be factored in. We help fishermen to locate sites. But a major challenge is developing a brood bank for artificial breeding of fish, said Dr Imelda Joseph, the head of mariculture division of the CMFRI.

Initially most farmers were reluctant to invest in cage farming, but rich yields of those ventured into it, prompted many others to take up this method of mariculture farming, he added.

The CMFRI will soon start a brood bank to produce high value marine fish seeds suitable for cage farming, Gopalakrishnan said.Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje on Sunday described the BJPs bypoll losses in two parliamentary seats and one assembly constituency in the state this week as a wake-up call for the party.

The opposition Congress won all three seats in the state, where the ruling BJP and the government had promoted a development agenda to win votes.

The bypoll result is a wake-up call for us. We are reviewing why such a situation arose despite so much development, Raje said, addressing BJP legislators meet in the state assembly.

But to keep the party workers morale high, she said: There is no need to get disappointed with these results as we together will perform well and succeed again.

She asked the MLAs to inform people in their constituencies about the development work done by the BJP in comparison to the previous Congress government.

State BJP president Ashok Parnami echoed the chief ministers views.

The roots of lotus (BJP poll symbol) are not weak. These results are alarming for us and we are analyzing them. The government has done its best in development. We will once again succeed with the blessing of the people.

State parliamentary affairs minister Rajendra Rathore exhorted BJP workers to launch a united fight against the Opposition. BJP workers will win again with their hard work, he said.Union home minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday launched a scathing attack on the Left Front government in Tripura for underdevelopment in the state despite being in power for over two decades.

On campaign trail in Tripura where assembly elections are scheduled for February 18, Singh slammed the Manik Sarkar government for unemployment, poverty, poor law and order and inadequate power supply in the northeastern state and appealed to the public to throw out the corrupt Left Front government and vote for the BJP.

I now have no doubt that the corrupt Left Front government will be rooted out in the Assembly polls, he said at a public rally at the Basic Training college ground. Lotus blooms in mud. The CPI(M) government, with its scams and corrupt practices over the last 25 years, has set the stage for the blooming of the lotus, he said.

The Left Front has been in power since 1993 while Manik Sarkar has been the chief minister since 1998.

No government requires 25 years to usher development in any state. But in Tripura, there are many people who cannot afford a bicycle worth of Rs. 1000. One should look at Chhatisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Jharkhand for good governance. People in the country could experience good governance only under BJP regime. So, I appeal to them to give chance to BJP this time to see beginning of development era in all sectors, Singh said.

A total of 297 candidates are in the fray for the elections to the 60-member legislative assembly.

Praising the two term of NDA rule in the country  one under Atal Bihari Vajpayee and another incumbent Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Singh said that people have seen era of development only under the NDAs rule.

He said significant work for development of northeastern region was done under the stewardship of former Prime Minister Vajpayee.

Ministry for Development of North Eastern Region, initiated by former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was established for the progress of the northeast. Introduction of Tripura Sundari Express train to connect Tripura with New Delhi, launching of Rajdhani Express, bus-service from Agartala to Kolkata via Dhaka were done only with the initiative of BJP. India has emerged as the country for its fastest growing economy only under Narendra Modis regime. No other party in the country except BJP thought for welfare of the country especially northeast, the Union minister said.

He also referred to the murder of two journalists in the state recently and said that if BJP forms the government, it would hand over the investigation to the CBI.Bringing the rift in the CPI(M) into the open, some party leaders from Kerala slammed general secretary Sitaram Yechury at a meet here on Sunday, a day after he confirmed that a complaint has been received against state Secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnans son for alleged fraud.

Yechury on Saturday revealed that the party received a complaint against Balakrishnans elder son Binoy Balakrishnan about an alleged Rs 13 crore fraud committed in Dubai.

In wake of this, many state leaders attacked Yechury in their speeches at the district conference, in which both Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and Balakrishnan took part, with a few even accusing him of being disgruntled for not getting a Rajya Sabha renomination.

While the Congress was willing to support the candidature of Yechury from West Bengal to the Rajya Sabha, his Communist Party of India-Marxist was not in favour of it and in the bargain, it lost a seat in the Upper House.

With Sundays attack, the inter-party rift has come out in the open.

Cracks started appearing in the party after Yechury took a stand favouring former Chief Minister VS Achuthanandan.

This difference of opinion deepened when the entire Kerala unit of the party early this month voted, at the Central Committee meeting in Kolkata, against Yechurys stand that the CPI(M) should tie up with the Congress to fight the common enemy - the BJP.

A few days after Yechurys draft resolution was voted out, came a news report alleging that Balakrishnan junior had duped a firm. A three-page letter -- dated January 5, from the Dubai company sponser H.I.A.Al Marzooqi -- states that legal procedures have ben started against Binoy for the fraud.

Sundays developments in the CPI(M) come ahead of the state party conference to be held in Thrissur later this month where those who will attend the upcoming party Congress would be selected and it seems certain that the delegates from the state will not be supporters of Yechury or his stand.The Telugu Desam Party will not pull out of the NDA for now but would raise in and outside Parliament the treatment meted out to Andhra Pradesh in the budget, senior party leader and Union minister YS Chowdary said on Sunday.

The decision was taken during a meeting the TDPs parliamentary party held at the residence of TDP president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu in Amaravati.

Chowdary said several issues pertaining to the state were pending with the Centre. We shall try first to talk to the central government to see that they are resolved. If there is still no response from the Centre, our party president will take an appropriate decision (on continuing in the NDA). Till then, we shall wait and watch, Chowdary said.

The BJPs biggest southern ally is upset over being ignored in the Union Budget that was presented on February 1. The meeting was called to decide if the TDP, the NDAs third largest constituent with 16 members in the Lok Sabha, should continue in the ruling coalition.

The people of the state are seething with anger with the injustice done to the state in the central budget. We need to reflect the same in Parliament, one of the MPs, who attended the meeting, quoted Naidu as saying.

Naidu is also learnt to have told party members to stage protests in Parliament, even if it led to their suspension, the MP said.

The chief minister would explore all options for getting what was legitimately due to the state as per the AP Reorganisation Act, Chowdary, who is the minister of state for science and technology in the Modi government, said after the three-hour meeting.

There was nothing was more important to the TDP than the interests of the state, he said. The party had been telling the Centre that the state had suffered due to unscientific bifurcation of the Andhra Pradesh.

We expected that at least in the current budget, which is the last full-fledged budget before the next elections, justice would be done to the state. Unfortunately, there was no mention of several issues, Chowdary said.

Parliament had in February 2014 passed the Andhra Pradesh reorganisation bill clearing the way for the new state of Telangana that was carved out of 10 northwestern districts of Andhra.

The party MPs would put up a strong fight in Parliament for liberal assistance to the state. If the Centre would fail to respond in the next two or three days, we shall bring pressure on the Centre to achieve our due, Chowdary said.

Some reports said that BJP president Amit Shah and his senior colleague and home minister Rajnath Singh spoke to Naidu, who protested strongly, saying the ill-treatment in the budget had turned into a matter of prestige for the people of the state.

Chowdary, however, said he was not aware of the BJP leaders talking to Naidu.

Special package in lieu of special category status, creation of a railway zone and completion of the Polavaram irrigation project are the key demands of the TDP.

Andhra Pradesh votes for the Lok Sabha and assembly elections simultaneously. The TDP and BJP together won 17 of the 25 Lok Sabha seats and 107 of the 175 assembly segments in 2014.

Naidus muscle-flexing comes within days of the BJPs largest ally, the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra, announcing to go solo in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.Five policemen in Uttar Pradeshs Mahoba town handed over the cash reward they had received for nabbing a rape accused to the family of a six-year-old survivor for the construction of a toilet at their home.

In December last year, the girl had gone about 50 metres away from her house to relieve herself in the open at around 3am when the accused raped her.

A police team comprising inspector Vikram Aditya Singh, senior sub-inspector KP Singh, in-charge of district crime records bureau MK Zaidi and two other policemen arrested the accused in less than two days of the incident. The girl is still recuperating from the sexual assault.

The forces promptness in solving the crime warmed the hearts and an NGO Always Believe in Yourself and local legislator Rajesh Goswami announced cash reward of Rs5,000 and Rs5,100 for the policemen respectively.

The police team received the money on February 2 and handed it over to the girls father the next day with the promise that they would provide more money for toilet construction if required.

We know the money is not enough for the construction of toilet. We will give more from our salaries. We have decided to see that the toilet is built, said inspector Vikram Aditya Singh.

Superintendent of police, Mahoba, N Kolanchi said the accused lived in the same locality as the survivor and committed the act in an inebriated state.

When the policemen came to know that the girl was raped as she had to go out alone to relieve herself during odd hours, they decided to raise money for a toilet on their own, he said.

The police officer said they have informed the administration about the need to construct toilets in the area.

We had apprised the chief secretary during a recent meeting in Jhansi that incidents of rape were on the rise in the area in the absence of toilets. We have requested him to ensure construction of toilets as soon as possible, Kolanchi said.

The district magistrate is also providing financial relief to the family for toilet construction. We are in touch with the girls family, the SP added.Several hundred skilled Indians workers, in agonising green card wait, along with their children and spouses held a rally in front of the White House in Washington in support of President Donald Trumps plan for a merit-based immigration system that, among other things, ends chain migration and diversity lottery visa.

Flying to the US capital from as far as California, Texas and Chicago and driving several hundred miles from places like Florida, New York and Massachusetts, these Indians, living in the US for the past several years and in many cases for more than a decade, urged Trump to end the per country limit on legal permanent residency so as to eliminate the massive Green Card backlog of highly skilled Indians.

We are looking strictly for a merit-based immigration. That will bring prosperity and fast economic growth of the US, Krishna Bansal, national policy and political director of Republican Hindu Coalition, told the rally.

We are with President Trump for taking initiative towards a merit-based immigration system, Bansal said, adding that his group is working with the White House and lawmakers towards a comprehensive immigration bill that should include all these things.

The participants, many of them software engineers, at Saturdays rally had banner and posters with slogans like Cut Green Card backlog, strictly merit-based point system, end country limit, we need to support legal dreamers, and We support Trump.

This was one of the rare pro-Trump immigration rallies at the White House.

Green Card backlogs have been taunting most High Skilled Immigrants who have come to this country for a better life. The wait expectancy for a Green Card for a High Skilled immigrant from India tends to be somewhat from 12 Years to 70+ Years, when most of the world can get their Green Card in less than 2 years, said Akshita Ramesh, 13, a student of Ronald Regan Middle School in Virginia.

Thanjavur-born Akshita was one-and-half-year-old when she moved to the US along with her father Ramesh Ranathan, who is in the IT profession and had a H-1B visa.

Describing herself as legal H-4 dreamer, Akshita said the current green card waiting period for Indians means that her parents are unlikely to get legal permanent residency for next few decades.

I have always known I was born in India, and that I was on H4 Visa with my dad having an approved petition to apply for Green Card, but I didnt know about everything to the full extent. I didnt know that being on a H4 could mean that it will be much harder for colleges to accept me, no matter how good my grades are, she said.

I didnt know that having a H4 until 21 would mean possibly getting pretty much kicked out of the US, the only home Ive ever known, the land that I felt all the happiness of achievement, and the burning anger of disappointment, Akshita said in a passionate plea.

And all of this just because I was born in a different country that I barely even lived in? Dont you think thats unfair? she said, adding that she feels that her dreams would be shattered.

It sounds scary when I think the day I would turn 21, I would be made to feel a bit like an outcast, or a misfit in the country that I grew up in, how would you feel if you were the only one kid in an area who will be stamped as an alien, a foreigner when you turn 21, even though youve lived in the country your whole life? she asked.

I urge all lawmakers and the President to hear me and support us in every way you can to solve the backlogs ASAP, and guarantee that this problem is solved once and for all, and no single ambitious kid and parent will have to go through the same scenario as me, Akshita said.

According to Republican Hindu Coalition, there are nearly 200,000 children of legal immigrants-in-line from India, who have never broken the law, but who simply age out at 21 and have to go back, because their parents have a 60-year wait to get their green card after it is approved.

US Economy if it was to grow four per cent per year will need another 400,000 high-skilled workers added to the work force each year. Immigration reform needs to address this issue as well. The Hindu and Indian community has some anxiety related to Immigration issues, said Anil Sharma a member of the organizing team.

Souptik Mukherjee, another member, said for the highly skilled professional with advanced degrees the green card wait seems to be endless. Any initiative to move towards a merit-based immigration system is highly laudable.The BJPs candidate choice, lack of connect with peoples expectations at the ground level and non-performance of MLAs were among the factors that led to the partys defeat in the Alwar Lok Sabha by-election, punching holes in its claims about a strong organisation right from the booth level, experts and people said.

The Congress won all the three by-elections to Alwar and Ajmer Lok Sabha seats, and Mandalgarh assembly constituency in Rajasthan.

Candidature of Dr Jaswant Singh Yadav, a state minister, diminished victory chances of the BJP that was already battling anti-incumbency, analysts said. Political analyst Hari Shankar Goyal said, The record of Jaswant Yadav has not been bright; there have been many question marks over his deeds earlier. But Dr Karan Singh Yadav, the Congress candidate, carries a clean image and people seem to have liked him.

After Congress announced Karan Yadav as its candidate, the BJP fielded a Yadav candidate, but the decision did not go down with other castes. When the BJP candidate visited villages, people asked him why he was contesting a parliamentary election when he was already a minister in the state, said Manohar Lal Yadav of Balluvas village in Mundawar tehsil.

He said Yadavs felt that they would benefit by having an MP and a minister. This was the reason why Yadavs voted for the Congress candidate.

At some meetings, BJP MLAs faced peoples anger and protests because of their non-performance. CM Vasundhara Raje had kept the Alwar city BJP MLA out of her road show, sensing peoples opposition towards him.

The Congress took lead in all 8 assembly segments though the BJP has seven MLAs in Alwar. Jaswant Yadav faced defeat in Behror, his own constituency, by 23,000 votes.

The CM started conducted Jan Samvad programmes in Alwar from November. The selection of people for the programmes was left to the local MLAs and this proved to be a problem in getting right feedback, villagers said.

Women blocked NH 8 in Behror when they were not allowed to speak to the CM about water problem. In Alwar city, many BJP leaders were prevented from attending Jan Samvad programmes as they were not in agreement with the MLA. Later, they were allowed after state BJP president Ashok Parnami intervened.

The BJP did not focus on local issues during the campaign, but the Congress talked about development works in Alwar carried out by former MP Jitendra Singh. Issues like ESI Medical college, Chambal water, mini secretariat and Sainik School were raised by Congress and this struck a chord with the people of Alwar, villagers said.The three soldiers of the Indian Army, who were killed in an avalanche in Jammu and Kashmir on Friday, were cremated with full state honours in their native villages on Sunday.

The mortal remains of the three men reached their villages in Rajasthan on Sunday morning by road.

Havaldar Kamlesh Singh of Jhunjhunu, Sepoy Rajendra Singh of Alwar and Naik Balveer Singh of Bharatpur were killed when an avalanche struck their post in Machhil sector on Friday.

Naib Subedar Ritesh Singh from 21 Rajput regiment reached Bharatpur with the body of Balveer Singh, who is from Anjari village. Ritesh said that the three men lost their lives before reaching the hospital while one of them was rescued alive from the avalanche. Four soldiers were patrolling at 11,000 foot when the avalanche took place, he said.

In Bharatpur, Singhs wife Guddi Devi and two sons, Gaurav (9) and Mohit (5) reached Anjari from Nadbai. The 33-year-old soldier had joined the army in 2001. He came home in October last year and returned to duty on November 14. His younger brother, Mukesh, is also in the army. The third brother, Balram, is a farmer.

Balveers father Devkaran Singh said the family was proud of their son, who laid down his life for the nation. He said he will come home for Holi this year, said Balram.

Bharatpur MP Bahadur Koli, MLA Anita Singh, SDM DC Meena, Col Hari Singh and Col Mukesh Sharma, president of Karauli District Sainik Welfare Board, attended the funeral.

In Alwar, Rajendra Singh was cremated in Maithna village.

In Jhunjhunu, district superintendent of police Manish Agarwal, Khetri SDM Sanjay Basu and other officials paid floral tributes to the martyr before they were cremated with full state honours.

District sainik welfare officer commander MA Rathore (retd.) and former MLA Ajaylal Gurjar were also present during the funeral.

Kamlesh Singhs brothers are also in the army. His sons, Rahul (20) and Ravikant (13), shouted slogans for India before lighting the pyre. Villagers said people in the village were always eager to serve the army.

Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje tweeted her tributes to the three brave men.A woman was killed and her sister injured when an 18-year-old man opened fire at them after she declined to marry him, police said Sunday.

Superintendent of police Chandra Prakash said Lovely Mishra alias Ilu, 18, who lived with her uncle in Ramnath Colony, was being pressured by Amit, a resident of her village Khera Jalalpur, to marry him.

The SP said Amit along with his brother, Sumit, and two sisters, arrived at Mishras house on Saturday and asked her to marry him.

When she refused, Amit shot Mishra dead, and also shot at her elder sister, Neeraj, when she tried to save her. Mishra died subsequently, he said.

A case was registered, the police official said, adding that the accused was absconding after the incident.We will never let democracy derail in Pakistan: CJP

ISLAMABAD: Vowing to protect democracy in country, Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Mian Saqib Nisar on Saturday rejected the accusation that judiciary was acting as part of a plan. He was addressing a meeting of the chairmen and presiding officers of all the administrative tribunals and special courts here at the Supreme Court. The meeting was held to review performance of judiciary in the country.



I am making a pledge and promise to you from this forum that Insha Allah we will never let democracy derail in Pakistan, the CJP said. Apparently in response to ousted prime minister Nawaz Sharifs recent accusations of judicial complicity in past coups, the chief justice said the doctrine of necessity had been buried.



The CJP said he will not be staying as CJP if democracy is ever derailed in the country. He said the judiciary is being accused of being a part of an anti-democracy campaign, but the judges must not come under any pressure. The judiciary is not part of any planning and we will not let anyone suffer from injustice, he said, adding that the judiciary was no any threat to democracy.



About some mistakes the judiciary made in the past, the chief justice said that in order to move forward, the institution will have to hold itself accountable as well. He urged the judges to regard their legal profession with passion instead of considering it a mere job. We are the highest paid public servants in this country, he said, adding, We are part of this nation, so we must deliver.



The CJP said the judiciary, being an important pillar of the state, must ensure that justice is served as quickly as possible, adding that judges must become part of the campaign to take the nation forward.



Defending his suo motu notices, he said he had never tried to exceed his authority, adding that the only reason behind taking a suo motu notice of certain issues was to ensure that the basic rights of the citizens are protected. He asked the judges to never let any emotion influence their verdicts. He said the judiciary was independent thus its verdicts should also be independent.



The CJP said although the judiciary was facing numerous challenges, everyone in the legal profession should do the best he can in the given circumstances.



Referring to a meeting he had with his Chinese counterpart, the CJP said the secret behind Chinas rapid progress is that the citizens work for their nation. He encouraged the judges to work towards building a better future for the coming generations. He said no one can stop a nation that has good leaders and a strong justice system from progressing. He lauded the tribunal court judges, saying that he values and respects them just as much as those in the mainstream.



The CJP said the constitution was the supreme document of any country, adding that parliament has the authority to make laws and courts job is to uphold the sanctity of the law.



He said judiciary was the most important pillar of the state, adding, If this pillar does not perform, then the state will face imbalances. He said trichotomy of power is the spirit of democracy.



The chief urged judges to join his campaign of justice and start delivering justice. We have to enforce the fundamental rights of the people, he said.



While addressing the accountability and anti-terrorism court (ATC) judges, the CJP said, There will be people who threaten the system and might claim that they will make your childrens lives difficult, but you have to bring these people to accountability. Perpetrators of white collar crime and people who threaten us need to be brought to accountability. He stressed upon all the judges to follow Article 4 of the constitution, which deals with right of individuals to be dealt with in accordance with law.A woman allegedly threw her five-year-old son from the 11th floor of a high-rise apartment before jumping to her death in Kalyanpur on the outskirts of Kanpur on Sunday, police said.

Senior superintendent of police, Kanpur, Akhilesh Kumar said the police were investigating the case.

The deceased were identified as Jaya Agarwal (30) and Utkarsh Agarwal.

Jayas husband Pawan Agarwal is a chartered accountant. He was in the lawn with his older son when his wife threw the child and then jumped off the top floor.

The family lives in Rania area of Kanpur and owned two flats in Divinity Homes apartment in Kalyanpur where they used to visit on weekends.

Jayas brother-in-law Atul Gupta claimed she had been suffering from depression and was undergoing treatment.

The CCTV footage showed she threw Utkarsh before jumping off, he said.A 27-year-old bone cancer survivor from Borivli finally received his insurance cover from a nationalised medical insurance company, two years after it rejected his insurance claim for a prosthetic replacement surgery and withheld the balance amount.

The insurance ombudsman in the city instructed the company in July 2017 to pay the balance of Rs1.22 lakh with interest to the claimant, Narendra Shetty. The last due of the amount was paid in January. HT has a copy of the forums observations and verdict.

In May 2005, Shetty was diagnosed with Ewings Sarcoma, a type of bone cancer, following which he got a prosthetic implant on his right thigh. A decade later, although he was completely cancer free, his implant wore out. In January 2016, he had a new titanium prosthesis implanted. The surgery and hospitalisation cost him Rs5,90,000. He claimed the amount of his insurance cover within a week of his surgery, but the insurance company rejected it stating that Ewings Sarcoma is a genetic disorder and genetic disorders are not payable.

Doctors have said that it is common for insurance companies to reject claims on inadmissable grounds. Dr Manish Agarwal, orthopaedic oncologist, PD Hinduja Hospital, who operated on Shetty, said, It looks like they have a standard response ready, to reject claims on the most illogical bases. Shetty wrote to the company, and attached the doctors letter which said the surgery was conducted because the old implant had worn out and not to treat his cancer. The letter also clarified that Ewings Sarcoma is not genetic.

After two months, the insurance officials agreed but paid only Rs1,50,000 and rejected the rest of the amount. Shetty then wrote to the chief managing director of the company. After the company kept rejecting the claim for over a year, he decided to approach the ombudsman.

In July 2017, the ombudsman forum heard both the parties and ruled in Shettys favour. It observed that Shetty was operated because his prosthesis had worn out, which had nothing to do with his cancer. After a point, it was not really about the money, but a matter of principle, Shetty said. If I hadnt fought now and needed a surgery again years later, they could have rejected the claim on the same grounds and I would not have been able to object it, he said.Ensuring the timely construction of rail foot overbridges (FOB) , the Indian Army and the Central Railway (CR) successfully launched the bridge at Currey Road and girder at Parel station respectively on Sunday.

To facilitate the construction of the FOBs, mega blocks of six to eight hours were observed on Sunday on the CR lines.

The Army plans to complete construction of the Currey Road FOB by the end of February, while the CR plans to complete the Parel side of the FOB by March 31.

Work on the FOB being built by the Army at Elphinstone Road station was also undertaken during the block.

The FOB is likely to be completed by the second week of February.

The girders for the foot overbridge were launched successfully at the Parel station, said, Sunil Udasi, chief public relation officer, CR.

The railways also completed other maintenance work, including maintaining of the over-head wires, signalling posts and track maintenance, during the block.

Commuters travelling towards south Mumbai faced severe inconvenience, as the local trains were terminated at Dadar station during the block.

We knew that a block will be operated, but did not expect all stations to be so over crowded. I boarded the train from Mulund station for Matunga, but was not able to deboard owing to the crowd. I had to finally get off at Dadar and walk. There was long queue for taxis and buses as well, said Sujata Yadav, a Thane resident

Meanwhile, railways had deployed 30 railway protection force (RPF) officials on each platform of Dadar station. Extra traffic policemen were also deployed in order to help commuters board BEST buses and taxis.

Subway between Jogeshwari and Andheri stations to be shut till Feb 6

To facilitate re-girdering work on fast lines of Western Railway, subway number 40 between Andheri and Jogeshwari stations will be shut for traffic until 8 am on February 6.

The machineries and equipments required for the re-girdering work will be placed on the subway, forcing authorities to keep it shut for the vehicular traffic. The subway was closed on February 2 . Vehicles have been advised to take alternative routes such as SV Road and Juhu.A 40-year-old attendant of a pay-and-park lot in south Mumbai was arrested by the Colaba police on Saturday for allegedly overcharging a share broker five times the actual price for parking his vehicle for three hours.

The complainant, Kalpesh Patil, 26, who is a resident of Bandra (East), arrived at Colabas Jehangir Art Gallery at 3pm on Saturday. He found a spot on Mandlik Road and parked his car at a pay-andpark service there.

When he returned at 5.30pm, the attendant, identified as Radhesham Maitri, gave him a receipt and demanded Rs300 from him. Patil then pointed to a Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation board, which stated that parking was to be charged at Rs20 per hour. An argument ensued between the two, and Maitri began abusing Patil.

Following the fight, Patil approached the Colaba police station and registered a case of cheating against Maitri.

The police said they arrested Maitri for overcharging Patil. He was later presented before court, where he was released on a cash bail of Rs1,000.

Vijay Dhopavkar, senior inspector at Colaba police station, said that the pay-and-park facility has been given on a contract basis to a Mahila Bachat Gat (womens small business group), who has sublet the facility to a private contractor.

We are now finding out who was running the pay-and-park facility, and whether they had told their attendants to overcharge or they were doing it on their own, said Dhopavkar.The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) busted an international gold smuggling racket and arrested three people who were trying to smuggle nearly 16 kilograms of gold, worth Rs4.52crore, from Dubai to India on an Air India flight.

Acting on a tip-off, the Mumbai unit of the DRI conducted searches in flight AI-984, and recovered 15.11 kilograms of gold underneath two seats and 800 grams from one of the three suspects.

The three passengers  Imran Tazneem, Fahad Sheikh and Dharmesh Soni  confessed they had been promised a monetary reward to leave the gold beneath the seats. It would be removed during the cleaning of the aircraft by a passenger or some staff, who are hand-in-glove with the racket members.

They are being questioned if they have smuggled gold before.The Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (IIT-B) has received flak from the student community over its recent decision to ban non-vegetarian food at a popular eatery, Civil Cafe, on the campus.

The institutes civil department issued a notice, which outlines a list of 15 dos and donts to the caterers of the cafe in the last week of January.

The institute released a statement saying that the decision was taken to avoid fire hazards at the cafe.

However, students have alleged that it is an attempt by the management to impose the food culture of a small section of people on the entire student body.

Non-vegetarian items are strictly banned and should not be served; lunch services are not permitted and the list of veg items on the menu will be reviewed by the food committee, reads the notice.

The notice also states that no cooking is allowed in the area allotted to the cafe as it is set-up in the academic section.

Civil Cafe is popular among students as it has an adjoining terrace.

Soumyo Mukherji, Dean of Student Affairs, said, Since cooking is not allowed in the cafe, food that is cooked in the morning is served by the caterers all day, which has led many students to complain about upset stomachs.

Apart from this cafe, non-veg food is sold throughout the campus, he said.

Besides, two out of the three faculty members who signed this notice are non-vegetarians, so theres no reason to believe there is any form of bias against non-vegetarian eaters, he added.

Students are planning to write a letter to the civil department as well as to the Dean of Student Affairs.

If this issue is not resolved soon, we are planning to start a signature campaign against the new rules, said a student.

The order comes less than a month after one of the institutes hostels asked students to use separate tables and plates for non-vegetarian and vegetarian food items at the hostel mess, after receiving complaints from some vegetarian students.The Gamdevi police are trying to trace the identity of a man who allegedly stole jewellery worth Rs73 lakh from a diamond merchants residence, in the period between February 28, 2017 and February 3, 2018.

According to the police, an unidentified man stole gold and diamond jewellery worth Rs73 lakh from Mehnaaz Jesanis house at Prithvi Apartments on Altamount Road.

When Jesani opened his locker on Saturday, he found the jewels missing.

Dyaneshwar Chavan, deputy commissioner of police (zone 2) said they registered a case of theft on Saturday and are investigating the matter,

This is the work of an insider or someone who has the duplicate key to Jesanis locker, said Chavan.

Chavan said the police are trying to find out who had access to the house keys.The state government is aiming to pocket maximum funds from the Centre for its development schemes, as its coffers are under the burden of debt. In its latest bid, the Maharashtra government has demanded Aurangabad to be added to the Centres National Heritage City Development and Augmentation Yojana (HRIDAY), for the development of 52 heritage monuments in the city. Currently, no city in Maharashtra has been selected by the Centre for the HRIDAY scheme.

In a recent meeting with Arun Jaitley, officials from the state government presented their demand before the Union finance minister. The Centre turned down the demand, saying that it cannot tweak its plans at this stage. However, the state administration hopes that the Centre will consider its request on Aurangabads inclusion to HRIDAY while planning the second set of heritage cities.

State finance minister Sudhir Mungantiwar said, Jaitley has expressed the Centres inability to include Aurangabad in HRIDAY. But we wont give up hope. Centre rarely makes changes to its schemes, once the initiatives are announced. But, we are hopeful of its inclusion in the second phase.

Aurangabad has dozens of monuments, which include UNESCO World Heritage site Ellora caves, Bibi Ka Maqbara and the Daulatabad Fort. The state had sought the Centres help in the maintenance and further development of these sites. The district administration has prepared a budget of Rs75 crore for the development of these monuments.

The Maharashtra government has been spending funds on the development of its cities from the state exchequer, without much help from the Centre. However, cities which make it to the Centres privileged list, receive better funding, which is essential for their holistic development. We have allocated Rs150 crore for the overall development of the city of Aurangbad. But if the city makes it to the HRIDAY scheme, it may get the benefits of better water supply, sanitation, drainage, waste management, approach road and tourist conveniences, Mungantiwar said.

The ministry of housing and urban affairs of the central government launched HRIDAY in January 2015 that focuses on the development of 12 Indian cities.The festive spirit was evident at Rampart Row on Sunday as the street came alive with a Koli parade, folk dance performances, handicraft stalls and revellers from across Mumbai and beyond, on Day 2 of the Hindustan Times Kala Ghoda Arts Festival.

Local culture and folk arts were what it was all about. Bahurupiyas, or impressionists from rural Gujarat and Rajasthan, plan to attend the fest daily, dressed up as different characters. On Sunday, they were wearing the costumes of a genie and that of Kachhi Ghodi  an Indian folk dance  performers .

We have youngsters and experienced street artistes performing here, said Varsha Karale, curator of the street section presented by Nerolac and powered by Valentine.

The bahurupiyas take two hours to put on their make-up and transform themselves daily. Today, I am asking this genie to grant my wish  that the festival is a success, she said.

A group of Kolis younger than 20 participated in the first-ever parade representing their community at the fest.We want people to know about our deity Ekvira Aai. Not a lot of people know about our culture and traditions. This festival is a good platform for us, said Sejal Mhaskar, a college student from Chembur who was part of the parade.

Considering that this festival only comes around once a year  and that there is no other time in the city when one can experience all forms of arts in one place  it becomes a must-visit over the weekend, said Keith Rodriguez, 30, a vlogger from Santacruz.

About 25 youngsters currently working as fellows with different departments of the Maharashtra government had set up a stall at the festival to promote tribal art.

Facilitated by Sahabhag, the state governments social responsibility cell, it featured Warli art and products made from bamboo, papier-mache and khadi by tribals from Jawhar, Dahanu and Chandrapur.Initiatives like these will help provide employment to the tribal community, said Priya Khan, officer on special duty to the CM.

It was these artefacts that captured the attention of the Bhuva family from Malad, who took a fancy to a deer head made of waste paper.Weve been visiting the Kala Ghoda festival for the past three years. We specifically look for traditional products made in villages, as we are unable to find them during the rest of the year. Last year, we found a stall selling torans made of discarded plastic bottles, said Anuj Bhuva, 38.

From handloom saris from Nagpur to cotton kurtis from Jaipur, products made by Navy officers wives, stalls selling wacky T-shirts and paintings from Mysore, creativity was on full display at the festival.Four men two of whom are vehicle lifters with a criminal backgroundand three police personnel were injured in a series of three encounters in Ghaziabad which took place late on Saturday night.

The shootouts took place within a span of one-and-a-half hours in Raj Nagar Extension (RNE), Vijay Nagar and near Wave City, NH-24, areas of the city.

In the first incident at Raj Nagar Extension, the police engaged with two armed robbers who had stolen a car from near river Hindon and fled towards Morta village. Having received information about the theft from car owner Nalin Gupta, the police cornered the two en route around 9pm.

The police and robbers exchanged fire in which constable Sachin Kumar was injured. The two robbers were also injured and arrested. Identified as Ravindra from Gautam Budh Nagar and Raman from Kasganj, the two were later rushed to the hospital.

Around 10pm in Vijay Nagar, a police checking team tried to stop two bike borne men who allegedly opened fire on the police team, injuring sub-inspector Mehkar Hussains hand. The police retaliated immediately and one of the two bike-borne assailants sustained a gunshot wound to his leg. The assailant, identified as Hashmat from Jarcha in Gautam Budh Nagar, was arrested and taken to a hospital, while his accomplice fled towards NH-24 on his bike.

Nearly half an hour later, a police team from the Masuri police station spotted a man on a bike near Wave City area, near NH-24, and asked him to stop. He allegedly opened fire at the police injuring police constable Shahid. The bike-borne assailant, identified as Imran, was shot and injured during retaliatory firing by the police. He was arrested and rushed to the hospital for treatment.

The police confirmed that the accused who was arrested from Masuri is the one who escaped from Vijay Nagar.

The two men at Raj Nagar Extension are vehicle lifters and have a criminal background. The criminal history of the other two, who were arrested from Vijay Nagar and Masuri, is being traced. Country made weapons and cartridges were recovered from the possession of all four arrested accused, superintendent of police (city) Akash Tomar said.

The three encounters in Ghaziabad come after a series of crackdown by UP police in different parts of the state. Similar encounters took place on February 2 at Gorakhpur, Muzaffarnagar, Bulandshahr, Hapur and Meerut.

From January 31 to February 1, within a period of 24 hours, the police engaged in 10 encounters and arrested 18 accused persons from different areas of Bualndshahr, Shamli, Kanpur, Saharanpur, Lucknow and Baghpat.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...Police have arrested a 23-year-old married man of Manakwal village in Ludhiana for raping two women within the last month. The accused, Balwinder Singh alias Kaku alias Manu, impersonated police officers and targeted women he spotted with male friends in the citys famous, Rakh Bagh Park, under the guise of moral policing.

Balwinder, who is unemployed, told his victims that senior police officers had deputed him in the park in civvies to keep a tab on unmarried couples creating nuisance.

He would ensure the man went away, but took the woman with him, claiming to be taking her to the police station to register a case. He would then take the woman to an isolated spot and rape her.

This sexual hunting would have continued unabated had his latest victim, a 25-year-old woman from Rakh Bagh, who had come to meet her boyfriend on Friday (February 2), not noted down the registration number of the Bullet motorcycle that Balwinder used to kidnap her. Here too, Balwinder had threatened the victims boyfriend, forcing him to leave.

This woman was raped at an isolated spot in Jassal village, around 7km from the Rakh Bagh Park.

The woman lodged a complaint at the Division Number 8 police station. Balwinder was booked under sections 376 (rape), 365 (kidnapping or abducting with intent to confine person) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code.

Additional deputy commissioner of police (ADCP, City 3) Gurpreet Kaur Purewal said, The victims presence of mind in noting down the registration number of the accuseds motorcycle helped us trace him.

Balwinder is also accused of kidnapping and raping a 27-year-old woman from the Rakh Bagh Park on December 30.

In her complaint, this woman had said, This man asked me and my male friend on why were we sitting together. He asked us our religion and told us he was a policeman and we could not sit there. He threatened to call our families and even lodge a case. My male friend was made to leave.

The accused then took her to a house in the Gill Chowk area, again on a Bullet motorcycle, and raped her, she alleged. It is possible that the accused could have raped more women. They might not have filed a complaint, ADCP Purewal added.A day after a premier hospital in neighbouring Mohali, the news for alleged improper disposal of bio-medical waste, the authorities failure to make arrangements for disposal of the waste it generates in routine  all 450 tonne a day  got the city more flak  this time from the Centre.

A mound of trouble 450 tonne: Waste city generates a day 10,000 tonne: Waste that is lying on the plant premises unprocessed; this arose due to the fact that the refuse was not processed due to a dispute between the MC and the private plant operator

Chandigarh is lagging in solid waste management with only 30% of the generation being processed, though it has achieved 100% door-to-door collection in all 26 wards, said Union minister of state for housing and urban affairs Hardeep Singh Puri.

He was in the city on Saturday to review the progress of urban development missions of the Central government in Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh. The city needs to take rapid steps improve waste processing. Authorities must ensure that 100% waste is processed, the minister added.

5m mound in Dadumajra dump

The lone waste processing plant in Dadumajra, that the Jaypee Group runs, has a mountain of waste that it is yet to process  10,000 tonne. This is lying on the plant premises. The new waste that the city generates relentlessly is thus being dumped opposite the plant without any processing. Over the past year or so, the MC has been sitting over the issue, even as the height of garbage dump has reached five metres, creating strong resentment among the residents. There is the risk of an epidemic, always.

Puri added he will also conduct a follow-up meeting in Delhi in three months.

When contacted, mayor Davesh Moudgil said he had already given directions to the firm to clear the waste on its premises at the earliest and start taking the citys waste in totality, daily.

I will again visit the premises in a weeks time. If the process is slow, we will take stern action since the company cant be allowed to play with citys cleanliness system, he said. He said the MC may even go ahead and cancel the contract if it does not mend its ways. I did not inaugurate the companys composting facility because I wanted them to first find a way to recycle the compost to be prepared from it, he said.

Mohali and Panchkula are also struggling to process the waste generated, adding to the problem in the region. Most of the waste is also dumped openly.I dislike the style of starting an article with a difficult word and its dictionary meaning, very often naming the dictionary, be it Oxford or Cambridge. But this time I am forced to begin thus, with the word misogyny, which is defined as an ingrained prejudice against women. Needless to say that the one who practises misogyny is a misogynist, which in simple lingo would be a sexist or a chauvinist.

Misogyny and misogynists of myriad kind are all around, but the most recent outburst of it was to be seen in the tale of two festivals: the Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF) and the Parallel Literature Festival (PLF) held in the Pink City with the dates coinciding with the last three days of the JLF. The parallel assault was on the mother of all litfests in the country, using terms such as touristy tamasha, return of the East India Company and more. The PLF had the respectable garb of the Progressive Writers Association with its old Communist Party ties.

What came as a bit of surprise was that invitees to JLF enjoying their travel expense and hospitality were also playing the role of keynote speakers at the PLF.

The bubble burst when on the eve of the PLF, well-known litterateur Ashok Vajpeyi, who has risen in esteem as leading the literature of dissent in present times, decided to pull out of the PLF, writing an open post on his Facebook page. Vajpeyi said he did not want to be associated with an event convened by Krishna Dev Kalpit, who in the past has been accused of making indecent and highly objectionable remarks against female writers. He added, In light of such a person convening the event, for me to be part of the PLF would represent supporting the indecent and objectionable behaviour of this person, which my conscience would not allow. Incidentally, among the women writers he picked for slander was the co-director of the JLF.

The post met with innumerable likes, including one by the much-cherished Hindi poet Manglesh Dabral. When contacted on phone, Dabral said. This person (Kalpit) has been making most ridiculous and sexually distorted remarks against many women writers openly on the Facebook and this must be condemned. So another of the keynote address faces opted out. Senior poet Kedarnath Singh was too ill to attend.

Closer home, Punjabis gentleman poet Surjit Patar, who spent many anxious days wondering where to go  main idhar jayoon ya udhar jayoon?  because one side was the comrade peer group and on the other side the Kanhaiya Lal Sethia Foundation Poetry Award fondly given to his contribution to Punjabi poetry. For some time he decided to skip the blushing pink city altogether, until the late poet Sethias son prevailed, How can we have the award ceremony without the larha (bridegroom)? So the safe way out for the reluctant bridegroom was to be absent from the day of the keynotes across the fence, and accept the modest award the other side, for Patar has received awards more prestigious ones and perhaps the only coveted award to come his way yet is the Jnanpith.

Meanwhile, woman writers are planning a discussion group to meet this practice of women-bashing, which is growing more so when women writers are very often at the helm of literary affairs, festivals and awards. Another male bastion breaking is intolerable to some who are mouthing muck. The other side, Kalpit, whose occupation on the Facebook is listed as self-employed , continues to run away with his kalpana, saying that if he is a woman-hater, then Vajpeyi is a woman-lover. Journalist Om Thanvi reports that he leered at a photograph of a woman writer when she too pulled out of the PLF.

Well, misogynists will be misogynists and boys will be boys; but girls are no longer willing to take it all with a sense of apology as of old. Time to change. Change for the better!

nirupamadutt@hindustantimes.comVery fishy at Sukhna

For past three weeks, the odour of dead fish has lingered at Sukhna lakes regulator-end. Mystified walkers have noted a few dead fish. A most unnatural spectacle was afforded with dying fish swimming feebly to the shores in the throes of death. House crows, Black kites, Pallass gull, Black-headed and Brown-headed gulls and Eurasian coots nibbled at floating carcasses though Great cormorants avoided the dead, preferring live fish shikar instead!

Walkers saw but a fraction of dead fish numbers as forests and wildlife department labourers scooped many hundreds of rotting fish and quietly buried them along the nallah flowing in from Saketri. The dead specimens hailed from the Perch group of fishes and were of size, 10-15 cm. Two coots died in the same period and were buried in similar, unofficial fashion.

The deaths required investigation not a pre-emptive file closure. Based on field observations, this writer informed Dr Kanwarjit Singh, joint director, animal husbandry and fisheries department, who got two samples of dead fish and a can of water lifted on Tuesday and dispatched to PUs zoology department.

On examination, I found very fine algae choking the gills of fish samples. The waters dissolved oxygen and biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) was suspected to be on the lower side as that part of the lake has stagnant water. Poisoning was ruled out as other aquatic species would have also been hit . The reason why only one kind of fish has been affected is because either Perch fish is in dominating numbers at the regulator-end or it is more susceptible to the prevailing aquatic conditions, Dr YK Rawal, assistant professor, zoology, told.

THE BEAUTIFUL DAMNED

The Burana mosque and maimed Peepul tree glow in the sunset. (Vikram Jit Singh)

Driving along the Shivalik foothills at sunset, one is awed by mustard blooms set aglow in soft light like a mela of diyas. Flanking the fields are a few peepul trees, standing mute witness to the ecological ravages and agrarian evolution of this fragile landscape. Undulating plains unraveling from the Shivaliks constitute the last steps down from the lofty temple of the Himalayas.

A tall, hunchback peepul tree, with upper limbs lopped off, stands sentinel to a petite, abandoned mosque. A brace of kilometres short of Mirzapur dam does stand this derelict memorial to the lost Muslim-dominated village of Burana. The mosque is a witness and storyteller of Partitions ravages and disruption. Burana has ceased to exist, barring the references in revenue records and its mention in Fridays renewed notification of the Punjab Land Preservation Act, 1900. Buranas Muslims left during the Partition and Indians reversing their lives from Pakistan were allocated these lands. Part of Buranas lands were re-sold to sons of the soil from neighbouring Kubheri village.

Kubheris clan of Ranjit Singh, who retired from the Artillerys 159 Medium Regiment, and his father, Tara Singh, who served in the 63rd Cavalry, bought 6.5 acre from Pakistan refugees, with mosque included, just after the Partition. The charming mosque, constructed in the 1930s with iconic Sirhind bricks, was many decades later to turn into a celebrated site for film shoots, including Waris Shah starring Gurdaas Maan and Juhi Chawla.

Muslim houses of Burana were demolished after Partition and undulating lands levelled with the advent of tubewells. The mosque survived  not because of sentiments for another religions place of worship  but because the structure sheltered our forefathers in the decades after Partition when it would rain for days on end and disrupt maize sowing. Winter rains would go on for 2-3 days and it would get cold. But the precipitation has waned and winters are much warmer. I lopped the Peepul because its shadow weakened crop growth and leaf fall inundated land, readied for wheat sowing, Ranjit Singh said.

Shikaris would bag a bountiful of partridges on the wing during a winter days excursion along the foothills in the 1960s and 1970s. But casting his memory back in time, Singh notes that the calls of partridges, like the pitter-patter of rains on Peepul leaves, have waned due to pesticides, earth mining and aggressive reclamation of scrub jungle.

The result: much before midnight, the countryside has rendered as hushed and helpless as the onlooking stars. Thus, the silence is obliged to sing a swan song, the loudest requiem for the unborn dead.

vjswild1@gmail.comPrime Minister Theresa May appeared to be rethinking the inclusion of Indian and non-EU students in the overall migration figures after at least two recent official reports concluded that the vast majority of international students return at the end of their studies.

In her previous role of home secretary, May had cracked down on bogus colleges and closed the post-study work visa as part of steps to bring down overall immigration, which has been a major promise of the Conservative party since the 2010 election.

Removing high fee-paying international students from migration data has been a long-standing demand by the higher education sector, since the post-2010 curbs have led to negative perceptions abroad and an over 50% drop in the number of Indian students.

Mays latest thinking on the issue was evident during her recent trip to China, when she said : It was important to look at what was happening with students in the UK when I was home secretary.

There was a lot of abuse taking place in colleges  something like 900 colleges can no longer bring in overseas students because all too often they were being brought in to work, rather than for education. Once you see that abuse out of the system, students coming in for the period of their education and then leaving actually wash through the numbers  they dont have a long-term impact on the numbers.

May did not budge from her view that Indian and non-EU students should continue to be counted in migration figures. But her rethink is seen as a welcome development in view of plans by opposition Labour and other parties to move an amendment to remove students from migration figures in the Brexit-related immigration bill to be introduced in the House of Commons (where the May government does not have a majority) later this year.

Several leading members of Mays government are also in favour of excluding students, since they not only leave after studies but also contribute over 25 billion pounds every year to the UK economy, besides contributing in other areas.

Three factors have led to the growing cross-party consensus that non-EU students should not be part of the net migration target: latest official reports reveal that contrary to previous claims, most international students return after studies; the need to project a global outlook post-Brexit; and the Theresa May governments dependence on outside support to remain in office.

A spokesperson for Universities UK, the umbrella organisation for all UK universities, said: Two official reports published last summer revealed that there is very high visa compliance by international students. The number of students overstaying their visas is a tiny fraction of previous (incorrect) claims.

Polling has shown that the British public does not see international students as long-term migrants, but as valuable, temporary visitors. There is now an opportunity to make sure that a reshaped, post-Brexit immigration system encourages qualified international students to choose the UK, it said.

If the UK wants to remain a top destination for international students and staff, it is more important than ever that we project a welcoming message to talented people from across the world.

Removing non-EU students from the migration target may not immediately bring back the post-study work visa that was popular among self-financing Indian students - and abolished in 2012 - but some efforts are already on to make it easier for them to find work here after studies.

A visa pilot introduced in July 2016 at four UK universities has now been extended to 23 more universities, allowing their non-EU students more time to find work after studies. It still remains difficult for non-EU students to secure employment and switch visa categories, but the extension is seen as a positive development.The British considered iconic leader Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose an enemy in the years before independence, and spared no efforts to ascertain and establish his alleged death in the plane crash on August 18, 1945 in Taipei, a new book on the controversial subject says.

The book, Laid to Rest: The Controversy over Subhas Chandra Boses Death, by London-based journalist Ashis Ray seeks to add to the conclusion that Bose indeed died in the crash, and cites several documents to back his claim, including some lesser-known reports. It is scheduled to be released in New Delhi on February 12.

According to Ray, the first British investigation into the crash was led T S Finney, a superintendent of police in colonial India, in 1945. His team of detectives visited Bangkok, Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City), and Taipei, producing four reports dated October 5, 7, 10 and 12. They categorically confirmed Bose had died as a result of an air tragedy, the book states.

On December 31, 1945, the British Combined Services Detailed Interrogation Centre in India submitted its report after interviewing Col Habibur Rehman, Netajis aide-de-camp who survived the crash. It said Rehman remained with Bose from the time of the crash until the death of Bose at about 2100 hours that night, Tokyo time.

Finally, the book says that Lt Col John Figgess, a British officer based in Tokyo, cross-examined Japanese officials connected with the plane crash, including the two survivors, Lt Col Shiro Nonogaki and Lt Col Tadeo Sakai, and Toyoshi Tsurita, the doctor who principally treated Bose at a Japanese military hospital before he passed away.

On July 25, 1946, Figgess reported: As a result of a series of interrogations of individuals it is confirmed as certain that SC Bose died in a Taihoku (Taipei) military hospital (Nanmon ward) sometime between 1900 hours and 2000 hours local time on August 18, 1945.

The three British investigations are among 11 official and unofficial inquests  four Indian, three Japanese and one Taiwanese  highlighted by the book. All reached the conclusion that Bose died as a result of a plane crash, the author says.

I have written the book for humanitarian reasons. Netajis widow Emilie Schenkl passed away in 1996 without closure on the matter of her husbands mortal remains. His only child Professor Anita Pfaff, now 75, is anxious to bring these from Tokyo to India for immersion in the Ganga, Ray adds.

Ray, in a chapter titled Enemy of the Raj, also outlines British hostility towards Bose from the time he was a student in Presidency College, Kolkata, to refusing his offer of food supplies from Myanmar (where he was then based) for famine-hit Bengal in 1943, in which millions had died.

It also cites the British governments approval of a plan to assassinate him through its intelligence unit in Turkey in 1941.

Boses death in the plane crash has been a subject of debate for decades, but his daughter believes that he perished and told Hindustan Times previously that all theories that he survived were asinine.India and Japan must maintain their diplomatic and financial support for Myanmar despite the Rohingya crisis, as sanctions would only impede the countrys path to democracy and disassembling of its China dependency, a top Japanese envoy has said.

Yohei Sasakawa, Japans special envoy for national reconciliation in Myanmar, said he has sought over the past five years to persuade the countrys 15 minority insurgencies to sign a national ceasefire agreement.

Eight of them have signed and two of them are expected to sign soon. I have not succeeded with the five ethnic groups who are under Chinas influence, he said.

China has begun to see how it can leverage the Rohingya issue to its advantage, as are Islamist groups in Bangladesh. These jeopardise the security of India and Japan, he warned.

The US sanctioned Myanmars military government and forced them closer to China, Sasakawa said. China is trying to re-establish that old relationship using the Rohingya crisis. Both the Myanmar civilian and military authorities are resisting.

With Washingtons stance uncertain, India and Japan need to keep the door open, Sasakawa said, while noting Myanmars geopolitical importance, especially in regard to the Indian Ocean.

India and Japan share the view that the 70-year-old civil war between Yangon and its minority insurgencies is a major reason the country is unable to resist China and an obstacle to its democratisation.

Soon after Sasakawa was appointed by Tokyo to help Myanmar, China announced a similar envoy position.

However, said author Bertil Lintner, a specialist in Myanmars insurgencies, The aim of the Chinese is not to solve Myanmars ethnic problems, but to take advantage of them for their own geostrategic reasons.

VR Seshadri, former Indian ambassador to Myanmar, agreed, saying the Chinese envoys purpose seemed to be to keep the pot boiling.

Lintner confirmed that the Kachins, the largest insurgency, have been told by Beijing to have nothing to do with Japans peace efforts.

Sasakawa said Japan provides millions of dollars to minorities who sign the ceasefire to build schools and hospitals so they can experience the fruits of peace immediately.

He is currently coordinating with Myanmars leader Aung San Suu Kyi and the army chief to find a time and place for two more ceasefire signatories.

I expect the ceremony to take place soon.

He has travelled to Myanmar over 50 times even while he remains chairman of the Nippon Foundation.

Former Indian high commissioner to Myanmar, Goutam Mukhopadyay, felt Yangon itself deserved most of the credit for getting the original eight groups to sign the truce pact. The Japanese can bring a lot of money which helps a lot and they have no historical baggage.

Seshadri said he saw the negotiations as part of a larger Japanese strategy regarding Myanmar, which included being the countrys largest aid provider and building special economic zones to attract investors.

These are in alignment with Indias interests, he said. Lintner warned that Chinas influence in Myanmar remains overwhelming and they continue to outmanoeuvre the Japanese and all other outsiders.The attorney general of the Maldives warned the countrys supreme court on Sunday that a move to unseat the president would be unconstitutional, amid a political crisis that has left the government in chaos since late last week.

Attorney General Mohamed Anil said at a news conference that he had heard rumors that the Supreme Court is going to order the impeachment of the president.

He said the president can be ousted only through a vote in parliament, and that police and security forces would not obey an impeachment order from an illegitimate set of people.

Mohammed Nasheed, the Indian Ocean archipelagos exiled former president and the main rival to current President Yameen Abdul Gayoom, responded angrily on Twitter, saying comments from Anil and other officials were tantamount to a coup.

Security services must uphold the constitution and serve the Maldivian people, Nasheed tweeted.

Under Maldivian law, a vote for impeachment removes a president from office.

The crisis, which has included repeated rounds of clashes between police and opposition protesters, began when the Supreme Court ruled that all politicians opposed to Yameen, including Nasheed, be released.

Nasheed has been living in exile in Britain since 2016 after being given asylum when he travelled there on medical leave from prison.

In addition to ordering the release of the political prisoners, the court also reinstated 12 lawmakers who had been ousted for switching allegiance to the opposition. When those lawmakers return, Yameens Progressive Party of the Maldives will lose its majority in the 85-member parliament, which can result in the legislative body functioning as a rival power to the president.

Speaking publicly for the first time since Thursdays Supreme Court order, Yameen said Saturday that he did not expect the court ruling, but that all relevant authorities of the state need to do a lot of work to see how to implement it.

We are working on making sure we can respect the Supreme Court order in a way that doesnt cause any difficulties to the people, he said at a rally in his support organized by his party

He also said he is ready to hold early presidential election if the opposition wants to test who is popular among the people.

Known for its luxury tourist resorts, the Maldives became a multiparty democracy 10 years ago after decades of autocratic rule by the current presidents half brother, Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

But the nation lost much of its democratic gains after Yameen was elected in 2013. He has maintained a tight grip on power, controlling institutions such as the judiciary and the police.

Yameen had been set to run for re-election this year virtually unopposed, with all of his opponents either jailed or exiled.

On Friday, Nasheed, whose conviction for abducting a judge was overturned by the Supreme Court order, said he would mount a fresh challenge for the presidency this year.

Nasheed was sentenced to 13 years in prison after he was convicted of the abduction charge under the Maldives anti-terror laws in a trial that was widely condemned by international rights groups.A man in Pakistan on Sunday allegedly gunned down three members of his family, including his wife, after they were adamant that his daughter marry a suitor he did not approve of.

Asif Shah shot dead his wife, his daughters Komal, 26, and Rida, 24, and injured his 15-year-old son in Punjab provinces Attock city, the Dawn reported.

The family had received a marriage proposal for Komal, but Asif did not want his elder daughter to get married to the suitor, district police officer Attock Ibadat Nisar said.

His family members, however, were adamant on her marriage with him. Because of this there were frequent arguments in the household, police said.

When the man saw his family members agree that Komal would marry her suitor against his wishes, he shot his wife and daughters dead.

The firing also left his son seriously injured.

After killing his wife and daughters, Asif fled the scene. Police have formed teams to arrest him.Israeli soldiers shot and killed a Palestinian teenager during an arrest raid in the village of Burqin in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian health officials said on Saturday.

A Reuters witness said about 200 Palestinians were throwing stones at Israeli military vehicles when a gunshot was heard, adding that a wounded person was then carried to a car.

Israels military said its forces had been searching in Burqin for suspects involved in the fatal drive-by shooting of an Israeli rabbi from a nearby settlement on January 9.

A military spokeswoman said rioting had broken out while troops were apprehending several suspects connected with that shooting and troops responded with non-fatal riot dispersal means against Palestinians throwing rocks and firebombs and then with live gunfire at the main instigators.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said the teenager killed on Saturday was 19 years old, while the hospital in Jenin where he was taken said he had been shot in the head.

The Israeli military spokeswoman said he had climbed onto a military vehicle and had opened its door before he was shot.

Israeli forces in the adjacent city of Jenin last month shot and killed a Palestinian gunman whom they had also suspected of involvement in the rabbis shooting.

Tensions in the region have risen since US President Donald Trump recognised Jerusalem as Israels capital in December. Since then at least 20 Palestinians and one Israeli have been killed.

Trumps reversal of decades of US policy enraged Palestinians, who want to create an independent state in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

Israel captured those territories in the 1967 Middle East War and annexed East Jerusalem in a move not recognised internationally. It says the entire city is its eternal, indivisible capital. It pulled out of Gaza in 2005.

US-led peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians broke down in 2014. A bid by Trumps administration to restart negotiations has shown no real signs of progress.A year after President Donald Trumps election, there has been a substantial increase in hate violence against South Asian, Muslim, Sikh, Hindu, Middle Eastern, and Arab communities in the US, a report said on Friday.

Between November 9, 2016 and November 7, 2017, the not- for-profit group South Asian Americans Living Together (SAALT) said in a report that it recorded 302 incidents of hate violence and xenophobic political rhetoric aimed at these communities.

This is an over 45% increase from its previous analysis in just a year, SAALT said, adding that this has not been seen since the year after the attacks of September 11, 2001.

This breaks down further into 213 incidents of hate violence and 89 instances of xenophobic political rhetoric  of which 248, or an astounding 82%, were motivated by anti-Muslim sentiment, it said.

One in five perpetrators of hate violence incidents referenced President Trump, a Trump policy, or a Trump campaign slogan, underlining a strong link between the presidents anti-Muslim agenda and hate violence post- election, the SAALT said.

Read more | Over 6,000 hate crimes recorded in US in 2016: FBI

Suman Raghunathan, executive director of SAALT alleged that through its policies and rhetoric, the Trump administrations incessant demonisation of Islam has created an environment of hate and fear-mongering for Muslims and those perceived to be Muslim.

Deadly shootings, torched mosques, vandalised homes and businesses, and young people harassed at school have animated an acutely violent post-election year. This administration must break eye contact with white supremacy if our nation is to live up to its highest ideals of religious freedom, Raghunathan said.

The report, among other things, underlines the way intersectionality informs hate - both the identities of victims targeted and the systems that criminalise communities.

Women who identify or are perceived as South Asian, Muslim, Sikh, Hindu, Middle Eastern, or Arab were the targets of attack in 28% of the 213 documented hate incidents post-election, it said.

Of the 213 incidents of hate violence documented, one in five perpetrators invoked Trumps name, his administrations policies, or his campaign slogans during attacks, it claims.

Women who wear hijab or head scarves are particularly vulnerable, accounting for 63% of the documented hate incidents targeting women.

Read more | US hate crimes rise for second year, Hindus and Sikhs among those targeted

The report discusses the intersection of immigration, racial profiling, surveillance, and criminal justice policies that compound against communities.

The growth of white supremacist hate groups and mounting attacks on our communities are proof positive that this administrations anti-Muslim agenda is not making America great, its making Americans afraid, Raghunathan said.A solemn group of Christians held their first prayer service in years on Saturday in the ravaged church of St. Mary in Syrias eastern Deir Ezzor city.

Stones, strips of wire, papers and remnants of rockets were strewn across the church floor, and bright sunlight streamed in from the blown-out windows.

Holding thin white candles under pockmarked archways, the congregation of less than two dozen worshippers relished their first service in nearly six years.

Fighting has gripped Deir Ezzor since rebels captured part of the city in 2012, and grew worse when the Islamic State jihadist group shot to prominence there in 2014.

Syrian troops recaptured the entire city in November and residents have slowly begun to trickle back.

Saturdays service -- which was also attended by Muslim clerics -- was led by the silver-haired Syriac Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, Ignatius Aphrem II.

He presided over the service from behind a small table draped in a white cloth, as the churchs altar had been badly damaged.

Its an indescribable feeling for us to pray in a nearly-destroyed church, which serves as a consolation for our hearts and a message of hope to the people of the city to come back and take part in building it anew, the patriarch said.

And Maurice Amseeh, a local bishop, called on Christians to return to their city.

The important thing now is for life to come back -- for Deir Ezzors residents and Christians to come back to it, he told worshippers.

An estimated 3,000 Christians lived in Deir Ezzor before Syrias uprising broke out in 2011.

Shadi Tuma, 31, decided to stay in his hometown despite years of clashes.

The hard times that Deir Ezzor went through pushed the families to leave, but there was a determination inside of me to stay in this city, he told AFP.

Deir Ezzor will always have coexistence. Christians will always have a presence here.

Much of the city remains practically unlivable, with buildings destroyed, irregular electricity service and no drinking water.

Still, forty-year-old Sally Qassar said Saturdays service had soothed her.

Prayer for me is like a new life, she told AFP.

It gave me the determination to come back to Deir Ezzor and put up with the poor provision of services, and participate in rebuilding it.A Russian warplane was shot down in Syria on Saturday and its pilot killed on the ground after he ejected from the plane, Russias defence ministry and Syrian rebels said.

A jihadist group linked to the former branch of al Qaeda in Syria claimed responsibility for shooting down the Russian SU-25 warplane with a shoulder launched anti-aircraft missile.

The group Tahrir al-Sham released a statement on social media quoting a commander in charge of its air defences as saying one of its fighters had hit the jet during an air raid over the city of Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib. Tahrir al-Sham includes the group formerly known as the Nusra Front, which served as al Qaedas Syrian branch.

Idlib province has seen heavy air strikes and fighting on the ground between government forces backed by Russia and Iran, and rebels who oppose President Bashar al-Assad.

Syrians opposed to Assad see Russia as an invading force they blame for the deaths of thousands of civilians since Moscow joined the war on the side of the Syrian government in 2015.

Although the Russian pilot escaped the crash, he was killed by rebels who had tried to capture him, a source said.

This work is the least we can do to revenge our people. Let the criminal invaders know that our skies are not a picnic and they will not pass through without paying a price God willing, senior Tahrir al-Sham commander Mahmoud Turkomani said in a statement released by the group.

Russias defence ministry also said that the aircraft was downed by a portable surface-to-air missile. The pilot reported that he had ejected by parachute, and he was later killed on the ground.

The pilot died in a fight with terrorists, it said.

Tass news agency quoted the Russian defence ministry as saying Moscow retaliated with a strike from an undisclosed high-precision weapon that killed more than 30 militants in an area of Idlib province where the plane was downed.

The Syrian opposition released footage on social media that purported to show the wreckage of the plane and the body of the pilot surrounded by fighters.

Rebels said the downed warplane had taken part in strikes that targeted civilian convoys fleeing along a major Syrian highway from villages that the army and foreign militias had overrun.

Syrias civil war, which is now entering its eighth year, has killed hundreds of thousands of people and driven more than 11 million from their homes.

A Russian plane was blamed for the death of seven civilians and scores of injuries after cars were targeted on the highway, according to a witness and two rebels sources.

Syrian soldiers and Iranian-backed militiamen were now around twelve kilometres from Saraqeb, advancing towards the Damascus-Aleppo highway under cover of heavy Russian air strikes, two opposition sources said.

At least five civilians were killed in Saraqeb city on Saturday, which residents blamed on Russian planes.

Syrians in rebel-held areas say they can distinguish between Russian warplanes and those of the Syrian air force, because the Russian planes fly at higher altitude.

Residents say thousands of people have been forced by air strikes to flee the area, moving further north to the safety of makeshift camps on the Syrian side of the Turkish border.

Russias defence ministry regularly says it targets only hardline Islamist militants in Syria.But just before that arrives, the South Central-bred artist has teamed up with T-Pain to deliver on his statement track "Paint Me In God." You'll notice that the cover art flosses a bold flip of the recent controversial H&M photo in which a young black model wore a hoodie that read "Coolest Monkey In The Jungle.

We were actually going to hold 'Paint Me In God' for a later release but when I saw the H&M ad, I felt it whether it was intentional or not, they were insensitive to the way people are pained in society," Mike explains. "So paint me in gold if youre going to paint me but Id rather you paint me in God."

Quotable Lyrics:

You been too busy tryna be wavy

Them niggas is not worried about your safety

If you keep shining on that corner, they gon' gun you down

And take that shit that you been flexing latelyWomen remain marginalised in fisheries in Trincomalee, Sri Lanka

by Raj Moorthy

February 04,2018 | Source: The Sunday Times

While there are discrepancies, hegemonies, racism and marginalisation of various castes of people around Sri Lanka, the fisheries industry in Trincomalee faces the situation on a much larger scale. There is lack of recognition and inclusion of women in fishing-related decision-making and fisheries management positions.



Last week the Centre for Poverty Analysis (CEPA) conducted its 57th open forum at the Sri Lanka Foundation in Colombo with the topic being, Even fish have an ethnicity, a Ph. D research study carried out by Gayathri Lokuge, a senior professional at CEPA in the coastal Trincomalee.



During the presentation Ms. Lokuge stated, globally studies have established the contribution of women to the fisheries sector with 19 per cent of people engaged in fishing being women. There is lack of recognition and inclusion of women in fisheries-related, decision-making and fisheries management positions, she added.



In Trincomalee there is a lack of women representation at the community level. Only 159 women are engaged in the inland fisheries sector in Trincomalee, she noted while stressing that there is no data disaggregated by sex for the marine sector.



Elaborating on the structural inequalities, she said, In the case of a Sinhala woman they are not involved in fishing in Trincomalee. Muslim women take fishing as a traditional job and continue for generations from the grandmother in the family. Tamil women only share the caught fish within their caste in Periyappadu in Trincomalee.



Stressing on the masculinities and marginalisations, she mentioned that there were Tamil and Muslim women earlier in the old wholesale fish market, according to a Muslim fisherman. There were 12 stalls for Tamils and three stalls for Muslims. After the war ended all of them left. Now all the fisheries women are Sinhalese and they dont allow Tamils to do business there, she said quoting fishermen as her source.



She pointed out that livelihoods are embedded in social, political and cultural worlds of men and women. A uni-dimensional understanding of identity is insufficient to explain marginalisations and social tensions. Men and women are marginalised at the intersection of different identity categories. There is need to understand power and positionality as a relational dimension. They are not passive victims of structural forces, noted Ms. Lokuge.



According to the government draft on fisheries and aquaculture it is clearly stated that the government will assist women in the fisheries community to set up micro business enterprises and promote equal opportunities for womens participation in the activities of the sector. She pointed out that the government needs to recognize womens diverse contribution to the fisheries sector in policy and practice, base policy on economic activities such as fishing with an understanding of the social and structural inequalities, not just men and women but other social categories. The government should also provide support to strengthen the economic activities of fisheries women within wider issues of stock depletion and climate related vulnerabilities, she noted.

 The Sunday Times Sri Lanka

Theme(s): Communities and Organisations.EU and Germany support new sustainable aquaculture programme in Myanmar

February 01,2018 | Source: FIS

Myanmar's Department of Fisheries of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation hosted the official launch of the Myanmar Sustainable Aquaculture Programme (MYSAP) in Naypyidaw.



The initiative will be developed over five years, with financial support from the European Union (EU) and the German government of EUR 22.25 million, reported Mizzima News.



The programs purpose is to support the sustainable development of aquaculture in Myanmar over the course of five years. The programme also aims to help improving nutrition standards and food security, and to create livelihoods.



Cyclone Nargis in 2008 and a lack of preservation of fishery resources in Myanmar have led to a decline in aquaculture production. Therefore, the Department of Fisheries is taking action, said U Khin Maung Maw, Director General of the Department of Fisheries.



On his part, Kristian Schmidt, Ambassador of the European Union, said: "MYSAP will benefit children, nutrition, and many other Sustainable Development Goals, jobs, investments, trade, the environment and government capacity."



With the programs lauch, a consultation and drafting process of the National Aquaculture Development Plan (NADP) was started, a document that establishes objectives with programmes, activities, resources and a schedule to achieve them.



The Department of Fisheries is facilitating the consultation process to draft an NADP that is in line with the 12-point national economic policy announced in 2016. Our goals are food security, increased export and the expansion of rural employment opportunities, granting fish farmers better access to credit, increasing private investment and competition in the fish sector, the Director General explained.



The first NADP meeting was carried out with government agencies and stakeholders from civil society and the private sector.

 1995 - 2018 Fish Info & Services Co.Ltd

Theme(s): Fisheries Development and Aquaculture.The mathematical (and other) thoughts of a (now retired) math teacher,Russian seafood delegation to take part in key global seafood events in 2018

by Ivan Stupachenko

February 01,2018 | Source: SeafoodSource

Russias Agency for Fisheries has announced the list of industry events its representatives will attend in 2018, and has named Seafood Expo Global and its own International Seafood Forum as its top two priorities.



The International Seafood Forum will be held in St. Petersburg, Russia, 13-15 September 2018. The event was set up by the agency in 2017 to create a platform for presenting Russian fisheries interests and needs to the international seafood community and to find partners for cooperation at a governmental level. Last years event was attended by more than 1,600 participants from 20 countries.



In 2018, the forum will see a wider membership of regulators, experts, and global companies, the agency announced. More than 40 percent of its exhibition space had already been booked by more than 300 companies from around 50 countries. DSI, Carsoe, Flottweg, Baader, Rolls-Royce, Marel, Amof Fjell and Optimar are among those confirmed to attend the show.



In 2017, Russia pushed to increase its presence at Seafood Expo Global, held annually in Brussels, Belgium. This year, Russian companies will take part in the forum for the third consecutive year to reach out to international clients and seek out informed perspectives on technologies, which the national seafood industry lacks, according to the agency.



In a press release, the agency said it considers Seafood Expo Global, to be held in Brussels, Belgium, from 24 to 26 April 2018, a very important event that brings together leaders from seafood industry from across the world to discuss common problems and exchange experience.



This is a superb marketing tool for Russian companies to showcase its production at a minimal cost through participation in the Russian national stand, with the area of the stand 2017 being enlarged six-fold in comparison to 2016, the agency said.



Other events on the agencys list include the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum from 24 to 26 May, where a special industry exposition will be organized; China Fisheries and Seafood Expo 2018 in Qindgao, China, from 7 to 9 November; and the East Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Russia, on 6 and 7 September.

 2018 Diversified Communications

Theme(s): Others.Last Monday in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the 30th African Union (AU) Summit ended with a call for strengthening the continents resolve and capacity in the fight against corruption and poverty as part of actions towards the early attainment of the unions long-term vision dubbed: Agenda 2063.



Other highlights of the summit included the election of Rwandan President, His Excellency Paul Kagame, as the new Chairman of the union, operation of the Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA) policy to enable the free movement of persons and goods, implementation of the Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM), as well as the launch of a levy on eligible imports policy and many more.



New leader





The election of President Kagame was refreshing, as he has proven to be a capable leader in the transformation of his own country Rwanda from ashes to beauty. He is the leader of the African country of eight million people that was plunged into a chaos of slaughter which left over one million dead.



To his credit, President Kagame has, since he took over after the genocide in his country, provided the leadership that has made it possible for widows, orphans, killers and survivors to find the heart to forgive, recover and rebuild the amazing Rwanda we see today.



Given what he has done with and for his country, I have no doubt in my mind that President Kagame has what it takes to mobilise the AU for the attainment of Agenda 2063 which has been clearly envisioned and spelt out.



He has experience in managing and ending conflicts, poverty, corruption and above all putting in place measures for socio-economic transformation.



His country is the only one in the world where there are more women in the legislature than men.



He must be a master craftsman at gender mainstreaming and re-engineering for development to have achieved such a record in favour of women in the National Assembly.



But that is not all - his leadership has so far delivered, sustainable progress in economic growth, health, education, technology, agriculture, manufacturing, infrastructure, enterprise, etc.



My only concern with Rwanda during my last visit in December 2015 was the feeling that I was in a Police State, from the airport to the hotel and everywhere I went till my departure. But I was assured the presence of armed policemen everywhere was part of the security system required for rebuilding the nation without any disruptions. It will soon be over, I was assured by a Rwandan management academic that I shared my concern with.



New problems



Few hours after the refreshing developments at the AU Summit, opposition National Super Alliance (NASA) Leader, Raila Odinga, presented a hitherto unknown problem in the continents political governance history. Odinga had taken an unofficial oath as the Peoples President of Kenya, compelling incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta to jet back into the country from his five-day official visit to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where he participated in the AU Summit that saw the election of President Kagame as the new Chairman.



President Kenyatta is reported to have landed at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in style and to an unusual reception that asserted his authority as the Head of State and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of Kenya. The message was unequivocal  I am the elected President and I am in charge!



No one knows how the new problem in Kenya will pan out. What I am certain of is that Odingas move is a dangerous one that must not be allowed to stand as precedent on a continent that is already late in the race to development. It must, however, be managed with absolute tact and care so as to avoid destabilising Kenya which is critical for the anticipated peace and development in the entire horn of Africa region.



Capable leadership



New as the Kenyan challenge may be, I am hopeful that appropriate solutions will be found. Kenyans have seen conflict before and they know where this contention can lead their lovely country if it is allowed to get out of hand.



As an incoming Chair of the AU, President Kagame showed a deep appreciation of the African challenge, as well as what it would take to overcome. In his address at the summit, he said: Africas defining challenge is to create a pathway to prosperity for our people; especially the young people, adding that: Elsewhere, this has been achieved through industrialisation. But the growth trajectory that transformed Asia is not necessarily any longer a viable option for Africa, simply because we waited too long. Technology has evolved so rapidly in recent years, that Africas window to follow that strategy is narrowing much more rapidly than previously understood. We are running out of time, and we must act now to save Africa from permanent deprivation.



Well, when you hear such forward-looking statements from a leader with a sense of urgency, it can only boost your confidence in his or her ability to deliver to expectation. It is my hope and prayer that Chairman Kagame will remain focused and dynamic in his leadership of the continent as the challenges keep changing. Yesterdays solutions will not necessarily solve todays problems. Dynamism is required!

Source: Graphic.com









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.

Featured VideoAsk The Doctor: Mu Is A COVID 'Variant of Interest', Its Virulence Is Yet To Be DeterminedMark Zuckerberg has a lot on his plate.

The 33-year-old runs Facebook, the social-media giant with a market cap of $547 billion.

This year Facebook snagged the top spot in Glassdoor's annual rankings of the most desirable places to work. Reviewers on the career site specifically said Zuckerberg himself was a big draw to the company.

While the tech CEO dedicates a ton of time to the company, he still makes the time to exercise, travel extensively, and spend time with his family.

He stays productive and balanced by eliminating nonessential choices from his life and setting ambitious goals for himself.

Here's a look at a typical day for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg:

After waking up at 8 a.m., the Facebook founder immediately checks Facebook, Facebook Messenger, and WhatsApp on his phone, he told Jerry Seinfeld in a Facebook Live Q&A. (Telegraph)

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg delivers the keynote address at Facebook's F8 Developer Conference on April 18, 2017 (Getty Images)

Once he's gotten his morning updates, it's time to work out. Zuckerberg exercises about three times a week. (BI)

Sometimes he brings his dog, Beast, along. The tech CEO says running with his pet has the "added bonus of being hilarious" because it's "basically like seeing a mop run." Beast is a Hungarian sheepdog with an impressive coat. (Time)

Once he's gotten his exercise in, Zuckerberg's not too picky about what he eats for breakfast. He'll usually just dig into whatever he's feeling that day. He doesn't like to waste time on small decisions. (Daily Mail)

That's also why he wears the same thing almost every day. Zuckerberg's "work uniform" consists of jeans, sneakers, and a grey T-shirt. When asked about his wardrobe in 2014, he told an audience: "I really want to clear my life to make it so that I have to make as few decisions as possible about anything except how to best serve this community." (BI)

Facebook Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg speaks on stage during the annual Facebook F8 developers conference in San Jose, California, U.S., April 18, 2017 (Reuters)

His Palo Alto home is tricked out with a "custom-made artificially intelligent assistant," according to CNBC.

Zuckerberg puts in 50 to 60 hours a week at Facebook, but he thinks about the social-media platform constantly. "I spend most of my time thinking about how to connect the world and serve our community better, but a lot of that time isn't in our office or meeting with people or doing what you'd call real work," he told CNN.

Mark Zuckerbergs signature look Show all 8 1 /8 Mark Zuckerbergs signature look Mark Zuckerbergs signature look Mark Zuckerberg told a Q&A audience he doesn't like spending on "frivolous" decision and that includes his attire Mark Zuckerbergs signature look The Facebook founder is often seen wearing Adidas flip flops, a gray T-shirt and a hoodie Getty Images Mark Zuckerbergs signature look That's Mark Zuckerberg wearing his signature gray shirt (again) Getty Images Mark Zuckerbergs signature look ...And again Mark Zuckerbergs signature look Zuckerberg showed up for Facebook's IPO wearing his favourite hoodie REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton Mark Zuckerbergs signature look Zuckerberg pictured with his wife, Priscilla, wearing THAT hoodie EPA Mark Zuckerbergs signature look Zuckerberg speaking at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco (in THAT hoodie again) Mark Zuckerbergs signature look Mark Zuckerberg (centre) at the Facebook headquarters as he remotely rings the bell to open the Nasdaq Getty Images

The Verge reported that Zuckerberg has some help managing his own social-media channels. A squad of 12 employees helps him eliminate inappropriate comments and post updates on his Facebook page.

When he's not working, Zuckerberg spends some time expanding his mind. He's learning Mandarin Chinese. He also tries to tackle as many books as he can  in 2015, he challenged himself to read a new book every two weeks.

He's met all sort of big names, including world leaders such as Pope Francis, and former President Barack Obama.

(Reuters // Jim Young ) (Reuters)

Whether he's travelling or working, Zuckerberg spends time with his wife, Priscilla Chan, and his daughters, Max and August. Every night before going to bed, the Facebook CEO tucks his children in with a traditional Jewish prayer, the "Mi Shebeirach."

Read more:

 This chart is easy to interpret: It says we're screwed

 How Uber became the world's most valuable startup

 These 4 things could trigger the next crisis in Europe

Read the original article on Business Insider UK.  2016. Follow Business Insider UK on Twitter.Vladimir Putin has renamed a regiment of the Russian air force after the Estonian capital, in a move likely to be seen as provocative by leaders of the former Soviet Baltic state.

A presidential order announced the 23rd Fighter Aviation Regiment would now be known as the Tallinn Regiment.

The decree said the units new name was intended to raise spirit of military obligation and preserve holy historical military traditions.

Recommended US Special Forces deployed at Russian border to defend Baltic states

Estonia was under Soviet rule for nearly 50 years after being occupied during World War II. Russias annexation of Crimea from Ukraine heightened tensions in the Baltic states, and the Kremlin has been accused of attempting to destabilise the region.

Derek Averre, a senior academic who specialises in Russian foreign policy at the University of Birmingham, said Moscows renaming of the regiment was likely meant to be provocative.

Russia is concerned that its influence is being further marginalised in the Baltic states and the dual NATO-EU enlargement has been pushed further eastwards, he told The Independent.

He said renaming an air force regiment after Tallinn, a former strategic outpost of the Soviet Union, was indicative of Moscows use of political narratives to exert influence on former Soviet estates.

The Russians like to make a point and as part of that the strategic narratives of Soviet Russian glories in the past, said Dr Averre, Reader in Russian Foreign and Security Policy at the university.

He added: In the absence of actually being able to exercise full control over the sovereignty it tends to take the form of cyber-mischief, trying to destabilise a bit through strategic narratives, trying to make people in these countries see things the Russian way.

"Thats been a feature over the last three or four years of Russian diplomatic intelligence operations.

Part of the Russian narratives which have emerged since then are very much harking back to Russias past. [They include] a lot of talk of Russia being the saviour of Ukraine and Eastern Europe, casting off the yolk of Nazism during the Second World War and really going back to past historical glories, during the Soviet period particularly.

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

Upnorth, an English-language news website covering the Baltic region, described the regiments renaming as a naked attempt at intimidation by Mr Putin.

The Soviet Union dropped thousands of bombs on Tallinn in repeated air raids during World War II. Hundreds of people, mostly civilians, were killed.

Last year Russia sent 2,500 troops to an airborne military drill in the Pskov region, which borders Estonia, raising anxieties about possible conflict in the region.

The UK has stationed troops in Estonia as part of a Nato mission to deter Russian aggression.Gerry Adams has backed outstanding Jeremy Corbyn to become prime minister at the next general election.

The Sinn Fein president steps down next weekend after 50 years in politics when a special party conference, or ard fheis, ratifies his successor, Mary Lou McDonald.

The Labour leader has said he wanted the Troubles bombings and shootings to stop, but refused to single out the IRA for condemnation.

Mr Adams told BBC Ones The Andrew Marr show: I would like to see Jeremy in that position (PM) for the benefit of people in Britain, leaving Ireland out of it.

I think Jeremy is an outstanding politician and I hope my endorsement of him is not used against him in the time ahead.

He and (former London Mayor) Ken Livingstone and others kept faith and they were the people who said, when others said no, talk.

They were the people who were open to conversation about how to deal with conflict and how to get conflict resolution processes.

aHang on! Youare not in the driveras seat for another weeka, says I to Mary Lou. pic.twitter.com/A3A0m7v7C2  Gerry Adams (@GerryAdamsSF) February 1, 2018

Mr Corbyn and shadow chancellor John McDonnell have faced scrutiny over their association with Irish republicans.

Before the IRA ceasefire, they controversially met Sinn Fein a number of times in Westminster during the 1990s.

During a wide-ranging interview, Mr Adams reiterated his position that Northern Ireland should enjoy special status within the EU after Brexit.

He said former prime minister Tony Blair enjoyed an opportunity on a plate in his handling of the Northern Ireland peace process, which produced the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and largely ended decades of violence.

Mr Adams, who represents the border county of Louth in the Irish Dail parliament, said he told Mr Blair not to invade Iraq in 2003.

We said to him, look at the Irish experience, dont go in there.

He said nobody could stand over the killing of children or civilians during the IRAs campaign, but it was different if it was soldiers versus soldiers.

The outgoing political leader, who for decades defended republican violence but was instrumental in its cessation, reflected on the awfulness and horror of war.

He said: I would wish that no one had been killed or injured in the course of the conflict.

We were able to come to an alternative. When you come forward with an alternative sensible people will embrace that alternative.Richard and Sheila Galvin grow organic oats, oil seed rape and apples on their farm near Portlaw and have now diversified into apple cider production. Photo: Garrett Fitzgerald

For over 15 years bruised and damaged apples from the organic orchard at Clashganny Farm near Portlaw were seen as little more than a nuisance and offloaded to local farmers as feedstuff for their cattle.

But last year the farm's owners, Sheila and Richard Galvin, spotted a gap in the market. They discovered they could use the discarded apples to produce their own organic apple cider vinegar which is gaining in popularity as a health and nutritional supplement.

They are now in full production stage and an estimated 20,000 bottles of Clashganny Farm Organic Apple Cider Vinegar are expected to be on the shelves of dozens of supermarkets and health food shops around Ireland in 2018.

"We supply wholesale to a good number of businesses and the quality of the apples is very important to us," says Richard.

"We usually sold off the bruised apples to local farmers for cattle, but felt there must be another way of putting them to good use by juicing them down.

"We did some research and found there was a lot of organic apple juice out there, but not so much organic cider vinegar, especially one that is produced in Ireland.

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"People have become very health conscious and want organic products. Apple cider vinegar is getting more and more popular every day.

"The fact that nothing is added to it, giving it the cloudy appearance known as the 'mother', naturally makes it more attractive to buyers."

Food Academy

When the Portlaw-based couple began the challenge of getting the business off the ground last spring, they were thrilled to be accepted into the Food Academy Programme in nearby Waterford City.

Run by SuperValu and launched in 2014, the Academy works with small businesses throughout their journey, from start-up to getting their products on the shelves.

Each candidate must first put forward their proposal in a 'Dragon's Den' type interview.

There are currently more than 300 Food Academy small producers in SuperValu stores.

"Together with the Waterford Enterprise Board, the Food Academy has been great and they have given us so much support, from advice on labelling to marketing the product."

Richard explains that the process of producing the organic apple cider vinegar takes approximately four months.

There are 20,000 trees of the Jonagold variety at Clashganny Farm and harvesting begins in October, with the process ongoing as apples ripen to the required standard.

The apples which are sold wholesale are quickly distributed, with those suitable for the cider vinegar put into bins and sent to the processing unit near Cahir in Co Tipperary.

These apples are then left to ferment naturally for approximately four months.

The liquids produced are unfiltered and typically take on a brownish, cloudy appearance.

This process leaves behind the 'mother of apple', a cobweb-like substance found at the bottom of all bottles of organic apple cider vinegar.

It is thought that the mother of apple is rich in enzymes, proteins and pectin. Because of this, organic varieties are considered the gold standard when used to treat various health conditions.

So far the Galvins have seen their product accepted by Super Valu stores throughout Munster and Leinster, with a number of stores in Dublin now recently coming on board.

"Each week we visit new places to do tastings and meet potential new customers," says Richard. "There is so much more that can be done with the product besides just drinking it and at tastings we share recipes and new ideas."

From sugar beet and sucklers to organic tillage

When Richard Galvin took over the family farm at Clashganny in 1996 he was at a crossroads.

Demand for sugar beet was drying up and a suckler herd would not provide enough income for him, his wife and three young children.

It was then he first decided to go down the route of organic tillage farming, later branching out to organic apples.

In order to comply with strict regulations, it would take two years to convert to organic farming, during which the land would be cleaned of any herbicides or fertilisers.

Once the two years were up he began growing oats on some 80 acres for nearby Flahavans.

"I believe I was one of the first to supply organic oats to them," he says.

Richard has also diversified into oilseed rape, and a further 10 acres are harvested each spring for supply to Second Nature Oils in Kilkenny.

"The rape is grown in spring as otherwise the winter variety would flower the same time as the apples ripen and we would run into problems with bees pollinating the oilseed rape instead," says Richard.

Honey bees are important pollinators in orchards and on occasion farmers are known to introduce bee hives to assist the process.

The first apple trees were set at Clashganny Farm in 2001.

From small beginnings the orchard has now grown to spread out over 20 acres, with some 20,000 trees producing approximately 60,000kg of apples each year.

Accolade

Apples are supplied wholesale to such businesses as Begleys and Beechlawn and Castleruddery organic farms, with the surplus going for the production of cider vinegar.

In 2011 Clashganny Farm won the Best Organic Fruit and Vegetable accolade for their organic apples during the National Organic Awards, presented by Bord Bia.

"With apple trees you can have a good year and then a bad year if there is disease, but to date we have been very lucky all-round," says Richard.Farmers provided most of the heartening moments in last week's RTE documentary How Ireland Eats, a fascinating but ultimately chilling snapshot of our current relationship with food, from the stance of a primary producer and a parent of young children.

The standing of farmers has been fading in the eyes of the consumer, but this programme showed what is still at the heart of most of us - passion for what we do and love for our stock.

We first saw Conor O'Malley out at the crack of dawn checking if a field of potatoes were warm enough to lift.

Then Peter Whelan got emotional talking about slaughtering his obviously well-cared-for pigs, while his comment about how different they would look in a few days, when they've "had a haircut and are in two halves", just added to his authenticity.

We also saw army sergeant Stevie Lafferty prepare a fresh (and probably healthy, nutritious and tasty) meal for 150 cadets on a diesel oven in a field in Cork. We even saw them baking brown soda bread, as his "mammy made".

But after that, I felt myself repeatedly saying a phrase my own mother used to use, "God be with the days when ."

My jaw first dropped when the chef in a 4-star hotel with, presumably, access to the best of equipment, told us that vegetables for a wedding had been prepared the day before. They were "blast chilled down" then "regenerated" for 12-15 minutes in an oven.

Is this replicated at big events in hotels across the country?

Then there was the story told by Ennis fast-food delivery guy, Mike, of a man opening his front door to receive his takeaway dressed only in his jocks. What a long way from, "dressing for dinner".

Mike also told us that they couldn't understand their spike in business on the first Tuesday of the month, until they realised it was Children's Allowance day. There was a time when this money was used to buy shoes.

We also heard that there are people who are eating the same takeaway five to six days a week.

To take the old maxim, 'you are what you eat', no wonder we, as a nation, are lumbering into an epidemic of not just obesity and diabetes, but also autoimmune diseases.

I am not immune (sorry, terrible pun) to eating a bag of chips myself and recently visited Supermacs in the Obama Plaza for that very purpose.

There was also a whole palaver about revamping the Freshways chicken stuffing sandwich.

This involved changing the stuffing and the bread. I would be interested to know where the chicken was from.

A few of the facts and figures in the programme jumped out at me.

One is that there are 600 pickers in Tesco's mega warehouse (the size of five Croke Parks) while there are just six traders left in Dublin's Victorian fruit and veg market.

This storyline was the scariest from a farmer's point of view.

Ciaran Butler is a trader who has worked at the market for 30 years. The biggest change he has witnessed is the move away from seasonal food to buying from the supermarket, with the top five now accounting for 90pc of the markets, who are only interested in working with large-scale producers.

In today's food purchase and consumption regimes, convenience reigns supreme.

Now there are plans to redevelop the market, which Ciaran believes will mean, "end of story". He was not being maudlin, just honest. It is not being swept away by a tsunami, rather declining day by day, right in front of our eyes, slowly into oblivion.

More of that kind of programming, please, RTE.Pictured at the announcement that AMI has donated 30,000 of IT equipment to YSI are: (L-R) Rachel Collier, co-founder and CEO, YSI; Philip McMichael, managing director, AMI; and Faye Thomas, business manager, AMI.

AMI, which specialises in secure IT retirement services, is to donate IT equipment worth in excess of 30,000 to the Young Social Innovators (YSI).

In the role, AMI will supply IT hardware which will be used to facilitate student-led projects aimed at improving communities.

Since its founding in 2001, more than 130,000 students have engaged in YSI programmes, with 7,000 young people taking part in 2016/17 alone.

Over the years young innovators have led more than 5,000 innovative projects designed to address social challenges important to them.

In a statement AMI said it was eager to support YSI in fulfilling its goals by reaching more young people across the country and enriching their social innovation learning experience.

AMI, which has been used by one in four of Irelands 200 largest IT user organisations, works to reuse IT equipment where possible, and by doing so will offer an environmentally friendly solution to YSIs IT hardware needs.

The donated hardware has been installed in YSIs premises and will enable students to work on-site and in collaboration with the senior YSI team to hone their innovative solutions.

"YSIs mission is to develop lifelong skills in young people and empower them to have a real impact in society," Rachel Collier, co-founder and chief executive of Young Social Innovators, said.

"Every year we see particularly passionate projects on conservation and the protection of our environment. AMIs work in re-using and extending the life of IT equipment, coupled with their commitment to a zero landfill policy and environmentally responsible disposal, make them a perfect partner for us."A&L Goodbody has become Ireland's largest law firm by number of practising solicitors, according to new figures compiled by the Law Society of Ireland.

Tied in first place with Arthur Cox last year, A&L is now 19 practising solicitors ahead of Arthur Cox in second, with 293 in total.

Matheson is in third place with 268, while McCann Fitzgerald is fourth with 247.

Overall, the number of practising certs issued cumulatively by the Law Society grew 3.5pc - to 10,461, up from 10,098 at the same time last year.

The percentage growth at the top 20 firms lagged slightly behind the overall growth figure at 3.4pc. The top 20 firms make around 24pc of the total number of practising certs issued.

"There is some evidence in the statistics that, in 2017, the firms towards the top and bottom ends of the size ranking were tending to expand while the firms in the middle were not," Law Society director general Ken Murphy writes in the new edition of the Law Society Gazette, published this coming week.

The society has also started compiling data on the number of certificates issued to British firms on foot of the Brexit vote.

Freshfields Buckhaus Deringer has by far and away the largest number with 86, but Murphy writes that the firm has made it clear that it has no intention of establishing itself here.

Pinsent Masons, which is in third place with 16, has recently opened a Dublin office however.

Murphy wrote in the last issue of the Gazette that since the vote, it had become clear that there was no 'invasion' of Ireland by British law firms.

"While very large numbers of England and Wales solicitors had indeed taken out a second qualification by applying to join the roll of solicitors in Ireland, they were not doing this for the purpose of establishing practices here," he said.

Murphy said that instead the primary motivation for many was to "maximise their status as EU law practitioners when, in the future, Britain will no longer be a member state," adding the Law Society had held meetings with a large number of these solicitors.Peter Conlon said in 2015 that there was potential to bring Ammado to be a global internet company. Photo: Fergal Phillips/The Sunday Times

A sister company of the Ammado entity placed into liquidation last week is the subject of intense scrutiny, with the charity fundraising group's boss Peter Conlon understood to be in custody in Switzerland.

Conlon told prospective investors that he had transferred all Ammado intellectual property to a company called Ammado Technology Ltd, based at the same address as the company that is in liquidation.

That's according to an affidavit from liquidator Myles Kirby that was opened in the High Court last week.

Kirby was appointed liquidator of Pembroke Dynamic Internet Services - an Ammado entity - on January 22, and told the court that funds due to charities had been misappropriated.

On Tuesday Rossa Fanning SC, counsel for the liquidator, told the court that it appeared Conlon was "guilty of very serious misconduct".

The affidavit says that in December 2017 Conlon told prospective investors that Ammado Technology Ltd would generate all the revenue from the Ammado platform and products going forward.

Conlon told them that Ammado Technology was a shelf company that had no liabilities and had not previously traded, Kirby's affidavit says, adding that Ammado Technology had sought to open bank accounts in a number of foreign countries. Ammado Technology is still in existence as Kirby has only been appointed liquidator of Pembroke Dynamic International Services.

Ireland's corporate watchdog, the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement, declined to comment when asked if it intended to use its public interest powers to wind up Ammado Technology.

At least 800 charities are being contacted to be told money due to them from the Ammado platform may be missing.

The dramatic news emerged when Revenue had Kirby appointed liquidator of the company on foot of an unpaid tax bill.

Charities including Trocaire and Concern were listed on the Ammado platform, alongside GAA clubs and animal shelters.

The Red Cross wrote to Conlon in May saying it wanted full payment of a sum of almost 200,000. A number of other charities including the Save the Children fund had sent similar letters.

The matter is due back in court this coming week.

Conlon, a native of Leitrim, had success when MV Technologies, a company he founded, was sold for more than 100m in the early 2000s. Later he set up Xsil, which ceased trading in 2008. After that came Ammado, which is based ultimately in Switzerland.

In an interview with the Sunday Independent in 2015 Conlon said: "I can tell you we got an amazing break recently. We were looking how to extend this franchise. In September we're going to launch something that's going to blow everyone away in the peer-to-peer world.

"We don't disclose the revenues. It will become profitable in September or October", Conlon added.

"There is no question that what we have today has the potential to bring Ammado to be a global internet company."Toll road operator turned renewables business NTR has raised 66.5m of fresh debt.

The company said it would use the money to finance the building of new wind farms and refinance an existing wind farm.

The funds are being provided in three separate facilities, from AIB, Norddeutsche Landesbank, and Japanese bank Mitsubishi UFG.

The AIB money is being used to build Castlecraig, a 25-megawatt project in Co Tyrone. The Norddeutsche Landesbank money is being used for the construction of a wind farm at Rathnacally in Co Cork.

NTR said both of those projects are expected to go into operation this year.

The Mitsubishi money is being used to refinance an 11.5-megawatt wind farm located in East Renfrewshire in Scotland.

"This is a diversified group of blue chip banking partners working with NTR on our portfolio of wind projects for our NTR Wind 1 LP fund and providing competitive banking terms," said NTR's chief financial officer Marie Joyce in a statement on the company's website.

NTR declined to comment further on the deal when contacted by the Sunday Independent.

Investors in the Wind 1 fund include Legal and General Capital, Strathclyde Pension Fund and the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund.

Last summer the company said it was looking to raise 500m for a new fund known as 'Renewable Energy Income Fund 2'.

The company's website said it was planning to launch its 'Renewable Energy Income Fund 2' in 2017 and that it would "invest in wind and solar projects, together with some energy-storage projects in select European countries".

Currently the website says the second fund "is under development".

NTR hived off its European wind business three years ago with the remainder of its assets - including legacy toll road assets - being placed into an entity called Altas Investments.

The business - in which the Roche family are the largest shareholders - currently has assets in the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and England.A concerned Irish accountancy firm has issued "a survival guide for sub-contractors" in the wake of last month's Carillion collapse.

Cork firm McAvoy & Associates warned clients "that the ripples" of the UK construction giant "had already spread to Ireland".

Sub-contractors were warned to check carefully that judgments have not been registered against a contractor, to "stay alert throughout the performance of the contract" and to "look out for any change in the behaviour of the main contractor".

"Many firms feel overjoyed whenever they land a contract," it said. "While this is understandable take care not to enter into one without first inspecting the counter party's financial statements and credit reports.

"Has there been a slowdown in the progress of the works? Is there a general decrease in the volume of labour on the site, or is equipment being removed?

"Cash is always king," said the accountant's guide. "Insist on stage payments, and look for an initial payment at the beginning of the contract." The survival guide warned that "the earlier that warning signs can be picked up, the better" to give the sub-contractor a chance of protecting itself "if cash dries up".

Carillion, one of the biggest construction and contracting firms in the world, collapsed owing 900m, with thousands of sub-contractors left without their money. This newspaper reported warnings from industry experts that similar models to Carillion exist in the Irish construction sector. It was reported in Britain last week that almost 400 workers had been made redundant by the huge firm but 18,000 on contracts were in limbo.

"The collapse of Carillion has left small businesses and sub-contractors out of pocket with many left unpaid for months and now facing potential ruin," said Rachel Reeves, the chair of a House of Commons business select committee.

"It's clear that Carillion were notorious late-payers, ruthlessly exploiting their position to bully their contractors in a desperate bid to prop up their precarious business model."Who could blame them? After the roasting Ulster Bank got at the Oireachtas Finance committee, senior officials there could be forgiven for retiring to an upmarket hostelry to cool down with some refreshments.

Last week committee chairman John McGuinness berated the Ulster Bank delegation which included Elizabeth Arnett, head of corporate affairs, formerly the voice of Irish Water. McGuinness said Ulster had a "brass neck" by sending chief finance officer Paul Stanley into the committee instead of departing chief executive Gerry Mallon.

The bank was even accused of robbery during a bruising appearance. But can appearances be deceptive? No sooner had the committee encounter concluded, Team Ulster, including Mr Stanley, decamped to that well-known renovated bank, The Westin Hotel. After a thoroughly heated interrogation, who could blame Ulster for wanting to cool its heels?This is a time of potential opportunity and challenge for Ireland's global trading relationships. Some 700 US companies have Irish operations across every county. Many have deep roots here. US companies stand at the centre of the Irish economy and the local community, directly employing almost 160,000 people and indirectly supporting 100,000 additional jobs.

I am often asked if these jobs are under threat - if Ireland is about to lose its hard-won reputation as a great country for inward investment. The good news is that the two-way US-Ireland business relationship is stronger than ever - in both directions. But the intense competition from other countries to beat Ireland at its own game is more fierce than I have ever seen it.

So what will keep Ireland ahead of the pack? We must keep a laser-like focus on competitiveness. We must listen to the experiences of returnees and those who have moved here for the first time: opening a first pay packet and seeing the outgoings in personal taxes; seeking residential accommodation and discovering the cost of renting; searching for school places for a child to enable them to have maximum choice in their careers - from languages to STEM; accessing high-speed broadband in a local area and getting from home to work using public or private transport.

We must also listen to businesses, from startups to PLCs, and learn from how they compete and adapt to new markets. A key lesson I have learned in business is that to compete successfully, speed and agility are crucial. Ireland must take this approach in relation to its physical and digital infrastructure and public-private collaboration.

Our national debt remains very high but our renewed economic growth and expanding workforce gives us options. We must invest wisely but quickly address our infrastructure deficits. In a small country it should be easier to get from A to B, while every school and small business should have high-speed broadband.

Ireland is rightly famous for an open and collegial approach to life and our strong sense of community. Let's focus on embedding that more in public-private sector collaboration.

Our competitiveness springs from a number of other areas: tax and business flexibility; a commitment to education that has paid huge dividends to date; our world-class third-level institutions which consistently turn out highly-educated graduates equipped to take up career opportunities throughout Ireland; a new emphasis on Stem and lifelong learning. We fully support the Government's ambition in all these areas and we believe they should be strengthened to keep pace with our leading-edge economy.

Some commentators have recently posited that Ireland is becoming too dependent on US FDI, portraying it as a potential negative. The American Chamber strongly challenges that view. Some will say 'Of course you do', but it is undeniable that US investment is very important in Ireland. Our members make up around 20pc of employment in this country, including additional jobs created by innovative Irish companies providing services to US FDI companies. Deep collaboration between the FDI sector and indigenous Irish companies is mutually important and both parties derive considerable benefits. The talent pool created by FDI feeds into Irish startups and established businesses. This diversity of talent and innovation is something to celebrate, and to work hard to protect, consolidate and expand.

Many of the 160,000 people working in US companies are at the cutting edge of their fields on products and services that are enhancing lives across the world. US investment in Ireland is worth over $387bn (311bn) and in the US, Irish companies now directly employ almost as many people as are employed by US companies here.

The Taoiseach said recently in Strasbourg that Ireland has the potential to be seen as an island at the centre of the world. I believe we have the potential to become famous as an island of talent at the centre of the world. We're building off strong foundations: a community of native talent and tens of thousands of people who have come from all over the world to proudly call Ireland home - making us global, broader in our thinking and more inclusive. The changing faces of Ireland and the Irish are transforming our society: out of every six children born today, one is born to non-Irish parents. Our global impact was felt by being the first country in the world to vote for marriage equality by popular vote.

From a business perspective, serving global markets successfully means doing so with a global mindset, making everyone feel truly "at home". We must ensure we do not place unnecessary barriers in the way of people's ability to build a life here.

In 2018, the Chamber looks forward to working successfully with the Government and state agencies in the battle to win new investment. Ireland is in a unique position at the heart of the EU-US relationship - soon to be the only English-speaking member of the EU; perfectly positioned in the global time-zone spectrum; with a diverse multinational workforce. We must make the most of the opportunities a post-Brexit world presents. Now is the time to double our efforts to equip Ireland to welcome tomorrow's wave of inward investment opportunity.

Barry O'Sullivan is the new President of the American Chamber of Commerce IrelandOllie Loomes, country director of Diageo Ireland, has warned that new restrictions on the marketing of alcohol could damage Ireland's brands abroad and hit investment.

"It could have very significant negative consequences in terms of international reputation of Irish brands and of their growth abroad.

"And, ultimately, I think that will have an impact on investment in Ireland," he said.

The Public Health (Alcohol) Bill is the Government's attempt to curb alcohol abuse in Ireland. The drinks industry has been lobbying hard against it.

"I would call on the Government to engage with the industry and find a way to work with us to find an appropriate, sensible solution that tackles misuse problems. But one that doesn't set us back in terms of our international reputation and our export growth and our investment in Ireland."

Loomes said he accepted that there was alcohol mis-use in Ireland, which was not good for Diageo or society. He also said that he does not have an issue with new legislation.

"We want an alcohol bill that's evidence based, that's proportionate and ultimately something that's sensible. We want an alcohol bill that's pointed at the problem of alcohol misuse, not pointed at products and the industry and the average consumer," said Loomes.

"I think it's worth remembering that we actually have a wonderful industry, we've got some wonderful Irish brands and products that have become huge Irish success stories on the international stage, accounting for very significant exports," he added.

"And, definitely, we want to be proactive in terms of how we get after misuse of alcohol in Ireland."

He said that the proposed alcohol rules were coming at a time when the food and drinks sector was facing into uncertainty around Brexit.

"Our estimate is that we would have something like 18,000 cross-border truck movements a year between beer and Baileys, which is clearly a very significant quantity of truck movements.

"And when you get into the impact in terms of costs, of delays at borders and so on, that would have a big impact on our business in terms of cost but also just complexity and ability to run our business."The Irish Radio Player is by no means the only brand to use Alexa to extend its reach

A little bit of Irish radio history was made last week when the country's commercial radio sector came together with RTE to launch a new voice-activated version of the popular Irish Radio Player on Amazon's Alexa platform.

In case you are not familiar with it, the Irish Radio Player is a useful one-stop shop for stations around the country, all of which are bundled up into one single app that can be downloaded to your mobile phone or listened to on your desktop.

And in case you are wondering what the hell Alexa is, it's an assistant on the likes of Amazon Echo, one of several voice-activated devices on the market that allows users to search for information, goods and services by simply asking the internet-enabled device to do the searching for them.

If you haven't heard of voice-search up until now, brace yourself for one of the most important developments in the digital marketing world in recent years.

Voice-activated devices, sometimes referred to as voice assistants, are becoming increasingly popular amongst consumers and the launch of the Irish Radio Player's "skill" - which is essentially an app that responds to voice-coincided with the official launch of Amazon's range of voice-controlled devices on the Irish market.

The Irish Radio Player is by no means the only brand to use Alexa to extend its reach. Ryanair, for example, is up and running on Alexa. Developed by the Irish company Cation Consulting, Ryanair's skill covers flight status, routes and price information across its 1,800 daily flights as well as an accommodation finder.

Elsewhere, RTE News was the first media brand to embrace Alexa.

As its popularity gathers momentum, many more Irish brands will inevitably follow.

Of all the voice-controlled offerings on the market, Amazon is the clear leader with over 37,000 different skills available across its three key markets - the USA, the UK and Germany - at the end of 2017. Some way behind is Google's Assistant, with 1,719, while Microsoft's Cortana trails the pack with a paltry 235.

While Amazon has stolen an early lead on everyone else, expect to hear a lot more from the likes of Apple with its new HomePod, Samsung's Bixby, Cortana and, of course, Google's Home which is the fastest growing of them all.

Given that Google effectively owns the global mobile and desktop search market, you can be sure that it's not going to take Amazon's early lead lying down, so a fascinating and possibly bruising battle lies ahead.

But like every new shiny new digital thing that comes along in the marketing and advertising world, there will be early adopters who will test the waters by putting down a marker with a first-to-market claim.

There will also be a no shortage of voice gurus and strategists, armed with a dizzying array of statistics, forecasts and insights, who will be there to help brands part with their money.

And, of course, there will be the eager beaver brands that will pile earnestly into voice-search without a clear strategy only to find tumbleweed blowing through their endeavours several months later. With comScore estimating that as much as 50pc of all search activity will be voice search by 2020, this will have huge implications for digital marketing as we know it.

It will also have significant ramifications for every consumer-facing brand and the retail channels through which they are distributed. So, it will come as no surprise to learn that the big FMCG companies like Unilever, P&G, L'Oreal and Uber are already planning for a future where voice-search will be an integral part of how they engage with their customers.

If you can picture somebody baking a cake in their ultra-modern kitchen, sometime in 2021, and they find that they have run out of flour, all they have to do is ask their voice assistant, Alexa, to add flour to their virtual shopping list.

But will that be Odlum's flour or a Tesco or Lidl own-brand? Or even an Amazon brand like Whole Foods? And does it really matter to the consumer if the flour comes from Tesco, SuperValu or Amazon?

In reality, the vast majority of products consumers purchase on a weekly basis are what's known in marketing parlance as low-involvement products.

They are consumable items that entail minimal effort and consideration on their part prior to purchase, since they don't have a substantial effect on the buyer's lifestyle and don't represent a significant investment.

Even so, this is where the lion's share of marketing investment is ploughed into every year and giants like P&G and Unilever spend billions of euro marketing low-involvement products.

Brand recognition and recall mean everything to them. In a world where voice-search becomes the norm, this will pose all kinds of challenges for them.

But rest assured, Irish consumers still have some way to go before voice-activated devices go mainstream in households. When they do, a recent piece of sobering research from Google noted that 41pc of people who use voice-activated devices say "It's like talking to a friend or another person".

Alexa, please beam me up.Online access for children is the thorny subject that has to be negotiated in the vast majority of cases that come before Joanna Fortune.

The Dublin-based clinical psychotherapist, who works with children and families, says there's often a stumbling block when it comes to the manner in which children engage with the internet and the amount of time they spend online, and what their parents are comfortable with.

"Parents are, rightly, concerned about what they're doing online and some recent cases that have come before the courts have shown that they're right to be worried."

It's a subject that is being thrown into sharp relief right now as the debate intensifies about what the digital age of consent should be for Irish children. The Government and child protection agencies suggest 13 years of age, but some cybersecurity experts believe this is far too young and Ireland should take its lead from Germany where the digital age of consent is set at 16.

The digital age of consent refers to the age from which it is legal for data controllers to hold data gathered on children and teenagers. For children under the age of 13, parental consent will be required.

Some contend that 13 is already the de facto age for digital consent as it is, for instance, the minimum age that Facebook allows its members to be (although younger children could lie about their age).

The Ombudsman for Children, Dr Niall Muldoon, has welcomed the proposed move, saying it "takes a more realistic view of children and young people's internet use, and of the integral role that the online environment plays in their lives.

"Choosing 13 as the digital age of consent is in keeping with international children's rights standards as it allows for the balancing of the different rights that children have. It also acknowledges the opportunities, as well the risks that the online environment presents to children and young people."

But Dr Mary Aiken, adjunct associate professor at UCD and a cybersecurity expert, believes 13 is far too young, and Ireland would be much wiser to opt for an age when children are well into their teenage years. "It's not over yet," she says. "This consultation process is to consultation what fake news is to news. The process has been categorically inadequate and I am being inundated with calls and emails from parents, teachers and professionals who simple do not understand the issue and feel they have not been consulted.

"It is my intention to do everything I can to stop these technology companies from using Irish children like clickbait."

Aiken points out that Germany, France and the Netherlands "have excellent practice in this area" and are staying with 16 as the age of consent, while "the UK is proposing an amendment to the data protection bill for children aged 13 to 17, acknowledging that while they are above the age of consent, they are still children that require protection.

"Our government," she adds, "is actively decreasing the age to 13, which makes us an outlier in terms of policy."

Earlier this month, the special rapporteur for child protection, Dr Geoffrey Shannon, echoed Muldoon's sentiments when appearing before the Oireachtas justice committee.

He also suggested that blocking certain sites could prevent children from accessing "much-needed" services such as online counselling or advice which they may wish to access without telling others, and he also argued that it was important to preserve children's "right to be forgotten".

"We all know that young people sometimes insert material online that they would regret afterwards. We need to recognise and acknowledge the vulnerability of young people." He said this issue is not dealt with under current legislation. Irrespective of what age is finally approved by the May 25 deadline when the EU General Data Protection Regulation comes into effect, Joanna Fortune believes the best way for parents to ensure that their children stay safe online is to engage with them about their internet behaviour.

"It's best to sit down with them and go through their phone - if they have one - and talk about new apps and so on. A lot of people who might consider themselves to be tech savvy won't have heard of newer social media sites like Kik, and they really need to be aware of them."

Anonymous instant messaging service Kik Interactive was in the news last week after it emerged that it was one of the services that Dublin man Matthew Horan (26) had been using to coerce young girls to send him sexually graphic pictures and videos of themselves.

Darker side of the web

"I got to know it when children that I would see in the course of my work started to talk about it," Fortune says, "and because these sort of things go in and out of popularity, it's important that they keep abreast of changes. And the best way they can do that is by talking to them directly, and not going behind their backs."

She also believes the conviction of Horan for possession of thousands of child porn images offers parents an opportunity to talk about the darker side of the web.

"Rather than coming out and saying to them if they had been approached by someone like that online, a tactic that might make them defensive and therefore not communicative, it would be better to ask if they knew if any of their friends had had such an experience," she says.

"Ultimately, parents have to ask themselves if their child even needs a smartphone at all. Every child is different, but it's best to wait until their at least 10 - or starting secondary school before they get one.

"You do hear of children as young as seven and eight buying phones with their Communion money and that's way too young, especially when they're at such a crucial time in their personal development."The cost of using Eir infrastructure in rural Ireland is an "outrage" and is the key stumbling block for the National Broadband Plan (NBP), Enet head David McCourt has said.

Enet is the last remaining bidder for the Government's flagship rural broadband plan after Eir's surprise withdrawal from the process last week.

McCourt, whose investment fund Granahan McCourt oversees Enet, told this newspaper that he remains very happy with the Government's NBP process and that Eir's departure was "a natural and healthy development."

But McCourt hit out at "partisan" opposition politicians who he said were more interested in attacking the overall process for political reasons than in tackling the real issues that are holding up the rollout of rural broadband to over 500,000 homes.

The cost of using the poles and ducts on Eir's existing network in rural Ireland - a central part of Enet's plans for its new high-speed broadband network - was "a huge issue" and "absolutely the elephant in the room", he said.

Government documents previously revealed that the price Eir charges other companies for such access could add 60pc - or hundreds of millions of euro - to the cost of the NBP. This newspaper revealed last week that the Government is preparing legislation to tackle the issue, but McCourt said it would "slow the process and cost money".

Irish people had already paid for the building of Eir's network "many times over" through monthly phone bills and Eir had since been sold on for profit numerous times since by investors, he said.

"We know this issue well. The way a regulated phone company works is that a regulator allows it to charge for its copper wires, poles and ducts so as to pass that cost on to residents. But the network we are trying to access has been paid for already by the residents of Ireland. Phone companies around the world argue to overcharge to allow people to keep using this infrastructure.

"It should outrage and upset people that they are trying to double dip and make people pay twice. People should be saying: 'We've already paid you for this infrastructure over decades and you have to make this available at a reasonable cost'."

Asked to comment, an Eir spokesman said that prices charged by the company for access to poles and other infrastructure was for installation and maintenance. He said the price had been set by the regulator in 2016 after detailed analysis and review.

Enet had only accessed the infrastructure in one instance, involving 1,000 poles in Co Kerry, said the Eir spokesman. By contrast Eir was already building a fibre network to cover 80pc of the country by the end of the year, he said.

But McCourt said: It wasnt long ago that they charged you rental for your phone too. Phone companies around the world fought for a long time to stop competition on handsets, claiming it would mess up the phone system.

If you lived in the same house for 50 years you bought that same phone 50 times over with the rental charge. Now we have the same type of arguments again over this network.

We have dealt with this issue in every state in America, in Europe and in Mexico, where we built a 1,200-mile network, he said. That involved resolving similar interconnection issues with billionaire Carlos Slims TelMex, he said.

Eirs decision to roll out fibre on a commercial basis to 300,000 homes previously covered by the NBP has been seen by many in the industry as damaging to the plan.

But McCourt insisted that the NBP process remains healthy and is moving forward. Enet continues to hold weekly meetings with Department of Communications officials. The departure of Eir from the process was not a sign that the NBP was going to collapse, he said.

Eir knew everything about this process. It is totally transparent. You get to a point where the Government or a company has issues on which they dont feel they can move and at that point a company may drop out. But that is natural, its healthy and its good. It means that the process is actually working.

Enet and its backers specialise in long term returns, he said. Eircom specialises in short term  flipping the company every 36 months. We specialise in infrastructure and public private partnerships.

We are geared up for this. If a company is not geared up for it because of their investment profile then that is part of the natural process. Its how a process is supposed to work.

He rejected criticisms that Enet was not big enough or equipped to carry out such a big project. In the US we have done projects where we have deployed more than $100m in capital a month. That meant deploying the same amount of capital every 45 days that we would have to deploy in a year with the NBP, he said.

He also rejected speculation that having just one bidder could see the cost of the NBP jump: We submitted our bid a long time ago. All the participants negotiated through 90pc of the issues and you cant go backwards on those. Outstanding matters involve design and implementation issues.

In 2017, 78pc of Enet was acquired by the Irish Infrastructure Fund (IIF), while the remaining 22pc is held by Granahan McCourt Capital  led by McCourt, as well as the private family fund of Berkshire Hathaway board member Walter Scott.

Enets partner for the NBP is SSE, which has invested over 2bn since 2008 in energy infrastructure in Ireland.An old saying is business is: 'You snooze, you lose'. When it comes to managing the process for the National Broadband Scheme, the Department didn't just nod off, but went into a coma.

Deadlines have been missed time and again. Communications Minister Denis Naughten was only in the job a few months when he had to announce that a previous deadline of awarding the contract for the scheme by June 2017 would be missed.

Here we are in February 2018 and there is continued uncertainty about what happens next, following the withdrawal of Eir from the process. It is now nearly six years since this plan was first given the go-ahead and there is still no final tender round conducted, never mind a shovel in the ground.

Eir was quick to blame the regulator, ComReg, for its decision but this looked more like a hard-nosed commercial decision. Relations between ComReg and Eir have been robust in recent years, with the regulator making findings against Eir on governance. Eir, in turn, has issued legal proceedings against ComReg.

Eir executives have been teeing the company up for a sale for several years. And they managed to do just that. The recent takeover of Eir by French telecoms billionaire Xavier Niel seems to have been a factor in Eir's withdrawal. Niel is believed to be more interested in pursuing urban broadband initiatives. However, if the Department had not been so slow in developing the tender process, this contract might well have been awarded, done and dusted before any Niel-inspired change of strategy.

Perhaps Eir wouldn't have won it, or perhaps they would, but at least there would have been a two-horse or even a three-horse race. A one-horse race is not a recipe for taxpayer value for money.

In fairness to Enet, it has shown its commitment to this project throughout and has done nothing wrong. As the last remaining bidder in the current process, it has been consistent. But surely it would have been better to have more than one final bidder.

The government is insisting that the process will go ahead and there will be no loss to the taxpayer. Enet has also suggested that having communicated its views on the rollout of the project, the State has a clear idea of the cost parameters and there simply isn't scope for it to do a major U-turn on price.

However, there are still several unknowns about this process. How much of a subsidy will Enet need to roll out this new network? How much will Eir charge it for using its network over part of the broadband route to rural housing?

Surely, the cost of building this new network is rising by the month, so the longer it drags on the more expensive it will be to build. This in turn will require a larger subsidy from the State.

But what is Enet? It all started in the early Noughties when the government decided to start investing in broadband technology around the country, because a newly-privatised Eircom was not doing enough investment in towns and villages.

The network built by the State was managed by a private sector company called Enet. This business was sold to US investment group Granahan McCourt in 2013 for around 43m. Then, in 2016, the Irish Infrastructure Fund, managed by Irish Life, bought a 78pc stake in the venture while Granahan McCourt and a friend of Warren Buffett, called Walter Scott, retained a combined 22pc.

The Irish Infrastructure Fund was set up in 2012 with 250m from the Irish Strategic Investment Fund, which is run through the NTMA. The fund now has around 400m invested in various projects. So, Enet, the last company standing in the broadband bid process, is 78pc-owned by an investment fund largely funded by the State.

It would be best if the situation can be salvaged with Enet proceeding with the contract fairly soon. But no matter what happens now, questions about value for money and the ultimate cost of the delays will hang over any outcome.

Viridian's big Dublin power play

Eir wasn't the only one talking about pulling out of something this week. Energia parent group Viridian is considering closing its two electricity plants here. This followed the failure of one of the plants to win a contract from Eirgrid, the company which manages the country's electricity requirements.

You win some, you lose some, should be the mantra from Viridian, but it isn't. The company has suggested that it would not be economically viable for it to run just one plant here. According to Eirgrid, any generator chosen to provide supply must give three years' notice before shutting down and withdrawing from the market.

Talks are ongoing between Viridian and Eirgrid but they are likely to generate plenty of electricity if Viridian proceeds with plant closures in just a few months' time.

Recent accounts for Viridian Power show how much the electricity generation market has changed. In 2013 turnover was 163m. This fell to 132m in 2014 and 90m in 2016. Viridian Power, which operates at Huntstown in Co Dublin, made a loss in 2013, 2014, and 2016, but made a profit of 7.5m in 2015.

Viridian Group was bought by US investment firm I Squared Capital for 1bn in 2016 and it obviously isn't happy about the latest development in the market here.

Security of supply will be the challenge for Eirgrid given that Viridian can supply a huge percentage of Dublin's electricity needs. But if Viridian wants to fold up its tent, Eirgrid will just have to find it elsewhere.

How many other outsourcing firms are still to show on radar?

The world of outsourcing is taking quite a hammering in 2018. First came the collapse of Carillion and this week Capita announced that it was raising fresh capital and cutting its dividend.

Capita is seen as well-stretched but not a candidate for liquidation. Analysts believe the outsourcing company, which employs a few thousand here in Ireland, can be turned around. It will take some sale of assets and about two years they reckon. Any change of ownership could lead to job losses.

But how come it didn't show up on the radar before now? The company has not grown organically since 2014 yet its share price soared through 2014 and 2015. It acquired its growth through acquisitions - 17 in 2014 and 16 in 2015. While this was going on, it paid out more than 1bn in dividends between 2011 and 2016. Its pension deficit rose from 86m in 2011 to 380m.

All these acquisitions cost money so its net debt also grew to 1.2bn.

This should have set off alarm bells that it was an emperor with no clothes, or not as many clothes as the market presumed.

Its shares were trading at 132 in July 2015 and are now down to 1.60.

Somebody took a close look under the bonnet and saw what was really there.

It makes you wonder, how many others are out there like that.The digital age of consent refers to the age from which it is legal for data controllers to hold data gathered from minors

Just a few days ago, Facebook announced that it makes over 1bn a month in profit from selling ads against our online profiles.

During the same week, fresh questions were asked about the appropriateness of Ireland's 'digital age of consent', as new EU-wide data protection laws approach.

But what is the digital age of consent?

In the case of children, this largely concerns the age at which it's considered legally acceptable for big companies like Facebook (or any service operating online) to legally hold and process personal data.

This is important for one big reason: advertising.

Advertising budgets are moving heavily into online platforms, partly because of the accuracy with which marketers can target specific groups and demographics, including kids. For example, on Facebook, it's possible to target an ad so that only young females who live in Dublin and have certain preferences will see it.

Ireland has opted for the lowest age permissible under upcoming EU data law - 13. This compares to more privacy-focused countries such as Germany, which opted for 16 as a digital age of consent.

In Ireland, it means that Facebook, Google, Twitter or any other company can mostly (though not fully) use a 13-year-old's personal information in the same way they would use an adult's information.

While the big tech companies were all in favour of the lower age of consent, so were almost all of the child protection agencies and children's rights advocates. That's because they see access to internet services as a critical source of information for children who cannot, for a variety of reasons, turn to an adult for help.

However, with a new focus on a digital age of consent comes new penalties for those who flout it.

Companies that are found to be marketing to children under the age of 13 could be in line for hefty penalties.

For instance, companies can no longer track children around the internet in the same way they legally track adults. Doing so attracts big fines, as toy companies Mattel, Hasbro and two others recently discovered when they were collectively fined almost 800,000 in the US for ad-related monitoring of kids' online behaviour.

Similar restrictions are set to be tightened in Europe in tandem with the new EU-wide data protection laws.

Proponents of the new data privacy rules say that this makes eminent sense. It's one thing to fire off ads, offers and other inducements at adults. But targeting eight year olds on screens their parents aren't monitoring (in the same way they might a television) feels more than a little heavy-handed.Another week, another National Broadband Plan (NBP) drama. But why did Eir really pull out? Can Enet complete the job by itself? What other blockages are waiting to intervene? With some dust settled, here's a look at how things stand.

1 Was it really Eir's prospective new billionaire owner, Xavier Niel, behind Eir's withdrawal?

Representatives for the French tycoon, which this column has been in touch with, say no.

They say that it was purely a decision taken by Eir's current management. They also say that Niel will pursue a balanced approach between rural and urban rollouts. But until they open up a little more about what that means for Eir's network development (which they might not feel able to do, given the acquisition hasn't been completed yet), we won't know any more than that.

But there is a pattern with Eir every time it changes corporate hands, where it pares back any fresh national investment plan to sweat its most profitable assets. To be fair to the company's new owners, there is some evidence to suggest that focusing a bit more on urban network infrastructure is as badly needed as tending to rural infrastructure.

In Ireland, cities are comparatively well served with broadband but largely through the cable infrastructure of one company - Virgin (formerly UPC).

Yes, Eir (and through it, Vodafone and Sky) offer DSL phone line broadband, but this tops out at a speed that's far, far less than fibre. While its "up to" 100Mbs maximum speed seems fine today, it will be an entry-level speed in five or 10 years.

So what does it do then? Telecoms is a medium-to-long term investment game. If Eir wants to remain as the country's largest telecom operator, it has to start planning more of its own fibre in Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway, Waterford and other built-up areas. Presumably, Niel sees this. Maybe he thinks that it's more of a business imperative than a 25-year NBP contract to service one-off bungalows in remote rural areas.

2 So Eir just changed its mind on rural broadband? Does this mean it won't complete its own 300,000-premise rural fibre rollout?

No. It has explicitly said that this rollout will be completed, probably by the end of this year. Remember that this tranche of 300,000 homes and businesses is the 'profitable' portion taken from the Government's state intervention list, which previously stood at 850,000 homes. (This is the same tranche of 300,000 premises that critics refer to as the 'cherry-picked' part of the NBP.)

Even if it wanted to back out of this rollout plan, which is already half done, it would be tricky to do given the agreed financial penalties that might result.

It also cannot aggravate relations with the government too much at the moment, as the Communications Minister Denis Naughten still technically has the power to intervene in the proposed takeover of the company by Xavier Niel.

3 Is Enet capable of taking on the entire National Broadband Plan rollout job?

Enet says it can and the Government certainly believes it. This column spoke to Enet chief David McCourt last week and put this question directly to him.

"These kind of projects are right in our sweet spot," McCourt told me.

"We know how to scale. We understand the business and we understand public-private partnership. We're committed to Ireland for the long-term."

In effect, Enet isn't relying solely on its own existing engineers. There are large European contractor firms with experience in telecoms buildout infrastructure that it will likely use.

However, there is one outstanding issue that it can't handle completely itself.

"Accessing Eir's infrastructure is a critical issue for us," said McCourt. "That could be solved in a number of ways, but being able to access their infrastructure is obviously a critical issue for us."

McCourt said that there was "still more work to be done for that to happen and that this will be done "between us and Eircom, or between us, the Government and Eircom".

4 Does that mean access to Eir's infrastructure is now a major sticking point for the National Broadband Plan?

If there is one issue that could hold things up in the short term, it may be this one. Despite McCourt's emphasis, Eir is no mood to start reducing prices on access to its infrastructure.

Indeed, this was one of the reasons it pulled out of the NBP in the first place, citing "growing uncertainty on a range of regulatory and pricing issues that reside outside of the National Broadband Process".

In effect, Eir said that ComReg is destabilising its incentive to invest in long-term infrastructure by, among other things, conducting a market review as to how much Eir can charge rivals to access that infrastructure.

Eir knows that rivals such as Vodafone and Sky (as well as smaller partners such as Magnet) have been baying for a reduction in the Eir's industry charges, with those firms going so far as to say they won't compete on Eir's infrastructure because of the comparatively high cost.

But with a new owner coming in, there seems little chance that Eir will give up some of its most controversial charges (such as a 270 access fee to other operators to trade on its home fibre lines) without a major fight.

The government knows this but has previously expressed sympathy for rival operators on this one, with Communications Department officials indicating they expected the 270 fee to be reduced either by the telecoms regulator or a separate government mechanism. This is a space to be watched closely in the coming months.

5 Does the Government have any other option now other than Enet?

Last week, Communications Minister Denis Naughten referred to a Plan B that his department has in the event that final negotiations with Enet aren't immediately successful.

There was nothing else forthcoming on any detail around this, although officials later said that it did not include the option of quitting the process altogether.Exxon Mobil and Chevron, failing to capitalise on a more than 50pc rise in oil prices since June, spurred the wrath of investors by missing fourth-quarter estimates on both earnings and output.

Results from the two companies followed a day-earlier report by rival ConocoPhillips that included a dividend boost, share buybacks, and a $400m (321m) Alaska expansion.

The difference: Conoco is solely focused on drilling; Exxon and Chevron's refineries reported lower than expected returns at a time of fat gasoline and diesel margins.

"One word: disappointing," is how Brian Youngberg, a St Louis-based analyst at Edward Jones & Co, described the results. "Chevron was close on production but Exxon was a significant miss," he said. "The company continues to be challenged on that side."

Exxon fell 15 cents short of fourth-quarter earnings estimates by analysts, while Chevron was 55 cents shy. Royal Dutch Shell also saw its shares fall on Thursday when it reported a weaker-than-expected outcome from refineries.

While Exxon has long held that choosing to produce lower-cost oil is more important than the volume of output, the latter remains a key metric for investors.

"I certainly acknowledge the drop that we've seen in upstream business and the return on capital employed," Jeff Woodbury, vice president of investor relations at Exxon, said on a call with analysts. Discoveries in Guyana and acquisitions in Mozambique and Papua New Guinea will boost returns in the future, he said.

Exxon will lay out a more detailed growth plan at its analyst day on March 7, Woodbury said. Meanwhile, the company said it has no plans to resume a share buyback programme to return capital to shareholders that was ended in early 2016.

Chevron will grow production between 4pc and 7pc next year and cash flow is improving, chief executive Mike Wirth said. "All the fundamental drivers of cash flow are moving in the right direction," he said, while cautioning that it's "premature" to talk about share buybacks. Chevron increased its dividend this week.

Exxon's per-share net income, excluding a one-time gain from US tax code changes, was 88 cents, well short of the $1.03 average of 20 estimates from analysts in a Bloomberg survey. Chevron's per-share earnings, excluding one-time items, amounted to 67 cents, far below the $1.22 average of 19 estimates from analysts in a Bloomberg survey.

The fourth-quarter results hit as both Exxon CEO Darren Woods and Chevron's CEO Mike Wirth, who stepped into the role on Thursday after being named CEO-in-waiting in September, are gearing up for production growth.

In Chevron's case, the company this year is expected to start reaping the rewards after years of investment into expensive mega projects from Australia to Kazakhstan. Production will rise between 4pc and 7pc in 2018 without asset sales, Wirth said.

BloombergIan Katz, the head of programming at Channel 4, was shown just one episode of Derry Girls and he green-lit the second series immediately. The short, snappy comedy has been a sensation since it first aired in early January.

The writing, characterisation, plotting and acting are all first-rate but part of the reason for its critical and popular success is its brilliant use of music.

The series is set in the Derry of the early 1990s, in the days where British soldiers patrolled the streets and the Good Friday Agreement was a long way into the future. And the song choice is utterly inspired.

The opening scene of the very first episode features The Cranberries' 'Dreams' as the camera tracks an army jeep before panning over the fine city on the banks of the Foyle. For those who've recently been catching up with the series on the All4 player, it will have felt terribly poignant in the wake of Dolores O'Riordan's untimely death.

Each episode leans heavily on the chart music that characterised the early 1990s and for those of us who were in our late teens then, it brings back great memories. EMF's 'Unbelievable'? It's there, and so too is Cypress Hill's then-ubiquitous 'Insane in the Brain'.

There's room, too, for the era's biggest pop hits, including the Eurodance anthem 'Saturday Night' from Danish one-hit-wonder Whigfield and En Vogue's 'My Lovin' (You're Never Gonna Get It)'.

Several of the songs found a much larger proportionate audience in Ireland than Britain, such as House of Pain's 'Jump Around' and Dropkick Murphys' 'I'm Shipping Up to Boston' and a handful were huge hits in Ireland only, including Eleanor McEvoy and Mary Black's 'Only a Woman's Heart' from the album 'A Woman's Heart' - still, all these years later, the biggest seller in Irish chart history.

And hearing these songs in the context of a really well-realised show delivers nostalgia and pleasure in equal amounts. It's all part of that shared experience - music that soundtracked a particular moment in time. And even for those who were not born when the action is set, there's much to savour in the authenticity of the soundtrack - and they're bloody good songs, too.

The best television drama has long understood the importance of its soundtrack; not just the score, but the songs, too. Consider how the Choir of Young Believers' 'Hollow Talk' elevates the opening titles of the pan-Scandinavian The Bridge to rarefied heights or how The Platters' 'Smoke Gets in Your Eyes' so brilliantly soundtracked a memorable scene in Mad Men. The latter used songs to help move the drama through the 1960s and while it opted for some of the decade's best-loved tracks, they were chosen with great care.

It was a similarly great song selection which helped make Bachelors Walk one of the best dramas RTE ever made. The finale of the first season back in 2001 concluded with our three heroes listening to Tom Waits's heart-rending 'Kentucky Avenue' - and the song played out as the credits rolled.

Its director John Carney knew a thing or two about the impact of a fine song having served his apprenticeship as a member of The Frames. And his cinematic work post-Bachelors Walk has majored heavily on songs, whether it's been the Dublin-set Once and Sing Street or his underrated Keira Knightley-vehicle Begin Again.

And yet, it was its brilliant choice of songs that has put paid to Bachelors Walk's life after that Christmas special was aired in 2006. Due to copyright issues, the second and third seasons can't be released on DVD or shown on such streaming sites as Netflix, thus denying a new generation the chance to see the exploits of much-loved central characters played by Don Wycherley, Keith McErlean and Simon Delaney.

It's little wonder, then, that subsequent homegrown TV hits have relied on music from Irish artists. The restaurant-set drama series, Raw, which was co-written by Derry Girls creator Lisa McGee, ran for five seasons on RTE and included a creatively curated soundtrack featuring the likes of Bell X1, Lisa Hannigan, Heathers and Two Door Cinema Club. Snappy tracks for snappy action.

A largely Irish ensemble also feature in RTE's latest big-money drama, Striking Out, which sees its second season conclude tomorrow night. The uncharitable might say the music is the best thing about the Amy Huberman lawyer drama, a triumph of style over substance - and both seasons have featured domestic acts both well established and fledgeling.

The quality of the songs from artists as diverse as Roisin O, Daithi and Sive has been notable, and it was Niall Byrne, the man behind the hugely popular Nialler9 new music blog, who was charged with selecting the songs in conjunction with New Music Port, the "independent music licensing and sonic branding agency".

It's win-win for the musicians, too, not least the London-based Cork artist Lyra, whose track 'Emerald' attracted plenty of excitement on social media when it aired at the finale of season one last year. And it's not just dramas that have witnessed superlative use of music. A huge part of the appeal of the perennially popular Reeling in the Years has been the smart choice of songs to soundtrack the events portrayed in each year. And as anyone who has watched even a single episode will know, the tracks were chosen to fit with the mood of the historical event being depicted and not simply selected because it was released in the year in question.

A couple of years ago, someone went to the trouble of creating a Spotify playlist featuring all 442 songs featured in the series - everything from Steely Dan's 'Reelin' in the Years' to The Temper Trap's 'Sweet Disposition'. On the very first day it was shared, it was picked up by almost 800 followers.

No doubt when Derry Girls' six-part run ends this Thursday, someone will have added every song featured to a streaming playlist - and it will provoke a smile here and there.

Certainly, I'll never be able to listen to 'Saturday Night' again and not think of the show.The house where up to 70 tenants were living Inset: Christian Carter

The landlords of a house where up to 70 tenants once lived have yet to pay the local authoritys legal costs of up to 60,000, Independent.ie can reveal.

Christian Carter and Richard Stanley were ordered by the Circuit Civil Court last February to pay Dun Laoghaire Rathdown County Councils legal costs after it was revealed how The Pines, Cabinteely, Co Dublin was being dangerously overcrowded.

The matter was brought before the courts following an undercover investigation by Independent.ie.

A spokesperson for the council said it is still "pursuing the recovery of its legal costs from the defendants in this matter".

It was estimated in court that their legal expenses would run close to the 60,000 mark.

Our investigation uncovered how tenants had no written leases, rent was paid cash-in-hand and up to 36 people slept in the basement.

There were only two showers between 70 people in the five-bedroom property.

Carter, who is involved in the running of up to 40 properties across Dublin, could not be reached for comment as his two original mobile numbers are no longer in use.

Richard Stanley (86) could also not be reached for comment.

The Circuit Civil Court heard that Carter had been paying Richard Stanleys son, Dermot, 2,000 a month by bankers order and 2,000 in cash to sublet The Pines.

Judge Linnane heard that in turn Dermot Stanley, who lives in London, was paying his father Richard, who owns the house, 2,000 a month.

Judge Linnane said that if 50 people had been paying 50 a week each to Mr Carter he would have been receiving 10,000 a month. Sixty tenants would have been paying him more than 12,000 a month. At an earlier hearing it was estimated Carter had been collecting up to 16,000 a month in rent.

The house was ordered to be vacated following the court case.It remains to be seen if the Catholic Church can mount a sustained campaign to save the Eighth Amendment, the constitutional ban on abortion.

Most senior churchmen do not seem to have the stomach for these battles anymore, but it was no surprise in recent days to see the Bishop of Elphin, Kevin Doran, leading the charge against moves to liberalise the laws.

Dispensing with any hint of moderation, the outspoken Dubliner warned that if abortion laws are loosened, similar arguments will be used to "justify ending the lives of frail elderly people and people with significant disability".

Doran warned in a pastoral message: "This is the final frontier. If we cross it, there will be no easy way back."

Over the past decade, Bishop Doran has emerged as the Church's leading hardliner, stepping forward to defend Catholic orthodoxy against the oncoming tide of secularism.

Doran is regarded as an intellectual heavy hitter in the Church. After his schooling at Christian Brothers College in Monkstown on the southside of Dublin, he went to UCD and after studying at the Pontifical University of St Thomas Aquinas in Rome became a Doctor of Philosophy.

Before becoming Bishop of Elphin, he has had a number of important roles in the Church.

A former university chaplain at UCD, he has been a key adviser to the bishops on medical ethics and has held other high-profile posts such as national director of vocations.

In recent years, he has seldom steered clear of controversy.

During the same-sex marriage referendum, he was heavily criticised when he suggested that gay couples who had children were not really parents at all. When an interviewer put it to him that gay and lesbian couples in Ireland were already parents, he responded: "But they're not parents. They might have children but, that's the point - people who have children are not necessarily parents."

That prompted the LGBT activist Ailbhe Smyth to tweet: "Bishop talking through his pointy hat. Am definitely mother of my daughter - hand-delivered."

Soon afterwards the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, appeared to slap Bishop Doran down. He described his remark as "an unfortunate phrase".

Bishop Doran expressed regret for the hurt his comment about gay parents had caused. But tact is not a quality normally associated with the cleric. In the same interview, he seemed to liken being gay to being born with a disability. When it was suggested to him that sexual orientation could be something that God intended, he replied: "That would be to suggest that if some people who are born with Down syndrome or spina bifida, that was what God intended."

He first found himself at the centre of national controversy in 2005, when he delayed cancer drug trials at the Mater hospital - because they would have required the women involved to use contraceptives.

He was one of a three-person sub-committee at the hospital that halted clinical trials for the chemotherapy drug, Tarceva, which later became a frontline treatment for lung cancer.

Members of his committee said the use of contraceptives contravened the hospital's ethos and the trial was held up for several weeks before a meeting of the full Mater board allowed it to go ahead.

He eventually resigned from the Mater hospital board in 2013 after the hospital said it would comply with the new Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act, which allowed for abortion in certain cases.

His main concern when he quit was that women would be allowed to have abortions when they were suicidal, as a result of the new legislation.

Bishop Doran was once asked whether a woman who is raped and becomes pregnant as a result should have to bear the child.

"Well, the child is still a human being, that's the issue - you don't destroy a life in order to get back at the mother's rapist," he replied. On another occasion he compared abortion to the involuntary Nazi euthanasia programme carried out during World War II.

We can expect more attacks such as this, as he drives the pro-life message home, but his approach has left him open to the charge of intemperate scaremongering, and could prove to be a liability for the No side in the coming campaign.Katherine Zappone's background as a cabinet minister is a world away from that of a conventional Irish politician.

Born in Seattle in the US, she was first elected to the Dail in her early sixties in 2016 as an independent, and she is the first openly lesbian TD, and first lesbian minister.

She was married to a former nun, Ann Louise Gilligan, but sadly her wife died after a brain haemorrhage in the middle of last year.

Zappone has shown that she is no innocent abroad in Leinster House, and her rise to the top in politics has been remarkable, even though she enjoyed some good fortune in getting elected.

Close observers have noted her gentle but shrewd manoeuvring into a position of power.

This week, as Leo Varadkar announced plans to hold a referendum to repeal the Eighth Amendment on abortion, he was flanked by his Health Minister Simon Harris on one side, and Zappone on the other.

Ever since she entered government, Zappone has said an abortion referendum would be a red-line issue for her, but she has been prepared to bide her time in winning support for it.

Early on, she was heavily criticised for not backing a bill proposed by left-wing TDs for an early poll.

Zappone was reported at the time to have told a pro-choice person who emailed her office: "A citizens' assembly... will be the fastest way to achieve our goal as, through its work, it shines a light on the human stories at the heart of this issue.

"This way of building support is tried and tested, and delivered marriage equality.

"As someone who has campaigned tirelessly to repeal the Eighth (Amendment) for 30 years, can I just assure you that my determination remains absolute and that this is an issue which I am working on every day."

It is a strategy that seems to have been successful. Instead of sitting powerless on the opposition benches, she has worked inside the system to achieve some of her goals as an independent.

In recent weeks, however, she showed signs of impatience. Prior to Monday's announcement, she had been pressing her government colleagues for more clarity on the referendum, and delivered a thinly-veiled rebuke to the Taoiseach in the Dail.

Narrow margin

"People across the country are looking to these houses, and to the Dail, to provide leadership on a human-rights issue, where up until now there has been none. This is a time for political courage not political cowardice," she said.

In the coming referendum, her experience as a veteran campaigner will be seen as an asset.

After meeting at Boston College, Zappone and Gilligan moved to Ireland in the 1980s.

She became a prominent figure in the Irish women's movement, as chairwoman of the National Women's Council, a member of the Irish Human Rights Commission and lectured in ethics and theology at Trinity College.

But she really came to public attention when she and her wife challenged the Revenue Commissioners' refusal to acknowledge them as a married couple, in both the High Court (2004) and later the Supreme Court. It was a case that mobilised the gay rights movement and helped to bring about the Marriage Equality Referendum of 2015.

Appointed to the Senate in May 2011 by Enda Kenny on the recommendation of Labour leader Eamon Gilmore, Zappone developed a good relationship with the then Taoiseach.

She squeaked into the Dail in 2016 as an Independent candidate for Dublin South West. She only won by a narrow margin on transfers having been well behind on the first count.

Political observers note how as Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, she has proved quite canny in delivering funding for her department.

Almost as soon as she was appointed, she approached the finance ministers Michael Noonan and Paschal Donohoe looking for childcare subsidies in the budget, and hyped up expectations in the media.

She came away with a subsidy of up to 80 a month for children in creches aged between six months and three years. The scheme has had its teething troubles, with complaints that creches have simply hiked fees, but if she remains in office, Zappone will hope to iron out the difficulties.The clatter of typewriters and a thick plume of tobacco smoke were once the mark of a busy newsroom.

But that is long gone, replaced by a computer-driven age of journalists meeting deadlines in relative silence. Many older hacks miss the buzz, and RTE newsreader Una O'Hagan is no different.

The presenter is to leave the station after 34 years, saying: "The time is right.

"I remember the noise the first day I went into the newsroom. Those big old typewriters with people clattering away, you nearly had to assault them to get anything written, whereas nowadays it's all very quiet. People don't make a sound. The contrast is amazing.

"There was a certain level of craziness that you don't get now. Maybe people are more serious and professional nowadays, but there was a lot of fun to it then. I remember one reporter who if he was bored on a Friday afternoon would stand up on the desk and dance around. You wouldn't get that now.

"I guess I felt that I am 55, I have another few years working so I thought it is now or never. I can not leave the cocoon where I have really enjoyed myself and have had a successful career or I can go out and try something new."

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She says the decision was a long time coming: "It was very gradual. It was a build-up over the last couple of years. I was toying with the idea and it just feels right."

But she adds: "The 'R' word is banned. I am not retiring. I would go out of my mind. And I am sure Colm [her husband and former RTE broadcaster] wouldn't want me under his feet all day. He retired from RTE 10 years ago and has brought out 10 best-selling books since so I don't think he is retired either. I don't think people do it that much anymore. It's just a new phase of life."

Speaking about her future plans, she says she and Colm are writing a book together, but her lips are sealed on the content. "I would have to shoot you if I told you," she quips. "It's due out in September."

O'Hagan says it is easier with another person in the mix. "There was a bit of pull and push at the start so we worked out a modus operandi where we would talk about it beforehand, do a rough draft and then take it in turns to type it up with suggestions from the other. It's organic and it's working very well. We fell into a very amicable pattern. Sometimes you need other ideas and another perspective."

She cites the example of Maeve Binchy and her husband, Gordon Snell. "They were allowed to criticise each other's work for 10 minutes and after that there was no sulking allowed!" she says. "That's a very good rule - you have to be able to give and take."

She's not a fan of the modern style of informal, chatty news: "I am old-fashioned when it comes to news. I like someone to tell me it with no frills. I don't particularly want to hear people's opinions about it. I was always conscious that I was being invited into people's homes and it was a great honour and you have to treat the audience fairly and make the story understandable and fair. I am very grateful to the audience and they have been particularly kind to me - especially when my son Sean died."

The only time O'Hagan's professional veneer almost broke was when she had to read out the names of every victim of the Omagh bombing. "I am becoming teary again even thinking about it," she says. "It was dreadful." Never subjected to the criticism many female presenters come under from the public, she says she appreciates that television is a visual medium. Only once did she feel slightly jarred by a piece of feedback that she received at the height of one of the North's biggest stories. "It was the first time it became clear John Hume was involved in talks with the IRA. I did live interviews all day and when I came out someone said 'your fringe was down a bit' and I remember thinking I have done trojan work over this and all someone is concerned about is my fringe?"

The Dublin woman is looking forward to giving up her drive to Montrose. "I can't wait until I can take off my 5.35am alarm clock on my phone," she says.

As a newscaster, she hosted live programmes on the deaths of former taoisigh Jack Lynch and Garret FitzGerald, the visit of Queen Elizabeth to Ireland in 2011, and the United States presidential election in 2012. She also interviewed Nelson Mandela.

Her last broadcast will be on February 25 and she promises there'll be no bells and whistles. "I will keep it straight," she says. "Remember, I am not the news."A temporary school is to be the first built on the former Harolds Cross Greyhound Stadium following the controversial sale of the grounds to the Department of Education.

The stadium - sold for 23m - was sold to the department for an undisclosed sum following its sudden closure last February.

The Irish Greyhound Board (IGB) closed the facility as it struggled with large debts related to the construction of Limerick Greyhound Stadium.

The sale kicked off a protest in Dublin from some greyhound owners, which saw no greyhound racing in the capitals other racing stadium, Shelbourne Park, for a number of months.

The IGB was forced to answer questions in front of the Dails Public Accounts Committee on the sale and the semi-states financial position.

TDs questioned the value of the site and whether the taxpayer was getting value for money.

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The sale was stalled pending the approval of a change of use zoning application for the land which was approved by Dublin City Councillors last September.

The Department of Education has now invited contractors to bid for the job of building a 12-classroom temporary school on the site.

The school will be made up of pre-fab buildings and the road access and other works will have to be carried out to make it viable as a school site.

Prior to closing the sale of the six-acre site the department said the site would be used for a number of school buildings in order to meet the growing demand for school places in the south Dublin area.

A review was due to be carried out to determine the exact configuration of the schools however that review has not yet been made publicly available.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Education said the acquisition of this site is in the final stages of conveyancing but the school is expected to open in time for the coming school year.

An analysis of the site is "highly suitable for the provision of school accommodation" but a demographic review to determine the make-up of the schools is ongoing.

Meanwhile, the IGB said aspects of the transfer are still being finalised.

"Bord na gCon is working with the Department of Education & Skills to complete all aspects associated with this transfer. Bord na gCon is satisfied that significant progress has and is being made towards concluding the overall transaction," Bord na gCon said in a statement.Bruno Clement's room had a shower in the corner and no windows. Inset, Paul Howard

A TENANT who was unlawfully evicted from his home by businessman Paul Howard has told how he left Ireland because he felt "extremely intimidated".

Bruno Clement (29) described how his belongings were thrown out on the street after eight men forced their way into the apartment and evicted the seven people living there.

The incident happened in January 2016 after the receivers appointed to the apartment wrote to the tenants advising them not to pay any more rent to their landlord, Paul Howard.

Howard demanded that the tenants continue to pay rent cash-in-hand and after they refused, due to written instructions from Cabot Financial, he evicted them from the apartment and refused to return their deposits.

All tenants had to sleep in emergency accommodation and hostels after their "distressing" experience.

Three of the seven lodged complaints to the Residential Tenancies Board and Howard was ordered to pay them a total of 7,694.

None of the tenants, including Mr Clement who is owed 3,260, have received a cent to date.

Mr Clement said he left Ireland shortly after his ordeal.

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He claims Mr Howard called him "numerous" times after he lodged the complaint and said he felt "extremely intimidated".

In texts seen by Independent.ie, Mr Howard said "Enjoy your life...remember what you did and what you did to me... you only have two choices 1. Pay your invoice or 2. walk away now... after your lies..."

"Once he called me and said 'this is what happens when you mess with Paul Howard'", he told Independent.ie.

"I was away at the time when the men forced their way in [to the apartment]. It was really frightening for the others living there. We called the police but there was nothing they could do because it was a civil matter. We originally changed the locks but he [Howard] kept going to the apartment, banging on the door and shouting 'give me my money, give me my money."

Mr Clement said his room was "the crappiest ever", had no windows and there was a shower in the corner of the room.

He moved in on December 1, 2015 and paid 600 rent and a 600 deposit before being removed from the apartment the following month.

"I once asked him could I wire money instead of paying cash and he said no, strictly cash. Sometimes he would get people to go to his launderette business to pay.

"He kept calling me saying I wouldn't get back my deposit. I lost so much valuable stuff after everything that happened. They smashed the door and eight men, like really muscular men, went into each room with flash lights and they put every belonging into bin bags and the two of them went outside on the street. All our belongings were mixed up so I didn't get a lot of them back as I was away at the time.

"I couldn't afford the legal fees to do anything so I just left it, but when I read about everything happening with him this week I had to speak out."

Last week, a man was hospitalised after a group of "up to ten men" forcibly removed tenants from another apartment owned by Paul Howard in Mountjoy Square.

"We were in bed and we heard a load of banging this morning, it was like a sledgehammer banging off something. Then there was a load of commotion and the tenants were all outside in the hallway in their pyjamas after being dragged out," a resident of the building told Independent.ie.

"There were around 10 heavies and they have now locked themselves inside," he added.

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Six tenants had been sharing the apartment in Mountjoy Square.

The High Court issued an injunction before Christmas blocking Paul Howard from evicting the tenants until the termination of the dispute resolution proceedings with the Residential Tenancies Board.

On Wednesday, receiver Ken Fennell secured another interim injunction against Paul Howard and Una McClean, who it's understood are in a relationship, preventing them from interfering with properties in Mountjoy Square, Harold's Cross, and Kilnamanagh, Tallaght.

The order requires the defendants, their agents and all persons with knowledge of the injunction to cease trespassing, not damage, not collect rent from tenants, and hand over possession of the properties to the receiver.

Counsel said that Mr Fennell's representative found a mother and her daughter living in a one roomed shed beside another of Mr Howard's properties.

Counsel said there also had been an attempt by Mr Howard and another person to remove a representative of the receiver from one of the properties.

Mr Howard said "should I even reply" when asked to comment on the above.

He later said: "The story is wrong. At this time we have been advised not to comment."Alan White, former husband of Irene White pictured outside the court after the trial of Anthony Lambe concluded. Photo: Gerry Mooney

THE husband of murdered Irene White has insisted he is an innocent man, but would not be "surprised" if he is arrested by gardai in the near future.

Businessman Alan White was speaking after a life sentence was handed down to Anthony Lambe (34), a history student who claimed he was paid to murder the mother-of-three in the kitchen of her home in Louth in 2005.

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Speaking to the Sunday World, Mr White said he not hire Lambe: "I didn't even know the f**king chap".

Ms White (43) was stabbed 34 times and had her throat cut as she was disturbed while doing the dishes in the kitchen of her home, in Dundalk, Co Louth, on the morning of April 6, 2005. Her body was discovered by her mother. There was no sign of forced entry and nothing was taken.

Lambe was eventually tracked down last year after the Garda's Serious Crime Review Team looked into the original investigation. He has been jailed for life after admitting he killed Ms White for cash.

Her former husband has insisted he wasn't involved in her death, nor was he part of an alleged group including Lambe who conspired to kill Ms White.

But he said he would not be surprised if he was arrested by investigating gardai for a second time.

"Nothing would surprise me anymore. In a way I wish they would because I might get some answers," Mr White told the Sunday World.

Lambe came on the Garda's radar after the cold-case review was launched in 2011. A woman in Australia contacted a confidential telephone line to say he had confessed the murder to her. It took four more years before gardai identified the woman and travelled to Australia to formally interview her.

According to sources familiar with the investigation, Lambe was shocked when he was arrested in his home town of Castleblaney, Co Monaghan, last January as he never expected to be caught. He was then a Phd student with a special interest in archaeology.

He confessed at the outset, telling gardai that he was "paid" to kill Ms White, a woman he never knew, and that he was given the layout of her house.

Lambe claimed he was in a "very bad place" at the time, on drugs and in debt.

He took a cocktail of ecstasy, cocaine and alcohol before going to Ms White's house. He said that after he attacked her, he said a prayer over her body and then jumped over the back wall of the house and ran. He was promised 10,000 but was paid less than half of that, sources said.EUROSCEPTIC: Former UKIP leader Nigel Farage speaking at the Irexit, Free to Prosper conference in RDS. Photo: Frank McGrath

Leading Brexiteer Nigel Farage has said he doesn't think Ireland is pro-EU, claiming that the country has been "humiliated" by Europe.

He made the remarks at the Irexit, Free to Prosper conference in Dublin where the controversial former UKIP leader sought to encourage debate on Ireland following the UK in leaving the European Union.

Fianna Fail's Brexit spokesman Stephen Donnelly last night criticised the conference, saying: "The empty rhetoric on Irexit is similar to the nonsense sold to the British people in 2016."

And Junior Finance Minister Michael D'Arcy dismissed Mr Farage's questioning of the benefits of EU membership to Ireland, arguing that many of the British politician's opinions are from a "very one-sided, biased, non-objective view about the European Union".

The event in Dublin's RDS was organised by Mr Farage's Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy Group and saw hundreds of people attend to hear speakers such as journalist John Waters and columnist Cormac Lucey.

During his keynote address, Mr Farage brought up austerity after the economic crash and the financial bailout by the European Commission, European Central Bank and IMF, known as the Troika.

"What on earth is going on in the politics of this country?

"How much more humiliated can the Irish nation be than for years being run by the Troika?" the MEP asked.

He also raised how Ireland has now become a net contributor to the EU Budget. He told the audience: "You are paying into the European budget and your Taoiseach said in Strasbourg the other week he is happy for Ireland to pay even more into the European budget.

"Are you pleased about that?"

Mr Varadkar said he was "open" to contributing more for things which advance the "European ideal" such as structural funds for Central and Eastern Europe. He has also spoken of how he believes the EU Budget needs to be well-funded, in part to protect the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

Mr Farage addressed what he views as the perception in European media that Ireland is very pro-European.

He said: "I don't think Ireland is a pro-EU country, I think the political, media and big businesses in Dublin, they are the ones."

He also argued that the euro currency has been "bad for Ireland but a total catastrophe for countries like Greece".

Mr Farage railed against the depiction of Brexiteers as xenophobes and bigots.

He said: "They go for the man and not for the ball." Mr Farage got a standing ovation for his speech.

People seeking tickets for the event online were required to confirm they agreed to terms and conditions that stated that the conference was "only open to supporters of an Irish Exit from the European Union".

The terms also said: "Unwelcome interjections from the audience may result in removal from the event." Mr Farage was challenged on this by RTE Radio's Marian Finucane.

He denied that people who disagreed with him weren't welcome at the event and added: "People who disagree but are coming along peaceably to listen to what's got to be said, of course that's fine."The investigation and prosecution of Ian Bailey (60) over the death of Sophie Toscan du Plantier is set to cost France more than 3m.

The revelation came as the Manchester-born freelance journalist now has only a single avenue of appeal left to block French plans to stage a Paris trial over the death of the mother of one almost 22 years ago.

The French film executive was found battered to death on a laneway leading to her isolated holiday home at Toormore outside Schull on December 23, 1996.

No one has ever been charged with her death in Ireland, despite one of the biggest Garda murder investigations in history.

Mr Bailey, who moved to Ireland in 1991, was twice arrested by gardai for questioning. He was released without charge on both occasions in 1997 and 1998.

Since then, Mr Bailey has insisted that "sinister attempts" were made to frame him for the crime.

He has vigorously protested his innocence and sued eight Irish and British newspapers for defamation in 2003 over their coverage of the murder. The journalist has also sued the State for wrongful arrest.

Mr Bailey insisted that, despite the Chamber d'Instruction last Thursday rejecting his appeal against being charged and prosecuted, he intends to fight on.

"I believe this will all only end with my death," he warned. "Or, the second alternative is if the French convict me of murder in my absence at a Paris trial."

Mr Bailey also said he discovered in February 2013 that a letter was on file in the Department of Justice which afforded him the opportunity to offer his evidence directly to the French magistrate and police. However, he was never facilitated in telling his story directly to the French.

"There was one document in particular which jumped out at me when I went through it [the file]," he said.

"It was dated February 2013 where the French authorities had written to the Department of Justice informing them that I had the right of being interviewed by them and putting my side... the French authorities asked the Department to write to me to help set up this meeting.

"That letter was never written. Why wasn't I afforded my constitutional right?"

The three-judge Chamber d'Instruction ruled that there were "sufficient grounds" for Mr Bailey to face a prosecution in France. The ruling can now be challenged to France's highest appeal court, the Cour de Cassation.

French prosecutors privately anticipate that such an appeal will be lodged. Defence legal counsel Dominique Tricaud admitted that the ruling of the Chamber d'Instruction had been expected with a widely held belief that a trial in absentia was always likely to be sanctioned.

The French failed in a 2012 bid to have Mr Bailey extradited with the Supreme Court rejecting the application.

A fresh European Arrest Warrant (EAW) was issued two years ago. Mr Tricaud said he will now be consulting with his client over any potential appeal. Such an appeal, if it happens, will likely taken between six and nine months to resolve.

Mr Bailey's Irish solicitor, Frank Buttimer, described what was happening in France as "farcical".Irelands first direct ferry route to Spain. A 150m Irish Ferries ship heralding a new era in ferry travel. Four stonking, 1,000-passenger Stena Line vessels under construction at a cost of hundreds of millions in China.

Not to mention business class, free Wi-Fi, Nordic spas and pet-cams...

It begs the question  are ferries sexy again?

People are looking at easier, stress-free ways of travelling, says Dermot Merrigan, Head of Passenger Sales at Irish Ferries, where car traffic is up 10pc in three years. They see that, hey, ferries are really coming along.

Ferry travel has got its cool back, adds Diane Poole, of Stena Line.

People are frustrated with airline baggage allowances and airport security. They realise ferries are exciting, that they are comfortable and relaxing.

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Surprised? If youre old enough to remember basic ships with yuck food and flickering TVs, you may be. Stena, Irish Ferries and Brittany Ferries have invested hugely in recent years, however  from restaurants to kids play areas, Wi-Fi and shopping.

Theyre not cruise ships, but the term cruise-ferry is increasingly justified.

New arrivals are coming thick and fast. Irish Ferries is investing 150m in the largest and most luxurious ferry ever to sail on the Irish Sea  a 1,885-passenger ship (pictured above) that will facilitate daily crossings between Ireland and France. Some 100,000 public votes were cast in a competition to name it, though sadly, Ferry McFerryFace missed the cut  the W.B. Yeats arrives in July.

In addition, Germanys Flensburg shipyard, where the W.B. Yeats is being completed, will shortly commence work on a second, even larger ship for delivery to Irish Ferries parent, Irish Continental plc, in 2020. With 5.6km of lanes, it will be the worlds largest cruise ferry for car capacity.

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Spain is on the radar, too. This April, Brittany Ferries launches the first direct ferry crossing from Ireland  a Cork to Santander route running through November (the no-frills service will take 26 hours). Brittany will also add an extra weekly return service to its Cork-Roscoff route.

In truth, ferries never went away. Like a certain US President, Ryanair has a habit of sucking the oxygen out of the room when it comes to media travel coverage, but ferries offer major connectivity to the UK and Europe  for holidaymakers, business and freight.

They can still suffer from stereotypes  some more dogged than others. But theyve generally gone beyond the quick sandwich in a plastic bucket seat, as Dermot Merrigan puts it.

Irish Ferries, for example, voted Irelands favourite cruise or ferry experience in our Reader Travel Awards 2018, was described by readers as a game-changer. Sea travelling is something you now look forward to, rather than dread.

Investments in Wi-Fi, food, customer alerts and pet-friendly travel have been noted. Brittany Ferries has refurbed its Pont-Aven. Stena Horizon is installing heated kennels for pets on its Rosslare to France route, and the W.B Yeats will include a shopping mall and luxury suites with private balconies.

Ferry travel today is transformed compared to a decade ago, according to Emma Batchelor, Director of industry group Discover Ferries. In the next four years, the scale of this investment will see another step change in service for travellers.

Whats next? Getting the message out.

For years, ferry travel had an old feel about it, Diane Poole says. Were trying to change that, to attract younger customers... to make people feel like the minute theyre on board, theyre on holidays.

Guys, come back on ferries, she enthuses. You will be wholly surprised at what you see.

Read more:Premium

Colm McCarthy Opinion UK is not alone in its Covid failures

New cases, hospitalisations and deaths from the virus have all risen somewhat in the UK over the last week. Given the rapid roll-out of vaccination, the best in Europe, this should not have been happening. The reason seems to be the so-called Indian variant, more infectious and more widespread in Britain, and some experts are worried the government may be forced to pause, or even reverse, the lifting of restrictions.Premium

Eoghan Harris Opinion Misery media fails to give due credit to the Taoiseach

Taoiseach Micheal Martin must drive his advisers mad. Unlike Leo Varadkar or Donald Trump, he never bigs up success stories such as the effect of Level 3 Plus on Covid or his visionary Shared Island project. Last Friday, Tony Holohan and RTE cheerleaders seemed to imply Level 5 was responsible for the improved Covid situation. Not so.Premium

Gene Kerrigan Opinion The penny is finally dropping for the Profits before People alliance

There was a time when the Irish had no problem with building stuff. We were so good at it that we sent generations of our offspring to help the British and the Americans build their cities. Now we have a crisis  we havent enough dwellings for our people to lay down their heads in at the end of the day.There may seem little to connect the political events of last week, but when you look closer at the State of the Union address in the US, the abortion debate here and the discussion around the future of rural Ireland, as represented by the shambles that is broadband roll-out, there is a common issue that has still not been settled, a divide that is, if anything, growing to a more dangerous level.

Generally speaking, that common issue relates to the future and past, what should be embraced and discarded and whether competing factions created by social discord can ever again rally, as before, to a widely unifying cause or political way forward.

More so than President Trump's address, people here, I imagine, were interested in the Democrats' official response delivered by the scion of the Kennedy dynasty, Joseph Kennedy III, grandson of Bobby and grandnephew of John and Ted.

Congressman Kennedy, aged 37, was chosen by the Democrats' hierarchy to deliver what is usually an immediately forgettable task. The decision to choose Kennedy, however, did give us an insight into the flailing Democrats' thinking.

By many accounts, the red-haired, square-jawed Kennedy is a sensible man. He will not be the Democrats' candidate to challenge Trump next time, however. Potential candidates do not get to respond to the State of the Union, as it would confer on them an unfair advantage over rivals. But Kennedy would seem to be in the frame as a future candidate - the Democrats' way forward, as it were.

In his speech he pressed all the right buttons, in shirt sleeves in front of an old Ford Mustang, hood up, that told of old manufacturing industry, but without going into detail or rising to the rhetorical heights of his forbears. He is clearly in the liberal tradition of the Kennedy clan, though, and of the Democrats, which in itself is no bad thing.

That said, he is male, white, wealthy and privileged and of the Establishment. So, in the US, his background and status has already identified him, and given rise to questions as to whether such a person should really represent the future of the Democrats.

The argument against asks whether the Democrats should be bothered at all to attract the support again of blue-collar white men who rallied to Trump's discordant call, or whether they should concentrate instead on building a base predominantly comprising African Americans, Latinos, members of the LGBTQ community and women of all classes who are struggling for equality and justice. In other words, the Democrats are still racked by the competing factions who unintentionally delivered us Trump in the first place.

A similar theme underlays, but for the most part is unstated, in the abortion debate here.

Supporters of Repeal the Eighth have been loud, even aggressive, and as a result successful in getting the abortion issue, and other ''liberal'' causes on the agenda here; more successful than conservatives, and successful also in cowing the middle ground, where I unashamedly stand.

After decades, indeed centuries, on the back foot, so-called progressives would seem to have little time for anybody they presume to be standing in their way now that their agenda is on an ever-forward march.

That way can lead to a comeuppance, however, as Hillary Clinton discovered to her cost.

So when Danny Healy-Rae, on RTE, and Willie O'Dea, on TV3, spoke last week in defence of a legitimately held belief that the constitution should retain some form of protection of the unborn, they were insidiously dismissed as rural Ireland backwoodsmen.

This throwing of the progressive eye heavenwards, or speaking through a gritted teeth smile - body language and words - betrays an irritating, not to say smug, attitude, in that it indicates a general dismissal of the metaphorical rural Ireland, its traditions, beliefs and concerns.

Now that the Catholic Church has been ''defeated'', it seems that the march of the progressive agenda has placed rural Ireland in its crosshairs.

Consequently, that Ireland is dismissed as behind the times, in much the same way as Hillary Clinton took for granted, or dismissed, the blue-collar, mostly male, working class who abandoned her assumptions for the likes of Donald Trump.

The Foreign Affairs Minister, Simon Coveney, is the latest to come in for such criticism for giving a voice to the concerns of the middle ground, however belatedly and ill thought out.

The Repeal the Eighth campaign would do well to take note, however, that those concerns are neither predominantly rural-based nor dominated by any social class; or to put it another way, proportionally there are as many in Dublin 4 as in Killorglin, Co Kerry concerned for the protection of the unborn.

Those concerns need to be addressed, face on, with science and facts, and not dismissed in frustration bordering on contempt.

Instead, rural Ireland is demonised as regressive for holding the seemingly outrageous view that the unborn should have some form of protection in law.

This takes us to the issue of the roll-out of rural broadband, which received another blow last week and caused a bit of ''jump up and down'' but not much more, as has been the case for almost 20 years.

The national broadband plan has been in the pipeline since 2012, although talked about for a decade before; but it will be 2023, at the earliest, before rural Ireland is connected - or at least that was the plan before Eir withdrew from the contest last week.

As an issue, the connectivity of rural or the ''other'' Ireland if you prefer, will fade from the limelight in weeks, lost in the red mists of an abortion referendum. These days, there is always something more pressing than the traditions, beliefs and concerns of rural Ireland.

The Democrats in the US made the same mistake: they took the rednecks for granted until the rednecks struck back. Rural Ireland's backwoodsmen, and women, may similarly upend the onward march of progressive Ireland if left unattended to.

And that really would be a pity because minorities, the LGBT community and women of all classes have waited long enough - too long. It seems lost on them, however, that the causes, or struggles, of rural Ireland, which have been exacerbated since the crash, are also to do with justice and equality, and, as such, should be the causes of us all, and not just a cause for insidious ridicule and discontent.It's exactly two years ago since Enda Kenny called the General Election and set off to tell the country he would "Keep The Recovery Going".

The Mayo man travelled the length and breath of Ireland - but his message was all wrong for those who live beyond the M50.

So what has changed in the time since? Well, the recovery has indeed worked its way past the Red Cow Roundabout.

Without exception, unemployment is down in every county. Dairy farm incomes hit a phenomenal average record high of more than 90,000 last year. And a weekend trip to Galway or Tullamore will leave you in no doubt that people are spending again.

But that's not enough - because for all the improvements outside of Dublin, it's still far from boom time.

Basic services are not up to scratch, long commutes have become the norm and family life is not what it was.

Another thing that has changed since February 2016 is the Taoiseach. Gone is the west of Ireland lilt, replaced by what some see as a "posh boy" from Castleknock.

That perception in itself is enough of a reason for Leo Varadkar to pay extra attention to what happens beyond the pale - and his TDs know it.

For several weeks now, a "rural uprising" has been brewing in Fine Gael. Ministers and TDs are deeply worried about the forthcoming National Planning Framework (NPF) and have not been shy about letting "D4 Minister" Eoghan Murphy know.

The Taoiseach has been warned by some of his senior colleagues that the plan, which sets out the vision for Ireland up to 2040, is not to be launched in Dublin by himself, Mr Murphy and Paschal Donohoe.

Sources say Rural Affairs Minister Michael Ring and Business Minister Heather Humphreys are not happy.

And a recent meeting, Fine Gael TDs and senators heard gripes from junior ministers Patrick O'Donovan, Sean Kyne, Andrew Doyle and David Stanton along with party chairman Martin Heydon and a long list of backbenchers.

Sources say that behind the scenes there have been some pretty abrasive rows.

The shortlist of problems included the idea that Shane Ross cares more about buying buses for Dublin than rural roads and Brexit will crucify the agri-food sector.

The withdrawal of Eir from the process aimed at bringing high-speed broadband down every laneway has sent shockwaves through ranks.

"It's a massive problem. Simon Coveney called it an 'emotive issue'. It's not only that it's an election issue that will cost us dearly," said one TD. Beyond that, the fears run deep. TDs are concerned that one-off housing is becoming a thing of the past.

Just 192 primary schools have access to ultra-fast broadband and most of them are in Dublin. Almost 100 schools have no high-speed internet at all. And there is the perennial problem of rural post offices and garda stations.

Fine Gael TDs want the Taoiseach to understand that modern-day problems aren't just defined by owning a negative equity apartment in a city suburb or having to deal with traffic congestion.

They won't have been overly encouraged by his contribution to the Seanad last week when he warned that more post offices and garda stations would close.

He said: "The number of post offices is going down everywhere, including in the cities, because people now have bank cards and use the internet... The number of post offices will go down in rural and urban Ireland and the number of garda stations will go down as well, because the garda stations were built before there were garda cars."

Varadkar did make a valid point that if we judge the success of rural Ireland based on post offices and garda stations, "we're making an enormous mistake".

But that's why the soon-to-be-published NPF is such a big moment for him and the party.

By 2040, the population will have grown by another million people. We'll need at least an extra 600,000 jobs and half-a-million additional homes. It is even suggested in the plan that half the jobs people will work in by then may not even exist today.

The number of people over 65 will more than double and we are likely to be facing increased climate pressures. The challenges are huge - which means there is little room for error.

The report sets out how the Government should target to have 50pc of overall national growth spread between Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway and Waterford.

That focus on the cities has scared TDs to the point that it's understood Mr Murphy's officials have been doing a massive redesign to ensure the document is seen to equally prioritise rural towns.

They are trying to balance how best to protect an economy with how best to ensure a decent quality of life outside or urban centres.

The existing draft has a foreword from Mr Ring in which he says it "reflects rural Ireland and our regions as key elements in the development of our country for the next two decades and beyond".

That's a statement he needs to be able to stand over when Eamon O Cuiv, Alan Kelly, Eoin O Broin and Michael Fitzmaurice come after him in the next few weeks.

Already, Mr Kelly says the NPF is "singularly the most important document for the future of the county" - but added that the North West "might as well be somewhere in outer space".

"This document will kill rural Ireland," he claims.

Tomorrow, the Cabinet will meet to "politically proof" the NPF. Based on it, Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe will then sign-off on a 10-year capital plan that see investment spread to every part of the country.

There will be no pleasing all of the people - but they must try to stop the narrative of a country versus city divide.

Otherwise, there's a rebellion coming over the hill.Voters in Cyprus are heading to the polls to choose between a conservative incumbent and a left-leaning independent in a presidential run-off.

It is the second time that President Nicos Anastasiades has faced off against independent Stavros Malas in a run-off.

Earlier polls have shown Mr Anastasiades beating Mr Malas, but the independents strong showing in the first round of voting could make it a closer race.

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Mr Anastasiades, 71, says Cyprus needs more of his experienced leadership to stay the course and not to repeat policies that set the economy on a downward spiral.

Mr Malas, a 50-year-old backed by the communist-rooted AKEL party, says change is needed to raise islanders standard of living.

A key variable is what voters who supported neither candidate in the first round will do.

More than a third of first-round votes went to candidates other than Mr Anastasiades and Mr Malas  and nearly 28% of the eligible 551,000 voters did not vote at all.

Many of those votes in the first round went to centre-right DIKO party leader Nicholas Papadopoulos.

Mr Papadopoulos has taken a tougher stance on reunification talks with breakaway Turkish Cypriots, accusing both Mr Anastasiades and Mr Malas of a willingness to make too many concessions.

DIKO and smaller parties who supported Mr Papadopoulos candidacy decided not to endorse either run-off candidate.

Our country still faces problems and whats needed is the cooperation of us all, Mr Anastasiades said after voting on Sunday.

Irrespective of who will be the winner tonight, tomorrow must be a day for everyone, by everyone.

Casting his ballot, Mr Malas appealed to young people, women and low-wage workers still feeling the sting from a financial crisis that nearly bankrupted the country five years ago.

We want to build bridges between state institutions and citizens. And the best way to do so is to always speak the truth, truth, truth and not lies, said Mr Malas.

Cyprus was split into an internationally recognised Greek Cypriot south and a breakaway Turkish Cypriot north in 1974 when Turkey invaded after a coup by supporters of union with Greece.Turkey has said eight of its troops were killed in Ankaras military operation against a Syrian Kurdish militia, the deadliest day in the two-week-old offensive in the enclave of Afrin.

In a statement late on Saturday, the Turkish military said five soldiers were killed after their tank in Syria came under attack near Afrin. The soldiers could not be saved despite all attempts, it said.

Earlier in the day, three Turkish soldiers were reported killed in the Afrin offensive  one was killed in the area of the tank attack, another in northern Syria and the third on the Turkish side of the border in what Ankara said was an attack by Syrian Kurdish militiamen.

The total death toll for Turkish troops since the operation, codenamed Olive Branch, started on January 20 now stands at 13.

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Turkey launched the incursion into Afrin to rout the US-backed Syrian Kurdish militia, known as the Peoples Protection Units (YPG), which it considers to be a terrorist organisation and an extension of Kurdish insurgents fighting within Turkey.

From Istanbul, Turkish presidential spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said Turkey will not tolerate the presence of the YPG anywhere along its southern border, hinting that Ankara might expand the Afrin operation eastward.

Turkeys first demand is to see the YPG move east of the Euphrates River and leave the town of Manbij, where American troops backing the Syrian Kurdish fighters are stationed, Mr Kalin said.

He called on the United States to disengage from the YPG and said Turkey will continue communications with our American allies to avoid any confrontation.

Turkey shares a 911km border with Syria. The YPG controls much of the territory along the border and an uninterrupted strip from Manbij to the Iraqi border.

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Meanwhile, in the embattled northwestern province of Idlib, al Qaida-linked militants said they downed a Russian fighter jet and killed its pilot after he ejected from the plane and landed on the ground.

The pilot resisted being captured and fired at the militants who then shot and killed him, according to one of the militants and Syrian monitors.

The Russian Defence Ministry confirmed the downing of the Su-25 and said the pilot was killed in fighting with terrorists. A report on the ministrys Zvezda TV said preliminary information indicated the plane was shot by a portable ground-to-air missile in an area under control of al Qaidas branch in Syria.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the plane was downed near the rebel-held town of Saraqeb, which Syrian troops have been trying to take under the cover of Russian airstrikes.

Russia is a key ally of President Bashar Assad, and has been waging a military campaign on behalf of his forces since 2015. Since then, Syrian troops have captured wide parts of the country and in recent weeks have been making advances in Idlib. The province is also a base for al Qaidas branch in Syria and other Islamic groups.

Also Saturday, Syrias Foreign Ministry has dismissed as null and void U.S. accusations that Assads government is producing and using new kinds of weapons to deliver deadly chemicals despite committing to abolish its program in 2013.

The American statements are nothing more than lies based on accounts of what the Trump administration called its partners on ground, the ministry said. It also said reports by Western-backed media outlets about Damascus using chemical weapons were a new version of U.S. and Western desperate intentions to create an excuses to attack Syria.

President Donald Trump has not ruled out additional military action to deter attacks or punish Assad, administration officials said earlier this week, although they did not suggest any action was imminent.DARK PAST: This picture taken just after the liberation of Oswiecim (Auschwitz) by the Soviet army in January 1945 shows children wearing concentration camp uniforms behind barbed wire fencing in the Nazi concentration camp. Polands Senate has waded into the most dangerous territory of all, the legislation of memory. Photo: AP

My friend Roman Halter was a hardy character. He detested bulls**t and was never afraid to call it out when he heard it, no matter how high or mighty his interlocutor. The first time I met him he was in a furious argument with a Rabbi. I forget now the root of the dispute but Roman was unrelenting. He knew his truth and held fast. Against his relentless marshalling of uncomfortable facts the Rabbi was rendered helpless.

Surviving the Lodz ghetto, the concentration camps of Auschwitz and Stutthof, the bombing of Dresden and the forced march by the SS in the dying days of the war, required a certain amount of luck, great physical and mental strength and immense courage. Roman had all of these qualities in abundance. He was a strapping 14-year-old when he was sent into the ghetto along with his family. Roman alone survived the war and came to England with a group of other Jewish survivors, the "Boys" who settled into their new country and made successful lives. They were refugees, speaking a foreign language, traumatised by war and landing on an alien shore. Behind them lay a devastated Europe that was already being divided between east and west, between the hopeful vision of democracy, economic unity and respect for human rights, and the tyranny of Soviet imperialism behind the Iron Curtain.

Nearly two decades after the fall of communism, and 60 years after the defeat of the Nazis, I went with Roman back to his old homeplace in Poland. It occupied a place in his memory that was still burnished with the glow of long ago summers. In the fields around Chodecz they gathered strawberries in June and mushrooms in September.

A small town, in the west of Poland, Chodecz was not a remote Shtetl in which the Jews lived in a confined, self-contained world, but a place where they were integrated into the local community and where, despite the growing drumbeats of hatred from neighbouring Germany, and the simmering anti-Semitism in the Polish body politic, they felt secure. The Halters spoke Russian, German and Polish, as well as Yiddish, the mother tongue of Roman's grandmother. In later life, Roman would sometimes speak angrily about his father's failure to remove the family to safety before the Nazis arrived. But Max Halter could not comprehend the exterminatory horror that was about to descend. Who could imagine then a plan to wipe an entire people from the face of the earth?

But history is full of the unimaginable come true. We would do well to remember this in our own times. Nothing is impossible. Nothing that has happened cannot come again. In a different guise perhaps, according to different plans and by the means of different masters. But the logic of exterminatory hatred pollutes our planet still.

Returning to Chodecz with Roman was a bitter sweet affair. He took me to the lake where his mother taught him to swim, the same lake where he watched an SS officer shoot a friend of his. And we went to his old home and knocked on the door to be met with suspicion and rejection. It was occupied now by a policeman and his family and they feared that Roman had come back to claim the property. He was a ghost from a past they did not know but which might upend their lives. Afterwards, Roman was angry and distant, one of those rare times when his energy sapped away and his equanimity vanished.

The other was when - during the making of a film about his life - I played him a recording of Hitler's infamous speech in the Reichstag in January, 1940: "Today I will once more be a prophet. If the international Jewish financiers in and outside Europe should succeed in plunging nations once more into a world war, then the result will not be the Bolshevisation of the earth and this the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe."

Roman flinched, then swore: "Bastards and criminals."

I thought of our visit to Poland on the recent Holocaust Memorial Day - January 27 - and of how when Roman tried to go back in the immediate aftermath of the war he discovered that Jews were no longer welcome in Chodecz. Of the 800 Jews who lived there before the war, only four survived and none of these ever went back to settle.

Poland suffered terribly under Nazi occupation. An estimated two million Poles - apart from the Jewish Poles who were killed - died under German rule. Unlike Vichy France there was no official regime of cooperation. Many Poles risked their own lives to protect and hide Jews.

But there were also numerous instances of Polish collaboration in the Holocaust and attacks by Poles against their Jewish neighbours. The notorious massacre at Jedwabne in 1941 in which an estimated 1,600 Jews were murdered by their Polish neighbours is a case in point.

It is that haunting legacy which now troubles Poland so much that the ruling Law and Justice Party is seeking to ban any assertion that the Polish nation is "responsible or co-responsible for Nazi crimes committed by the Third Reich". With big boots, the government has waded into the most dangerous territory of all - the legislation of memory. The fear is that the prosecutors will go after those who have courageously exposed the complicity of some Poles in atrocious acts of murder during the Holocaust.

As we know on our own island, the past deserves a rigorous investigation by open minds, a willingness to explore the nuances and moral challenges of life lived in a state of absolute terror, above all, the courage to look at the cold facts and not seek to either deny outright or twist into a more palatable narrative. The Polish legislation is being pushed by a populist right-wing Government but it is part of a wider international trend that infects left and right and seeks to re-frame the past in order to advance the political ambitions of the present.

The greatest crisis of our age is not the threat of nuclear weapons or even climate change - terrifying as they both are - but the steady retreat from rationality, the idea that truth is what the powerful legislate it to be; it is felt in the repetition of lies that are believed and regurgitated by partisan masses, in the contempt for the enlightenment values of rational inquiry and discourse.

Throughout history, humankind has shown an exceptional ability to create necessary fictions that bolster the origin myths of nations and peoples.

Despite all the suffering caused by this, we have not learned yet that in ignoring the darker claims of the past, we risk no end of trouble. Little wonder that intolerance according to race, religion and creed are on the rise everywhere.They say change happens at the speed of trust. And before he has officially assumed control as king, the young Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman - known colloquially as MBS - has hitched his future to a considerable reform agenda.

He's asked Saudi Arabians to trust they'll all benefit from the changes he's making, through liberalising the oil-reliant economy and allowing society to move, albeit slowly, with the times.

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There is an argument to be cynical and a case to welcome the changes he's headlined so far.

When Bashar al-Assad took over from his father Hafez as president of Syria he promised to grant greater freedoms and more openness. Disappointingly for hopeful Syrians, none was forthcoming.

And so in 2011, the Syrian uprising began. It was primarily about pushing the government to deal with income inequality, basic human rights and the justice system.

Perhaps the carnage today could have been avoided if Bashar al-Assad, who'd been living the good life in London with his wife Asma, had agreed that a small trade-off was quite easily attainable. Especially when his young, educated citizenry could see what they were missing out on.

In an interview with Vogue circa 2011, Asma had said she wanted to give Syria "brand-essence".

On the face of it, MBS's new social contract, officially titled 'Vision for 2030', recognises that among the 32 million Saudis, 70pc are younger than 30.

They are some of the most avid users of social media and recognise the contrasts between their lives and those of their peers living elsewhere.

There have long been calls to address social and economic inequalities in Saudi Arabia.

Now appears to be the right time, given that unemployment is 12pc and growing - unusually high for an oil-rich state.

But how does one make fundamental changes deemed fast enough for a frustrated population, credible to the outside world, and acceptable to a community that pursues some of the strictest interpretations of Islam?

Last September MBS issued a decree allowing women to drive.

It seemed like a minor concession motivated by the need to draw more women into economic activity at a time of sluggishness and rising poverty.

But to the Saudi women who've sacrificed their careers, suffered abuse and been imprisoned for their fight, it was a triumph.

The car is a "symbol for women to express their need for jobs, transportation, independence", said Madeha Al-Ajroush who led the first protests for women to drive in 1990.

"I was really scared when we decided to drive back then. There were 47 women with 14 cars. We drove in front of a supermarket that had a big parking lot and through to King Abdulaziz Street.

"We also decided to drive between prayers so we didn't face men coming back from the mosque. But we wanted to be caught by the police."

Afterwards, the group was castigated by most mosques. "They called us bad, evil women and prostitutes," says Al-Ajroush.

"Women who were working in schools were fired from their jobs; and to this day they can never get promoted.

"I was a photographer back then and the officials came and took all my negatives and burned them; it was 15 years' work.

"If burning my photography was the price I had to pay, then that was fine. I was grateful for that because I summoned up all my energy and went out and photographed again and again."

She had a supportive, "liberal" husband. "We were young and had the energy to fight the backlash."

She did it again in 2013. "I was detained and my name went in to Twitter. Immediately I lost my job as a consultant psychologist," she tells the Sunday Independent in her living room at her home in Riyadh.

Another chief social reform by the kingdom is the curtailment of the authority of the religious police or 'Hai'a', formally called the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue.

For a long time they've had free rein to humiliate and punish any woman or man deemed to be acting 'un-Islamically'.

Their heavy-handedness has led to severe punishments like flogging and even death.

Execution is by be-heading in Saudi Arabia, and it conjures up the type of barbarity associated with groups like Isil. "The West has a fascination of how we execute people," says Al-Ajroush.

"Killing a human being is killing a human being, but Westerners are obsessed with the Saudi policy of cutting off heads, even though it's been proven once you cut off their heads there's no more pain; it's more ethical.

"I'm not in favour of cutting people's heads off, but the US does similar and worse," she adds, referring to America's capital punishment system which is frequently condemned as cruel and unnecessary.

The guardianship system remains in place, although it too has been dramatically diminished.

Guardianship "treats a woman as a child", says Al-Ajroush. "She can't leave the country, the house, can't work or even be operated on in times of emergency unless the guardian gives permission."

The first guardian is always the father, then the brother if the father passes away. "After that it is her husband but if her husband passes away, it will fall to her son," adds Al-Ajroush. "So you're talking about the child that she's raising, he could be her guardian at age 12.

"The contradiction was appalling. Women had to be prisoners in their own confinement. When the 'Vision for 2030' came in there was a strategy to eventually phase it out."

"It is slow, but for people who want to have a secular democracy what they don't understand is that they're asking for a war," says Saudi-born analyst Aimen Dean.

Saudi Arabia is a cross between "conservatives who are deeply religious and moderates who are moving towards the 21st Century at a fast pace, and tribalists who are fundamentalist under tribal convictions", he adds.

A sudden jolt toward democracy would bring the rise of "a federation of warring parties coming to power" which would divide the kingdom, he tells the Sunday Independent.

"Democracy is a culture; people need to be ready for it and Saudi Arabia is not ready.

"Anyone who is demanding democracy now is demanding civil war in Saudi Arabia."

Not to mention Saudi is suffering from a high percentage of young people associated with and supportive of groups like Isil and Al-Qa'ida and others.

The number of Saudis that left to fight with Isil is around 5,000, or 145 per million of the country's population.

"Making it so liberal so quickly could be counterproductive and put the security of the kingdom in jeopardy," adds Dean.

The reforms "are not a facade" but the crown prince has to tread carefully, he says.

Moreover, MBS's new agenda is not about promoting Western democracy. "We are modernising not Westernising," a senior minister tells the Sunday Independent. "The laws will be based on Islam; that is our religion."

Although in most Muslim-majority or Islamic countries women dress conservatively - either in a headscarf or a niqab (a full face covering with a slit for the eyes) - in Saudi Arabia it is mandatory for all women to wear an abaya, a long-sleeved flowing overdress that covers the ankles.

They must wear a headscarf too, although foreign women don't have to cover their heads. Nonetheless most women in Riyadh go a step further and cover their face; some in fact cover their eyes with a scarf as well, rendering them at a huge disadvantage with limited sight.

"Women are told that if you don't cover up you're basically going to hell," says Al-Ajroush.

"When a woman tells me 'it's my choice' I have a hard time dealing with it mainly because she was still told through the interpretation of religion what she needed to wear. And she believes it because I know she wants to be a good Muslim and she wants to go to heaven but these are the things she was told by a male interpretation."

However, in European countries like France that ban the niqab, she says this is not based on any support for the women in question but on "racism and oppression".

"The Muslim woman is attacked from everywhere," she says.

"You can't use the language that I use about women in Riyadh as the women in the West because they use Muslim women to prove a point about their own prejudices about Islam."

Government staff and ministers are genuinely immensely enthusiastic about Vision for 2030.

"We are sick of the West accusing us of treating people harshly and stereotyping Saudi Arabia," the senior government minister - who doesn't wish to be directly quoted - tells me from the top floor of his ministry.

"The women know how to drive already; they should have been allowed years ago but it wouldn't have happened without this great leader.

"We are opening theatres and letting people watch movies, it's really something. We are now going to fund some of these movies too.

"We want to unlock culture and art in Saudi Arabia, but the West won't see it for what it is.

"Look around, it's Thursday night, it's our weekend and we are sitting here planning how to implement all of these new measures.

"We are doing it for Saudis so that we can all take advantage of the country we have," he says sitting at his desk at 10pm with three senior staff, two of whom are women.

MBS is visiting London, Paris and Washington later this month. Undoubtedly he will be met with considerable protest over Saudi Arabia's role in the vicious onslaught against civilians in Yemen.

But behind closed doors the battle for post-Brexit financial services will be centre stage.

The UK in particular is eager to support MBS's 2030 vision, not least as part of it includes the flotation of the state oil company Aramco.

At a time when the City of London's position as the world leader in finance markets could be damaged, winning this flotation would bring a serious boon.Italian Forensic policemen take pictures of the site of a shooting (Carotti/ANSA/AP)

The extreme right-wing suspect in drive-by shootings targeting African migrants in Italy was lucid and determined, aware of what he had done, the citys police chief has said.

The Carabinieri commander of Macerata, Col Michele Roberti, told Sky TG24 on Sunday that the suspect, Luca Traini, demonstrated no remorse for the two-hour shooting spree on Saturday that wounded five men and one woman, all African migrants.

Col Roberti said its likely that he carried out this crazy gesture as a sort of retaliation, a sort of vendetta after a Nigerian man was arrested in the gruesome killing of an Italian teenager a few days previously in the same city.

He said investigators had determined there was no connection between 28-year-old Traini and the victim, Pamela Mastropietro.

Traini has been jailed as police investigate a shooting rampage motivated by racial hatred.Melania Trump has much to be thankful for. A Slovenian model who landed her first gigs in the United States barely 20 years ago and only became a green-card holder in 2001, she now lives in the world's most recognisable mansion with the world's most powerful man. She's rich, she's beautiful, she has a handsome young son and an array of homes to go to at weekends.

She is most fond of Mar-a-Lago, the 126-room villa once owned by cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post in South Florida. We knew this two weekends ago when she was meant to join her husband, Donald Trump, on his brief trip to Davos, Switzerland. Most of us would leap at the chance, particularly since travel was by private 747. But no. She went to the villa instead.

Maybe she doesn't like the cold. But her demurring made us wonder. Was there some kind of marital beef between her and the President? Or was this a signal that actually she wasn't going to be playing by the old rules any more. No more traipsing along with POTUS wherever he goes. No more pandering to the expectations associated with the role of America's first lady - FLOTUS.

The tensions-in-the-bedroom theory was instantly more popular. The confirmation from the First Lady's office of her intention to skip Davos came on the heels of a Wall Street Journal report about the President allegedly paying $130,000 (92,000) to a dirty films actress named Stormy Daniels in return for her staying silent about an affair they had purportedly had a decade before. The paper said that transaction occurred just weeks before the presidential election in November 2016.

The lawyer, Michael Cohen, denied the two had ever had a sexual encounter. But the Washington Post said it had two sources confirming that the First Lady had felt "blindsided" by the report and was "furious" with the President.

Remarkably, the Stormy Daniels story hasn't consumed political discourse in Washington in the way you'd expect. Such is the fraught nature of this presidency: pitch one more hand-grenade in a bathtub full of them and no one takes much notice. And this isn't just a tabloid-titillation deal. Were such a sum indeed paid to suppress a story that might have altered the course of the election, that could be deemed illegal.

It is not inconceivable, in fact, that Robert Mueller, the special investigator, may add this to his already long list of matters he considers worthy of his attention. It has nothing to do with colluding with Russia, but Monica Lewinsky had nothing to do with the Whitewater land deals, which were the starting point of Kenneth Starr's probe of Bill Clinton in the 1990s.

But if it hasn't triggered an earthquake, the Stormy affair hasn't gone away either. In Touch, a tabloid magazine, followed the Journal by releasing an interview it conducted with Daniels in 2011 offering more details of the purported relationship. Jacob Weisberg, editor-in-chief of Slate, offered his own corroboration of the outlines of the Journal report, based on interviews he did with Daniels in 2016.

At times, the story has erred into the comical. Daniels, real name Stephanie Clifford, has recounted Trump allegedly sharing with her a special hatred for sharks. That triggered a surge of donations to shark research groups across the United States. One anonymous donor just sent a $2,500 donation to the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy to name a shark after Special Counsel Mueller. And there was this tidbit: Trump once asked Daniels to spank him with a rolled-up copy of Forbes magazine. We also learned from Stormy that Trump did not use a condom and that when she enquired about Melania, he replied: "Oh, don't worry about her."

There has also been the denial, non-denial pantomime. Oh yes they did. Oh no they didn't. On the day of the State of the Union, Daniels released a statement apparently meant to knock the story dead.

With her own signature attached, it said: "I am not denying this affair because I was paid 'hush money' as has been reported in overseas-owned tabloids. I am denying this affair because it never happened."

But then on the Jimmy Kimmel Show that night she said she didn't know where the statement had come from and that the signature didn't look like hers.

You begin to see why every late-night show in the land has been in Stormy heaven. The First Lady has been giving them fodder too. While she did attend her husband's State of the Union last Tuesday, she travelled to Capitol Hill in a separate limo. No first lady has ever done that. When he included a line in his speech about the importance of faith and family, she remained seated while everyone around her stood up. There was even chatter about the white Dior pantsuit she wore. It looked a lot like outfits favoured by Hillary Clinton at key moments in her presidential campaign. Dressing like Hillary would surely get Donald's attention.

It's dangerous to guess at other people's marriages. But it's safe to say that life for Melania Trump, despite all the privileges, is a lonely one. She can't seek solace from the former-first-ladies club because they - Hillary, Laura, Michelle - won't let her in. She isn't finding it from her husband either. And we know also she never wanted the job of first lady in the first place.

But just maybe, her anger and isolation will mean that more than any of her predecessors, Trump will be able to update and modernise the business of being first lady, from slavish subjugation to spouse and office to confident, if occasionally rebellious independence. It will be tricky. The relationship with her husband must be repaired and so too her relationship with the country. But get it right and she could go from figure of fun to figure of inspiration.

The one-time supermodel from Slovenia could even end up making Eleanor Roosevelt proud.

 IndependentUS House Speaker Paul Ryan has highlighted on Twitter a school secretary benefiting from the Republican tax overhaul, then deleted the tweet after online criticism that he is cheering an increase of 1.50 dollars (1) a week.

The Associated Press reported on Thursday that changes in tax withholding were sparking bigger wages, citing as one example Julia Ketchum of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, whose pay went up 1.50 dollars a week.

Paul Ryan deleted his embarrassing tweet of a blatant admission because he and Republicans donat want you to know the truth: the #GOPTaxScam is a gift to corporate America and the top 1% at your expense.



He also doesnat want you to know he got $500.000.00 from the Koch family. pic.twitter.com/ENXxASfAMP  Nancy Pelosi (@TeamPelosi) February 3, 2018

That tweet about the $1.50 a week is not a PR mistake. It is really what they think.  Brian Schatz (@brianschatz) February 3, 2018

Mr Ryan on Saturday posted a tweet noting the secretarys increase and linking to the AP story. He has posted several other examples of worker pay increases and bonuses since the overhaul, some as much as 1,000 dollars (700).

More and more, Americans are seeing higher wages and more economic opportunities after tax reform. https://t.co/rrEYW0r1pe  Paul Ryan (@PRyan) February 1, 2018

Mr Ryans spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades waves to supporters who gathered at a stadium to attend his inauguration ceremony after being re-elected, in Nicosia (Petros Karadjias/AP)

Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades has vowed to push on with attempts to reunify the ethnically divided island nation and improve the economic fortunes of its people after he was re-elected by a wide margin.

Mr Anastasiades defeated left-leaning independent challenger Stavros Malas in a run-off election.

He received 56% of the vote, compared to 44% for Mr Malas, in the final returns.

Mr Malas telephoned Mr Anastasiades to concede defeat about an hour after polls closed, when half of the ballots had been counted and Mr Malas trailed badly.

Speaking to supporters, Mr Malas said he told Mr Anastasiades to take care of our Cyprus.

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It is the second consecutive time that Mr Anastasiades, 71, a conservative veteran politician, won a head-to-head contest with Mr Malas, 50, for the presidency.

Tomorrow, a new day, a new era dawns, where people demand co-operation from all of us, Mr Anastasiades told throngs of jubilant supporters at his campaign headquarters.

Mr Malas campaigned as the candidate who would bring change to a tired political system that short-changes ordinary Cypriots, who have seen salaries and benefits slashed in the wake of the national economys near-meltdown.

But voters appeared to heed the incumbents campaign message, which blamed the left-wing economic policies of previous administrations for bringing Cyprus close to bankruptcy.

Mr Malas also struggled to separate himself from the party that supported him, the communist-rooted AKEL.

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Mr Anastasiades accused AKEL of crushing the economy during the presidency of former leader Demetris Christofias.

I know that the result has disappointed you, but we must respect it, and above all else for all of us to recognise that this was a worthy battle that neither begins nor ends with an election, Mr Malas told his backers.

Cyprus was split into an internationally recognised Greek Cypriot south and a breakaway Turkish Cypriot north in 1974 when Turkey invaded after a coup by supporters of union with Greece.

Only Turkey recognises a Turkish Cypriot declaration of independence and keeps more than 35,000 troops in the north.

Voters remain sceptical about whether a reunification deal can be reached any time soon.

The latest round of talks at a Swiss resort in July collapsed amid finger-pointing about who was responsible for the failure.

To buoy public hopes, Mr Anastasiades said he would reach out to Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci to try and resuscitate their negotiations.

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I call on all Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots to understand the current state of affairs can be a solution to the Cyprus problem, he said.

mr Anastasiades repeated that he would seek a peace deal that does not include Turkeys demands for a permanent troop presence and the right to intervene militarily in a federated Cyprus.

One of the presidents first orders of business will be to oversee ongoing exploratory drilling for gas off the islands southern coast  an enterprise that could help the economy but also complicate efforts to heal Cyprus ethnic divide.

Italian energy company ENI is currently drilling an exploratory well and Cypriot Energy Minister Yiorgos Lakkotrypis said indications of another find are very encouraging.

The hydrocarbon search undergirds alliances Cyprus has forged with Egypt and Israel, which have located their own sizeable offshore gas reserves.

The exploration has raised the ire of Turkey, which has characterised the work as an attempt to cheat Turkish Cypriots.

Results showed that 74% of eligible voters cast ballots on Sunday, slightly more than the first round of voting last week, but 7% less than in the 2013 election.

Mr Anastasiades has said a second term would be his last.Chancellor Angela Merkels conservatives and the centre-left Social Democrats have embarked on a final push for an agreement on a new German government, though negotiators appeared likely to need one more day.

The effort to put together a governing coalition is already post-Second World War Germanys longest and will not finish with these talks.

A deal will require approval in a ballot of the Social Democrats members, many of whom are sceptical about renewing the alliance that has governed Germany since 2013 after a disastrous election result in September.

Mrs Merkels Christian Democratic Union, its Bavaria-only sister, the Christian Social Union, and the Social Democrats set Sunday as a deadline to wrap up negotiations, though they have budgeted two extra days as a precaution.

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The three parties have agreed and come closer on many points in recent days, but there are still issues to discuss  particularly on questions of social policy, Social Democrat leader Martin Schulz told reporters as he arrived at the talks.

Those include labour and health policy questions that are a priority for his party.

I am still interested in making quick progress, but we want to give Germany a stable government, and a stable government involves a durable coalition deal that is agreeable to all, he said. So, in the end, we must take the time that we need to create such a stable foundation.

Mrs Merkel said important points had to be cleared up. We know what task we have and are trying to do justice to it, she said.

News agency dpa reported later on Sunday, citing unidentified participants, that the negotiations would have to continue on Monday.

Senior Social Democrat lawmaker Hubertus Heil told ARD television that a few central sticking points remain. If we cant do it tonight, we will continue tomorrow, because the problems have to be solved, he said.

Mrs Merkels attempt to put together a government with two smaller parties collapsed in November.

Mr Schulz, who had previously ruled out renewing the grand coalition of Germanys biggest parties, then reversed course but still faces resistance from parts of his party.

Failure to reach an agreement, or a deals rejection by Social Democrat members, would leave a minority government under Mrs Merkel or a new election as the only viable governing options.US banking giant Citi plans to keep the vast majority of its 9,000 strong workforce in the UK, regardless of how Brexit talks pan out.

The group will pepper its EU operations with an extra 150 staff, but is set to bolster offices through a hiring spree rather than a shift of British employees, its local government liaison has assured.

It is understood that job moves will stay in the single digits.

Were moving some roles and will create several, Alan Houmann, head of government affairs for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), told the Press Association.

When asked whether the outcome of Brexit negotiations could spark a larger raft of relocations, he suggested larger trends were at play and that the central causes of any further moves were not directly on Brexit.

Our goal is to be ready to serve our European clients and our plans are very much under way to do that, Mr Houmann said.

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The broader banking sector has been looking at moving staff closer to clients, with some taking advantage of outsourcing opportunities for back office operations.

An internal memo sent to staff last year explained that Citi was planning to convert its Frankfurt office, which currently houses 350 staff to a broker-dealer entity, adding to its currently broker dealer operations in Dublin.

Frankfurt makes a lot of sense for us. We know Germany well, weve been there for decades, know and have experience dealing with the regulator.

Citi, which has already submitted its licence application to the German regulator, is expecting to see the new broker dealer up and running by the end of the year.

While the bulk of new roles will be allocated to the converted German office, staff also be hired to work in cities including Paris, Madrid, Milan, Amsterdam and, Dublin.

We will also increase our presence in Luxembourg. Were adding roles in countries where we believe it will benefit our clients, Mr Houmann said.

It is understood Citis hiring plans include adding private banking staff to its Luxembourg operations.

The Wall Street giants liaison was happy with the way the UK Government has been engaging with the financial services sector to date, adding that theres no lack of conversations, whatsoever.

We feel like were being heard. As an industry, and the committees I chairweve done a ton of work, weve been producing reports, so were just churning out evidence in the hope that theres such a thing as evidence-based policy making, and its all going to the appropriate people

Talks with EU government representatives have also been productive, Mr Houmann assured, adding that the bank was more engaged in some countries based on the size of its operations or regional plans.

Were relatively well placed when it comes to Brexit. We have almost 60% of our EU employees already outside of the UK, our Bank chainis headquartered in Dublin and were already on the ground in 21 of the 27 EU countries.

Citi currently employs around 9,000 staff in the UK, 6,000 of whom are based in the City of London.Guwahati, Feb 4 (IBNS): To boost in water transport, Assam government and Ola, one of the worlds largest ride-sharing company, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to pilot an app-based river taxi service in Guwahati.

The MoU has been signed in the presence of Assam Transport minister Chandra Mohan Patowary, Vijay Ghadge, VP of Operations of Ola in the Assam Advantage - Global Investors' Summit ended on Sunday at Sarusajai Stadium, Guwahati.

Ola launched in Assam in December 2014 and has since transformed the commuting experience of citizens with a range of offerings for day to day as well as long distance, inter-city and state commute.

Bringing water taxis on the online platform, a localised and key mode of commute in the capital city will further strengthen the transportation ecosystem.

App-based bookings will streamline demand, and enable advance bookings and cashless payments, ensuring a convenient commuting experience as well as given an impetus the local transportation infrastructure and economy.



Assam Minister Chandra Mohan Patowary said Assam has a very unique transportation landscape where water transport plays an important role in cities such as Guwahati.

"Ola has played a key role in streamlining road transport over the last few years in the state. This time around, we are thrilled to extend the partnership with Ola to pilot app-based water taxis in the capital city. We are certain that bringing a localised mode of commute on an app platform will enable convenient transportation for citizens and tourists alike, and we look forward to more such collaborations with Ola," the Assam Minister said.

Vijay Ghadge, VP of Operations at Ola, said that, convenience and safety of the commuters are paramount to us.

"Our aim is to stand out as a reliable choice of transportation for the country. Our intent is reflected in all our partnerships with various state governments across transportation and tourism. As a part of this endeavour, we are delighted to partner and work with the Government of Assam to enhance and empower the local transportation infrastructure. We laud the Governments efforts in providing opportunities to companies such as ours and are honoured to be a part of this initiative," Vijay Ghadge said.

The river taxis will be a machine-operated boat, which is faster and safer than the conventional ones.

Ola will pilot high-speed taxis on the Lachit Ghat, Machkhowa to North Guwahati route, bringing the commute time down 2-5 minutes from 45 minutes by road.

The fast pace of these boats-cum-taxis will not only reduce the travel time, but will also provide a more comfortable journey for its commuters.

(Reporting by Hemanta Kumar Nath)New Delhi, Feb 4 (IBNS): Photographer Ankit Saxena had 'denied' being in a relationship with the Muslim girl who family allegedly killed him in west Delhi on Thursday, media reports said.

The police said Ankit might have taken the move as he was threatened with a knife.

When he was confronted about her disappearance on the day of the crime, he told them that he did not have any role in it and that he was not in a relationship with her in the first place. It could be because they were carrying a knife and he thought that was the only way to save his life, a police official told Hindustan Times.

Three people have been arrested for their involvement in the death of Ankit Saxena.

Saxena, a 23 year old photographer, who was reportedly dating the 20-year old college student, had his throat slashed by the attackers, reports said.

According to reports, Saxena was attacked on Thursday night near his home by the girl's family.

The police have arrested the parents and an uncle of the girl and detained a minor allegedly involved in the incident, media reported.

It has been alleged that the girl's family was opposed to their relation as Saxena was a Hindu.

Police have stepped up security in the area to avoid any further conflict in the area.

Meanwhile, netizens have reacted to the incident as Twitter flooded over reactions against the alledged murder.

Filmmaker Ashoke Pandit tweeted :" Why dont you straight away condemn the gruesome murder of #AnkitSaxena rather being philosophical about it. ? I find U no less then a part of so called intellectual #RabidForce."

Why dont you straight away condemn the gruesome murder of #AnkitSaxena rather being philosophical about it. ? I find U no less then a part of so called intellectual #RabidForce. https://t.co/D6LmQdo2iU  Ashoke Pandit (@ashokepandit) February 3, 2018

Filmmaker Shirish Kunder said: "There is no honour in 'honour killing'. This term is the point of view of the killers. Their excuse to justify their "honourable" motives. To suggest women are the property of men. We need to see the crime through the eyes of those attacked. Call it "shame killing". #AnkitSaxena."

There is no honour in "honour killing". This term is the point of view of the killers. Their excuse to justify their "honourable" motives. To suggest women are the property of men. We need to see the crime through the eyes of those attacked. Call it "shame killing". #AnkitSaxena https://t.co/VQ1lLcQX3j  Shirish Kunder (@ShirishKunder) February 3, 2018

Dewlhi BJP leader Manoj Tiwari have met family members of Ankit.

He tweeted: " Met father and other members of #AnkitSaxena . Family demanded medical help immediately for Ankits Mother, arranged. It was Preplanned professional killing on road..#JusticeForAnkit @DelhiPolice has arrested 4 accused and assured filling of chargesheet on fasttrack basis."

Met father and other members of #AnkitSaxena . Family demanded medical help immediately for Ankits Mother, arranged.

It was Preplanned professional killing on road..#JusticeForAnkit @DelhiPolice has arrested 4 accused and assured filling of chargesheet on fasttrack basis. pic.twitter.com/6cJ7aWdMFy  Manoj Tiwari (@ManojTiwariMP) February 3, 2018 Shocked and Horrified on cold blooded murder of #AnkitSaxena .

Culprits should be punished with the highest quantum @CPDelhi @DelhiPolice #JusticeForAnkit  Manoj Tiwari (@ManojTiwariMP) February 3, 2018

Filmmaker-Actor Farhan Akhtar said: "Horrified to hear about the cold blooded murder of #AnkitSaxena in Delhi. And for what??? #shame Cannot imagine the grief his parents must be going through. My deepest condolences to them. #tragedy."

Horrified to hear about the cold blooded murder of #AnkitSaxena in Delhi. And for what??? #shame

Cannot imagine the grief his parents must be going through. My deepest condolences to them. #tragedy  Farhan Akhtar (@FarOutAkhtar) February 3, 2018



New Delhi/Hyderabad, Feb 4 (IBNS) With an angry Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu holding a meeting of his party on Sunday over the "unsatisfactory" Union Budget to decide on its alliance with the BJP, the latter's president Amit Shah has reportedly called up the southern leader and requested him to not take any "tough decisions", said media reports.

Reports said the Telugu Desam Party chief is holding a meeting to reconsider its alliance with the BJP led NDA at the centre.

Naidu called the "emergency meeting" in Vijaywada upset with the Budget in which he said there was nothing for his state.

Arun Jaitley's Union Budget has not gone down well with the Telegu Desam Party (TDP), the biggest ally of BJP from the South, which rules Andhra Pradesh.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu called the party meeting to decide the next course of action.

The party is not happy with the allocation of resources for the state in the budget.

Speaking to reporters, TDP leader YS Chowdhary expressed his disappointment over the entire budget.

Chowdhary, who is the Minister of State for Science and Technology, said there was no progress in the infrastructural works in last four years.

"The Polavaram project was linked to the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), but there was no smooth flow of funds. The budget should have included it," he said.

TDP is presently an ally of BJP in the NDA government.

However, the party has recently sided with the Opposition in Rajya Sabha, where BJP lacks the majority, demanding a review of theTriple Talaq bill.New Delhi, Feb 4 (IBNS): Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Sunday attacked Narendra Modi and said he is the first Prime Minister of the nation whose words ' don't mean anything'.

Questioning the PM over the NAGA accord, Gandi tweeted: " August 2015, Mr Modi claims to create history by signing the NAGA accord. Feb 2018, Naga Accord is still nowhere to be found. Modi ji is the first ever Indian PM whose words don't mean anything. #CantFindTheAccord."

August 2015, Mr Modi claims to create history by signing the NAGA accord.



Feb 2018, Naga Accord is still nowhere to be found.



Modi ji is the first ever Indian PM whose words don't mean anything. #CantFindTheAccord  Office of RG (@OfficeOfRG) February 4, 2018

Nagaland will go to poll on Feb 27.

Gandhi made the remarks at this crucial juncture for the state where people will vote to elect a new Assembly in the upcoming days.

Modi and National Socialist Council of Nagaland had signed the crucial accord in August 2015 with an aim of ending insurgency in the region.Bangalore, Feb 4 (IBNS): Highlighting the development works performed by his government, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said the ruling Congress is standing at the 'exit gate' in the south Indian state of Karnataka.

"The countdown for Congress party's exit from the state has started," Modi said while addressing a rally in Bangalore.

"The Congress is currently standing on the exit gate in the state," he said.

Promising more developments in the state, the Indian PM said: " A BJP government in Karnataka will ensure development, better roads, new metro routes, trains. and many more."

Modi said his government is working by following the policy of 'reform, perform and transform'.

He said the BJP-led Central government is working for the betterment of the poor and the middle class section of the society.

He said: "Our government will give free electricity connection to 7 lakh houses in Karnataka under the Centre's new scheme on electricity."

Karnataka is all set to vote to elect new Assembly in the next few months.

This is the first major rally in the state by Modi this year.

Modi said he has a dream to see that even a person who wears "hawai chappal" (sandal) can fly on a "hawai jahaaz" (aeroplane).Guwahati, Feb 4 (IBNS): While the BJP and NDPP are preparing to file nominations for the Nagaland assembly polls from Monday, the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN) on Sunday again said that imposed election is not acceptable to the Naga people and warned that they will take stern action against people found defying the decision of the Naga people.

On Feb 3, the BJP has ended up its 15-year tie with the ruling Naga Peoples Front (NPF) in Nagaland and picked up new ally National Democratic Political Party (NDPP) for the upcoming assembly polls in the state and said that their candidates will file nominations for the polls from Feb 5.

In a statement issued by the Naga outfit, the group said: "We fully support the prudent decision of the Naga people for solution of the Naga issue and hence we will not go for election."

We will stand by this decision to the end. We fully appreciate the wisdom of the Core Committee (CCNTHCO), the Churches, tribal bodies, Apex Naga organizations including Naga Hoho, Naga Council Dimapur, Naga Mothers, the Naga Students Federation (NSF), ENPO and others for their earnest and consistent decision to stand by the Naga peoples will, NSCN (IM) said in the statement.

The outfit group further said in the statement that the NSCN shall uphold the historical and political rights of the Nagas and sincerely endeavor to negotiate an honourable political settlement based on unique history and situation of the Nagas and Aug 3, 2015 Framework Agreement between the Government of India and the NSCN.

We will not betray the responsibility and trust reposed on us by God and the Naga people. We reiterate our stand that imposed election is not acceptable to the Naga people, NSCN (IM) said in the statement.

Despite calling for election boycott by NSCN (IM), NNPGs and few other Naga civil society organizations, BJP had earlier announced that the party will take part in the election.

Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju, who is also BJP's poll in-charge for Nagaland, on Feb 3 said that BJP and newly formed regional political party NDPP will jointly contest in the assembly polls.

During a press conference held in Guwahati, Rijiju said seat sharing between BJP and NDPP has already been finalized and BJP will contest in 20 seats while NDPP to contest in 40 seats.

Apart from BJP and NDPP, ruling Naga Peoples Front (NPF), Congress had also announced that they will participate in the election scheduled on Feb 27.

On the other hand, no nomination has been filed till today after the Nagaland Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) issued notification for the assembly polls on Jan 31 last.

(Reporting by Hemanta Kumar Nath)Srinagar, Feb 4 (IBNS): The armies of India and Pakistan on Sunday exchanged heavy fire and shelling along the Line of Control (LoC) in Rajouri and Poonch districts of Jammu and Kashmir, leaving four Indian army soldiers killed and five persons injured.

The injured included two army men, BSF assistant sub-inspector and two civilians.

DC Rajouri tweeted about the death of three soldiers and an officer.

Earlier in the day, two forces personnel and two civilians were injured in cross-LoC shelling in Rajouri and Poonch districts.

Meanwhile, warning Pakistan on ceasefire violation, Indian Home Minister Rajnath Singh said on Saturday that the country will shoot limitless bullets to retaliate a single shot from its neighbour.

Addressing a rally in Tripura, Singh said that he has given orders to the army to go heavy on Pakistan if it fires on Indian territory.

However, he said that India will not attack first as it wants to establish a cordial relationship with all its neighbours.

He added that Pakistan is trying to create unrest in India by constantly provoking Jammu and Kashmir.

(Reporting by Saleem Iqbal Qadri)Rajouri, Feb 4 (IBNS): An army officer was among four soldiers killed and two others received injuries in cross border shelling at Rajouri district of Jammu region on Sunday evening.

Official sources said that Pakistani army violated ceasefire and opened fire upon armys 15 Jak Li posts at Bhimber Gali sector late on Sunday evening, resulting into the killing of four army men, including an officer.

Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatics, mortars and missiles from 1530 hours in BG sector along the Line of Control (LC). Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively and heavy damage has been inflicted on Pakistani Army Posts, armys spokesperson said in a statement.

However, in the exchange of fire, one officer and three jawans were grievously injured and succumbed to their injuries, the spokesman said.

The unprovoked action by Pakistani Army will be given a befitting response, the spokesman claimed.

The deceased people have been identified as Captain Kapil Kundu, Rifleman Ram Avtar, Rifleman Shubam Singh and Havaldar Roshan Lal.

One more soldier namely Niak Iqbal Ahmed, sources said was injured in the area and has been hospitalized.

Meanwhile, sources said that Pakistani army violated ceasefire in Sunderbani area along the border.

In the incident, an Assistant Sub-Inspector of BSF 126 bn sustained injuries and was hospitalized.

When reports last came in the intermittent cross-border exchange of firing were going on at both the places.

Meanwhile, Deputy Commissioner Rajouri, Shahid Iqbal Choudary ordered closure of schools close to the borders.

All 84 Schools located in 0-5KM along LoC from Sunderbani to Manjakote shall remain closed for next 3 days, DC said.

Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti expressed anguish over the killings.

Pained to hear that three soldiers were killed & two injured along the Line of Control in Rajouri. My condolences to the deceaseds families, Mehooba tweeted.



(Reporting by Saleem Iqbal Qadri)Los Angeles, Feb 4 (IBNS): Hollywood actress Uma Thurman has finally broken her silence and said American film producer Harvey Weinstein had attacked her in a hotel room.

In an interview to The New York Times, the actress revealed how two incidents in London took disturbing turn following the release of 1994's Oscar-winning Pulp Fiction.

As per The New York Times report, the first attack, she says, came not long after in Weinsteins suite at the Savoy Hotel in London.

Uma said the producer tried to do all kinds of 'unpleasant things'.

"It was such a bat to the head. He pushed me down. He tried to shove himself on me. He tried to expose himself. He did all kinds of unpleasant things. But he didnt actually put his back into it and force me. Youre like an animal wriggling away, like a lizard. I was doing anything I could to get the train back on the track. My track. Not his track," she told the newspaper.

The actress revealed that after the first incident she had taken a friend with her to confront Weinstein.

However, his assistants pressured her to meet the Hollywood producer alone in his room.

Thurman says, she warned Weinstein, If you do what you did to me to other people you will lose your career, your reputation and your family, I promise you.

The news report said through a spokesperson, Weinstein denied ever threatening her prospects and said that he thought she was a brilliant actress.

A spokeswoman for Harvey Weinstein has issued a statement.

Mr. Weinstein acknowledges making a pass at Ms. Thurman in England after misreading her signals in Paris, the statement said as published by The New York Times. He immediately apologized.

The Weinstein row is one of the nastiest incidents to have come out from the multi-billion dollar industry.

A string of Hollywood A-listers, including Gwyneth Paltrow, Agelina Jolie and others have shared their stories of how Weinstein at various junctures in their lifetime had harassed them sexually.

Even though Weinstein had played down all accusations as 'patently false', most industry insider have claimed that his notorious behaviour was an 'open secret'.New York, Feb 4 (JEN): The top leaders of the African Union and the United Nations on Saturday expressed concern over the prolonged political crisis in Guinea-Bissau, condemning the recent actions taken by the national authorities to prevent a political party from holding its conference.

The Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, and the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, express concern over the protracted political crisis in Guinea-Bissau despite the multiple opportunities offered to the main political stakeholders to arrive at a consensual arrangement, said an AU-UN joint statement.

They condemn the recent actions taken by the national authorities to prevent the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cabo Verde (PAIGC) from convening and holding its Party Congress, including the directive given to national security services to evacuate and shutter the party's headquarters, it added.

Faki Mahamat and Guterres called on all relevant authorities to strictly adhere to international human rights and humanitarian law and to immediately remove all restrictions on the right to peaceful assembly, political participation and freedom of speech.

They fully endorsed the recent decisions on Guinea-Bissau taken by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) on 27 January and endorsed by the AU on 29 January.

They also supported the measures being taken by ECOWAS against political obstructionists in the country, welcoming the communique issued by the ECOWAS ministerial mission that visited Guinea-Bissau on 31 January and 1 February.

Further, they reiterated their endorsement of the centrality of the Conakry Agreement of 14 October 2016, which, inter alia, provides for the appointment of a consensual Prime Minister, and called on the main political stakeholders to faithfully and urgently implement this Agreement, as well as the ECOWAS Roadmap to which they have all signed up to.

Faki Mahamat and Guterres reaffirmed their commitment to continue to closely follow all political developments and to support ECOWAS in its efforts to ensure a swift resolution of the protracted crisis in Guinea-Bissau, and stand ready to employ additional measures, should the situation warrant it.

According to the UN Department of Political Affairs (DPA), Guinea-Bissau has been plagued by chronic political instability since gaining independence in 1974.

The DPA provides support and oversight to the UN Integrated Peacebuilding Office for Guinea-Bissau (UNIOGBIS), a special political mission first established in 1999 following a two-year civil war in the country. Since mid-2016, the Mission is headed by the Secretary-General's Representative, Modibo I. Toure.

The main priorities of UNIOGBIS are to support efforts to consolidate constitutional order, further political dialogue and national reconciliation, encourage security sector reform, and promote respect for human rights and the rule of law.

The mission has provided assistance in several national elections, including during the legislative and presidential elections in April and May 2014, and has again been mandated by the Security Council to work closely with national authorities as well as the United Nations country team in support of the timely conduct of legislative and presidential elections in 2018 and 2019, respectively.



UN Photo/Manuel EliasNew York, Feb 4 (JEN): Following the Maldives' Supreme Court decision ordering the release of convicted opposition leaders and the reinstatement of 12 parliamentarians, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has expressed the world body's continued readiness to facilitate all-party talks in finding a solution to the Indian Ocean nation's political stalemate.

The Secretary-General takes note of the important ruling by the Supreme Court and calls on the Government to respect it, said a statement issued overnight by his Spokesman Stephane Dujarric.

The Secretary-General reiterates his belief in finding a solution to the political stalemate in the Maldives through all-party talks, which the United Nations continues to stand ready to facilitate, the statement added.

On Friday, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) also urged the Government of the Maldives to fully respect the Supreme Court decision, which also overturned the conviction of former President Mohamed Nasheed and ordered to retry his case.

We are concerned by what appears to be an initial heavy-handed reaction by security forces in the capital Male against people celebrating the Court's decision, Spokesperson Rupert Colville told reporters at a press briefing in Geneva, Switzerland, urging them to show understanding and restraint, and to act in full accordance with international laws and standards governing the policing of protests and other forms of public assembly.

We also urge all those celebrating, or protesting, to do so in a peaceful fashion, he added.

Photo: NattuImage: Wallpaper

Damascus, Feb 4 (IBNS): Turkish military suffered a heavy loss as seven soldiers were killed during an offensive against Kurdish militias.

At least five soldiers died in the Afrin region of Syria after the militias ambushed an army tank, report said.

Mourning the loss, Turkish Prime Minister Binali YAldArAm has vowed to make the perpetrators pay twice as much.

Later on Saturday, Turkish Jets launched another offensive targeting Kurdish militants at Afrin.

On Jan 20, 2018, Turkey launched an operation, Olive Branch, to eliminate YGP/PKK militants in Syria.

So far, at least 14 Turkish soldiers have died during the operation.

Image: WallpaperToronto, Feb 4 (IBNS): Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care is investing in hospital beds to improve patients' access to care and reduce wait times in hospitals across the province, media reports said.

Dr. Eric Hoskins, Ontario Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, announced Feb 2 at the Reactivation Care Centre, formerly the Humber River Hospital - Finch site, that Ontario would be investing $187 million in 2018-19 compared to its investment of $100 in 2017-18.

This additional capacity would reportedly support a patient-centered approach by "delivery of the right level of care, to the right patient, in the right setting, benefitting both ALC patients and acute care patients.:

"We look forward to continuing to work with the government on this important initiative moving forward, Barb Collins, President and CEO, Humber River Hospital, was quoted saying in media.

Welcoming the renewal of the governments increased funding strategy, Anthony Dale, President and CEO, Ontario Hospital Association reportedly stated that this would further stabilize hospital operations and build new service capacity across all parts of Ontarios health care system.

Ontario would reportedly create 5,000 long-term care beds over the next four years and more than 30,000 across the province over the next decade and more home and community care services as part of its commitment to 'Aging with Confidence: Ontario's Action Plan for Seniors', launched in 2013.



(Reporting by Asha Bajaj)

Image: Eric Hoskins:Thanks to the Internet the world has become a really small place. Not only do we get to know about things that are happening thousands of miles away, we also get to share our own.

Read more: Zara Is Trying To Sell You Your Uncle's 'Lungi' For INR 6,000 & Twitter Is Going Bonkers Over It

So when China tried to copy our very own baby, the heart of north India and the staple food of everyone living in Delhi 'Bhatura' and called it 'Scallion Bubble Pancake,' Indians weren't impressed.

Twitter

Popular Facebook food page Tastemade shared a video (which they have taken down following the outrage) wherein they showed a brand new dish called Bubble Pancake. This bubble pancake is to be served with a savoury curry.

Now everything is fine about this except for the fact that this is a goddamn bhatura.

Within seconds, desis got to know about this sorcery and they called the page names and shamed for messing with our beloved bhatura.

Chinese Chef Is Selling Bhaturas As Scallion Bubble Pancakes & The Internet Isnt Happy https://t.co/foScCeMfLU pic.twitter.com/XCqH0yuOEX  Neha Shrivastav (@Neha_Social) February 4, 2018

So not only did desis left their harsh comments on Tastemade, ensuring in a pull-down of the video, they found the person behind him. Maryland-based restaurant Q by Peter Chang, run by Chinese chef Peter Chang was surprised to see so many Indians giving him a poor rating and writing long ass messages to express their discontentment.

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Well, nobody messes with our food. You should have known Peter.Unlike what we learnt from 2006 blockbuster Dhoom 2, where Hrithik Roshan copiously claimed that in the thieving business, working with partners means that you are digging your own grave. A bunch of Thane hooligans are proving otherwise.

Navghar Police in Maharashtra recently arrested a four-member team of robbers in Mumbai, who had a spiritual take on all the robberies they made.

According to the police, the team had a ritual of spinning a coconut at the road junction and then rob the house towards which the coconut would point.

Read more: Brave Woman Packs A Few Punches After Two Robbers Try To Steal Her Purse

mid-day

YES, YOU READ IT RIGHT!

The robbers would also conduct a tiny 'pooja' on the junction with flowers and vermilion to mark the ceremony, read reports.



We received a tip-off about them when they were approaching the check naka, most likely to do their routine and find a new area to commit a crime in. My team laid a trap and got ready for these men at the spot before they reached. Four were arrested. said Pratap Bhosle, from Navghar Police station.

Youtube

The police confiscated four knives, two katawanis, two screwdrivers, one spring panha, four keys, two caps, and a coconut along with flowers.

Upon further digging, police found out that there were several cases registered on the gang at many police stations in the vicinity.

In their last house break-in, theyd robbed Rs 1.6 lakh; the house had been shut for many days. We found fresh flowers at the spot, and that matched with several crimes in other areas. the police further added.

Read more: 11 Lakh People Were Arrested For Stealing Blankets And Towels From Trains In 2016. WTF!

mid-day

We are not sure whether to laugh or cry at the situation of these robbers. Thinking that by performing a tiny religious ceremony, the Almighty will help them and guide them on this absurd voyage is pointless and laugh-worthy.Ankit Saxenas gruesome murder in the national capital by the father and relatives of the girl he was in love with one again proved that Indias doesnt accept love easily and if the love is between the couples with different castes and religion, then death is more likely to be their fate.

Ankit Saxena who was in love with a Muslim girl living in his neighbourhood was murdered in broad daylight by girls relatives in west Delhi Raghubir Nagar.

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Honour killing incidents dont surprise anymore as we get to hear about these every now and then. But Saxenas murder did hit us because first it happened in Delhi and second it was the case of an inter-faith love affair.

Cases like Manoj-Babli and others in Haryana which brought these horror killings in the name of honour to mainstream are still on our minds. But in recent years too, there have several cases in Indian hinterlands where lovers, sometimes one, and most of the time both were killed by their own parents and relatives.

facebook

Here are the recent cases of honour killing where lovers paid price choosing persons of their choice over the decrees of their parents and relatives.

1. 17-Year-Old girl shot dead by father in Rajasthan

In a case of honour killing, a 17-year-old girl, studying in Class XII, was shot dead and burnt allegedly by her father and other relatives at Samrathpura village in Dholpur district of the state. The girl was in a relationship with a classmate which was disapproved by the family. Police have arrested the father of the girl along with her uncle on charges of murder. Senior police officers said that they were also probing the role of other relatives, including the grandfather of the girl.

2. Delhi Cop killed his daughter

Reu

In October last year, Delhi police head constable and his wife have been arrested for their involvement in a conspiracy to kill their 20-year-old daughter. The couple was reportedly upset that the girl, a nursing student, was having an affair with a boy from a neighbouring village. According to the FIR, the victim's maternal uncle, Jaswant, strangulated her in the presence of her parents. The father, Vedpal, is an Army veteran who joined Delhi police after taking premature retirement. Both Vedpal and his wife Moni Devi have been arrested while Jaswant is on the run. Jhajjar police said that initially, the family tried to project the death as a suicide but villagers told sleuths they suspected it to be a case of honour killing.

3. Married couple killed

In October last year, a married couple who were also from the same community was hacked to death by the relatives of the girl in Telangana Rajanna Sircilla district. The couple, identified as Nedunuri Rachana and N Harish were attacked with swords killing them on the spot. The duo, both neighbours and belonging to the same community had got married a couple of months ago. Rachana's uncles Ashok, Shekhar and Nagaraju who brought her up after she lost her parents were against the relationship as Harish was an auto driver.

4. Girl killed for loving boy from another caste

In September last year Just a few kilometres away from Taj Mahal, a Jat girl had to give up her life for her love, as she was brutally murdered by her parents for falling in love with a Thakur boy.

The incident took place at night in Kotli Bagichi area of Tajganj police jurisdiction Agra.

5. Girl 13, Killed by father for being friendly with boys

Last year, a 13-year-old, schoolgirl was killed by father in Telengana for being 'friendly' with boys at school. Described by friends as being bright and cheerful, is believed to be one of the youngest victims of honour killings following their girls death in Nalgonda, near Hyderabad, India. It was reported that her father, identified as Narasimha, tried to claim she had taken her own life after he strangled her then set her body on fire.

6. Lovers electrocuted in Pakistan

In September last year, a teenage couple in Pakistan were electrocuted after tribal leaders approved their killing. The couple had planned to elope. Bakht Jan, 15, and her boyfriend Rehman, 17, were killed after the Pashtun council of elders, known as a jirga, ruled they had brought dishonour to the community.

7. Man killed daughter in UP

ap/representational image

In July last year, a man allegedly killed his daughter and her lover in Sambhal area in UP. Achhan Qureishi woke up at night to find his 16-year-old daughter missing from home.

He later found his daughter with her lover Salman in compromising position and in a fit of anger he killed he strangulated his daughter and stabbed Salman.

8. Father killed daughters husband

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In May last year, a Dalit was killed by his wife's father in Telegana. Amboji Naresh, a Dalit man married daughter of Srinivas Reddy. He was unhappy with their marriage and that's why he murdered Naresh. He called the couple and promised them to accept their marriage, but he killed Naresh in his fields at Longarajupally village of Nalgonda district.

9. Girl axed by step brother in Pakistan

In October last year, another girl fell prey to honour killing as a 19-year-old girl was killed by step brother as he suspected his sister to have relation with a man in the locality. The incident took place on Sunday at Christian Wala in Sahiwal district, some 230 km from Lahore. According to Station House Officer Rana Tahir, accused Irfan suspected his stepsister Saira had relations with a man of her locality.Associations representing atomic bomb survivors in Japan criticised a change in the policy of the US which advocates modernising its atomic arsenal and increasing its launch capacity. Toshiyuki Mimaki of the Japan Confederation of A-and H-Bomb Sufferers Organisations expressed anger over the change in Washington's strategy, saying it posed an obstacle to global denuclearization, reported Japan's state broadcaster NHK.

AP

Mimaki said, "if the President of a global power such as the US wanted to increase and modernize its nuclear capacities, the survivors of the atomic bombings in Japan will never see a world without nuclear weapons".

Mimaki, a survivor of the nuclear bombing by the US on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, said that these weapons do not make the world a safer place and should never be used.

Koichi Kawano, leader of Hibakuren, a survivor group based in Nagasaki -- which suffered a nuclear attack on August 9, 1945 -- said the announcement poured cold water on the historic UN treaty to ban nuclear weapons, adopted last year by over 120 countries.

Kawano warned that the new US strategy, which seeks to develop smaller nuclear arms, could lower the bar for the use of such weapons and raise the likelihood of nuclear war.

He also urged the Japanese government to utilise the US presence in Japan to intensify its diplomatic efforts to prevent such a scenario.Brawls between schoolboys is not a new thing, but when but turns fatal, that becomes a grave matter of concern. In a recent incident, a class 9th student was beaten to death by his classmates over a petty issue of a wristband. According to police, the incident took place at Jeevan Jyoti Senior Secondary School in Delhi's Karawal Nagar area. All the juvelines have been detained by the police.

Police said that the victim, identified as 14-year-old Tushar Kumar, was found dead inside the school toilet on Thursday.

According to police, Tushar had a fight with one of the accused over a wristband which he had given the later a couple of days ago.

Despite repeatedly reminding him to return it, the classmate did not. On the day of the incident, Tushar confronted the boy. As the fight broke out, he was joined by three other boys from the same class.

Later when Tushar went to the toilet, he was followed by the accused boys who attacked him. They allegedly punched him on his face and neck. As a result, Tushar collapsed. After this, the boys left the toilet.

His body was found by two other students inside the toilet, who informed the teachers.

Police had apprehended three of the accused, a day after the murder and the fourth on Saturday.

The shocking incident comes months after the murder of Pradyuman Thakur, a 9-year-old boy his senior student in Gurugram's Ryan International School.Ravindra Bali, a former captain in the army who was living as a recluse in a makeshift tent on a footpath in the Pune Camp Area was beaten to death by two unidentified people.

According to police, his body was found in the Pune Cantonment area late Thursday night.

SSBCrack

According to police the 67, former captain was assaulted by unidentified men.

"The watchman of a bungalow, who saw two people assaulting Bali and fleeing from the scene, alerted the police," said an officer with Lashkar police station.

"Bali died of multiple head injuries around 3.30 am at the Sassoon general hospital," said Cantonment police's senior inspector Vasant Kunvar.

"He was not in touch with his family for several years and was leading a reclusive life. During investigations, we managed to get details of his family and this, in turn, helped us identify Bali," the official said.

According to locals, Bali had told them in the past that he had taken voluntary retirement from the army as an officer after 17 years in service.More than 100,000 Rohingya refugees huddled in squalid, muddy camps in Bangladesh will be in grave danger from landslides when the mid-year monsoon season begins, a U.N. humanitarian report said.

There are now more than 900,000 Rohingyas in the Coxs Bazar area of Bangladesh, after 688,000 fled violence in Myanmar that flared up in late August. Aid workers say the camps sheltering the new arrivals are completely inadequate.

reuters/representational image

Landslide and flood risk hazard mapping reveal that at least 100,000 people are in grave danger from these risks and require relocation to new areas or within the neighborhoods that they live in, the U.N. report said.

The lack of space remains the main challenge for the sector as sites are highly congested leading to extremely hard living conditions with no space for service provisions and facilities. In addition, congestion brings increased protections risks and favors disease outbreak such as the diphtheria outbreak currently escalating in most of the sites.

Although a rapid vaccination program appears to have staved off the risk of cholera, 4,865 have confirmed, probable or suspected diphtheria, and 35 have died.

reuters/representational image

The World Health Organization has vaccinated over 500,000 Rohingyas against diphtheria and on Saturday health workers began giving 350,000 children a second dose. The WHO also has 2,500 doses of anti-toxin, which is in short supply globally, to treat the deadly effects of the disease.

But a new health concern has arisen - mumps. The U.N. report said there had been an increase in cases in the past few weeks, and Rohingya refugees and host communities had never been vaccinated against the highly contagious disease, which is rarely fatal but can cause complications such as meningitis.

Most of the Rohingya refugees - almost 585,000 - are in an overcrowded area called Kutupalong-Balukhali.

A high percentage of the land is unsuitable for human settlement as risks of flooding and landslides are high and are further aggravated by the congestion and extensive terracing of the hills, the U.N. report said.

The anticipated flooding and landslides in the upcoming monsoon season will make a bad situation much worse.By Darragh Bermingham

The Government must acknowledge the potential of Cork as Irelands second city with investment to substantially strengthen our metropolitan profile, Cork Chamber President Bill O'Connell has said.

Mr O'Connell was speaking at Cork Chamber's annual dinner in City Hall last night. He has called for a commitment from Government to invest in Corks public transport needs including a rapid transit system and a high-speed rail connecting Cork and Dublin while emphasising that the Limerick to Cork motorway and events centre must be built.

A second city of scale, a true compliment to Dublin, with critical mass of talent, innovation, infrastructure, diversity and culture will ensure the continued success of the Irish economy," he said.

Cork will be the fastest growing region in the country for the next two decades. We are ready for this challenge. Government must be ready to allocate investment accordingly and acknowledge the potential of Irelands second city to substantially strengthen Irelands metropolitan profile.

At the dinner, Boston Scientific was named Cork Company of the Year as it celebrates 21 years in Cork next month.

Accepting the award on behalf of Boston Scientific, Sean Gayer, VP Operations, said the award was down to the 890 staff in Cork.

This is a fantastic recognition for the entire Boston Scientific team at Model Farm Road. It is an honour to be considered in the same light as previous finalists, who have inspired business excellence in our community, said Mr Gayer.

The awards, run in association with Vodafone Ireland, involve a thorough four-month judging process with an experienced mix of business professionals from across the business community.

The Cork Emerging Company of the Year 2018 was awarded to EviView, providers of analytic software for pharmaceutical manufacturers, while Cork SME Company of the Year 2018 was won by Spearline, providing the worlds only automated monitoring platform which allows enterprise clients to benchmark, monitor and troubleshoot their global telecoms footprint.

Cork Large Company of the Year 2018 went to Teamwork.com, who are leading the way for SaaS in Ireland, providing a suite of operations to help run the businesses of their 20,000 customers across 183 international companies.

Bill OConnell, President Cork Chamber, noted the high standard of entrants and how becoming a finalist in these awards is an achievement in itself given the rigour of the judging process.

Cork Company of the Year Awards provide a wonderful platform for businesses in Cork to reflect on their success and the deserving winners will now join the 20- year network of previous respected winners, he added.Gardai are investigating after an armed robbery took place at a shop in north Dublin yesterday evening.

At around 6.30pm yesterday evening, a man entered a Paddy Power shop on the Strand Road in Portmarnock armed with what's being described as a gun.Update 10.30pm: Sinn Fein's policing spokesman has been quizzed over alleged criminal damage after a man was filmed removing a clamp from a car.

Gerry Kelly, 64, was interviewed about the incident in Belfast city centre on Friday.

He later tweeted: "No one can be above the law.

"I made a voluntary arrangement to meet the police and met them today for interview.

"I want to get the issue resolved as soon as possible."

No one can be above the law. I made a voluntary arrangement to meet the police and met them today for interview. I want to get the issue resolved as soon as possible.  Gerry Kelly (@GerryKellyMLA) February 4, 2018

A Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) statement said a 64-year-old man was interviewed at a city centre police station.

Social media footage appears to show a man kneeling down to remove the orange device from the vehicle's right-hand wheel, before resting it against a nearby wall.

A pair of bolt cutters appear to be lying beside the wheel.

The private parking firm that controls the area outside the Metropolitan Arts Centre (MAC) near St Anne's Cathedral had reported the matter to police.

The DUP said Sinn Fein's leadership faces a "significant test".

Deputy leader Nigel Dodds said he was not holding his breath waiting for action from the republican party's leadership.

It is the latest row to hit Sinn Fein after its West Tyrone MP Barry McElduff resigned under pressure after posting a tweet with a loaf of Kingsmill bread on his head on the anniversary of the republican Kingsmill massacre in 1976.

In a statement Sinn Fein said Mr Kelly's solicitor was dealing with the matter.

Comment on clamping of Gerry Kelly's car https://t.co/1xA1eXWZwf @GerryKellyMLA  Sinn Fein (@sinnfeinireland) February 3, 2018

Earlier: Sinn Fein leaders 'face test' after Gerry Kelly apparently cuts clamp from car

Sinn Fein's leadership faces a "significant test" after the Republican party's policing spokesman apparently removed a clamp from his car, the DUP said.

Police have been notified of alleged criminal damage after Gerry Kelly was filmed appearing to use bolt cutters on the device.

He removed it after finding his vehicle had been immobilised while he was at a gym in Belfast city centre on Friday morning, the party said.

The private parking firm that controls the area outside the Metropolitan Arts Centre (MAC) near St Anne's Cathedral reported the matter to police.

DUP deputy leader Nigel Dodds said he was not holding his breath waiting for action from Sinn Fein's leadership.

"They preach respect but show little or no respect for people, rules or laws which they disagree with.

"They preach equality but, to them, some are more equal than others."

Gerry Kelly MLA has admitted removing a parking clamp from his car. Sinn Fein has issued a statement https://t.co/d1hyhkrNIU pic.twitter.com/SzeLzWUWaa  Sunday Life (@TheSundayLife) February 3, 2018

It is the latest row to hit Sinn Fein after its West Tyrone MP Barry McElduff resigned under pressure after posting a tweet with a loaf of Kingsmill bread on his head on the anniversary of the republican Kingsmill massacre in 1976.

Mr Dodds added: "This is another significant test for the Sinn Fein leadership."

A Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) statement said police in north Belfast received a report of criminal damage in the Exchange Street area of Belfast at around 2.20pm on Friday.

"It is believed that damage was caused to the wheel-clamp of a car."

Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) leader Jim Allister called for the Northern Ireland Assembly member to resign and the police to take action.

"It must be demonstrated he is not above the law," he said.

A spokesman for parking firm PEA told the Belfast Telegraph: "PEA is aware of this incident and has reported the matter to the PSNI (Police Service Northern Ireland) as we do in all such cases."

Social media footage appears to show Mr Kelly kneeling down to remove the orange device from the vehicle's right-hand wheel, before resting it against a nearby wall.

A pair of bolt cutters appear to be lying beside the wheel.

A Sinn Fein spokesman said: "Yesterday, Friday 2 February, Gerry Kelly MLA returned to his car after an early morning gym session to find that his car had been made immobile by a clamp just after 7.20am.

"He removed the clamp from the front wheel. He left the device nearby and drove off to pre-arranged meetings.

"His solicitor is dealing with the matter and he will be making no further comment at this time."

- Press Association & Digital DeskTributes have been paid to Former Ceann Comhairle Seamus Pattison, has died aged 81 following a long illness.

Mr Pattison served as a Labour TD for Carlow-Kilkenny for almost 50 years until he stepped down in 2007.

He served two Dail terms as Ceann Comhairle, or Dail Chairman, and was for a long time "Father of the House", meaning its longest serving member.

He was also a Minister of State in the Department of Social Welfare and was Leas Ceann Comhairle. He also served as an MEP.

Mr Pattison is survived by his brothers Joseph, Michael and Monsigeur Francis Pattison in San Diego.

Reacting to Mr Pattison's passing Fianna Fail Leader Micheal Martin TD said the former Ceann Comhairle and Labour TD was a distinguished public representative who diligently represented the people of Carlow - Kilkenny for 46 years.

"He also served the country at a national level through his time as Minister of State for Social Welfare from 1983 to 1987. Seamus also represented Ireland at the European Parliament during his tenure as MEP from 1981 to 1983.

Seamus will be widely remembered from his time as Ceann Comhairle of Dail Eireann from 1997 to 2002, and Leas Ceann Comhairle from 2002 until his retirement from politics in 2007. He was a gentleman who commanded the respect of all sides of the house. He was fair and impartial and ensured that all TDs got a fair hearing when he sat in the chair.

As Father of the Dail he was always on hand to offer advice and support to TDs and Senators when needed. I remember many conversations that I had with him down through the years, and one thing which always struck me was his strong sense of social duty. He was a passionate man who espoused the values of the Labour movement throughout his long career.

On my own behalf and on behalf of the entire Fianna Fail family I would like to offer my condolences to his family.

Ar dheis De go raibh a anam.

An Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has also paid tribute.

He said: "Seamus was a well respected Ceann Comhairle, and as a Minister, TD and MEP he represented his constituents in Carlow and Kilkenny for nearly five decades with distinction. I send my condolences to his family at this sad time.

Labour Leader Brendan Howlin says he was a stalwart in the Parliamentary Labour Party that he joined as a young man.

He says Mr. Pattison was generous both with his time and his advice.

Daniel McConnell & Digital DeskAileen Lee speaks to artist Jack Hickey about his background and work to date.

Whats your background?

I grew up and live in the town of Cobh. I was accepted into CIT s Crawford College of Art and Design in 2007.

I graduated in 2011 and have been a practising artist ever since.

Most artists find it very difficult to be financially self-sufficient through their artwork. I recently won the Hennessy Portrait Prize and the prize money allows me to make and create what I want without this pressure.

Winning the Hennessy prize also validates my practice, which I believe is very important for any artist.

Whats a typical workday like for you?

I tend to put in between six and eight hours painting, Monday to Friday. My time is usually split between producing work and promoting it.

Most artists dont work nine-to-five, five days a week. It is an ongoing process every day.

My Time which won Jack Hickey the Hennessy Portrait Prize in 2017.

Tell us about a recentfavourite project or design you have worked on?

Hennessy Prize aside, I recently had an exhibition in Bordeaux in France. I was lucky enough to have a residency there in 2016, where I captured moments that would inspire the show, Arrival.

This was my first solo show outside of Ireland. Residencies can challenge and influence your practice and I would recommend it to all artists.

Whats your design style?

My style of painting would be described as realism/photorealism. This description tends to focus on the detail in the painting and the technical ability of the artist.

Unfortunately, because of this, the subject matter in the painting usually gets overlooked. Achieving a balance is key and I try to do this in my work.

'Tread Softly' by Jack Hickey.

What/who inspires your work?

Most of my work is semi-autobiographical with my camera never too far away. I have often painted issues which have affected me personally.

Whats your favourite trend at the moment (if you have any)?

Its difficult because most artists are veryindividual, having their own trend and style. Itry to let my work do the talking.

Whats your most treasured possession?

My camera and iMac would be possessions that I would use daily, maybe not treasured but definitely of high importance. I do have some artwork I did in college and secondary school that I treasure.

Its great to look back on work you produced at a time where the creative act was simply for the joy of it.

Who would be your favourite designer/artist, or style inspiration?

As for traditional masters of painting it would be Caravaggio  he is God for me as a painter. Having seen a number of his pieces in the flesh, especially the Taking of Christ in the National Gallery, it gave me a purpose and I realised why I paint.

'Lift' by Jack Hickey.

Rembrandt would be another  after my own recent experience with portraiture, understanding the difficulty of painting another person made me admire the man who did a self-portrait most years. For contemporary artists I tend to drift closer to photography and film, artists like Uta Barth, Nan Goldin, Larry Sultan, and DougDubois.

What would be a dream project for you to work on?

I am visiting the US in July and exhibiting in New York would be on the bucket list, especially if it was a solo show in an established gallery.

I have a patron living in the city who has bought a number of my works. I will be meeting up with him and discussing my future stateside.

Apollos Calling by Jack Hickey.

There is one other project that I am looking into, which would be quite different. It would be to travel with the Irish Naval Service to the Mediterranean, to see the humanitarian work they are doing over there. I would love to document it and produce a body of work that reflects the situation.

Both my father and my brother served in the Irish Navy, so the connection and relationship already exists.

Have you any design tips for us?

Try and hold onto your artistic credibility as much as you can, artists forget the power they have  without them there is no work, no exhibition, no sales.Turkey has said eight of its troops were killed in Ankara's military operation against a Syrian Kurdish militia, the deadliest day in the two-week-old offensive in the enclave of Afrin.

In a statement late on Saturday, the Turkish military said five soldiers were killed after their tank in Syria came under attack near Afrin. The soldiers could not be saved despite all attempts, it said.

Earlier in the day, three Turkish soldiers were reported killed in the Afrin offensive - one was killed in the area of the tank attack, another in northern Syria and the third on the Turkish side of the border in what Ankara said was an attack by Syrian Kurdish militiamen.

The total death toll for Turkish troops since the operation, codenamed Olive Branch, started on January 20 now stands at 13.

Turkey launched the incursion into Afrin to rout the US-backed Syrian Kurdish militia, known as the People's Protection Units (YPG), which it considers to be a terrorist organisation and an extension of Kurdish insurgents fighting within Turkey.

From Istanbul, Turkish presidential spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said Turkey will not tolerate the presence of the YPG "anywhere" along its southern border, hinting that Ankara might expand the Afrin operation eastward.

Turkey's first demand is to see the YPG move east of the Euphrates River and leave the town of Manbij, where American troops backing the Syrian Kurdish fighters are stationed, Mr Kalin said.

He called on the United States to "disengage" from the YPG and said Turkey will continue communications with "our American allies to avoid any confrontation".

Turkey shares a 911km border with Syria. The YPG controls much of the territory along the border and an uninterrupted strip from Manbij to the Iraqi border.

Meanwhile, in the embattled northwestern province of Idlib, al Qaida-linked militants said they downed a Russian fighter jet and killed its pilot after he ejected from the plane and landed on the ground.

The pilot resisted being captured and fired at the militants who then shot and killed him, according to one of the militants and Syrian monitors.

The Russian Defence Ministry confirmed the downing of the Su-25 and said the pilot was killed in fighting with "terrorists". A report on the ministry's Zvezda TV said preliminary information indicated the plane was shot by a portable ground-to-air missile in an area under control of al Qaida's branch in Syria.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the plane was downed near the rebel-held town of Saraqeb, which Syrian troops have been trying to take under the cover of Russian airstrikes.

Russia is a key ally of President Bashar Assad, and has been waging a military campaign on behalf of his forces since 2015. Since then, Syrian troops have captured wide parts of the country and in recent weeks have been making advances in Idlib. The province is also a base for al Qaida's branch in Syria and other Islamic groups.

Also Saturday, Syria's Foreign Ministry has dismissed as "null and void" U.S. accusations that Assad's government is producing and using "new kinds of weapons" to deliver deadly chemicals despite committing to abolish its program in 2013.

The American statements are "nothing more than lies" based on accounts of what the Trump administration called its partners on ground, the ministry said. It also said reports by Western-backed media outlets about Damascus using chemical weapons were "a new version of U.S. and Western desperate intentions to create" an excuses to attack Syria.

President Donald Trump has not ruled out additional military action to deter attacks or punish Assad, administration officials said earlier this week, although they did not suggest any action was imminent.

- Press AssociationIt's only set up to work with US airlines American, Delta and United, but Google's Flights app can now predict flight delays in advance, all in the quest to make travel better and cheaper.

Google's official blog has posted an update on the "Google Flights" app, which I've never heard of before, but which is now making global news thanks to the power of machine learning and predictive abilities.

The blog post is entitled "Get help with cheaper flights and potential flight delays this winter" and is written by Anket Mathur and Grace Dance, both Flights Product Managers at Google.

As the blog post is written for a US audience, it talks about the winter they're experiencing while we, here in the sunny Southern Hemisphere, are baking through recent heatwaves while waiting for cooler temperatures to finally emerge.

That said, we can easily understand why Google's product managing duo note how skiers and snowboarders are hitting the slopes, while others seek out tropical getaways where there's presumably not a single snowflake in sight, except perhaps in the deep freezers in those tropical supermarkets.

So, no matter where you are in the world, or your reason for flying, flight delays at airports can be very stressful, and Google says its Flights app "can now help you predict those flight delays, and were also introducing a new feature to help you feel confident about finding the cheapest fare no matter where youre going".

With Google's algorithms growing ever more powerful, it's a promise you certainly expect is true, but whether Google will ever become Godgle is presumably a flight of fancy that humanity can ill-afford, cheapest fare or no.

What humans can afford are the new fare types Google's blog post tells us about, dubbed Basic Economy.

Article continues below image, please read on.

We're told these "are great for people traveling on a budget, but it can be confusing to understand whether important options  like overhead bin space, ability to select your seat, and baggage fees  are included in the fare".

These types of bare-minimum flights are on offer in Australia, too, but until Google Flights operates on more airlines than simply American, Delta and United, we'll just have to wait until Google Flights truly goes global.

Besides the "stress" of waiting for Google Flights to take off globally, we're told that "one of the most stressful parts of traveling happens between heading to the airport and waiting to board your flight, as you start checking to see if your flight is on time".

Naturally, anyone who has ever flown a few flights now this to be only too true, but the power of Google means that while the Google Flights app "already shows delays" for those lucky Americans able to use it, the app now shares"reasons for those delays and delay predictions too".

Google says it does this "using historic flight status data", and says its "machine learning algorithms can predict some delays even when this information isnt available from airlines yet  and delays are only flagged when were at least 80% confident in the prediction".

As you'd expect, Google's product managers says they "still recommend getting to the airport with enough time to spare, but hope this information can manage expectations and prevent surprises".

If you have access to the Google Flights app, you can "simply search for your flight (American 4442) or the airline and flight route (Air New Zealand Auckland to Singapore), and these details will appear right in your search results".

Google's product managers offer a final piece of advice: "Dont let uncertainty  whether its understanding the fine print of fare options or navigating potential delays  keep you from your next vacation. Well help you get to those sunnier skies."

Well, if you use one of the three airlines in question, that is, but with Google seeking to organise the world's information, and not just that of the US, there can be no doubt that Google Flights will touch down for Aussies at some point, too, if it isn't already being tested globally on an "under the radar" basis.Microsoft Windows servers around the globe are playing host to a mining botnet known as Smominru Monero, which may have made as much as US$3.6 million for its operators based on the current value of the monero cryptocurrency.

The security company Proofpoint said in a blog post that since May last year, its researchers had been monitoring the miner that was infecting new Windows servers using the EternalBlue exploit, malware crafted by the NSA and leaked on the Web in April 2017 by a group known as the Shadow Brokers.

While Proofpoint researcher Kafeine said that the miner, which had been christened as Smominru or Ismo, was well-known, the fact that it was using Windows Management Infrastructure was unusual.

"Based on the hash power associated with the Monero payment address for this operation, it appears that this botnet was likely twice the size of Adylkuzz," he wrote.

At least 25 hosts were carrying out attacks using EternalBlue to infect new nodes and increase the size of the botnet, Kafeine noted.

Other researchers had noted attacks via Microsoft's SQL Server and EsteemAudit, an RDP vulnerability.

A sinkholing operation had provided an estimate of 526,000 infected Windows hosts, most of which were in Russia, India and Taiwan.

Kafeine said Proofpoint had contacted the mining pool MineXMR to request that that the existing Monero address associated with Smominru be removed, but though this was done after several days, the botnet operators were observed registering new domains and mining to a new address on the same mining pool.

On the bright side, the operators may have lost control over a third of the botnet as a result.

"Because most of the nodes in this botnet appear to be Windows servers, the performance impact on potentially critical business infrastructure may be high, as can the cost of increased energy usage by servers running much closer to capacity," Kafeine said.

"The operators of this botnet are persistent, use all available exploits to expand their botnet, and have found multiple ways to recover after sinkhole operations."

Kevin Epstein, vice-president of Threat Operations at Proofpoint, said: "We repeatedly see threat actors follow the money - over the last several months, the money has been in cryptocurrency and actors are turning their attention to a variety of illicit means to obtain both Bitcoins and alternatives.

"This monero mining botnet is extremely large, made up mostly of Microsoft Windows servers spread around the globe.

"Taking down the botnet is very difficult given its distributed nature and the persistence of its operators. For businesses, preventing infection through robust patching regimens and layered security is the best protection from potentially disruptive impacts on critical infrastructure."

Graphic: courtesy ProofpointReddit Email 1K Shares

TeleSur |  

Two left-wing groups in the U.S. organized the letters campaign and protests marking the the 17th birthday of the imprised Palestinian teen.

More than 700 Jewish young people from the U.S. wrote letters of solidarity to Ahed Tamimi, the iconic Palestinian 17-year-old who was arrested by Israeli authorities last month and charged with 12 counts including assaulting an occupation soldier and stone throwing after a video of her slapping a soldier at her homes yard went viral.

The letters were delivered by dozens of Jewish activists to Aheds father Bassem Tamimi at their family home in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh on Thursday, a day after her 17th birthday, the left-leaning Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported Friday.

One note read, Dear Ahed, my name is Shula and I am 17. Were [the] same age and we live in different worlds. Your courage inspires me to stand up for what I believe in. Your actions are not done in vain.

Meanwhile hundreds if young Jewish activists in the U.S. marked Aheds birthday Wednesday by protesting against her detention and show her support ahead of her trial in an Israeli military court next Tuesday. The protests took place in New York, Boston, Washington among other U.S. cities.

The letters and the protest actions were organized by the U.S.-based anti-occupation groups IfNotNow and All Thats Left with the slogan #NoBirthdayBehindBars.

IfNotNow founding member Simone Zimmerman was one of the activists who visited the Tamimis home and told Bassem that Aheds story has really moved a lot of people. Of course shes a symbol, but shes also just a person who deserves to have the future that she wants to have.

Also All Thats Left member, Micah Friedman, told Haaretz Its particularly important for me as a Jew who connects to this place not just through a political lens but religiously and spiritually, to communicate to Ahed  as a young person whose lifes been shaped by occupation in the name of the Jewish people  that there are Jews throughout the world and living here who dont believe that the justice system shes currently dealing with is just.

While Bassem thanked the activists for their visit and protests, he did point out how Jewish and Israeli activist groups plant olive trees to make themselves feel good, when its freedom, not trees, that he and his family needs.

She was arrested on Dec. 19 after a video of her slapping an Israeli soldier outside her home in the occupied West Bank village of Nabi Saleh, in mid-December went viral. It was revealed later that the Palestinian girl was upset after soldiers had shot her 14-year-old cousin in the head with a rubber bullet a day earlier.

Ahed has been in the public eye for years. In 2010, as a child, she became an iconic figure of Palestinian youth struggle against the occupation through a photograph in which she stands before a soldier with her fist raised.

Ahed had also made international news few years ago when a video of her, along with female members of her family, went viral showing her fighting an Israeli occupation soldier who was pinning down her 12-year old male cousin.

But the Israeli occupation has been actively persecuting the Tamimi family for decades over their weekly protests against the theft of their lands in favor of the illegal Jewish settlement of Halamish near their villages. Several members of the family have been detained and killed over the years.

Via TeleSur



Bonus video added by Informed Comment:

SABC: Free Ahed Tamimi calls mountReddit Email 548 Shares

Human Rights Watch |  

(Beirut)  Guards at Turkeys closed border with Syria are indiscriminately shooting at and summarily returning Syrian asylum seekers attempting to cross into Turkey, Human Rights Watch said today.

Syrians are fleeing heightened violence in Idlib to seek refuge near the Turkish border, which remains closed to all but critical medical cases. According to the UN, 247,000 Syrians were displaced to the border area between December 15, 2017 and January 15, 2018. Refugees who succeeded in crossing to Turkey, using smuggling routes, told Human Rights Watch that Turkish border guards shot at them and others while attempting to cross into Turkey. In some cases, Turkish border guards beat asylum seekers they detained and denied them medical assistance.

Syrians fleeing to the Turkish border seeking safety and asylum are being forced back with bullets and abuse, said Lama Fakih, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. As fighting in Idlib and Afrin displaces thousands more, the number of Syrians trapped along the border willing to risk their lives to reach Turkey is only likely to increase.

Human Rights Watch described its findings in a letter on January 30, 2018 to Turkeys interior minister.

Human Rights Watch spoke to 16 Syrian refugees who entered Turkey with smugglers between May and December 2017, 15 in person in Urfa and Gaziantep, in southern Turkey, and the other remotely. Thirteen said Turkish border guards shot toward them or other fleeing asylum seekers as they tried to cross while still in Syria, killing 10 people, including one child, and injuring several more. At other border crossings, witnesses told Human Rights Watch that Turkish border guards fired warning shots into the air but did not target asylum seekers directly.

Turkish border guards also abused detained asylum seekers, witnesses said. Those interviewed described different treatment at various crossing points, though treatment at each point was consistent. In seven cases, interviewees told Human Rights Watch that Turkish border guards also failed to provide apprehended asylum seekers with medical treatment when it was requested or clearly needed, and instead summarily returned them to Syria.

Twelve of the families Human Rights Watch spoke to who crossed near the Syrian internally displaced persons camp in al-Dureyya, near the city of Darkush said that upon capture, Turkish border guards placed them in a large square where they would remain until the guards had collected enough people to send back to Syria. Three families estimated that the square could fit up to a thousand people and usually had hundreds in it.

Those interviewed described their journeys across the border into Turkey as arduous and dangerous. Aside from the danger of being shot at by border guards, they described terrain littered with landmines, steep climbs, narrow paths along ravines, and valleys. They said they paid smugglers between US$300 and US$8,000 per person to reach Turkey, in many cases exhausting their resources.

Turkey has taken in about 3.5 million Syrians, hosting more refugees than any other country. Turkey has granted many of them temporary protection status, and sought to provide them with basic services, including medical care and education. However, Turkeys generous hosting of large numbers of Syrians does not absolve it of its responsibility to help those seeking protection at its borders.

While Turkey is entitled to secure its border with Syria, it is required to respect the principle of nonrefoulement, which prohibits rejecting asylum seekers at borders when that would expose them to the threat of persecution, torture, and threats to life and freedom. Turkey must also respect the right to life and bodily integrity, including the absolute prohibition on subjecting anyone to inhuman and degrading treatment.

The Turkish government should issue standard instructions to the border guards at all crossing points that lethal force must not be used against asylum seekers and no asylum seeker is to be mistreated, but should be given access to medical aid when required. It should ensure that all crossing points comply with these core legal obligations, as well as the ban on refoulement.

The escalation of hostilities in the provinces of Idlib and Afrin inside Syria, and Turkeys refusal to allow Syrian asylum seekers to cross the border, comes as some refugee host countries assert that Syria is safe for returns. Both Lebanon and Jordan have effectively closed their borders to Syrian asylum seekers as well.

In October 2017, the UN refugee agency stressed that all parts of Syria are reported to have been affected, directly or indirectly, by one or multiple conflicts and therefore maintained its long-standing call on all countries not to forcibly return Syrians.

Turkeys international partners  including the European Union, which has a migration agreement with Ankara aimed at stemming onward migration to the EU  should press Turkey to keep its borders open to refugees, provide financial support to support Turkeys refugee efforts, share responsibility by stepping up resettlement of refugees from Turkey, and refrain from returning people to Syria, Human Rights Watch said.

Conditions in Syria are not safe for refugee returns, Fakih said. With hostilities in Afrin contributing to the growing displacement crisis in the country, Turkey should allow the thousands of desperate Syrians seeking refuge to cross the border.

Since at least mid-August 2015, Turkish border guards have pushed back Syrians trying to reach Turkey. In April and May 2016, Human Rights Watch documented Turkish border guards shooting and beating Syrian asylum seekers trying to cross to Turkey, resulting in deaths and serious injuries, and sending those who managed to cross back to Syria. By November 2017, at least 330 people had died while trying to cross the border, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Turkey has also erected a wall along most of its 911-kilometer borders with Syria.

Turkeys land borders are legally protected by army border units of the Turkish Armed Forces. Gendarmerie also on duty at the borders operate under the authority of the land forces command. There are also gendarmerie stations near the borders charged with regular rural policing activities. In documenting the abuses, Human Rights Watch refers generically to border guards without specifying if they are soldiers or gendarmes since such specific information was not provided or known by many witnesses.

In December 2017, clashes between the Syrian government and non-state armed groups in Idlib escalated, with the Russian-Syrian military alliance conducting strikes to support the advancement of Syrian ground troops. According to the UN, heightened violence led 247,000 Syrians to seek refuge near the Turkish border between December 15th and January 15th. On January 20, 2018, Turkey launched an offensive in Kurdish-held Afrin in Syria.

Accounts of Shootings by Border Guards

The refugees said the shootings took place near al-Dureyya camp for internally displaced Syrians, at Turkeys border wall near the Bab al-Hawa/Cilvegozu border crossing, and near the Orontes river smuggling point.

Witnesses told Human Rights Watch of new cases of Turkish border guards opening fire at civilians trying to enter Turkey through smuggling routes. Twelve witnesses said that the guards shot directly at the groups as well as firing indiscriminately. Three witnesses said that at least three people had died with them while attempting to cross, and one family spoke of six others that died with them in one crossing. In one of these cases, they shared the names of the dead with Human Rights Watch.

One woman that attempted the crossing with her family seven times at several crossing points between September and October said that the Turkish border guards shot at them during almost every attempt:

When they [Turkish border guards] open fire, we would be hiding in the valley. They would shoot randomly. I could see the bullets spark between my feet. In one incident, a woman was hit twice in her belly, and two men carried her back to Syria. We could see the trail of blood between the bushes.

She told Human Rights Watch that the shots came from the front. The family had three children with them, and the woman was pregnant at the time.

A second woman described the shooting of a 13-year-old child who was attempting to cross with his mother:

We had reached the wide street that divides Syria and Turkey, and the smuggler told the child and another man to cross it. They started to walk across, and then bang, bang. They were both shot. The kid, it went straight through his stomach, and he was bleeding heavily. We dragged him back with us all the way, and he died in Syria.

Abuse of Detainees; Lack of Medical Care

At al-Dureyya crossing, border guards hit and otherwise mistreated captured asylum seekers, Syrians interviewed said. Five asylum seekers said that they saw the border guards hit men and women, including stepping on them with military-issued boots. One witness who was captured while attempting to cross, described the treatment:

When they [the Turkish border guards] captured us, we would stay out in the cold for hours [gathered in a square] until they had collected enough groups to return us to Syria. Even when it was cold and raining, they would force us to sit silently. One time a woman asked for a drink of water, and they hit her.

Three witnesses said that as many as 1,500 people were being held in the square when they were there.

Witnesses also described mistreatment at the crossing near Bab Al-Hawa/ Cilvegozu. A young man who was captured after attempting to cross with his family said that members of the Turkish border patrol hit him on the back and shoulder with a rifle and military-issue helmet, and subjected others in the group to similar treatment.

One witness said that a man had fallen into the valley while trying to cross, and had clearly broken his hands. When the group was captured, the man asked for help, but the Turkish border guard refused to take him to a hospital. They didnt even give him painkillers, the witness said.

In a second case, a woman had given birth while attempting to cross the border. The Turkish border guards sent her and the child back to Syria without providing medical assistance.

In two cases described, it appeared that guards were trying to provide medical care, but that the efforts were too late and two refugees died. In one of the cases, a family told Human Rights Watch that a man had fallen ill at the border. The Turkish border guards had requested an ambulance, but the man died. His body was returned to Syria, with his family and the captured group.

Human Rights Watch



Bonus video added by Informed Comment:

Wochit News: Reports Of Border Guards Shooting At Syrian Refuge SeekersJersey, Channel Islands - February 4, 2018 - (FSCwire) - Randgold Resources says it is engaging at the highest level with the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo to head off the enactment of a new mining code which the company believes will severely limit the growth of the mining industry in the DRC as well as the country's own economic prospects. The new code was passed by both houses of parliament last week but still has to be signed by the president before it becomes law.

Chief executive Mark Bristow, in Cape Town for the Mining Indaba, said since the new code surfaced in draft form in 2014 the mining industry had made detailed and repeated representations to the Congolese Ministry of Mines about what it regarded as very serious flaws in its provisions.

"It is therefore very disappointing to see that none of our proposals and comments are reflected in the legislation, which is in fact more draconian in its final form than earlier drafts. Among other things, its attempts to scrap the 10-year stability clause enshrined in the 2002 code, which was the basis on which Randgold and other mining companies invested in the DRC. In fact, when Randgold and AngloGold Ashanti bought the project which became the Kibali mine, we sought and received a formal written declaration from the DRC government which entrenches our rights under the 2002 code and confirms that the law would be honoured in respect, not only of Kibali but also any permit renewals," he said.

"It is our express wish that the government grasps the serious consequences this ill-considered code will have on its ability as a country to attract international investment and re-investment to the DRC, and to refer the code back to the ministry of mines for further consultation with the industry. If this fails, however, we shall seek to enforce our rights including those which provide for international arbitration."804 Shares Share

I often tell people that medical school has been one of the most challenging periods of my life  emotionally more than academically, although my test scores might tell you that it hasnt exactly been a walk in the park in that regard either. I came to medical school after a fantastic gap year in Boston where met and built a strong community of friends that turned into a family of sorts.

Consisting of mostly women  attending a womens college leaves you with a strong affiliation and love for women  my Beantown crew were the people with whom I explored my new city. These were the people in whose houses I had spare toothbrushes and designated pajamas, people with whom I discussed theology and explored tough questions about God and Christianity during our onesie-wearing estrogen parties. These were the people who supported and prayed for me as I embarked on the almost year-long process that is medical school applications and those who came en masse to celebrate with me at my white-coat ceremony  complete with silly selfies and obligatory jumping pictures.

And yet, these were exactly the ones I found myself without as I tackled eight-hour lecture days, biweekly tests covering textbooks worth of material and declining sleep.

Prior to medical school, I had attacked every new opportunity with extreme optimism and confidence, the kind that looked arrogantly ahead without even a last glance at the past. It wasnt that I did not cherish memories or the people that featured fondly in them, it was that I had developed a track record of immediate thriving even after the most heartfelt of goodbyes. I expected medical school to be challenging, especially academically, because everyone tells you it is. But I also expected to meet its challenges with a good work ethic and consequently, excel immediately at it. And so medical school said, Ill raise you one, chica.

I dont remember if there was ever one breaking point, one moment where I decided that it was too much and that I was done. Instead, I remember several breaking points, several towel throw-ins, several moments where tears were shed at the most mundane of stimuli. I also remember that it was in these moments that emotionally-laden words collided into sentences in my brain and rolled off my thumbs unto my phones notes app: I found poetry.

One of my first poems came to me as I listened to a physician talk about his work with the homeless population in Boston at a public health event. I was inspired by his lifes work and encouraged by the fact that there was indeed meaning after the drudgery of medical school. But I was stuck on the in-between: how does one nurture dreams of a far-off, promised land and yet live contently in the realities of a current one that devitalizes? So I wrote:

Your belly burns

with dreams so fierce,

they convince you

tomorrow will be lit

almost entirely by their flames.

But tomorrow is still tomorrow.

Today, you must face the reality

that on a cold day,

imagined fires are scarcely enough.

The poems never really provided answers to my questions or completely resolved my angst about the path I was on, but they served as outlets for my emotions in an environment that often treats emotion as taboo. They soothed me with the comfort that comes from creating and knowing that you can bend shapes and words in ways that sometimes bring beauty amidst uncertainty.

Poetry became my fortress and also the means through which I rebuilt my social system: it became a way to tell the world  read: small group of Instagram followers  that I was struggling quite a bit with the fact that medical school isnt all that it is cracked up to be or perhaps put differently, that it is all it is cracked up to be and then some. Putting myself out there in words made it easier to reach out to people around me  classmates, other medical students, family, my Beantown crew. I found that I was not alone, that my classmates were going through similar struggles and life crises and drawing on the strengths of people and experiences from times past was essential for survival. Indeed, a woman  particularly one in medical school  is not an island.

My story of survival  or surviving, because sista hasnt graduated yet  will not be complete without mentioning Lola my cousin-sister-friend who despite working on a PhD, managed to provide a listening ear on days when tears fell freely and serve as first reader for everything I wrote. We have always been close but the past years have drawn us even closer in a way that has been life-saving for me. Through her constant cheerleading and friendship, I have found small ways to nurture dreams of a far-off promised land and yet live contently in the realities of a current one that threatens to devitalize.

Tolu Kehinde is a medical student who blogs at The process book project.

Image credit: Shutterstock.com471 Shares Share

Bill is a 58-year-old male with a history of head and neck cancer as well as chronic low back pain who presents to his new primary care doctor for a routine checkup and visit for a medication refill. He works in construction and has been on chronic opioid therapy after his cancer  with a stable dose of 15 mg of oxycodone for over five years.

At his new primary care visit, after a few meet and greet pleasantries, his new primary care doctor discusses his current medication regimen with him  ibuprofen 400mg TID and oxycodone 15mg BID. His physician expresses significant concern with his medication regimen, telling Bill that its against the rules to continue prescribing opioids for him  despite the fact that hes been on this dose for several years.

She prescribes an oxycodone taper for him and requests he return to her office in two weeks for a re-evaluation.

Bill, not wanting to be a problem, takes his taper as prescribed for the first few days. However, as hes been on opioids for over five years, he begins feeling sick  nausea, vomiting, malaise, and irritability. He tries to go back to his old dose but runs out of oxycodone. While trying to work at a construction site, Bill is having trouble completing his tasks and drops a few expensive objects.

After a few harsh words from his supervisor, Bill realizes he cannot work given how he feels and contacts his old oncologist for help. His oncologist provides him with a small prescription for oxycodone, which he fills. Bill feels better and is able to get through to his primary care follow-up visit.

Bill lets his new primary care doctor know about what happened: the withdrawal, not being able to work and how he had to get a refill from his oncologist. The doctor expresses extreme concern

about his drug seeking and doctor shopping and tells him he is fired as a patient. He is discharged from the practice.

Out of opioids and feeling sick again, he presents to the emergency department with a chief complaint of medication refill.

How could this have been avoided? Was his primary care provider too quick to vilify his chronic, stable opioid regimen and start him on an opioid taper? Was there any reason to taper him?

America clearly has a problem with opioids. Going forward, it is best practice to avoid starting an opiate naive patient on opiates for chronic nonterminal pain. However, what do we do with patients like Bill? There is clearly a group of patients who have been previously prescribed opioids for chronic pain and are dependent on opioids. While some of these patients have struggled with addiction to their opioids, others  like Bill  have been stable on a particular dose of opioids without any problems.

When confronted with such patients on chronic opioid therapy, physicians must consider the risk of addiction or medication misuse when choosing whether or not to taper or discontinue opioid therapy. Providers should consider whether or not any of the four major risk factors for substance abuse are present: a current substance use disorder, a history of substance abuse, a family history of substance abuse and severe/untreated mental illness.

Attention should also be paid to signs of patients developing addiction to chronic opioid therapy: excessively escalating doses, obtaining medications from multiple prescribers in an irregular fashion, requesting early refills and losing prescriptions  to

name a few.

It is important to realize that not every patient on long-term opioid therapy is an addict  and that some people can be stable, without addiction, on long-term opioid therapy. Patients without major risk factors for addiction and who do not show signs of developing addiction could be just simply maintained on the opioid regimen that works for them, with regular check-ins to ensure that they are still doing well with their treatment. While long-term opioid therapy for a non-terminal pain syndrome is clearly not desirable, abruptly tapering or discontinuing opioid therapy in such patients  without first developing a plan with the patient or other providers  is bound to cause problems with uncontrolled pain and withdrawal, as we saw with our patient Bill.

Casey Grover is an emergency physician. Lee Goldman is a family physician.

Image credit: Shutterstock.comCartoon Saloon's film The Breadwinner has made history winning the Best Independent Animated Feature Film at the Annie Awards in Los Angeles.

It is the first time that a solo female director has won in this category.

"On behalf of all those who gave their experience, skill and talent to this film, I am absolutely thrilled. At a time when womens voices are coming to the forefront, the story of a young girl using her voice for what she believes in is more relevant than ever. Recognizing stories like Parvanas helps point to the importance of women and girls being heard around the world," said Director Nora Twomey.

The Breadwinner is an animated feature film that tells the story of Parvana, a 12-year-old girl who gives up everything to provide for her family and reunite with her father.

Based on Deborah Eilis's novel, the film spans the autumn of 2001 in Kabul, Afghanistan just as the Taliban regime began to fall. The book has been published in more than 40 editions and translated into many languages.

The film was named Best Animated Feature by The Los Angeles Film Critics Association. It also received a Golden Globe nomination.

The Breadwinner will premiere in Ireland as part of the Dublin International Film Festival on February 22.

The film is nominated for an Oscar next month.The vessel lost contact with the MT Marine Express group at 03:30 hrs (UTC) on February 1 (PTI image used for representational purpose)

New Delhi, Feb 4: A Panama-registered ship of MT Marine Express, which went missing off the coast of Nigeria nearly three days back, is yet to be traced. At least 22 Indian crew members were on board, the company's UK-based media cell confirmed on Wednesday.

Loaded with nearly 13,500 tonnes of gasoline, the ship went off the radar on February 1. The vessel's last location was traced off the coasts of Nigeria and Benin in West Africa. The possibility of the oil tanker being hijacked cannot be ruled out, considering the high-monetary value of the cargo it was laden with, the authorities said.

"The vessel was last contacted at 0330 UTC on February 1. The first priority is the safety of the 22 crew members on board whose families have been contacted and informed of the situation," the statement issued by the MT Marine Express was quoted as saying by foreign news agencies.

All missing crew members are from India

The crew-manning agency, Andheri-based Anglo-Eastern Ship Management, has confirmed that all members on board of the merchant vessel are Indians. While refraining to give more insight on the issue than what the London-based media cell of MT Marine Express has said, the agency said whether the ship has been hijacked or looted by pirates could only be determined after any contact is established with the missing sailors.

Among those missing, the identity of one has been published in reports -- Sree Unni (25) from Kerala's Kasaragod district. While another crew member is reported to be from Kerala's Kozhikode, the identities of remaining 20 are yet to be published. The MT Marine Express, however, maintains that it has informed the family members of all the 22 missing crew members about the incident.

Search operation underway

Director General of Shipping, Mumbai, B R Shekhar says available diplomatic channels are being used to expedite the search operation. The DG counterparts in Nigeria and Benin have been asked to take immediate measures.

The Indian High Commission in Abuja is constantly in touch with the Nigerian maritime authorities, reports claimed. A lookout has been issued for the missing vessel by Nigerian and Beninian security boats, with the London-based International Maritime Bureau (IMB) Anti-Piracy Reporting Centre also monitoring the case closely.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 04, 2018 11:18 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).Midlands band Chasing Abbey have been encouraging their legion of fans to vote for their song That Good Thing, which has been nominated for Irish Song of the Year 2017.

The widespread radio smash was shortlisted for the the shortlist for the RTE Choice Music Prize  Irish Song of The Year 2017 where you can currently vote for the Tullamore three-piece.

Speaking about the success of 'That Good Thing' and this nomination, the band said, "when we wrote this song in Bees shed a year ago, we never could have imagined that it would be nominated for an award."

"We are so grateful, so honoured and so thankful for everything and everyone that has made this possible."

They asked people through social media to head over to the voting website and give them a vote.

The lads are up against stiff competition in the shape of The Academic, The Script, Niall Horan, Dermot Kennedy and Gavin James.

Voting closing on March 4.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________Laois hotel The Heritage, Killenard has followed up on the success of Castle Durrow in the TripAdvisor Choice Award with its a commendation in Irish Tatler Spa Awards.

Each year the montly Irish Tatler magazine travels around Ireland in search of the best spa and wellness destinations. Judges and editors road test the best service, therapists, and properties.

The Killenard hotel won a Highly Commended award and the judges were glowing in their praise.

"A hotel spa with one of the best thermal suites weve ever encountered, The Heritage Killenard impressed our judge with its high levels of customer service, relaxing atmosphere and its commitment to ensuring that each guest gets the most from their visit.

"During our stay we found staff to be knowledgeable and approachable while the treatment menu includes something for all budgets and inclinations, including the option of having lunch served in the spa itself. The staggering of appointments for the thermal suite is a small but effective touch that ensured our judge enjoyed the facilities in peace and quiet," said the judges.

The Heritage Killenard opened its doors in June 2005. The Heritage Spa Experience (Thermal Suite) includes jacuzzi, sauna and steam rooms

The awards will be music to the ears of Laois Tourism which has just launched a new five year strategy to attract more visitors to Laois.

COULD YOU BE THE NEXT ROSE OF TRALEE?Met Eireann has warned that the snow ice weather alert for Monday night into Tuesday will make for 'treacherous' morning commutes while Monday morning also requires care and another wintry front with possibly more snow could hit on Thursday.

In the latest weather bulletin on RTE, Met Eireann forecaster Joanne Donnelly gave details of the Status Yellow snow ice warning.

She warned that up to 3cms is expected for 'virtually all of Ireland' apart from Atlantic coastal areas. The snow will be accompanied by strong winds making driving hazardous.

"There could be some drifting of snow giving a very treacherous start on early on Tuesday morning for the roads," said Ms Donnelly.

Before that, temperatures will plummet on Sunday night into Monday morning to as low -4. Also making for tricky driving on Monday morning.

"A very very cold and frosty night and a cold and frosty start to Monday," said Ms Donnelly.

The forecaster warned that a wintry front could bring more snow on Thursday.

WATCH LATEST MET EIREANN RTE FORECAST HERE

WATCH MET EIREANN RTE FARMING FORECAST HEREIrish Water is commencing work to upgrade the Ballinakill Wastewater Treatment Plant in Laois.

The 50,000 investment will improve the level of treatment at the plant and improve the discharge quality of treated water from the plant into the River Ballymaddock.

The project includes the installation of a new ferric dosing system for the removal of phosphorus from the wastewater.

Irish Water says the removal of phosphorus during the wastewater treatment process will improve the water quality in the receiving waters as the discharge of treated water from the plant is improved. The utility says This benefits the environment for those using the river for recreational activities and for the wildlife and ecosystems that live in the river and along the river banks.

Work began in December 2017 and will be completed in February 2018. CSL will be carrying out the works on behalf of Irish Water.

The investment in the Balllinakill Wastewater Treatment Plant ensures that Irish Water is fully compliant with the EU Urban Wastewater Directives. Peter Flood is Capital Programmes Lead for Irish Water in the East and Midlands. The quality of the treated water discharged from the plant will be improved. The removal of phosphorus improves the quality of the water in the Ballymaddock River.

"Benefiting the environment for everyone who uses the river and the wildlife living and along it. Irish Water is investing our wastewater treatment plants to ensure they comply with EU Urban Wastewater Directives and to protect and benefit the environment, he said.The lifting of the Good Friday ban on the sale of alcohol met with almost universally acclaim last week.

So much so that many were using it as another yardstick of how far we have come as a society.

Although reducing the only two days of the year in which alcohol is not permitted to be sold to one day is probably more a yardstick of our ambiguous relationship to drink.

There was a lot of blather vented as regards the justification for doing so.

The Good Friday ban was having a very harmful impact on the tourist industry, which is now surely set to flourish with the addition of this extra day.

Although if tourism is hinging on this one day, then it should give us pause for thought and maybe even concern.

It was also hailed it as a progressive step in the long journey of separation between Church and State.'

Regardless of what your views on the religous dimension are, the links between Church and State have been sundered for a long time.

That journey is largely completed, and has been accomplished without this progressive Bill.

And anyway how progressive is a piece of legislation that feeds into and enhances the public health crisis which surrounds alcohol.

On average three people a day die as a result of alcohol abuse in Ireland.

We have had this problem for generations, and are still very much grabbling with it.

Not to mention the many social and domestic problems that accrue in so many domestic situations because of it.

But none of these issues merited much notice in the journey we took last week in giving this priority over public health legislation.

And aside from the health aspect was the retention of two days in a year in which alcohol could not be sold really that regressive to society.

If the passage of this Bill highlighted anything it was our continued immaturity and ambivalence as a society in regards to our attitude towards alcohol.

Are we a better society because of the lifting of this ban?

Hardly.

Should our national parliament be more concerned with dealing with a slew of substantive issues such has housing and Brexit.

One can only hope.The money has been handed over by the receiver to fix the public lights at The Meadows estate in Newbridge, however residents must now wait for the councils energy provider to do the work.

Residents in homes in Morristown and Cornelscourt, Newbridge, have been campaigning for the problem to be fixed for a long time.

A progress report at this months Kildare Newbridge Municipal District meeting notes a Site Resolution Plan (SRP) has been agreed and it said it is the bond provider/receivers responsibility to implement the plan including the public lighting issues.

The council said the provision of public lighting in The Meadows was highlighted by Building and Development Control staff as a priority issue to be addressed by the bond provider/receiver but has not been completed to date.

It was agreed that the bond provider/receiver would pay the council to provide a new public lighting system, the paymentwas received at the end of December and the request has been issued to the councils energy supplier.Sixteen-year-old Aisling Manning jetted out to Kenya last Thursday, February 1 to volunteer with a Kildare charity.

The Holy Family secondary school student lives in Kildare town.

Speaking prior to her departure, she told the Leader; Im going to Kenya with the Cara Projects on February 1 for two weeks and there is a group of 35 of us going over."

I wanted to do this trip because I felt it was a once in a life time experience and I know people that went last year. When I heard their stories I just knew I had to go, I really want to help there and just to see different culture and have different experiences, but all while helping.

She said she was excited about the trip and had been concentrating on reaching her fundraising target of 2,200.

In order to raise the money, the fifth year student organised a number of fundraisers.

Ive done a makeup masterclass and a party, I also had a table quiz in Sarsfields on Friday January 19, she said.

Cara Projects is an Irish registered charity and Kenyan registered NGO. It runs Cara Girls Rescue Centre near Ngong outside Nairobi. This centre provides a family environment encompassing love, welfare, trust, education, schooling and mentoring/training for 30 to 40 girls aged between 3 and 18 years. The girls are rescued from a variety of circumstances involving physical, sexual abuse, neglect and forced marriage.The new chairperson of Kildare Town Tidy Towns was recently appointed at the AGM, which was held on Thursday, January 18 last.

Willie Redmond officially handed the chair of Kildare Town Tidy Towns to Dr Mary OConnor at the AGM in Solas Bhride.

There was a large turnout at the AGM which was held in the wake of its recent IBAL honour as Irelands second cleanest town.

One of the main priorities for the organisation this year is to secure higher points in the National Tidy Towns competition.

I am stepping down as chairperson after being in the role for the past few years, said long-standing out going chair Mr Redmond.

He said that the goodwill which has been generated in the town since the IBALwin is contagious.

The level of community involvement is strong and credit must be given to the numerous residents associations, he added.

Meanwhile the Tidy Towns organisation is looking for new volunteers to get involved with their work, and those interested are invited to get in touch.

SEE ALSO: POLL: Vote for Kildare's Top Memorable Sporting MomentThyroid cancer survivor Amy Mahon from Newbridge has been announced as the Irish Global Hero of Hope on World Cancer Day, Sunday, February 4.

Heroes of Hope are cancer survivors who inspire hope, courage and determination in the fight against cancer. Amy joins Heroes from countries including South Africa, America and Germany who have been recognised by the American Cancer Society.

Amy was diagnosed with cancer in 2012 aged 29. Two years previously she was diagnosed with a borderline underactive thyroid and by the time her cancer was discovered it had spread to her lymph nodes.

She had her thyroid removed and radioactive iodine treatment. This required the single mum to be in isolation for five days, away from her five-year-old son.

Amy is now five years cancer free but the removal of her thyroid has resulted in lasting complications. Despite this, the nail and lash technician is determined to live her life to the full.

She said, Cancer has changed my life. I had to change my career and lifestyle and I have some health complications but I dont allow this to define me. Cancer made my life new, not different.

Amy was supported by the Irish Cancer Society during her treatment and as a result got involved in the Societys Relay For Life, Kildare.

Relay For Life is a 24 hour event that brings the community together to celebrate the lives of cancer survivors, remember those lost to the disease and fight back by increasing knowledge of cancer and raising money to fund vital research and services of the Society.

40,000 people will be diagnosed with cancer in Ireland this year. The money we raise will help fund vital research to treat cancer better and services to help people affected by the disease. Relay For Life also brings communities together to fight against an illness that can sadly make a person feel so alone. If I can help anyone feel like there is light at the end of that dark tunnel, I will walk over glass to do that, said Amy.

Mary Quinn, Relay For Life Fundraiser for the Irish Cancer Society said: Amy is a very deserving Hero of Hope and we are thrilled that she has been recognised for her outstanding contribution to Relay For Life Kildare. Despite her cancer diagnosis and the ongoing impact this has on her life, Amy has maintained such a positive attitude and is a beacon of hope for people affected by cancer.

For more information on Relay For Life events in Ireland, or to start one in your community, see www.cancer.ie/relayforlife For more information on Relay for Life Kildare contact Ozzie OToole on 0870910768.Please allow ads as they help fund our trusted local news content.

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Support our mission and join our community now.RESIDENTS concerned about the proposal to build a gasification plant at Gortadroma have been left in the dark, after a year with no update as to the status of the project.

The pre-planning consultation period, which sets out to decide whether or not it is deemed strategic infrastructure, was initially estimated to be completed within a 12-week period. It was submitted on January 13, 2017, and the case is still lying open.

The company behind the project, Cadence EnviroPower, has not met with An Bord Pleanala since their first consultation meeting last February.

The application for a waste to energy facility at Gortadroma was lodged with us at the beginning of last year. To date, weve only had one meeting with the prospective applicants, which took place towards the end of February last year. There havent been any other meetings since then, said a spokesperson at An Bord Pleanala.

With these cases usually, when a meeting is held and the board has formed the preliminary opinion that the project would be strategic infrastructure, its up to the applicant or developer to request further meetings with us. It seems as though its been sitting with us in the interim and they havent come back to us - the onus is on them to drive the thing forward, he added.

It is unclear why the company is stalling, after they secured the lease of the former landfill site by Limerick City and County Council in 2015 when councillors voted to grant it. Subsequent public outcry led many of the councillors to change their position, with some calling for the lease to be revoked.

However, the council was unable to go back on its decision as legal advice suggested that such action could result in it being liable for a large claim for damages.

Some locals are suggesting that funding may be the issue, while others think it may be the uncertain future of other waste-to-energy facilities in the south-west.

It has been suggested that the company may be reluctant to make a move, until the fate of rubbish-burning plants in both Ringaskiddy in Cork, and Irish Cement in Mungret, become more clear. If they are both to proceed, it would call into question the need for another nearby waste-to-energy facility.

Catherine Dowling, chairperson of RAGE - an action group against gasification at Gortadroma - said that they are concerned that they have not been informed of the status of the project for more than a year.

RAGE is continuing to monitor the situation regarding the possibility of a Gasification/Incinerator development at a site in Gortadroma which is subject of an option to lease from Limerick City and County Council, she said on behalf of the group.

RAGE committee members meet regularly to discuss and consider any possible developments, and continue to stand united with the local community in vehemently opposing any such development of this nature at the rural site in question.

Attempts to contact Cadence Enviropower this week were unsuccessful.THE BISHOP of Limerick is currently rolling out contingency plans for parishes around the city and county for the future at a time when there will be no priests available.

The Limerick Diocese says it has accepted that the current ministry structure no longer meets the needs and challenges of our time, and is working towards putting a team ministry model in place.

This future model will involve priests being shared between parishes and lay people taking on a far greater role.

More than 40% of priests working in Limerick are due to retire within the next ten years and it will be at least another four years until the next priest for the Diocese is ordained.

We are faced with many challenges but these can also be opportunities for new ways and new life, Bishop Brendan Leahy told the Limerick Leader.

According to the Bishop, the changes are in response to the Synod in 2016, which heard calls for a renewal in the Catholic Church in Limerick.

The team ministry model will involve parishes sharing resources and personnel in the future, including clergy, and the development of further roles for lay people including administrative roles, pastoral leaders, lay catechists, baptism teams and parishioners being trained in funeral prayers.

A Diocese-wide review is currently being conducted by the Bishop along with the Episcopal Vicar for Pastoral Planning Fr Eamonn Fitzgibbon and the pastoral implementation manager Rose OConnor.

Parishes are being gathered in their respective areas throughout the coming months for consultation on the best way to put this structure in place in each individual parish.

The needs and challenges of each parish will be different depending on their location and due to how many amenities they each have.

For example, some parishes may have a number of primary schools and some have at least one secondary school; others have third level colleges or hospitals or nursing homes. Some parishes have more than one church and indeed, some have three, the Bishop said.

The need for youth ministry leaders may also be identified as part of the review. Funding and income sources for parishes are also being reviewed as clergy members income was typically funded through weekly collections.

With the fall-off in Mass attendance, the income source is no longer sufficient yet the number of services, from regular Mass to sacramental moments in life like weddings, funerals, christenings, has not declined.

Limerick currently has 65 priests in active ministry; 27 are due to retire within the next ten years.

The last priest in Limerick was ordained in 2014 and it will be at least four more years until two students finish their priestly formation.

I believe in Pope Francis dream of a missionary option, the Bishop said.

He says he prays every day for the whole Church that we may have joy, hope and an ability to keep going out, journeying with others. Its true. We need to make sure we dont get robbed of hope.

God has a plan and we are co-operating with the unfolding of that plan every day.IT will be the end of an era in one County Limerick town this spring when a popular family business, which has been in operation for more than 50 years, serves its final customer.

Sheahans Korner Shop and Butcher, Askeaton, will be closing up at the end of March. The brightly-coloured shop, in the towns West Square, holds a special place in the hearts of locals. Generations of young people have memories of walking down the town after school to buy penny sweets and ice-cream.

Dozens of tributes have been paid on social media to the longstanding shop and its owners, Bridget Sheahan and her son Kevin, who took over as butcher after the death of Bridgets husband Michael.

It will be a sad day when the key turns for the last time. Can't remember a time without Bridget and Michael RIP, and then Kevin. Its definitely the end of an era in Askeaton and one place that all will miss, wrote one person.

So sad to see such a major piece of Askeatons history go, said another. So many memories, Mr Freezes on the way home from the pool, and the best penny mixture around.

Im devastated, posted another local. Always got a lovely welcome in Sheahans shop  best 99s in Ireland!

Another tribute read: So sad to see ye go, a lot of memories for generations.

End of an era. The memories I have of moving to Askeaton and getting all my meat here, Michael was always so helpful, followed by Kevin. Enjoy your retirement Bridget, and thanks for the memories, wrote another.

Nearly 100 wellwishers posted on the shops Facebook page to thank the family  and to tell Bridget to put the feet up!

Bridget said that she had Michael had worked the shop for around 40 years, and he had been there, butchering, for at least another 15 before that.

He was there his whole life, she said, adding that therell be no independent butcher in the town after they close.

Kevin has taken up a new job, while his mother will retire. She is here every day  she deserves a break now, he said.

The shop was competing with some chain stores in the town, such as SuperValu and Centra.

But theres not many other shops that sell the sweets for 2 cent anymore, other places are mostly weighing them, said Kevin. People cant understand how we still have the patience to do it.

You get that phrase every day, what can I get for 50c...

The premises is now being advertised for sale or to let, and there are houses on either side that will go with it.

Askeaton has faced other small business closures. The town once had eight or nine pubs, but several have closed in recent years.LIMERICK community groups are being encouraged to take part in the latest Get Involved initiative, with winning projects in line to share a prize fund of 17,000.

Now in its fifth year and with over 38,000 put into 22 projects in local communities across the country, the latest Get Involved Community Initiative has been launched with the sponsorship of the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) and the backing of the Local Ireland representative group of weekly newspapers.

This initiative aims to identify, promote and ultimately reward the best community initiatives undertaken by local groups throughout the country over the period between now and September 2018.

Last year, the Limerick Leaders representative in the contest from West Limerick were joint winners of the title.

The Broadford-Ashford walking trails, which has upgraded a series of tourist trails and united the twin parishes shared a prize fund of 6,000 with a group from Co Cork.

Once again sponsored by the Sustainability Energy Association of Ireland, projects can come from a variety of sectors including food production, nature, sustainability and waste resource efficiency.

To enter this years community initiative competition, go online to the official website, www. get-involved.ie and submit your application by Friday February 23, 2018. Once your entry has been received you will be contacted - and then you are up and running!

All successful entries will receive support in identifying local expertise, sources of funding and, where possible and at the discretion of the organisers, some professional mentorship.

The competition judging panel will be chaired by broadcaster and environmentalist Duncan Stewart.

Judging will take place in September 2018 and the awards presentation will take place in October 2018.

See also www.get-involved.ie for film clips of last years winning entries.POIGNANT tributes have been paid to the late Cambridge scholar, Marist Father and proud Limerick man Rev Dr Brendan Bradshaw who has passed away at the age of 80.

Reared in the heart of St Marys Parish, Father Bradshaw had deep rooted, widespread and ongoing family connections to his home city. The late priest lectured in Mary Immaculate College (MIC) during the 1970s, where he played an instrumental role in establishing the institutes history department.

He became one of the first Catholic priests to study at Cambridge in almost 400 years and went on to spend most of his professional life teaching at the renowned institution.

He grew up just off Newgate Lane, attending primary school in Creagh Lane, and secondary school in Sexton Street CBS.

Both his father, Kevin, and grandfather, James were city councillors, with his father Kevin twice elected Mayor. His mother, Annie Harrison, was brought up on Athlunkard Street.

His grandfather Jim started the Murphy and Bradshaw Mineral Water business in Denmark Street, which developed into the well-known soft drinks brand of OLO Minerals- Our Lady's Own. He joined the Marist Order, an order of priests with a special devotion to Mary, in 1960. He went on to achieve a BA Honours degree in Irish and history and an MA in history at the University College Dublin (UCD).

At his requiem Mass, fellow scholar Professor Eamon Duffy said that Father Bradshaws brilliance was spotted by his UCD professor Rev FX Martin, himself a priest, who encouraged him to study at Cambridge. Following his ordination in 1969, he received a scholarship to complete his PhD at the university.

His Cambridge supervisor Geoffrey Elton came to consider him as the brightest of all his pupils. If you have any idea of the roster of distinguished tudor historians Elton trained, you'll grasp what an accolade that was, Professor Duffy said.

While lecturing in MIC in the 1970s, Father Bradshaw also worked closely with other historians in the city. According to his colleague Dr John Logan, he had a clear vision of what a unified history faculty in Limerick might achieve if the colleges pursued common goals.

Father Bradshaw is predeceased by his sister Ann Power, survived by his brother John and sisters Maire Bradshaw-Tierney and Claire Scott-Lennon, brothers-in-law, nieces, nephews, grandnieces and grandnephews and cousins.TWO intercity rail lines cut through south and east Limerick but you can only get on board in Cork or Tipperary, said Cllr Lisa Marie Sheehy, who has called for Kilmallock station to be re-opened.

The independent councillor put down a motion at a Cappamore-Kilmallock municipal area meeting to invite Irish Rail to discuss the proposal. Cllr Sheehy said it closed in 1976 but there are 25 to 30 trains passing daily.

If even one or two stopped a day it would not just benefit Kilmallock but the whole Ballyhoura region and south Limerick. We have to go into the city or outside of the county to Limerick Junction or Charleville to get a train. It is an ideal location in Kilmallock with plenty of parking and the mart beside it, said Cllr Sheehy, who got all her council colleagues on board.

She said she wasnt asking anyone to build a railway station, just simply stop there.

Lets get the ball rolling. Lets talk to Irish Rail. Does the council have an interest? It is falling apart. It is a protected structure which means dont touch it, let it fall away... Lets invest in it and have even one or two trains stopping a day. It is important for tourism, business and our heritage. Lets start the discussion, said Cllr Sheehy.

Cllr Mike Donegan said 40kms of rail goes through south east Limerick.

Its a disgrace you have to go to Tipperary or Cork at Limerick city to get the train. One hundred years ago when Kilmallock was thriving the train station was as important to the town as Shannon Airport is to Limerick city. Reopening the train station would help attract businesses and bring footfall, said Cllr Donegan, who added that he was very disappointed that the footbridge of a protected structure was taken away overnight.

Cllr Bill ODonnell backed the motion but said that Knocklong or Rosstemple in Athlacca might have a better chance due to Kilmallocks close proximity to Charleville.

It is disappointing that there is all that length of track through the county and no stop. It doesnt have to be 10 or 12 carriages. Why not one or two trains a day with four carriages, asked Cllr ODonnell.

A couple of years ago, Cllr Eddie Ryan said it stopped in Knocklong to take supporters to a Limerick GAA match in Cork.

It was five deep on the platform. I dont care how close Charleville is to Kilmallock there is 40kms of line in our county. We are protecting a very historic spot. It is the right time to fight for it, said Cllr Ryan.

Cllr Noel Gleeson gave it his full support. It is taking people off the roads and in a very safe manner. It is a pity to see infrastructure lie idle, he said.

Cllr Brigid Teefy agreed it would help keep cars off the roads and mooted reopening Dromkeen in east Limeick. Cllr Gerald Mitchell said it was an essential service in rural Ireland. It doesnt make sense to travel to Tipperary or Cork, he said.CAN dreams help us flourish as a person? That is indeed the case, according to dreams expert and former RTE director Michael Murphy, who will bring his show Speaking of Dreams to the Belltable this month.

The psychoanalyst takes his Irish tour to the city centre stage with presenter Ciana Campbell, based on his latest publication Book of Dreams, on February 16.

The evening will include an interview with Mr Murphy on dream analysis and how they can guide a person in everyday life, the Irish dreamer, recital of his poetry, and a discussion with the audience to examine their dreams.

As a producer and director with RTE, Michael worked on a number of projects in Limerick and has been allured to the warmth of Limerick people.

I hope that people will take from the show the importance of our dream life, and be able to understand how dreams can help us to be the best that we can be. And Ciana and I also look forward to having a quiet word with some Limerick people after the show, to be confirmed once again by their goodness and warmth.

He said that dreams are important because they always want whats best for us.

If our personalities are out of balance in some way, the unconscious manifested in our dreams will try to pull us back into alignment. Dreams give us a direction to follow so that our personalities can flourish to the best of our abilities in the circumstances we find ourselves.

Michael Murphys Speaking of Dreams takes place at 8pm on February 16. Tickets range between 17 and 20.A snow ice weather warning is in place for Longford, Leinster and other counties leading to the possibility of treacherous roads.

Met Eireann issued the Status Yellow warning for Leinster, Cavan, Monaghan, Donegal, Leitrim, Roscommon, Sligo, Tipperary and Waterford.

It says there wall be falls of snow from Monday evening, with accumulations totalling up to 3cm possible in some areas, leading to treacherous road conditions by Tuesday morning.

The warning is valid from 6pm Monday, February 5 to 6m Tuesday, February 6.

In its forecast Met Eireann says it will be cold and largely dry on Sunday night apart from isolated showers near eastern coasts. Long clear spells will occur in near calm conditions allowing a few mist and fog patches to form. Lowest temperatures of minus 4 and plus 1 degrees Celsius, leading to a widespread sharp or severe frost and the risk of ice on untreated surfaces.

The forecaster says it will be cold with variable cloud and some sunshine to begin on Monday, with frosts only slowly clearing during the morning and just the risk of the odd light shower near the east coast.

Cloud will thicken and rain will arrive in the Atlantic coastal counties during the afternoon, however. Daytime highs just 3 to 6 degrees Celsius in light east to southeast breezes.

Rain is due to extend eastwards to all parts on Monday night, turning to sleet and snow, with snow depositions likely over the midlands, north and east. Minimum temperatures of minus 2 to plus 2 degrees Celsius, but less cold in the west before midnight. Light to moderate south to southwest breezes veering northwest and freshening as the rain and snow clears.

Tuesday is likely to be a cold, bright day with sunny spells and scattered wintry showers. The showers will be largely confined to the north and west during the day, with some hail, sleet and snow leading to some small accumulations. Maximum temperatures on Tuesday of 3 to 6 degrees, but feeling colder owing to brisk northwesterly winds.

Cold and frosty on Tuesday night with a scattering of snow showers spreading eastwards followed by clear skies. Winds will fall light and a widespread severe frost will follow with icy patches.

Wednesday is set to be mainly fine and frosty to begin in the east, but cloudier in the west with drizzle along the Atlantic Seaboard by noon. Thickening cloud and rain will gradually extend countrywide during the afternoon and evening, possibly preceded by sleet or snow in eastern counties for a time, in freshening southwesterly breezes. Daytime highs of 3 to 6 degrees Generally, but 7 or 8 degrees near Atlantic coasts.

Thursday and Friday are likely to continue cold and changeable. A lot of dry weather over the south and east, but wintry showers will recur at times across the north and west. Night frosts will be sharp and extensive.

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Vote for Longford's greatest sportest moment HEREIt's a well-known fact that there are more remakes of Sherlock Holmes than the number of brain cells required to predict the ending of 'Tiger Zinda Hai'. Sherlock Holmes, James Bond, Batman have become characters done, just like Batman's parents, to death. There are so many more layered, unconventional and unique male characters in modern literature. These characters are not pop culture favourites, but their stories are inspirational or at the very least, instructional.

1. Captain John Yossarian

Yossarian is the protagonist of Joseph Heller's satirical masterpiece, 'Catch 22', the first book to use the phrase catch-22 to represent a paradox. He serves as a bombardier in the 256th Squadron of the Army Air Forces during World War 2. He is an antihero, that is, he doesn't possess great physical strength, doesn't have superior mental faculties and cannot control supernatural forces.

When James Bond is in trouble, the audience knows that he'll get out of it one way or another because he's James Bond. James Bond is a hero. He will deliberately run into trouble, comfortable in the knowledge that his skills will bring him out alive. In stark contrast, the aim of Yossarian's life is to avoid the war entirely. He fakes disease, lies to his superiors, misuses his own position as Captain and anything else that he can to not be a hero.

 Paramount Pictures

Joseph Heller, a World War 2 veteran himself, emphasises on the circular logic and bureaucracy that is employed to make young men willingly give their lives for their country. For example, in the book, any soldier who thought he was becoming crazy could ask to be grounded and hence, relieved of his duties. But if he asked to be grounded, he would be exhibiting a rational sense of fear and self-preservation and thus, become disqualified from being crazy. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. That's a catch and the book is filled with them.

Yossarian is a man stuck in a situation beyond his control. He doesn't buy into the traditional ideas of the glory of war. He doesn't want his zest for life to be exploited by the government. He responds in silly, stubborn ways but never gives in to the concept of war. He understands that some people have to die, but doesn't see the point of him being one of them. Yossarian realised that in a war, The enemy is anybody who's going to get you killed, no matter which side he is on. If war is won by survivors, Yossarian found a way to win every day, regardless of his country's fate.

2. Sergeant Scheisskopf

 Paramount Pictures

A minor character in the same book is Sergeant Scheisskopf. He is obsessed with the Sunday afternoon parade. He reads books on marching, uses tiny plastic cowboys to simulate the perfect parade, berates his juniors, i.e. the cadet officers who march in the parade, punishes them for minor mistakes and ignores his own wife to focus on getting recognised for an entirely useless skill like parades while there's a war going on. His life is just mindless drudgery to reach a meaningless destination. Sounds a bit like college, doesn't it?

Scheisskopf serves as a warning to those who devote their lives to patently worthless pursuits, never realising the futility of their worship, nor the pain that it causes to real people. Given the religious and nationalistic fanaticism that has become all too common in our country, the stubborn Scheisskopf is unfortunately a character that we are all too familiar with.

3. Hank Rearden

 The Strike Productions

Hank Rearden is a pivotal character in 'Atlas Shrugged'. Like most characters in the novel, he symbolises hard work, productivity and ethics in business. He is like a fictional Elon Musk. He creates a special metal alloy that's so good that the government feels it's unfair to his competitors. Imagine if the US government asks Elon to hand over the rights to launching SpaceX rockets to other companies. That is the conflict that Rearden faces in the novel. He almost ends up losing too because of his massive guilt complex. He constantly lets his family and his wife torture him for being an evil industrialist when he's really just a hard-working person who deserves all the credit he gets.

There's a Hank Rearden in all of us. We have the talent and the ability to create value and earn wealth but it's often toxic relationships that hold us back from believing in ourselves. In the novel, towards the end, Hank loses everyone in his life in the process of defending his values and realises that he didn't need their validation after all.

4. Hercule Poirot

 Carnival Film & Television

Although he's seen enough screen time in the UK before the 2017 movie, he's not as well-known as Sherlock among Indian audiences. For those who missed 'Murder on the Orient Express', Hercule Poirot is an obsessive compulsive Belgian detective. He is mature, suave and solves crime by talking to people to understand the psychology of the suspects unlike Sherlock Holmes who is more of a 'bloodhound' detective. Poirot uses conversation, not clues, to form his theories. This makes him feel more 'human' than Sherlock even though he is just as narcissistic, often expecting people to be excited when he tells them his name.

Where Sherlock is associated with drugs and photographic memory, Hercule Poirot is a subtle, refined showman but a showman nonetheless. His compulsive attitude towards balance and justice enable him to be deceptive, sacrificing his morals if the nature of the crime warrants it. In summary, less deductive superpowers, more mind games, hence, more real.

5. Atticus Finch

 Universal Pictures

In Harper Lee's book, 'To Kill A Mockingbird', Atticus Finch is Jean Louise Finch's (a little girl fondly known as Scout, also the narrator) father. He is a lawyer and appears to be a simple, timid person just like everyone else in the small fictional town of Maycomb. But, when a black man named Tom Robinson is unfairly charged with the rape of an underage white woman, he decides to defend Tom in court, inviting criticism and death threats from the rest of the people. The book explores complex themes like race and religion, and does so humorously through the innocent eyes of Scout.

Atticus represents morality and justice in the book. He is a man without a facade, a person with a concrete belief system and one who's unafraid to stand by it. This is unheard of in this era where people change their personality based on which social media platform they're on and worse, they exploit their anonymity. Given the racial divide that existed in Maycomb,

Tom Robinson was bound to lose the case but that didn't stop Atticus from giving him the best possible defence. He doesn't believe in showing off his skills. When a mad (rabid) dog wanders down the main street in Maycomb, Atticus, described as an old bespectacled fellow, borrows a rifle from the sheriff to put it down in one shot from a considerable distance. It's later revealed that in his youth, he was known as Atticus One-Shot Finch, a skill he never revealed to his children. Atticus Finch is a humble, righteous man who exemplifies living a peaceful life without ever compromising on his personal moral code.

Some of these characters may appear to be perfect, while some appear to be painfully flawed. Looking at the portrait of a good man is like wearing glasses, it helps you see the world around you a bit clearer but how you move around in it is still up to you. These characters show that "being a man" is not about torn shirts and big guns. Being a man is straightforward  have an identity, believe in something and live in a way that both are in agreement.Turning the ship before it hits the icebergDYESS AIR FORCE BASE, Texas -- If there had ever been a "nuclear button," this would have been it.

A switch on the B-1B Lancer's dashboard labeled "weapons" toggles between "release" and "safe."

Maj. Charles "Astro" Kilchrist, chief of training for the 9th Bomb Squadron and a B-1 pilot, pointed it out during Military.com's flight in the B-1B over training ranges in New Mexico on Dec. 19.

The switch, now used in the process to release both guided and unguided conventional bombs, once could have launched nuclear weapons before the B-1 fleet was converted to a non-nuclear role.

Related content:

The B-1, which has the largest payload in the bomber fleet, can be put into any theater without stirring the same concerns as nuclear-capable aircraft, Kilchrist said.

"We have the ability to have a global footprint," he said.

Recently, the B-52 Stratofortress replaced the B-1B in the Pacific. The move marked a significant shift to bring back the B-52H -- which provided a continuous bomber presence in the region from 2006 to 2016 -- to put a nuclear-capable bomber in theater at a time when relations between the U.S. and North Korea are largely unpredictable.

The B-1, by comparison, is all about variety now -- the missions it can perform, and the bombs it can drop, Kilchrist said.

"The list of weapons [we have now], it's pages and pages of different options and different systems," added Lt. Col. Christopher Wachter, director of operations for the 345th Bomb Squadron at Dyess. "The mission sets [have] grown."

And Kilchrist has an answer for critics who say the supersonic-capable bomber should be converted back: "It's not an easy disconnect," he said, adding, "Why add that one more [detail] in a conventional bomber now?"

Treaty Compliance

The B-1 fleet was converted as part of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty.

Every year, Russian officials travel to either Ellsworth Air Force Base, South Dakota, or Dyess to review whether the B-1 fleet complies with the treaty, which specifies it must remain disarmed.

"It's fine  it's nothing contentious," said Col. Brandon Parker, 7th Bomb Wing commander, during a roundtable discussion Dec. 18. "We fully support compliance with the treaty. It's part of the inspection regime. We see it as a part of our mission."

Compliance with the treaty ended the bombers' nuclear future, so many were surprised when the fleet was realigned in 2015 from Air Combat Command to Global Strike Command, which oversees strategic nuclear deterrence.

"We liked it better that way [under ACC]," said Lt. Col. Dominic "Beaver" Ross, director of operations for the 337th Test and Evaluations Squadron. Ross still wears an ACC patch on his flight suit because the testing and evaluations portion of the mission resides with the 53rd Wing under ACC.

For the testing office, there's been some jumble, he said.

For example, "We have noticed, when you combined us with the B-52, as far as testing and stuff goes, they almost drudge us down a little bit; it kind of diluted the pool, if you will, when you take the two and combine the program office [into one]," Ross said.

"That's still a hurdle we're trying to overcome, because you're spreading what we had available to us out over more, so we get a little bit less [in both money and resources]," he said.

He added, "It's a weird realm because we have to operate under both sets of regulations in [the Air Force Instruction]. We think of them differently too. They're [The B-52s] more high-altitude; they're the nuke guys. We're two completely different animals."

Still as an ops director, Ross knows both the B-52 and B-1 communities are proud of their work.

For the B-1s, "we try to keep it the most lethal machine there is," he said.

Prepping for the B-21

B-1 operators are keeping in mind how they may shift again in preparation for the B-21 Long Range Strike Bomber -- the Pentagon's latest classified, multi-billion-dollar program in development by Northrop Grumman Corp. -- should it come to Dyess.

Officials are weighing whether the B-21 should eventually replace a portion of the B-1 fleet, since it will have both nuclear and non-nuclear roles.

The first B-21s are expected to reach initial operating capability in the mid-2020s.

"We try to posture ourselves as best we can so that if the [B-21 Raider] does come here, leaders, our senior leaders make that decision to bring it here, that we're ready," Parker said.

"But until it comes, we're going to fly these B-1s  full speed ahead. We're an afterburner, and we're going to go as full speed ahead as best we can," he said.

-- Oriana Pawlyk can be reached at oriana.pawlyk@military.com. Follow her on Twitter at @Oriana0214.What Is ISIS-K? Two Experts on the Group Behind the Kabul Airport Attack and its Rivalry with the Taliban

By 2018, the group had become one of the top four deadliest terrorist organizations in the world.Free agent utilityman Eduardo Nunez hasnt lost contact with the Red Sox, Chad Jennings of the Boston Herald writes. With Dustin Pedroia set to miss the early portion of the year as he recovers from knee surgery, re-signing Nunez would give Boston a clear Opening Day second baseman. However, Nunez would obviously lose playing time upon Pedroias return, and the Red Sox are also set at his other positions  third base, shortstop and the corner outfield. All of those factors, not to mention interest from other clubs, could prevent Nunezs return to the Red Sox. The 30-year-old joined the Sox via trade with the Giants last summer and thrived, hitting a stellar .321/.353/.539 in 173 plate appearances.

Heres more from the American League:Counting of votes for 3 city corporations in K'taka under way

CEO Dr. Raju held a meeting with the representatives of recognised political partiesMy legacy for you would be ...A teacher at Cypress-Woods High School has been removed from campus after a video surfaced showing a faculty member striking a student with a belt, the Cypress Fair Independent School District said in a statement.

"We were shocked to learn of the video," said the statement from the school district. "These actions are certainly not representative of Cypress Woods or CFISD employee standards of conduct."

The school district is not releasing the identity of the male staff member, but said the school district's police department is "conducting a thorough investigation," according to the statement.

The video posted on Facebook shows the student wiping something across the head of the teacher, who is sitting down.

The teacher then stands up, takes off his belt and follows the student around the classroom as other students get out of the way. As other students look on, the teacher strikes the student with a belt multiple times.

The video that posted on Friday says the incident happened at 10 a.m. on Friday; it had been viewed more than 6,000 times and shared over a 100 times as of early Saturday afternoon.

A man believed to be the faculty member declined to comment to KTRK-TV on Friday night. Students told the news station that the student involved had spat on the teacher, though that wasn't apparent in the video.

Although Texas is one of 15 states that explicitly allows corporal punishment, it is prohibited in the Cy-Fair district, according to the district's 2017-2018 student code of conduct.Lamebert here: Love the name, Capita, as in head count. Why the heck not go the whole nine yards and brand as Body Shop? Or, I suppose, following Carrill i on, Capit i a. Or Body Shoppe.

By Don Quijones, Spain, UK, & Mexico, editor at Wolf Street. Originally published at Wolf Street.

Since the sudden downfall of the British infrastructure giant Carillion two weeks ago, investors nerves in London are frayed. And short-sellers, scanning the horizon for their next prey, seem to have found it.

Its name is Capita. It is one of the UK governments biggest outsourcing firms with contracts to provide services to government entities, such as NHS cleaning, school dinners, and prison maintenance. It has 70,000 employees in the UK, Europe, South Africa, and India.

On Wednesday, its shares tumbled 47.5% to a 15-year low after its new CEO, Jon Lewis, slashed profit forecasts, announced plans to tap the capital market for 700 million, and suspended a dividend that was worth more than 200 million to shareholders last year.

On Thursday, the rout continued , with shares dropping a further 13%. On Friday, shares bounced off a tiny 2.3% to close at 162.3 pence, down 77% from June 2017 and down 88% from July 2015.

In a desperate bid to calm market nerves at the height of Wednesdays rout, the UK government released a statement insisting that Capita was not another Carillion.

But Whatever the Government Might Say, There Is a Striking Resemblance Between the Two Companies:

Like Carillion, Capita is massively dependent on government contracts. In the last two years alone it was awarded 226 public sector contracts  10 times more than Carillion  making it the biggest supplier of local government services in the country, according to public sector data provider Tussel.

Like Carillion, Capita is massively in debt, with an estimated 1.1 billion of funds outstanding. And like Carillion, its been exceptionally generous with its dividend policy in recent years. So did it, as Carillion is accused of doing, borrow money and sell-off assets in order to pay its dividends, in direct contravention of UK law?

Like Carillion, Capita has a pension shortfall, estimated to be around 380 millioin, but, as happened with Carillion, it could grow in the coming days as the full extent of its long-term liabilities becomes clear.

Capita also shares the same auditor as Carillion, KPMG, whose alleged role in cloaking Carillions financial reality is already under investigation by two parliamentary inquiries.

There Are Also Important Differences Between Capita and Carillion, Not All Good.

On the positive side, unlike Carlillion, Capita has over 1 billion of cash on its balance sheet. And Capita doesnt have high-risk high-cost construction projects bleeding it dry.

But Capita is hemorrhaging funds at a startling rate. And it has been losing important business contracts, partly as a result of the political uncertainty over Brexit. Whether Capita gets through the immediate storm it faces will depend largely on its ability to raise 700 million from shareholders, for which it claims it already has full standby underwriting  but this undertaking has gotten immensely more difficult after the crash of its shares.

If it fails, the implications for the UK government could be huge. It already has to take over many of Carillions sprawling public service operations, which will no doubt be funded by an expansion of public debt, while concerns are growing about the gaping deficits at UK pension funds, estimated to be worth a combined 210 billion. If Capita were also to collapse, the sheer scale and scope of its operations would make it even more complicated to replace. As the UK Independent reports, Capita doesnt just provide some services, it runs entire councils:

Created from humble beginnings in 1984 as a for-profit consultancy arm of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA)  Capita became the Vampire Squid of business process outsourcing, its money grabbing tentacles extending through every layer of Government, from pensions, to council finance, from parking and congestion charges to NHS GP primary care support, funeral services, and even the privatised food safety agency.

If the financial situation becomes untenable at Capita, not only would the government have to mobilize a herculean effort to ensure the firms sprawling, diffuse web of services continue to be delivered; it could also have serious knock-on effects for other outsourcing firms such as Serco and Interserve, both of which have their own share of problems.

In the last 12 months, Sercos stock has fallen 40% and is down 78% from July 2013. Shares of Interserve, which is already on a watch list, plunged 25% over the past two days, 35% over the past two weeks, and 88% from June 2015. In the event that Capitas turnaround plan fails, contagion could spread throughout the teetering sector, at which point the viability of the UKs public-private service model could even be threatened. For the countrys already slowing economy, the timing could not be worse. By Don Quijones.

Has the Carillion collapse triggered the Next Arthur Andersen? No, the Final Four audit firms are too big to replace. Read Fallout from Carillion Collapse Hits KPMG(Natural News) Many in the natural health community are already aware of the recent death threat that vaccine truth advocate Dr. Suzanne Humphries received from an anonymous assailant. But what you may not realize is that Dr. Humphries was previously targeted for murder when someone maliciously severed the brake lines on her vehicle.

During a recent interview with Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, Dr. Humphries bore it all about her history working in medicine; the criticism and animosity shes faced over the years for departing from its dogma; and more recently the vulgar threat she received on her life via anonymous email. Dr. Humphries also told of how her work in exposing vaccine truth hasnt exactly done her any favors in terms of her personal safety.

It was right around the time when Dr. Humphries began to notice, and talk about, the increasing number of kidney conditions she was observing in conjunction with influenza vaccination that she quickly landed in the crosshairs of pro-vaccine cultists. She was falsely accused of being an anti-vaxxer, a categorical branding that represents a type of medical scarlet letter, and one that draws plenty of ire and hate from the more extremist jabbers who believe that people who dont vaccinate put all of society at risk.

If a person really believes this unsubstantiated dogma, its easy to see how angered they might become at people like Dr. Humphries who are spreading a different narrative. To pro-vaccination cultists like the anonymous assailant who most recently threatened Dr. Humphriess life, warning people about the dangers of vaccines basically makes one an infidel who must be taken out for the protection of the herd.

The brake lines to my Honda CR-V were clamped, and there was something wrong with how the car was functioning, Dr. Humphries revealed for the first time, recalling an incident thats she never gone public with that occurred back around 2010. It was immediately taken into the service station, and the service station attendant was practically in tears. He said, This was a malicious act.'

The full video of Dr. Humphriess exclusive interview with the Health Ranger is available on YouTube and on Vimeo.

Dr. Humphries says shes also been targeted with a crossbow arrow on her lawn, aggressor who turned gas line on inside her home

Dr. Humphries also recalled at least three other incidents besides the recent death threat that shes faced over the years. One of them was a large crossbow arrow that someone had stuck into the ground on her front lawn. Another was an incident where someone had broken into her home and turned on the gas line, presumably to kill whoever might be inside with carbon monoxide.

On a fourth occasion, Dr. Humphriess dog was sprayed with some kind of chemical that left him blind for the night (but he apparently later recovered). Dr. Humphries is sure that a skunk wasnt the culprit, and believes that someone may have targeted her pup with pepper spray for malicious, threatening purposes.

When Dr. Humphries reported these various incidents to the police, she was told that there was nothing law enforcement could do other than to simply hold onto the records in case more happened later  which is completely illogical. They never even attempted to conduct an investigation, and now Dr. Humphries is facing yet another, more serious, threat that law enforcement similarly wants to ignore. Dr. Humphries has also received countless nasty emails and other threats against her, none of which have been taken seriously by law enforcement.

What Im learning is that the so-called protective authorities are not actually that, Dr. Humphries soberly admitted to the Health Ranger.

Stay informed about the criminality of the vaccine industry at Vaccines.news.

Sources for this article include:

NaturalNews.com

NaturalNews.com

YouTu.be

Vimeo.com(Natural News) Following Fridays release of the infamous, scandal-filled FISA memo on Friday, it didnt take long for a member of Congress to call for the obvious: Legal action against those involved in misrepresenting the fake Trump dossier as a legitimate piece of intelligence before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court so the Obama administration could spy on Donald J. Trumps campaign.

U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, himself a former judge, told The Daily Caller that former FBI Director James Comey, former deputy director Andrew McCabe, Justice Department official Bruce Ohr should face prison for using what they knew to be a political document to convince the FISA court to let them spy on the campaign of someone they decided should not be president.

Per the news site:

A FISA court judge has grounds to hold Department of Justice officials including Bruce Ohr in contempt of court for making misrepresentations about the sources of information used to obtain a surveillance warrant against a Trump associate, a former judge and Republican congressman said.

I think its important to know who the FISA judge was, and why with all the info hes had for some time, he has not put anyone in jail for committing fraud on his court, Gohmert, who serves on the Committee on the Judiciary, told The DC.

You shouldnt be able to get quotes from Bruce Ohr or [former FBI Director Jim] Comey or [deputy director Andrew] McCabe because they ought to be sitting in jail for committing fraud upon the court, he added.

The FISA memo was released at noon on Friday, revealing serial abuses of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court by upper echelon officials in the FBI and Justice Department to prevent Donald J. Trump from becoming president, and to undermine him after he defeated Hillary Clinton in November 2016. (Related: SHAMELESS: No Democrats or left-leaning publishers denounce shocking abuses of power detailed in FISA memo release)

As reported by Fox News, the discredited and unverified Trump dossier was used not once but on three separate occasions to secure a FISA court surveillance warrant so the Obama administration could legally spy on Team Trump  a revelation that proves Trump was right in March 2017 when he was widely ridiculed for claiming Obama wiretapped him.

In addition, Hillary Clinton, U.S. media outlets, and ranking officials within DOJ and FBI including former FBI Director James Comey, former deputy director Andrew McCabe, and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein were all aware that the dossier was a political document, not a serious piece of intelligence work, the memo explains.

As Fox News reported further, the four-page memo [which you can read here] also includes testimony from a high-ranking government official who says without the infamous Trump dossier, the FBI and DOJ would not have secured surveillance warrants to spy on at least one member of the Trump team.

The dossier was commissioned by opposition research firm Fusion GPS, who hired former British spy Christopher Steele to compile it. The dossier was paid for in large part by the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign.

During the summer of 2016, the memo noted, Ohrs wife went to work for Fusion as the dossier was being compiled.

The memo said Ohrs wife was employed by Fusion GPS to assist in the cultivation of opposition research on Trump. Ohr later provided the FBI with all of his wifes opposition research, paid for by the DNC and Clinton campaign via Fusion GPS. The Ohrs relationship with Steele and Fusion GPS was inexplicably concealed from the court when it was used to obtain a surveillance warrant.

To Gohmert, all of this is more than enough to go after Comey, McCabe, and Ohr for defrauding the court.

This was an action by the DNC and known collusion with top officials at the DOJ and FBI to commit a fraud upon the FISA court, he added.

He also noted that the FISA court judges own actions ought to be examined more closely.

The judge has to have known for months now that he or she had a fraud committed against them and he or she has done nothing, he said.

J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for NaturalNews.com and NewsTarget.com, as well as editor of The National Sentinel.

Sources include:

TheNationalSentinel.com

DailyCaller.comA San Francisco bicyclist is suffering from life-threatening injuries after colliding into a parked car Saturday morning.

Officials say the adult male bicyclist collided in the area of 22nd Ave and Anza. Medics arrived at the scene soon after the report was made.

An investigation is now underway, officials say.

Check back for updates.It's the beginning of February, but it sure doesn't feel like it outside across the Bay Area.

Unseasonably warm weather on Saturday broke or tied a host of Feb. 3 temperature records across the region, and more records were set on Sunday, according to the National Weather Service.

San Francisco on Sunday topped out at 74 degrees, a repeat of Saturday, both besting an old high temperature mark of 71 established in 1992, according to the NWS. San Jose reached 76 degrees, which was two degrees cooler than Saturday. The Oakland Airport reached 70 degrees.



On Saturday, San Francisco hit 74 degrees, besting an old high temperature mark of 71 established in 1992, according to the NWS. San Jose reached 78 degrees, which was four degrees warmer than the previous high mark set in 2009. The mercury soared to 76 degrees at the Oakland Airport, breaking an old record of 70 degrees recorded in 1963.

Santa Rosa (76 degrees), San Francisco Airport (76 degrees), Half Moon Bay (77 degrees), Moffett Federal Airfield (77 degrees) and Healdsburg (80 degrees) also broke old records Saturday, according to the NWS. Kentfield (72 degrees) tied a record set back in 2001.

Crowds of San Francisco residents filled Dolores Park Saturday as they enjoyed warm winter weather temperatures typical in May or June. Christie Smith reports.

The spring-like temperatures will once again return to the Bay Area on Sunday with highs expected to reach 73 degrees in San Francisco, 75 degrees in Concord, 76 degrees in San Jose, 78 degrees in Santa Cruz and 75 degrees in Santa Rosa, according to the NWS.

Those hoping for winter's return will have to practice some patience. Little to no rain is expected to fall through Feb. 20, according to the NWS.Archaeologists in Egypt have discovered a 4,400-year-old tomb near the country's famed pyramids at the Giza plateau just outside of Cairo, the Antiquities Ministry said Saturday, the latest discovery that authorities hope will help revive the country's staggering tourism sector.

The tomb was found in a wider area of Giza's western necropolis, which is known to be home to tombs from the Old Kingdom.

It likely belonged to a woman known as Hetpet, who archaeologists believe was close to ancient Egyptian royals of the 5th Dynasty.

The tomb, unveiled to the media on Saturday, is made of mud brick and includes wall paintings in good condition depicting Hetpet observing different hunting and fishing scenes.

Other scenes also depict a monkey  in pharaonic times, monkeys were commonly kept as domestic animals  picking fruit. Similar scenes have been found in other tombs belonging to the later 12th dynasty, according to the ministry's statement. Another scene shows a monkey dancing before an orchestra.

According to the ministry, the archaeological mission behind the discovery started excavation work last October. Archaeologists have been making discoveries near the site since the 19th century, and Mostafa al-Waziri, who led the mission, believes there is still more to be found.

"This is a very promising area. We expect to find more," Al-Waziri told reporters at the site. "We have removed between 250-300 cubic meters of layers of earth to find the tomb."

"What we see above the earth's surface in Egypt doesn't exceed 40 percent of what the core holds," he added.

Al-Waziri believes Hetpet had another tomb in Giza's western necropolis and said that excavation work is underway to find that one too.

Hetpet is a previously known figure in Egyptian antiquity though her mummy has not been discovered yet. Fragments of artefacts belonging to Hetpet were found in the same area back in 1909, and were moved to a museum in Berlin at the time, Antiquities Minister Khaled al-Anani said Saturday, speaking at the site to reporters and Western diplomats.

Despite all the discoveries already made about ancient Egypt, experts say they hope to find much more  in part thanks to modern technology  treasures still buried under the vast desert.

The area of the latest discovery is close to a new museum under construction that will house some of Egypt's most unique and precious artifacts, including many belonging to the famed boy King Tutankhamun.

The first phase of Grand Egyptian museum is expected to be opened later this year while the grand opening is planned for 2022.

In January, Egypt placed the ancient statue of one of its most famous pharaohs, Ramses II at the museum's atrium, which will include 43 massive statues.

Throughout 2017, the Antiquities Ministry made a string of discoveries across Egypt  including some in the southern city Luxor known for its spectacular temples and tombs spanning different dynasties of ancient Egyptian history.

Egypt hopes the inauguration of the new museum, along with the recent discoveries, will help spur a vital tourism industry that has been reeling from the political turmoil that engulfed the country following the 2011 popular uprising that toppled longtime autocrat Hosni Mubarak and the authorities' struggles to rein in an insurgency by Islamic militants.What to Know An Amtrak train traveling from New York to Miami derailed in South Carolina on Sunday morning

Two people on the Amtrak train were killed and 116 were injured, authorities said. Most of the injuries were minor

The crash also caused 5,000 gallons of fuel to spill

The Amtrak train from New York that crashed head-on into a parked freight train in South Carolina early Sunday, killing two crew members and injuring 116 people, had been given verbal approval to proceed down the track, railroad sources familiar with the investigation told NBC News.

But the switch on the track was left in the wrong position, causing the Amtrak train with nine crew members and 136 passengers onboard to drive directly into the CSX train, the sources said.

Amtrak said in a statement that CSX owns and controls the subdivision where the trains crashed, maintains the tracks and signal systems there, and handles the dispatching of all trains.

The CSX signals were down for work and had been offline, the sources said. But verbal permission was given by CSX dispatch to the Amtrak crew to proceed.



[NATL] Images Show Damage After Amtrak Crash in S. Carolina

Amtrak Train 91 had departed from New York's Penn Station on Saturday and was headed for Miami when it barreled into the CSX train. The crash happened at 2:35 a.m. near a switchyard about 10 miles south of Columbia where autos are loaded and unloaded from railcars.

The CSX freight train was parked on a loading or switch track to the side of the main track, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster said. The Amtrak train was moving at about 59 mph when the switch rerouted it to the right.

At a press conference, NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt said that for some reason the rail switch was aligned for the train coming down the track to be diverted to the siding, where the CSX train was and hit it head-on.

"Key to this investigation is learning why that switch was aligned that way, because the expectation is that the Amtrak would be cleared and would be operating straight down," Sumwalt said.

The switch that triggered the crash was padlocked in position, which conductors are supposed to do when they move a train from one line to another, Sumwalt said.



NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt lays out a deadly crash in which an Amtrak passenger train slammed into a freight train parked along a siding in South Carolina. Two Amtrak crew members were killed and more than 110 people were injured, authorities said.

Amtrak President Richard Anderson appeared to point the finger at CSX, saying the signal system run by the freight railroad at that spot was down at the time, and CSX dispatchers were manually routing trains.

CSX issued a statement expressing condolences but said nothing about the cause of the accident.

Sumwalt said that positive train control - a GPS-based safety system that can automatically slow or stop trains - could have prevented the accident.

"That's what it's designed to do," he said, referring to technology that regulators have been pressing for for decades with mixed success.

Sumwalt said NTSB investigators will be at the scene over the next few days documenting the accident site and interviewing train crews and dispatchers. He said investigators recovered a camera from the front of the Amtrak train and were looking for the data recorders from the two trains.

WASHINGTON, DC  JUNE 30: U.S. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and son Barron Trump walk on the South Lawn prior to a Marine One departure at the White House June 30, 2017 in Washington, DC. President Trump is spending the weekend with his family in Bedminster, New Jersey. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

The impact of the crash caused the lead engine of the Amtrak train to derail as well as some passenger cars. Video from the scene showed the twisted and gnarled wreckage of several CSX cars.

"I can tell you there's catastrophic damage to each of the locomotives," Sumwalt said. "I can say that the Amtrak locomotive would not be recognizable at all."

Both people who died were Amtrak employees who were in the train engine. The county coroner identified the dead as engineer Michael Kempf, 46, of Savannah, Georgia, and conductor Michael Cella, 36, of Orange Park, Florida.

After the crash, 116 people were taken to four hospitals, according to Gov. McMaster. At least three patients were hospitalized in critical or serious condition, with nearly all the rest treated for minor injuries such as cuts, bruises and whiplash, authorities said.

Palmetto Health emergency room doctor Eric Brown said so many passengers were hurt that they were brought in on two buses, and a tent that had been set up as a waiting room to keep people separate from flu patients was turned into a triage area.

About 5,000 gallons of fuel spilled as a result of the crash and authorities said crews were working to clean it up. Officials said there was no immediate danger to the public.

NBC News

Jaclyn Kinney, 22, of Pinehurst, North Carolina, said she and her boyfriend were asleep on the train as they traveled to Orlando for a trip to Disney World.

She said they woke up to the crash.

"We got bumped into the wall from the impact and the train derailed," she told NBC via Twitter. "The cafe car that was right in front of us was in much worse shape so we were lucky."

She said Amtrak staff helped them off the train and checked to make sure the passengers were OK.

Kinney said she and her boyfriend suffered minor injuries.

Another passenger, Derek Pettaway, said he was asleep and hit his head on the side of the sleeper cabin during the crash. He suffered a bump on the head, minor whiplash and other bruises.

He described seeing the engine toppled on its side and the cafe car "completely folded in half."

Amtrak officials gathered up luggage and other belongings and within hours put passengers aboard buses to their destinations. Many of them were asleep when the crash happened.

The Red Cross tweeted that "disaster trained volunteers" were responding to the scene of the accident. The National Transportation Safety Board also launched a team to the site. South Carolina emergency officials said that all passengers were off the train by 6:30 a.m.

Before being sent on their way, those who were not hurt were taken to a shelter set up at a middle school, and local businesses provided coffee and breakfast.

"We know they are shaken up quite a bit. We know this is like nothing else they have ever been through. So we wanted to get them out of the cold, get them out of the weather - get them to a warm place," sheriff's spokesman Adam Myrick said.

Volunteers serving hot breakfast to survivors of Amtrak collision/derailment. #scnews pic.twitter.com/CiU9tjVYLS  Red Cross S. Carolina (@RedCrossSC) February 4, 2018

Lexington County Coroner Margaret Fisher's voice caught as she released the names of the dead.

"Any time you have anything that happens like that, you expect more fatalities. But God blessed us, and we only had the two," Fisher said.

In a statement, Amtrak said that it was "deeply saddened" by the deaths and added that it was cooperating fully with the NTSB, as did CSX. But Amtrak also said CSX maintains all the tracks and signals where the accident happened and controls access to the sidings and yards.

President Donald Trump was briefed on the crash and tweeted his condolences, saying his thoughts and prayers are with the victims. He also thanked first responders for their work.

My thoughts and prayers are with all of the victims involved in this mornings train collision in South Carolina. Thank you to our incredible First Responders for the work theyve done!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 4, 2018

Amtrak's "Silver Service" is an overnight line that connects New York and Miami with dozens of local stops along the way.

On Wednesday, a chartered Amtrak train carrying Republican members of Congress to a strategy retreat slammed into a garbage truck at a crossing in rural Virginia, killing one person in the truck and injuring six others.

And on Dec. 18, an Amtrak train ran off the rails along a curve during its inaugural run on a route south of Tacoma, Washington, killing three people and injuring dozens. It was going nearly 80 mph, more than twice the speed limit.

Deadliest Train Crashes: 1996-2018

After the latest crash, Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said the nation's railroads must be made safer, declaring, "Business as usual must end." He said proven technology, including positive train control, cannot continue to be delayed.

The latest wreck again raised criticism about the safety culture of the nation's passenger railway.

With the string of crashes, "it's becoming almost like an epidemic for Amtrak," said Najmedin Meshkati, a University of Southern California engineering professor who has studied positive train control.

The worst rail tragedy in recent South Carolina history took place in 2005 when a freight engineer parked a train on a side track near a textile mill in Graniteville and forgot to flip the switch back to keep trains on the main track.

A freight train passing through went barreling down the side track and slammed into the parked train, killing nine people, most of them millworkers choked by chorine gas that leaked from a damaged tanker car.

Anyone with questions about passengers on the train can call (800) 523-9101, Amtrak said.

Individuals with questions regarding passengers on train 91 can contact us at 1.800.523.9101  Amtrak (@Amtrak) February 4, 2018

-NBC reporter Tom Costello and the Associated Press contributed to this report.Authorities say an inmate who escaped from a Connecticut state prison has been extradited from Georgia.

The state Department of Correction says 25-year-old Jerry Mercado was returned Friday night from Georgia, where he'd been held since being apprehended Jan. 17. Officials say he initially fought extradition, but later waived that right.

Mercado escaped from the Carl Robinson Correctional Facility in Enfield on Jan. 7. He was serving three years for burglary. He was taken Friday to the high-security Northern Correctional Institution in Somers.

Authorities believe Mercado may have stowed away in the undercarriage of a garbage truck or state vehicle to escape.

Department of Correction Commissioner Scott Semple says Mercado's capture and return to state custody was the "culmination of tireless work by multiple public safety departments and agencies."

Five Connecticut DOC employees were placed on administrative leave amid the investigation into the escape.

Bond for Mercado was set at $500,000 and he is due in court in Enfield tomorrow.A home in East Hampton was destroyed by a fire Saturday morning.

East Hampton Fire Chief Gregg Voelker said crews responded to a fire at 22 Knowles Road in the Middle Haddam section of town around 2:40 a.m. When crews arrived the south end of the house was burning. It took crews around 45 minutes to get the fire contained.

It was well involved when we got here. I would say about half of the building was already burnt, and then it continued to burn the building because of the wind. Then it just collapsed. The walls came down, Voelker said.

Five people were inside the home at the time and all escaped uninjured. Fire officials said the occupants made it out because of smoke detectors sounding.

Mutual aid and tanker trucks responded to assist East Hampton firefighters because there are no hydrants in the area. Weather conditions that included high winds, cold temperatures and already icy streets hampered firefighting efforts. Department of Public Works crews came out and put down salt and sand to help deal with the ice.

The home was built in the early 1700s and the fire chief said its construction was part of the difficulty. Despite firefighters best efforts, the building was destroyed.

Some of the older structures, the way they were made back then, its much harder to fight those fires because they can get throughout the house very quickly. Theres no sheetrock to stop them from going from room to room, Voelker said.

The state fire marshal has been called in to investigate the exact cause, but officials do not believe the fire is suspicious.What to Know A Florida man is accused of breaking into a funeral home and stealing items including a tub of formaldehyde.

29-year-old Aaron Meininger arrested on commercial burglary and grand theft charges

A Florida man is accused of breaking into a funeral home and stealing items including a tub of formaldehyde.

Hernando County Sheriff's deputies went to the Demarco Family Funeral Home in Spring Hill early Friday after someone working in a nearby business saw a man carrying a crowbar going in and out of the building.

Hernando County Sheriff's officials said in a news release that deputies arrested 29-year-old Aaron Meininger on commercial burglary and grand theft charges.

Meininger told investigators he was bored and didn't know he was breaking into a funeral home. He said he didn't even know what he was going to do with the items found in his car, including makeup and various instruments used in funeral preparation.

An attorney isn't listed on jail records.The contentious tax overhaul is beginning to deliver a change that many will welcome  bigger paychecks.

Workers are starting to see more take-home pay as employers implement the new withholding guidelines from the IRS, which dictate how much employers withhold from pay for federal taxes. Those whose checks have remained the same shouldn't fret  employers have until Feb. 15 to make the changes.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has estimated that the new rules will mean more take-home pay for about 90 percent of American workers.

How much extra cash? It depends on several factors, such as workers' income, how often they are paid and the number of withholdings allowances they claim on their IRS Form W-4 with their employer.

Those whose employers were quick to make the change welcomed the extra money  anywhere from a few dollars to a few hundred dollars.

Wayne Love, who works in managed care in Spring Hill, Florida, got an extra $200 in his paycheck last week, which he said will help offset a $300 increase in the cost of his health insurance.

"I have heard time and again that the middle class is getting crumbs, but I'll take it!" Love said by email.

Julia Ketchum, a secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, said she was pleasantly surprised her pay went up $1.50 a week. She didn't think her pay would go up at all, let alone this soon. That adds up to $78 a year, which she said will more than cover her Costco membership for the year.

And Todd Anderson of Texas and his fiance, who are both educators, got an extra $200 in their paychecks combined that they plan to use to cover the costs of a second baby on its way.

According to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, a middle-income household would on average get a tax cut of $930 this year, lifting their after-tax income by about 1.6 percent. That increase won't be perfectly reflected in their paycheck though.

That's because lower tax withholding on paychecks is just a piece of a complicated set of changes to tax law that the GOP pushed through in December. And what your employer withholds is based on an estimate of your tax obligation that includes many complex factors, but it's not a perfect measure.

As a result, taxpayers may find they are unintentionally over- or underwithholding for their taxes if they don't do some legwork.

Senator Ron Wyden, on the Senate Finance Committee, and Rep. Richard Neal, on the House Ways and Means Committee, both Democrats, have asked the Government Accountability Office to analyze the new tables to make sure workers' paychecks weren't being systematically underwithheld, which would make paychecks bigger now but lead to a bigger bill at tax time. Mnuchin, speaking at a White House press briefing, dismissed this notion as "ridiculous."

Still, experts suggest that all taxpayers take a look the new IRS calculator when it becomes available later in February to ensure they are having the correct amount withheld. And they should update the information on their W-4 after the IRS releases a revised version later this year.

For most people though, no change will be needed.

The IRS said the new withholding tables should produce an accurate withholding amount for people with simpler tax situations. But tax experts say those who will still itemize, have larger families or more complicated tax situations may want to take a closer look.

"If they haven't done it before, this is a really good year to talk to your tax professional," said Pete Isberg, vice president of government relations for ADP, a payroll provider.

The IRS, payroll and tax professionals have been scrambling to react to the passage of the new tax law. And the IRS says it plans to make further changes involving withholding matters in 2019. Many in the industry say they expect the IRS to update the W-4 form in 2019 in a more dramatic fashion to fully reflect the scope of the law.

No worker should anticipate a negative impact from the new withholding table if their pay remained the same, said Joseph Rosenberg, a senior researcher at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.

However, someone who got a raise may face a higher tax rate as a result. And some corporations have been handing out bonuses and wage increases in reaction to passage of the law. A worker's net pay may also fall if other factors that go into their paycheck changed  such as an increase in health insurance premiums or higher state taxes.

Still, a little extra money in the hands of most Americans may also help boost support of President Donald Trump and his tax plan. Trump and the Republican backers of the plan have deflected criticism of the legislation, insisting that Americans will come to love the new law when they see their heftier paychecks.

Some workers received the increase with mixed emotions though.

"It's tough to be upset about more money in my pocket," said Jefferey Snively, an aerospace engineer who got a 4 percent bump in his last paycheck due to the lower tax rate.

He said that's not enough to feel like a windfall or change his spending habits, but is a pleasant change. Yet, he thinks the tax overhaul wasn't really about him or other workers, but more about corporations and the wealthy.

"I think the people this bill made the most difference for are the ones who needed it least," he said.Police have arrested one person for allegedly taking a sledgehammer to Dallas police cars Sunday morning.

Gregory Simpson, 58, has been charged with criminal mischief.



Dallas Police Department

Officers said Simpson entered the Central Patrol station parking lot on Chestnut Street and used a sledgehammer to damage twelve marked squad cars.

The person was taken into custody and is in the Lew Sterrett Jail.

The Dallas Police Association posted photos of the damage Sunday afternoon calling for security modifications at the substation.

"What's it going to take folks, officer getting killed?," DPA said in a tweet. "These parking lots need to be secure!."

There have been a series of attacks at Dallas police stations the last two years.

Last year voters approved nearly $7 million in bond funding for security upgrades.

Simspon's bond has been set at $50,000.

A man was found dead in a vehicle Saturday morning in Jefferson Park, according to Sgt. Bjorkus of the Los Angeles Police Department.

Police received a call of a shooting at approximately 4 a.m. near 29th Street and Western Avenue, where the victim was found dead on the driver's side of a car. The driver was identified as a man in his 20s, according to Los Angeles Police Department Cpt. Darnell Davenport.

Police said that the driver crashed into a parked vehicle after he was shot. "It's tragic that anybody would die under these kinds of circumstances," Davenport said.

At least one passenger survived the shooting and was uninjured. As a result of an ongoing investigation, Western Avenue was closed from 27th Street to 29th Street.

This is a developing story. Please refresh for details.Two Florida homeowners owe thousands of dollars in fines for painting murals emulating a Vincent van Gogh masterpiece on the exterior of their home.

A news report shows the Mount Dora home covered in blue and yellow paint swirled on the house and a perimeter wall in the style of van Gogh's painting "The Starry Night."

Homeowners Nancy Nemhauser and Ludomir Jastrzebski were fined $100 per day, but the fines were capped at 31 days.



The news reported that a magistrate lifted the cap Thursday. That means the homeowners now owe over $8,000. The fines will continue until the murals are removed.What to Know Jondre Thomas charged with aggravated battery in incident that was caught on camera

Her supervisor suffered second degree facial burns as a result of the incident

An enraged employee at the 595 Truck Stop in Davie threw scalding hot water in her managers face after she was fired Friday, causing a physical altercation and leaving the supervisor with severe facial burns, police said.

Surveillance video caught the incident at 2705 Burris Road, which began when 33-year-old Jondre Thomas was confronted about stealing money from the business, according to an arrest report. The CEO and vice president of Truck Stop suspected Thomas of grand theft, who left the meeting under the impression she was getting fired, the report said.

Once outside, Thomas began talking with Claudio Salcedo, her supervisor for the past five months. She accused Salcedo of trying to get her fired, police said, and tossed boiling hot liquid straight into his face.

"You clearly see her throwing this cup of hot water right in his face," Davie Police Sgt. Mark Leone said.



Infuriated, Salcedo ran after Thomas and a physical fight ensued, the report said. Surveillance footage shows other employees and witnesses trying to break up the brawl.

"I was in shock, I was in shock. I felt some sizzling immediately," Salcedo said. "She just got me in the corner there of the store by surprise, approached me and told me some quick words and said 'youve been trying to get rid of me' and immediately after the boiling water case to my face."



Thomas fled the scene, but police arrested her at her home on Friday. She is being charged on one count of aggravated battery, according to an arrest report.

Salcedo suffered second degree facial burns as a result of the incident. His eye was also injured in the attack.

Police said they're looking into the allegations of theft.

"Theres another incident that were currently investigating and that incident is in reference to some possible theft. This is one of the reasons why she was being terminated and why the manager was speaking with her in the first place," Leone said.

It's been just over two years since Nicole Lovell, 13, was found stabbed to death after climbing out her bedroom window in Blacksburg, Virginia, to meet a much-older teenager whom she thought of as her boyfriend.

Prosecutors said the teen was David Eisenhauer, 18, a Virginia Tech student from Columbia, Maryland, who had met Lovell through social media.

As Eisenhauer's first-degree murder trial began Monday, a key question remained largely unanswered: Why?

Why would Eisenhauer, a high school track star and freshman engineering student at a highly ranked university, kill a 7th-grade girl? And what role did his friend, Natalie Keepers, also a Virginia Tech engineering student, play in the killing?

Lovell's family, the Virginia Tech community and the town of Blacksburg are hoping the trial provides some answers.

Eisenhauer pleaded not guilty on Monday in Montgomery County Circuit Court in Christiansburg.

During her short life, Lovell had endured multiple health problems, including a liver transplant and lymphoma. Her mother said she was bullied because of her weight and a tracheotomy scar.

"Of all the children for a predator or predators to betray, it really is grotesque for Nicole Lovell to have been betrayed because she was such an innocent," said Jane Lillian Vance, a local artist who got to know Nicole as a teaching assistant at Blacksburg Middle School.

"She was such a kind, tender-hearted little girl."

Vance recalled being in Nicole's science class one day as students watched a film. In the background, two dogs were fighting, a scene that horrified Lovell, Vance said.

"She turned to me and said, 'Miss Jane, I can't stand it when things are hurt,'" Vance recalled.

Court documents and testimony during pretrial hearings have painted only a vague picture of the relationship between Eisenhauer and Lovell.

Investigators have said they believe they first communicated through the online instant messaging app Kik.

Bryce Dustin, a friend of Eisenhauer, told The Roanoke Times that Eisenhauer texted him about meeting a teenage girl at a party and later learning she was underage. Dustin said Eisenhauer was afraid the girl would "expose" him and asked if he knew where he could hide a body.

A neighbor told The Associated Press in 2016 that Nicole told friends she planned to sneak out to meet her 18-year-old "boyfriend" named David.

A Blacksburg detective testified that Eisenhauer said he talked to a girl online who confided in him that everyone hated her and asked to meet him. He told police he arranged to pick up Lovell outside her apartment but left after he saw how young she was.

But Keepers told police Eisenhauer told her he met Lovell at a party and worried that he might have had sex with her. She said Eisenhauer claimed he could not remember, because he blacked out and woke up the next morning in a ditch.

Eisenhauer feared Lovell could be pregnant and claimed she had threatened to kill herself if he broke off contact with her, Keepers told police.

Detective Ryan Hite testified that Keepers said she and Eisenhauer discussed several ways to kill Lovell then agreed on a plan to "grab her from behind, cover her mouth and slit her throat."

The next morning, she said, Eisenhauer texted her: "It's done."

Keepers insisted she was not present for the killing but acknowledged helping Eisenhauer clean Lovell's body and dump it just over the state line in North Carolina.

"She referred to Eisenhauer as a sociopath and to herself as a sociopath in training," Hite testified.

Blacksburg, a town of about 45,000 tucked between the Blue Ridge and Alleghany mountains, has dealt with tragedy before, notably the mass shooting at Virginia Tech in 2007 that left 32 people dead.

Lovell's killing hit the town and Virginia Tech hard.

"It was devastating for the community," said Blacksburg Vice Mayor Susan Anderson, who has taught mathematics at Virginia Tech since the 1980s.

"To have a middle school student murdered is horrific. It had an impact on the students who knew her in middle school. And the accused were students at Virginia Tech, and so, of course, that had a very horrific impact on the university community."

Kristi Snyder, administrator of the Rainbow Riders Child Care Centers in Blacksburg, said parents were stunned by Lovell's killing.

"It really shook us to the core," she said. "The fear of, how could this happen to someone in our small community? It was overwhelming."

After details emerged about Lovell meeting Eisenhauer through social media, Snyder asked the Blacksburg police to conduct informational forums on internet safety for both children and their families. Sessions have been held each year since Lovell's death.

Snyder said she expects residents will closely follow Eisenhauer's trial, as well as Keepers' trial, now scheduled to begin in September. Keepers, of Laurel, Maryland, has pleaded not guilty to being an accessory before the fact and concealing a dead body.

"I think people want to see justice and closure," Snyder said. "It was such a horrifying event that it's hard to imagine. We as a community really want to embrace the family and show our support."Al-Qaida-linked militants in Syria downed a Russian fighter jet on Saturday and killed its pilot after he ejected from the plane and landed on the ground in the embattled northwestern province of Idlib. The pilot resisted being captured and fired at the militants who then shot and killed him, according to one of the militants and Syrian monitors.

The Russian Defense Ministry confirmed the downing of the Su-25 and said the pilot was killed in fighting with "terrorists." A report on the ministry's Zvezda TV said preliminary information indicated the plane was shot by a portable ground-to-air missile in an area under control of al-Qaida's branch in Syria.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the plane was downed on Saturday afternoon near the rebel-held town of Sarqeb, which Syrian troops have been trying to take under the cover of Russian airstrikes.

Russia is a key ally of President Bashar Assad, and has been waging a military campaign on behalf of his forces since 2015. Since then, Syrian troops have captured wide parts of the country and in recent weeks have been making advances in Idlib. The province is also a base for al-Qaida's branch in Syria and other Islamic groups.

A Syrian militant in the area told The Associated Press that the Russian pilot was shot and killed when he resisted capture. The pilot opened fire from his pistol as the militants were trying to seize him, said the militant, who refused to be identified by his real name because was not authorized to speak to the media.

A video circulating on social media shows a lifeless body of a man, his face stained with blood, as bearded gunmen stand around him. One of the armed men shouts: "He is Russian." The authenticity of the video could not be independently confirmed but it corresponded to events reported by the AP.

Earlier in the day, the Observatory and the media arm of al-Qaida-linked militants reported intense airstrikes in Idlib. The Observatory reported more than 35 airstrikes on Saraqeb since late Friday, adding that many of its residents are fleeing.

The Ibaa News Agency of the al-Qaida-linked Levant Liberation Committee, said Russian and Syrian warplanes and helicopter gunships have been pounding Saraqeb and the village of Tel Mardeekh in Idlib since the early hours of Saturday.

Syria's state news agency, SANA, said Syrian troops captured the village of Maasaran as well as the Tel Tokan hill, cutting links between Saraqeb and the rebel stronghold of Maarest al-Numan to the south.

Syrian government forces and their allies launched a push into Idlib six weeks ago, inching closer to a key highway that connects Syria's two largest cities, Damascus and Aleppo.

The U.N. says more than 270,000 people have been displaced in Idlib because of the government onslaught since Dec. 15.

Meanwhile, fighting raged on Saturday between Turkish troops and allied Syrian opposition fighters, and a Syrian Kurdish militia in the northern Syrian enclave of Afrin.

The Turkish military said two of its soldiers were killed in Syria and a third was killed on the Turkish side of the border in an attack by Syrian Kurdish militiamen.

The military said Saturday's deaths were related to Turkey's operation against Syrian Kurdish-held Afrin, codenamed Olive Branch. One of the soldiers was killed when a Turkish tank was hit in Afrin.

A total of eight Turkish soldiers and at least 24 allied Syrian opposition fighters have died so far in Ankara's offensive, which started on Jan. 20.

The Turkish operation aims to clear Afrin of the U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish militia, known as the People's Protection Units or YPG, which Turkey considers to be a terrorist group and an extension of the Kurdish insurgency within its borders.

Turkish presidential spokesman said Turkey will not tolerate the presence of a Syrian Kurdish militia "anywhere" along its southern border, hinting that Ankara might expand its military operation underway in the Syrian enclave of Afrin eastward.

The spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said Saturday that Turkey's first demand is to see the YPG move east of the Euphrates River and leave the town of Manbij, where American troops backing the Syrian Kurdish fighters are stationed.

Kalin called on the United States to "disengage" from the YPG and said Turkey will continue communications with "our American allies to avoid any confrontation."

Turkey shares a 911-kilometer border with Syria. The YPG controls much of the territory along the border and an uninterrupted strip from Manbij to the Iraqi border.A Reading, Massachusetts, police officer has been indicted for allegedly shooting a 43-year-old resident in 2018.

Erik Drauschke was indicted by a Middlesex County grand jury on a charge of manslaughter in connection with the shooting death of Alan Greenough in Reading on Feb. 3, 2018.

Police had responded that day to a Main Street apartment just before 4 p.m. for a report of an alleged domestic assault by Greenough, who lived at the residence. He had allegedly assaulted two other residents.

Prosecutors said police were familiar with Greenough and the residence from a previous altercation the night before. Responding officers were sent both to investigate the current incident and to arrest Greenough for the incident the previous evening.

When they arrived, prosecutors said police located Greenough inside the residence, which was dead-bolted from the inside. By the time officers were able to enter the residence, police said he had fled the premises by climbing out a rear window.

Reading police searched the surrounding area until around 4:30 p.m., when Drauschke located Greenough sitting inside a parked car.

Prosecutors said Drauschke allegedly approached the vehicle alone and did not wait for assistance even though other officers were nearby. Greenough is not alleged to have made any attempt to flee or to any threatening gestures toward the officer.

Drauschke allegedly opened the car door and took out his gun as he ordered Greenough out of the car. Greenough allegedly exited the car with both of his hands inside his sweatshirt pocket. He refused to take his hands out of his pockets and yelled, Shoot me, shoot me," prosecutors said. Drauschke allegedly began to back up, then fired twice, striking Greenough in the chest.

Greenough was unarmed and a search of the area did not yield any weapons. He was taken to Lahey Hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.

Reading police announced that Drauschke had been placed on unpaid administrative leave following his indictment Wednesday. He had been on paid administrative leave since the 2018 incident. He had worked for the department since 2006.

"The Reading Police Department has cooperated fully with the district attorney's investigation over the past two-and-a-half years, and the agency will continue to cooperate fully," Reading police Chief David Clark said in a statement.

Drauschke is scheduled to be arraigned in Middlesex Superior Court at a later date.Not only is it a showdown in Minneapolis with the Patriots taking on the Eagles for the Super Bowl on Sunday, but its also a showdown between the warmer air versus the colder air that settled over the region Saturday.

It was a cloudy and warmer start to our Sunday, compared to Saturdays bright and frigid start. A few flurries have popped up in parts of New Hampshire and Maine at this point and the wind has started to pick up out of the SSW at 10-15 MPH with some gusts up to 30 MPH.

Winds are expected to climb, along with the temperatures, as high temperatures will reach into the lower 40s for Boston and Providence as early as noon. Areas farther inland and higher terrain will be in the mid to upper 30s for highs, with lower 30s along the Canadian border.

With the system sliding in, warmer air slides in by midday, making most of the precipitation falling as rain for most of southern New England, with a spot mix for the higher terrain in the Berkshires and the Worcester Hills. However, a Winter Weather Advisory has been posted along the spine of the Green Mountains of Vermont, northern New Hampshire, and northwestern Maine in anticipation of at least several inches of snowfall in those locations. The advisory is in effect through Monday morning.

There is also a Wind Advisory posted for Downeast Maine through midnight tonight, with gusts upwards of 45 mph possible, meaning we could see some minor power outages there.

As far as timing of the system Sunday for your Super Bowl travels, rain overspreads southern New England between 4 to 6 p.m. this evening, with the rain/snow line just north of an imaginary line from Bangor, Maine to Concord, New Hampshire to the Massachusetts/Vermont state line. So, most of Vermont, northern New Hampshire and northern Maine will deal with the snow showers through this evening before winding down after midnight tonight.

However, as the snow showers start to simmer, the rain showers in southern New England start to ramp up. Between 9 to 11 p.m. we could see pockets of heavier downpours, along the immediate coastline of New England and the rain/snow line continues to retreat northward, giving way to a changeover from snow to rain for most of Maine and New Hampshire.

Drier and colder conditions start to slide in as the system exits the region from west to east through Monday morning with some scattered snow showers developing along the higher terrain for Vermont, NW Massachusetts, and northern New Hampshire. In total, 3-6 inches are expected for areas closest to the Canadian border and along the higher elevations of the Green Mountains in Vermont, with some locally higher amounts up to 7 inches. One to three inches of snow is expected along and north from the Massachusetts/Vermont state line to Manchester, New Hampshire, to Lewiston, Maine.

Colder air settles in for Monday and Tuesday with highs into the low to mid 30s south, and low to mid 20s north.

Wednesday brings our next system with a mixed bag of precipitation and could make for a slick morning commute both Wednesday and early Thursday morning.

Stick with NECN and NBC10 Boston on the air, online, and on-the-go with the app for the very latest updates to your forecast. In the meantime, we hope everyone has a fun and safe Super Bowl Sunday.Researchers at the UNC School of Medicine, the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health, and the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center have found that adolescents who are not susceptible to smoking cigarettes and who thought e-cigarettes were less harmful were more likely to use e-cigarettes. Additionally, youth exposed to e-cigarette vapor in public places were also more likely to use e-cigarettes. The study also found that 26 percent of those surveyed were at high risk for future e-cigarette use.

"There's growing concern that youth who use e-cigarettes may transition to smoke conventional cigarettes or use other tobacco products," said first author Sarah Kowitt, MPH, a doctoral candidate at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health and member of Lineberger's Center for Regulatory Research on Tobacco Communication. "This work helps identify risk factors for e-cigarette use among youth who might not otherwise smoke cigarettes."

Adolescents who are not susceptible to smoking cigarettes but who use e-cigarettes are a priority population for prevention of future tobacco product use. This is believed to be one of the first studies to analyze correlates of e-cigarette use among adolescents not susceptible to smoking cigarettes.

The study, published in Preventing Chronic Disease, suggests that a lot of youth who are not interested in regular cigarettes are susceptible to using e-cigarettes, despite the fact that very little is known about long-term health consequences of vaping. And once youth are hooked on the nicotine in e-cigarettes, researchers believe this could increase the chances of adolescents switching over to traditional tobacco products.

"We want to prevent youth from using harmful tobacco products," said Kowitt. "Focusing on a group of adolescents who are traditionally at low risk for using cigarettes but who might use e-cigarettes can help prevent youth from transitioning from e-cigarette use to other tobacco product use."

E-cigarette use is a major public health issue, especially among adolescents and teenagers. Nicotine is a highly addictive substance and particularly harmful to adolescent brain-development. And researchers are still discovering the hidden impacts of e-cigarette use. This past summer, UNC School of Medicine scientists found that e-cigarette vapor alters genes that are crucial for immune defense in the upper-airway. The study analyzed data from the 2015 North Carolina Youth Tobacco Survey that included 1,627 high school students not susceptible to smoking cigarettes from across the state. Researchers divided these students into four categories depending on their e-cigarette use and susceptibility to use e-cigarette.

Survey questions were aimed at finding out what factors led youth to be susceptible to e-cigarette use. Students were asked about their exposure to e-cigs in public places, whether someone who lives with them now uses an e-cig, as well as their exposure to online tobacco advertising. They were also asked about the perceived harm of e-cigarette use.

The results showed that:

Increasing perceived harms of e-cigarettes and e-cigarette vapor were associated with lower odds of susceptibility to using e-cigarettes and current use of e-cigarettes.

Exposure to e-cigarette vapor in indoor or outdoor public places was positively associated with susceptibility to using e-cigarettes and with current e-cigarette use.

"E-cigarette use is a major public health issue, especially among adolescents and teenagers," said Adam Goldstein, MD, professor of family medicine at the UNC School of Medicine and senior author of the study. "Nicotine is highly addictive and particularly harmful to adolescent brain-development."

While major national anti-smoking campaigns have helped curb adolescent combustible cigarette use, e-cigarettes present a dangerous gateway to nicotine addiction and tobacco use. Previous research shows that youth susceptible to smoking cigarettes are more likely to believe e-cigs are less harmful than cigarettes, and are more likely to use e-cigarettes than those not susceptible to smoking cigarettes.

"We estimate that there are over 55,000 high school students in North Carolina at low risk of smoking cigarettes but at high risk for sustained e-cigarette use," Kowitt said.Oil tanker ship with 22 Indians missing from West Africa: MEA

New Delhi : The Ministry of External Affairs has informed that an oil tanker ship with 22 Indians on-board has gone missing from coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar in a tweet said, "A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo-Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea."

A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.  Anurag Srivastava (@MEAIndia) February 3, 2018

Indian authorities based in Nigeria have sought for help in locating the missing vessel, he added.

"Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860," he mentioned in another tweet.

As per media reports, it is suspected that the ship has been hijacked in West Africa. Meanwhile, Nigerian authorities have alerted all boats to look out for the missing tanker ship and if sighted to report to the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) Anti-Piracy Reporting Centre immediately in London.China seems to have made a lot of progress making more practical electromagnetic catapults for aircraft carriers and such electromagnetic catapults could be scaled to launch large drones from smaller ships.

In a presentation at the PLAN University Rear Admiral Ma Weiming told Chinese experts in electromagnetic research that China had made breakthroughs in key areas of electromagnetic applications, such as railguns and electromagnetic-assisted launch system (EMALS) catapults.

Various photos now appear to show that China has installed a railgun onto a military ship. The size of the railgun appears competitive with the size of the 32-megajoule landbased railgun which the United States has been testing.

The US had considered installing a demonstration railgun onto its own Navy ship in 2006 but delayed the work. The US BAE railgun system is designed to fire 22-pound projectiles at Mach 7 speeds to more than 100 miles.

If China is making significant progress in these leading areas of emerging military technology, this will force the USA to revamp wasteful military spending and research. The United States had been actively researching railguns for over a decade and had been working on hypersonic missiles and engines for many decades. It is likely that China has closely followed and studied the US multi-decade long programs and copied or stole what the US was doing and created some innovations on their own.

The US has overpaid and wasted funds on many large weapons systems. The F35 stealth fighter program has used $122 billion and is taking $12-15 billion per year. Over half of the 360 F35s are not flying because they need repairs and are waiting for parts.

The electromagnetic catapult on the new US Ford supercarriers has had extensive reliability and performance problems. The new US carriers are overbudget and heading to $14+ billion for the first carrier.

The US has been very wasteful with military research and procurement. For the past several decades this has not been strategically significant because no other competing country was near the US level of military technology.

This situation has now changed.

The US military waste will cause the US to lose ground in high tech military technology.

SpaceX reusable rocket technology is a decade or two ahead of competitors. The US military and NASA could support SpaceX BFR rocket and leverage it for hypersonic weapons capability. Placing orbital systems to drop telephone pole-sized metal would enable hypersonic bombardment of targets. This would be capability that could neutralize North Koreas weapons.

Other military electromagnetic advances from China

China claims to have successfully tested its first permanent magnet propulsion motor for vessels recently, according to the State-owned China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation (CSIC), which is known for manufacturing Chinas first aircraft carrier and the Jiaolong submersible vessel.

The motor used in conventional submarines has the power of several megawatts, but he still cannot determine the exact power of the installed test model.

Permanent magnet propulsion motor technology can replace the reduction gears and significantly reduce the running sound to the lowest possible level, the expert said.

On the global scale, the permanent magnet motor will have the power to meet the needs of full electrical movement for nuclear submarines.

In July 2017, Chinese state media had reported that the China is fitting its newest nuclear sub with an electromagnetic engine that sounds a lot like Tom Clancys fictional Red October engine.

They had also reported that an electric rim driven shaftless submarine propulsion system was installed.

Rear Admiral Ma Weiming, Chinas top naval engineer, is notably responsible for the development of multiple Chinese naval electromagnetic programs, including the electromagnetic catapult and railguns. He said the Chinese navy is adding a shaftless rim-driven pumpjet, a revolutionary and silent propulsion system to their newest attack submarine, the Type 095 SSN.

This electric drive is an attempt to leap beyond current submarine technology to technology with a long history of attempted development. This is similar to China making a stronger commitment to develop a submersible arsenal ship. China is taking technology and designs with decades of history and actually implementing them.

Previous submarine pumpjets are shrouded propellers, which consist of a tubular nozzle covering the propeller. By removing the shaft of the propeller, the reduction in the number of moving parts decreases the noise made by the pumpjet, as well as saving hull space. Smaller civilian rim driven electric pumpjets are easier to maintain, and have less cavitation (bubbles that form during propeller movement), which make them even more quiet.

CCTV13 had a Focus on the interview segment on May 30,2017. They discussed the of electric propulsion technology power of Admiral Ma Weiming. There was some discussion of the technology and spin about how China was moving beyond copying to attempt to create breakthroughs.The first few minutes of the video discussed telecommunication switching work of Zhang Ping.

Integrated Electrical Propulsion System (IEPS) turns all the output of the ships engine into electricity, unlike traditional propulsion designs, which convert engine and reactor output into mechanical action to turn the propeller shaft. The high electrical output can also be used to power motors for the propellers or potentially high-energy weapons. Additionally, IEPS has far fewer moving parts, making them quieter, and thus ideal for use on submarines. When coupled with quieter reactors like the Type 095s reported natural circulation reactor, the rim-driven pumpjet and IEPS can drastically reduce the acoustic signature of any SSN.



Yamato-1 in 1991

Westinghouse, the leading U.S. advocate, gave up in the late 1960s  because the weight required to create a sufficiently powerful magnetic field would sink most ships.

In the early 1990s, Japan succeeded in making a 100 foot long 8 mph prototype surface ship called the Yamato. A group of Japanese physicists and naval architects quickly realized that the powerful magnetic coil made possible by superconductors could transform the MHD ship from old dream to new reality. Aconsortium of universities and major high-tech firms here committed about six years ago to forge ahead with a $40 million-plus project to build the propellerless MHD ship.

US and UK have tried to get electric drive to work but have not committed to it for their next generation submarines

The US Columbia submarine and UK Dreadought will not start construction for a few years and the first unit will be ready around the 2031. They have not decided to use electric drive and may choose more conventional propulsion systems.

The US and UK military and researchers have been working on electric drive propulsion tests for at least two decades. The RED-I motor used a wet gap permanent magnet motor to turn a ring of propeller blades. Two RED-I motors are mounted in free flood areas in the submarine mud tank, forward of the stern planes. The permanent magnet motor employed is large enough to permit a four feet diameter UUV to internally pass through the RED-I propulsor system in order to deploy from the stern of the submarine.

There has been general acceptance that there is potential benefit for quieter submarines using this technology but the US has opted for more conventional approaches for quieter submarines.

Potential modernization plans of the Peoples Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) were revealed in unprecedented detail by a former rear admiral in a university lecture, perhaps delivered within the last 2-3 years. The admiral, retired Rear Admiral Zhao Dengping, revealed key programs such as: a new medium-size nuclear attack submarine; a small nuclear auxiliary engine for conventional submarines; ship-based use of anti-ship ballistic missiles (ASBMs); next-generation destroyer capabilities; and goals for PLAN Air Force modernization.

This information was from an article by Richard D. Fisher, Jr. at the Center for International Maritime Security.

Zhao is a former Director of the Equipment Department of the PLAN.

Admiral Zhao described a new unidentified 7,000-ton nuclear-powered attack submarine (SSN) that will feature a new type of powerplantnew weapon system and electronic information system. It has a sound isolation raft and propulsor which should reduce its acoustic signature, 12 cruise missile tubes in front of the sail, and a bow and sail similar to the current Type 093 SSN. The 7,000 ton weigh suggests it may reflect the lower-cost weight and capability balance seen in current U.S. and British SSNs.

This might be the rumored next generation Type 095 SSN. China plans to build 14 Type 095s.

Small Nuclear Powerplant for long duration AIP diesel submarines

There was a slide showing a new low power/low pressure auxiliary nuclear powerplant for electricity generation for fitting into conventional submarine designs, possibly succeeding the PLANs current Stirling engine-based air independent propulsion (AIP) systems.

The cost of typical AIP diesel submarines are 100 million USD to 250 million USD compared to 1  5 billion USD for typical nuclear submarines. There are large AIP diesel submarines that can be around 1 billion dollars.

AIP subs have submerged (AIP) endurance of 14-30 days, and total endurance of 45 to 90 days. .Nuclear subs typically have endurance submerged or not of 90-100 days, limited by the food storage for the crew. AIP submarines using no air have to use the less powerful non-air power source and engines which limits speed to about 4-5 knots.

A nuclear auxiliary power system for SSK-sized submarines would be an affordable conversion to an all-nuclear powered submarine fleet. While nuclear auxiliary powered submarines may not have the endurance of SSNs, their performance could exceed that of most AIP powered submarines while still being very cheap.



Admiral Zhao suggests that the PLAN is developing a new nuclear reactor-powered auxiliary power unit to charge the batteries of smaller and less expensive conventional submarines, allowing the PLAN to more rapidly increase its numbers of nuclear powered submarines. (CJDBY)

Zhaos slides detailed hypersonic weapons and laser and microwave weapons.

Another slide with a future destroyer with integrated electric power system, full-spectrum stealthiness, integrated mast and integrated RF technology and new type laser/kinetic energy weapon appear to be China copying many of the US Zumwalt-class destroyer. The US only built three Zumwalt destroyers.

China is also developing stratospheric long-endurance UAV and a stratospheric airship.In August, 2017, Theatre on the Square (TOTS) shuttered for repairs. Since then, the venue has become ground zero in the fight to keep theater alive in the Mass Ave Cultural District.

Maintaining the TOTS building as a performance venue is critical to the vibrancy of Mass Ave and for it to remain a theater destination in the city, says Dave Lawrence, President and CEO of the Arts Council of Indianapolis.

The effort to keep the TOTS building as a theatrical venue is being spearheaded by the Central Indiana Community Foundation (CICF).

But TOTS as a nonprofit performing arts organization is no more. A search for a new name for the venue  and a new theater organization to inhabit it  is about to begin.

When CICF stepped in in August we tried to be very clear that we werent going to save TOTS as the organization, says Brian Payne, Executive Director of CICF. We were going to save that physical theater venue for the good of the theatrical and performing arts community.

Payne says that the building is getting close to the point where the building can open: Its more of a question of the timing when it happens.

But actually getting to that point requires a number of steps.

Theres a little bit of a process, says Payne. We dont have a grand reopening scheduled. Were creating a new not-for-profit; I personally am going to be chair of the nonprofit board. Were still trying to figure out a name for the organization and the building and were working on that. So weve got a new board of directors. Weve invited a couple of the board members too who were on the TOTS board as it kind of went out of business; we invited two of them to be on our [new] board.

One of the decisions made at the last CCIF board meeting, on Jan. 23, was to have a subcommittee work on a request for proposal. The idea is to have various theater companies propose how they might manage the space.

They will operate the building they and will rent to other performing arts organizations, says Payne. They may produce some of their own work but we will not pick a producer who says I want to do only my own work in this building. We want to serve multiple performing arts organizations.

The Arts Councils Lawrence expands on that idea.

Time on the stage will also be allowed for homeless theatre companies our those without a permanent home, he says. There are small theatre companies in Indianapolis for which this could be a wonderful opportunity. Space remains at a premium in Indianapolis and this possibility could provide much needed rehearsal and performance space for groups.

A request for proposal will be issued on or around February 12.

The board that Payne chairs will focus on making the venue sustainable, he says, and to create an organizational long term plan to keep that venue thriving for the theatrical and the performing arts community for small and emerging arts organizations.

The intent of CICF is to pull away once the new theater is put on a course to financial stability, according to Payne.

But its not just TOTS at a crossroads. The Phoenix Theatre will soon move from its longtime location to 709 N. Illinois street, well outside the Mass Ave Cultural District. And the vacated Phoenix venue will likely not be available to showcase IndyFringe performances come August, when the annual 11-day-long multi-venue theatrical festival is set to begin.

The Phoenix property will be developed into housing.

And the TOTS buildings status as a venue for IndyFringe  which is preparing for its 14th season  is unclear at this point in time.

IndyFringe Executive Director Pauline Moffat describes the developing status of TOTS as critical for the festival, but they have a plan B if enough brick and mortar venues arent available in August.

That is, they are considering the use of large tents  the type of tents she has seen at Fringe events in Perth, Australia  to house productions.

But its not ideal, says Moffat. Wed rather have another theater space.

Roger Schmelzer, the former board president of TOTS who has is also on Payne's new board, thinks that the refurbished theater venue will be ready for Fringe.

"I think she can go with Plan A," he says. "I think its going to be fine. The building is in much better shape today than it was six months ago."

He also said that the new building will be operational at the beginning of March.

"Were not in a rush though," Schmelzer says, "because we want to get the right person in the building and the right contract together for somebody but I just feel certain by the summertime, by the time Fringe goes up, the building will be available for that."

How things got to this point

In 1993 TOTS moved from Fountain Square to 627 Massachusetts Avenue, in Downtown Indianapolis. The theater quickly established itself as an anchor in the burgeoning Mass. Ave. cultural scene. It has produced upwards of 250 plays and musicals  among them challenging works like Corpus Christi, Equus, and Southern Baptist Sissies  and has been a longstanding participant in IndyFringe.

But TOTS had experienced financial strains as well as turnover both in the board of directors and with its leadership. TOTS founder Ron Spencer (and 2008 NUVO Cultural Vision Award recipient) left in 2014. Lori Raffel, his replacement as executive director left in March, 2017.

Also particularly problematic, at least from the perspective of CCIF  a longstanding grant-maker to TOTS  was a second mortgage that TOTS took out on the building during the tenure of Ron Spencer as executive director, as Brian Payne related for a Jan. 26 article in the Indianapolis Business Journal.

TOTS ended their 2016-2017 season prematurely due to financial difficulty and productions already cast were abandoned.

We looked at our situation and we thought that were probably not as sustainable as we need to be, Schmelzer told NUVO in August, 2017. And we carried that forward and started making steps to try to shore everything up and that led to discussions with CICF.

TOTS had more that just financial issues, however, The building itself was in desperate need of repair.

Structural issues issues and public safety issues came to the forefront, says Payne, whose organization is putting $200,000 into the refurbishing the building.

The reason CICF got involved is that we were afraid if TOTS took on more debt and went out of business some bank would wind up owning this building making another restaurant or a bar out of it, Payne says. "The Mass Ave cultural district and all these performing arts organizations would lose a very valuable venue for them to do their work.

Editor's Note: In April 2018, IndyFringe took ofter management of the venue (renamed the District Theatre). Read Dan Grossman's follow-up piece belowArchaeologists in Egypt have discovered a 4,400-year-old tomb near Cairo that contains rare wall paintings and is believed to belong to a high-ranking Egyptian priestess, government officials said on Saturday.

The tomb is thought to be that of a priestess named Hetpet, Mostafa Waziri, the secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, said at the archaeological site, near the Giza pyramids, according to a video recorded by Agence France-Presse.

Officials unveiled the discovery to reporters on Saturday. The Egyptian authorities have hoped that a surge in discoveries will attract more tourists to the country.MTVs TRL recently welcomed Poppy, a rising star with hologram-perfect skin, an avant-garde Japanese schoolgirl wardrobe and a voice like Betty Boops on benzos.

For much of the show, she perched silently on the couch and methodically stacked candies on a glass table. A longhaired handler called Titanic Sinclair accompanied her, explaining, Im just making sure she doesnt malfunction. Poppy proved a tough interview. Asked what she thought of the Grammys, which had aired the night before, she chirped: Um, I dont really remember them. Then she changed into a costume that made her look like a beautiful egg yolk and performed Bleach Blonde Baby, a song about how she was born with full makeup and a mani-pedi.

Poppy is  to sum up her project most simply  an android-themed pop star. She first appeared on YouTube in 2014, in a video where she eats cotton candy while an overdubbed soundtrack plays oddly pleasant eating sounds. When she speaks, Poppy exhibits the limited range of a chat bot, the oddly formal vocabulary of a digital assistant (she says New York New York and YouTube dot com) and the late-capitalist tics of an online influencer. In Hey YouTube, she repeats vlogger greetings  Whats up, guys? and Hey YouTube!  until they lose their meaning. In I am empowered, she purrs, I feel empowered when I create high-quality content on the internet over and over again.

The fembot has long been a pop culture fixation, but now feminized tech is all around us. Digital helpmeets like Apples Siri, Amazons Alexa and Microsofts Cortana are fitted with nonthreatening feminine voices and programmed to respond to sexist comments with cutesy repartee. (If you tell Siri to make you a sandwich, she replies: I cant. I have no condiments.) Creepy techno-Pygmalion stories  like the one about the guy who 3-D-printed his own Scarlett Johansson bot on his patio  captivate the online news landscape. With the help of machine learning, a community of Redditors are creating highly realistic fake porn that melds famous actresses faces onto porn performers bodies. Twitter lit up with crazed sex-robot memes last month after images of a new sex doll styled as an Instagram model (swollen lips, thick thighs and an athleisure-lingerie uniform) went viral.She predicted that if the regulation took effect and employers decided to share tips with these workers, their base pay would be reduced and there would be no more take-home pay.

The Labor Department estimated that the rule would affect about one million waiters and waitresses and over 200,000 bartenders. Workers in other industries, like hairstylists and manicurists, would also be affected.

Many tipped workers would not be affected, however, because the law would continue to prevent employers from taking the tips of those who earned less than the minimum wage. The law allows workers to be paid below the minimum wage as long as their tips make up the difference.

The proposed rule has generated a surprising amount of attention, attracting more than 180,000 comments from the public by Friday. That is roughly two-thirds the number of comments that the Obama administrations proposal to increase overtime eligibility  which affected millions more workers and nearly every industry  generated after it was formally unveiled in 2015.

At least one major business group and some restaurant owners wrote that the rule would allow employers to put in place new pay practices that benefited both them and workers.

It used to be that our servers typically made 1.5 to two times more than our kitchen staff, which is a big gap, but now they make two to four times more, wrote Kim Snuggerud, who owns the Hilo Bay Cafe in Hawaii. This gap can be better managed with this change in the regulations. The wage disparity creates many problems, from morale issues to higher turnover.Want the latest climate news in your inbox? You can sign up here to receive Climate Fwd:, our new email newsletter.

WASHINGTON  The Trump administration plans to withdraw its nomination of Kathleen Hartnett White, a climate change skeptic, to lead the Council on Environmental Quality, a White House official said.

President Trump in October appointed Ms. White, a former Texas environmental regulator who has said that carbon dioxide should be considered the gas of life rather than a pollutant, to be the White House senior environmental adviser. Carbon dioxide emissions contribute to global warming.

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee approved Ms. White on a party-line vote, but her nomination languished at the end of 2017. That was in part, lawmakers acknowledged, because of Ms. Whites performance at her hearing in which she not only espoused controversial views on climate change but also stumbled over science questions.Amanda Cate Davis and Leonard Michael Winters were married Feb. 3 at the Woodbury Jewish Center in Woodbury, N.Y. Rabbi Menashe East officiated.

The bride, 31, is a senior engagement manager in the New York office of L.E.K. Consulting, a management consultancy based in London. She graduated cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania and received an M.B.A. from New York University.

She is the daughter of Lisa Z. Davis and Frank R. Davis of Jericho, N.Y. The brides father is a partner in Forchelli Deegan Terrana, a law firm in Uniondale, N.Y. Her mother is a senior director in the tax department of the Interpublic Group of Companies, an advertising and marketing company in New York.

The groom, 32, is a litigation specialist at the Susquehanna Financial Group, an institutional brokerage in New York. He graduated magna cum laude from Brandeis and received a law degree, magna cum laude, from Fordham.Jill Nicole Filipovic and Ty Lohrer McCormick were married Jan. 29 at the Talisman restaurant in Nairobi, Kenya. Diane Lucas, an assistant attorney general for the State of New York and a friend of the couple who became a Universal Life Minister for the occasion, officiated.

The bride, 34, is a Nairobi-based freelance journalist and a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times. She graduated cum laude from N.Y.U., from which she also received a law degree. She is the author of The H-Spot: The Feminist Pursuit of Happiness, (Nation Books, 2017).

She is a daughter of Mary Judith Filipovic and Michael Filipovic, both of Seattle. The brides father, who works in Seattle, is the federal public defender for Western Washington. Her mother is a nurse manager at Northwest Hospital, also in Seattle.

The groom, who is 30 and also works in Nairobi, is the Africa editor of Foreign Policy magazine. He graduated with distinction from Stanford and received a masters degree from Oxford. He also received a second masters from the Queens University Belfast in Northern Ireland.And in case the message was still not clear, Milton L. Williams Jr., a lawyer for a third defendant, said Mr. Howe was a liar who is trying to save his own neck.

Mr. Howes testimony has been eagerly anticipated ever since federal prosecutors announced in 2016 that he had pleaded guilty and was cooperating with authorities in an investigation of Joseph Percoco, a former senior aide to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and one of his closest friends. (Mr. Cuomo has not been accused of any wrongdoing.)

The government has charged that Mr. Percoco, one of four men on trial, accepted more than $300,000 in bribes from Mr. Howes clients in return for taking official actions on their behalf.

Mr. Howe, who had lobbied in Albany and Washington, has longstanding ties to the Cuomo family. He worked in the administration of former Gov. Mario M. Cuomo, the current governors father, and he also worked under Andrew Cuomo when he served as secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development under President Bill Clinton.

Defense lawyers attacks on Mr. Howe in Mr. Percocos trial began early and relentlessly, as they warned the jury that Mr. Howe could not be believed  a common defense tactic to try to weaken the credibility of a key witness.Early in the trial, Judge Walls made it clear that he was not going to let any of the salacious rumors work their way into his courtroom, nor what he viewed as loaded references to Mr. Menendezs decisions to stay in luxury hotels with a female friend.

Its not going to be a tabloid trial, and I am not going to let you just swish and swash nonsensical, you know, nonsensical substances  not substances, scenarios that really dont even make for a good pulp fiction story, he told a prosecutor at one point.

Gerald Krovatin, a lawyer in Newark who had worked with Mr. Menendezs defense team, said, They had really criminalized a relationship. It had its seamy underside with the Melgen girlfriends, but it was kind of a bloodless case once Walls cut all the sex out of it.

Federal prosecutors saw their case slip away. The jury was deadlocked. Judge Walls tried to encourage them to reach a decision but eventually had to declare a mistrial. Jurors told reporters afterward that they were stuck at 10-2, with the majority for acquittal. It was unusual insight into a jurys deliberations, and it made some in the Justice Department unenthusiastic about a retrial.

The government was facing other hurdles.

Judge Walls had said he would not preside over the retrial, and the case was expected to go to Judge William Martini. Reflecting Mr. Menendezs long and deep involvement in New Jersey politics, every other federal judge in Newark, where the first trial was held, had either passed or recused from the case; Mr. Menendez had helped sponsor several of the judges for the bench.

Prosecutors had reason to feel anxious about arguing the case before Judge Martini. A former Republican congressman  he served in the House with Mr. Menendez in the mid 1990s  he has been an outspoken critic of government overreach.Rafael Ocasio Barreto refused to leave Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria tore through his part of San Juan, Cano Martin Pena, flooding streets with dirty water, toppling power lines and destroying houses. He soldiered on for two weeks, although he was just as devastated as his community. Finally, his friends forced him  wearing just the clothes on his back  to get on a plane to the States.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency resettled him at a suite motel in Queens, not far from La Guardia Airport. A tiny Puerto Rican flag adorns his living room, as if he was claiming this corner of Northern Boulevard. In a bedroom, plump winter coats and new sneakers are piled atop the bed. The kitchen is stocked with food. Just as he cared little for material possessions in Puerto Rico, these items are not for him, but to share with other uprooted Puerto Ricans also staying at the motel as they await the next steps when FEMA stops covering their hotel costs on Feb. 14.

I have to give them a hand so they can confront this new life, Mr. Ocasio Barreto said last week. In Puerto Rico, even with all its dire needs, you can get someone to help. Here, that really doesnt exist. Here, its about individualism. You feel the racism. Its not the affection you felt back home. Fortunately, even in this motel, I have found Dominicans, Hondurans and Ecuadoreans who identify with us and extend their hand like a brother nation.

Perhaps it was because he saw too much and felt too much that he made the reluctant trip north. Mr. Ocasio Barreto, 48, had been living in Cano Martin Pena, where he worked with a public-private coalition of eight local communities to address the needs of residents and the environment. More than a century ago, squatters descended upon the areas mangroves, using debris and castoffs for landfill as they built shacks. Over decades, the mangroves almost vanished as tens of thousands of people settled the area, which mostly lacked proper sewage systems.To the Editor:

Re We Cant Win a War We Dont Understand, by Steve Coll (Sunday Review, Jan. 28):

The war in Afghanistan is but one chapter in a century-long struggle across the Muslim world between secular modernizing forces and religious fundamentalists, who are backed by Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

These states motivation for countering reform with extremism is to block socioeconomic transformations that would come at their rulers expense. And they were able to do this only under the cover of alliances with a Cold War America that saw the struggle against Communism as the only reality.

Thus the humility that Mr. Coll calls for must begin with a recognition of our own tragic role as enablers in the wider drama of the rise of Islamic extremism. Yet there has been intense psychological resistance to this fact since 9/11.

Having helped drive back what T. E. Lawrence called a return pilgrimage toward liberty and away from an intolerant imposition of religious dogma in the Muslim world, we must relaunch this vital journey together with the reformers, or we will be fighting jihadists forever.DETAILS A 22-year-old semidetached condo with a living room with fireplace, a kitchen with stainless steel appliances, and two decks, in a gated community with an outdoor pool.

COSTS $13,651 a year in taxes; $615 a month in common charges

LISTING BROKER Julia B. Fee Sothebys International Realty

____SAN FRANCISCO  A group of Silicon Valley technologists who were early employees at Facebook and Google, alarmed over the ill effects of social networks and smartphones, are banding together to challenge the companies they helped build.

The cohort is creating a union of concerned experts called the Center for Humane Technology. Along with the nonprofit media watchdog group Common Sense Media, it also plans an anti-tech addiction lobbying effort and an ad campaign at 55,000 public schools in the United States.

The campaign, titled The Truth About Tech, will be funded with $7 million from Common Sense and capital raised by the Center for Humane Technology. Common Sense also has $50 million in donated media and airtime from partners including Comcast and DirecTV. It will be aimed at educating students, parents and teachers about the dangers of technology, including the depression that can come from heavy use of social media.

We were on the inside, said Tristan Harris, a former in-house ethicist at Google who is heading the new group. We know what the companies measure. We know how they talk, and we know how the engineering works.CAYCE, S.C.  Amtrak suffered its third high-profile crash in less than seven weeks early Sunday when a passenger train traveling on the wrong track slammed into a stationary freight train in South Carolina, killing two people and intensifying worries about the safety and reliability of passenger rail service in the United States.

Although the crash was the subject of a federal inquiry on Sunday, Amtraks chief executive, Richard H. Anderson, said that a signal system had been down and that dispatchers from another company, CSX, were routing trains at about the time of the wreck. The passenger train, heading south, was diverted onto a rail siding where, while apparently traveling below the speed limit, it crashed into a CSX train that had been loaded with automobiles.

But with the specific sequence of events and cause of the crash unlikely to be settled for many months, the episode, which injured at least 116 people and allowed thousands of gallons of fuel to spill, posed a new challenge for an already beleaguered Amtrak.

By one crucial metric, Amtrak is stronger than ever: In its most recent fiscal year, it posted a record-high ridership of about 31.7 million passenger trips. Yet a series of fatal accidents in recent months have triggered a test of confidence in the rail service.

Amtrak has put a question in peoples minds, said James E. Hall, a former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, which is investigating the crash in South Carolina.

On Wednesday, a train carrying Republican members of Congress to a retreat in West Virginia hit a garbage truck in rural Virginia, killing a passenger in the truck. And in December, a passenger train on a newly opened Amtrak route jumped the tracks on an overpass near Seattle, slamming rail cars into a busy highway, killing at least three people and injuring about 100 others.

Federal Railroad Administration statistics have shown that in recent years the agency has had an average of about two derailments a month, accounting for about one-quarter of the accidents it reports.

Derailments rarely cause more than minor injuries, but the aftermath was tragically different on Sunday not far from Columbia, the state capital.

Gov. Henry McMaster said the engine of the Amtrak train, which had been carrying eight crew members and 139 passengers on its route from New York to Miami, was barely recognizable.

Its a horrible thing to see  to understand the force that this involved, Mr. McMaster said.

The Lexington County coroner, Margaret Fisher, identified the dead as Amtrak employees: the trains 54-year-old engineer, Michael Kempf, of Savannah, Ga., and a conductor, Michael Cella, 36, of Orange Park, Fla. Both men were in the first car of the train.

We should have had a lot more casualties, but we didnt, she said.

Dozens of passengers were taken to a nearby middle school, where the American Red Cross set up a temporary shelter and passengers tried to make sense of what had happened aboard Train 91 at about 2:35 a.m. on Sunday.

It just started shaking, you could actually feel the cars hitting the back of our train, said Samuel Rodriguez, an unemployed metalworker from Brownsville, Brooklyn, who had been sitting beside his mother as they traveled to Florida. Smoke. Screaming. I went to pick up one kid, checked my mother out to see if she was all right: Ma, you all right? Dont move.

Mr. Rodriguez continued: Thats when I went between aisles, and I saw a kid bleeding all over, his skull was showing, and his mother was in shock. So I run to the back, try to get to the bathroom. Bathrooms tore up, toilet bowls out, everythings a disaster, and Im like, Wow, Im still walking.

He said his mother suffered a fractured nose and injured her leg in the crash, and was released from Lexington Medical Center in Columbia.

Officials said that about 115 other Amtrak passengers had been transferred to local hospitals. The CSX train did not have any passengers on board, Mr. McMaster said.

In a post on Twitter, President Trump expressed his condolences to victims of the crash and thanked emergency workers. Representative Joe Wilson, a Republican who represents this area, visited the Red Cross shelter and said he remained confident in Amtrak. But days after being aboard the train that derailed in Virginia, Mr. Wilson suggested that his experience on Sunday of seeing first responders and shaken passengers had been deeply unusual.SAO PAULO, Brazil  The American aerospace giant Boeing is eagerly pursuing a partnership with the Brazilian jet maker Embraer as part of a global battle with its European rival, Airbus.

But the talks, which moved into high gear late last year, are advancing at a politically fraught time in Brazil, and the Brazilian government  which owns a so-called golden share that gives it veto power over any change in ownership at Embraer  could derail a deal the two companies are said to be racing to complete.

A deal with Embraer would give Boeing a broader portfolio of aircraft, including, crucially, access to Embraers smaller regional planes, which compete directly with jets manufactured by the Canadian company Bombardier.

To prevail, however, Boeing will need to overcome political misgivings in Brazil, even though Embraer has a lot to gain.LONDON  The story of a lonely seabird named Nigel who tried to woo a mate that had a heart of stone and died on an uninhabited island off New Zealand has captivated many on social media.

Footage of the bird preening and cooing as he fruitlessly courted a decoy made of concrete has been watched obsessively online. Though his chosen partner kept a cold silence, Nigel, a gannet, won the affection of visitors and conservationists alike.

His solitary life shined a light on a yearslong effort by an army of conservationists, devoted volunteers and others to repopulate his species on the island.

News of the seabirds death in late January hit the islands caretakers and social media users hard.BRUSSELS  The police seek him in Spain. Journalists seek him in Belgium. His whereabouts usually remains a mystery, turning the exile of Carles Puigdemont, the once and would-still-be leader of Catalonia, into a real-life game of Wheres Waldo.

In November he surfaced in the Sonian Forest, a woodland near Brussels. Several days later he was spotted buying candy in Ghent, before re-emerging at the citys opera house. Residents of a small village near the Dutch border were surprised to find him dining there. Then in January he turned up in Denmark for a day.

To get the man in and out of a place where he could eat without being seen was a huge feat, said Lorin Parys, a Belgian politician who has befriended him.

All of this points to the paradox of Mr. Puigdemonts strange existence since he fled Spain for Belgium in October after the authorities disbanded his government and sought his arrest on charges of sedition for leading Catalonias independence drive.ATHENS  More than 100,000 people gathered in the Greek capital on Sunday to stage the biggest demonstration in decades against the inclusion of the word Macedonia in the name of a neighboring former Yugoslav republic, saying it implies a territorial claim on a northern Greek region.

The rally, drawing around 140,000, according to police estimates, was larger even than most of the numerous demonstrations organized after Greece signed its first international bailout program in 2010, paving the way for years of painful belt-tightening. Still, the demonstration on Sunday appeared to fall far short of the one million that organizers said had attended.

Greece and the Republic of Macedonia began United Nations-mediated talks last month to try to settle the 25-year name dispute. Many Greeks argue that its neighbors use of Macedonia suggests an encroachment on the Greek region of that name, whose capital is Thessaloniki. That city has itself staged protests over the disagreement.MADRID  The authorities in Spain and Morocco extended a search-and-rescue operation at sea on Sunday after recovering the bodies of at least 20 African migrants a day earlier off Melilla, a Spanish enclave in northern Africa.

Most of the bodies, spotted on Saturday by a Spanish passenger boat that had sailed out of Melilla, were recovered by the Moroccan authorities. One was found in a separate location by a Spanish police boat and was taken to Melilla, where an autopsy was to be performed.

Rescue boats began patrolling a wider radius on Sunday with the support of a Spanish police helicopter, said Irene Flores, a spokeswoman for the Spanish government in Melilla, amid fears that the strong winds and currents that made the seas dangerous in the past few days would lead the bodies to drift farther.

The authorities have not been able to determine exactly when the tragedy occurred, Ms. Flores said, nor do they know the exact route the migrants were following. Melilla, an enclave of about seven square miles, is roughly 100 miles from the Spanish mainland and attracts many seeking the promise of life in Europe.Women such as Millicent Garrett Fawcett and Emmeline Pankhurst campaigned for the right to vote for all. The movement was split into labels: suffragists and suffragettes, whose members took a harder stance, staging loud protests, smashing windows and the like.

Mrs. Fawcett considered herself a suffragist, a moderate opposed to the sometimes violent protests of campaigners like Ms. Pankhurst, known as a suffragette.

History so far seems to have been relatively kinder to the moderate. Last year, Prime Minister Theresa May announced that Mrs. Fawcett would be the first woman to be honored by a statue in Parliament Square in London, where there are 11 statues of men  giants like Churchill, Lincoln and Mandela.

(A memorial to Ms. Pankhurst and her daughter Christabel stands in a corner of the Palace of Westminster in London.)Britain already has Europes highest proportion of heroin addicts, and last year, drug-related deaths hit a record high in England and Wales, with 3,744 deaths mainly from heroin and other opioids. While the scale is small compared with deaths in the United States  where more than 100 Americans die each day from opioid abuse  British authorities fear that fentanyl could become the countrys next most dangerous drug.

People here are prescribed opioids for pain, but nothing to the extent of the U.S., where extremely potent opioids are being prescribed on a large scale, said Dr. Prun Bijral, the medical director for Change, Grow, Live, a nonprofit organization that focuses on substance abuse. On the one hand, this is positive. But on the other hand, the U.K. has one of the highest rates of drug-related deaths in Europe.

No place has been hit harder by heroin, fentanyl and opioid addiction recently than Hull, a former fishing town of 260,000 people about 150 miles north of London that was improbably named Britains 2017 City of Culture. On a drizzly cold day last month, under a bright green sign welcoming visitors to the city, several addicts lay bundled up, stashes of drugs and alcohol secreted in blankets and other belongings. Others lined the doorways of nondescript buildings on the citys main street.

Since the fishing industry collapsed in the 1970s, the city has suffered some of the highest rates of unemployment  currently 8.9 percent  and addiction in the country. The citys easy transport links to the port and two major highways also facilitate drug trafficking.VIENNA  Black tie and satin gowns. Horse-drawn carriages. Waltzes, cha-chas and tangos until the wee hours. High-society revelers scarfing down Wiener wurst with their fingers.

And now, police blockades and marching protesters.

This is peak ball season in Vienna, 2018.

A tradition deeply embedded in the Viennese soul, the formal dance events of the ball season are held by the citys professional guilds, political parties and universities from November until Lent, with the highest concentration of parties from early January until the end of February.

Many are stiff high-society affairs, like the New Years Ball and the Opera Ball  the official ball of the Federal Republic of Austria, which dates in its various forms to the 1800s, and this year takes place on Thursday.



Others, like the Confectioners Ball, Coffee Brewers Ball and Flower Ball, all held last month, are just as formal but attended by a wider audience.The group is transitioning into an underground organization that places more weight on asymmetric tactics, like suicide bombings against soft targets in government-secured areas like Baghdad, said Otso Iho, a senior analyst at Janes Terrorism and Insurgency Center at IHS Markit in London.

Mr. Iho cited an attack by two suicide bombers in Baghdad last month that killed three dozen people and injured 90 more. The attack took place in a busy Baghdad square where day laborers gather to look for work.

Estimates of how many fighters may have escaped into the deserts of Syria or Iraq and beyond are difficult to pin down, but American and other Western intelligence and counterterrorism analysts with access to classified assessments put the number in the low thousands. Many are traveling with spouses and children who are likely to have been radicalized during more than three years of Islamic State control of the region and could pose security risks as well, analysts say.

In December, Col. Ryan Dillon, the chief spokesman for the American-led military campaign in Iraq and Syria, said in a briefing with Pentagon reporters: Syrian regime commanders in eastern Syria suggest that ISIS fighters from the Middle Euphrates River Valley may have slipped through porous Syrian and Russian defenses to arrive in areas near Damascus.

Asked late last month by The New York Times about indications that as many as 1,000 fighters and family members had fled the Euphrates River area just in recent days, Colonel Dillons command replied in a statement: We know that the Syrian regime has given ISIS the leeway to travel through their area of operations, but we cannot confirm any alleged incidents or operations that are taking place outside our area of operations.

The United States military is concerned that a Turkish offensive against the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces in Afrin, in northern Syria, has worsened the problem. The S.D.F. has been working with the Americans in former Islamic State-held areas to interdict fleeing jihadists, but those efforts have been greatly reduced as the Kurds have shifted resources to reinforce Afrin.KOBANI, Syria  Turkeys military suffered its worst day yet in the two-week offensive in Afrin, Syria, when at least seven soldiers were killed and a tank was destroyed in the fighting, official Turkish news outlets reported on Sunday.

But the losses may be higher, according to other reports.

Mustafa Bali, a spokesman for the Kurdish-led militia defending the city in northern Syria, the Syrian Democratic Forces, said its fighters had killed eight Turkish Army soldiers in two episodes northeast of the city on Saturday. Two tanks were destroyed, he said.

An independent monitoring group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said that two tanks had been destroyed and that 19 Turkish soldiers and allied Syrian militiamen had been killed in total on Saturday.

It was the single biggest one-day loss for the Turkish forces since they pushed into Syria on Jan. 20, vowing to take the enclave from the Syrian Democratic Forces, which Turkey describes as terrorists. The losses bring to at least 14 the number of Turkish soldiers killed in the offensive so far.No break up between TDP-BJP for now, but AP govt to keep pressuring Centre for funds

India

oi-Madhuri

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president N Chandrababu Naidu on Sunday held a crucial meeting with party MPs, senior MLAs and leaders to review the party's ties with its ally BJP.

"During the meeting Budget and fund allocations to Andhra Pradesh were discussed. We will continue pressurising the Centre for it. We will also raise the matter in Parliament, if needed," Andhra Minister YS Chowdary said after the meeting.

On being asked about TDP-BJP alliance K.Rammohan Rao said, 'We are discussing about budget, political alliance is different and state govt development is different.'

The chief minister had said that he was highly disappointed with the Governement at the Centre, stating that no funds were alloted for various institutions and projects in the state and also for the construction of AP's capital city Amaravati.

It may be recalled that TDP and the BJP had contested the 2014 elections in alliance and the former is the second largest party in the NDA in terms of seats won. The BJP has two MPs and five MLAs from Andhra Pradesh.

Meanwhile, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national general secretary Ram Madhav on Saturday said that the party and the Centre would soon be extending the olive branch to Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and leader of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) N Chandrababu Naidu to resolve his concerns in a mutually beneficial to both parties.

OneIndia NewsList of all single-use plastic items to be banned from July 2022

Delhi: Teen arrested over murder of classmate in school toilet; argument began over wristband

India

oi-Madhuri

A minor, who was on the run, in connection with the mysterious death of a Class 9 student in northeast Delhi's Karawal Nagar was arrested on Saturday.

Tusshar (16) was found unconscious by some students in his school bathroom and was taken to a hospital.

He was later referred to the GTB Hospital where he was declared brought dead. CCTV footage revealed that he had a fight with some students near the washroom.

Earlier on Saturday, Three students with whom the victim had a fight were apprehended.

However, investigation has revealed that the argument between Tushar, who was beaten to death inside the toilet, and his four classmates started over a wristband. As Tushar and one of the accused were fighting, the latter was allegedly joined by his three other friends. They had a scuffle with Tushar in the classroom before lunch break.

Meanwhile, family members of the deceased alleged that he was thrashed by the students. On the basis of a complaint by the boy's family, a case was registered. A medical board will conduct post-mortem on the body later today.

OneIndia News (with PTI inputs)

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Story first published: Sunday, February 4, 2018, 5:51 [IST]PM Modi to launch Sansad TV on September 15, say sources

Tragedies like 9/11 have permanent solution only through humanitarian values: PM Modi

Media was critical of UPA during 26/11 attack, not the same with Narendra Modi govt: Rahul Gandhi

Even small things by you can motivate the country a lot: Prime Minister Modi to para athletes [Video]

'Exam Warriors: Modi pens book for students, lists mantras on how to 'compete with self'

India

oi-Madhuri

With stressful days round the corner for students appearing for board exams, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has penned a book detailing '25 mantras' to help students treat examinations as a cause for celebration and not despair.

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and HRD minister Prakash Javadekar released the compact handy book 'Exam Warriors' - a book written by Prime Minister Narendra Modi - on Saturday.

The book consists of 193 pages and gives students 25 mantras in the form of illustrations and activities to overcome exam stress.

The 193-page book, published by Penguin, has been presented in an interactive mode with activities, tearaways as well as a pledge not to cheat.

The mantras ask students to celebrate exams. "Exams are like festivals, celebrate them".

Union human resource development minister Prakash Javadekar said the "book will find space in each household as it connects with millions of students, teachers, parents and grandparents in a non-political way".

The book also asks youngsters to discover themselves by stepping out of their comfort zone, getting involved in community service and travelling across India.

OneIndia NewsBefore the ceasefire on Feb 24, Pakistan resorted to over 4,000 border violations

Four Army soldiers killed in ceasefire violation by Pakistan

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

Four Indian Army soldiers were killed and one injured in ceasefire violation by Pakistani forces in Jammu and Kashmir's Rajouri Sector on Sunday, said reports.

The martyred soldiers have been identified as - Capt Kapil Kundu, Rifleman Ram Avtar, Riflemab Shubam Singh and Hav Roshan Lal. The injured soldier is Lance Naik Iqbal Ahmed.

As per last reports, the exchange of fire is still underway between the two sides.

Earlier in the day, a 15-year-old girl, Shahnaz Bano, of Islamabad village of Shahpur, Poonch District, was injured in the Pakistani firing.

A Defence spokesman had earlier on Sunday said Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small arms, automatics and mortars around 1110 hours. The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

[Ceasefire violation by Pakistan: 15-year-old girl injured]

Fourteen persons, including eight civilians, were killed and over 70 others injured in intense shelling by Pakistan along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts from January 18 to 22.

On January 20, five people, including two BSF jawans were killed and 35 others injured after Pakistan violated ceasefire along the International Border.

During a during a meeting of the BSF and Pakistan Rangers in January, India had warned it against ceasefire violations along the International Border. The BSF Director General (DG), who recently toured the area, had said that the situation along the IB here was "very tense" and his men were on a high alert. The last such meeting of sector commanders of the two sides was held on September 29 last year.

OneIndia NewsKJ Alphons calls for doubling foreign tourist arrivals in 3 years

India

pti-PTI

Guwahati, Feb 4: Union Tourism Minister K J Alphons on Sunday said the Centre aims to double the number of foreign tourist arrivals (FTA) to 20 million in the next three years.

All stakeholders must work hard to achieve the target, the minister said. "We have earned 27 billion US dollars in the last financial year but we are not happy with these figures. We want the figures to increase dramatically," Alphons said in Guwahati during a session on tourism and wellness on the concluding day of Global Investors Summit-Advantage Assam.

He also urged the domestic tourists to visit different parts of the country as "Indians must see India".

"Last year, more than 23 million Indians went abroad and there is nothing wrong with that but at the same time, we must also adopt the policy of 'Let's see India'," the minister said.

The tourism ministry is committed to create an environment that is conducive for the visitors and appoint global ambassadors for promoting tourist circuits and sites, he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has now emerged as an undisputed global leader, is committed to create a 'New India' and "the country today thinks, looks, sounds and acts differently", Alphons added.

Referring to North East, the minister said that there is no better and beautiful place in the world.

"The entire North East has incredible people with beautiful smiles, music, dances, textiles and cuisines. It has scenic places, wildlife among many more things," he said.

Assam, and particularly Guwahati, is the 'Gateway to North East' and the Centre will develop all tourist facilities in the state, Alphons added. Lauding the Centre's initiative, Assam tourism minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the state has already formulated a new tourism policy and his ministry is ready to cater to the specific requirements of investors.

"Our policy is dynamic and flexible and we are ready to address specific cases as required. The state government will go an extra mile to promote tourism," Sarma said. There is no law and order problem in the state, and the people of Assam is, by tradition, very hospitable, he added.

PTIKarnataka Assembly polls: Modi to address a BJP rally in Bengaluru today

India

oi-Madhuri

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) rally in Bengaluru on Sunday which will conclude the party's 90-day Nava Nirman Parivarthan yatra across poll-bound Karnataka. The yatra was led by its state unit president and former Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa and party's other state leaders.

Modi was scheduled to address the rally on January 28, 2018, that began in Bengaluru on November 1, 2017, however, it was put off to February 4, owing to his pre-occupation with other engagements.

The Bengaluru bandh was planned for February 4 when Modi is in the city. However, it has been cancelled by the Karnataka High Court. The court, which cited a Supreme Court verdict on strikes, also directed the Siddaramaiah government to ensure that the daily lives of people, and other industrial and commerce activities, are not affected due to the shutdown.

The yatra, is being held with a view to bring the BJP back to power in the state on the plank of transforming Karnataka through development.

Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who faces state elections a few months later, was widely seen to have backed the protests over sharing the river water. He has been using the row with Goa and Maharashtra, both ruled by the BJP, to corner the BJP's presumptive chief minister BS Yeddyurappa.

OneIndia NewsAndhra-based IT employee raped by Nigerian nationals in Bengaluru, two arrested

Not a word on Mahadayi issue, Modi has let down Karnataka': Congress

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

Karnataka Congress on Sunday lashed out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi for not mentioning the Mahadayi river issue during his speech in Bengaluru earlier today. Working President of the Karnataka Congress Dinesh Gundu Rao also trained gun at BJP chief Amit Shah and called him 'Shah of lies'.

Modi earlier today launched a scathing attack on Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka in his address at the Palace Grounds in Bengaluru. Modi spoke on various issues but conspicuously did not touch upon the Mahadayi river dispute between Karnataka and Goa, where the BJP is on power.

"Not a word on #Mahadaayi, nothing for farmers @PMOIndia has let down #Karnataka. Most disappointing," Gundu Rao tweeted barely an hour after Modi's speech ended.

Modi was addressing the valedictory of the 90-day Parivartana yatra undertaken by the Karnataka BJP ahead of the crucial Karnataka assembly elections 2018, scheduled to be held in April-May.

[Tomato, Potato, Onion- Farmer my TOP priority says Modi]

Modi, in his speech, had said that "Karnataka got a grant of over Rs 2 lakh crore."

Gundu Rao, in his tweet, said that Amit Shah had said that it was Rs 3 lakh crore and called the BJP chief "Shah of lies".

Thank you @PMOIndia for putting out the still partial facts..hope this stops @BJP4Karnataka from protesting when we call @AmitShah #ShahOfLies. https://t.co/mPwYVFU1tv  Dinesh Gundu Rao (@dineshgrao) February 4, 2018

Kannada organisations and farmers had called for two bandhs in Karnataka, on January 25 and February 4, to protest against the non-implementation of the Kalasa-Banduri dam project. The Karnataka High Court on Friday stayed the shutdown called by some pro-Kannada groups on February 4, calling it "unconstitutional".

OneIndia NewsWhy the Tripura verdict will have an impact on Karnataka Assembly Elections 2018

Tripura MLAs spent just 56 per cent of their expense limit in 2018 poll

Tripura CM lacks courage to act against tainted ministers: Rajnath Singh

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

Launching a blistering attack on Manik Sarkar-led government in Tripura, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday said the state Chief Minister lacks courage to courage to act against the tainted ministers in his cabinet.

Singh, speaking at a public rally at Indranagar in Agartala, said that in BJP government, if any minister is found involved in corruption, he would be removed from the cabinet.

"Main yakin dilana chahta hun, yadi hamare kisi mantri ke daman par bhrashtachar ka daag lag jaaye, dudh mein makkhi ki tarah mantrimandal se nikal kar use bahar kar diya jaayega. (I assure you that if any minister in our government is accused of corruption, then we would be removed from the cabinet.) But CM of this place doesn't have the courage to remove ministers against whom fingers are raised," Singh said in Agartala.

Expressing concern over the attack on BJP workers in Tripura, Singh said, "Political murders are taking place in Tripura every 2nd day. There is no guarantee of BJP workers' lives. As Home Minister of India, I want to assure that if you bring BJP to power, even CPM cadre will feel safe apart from the citizens."

The home minister said he was surprised to find out that 66 percent of the people live below poverty line in the state.

"Lotus blooms in mud. The CPI(M) government, with its scams and corrupt practices over the last 25 years, has created the ground for the blooming of lotus," he said.

Earlier, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh were referred to as "the weak and sick states of the country" but after the BJP came to power in these states, the problems have been taken care of, the Union minister claimed.

"Not a single minister has indulged in any corrupt practice in the NDA governments under the leadership of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Narendra Modi," he said.

Tripura is set to go to polls on February 18 and the results will be declared on March 3.

Tripura Assembly Party 2013 Current Standing CPIM 49 50 Election Date : Feb 18 2018

Counting : Mar 03 2018 CONG 10 02 CPI 01 01 BJP 00 06 OTHERS 00 00 Total 60 59 (1 Vacant)

OneIndia NewsTaliban has Pakistan to thank for its takeover of Panjshir

47 Indian fishermen arrested in Pakistan

International

pti-PTI

Karachi, Feb 4: Forty-seven Indian fishermen have been arrested by Pakistani authorities for allegedly fishing in the country's territorial waters in the Arabian Sea, according to a maritime official.

The Pakistan Maritime Security Agency (PMSA) yesterday arrested 47 Indian fishermen and seized nine launches for illegally fishing in Pakistani waters, a PMSA spokesperson was quoted as saying by the Express Tribune. The arrested fishermen were handed over to the Docks police for further proceedings and investigation, it said.

The Indian boats have been confiscated for violating Pakistans coastal territory, the spokesperson said, adding that said PMSA vessels and fast attack boats took part in an open sea operation for the purpose. On January 19, as many as 17 Indian fishermen had been arrested by the PSMA for allegedly fishing in Pakistan's territorial waters. Three boats had also been impounded.

Pakistan had released 292 Indian fishermen as a goodwill gesture in December-January. Pakistan and India frequently arrest fishermen as there is no clear demarcation of the maritime border in the Arabian Sea and these fishermen do not have boats equipped with the technology to know their precise location.

A number of non-governmental organisations in both India and Pakistan have raised the issue, pressing their governments to release the arrested fishermen without delay.

PTIEarthquake measuring 6.1 on Richter scale strikes Taiwan

International

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

An earthquake measuring 6.1 on the Richter Scale struck off the coast of Hualien, Taiwan on Sunday. There were no immediate reports of damage, said reports. Several aftershocks were felt minutes after the main quake.

The epicentre of the earthquake was located 27.8 kilometers northeast of Hualien at a shallow depth of 16 kilometres.

Taiwan is located on Pacific Ring of Fire, supposed to be one of the most seismically active zones in the world.

The USGS later reported another quake in the same area, measuring 5.3.

Taiwan's high-speed rail system and local railways are said to be operating normally.

On February 6, 2016, an earthquake with a magnitude of 6.4 struck 28 km northeast of Pingtung City in southern Taiwan. The earthquake had a maximum intensity of 7 (Very strong) on the Mercalli intensity scale, causing widespread damage and 117 deaths. Almost all of the deaths were caused by a collapsed residential building, named Weiguan Jinlong in Yongkang District, except two others, who were killed in Guiren District. Sixty-eight aftershocks were then occurred. The earthquake was the deadliest earthquake in Taiwan since the 921 earthquakes in 1999.

OneIndia News

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Story first published: Sunday, February 4, 2018, 20:56 [IST]Anti-CAA stir: Protesters blocked from taking out march at AMU against youth's who died of gunshot

Multiple fires set near White House as protests in Washington escalate ahead of curfew

Explained: What the farmers protest is all about

Maldives: Massive protests over release of 12 MPs including ex-president Mohamed Nasheed

International

oi-Madhuri

Protesters opened the gate of Maafushi Prison in Male where the 12 MPs including former President Mohamed Nasheed are detained on Saturday.

Protests are being held in Male as President Abdulla Yameen refused to follow Supreme Court's ruling to release key political prisoners and reinstate 12 MPs.

Supreme Court of the Maldives had ordered the immediate release of exiled former leader Mohamed Nasheed and eight others, terming their trials a violation of the constitution and international law.

Nasheed, jailed for 13 years in 2015 on terrorism charges, got political asylum in 2016 in the UK, where he was allowed to go for medical treatment". He has since been living in Sri Lanka.

''Absolute breakdown of law and order. The public is on the edge. I am very concerned as we are facing increased unrest. They have just used pepper spray & tear gas on crowd,'' Eva Abdulla, Member of Parliament said.

OneIndia News

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Story first published: Sunday, February 4, 2018, 6:05 [IST]Where did the 'out of control' Chinese rocket debris land after re-entering Earth?

Planning a trip to Maldives: You can do so from July 15

Maldives political crisis: Army on high alert after Abdulla Yameen refuses to accept court order

International

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

The Army in the Maldives was on Sunday put on high alert after President Abdulla Yameen refused to accept the Supreme Court order to release political prisoners and reinstate dissident lawmakers.

The court order to restore the seats of 12 government MPs who defected to the opposition would effectively reduce Yameen's party to a minority and expose him to the risk of impeachment.

Meanwhile, Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed has claimed that he has been getting anonymous threat calls. He along with judge Ali Hameed and judicial administrator Hassan Saeed would be spending the night in court, reported news agency ANI.

The government had earlier expressed "concerns" over the judicial order and resisted complying with it, but the court said there can be no excuses.

Dissidents must be released because their trials were politically motivated and flawed, the Supreme Court had said in a statement.

Security forces have been deployed inside the national parliament - known as the People's Majlis - since March last year when Yameen ordered them to evict dissident lawmakers.

Former president and current opposition leader Mohamed Nasheed described the government's refusal to obey the Supreme Court as a "coup". Nasheed, who was controversially convicted of a terrorism charge and jailed for 13 years in 2015, urged police and troops to uphold the constitution. He has been in exile since 2016, when he left on prison leave for medical treatment. He is currently in Colombo, meeting Maldivian dissidents based in Sri Lanka.

[Maldives: Massive protests over release of 12 MPs including ex-president Mohamed Nasheed]

The MDP - which is led by Nasheed - has expressed fears that any move by the government to resist the Supreme Court's order may trigger unrest in the nation of 340,000 Sunni Muslims.

OneIndia News with PTI inputsWould you like to know how many people have read this article? Or how reputable the author is? Simply sign up for a Advocate premium membership and you'll automatically see this data on every article. Plus a lot more, too.

From Robert Reich Blog

1. He told you he'd cut your taxes, and that the super-rich like him would pay more. You bought it. But his new tax law does the opposite. By 2027, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, the richest 1 percent will have gotten 83 percent of the tax cut and the richest 0.1 percent, 60 percent of it. But more than half of all Americans -- 53 percent -- will pay more in taxes. As Trump told his wealthy friends at Mar-a-Lago just days after the tax bill became law, "You all just got a lot richer."

2. He promised to close "special interest loopholes that have been so good for Wall Street investors but unfair to American workers," especially the notorious "carried interest" loophole for private-equity, hedge fund, and real estate partners. You bought it. But the new tax law keeps the "carried interest" loophole.

3. He told you he'd repeal Obamacare and replace it with something "beautiful." You bought it. But he didn't repeal and he didn't replace. (Just as well: His plan would have knocked at least 23 million Americans off health insurance, including many of you.) Instead, he's doing what he can to cut it back and replace it with nothing. The new tax law will result in 13 million people losing health coverage, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

4. He told you he'd invest $1 trillion in our nation's crumbling infrastructure. You bought it. But after his giant tax cut for corporations and millionaires, there's no money left for infrastructure.

5. He said he'd drain the Washington swamp. You bought it. But he's brought into his administration more billionaires, CEOs, and Wall Street moguls than in any administration in history, to make laws that will enrich their businesses, and he's filled departments and agencies with former lobbyists, lawyers and consultants who are crafting new policies for the same industries they recently worked for.

6. He said he'd use his business experience to whip the White House into shape. You bought it. But he has created the most dysfunctional, back-stabbing White House in modern history, and has already fired and replaced so many assistants (one of them hired and fired in a little more than a week) that people there barely know who's in charge of what.

7. He told you he'd "bring down drug prices" by making deals with drug companies. You bought it. But now the White House says that promise is "inoperative."

8. He told you he'd "stop foreign lobbyists from raising money for American elections." You bought it. But foreign lobbyists are still raising money for American elections.

9. He told you "I'm not going to cut Social Security like every other Republican and I'm not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid." You bought it. But he and House Speaker Paul Ryan are already planning such cuts in order to deal with the ballooning deficit created, in part, by the new tax law for corporations and the rich.

10. He promised "six weeks of paid maternity leave to any mother with a newborn child whose employer does not provide the benefit." You bought it. But the giant tax cut for corporations and the rich doesn't leave any money for this.

11. He said that on Day One he'd label China a "currency manipulator." You bought it. But then he met with China's president Xi Jinping and declared "China is not a currency manipulator." Ever since then, Trump has been cozying up to Xi.

12. He said he "won't bomb Syria." You bought it. Then he bombed Syria.

13. He said he'd build a "wall" across the southern border. You believed him. But chief of staff John Kelly says it is "unlikely that we will build a wall, a physical barrier, from sea to shining sea."

14. He promised that the many women who accused him of sexual misconduct "will be sued after the election is over." You bought it. He hasn't sued them, presumably because he doesn't want the truth to come out.

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From Alternet

Trump believes that a "Trump war" will brings us together behind him.



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There are two bright-red warning lights flashing right now on the dashboard of what's left of American democracy. While Donald Trump is hyper-aware of both of them, the media and most of our politicians are ignoring them.

They are War and Crash.

War

War is one of the principal instruments of power-grabs by strong-man governments, and Donald Trump isn't missing a beat. While hundreds of thousands of civilians in Syria right now haven't had any humanitarian aid since November of last year and are literally dying as you read these words, Trump wants to amp up his bombing of that country.

But the biggest threat may be an unnecessary (but short-term politically useful) war with North Korea or Iran.

The day of his State of the Union speech, Trump met with a group of newspaper editors, and apparently harkening back to George W. Bush's strategy, talked about how useful a war could be for a politician who wants the entire nation to love him and unite around him. He said: "I would love to be able to bring back our country into a great form of unity. Without a major event where people pull together. That's hard to do."

Similarly, while campaigning in 1999, George W. Bush told his biographer, Mickey Herskowitz, that if he became president, he wouldn't make the mistake his father made in having only a short and limited war with Iraq; he'd have a big enough war so he'd become a "war-time president" with enough political capital to do things like privatize Social Security.

Cindy Sheehan talked about this when she testified in front of Congress in 2005. Speaking before a committee put together by John Conyers, she said:

"[I]in interviews in 1999 with respected journalist and long-time Bush family friend, Mickey Herskowitz, then Governor George Bush stated, 'One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as commander in chief. My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it. If I have a chance to invade, if I have that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency.'"

Now the only question is, which country will provide Donald Trump's unifying event. Will it be Syria, Iran or North Korea? Although Trump has radically escalated our military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, leading to a spike in both US soldier and civilian deaths, it's being largely ignored by the media.

But Iraq and Afghanistan are so George Bush. Thus, Trump reasons, he needs a "Trump war" to bring us together behind him.

Another possibility is that he's doing everything he can to both provoke North Korea and Iran, and piss off radicalized Muslims worldwide and in the US to attack us, so he can use that as well as George W. Bush used 9/11.

The Pentagon is apparently so freaked out about this possibility that it's refusing to hand over to Trump limited-war plans against North Korea. As noted in the New York Times: "[T]he Pentagon, they say, is worried that the White House is moving too hastily toward military action on the Korean Peninsula that could escalate catastrophically."

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See original here

The next big battle, says Senator from Massachusetts, "takes place at the ballot box in November."

By Patrick Cochran

The day after Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th president of the United States, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren found herself staring across the Boston Common, flooded with over a quarter of a million demonstrators at the Women's March, part of the largest political display in human history. As the Bay State's senior senator put it at a Town Hall in Malden on Sunday, she stood before an "army."

"I saw an army, an army ready to fight for their values," Warren told over a thousand town hall goers, jammed into the Malden High School auditorium. "Well, let me tell you where that battle takes place. It takes place at the ballot box in November."

The crowd was enthusiastic, even rowdy at times, frequently breaking into applause while Warren derided the first year-plus of the Trump administration, and lauded the New Deal-era economy that quelled extreme inequality from the Great Depression through the 1970's. The senator also implored stronger organization and greater involvement in the effort to rebuke the GOP and create a progressive movement.

"It was amazing," Vanessa Pendexter, a big fan of Warren, said of the event. "I especially liked what she said about how people can get involved, to keep on going and make a difference."

"I'm going to get more involved," said Pendexter, who served as a delegate to the Massachusetts Democratic Convention last year. In 2017, Massachusetts Democrats voted to establish one of the most progressive platforms in state history.

Warren is up for reelection in November -- a contest not expected to be very competitive -- and is considered a top contender for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.

Malden Mayor Gary Christenson, who moderated the event, alluded to Warren's rising star in introducing her as "senator -- and who knows? -- maybe the next president." Christenson also noted that Malden High School is the most diverse high school in Massachusetts, symbolically significant as the discussion continually decried the GOP's racist and bigoted attacks on marginalized groups in America.

But most of the event eyed the more immediate fight: the 2018 midterms.

"Man, we've got to ratchet up democracy even harder and fight back," Warren said, adding that liberals and progressives need to target "local and state" offices down the ballot.

2018 features narrow paths for the Democratic Party to take control of the House and Senate. The party needs a net gain of 24 seats to regain the House of Representatives for the first time since 2011, and two to regain the Senate for the first time since losing the upper chamber in the 2014 midterms. (The road to a majority in the Senate is considered more of a long shot, as Democrats are defending seats in 10 states carried by Trump in 2016.) Dozens of governorships and thousands of state legislature seats will also be up for grabs.

The crowd erupted at the conclusion of Warren's emotional story of her mother having to get a minimum-wage job to provide for the family after her father suffered a heart attack.

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H.R.4391 - Promoting Human Rights by Ending Israeli Military Detention of Palestinian Children Act, sponsored by Betty McCollum (D-MN-4) was introduced in the House on Nov 14, 2017. It would end U.S. support of Israel's child abuse.

Abuses in the West Bank have been in the spotlight recently due to the imprisonment of Palestinian teen Ahed Tamimi in mid-December, 2017.

Only an hour after Israeli soldiers shot her 15-year-old cousin in the head, 16-year-old Ahed Tamimi slapped them in an effort to remove them from her family's property. (One report says that in the full video, it can be seen that the soldiers slapped her first, and that Israel-sympathetic videos show versions with this first slap edited out.)

A couple of days later, in a nighttime raid on Ahed's home, Israeli soldiers removed her and put her in prison. Bail was denied.

The conditions under which she is being held appear to be in violation of international humanitarian law.

CODEPINK said that Ahed was being held in "a freezing cold isolation cell with a camera monitoring her every move."

An Israeli journalist has publicly called for her to be raped while in prison.

Current estimates indicate at least 350-375 Palestinian children are being detained in Israeli prisons.

You can help by telling your representatives to support H.R.4391:

HR 4391 Bill Summary: This bill prohibits U.S. assistance to Israel from being used to support the military detention, interrogation, or ill-treatment of Palestinian children in violation of international humanitarian law or the use against Palestinian children of: (1) torture, inhumane, or degrading treatment; (2) physical violence or psychological abuse; (3) incommunicado or administrative detention; (4) solitary confinement; (5) denial of parental or legal access during interrogations; or (6) force or coercion to obtain a confession. The Department of State shall annually submit to Congress: (1) a certification that none of the funds obligated or expended in the previous fiscal year for assistance to Israel have been used to support any of such activities; or (2) if the State Department cannot make such certification, a report describing each activity and the amount of funds used by Israel in violation of this bill. The State Department shall include in each annual report on the barring of development assistance to a country that engages in human rights violations a description of the nature and extent of detention, interrogation, or ill-treatment of Palestinian children by Israeli military forces or police in violation of international humanitarian law.

Paul Clements, running for Congress in Michigan, notes that in his district, in addition to contacting their representative, activists are making Valentines to send to Ahed in prison.

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From Sputnik

All statecraft and politics is notoriously deceptive and duplicitous to a degree. It's part of the Machiavellian game and even at times, arguably, can be paradoxically key to success for good outcomes.

But Washington's current problem is on an altogether different scale. Its rampant duplicity seems to be spinning itself into an ominous credibility crisis. A crisis that conveys historic existential consequences for American democracy and political function. Perhaps even a harbinger of world war.

Take CIA director Mike Pompeo. Last week, he gave a big interview to Britain's state broadcaster, the BBC, in which he reiterated serious claims that Russia hacked into the American presidential election in 2016.

Further, he forewarned that Russian state agents were planning to repeat their alleged meddling in the forthcoming mid-term Congressional elections later this year.

However, within days of making such dire accusations against the Kremlin, the American spymaster was reportedly holding meetings in Washington DC with two senior Russian intelligence figures -- Alexander Bortnikov and Sergei Naryshkin. The two men represent Russia's federal and foreign intelligence services, the FSB and SVR, respectively.

There was apparently nothing untoward about the top-level meeting. The American and Russian spy chiefs were reportedly exchanging views on counter-terrorism, which arguably is a positive thing. After all, a foiled terror attack in St Petersburg recently was thwarted by Russian security services reportedly following up on a tip-off from the American CIA.

But here's the thing. Doesn't it seem a bit strange that the chief of the CIA is warning in very public media interviews that the Kremlin is meddling in US democracy through underhand means, yet virtually his next appointment involves hosting Russia's top spies?

Not only that, but the two Russian intelligence chiefs in question have been put on an American government sanctions list and travel ban purportedly over Russia's "annexation" of Crimea and "aggression" in Eastern Ukraine.

So, if American official concerns about alleged Russian subversion in the US and abroad are as vexed as they are made out to be in public announcements, then how does that square with Mike Pompeo greeting his Russian counterparts in a convivial professional setting?

When the CIA director was challenged by Congressional Democrats about his meeting with the Russians he responded by claiming there was nothing incongruous about their cooperation in Washington, and, he said, it was tough-talking encounter.

"You and the American people should rest assured that we covered very difficult subjects in which American and Russian interests do not align," stated Pompeo in a written reply to lawmakers.

"We vigorously defend America in these encounters and pull no punches," he added.

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Donald Trump made a lot of promises to his supporters. It is crucial that we continue to point out these 20 broken promises to Trump voters, whether they like it or not. As their realities start to misalign with his failed promises, some will turn against what is mostly a fraud.

Donald Trump recently claimed that he had fulfilled more promises than he promised.

Speaking to the House and Senate Republicans at their annual legislative retreat at the luxury Greenbrier Resort, Trump claimed his first year in office was "one of the greatest years in the history of politics, in the history of our country, for a party, what we've done and what we've accomplished. I don't think it's been done." That's despite a limited legislative record that includes a single, though sizable accomplishment: passage of the Republican tax bill. Still, he said the party was unified like never before and claimed he'd now fulfilled "far more promises than we promised," dubbing his record: "promises plus."

Robert Reich recently blew that lie out of the water in his article "Trump Voters: One Year in, and he's Broken 20 Big Promises He Made to You" that everyone must read. He enumerated the following promises and explained each failure to deliver.

He told you he'd cut your taxes, and that the super-rich like him would pay more.

He promised to close "special interest loopholes."

He told you he'd repeal Obamacare and replace it with something "beautiful."

He told you he'd invest $1 trillion in our nation's crumbling infrastructure.

He said he'd drain the Washington swamp.

He said he'd use his business experience to whip the White House into shape.

He told you he'd "bring down drug prices" by making deals with drug companies.

He told you he'd "stop foreign lobbyists from raising money for American elections."

He told you "I'm not going to cut Social Security like every other Republican and I'm not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid."

He promised, "six weeks of paid maternity leave to any mother with a newborn child whose employer does not provide the benefit."

He said that on Day One he'd label China, a "currency manipulator."

He said he "won't bomb Syria.

He said he'd build a "wall" across the southern border.

He promised that the many women who accused him of sexual misconduct "will be sued after the election is over."

He said he would not be a president who took vacations, and he called Barack Obama "the Vacationer-in-Chief."

He said he'd force companies to keep jobs in America, and that there would be "consequences" for companies that shipped jobs abroad.

He promised to revive the struggling coal industry and "bring back thousands" of lost mining jobs.

He promised to protect steelworkers.

He said he'd make America safer.

He said he'd release his taxes.

It is vital that Progressive push back anytime Trump make statements about fulfilling promises. When we leave the lies unanswered, we get the cauterization of lies that morph into truth in the minds of many.Would you like to know how many people have read this article? Or how reputable the author is? Simply sign up for a Advocate premium membership and you'll automatically see this data on every article. Plus a lot more, too.

This piece was reprinted by OpEdNews with permission or license. It may not be reproduced in any form without permission or license from the source.



Bernie Sanders

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[First Published at Caitlin Johnstone Rogue Journalist]

In an otherwise fine video response to the last night's vapid, flag-waving State of the Union address, Bernie Sanders once again promoted the neocon think tank-generated and unproven claim that Russia interfered in America's 2016 elections via "cyberwarfare", and repeated the completely baseless insinuation that they colluded with Trump to do so.

"How can he not talk about the reality that Russia, through cyberwarfare, interfered in our election in 2016, is interfering in democratic elections all over the world, and according to his own CIA director will likely interfere in the 2018 midterm elections that we will be holding?" asked the Vermont Senator. "How do you not talk about that unless you have a very special relationship with Mr. Putin?"

This is not an exception to the rule for Sanders, but one more addition to an already consistent and deliberate pattern. In February of last year Sanders delivered a widely viewed video message to his massive online audience solely geared at promoting the Russiagate narrative. At the end of March, he did it again. In May, he did it again. Over and over and over again, month after month after month, Sanders has been using his immense platform as the most popular and trusted politician in America to sell these world-threatening cold war escalations to the millions of Americans who adore him.

This is a big deal. This is not some petty quibble with Sanders' policies like disagreeing with the specifics of his stance on free trade or fracking. This is not some minor detail that can be dismissed with accusations of purism and impracticality and "Hey, no politician is perfect." This is the single most pressing issue of our time, and Bernie Sanders is currently, actively marching our world in the exact opposite direction of where it needs to be heading. There is no threat to our species more imminent and dangerous than the threat of annihilation in a nuclear holocaust, and Sanders is helping to manufacture consent for escalations that make that possibility more and more likely. This is a huge problem, and we need to talk about it right now.



Bernie Sanders

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I keep getting shushed and dismissed by American progressives whenever I try to bring this up, and that pushback is getting a lot more heated now that Sanders is preparing for the possibility of a 2020 presidential run. As an aggressive promoter of Bernie-or-Bust in the Democratic primary contests, I must say that some of the "DO YOU WANT TRUMP TO WIN??" responses I've been getting have been giving me flashbacks, and they aren't coming from the direction I'm used to.

I sit in a weird space on the political left with regard to Senator Sanders because I have never been one of the nasty, vituperative lefties who constantly sh*t on Bernie and call him a "sheepdog" or anything like that, but I also haven't been able to look past his dangerous capitulations to the establishment, so I tend to catch flak from both sides of the debate. I recognize how pervasively toxic the US political climate is and how sane Sanders is in comparison, but at the same time his relentless promotion of a blatant psyop designed to manipulate the public into consenting to geopolitical agendas which have been in place since long before Russiagate is a very big problem that needs to be addressed.

It's like if you found the perfect boyfriend with a great personality, a rockin' bod, and an amazing lifestyle" who also happens to murder a prostitute once in a while. All the other truthful and undeniable things Sanders said in his State of the Union response were eclipsed by his promotion of an extremely dangerous agenda like a tiny piece of cat poo on an expensive French cuisine. It's absolutely unforgivable, and it should be loudly and aggressively resisted by every clear-eyed rebel on earth.

I'm not even saying I'll oppose Bernie's presidential run if it comes down to that in 2020. If that's the direction the American people want to take this thing as part of the awkward two-steps-forward, one-step-back shuffling movement that any shove toward freedom will necessarily look like, I don't imagine that I will try and stop them. As horrible as Sanders' foreign policy is I understand that Americans are in an abusive relationship with oligarchy, and if they genuinely feel he's their best shot at sane domestic policy and a real healthcare system I don't at this time think it's my place as an Australian to tell them not to go that route to escape the abuse.

I can however promise that I will never, ever stop aggressively fighting the Russiagate establishment propaganda that Sanders has been consistently promoting. The further into cold war escalations we get, the more likely it is that a nuclear weapon could be discharged in the chaos and confusion. There are too many small moving parts to be able to predict and control how these escalations will unfold, which is why we came within a hair's breadth of total annihilation on more than one occasion in the last Cold War.

Stephen Cohen is easily the leading expert on US-Russian relations in America, and he recently sounded his ongoing alarm in an interview with Jimmy Dore that everyone should watch. Cohen is not a Trump supporter, not a conspiracy kook, and not a Russian agent, but a gifted and learned scholar who says that the political pressures being placed on Trump by the Russiagate narrative have placed us in a uniquely dangerous place in our species' history which we may very well not make it past. He makes a very solid argument, and I strongly encourage everyone to heed his warning.

Make no mistake: our species absolutely has the freedom to fail this test. We absolutely have the freedom to fail as a species and go the way of the dinosaurs. There is no divine hand shielding us from this fate enabling us to behave as unconsciously and recklessly as our still-evolving primate brains desire without the natural consequences that come with it. Our biggest and most trusted voices should be pointing us toward life, not toward extinction. We must all do better, and we must all demand better.

Friends don't let friends Russiagate, Bernie. Do better. Be better.

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From The Guardian

Global warming is an immediate battle with enormous consequences. We dare not wait for Washington to return to sanity -- nor do we have to



See the Bigger Picture, Act on Climate Change

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The most telling item in Donald Trump's State of the Union address may have been what wasn't there: any mention of climate change, the greatest problem the world faces. And just as telling was the fact that official Washington seemed barely to notice.

Understandably preoccupied with his vile attacks on immigrants (or cheering his ability to actually stay with one task for one hour), press, pundits, and other politicians treated the omission as not even worthy of note. The Democratic response from Representative Joe Kennedy didn't touch on global warming, either, though it did avoid Trump's oddly intimate ode to "beautiful clean coal."

This means many things, but for climate campaigners one of them should be patently clear: if we're going to make progress on climate change it's not going to come through Washington DC -- not any time soon. Even if Democrats manage to take back the House and Senate in the midterm elections, they wouldn't be able to get meaningful legislation past Trump -- and there's nothing much to suggest they'd try very hard.

Winning those elections is crucial in other ways -- it will help the effort to play defense on issues including the environment -- but since global warming is an immediate battle with enormous consequences, we dare not wait for Washington to return to sanity. And happily, we don't have to. The strategy that's been evolving for US climate action -- and for action in many other parts of the planet -- bypasses the central governments as much as possible. That's because the oil industry is strongest in national capitals -- that's where its money is most toxically powerful. But if frontal attack is therefore hard, its flanks are wide open. Consider what happened in mid-January, for instance, when New York City declared war on the oil industry, pledging to divest its $200bn pension funds of fossil fuel stocks and announcing that it would sue the five biggest energy majors for the damage they knowingly inflicted by not 'fessing up to their knowledge of climate change.

New York City is not as big as the federal government, but it's big enough: it's got lawyers aplenty, and the resources to do real damage. And it won't be alone. We've just launched a huge Fossil Free US campaign, designed to make sure there are a thousand New Yorks working on a thousand fronts.

It has three main components...

The first -- joining in work pioneered by groups like the Sierra Club -- is to persuade towns, cities, counties, and states to pledge to make the transition to 100% renewable energy. This is now easy and affordable enough that it doesn't scare politicians -- cities from San Diego to Atlanta have joined in, and they will help maintain the momentum towards clean energy that the Trump administration is trying so hard to blunt.

Job two is to block new fossil fuel infrastructure. In some places, that will be by law: Portland, Oregon, recently passed a bill banning new pipes and such, over the strenuous objections of the industry. In other places it will take bodies -- tens of thousands have already pledged to journey to the upper midwest if and when TransCanada decides to build out the Keystone XL pipeline that Trump has permitted.Would you like to know how many people have read this article? Or how reputable the author is? Simply sign up for a Advocate premium membership and you'll automatically see this data on every article. Plus a lot more, too.

From Smirking Chimp



Blind Dictator

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The partisan uproar over the release of the infamous Nunes memo on FBI surveillance MUST be accompanied by the release of Donald Trump's tax returns.

If Trump is to be consistent about openness in government and the public's right to critical information, releasing his tax returns is the least he can do in conjunction with this attack on the FBI.

But of course that would be too much to ask of this White House, which has long since established itself as a fascist regime that hates democracy and is consistent only in its demand for more and more personal power and money for el jefe at the top.

A kleptocracy like this one has just one agenda item -- more cash and crushing ability for the would-be dictator and his inner circle. Zero openness and access for the rest of us.

That's why the fight over this memo has long since entered the realm of the surreal.

The Nunes memo has clearly been doctored since its original appearance before the House Intelligence Committee. There is nothing of real substance in it to implicate corruption at the FBI in terms of Trump's connections to the Russian mafia.

But never mind. The document has a singular purpose, which is to give Donald Trump a pretext to fire Rod Rosenstein, the Deputy Attorney General, who is technically the boss of Robert Mueller, the guy handling the investigation into the Trumputin connections.

Trump was stopped from firing Mueller when he wanted to many months ago. So The Donald wants Rosenstein removed so he can install a flunky who'll do the job.

In other words, Trump is so desperate to stop the investigation into his connections with the Russian mob that he's more than happy to concoct this absurd scenario.

If it doesn't work, by the way, and he finds himself unable to fire Mueller, let's see how long Mueller actually lives. Putin is infamous for eliminating his opposition. Four bullets to the back while walking across a Moscow bridge were a recent prescription for an annoying anti-mob opponent. Is Mueller exempt from such a "remedy?" Don't bet on it.

If there's anything Putin and The Donald hate, it's full disclosure, especially when it comes to the connections between the Trump Junta and the Russian mafia. As David Cay Johnston has reported in his superb book It's Worse Than You Think and elsewhere, La Moscow Cosa Nostra has been funneling money to Trump Inc since the 1980s -- since before the fall of the Soviet Union.

The bottom line is that Trump is a lousy businessman. All flash and no cash. He has repeatedly mishandled the fortune his KKK father left him and been continually in desperate need of hard money. Having burned everyone around him in a business mode, he has gone to the lender of last resort -- a Russian underworld operation with an abiding interest in his media/political assets, rather than his financial ones.

As partial repayment, he's killed the sanctions approved almost unanimously by Congress. Those, as you'll recall, were aimed at discouraging the Russians from stealing our elections, like the one that put Trump in office.

Hmmmm. Is there a conflict of interest here?

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(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).Attitude Heading Reference Systems Market: Increasing Demand For Use In Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=35792

https://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/attitude-heading-reference-systems-market.html?secure=NTIxNS41&type=PB

http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com

Attitude and Heading Reference Systems (AHRS) are multi-axis sensors which use inertial navigation for calculating the position and velocity of an aircraft, namely heading, altitude and yaw. It also outputs flight dynamics information to flight deck displays, flight controls, weather radar antenna platform and other aircraft systems.The sensors replace mechanical gyroscopic flight instruments providing superior reliability and preciseness. It features solid-state or MEMS gyrometer, accelerometers and magnetometers on all the three axes. It is basically a self-contained system and is a mixture of sensors in one package. It requires less power and less wiring.It is lighter in weight and possess a smaller footprint. AHRS provides heading and attitude information with greater accuracy and reliability. An AHRS provides 3D orientation by integrating gyroscopes and fusing this data with accelerometer data and magnetometer data.AHRS provides enriched performance over the existing vertical and directional gyros. A form of non-linear estimation such as an Extended Kalman filter is commonly used to compute the solution from these multiple sources. They are in common use in business and commercial aircraft.Rise in aircraft deliveries, due to the rising air passenger traffic across the globe, the need to strengthen the aircrafts performance, accuracy and safety as well as increasing demand for use in Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, aircrafts and ships are some of the primary factors driving the growth of global Attitude and Heading Reference Systems (AHRS) Market.Request Brochure:AHRS offer a better cost effective solution, unparalleled reliability and performance than traditional high-grade IMUs (Inertial Measurement Units). Decreased defense budgets of several developed nations is one of the key factor hindering the market growth.Technological advancements in the MEMS technology and integration of AHRS with GPS and other systems are some of the major opportunities in this market. Efforts are being taken by many companies to upgrade their research and development activities to introduce innovations in this field.The global market is segmented on the basis of type, component, end use and region. On the basis of type, the AHRS Market is subdivided into conventional attitude and heading reference systems (AHRS), air data attitude and heading reference systems, GPS-aided attitude and heading reference systems (GPS AHRS).Air data, attitude and heading reference system (ADAHRS) provides added information such as airspeed, altitude and outside air temperature. AHRS are generally integrated with electronic flight instrument systems (EFIS) which are the central part of glass cockpits, to form the primary flight display. The AHRS sensors that use GPS, helps to stabilize the gyro drift and provides a more accurate estimate of the inertial acceleration vector.The accuracy of GPS AHRS systems is high and the systems can detect change in velocity and position, without using accelerometers and magnetometers. On the basis of component, the market is classified into inertial sensors, magnetic sensors and processor. On the basis of end-use, the AHRS market is segmented into military aviation, civil aviation, unmanned vehicles and marine applications.The unmanned vehicles segment is projected to observe highest growth during the forecast period. Geographically, the attitude and heading reference systems global market can be segmented into North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Middle East & Africa and Latin America.Some of the key players operating in the global AHRS market with most significant development are Honeywell International, Inc., Rockwell Collins, Inc., Northrop Grumman Corporation, Moog Inc., Meggitt PLC, VectorNav Technologies, Sparton Navigation Exploration, LLC, Lord MicroStrain, MEMSIC, Inc., iXblue, Inc. and LORD Microstrain among others.The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions. By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.Book Now:About TMRTransparency 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 TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email:sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Data Center Support Infrastructure Market: Lucrative Opportunities Across Globe

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A data center stores and processes critical business data. Exponential rise in demand for data storage facilities is forcing businesses to either build new data centers or increase the capacity of their existing data centers. Business organizations across all major industry verticals are experiencing huge data traffic which is resulting in high demand for infrastructure to storage this information. Rise in adoption of cloud computing and virtualization is also contributing to the increasing demand for data center support infrastructure.A data center support infrastructure is a digitalized infrastructure used for promoting data consumption and sharing. Data center support infrastructure can be referred to as the important functional system of a data center, which is helpful in storing and processing the data. It is developed to meet the demands of a data economy to function properly.Majorly, the data center support infrastructure comprises security, cooling, power, and monitoring and measurement systems, which aid in maintaining the core operations of a data center such as data storage and processing. Cooling can be done through various equipment such as air conditioner, chiller, economizer, and cooling tower.The market for data center support infrastructure can be segmented on the basis of solution, service, industry vertical, end user, and geography. On the basis of solution, the market can be segmented into power support infrastructure, security infrastructure, cooling infrastructure, and management support infrastructure. Power and cooling are the prime components of a data centers operational expenditure.Request Brochure:With the increasing need to expand data center capacity, enterprises need to reduce the cost associated with power and cooling. Furthermore, organizations have also started concentrating on ecofriendly and efficient power and cooling solutions due to strict government and environmental regulations.Moreover, worldwide increase in IT spending as major companies are investing to obtain efficient solutions is contributing to the growth of the market On the basis of services, the global market can be segmented into consultation service, professional service, and system integration.In terms of end user, the market is segmented into cloud provider, colocation provider, and enterprise. On the basis of industry vertical, the market is segmented into banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), telecom and information technology, government, healthcare, energy and others.Major factors driving this market are the rising data center demand owing to the need for reliable and efficient processing of stored data along with the rise in demand for high density and efficient data centers in various business organizations.Moreover, increasing threat of cyber-attacks is contributing to the growth of the market due to the need for reliable data center support infrastructure. Such factors are expected to drive the market growth during the forecast period. Geographical segmentation of the data center support infrastructure market includes North America, Europe, Asia Pacific (APAC), Middle East & Africa (MEA), and South America.Emerging cooling technologies and use of renewable sources of power in data centers are becoming major challenges in the growth of the data center support infrastructure market.Data center support infrastructures require high capital investment which is expected to restrain the market growth during the forecast period. Furthermore, providing compatible infrastructure solutions for efficient functioning is a challenge for market players. Thus, the above factors are expected to affect the market adversely during the forecast period.Key players in the data center support infrastructure market are ABB, Eaton, Emerson Network Power, HP, Schneider Electric, Intel, Siemens, McAfee, Hitachi, Raritan, and Rittal. Major players are adopting strategies such as product innovation, and mergers and acquisitions to gain competitive advantage in the market.The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions.By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.Book Now:About TMRTransparency 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 TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email:sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Tissue Paper Packaging Machines Market - Among Key System Types, Toilet Roll Packaging Lines Emerges Dominant

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Fabio Perini S.p.A, Tissue Machinery Company S.p.A., BaoSuo Paper Machinery Manufacture Co., Ltd., and STAX Technologies D.O.O., are among the most prominent enterprises in the global tissue paper packaging machines market. Together they wield a considerable influence on the global tissue paper packaging machines market. These market players are identified by high capacity and highly automated machines, finds Transparency Market Research (TMR) in a recent study.Obtain Brochure@Investment in innovations and developing competencies has significantly risen among these companies, as they aim at accelerating their growth pace. Besides this, they have their focus on expanding their footprint to sustain their global positions. In addition, their efforts are aimed at updating their offerings to gain better traction amidst the prevailing competition. Given the scenario, the global tissue paper packaging market will witness several technological advancements in the coming years.According to TMR, the global tissue paper packaging machines market is projected to surpass US$321.8 mn by the end of 2027. In 2016, the market was valued at US$194.4 mn. Considering the estimated and historic market figures hold true, the global tissue paper packaging machines market will expand at a CAGR of 4.7% between 2017 and 2027. Among key system types available in the market, the toilet roll packaging lines segment was estimated to hold the dominant 47.2% in the global market in 2017. As per TMR, North America held the lead in the global tissue paper packaging machines market in 2017.Rising Consciousness about Better Hygiene Practices to Propel GrowthThe globally increasing urban population and subsequently rising concerns among people regarding better hygiene, fuelling the use of tissue paper products are driving the market for tissue paper products, in turn giving impetus to the global tissue paper packaging machinery market. Other than this, the market will gain immensely as companies invest in novel machineries as a part of their brand building activity. Considering the highly competitive environment they have to operate in, most companies are wary about their process of product development and its alignment with their brand strategies. They are constantly focusing on improving the end user experience, which will enable the global tissue paper packaging machines market gain significant momentum in the coming years.In the coming years, the market will benefit from technological advancements and automation introduced in the production process. As a result of evolving technologies and automation services the demand for advanced machinery has increased in the global tissue paper packaging machines market. Subsequently, recent technological advancements in the production of packaging lines and standalone machines have enabled the manufacturers produce in larger volumes.Obtain Report Details @Slow Acceptance of Proper Hygiene to Restrain Growth in Underdeveloped CountriesDespite growth prospects witnessed worldwide, the slow acceptance of proper hygiene and the availability of economic alternatives are creating hindrances for the global tissue paper packaging market. This is especially true in case of underdeveloped economies where the pace of adopting novel hygiene solutions is way lesser than that of developed economies. A majority of consumers living across emerging nations also prefer more economic solutions which pose threat to the markets growth. Furthermore, the market is negatively impacted by the economic instability in South America. The Russia-Ukraine conflict, which has negatively impacted technological advancements, has affected the growth of trade in the region, in turn creating obstacles for the tissue paper packaging machines market.About TMRTransparency 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.Contact TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Laminated Paper Board Packaging Market - Industry Analysis, Growth and New Market Opportunities Explored

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The laminated paperboard is a multi-layered solid board that is being used in the packaging of raw fruits and vegetables. The laminated paperboard is being finished with the kraft paper or PE coated papers. Products packed through the laminated board are being packed wet and it is being stored in the damp conditions. The laminated board is highly resistant to moisture which makes our food product fresh and free from germs. Laminated boards are being used in various industries like food and drink packaging, consumer goods packaging, industrial packaging and retail ready packaging. The laminated board is highly moisture resistant. Laminated boards are widely used in the pharmaceutical industries in the packaging of various articles which include perfumes, deodorant, soaps, cream and much more.Obtain Brochure@Global laminated paperboard packaging market: DynamicsThe major factors driving the growth of laminated paperboard market is the constant relative growth of laminated paperboard boxes market in the fruits packaging, food and beverage industries, advancement in the packaging industry and increasing usage of laminated paperboard boxes in the wide range of end -user applications. With the increase in the technological advancements, the manufacturers in the laminated paperboard industries are mainly focusing on the consumer convenience and the product appeal. With the rise of online shopping and e-commerce portals, which widen the scope of transportation and in turn fuel the market of the laminated paperboard. Majorly retail stores use laminated paperboard not only for the purpose of preserving the food but also to maintain the nutritional value of the food so that the food can be kept fresh for a long time. With the increasing number of consumers purchasing grocery items, including chilled and frozen foods which are also contributing to the growth of laminated paperboard market. The laminated paperboard also has a good margin in the pharmaceutical industry in the packaging of various cosmetics material like syrup, creams, powder, perfumes, deodorant and much more. As the production cost is high many business people are not willing to invest in the laminated paperboard industry as manufacturers need to attain comparatively high production in terms of volume so that they can attain a big profit in their investment. This economic restriction could restrain the overall growth in the laminated paperboard industry over the forecast period.Global laminated paperboard packaging market: SegmentationThe global laminated paperboard packaging market has been segmented as follows -On the basis of end use industry, the laminated board packaging market has been segmented as:Food & Beverages IndustryPharmaceutical IndustryChemical IndustryOthersOn the basis of paperboard type, the laminated paperboard packaging market has been segmented as:Kraft BoardSolid Bleached BoardSolid Unbleached BoardOn the basis of lamination material type, the laminated paperboard packaging market has been segmented as:PEPPAluminiumBrowse Market Research Report @On the basis of application, the laminated paperboard packaging market has been segmented as:Paper and Publishing ProductsConsumer and Goods PackagingFood and Drinks PackagingIndustrial PackagingRetail Ready PackagingGlobal laminated paperboard packaging market: Geographical OutlookThe Laminated Board packaging market has been divided into seven regions as follows North AmericaLatin AmericaWestern EuropeEastern EuropeAsia Pacific Excluding Japan (APEJ)Middle East & Africa (MEA)JapanAsia Pacific represents the comparatively high market share and grows with comparatively significant CAGR during the forecast period. North American market is also growing in the laminated paperboard packaging due to the rapid increase in the production capacity of the laminated paperboard as the number of supermarkets are rising day by day. Key factors driving the growth of laminated paperboard packaging include a change in the packaging pattern and increase in demand of laminated board in food and beverage industries. The laminated paperboard packaging is projected to register healthy growth due to the rising demand of laminated paperboard packaging across the globe.Global laminated paperboard packaging market: Key PlayersSome of the players operating in the global XYZ packaging market are Orchid Laminates Private Ltd, Roxcel Group, Sierra Coating Technologies LLC, Yogeshwar Polymers, and Vacmet IndiaAbout TMRTransparency 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.Contact TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:ERP Software Market: Into Cloud Based & On-Premise Deployment Models

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Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is a software that enables organizations to manage and automate their business processes. The capabilities of the ERP system has evolved from back office activities to the integration of business processes. ERP software has been widely used for back office operations, which include order management, inventory control production, and accounting, etc.An ERP software system comprises several software modules and each ERP model is focused on a particular departmental area such as inventory control, material purchasing, finance, marketing, HR, and accounting. These modules can be customized according to the requirement of the organization.An ERP software system can be deployed either as a cloud based or on premise software. Integration of organizational activities and managing resources efficiently are some of the major tasks of the ERP system.The need for enhanced operational efficiency along with transparency within the departments of an organization is one of the key drivers propelling the growth of the market. Furthermore, rising demand for cloud based deployment models is boosting the global ERP software market growth.The ability to access the central system from any demographic due to integrated system architecture of the ERP system module, is compelling enterprises to adopt these systems. It is responsible for enhancing productivity by enabling organizations get potential return on investment by reducing their expenses.Request Brochure:This software enables organizations to integrate large amounts of data and reconcile the shipments of companies faster. However, some of the factors restraining the market growth are high installation cost and the accessibility of open source applications.The ERP software market has been segmented based on deployment, functions, industry, end-user, and region. Based on deployment, the ERP software market is segmented into cloud based and on-premise deployment models. The cloud based deployment model segment is estimated to hold the major share of the global ERP software market.This is attributed to the rise in adoption of cloud-based technologies coupled with rising scalability offered by these technologies. Rising necessity for real-time data analytics is a prominent factor propelling the ERP software market. The function segment includes human resource (HR), supply chain, finance, and others.The industry segment includes key industries such as BFSI, manufacturing, healthcare, government utilities, retail, telecom, aerospace and defense and others. The end-user segment in the ERP software market includes large, small and medium enterprises. Large enterprises are estimated to have major share in the global ERP software market, due to their rising investments, whereas extensive adoption of ERP systems by mid and small sized enterprises are further supporting the growth of the SMEs in the market.Region wise, the global ERP software market is segmented into North America, South America, Europe, Asia Pacific (APAC), and Middle East & Africa (MEA). Presently, North America is estimated to dominate the market in terms of its revenue contribution share followed by Europe. However among all the regions, APAC is expected to create significant market opportunity for key players operating in the market due to growth in industrialization in this region during the forecast period.Key players in the market are prominently focusing on introduction of advanced services and solutions in order to strengthen their position and improve their offerings. Key vendors operating in the global ERP software market include Oracle, TOTVS S.A, Microsoft Corporation, SAP SE, Infor, IBM Corporation, Netsuite Inc., SYSPRO, Unit4, Sage Group Plc, QAD, Focus Softnet, and Ultimate Software. ERP software vendors are updating the pricing models to strengthen their position in the market. The vendors are aiming on providing better integration architecture modules owing to the rising adoption of customized ERP software.The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions. By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.Book Now:About TMRTransparency 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 TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email:sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Infectious Waste Packaging Market - Application of Up-to-Date Waste Management Principles

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Infectious waste is produced in large amounts all over the globe on a daily basis, especially from hospitals, clinics, and other healthcare centers. This waste can prove to be a breeding ground for pathogens and other harmful disease causing organisms. To avoid these issues and maintain a good hygienic environment, it is highly necessary to enable effective and safe disposal of infectious waste.Obtain Brochure@The global infectious waste packaging market is steadily projected to rise in the next few years, mainly due to increasing investments for developing the required packaging material. This is expected to create several opportunities from a work based as well as development based perspective. However, to maintain this growth, the investments put in the market need to continue at a strong rate. The number of public as well as private organizations are also increasing around the world, which bode well for the development of the market. Incineration, chemical treatment, autoclaving, etc. are some of the processes associated with this market. Amongst these processes, most progress is expected to occur for the incineration treatments. Even the market share for this process is expected to be larger than any other activity associated with the infectious waste packaging market. Such growth is mainly due to rise in the initiatives taken by the organizations for medical waste management and other technological developments.Infectious waste mainly consists of hazardous and non-hazardous wastes, which further are subdivided into several other subclasses. From a regional perspective, the global infectious waste packaging market has an extensive reach in the North American and European regions. This is mainly due to the rising number of old people in these regions. These people could get diagnosed with health problems, thus causing them to end up in hospitals and healthcare centers, and hence ultimately leading to an increase in infectious waste. North America is expected to continue its dominance in this market in the near future. Other than these regions, the infectious waste packaging market has a significant presence in Asia.Global infectious waste packaging market: IntroductionInfectious waste packaging is absolutely crucial for the sustainable management of waste. A waste which include pathogens, miscellaneous waste such dialysis unit waste, contaminated equipment, and others with enough virulence and quantity so that exposure to the waste by human or animals could result in infectious disease is called infectious waste. The need for infectious waste packaging follows from the application of up-to-date waste management principles. Infectious waste packaging provides a management plan against infectious waste. Infectious waste packaging finds application in various waste managements which include medical waste, radioactive waste, and pathological waste. Infectious waste packaging includes different packaging for different types of wastes such as, plastic bags for various solid and semisolid wastes, plastics and glass bottles, tanks or flasks for liquid waste. Packaging mediums used in infectious waste packaging are leak proof which are sealed and impervious to moisture and must be labelled with biohazard symbol. Medical practitioners, laboratory staff, and personnel who deliberately deal with contaminated waste are creating awareness regarding benefits of infectious waste packaging. Government policies of cleanliness give rise to infectious waste packaging market.Global infectious waste packaging market: DynamicsEvery year, tons of infectious waste is generated which requires proper disposal, which in turn drives the global demand for the infectious waste packaging. The aim of infectious waste packaging is to ensure that no hazard should be presented on personnel who involved in handling and disposing of infectious waste. With so many fatal substances falling under the umbrella of infectious waste, if safety standards are not complied with, it could lead to illness, chronic diseases and other serious effects. To deal with it, infectious waste packaging is a reliable option. Infectious waste packaging market is flourishing in the backdrop of growing awareness among people, regarding clean and safe society. In recent years, the number of patients visit to hospitals has risen, it will drive the global infectious waste packaging demand.Browse Market Research Report @Need of segregating infectious waste is expected to penetrate the global infectious waste market. The UN puts infectious substances in a separate division as per which the infectious waste must be handled or disposed. These divisions are classified as class 6.2 which includes lower-risk infectious waste and higher-risk infectious waste. Being declared by the United Nations regarding proper dispose of medical waste would lead to rise in global infectious waste packaging market. Today various diseases are spreading in the society due to improper waste management by the regulatory bodies. Prevention of diseases is expected to boost the global infectious waste packaging market consequentially. Infectious waste packaging is a hazardous work to carry out, forces people to keep their hands away in doing this, and it might hamper growth of the global infectious waste packaging market. Government policies of cleanliness gives rise to infectious waste packaging market.Global infectious waste packaging market: SegmentationGlobal infectious waste packaging market can be segmented as follows:On the basis of waste type, the global infectious waste packaging market has been segmented as:Solid & semi-solid infectious waste packagingLiquid infectious waste packagingOn the basis of products, the global infectious waste packaging market has been segmented as:Coloured rigid boxesSharps containersBio-hazard containersLabelsBagsBottlesOn the basis of material type, the global infectious waste packaging market has been segmented as:PaperboardGlassPlasticsGlobal infectious waste packaging market: Regional OutlookBased on regions, the global infectious waste packaging market is segmented into seven regions namely:North AmericaWestern EuropeAsia-pacific except JapanEastern EuropeLatin AmericaMiddle East and AfricaJapanThe global infectious waste packaging market is expected to witness lucrative growth due to rise in awareness regarding hygienic packaging. North America, Western Europe, and Asia Pacific are expected to drive the global infectious waste packaging industry. MEA, Latin America and Eastern Europe are anticipated to witness moderate growth. Japan is expected to witness higher than average growth in the global infectious waste packaging market.Global infectious waste packaging market: Key PlayersFew of the key market players in the global infectious waste packaging market are  Smurfit Kappa Group, Uniflex Healthcare, Interstate Packaging LLC, Carolina CoverTech, and International Plastics Inc., among others.About TMRTransparency 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.Contact TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Healthcare Automation Market is likely to pace ahead at a CAGR of 8.8% to reach a valuation of US$58.98 bn by 2025

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The research report states that the global healthcare automation market was valued at US$28.31 bn in 2016. However, over the forecast period of 2017 and 2025, the global market is likely to pace ahead at a CAGR of 8.8% to reach a valuation of US$58.98 bn by the end of 2025. Research institutes and labs have been identified as the key end users of healthcare automation. The need for fast-paced operations and precision is expected to propel this end-user segment at a CAGR of 8.2% in the global market over the forecast period. From a geographic point of view, North America is expected to dominate the global healthcare automation market despite a slight dip in its overall share. Analysts expect that this regional market will account for a share of 39.5% by 2025, which will be higher than the rest of the regional markets across the globe.Read Report Overview:Wearable Technology to be an Emerging Trend in Global Healthcare Automation MarketAutomation has brought in a range of benefits across all industrial platforms. The healthcare industry has been steadily adoption automation in several areas such as research institutes and labs, pharmacies, and home care among others. The uptake of healthcare automation processes and systems is expected to remain persistent in the coming years as these solutions designed with smarter technologies tend to make operations significantly efficient. The superior quality of these systems has also garnered unprecedented support from governments across the globe, thereby bolstering market growth. A clear example of remarkable advantages rendered by application of healthcare automation are the lack of errors in maintaining inventory and medicine management in pharmacies. Owing to this very reasons, the pharmacies are also expected to offer the healthcare automation market lucrative growth opportunities in the near future.Request Sample of Report:The high-tech solutions offered by healthcare automation also expands to material handling, transport, and disease management. The growing demand for wearable technology has been noted as an emerging trend in the global market. Smartwatches, an important aspect of wearable technology, has empowered both patients and physicians to closely monitor changes in health, intervene at an appropriate time, and ensure a better lifestyle. In light of these reasons, the global healthcare automation market has a bright future in the world economics.Additional Maintenance Costs Discourage End UsersOn the flip side and despite the advantages, the cost of automation has turned out to be a major disappointment to the global healthcare automation market. The requirement of regular maintenance has also dissuaded several end users as it adds to the operational costs. Thus, the hesitation amongst end users is likely to hold back the market from achieving its potential in the near future.Buy Healthcare Automation Market Research Report:Transparency Market Research (TMR) states that Siemens AG, General Electric Company, Swisslog Holding AG, and Koninklijke Philips N.V. are some of the leading companies in the global healthcare automation market. These players have consistently worked toward expansion of product portfolio and reinforcing business through innovation product development. In the coming years, to beat the competition, players are expected to plan for mergers and acquisitions to expand their horizons to newer geographies.About us:Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a U.S.-based provider of syndicated research, customized research, and consulting services. TMRs global and regional market intelligence coverage includes industries such as pharmaceutical, chemicals and materials, technology and media, food and beverages, and consumer goods, among others. Each TMR research report provides clients with a 360-degree view of the market with statistical forecasts, competitive landscape, detailed segmentation, key trends, and strategic recommendations.Contact us:Transparency Market Research90 State Street,Suite 700,AlbanyNY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Dyebath Additives Market Covering Latest Trends & Recent Developments | 2024

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Dyebath additives are chemical compounds which are added to dyebaths to enhance color fastness, fabric scouring, dye leveling & dispersing and brightness. Electrolytes, chelating agents, reducing agents, optical brighteners and dispersing agents are types of dyebath additives which are used in the textile industry. Sodium chloride, sodium sulfate, EDTA (ethylene diamine tetra acetic acid) and sodium dithionite are the commonly used dyebath additives used in textile dyeing processes. Mordants are used in several dyeing processes to increase the uptake of dye by the fiber, making mordants a category of dyebath additives.Read Report Overview @Hardness caused due to the presence of heavy metal ions in dyeing chemicals hinder the textile dyeing and cleaning process. These heavy metal ions can reduce the dye adhesion and cleaning effectiveness of the fabric. Improper dye adhesion causes fading of garments. Dyebath additives such as chelating agents increase the color fastness of dyes on textiles. Additionally, the presence of metal ions result in precipitation of dye pigments which causes variations in dye shades. Chelating agents and electrolytes help in restricting dye precipitation. Dyebath additives therefore help in proper dye leveling, dispersion of dye pigments and dye adhesion.Versene, a brand of chelating agents, produced by the Dow Chemical Company, deactivates the metal ions thereby preventing their undesirable reactions in textile processing stages. The use of Versene in silk increases soap effectiveness and in synthetic fibers, it enables fabric scouring. In case of direct dyes and vat dyes, chelating agents used in dyebath additives enhance the optical brightness of the fabrics.The growth of the fashion industry involving the extensive use of textured and dyed fabrics is a major consumer of dyebath additives. Furthermore, the increasing demand for dyed fabrics required in automotive and domestic upholstery & furnishing is responsible for the growth of dyebath additives market. The exponentially increasing world population is driving the growth of the textile industry. Fabric dyeing to cater to this increasing demand of clothes is a prominent end use of dyebath additives. Furthermore, use of dyebath additives in paper and leather industry is fuelling the growth of this market. However, the increasing environmental pollution due to release of certain dyes such as reactive dyes is expected to impede the growth of this market in the coming years. The growing population and GDP of countries, owing to the economic recovery are expected to open new areas of opportunity for the dyebath additives market. Additionally, the growing paper based dyes and specialty dyes are expected to exponentially increase the end uses for dyebath additives within the forecast period.China and India dominate the textile dyeing market. These countries are large scale consumers of dyebath additives. Germany and Switzerland are major consumers of dyebath additives due to the flourishing textile dyeing industry in these countries. Additionally, countries such as Turkey, Brazil, Japan, Thailand, the Republic of Korea and the U.S. are the major export markets for dyebath additives. Asia Pacific is expected to be the largest and the fastest growing market for textile dyes due to the high volume of textiles traded in the near future.Request to view Sample Report:The major companies manufacturing dyebath additives include Amitech Inc, Apollo Chemical Corp, Burlington Chemical Co, Chimista Specialty Chemicals, LLC, Dyetech, Inc and Dow Chemical Co, Huntsman International LLC, Intersac Group and Piedmont Chemical Industries Inc and Neochem Technologies among others.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.ContactTransparency Market ResearchState Tower,90 State Street,Suite 700,Albany NY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:High Content Screening Products Market: Increasing Cell-based Research to Drive Demand

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According to TMR, the global high content screening products market will expand at an 8% CAGR from 2017 to 2022 and be worth US$1.23 bn by 2022. On the basis of product, the consumable segment is anticipated to expand at a high CAGR of 8.3% between 2017 and 2022 and reach an evaluation of US$486.6 mn by 2022.Advanced Healthcare Infrastructure in North America Supports Growth of High Content Screening ProductsOn the basis of geography, North America is currently leading in the global high content screening market on account of the high prevalence of chronic diseases, increasing geriatric population, advanced healthcare infrastructure, rising collaborations of research institutes, and the presence of well established players within this region. North American market for high content screening products is expected to exhibit a high CAGR of 8.2% from 2017 to 2022 and reach an evaluation of US$402.1 mn by 2022. Europe is estimated to emerge as the second leading regional segment and is currently accounting for 25.8% of the total revenue in the global high content screening products market. Substantial investments by the government in the healthcare sector are one of the key reasons behind the growth of the European market for these products. Asia Pacific is anticipated to beat all other regions, with Japan single handedly responsible for generating a revenue of US113.1 mn and exhibiting a CAGR of 7.8% between 2017 and 2022.Read Report Overview:Increasing Cell-based Research to Drive Demand for High Content ScreeningHigh content screening is finding extensive application in the field of drug discovery and biological research. This in turn is fueling the demand for high content screening products. With the growing number of cell based research, emergence of sophisticated image analysis instruments, and growing initiatives taken by pharmaceutical companies, research organizations, and biotechnology companies for drug discovery, the market for high content screening products is slated to witness a high growth. Some of the key factors driving the growth of this market is the increasing prevalence of Parkinson's disease, HIV, AIDS, epilepsy, and other chronic diseases which require intensive treatment as well as the need to determine and study toxicity levels in the initial phase of drug discovery.Request Sample of Report:Increased Pressure to Develop New Drugs on Account of High Prevalence of Chronic Diseases to Spur Growth of MarketThe demand for improved technology for cell research, better screening systems, and emergence of sophisticated informatics solutions will also aid the growth of the market. The demand will also be boosted by the growing support received from governments across the world for cell based research. Increasing prevalence of diseases has also pressurized and created a heighted need to develop new drug molecules and propelled the demand for advanced cell-based imaging. The in turn is expected to drive the growth prospects of the global high content screening products market.Key players within the global high content screening products market are investing extensively in research and development so as to come up with new technologically advanced instruments for designing new therapies to treat various ailments. This strategy is being used by key players to strengthen their position in the market. Another strategy adopted by leading players is to collaborate, partner, merge or acquire other companies so as to expand their geographical reach. With the degree of competition currently being low in the global high content screening products market many aspiring players are attempting to enter this market on account of its high attractiveness, states Transparency Market Research (TMR) in its latest research report. Key players within the market include Thermo Fisher Scientific, GE Healthcare, Molecular Devices, PerkinElmer Inc., Dickinson and Company, Becton, Thorlabs, Inc., Merck KGaA, Genedata AG, Cell Signaling Technology, and Yokogawa Electric Corporation.Buy High Content Screening Products Market Research Report:About us:Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a U.S.-based provider of syndicated research, customized research, and consulting services. TMRs global and regional market intelligence coverage includes industries such as pharmaceutical, chemicals and materials, technology and media, food and beverages, and consumer goods, among others. Each TMR research report provides clients with a 360-degree view of the market with statistical forecasts, competitive landscape, detailed segmentation, key trends, and strategic recommendations.Contact us:Transparency Market Research90 State Street,Suite 700,AlbanyNY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Smart Pole Market Application in Highways & Roads to Remain High

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Initiatives taken by the government in various countries has led to upsurge in demand for the global smart poles market. In addition, growing need for monitoring the roads and routes for traffic management is projected to impact growth of the global market of smart pole positively. According to Transparency Market Research, the global market of smart pole is projected to register a CAGR of 13.7% through 2022.Factors Fuelling Growth of the Global MarketGrowth of the global smart poles market is mainly bound to various micro-economic and macro-economic factors. Growing need to monitor the traffic and prevent accidents has led to an upsurge in demand for the smart poles. Manufacturers are increasingly installing the smart poles as they are equipped with smart cameras and enable traffic management conveniently. In addition, as the smart poles are equipped with features such as smart sensors, the end users can easily monitor the weather conditions and unprecedented accidents. Moreover, the smart poles are also equipped with announcement speakers, public charging points and internet connectivity, which is expected to rev up adoption of smart poles globally. These factors are expected to propel growth of the global market of smart pole during the forecast period.Request Brochure:Furthermore, government in developing countries are taking initiatives to implement the smart city plan, which is projected to fuel adoption of smart poles globally. Attributed to features such as access to the internet connectivity and sensors in these poles, various disconnected regions can conveniently connect with the developed regions. Smart poles mainly run on solar batteries and is energy efficient as compared to the conventional street light poles. Bound to these factors, government in various countries continue to encourage installation of smart poles. Several market players in the commercial industry can bank on the lucrative opportunity of offering their services in the disconnected regions in the commercial industry attributed to increasing internet connectivity. These factors will continue to rev up adoption of the smart poles in the global market during the forecast period.However, smart poles need increasing maintenance requirement as they operate on solar power. The conventional street light poles require comparatively low initial investment as they mainly function on electricity. Extreme climatic conditions such as moisture, dust and snow can disrupt the functioning of these poles. Attributed to these factors, sales of the smart poles is likely to dip in the backward region of the country. As the smart poles are mainly wireless, the risk of theft continues to remain high. These factors are projected to inhibit growth of the global market of smart pole throughout the forecast period.Adoption of Sensors to Remain High in the Smart PolesGrowing need for traffic management, tracking weather conditions and on-road accidents has led to an upsurge in demand for sensors in the global market. By component, the sensor segment is projected to witness a relatively high growth in terms of revenue, accounting for more than US$ 1,000 Mn by 2022-end. Moreover, the sensor segment is projected to reflect a relatively high CAGR in the global market of smart pole through 2022.In terms of revenue, the retrofit installation type segment is projected to witness robust growth, accounting for more than US$ 1,000 Mn by 2017-end. Through 2022, the new installment segment will continue to reflect the fastest growth in the global market of smart pole. On the basis of application, revenue growth of the highway & roads segment is projected to remain high. The highway & roads segment is projected to represent more than US$ 1,000 Mn in the global market by 2022-end. However, adoption of smart poles will continue to witness the fastest adoption in the public places as compared to the other applications.Book Now:About TMRTransparency 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 TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email:sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Global eCommerce Software Market 2017 Latest Trend - Pitney Bowes, Digital River, Magento, Volusion, Wix, Aabaco

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Qyresearchreports include new market research report "Global eCommerce Software Market Size, Status and Forecast 2022" to its huge collection of research reports.The international market for eCommerce Software has been researched with every detail in the publication with increased emphasis on various important factors such as opportunities, and restraints, growth drivers. Each of the factors that pertain to shaping of the market dynamics has been studied and analyzed in detail by the analysts, so as to offer the best and most evaluative and exhaustive study to the report buyers. The snapshot or the executive summary that has been provided in the market intelligence study has been designed in such a way so as to give a quick overview of the market for receiving information on the go. This could help readers with hands-on data needed to make quick decisions anytime during their growth journey in the market.Click here to get a FREE sample report in your inbox :The market segmentations study that has been offered in the publication explores some of the most significant segments of the world eCommerce Software market deemed important for the growth of industry participants. All of the segments that have been studied elaborately in the said publication have been deeply evaluated with assistance from best of the research techniques. The analysts have dissected each of the segments and have shed light on vital factors that influence the growth of the various segments. Using this crucial information, market players could rightly shape their business plans in favor of the betterment of their growth in the world market. Segments that have been analyzed in the publication could be related to product, end use, application, and geography.A group of experienced analysts who have prepared the said report delves deep into the various factors that hinder or fuel the global market for eCommerce Software. It also discovers and mentions the important trends that are emerging in the said market. Banking upon all these information that has been gathered so far, it has come up with the best course of action for all the stake holders of the market.Table of ContentsGlobal eCommerce Software Market Size, Status and Forecast 20221 Industry Overview of eCommerce Software1.1 eCommerce Software Market Overview1.1.1 eCommerce Software Product Scope1.1.2 Market Status and Outlook1.3 eCommerce Software Market by Type1.3.1 By Software Platform1.3.2 By eCommerce Software type1.4 eCommerce Software Market by End Users/Application1.4.1 Small Business1.4.2 Medium Business1.4.3 OtherRead Complete Table of Content @2 Global eCommerce Software Competition Analysis by Players2.1 eCommerce Software Market Size (Value) by Players (2016 and 2017)2.2 Competitive Status and Trend2.2.1 Market Concentration Rate2.2.2 Product/Service Differences2.2.3 New Entrants2.2.4 The Technology Trends in Future3 Company (Top Players) Profiles3.1 SAP3.1.1 Company Profile3.1.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.1.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.1.4 eCommerce Software Revenue (Value) (2012-2017)3.1.5 Recent Developments3.2 Oracle3.2.1 Company Profile3.2.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.2.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.2.4 eCommerce Software Revenue (Value) (2012-2017)3.2.5 Recent Developments3.3 IBM4 Global eCommerce Software Market Size by Type and Application (2012-2017)4.1 Global eCommerce Software Market Size by Type (2012-2017)4.2 Global eCommerce Software Market Size by Application (2012-2017)4.3 Potential Application of eCommerce Software in Future4.4 Top Consumer/End Users of eCommerce Software5 United States eCommerce Software Development Status and Outlook5.1 United States eCommerce Software Market Size (2012-2017)5.2 United States eCommerce Software Market Size and Market Share by Players (2016 and 2017)List of Tables and FiguresFigure eCommerce Software Product ScopeFigure Global eCommerce Software Market Size (Million USD) (2012-2017)Table Global eCommerce Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure Global eCommerce Software Market Share by Regions in 2016Figure United States eCommerce Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure EU eCommerce Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure Japan eCommerce Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure China eCommerce Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure India eCommerce Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)About Us:QYResearchReports.com delivers the latest strategic market intelligence to build a successful business footprint in China. Our syndicated and customized research reports provide companies with vital background information of the market and in-depth analysis on the Chinese trade and investment framework, which directly affects their business operations. Reports from QYResearchReports.com feature valuable recommendations on how to navigate in the extremely unpredictable yet highly attractive Chinese market.Contact Us:1820 AvenueM Suite #1047Brooklyn, NY 11230United StatesToll Free: 866-997-4948 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-518-621-2074Web:Email: sales@qyresearchreports.comBlog:QYResearchReports.com delivers the latest strategic market intelligence to build a successful business footprint in China. Our syndicated and customized research reports provide companies with vital background information of the market and in-depth analysis on the Chinese trade and investment framework, which directly affects their business operations. Reports from QYResearchReports.com feature valuable recommendations on how to navigate in the extremely unpredictable yet highly attractive Chinese market.1820 AvenueM Suite #1047Brooklyn, NY 11230United StatesToll Free: 866-997-4948 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-518-621-2074Web:Email: sales@qyresearchreports.comGlobal Fundraising Software Market 2018 Industry Key Players - Salesforce, NeonCRM, Blackbaud, Giveffect, GiveGab, Intuit

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Qyresearchreports include new market research report "Global Fundraising Software Market Size, Status and Forecast 2022" to its huge collection of research reports.This report studies the global Fundraising Software market, analyzes and researches the Fundraising Software development status and forecast in United States, EU, Japan, China, India and Southeast Asia. This report focuses on the top players in global market, likeSalesforceNeonCRMBlackbaudSalsa CRMMemberClicksGrowthZoneDonorViewGiveffectGiveGabIntuitGet Free PDF Brochure For More Technical Insights@The demand in the international Fundraising Software market has been critically gauged and analyzed as per different products and services and their adoption rate across various regional segments, end-user trend, annual revenue, number of units launched, and other vital factors. Using this market intelligence study of the market demand, market players have been expected to set the pace for a valuable growth in the said industry. Information about various different segments of the market has also been provided in a market synopsis and added to the comprehensive executive summary that has been provided in the said publication. The market overview section of the publication exposes some of the critical dynamics, including opportunities, restraints, and growth drivers.The market share analysis of the eminent market players that are operating in the international Fundraising Software market has been offered in the said publication to help readers gain a deep understanding of their status and position in the industry. Using the analysis, companies could plan their powerful and effective strategies that would strengthen their position in the market. Moreover, they could become aware about the latest strategies adopted by other top players in the market.Readers have been forecasted to explore the probable opportunities in different regions of the world market for Fundraising Software with the assistance of regional analysis as provided in the publication. Each region has been carefully researched by the analysts. The publication also profiles a list of eminent companies that are present in the market, studies their main product offerings, sales and revenues, and growth prospects.Table of ContentsGlobal Fundraising Software Market Size, Status and Forecast 20221 Industry Overview of Fundraising Software1.1 Fundraising Software Market Overview1.1.1 Fundraising Software Product Scope1.1.2 Market Status and Outlook1.2 Global Fundraising Software Market Size and Analysis by Regions1.2.1 United States1.2.2 EU1.2.3 Japan1.2.4 China1.2.5 India1.2.6 Southeast Asia1.3 Fundraising Software Market by End Users/Application1.3.1 PC Terminal1.3.2 Mobile TerminalAccess the full Report TOC in Detail @2 Global Fundraising Software Competition Analysis by Players2.1 Fundraising Software Market Size (Value) by Players (2016 and 2017)2.2 Competitive Status and Trend2.2.1 Market Concentration Rate2.2.2 Product/Service Differences2.2.3 New Entrants2.2.4 The Technology Trends in Future3 Company (Top Players) Profiles3.1 Salesforce3.1.1 Company Profile3.1.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.1.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.1.4 Fundraising Software Revenue (Value) (2012-2017)3.1.5 Recent Developments3.2 NeonCRM3.2.1 Company Profile3.2.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.2.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.2.4 Fundraising Software Revenue (Value) (2012-2017)3.2.5 Recent Developments3.3 Blackbaud3.3.1 Company Profile3.3.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.3.3 Products, Services and Solutions4 Global Fundraising Software Market Size by Application (2012-2017)4.1 Global Fundraising Software Market Size by Application (2012-2017)4.2 Potential Application of Fundraising Software in Future4.3 Top Consumer/End Users of Fundraising Software5 United States Fundraising Software Development Status and Outlook5.1 United States Fundraising Software Market Size (2012-2017)5.2 United States Fundraising Software Market Size and Market Share by Players (2016 and 2017)List of Tables and FiguresFigure Fundraising Software Product ScopeFigure Global Fundraising Software Market Size (Million USD) (2012-2017)Table Global Fundraising Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure Global Fundraising Software Market Share by Regions in 2016Figure United States Fundraising Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure EU Fundraising Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure Japan Fundraising Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure China Fundraising Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)Figure India Fundraising Software Market Size (Million USD) and Growth Rate by Regions (2012-2017)About Us:QYResearchReports.com delivers the latest strategic market intelligence to build a successful business footprint in China. Our syndicated and customized research reports provide companies with vital background information of the market and in-depth analysis on the Chinese trade and investment framework, which directly affects their business operations. Reports from QYResearchReports.com feature valuable recommendations on how to navigate in the extremely unpredictable yet highly attractive Chinese market.Contact Us:1820 AvenueM Suite #1047Brooklyn, NY 11230United StatesToll Free: 866-997-4948 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-518-621-2074Web:Email: sales@qyresearchreports.comBlog:QYResearchReports.com delivers the latest strategic market intelligence to build a successful business footprint in China. Our syndicated and customized research reports provide companies with vital background information of the market and in-depth analysis on the Chinese trade and investment framework, which directly affects their business operations. Reports from QYResearchReports.com feature valuable recommendations on how to navigate in the extremely unpredictable yet highly attractive Chinese market.1820 AvenueM Suite #1047Brooklyn, NY 11230United StatesToll Free: 866-997-4948 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-518-621-2074Web:Email: sales@qyresearchreports.comUV Curing Lamps Market - Current and Future Plans 2025

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Global UV Curing Lamps Market: IntroductionUV curing is a unique way in which coatings, varnishes, ink, adhesives and others are cured using polymerization instead of using methods which involve evaporation or heating. Inks, varnishes, adhesives and other different types of photo initiators respond to different wavelengths of UV light for curing. Selection of a proper photo initiator is most important to achieve the desired speed and to balance the properties of cure films. UV LED a type of UV curing lamp is divided into two systems which are radical systems and cationic systems respectively. UV lamps are powered by ballasts. Ceramic end cap is used for the electrical insulation of the UV curing lamps. Some UV curing lamps have an aluminum polished reflector which increases the UV curing lamps efficiency. The UV curing systems are efficient and are preferred more than thermal coating methods. Mercury curing lamps will dominate the digital print sector until UV LEDs substitute it. Owing to the technology advancement, reduction in manufacturing time is observed. UV LED curing lamp takes less time to dry the adhesives, inks and coatings compared to the traditional lamps. The reduction in manufacturing time thereby reduces the manufacturing costs.Global UV Curing Lamps Market: DynamicsEnvironmental improvements and new system capability has made a lot of demand for adoption of UV curing technology. Increased adoption of UV curing systems in end users like automotive, medical, chemical and other industries has created growth opportunities for the Global UV curing lamps market along with its different applications. Advances in printing industry and vehicle manufacturing is another factor leading to a rise in the Global UV curing lamps market.Request Sample Report @UV LED curing lamps are eco-friendly and resource saving. There is a demand for shorter turnaround time for the job to be cured and also increasing demand for uncoated stocks that can be challenging with traditional lamps. These trends make the UV attractive in the market leading to a potential growth of Global UV curing lamps.UV LED curing technology is now used in UV ink jet printing. Mercury based UV curing lamps will be replaced owing to United Nations ban on mercury by 2020. However, the LED based UV curing lamps have disadvantages too. The UV LED curing lamps react to specially formulated inks owing to their narrow wavelengths. Life span and maintenance costs of UV curing lamps are other factors which may slow down the growth of the Global UV curing lamp market. UV curing lamps require a high installation which may also affect the growth of the Global UV curing lamps market.Global UV Curing Lamps Market: Region-wise OutlookOwing to the recent advances in the technologies the regions of North America and Europe have been forecasted to hold the major shares for the global UV curing lamps market. The United States is the foremost consumer of the UV curing lamps. In future, the emerging countries of Latin America and Asia-Pacific are expected to have high demand for the UV curing lamps owing to its eco-friendly and resource saving feature which thereby leads to the growth of the consumer electronics industry in all these regions.Request to Browse Full Table of Content, figure and Tables @Global UV Curing Lamps Market: Market ParticipantsSome of the examples of the market participants identified in the global UV curing lamps market are Nordson Corporation, Novachem Corporation Ltd, Primarc A Baldwin Company, Dymax Corporation, Heraeus Holding, Hanovia, Uvexs Inc, Scheugenpflug AG, Phoseon Technology, GEW, Miltec uv, Benford uv.ABOUT US:Persistence 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.CONTACT:Persistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Industrial Oven Market Competitive Landscape by 2025

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Industrial Oven Market: IntroductionIndustrial oven plays a vital role from planning stage to the final manufacturing stage in chemical sector to steel industries, for heat treatment, drying, curing and hardening of different types of materials for a wide range of industrial applications. The industrial ovens are highly used for the tempering of metals (such as aluminium, copper, ferrous metals, copper and brass) as well as glass. The iconic growth in the industrial oven market is expected with the increase in the industrialization across the globe. At every stage of processing, such as aging, annealing, tempering, bonding, baking, Homogenizing, stress relieving, hardening, normalizing, preheating, sterilization and many others, industrial oven market is expected to gain a profitable monetary value over the forecast period. The industrial oven market offers goods, which can be operated with less electricity and less heat (under 1000 degrees F), while maintaining the international standards to meet the future requirements of the end users.Some of the manufacturers in industrial oven market also offer the in-house-built industrial ovens named as walk-in ovens, which can save money on construction and shipping. Thus it can be expected to represent an upcoming trend in the industrial oven market over the forecast period.Industrial Oven Market: Drivers and RestraintsIn heat treatment operations, where less than 1000 degrees F temperature is required in the manufacturing plants, the industrial oven has been expected to replace the industrial furnaces and accentuate the growth of industrial oven market over the forecast period. One of the developments observed is the continuous line industrial ovens where multiple operations can take place without any intermission during the processing stage and reduced reliance on skills of the workforce. Such ease at the manufacturing stage aids in the productivity economically, which lead to gain lucrative growth in the industrial oven market. Thus, maximum output at affordable cost is expected to be achieved, resulting in gaining fortune for the industrial oven market over the forecast period.Request Sample Report @However, the initial cost of the industrial oven is one of the confining factors inhibiting the growth of industrial oven market. Also, difficulty to trust the machines over the man power leads towards affecting the productivity of the companies using the industrial oven over the forecast period. Less awareness among the manufacturers regarding the requirement of industrial oven or furnace for similar applications is also a factor expected to hamper the growth of industrial oven market in near future.Industrial Oven Market: Region Wise OutlookBased on geography, the industrial oven market is expected to be dominated by Europe over the forecast period, followed by the U.S. The market growth in the region is expected to be fuelled by the demand for electric heating industrial oven. With the increasing rate of industrialization in Asia Pacific region, the region is estimated to gain substantial monetary value in the industrial oven market over the forecast period. Certain noteworthy steel making plants are expected to start projects in India and China, which will aid to gain profitable share in the industrial oven market for conveyor industrial oven. Whereas, countries such as Turkey in Middle East region are expected to account for moderate share in industrial oven market over the forecast period.Request to Browse Full Table of Content, figure and Tables @Industrial Oven Market: Market ParticipantsSome of the examples of market participants in the global industrial oven market are listed below:ASC Process SystemsHarper InternationalHeatronEastman Manufacturing Ltd.Rowan TechnologiesWisconsin Oven Corporation.JPW Ovens & FurnacesDavron TechnologiesGrieve CorporationJLS OvensSteelman Industries, Inc.ABOUT US:Persistence 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.CONTACT:Persistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:1-Decanol Market trends estimates high demand by 2024

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A new research report by Transparency Market Research offers a comprehensive evaluation of the global 1-Decanol Market. The study, titled 1-Decanol Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024, is available for sale on the firms website.The molecular formula of 1-decanol is C10H22O. 1-Decanol is a derivative of oil or natural fat. It is prepared by hydrogenation reaction of decanoic acid. The IUPAC name of 1-Decanol is Dec-1-ol. It has an aromatic odor, density of 0.8297 g/cm3 and boiling point 232.90C. 1-Decanol belongs to a group of long chain aliphatic alcohols within a carbon chain length of C6-24. It possesses solubilizing or emulsifying properties, and can be used as anti-spalling agent in concrete. It is an excellent lubricating agent. 1-Decanol is also used as antifoam and raw material for natural based wetting agents. It is a colorless liquid substance, which is inflammable. 1-Decanol is readily biodegradable and therefore degrades in the environment.View Report Preview:The biodegradability of 1-Decanol is expected to boost its usage in personal care and polymer processing applications. However, it is acutely toxic and therefore is harmful for aquatic life. When accumulated in large quantities, it may cause death of aquatic organisms. It causes mild skin irritation when exposed in large quantities to skin. 1-Decanol is also used in cleaning agents and coatings; however, the concentration of 1-decanol is generally low in cleaning agents. The other names of 1- Decanol are Decyl Alcohol; n-Decanol; primary Decyl Alcohol; Decylic Alcohol; n- Decyl Alcohol; Capric Alcohol; and Alcohol C-10.The market for 1-Decanol can be segmented based on end-use applications into plasticizers, lubricants, surfactants, cleaning agents, personal care, and pharmaceutical. It is used as penetration enhancer in transdermal drug delivery in the pharmaceutical industry because of its ability to permeate the skin. It is used as aluminum rolling lubricants, lubricant oil additives, and plastic lubricants in the lubricants industry. 1-Decanol is extensively used in lotions, creams, and conditioners in the personal care industry.In terms of region, the 1-Decanol market can be segregated into Asia Pacific, North America, Latin America, Middle East & Africa, and Europe. The global market for 1-Decanol is expected to expand. Asia Pacific is anticipated to be the dominant region due to the high demand for personal care products. China and India are likely to be the prominent consumers of 1-Decanol in Asia Pacific due to presence of established end-user industries in these countries. Growth in the polymer processing industry in Asia Pacific and North America is also estimated to propel the demand for 1-Decanol. The 1-Decanol market in North America and Europe is expected to expand, led by the increase in demand for beauty products in these regions.Key players operating in the 1-Decanol market are P&G Chemicals, Sasol, BASF SE, Thai Fatty Alcohol, Kao, Muslim Mas, and Emery Oleochemicals.Emery Oleochemicals sells products under the brand name EMERCOL, which is a group of natural based fatty alcohols. It is used for various purposes in skin care, sun screens, and toiletries applications. BASF SE provides 1-Decanol, which is nontoxic, non-carcinogenic and is used in various end user applications such as personal care, cleaning agents, and polymer processing.Request to view Sample Report:Companies are adopting aggressive marketing tactics and merger and acquisition strategies to expand their market share. They are also shifting their production facilities to emerging economies in Asia Pacific and Latin America due to the easy availability of land, cheap labor, and governmental subsidies in these regions. Additionally, companies are using export as a tool for geographic expansion in emerging economies in Middle East & Africa.The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions. By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.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 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.Contact UsTransparency Market Research90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA  Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Australia Lime Market Expected to Behold a CAGR of 1.7% by 2024

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The lime market in Australia is expected to expand at a CAGR of 1.7% in terms of value over the forecast period, 20162024. The market has been segmented by product type and application. The application segmentation consists of mining & metallurgy, building materials, agriculture, water treatment and others of which the mining & metallurgy segment is expected to account for the highest share of the lime market in Australia throughout the forecast period, to account for 31.4% by 2024.Australia Lime Market Research Report Overview @Demand for energy-efficient and cost-effective solutions is expected to be a priority for lime manufacturers in the country over the forecast period. By product type, slaked/hydrated lime segment is expected to continue to dominate the market in terms of both value and volume throughout the forecast period. The segment is estimated to be valued at US$ 146.7 Mn and account for volume share of 68% in 2016. By application, mining & metallurgy and building materials, segments in the Australia lime market are expected to account for significant volume shares of 38% and 35%, respectively.New South Wales is expected to be the largest market for lime in Australia throughout the forecast period. The market in the region is estimated to be valued at US$ 59.1 Mn by 2016 end. In terms of production, Western Australia is expected to be a major producer, contributing over 65% to the total lime production in the country, and is expected to expand at a CAGR of 0.8% over the forecast period.Request Sample Report@Key players in the Australia lime market include Adelaide Brighton Ltd., Boral Limited, Sibelco Australia, Omya Australia Pty. Ltd, Wagners, and Lime Group Australia. Key players in the Australia lime market are focusing on enhancing their product portfolios. They are focusing not only on basic lime products but also on importing quicklime from ASEAN countries such as Thailand and Vietnam and Southeast Asian countries such as China to minimize a cost of raw materials involved in a lime production. Manufacturers are focusing on capitalizing on economies of scale to increase production, profitability, and offer cost-effective products in order to target cost-sensitive population in the region. Joint ventures, acquisitions, and strategic collaborations in terms of production and distribution of lime have been the common strategies employed by these companies to achieve their production objectives.Download and View Report TOC, Figures and Tables @Long-term Outlook: The long-term outlook on the Australia lime market remains on the conservative side, with the market expected to expand at a modest CAGR of 1.7% in terms of value during the forecast period. The revival of the mining sector in the country, increasing demand from the construction sector, particularly in the countrys east coast region, and demand from the water treatment industry are some of the factors expected to sustain a growth of the lime market in Australia.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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Die Quench Door Beam market: Global Forecast over 2025

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Die Quench Door Beam Market: OverviewA beam is a sturdy and long piece of metal or timber that is used to support the floor or the roof of a building or an automobile. Quenching takes place in the press hardening process. When the part of the work piece that is being quenched, achieves its desired strength, it becomes hard. This is ensured by quenching. Quenching helps the work piece to achieve its desired material properties by rapidly cooling it.Request Report for TOC @Metal can be moulded or cut into a particular shape with the help of a device called die. A die quench door beam is a type of beam used to support floors and roofs of buildings or automobiles, and that is manufactured by the die quenching process. Die quench door beams are increasingly replacing the older versions of door beams that were used in the automobiles earlier. With new government policies regarding light weight automobiles and growing concern regarding safety, die quench door beams are gradually replacing traditional door beams.Die Quench Door Beam Market: Drivers and RestraintsThe need for reduction in the levels of Carbon dioxide emissions, improvement in the characteristics of fuel consumption and improvement in methods to ensure collision safety points at one smart solution that is decreasing the weight of automobile bodies. Growing awareness among people regarding these issues is likely to push the demand for the die quench door beam. This is because die quench door beams are a safer alternatives to the traditional door beams used in the automobiles. Owing to their light weight and low cost die quench door beam market is expected to grow at a high CAGR. Technological advancements, awareness of consumers regarding vehicle security features and vehicle security regulations are other likely factors that may drive the growth of Die Quench Door Beam Market. Side impact crashes usually prove to be very dangerous and cause a lot of damage.This is due to the unavailability of unavailability of space for large deformation that can protect the person sitting on the seat. The increasing number of side impact crashes are the reason why automobile manufacturers are now preferring die quench door beams in place of traditional door beams. The vehicle standards that are being followed presently require driver as well as passenger doors to resist the crash force. So automobile manufacturers reinforce these car doors with die quench door beams that can resist the crash force and hence ensure high levels of safety for the occupant sitting on the seat. This factor is likely to drive the growth of Die Quench Door Beam Market.Die Quench Door Beam Market: Regional OutlookIn the automobile sector, Asia Pacific region is expected to see a growth in the Die Quench Door Beam Market at a high CAGR. The reason behind this is that the Asia-Pacific region is the hub for the production of passenger cars and electric automobiles. This is growth is also attributed to the potential and growth of the Chinese vehicle market. High sales of automobiles in the China as well as United States region is likely to boost the demand for Die Quench Door Beam in these regions. Also, owing to high demand and significant vehicle production in China, China is estimated to show significant growth trends in the Automotive Relay Market. North America is also expected to see a growth in the Die Quench Door Beam Market. This growth is attributed to the huge production of Light Commercial Vehicles (LCV) in this region.Request to Sample of Report-Die Quench Door Beam Market: Key PlayersSome of the major players of the Die Quench Door Beam Market are:-Aisin Takaoka Co. Ltd.KVA StainlessAisin SeikiDuPontGNS AutomotiveBenteler Automotive CorporationKIRCHHOFF Automotive GmbHAbout 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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Australia Ammonia Market Expected to Witness a CAGR of 6.3% by 2024

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Persistence Market Research delivers key insights on the Australia ammonia market in its latest report titled, Australia Market Study on Ammonia: Increasing Consumption in Nitric Acid Production to Drive Growth by 2024. The ammonia market in Australia is estimated to register 5.8% Y-o-Y growth in 2016 over 2015 and is expected to expand at a CAGR of 6.3% over the forecast period (2016-2024).By product type, anhydrous ammonia segment is expected to continue to dominate the market in terms of value and volume share throughout the forecast period (20162024). Production of ammonium nitrate by explosives manufacturers to cater to demand for industrial explosives from the mining sector is anticipated to drive growth of the Australia ammonia market over the forecast period. Also, increasing demand for nitrogen-rich fertilizers such as DAP and MAP is expected to drive volume sales of ammonia during the forecast period. However, volatility in natural gas prices and increasing dependency on fertilizer imports are factors expected to restraint growth of the ammonia market in Australia.Australia Ammonia Market Research Report Overview @On the basis of end use, nitric acid segment is expected to exhibit relatively strong projections by 2024 end, owing to pivotal use of nitric acid both directly and as precursor to other downstream products. The segment is expected to continue to account for major value and volume shares in the Australia ammonia market throughout the forecast period, to account for 46.2% by 2024 in terms of value and expand at a CAGR of 7.9% in terms of volume during the forecast period. Ammonium nitrate segment in the Australia ammonia market is expected to be valued at US$ 172.0 Mn by 2016 end, registering 7.3% Y-o-Y growth over 2015.Request Sample Report@On the basis of application, industrial chemicals segment is expected to maintain its dominance throughout the forecast period. Explosives segment is expected to register the second-highest CAGR of 7.5% over the forecast period, to reach value of US$ 298.2 Mn by 2024 end.Western Australia is the largest market for ammonia. The market in the region is estimated to be valued at US$ 230.7 Bn by 2016 end. The ammonia market in New South Wales is anticipated to expand at a significant CAGR of 7.2% in terms of value over the forecast period.Download and View Report TOC, Figures and Tables @Key players in the Australia ammonia market include Yara International ASA, Orica Limited, Incitec Pivot Limited, and CSBP Limited (Wesfarmers Limited). The Australia ammonia market is highly consolidated, with limited number of ammonia manufacturers and suppliers. However, major players in the market are focusing on expanding their production of ammonium nitrate to cater to demand for industrial explosives from the mining industry. Increase in ammonium nitrate production is anticipated to significantly increase demand for ammonia and nitric acid.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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Isostearyl Alcohol Market will possibly reach 19,594.4 tons by 2024

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The global isostearyl alcohol market was pegged at 14,700.0 tons in 2015 and is anticipated to increase at a CAGR of 3.2% over an eight-year forecast period to reach 19,594.4 tons by the end of 2024. Persistence Market Research in a latest report titled Global Market Study on Isostearyl Alcohol: Increasing Demand for Isostearyl Alcohol as an Ingredient in Personal care Products and Cosmetics Likely to Boost Market Growth? focuses on the growth of the global isostearyl alcohol market from 2016 to 2024 and provides useful insights into key market dynamics impacting this growth.A rising demand for isostearyl alcohol as an ingredient in personal care products and cosmetics is expected to boost growth of the isostearyl alcohol market over the forecast period. However, increasing demand for multifunctional personal care ingredients and development of natural ingredients for anti-aging skin care products are major challenges likely to affect the global isostearyl alcohol market. Isostearyl alcohol is basically derived from isostearic acid and globally, 16%18% of isostearic acid produced is captively consumed for production of isostearyl alcohol. However, isostearic acid producers are moving towards development of environmentally friendly emollients and surfactants, which could reduce the percentage of conversion of isostearyl acid into isostearyl alcohol over the forecast period. The report focuses on the key drivers and trends likely to impact the global isostearyl alcohol market over the forecast period.Isostearyl Alcohol Market Research Report Overview @The global isostearyl alcohol market is segmented on the basis of application, end use, and region. On the basis of application, the emollient and solvent segments collectively accounted for 49.5% share of global consumption of isostearyl alcohol in 2015 and are expected to exhibit CAGRs of 3.9% and 3.5% respectively over the forecast period. The glossing agent and dispersing agent segments collectively accounted for 28.0% share of global consumption of isostearic alcohol in 2015 and are expected to exhibit CAGRs of 4.4% and 3.9% respectively over the forecast period. On the basis of end use, personal care is currently the most prominent segment in this market in terms of volume while the cosmetics segment is expected to gain traction over the forecast period due to a rising demand for anti-aging products. Increasing per capita consumer expenditure on personal care and cosmetics products and a growing demand for skin care products in the Asia Pacific geography especially in China are some of the factors driving demand for anti-aging products, in turn anticipated to boost growth of the isostearyl alcohol market.Request to Sample of Report @By region, the market is segmented into Asia Pacific, Europe, North America, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa. The Europe and North America markets collectively accounted for 57.5% share of global consumption of isostearyl alcohol in 2015 and are expected to exhibit CAGRs of 3.0% and 2.5% respectively over the forecast period. Asia Pacific accounted for 22.4% share of global consumption of isostearyl alcohol in 2015 and is expected to exhibit a CAGR of 4.2% over the forecast period to account for 24.0% share by the end of 2024. Latin America accounted for 15.2% share of global consumption of isostearyl alcohol in 2015 and is expected to exhibit a CAGR of 3.7% over the forecast period to account for 15.9% share by the end of 2024.Download and View Report TOC, Figures and Tables @Croda International Plc., Oleon N.V (Avril Group), Jarchem Industries Inc., and Nissan Chemicals America Corporation are the top producers of isostearyl alcohol. While isostearic acid is the basic raw material for the production of isostearyl alcohol, most producers are shifting their production to other isostearic acid derivatives due to the monotonic properties of isostearyl alcohol as compared to other fatty alcohols.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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Presence sensing devices Market to Undertake Strapping Growth During 2017-2025

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Presence Sensing Devices Market: OverviewPresence sensing devices are one of the most important safety devices used for press brake safety. Presence sensing devices are categorized into various sensing devices such as, photoelectric Sensors, proximity sensor, motion sensor, human sensing and occupancy sensor. Photoelectric sensors works on the principle of light, light falling on curtains which uses infrared rays. Proximity sensor are used for detecting the various objects without any physical contact.Request Report for TOC @A proximity sensors emits an electromagnetic field radiation and looks for changes in the field or return signal. The motion sensor is an infrared human detection sensor, which, as opposed to factory automation sensors that are used with factory equipment, is designed to be incorporated into various devices that exist around us in daily life. Human sensing is a technology used for the sensing the people in a particular area. Occupancy sensor is a device which contains light or heat, which is being used for sensing the occupancy of a people in a space.Presence Sensing Devices Market: DynamicsOne of the most important driving factor of the presence sensing devices is machine safeguarding. Presence sensing devices are used for machine safeguarding for various operations such as, point of operation, in-running nip points, rotating parts, flying chips and sparks. Another major driving factor is electronic safety industry, presence sensing devices are manly used in detecting foreign objects by using lasers and cameras. Some challenges of presence sensing devices are such as, improper installation of machine safeguard and mechanical failure.Machine accidents can be reduce by proper installation of presence sensing devices, so this reduces the mechanical failure. Some opportunities of the presence sensing devices are such as, this devices can be used to recognize the air gestures and hover manipulations. Other opportunities is in the ground proximity warning system and in automatic faucets. There are some latest trends in the presence sensing devices are such as, passive infrared sensing devices, ultrasonic presence sensing devices, tomographic motion detector, video camera software presence sensing devices and gesture detector presence sensing devices.Presence Sensing Devices Market: Regional OverviewThe global presence sensing devices market is divided into seven regions, namely North America, Latin America, Asia Pacific excluding Japan (APEJ), Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Japan and Middle East and Africa (MEA). North America holds the major share in the global presence sensing devices market in terms of production and revenue sharing. The presence sensing devices market in electronic safety is currently dominated by the North American market. Followed by North America, Europe and Latin America are expected to grow relatively at a higher CAGR during the forecast period since the use of presence sensing devices market improves the various operations in many industries. The global presence sensing devices market in Japan is well established and expected to grow at average CAGR over the forecast period. MEA is expected to expand at sluggish growth rate due to very high population in this region.Request to Sample of Report-Presence Sensing Devices Market: Key PlayersABB LTD.Ametek, INC.Eaton CORPPLCEmerson Electric CO.Honeywell International, INC.IFM Electronic GmbhKASchmersal Gmbh & COKG.Leuze Electronic Gmbh & COKGMayser Gmbh & COKG.Mitsubishi Electric CorporationOmron CorporationPepperl+Fuchs GmbhPilz Gmbh & COKG.Rockwell Automation, INC.Schneider Electric S.A.Sense Eletronica LTDA.Sick AGSiemens AGSitema Gmbh & COKG.Wenglor Sensoric GmbhAbout 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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Market Research on Cancer Supportive Care Therapeutics Market 2017 and Analysis to 2025

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Cancer is characterized by abnormal uncontrolled proliferation of cells caused due to mutations which result in tumor formation migrating to different parts of the human body. This migration of tumor cells is termed metastasis. Cancer supportive care therapeutics comprise drugs used to prevent and treat cancer. These reduce side effects caused because of cancer treatments, thereby assisting in increasing the life expectancy of individuals. These cancer supportive care therapeutics are used to treat pain due to cancer, neutropenia, nausea caused due to chemotherapy, and bone metastasis. According to the American Society of Cancer, the total number of individuals diagnosed with cancer in the U.S. is estimated to be 15.5 million.Cancer supportive care therapeutics is an emerging trend in cancer treatment as it significantly due to rapid increases drug discovery and development process for therapeutics which are able to decrease the after-effects of complication arising during and after cancer treatment in an individual thus assisting in increasing the life expectancy of cancer patients. Increasing awareness and collaboration by leading organizations to promote cancer supportive care programs is expected to drive the market during the forecast period. For instance, in 2007, the National Palliative Care Research Center and the American Cancer Society invested in palliative care and symptom management to improve the quality of life of cancer patients and survivors. The collaboration also aimed at increasing research activity in cancer palliative care.Obtain Report Details @The European Society for Medical Oncology has proposed a set of clinical guidelines which are a set of recommendations for cancer care. These guideline address the management of anticancer therapy, febrile neutropenia, prevention of chemotherapy and radiotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting, treatment of dyspnea in advance cancer stages, oral and gastrointestinal mucosal injury, advanced care planning in palliative care, bone health, and other cancer supportive care.The global cancer supportive care therapeutics market has been segmented based on drug type, indication type, distribution channel, and region. In terms of drug type, the market has been segmented into allopurinol, rasburicase, amifostine, colony-stimulating factors, and others. Based on indication type, the market has been classified into cancer pain, chemotherapy-induced anemia, chemotherapy induced neutropenia, chemotherapy-induced nausea & vomiting, oral mucositis, and bone metastasis. In terms of distribution channel, the cancer supportive care therapeutics market has been classified into hospital pharmacies, retail pharmacies, and e-commerce.Download Report Brochure @Major drivers of the cancer supportive care therapeutics market are increasing prevalence of cancer disease, rapidly developing biopharmaceutical industry, rising academic & clinical research activity, increasing collaboration between organizations to spread awareness, changing lifestyle, advancements in the health care industry, launch of novel therapeutics, and increasing per capita income in emerging markets. Increasing growth in the biopharmaceutical industry has resulted in major advancement in cancer research and treatment.Developments in drug discovery have resulted in decreased mortality rates among cancer patients. There have been major improvements in cancer pain management; however, these improvements have been underutilized due to poor assessment by physicians and lack of adequate knowledge of newer drugs and treatment. Lack of awareness about different therapeutics used during cancer supportive care in emerging economies, high cost of treatment, rigid government regulation, and unfavorable reimbursement rates are the major restraints of the cancer supportive care therapeutics market.Geographically, the global cancer supportive care therapeutics market has been divided into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa. North America leads the cancer supportive care therapeutic market due of increasing population, rising patient pool, growing geriatric population, increasing number of screening procedures, presence of leading manufacturers, and technological advancements. North America is closely followed by Europe and Asia Pacific. Asia Pacific is an emerging market for cancer supportive care therapeutics primarily because of increasing health care expenditure in the region, rising population, and growing awareness.Key players in the global spasticity treatment market are Amgen, Inc., Bayer AG, Daiichi Sankyo Company Limited, Pfizer, Inc., F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd., Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd., Depomed, Inc., Eli Lilly and Company, and Merck & Co., Inc., among others.Pre-Book Full Report @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. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.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:Inverted Bucket Steam Trap Market to Perceive Substantial Growth During 2017-2025

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Inverted Bucket Steam Trap Market: OverviewNon-condensable as well as condensable gases can be discharged with a very little loss and consumption of the live stream with the help of a stream trap. Stream traps are like automotive valves. They modulate, close and open on their own. The inverted bucket stream traps have a bucket that is attached by a lever with the trap. The lever is responsible for sensing the buckets motion and close and open the trap valve in accordance with it. When the inverted bucket is surrounded by the condensate on the outside and air or steam flow from the bottom, the bucket becomes buoyant and rises due to the steam. In this condition, the inverted bucket forces the trap valve to close. A small at the top off the inverted bucket, known as vent hole is the place where small amount of pressure can be released.Request Report for TOC @Inverted Bucket Steam Trap Market: Drivers and RestraintsThe growth in the Inverted Bucket Stream Trap Market can be attributed to factors such as stringent policies and regulations to decrease carbon footprint led by the government and increased adoption of the inverted bucket stream traps by the end- user industries for the purpose of increasing their fuel savings. The gas and oil industry is estimated to be responsible for the growth of Inverted Bucket Steam Trap Market in the forecast period 2017 to 2022 owing to the huge investments in the gas and oil fields and also to the growing concern for energy management solutions.Increasing concerns related to the environment such as reduction in CO2 levels is likely to push the growth of the Inverted Bucket Steam Trap Market. In oil refineries, steam is a part of many applications. Some of these applications include huge reboilers that are responsible for the consumption of many tons of steam every hour and trace heating system that are responsible for maintaining the product in the correct viscosity range. Owing to its applications in the oil refineries, huge demand for the inverted bucket stream traps is likely to be generated in the oil refineries sector. However efficient the inverted bucket stream traps may be, there are energy losses in the inverted bucket steam traps as well. This factor is likely to restrain the growth of the Inverted Bucket Steam Trap Market.Request to Sample of Report-Inverted Bucket Steam Trap Market: Key PlayersSome of the major players of the Inverted Bucket Steam Trap Market are:-Watts Water Technologies, Inc. (US)CIRCOR International, Inc. (US)Velan Inc. (Canada)Emerson Electric Co. (US)The Weir Group PLC (U.K.)Flowserve Corporation (US)Thermax Limited (India)Pentair plc (US)Spirax-Sarco Engineering plc (UK)Schlumberger N.V. (US)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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Fiber Channel SAN (storage-area network) Market to Witness an Outstanding Growth by 2025

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Fiber Channel SAN is a dedicated high-speed network or sub-network that interconnects and presents shared pools of storage devices to multiple servers. Fiber channel SAN uses fiber cables, compatible switches, and host hub adapters to connect servers and storage arrays.Request Report for TOC @Fiber channel SAN provides a high-speed serial interface that merges features of data storage and data networking technologies. Fiber channel SAN offers a new interface that combines aspects of both SCSI and Ethernet. Fiber channel SAN offers new solutions to many of the inherent limitations of these prior standards. Fiber channel SAN interface was designed for a high-performance, reliable, low-latency, scalable network optimized for server-to-storage and server-to-server connections. Fabrics and management software providers work together with solution providers to create entire solutions. Fiber Channel SAN supports most demanding workloads.Fiber Channel SAN market: Drivers and Challenges:Fiber channel SAN enables faster flash, high-density virtualization, and advanced analytics for SMB, enterprises. Fiber channel SAN guarantees in-order delivery of data frames with flow control. Fiber channel SAN allows hardware-managed error detection for reduced network overhead. Fiber Channel SAN provides one gigabit per second speeds and allows variable media types, multiple protocols, and different interconnection topologies.Migration of data to the newly deployed, high performance disk storage system without interrupting the clients critical applications is one of the challenges for Fiber channel SAN. Data replication over storage area networks is other challenge for Fiber Channel SAN. Complex system structure, lack of integration with legacy systems also the challenges fiber channel SAN market.Fiber Channel SAN market: Regional OutlookOn regional basis, fiber channel SAN market can be segmented into North America, Latin America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia Pacific excluding Japan, Japan, and Middle East and Africa.North America and Western Europe fiber channel SAN market is predominantly mature as compared to the other regional market as they are fast in the adoption of technology. Fiber channel SAN market in Asia Pacific excluding Japan and Japan are expected to possess maximum potential in the forecast period. Fiber channel SAN market in Latin America and Middle East and Africa are also projected to witness growth during the forecast period.Request to Sample of Report-Fiber Channel SAN market: competition landscapeKey Vendors for Fiber Channel SAN market include, International Business Machines Corporation, Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP, Dell Inc., NetApp Inc., Hitachi Data Systems Corporation, Oracle Corporation, Cisco Systems, Inc., Nexsan, Inc.,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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Report Explores the Hidradenitis Suppurativa Market Latest Trends and Insights by 2025

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Hidradenitis suppurativa is a dermatological disease that affects areas of apocrine sweat glands such as buttocks, area under the breast, under the arms, inner the thighs. It is also known as acne inversa. The disease is characterized by development of follicular occlusions that lead to progressive scarring. Early symptoms of hidradenitis suppurativa include erythema and local hidradenitis, which become painful in later stages. Hidradenitis suppurativa arises as a result of hormonal imbalance, friction from clothing, and sweating.According to an article published in Current Dermatology Reports in 2014; smoking, obesity, and genetic factors are also responsible for causing the disease. The disease is more prevalent in women as compared to men, with a ratio of 3:1. Globally, the disease affects around 1% of the population. The disease is uncommon but not rare. It can occur at any age, but it is most common at the age of 2030 years.Based on treatment, the global hidradenitis suppurativa market has been segmented into medications, laser treatment, surgery, and others. The medications segment has been sub-segmented into biologics, antibiotics, hormonal therapy, immunosuppressive drugs, zinc supplements, retinoids, pain medication, and others. Currently, only one FDA-approved therapeutic drug i.e. adalimumab (Humira) is available for treatment of hidradenitis suppurativa. Several antibiotics, hormone therapy, and corticosteroids are prescribed off-label. Treatment of hidradenitis suppurativa still remains a challenge for scientists worldwide.Obtain Report Details @Surgical removal is also a preferred mode of treatment, but the disease may relapse in other areas. Research to develop drugs for the treatment of hidradenitis suppurativa is currently in progress. As of 2017, certain drugs are under clinical development such as brilacidin, CJM 112, and xilonix. Increase in the incidence of chronic inflammatory skin diseases, the large number of ongoing clinical trials, and introduction to new treatment options are factors likely to boost the hidradenitis suppurativa market during the forecast period.However, a weak pipeline has questioned growth of the market for hidradenitis suppurativa, as most of these trials are in phase II, indicating lesser chances of approval. This factor is projected to restrain the hidradenitis suppurativa market in the near future. In addition, high cost of therapy and associated side-effects are estimated to restrain the hidradenitis suppurativa market during the forecast period.Based on skin conditions, the hidradenitis suppurativa market has been divided into pimples, boils, deep-acne, folliculitis, and others. The folliculitis segment has been sub-segmented into hot tub folliculitis (pseudomonas folliculitis), bacterial folliculitis, pityrosporum folliculitis, barber's itch (pseudofolliculitis barbae), and others. The deep-acne segment has been further divided into blackheads, cysts, and others. The boils segment has been sub-divided into pilondial cyst, carbuncle, cystic acne, and others.Download Report Brochure @In terms of geography, the global hidradenitis suppurativa market has been segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa. North America leads the global hidradenitis suppurativa market, followed by Europe. Growth of the market in North America is attributable to increase in the number of inflammatory skin conditions and the large number of ongoing clinical trials. Asia Pacific is an emerging market for hidradenitis suppurativa, due to increase in the prevalence of hidradenitis suppurativa in this region.Developing health care infrastructure and rising government expenditure on the health care industry are factors projected to boost the hidradenitis suppurativa market in Asia Pacific during the forecast period. However, factors such as low awareness among patients, high cost of therapy, and limited access to health care facilities restrain the hidradenitis suppurativa market in regions such as Middle East & Africa and Latin America.Major players operating in the global hidradenitis suppurativa market include AbbVie Inc., AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, Merck & Co., Inc., Allergan, Pfizer Inc., and GlaxoSmithKline plc.Pre-Book Full Report @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. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.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:Trends in Western Blotting Market Detailed in New Research Report

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MWestern blotting is a technique that is specifically used for protein analysis. The western blotting technique initiates with separation of molecules using gel electrophoresis. At the end of electrophoresis the separated molecules are transferred to a second matrix which commonly includes polyvinylidene difluoride (PVDF) or nitrocellulose membrane. Then, to prevent any nonspecific binding of antibodies to the surface of the membrane it is blocked with a specific mechanism.As a probe was combined with an enzyme-labeled antibody an appropriate substrate is then added to the enzyme which together produces detectable product such as chromogenic precipitate on the membrane for colorimetric detection. There are two types of western blotting procedures direct and in direct detection methods. The various advantages associate with direct method are rapid effect due to presence of one antibody, and primary antibodies. The disadvantages of direct detection method consist of reduced immunoreactivity of primary antibody labeled primary antibody, expensive, low flexibility in choice of primary antibody label and minimal signal amplification.Obtain Report Details @Moreover, indirect detection method has advantages such as secondary antibody amplifying signal, variety of labeled secondary antibodies, and primary antibody immunoreactivity remain unaffected by labeling. The various disorders related with indirect detection are non-specific staining produced by secondary antibodies and a time consuming process due to presence of additional steps.The western blotting market can be segmented on the basis of type of instrument such as manual, semi-automated and automated instruments. The consumables that are used in western blotting are also part of this market; western blotting kits, western blotting reagents and others. The western blotting reagents can be further sub-segmented as fluorescent reagents, chemifluorescent reagents, radioisotopic, reagents, chemiluminescent reagents, and chromogenic reagents.The other western blotting consumables are western blotting membranes, blotting papers and molecular weight markers. The western blotting market can be also segmented on the basis of its applications such as biomedical research, agriculture, disease diagnosis, and biochemical research. The diseases that are mainly diagnosed with the help of western blotting technique are human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), LYME disease, bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV), Hepatitis B virus (HBV) and herpes simplex virus (HSV).Download Report Brochure @North America was observed to be the largest market for western blotting market. High awareness, escalating prevalence of diseases and introduction of advanced diagnostic technologies are the major factors driving the growth of this market. In 2010, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an estimated 1,148,200 persons aged 13 years and above were diagnosed with HIV infection in the United States, including 207,600 (18.1%) persons whose infections had not been diagnosed.Europe was observed to be the second largest market and one of the leading research destinations for diagnostics and treatment for BSE and HIV diseases. According to UNAIDS estimates, around 2.3 million people were diagnosed with HIV in the European region at the end of 2010. Estimated adult HIV prevalence varies from 0.2% in parts of Central Europe to 1% in parts of Eastern Europe. Asia-Pacific and Rest of the World were observed to be the most potential markets for western blotting market.These regions are developing their infrastructure and medical emergency processes which increase the demand for disease diagnostics techniques. The future growth in these geographical regions is expected due to increase in the diagnosed patients especially from the emerging economies such as India, Brazil, China, and other countries.Pre-Book Full Report @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. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.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:TV White Space Technology Market Set to Surge Significantly During 2017-2025

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TV White Space Technology Market: OverviewTV white space technology is also known as Super Wi-Fi.'The rapid increase in the Internet based users is resulting in the rise in the demand for the TV White space technology globally. The rural area based people are still not able to use the internet at their locations. This technology is providing access to them to the high-speed internet speeds.Request Report for TOC @The TV White Space Technology deployment is increasing rapidly in developed as well as developing countries as the wastage of the TV spectrum is amazingly utilized for generating the internet connections out of it at very remoter locations. The popularity of the TV white space technology is increasing rapidly from the past decade as the unused TV channels called as buffers' are effectively and efficiently used for the transfer of the Wi-Fi on the locations which are very far from the operating locations.Global TV White Space Technology Market Drivers & RestraintsThe TV white space technology market is expected to witness significant growth in terms of demand in the forecast period because of the features and benefits of the TV white space technology over traditional WI-Fi such asTV White Space technology can cover an area of about 10 km in diameter (100 times the distance whereas traditional Wi-Fi routers has around 100 metersTV white space technology can penetrate obstacles such as buildings, trees, and rough surfaces as well whereas traditional Wi-Fi gets blocked by any environmental barriersOn the other hand, significant technical challenges are faced while implementing the TV whitespace technology. This is the major factor for the growth of the global TV white space technology.Global TV White Space Technology Market: Regional OutlookThe global market for TV whitespace technology is divided regionally into North America, Latin America, Eastern Europe, Western Europe, Asia-Pacific excluding Japan, Japan, and Middle East and Africa. Among these regions, the North America region dominates the market for TV whitespace technology as the highest demand for the fastest internet connections as well as the availability of disposable income in the rural area customers. Also, Latin America, Europe, and Japan follow North America in terms of demand for the TV whitespace technology. APEJ region is expected to show highest growth rate in the presence of a large number of mobile users in countries such as India and China. On the other hand, MEA is expected to show moderate growth rate for TV whitespace technology demand.Request to Sample of Report-Global TV White Space Technology Competitive LandscapeSome of the prominent players in the TV White Space Technology market includeMetric Systems Corp.Microsoft Corp.ATDI S.ACarlson Wireless Technologies, Inc.Aviacomm Inc.Adaptrum, Inc.MELD Technology Inc.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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:3-Hexenyl Salicylate Market show exponential growth by 2025

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A new research report by Transparency Market Research offers a comprehensive evaluation of the global 3-Hexenyl Salicylate Market. The study, titled 3-Hexenyl Salicylate Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2017 - 2025, is available for sale on the firms website.3-hexenyl salicylate is an odorant occurring in a colorless liquid form which is widely used as a perfuming, flavoring, and fragrance agent in the personal care, cosmetics, and toiletries industries. It is well-known for its fresh and sweet floral aroma, which is also termed as green, metallic, and herbal balsam. While the ingredient is naturally available, it can also be synthesized and is the ester derivative of benzoic acid. Its CAS Number is 65405-77-8 and molecular formula C13H16O3.View Report Preview:Salient properties of 3-hexenyl salicylate include its high boiling point and density which allow it to stay stable in normal environments & temperatures and its long-lasting floral fragrance, which make it a highly desirable ingredient in various products apart from perfumes. These include emollients and skin cleaning agents such as antiperspirants or deodorants, creams & lotions, talcum powders, tablet & liquid soaps, shampoos, hair conditioners, bath & shower gels, liquid detergents, fabric softeners, and incense & pot pourri, among others. It also helps that the product is insoluble in water and soluble in alcohol. Different products comprise a different mix of 3-hexenyl salicylate, and as such, the ingredient can be classified by its average percentage used in products which differs from a minimum of around 0.12% to an average of around 1.2% and a maximum of 12%.There are no major disadvantages associated with 3-hexenyl salicylate, which points to a bright financial outlook. However, the product can cause skin, eye, and respiratory irritation, especially in people with skin allergies or extra-sensitive skin. This is apart from the product being designated hazardous to aquatic environment and life. There are also a few substitutes available in the market, especially some with a lower odor threshold value such as 3-hexenyl benzoate. However, these do not present a major threat in the foreseeable future. 3-hexenyl salicylate is an established and popular flavor with well-known properties, which is expected to help its global market remain stable in the next few years and expand at a rate corresponding to the personal care, cosmetics, and toiletries sectors. On a global level, these are expected to expand at an average rate of 5% per annum. Accordingly, 3-hexenyl salicylate can be classified by these end-user industries.In terms of ingredient availability, suppliers of 3-hexenyl salicylate are spread across the world with no particular region having an upper hand. But the future demand for its end-products like perfumes, creams and shampoos etc. is likely to increase at a higher rate in developing countries in Asia Pacific and Latin America over traditional markets in developed countries in Europe and North America. This change is a direct result of the sluggish population and income growth in developed countries, compared to the higher disposable incomes now witnessed in developing ones. In the meantime, the Middle East & Africa will continue to be a slow but stable market. The global 3-hexenyl salicylate market is distributed by region over Asia Pacific, Latin America, Europe, North America, and Middle East & Africa.Among the suppliers, some of the better-known companies include Germany-based A.C.S. International and abcr GmbH, U.S.-based Advanced Biotech, Apiscent Labs, Bedoukian Research, Berje, Sigma-Aldrich, and Parchem, Europes Azelis, French Charabot and PCW France, U.K.-based SRS Aromatics, India-based Biosynth, and China-based Shanghai Ruizheng Chemical Technology Co. Ltd., Simagchem Corp., and Shanghai Hungsun Chemical Co. Ltd.Request to view Sample Report:The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions. By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.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 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.Contact UsTransparency Market Research90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA  Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Bacillus Thuringiensis Market to Register Substantial Expansion by 2024

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A new research report by Transparency Market Research offers a comprehensive evaluation of the global Bacillus Thuringiensis Market. The study, titled Bacillus Thuringiensis Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024, is available for sale on the firms website.Bacillus Thuringiensis (BT) belongs to the category of bacteria which can be used in numerous chemicals compounds, commonly as pesticides. In microbiological terms, BT is an anaerobic bacterium which inhabits water plants or soil surfaces. It is frequently employed as a suppressor of insects which contribute to the degradation of the quality as well as quantity of plant production. Several other bacteria such as B. spharicus and B. poppilae can be used as well, but their insecticidal activity is comparatively low. BT chiefly controls moths, mosquito larvae, and butterflies and has been accepted by farmers worldwide due to its ecofriendly nature and ability to obstruct the presence of a wide variety of pests. It is extensively used in bio-pesticides across the globe and these products represent 1% of the global market for agrochemicals including herbicides, fungicides, and insecticides. BT products are available in powder form which contains a mixture of toxin crystals and dried spores.View Report Preview:They aid crop growth by reducing harmful toxins and providing stability to the soil by fighting the root diseases. BT contains nine different types of toxins, among which delta endotoxin is majorly studied for bio-pesticide applications. These are either applied on the plant leaves or mixed with the soil to inhibit the growth of pests. Based on crop, the market has been segregated into cereals, fruits, vegetables, oils, and other types. In terms of the target pests covered, the market is divided into the following categories: arthropods and microorganisms.BT holds a significant share in the global bio-pesticide market and is anticipated to expand at a promising pace owing to the increasing need to consume contamination-free food. Pests do not only hamper the production quantity but also degrade the quality of crops. To counter these adverse effects, farmers use chemical-based agents to suppress their presence. However, the usage and subsequent consumption of toxic chemicals impacts human health and worsens the quality of soil. Due to this, the market is shifting toward eco-friendly and non-toxic bio-pesticides, in turn driving the market for BT-based products. The arthropods segment constitutes a substantial share in the market on account of the effectiveness of BT products against arthropods in comparison to microorganisms. Other factors propelling this market over the forecast period include the easy availability of BT products and their environment-friendliness. Moreover, BT is required in small quantities to suppress pests, leading to limited exposure. Additionally, it decomposes faster which leaves negligible amounts of residue. All these factors boost the usage of BT products, propelling this market over the next few years.Geographically, North America accounted for a promising share in the market in 2015 which is anticipated to rise over the forecast period owing to the wide acceptance of these products among farmers in this region and efforts taken by government to promote their usage. The market in Europe ranks second in terms of dominance, due to the presence of prominent manufacturers in the region. France, Italy, and Spain have emerged as key countries where BT is widely accepted whereas Germany is an important testing market for new products. The market in Asia Pacific is anticipated to witness significant growth as a result of the escalating population coupled with increasing health consciousness among consumers here.Request to view Sample Report:Key players operating in the BT market include Molecraft., Zhejiang Rayfull Chemicals Co. Ltd., STAR BIO SCIENCE, Varsha Bioscience, and Technology India Pvt Ltd.The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions. By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.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 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.Contact UsTransparency Market Research90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA  Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Calcium Lactate Market Plan, Supply and Revenue to 2024

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A new research report by Transparency Market Research offers a comprehensive evaluation of the global Calcium Lactate Market. The study, titled Calcium Lactate Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024, is available for sale on the firms website.Calcium lactate is a black or white crystalline salt of calcium, which is also known as Calcium 2-hydroxipropanoate. Calcium carbonate and lactic acid are the raw materials used for the manufacturing calcium lactate. Lactic acid displaces carbonate group from calcium carbonate hence procuring calcium lactate. Calcium is an important constituent of the human body, and is also the building material for bones and teeth. Calcium is required for the proper functioning of nerves, muscles and bones. In case of calcium deficiency, the body draws calcium from the bones hence weakening the bones. Hence maintaining appropriate calcium level in the body is of utmost importance. Calcium lactate is used as a calcium supplement and is used to treat and prevent calcium deficiency.View Report Preview:Food & beverages is the major end user industry of calcium lactate. Calcium lactate, the calcium supplement, is used as food additives. Cheese contains calcium lactate; the ageing variety of cheese is high in calcium lactate concentration. In cheese crystals, calcium lactate is present in the outer layer, along with other chemicals such as tyrocine and leucine. Calcium lactate is also present in baking power. Baking power is a leavening agent which is widely used in the food & beverage industry. Calcium lactate, present in baking powder, enhances the texture and volume of the baked goods. Calcium lactate is also added in small quantities in chewing gums, personal care products such as mouth washes and sugar free foods. Calcium lactate helps to maintain the calcium content of teeth in these products.Calcium lactate is widely used in fruit preservatives as it keeps the fruit firm and fresh for a longer period. Pharmaceutical industry accounts for second largest demand for calcium lactate, where calcium lactate is a commonly used antacid. Presence of calcium, which is an alkaline metal, enhances neutralizes stomach acidity. Antacids are the most commonly used un-prescribed medicines owing to their effective results and low side effects. Calcium lactate is effective over a range of pH owing to which it is preferred as an antacid along with calcium carbonate, calcium bicarbonate and calcium hydroxide. Since calcium lactate can be absorbed in the body at various pH levels, it has medium bioavailability in the human body. Calcium lactate is widely used as a raw material for the preparation of calcium supplement drugs, which is used for the treatment of calcium deficiency. Calcium lactate drugs also help in nerve conduction and muscle contraction.The market for calcium lactate is growing substantially owing to the fast growing pharmaceutical market. Global pharmaceutical industry, the major end user of calcium lactate after food & beverages, is valued more than US$ 900 Bn. Asia Pacific accounts for the largest as well as the fastest growing market for calcium lactate.. Emerging countries in Asia Pacific such as China and India are some of the largest consumers of calcium lactate. The pharmaceutical industry in these economies is developing steadily due to which these two countries are the largest exporters of calcium lactate. Growing food processing industry in South Asian countries such as Indonesia, Myanmar and Taiwan is also driving the demand for calcium lactate.North America accounts for the second largest market for calcium lactate owing to the well organized pharmaceutical industry and presence of international drug manufacturers such as Pfizer and Johnson & Johnsons. U.S. is the largest market for calcium lactate in the world. Despite the economic slowdown in Europe the demand for calcium lactate is increasing. The enhancing demand for calcium lactate in Europe is primarily because of the presence of pharmaceutical product manufacturing nations such as Belgium, Germany, and Italy. Moreover the increase in the consumption of fast food is increasing the calcium deficiency among people which in turn is driving the global demand for calcium supplements such as calcium lactate. The demand for calcium lactate is considerable slow in Rest of the World due to the absence of pharmaceutical product manufactures. However the demand for this product is anticipated to increase owing to the development of food processing industry in the Latin American and Middle Eastern Countries.Request to view Sample Report:Alfa Chemical Corporation, Wego Chemicals & Minerals Corp., Haviland Enterprises, Inc. and Action Labs Inc. are some of the manufacturers of calcium lactate.The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions. By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.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 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.Contact UsTransparency Market Research90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA  Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Coconut Alcohol Market Analysis, Segments, Growth and Value Chain -2024

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A new research report by Transparency Market Research offers a comprehensive evaluation of the global Coconut Alcohol Market. The study, titled Coconut Alcohol Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024, is available for sale on the firms website.Coconut Alcohol Market: OverviewThe coconut tree, also known as tree of life, is a perennial food supplier, as the tree provides fruit throughout the year. The coconut fruit is edible at any stage of its development. It provides not only solid food but also a large amount of safe and healthy water. The fruit is the source of several products such as coconut milk/cream, desiccated coconut, coconut chips, nata de coco, coconut oil, and copra. Apart from these, the unopened inflorescence of coconut can produce coconut sap or toddy, which can be processed into high-value and nutritious food products. Coconut sap (toddy) is sweet exudate from the tapped unopened spathe or inflorescence of coconut. It is one of the highly used food products of coconut. It is marketed as an alcoholic drink (4%6% alcohol) too.View Report Preview:Fermented beverages exclusively produced from coconut water and a blend of black grape juice with coconut water exhibit characters of wine. They can be classified under wine beverages and termed as coconut water wine and blend of grape juice and coconut water wine. Wines from both the sources (exclusively produced from coconut water and a blend of black grape juice with coconut water) are suitable for human consumption. Vinegar obtained from both these fermented beverages can be effectively used in different food and industrial applications.Coconut Alcohol Market: Dynamics and TrendsProduction of alcoholic beverage exclusively with coconut water is carried out after collection and filtration of coconut water. Using hand refractometer, sugar concentration is determined as brix Total Soluble Sugars (TSS %). The final sugar concentration is adjusted to 15 brix by using sucrose. Then, the coconut water is subjected to pasteurization.Coconut water fermented (with Lactobacillus sp.) products are readily available in the market, but they are non-alcoholic. On the other hand, coconut water fermented alcoholic beverages are produced purely with the help of yeast. They are at a nascent stage of commercialization. Ethanol content is one of the major parameters for classifying the fermented coconut alcoholic beverages into different types. The coconut taken for fermentation and having 15% of sugar produces ethanol content close to 8%.Coconut Alcohol Market: SegmentationThe coconut alcohol market can be segmented by type (beer, wine, vinegar, traditional toddy, and others) and by region (North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Middle East & Africa).Coconut Alcohol Market: Region-wise OutlookAsia Pacific and Latin America are the leading markets for coconut alcohol. Government targets, policy support incentives such as feed-in tariffs, tenders and competitive bidding for coconut farming in the coastal areas in the two regions are factors likely to drive the coconut alcohol market in APAC and Latin America in the next few years.Request to view Sample Report:Coconut Alcohol Market: Key PlayersKey players operating in the global coconut alcohol market include Hunter Distilleries, Island Distillers, St. Lucis Distillers Group of Companies, and Demirara Distilleries Ltd.The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions. By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.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 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.Contact UsTransparency Market Research90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA  Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Picture Archiving And Communication System Market to expand at a CAGR of 6.2% by 2026

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Persistence Market Research delivers in-depth research on the global PACS market in its latest report titled Global Market Study on Picture Archiving and Communication System (PACS): North America Likely to Remain Dominant Regional Market?. According to the report, the global PACS market is projected to expand at a healthy CAGR of 6.2% during the forecast period in terms of revenue.A PACS is a fully integrated system which is used for the data storage, distribution and analysis of medical images by doctors or by any other medical officials. PACS is termed as a picture archiving and communication system which is a combination of hardware, software, image modalities, and archiving that is used for data or image capturing, storing, distributing and then presenting these medical images. A picture archiving and communication system comprises of four key components including the imaging modalities such as MRI and CT, a secure network to transfer patient data, PACSs for interpreting and reviewing images, and long term and short term archives to retrieve and store reports and images.Picture Archiving And Communication System Market Research Report Overview @Demand for cloud-based PACS which are increasingly used in wide range of healthcare end-users such as hospitals, diagnostic centers, imaging centers, clinics, and many others is increasing significantly. PACS solutions are gaining traction due to an immediate reduction in the cost of archiving and storage for the clinics, hospitals, or imaging centers. This is expected to bolster the global PACS market. Recently, healthcare and hospitals providers are moving towards an e cloud-based system due to low cost and flexibility in technology adoption as compared to traditional PACS. Thus, increasing uses and applications of PACS are anticipated to increase the revenue growth of the global PACS market during the forecast period.However, declining penetration rate of PACS, its high installation and operating cost, complexity of PACS technology and a lack of harmonization are the restraints hampering the growth of the global PACS market.Request Sample Report@The global PACS market is segmented on the basis of deployment, components, business mode, end-use, and region. By deployment, PACS market is segmented into web-based PACS, cloud-based PACS and on-premise. Moreover, by components market is categorized into imaging modalities, secured network, and workstation and archives. On the basis of business mode, PACS market is fragmented into enterprise and departmental. Further PACS market end-users are hospitals, clinic imaging, dental practices, imaging centers, diagnostic centers, research & academic institutes, ambulatory surgical centers, and others. Key regions covered in the report are North America, Western Europe, Asia-Pacific excluding Japan, Eastern Europe, Middle East & Africa, Latin America and Japan.Download and View Report TOC, Figures and Tables @The report analyzes the global PACS market in terms of value (US$ Mn) by deployment, components, business mode, end-use, and region; and provides insightful information regarding the value chain, market trends, competitive landscape, market dynamics and market estimations and forecast.On the basis of regions, North America is estimated to be the largest market for PACS, accounting for 31.1% value share of the global PACS market in 2016. The region continues to dominate the market presently and is expected to continue to do so throughout the forecast period. On the basis of deployment, cloud-based PACS segments are projected to exhibit CAGR of 7.1%, respectively, in terms of market value during the forecast period. This is attributed to increasing usage of PACS in wide range of end-user application.The markets in APEJ, Western Europe, MEA and Latin America are anticipated to contribute majorly to the global PACS market. The market in APEJ is expected to account for 18.4% share in terms of value in the global PACS market and be valued at US$ 674.9 Mn by 2026 end. The increasing demand for PACS from the hospitals, diagnostic centers, and Imaging centers in Western Europe, especially in EU5 is expected to fuel revenue growth of the market in the region. The market in Western Europe is estimated to be valued at US$ 790.7 Mn by 2026 end and projected to register a CAGR of 6.0% during the forecast period.Factors such as increasing demand for increasing use of diagnostic imaging, growing healthcare IT adoption, and increasing adoption of cloud-based PACS is set to drive revenue growth of the global PACS market.Key market participants covered in this report include GE Healthcare, Koninklijke Philips N.V.-(Philips Healthcare), Carestream Health, Agfa-Gevaert Group, FUJIFILM Medical Systems, INFINITT Healthcare Co. Ltd., Siemens Healthineers, Merge Healthcare Solutions Inc. (an IBM company), Sectra AB, and Mckesson Corp.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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Pyridine Market Going to Touch at Value of US$ 1,741.4 Mn by 2025

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According to a new market report published by Persistence Market Research, titled Global Market Study on Pyridine: Increasing Demand for Synthetic Pyridine to Drive Growth During Forecast Period 2015 -2025 , the global pyridine market is estimated to reach US$ 1,741.4 Mn by 2025 from US$ 786.4 Mn in 2015.Pyridine is a toxic and soluble flammable liquid base with a distinct, strong odor. It is often considered the parent compound of several naturally occurring organic compounds. It is the preferred choice as a precursor to agrochemicals and pharmaceuticals. Initially, pyridine was extracted from coal tar or obtained as a by-product of coal gasification. The process was very expensive and inefficient as coal tar constituted only 0.10.2% of pyridine after extraction. Currently, pyridine and its derivatives are produced synthetically. The most commonly used reactions for pyridine synthesis are Chichibabin synthesis, Bonnemann cyclization, and Cobalt-catalyzed alkyne-nitrile cyclotrimerization, etc.Pyridine Market Research Report Overview @By region, the market in Asia Pacific has been estimated to account for 51.6% volume share of the overall pyridine market by 2015 end, followed by Europe and North America. Due to increase in usage of pyridine and its derivatives in agrochemicals and pharmaceuticals segments in Asia Pacific, the pyridine market in the region is projected to expand at a higher than average CAGR of 9.9% over 20152025 in terms of revenue. The U.S. pyridine market, which has been estimated to account for 89.5% revenue share of the overall market in North America by 2015 end, is expected to be driven by increasing adoption of pyridine and its derivatives in chemicals and pharmaceuticals segments. The pyridine market in the Middle East & Africa is estimated to register increased revenue due to a growth of pharmaceuticals and chemicals segments in the region. Europe market is anticipated to witness lower revenue growth in the coming years as compared to other regions due to the economic downturn in the region.Request to Sample of Report @Globally, pyridine N-oxide segment volume is estimated to expand at a lower than average CAGR of 7.4% over 20152025. Demand for 2-Methyl-5-Ethylpyridine (MEP) and gamma-picoline is expected grow significantly due to increasing application of these product types in chemicals segment. Alpha picoline finds wide application as a solvent in chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and food industries. The segment is projected to exhibit moderate growth over the forecast period. Key growth contributor for alpha picoline segment is 2-vinylpyridine, which is used as a raw material for styrene-butadiene-2-vinylpyridine terpolymer latexes (SBV latexes). Beta picoline is used to produce Vitamin B3. In terms of value, beta picoline segment is projected to experience significant growth rate over the forecast period. This is mainly attributed to rising demand for niacin in developing regions such as APAC and Middle East & Africa.Download and View Report TOC, Figures and Tables @Asia Pacific is the most attractive region in terms of CAGR and market share in the global pyridine market. India has been estimated to account for 24.4 % of the total APAC pyridine market by 2015 end due to expected increase in domestic pyridine production by 40%. In terms of value, gamma-picoline segment is expected to experience the highest growth rate during the forecast period in the Asia Pacific market. The Middle East & Africa accounts for the smallest market share. However, it is expected to expand at a CAGR of 9.9% in terms of value over the forecast period. Food segment is expected to expand at the highest CAGR in terms of volume during the forecast period in the Middle East & Africa market. Pyridine manufacturers are strengthening their presence in the regulated markets of Japan, North America and Europe as well as in key emerging markets. They are also focusing on local tie-ups and out-licensing of local companies in order to strengthen their regional presence.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.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA  Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb:Research Report and Overview on Transfusion Diagnostics Market, 2016 - 2024

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Blood transfusion is a process of receiving blood products or blood into the circulatory system intravenously. Blood transfusion is used in different medical conditions for replacement of lost component in the blood. Earlier blood transfusion included whole blood; however, modern medical methods can use only a component of blood for transfusion. Blood transfusion is among the most common procedures used for patients in hospitals. Hence, it becomes imperative that clinicians have knowledge about the appropriate administration of blood products, along with the symptoms, signs, and transfusion reaction management. Different blood products that can be transfused in the human body are red blood cells, platelets, plasma, albumin, and immunoglobulin preparations.The blood transfusion process is as follows: blood sample is taken and sent to hospital laboratory where tests are performed to ensure that the donor blood is compatible with patient's blood. This process is called cross-matching. Risks associated with blood transfusion are viral infections, allergic reactions, fever, hemolytic reactions, and iron overload. Everything possible should be done to reduce these risks during blood transfusion. Hence, before blood transfusion, several steps are taken to ensure the quality of blood products, compatibility, and safety to the recipient. A definite diagnosis is required for both the donor and recipient blood.Obtain Report Details @Red blood cells are the most common blood products to be transfused. One of the transfusion diagnostics incudes molecular blood group diagnostics. Molecular blood group diagnostic enables safer blood preservation and on-demand supply for patients who have antibodies against clinically relevant, rare or weak antigens. Blood group serology is another blood transfusion diagnostic used to avoid side effects caused due to administration of incorrect blood preservatives or immunizations.Based on type, the transfusion diagnostics market can be segmented into instruments, reagents and others. In terms of application, the market can be segmented into blood grouping, disease screening, and others. Based on distribution channel, the market can be segmented into hospitals, laboratories, blood banks, plasma fractionation facilities, military blood banks, and others. Blood banks and hospitals are the major segments of the transfusion diagnostics market.Increasing prevalence of diseases which require complete blood transfusion is one of the major drivers of the transfusion diagnostics market. Rising number of accidents due to road rash or other reasons which lead to blood loss is also likely to propel the market. Another factor driving the transfusion diagnostics market is the rising emergency situations for blood transfusions during surgical blood loss. Rising number of diseases due to improper blood transfusion without diagnosis of blood also fuels the growth of the transfusion diagnostics market. Alternative treatments and better techniques for blood transfusion are the major restraints of the transfusion diagnostics market. More advanced, efficient, and reliable transfusion diagnostic techniques are expected to create significant opportunities in the market.Download Report Brochure @Geographically, the transfusion diagnostics market can be segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa. North America accounted for the largest share of the blood transfusion diagnostics market owing to increasing health care awareness and technological advancement in the region. Europe is the second largest market for blood transfusion diagnostics due to large geriatric population in the region. Asia Pacific is the fastest growing market for blood transfusion diagnostics due to increasing adoption of improved health care technologies, emerging health care infrastructure, and rising accidents, diseases, and other emergency situations which require blood transfusion.Major players in the blood transfusion diagnostics market include Ortho Clinical Diagnostics, Beckman Coulter, Quotient Limited, Novartis AG, Abbott Diagnostics, Diagast, Becton, Dickinson and Company, Immucor, Inc., BAG Health Care, DiaSorin, Fujirebio Diagnostics, Inc., Grifols, S.A., Hologic/Gen-Probe, Biokit, Bio-Rad Laboratories, and Quidel Corporation.Pre-Book Full Report @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. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.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:Blood Processing Devices and Consumables Market is Expected to Expand at an 8.90% CAGR from 2013 to 2019

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Normal blood supply can be affected by infectious illnesses such as hepatitis and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Over the past few years, there has been an increase in complex surgeries such as orthopedic surgeries and open heart surgeries. A rise in infections being transmitted via blood donation is a point of concern for the global blood industry. However, manufacturers are engaged in developing advanced products to collect, store, process, and deliver blood components for surgeries. This is expected to benefit the global blood processing devices and consumables market in the near future.Report Overview @The global blood processing devices and consumables market is segmented on the basis of region, device, and consumables. By consumables, the global blood processing devices and consumables market is classified into blood filters, blood administration sets, blood lancets, vials, test tube racks, microscopic slides, slide strainers, coagulation reagents, and blood grouping reagents.Blood bank refrigerators, blood bank freezers, blood warmers, blood grouping analyzers, blood cell processers, and hematocrit centrifuges are some of the popularly used blood processing devices. The growing demand for innovative blood processing devices is expected to propel the global blood processing devices and consumables market in the years to come.Request for Sample Copy of Report @The global blood processing devices and consumables market is geographically distributed into Europe, Asia Pacific, North America, and Rest of the World regions. At present, the global blood processing devices and consumables market is dominated by North America, followed by Asia Pacific. The development of economies and favorable reimbursement policies are expected to help North America to maintain its dominance in the years to come. Going forward, Asia Pacific is predicted to display attractive growth opportunities due to the increasing population base.Nowadays, governments of many nations are taking extra efforts to spend more money towards research and development of new drugs and medical devices. This is creating an impact on the growth of the global blood processing devices and consumables market.Purchase this Report @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.Each TMR syndicated research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With wider scope and stratified research methodology, TMRs syndicated reports strive to provide clients to serve their overall research requirementUS Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Medical Tourism Market Size to Reach $160.8 Billion by 2025 | CAGR: 14.9%

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Global Medical Tourism Market: SnapshotMedical tourism is also defined as the travel of patients from their home country to different destinations for the purpose of medical treatment. These medical services could be sophisticated treatments such as Cosmetology, Dentistry, Cardiology, Orthopedic surgery, Neurology, Oncology or even routine health check-ups. The medical tourism industry is emerging due to rise in healthcare expenditure in developed countries coupled with the availability of cost effective treatments in developing countries. The high cost of treatment in developed countries is seen as a prime reason for the migration of patients to other destinations.Request Sample Copy of the Report @Medical tourism market is now targeted by many countries hospitals and governments worldwide for further growth and investment. Asia Pacific provides the best medical tourism market development and promotion example on a regional scale. Government tourism agency also working to increase medical tourism market where it is not yet established. As per OECD estimates, 50 million medical tourists travel worldwide annually. In 2016, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS), stated that there were 17.1 million cosmetology procedures were in the U.S. alone. The International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (ISAPS) published that 9 percent surgical and non-surgical cosmetic procedures were increase worldwide over the last year. Approximately 23,626,909 cosmetic procedure were accounted in 2016 out of which 39 percent rise in labiaplasty.Low cost medical treatment demand and rise in compliance to international quality standards drive medical tourism market worldwide. Rise in health care costs in most of the developed countries is putting significant pressure on both health care providers and individuals. Health care access in several countries is regulated by government health care system and mired with delays and long waiting lists. According to the 2004 estimates of Institute of Medicine, around 18000 patients die each year as they could not afford treatment for conditions or diseases.Orthopedics Segment Held Lead on the Basis of Revenue in 2016The global medical tourism market can be segmented on the basis of medical treatment and region. On the bases of medical treatment, medical tourism market can be further segmented into Cosmetology, Dentistry, Cardiology, Orthopedic surgery, Neurology, Oncology and Others. Orthopedics is a branch of medicine which deals with conditions concerning bones and muscles. It majorly involves the surgical procedures for correcting the musculoskeletal system. Cosmetology is a branch of medicine which deals with the treatment options concerning skin, wrinkles, skin coloration, unwanted hair, plastic surgery, rhinoplasty and overall external appearance. A branch of medicine that is concern with the study, diagnosis, prevention and treatment of disorders and conditions related to oral cavity called Dentistry. In term of revenue, Orthopedics segment held a significant share of the medical tourism market in 2016.Request Brochure Copy of the report @Asia Pacific Emerges as Lucrative Market for Medical TourismIn terms of region, the medical tourism market can be segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa. Asia Pacific is the leading market for global medical tourism market, followed by Europe, Latin America, Middle East & Africa and North America. In terms of revenue, the Thailand holds a major share of the medical tourism market in Asia Pacific region. The market in Europe is expanding rapidly, due to increase in the number of medical travel patient, especially in UK, Germany, Italy and France, Moreover, the market in Latin America and Middle East & Africa projected to expand significantly in the near future due to high medical treatment cost in United State and Europe region. Developing economies such as India and Thailand are projected to contribute to growth of the market in APAC between 2017 and 2025, due to better health care infrastructure, economic growth, increase in the number of insurance payers, growth of the private health care sector, and increase medical tourism education awareness.Key players operating in the medical tourism market are Bumrungrad International Hospital, Bangkok Chain Hospital, Asklepios Kliniken GmbH, Fortis Healthcare Limited, Apollo Hospitals Enterprise Limited, Mount Elizabeth Hospital, Jordan Hospital, The Ac?badem Hospitals Group, Al Rahba Hospital and KPJ Healthcare Berhad.Purchase this Report @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.Each TMR syndicated research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With wider scope and stratified research methodology, TMRs syndicated reports strive to provide clients to serve their overall research requirement.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Wearable Medical Devices Market worth $10 Billion by 2025 | CAGR: 18.0%

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Wearable technology has gained momentum of late. Changing lifestyle of young people demands connectivity. The healthcare segment accounts for a major part of the wearable technology market, considering the innovations in several applications in this area in the last two decades. Mobile phones with wearable sensors, implanted medical devices, and home-based telehealth devices can help monitor and manage the health of a patient. Smartphones have made tremendous development in terms of applications and can now accomplish actual diagnostic tests such as the Apple iPhone glucose test. Withings is another company that has collaborated with Apple to introduce a device that actually monitors blood-pressure on the go. Moreover, wearable medical devices for athletes who wish to monitor their performance and condition are available in the market. Similarly, such devices for continuous medical monitoring for outpatients with chronic medical conditions, physicians needing to quantify and detect behavioral aberrations for early diagnosis are also available.According to the report, the global wearable medical devices market was estimated to have a valuation close to US$2.7 bn in 2014, which is projected to reach nearly US$10 bn by 2023, rising at a strong CAGR of 18.0% during the forecast period of 2015 to 2023.Request Sample Copy of the Report @Wearable Electrocardiographs Projected for Healthy Growth RateIn terms of diagnostic devices, the report segments the global wearable medical devices market into vital signs monitors, fetal monitors and obstetric devices, and neuromonitoring devices. The segment of vital sign monitors has been further sub-segmented into heart rate monitor, activity monitor, sleep monitor, electrocardiographs, and others. Out of these, heart rate monitor currently serves the maximum demand, reaching an estimated valuation of US$2.5 bn by 2023, although the sub-segment of wearable electrocardiographs are projected for the best CAGR of 17.8% during the forecast period, owning to its factors such as reliable, light weight, risk associated with cardiac arrhythmias, increasing prevalence of cardiovascular disease, and cost effectiveness. However, the lack of security and privacy of important data, short battery life, and slow-rate of acceptability by individuals are anticipated to hinder the growth rate of the sub-segment during the forecast period.Request Brochure Copy of the report @North America Serves Maximum DemandGeographically, the report studies the opportunities available in the regional market in North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Rest of the World. Currently, North America serves maximum demand, valued at US$1.6 bn in 2016, which is projected to reach US$4.5 bn by the end of 2023, expanding at a CAGR of 15.8% during the forecast period of 20152023. The dominance of this region is attributed to the large number of early adopters and consumers, presence of several mid-sized and large players, and increasing number of new players. North America market for Wearable medical devices is mainly dependent on the country of the U.S. and Canada. According to CDC, 29.1 million people in the U.S. have diabetes, which is driving the uptake of glucose monitors, heart rate monitors, and activity monitors. Collectively, the segment of vital signs monitors is most profitable in this region.Fitbit Inc., Omron Corporation, and Medtronic plc., are identified by the report as the most prominent companies in the global wearable medical devices market.Purchase this Report @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.Each TMR syndicated research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With wider scope and stratified research methodology, TMRs syndicated reports strive to provide clients to serve their overall research requirement.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Microscopy Devices Market Size to Reach $9.7 Billion by 2025 | CAGR: 7.60%

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The growing interest in research and development has lead to various innovations and product evolutions. Microscopes have been a requirement for any study as they provide details that cannot be simply assumed on the large scale. They form an intricate part of any exploratory research and have since the past made them indistinguishable from science. With the future heading towards smaller sizes of microprocessors and transistors to the scale of nanometers, microscopes shall be a requirement in all principles.Request Sample Copy of the Report @Sections not involving scientific research are also proving to be a good market, e.g. art verification, customs check, etc. These at present, however only occupy the fraction of the overall application market. Microscopes have become more detailed and versatile in the past few years, with the integration of microscopy and software development, computers are able to render better quality images with the same data. In medical sciences, the implementations of HD and 3D technology has taken surgery to a whole new level, wherein doctors are able to clearly visualize and differentiate between infected cells and normal cells, besides enabling them to perform operations without direct visibility. All this has enabled the overall microscopy devices segment to grow a CAGR of 7.6% for the forecast period of 2014 - 2020.The microscopy devices market is broadly classified on the basis of product segments and application areas. Among the product segments, optical microscopes remain the most widely used segment with the largest share in the net sales across various companies, the global sales in 2013 being USD 2,235.1 million. This is probably because it is among the oldest segments of microscopy in sales. Besides optical microscopes, there are electron microscopes, scanning probe microscopes and other customized hybrids, arranged in decreasing order of their shares in global microscopes revenues. Among various applications of microscopy devices, life sciences industry was accounted for the largest market share of overall market in 2013, closely followed by semiconductors and material sciences segment. However, nanotechnology industry is forecast to grow at an impressive pace during the forecast period of 2014 to 2020.Request Brochure Copy of the report @Geographically, Asia-Pacific was accounted for the largest share of global microscopy devices market in 2013 i.e. 40.9% followed by North America. This can be attributed to the growing investment in research and development in these regions by the respective governments of Asia. China for example, is at present the worlds second largest investor in research and development according to the World Bank data. This along with presence of numerous schools, universities and research institutions would translate to greater growth in the coming years for the Asia-Pacific region. The market for Asia-Pacific region is followed by the North American region.The major players of this market include Leica Microsystems, Olympus, JEOL Company, FEI Company, Danish Micro Engineering A/S, Hitachi High Tech, Cameca SAS, Bruker Corporation, Carl Zeiss, NT-MDT and Nikon to name a few.Purchase this Report @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.Each TMR syndicated research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With wider scope and stratified research methodology, TMRs syndicated reports strive to provide clients to serve their overall research requirement.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Increased Investments in Global Nanomedicine Market Push it to Reach US$177.60 bn by 2019

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According to the data given in the report, the global nanomedicine market is primarily driven by an increase in the rate of investments made into it. These investments are coming in the form of government support and collaborations within the healthcare industry. Most of the investments are made to improve the research and development efforts in the global nanomedicine market.The high rate of investments is being made to complement the rising prevalence of chronic diseases, which is increasing the number of patients with unresolved medical requirements.Report Overview @Major restraints on the global nanomedicine market, as stated in the report, are the high costs associated with the development of effective nanomedicine, along with the overall insufficiency of framework in terms of regulatory guidance.The future of the global nanomedicine market could rely on a growing trend of identifying new applications in nanomedicine, along with its increasing scope of use in emerging economies.The report provides a segmented analysis of the global nanomedicine market in terms of applications and geography.In terms of applications, the global nanomedicine market was led by the oncology segment in 2012, when it held nearly 38.0% of the market. Oncology holds a high percentage of nanomedicine use in the commercialized sense, allowing it to hold the largest share in the global nanomedicine market. The report, however, states that the oncology segment will lose market share to the cardiovascular segment, which is growing at the fastest rate due to an increasing population of geriatric citizens around the world.Request for Sample Copy of Report @The regional analysis of the global nanomedicine market provided in the report reveals Asia Pacific to exhibit the fastest CAGR of 14.6% between 2013 and 2019. This region owes its rapid growth rate to the increase in awareness of the benefits of nanomedicine usage in the treatment of chronic diseases. This is more relevant to China and India, where the growing rate of diagnosis of chronic illnesses, coupled with the increase in healthcare expenditure and collaborative efforts, is promoting the use of nanomedicine.Till 2012, the global nanomedicine market was led by North America owing to the highly advanced infrastructure and services present in the healthcare industry. The report suggests that North America will maintain its dominance over the global nanomedicine market for the given forecast period.Purchase this Report @The key players in the global nanomedicine market are Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd., Sigma-Tau Pharmaceuticals Inc., UCB SA, Nanosphere Inc., Pfizer Inc., GE Healthcare, Merck & Co. Inc., Johnson & Johnson, Mallinckrodt plc, Celgene Corporation, Abbott Laboratories, and CombiMatrix Corp.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.Each TMR syndicated research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With wider scope and stratified research methodology, TMRs syndicated reports strive to provide clients to serve their overall research requirement.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:New Report Examines the Growth of Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing Market Forecast to 2025

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Antimicrobial resistance is the ability of microorganisms to resist effects of a wide range of antimicrobial drugs. This condition leads to the ineffectiveness of standard treatments against microbial infections, persistence of infectious diseases, and their spread to others. It may require costly and toxic treatments. Antimicrobial resistance is one of the major challenges faced by health care professionals in recent years. Several clinical studies are under development for optimizing the therapeutic management of patients with infections. Antimicrobial susceptibility tests are conducted to detect the possible drug resistance by known microorganisms and to find out the most sensitive antimicrobial drug against the infective microorganism.Results of these tests help doctors optimize the therapeutic management of patients with infections. Different antimicrobial susceptibility tests and products have been developed including disk diffusion method, broth microdilution method, and rapid automated instrument method. Some of these methods yield qualitative results such as minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC), while others provide the qualitative information in three different categories: susceptible, intermediate, and resistant.Obtain Report Details @Increased usage of antibiotics in the treatment of microbial infections without proper indication and need is one of the most important reasons for development of antimicrobial resistance across the world. Emergence of several microorganisms resistant to antimicrobial drugs and high incidence rate of antimicrobial-resistant infections such as persistent sore throat, recurring urinary tract infection (UTI), and unresponsive case of pneumonia are some of the key factors driving the global antimicrobial susceptibility testing market. It has been observed that more than 50% of antibiotics are not optimally prescribed; sometimes they are prescribed when not needed.Also, spread of resistant strains of bacteria from person to person and from non-human sources into food, water, and natural environment increases the risk of antimicrobial resistance of pathogens. Development of automated testing equipment and newer tests and methods for detection of antimicrobial susceptibility would propel the antimicrobial susceptibility testing market during the forecast period. Automated testing equipment require a large number of viable organisms; they have limited organism spectrum; and they are quite costlier. This restricts the antimicrobial susceptibility testing market.Download Report Brochure @The global antimicrobial susceptibility testing market can be segmented on the basis of method, product, test type, end-user, and region. Based on method, the market has been segmented into broth microdilution method, rapid automated instrument method, disk diffusion method, and gradient diffusion method. The rapid automated instrument method segment dominated the market in 2016 and is likely to account for a leading market share by 2025. Based on test type, the market has been divided into qualitative and quantitative tests. Based on product, the market has been classified into tests & kits, culture mediums, and automated test systems. End-users of antimicrobial susceptibility tests include biotechnology & pharmaceutical companies, hospitals & diagnostics centers, veterinary clinics, clinical research laboratories, and academic & research institutes.In terms of geography, the global antimicrobial susceptibility testing market has been segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa. North America accounts for a major market share and is likely to hold a leading market share by 2025 as well. Europe follows North America, holding the second-largest share of the global market. The market in Europe is projected to be growing rapidly during the forecast period. High R&D expenditure by governments as well as private players, emergence of newer antimicrobial-resistant pathogens, and high incidence rate of antimicrobial resistance in the region are key factors estimated to drive the market in Europe during the forecast period.Pre-Book Full Report @Key players operating in the global antimicrobial susceptible testing market are bioMerieux, Inc., Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc., HiMedia Laboratories, Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., Laboratorios CONDA, S.A., Creative Diagnostics, Alifax S.r.l., Becton, Dickinson and Company, and Beckman Coulter, Inc.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. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.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:Electronic Health Records Market Size Will Observe Lucrative Surge By The End 2025

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The global market for electronic health record (EHR) features a largely fragmented vendor landscape, with the presence of a large number of small and large players and the top five companies cumulatively accounting for a nearly 44% of the overall market in 2016. Leading vendors in the global EHR market are adopting inorganic growth strategies such as mergers and acquisitions to expand their reach across high-growth potential regional markets, consolidate consumer base, and strengthen their market presence.View Report -Quality Systems, Inc. acquired HealthFusion, a developer of cloud-based EHRs for physician practices, towards the end of 2015. The acquisition is anticipated to enhance the market share of Quality Systems in SaaS-based healthcare products in ambulatory market segment. In addition, this acquisition will add over 3,000 physician practices, ambulatory centers and medical billing services who employ HealthFusions EHR to Quality Systems client base.According to Transparency Market Research, The Global Ehr Market was valued at US$23.22 bn in 2016 and is expected to exhibit a CAGR of 5.7% from 2017 to 2025, to reach an estimated value of US$38.29 bn by 2025.Request to View Brochure of Report -Hospitals to Remain Leading Users of Electronic Health RecordsIn the end user segment, hospitals are among the most prominent buyers as 65% of the hospitals across the globe have installed some form of EHR in 2015 compared to 54% in 2014. The segment is expected to remain the top end-use sector of the global EHR market over the forecast period, exhibiting a promising 5.1% CAGR over the reports forecast period.Geographically, North America, which is the cumulative market for the U.S. and Canada, accounted for a massive 46.2% of the global market in 2016, primarily due to favorable government policies such as pay for value and rapid inclination towards installation of EHR platforms across care providers segment. Europe and Asia Pacific are also among the leading contributors of revenue to the global market and are expected to remain high-growth regions over the forecast period as well. The Asia Pacific market, especially, is expected to offer the most promising opportunities for growth in the EHR market with a thriving and rapidly digitizing healthcare industry in emerging economies such as India and China.Request to View Sample of Report -Vast Benefits of EHR Systems and Government Backing to Encourage Increased Adoption GloballySignificant advantages associated with EHR systems and financial incentives by government of various countries are among the major factors driving the growth of EHR market worldwide. Benefits of EHR systems include up-to-date patient information, reduced healthcare cost in the long-term scenario, quick access to patient-related data, reduced medical errors, increased patient participation and improved efficiency of healthcare providers. These advantages encourage healthcare providers to equip themselves with technically advanced EHR systems, and thereby drive the market growth.During the forecast period from 2017 to 2025, financial incentives by governments in developed countries will also emerge as a key driving force for the global EHR market. Factors such as rapid technological advancement with data access through smartphones, need for improved efficiency and quality of service delivery to sustain in the intensively competitive healthcare industry, and increasing disposable income are also expected to fuel the growth of the market.Purchase this Report @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:ePharmacy Market | Increased Consumer Confidence in e-commerce Sector to Drive Market

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The Global Epharmcy Market, much like the global e-retail industry, has seen the entry of a large number of players in developed as well as developing economies with high-speed and consistent internet connections and a large consumer base of smart computing devices, observes Transparency Market Research in a recent report. The market is strictly regulated in developed economies across North America and Europe, wherein ePharmacies are registered with a central drug enforcement or advisory authority and are required to conform to specific norms, with only lawfully registered pharmacies allowed to sell drugs. Owing to the vast growth potential displayed by the market, several retail pharmacists in these regions are partnering with online portals to establish their ePharmacies.View Report -In a number of developing economies, however, many rogue ePharmacies have mushroomed over the years and drug enforcement authorities are taking major steps to make the ePharmacy marketplace more regulated. Developments in this direction will put a rein on the rapidly rising numbers of ePharmacies, especially in regions such as Asia Pacific and Latin America. These regions are also the ones with the most promising growth opportunities owing to the presence of high-speed internet connectivity and a large consumer base of mobile computing device users. Thus companies in the relatively novel marketplace could find promising growth opportunities in these regions as the ePharmacy market becomes more regulated.Transparency Market Research estimates that the global ePharmacy market will exhibit an impressive CAGR of 17.5% over the period between 2015 and 2023, taking a massive leap from a valuation of US$29.35 bn in 2014 to an opportunity of US$128.02 bn by 2023.Request to View Brochure of Report -Europe to Outpace North America, Claim the Top SpotFrom a geographical standpoint, the ePharmacy market in North America is presently the leading contributor of revenue to the global market. The region accounted for a nearly 37% of the global market in 2014, followed by Europe. Over the reports forecast period, however, Europe is projected to lead the way, outpacing North America in terms of revenue generation. The market in Asia Pacific is expected to remain filled with promising growth opportunities and become more regulated over the forecast period. Emerging economies such as China and India and developed ones including Japan and South Korea will be at the forefront of development of the Asia Pacific ePharmacy market over the reports forecast period.Request to View Sample of Report -Increased Consumer Confidence in e-commerce Sector to Drive MarketThe key factors driving the global market for ePharmacies is the increased consumer confidence about the e-commerce industry, convenience offered by ePharmacies, faster drug delivery even at remote locations, and availability of detailed data pertaining to composition, benefits, and side-effects of drugs on online portals. Vast benefits of ePharmacies to consumers (convenient delivery options and cheaper costs due to elimination of several layers of distribution) as well as pharmacies (possibility of reaching out to a larger patient pool), government bodies are also encouraging the ePharmacy sector. Attempts by government bodies aimed at regularizing the ePharmacy industry across a number of high-growth promise regional markets will usher the growth opportunities for players in the global ePharmacy market.Presence of Several Rogue ePharmacies could Hamper Customer TrustIn unregulated regional markets, the high number of rogue pharmacies makes it difficult for legitimate players to make their mark and earn back the trust lost in the online mode of operation for pharmacies. This, combined with the potential abuse of spurious or habit forming medicines that may be sold without the required prescription, especially in regions where there is no regulatory check on the modus operandi followed by online pharmacies, could hamper consumer trust in ePharmacies, hindering the growth prospects of the global ePharmacy market.Purchase this Report @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:Optical Imaging Market to Reach US$2.1 bn by 2020

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A research study on the global optical imaging market, published by Transparency Market Research (TMR), estimates the market to expand at a healthy CAGR of 10.80% during the period from 2014 to 2020 and reach a market value of US$2.1 bn by the end of the forecast period.The research report, titled Optical Imaging Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast, 2014 - 2020, states that the global optical imaging market stood at US$1 bn in 2013.View Report -The increasing incidence of skin-, eye-, teeth-, and other organ-related diseases is the key driving force behind the rise of the global optical imaging market, cites the report.The report analyzes the global optical imaging market on the basis of the application and techniques of optical imaging. Ophthalmology, dermatology, dentistry, cardiology, oncology, neurology, and biotechnology and research are the main application areas of optical imaging.Request to View Brochure of Report -The oncology segment is likely to report the fastest growth at a CAGR of 15.10% over the forecast period. Analysts expect this segment to generate US$7.4 mn revenue in the overall optical imaging market by the end of 2020.Optical coherence tomography (OCT), near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), hyperspectral imaging (HSI), and photoacoustic tomography (PAT) are the major techniques of optical imaging. Among these, the market for OCT dominates the global market. It occupied a share of 75.7% in 2013 and is projected to expand at a CAGR of 9.70% over the forecast period, notes the study.Request to View Sample of Report -Asia Pacific, North America, Europe, and the Rest of the World are the major regional markets for optical imaging in the global arena. According to the report, North America is leading the global optical imaging market at present and is closely followed by Europe. The high penetration rate and growing adoption of advanced optical imaging technologies have fueled the market for optical imaging significantly in this region. Analysts expect this market to maintain dominance over the forecast period.On the other hand, the optical imaging market in Asia Pacific is likely to rise at the highest CAGR of 14.50% during the forecast period. The presence of a huge pool of patients, together with the soaring demand for innovative as well as advanced diagnostic and treatment technologies, improving healthcare infrastructure, and the rapid rise in the disposable income of consumers in this region, is the prime reason for the extensive growth of the Asia Pacific optical imaging market, says the study.Bioptigen Inc., Carl Zeiss AG, Canon, Inc., ChemImage Corp., Headwall Photonics Inc., Heidelberg Engineering GmbH, Michelson Diagnostics Ltd., Optovue Inc., NIDEK Co. Ltd., Topcon Medical Systems Inc., and Topcon Medical Systems Inc. are the key players functioning is the global optical imaging market, states the research report.Purchase this Report @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:'It's a pretty big deal': A look back at Sept. 11 on its 20th anniversary

localToby Lewis Wins the Largest Ever Aussie Millions Main Event

February 04, 2018 Mo Nuwwarah

He came in as the chip leader, and the player with by far the most live cashes, so Toby Lewis looked like the clear favorite heading into the final table of the 2018 Aussie Millions Main Event at Crown Melbourne.

Lewis: "I've been working really hard on my game lately, more than ever. I just felt really comfortable."

The former EPT champion and an accomplished online player had his mind locked in on the biggest chance of his life for a career-defining score, but the 28-year-old British pro said he felt no pressure heading into the final day.

"It's probably the least amount I've ever felt heading into a major final table," Lewis said. "I've been working really hard on my game lately, more than ever. I just felt really comfortable. I had an understanding of the players I was playing against.

"I tried to stay off social media as much as possible and tried not to hype myself up too much."

It must have worked. Lewis put on an absolutely dominant display of poker Sunday night on the big stage at Crown, moving into a huge chip lead and using it to roll over most of his opponents en route to an A$1,458,198 payday for topping a field of 800  a record for the 21-year-old event. That adjusted amount came after a three-way deal between Lewis, Stefan Huber, and Espen Solaas, with Lewis locking up more than second-place prize money and proceeding to win the A$75,000 and commemorative bracelet set aside for the winner.

Official Final Table Results

Place Player Home Country Prize in AU$ Prize in US$ 1 Toby Lewis United Kingdom AU$1,458,198 $1,156,653* 2 Stefan Huber Switzerland AU$909,699 $721,579* 3 Espen Solaas Norway AU$1,177,103 $933,686* 4 Chul-Hyon Park Australia AU$470,000 $372,807 5 Mike Del Vecchio United States AU$370,000 $293,486 6 Ben Richardson Australia AU$300,000 $237,962 7 Johan Schumacher Belgium AU$235,000 $186,403

In perhaps an indicator of what was in store for the day, Lewis began making hands more or less immediately when the final day of play got underway and began broadcasting with Jason Somerville and Co. on the Run It Up stream.

The player with the least to lose, Johan Schumacher, experienced just the opposite fortune. He got his stack in the middle twice, both in dominating spots and got one chop and an elimination for his efforts, the latter coming when Solaas binked a flush with seven-five suited all in against Schumacher's pocket fives.

PARK: "It was the most stressful thing that I've ever done in my entire life."

Continuing something of a theme for the event, Lewis made a big laydown with tens on a seven-high board when local player Chul-Hyon Park turned a set of sevens on him. Avoiding that potential mine enabled Lewis to stay afloat in the top two spots despite a strong challenge from Solaas.

The Norwegian certainly got dealt all of the hands one could hope for at the final table, but things didn't always work out as he hoped after that. He held with kings against home crowd favorite Ben Richardson's ace-queen but dropped two other big pots when kings got cracked by Huber's ace-four and he ran ace-king ran into Park's aces.

Ben Richardson

After coming in with one of the bigger stacks, Richardson got nothing going on the final day.

"It was a pretty bad start," he said. "I lost every hand I played, mostly."

Lewis, on the other hand, got a dream board with ace-king against Park's jacks when he flopped top pair, turned trips and hit a full house on the river. Park paid off a huge river bet and that pot cemented Lewis as the clear leader.

Mike Del Vecchio, the lone American at the final table, held that lofty position for awhile on earlier days. He came into the event hot after a third-place finish at WPT Five Diamond in December that netted him a career-best payout of $750,000 but that would remain his biggest score as he gambled with a flush draw against Lewis' two pair and didn't get there to go down in fifth.

That prompted a four-handed battle with Lewis way out in front and the short stacks eyeing each other, all trying to ladder. Nobody wanted to miss out on a big money jump, and that benefited Lewis, who began hauling in every blind and ante in sight. Park was a little ahead of Huber and Solaas and clearly was looking to outlast them, folding hands such as pocket fives in position to Lewis' opens.

"He knew he had to be very tight," Lewis said. "[Huber and Solaas] both understood ICM very well. It's an absolute disaster for either of them to get it in against me. It was one of those spots where eventually something had to give but nobody wanted it to give."

Stefan Huber

What gave was Park's luck. No Aussie Millions final table is quite complete without a local satellite player making a Cinderella run, and Park was the man for 2018, just a year after Shane Vijayaram took the whole thing down in 2017. However, he would lose with queens all in preflop against Solaas' sevens to go out fourth.

"It was the most stressful thing that I've ever done in my entire life," Park said afterward. "It was tough playing against all the pros. I was the underdog definitely with the least experience. But, I enjoyed it and hopefully, I can do it again."

The three pros remaining began talking deal, and eventually they came to an agreement based on chip stacks with A$75,000 set aside for the winner. They locked up A$1,383,198 (Lewis), A$1,177,103 (Solaas) and $A909,699 (Huber).

Lewis was already guaranteed his biggest cash.

"Obviously, I was over the moon," he said. "I have a lot of respect for both of those guys. These spots don't come around very often, so I wanted to make sure I realized a good amount of equity.

Lewis: "I would have liked to have taken a little bit more. But, Espen played a very hard deal."

"I would have liked to have taken a little bit more. But, Espen played a very hard deal."

Things got very aggressive after that, with players beginning to reraise each other more often and jam lighter than before. Solaas was first to bust when he ran into Lewis' kings and bricked with ace-nine.

Despite running poor in a number of huge spots during the last two days  Solaas lost a particularly monstrous Day 4 flip to Lewis that could have seen the Norwegian lock up 40 percent of the chips with two tables left  he maintained that he ran well throughout the tournament. He credited the staff for running a great event with a great structure.

Lewis had a big lead on Huber and didn't take long to finish him off, much to the disappointment of a jovial, beer-swigging German contingent of supporters. Still, Huber's charity, Raising for Effective Giving, is likely to get a handsome chunk of change.

Fellow British pros Sam Grafton and Ludovic Geilich were among those enfolding Lewis in big hugs after the final card hit the felt. Lewis credited Grafton in particular with helping him on the day off before the final table, as the two did a few hours worth of preparation work on Saturday.

It's a continuation of the past few months overall, which Lewis said have been filled with hours of study and less play than usual. It all paid off with an Aussie Millions title, and Lewis joined his brethren for celebratory drinks in what's sure to be a special day in his career no matter what heights he reaches in the years ahead.

The Aussie Millions Main Event may be over, but there's more poker to be played in Melbourne. The $100,000 Challenge is on to Day 2, and PokerNews remains in the Crown Melbourne to bring you live updates till a winner is crowned. Head over to the Aussie Millions live updates page for the latest news.

Toby Lewis and friends

Toby Lewis Stats

England All Time Money List 22nd All Time Money List 376th Global Poker Index Ranking 711th Total Live Earnings $4,379,236

Toby Lewis' Biggest ScoresGet the SC business stories that matter.

Our newsletter catches you up with all the business stories that are shaping Charleston and South Carolina every Monday and Thursday at noon. Get ahead with us - it's free.The University of South Carolina and the Medical University of South Carolina are among research institutions investing in research on the public health effects of e-cigarettes. A national review recently concluded teens who begin smoking e-cigarettes are likely to move on to the combustible type. FileMary Katherine, who also goes by MK, covers health care for The Post and Courier. She is also pursuing a master's degree in data science. She grew up in upstate New York and enjoys playing cards, kayaking and the Blue Ridge Mountains.Fueled by his addiction to crack cocaine, Patrick McTeer started racking up criminal convictions in the early 1990s.

Police nabbed him for low-level offenses at first. Disorderly conduct. An open beer container. Shoplifting.

But as McTeer's drug use increased, so did the frequency of his crimes. He accumulated felony after felony  most times for forging checks or hurling bricks into car windows to rummage for cash  totaling some 50 nonviolent convictions.

All told, he served seven prison sentences between which he'd put down the crack for six months or even a year, only to return to drugs after earning enough money to support his habit.

Once, McTeer astonished investigators by voluntarily disclosing dozens of crimes. He said he came clean to earn God's forgiveness.

"I'd call the sheriffs department: 'Hey look, I need to share some things with y'all,'" he said. "I figured I would die one day getting high or somebody would kill me, so that would be a relief to me to go to prison."

This time around, McTeer, 49, has landed on his feet following his release on probation from the state Department of Corrections in March. He holds two jobs in Lexington, where he works up to 80 hours a week. He has a car, housing and a supportive girlfriend. He says he hasn't touched drugs since his last arrest in 2016.

McTeer credits much of his recent success to the Manning Reentry/Work Release Center, an SCDC facility in Columbia for men within six months of release. The center's Second Chance program, a collaboration between SCDC and the state Department of Employment and Workforce, boasts a 67 percent employment rate for the 875 nonviolent male offenders released from the program as of June.

"It was like being pushed off a bicycle and having training wheels and they just fell off like, 'Hey, look down, you doing this on your own,'" McTeer said of the reentry center and Second Chance.

Another chance

Currently, 22.7 percent of SCDC inmates return to prison within three years of release, representing a near all-time-low recidivism rate for the agency. Director Bryan Stirling attributes this to sentencing reform, partnerships and programs such as Second Chance.

"If we are able to knock down the barriers that folks face when they leave prison, they can be successful and go on to lead a normal life," he said.

The employment department piloted Second Chance at the men's facility in 2014. Officials in March launched the program for women at Graham Correctional Institution, also in Columbia. Next, officials want to expand Second Chance to include violent offenders.

Inmates with a high school diploma or GED may enroll in Second Chance three months before their release. By that point, they've already been exposed to soft skills-training at the reentry facility.

Participants learn how to craft a resume and apply and interview for jobs. They're taught about federal bonding, an insurance policy that protects employers against theft by high-risk employees. They write a letter of explanation to potential employers and enroll in the SC Works career center system.

Latoya Richardson, career development specialist with DEW, heads Second Chance at Manning. She encourages graduates to call her any time, whether it's to vent or ask what to wear to an interview.

McTeer stays in touch, and for that reason, Richardson refers to him as a "model" graduate.

"I, without a doubt, know he's gonna do well, that he'll continue to succeed," she said.

Daily struggles

McTeer had a good childhood growing up with his hardworking grandparents in Walterboro. He graduated high school with honors.

Then, as a young man in the Army  after tours in Kuwait and Germany  he tried crack cocaine out of curiosity. Drugs led him to slack off on his military duties. Then he went AWOL, he said. He was eventually discharged with bad conduct in the early 1990s.

McTeer's addiction dictated his life, off and on, for more than two decades.

Behind bars, McTeer didn't use drugs or alcohol, he says. He worked construction jobs between prison stints, even making employee of the year at one gig.

Money was always his downfall. He would blow his earnings on drugs. Then he'd skip work, start stealing again.

Temptation lingers today. McTeer recently wondered how much crack he could score with his paycheck. Sometimes he asks his girlfriend, Marina Curtain, to temporarily hold his money. She's encouraging him to go to Narcotics Anonymous meetings.

"Those struggles, it's daily," McTeer said.

But now when McTeer entertains the idea of getting high, he remembers the respect his employers have for him.

He doesn't want to let them down.

He doesn't want to let himself down.

Taking responsibility

It's a Friday afternoon at the Village at Southlake retirement home in Lexington. The promise of happy hour has lured a few residents from their living quarters.

An older man finds McTeer in a common area as he takes a break from his dining room job.

"I fell last night," the man quietly tells McTeer.

"That's OK, man," McTeer replies, patting the man's shoulder. "You doing good."

The man also fell a few days earlier. McTeer tried to pick him up but couldn't lift him alone. So he laid down on the floor next to the man while they waited for others to come assist.

His rapport with residents and his work ethic assure Southlake executive director Wendy Barnhill she made the right choice in hiring McTeer last spring, shortly after his release from prison.

She initially considered his long rap sheet and said no. But the facility's chef, Tony Jackson, convinced her otherwise. McTeer had seemed forthright about his past when asking for a chance. No one had ever approached Jackson quite like that.

That level of honesty was new for McTeer, too. Past employers have fired him for not disclosing his criminal history. Teachers at the reentry center taught him to take responsibility for his crimes.

McTeer threw himself into his work, picking up extra shifts at the retirement home around his second job as a contractor at Michelin, a position he landed through Second Chance.

"If I could clone him 15 times, it would not be enough," Barnhill said.

McTeer rode his bicycle to work before he saved up for a car. Embarrassed, he would tie the bike to a tree away from the retirement home. Southlake residents caught on, though.

"You don't have a car?" he remembers someone asking.

His first inclination was to lie, as he would have done when he was using crack. On drugs, he deceived people and concealed parts of himself. But not anymore.

"No, not yet," McTeer replied. "But I'll get one."CAYCE  An Amtrak train traveling along the wrong track in Lexington County rammed into the back of a parked freight train early Sunday, killing the conductor and engineer and sending 116 people to area hospitals.

The New York-to-Miami train with 139 passengers collided with an unmanned CSX train on a track at 2:34 a.m. near Cayce. Amtrak President Richard Anderson said the train was traveling at about 60 mph when it wrecked.

NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt told reporters that the Amtrak train was switched off the main track to a side track with the parked freight train. The switch was left in the wrong position after the freight train was moved across four sets of track. Sumwalt said early indications point to "tragic human error" and not foul play.

The 36-car freight train had unloaded cars on the far side of the tracks and then moved to opposite side. As the train was moved across the four tracks, a switch was activated and padlocked so the train could go from the main track to a side track, which is a standard procedure, Sumwalt said.

Investigators found the padlock still on the rail switch Sunday after the collision, Sumwalt said. He did not know why the lock had not been removed after the freight train moved. The Amtrak train was supposed to stay on a track next to the freight cars.

Anderson said CSX owns the tracks and manages the switches in the area where the collision took place. The track signals were not working because of maintenance, Anderson said, but neither the Amtrak boss nor Sumwalt could say if that played a role in the collision.

Sumwalt said a long-delayed nationwide system known as positive train control that could slow speeding trains, prevent head-on collisions and alert engineers to switches set the wrong direction could have helped.

"An operational (positive train control) system is designed to prevent this type of accident," Sumwalt said

Drone footage aired on Columbia TV station WLTX showed the trains near the the S.C. State Farmers Market at the intersection of U.S. 321 and Pine Ridge Road were traveling along the same track when they collided. The lead passenger train engine derailed along with several cars, including a pair in the middle that jackknifed.

The trains were mangled. "I would say the Amtrak locomotive would be not recognizable at all," said Sumwalt, a Columbia native.

Amtrak conductor Michael Cella, 36, of Orange Park, Fla., and engineer Michael Kempf, 54, of Savannah, Ga., who were in the engine, died from injuries sustained in the collision, Lexington County Coroner Margaret Fisher said.

The wreck jarred awake sleepy passengers.

Samuel Rodriguez from Brooklyn said he woke up just before the crash because he thought the train was traveling faster than it had earlier during his trip to Tampa with his mother that started on Saturday. He said the conductor told passengers at one point that the train was running behind schedule because of freight trains in front of them.

Amtrak 91 was supposed to arrive in Columbia at 1:38 a.m. Sunday, according to an online schedule.

Right when Rodriguez mentioned how fast the train going to his mother, he felt the train brakes jam: "It was amazing, right when I said that, the car just started going crazy and it was just shaking back and forth."

He saw a toddler fly in the air. His mother's face smacked into the seat in front of her. The seat in front of him twisted sideways.

Screams of pain were followed by what Rodriguez called a chilling quiet. The train car filled with smoke. Rodriguez said he brought the first toddler back to his mother and then helped another toddler, who had a deep cut on his head.

Passengers walked away from mangled train into the cold night air that smelled of fuel leaking from the freight engine.

"Everybody was in shock," he said.

Anderson said though the train was running late, a common occurrence because of freight train delays, the passenger train was not traveling too fast. "That is not how you run a railroad," he said.

Sumwalt said the speed limit is 59 mph in that area of track where the collision took place, though it would have been too fast if a train switched tracks.

National Transportation Safety Board investigators started work at the crash site just southwest of Columbia. An investigation will take 12 to 18 months. The NTSB already recovered the front-facing video camera for the Amtrak train but it still looking for other recording "black" boxes for both trains, Sumwalt said.

Inspectors from the S.C. Office of Regulatory Staff, the state agency that oversee railroads, also visited the crash site.

The 139 passengers and six surviving Amtrak crew members were evacuated from the Amtrak train. The collision sent 116 people, including children, to four area hospitals in buses and ambulances. Six were admitted. At least one passenger is in critical condition with another two in serious condition, Palmetto Health officials said.

The nearly 50 patients who arrived at Palmetto Health Richland were screened in a tent the had been set up to handle the recent influx of flu patients. Many passengers were released from all four hospitals after being treated for minor injuries.

The South Carolina Red Cross set up a shelter for more than 30 passengers at Pine Ridge Middle School. Amtrak brought buses to carry passengers to their final destinations.

Some 5,000 gallons of fuel leaked from the freight train but did not pose a public threat, county authorities said.

The wreck revived memories of the deadly 2005 train collision in Graniteville that killed nine and hurt more than 250 people, many of whom were treated for exposure to chlorine gas. In August, a CSX freight train derailed in Lugoff in Kershaw County after striking a bulldozer that was intentionally placed on the tracks.

Sunday's collision took place near the intersection on Interstates 26 and 77, not far from the S.C. Emergency Management Division headquarters where Gov. Henry McMaster and NTSB officials held news briefings on the collision.

The governor visited the crash site about 10 miles away from the Statehouse as well as the Red Cross shelter. He spoke with U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao.

President Donald Trump tweeted about the crash: "My thoughts and prayers are with all of the victims involved in this mornings train collision in South Carolina. Thank you to our incredible First Responders for the work theyve done!"

Families who want to check on passengers can call a hotline set up by Amtrak, (800) 523-9101.ORANGEBURG  Cleveland Sellers can't say for sure how long the gunfire lasted.

Was it 8 seconds? he wonders. Maybe it was closer to 10.

On the campus of South Carolina State University, he stops at the very spot where he stood when he was shot 50 years ago.

He was 23 on the night of Feb. 8, 1968, and joined the crowd of students who had gathered to vent frustrations over a segregated bowling alley and other concerns. It was the third straight day of unrest, but this one was especially menacing.

"I had a bad feeling that day," recalled Sellers, now 73.

In a barrage of trooper shotgun fire that lasted about 10 seconds, at least 28 students were injured and three  Samuel Hammond, Jr., Delano Middleton and Henry Smith  were killed.

It was the bloodiest civil rights event in South Carolina's history.

Yet the Orangeburg Massacre, an era-defining moment of the 1960s, would not pierce the collective consciousness of America. Fifty years later, some fear it's fading from memory.

"Many people haven't heard about it, but those who have think it was this isolated incident," said Bill Hine, a retired history professor at S.C. State. Misunderstandings run deep, he said.

As recently as last year, an editorial in Orangeburg's Times and Democrat newspaper acknowledged the struggle of a still-healing city, writing, "The result too often over the years has been a community divided annually by racial wounds."

A commemoration is planned for Wednesday and Thursday on campus. Sellers' son, former state lawmaker Bakari Sellers, is the keynote speaker. The annual event draws attention to the Orangeburg Massacre and the plight of its victims. Organizers say it's a chance to remind the world of a historical trauma many seem to prefer to forget.

"There is so much confusion about what happened, and it needs to come out," Cleveland Sellers said. "Because they always think of their state as being on the side of justice and stability, and not having this kind of shoot-to-kill operation on students on their college campus."

Teaching history

Inside Barber Tech Academies, a salon and school that caters to African-Americans, co-owner Dashaun West, 35, said he first heard about the Orangeburg Massacre when he was student at S.C. State. The salon is located next to All-Star Bowling Lanes, the site of student protests two days before the campus shooting.

Bernard Dash, who was 16 in 1968, said he heard about it as it was happening.

"My parents made sure I (didn't) go to school," he said, referring to the closure of the city by authorities and his parents' concern for his safety. "We stayed at home for two weeks."

Dash said the shooting had a lasting effect on how local residents think about race relations. But today, he said his children know nothing of the Orangeburg Massacre.

The state's education standards include one mention of the event, citing it as an example of civil rights demonstrations that eighth-grade social studies teachers might discuss in the context of the movement in South Carolina.

Orangeburg Mayor Michael Butler said that doesn't mean the shooting and its effects are taught. Sharing the specifics of the Orangeburg Massacre is at the discretion of individual teachers. Some mention it in the broader context of the civil rights movement, others dwell on it a little.

"Some teachers even choose not to teach it, really, if it doesn't matter to them," said Butler, who is also a career specialist at the Technology Center in Orangeburg Consolidated School District 5.

"But these students need to understand that we didn't just come up by night to get where we are," the city's first black mayor said.

+4 This S.C. bowling alley was a focal point in civil rights history, but you'd never know it ORANGEBURG  The bowling alley now blends into the rest of a rundown shopping center on Russell Street, its exceptional place in civil rights 

Andrew Pruitt, director of communications and technology for the Charleston County School District, said that all eighth-graders in the Charleston system hear at least a passing reference to the 1968 campus shooting, and some fifth-graders, too. High school students who take U.S. history also learn about it.

"The Orangeburg Massacre is part of the history and social studies curriculum (per state requirement) for Charleston County School District eighth grade students when they learn about the Civil Rights Movement," Pruitt said in an email statement. "In addition, every teacher in CCSD has access to district resources and lesson plans that include the Orangeburg Massacre."

Pat Raynor, spokeswoman for Dorchester District 2, said it varies from classroom to classroom.

"Certainly the standards are broad in scope and cover so many different parts of our history," Raynor said.

Megan Vallario, an 18-year-old student at the Charleston County School of the Arts, said she did not recall learning about the Orangeburg Massacre in the classroom.

Keagan Larkins, a 17-year-old senior at Academic Magnet High School, said he learned about the campus shooting last school year. His teacher spent one class period discussing it. Larkins recalled it "was a protest against segregation in which three black men were killed."

The buildup

That year  1968  was a turning point for America. The civil rights movement of Martin Luther King Jr. gave way to a more forceful call for "Black Power," and civil rights groups were increasingly connecting the dots between their struggle and the global fight for justice and empowerment.

Orangeburg Massacre Timeline The Orangeburg Massacre was a watershed moment in South Carolina that tore families apart and heightened divisions between whites and blacks i

In January, the communist North Vietnamese launched the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, sparking mass demonstrations against the war in the U.S., with some protests turning violent.

In April, King would be assassinated. In June, Robert F. Kennedy would be shot and killed, too.

What happened at S.C. State did not reach as high as these headlines.

When Sellers arrived in Orangeburg the previous fall, the legendary Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee activist had already been pegged as the "outside agitator" even though his family lived in the tiny town of Denmark, 23 miles to the southwest.

He was in town to promote black studies at the school and work with students to heighten their cultural awareness and encourage them to embrace the principles of the Black Power movement, which included self-determination and self-actualization.

He also was thinking about going back to school, taking up where he left off when he became embroiled in the civil rights movement starting in 1963.

On that cold winter evening, students gathered on campus, frustrated about the still-segregated All-Star Bowling Lanes just down the street. Additionally, there was anger about the militarized environment and lack of support from city and state officials.

Gov. Robert McNair had called in state troopers and National Guardsmen. The FBI was on the scene, keeping one eye on the rebellious students and another on Sellers, the SNCC activist they sought to blame for the unrest. The city was all but shut down for fear of an urban riot.

The students were corralled on campus, illuminated by street lamps and the bright beams of spotlights. They lit a bonfire and taunted troopers, throwing debris at them.

That's when the violence erupted.

At least nine state troopers, under what turned out to be a false impression they were under fire, shot into the unarmed crowd of students, striking many with heavy buckshot in their backs and in the soles of their feet as they scrambled up the bluff to get away.

Sellers was hit in the left armpit as he tried to help students clear the area.

After the shooting, students were rushed first to the college infirmary, then to an area hospital, many driven in private cars. Sellers was among the wounded to seek medical attention.

At the hospital later that night, he was taken into custody and charged with arson, inciting a riot, assault and battery with intent to kill, property damage, housebreaking and grand larceny.

The FBI would perform a half-hearted investigation in the eyes of some, but the state never formally delved into what happened despite repeated calls for an independent query. The nine troopers were tried on various charges and acquitted.

More than two and a half years after the tragedy, Sellers was convicted on a riot charge that wasn't part of the original indictment. In 1973, he spent seven months in prison.

Sellers said misinformation at the time  reports of student gunfire, for example  convinced many whites that the troopers had done the right thing, that they had saved the city from radical blacks set on destroying it.

It didn't help that McNair, the governor at the time, subscribed to this point of view and suppressed attempts at fostering a public debate about the first tragedy of its kind on any college campus in America.

"When McNair was alive, he didn't want any discussion," Sellers said. Once opinions are formed, it can be difficult to change people's minds, he added.

Since the shooting, Sellers and others have repeated the basic facts, laid bare in the book "The Orangeburg Massacre" by Jack Bass and Jack Nelson. Healing, Sellers said, depends on more than the mere passage of time and a focus on the positive; it demands a confrontation with the facts.

Sellers, his son Bakari, Hine and several others, such as historian Bass, have called for a state-convened blue-ribbon panel to launch a formal investigation, generate a report and promote dialogue.

"(The state) needs to do something for the victims, especially those who were killed," Sellers said, adding that monetary reparations are in order since the lives of Hammond, Middleton and Smith were cut short, destroying their potential to contribute to society and generate wealth for their families.

"Even though it's been 50 years, you can't quit now, even though the state has been recalcitrant and resistant," he said.

Hine noted that, even today, views on the Orangeburg Massacre differ according to race. Some whites credit state troopers for saving the city while some blacks consider the episode an example of "cold-blooded murder," Hine said.

Some whites would rather not "pick this scab," he said, while some blacks crave truth and justice. An investigation would help.

"It would give us a better understanding of what transpired," Hine said. "It would answer questions, clarify matters, maybe help with healing and reconciliation."

Reconciliation

It took the state decades to express contrition.

Former Democratic Gov. Jim Hodges in 2001 called the shooting "a great tragedy for our state." In 2003, Republican Mark Sanford was the first South Carolina governor to formally apologize for what happened.

"I think it's important to tell the African-American community in South Carolina we don't just regret what happened in Orangeburg 35 years ago, we apologize for it," Sanford said at that year's commemoration of the tragedy at S.C. State.

Jack Shuler, an Orangeburg native and author of the book about his hometown, "Blood and Bone: Truth and Reconciliation in a Southern Town," said the campus shooting and the unrest that preceded it traumatized many local residents.

"I have encountered people who didn't want to talk about it, who think you shouldn't talk about tragedies of the past. In general terms, there are probably more white people who would like to move on than those who want to address it head on. But there are those who want to address it head on," Shuler said.

In 1999, more than 250 community members signed onto a public statement published in The Times and Democrat. "Orangeburg, let us heal ourselves," the statement said.

Eric Powell, the director of the Orangeburg County Historical Society, was just 10 when the massacre happened. He is white, and remembers the summer of 1968. Nobody, he said, talked about what had happened months before.

"'Let us heal' is the politically correct words that go along with 'We want to forget about it because it was a big mistake,'" he said.

Cecil Williams, an Orangeburg resident and official photographer for S.C. State who witnessed the events of 1968, said many of the problems students faced back then persist today.

African-Americans are too often victims of police violence and continue to face social and economic injustices, he said.

"In 50 years things have not really changed a lot," Williams said.The Post and Courier provides a forum for our readers to share their opinions, and to hold up a mirror to our community. Publication does not imply endorsement by the newspaper; the editorial staff attempts to select a representative sample of letters because we believe its important to let our readers see the range of opinions their neighbors submit for publication.Jamie Lovegrove is a political reporter covering the South Carolina Statehouse, congressional delegation and campaigns. He previously covered Texas politics in Washington for The Dallas Morning News and in Austin for the Texas Tribune.Assistant Columbia bureau chief

Adcox returned to The Post and Courier in October 2017 after 12 years covering the Statehouse for The Associated Press. She previously covered education for The P&C. She has also worked for The AP in Albany, N.Y., and for The Herald in Rock Hill.Do you want this man's job? Well, get in line.

U.S. Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-Spartanburg, speaks with CBS' Face the Nation Sunday Feb. 4, 2018.Three young men were killed and at least 28 others wounded in 1968 when state troopers fired on a group of unarmed students demonstrating at South Carolina State College over a segregated blowing alley nearby.

ClosePR-Inside.com: 2018-02-04 22:01:03

 Company Contributes Innovative Technology and Australian Industrial Capability to Team 

L3 Collaborates With BAE Systems for SEA5000 Program Pursuit

L3 Technologies Australia Group Pty Ltd

Alan Titheridge, +61 2 6248 4406

Managing Director

L3 Technologies announced today that it will support the BAE Systems Power and Propulsion Team by providing the Integrated Platform Management System (IPMS) for the upcoming Royal Australian Navy (RAN) SEA5000 program pursuit.

L3 was selected to provide the IPMS, as well as Controls and Instrumentation (C&I), for the nine Type 26 Global Combat Ships proposed for the SEA5000 program. If BAE is successful, the total value of this contract, which is expected to be awarded by the federal government in April or May, is AU$35 billion (approximately US$27.4 billion).

The L3 IPMS provides integrated monitoring and control of warship propulsion, electrical, auxiliary and damage control machinery and systems along with advanced functionality, such as onboard training and equipment health monitoring. The IPMS will be implemented in Australia through L3 supported by Australian industry using technology from L3 MAPPS units based in Canada and the U.K.

With a successful SEA5000 bid, L3 will be part of a team prepared to offer power and propulsion solutions for naval shipbuilding programs around the world.

This is an excellent example of Australian industry collaboration and innovation to deliver a world-leading solution to the Royal Australian Navy, said Alan Titheridge, Managing Director of L3 Technologies Australia. This teaming will achieve unrivalled Australian Industrial Capability (AIC) in this niche domain.

The proposed system shares its core technology with more than 200 naval ships in 22 different navies, and we are pleased to support BAEs proposal for SEA5000 with such leading-edge technology, added Rangesh Kasturi, President of L3 MAPPS.

L3 established an industrial capability in Australia more than a decade ago, and with steady growth, over 200 Australians are currently employed by L3 in several locations, including Fremantle, Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide. Sales in 2017 were in excess of AU$100 million. L3 has typically enhanced its capability portfolio through the acquisition of key Australian companies and by leveraging technology transfers from overseas L3 companies into Australian industry. This approach directly supports the Australian governments AIC strategy and promotes confidence by L3 demonstrating the ability to build, deliver, maintain and support complex systems and equipment in Australia.

Headquartered in New York City, L3 Technologies employs approximately 31,000 people worldwide and is a leading provider of a broad range of communication, electronic and sensor systems used on military, homeland security and commercial platforms. L3 is also a prime contractor in aerospace systems, security and detection systems, and pilot training. The company reported 2017 sales of $9.6 billion.

To learn more about L3, please visit the companys website at www.L3T.com. L3 uses its website as a channel of distribution of material company information. Financial and other material information regarding L3 is routinely posted on the company's website and is readily accessible.

Safe Harbor Statement Under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995

Except for historical information contained herein, the matters set forth in this news release are forward-looking statements. Statements that are predictive in nature, that depend upon or refer to events or conditions or that include words such as expects, anticipates, intends, plans, believes, estimates, will, could and similar expressions are forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements set forth above involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from any such statement, including the risks and uncertainties discussed in the companys Safe Harbor Compliance Statement for Forward-Looking Statements included in the companys recent filings, including Forms 10-K and 10-Q, with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The forward-looking statements speak only as of the date made, and the company undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/201802040050Governor Abdullahi Ganduje of Kano on Sunday invited Fulani herdsmen facing challenges in grazing their cattle in different parts of the country to come and establish themselves in Kano State.

Mr. Ganduje said the recent killings linked to the farmers-herders crisis were unwarranted especially since Kano has a wide expanse of land, including dedicated grazing reserves, that remained largely underutilised.

I am inviting herdsmen from all parts of Nigeria to relocate to Kano because we have enough facilities to accommodate them, Mr. Ganduje said at an event held to vaccinate over one million cattle and other small animals in Garum Malam Local Government Area Sunday afternoon.

We have grazing lands in Rogo, Gaya, Kura, Tudun Wada, Ungogo and other reserved places where facilities are in place to accommodate the herdsmen and their cattle.

Mr. Gandujes call came amidst widening conflict over open grazing of livestock in agrarian settlements across the country.

Attacks and reprisals between herdsmen and farmers have left thousands dead within the last five years.

While most of the attacks are concentrated in the north-central, killings linked to herdsmen have been recorded as far as the South -South state of Delta.

In response to the confrontations, three states Benue, Taraba and Ekiti have passed their respective laws which specifically restricted open grazing of livestock and other activities by herdsmen. Several other southern states are currently mulling similar statutes to curb operations of herdsmen.

Mr. Ganduje said while it is rare to find a Fulani herder of Kano origin in other states, it had become a priority for his administration to ensure that Fulani, notwithstanding their origin, do not face stigmatisation or outright rejection on the basis of their nomadic exploits.

These killings must stop, Mr. Ganduje stated. We cannot afford to continue to witness these senseless killings in the name of Fulani herdsmen and farmers clash over lack of grazing land while we have a place like the Falgore Game Reserve underutilised.

The governor said the Falgore Game Reserve, spanning over three local government areas in Kano State, can take care of millions of herdsmen and their cattle in Nigeria. Kano State is about 20,000 square kilometres in size.

The place has been designed to contain schools, human and animal clinics, markets, recreational centres and other social amenities that can give the herdsmen enough comfort to take care of their animals and do their business without hindrance, he said, adding that Kano State would partner with the federal government to modernise grazing.

But the governors generous proposal was not immediately acceptable to the leadership of the herders association.

Ubi Haruna, chairman of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria in Benue State, told PREMIUM TIMES Sunday evening that the governor might have sounded nice, but his suggestion was impractical.

There are Tiv also in Kano, Niger, Kogi and other states, are they going to return to Benue? Mr. Haruna said by telephone. We appreciate the governors concern, but were not going to leave Benue or anywhere in the north-central because of the bad laws they are putting in place.

Our problems in Benue State include the anti-open grazing law and the livestock guards who are harassing and attacking Fulani and their livestock, he added. But the problems would soon be resolved.

Mr. Ganduje said his administration had sponsored more than 60 herdsmen to Europe where they received training on modern ranching of cattle.

The need to adopt modern animal husbandry techniques to end the roaming of herdsmen and their livestock has grown popular amongst political and economic commentators in the wake of the recent attacks across the country.

ADVERTISEMENT

Several states, including Kogi and Kaduna, have embraced a proposal by the Buhari administration for the establishment of cattle colonies across the country, although many states in the south are still largely apprehensive about the idea.A Lagos Division of the Federal High Court has fixed February 6 and 7 for the resumption of a case of alleged conspiracy and stealing of $1.630 million involving Emirates Airlines and six others.

Mike OSong, the prosecution counsel, said the offence was committed in 2007 when the complainant, one Chu Ikem Orji, boarded an Emirates Airline in Lagos enroute China.

Joined alongside the airline in the three-count charge were Pathfinder International Ltd, Nigerian Aviation Handling Company Plc, Abayomi Adekanbi Abiola, Isiaka Adegoke Adedeji, Awonubi Abayomi, and Jennifer Eze.

Others were Obinna Onyeukwu Onyenso, Mohammed Yousouf, George Ikpekhia, and Haffeez Azeem.

The defendants were accused of conspiring and stealing four bags with tag numbers EK 428682, EK 423683, EK 650162, and EK 650161 one of which contained $1.630 million on December 19, 2007 at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos.

The prosecution said the defendants tagged and collected the bags from Mr. Orji.

One of the charges read, That you, Emirates Airlines, Pathfinders International Limited, Nigerian Aviation Handling Company Plc, Abayomi Adekambi Abiola, Isiaka Adegoke Adedeji, Awonubi Abayomi, George Ipekhia and others now at large on or about the 19th day of December, 2007 at Murtala Mohammed Airport, Ikeja within the jurisdiction of this honourable court conspired among yourselves to commit a felony to wit: stealing four bags with tag number EK 428682, EK 428583, EK 650162, EK 650161, tagged and collected by you from Prince Chu Ikem Orji, one of which contained the sum of $1,630,000 on the promise of keeping them intact for onward delivery to him at Guangzhou China and thereby committed an offence contrary to and punishable under section 516 of the criminal Code Act, Cap C38, Laws of the federation of Nigeria, 2004.

The defendants had pleaded not guilty to the charges.

According to Mr. OSong, upon complaint of non delivery of the bags containing the funds, the Sales Manager of Emirates Airlines, Mr. Adedeji issued a letter of undertaking dated November 2008 and addressed to the commissioner of police special fraud unit promising to produce the missing bags.

Having failed to fulfill the undertaking, the defendants were arraigned in March 2012 before Mohammed Idris, a federal judge.

In July 2012, the defendants filed a motion seeking to quash the charges on the grounds that the charges were an abuse of court process, did not disclose any prima facie case against them, and that the missing funds were proceeds of money laundering.

In his ruling delivered on January 21, 2013, the judge dismissed the motion.

According to Mr. Idris, the court is obliged to conduct summary trial of the accused without proof of evidence, as it is not a requirement for summary trials as provided under Section 33(2) of the Federal High Court Act.

I am of the view therefore that attaching a proof of evidence to a charge sheet in criminal proceedings instituted before the Federal High Court is an anomaly which should not be allowed to detract from the aim and objective of the summary trial procedure, said Mr. Idris.

Arising from the above, I am of the view that the issue whether or not the charges discloses a prima facie case is premature and completely irrelevant. There are no materials before the court to enable it conclude that the charge constitutes an abuse of the process of this court.

Following the high courts decision, the defendants filed a notice of appeal in February 2013 to quash the ruling, on two grounds: that the trial judge erred in law when he failed to consider that the subject matter was the proceeds of crime under the Money Laundering Act and when he held that the prosecution did not have to file a proof of evidence relied upon by the accused persons of their preliminary objection.

In his arguments before the appellate court, the appellants counsel stated that the alleged owner of the funds, Mr. Orji, had been charged to court for money laundering but that the charges were strangely withdrawn on 15 January, 2009.

He added that in November 2009, the federal director of public prosecution forwarded a legal opinion to the office of the Inspector-General of Police exonerating the defendants and recommending Mr. Orji for prosecution.

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The three-judge panel at the Court of Appeal comprising Samuel Oseni, Abimbola Obaseki-Adejumo, and Amina Augie (the presiding judge), in a unanimous decision on November 27, 2014, dismissed the appeal.

According to Mr. Oseni, who read the lead judgment, the appellant failed to provide evidence of his claims that the owner of the mission money had been tried and convicted for money laundering.

It is also not disputed anywhere that the said sum of money is missing and it belongs to Prince Orji, Mr. Oseni stated in the judgement, a copy of which has been obtained by PREMIUM TIMES.

Learned counsel for the appellant had also relied heavily on the legal opinion of the Federal DPP, to support his argument that Prince Orji, having been recommended for prosecution under the Money Laundering Act, no charge based on the missing sum should be brought against the appellant because it is the proceed of crime.

However, I know for sure, at least till this very moment that the law has not changed, neither has the Constitution been amended to alter the provisions of section 36(5), which guarantees that any person charged with the commission of a crime shall be presumed innocent until proven guilty by a court of competent jurisdiction.

The appellate court agreed with the lower courts decision that annexing a proof of evidence to a charge sheet is not part of a summary trial as it pertains to the Federal High Court.

I am therefore inclined to resolve this issue against the appellant. In the final result, I hold that this appeal lacks merit and it is hereby dismissed.

The ruling of the Federal High Court, Lagos Division delivered by M. B. Idris J. on the 21 January 2013 is hereby affirmed. Given the fact that the charge against the appellant was filed since 2009,it is hereby ordered that the said charge be given accelerated trial by the lower court.

At the last adjourned date, counsel to the defendants, Awah Kalu, applied that the Attorney-General of the Federation be ordered to produce the document upon which the Appeal Court dismissed their appeal and ordered accelerated hearing.

The application was, however, opposed by the prosecution counsel who claimed that the same application was refused in the civil suit pending before justice Muslim Hassan of the same court.

But Mr. Idris, while granting the defendants application, said defendants in criminal proceedings must be accorded all necessary material to enable them prepare for their defence.ADVERTISEMENT

The All Progressives Congress in Ondo State has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to dissolve the board of Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) following the expiration of its tenure in December.

The state Publicity Secretary, Abayomi Adesanya, made the call in a statement in Lagos on Sunday.

The party said the tenure of the board had expired in December after a four-year term.

The party said it frowned at surreptitious moves by some powerful persons at the Presidency to elongate the tenure of the board beyond the December 8, 2017 term.

Any extension of the tenure of the board is unconstitutional and an attempt to give Cross River and Akwa-Ibom states undue advantage of serving for continuous period of six years as chairman and managing director, respectively, to the detriment of other member states.

For the fact that it is the turn of Ondo State, as the fifth highest oil producing state in the country, to produce the next Managing Director of NDDC, President Muhammadu Buhari must compensate the people of Ondo State for their commitment to the Party (APC) and the victory of the President in the 2015 presidential election.

It is on record that of all the nine oil producing states in Nigeria, it was only in Ondo State that President Muhammadu Buhari had an overwhelming victory in the 2015 Presidential election and we have not been so compensated.

The party, therefore, called on the President to, as matter of urgency, dissolve the NDDC board and appoint loyal and committed members of the party as chairman from Delta State and managing director from Ondo State.

(NAN)ADVERTISEMENT

Scores of self-confessed repentant thieves on Saturday held a rally at Kudai, a village in Dutse Local Government Area of Jigawa State to publicly declare their rebirth and counsel other youth against stealing.

Ahmadu Dodo, the head of Gyara Kayanka (Repair It Yourself in Hausa language) said repentant thieves across the state came together to form the association with the aim of helping society curtail atrocities and misdemeanour by youth in the state.

The rally featured self-confessed former thieves climbing up a podium before a large crowd of people from the village and neighbouring communities to take oath denouncing stealing and pledging to expose their old accomplices and buyers of stolen articles.

Local people trooped out from Kwaimawa, Laraba, Danmasara, Rungumau, Dadin Duniya and Kwanar Huguma villages to the special arena created in Kudai village to witness the ceremony.

According to Mr. Dodo, who described himself as a retired thief, some shy members of the association secretly took the oath of repentance. We accepted them, but we compelled the stubborn ones to come to the podium to repent, he told journalists.

Put together, in this year we have been able to get 560 repentant thieves across the state, apart from this Saturday occasion which you can see is ongoing.

Mr. Dodo said his association would be of benefit to farmers and herders in the state because most of the repentant thieves specialised in stealing cattle and farm produce such as rice, sorghum and maize.

He said the association has returned four cows to their owners, adding that the group was committed to dealing with deviant youth who persist in stealing and other acts such as substance abuse and indecent dressing.

At the rally, the association also spelt out its dos and donts to its members, which include, No herdsman is allowed to walk with cutlass, or sword, no one is allowed to transport goat on motorcycle.

No one is allowed to cut down trees in the forest without the permission of agricultural extension worker, no farmer is allowed to set ablaze the remnant of stems in his farm.

Anyone that calls a repentant thief a thief, after repentance, is subject to the fine of N100.000. and no Fulani woman is allowed to hawk beyond 6:00 PM.

When contacted for comment on the development, the spokesperson of the police in Jigawa State, Abdu Jinjiri, said, he needed permission from his superior officers to do so.NATIONAL PATRIOTSFORUM

PRESS RELEASE

The Presidency, in its seeming desperation to cover up the fraud at the National Intelligence Agency, NIA, and defend the wrong appointment of AbubakarRufai Ahmed as the substantive Director General has been telling unbridled lies and half-truths, using its propaganda machinery.

In a Hausa Radio programme onVision FMmonitored in Abuja onWednesday, one of the Presidential spokespersons,Garba Shehu tried misleading thegullible Nigerian Hausa listeners ignoring the obvious contradictions in the birth and nationality of Rufai Ahmed.

Whereas Garba Shehu, in seeming ignorance of what is contained in the official Resume of Rufai Ahmed stated that the NIA DG was born in Chad, which is the truth, the official records, as contained in Rufais CV however indicatesthat the man was born inKatsina state of Nigeria. The poser here is who is telling lies between the Presidency and AbubakarRufaiAhmed?

Suffice it to state that, being born in Chad automatically confers onAbubakar RufaiAhmed the citizenship of Chad, going by conventional practice which makes citizenship either by birth, by naturalization or by registration.

Since The Presidency admitted the truth of his place of birth, it pre-supposes that a holistic vetting would have been carried out from the cradle. As far as we are concerned, he could have been born anywhere else since nobody has carried out any vetting on him as required by law.

On the issue of his marriage to a foreigner, it is necessary to point out that, contrary toGarbaShehus postulations that no law exists guiding the marriage of a foreigner by diplomats and other officers of the foreign Affairs Ministry; regulation no. 6, appendix c, section 2, sub section (a) and (b), of the Federal Public Service Rules which the Foreign Affairs Ministry subscribes to stipulates amongst others that: (a) Any member of the foreign service who proposes to marry a foreigner shall first seek prior permission of the PermanentSecretarybefore proceeding with the marriage.

It is needless to expatiate that it is completely forbidden in the case of Head of the National Intelligence Agency, NIA. This is intended to insulate officers from vulnerability to double loyalty and exposure to HostileIntelligencecounterparts.

It was rather laughable the explanations made by the Presidency on the issue ofAbubakarRufai Ahmeds failure in promotion examinations, to the effect that Garba Shehusaid, Rufaiwas made to sacrifice his promotion having come from outside the country to sit for the examinations at each turn.

It is rather absurd to say that he was prevailed upon to be patient on the grounds that he had been a Director at the UN. AbubakerRufaiAhmed never rose to the rank of a Director at the United Nations. At best, he was a P5Officer, the equivalence of an Assistant Director. He was given an honorary Deputy Director so that he will be entitled to pensions, as has been the practice at the UN.

The contradiction is, whether he accepted to return to the NIA as an Assistant Director, having been a Director at the UN, or that he was too provident to allow others proceed, while he downgrades? The fact remainsthat he was a glorified Personal Assistant, PA, to Ambassador Babagana Kingibe, who was head of Africas Peace Keeping Mission, UNAMID, before it was taken over by the UN.

In accordance with Civil ServiceRules, where an officer comes from does not count in his promotion, just as it does not subtract anything from his record of service. It has always been a level playing field, with no room for forfeiture on account of ones duty post.

There is nowhere all over the world that an officer will be prevailed upon to forgo his promotion, in a situation that he passed necessary evaluation tests, under the guise of sympathy for others. The question to ask include; whetherRufai Abubakar was prevailed upon verbally or in written and under which Director General did that take place?

That Abubakar Rufai came in fromKatsina then into the NIA is a fact, contrary to the claim that he came in from the United Nations. Infactthe issue coming from the UN does not arise because it is assumed that he came from the NIA to take up appointment with the UN.

It remains an aberration that the NIA DG who was supposed to have been downgraded on his transfer of service from KatsinaState to the Foreign Affairs, hewas rather promoted from Grade level 12 to Grade level 14.

That Abubakar was both a permanent staff of the NIA as well as the UN, and retired from both in the same year are issues to be investigated. It is not practicable anywhere for an officer to hold two appointments both on permanent basis at the same time.

There is the need to state for the avoidance of doubt that Nigerians, including supporters of President Muhammadu Buhariare not impressed with the infantile defenses being put up to save the job for the cabal, usingAbubakar Rufai Ahmed and the NIA as a proxy.

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Lies, however beautifully colored can never take the place of truth, neither can deceit, however well clothed take the place of reality. Nigerians are watching.

Comrade Adewale Benjamin

Convener

Mustapha S. Tarajo

Co-ConvenerThe leaders of the All Progressives Congress, APC, in the Owan East Local Government Area of Edo State are battling with the state Deputy Governor, Phillip Shaibu, over allegation of a chairmanship candidate for the forthcoming local government elections.

The APC local leaders said they have, therefore, rejected one Andrew Osigbe, whose name they said was unduly submitted to the party leadership at the state.

During a protest in front of the state headquarters of the APC in Benin City, on Thursday, a day after the party primaries, the local leaders of the APC insisted the party field one Victor Ohiosumuan as its authentic candidate.

The protest was led by the Chapter Chairman of the APC in Owan East, Roland Edeki.

This is to bring to the knowledge of the State Chairman of our party, Barr. Anselem Ojezua, the Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, party leaders at various Local Government Areas, and the entire people of Edo State that the party primaries scheduled to hold on 24 January 2018 was purportedly hijacked by the Deputy Governor of the State, Comrade Phillip Shaibu, Mr. Edeki read out a prepared statement to journalists at the venue of the protest.

The statement was co-signed by him and two other persons  Aledu Bello and Haruna Raphael  the party secretary and leader respectively.

PREMIUM TIMES learnt that the party leaders, including the party executive from 10 out of the 11 wards in the area, and other statutory delegates, were all waiting at the mini stadium at the local government headquarters, Afuze, for the ratification of Mr. Ohiosumuan as their consensus candidate, unaware that the deputy governor was supervising a parallel primaries elsewhere.

Mr. Shaibu, allegedly connived with the state Commissioner for Science and Technology, Emmanuel Agbale, who was the head of the three-man electoral panel in the local government area.

The other two members of the electoral panel  Isikpe Kadiri and Jafaru Yakubu  were with the rest of the other party officials and delegates at Afuze. They were not part of the parallel primaries.

At about 4:02 p.m., the APC chapter chairman, Mr. Edeki and the two electoral officers decided to conduct the primaries, having waited for long without seeing the head of the electoral panel.

Mr. Ohiosumuan, a lawyer, was overwhelmingly elected by the delegates.

Pally Iriase, the member representing Owan West/East Federal Constituency in the Federal House of Representatives, told PREMIUM TIMES, Friday, that Mr. Ohiosumuan was the validly elected flagbearer of the APC.

Mr. Iriase, who is the chairman of the APC Caucus in Owan East, said that 22, out of the 27 members of the caucus present on that day, voted for Mr. Ohiosumuan.

We know that democracy is on trial in Owan East. Its a very sad case for us in the APC because this is the same thing that made many of us to leave the PDP.

The revolution is reversing itself, we pray to God to save the soul of the APC, he said.

Ebomhiana Musa, the spokesperson for the deputy governor, admitted that there was controversy over the APC primaries in Owan East, but said the deputy governor had no hand in what happened.

It is not the government that determines who emerges as a candidate of the party; its purely a party affair. So, the issue of the deputy governor imposing a candidate does not arise because its not within his power to do so, Mr. Musa told PREMIUM TIMES.

Yes, the deputy governor was there in Owan East during the primaries. He was there by virtue of his position and his office. As the leader of the Edo North, he has the power and every right to visit any of the local government areas with the Edo North and outside the Edo North to supervise and make sure everything went well.

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I dont want you to isolate Owan East; he visited all the local government areas in the Edo North to make sure all went well, he said.

When contacted, the state chairman of the party, Mr. Ojezua, told PREMIUM TIMES that the party was looking into the controversy.

A process like this must always have its challenges and we are dealing with them, he said. We must have a resolution at the end of the day.By: Australasian Furniture Association

Contact

Joe Perri & Associates

***@joeperri.com.au Joe Perri & Associates

End

-- An exciting new working partnership between the Australasian Furnishing Association (AFA) and the Australian Gift and Homewares Association (AGHA) will see the launch of new industry events and an upscaling of existing events across Australia commencing in February 2018.Both organisations are peak industry bodies representing thousands of businesses across Australia and this partnership will provide even more opportunities for members in a very cost-effective environment across a broader audience reach and specific target markets.AFA CEO, Ms Patrizia Torelli, said that the synergies between both organisations and the sharing of resources and capabilities was an exciting development that could be rolled-out across many likeminded industry associations in the near future."We're proud to be partnering with AGHA and sharing their extensive inhouse event management capabilities and networks to complement those of our Association. Between us we will launch some of Australia's most exciting events and reboot some old favourites including the relaunch of the iconic 'Furnitex',"Ms Torelli said.AGHA CEO, Wayne Castle, welcomed the partnership."In addition to all the new projects that we will be working on together the relationship will add a new dimension and content to our already successful Gift Fairs. The members of both associations will benefit from the sharing of resources and the extended international promotional opportunities created by the new partnership,"he said.One of the most exciting ventures for the new partnership will be the relaunch of the Australasian Hospitality Industry Exhibition and Conference to be held in Sydney in March 2019 with more details being released in the coming weeks.The partnership will also give a much stronger combined voice on industry matters while increasing the profile and reach of both organisations for the benefit of their members.Briana Healey / AGHAT: 1300 441 384E: briana@agha.com.auJoe Perri /AFAJoe Perri & Associates Pty LtdT: +61 3 9324 0362M: +61 412 112 545WASHINGTON, D.C.  The Pentagon released a muscular new nuclear review on Friday, doubling down on Obama-era efforts to modernize the U.S. nuclear arsenal while launching initiatives officials say are designed to deter Russia, China, North Korea and Iran from going nuclear.We must look reality in the eye and see the world as it is, not as we wish it to be, Defense Secretary James Mattis said in an introduction to the document. The plan, which places Russia at the top of the country's potential adversaries  mentioning the country 127 times in the 74-page paper, while North Korea received 49 mentions  also calls for new nuclear cruise missiles.

In the short term, the strategy unveiled plans for a new nuclear sea-launched cruise missile, and a lower-yield nuclear warhead for submarine-launched ballistic missiles.Blog Archive September 2021 (22) August 2021 (56) July 2021 (57) June 2021 (66) May 2021 (63) April 2021 (75) March 2021 (73) February 2021 (61) January 2021 (69) December 2020 (62) November 2020 (62) October 2020 (70) September 2020 (51) August 2020 (52) July 2020 (60) June 2020 (57) May 2020 (79) April 2020 (56) March 2020 (52) February 2020 (50) January 2020 (69) December 2019 (58) November 2019 (64) October 2019 (44) September 2019 (49) August 2019 (71) July 2019 (71) June 2019 (71) May 2019 (67) April 2019 (74) March 2019 (85) February 2019 (64) January 2019 (73) December 2018 (66) November 2018 (81) October 2018 (87) September 2018 (66) August 2018 (76) July 2018 (84) June 2018 (86) May 2018 (64) April 2018 (83) March 2018 (78) February 2018 (69) January 2018 (69) December 2017 (82) November 2017 (87) October 2017 (89) September 2017 (77) August 2017 (75) July 2017 (76) June 2017 (90) May 2017 (86) April 2017 (59) March 2017 (61) February 2017 (82) January 2017 (92) December 2016 (90) November 2016 (80) October 2016 (75) September 2016 (95) August 2016 (104) July 2016 (93) June 2016 (96) May 2016 (98) April 2016 (99) March 2016 (113) February 2016 (82) January 2016 (98) December 2015 (113) November 2015 (94) October 2015 (93) September 2015 (98) August 2015 (97) July 2015 (105) June 2015 (103) May 2015 (95) April 2015 (100) March 2015 (102) February 2015 (93) January 2015 (114) December 2014 (110) November 2014 (103) October 2014 (105) September 2014 (96) August 2014 (96) July 2014 (112) June 2014 (119) May 2014 (109) April 2014 (116) March 2014 (117) February 2014 (109) January 2014 (116) December 2013 (117) November 2013 (121) October 2013 (125) September 2013 (93) August 2013 (115) July 2013 (110) June 2013 (102) May 2013 (115) April 2013 (113) March 2013 (119) February 2013 (108) January 2013 (119) December 2012 (132) November 2012 (115) October 2012 (121) September 2012 (115) August 2012 (124) July 2012 (102) June 2012 (121) May 2012 (121) April 2012 (127) March 2012 (130) February 2012 (112) January 2012 (131) December 2011 (129) November 2011 (118) October 2011 (118) September 2011 (110) August 2011 (138) July 2011 (146) June 2011 (139) May 2011 (144) April 2011 (127) March 2011 (140) February 2011 (116) January 2011 (134) December 2010 (133) November 2010 (136) October 2010 (148) September 2010 (128) August 2010 (155) July 2010 (129) June 2010 (138) May 2010 (152) April 2010 (161) March 2010 (119) February 2010 (149) January 2010 (155) December 2009 (177) November 2009 (171) October 2009 (176) September 2009 (159) August 2009 (156) July 2009 (170) June 2009 (157) May 2009 (185) April 2009 (179) March 2009 (183) February 2009 (170) January 2009 (181) December 2008 (189) November 2008 (183) October 2008 (164) September 2008 (164) August 2008 (177) July 2008 (179) June 2008 (170) May 2008 (191) April 2008 (175) March 2008 (195) February 2008 (162) January 2008 (188) December 2007 (187) November 2007 (189) October 2007 (194) September 2007 (156) August 2007 (194) July 2007 (163) June 2007 (176) May 2007 (190) April 2007 (177) March 2007 (192) February 2007 (165) January 2007 (170) December 2006 (182) November 2006 (177) October 2006 (185) September 2006 (180) August 2006 (156) July 2006 (160) June 2006 (177) May 2006 (173) April 2006 (157) March 2006 (158) February 2006 (146) January 2006 (144) December 2005 (135) November 2005 (138) October 2005 (128) September 2005 (141) August 2005 (136) July 2005 (133) June 2005 (119) May 2005 (143) April 2005 (52)The Georgia Museum of Art at the University of Georgia is known throughout the state for the various exhibitions and events it has hosted sincTurkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has told France's Emmanuel Macron that Turkey's military operation inside Syria is aimed at purging "terror elements" and not designed to permanently take Syrian territory.

The state-run Anadolu news agency reported on February 3 that Erdogan told Macron in a telephone call that Turkey had "no eye on the territory of another country."

Turkey on January 20 launched its air-and-land operation, dubbed Olive Branch, against members of the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia in Syria's Kurdish-run Afrin region.

Ankara said its forces are supported by the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which seeks to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The Turks accuse the YPG of having links to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged an insurgency in southeast Turkish for more than 30 years. The PKK is regarded as a terror group by Turkey, the United States, and the European Union.

But Turkey's Western allies have worked closely with YPG fighters in the battle against Islamic State (IS) extremists and do not consider it to be a terror group.

Macron said in a newspaper interview last week that France would have a "real problem" with the Turkish campaign if it turned out to be an "invasion operation."

After the French leaders remarks, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that France had no right "to give us lessons" on a cross-border offensive, citing France's colonial history.

The comments came amid reports that seven Turkish soldiers were killed on February 3 in clashes against Kurdish fighters in Syria.

The Kurdish news portal Rudaw quoted the Turkish military as saying five of the soldiers were killed in an attack on a Turkish tank.The two others were killed earlier in the day in separate clashes.

If confirmed, the deaths would bring to 14 the number of Turkish soldiers killed during the offensive in Afrin.

Meanwhile, a Turkish government official denied a report by Human Rights Watch on February 3 that Turkish guards at the border are indiscriminately shooting at and summarily forcing back asylum seekers attempting to cross into Turkey.

Erdogan's spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, told reporters that Turkish soldiers were there to protect these people and that Ankara has had an "open-door policy" since the start of Syria's civil war in 2011.

With reporting by AFP and ReutersTens of thousands of Greeks have staged a mass rally in Athens urging the government not to compromise in the countrys long-running name dispute with neighboring Macedonia.

Organizers claimed some 1.5 million people from all over the country traveled to Athens' central Syntagma Square on February 4 to join the demonstration against Skopje's use of the name Macedonia.

Police put the figure at around 140,000.

Demonstrators carrying Greek flags chanted slogans such as "hands off Macedonia" and "Macedonia is Greece" as they assembled in the square outside parliament.

Renowned Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis, 92, addressed the crowd, saying, "Macedonia was, is, and will forever be Greek."

Greek Prime Minister Alexi Tsipras has been considering a resolution to the dispute -- angering both opposition politicians and members of his own nationalist coalition.

In a statement released by his office on February 4, Tsipras said that "the million protesters that the organizers [of the demonstration] imagined was wishful thinking."

"The crushing majority of Greek people conclude that foreign policy issues should not be dealt with fanaticism," he added.

Among those at the February 4 rally in Athens were mayors, senior religious figures, Greek military officers, and former Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, who was Greece's foreign minister when the name dispute began.

The dispute broke out after Macedonia, for decades a part of the former Yugoslavia, gained independence in 1991.

Greece argues the neighbor's name implies claims on its own province of Macedonia and wants it changed. The Macedonian government denies the charge.

Leaders of the two countries have said progress has been made in settling the dispute, with indications that any agreement could include Macedonia adding "Upper," "New," or "North" to its name.

UN negotiator Matthew Nimetz on February 1 voiced optimism that the Balkan neighbors could end the dispute this year, despite vehement opposition from nationalist parties in both countries.

The Athens protest would be the second major demonstration in the capital in recent weeks. It is being organized and funded by Greek diaspora groups, backed by retired officer associations, Greek Macedonian cultural unions, church groups, and others.

Outside the capital, tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Thessaloniki on January 21 in the first major protest over the name dispute, with police saying 90,000 people attended but organizers putting the number at 400,000.

The government has said the protests will not affect its efforts to solve the dispute. "Not having a solution undermines our national interest," Tsipras said recently.

Based on Greece's objections to the use of the name, Macedonia in 1993 joined the United Nations as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM).

With reporting by AFP, Greek Reporter, and Channel NewsAsiaThree Iranian Christians are due to appear before Irans Islamic Revolutionary Court on February 4 to appeal against their 2017 convictions on charges of "conducting evangelism" and carrying out "illegal church activities."

Pastor Victor Bet Tamraz, Amin Afshar Naderi, and Hadi Asgari each received a provisional sentence of 10 years in prison for the charges filed against them.

The Islamic judges also imposed an additional five-year prison sentence against Naderi on a charge of blasphemy.

The Revolutionary Court has the power to end the case, confirm the sentences, or refer the case to Iran's Supreme Court.

Iran's secretive Revolutionary Court system was established after the 1979 Islamic Revolution to try suspected ideological opponents of the country's Islamic rulers.

It operates without juries, without defense lawyers, and often without evidence except confessions extracted through torture.

The court system's case load includes suspects charged with espionage, threatening the internal and external security of Iran, trying to overthrow Iran's Islamic government, blasphemy, inciting violence, and drug smuggling.

On February 2, four UN human rights experts issued a joint statement calling on Iran to ensure "a fair and transparent final hearing" for the three men.

The UN special rapporteurs said the charges and sentences were "completely contrary" to Iran's obligations under international law.

"We are additionally concerned about the lack of health care made available to them while in detention and, in particular, about the current health condition of Mr. Asgari, who remains in prison," they said.

The UN experts also said they were concerned that the prosecution of the three Christians was not an isolated case.

They called on Iran to "ensure fair trials for all, including the religious minorities in the country."

"We are aware of several other reported cases in which members of the Christian minority have received heavy sentences after being charged with 'threatening national security,' either for converting people or for attending house churches," their joint statement said.

"This shows a disturbing pattern of individuals being targeted because of their religion or beliefs, in this case a religious minority in the country," they said.

"Members of the Christian minority in Iran, particularly those who have converted to the faith, are facing severe discrimination and religious persecution," the UN experts said.

The UN experts also urged Iran's government to "immediately and unconditionally release all those who have been arrested and detained for exercising their right to freedom of religion or belief."

The United States said in its 2017 International Religious Freedom Report that Tehran "regulated Christian religious practices closely to enforce the prohibition on proselytizing."

With reporting by AFP and BBCTehran's prosecutor says an unnamed person has been sentenced to six years in prison after being convicted of relaying information about Iran's nuclear program to a U.S. intelligence agent and a European country.

Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi told judiciary news website Mizan that the Iranian court also ordered the confiscation of the money the convict allegedly received for the information.

Dolatabadi said the alleged spy met the U.S. agent nine times and provided him with information about "nuclear affairs and sanctions."

The convict also provided the information to a European country, the prosecutor added, without providing further details.

In December, Dolatabadi said Iran's Supreme Court had upheld a death sentence against Ahmadreza Djalali, an Iranian-Swedish academic convicted of providing information to Israel about Iran's nuclear and defense plans and personnel.

Djalali, a researcher at Stockholms Karolinska Institute, has denied the charges.

Iran insists its nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes, while the United States and other countries claim it has been trying to develop nuclear weapons.

U.S. President Donald Trump said last month that he wanted to work with European allies and Congress to fix what he called "disastrous flaws" in the 2015 nuclear accord between Tehran and world powers.

Trump warned that Washington would withdraw from the deal, which curbed Iran's nuclear program in exchange for the easing of crippling international sanctions targeting Tehran, if the terms of the agreement are not strengthened within four months.

Tehran has ruled out any changes in the agreement, while the other signatories -- Britain, France, Germany, China, and Russia -- have closed ranks in support of the accord.

Also on February 4, Iran's judiciary acknowledged that it had granted medical leave to an 81-year-old Iranian-American convicted of "collaborating with the hostile American government."

However, the judiciary sought to downplay any expectation that Baquer Namazi would be put on an indefinite release after his recent surgery to install a pacemaker.

"Like many prisoners who can go on leave, he went on a three-day leave," spokesman Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei said. "When he was out of prison, they requested the leave to be extended for another three days."

"His leave must have come to an end yesterday or today," he added.

Namazis lawyer Jared Genser said he believed his client would remain on leave until at least February 5.

Baquer Namazi, a retired UNICEF official, and his son Siamak are serving 10-year prison sentences.

A United Nations human rights group and the United States have called for their immediate release.

With reporting by AP and ReutersIn its effort to give police more power to fight "destructive religious movements," Kazakhstan has set its sights on beards and short pants.

Ultraconservative Muslims who do not fit with the Central Asian country's officially approved form of Islam often display their religious stance through the wearing of heavy beards and ankle-length trousers.

The authorities, in turn, often pass broad judgement on those with such beards and attire, labeling them as adherents to what they consider a dangerous "Salafist" strain of Sunni Islam.

A bill that passed in its first reading in parliament on January 31 seeks to support police efforts to prevent "crimes linked to religious activities" by amending the law on religion. The bill calls for tightening rules under which citizens can study at religious schools abroad, sets preconditions for minors to attend mosques and church services, and bars the "public display of the attributes and outward signs" of "destructive religious movements."

The bill, based on the definition given by the Religious Affairs Ministry, describes "destructive" movements as those that promote religious views and teachings that threaten people's rights and freedoms.

Such movements, according to the bill, are aimed at weakening and even destroying society's moral foundations and its spiritual and cultural values.

Religious Affairs Minister Nurlan Yermekbaev says the authorities will compile and issue a list of groups they deem "destructive." "Pseudo-Salafists," he told reporters in Astana this week, will be among them.

Certain types of long beards would be banned and their wearers subjected to a fine, according to the new bill.

Yermekbaev said the permitted length of beards would be announced by the authorities in due time.

However, the minister emphasized that not everyone with a long beard should fear being stopped on the street and fined.

Officials would determine if the person had links to extremist movements, the minister said. "The most important is what the person [with the banned beard] says and promotes," he said.

Yermekbaev added that no action will be taken against those who bear "only one banned attribute, but is not religious at all." Religious figures, such as imams and priests, would be exempt from the ban.

If the bill becomes law, as it is nearly certain to do, Kazakhstan would also ban clothing that obscures a person's face, a move that appears aimed at the niqab face veil.

Offenders would face a fine of 120,000 tenges, approximately $370.

Fears Of Radicalization

In April, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaev called for a legal ban on Islamic garments that cover women head to toe, and ankle-length pants for men.

Nazarbaev expressed concerns that the number of young Kazakhs wearing such attire was "on the rise" and blamed the trend on young people's "ignorance."

The bill also gives police more rein to monitor people suspected of religious extremism, issue warnings, and to compile a list of such suspects.

With few exceptions, only graduates of Kazakh religious schools would be allowed to study at foreign religious schools.

The bill also stipulates that minors under the age of 16 would be allowed to attend mosque prayers or church services only if accompanied by a parent or a close relative -- and only if both parents agree.

Kazakhstan has already banned the Islamic head scarf, or hijab, in schools, despite criticism by some parents.

Officials in the former Soviet, resource-rich Central Asian country frequently warn about the threat posed by religious extremist groups. The government blames "radical religious movements" for deadly attacks in Aqtobe in June 2016.

Kazakh authorities estimate that several hundred Kazakh nationals, including some young families, joined the extremist group Islamic State fighting in Iraq and Syria.

Written by Farangis Najibullah based on reporting by RFE/RL's Kazakh Service correspondent Svetlana GlushkovaThe departure of Rustam Inoyatov, the head of the powerful National Security Service, after more than 20 years has been called one of the biggest event in Uzbekistan's recent history, second only to the death of President Islam Karimov in 2016.

Seen as an obstacle to new President Shavkat Mirziyoev's plans for reform, Inoyatov's removal from power should free Mirziyoev to push forward his policies. Opinions vary on Mirziyoev's ability, and perhaps even desire, to make good on all his promises.

Muhammad Tahir, RFE/RL's media-relations manager, moderated a discussion on what Inoyatov's exit means for President Mirziyoev, and his plans for Uzbekistan.

Joining the discussion from Bishkek was Steve Swerdlow (@steveswerdlow), the Central Asia researcher for Human Rights Watch. From Washington D.C., we had Catherine Putz (@LadyPutz ), managing editor at The Diplomat magazine and also the author of many articles about Central Asia, taking part in the conversation. Our own Alisher Sidik, director of RFE/RL's Uzbek Service, known locally as Ozodlik, helped us out. And I'm one of many people who were waiting for Inoyatov to leave, so I wanted to say some things as well.

Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes.Russia, Iran, and China have strongly criticized Washington's newly revealed policy plan to expand U.S. nuclear weapons capabilities in order to deter other countries.

The plan, which calls for the U.S. nuclear arsenal to be revamped with the development of new low-yield atomic weapons, was announced in a policy statement by President Donald Trump's administration released on February 2.

Iranian President Hassan Rohani on February 4 accused the United States of "shamelessly threatening Russia with a new atomic weapon."

Speaking in a televised speech from Tehran, Rohani said that "the same people who supposedly believe that using weapons of mass destruction is a crime against humanity...are talking about new weapons to threaten or use against rivals."

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif warned in a Twitter message that the U.S. policy document risked "bringing humankind closer to annihilation."

China on February 4 criticized the U.S. government for portraying Beijing as a potential nuclear adversary after the nuclear-policy review said Washington wanted to prevent Beijing from mistakenly concluding that any use of nuclear weapons, however limited, is acceptable.

China also called on Washington to honor its commitments to reduce its own nuclear arsenal.

China's Defense Ministry said its military activities were defensive and its nuclear arsenal was the "minimum level" required for its security.

In a statement, the ministry expressed hope that the United States would "abandon a Cold War mentality" and "shoulder its special and prior responsibility for its own nuclear disarmament."

On February 3, Russia's Foreign Ministry characterized the Trump administrations policy statement as both "confrontational" and "anti-Russian."

The statement dismissed the document as "an unscrupulous attempt to shift onto others one's own responsibility for the degrading situation in the field of international and regional security."

It particularly condemned the development of low-yield nuclear weapons, which Moscow said can significantly lower the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons and "lead to a nuclear-missile war even in low-intensity conflicts."

The Nuclear Posture Review, a report customarily done at the outset of a new U.S. administration, outlines the Pentagon's nuclear goals under Trump.

It is the first time since 2010 that the U.S. military has enunciated how it foresees nuclear threats in the coming decades.

It says Russia must be persuaded it would face "unacceptably dire costs" if it were to threaten even a limited nuclear attack in Europe.

"This is a response to Russian expansion of their capability and the nature of their strategy and doctrine," Defense Secretary Jim Mattis wrote in the 75-page summary of the review, which also highlights the U.S. concerns about North Korea, Iran, and China.

The document specifically points to a Russian doctrine known as "escalate to de-escalate," in which Moscow would use or threaten to use smaller-yield nuclear weapons in a limited conventional conflict in Europe to compel the United States and NATO to back down.

With reporting by Reuters, AP, AFP, dpa, and InterfaxAgencies

Bollywod film industries renowned actress Tamannaah Bhatia has faced misbehaves from her own fan in Hyderabad of India. It is said that one of her fans had hurled footwear at her when the actress was in the city to launch a jewellery store.

It is said that the footwear had missed its target to actress Bhatia, while it hit an employee of the jewellery store. The attacker, A B-Tech graduate of Musheerabad is said to be the accused in this incident and was immediately detained by the police.



The Japanese government is ready to press forward on a joint urban-development proposal for Russias Far East city of Vladivostok as part of the two countries' economic partnership effort.

The Nikkei Asian Review on February 4 reported the plan includes the introduction of a smart traffic-signal system developed by Japan that automatically adjusts signal times based on traffic volume.

It also is proposing a new technology to repair aging sewer pipes without the need for excavation work.

Nikkei reported that Tokyo is hoping the joint effort for the Far East city will help improve ties and smooth the way toward a solution to a dispute over a chain of islands that Tokyo calls the Northern Territories and Moscow calls the Southern Kuriles.

Although Russian-held, Japan still claims the islands, which the Soviet Union seized in the closing days of World War II.

Russia President Vladimir Putin has expressed hopes that, with major development work, Vladivostok can be made into the leading port in the Far East. Development is also under way to make it an economic and tourist hub and includes a major casino project.

Tokyo has put together a package of proposals for the development of Vladivostok using Japanese technologies and other resources ahead of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's scheduled visit to Russia in May.

Putin and Abe agreed in principle to creating a redevelopment plan for the city when the two leaders met in December 2016.

The Japanese proposal includes a plan to establish tourism facilities and redevelop areas near train stations in Vladivostok.

Japanese-style garbage-incineration plants, which lessen the impact on the environment, are also to be proposed, Nikkei reported.

Vladivostok, which is nearly 9,000 kilometers from Moscow, has a population of just over 600,000. International flights connect the city to South Korea, Japan, China, North Korea, the Philippines, and Vietnam.

With reporting by Nikkei and TASSRussian opposition activist Konstantin Sinitsyn has been found dead of head injuries in the entranceway to his St. Petersburg apartment building.

St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly lawmaker Boris Vishnevsky posted the news on February 2, although the incident apparently happened on January 26.

Vishnevsky said Sinitsyn died of trauma to the head and that police had detained one suspect. Authorities say they believe the motive was robbery.

Sinitsyn, 53, was a regular participant in pro-democracy and anticorruption demonstrations in St. Petersburg.

In 2015, he supported a wave of protests conducted by long-distance truckers against rising road tariffs. He also figured prominently in St. Petersburg protests against a government decision to hand the landmark St. Isaac's Cathedral over to the Russian Orthodox Church.

With reporting by Fontanka.ruSeveral hundred protesters have gathered outside the main building of Serbia's national broadcaster in Belgrade to demand the resignation of the station's management.

The participants in the February 4 demonstration denounced what they called the unfair coverage of the opposition's activities by RTS ahead of next month's local elections in Belgrade.

Among the protesters were one of the candidates in the March 4 vote, Dragan Djilas, and members of the coalition backing him.

Former Serbian President Boris Tadic and Democratic Party leader Dragan Sutanovac also participated in the protest.

The European Union, international institutions, and media-watchdog organizations have raised concerns about media freedom in Serbia.

In a November 2016 report, the European Commission said that Serbia achieved "some level of preparation" regarding freedom of expression, but still needs to "create an enabling environment in which freedom of expression can be exercised without hindrance."Several thousand people have marched through the center of the Ukrainian capital to call for President Petro Poroshenko's resignation.

Police said the February 4 demonstration organized by opposition politician Mikheil Saakashvili's Movement of New Forces party attracted 2,500 people, but local reports said up to 5,000 people participated.

Addressing the demonstration, Saakashvili said the event marked the beginning of a campaign to "dismantle this rotten and corrupt system."

"And Poroshenko's resignation is only the first step," he added.

"The people who have ascended to the government in our country do not deliver on people's demands," a protester told RFE/RL, calling for Poroshenko's impeachment and his "whole corrupt government to go away."

The protester said that "nothing has been done from what people called for" during the Euromaidan protests that pushed Moscow-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych out in 2014 and brought Poroshenko to power.

Organizers of the "March for the Future" are also calling for early parliamentary elections and the formation of a new government.

The demonstrators adopted a resolution calling for nationwide rallies on February 18, lawmaker Yuriy Derevyanko said.

The participants in the protest marched from Kyiv's Shevchenko Park to European Square, where they held a rally, holding Ukrainian flags and red-and-black party banners and shouting slogans such as "Resignation" and "Ukraine without oligarchs."

About 2,000 law enforcement officers were deployed to the capital ahead of the rally. No incidents were reported.

Saakashvili was president of Georgia from 2004 to 2013. He gave up his Georgian passport in 2015 when he accepted Ukrainian citizenship in order to take the post of Odesa governor at the request of Poroshenko.

Saakashvili resigned from the Odesa post in November 2016, accusing the government of undermining his efforts to fight corruption and carry out reforms, and has since become an ardent opponent of the Ukrainian president.

He was then stripped of his Ukrainian citizenship by Poroshenko in June 2017 in a move he is challenging in court.U.S. President Donald Trump is claiming that he has been completely vindicated by a Republican-written congressional memo that alleges the FBI abused its surveillance powers during an investigation of the Trump presidential election campaign's possible ties to Russia.

In a Twitter message late on February 3, Trump said: "This memo totally vindicates 'Trump' in probe. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on."

Trump tweeted that there was "no Collusion and there was no Obstruction" of justice by his administration to block the FBI's investigation.

But the memo also includes revelations that could complicate any attempt by Trump and his allies to undermine Justice Department Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating the Kremlins alleged meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

The memo released on February 2 contends that the FBI, when it applied for a surveillance warrant on a onetime Trump campaign associate, relied excessively on an ex-British spy whose opposition research was funded by Democrats.

But the memo also calls that source a "longtime FBI source" with a credible track record.

It also confirms that the investigation actually began several months earlier, and was "triggered" by information involving a different campaign aide.

The controversial memorandum accuses the FBI and the U.S. Justice Department of being biased.

Republicans on the U.S. House Intelligence Committee released the document just moments after it was declassified by Trump.

The document says its findings "raise concerns with the legitimacy and legality" of the actions of the FBI and Justice Department and "represent a troubling breakdown of legal processes."

The White House said earlier that the memo "raises serious concerns about the integrity of decisions made at the highest levels of the Department of Justice and the FBI."

The FBI on January 31 took the unusual step of publicly opposing the release of the memo, saying it demonstrated "material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo's accuracy."

Democrats say the memo is a selectively edited set of Republican talking points aimed at distracting attention from the committee's own investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Senior Democrats in Congress have warned that Trump could trigger a "constitutional crisis" if he uses the memo as a pretext to fire Mueller.

Democrats also said they hope to release their own memo on February 5.

With reporting by AP, Reuters, AFP, and dpaToyota Vios is going to be the star attraction from the Japanese brand at this editions Auto Expo. Along with Vios, Toyota is going to showcase one of the largest number of cars from any brand. A total of 20 new cars will be on display at the Toyota stall, and the highlight will be Vios.

Ahead of official debut, Toyota has teased the new Vios for India. Seen in red colour, this new car will sit above the Etios in the company when launched. Expect launch to take place at the Auto Expo.

To be offered in both petrol and diesel engine options, the Toyota Vios will most likely get a 1.5 liter petrol engine and a 1.4 liter diesel engine similar to those seen powering the Etios and Liva. Gearbox options could include a 5 speed manual, 7 speed CVT and 6 speed manual for the diesel engined variant.

Slotted between the Etios and Altis, the new India spec Toyota Vios midsized sedan will sport a front grille as seen on the new Corolla while side profile gets a sportier appeal with strong shoulder line. Flared wheel arches along with a more dominating base line add to the sporty appeal while at the rear, strong resemblance to the new Toyota Corolla is apparent. The Vios receives wrap around tail lamps, a large chrome strip across the length of the boot and will sit on 16 alloy wheels.

The premium look is carried forward to the interiors of the Toyota Vios which receives a two tone beige and black colour scheme. Silver accents are also evident while features include climate controls, 2 DIV music system, leather upholstery and steering mounted controls. The Vios in India will also receive AC vents at the rear.

Slated to make its way into markets in India in the coming weeks, Toyota Vios could claim a price tag of around INR 8-13 lakhs and rival the likes of Honda City, Maruti Ciaz and Hyundai Verna. More details to be revealed from the 2018 Auto Expo.



Guwahati, February 4 : Assam gets Rs 1,00,000 crore investment proposals from over 175 domestic and international companies in various sectors including petroleum, tourism, health, telecom, agriculture, transport.





In the first ever investment promotion and facilitation initiative by the Assam government, Advantage Assam  Global Investors Summit, 2018 has attracted the investors from both domestic and international and they committed to invest around Rs 1,00,000 crore in the North Eastern Indian state and signed over 200 Memorandum of understanding (MoUs).





The 2-day event witnessed the luminaries of Indian business fraternity descending on the most talked about investment summit in the largest economy of North-Eastern India.





Assam received saw a mammoth 200 MoUs with amounting of Rs 1,00,000 crore signed in the mega business event held at Sarsajai, Guwahati.





Among the 175 companies who signed MoUs with the Assam government in the event, Oil India Limited (OIL) will be investing Rs 10,000 crore, Indo-UK

Institute of Health will be investing Rs 2,700 crore, Century Ply has shared plans of investing Rs 2,100 crore, Spicejet outlined plans of Rs 1,250 crore worth of investment for Assam through sea planes boosting the tourism sector besides connecting Lakhimpur and Jorhat under the Udaan Scheme.





Infinity Group will be investing Rs 1,000 crore in an IT Park and Real Estate in Guwahati.





Medanta Group shared their proposal of Rs 500 crore investment in the Healthcare sector.





Essel Infra group will be investing in Road Infra, Power and Water Resource, Dalmia Bharat Cement announced an investment attuned to Rs 1,100 crore.





Tourism sector which is one of the key focus areas of the Assam government saw an investment proposal in concurrence of around Rs 736 crore.





Infrastructure sector a prime determinant of progress saw a total investment proposal worth Rs 2,347 crore.





With Prime Minister Narendra Modis thrust on the Act East Policy, Assam is swiftly becoming the most advantageous destination for all businesses aiming to connect with the ASEAN and BBIN nations.





PM Modi had inaugurated the summit on Saturday and said that, Northeast is at heart of India's 'Act East Policy' and Assam is Indias expressway to ASEAN.





Over 4500 delegates from different parts of the country and nations including Australia, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Canada, Cambodia, Czech Republic, Germany, Hong Kong, Israel, Italy, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Laos, Myanmar, Netherlands, Nepal, Singapore, Thailand, UAE, UK, USA and Vietnam had participated in the event.





Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said in the closing ceremony of the event that, Advantage Assam is an initiative for the younger generation of the state.





Today is a special day for us and todays success is a reflection of the hard work put in by the team and all our officials for the last one and a half years. The main ambition of the event, held with the help of our Prime Minister Naredra Modi, is to provide the youngsters of the state with a better tomorrow by taking initiatives today and providing platforms for youth to enhance their skills. I thank everyone for their encouragement and support, and helping us make this event a grand success. We have many miles to go, and we look forward to your continued support in implementing all these initiatives which will not only benefit Assam but the northeastern region as a whole, Sonowal said.





In the summit Foreign delegates and ministers who were Dasho Tshering Tobgay, Prime Minister of Bhutan, Lyonpo Damcho Dorji, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bhutan, Amir Hossain Amu, Minister of Industries, Bangladesh, Lyonpo Damcho Dorji, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bhutan, Lyonpo Lekey Dorji, Minister of Economic Affairs, Bhutan, Dr. Thong Khon, Minister of Tourism Cambodia, Ounethoang Khaophanh, Vice Minister of Information Culture and Tourism, Government of Laos, Dr. Than Myint, Minister of Commerce Myanmar, Jagdish Mukhi, Governor of Assam, Union ministers including Suresh Prabhu, Union Minister for Commerce and Industries, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Union Minister for Information Technology, Law and Justice, Dharmendra Pradhan, Union Minister, Petroleum and Natural Gas, Pema Khandu, Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh, Chandra Mohan Patowary, Minister of Industries and Commerce, Assam and Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma, Minister Finance, Assam, Jitendra Singh, Minister of State (Independent Charge) for the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region, Kiren Rijiju, Minister of State for the Ministry of Home.





The summit focussed on sectors such as IT & ITeS, Handloom, Textiles and Handicrafts, Petroleum and Natural Gas, Tourism, Civil Aviation, River Transport and Port Townships, Pharmaceutical and Medical Devices and a special session on the opportunities in Bamboo.



A weekly feature in which we're trying to find the most compelling, best acted, written, directed and just generally great, memorable scenes that we've seen in past seven days on TV.Bobby trying to save his family from the fire (he indirectly caused).Another powerful episode of the show with many memorable scenes to highlight. The focus of the hour once again stayed with Yo-Yo and Mack this week, and the parts where Elena meets her future self and when Mack is forced to watch the other Yo-Yo die were emotional and wonderfully acted. However, I had to choose the final confrontation with Kasius. After everything he's done, it was both important and satisfying to see the conclusion of his story. I was very worried about Mack for a little while but Jemma's entrance changed everything. I loved that she got her chance to face Kasius one last time and make him understand how she felt when he left her in complete silence. And then Mack got to use his favorite weapon and killed their Kree enemy. Finally, just when Mack looks broken and hopeless, Yo-Yo enters the scene and their beautiful reunion makes for the best possible ending to the fight. Great performance by the entire cast & fitting conclusion to this chapter of the story. Can't wait to see what awaits the team back home.Chip is nice to Martha while she is doubting herself; telling her that she has a real sweetness about her. Ive always seen these two together. It is so rare to see Chips nice side.Jennifer announces she's ready to have sex. Or....how to shock your parents to death with one sentence. It's one thing to be all modern and tell your kids to talk to you before they make major life decisions like having sex for the first time. It's a completely different thing when your kids do as you ask and announce that they've not only made the decision but scheduled the date and time around their curfew. Watching Jefferson and Lynn struggle not to freak out was hysterical.Jennifer decides shes ready to have sex and springs the news on her parents during family dinner. Watching Jefferson and Lynn silently panic and become flustered and each reach for their glass of wine was hilariously awkward, and the scene afterwards when Jennifer described what happened to her sister was fun too. Black Lightning has really nailed the family dynamic.Jeff intimidates Khalil. Never was a big fan of Cress Williams but the role of Jefferson is fitting him like a glove. He balances the light and dark so well, and this scene had me rolling on the floor. Jeff is a Papa Bear and no one is getting close to his girl. The two actors played really well of each other and I'm quite sad we won't see more of Khalil.Anissa and Grace talk at the bar.Rebecca sings Face your fears. What a powerful tune, executed with sooo much emotion and facial expression. Rachel once again proved worthy of that Golden Globe.In the time jump, Valencia is revealed to be in a relationship with Beth.Rebecca's therapist tries to make her understand she's worthy.Prentiss vs. Barnes - The case of the week was mere background noise this episode, since the real fireworks was the standoff between Prentiss and Barnes. It starts when Barnes says this is just a standard review of the BAU, but skyrockets when Prentiss calls Barnes out on her ambition driving this witch hunt. However, the best part was when Barnes tells her to sacrifice either Rossi or Spencer's careers and she refuses to do so. Prentiss is a great team leader because she genuinely cares about the team and would never throw any of them under the bus. It was a great scene between 2 strong women.Prentiss reveals she's been suspended indefinitely.Ben and Miranda reunite after her surgery. The moment Ben said "You should've called me." I was in tears. This episode was another winner in a greatly composed season so far and the emotional stakes felt real like back when the show just premiered.Bailey walks into Seattle Pres. and says that she believes she is having a heart attack.Bailey calls her mother. I loved getting a look at Bailey's childhood. I hope we get to see more of her mother in the future.It's near the end of the trial and Barba finds out that there was a piece of information that Martha forgot to mention. So Benson took Martha into the station to question her about the night in the bar with Platt. Martha got defensive, but Benson asked if they could speak to one another like humans. For the first time Martha opened up about telling her story.These two were so funny in this episode. Their speeches to each other were great. And then that kiss, actually made me start shipping it a bit.Penelope records herself at her lowest point.Lydia dances with Berto in the near-afterlife before deciding that it isn't time for her to go yet.Elena's speech to her father. Such an emotional and strong moment. I'd been waiting for this moment since last year's finale.Betty coming home to find a dead guy in the dining room and her mother trying to clean up copious amounts of blood. Life at Chez Cooper is never dull!Olivia is brought to Vermont thinking Fitz just wants a romantic getaway, but he really brought her to be confronted by her team about orchestrating the murder of Quinn. This was explosive and very fulfilling. Olivia was literally boxed in while being forced to deal with her dirtiest secret. I'm so glad the mirror was finally turned in her direction, and no amount of fast talking could get her out of it.David refers to Patrick as his official "boyfriend" for the first time.Alexis tells Moira there's no-one in the bar for her.I think sometimes we underestimate the strength it takes to support and love a soldier. They go into harm's way to protect their country. This seems doubly so for the members of the various special forces units around the world. Naima called Ray on, what she realizes could be a deadly lie. But more importantly, she called him out on lying to her. She was a warrior fighting for her man and her family. Ray tried to keep the lie going, but wilted. I'm guilty of, sometimes defining strong female characters as those that will go toe to toe with men in action sequences. But Naima reminds me that real strength comes in all kinds of forms.Janelle performs her final audition dance intercut with her twin Tal being chased / beat up by his bullies, before Tal himself arrives at the audition and performs an incredible dance.Moore learns about "Silver Smile" from Sally, before suddenly getting sick and passing out. The second episode was more focused on characterization then its eerie mystery, but the final scene surely gave the episode a worthy dose of its Gothic leanings. I was pretty intrigued with the way Sally told John Moore the story, creating a bit of myth in terms of how the killer and Giorgio could have escaped the locked room, but what really made the scene for me, was Moore's unfathomable reaction, which was furthered by seemingly being drugged, leading to exasperated and restrictive breathing and dizzying room spinning, before he passes out and the brothel's owners appear and converse! Luke Evans just brings such a romantic and child-like disposition to Moore and the irony of that contrasted by these ruthless and reckless brothel-children just made it all wonderfully creepy.Dalton has shown several sides this season, but he has never been as ruthless as pursuing the man who put 2 of his team members in the hospital, including one in a coma. Their tete-a-tete was calm and philosophical but you could see the concealed rage in Dalton. When the moment came for the final draw, it was like an old western. Then Dalton gets the last word. Awesome finale that needs a second season.That scene between Adam and Alex blew me away.First of all, I liked season one, but I loved season two. It was so creative, hilarious and heartfelt. All the characters got their chance to shine and we've seen a few great developments. The finale was just another example of how wonderfully this show works. The idea of everyone returning back to Earth once again changes everything. This series keeps reimagining itself and the cast & crew are doing fantastic job with each version of this world. After everything Eleanor has been through, it was great to see her back alive but with a genuine need to change and do better. Of course, it would be too easy if her first attempt was a complete success without knowing about her previous experiences. But the best part for me was Michael understanding what's missing. When he inspires Eleanor to look for answers on the Internet and she finds Chidi's lectures, Chidi's theory that "we choose to be good because of our bonds with other people" makes all the sense in the world. And just like season one finishes with Eleanor's message to herself about finding Chidi, she follows the same path in the last minutes of season two. They made each other better after death, so I can't wait to see where their story goes back on Earth. Kudos to cast & crew for their amazing work on the show.Eleanor flies to Australia after watching a three hour video of Chidi's lecture. The fact that they just keep finding each other (and falling in love) no matter what kills me and ultimately proves they are 100% soulmates. Plus, Chidi mentioned a few episodes back that this is how he wishes he and Eleanor could have met, so the fact that it played out this way this time around was perfect.Scully and Mulder stop for gas and Scully has another chance meeting with an older gentleman who gives her some advice. Realizing he might be their son disguised as someone else, they check the gas station footage; it confirms that the strange man is really William. It was such a touching scene because Scully was so distraught thinking William died without knowing how much she loved him. The way Mulder was there to comfort and support her only continues to solidify their unbreakable bond.Scully's speech to William when she believes he's dead. Everything about this scene hurt and was emotional - Gillian absolutely knocked it out of the park as Scully's grief threatened to overwhelm her.



Strike Back has returned, fully rebooted with a new cast, after a two-year absence. But it feels like its missing something, and something that comes in mind its the spirit of its predecessors.



This time, there are four main characters. While one would assume that these should be rich with complicated pasts and rough personalities, they fall short when it comes to comparing them with Stonebridge (Philip Winchester) and Scott (Sullivan Stapleton).



The new season starts with British Sergeant Thomas McAllister (Warren Brown), who ends up getting his entire squad killed when they try to extract a radical terrorist, Omar Idrisi (Don Hany). Idrisi's men pose as allied Libyan soldiers until they ambush McAllister and his men. This opening scene is reminiscent as far as intensity and suspense goes with Denis Villeneuve's Sicario, with a haunting score playing as McAllister starts to sense the possibility of an ambush. After a massacre unfolds, everyone but McAllister are killed as Idrisi decides to spare his life after running out of bullets. McAllister returns to base with the bodies of his men and unleashes his anger at one of his superior officers, risking court martial.



Awaiting for the proceedings, McAllister is visited by a Colonel Donovan (Nina Sosanya), who invites him to join to "Section Initiative", a literal reboot of the disbanded Section 20. Promised vengeance by Donovan, McAllister agrees to join without batting an eye. Straight to business, he is tasked on his first mission to rescue and rendezvous with Samuel Wyatt (Daniel MacPherson), an American soldier who is posing as an informant. Wyatt is being tortured by a Lybian army General (Selva Rasalingam) as McAllister sneaks into the military outpost posing as a Lybian soldier (irony?). Creating a distraction, McAllister rescues Wyatt and both escape in a stolen vehicle. Soon after, they run out of gas in the middle of nowhere. The pair bicker and complain at each other until they are picked up by a British operative named Gracie Novin (Alin Sumarwata), who happens to know the lay and language of the land. The trio manage to get back to base safely.



Meanwhile, Idrisi reunites with his small army and his wife, Jane Lowry, played wonderfully by Katherine Kelly. Back with our heroes, Wyatt meets with his superior, Major General Davis (Corey Johnson), who uses him as a pawn in exchange for something Wyatt did in the past. Davis tells Wyatt that he has to continue to work with the Brits if he ever expects to return home. With no other option, Wyatt complies. After a steamy encounter with a stranger (because the show wouldn't be itself without it), Wyatt meets with his colleagues. Donovan assigns them to meet with Captain Reynolds (Roxanne McKee) at a night-club, where she would try to get close to Prince Khalid (Zaqi Ismail), who is apparently funding Idrisi's army. The meet goes awry when Idrisi's men crash the club and open fire on everybody inside, kidnapping Khalid.



Now all reunited, McAllister, Wyatt, Novin and Reynolds track down Khalid's whereabouts and attack one of Idrisi's compounds. After being tortured by Jane, Khalid transfers funds to Idrisi's account. The team crashes the compound soon after. Idrisi and Jane escape (of course), while the team engages their men in a close-quarters firefight. McAllister rescues the rest of the team from being pinned down and they succeed in retrieving Khalid. Meanwhile, Idrisi and Jane make contact with a shady guns supplier, who seems to have a massive arsenal in stock.



Even though Strike Back has been rebooted, while it should feel like a rejuvenation, it feels like the show has run out of fumes. I like to compare it as if a young person had taken over his/her father's young business and try to change it, but failed because of over-confidence and cockiness. The new cast seems to be forced and lacks chemistry. The two male leads seems like dull stereotypes and recycled copies of Scott and Stonebridge. Both can't stop bickering at each other, and while Scott and Stonebridge had a friendly and competitive banter, McAllister and Wyatt sound like a couple of crybabies while they try hard to assert bravado.



Another flaw of this episode is continuity issues and convenient writing that result in choppy editing and low-quality storytelling. I understand that writing has to be simplified to have all these characters introduced, but it could've been done in more creative ways. While the concept itself seems fresh, modern and attractive, the story seems forced and stale. Stakes don't seem to be high enough and there's poor coordination between the team while the enemies seem to be even less capable and threatening.



While this reboot seems to have some sort of familiarity to the past seasons, I can't help but to be concerned. The first few seasons of the show did not focus much on the action but instead on character development. As the series progressed, stakes became higher and it turned into a pattern, which could seem repetitive and tedious at times. I hope the writers go back to the origins of the show and try to take a few step backs before giving the mantle to four protagonists who have yet to prove themselves to pick the legacy that Scott and Stonebridge left. Whether the show gets better or not, remains to be seen, but I have high hopes because it usually gives some pleasant surprises.



Cons:



-While chased by the Libyan army, Wyatt tells McAllister not to kill anybody. Yet a few seconds later he jumps into one of the chasing vehicles and causes a grenade to go off, which could've potentially killed everyone on board.

-Captain Reynolds is sexualized, while Corporal Novin takes the trope of the "looney" woman, who everybody is afraid of and no one understands.

-As mentioned before, Wyatt and McAllister bicker like a couple of crybabies, which you wouldn't expect from two men who have been trained to withstand any grueling conditions.

-Predictive storytelling.

-Confusing editing, for which, in a TV series that should clearly show effective tactical situations and firefights.

-Cliche plot elements.



Pros:



-Likable villains. Both Idrisi and Jane are charismatic. I almost rooted for them.

-Night-club scene. McAllister and Wyatt get to be more dynamic with each other while they are undercover.

-Novin mocking Wyatt after he walks out of the shower naked. She tells him "Cold shower huh?". This bit is funny and ironic because it implies that Wyatt will have a hard time putting Scott's big boy pants. Novin continues by giving Wyatt a small towel, saying "That's more your size".





Brussels (Belgium), Feb 3, 2017 (SPS) - About a hundred organizations of the Sahrawi civil society expressed Saturday, their deep concern regarding the negotiations between the European Union (EU) and Morocco, to include products from Western Sahara in their trade agreements, without the consent of the Sahrawi people, condemning a destructive and unsustainable approach of the European commission.

We express our deep concern regarding the ongoing negotiations between Morocco and the European Union to include Western Sahara in the trade agreements with Morocco without the consent of the Sahrawi people through its legitimate representative, the Polisario Front, wrote these organizations coming from the occupied territories, liberated territories, refugee camps in Tindouf and the diaspora in a letter to the European Commission.

The organizations expressed serious concerns about the attitude of the European Commission, affirming that its persistent will to ignore or circumvent a decision of its highest jurisdiction violates the fundamental rights of the Sahrawi people and allows the continued illegal exploitation of Western Saharas natural resources.

The organizations of the Sahrawi civil society underlined, in this regard that to this day, no serious examination of this negotiations process has been authorized, given that the mandate granted by the Council of the European Union to the European Commission last May, to negotiate with Morocco, with an amendment to the text of the agreement liberalizing agricultural products was kept secret.

Regretting that the European executive has not made any attempts to engage with the Polisario Front as the legitimate representative of the Sahrawi people, the Sahrawi organizations recall that however, the Court of Justice of the European Justice (CJEU) ruled that no trade treaty between Morocco and the European Union can legally apply to Western Sahara except if the Sahrawi people consent to it. (SPS)

062/SPS/APS



N orth Korea has lashed out at President Donald Trump's State of the Union speech, boasting its nuclear capabilities would "deter Trump and his lackeys from showing off".

In his address last week, Mr Trump said that "no regime has oppressed its own citizens more totally or brutally than the cruel dictatorship in North Korea."

"We need only look at the depraved character of the North Korean regime to understand the nature of the nuclear threat it could pose to America and to our allies," Mr Trump said.

On Sunday, a North Korean foreign ministry official shot back at the president.

"If Trump does not get rid of his anachronistic and dogmatic way of thinking, it will only bring about the consequence of further endangering security and future of the United States," the official said, in comments carried by the North's official Korean Central News Agency.

Kim Jong-Un's regime has played brinkmanship with the US over weapons capabilities / AP

The official disputed Trump's claim in his address that the United States had "made incredible progress and achieved extraordinary success" over the last year, calling it "the height of Trump-style arrogance, arbitrariness and self-conceit."

Trump also said in his speech that the US was "waging a campaign of maximum pressure" to prevent North Korea from being able to attack America with nuclear weapons.

The foreign ministry official said that North Korea's "self-reliant defence capability with the nuclear force as its backbone will, however, completely deter Trump and his lackeys from showing off on the Korean peninsula."

On Friday, Trump sought to increase pressure on Pyongyang over its nuclear program by consulting with allies and highlighting the human rights abuses suffered by defectors from North Korea.

Trump hosted about a half-dozen North Korean defectors in the Oval Office, including Ji Seong-ho, who had used crutches to escape the reclusive country after a train ran over his limbs.

Days earlier, Ji raised his crutches in triumph when Trump singled him out during his State of the Union address.P olice in the US state of Florida say they have arrested a man who allegedly threatened to kidnap the pop singer Lana Del Rey.

Orlando Police revealed on Twitter they had arrested Michael Hunt, 43, on Friday after deeming him a "credible threat".

The singer, real name Elizabeth Woolridge Grant, had been due to perform at the local Amway Centre that night.

Officials said Mr Hunt was reported to have made "cryptic and threatening" posts on social media.

A police spokesman said: "On Friday, OPD determined this was a credible threat and worked swiftly to ensure the safety of everyone involved and of everyone who attended the show.

"We rely on the community to call in anything suspicious.

"If it weren't for that tip, authorities might have been unaware of the threat Hunt posed."Guwahati : BJP has ended up its 15-year tie with the ruling Naga Peoples Front (NPF) in Nagaland and picks up new ally National Democratic Political Party (NDPP) for the upcoming assembly polls in the state.





Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju, who is also BJP's poll in-charge for Nagaland on Saturday said that, BJP and newly formed regional political party NDPP will jointly contest in the assembly polls.





During a press conference held in Guwahati, Rijiju said that, seat sharing between BJP and NDPP has already finalized and BJP will contest in 20 seats while NDPP to contest in 40 seats.





We tried to have alliance with NPF, but we couldnt come into conclusion with the proper seat sharing arrangement. That is why we couldnt have any pre-poll alliance with NPF. So we have formally intern our alliance with the NDPP and we are very hopeful our alliance BJP and NDPP will secured absolute majority in the coming election we will form the next government, Rijiju said in the joint press conference in presence of former Chief Minister of Nagaland and present MP Neiphiu Rio and top NDPP leaders.





Rijiju further said that, Nagaland is a very sensitive state and the Centre gives special attention and care to the Naga issue.





We understand and appreciate the sentiments being put forward by the Core Committee of Nagaland Tribal Hoho and Civil Organisations (CCNTCHOC), we have appealed all one not to boycott election and we are very greatful that

major civil society groups have openly come out in support of election, Rijiju said.





BJP is partner in the NPF led Democratic Alliance coalition government in Nagaland.





Former Nagaland CM and Lok Sabha MP Neiphiu Rio had recently resigned from NPF and joined the NDPP.





On February 29, 11 political parties including Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Congress, NPF, NDPP, Nagaland Congress, AAPN, NDPP, NCP, JD (U), NPP had declared boycott the assembly polls in the state in view of growing demand from the civil society groups, naga outfit NSCN (IM) and Naga National Political Groups (NNPGs) to defer the assembly polls which is schedule on February 27 next.





The political parties had taken decision for boycott the election after NSCN (IM) and the Naga National Political Groups (NNPGs) asked the politicians of Nagaland not to file nomination.





But in recent development, apart from BJP, ruling NPF, Congress and NDPP have decided to contest in polls.





On the other hand, no nomination was file in past 72 hours in Nagaland after election issued election notification in the state on January 31 last.



T he FBI investigation into a pervert gymnastics doctor moved at a "plodding pace" over the course of a year in which dozens more women claim to have been molested by him.

The New York Times reports the agency's inquiry into disgraced doctor Larry Nassar "moved with little evident urgency" when first opened in July 2015.

The NYT claims to have identified 40 girls and women who say he molested them between September 2016 and the previous summer, when he was finally exposed by the Indianapolis Star.

Gina Nichols, the mother of victim Maggie Nichols (initially known as 'Athlete A'), said: "I never got a phone call from the police or FBI [during that time]...not one."

Judge tells Larry Nassar 'I just signed your death warrant'

Reports say some of the delay stemmed from difficulties in the federal vs. state legal jurisdictions the agency was forced to manoeuvre.

W. Jay Abbot, a former special agent at the Indianapolis branch of the FBI, told the NYT: "There is a duty to warn those who might be harmed in the future.

"But everyone is still trying to ascertain whether a crime has been committed. And everybody has rights here."

Nassar was sentenced to between 40 and 175 years in jail in January after a judge heard testimony from nearly 160 victims.

In 2015, USA Gymnastics cut ties with Nassar after a series of allegations about him.

However, he continued to see patients until he was publicly accused of abuse in 2016. He was later arrested and sentenced for child abuse images which were discovered on his computer.A n emergency mental health hotline has been introduced in west London to provide on-call support for police on duty.

The 24-hour hotline will put officers in Kensington, Chelsea and Westminster in touch with rapid response mental health professionals who can be deployed to help them.

Police will be able to access the service when they are on the beat in London and come across someone who may be suffering from a mental health episode.

A pilot of the scheme was launched in areas across the capital to help officers deal effectively and appropriately with call-outs about mental health sufferers  which make up a large number of 999 callouts.

Data has already shown that in the first two months of the service, the number of police imposing a Section 136 (of the Mental Health Act) dropped by almost 80 per cent.

In the pilot area, cases of Section 136 dropped from 138 per month to 29 per month within three months. In parts of north west London without the service, the number of Section 136 orders imposed rose slightly.

Triage: The new service is being rolled out in London boroughs

Officers are trained in detail about mental health and have the on-call service where they can speak with professionals and describe the symptoms or behaviour of the member of the public they are dealing with.

They are given advice by the specialist triage team, who can make a referral to the Mental Health Crisis Resolution Team or deploy immediate on-scene help from a member of the Rapid Response Team.

The service, launched by Camden and North West London (CNWL) trust is not the first of its kind in the capital but differs in the sense that, instead of having mental health specialists on the streets with beat officers, they are accessible any time over the phone.

Met mental health lead Superintendent Mark Lawrence said the issue places a huge demand on police and said officers attend mental health calls on average every 12 minutes.

This collaborative approach to policing mental health will enable officers to provide a more informed and effective resolution, and signpost people in mental health crisis to the appropriate service, he said.

Dr John Lowe, CNWL consultant, added; "By reaching across traditional boundaries in a supportive and constructive way  Street Triage shows how closer inter-professional working between Mental Health Services and the police can be of huge benefit to users, staff and services.

He added that the advice received by officers has allowed them to consider alternatives to a section 136  the Mental Health Act which allows police to hold members of the public.

According to our preliminary data from the project, the use of section 136 has already been reduced across Kensington, Chelsea and Westminster which is great news," Dr Lowe added.B lack cab rapist John Worboys has been moved out of London after uproar over his move into a jail in the capital.

Worboys was transferred back to HMP Wakefield from HMP Belmarsh after a fierce backlash in January when critics slammed the prison service for moving him to the city where he committed his crimes.

It is understood that he has been moved back to the category A prison in West Yorkshire while legal proceedings take place over his release on parole.

Worboys' return to HMP Wakefield came out as a lawyer said she had passed details of fresh allegations made by five women to police.

Harriet Wistrich told the Sunday Mirror that two further women, whose cases were reported to police but not prosecuted as part of his trial, have asked for their allegations to be reconsidered.

Worboys was jailed indefinitely in 2009, with a minimum term of eight years, for drugging and sexually assaulting women passengers.

He became known as the black cab rapist after attacking victims in his hackney carriage.

The predator was convicted of 19 offences against 12 victims, but has been linked to more than 100 complaints in total.

A Parole Board decision that he should be released on licence after spending less than a decade behind bars sparked outrage when it emerged in January.

A High Court judge later ordered a temporary bar on Worboys' release after considering an urgent application by two of his victims.

The women, supported by London Mayor Sadiq Khan, applied for a "stay" on his release "pending determination of the claim for judicial review or further order".B rexiteers are lining up a "dream team" to replace Theresa May in case she tries to keep Britain in the customs union with the EU, according to reports.

Tory MPs would have Boris Johnson as their prime minister, Michael Gove as his deputy, and Jacob Rees-Mogg as Chancellor, according to the Sunday Times.

Boris Johnson was said to have told one plotter he was "ready" to be PM and warned the "cavalry is coming", despite also encouraging them to "rally round" the PM.

The news came ahead of ministerial crunch talks on Wednesday and Thursday, with the Conservatives deeply divided over their EU negotiating strategy.

Home Secretary Amber Rudd poured water on the reports however, insisting the Government would come forward with proposals for a final deal which could win broad support.

"I have surprise for the Brexiteers which is the (Cabinet) committee that meets in order to help make these decisions is more united than they think," she told BBC1's The Andrew Marr Show.

"We meet in the committee. We meet privately for discussions. I think that we will arrive at something which suits us all.

"There will be choices to be made within that but we all want the same thing which is to arrive at a deal which works for the UK."

The reported rifts began after Theresa May appeared to leave the door open to some sort of customs agreement with the EU on the final day of her visit to China - even though ministers have said Britain will leave the existing customs union.

Pro-Brexit Tory MPs are concerned Britain would not be free to sign trade deals with other countries if it stayed in the customs union with the EU.

Liam Fox, the International Trade Secretary, has told allies he is ready to quit the Cabinet if the UK stays in a customs union, The Sunday Times reports.

Meanwhile Mr Rees-Mogg accused the Treasury of "fiddling the figures" to force the issue and made clear any such arrangement would be unacceptable to Conservative Brexiteers.I nternal Government divisions over Brexit were laid bare on Sunday morning as the Home Secretary and the Housing Minister appeared to contradict each other in separate TV interviews.

Home secretary Amber Rudd said the UK would seek membership of "something within the customs framework" of the EU following its departure from the EU in a BBC interview with Andrew Marr.

Meanwhile, just minutes later, housing minister Dominic Raab told Sky News' Paterson on Sunday that Britain would not remain "in any form of customs union".

Ms Rudd said: "We published a document last year and we proposed either a customs arrangement or a customs partnership. Those are both alternatives we could look at.

Mr Raab was a prominent Brexiteer in the referendum campaign / Getty Images

We do not want to have tariffs at the border, so that is a form of customs agreement, arrangement [or] partnership. It is likely to be something within the customs framework.

If you set up trade barriers, there is a consequence to a trading nation. I am very enthusiastic for making sure we have as few trade barriers as possible."

Meanwhile, Mr Raab said: I dont think well be in any form of customs union, at least as conceived in international trade practice.

Because if we were we would have our hands tied in negotiating free trade deals with other parts of the world, whether its Brazil, whether its China or India.

Thousands of anti-Brexit activists march to Parliament in protest 1 /12 Thousands of anti-Brexit activists march to Parliament in protest Demonstrators head towards Parliament Square. REUTERS Signs include 'I love EU' REUTERS The pro-EU march began in Hyde Park Corner. Si Carrington 'NHS? Brexit Wrexit' Oliver Day The march took protesters through the streets of London. Oliver Day One protester brought along a papier mache Queen, in reference to the blue and yellow hat she wore at the State Opening of Parliament. Peter Bailey 'Exit Brexit' Jonathan Hawley The September sun shone as activists marched through the streets. Martin Tod Roads were blocked during the protest. Maggie Jones The campaigners set off shortly after 11am from Hyde Park Corner. Maggie Jones The rally saw the activists march through the streets of central London. Johann Ketel EU colours of blue and yellow were seen throughout the march. Judi Conner

"The Prime Minister has been very clear we want to be able to grasp those opportunities.

The news comes as reports emerged that Brexiteers are lining up a "dream team" to replace Theresa May in case she tries to keep Britain in the customs union with the EU.

Tory MPs would have Boris Johnson as their prime minister, Michael Gove as his deputy, and Jacob Rees-Mogg as Chancellor, according to the Sunday Times.

Boris Johnson was said to have told one plotter he was "ready" to be PM and warned the "cavalry is coming", despite also encouraging them to "rally round" the PM.T he author of a controversial book about Donald Trump is to sit down with Armando Iannucci, creator of UK comedy The Thick of It, for an event in London.

Michael Wolff will appear at The Light auditorium, in the Friends House on Euston Road, to talk all things Trump with the critically acclaimed British satirist.

Waterstones, the bookstore giant hosting the event, shared a humorous tweet online, saying: "This is gonna be huge. This will probably draw the largest audience ever to witness a book event, period."

Mr Wolff's bestselling expose - Fire and Fury: Inside the Donald Trump White House - sent shock waves through the Trump establishment when it was released in the New Year.

The book sold more than a million copies in its first week alone / Getty Images

The book includes explosive claims that Mr Trump goes to bed with a cheeseburger every night at 6.30pm and watches three televisions at once.

It also alleges that he was scared of the White House and told staff not to touch anything  especially his toothbrush, because he reportedly fears being poisoned.

Mr Trump denied the claims, tweeting: "I authorised Zero access to White House (actually turned him down many times) for author of phoney book!

"I never spoke to him for book. Full of lies, misrepresentations and sources that dont exist."

Last year, Mr Iannucci told The Independent: "The danger is turning Trump into a comedy character. He's not. He's dangerous."

The event will take place at 7pm on Friday February 23. Tickets go on sale at midday on Monday.G erry Adams has backed "outstanding" Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to become prime minister at the next general election.

The Sinn Fein president steps down next weekend after 50 years in politics when a special party conference, or ard fheis, ratifies his successor, Mary Lou McDonald.

The Labour leader has said he wanted the Troubles bombings and shootings to stop, but refused to single out the IRA for condemnation.

Mr Adams told BBC One's The Andrew Marr show: "I would like to see Jeremy in that position (Prime Minister) for the benefit of people in Britain, leaving Ireland out of it.

Corbyn has faced scrutiny over his ties to Irish republicans / Getty Images

"I think Jeremy is an outstanding politician and I hope my endorsement of him is not used against him in the time ahead.

"He and Ken Livingstone and others kept faith and they were the people who said, when others said no, talk.

"They were the people who were open to conversation about how to deal with conflict and how to get conflict resolution processes."

Mr Corbyn and shadow chancellor John McDonnell have faced scrutiny over their association with Irish republicans.

Before the IRA ceasefire, they controversially met Sinn Fein a number of times in Westminster during the 1990s.

During a wide-ranging interview, Mr Adams reiterated his position that Northern Ireland should enjoy special status within the EU after Brexit.

He said former prime minister Tony Blair enjoyed an "opportunity on a plate" in his handling of the Northern Ireland peace process, which produced the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and largely ended decades of violence.

Mr Adams, who represents the border county of Louth in the Irish Dail parliament, said he told Mr Blair not to invade Iraq in 2003.

"We said to him, look at the Irish experience, don't go in there."

He said nobody could stand over the killing of children or civilians during the IRA's campaign, but it was different if it was "soldiers versus soldiers".

The outgoing political leader, who for decades defended republican violence but was instrumental in its cessation, reflected on the "awfulness and horror of war".

He said: "I would wish that no one had been killed or injured in the course of the conflict.

"We were able to come to an alternative. When you come forward with an alternative sensible people will embrace that alternative."S ir Vince Cable has accused Jeremy Corbyn of acting in "collusion" with the Conservatives over Brexit and said most of his own MPs are worried about it.

In an interview with BBC1's The Andrew Marr Show, the Liberal Democrat leader said there was "simmering anger" in the Labour ranks at their leader's failure to oppose Britain's withdrawal from the EU.

He predicted Mr Corbyn would be forced to a second referendum on the final Brexit deal with Brussels - and he said Britain's withdrawal from the EU was not inevitable.

"Jeremy Corbyn is crucial to this. The vast majority of his MPs and his party and his supporters are very concerned about the fact that he hasn't opposed Brexit," he said.

"He has effectively worked in collusion with Theresa May and her Government to enable Brexit to happen. I think there is a simmering anger about that.

"I think as we get through this year and we get closer to the final decision, and it becomes clear that we are going to get a very bad deal from these negotiations, he will be under enormous pressure to support a referendum on the final deal.

"I think the Labour Party will come round to it as will as significant number of dissident Conservatives."

Sir Vince said that he believed that Brexit could still be stopped.A t least two people are dead after an Amtrak train travelling in South Carolina has smashed into CSX freight train, CNN and other media reported.

More than 50 people have been injured, according to officials.

The train with 139 passengers and eight crew members was travelling between New York and Miami.

It hit the other train and derailed near Columbia, South Carolina, Amtrak officials told local media.

The collision happened about 2.30 am local time, 7.30 am GMT, according to local media.

Lexington County Sheriff's Department tweeted: "#BREAKING: Train collision and derailment near Charleston Highway and Pine Ridge Rd. More details to come."

It added a few minutes later: "All passengers are off the train."

The collision is the latest in a series of serious incidents involving Amtrak.

Last week, an Amtrak train ferrying members of Congress to a Republican retreat in West Virginia hit a truck near Charlottesville, Virginia.



Guwahati, February 4 : To boost in water transport, Assam government and Ola, one of the worlds largest ride-sharing company had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to pilot an app-based river taxi service in Guwahati.





The MoU has been signed in the presence of Assam Transport minister Chandra Mohan Patowary, Vijay Ghadge, VP of Operations of Ola in the Assam Advantage - Global Investors' Summit ended today at Sarusajai Stadium, Guwahati.





Ola launched in Assam in December 2014 and has since transformed the commuting experience of citizens with a range of offerings for day to day as well as long distance, inter-city and state commute.





Bringing water taxis on the online platform, a localised and key mode of commute in the capital city will further strengthen the transportation ecosystem.





App-based bookings will streamline demand, and enable advance bookings and cashless payments, ensuring a convenient commuting experience as well as given an impetus the local transportation infrastructure and economy.





Assam Minister Chandra Mohan Patowary said that, Assam has a very unique transportation landscape where water transport plays an important role in cities such as Guwahati.





"Ola has played a key role in streamlining road transport over the last few years in the state. This time around, we are thrilled to extend the partnership with Ola to pilot app-based water taxis in the capital city. We are certain that bringing a localised mode of commute on an app platform will enable convenient transportation for citizens and tourists alike, and we look forward to more such collaborations with Ola," the Assam Minister said.





Vijay Ghadge, VP of Operations at Ola, said that, convenience and safety of the commuters are paramount to us.





"Our aim is to stand out as a reliable choice of transportation for the country. Our intent is reflected in all our partnerships with various state governments across transportation and tourism. As a part of this endeavour, we are delighted to partner and work with the Government of Assam to enhance and empower the local transportation infrastructure. We laud the Governments efforts in providing opportunities to companies such as ours and are honoured to be a part of this initiative," Vijay Ghadge said.





The river taxis will be a machine-operated boat, which is faster and safer than the conventional ones.





Ola will pilot high-speed taxis on the Lachit Ghat, Machkhowa to North Guwahati route, bringing the commute time down 2-5 minutes from 45 minutes by road.





The fast pace of these boats-cum-taxis will not only reduce the travel time, but will also provide a more comfortable journey for its commuters.



The French Air Force is seeking to recruit 40 candidates for its Air Force Special Operations unit. This force only has a strength of 750 and only a third of them are in commando (operator) type jobs. Actually the operator units are about 12 percent short of their authorized strength, thus the French Air Force is seeking a reasonable (as in small) number of suitable candidates from the civilian population. The 40 who make it through the basic military, parachute and commando training will then be selected for specialist training, which is what most of the French Air Force Special Operations do; specialize.

To attract the required hundreds of potential candidates (who meet the basic age, physical and psychological criteria) a video was prepared to use in the media and on the Internet. The video presents a rare insider description of a top-secret commando organization. The ten man air force commando teams contain personnel with different specialties and spend most of their time training. On average each team will deploy (usually overseas) for a combat operation once a year. The air force commandos tend to specialize in intelligence gathering in hostile territory as well as calling in airstrikes or establishing landing zones for additional commandos and regular troops. Many of the French special operations troops use technical skills found in civilian occupations, which makes the air force optimistic that their recruiting effort will succeed. Another encouraging factor is the success of British and American special operations units recruiting from the civilian population. These efforts were not always as successful as the British or Americans wished but they did provide enough guidance and success to make the French believe their goals were realistic.

The most recent effort in this area took place in 2011 when Britain sought civilian candidates for the SAS (Special Air Service) commandos. The SAS was the original modern commando force that set the standards for all that followed. Normally the SAS had no problem attracting enough qualified candidates from active duty British military personnel. But the 21st century had presented some new problems. First, the SAS decided in 2004 to expand its strength by twenty percent. That attracted a lot of the new recruits the SAS would have taken later on. That's because the SAS recruits from people already in the army (usually infantry). But then something else developed. Since 2003 Britain had been sending more combat troops overseas (first to Iraq, then Afghanistan and some new hot spots). Britain does not have a large army, and this meant that most potential SAS recruits were too busy being overseas, or getting ready to go overseas (or recovering from being overseas) to train for the arduous SAS entrance exam. There were few options when you have this sort of situation. The U.S. Army Special Forces ran into a similar problem after 2002 and tried to recruit directly from the civilian population. That brought in a few good people, but not enough. The best recruits, as always, are those already in the army. But the Americans had a large army to begin with in 2001 and were expanding their ground forces after that, so the pressure to get commando candidates direct from civilian life was not as urgent.

In contrast the British infantry force was shrinking, for several reasons even though more troops were being sent into combat. In 2007 the British Army revealed that it was short about 3,000 infantry, mainly because fewer Britons were willing to join. The situation has not improved much since then. In 2011 there were only 51 infantry battalions in the British army, and only 37 were active duty units. That's about 26,000 infantrymen (if the battalions are at full strength). But from 2003 to 2011 troops had been heavily involved in Iraq and Afghanistan. The 2011 army troop shortage were the accumulation of injuries from repeated deployments that has left 20 percent of active duty infantry unfit for duty in a combat zone. The main reasons are medical, including combat fatigue, and battle wounds, as well as all the exotic diseases one can pick up in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as the many accidents (especially vehicular). From 2002 through 2011 over 1,500 British troops were killed or wounded in Afghanistan. There were far fewer casualties in Iraq.

While the British military has been all-volunteer since the 1950s, the early 21st century shortages were partly driven by the job offers from private security firms, especially for the best people. British troops in elite infantry units (paratroopers, marines, SAS), were particularly attractive to the private security firm recruiters and vice versa.

Noting the American success with reenlistment bonuses, the British began offering bonuses of about $10,000, for troops who agree to sign up for more time in uniform, or return after having been a civilian for a while. Some of the troops who had gone off to work for the private security companies, found the work not to their liking and came back to the army. This bonus system encouraged more such returns. But it was not enough to generate a lot of additional commando recruits.

In addition, Britain has been reducing its infantry force since the 1990s. Battalions were being disbanded. In 2011 it was also noted that about eight percent of the infantry are tied down in ceremonial functions, a distraction that had largely gone unnoticed. Many infantrymen leave the military because of the constant trips to Iraq and Afghanistan. While some young Brits are attracted to the prospect of combat, for others, a taste is enough. Another problem is that not all who join the infantry have what it takes. The British have high standards and not everyone can make it through the training.

Finally, a unique problem with British infantry battalion shortages was that each regiment (of one or more battalions) does its own recruiting. The regiments are local, except for the five Guards battalions (two of which are always performing ceremonial duties). Some regiments have an easier time attracting recruits than others. But these days, most infantry battalions are going off to Afghanistan shorthanded.

The SAS itself is the model for all modern commando units. The SAS evolved during World War II, from the original commando units (which were more similar to current Royal Marine Commandos and U.S. Army Rangers). SAS developed the concept of elite infantry operating in small groups (as few as 3-4 men) for special operations. Britain has only some 460 men in the SAS, and four 80 man "Sabre Squadrons" form the deployable combat units of the organization. SAS commandos are often sent around the world in groups of less than a dozen men for missions.

The SAS has to recruit and train 20 or more new commandos a year just to maintain its current strength. Several thousand British troops apply to join the SAS each year, but the SAS is very selective in who it takes. Some SAS members felt that expanding would dilute the quality. This is not necessarily so, but the debate over the issue continues within the SAS. Another ongoing dispute has to do with how the SAS is sometimes used. In peacetime, most SAS missions are at the request of the Foreign Ministry, and are usually to solve some problem overseas that does not require a lot of muscle, but must be done quietly. In these situations, the SAS will spend a lot of their time operating as spies, even though all they are doing is reconnaissance for some mission. In peacetime, the SAS rarely operates in groups of more than a dozen men. But the war in Afghanistan found British military planners realizing that the troops that could be moved to that isolated country most quickly were the SAS. For a while in Afghanistan, the only British combat troops available there were SAS. So anything that British commanders wanted to do had to be done by SAS. In effect, the SAS were victims of their own success in being able to get anywhere, anytime, in a hurry.

France has always had larger ground forces, even though they also ended peace time conscription by 1996. France also had another source of recruits; the Foreign Legion, which many Frenchmen were technically not allowed to join. But much of the Foreign Legion consists of French citizens and some manage to join despite the prohibitions. After 2001 France faced another problem, a growing proportion of its military age population was Moslem and surveys indicated more of these young men were willing to join an Islamic terror organization that a French combat organization. French commandos, like those of every other nation, have high security clearances and get exhaustive background checks.

The French Special Operations forces know that they survive by being innovative and resourceful. That is why some special operations organizations survive and others fade away. So the French will solve their recruiting problems or else.A civilian was martyred and two children were injured after Indian security forces opened unprovoked fire across the Line of Control (LoC), the Inter-Services Public Relations said on Sunday.

According to armys media cell, Indian forces opened unprovoked firing in Nezapir and Rawalkot sectors, targeting civil population.

Pakistan army responded effectively to Indian posts targeting civilians, said the ISPR.

On Jan 28, three civilians were injured after Indian forces opened unprovoked fire across LoC in Kashmir.

"Indian troops resorted to unprovoked ceasefire violations in Khuiratta, Kotli and Battal in Rawalakot, said the ISPR.

Earlier on Jan 20-21, the Foreign Office had informed of an Indian ceasefire violation across the LoC in Nikial Sector.

A man and a woman, both villagers, were said to have been martyred in the incident and three, including a six-month-old, injured.

The Foreign Ministry had summoned the Indian deputy high commissioner that day to record a protest. On January 22, at a visit to the LoC and Working Boundary in Khuiratta and Ratta Arayan sectors, Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa said Indian aggression or any misadventure will always get a befitting response.

In 2018, Indian forces carried out more than 150 ceasefire violations along the Line of Control and the Working Boundary in just 20 days, resulting in the martyrdom of nine innocent civilians, while injuring 40 others.

In 2017, Indian forces committed more than 1900 ceasefire violations.The Foreign Office of Pakistan Sunday said that 32 Pakistani nationals were aboard the ship that wrecked off Libya coast on January 31.

"There were 32 Pakistanis among 80 to 90 people aboard the boat," FO spokesman Dr Mohammad Faisal told newsmen during a press briefing here.

He said that officials of the Pakistani mission reached the site on the same day, adding that human smugglers were trying to illegally take the passengers in the boat to Europe.

Faisal said information on the deceased [Pakistani] citizens is available on the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, adding that four of the deceased Pakistanis have yet to be identified.

"Efforts are being made to bring bodies of deceased Pakistani citizens, for which funds have been provided to the embassy," the spokesman said.

Earlier on Saturday, Faisal confirmed that 16 Pakistanis died in the shipwreck.

The International Organisation for Migration believes the incident did not take place due to inclement weather as the sea was calm.

"We know that the weather was calm, so that's indicating that the smugglers - who are cavalier to say the least - have hugely overloaded this vessel," Al Jazeera quoted IOM's Leonard Doyle as saying.

"We need to get the word out to people, desperate people around the world, who think they are coming to a better life and they are reading about it on social media, that it's not the case."

The people whose bodies have been recovered belonged to Mandi Bahauddin, Gujrat, Rawalpindi and Sargodha areas of Punjab in Pakistan. Previously, a number of similar cases have occurred in which people  mostly from the mentioned areas of Punjab  have lost their lives en route to illegally sneaking into another country.

In November 2017, over a dozen bodies were found in Turbat, Balochistan from where people, mainly from different areas of Punjab, were trying to illegally cross the border into Iran so as to reach Europe from there for better employment opportunities.

The incident

At least 90 people were feared dead in the Mediterranean Sea as they tried to undertake the treacherous journey in search of employment.

A boat carrying the migrants capsized off the coast of Zuwara in the early hours Friday, IOM spokesperson Olivia Headon confirmed to reporters in Geneva by phone from Tunis.

"At least 90 migrants are reported to have drowned, when a boat capsized off the coast of Libya this morning", the agency had added in a statement.

Two survivors from the disaster had swum to shore, while another was rescued by a fishing boat, it had stated.

The agency has repeatedly issued warnings over the extreme dangers facing migrants who try to reach Europe via the so-called central Mediterranean route, which connects Libya to Italy.

IOM had said on Friday that more than 6,600 migrants and refugees had already entered Europe by sea since the beginning of the year, with central Mediterranean route crossings to Italy accounting for nearly 65% of the entries.

Thousands drowned over past years

Drownings in the Mediterranean began surging in 2013 as Europe's worst migration crisis since World War II began picking up speed, with hundreds of thousands of people fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and elsewhere.

Over the past five years, more than 16,000 people have died trying to make the perilous crossing to Europe, according to IOM numbers.

Excluding Friday's tragedy, 246 migrants and refugees have already died trying to cross the Mediterranean since the beginning of the year, compared to 254 casualties during the first month of 2017.

Ship with 22 Indian sailors on board missing off West Africa

Two hundred and eighteen of those deaths occurred on the central route in 2018, IOM said, while 28 happened on the western route that links North Africa to Spain.

Meanwhile, on the eastern Mediterranean route that connects Turkey and Greece, used by 1,089 so far this year, no fatalities have yet been recorded in 2018.

The EU last year reached controversial agreements with chaos-wracked Libya to stem the flow of migrants from that country, following a more comprehensive deal with Turkey in 2016, which sharply reduced the numbers crossing to Greece.

Casualties in the eastern Mediterranean have dropped dramatically since then.

In the 22 months since the deal with Turkey was reached in April 2016, fatalities on that route have fallen to an average of 6.75 per month, from 96.25 per month during the year prior to the agreement, IOM said.Last Friday, I was one of the 60 or so students dressed in black and standing outside the UL at 2pm, staring solemnly ahead instead of smiling for the photo, and thinking about the campaigns motivations and aims.

The reaction to such campaigns is understandably mixed. The international campaign in which actresses took activists as their date has been described by some as being performative or hypocritical as some celebrities pledge their support and then continue to work alongside known harassers in the industry, while others may see smaller campaigns such as the Cambridge one as ineffectual, or detrimental to larger-scale efforts like the Breaking the Silence campaign. It requires very little effort from participants, which is a good thing in terms of amassing support on a wider scale  but if the price of participating is so low, how much longterm support or commitment can we really infer from those who turned up? Why join in with a campaign like this, if that is the case? Does it really achieve anything, or is it just a way of making yourself and the university look good?

I would argue there is absolutely a point to #TimesUpCambridge and all similar campaigns, despite the criticism. Perhaps, yes, there are those who participate simply as a performative gesture, an activity to make them look good for a cause which is popular at the time, but the point in these campaigns goes far beyond the motivations of one individual: they are a collective demonstration of solidarity and above all, awareness. The crowd of people becomes more powerful with every person who aligns themselves with it, no matter their motivation. The more times the same message is said, whether by the same campaign or by different ones, the more exposure the topic will get, and the more normalised it will become to talk about these difficulties and to speak up against the perpetrators.

The campaign on its own, however, is not enough. It is not enough to wear black for one day to show your solidarity, click like on a Facebook page, donate some money, and think the work is done. The real work behind #TimesUp and other similar movements is the everyday grind which must take place behind the publicity moments. It is about changing mindsets worldwide and acting mindfully around those you associate with  something which requires a lot more commitment, and a lot more patience.

In Cambridge specifically, it is about cutting known perpetrators of assault out of friendship groups, supporting victims rather than blaming them, and creating safe spaces for survivors to access the tools they need. These tools need to be accessed without the kinds of bureaucracy and endless question-asking we are accustomed to finding in institutions such as a University, and they need to be given freely, without judgement.Although national media outlets have a tendency to paint Cambridge students as a homogenous beige mass of privilege, the real picture is more complex. Life at one college can be entirely different from the next, due to differences in facilities, location and policy. Nowhere is this more evident than in the huge range in weekly rents available.

An investigation carried out by TCS has revealed that, at the lower end of the scale, 70 a week is enough to stay at Peterhouse and Trinity Hall, while Girtonians must shell out 160 for even the worst rooms. Such a huge spread of minimum rents creates significant disparities in a less well off students ability to enjoy Cambridge life, especially given that many are not aware of the price of accommodation when applying. This by and large has been the focus of Cut the Rent, which so far has only campaigned at Murray Edwards, Robinson and Magdalene. While for the former two, minimum rates are significantly above average, Magdalene students can pay around 103 each week for the cheapest room  hardly an outlier when 18 other colleges face minimum rents of 100+ a week. Whether the movement will spread to these colleges remains to be seen.

Girton rent increases

Interestingly, many of the distant colleges have fairly high rents in comparison to the more central ones. Pembroke, Trinity, St Catherines, Clare and Sidney Sussex students can all rent for below 90 a week, while as discussed Girton and Murray Edwards pay high rates. This suggests land value has very little bearing on the cost of rent. In a statement concerning these statistics, Murray Edwards College said:

"Murray Edwards College, like other Colleges at the University of Cambridge, is a charity  and our students are the principal beneficiaries of this charity. In no way does the College wish to extract money wilfully from students. As beneficiaries of the charity, the financial benefits which students receive are significant and arise in two main ways. Firstly, there is a significant subsidy which the College provides to the cost of their education: fees received do not cover the costs of that education, and the subsidy here totals more than 5,000 per undergraduate student per year. Secondly, rents do not cover the costs of the accommodation, and so these represent a further subsidy. Rent calculations are discussed with the JCR and MCR annually, and any student who wishes to know more about this is welcome to make an appointment with the Bursar. It is worth noting that in calculating rent the College takes into account the importance of those who look after student rooms (cleaners, maintenance) receiving a Living Wage."

The College also clarified that:

"We recognise that students can and do experience financial hardship and that rent can be a component in this, and would urge any student finding themselves in this situation to speak to the Finance Tutor at their College who will help them apply for hardship funding. No student should be in the position of considering leaving Cambridge due to financial concerns."

Yet also interesting to consider is the difference between the maximum and minimum rents at each college. The cheapest room at Downing costs 116 per week, which while not exactly low, is dwarfed by 198 rent on its most expensive room. Other offenders in this area include Queens, with an 82 maximum-minimum disparity, and Churchill, where rents start at 98.40 but stretch all the way to 179.40. Such disparities raise questions as to whether colleges are perpetuating pre-existing economic inequalities between students by charging hugely variable rents. Admittedly the higher rents likely subsidise lower rents, making university more affordable for students from poorer backgrounds. The alternative is a having a flat rent like Girton, which removes inequality but as discussed, massively raises minimum rent.

Girton's Accommodation Officer Dan Edwards welcomed the findings, and recognised that while some students at Girton like having a flat rate for rent "others feel it doesn't suit their needs.

"The system is open to revision. The JCR is currently in negotiations with college over proposed rent increases."

Peterhouse's President Bec Robsinson responded by explaining the college's hidden charges: "we have a kitchen fixed charge of 184, a minimum spend in hall of 98 and an electricity bill of around 30 each term. 70 is one of the lower options  most are a bit more than that but the rent prices here are definitely super reasonable and priced differently per room."

Of course these conclusions should be taken with a pinch of salt. Our figures only give the maximum and minimum rents available, as opposed to the mean rent, which gives better a representation of the cost of accomodation at each college. This is largely because these figures are not readily provided by colleges. Given the significance of rent to a prospective students ability to afford Cambridge, this is especially surprising, however might be explained by the universitys desire to avoid segregating students by familial wealth.Exclusive: Cambridge University Graduate Union president accuses fellow students of racism.

An article published in Pakistans largest English language newspaper this weekend has accused unnamed Cambridge students of mounting a racially motivated campaign against incumbent Graduate Union president Arsalan Ghani (pictured above).

In largely unsubstantiated allegations, Fridays edition of Pakistans The News International newspaper (not to be confused with the Murdoch owned publishing group of the same name) derided Cambridge students for rendering Ghanis authority toothless and preventing him from implementing much of his manifesto. It goes on launch a personal attack on the conduct of the former GU president, Liv Watson and, in a bizarre turn, extends its accusations of racism to unrelated CUSU presidential elections.

Cambridges Graduate Union (GU) represents graduate students who are studying for a Masters, PHD or similar. It conducts its own elections and has its own constitution. It is separate to The Cambridge University Students Union (CUSU) which represents undergraduate and post-graduate students. Although elections for the president of both student groups take place at the same time and share a common electronic voting platform, they remain entirely separate in their operation.

Regardless of cultural differences in journalistic best practice, the article (by journalist Murtaza Ali Shah) shows a clear editorial bias in support of current GU president Ghani. There are no direct quotations from either Ghani or his supporters in support of the allegations. It also fails to mention whether Liv Watson, the former president of the GU, was contacted for comment on the issue. Save for a request for comment by the newspaper by the University press office (named as a university spokesperson at the External Affairs and Communications department) there seems to be little attempt by Shah to provide any evidence or quotations to back up the allegations.

The article is reproduced here in full:

A Pakistani student who made history after being elected as president of the prestigious Cambridge University Graduate Union has been a victim of racial discrimination after a campaign was orchestrated to marginalise him in the union.

In over 800 years of the universitys history, a Pakistani, Arsalan Ghani, from

Faisalabad, was elected in March this year to head the student union till July next year representing 12,000 MA, MPhil and PhD students studying at the Cambridge University, most of them international students.

This was a historic achievement and had similarity to what Benazir Bhutto had achieved as leader of the Oxford union but The News has learnt of the systematic discrimination against Arsalan Ghani. This position requires Arsalan to suspend his studies and take a full time role as president and head the union offices. He was deprived of his authorities and role in the union, according to his complaint.

Information reveal the student leader faced multiple discriminations from his colleagues, mostly the former board members in the first month of joining his duty in the union.

There are reports that he was marginalised, abused, threatened and discriminated in the union to the extent that he was forced to launch a formal complaint to the university in this regard.

A popular figure amongst the local and international students, a fact demonstrated by his sweeping victory, Arsalan promised in his election manifesto to organise events for diverse communities, develop interfaith unity and to initiate a UK wide and global campaign against fee and cuts in education sector. It was through Arsalans initiatives that for the first time ever Kosher, Halal and vegetarian sections were introduced in the unions cafe.

But Arsalan Ghanis activism and ambitions to promote student welfare has faced opposition. In a sheer discriminatory move, his powers as a president were cut down immediately after the election results were announced. This is done by making changes to the union constitution overnight by the previous president and board members.

The outgoing president of the union, in a brazen attempt to stay on to power, crafted a new position through the constitutional changes, allowing herself to remain in the unions trustee board for the next four years to eight years, undermining the rights of democratically elected presidents and attempting to make them dysfunctional.

Previous board members who are still holding office refused to cooperate with the newly elected president and held meetings and took key decisions excluding the president. Not only this, the union staff also refused to get approvals in administrative and financial matters from the president undermining his authority given to him.

Such efforts to marginalise the president have effectively rendered Arsalan Ghani, supposed to be the head of the union, toothless and unable to implement his election manifesto for the student community.

The universitys student elections held in March 2012 were also marred with controversy when the undergraduate candidate of African-Caribbean origin was discriminated and purposely disqualified on the pretence of irregularities during her election campaign.

After initially hesitating to listening to Ghanis complaints, the university has now accepted his complaint. When approached, a university spokesperson at the External Affairs and Communications department refused to offer comments on the issue.

The article quoted above is in the public domain. The purpose of our report here is to highlight our belief that there is a prevailing public interest in the manner that a reputable major overseas newspaper could publish unsubstantiated and unsupported allegations regarding the conduct of the students of the University of Cambridge and their student representative bodies. Regardless, The Cambridge Student has begun a process of investigating the accusations detailed below. To date, we have not been able to find any evidence of racist behaviour.

Speaking exclusively to the The Cambridge Student, GU President Ghani said: I cannot comment on the published news and their style of reporting. I believe that I am discriminated on racial grounds in the Graduate Union. I have launched a complaint to the university authorities in this matter who are investigating. I have all the necessary evidences. Further information, I can only provide after consultation with my lawyers.

Former GU President Liv Watson reacted: The allegations made in this article are utterly baffling. Changes to the Constitution to allow the GU to become a charity  and thus to have a Trustee Board  were started long before Arsalan voiced his intentions to run for President. The suggestion that I manipulated the Constitution to gain a place on the Trustee Board is particularly bizarre, since I left before the new Constitution came into effect and am not a Trustee. As for the unfounded charges of racism; if I didnt have a hefty student loan to pay off Id be suing this so-called journalist for libel.

TCS has contacted or attempted to contact Cambridge University Students Union, former CUSU Presidential Candidate Akilah Jeffers and the editor of The News International for comment but we are yet to receive any replies. The article will be updated as soon as any comments are received.

Following a second article published by The News International newspaper, the editors of The Cambridge student have published an editorial here.

The second News International Article is reproduced here in full:

Cambridge student leader lives in fear after complaint

LONDON: A Pakistani student leader at the Cambridge University has openly accused the universitys certain board members and staff in the Graduate Union for discriminating against him on racial grounds but the student leader faces hostility for going public about his concerns.

After this newspaper highlighted the difficulties of Arsalan Ghani  student from Faisalabad who was elected in March this year to head the union on full time basis  local media in Cambridge picked up the issue and called these allegations as scathing attack on the Cambridge student bodies.

Speaking to The Cambridge Student TCS newspaper, GU President Ghani said: I have launched a complaint to the university authorities in this matter who are investigating. I have all the necessary evidences. Further information, I can only provide after consultation with my lawyers.

But the same news report totally ignored the above statement and concluded to date, we have not been able to find any evidence of racist behavior. The report in effect attempted to deny natural justice to a person who claims that he has been a victim of racial discrimination. The same newspaper played vital role in the campaign against African-Caribbean candidate during CUSU elections and slandered her as hilariously incompetent.

The former GU President Olivia Watson who has been accused of orchestrating campaign against Arsalan, hit back saying that changes to the constitution to allow the GU to become a charity  and thus to have a Trustee Board  were started long before Arsalan voiced his intentions to run for President. The suggestion that I manipulated the Constitution to gain a place on the Trustee Board is particularly bizarre, since I left before the new Constitution came into effect and am not a Trustee.

CUSU LGBT chair Charlie Bell said that it was totally unfair to attack Cambridge students as somehow being against minority groups.

Varsity, the independent Cambridge student newspaper published since 1947, said it had received reports that Ghani had systematic campaign  at times underhand against him. The paper speculated that the antagonism towards Ghani may have stemmed at least in part from his political views because he is a well-known left-wing campaigner as he is actively involved with the Cambridge Marxist Society. The source to Varsity quoted: Covert racism definitely exists in Cambridge student society. Had the president been white, I dont believe he would have received the same level of antagonism and abuse.

One of the local publications went on to criticise the publishing of the original exclusive report of discrimination allegation but a source at the Universitys administration told this correspondent that the prestigious universitys senior figures were highly concerned that a relatively internal matter had gone global and carried serious implications to the reputation of the university which heavily depends on sizeable international students.

According to reports received by this correspondent, Ghani has been deprived of his authorities and role in the union as a President and encountered lot of problems from a certain group of board members.

His responsibilities as a president were cut down by making changes to the union constitution overnight by the previous president and those board members leaving behind serious flaws in the constitution. According to internal Cambridge sources, the group opposed to ethnic minorities, has established strong network in the Cambridge University. The far-right English Defense League (EDL) and racist British National Party (BNP) has a lot of support base in Cambridge.

Racism in Cambridge University is not new. Sources close to Arsalan stated that he is facing serious threats and victimization after launching complaint to the University and highlighting the issue.

Ben Richardson  News Editor

Related Stories:

Editorial -18th September 2012

Graduate students apathetic in GU referendum

CUSU Election Results 2012: In with the Old!

Election Latest: Former CUSU Sabbatical officer slams Presidential Candidates record

Student democracy: how much should we care about voting?

CUSU squirms under continued controversyThe Lay Dean of Kings College, Dr Paul Ryan, is set to publish a strongly-worded statement lambasting criticisms of King's from Whose University? (WU?).

This comes after the group encouraged Cambridge students to offer college space to others over the vacation, and highlighted a number of corporate events on college property during the applicant interviews period.

Room sharing

The WU? campaign, established in November, aimed to draw attention to the times when colleges and the university fail to prioritise students, their needs and their welfare over their business interests.

Drawing attention to the fact many undergraduates were forced to vacate their rooms over Christmas, they created a room-sharing facebook group earlier this month, 'Cambridge Holiday Help Out' for students who wanted to stay in Cambridge. The description said: This will work a little like the May Ball Marketplace but this time for room space/floor space/storage space or even things like sharing cars/busses/trains home so that people can help each other carry stuff or simply have some going-home solidarity!



'Cambridge Holiday Help Out' facebook group. Credit: Colm Murphy

In reaction, Ryan sent an email on December 5 to Kings members warning them that this broke college rules. I would like to remind you that [] you are not allowed to store anyone elses belongings in your room. The reasons for the rule concern security (personal knowledge of and responsibility for possessions left over the vacation) and housekeeping.

I will take disciplinary action against any student who is found to have ignored the rule.

The email prompted an article from trainee history teacher at the University, Adam Robertson, on Open Democracy. Robertson argued that Kings prioritised business interests over Kings students, and that vacation residence may be required because of financial circumstances, or a requirement for mental health access, saying: nowhere in this model is there space for students to be human beings with human needs. He claimed that WU? had provoked Kings College into letting the mask of its humanity slip, revealing the ugly face of its neoliberal ideology.

Lay Deans statement

However, Ryan has attacked the article and a number of WU?s arguments. In an article set for publication on Open Democracy seen by The Cambridge Student, he says: [the] article contains so many errors, of both fact and interpretation, that it should not go unanswered.

He stresses that, during the Christmas Vacation, the space which most undergraduates create by clearing their rooms is used not for conference business  but for the (this year, 854 strong) sixth formers who stay for interviews.

According to Ryan, the tutorial system gives permission to individuals who had a valid reason, such as finances or mental health, to stay during the vacations, thus it is incorrect to state that any undergraduates who need to remain in college accommodation during the vacations are required to leave.

He disputes WU?s core argument that, because of ownership in the sense of who has a right to feel at home in these spaces belongs to the students, the college should make students the priority. Ryan said: WU? appears to be unaware that colleges such as Kings exist for a multitude of purposes. Education, religion, learning and research are stated explicitly in the Kings Statutes; to them should be added the performance of music and the handling of tourism. No particular group, including undergraduates, is entitled to claim ownership.

Finally, Ryan claims that events such as corporate fundraisers are vital to the college: Were a college like Kings to abandon the outside events that help finance the high cost of its educational provision, charges to undergraduates would have to be much higher than at present. He ends his response to the original Open Democracy article by labelling WU?s case as both ill-informed and tendentious.

Whose University? statement

WU? gave TCS a brief statement in response to the Lay Deans comments. They say that Dr Ryan is explicitly, if not wilfully, missing the point of Whose University? and he is working to deny the lived experiences of students.

It is not for the privileged to define or deny others experiences of marginalisation, that only serves further to marginalise them. We as WU? will continue to give a platform to these experiences and try to reclaim a space for the student voice which Dr Ryan appears so eager to silence.

Corporate Controversy

The campaign has recently publicly denounced corporate events staged at Kings and Murray Edwards colleges during interviews week, arguing that they prioritised profits over access.

Posting on their facebook group, the activist group criticised Kings for hosting a corporate drinks in the college bar on 11 December while applicants were staying there for interviews. They claim this was in direct contradiction of explicit promises from management and catering.

Access officers across our university work tirelessly to change the perception of Cambridge as an exclusive and privileged institution [] Last night King's showed that they cared more about the profits they could make from selling off that space than the welfare and comfort of those for whom it was created.

Later, Kings College Student Union put up an announcement on the bars noticeboard, saying: Apologies to any interviewees who felt uncomfortable in the Bar last night due to the presence of corporate dining guests. It was supposed to only be open for you and Kings students. We are sorry!



Notice in King's Bar from KCSU. Credit: Whose University?

In a further statement to TCS, Ryan said: "The current practice in King's is for the student bar to off limits to those attending external dinners in the hall (there are no conferences in this vacation) from Sunday to Thursday of admissions week".

He added that "a more sensitive view than WU?'s would recognise this incursion as having been a mistake, made in the early stages of a new policy toward the use of the bar, which was adopted last month in response to student demands for just that, and not some commercial assault on undergraduate priveleges."

WU? criticised Murray Edwards for hosting a huge formal dinner for an external company, with a live band playing until midnight. Whose University? claim that this shows a complete disregard for the welfare of interviewees. Murray Edwards's Access Officer was unavailable for comment.

However, some have questioned the campaigns anger. Commenting on one of their facebook posts, Junior Research Fellow Paul Sagar said: I find it quite hard to believe that candidates who are going to be made offers in the coming weeks will decline those offers because on one night there were lots of people in suits hanging around.Kathmandu, Nepal: Four provincial States-- 2, 5, 6 and 7 are going to hold their first provincial meeting today.





The province 3 had already held its first provincial meeting while province 1 yet to fix the date for the first provincial meeting.





It is said that the four provinces, which are going to hold their first provincial meeting today would take decision regarding the date for the election of the speaker and fix other procedures.It is estimated that over 35,000 people were victims of human rights violations, political and sexual violence during the dictatorship (1973-1990). | Read MoreThis last December, shortly before Christmas, the Auction House of Christie's arranged a private display of jewelry in Moscow. The correspondent of Rough & Polished, who had an opportunity to visit this event, was able to admire a luxurious collection of jewelry from famous brands and talk with Julien-Vincent Brunie, International Head of Jewellery Private Sales at Christies.

At the annual exhibition of jewelry offered for private sale, the Moscow office of Christie's in Romanov Lane displayed a collection of more than 30 jewelry pieces for a total of about 2.5 million euros. Among the invited guests there were prospect buyers, including media personalities, and journalists of glossy magazines and specialized publications.

Julien-Vincent Brunie, Christies Head of Jewellery Private Sales told about the collection, which was a mix of vintage and modern pieces. It included contemporary jewelry of the SABBA brand maintained by Sandro Sabbatini, a talented designer of Italian origin, who works in Paris. These were made of titanium and graced with diamonds and spinel. There were classical things, which may be even called vintage, originating from aristocratic families that are usually sold privately, avoiding open auctions - a Buccelatti necklace with an aquamarine weighing more than 60 carats, a Bvlgari ring with a ruby and a yellow diamond and the most expensive item on display - a spectacular ring with a Burmese ruby of 4.5 carats in size. As Mr. Brunie explained, "auctions have already finished, but before Christmas many still want to buy something and need the mediation of Christie's to find buyers looking for Christmas gifts."





Image credit: Christie's



Besides this, Christie's and de GRISOGONO launched a partnership project, Art of de GRISOGONO, last November. Mr. Brunie said de GRISOGONO is a fine brand and Fawaz Gruosi is a talented designer. In jewelry, the latter often uses excellent large diamonds. Hence, the idea that both companies join their efforts, selling the most outstanding jewelry in the auction history. Most recently, Christie's put up for sale an impressive and unique emerald necklace from de GRISOGONO with a suspension carrying a diamond weighing 163.41 carats, the largest in the auction history.

Christie's used to sell large diamonds and diamond jewelry quite often before. In the first half of 2017, a diamond weighing 101.73 carats was sold at Christies auction in Geneva for $ 26.7 million - a record sum for colorless diamonds. It was bought by the famous jeweler Harry Winston, and, since he was given the right to give it its own name, the diamond was re-named as Winston's Legacy. This stone has the shape of a pear, it is absolutely symmetrical and has a flawless grade. "We sold several diamonds weighing more than 100 carats," Mr. Brunie is proud to say, "but that jewelry piece of de GRISOGONO fetched a record price."

Mr. Brunie regards high quality diamonds as a good investment:

Everything in this life is determined by quality. At Christie's, I'm responsible for private sales - I attend many exhibitions, and I need to be aware of everything that comes into sight to choose what is needed. I communicate with a number of clients, and I advise them what it is worth to buy - which are the best quality stones that will be a good investment.





Image credit: Christie's



In any field, be it art or jewelry, you buy what you like. And you always buy quality, which means it's very important to buy in the right place. Then it will always be a good investment. This is something that we always advise to do to our customers.

Speaking of synthetic diamonds and asked if they have ever been put up for auction (No, of course) and if this may happen in the future, Mr. Brunie answers quite definitely: No and it is unlikely to happen.

"Although technology is becoming more and more sophisticated, ways of identifying synthetics are becoming more sophisticated as well. At Christie's, we treat our business very attentively and carefully. We have the best evaluation experts and we have a super reliable certification system.

Though Mr. Brunie is engaged in private sales, he works closely with the auction department. According to him, the procedure for examining precious stones participating in auctions is quite complicated and reliable. If these are collectible stones, then we have 2-3 certificates for diamonds, including from the GIA. Christie's has a very powerful and experienced team of experts, which includes 2,500 employees around the world, and when there are doubts, they exchange opinions and make decisions collectively.

By the income that diamonds bring to the auction house, they can perhaps be compared with contemporary art - in particular, painting. But in this respect diamonds may even be compared with the classical painting as well - Mr. Bruni recalls a recent event, when Christie's sold a canvas of Leonardo da Vinci for $ 450 million at an auction last November. But this is a unique case. Meanwhile, the aforementioned necklace of De GRISOGONO was sold for $ 37 million, a sum quite hefty for jewelry.





Image credit: Christie's



According to Mr. Brunie, the year of 2017 was quite successful for Christie's compared to 2016: The economic downturn is rather beneficial for collectors - the quality of auction lots in this period is increasing. And you can buy the right thing for the right price - it's a pretty positive time for auctions.

There are all sorts of nuances, however, as it is hard to say which auction items bring the greatest benefit to Christie's. The auction house, Mr. Brunie explains, is a company that buys and sells: "We are operating not for profit, but for the sake of quality."

The work of Mr. Brunie is quite specific and continuous, as he acts on his own schedule - travelling everywhere, looking and seeking what he likes. Mr. Brunie is enthusiastic speaking about jewelry collections, about his penchant (for colored diamonds), about Kashmir sapphires, Colombian emeralds and Burmese rubies  he finds that all precious stones are beautiful and jokes that for him it is easier to deal with women than with their husbands, because women love diamonds, while husbands get nervous buying "their best friends" for them.

Julien-Vincent Brunie came to the jewelry industry 17 years ago having behind him the Law Academy and the Paris School of Business. He talks about Christies clients - Elizabeth Taylor among them - and says that many celebrities and collectors are customers of Christie's. Mr. Brunie also says that he was fortunate enough to witness the sale of a stone with an amazing history  it was the pink diamond, which had once belonged to Cardinal Mazarin known for his passion for jewelry and rare stones, who gave it to Louis XIV as a gift.

And this is not the only case. When you work at Christie's, you have a chance to see unique things and deal with amazing people. I am happy that I am doing this - being surrounded by beauty and art is a privilege. I think that I am lucky - this is the best, most delightful work in the world!

Galina Semyonova for Rough&Polished





Chinese journalists work on their computers during the G20 meeting in Chengdu, in western China's Sichuan Province on July 23, 2016. Observers say that the digitalization of journalism and the emergence of social media have done little to increase press freedom in China, as Chinese regime rapidly moved to impose censorship on new platforms. (Fred Dufour/AFP/Getty Images)

A New Generation of Journalists in China Face the Same Censorship, Despite New Technology

The regime quickly adapted to changes in the media environment, maintaining strict control

Despite the emergence of a new generation of talented reporters and a radical transformation into the digital age, mass media in China across the board are still firmly controlled and censored by the Chinese regime, according to observers. Investigative journalism, the type of reporting that is often considered the lifeblood of a healthy democracy and open society, remains an extremely risky endeavor in China that is desperately needed but practiced by few.

The dominant media policy in China since the Mao era has really remained quite constant, said Maria Repnikova, an assistant professor of global communication at Georgia State University, the idea that the media should serve the partys interest has not really transformed.

In an event at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington on Jan. 29, Repnikova began by saying that her presentation would surely disappoint anyone who hopes to hear of positive changes or an opening in Chinas media landscape. The Chinese Communist Party regime has been constantly adapting and adjusting its mechanisms of persuasion and propaganda to keep up with any latest development in technology and the market, said Repnikova.

Similar to other countries around the world, the traditional print media in China has witnessed a steep decline in recent years due to digitalization, with readers moving to internet platforms and social media. According to Repnikova, however, the Chinese regime quickly moved to subsidize and establish control over the new platforms and media apps.

As a result, the radical transformation of media in the internet age has contributed little if any opening up or liberalization of Chinas media landscape. Through its dominant control over digital media, the Chinese regime continues the intensification and centralization of censorship, dissemination of propaganda, and a coerced infusion of the partys ideology onto the minds of the Chinese people.

Other observers of Chinas media environment have recorded an equally pessimistic note. Sarah Cook, an analyst at Freedom House, recently wrote in China Media Bulletin that leaked censorship directives from the year 2017 illustrate the efforts of the Chinese regimes censors to expand their control beyond traditional media, websites, and news portals to reach mobile-based news applications and other dissemination methods.

Even contents from Chinese state media are sometimes blocked from circulation when the Chinese regime seeks to reduce the visibility of certain topics in the public eye, according to Sarah Cooks research.

China is ranked 176 out of 180 countries in the world rankings in the 2017 World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders. Watchdog groups have documented numerous Chinese journalists, bloggers, and social media pundits being routinely censored, blocked, and arrested by the authorities whenever they crossed the line of the Chinese regimes media policy.

Repnikova also pointed out that investigative journalism, a practice that is highly-regarded in Western media reporting and is often considered the backbone of the profession, exists only in selected pockets in China, although it is not completely dead.

Journalists in China, according to Repnikova, are often forced into a fluid collaboration with the party and only investigate officials who are already under investigation and are about to fall from power. So instead of [Chinese journalists] being the first to get the story, the scoop, theyre the ones helping to expand the scoop.

In response to a question posed by a former journalist in China, Repnikova said that deep down in their hearts there are indeed a number of Chinese journalists who want to do reporting to serve the public interest and who dont share the regimes vision of helping the state, yet when they test the limits they still end up staying within the edge imposed by the censors.

[They do so] not because they necessarily believe or fully endorse the collaboration [with the government], said Repnikova, but because thats a pragmatic decision that they make in terms of surviving in the system.

The Chinese regimes censorship does not limit itself to Chinese journalists and media. Foreign journalists in China have also witnessed ever-deteriorating working conditions in China as many were reportedly beaten, detained, and harassed last year, according to a report by the Foreign Correspondents Club of China.The Sunday Island, Colombo, 4 February 2018

The Vavuniya Diaries by Neville Jayaweera

Ravaya Publishers, Maharagama 2017 pp117+xvii, Rs250

Reviewer: B. Skanthakumar

This slim memoir spanning a few months in 1971 is noteworthy for its insider view on the failed first insurrection of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVPaPeoples Liberation Front), or more exactly its repression somewhere remote from Colombo and the southwest, by a principal participant. The author was then Government Agent, that is the top-most administrative official, in undivided Vavuniya (before Mullaithivu had been carved from it).

Jungle Outpost

This Tamil majority northern district was sprawling and forested and populated by poor peasants and wild animals. It was a punishment station "away from the comforts of home, family and friends", for public officials out-of-favour with the incumbent government; and is variously described by Jayaweera as a "jungle outpost", "Siberia", and even "gulag"!

Their politically motivated transfer was to affect the loyalty and morale of police personnel and other state cadre as news of a daring bid for state power by a shadowy movement of Sinhala radical youth a known colloquially as aCheguaraa (through association with the image and example of the Argentine-Cuban revolutionary Ernesto aChea Guevara) a trickled in from the Sinhala villages of Madukanda, Mamaduwa and Pavatkulama, to the town.

After his previous roles as Government Agent of Jaffna during the implementation of the aSinhala Onlya Act a narrated in his Jaffna: Exorcising the Past and Holding the Vision (Ravaya Publishers, 2014) a and as Chairman cum Director-General of the Ceylon Broadcasting Corporation, Jayaweera had anticipated measuring the length of his sentence in Vavuniya by "purchasing paddy and looking into corruption in cooperative societies".

The eruption of armed rebellion from 4th April 1971 and until its eradication (in Vavuniya at least) by mid-August, changed the situation utterly.

Writ of the State

As Government Agent, Jayaweera was responsible for facing down the JVPas challenge and maintaining the writ of the state during those hot months. The defence of the town and its police station was critical.

The JVP strategy of a aone-day revolutiona boiled down to storming police stations and arming themselves from their arsenal of weapons and ammunition; along with taking the political and administrative hierarchy up to prime minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike into captivity and possibly execution. Vavuniya town was an asset to both the state and the JVP for its location on the arterial road connecting Jaffna to Colombo and Mannar to Trincomalee and the rail-link between north and south.

Vavuniya police station came under attack on the night of 4th April, lasting into the early hours of the next morning, until the rebels withdrew. Later on the 5th, Vavuniya town itself was besieged by between 100 and 150 armed men, vastly outnumbering the police. An infantry platoon from Mannar only arrived that afternoon.

As the reader can guess, the story that unfolds is of the successful resistance to the seizure of authority by the JVP, ending instead in the capture of its known supporters, and against all manner of worries. Aside from the constant threat to his life by the insurgents, these problems ranged from minimal support from a distant and panic-stricken central government a Felix Dias Bandaranaike, nephew and advisor to the prime minister, is a malevolent character in this drama a to a conspiracy against his own life from within the state security force.

However, the authoras purpose lies elsewhere, setting this book apart from the recent crop of autobiographies by senior civil servants of yesteryear.

Make amends

In the twilight of a long and eventful life, Neville Jayaweera attempts to make amends for the loss of innocent lives on his watch; and to accuse an unjust socio-political and economic order of begetting the (wholly legitimate, in his view) reaction in the form of the JVP. Along the way, non-believers must endure a heavy dose of spirituality: for it was also in Vavuniya, in the midst of the turmoil outside and within him, that the author renewed his Christian faith.

A centrepiece of the book is to do with a 21 year-old man who had attended a couple of the JVPas political education classes, known as the Panthi Paha (aFive Lessonsa). On the urging of his wife and accompanied by her and their infant child, he voluntarily surrendered himself to Jayaweera who assured his prompt release the following day, after interrogation by the army officer in charge of the local military unit.

The next morning the Sandhurst-trained captain announced that the individual had attempted to escape from his custody and been fatally wounded in the chase. As authorised under emergency regulations, his body was disposed of in the forest, burned on rubber tyres without magisterial inquiry and a coroneras inquest. Sickened to his stomach, Jayaweera knew this chain of events to be a concoction. He movingly recalls the disbelief and anguish of the young wife, who had trusted in him, when he broke the news to her.

Upon inquiries from villagers, Jayaweera discovered that the army captain had made a sport of "grilling holes in the palms of youth who were in some instances no more than ten years old, ostensibly for extracting information about rebel hideouts". At least 30 of those he had claimed to kill in combat, were unarmed youth who had been murdered.

He describes his swift action to have the captain and his unit removed from Vavuniya and to submit an inventory on the unlawful killings and missing persons in the district to his superiors in Colombo. Nevertheless, "...any attempt by me to launch even the most rudimentary investigations ran up against a stone wall of hostility and silence from the military."

No court martial of the captain took place, nor was any further action taken by the government on his report, likely because of the political embarrassment it would have caused. Whereas the government later claimed no more than 1,100 civilian deaths across the island; by Jayaweeraas reckoning the true number was closer to 20,000.

Barrel of a gun

The author admits that "ultimately, the state has to depend on the barrel of a gun, rather than on a moral code or even on the Courts of Law, to enforce its authority". However, he explains his exposure of these events, after almost half-a-century, because of the destructive effect on society of concealing such abuses. As people of integrity know, and as the subsequent decades in Sri Lanka tragically illustrate, impunity and non-accountability for gross crimes reproduce them in a cycle without end.

What is also surprising in an account by a former senior state administrator is his assessment of the JVP and its cause. The insurgents he says were drawn from "a militant peasant group ... [that] sought to capture power in the name of a new social class...who had lived on the fringes of society for hundreds of years." The JVP was a systemic challenge. It "threatened the whole system" and "for that reason, the entire system ... mobilised to defeat it.

His criticisms of the JVP appear to be not of its goal but rather its strategy and methods. He points out that it had not mobilised the working class and the peasantry nor "grasped the theory and practice of revolution". Both in 1971 and between 1987 and 1989, the JVP had embarked on an adventurist course, which he says not without reason, only consolidated the extreme right on both occasions.

He is sceptical of its current avatar. Parliament has been the graveyard of the JVP, he says, as it was earlier for the aOld Lefta.

Unique addition

The Vavuniya Diaries is a unique addition to our understanding of the 1971 insurrection, the amateurishness of the JVP and the state alike, and the tensions of that time. Its promoters, Marshal Fernando and Susil Sirivardhana, are owed our appreciation for realising its release.

It would have benefited from stronger editing and closer attention to layout. The foreword could have been used to introduce the lay reader to the political dynamics of that period and the origins and ideology of the JVP in particular. The initials JVP are repetitively mis-spelled as Jathika Vimukthi Peramuna, which was a political vehicle of the arch-racist K. M. P. Rajaratne, and no relation to the party founded by Rohana Wijeweera and his comrades. A state of emergency was declared on March 16th and not subsequent to the insurrection.

The author does not expand on a couple of intriguing asides. What were the "tensionsa that sparked an assault on the police station in May 1971...by the army!? How was the peaceful surrender of the remaining rebels in hiding achieved in August 1971? He is silent on the attitude and part of Tamils, who comprised 70 percent of the district, to the events he details. Were there any indications among Tamils of support for the nascent armed nationalist movement in the north?

Neville Jayaweera resigned from the Sri Lanka Administrative Service and therefore as Government Agent of Vavuniya in early 1973. But not before he was subject to further harassment and threat of imprisonment by the Minister of Public Administration, Felix Dias Bandaranaike. He was only 42 years old. Shortly after, Jayaweera and his family left Sri Lanka and have lived ever since in England. He never returned to Vavuniya.Photographs are pictured outside the compound of the North Korean embassy in Berlin, Germany, Dec. 1, 2017. The sign reads "Democratic People's Republic of Korea". (Reuters/Fabrizio Bensch)

German Spy Chief Alleges North Korea Uses Berlin Embassy for Procurement

BERLINNorth Korea has been using its embassy in Berlin to procure parts for its missile program, the head of Germanys BfV domestic intelligence agency told a German broadcaster.

No one at the North Korean embassy in Berlin was immediately available to comment on the allegation.

In a program to be aired on NDR television on Monday, BfV head Hans-Georg Maassen said: We determined that procurement activities have been carried out from there that are, in our view, done with a view to the missile program and sometimes also for the nuclear program.

He said it was often so-called dual use goods, which can be used for both civil and military purposes.

Comments released by NDR ahead of the broadcast showed Maassen said German authorities prevented such activities when they found them but he added: We cant guarantee that we can detect and prevent this in all cases.

He said it was necessary to presume that parts for North Koreas launch program were acquired via other markets or underground buyers had acquired them in Germany.

North Korea has defied years of multilateral and bilateral sanctions with a weapons program aimed at developing nuclear-tipped missiles capable of hitting the United States.

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How Doctors in China Turn into MurderersPoland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki visits the Ulma Family Museum of Poles Who Saved Jews during WWII in Markowa, Poland Feb. 2, 2018. (Agencja Gazeta/Patryk Ogorzalek via Reuters)

Pressure Mounts on Poland to Back Away From Holocaust Bill

WARSAWPoland is seeing a resurgence of anti-Semitism over pending legislation that would impose jail terms for suggestions that the nation was complicit in the Holocaust, local minority groups warned, as pressure mounts on the president to veto the bill.

Parliament passed the measure on Thursday, drawing outrage from Israel, U.S. criticism and condemnation from a number of international organizations. President Andrzej Duda has 21 days to decide whether to sign it into law.

The bill would impose prison sentences of up to three years for mentioning the term Polish death camps and for suggesting publicly and against the facts complicity on the part of the Polish nation or state in Nazi Germanys crimes.

More than three million of Polands 3.2 million Jews were murdered by the Nazis, accounting for about half of the Jews killed in the Holocaust. Jews from across Europe were sent to be killed at death camps built and operated by the Germans on Polish soil, including Auschwitz, Treblinka, Belzec and Sobibor.

According to figures from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the Nazis also killed at least 1.9 million non-Jewish Polish civilians.

In a rare show of unity, Polish minority and ethnic groups, including Jewish, Ukrainian and Russian, urged Duda and other authorities to counteract all forms of xenophobia, intolerance and anti-Semitism, although they did not directly call on the president to veto the bill.

Our particular concern and objection is caused by the numerous and loud manifestations of anti-Semitism that we have been witnessing this week after the (parliament) passed (the Holocaust bill), the groups said in statement.

German Death Camps

Poland, which has gone through a painful public debate in recent years after the publication of research showing some Poles participated in the Nazi atrocities, has long sought to discourage use of the term Polish camps to refer to Nazi camps on its territory, arguing that the phrase implies complicity.

On Saturday, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said the use of the phrase Polish death camps was wrong.

There is not the slightest doubt as to who was responsible for the extermination camps, operated them and murdered millions of European Jews there: namely Germans, Gabriel said in a statement.

Israeli officials said the legislation criminalizes basic historical facts. The countrys foreign ministry said on Thursday that Israel adamantly opposes the bills approval as a whole.

The Israeli embassy in Warsaw said late on Friday that Israel does not oppose Polands fight for assuring the phrase Polish death camps is never used.

We would like to use this opportunity to repeat that Israel stands with Poland in using the proper term for the death camps  German Nazi camps, the embassy said in its statement.

The embassy also said that it has received a wave of anti-Semitic statements in the past week.

Poland is one of the most ethnically and religiously homogenous countries in Europe, but before World War Two Jews made up 10 percent of the population and the country also had large Ukrainian, German, Belarussian and other minorities.

Polands ruling party, the socially conservative PiS, has reignited debate on the Holocaust as part of a campaign to fuel patriotism since sweeping into power in 2015.

The party says the bill is needed to protect Polands reputation and ensure historians recognize that Poles as well as Jews were victims of the Nazis.

Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the chairman of the PiS and de facto the countrys leader, told the public radio Jedynka on Saturday that Poland rejects anti-Semitism very radically.

But we are also a sovereign state and we have a duty to start, because this is only the beginning, the fight against  this great defamatory campaign against Poland, namely, insulting Poland, blaming us for someone elses actions.

Free Speech

Critics of the bill have raised concerns it will curb free speech and could potentially be used against Holocaust survivors or historians.

A U.S. congressional task force on combating anti-Semitism and a number of Jewish groups urged Duda to veto the bill.

The International Auschwitz Council, an advisory body to the office of the Polish prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, said on Friday the bills imprecision raised legitimate concerns about restricting freedom in discovering the truth about the Holocaust.

Duda has not said whether he will sign the bill, but his spokesman told the Polish state radio Trojka: The president believes that Poland, as any other country, has the right to defend its good name  has the right to defend the truth.

Kaczynski said that Duda should sign the law.

We must talk to our allies in a way that would allow them to understand that we have no intention of renouncing our dignity, he said.

By Lidia Kelly and Anna Wlodarczak

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How Doctors in China Turn into MurderersThe Mardela Springs home on the 11000 block of Norris Twilley Road in Maryland where three children were allegedly abused beginning in the spring or early summer of 2017. (Screenshot via Google Maps)

Update: Maryland Women Charged With Abusing Children in New House of Horrors

In a shocking case of abuse, officials said that three children were beaten and locked in the closets of a Maryland home for months.

The childrenages 8, 9, and 10were also assaulted with stun gun and they were beaten by two women using belts as well as extension cords, Maryland State Police said, WMDT reported. In one instance, one of the children was allegedly forced to eat dog excrement.

Amanda Wright, 29, and Besline Joseph, 25, were arrested Wednesday, Jan. 31, in Mardela Springs, Maryland. They were charged with several counts of child abuse. According to Delmarva Now, Wright is the mother of the children.

Amanda Wright, 29, And Her Live-in Girlfriend Besline Joseph, 25, Charged With #ChildAbuse, Accused Of Beating Kids, Forcing Them To Eat Dog Feces. https://t.co/4Z49WVRKHD  ARC ? (@AnonRoughCoitus) February 2, 2018

The women mostly kept the kids in closets or in the basement of the home, and they threatened them with death if they told anyone about the abuse.

Police began an investigation into the case after a relative reported the child abuse. Delmarva Now reported that police and a social worker interviewed the children on Jan. 30, and the two women were arrested the following day.

The 10-year-old child was tased on numerous occasions by Amanda [Wright] and Besline [Joseph] for not matching up laundry correctly, forgetting to feed the dog and eating food that Amanda and Besline do not want him to have, said police in charging documents.

When officers found them, the children had signs of abuse, such as bloody noses, cuts, and bruises. They were fed a diet of bread, oatmeal, and water, officials said.

It is hard to imagine this type of abuse, and certainly even harder to imagine the motive behind it, Greg Shipley, the states police director of communications, told WMDT.

Its a tragic situation that these children had to endure during that period of time.

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How Doctors in China Turn into MurderersNobel Peace Prize winner Tawakkol Karman of Yemen looks on during a news conference as part of the Nobel Women's Initiative to gather a first-hand account of the ongoing violence against women land defenders, in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, October 24, 2017. (Reuters/Jorge Cabrera)

Yemen Islamist Party Suspends Membership of Nobel Laureate Karman

DUBAIYemeni Nobel Prize winner Tawakkol Karman was suspended from an Islamist party allied with President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi after she accused the Saudi-led coalition that backs him in the countrys civil war of acting as occupiers.

Karman won the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize for her role in Arab Spring protests that ousted authoritarian President Ali Abdullah. More recently she has ramped up public criticism of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, accusing them of backing a campaign to divide Yemen by supporting southern separatists against the internationally recognized government.

Speaking at the Warwick Economics Summit in London over the weekend, Karman said Saudi Arabia and the UAE were driven by a reckless adventurism when they intervened in Yemen in 2015 after Iran-aligned Houthi forces drove Hadi into exile.

In an earlier Twitter message, she wrote: Saudi Arabia and UAE took advantage of the (Houthi) militia coup in Sanaa to launch a very ugly occupation and an uglier influence in Yemen.

The Islah party, regarded as a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is viewed by Saudi Arabia and the UAE as a terrorist organization, tried to distance itself from Karman and order her suspended from its ranks.

Tawakkol Karmans statements do not represent the Islah party and its policies, and are not in line with the partys positions, a statement posted on Islahs website said.

Therefore, the general secretary has decided to freeze her membership according to the partys status.

Karman, who left Yemen after Houthi militia seized the capital Sanaa in a series of military advances that began in late 2014, responded on her Twitter account by describing Islah leaders as prisoners and slaves of Riyadh and Abu Dhabi.

Tensions between Islah and southern separatists have been rising since Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia and the UAE, announced a boycott of Qatar in June last year over allegations that Doha backs Islamist militants. Qatar denies the charges.

Islah, eager to ease the worries of Gulf Arab states about its Islamist leanings, has sought to distance itself from the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Brotherhood denies accusations from conservative Arab governments of involvement in terrorism, saying it seeks democracy by peaceful means only.

The southern separatists want to restore the independent state of South Yemen, which merged with North Yemen in 1990. They have fought the Houthis alongside Hadis forces, but rose up last week and seized control of the southern port of Aden after Hadi refused to sack his prime minister, whom the separatists accuse of mismanagement and corruption.

Reporting By Aziz El YaakoubiWall Street analysts have given Enel Generacion Chile a "N/A" rating, but there may be better buying opportunities in the stock market. Some of MarketBeat's past winning trading ideas have resulted in 5-15% weekly gains. MarketBeat just released five new stock ideas, but Enel Generacion Chile wasn't one of them. MarketBeat thinks these five companies may be even better buys.

View MarketBeat's top stock picks here.HSBC Holdings plc provides banking and financial products and services worldwide. The company operates through Wealth and Personal Banking, Commercial Banking, and Global Banking and Markets segments. The Wealth and Personal Banking segment offers retail banking products and services, such as current and savings accounts, mortgages and personal loans, credit and debit cards, and local and international payment services for ultra high net worth individuals; and wealth management services, including insurance and investment products, global asset management services, investment management, and private wealth solutions. The Commercial Banking segment provides credit and lending, treasury management, payment, cash management, commercial insurance, and investment services, as well as commercial cards, and international trade and receivables finance services; and foreign exchange products, and capital raising and advisory services to small and medium sized enterprises, mid-market enterprises, and corporates. The Global Banking and Markets segment is involved in the provision of financing, advisory, and transaction services, including credit, rates, foreign exchange, equities, money markets, and securities services, as well as principal investment activities to government, corporate and institutional clients, and private investors. The Global Private Banking segment provides a range of services to high net worth individuals and families with complex and international needs. HSBC Holdings plc was founded in 1865 and is headquartered in London, the United Kingdom.

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Lawrie Receivables Financing Ltd, Amberdate Ltd, Anglo Scottish Utilities Partnership 1, Aquilus Ltd, Automobile Association Personal Finance Ltd, BOS (Ireland) Property Services 2 Ltd, BOS (Ireland) Property Services Ltd, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages (Scotland) No. 2) Ltd, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages (Scotland) No. 3) Ltd, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages (Scotland)) Ltd, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages) No. 1 plc, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages) No. 2 plc, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages) No. 3 plc, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages) No. 4 plc, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages) No. 5 plc, BOS (Shared Appreciation Mortgages) No. 6 plc, BOS (USA) Fund Investments Inc., BOS (USA) Inc., BOS Edinburgh No 1 Ltd, BOS Mistral Ltd, BOS Personal Lending Ltd, BOSSAF Rail Ltd, Bank of Scotland (B G S) Nominees Ltd, Bank of Scotland (Stanlife) London Nominees Ltd, Bank of Scotland Branch Nominees Ltd, Bank of Scotland Central Nominees Ltd, Bank of Scotland Edinburgh Nominees Ltd, Bank of Scotland Equipment Finance Ltd, Bank of Scotland Foundation, Bank of Scotland LNG Leasing (No 1) Ltd, Bank of Scotland London Nominees Ltd, Bank of Scotland Nominees (Unit Trusts) Ltd, Bank of Scotland P.E.P. Nominees Ltd, Bank of Scotland Structured Asset Finance Ltd, Bank of Scotland Transport Finance 1 Ltd, Bank of Scotland plc, Bank of Wales Ltd, Barents Leasing Ltd, Barnwood Mortgages Ltd, Birchcrown Finance Ltd, Birmingham Midshires Financial Services Ltd, Birmingham Midshires Land Development Ltd, Birmingham Midshires Mortgage Services Ltd, Black Horse (TRF) Ltd, Black Horse Executive Mortgages Ltd, Black Horse Finance Holdings Ltd, Black Horse Finance Management Ltd, Black Horse Group Ltd, Black Horse Ltd, Black Horse Offshore Ltd, Black Horse Property Services Ltd, Boltro Nominees Ltd, British Linen Leasing (London) Ltd, British Linen Leasing Ltd, British Linen Shipping Ltd, C.T.S.B. Leasing Ltd, CBRail S.A.R.L., CF Asset Finance Ltd, CF1 Ltd, CM Venture Investments Ltd, Cancara Asset Securitisation Ltd, Capital 1945 Ltd, Capital Bank Leasing 12 Ltd, Capital Bank Leasing 3 Ltd, Capital Bank Leasing 5 Ltd, Capital Bank Leasing 9 Ltd, Capital Bank Property Investments (3) Ltd, Capital Personal Finance Ltd, Cardiff Auto Receivables Securitisation 2018-1 Plc, Cardiff Auto Receivables Securitisation 2019-1 Plc, Cardiff Auto Receivables Securitisation Holdings Ltd, Cardnet Merchant Services Ltd, Cashfriday Ltd, Cashpoint Ltd, Caveminster Ltd, Cedar Holdings Ltd, Celsius European Lux 2 S.A.R.L., Central Mortgage Finance Ltd, Chariot Finance Ltd, Cheltenham & Gloucester plc, Cheltenham II Securities 2020 DAC, Cheltenham Securities 2017 Ltd, Chepstow Blue Holdings Ltd, Chepstow Blue plc, Chester Asset Options No.2 Ltd, Chester Asset Options No.3 Ltd, Chester Asset Receivables Dealings Issuer Ltd, Chester Asset Securitisation Holdings Ltd, Chester Asset Securitisation Holdings No.2 Ltd, Chiswell Stockbrokers Ltd, Clerical Medical Finance plc, Clerical Medical Financial Services Ltd, Clerical Medical International Holdings B.V., Clerical Medical Investment Fund Managers Ltd, Clerical Medical Managed Funds Ltd, Clerical Medical Non Sterling Guadalix Hold Co BV, Clerical Medical Non Sterling Guadalix Spanish Prop Co SL, Clerical Medical Non Sterling Megapark Hold Co BV, Clerical Medical Non Sterling Megapark Prop Co SA, Clerical Medical Non Sterling Property Company S.A.R.L., Cloak Lane Funding S.A.R.L., Cloak Lane Investments S.A.R.L., Conquest Securities Ltd, Corbiere Asset Investments Ltd, Create Services Ltd, Credit Card Securitisation Europe Ltd, Dalkeith Corporation, Deva Financing Holdings Ltd, Deva Financing plc, Deva One Ltd, Deva Three Ltd, Deva Two Ltd, Dunstan Investments (UK) Ltd, Edgbaston RMBS 2010-1 plc, Edgbaston RMBS Holdings Ltd, Elland RMBS 2018 plc, Elland RMBS Holdings Ltd, Eurolead Services Holdings Ltd, First Retail Finance (Chester) Ltd, Fontwell Securities 2016 Ltd, Forthright Finance Ltd, France Industrial Premises Holding Company, General Leasing (No. 12) Ltd, General Reversionary and Investment Company, Gresham Nominee 1 Ltd, Gresham Nominee 2 Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 1) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 10) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 11) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 12) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 13) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 14) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 15) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 16) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 19) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 20) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 21) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 22) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 23) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 24) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 25) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 26) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 27) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 28) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 29) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 3) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 30) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 31) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 32) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 33) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 34) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 35) Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 36) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 37) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 38) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 39) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 40) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 41) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 44) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 45) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 46) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 47) UK Ltd, Gresham Receivables (No. 48) UK Ltd, Guildhall Asset Purchasing Company (No 3) Ltd, Guildhall Asset Purchasing Company (No.11) UK Ltd, HBOS Covered Bonds LLP, HBOS Final Salary Trust Ltd, HBOS Financial Services Ltd, HBOS Insurance & Investment Group Ltd, HBOS International Financial Services Holdings Ltd, HBOS Investment Fund Managers Ltd, HBOS Social Housing Covered Bonds LLP, HBOS UK Ltd, HBOS plc, HSDL Nominees Ltd, HVF Ltd, Halifax Credit Card Ltd, Halifax Financial Brokers Ltd, Halifax Financial Services (Holdings) Ltd, Halifax Financial Services Ltd, Halifax General Insurance Services Ltd, Halifax Group Ltd, Halifax Investment Services Ltd, Halifax Leasing (June) Ltd, Halifax Leasing (March No.2) Ltd, Halifax Leasing (September) Ltd, Halifax Life Ltd, Halifax Loans Ltd, Halifax Ltd, Halifax Mortgage Services Ltd, Halifax Nominees Ltd, Halifax Pension Nominees Ltd, Halifax Premises Ltd, Halifax Share Dealing Ltd, Halifax Vehicle Leasing (1998) Ltd, Heidi Finance Holdings (UK) Ltd, Hill Samuel Bank Ltd, Hill Samuel Finance Ltd, Hill Samuel Leasing Co. Ltd, Home Shopping Personal Finance Ltd, Horizon Capital 2000 Ltd, Housing Association Risk Transfer 2019 DAC, Housing Growth Partnership GP LLP, Housing Growth Partnership LP, Housing Growth Partnership Ltd, Housing Growth Partnership Manager Ltd, Hyundai Car Finance Ltd, IBOS Finance Ltd, ICC Enterprise Partners Ltd, ICC Equity Partners Ltd, ICC Holdings Unlimited Company, Inchcape Financial Services Ltd, Intelligent Finance Financial Services Ltd, Intelligent Finance Software Ltd, International Motors Finance Ltd, Kanaalstraat Funding C.V., Katrine Leasing Ltd, LB Healthcare Trustee Ltd, LB Motorent Ltd, LB Quest Ltd, LB Share Schemes Trustees Ltd, LBCF Ltd, LBG Brasil Administracao LTDA, LBG Capital Holdings Ltd, LBG Equity Investments Ltd, LBI Leasing Ltd, LDC (General Partner) Ltd, LDC (Managers) Ltd, LDC (Nominees) Ltd, LDC GP LLP, LDC I LP, LDC II LP, LDC III LP, LDC IV LP, LDC Parallel (Nominees) Ltd, LDC V LP, LDC VI LP, LDC VII LP, LDC VIII LP, LTGP Limited Partnership Incorporated, Legacy Renewal Company Ltd, Leicester Securities 2014 Ltd, Lex Autolease (CH) Ltd, Lex Autolease (VC) Ltd, Lex Autolease Carselect Ltd, Lex Autolease Ltd, Lex Vehicle Finance 2 Ltd, Lex Vehicle Leasing (Holdings) Ltd, Lex Vehicle Leasing Ltd, Lime Street (Funding) Ltd, Lingfield 2014 I Holdings Ltd, Lingfield 2014 I plc, Lloyds (Gresham) Ltd, Lloyds (Gresham) No. 1 Ltd, Lloyds (Nimrod) Specialist Finance Ltd, Lloyds America Securities Corporation1, Lloyds Asset Leasing Ltd, Lloyds Bank (Branches) Nominees Ltd, Lloyds Bank (Colonial & Foreign) Nominees Ltd, Lloyds Bank (Fountainbridge 1) Ltd, Lloyds Bank (Fountainbridge 2) Ltd, Lloyds Bank (I.D.) Nominees Ltd, Lloyds Bank (International Services) Ltd, Lloyds Bank (Stock Exchange Branch) Nominees Ltd, Lloyds Bank Asset Finance Ltd, Lloyds Bank Commercial Finance Ltd, Lloyds Bank Commercial Finance Scotland Ltd, Lloyds Bank Corporate Asset Finance (HP) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Corporate Asset Finance (No.1) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Corporate Asset Finance (No.2) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Corporate Asset Finance (No.3) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Corporate Asset Finance (No.4) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Corporate Markets Wertpapierhandelsbank GmbH, Lloyds Bank Corporate Markets plc, Lloyds Bank Covered Bonds (Holdings) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Covered Bonds (LM) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Covered Bonds LLP, Lloyds Bank Equipment Leasing (No. 1) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Equipment Leasing (No. 7) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Equipment Leasing (No. 9) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Financial Services (Holdings) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Foundation for England & Wales, Lloyds Bank Foundation for the Channel Islands, Lloyds Bank General Insurance Holdings Ltd, Lloyds Bank General Insurance Ltd, Lloyds Bank General Leasing (No. 11) Ltd, Lloyds Bank General Leasing (No. 17) Ltd, Lloyds Bank General Leasing (No. 20) Ltd, Lloyds Bank General Leasing (No. 3) Ltd, Lloyds Bank General Leasing (No. 5) Ltd, Lloyds Bank GmbH, Lloyds Bank Hill Samuel Holding Company Ltd, Lloyds Bank Insurance Services Ltd, Lloyds Bank International Ltd, Lloyds Bank Leasing (No. 6) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Leasing (No. 8) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Leasing Ltd, Lloyds Bank MTCH Ltd, Lloyds Bank Maritime Leasing (No. 10) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Maritime Leasing (No. 13) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Maritime Leasing (No. 17) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Maritime Leasing (No.16) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Nominees Ltd, Lloyds Bank Offshore Pension Trust Ltd, Lloyds Bank Pension ABCS (No. 1) LLP, Lloyds Bank Pension ABCS (No. 2) LLP, Lloyds Bank Pension Trust (No. 1) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Pension Trust (No. 2) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Pensions Property (Guernsey) Ltd, Lloyds Bank Properties Ltd, Lloyds Bank Property Company Ltd, Lloyds Bank S.F. Nominees Ltd, Lloyds Bank Subsidiaries Ltd, Lloyds Bank Trustee Services Ltd, Lloyds Bank plc, Lloyds Banking Group Pensions Trustees Ltd, Lloyds Capital GP Ltd, Lloyds Commercial Leasing Ltd, Lloyds Commercial Properties Ltd, Lloyds Commercial Property Investments Ltd, Lloyds Corporate Services (Jersey) Ltd, Lloyds Development Capital (Holdings) Ltd, Lloyds Engine Capital (No.1) U.S LLC, Lloyds Far East S.A.R.L., Lloyds General Leasing Ltd, Lloyds Group Holdings (Jersey) Ltd, Lloyds Holdings (Jersey) Ltd, Lloyds Hypotheken B.V., Lloyds Industrial Leasing Ltd, Lloyds International Pty Ltd, Lloyds Investment Bonds Ltd, Lloyds Investment Fund Managers Ltd, Lloyds Investment Securities No.5 Ltd, Lloyds Leasing (North Sea Transport) Ltd1, Lloyds Leasing Developments Ltd, Lloyds Nominees (Guernsey) Ltd, Lloyds Offshore Global Services Private Ltd, Lloyds Plant Leasing Ltd, Lloyds Portfolio Leasing Ltd, Lloyds Premises Investments Ltd, Lloyds Project Leasing Ltd, Lloyds Property Investment Company No. 3 Ltd, Lloyds Property Investment Company No. 4 Ltd, Lloyds Property Investment Company No.5 Ltd, Lloyds Secretaries Ltd, Lloyds Securities Inc., Lloyds TSB Pacific Ltd, Lloyds UDT Asset Leasing Ltd, Lloyds UDT Asset Rentals Ltd, Lloyds UDT Hiring Ltd, Lloyds UDT Leasing Ltd, Lloyds UDT Ltd, Lloyds Your Tomorrow Trustee Ltd, Loans.co.uk Ltd, London Taxi Finance Ltd, London Uberior (L.A.S. Group) Nominees Ltd, Lotus Finance Ltd, MBNA, MBNA Direct Ltd, MBNA Europe Finance Ltd, MBNA Europe Holdings Ltd, MBNA General Foundation, MBNA Global Services Ltd, MBNA Indian Services Private Ltd, MBNA Ltd, MBNA R & L S.A.R.L., MBNA Receivables Ltd, Mainsearch Company Ltd, Maritime Leasing (No. 19) Ltd, Membership Services Finance Ltd, Mitre Street Funding S.A.R.L., Molineux RMBS 2016-1 plc, Molineux RMBS Holdings Ltd, Moor Lane Holdings Ltd, NFU Mutual Finance Ltd, NWS Trust Ltd, Nominees (Jersey) Ltd, Nordic Leasing Ltd, Ocean Leasing (July) Ltd, Oystercatcher Nominees Ltd, Oystercatcher Residential Ltd, PIPS Asset Investments Ltd, Pacific Leasing Ltd, Penarth Asset Securitisation Holdings Ltd, Penarth Funding 1 Ltd, Penarth Funding 2 Ltd, Penarth Master Issuer plc, Penarth Receivables Trustee Ltd, Pensions Management (S.W.F.) Ltd, Peony Eastern Leasing Ltd, Peony Leasing Ltd, Peony Western Leasing Ltd, Permanent Funding (No. 1) Ltd, Permanent Funding (No. 2) Ltd, Permanent Holdings Ltd, Permanent Master Issuer plc, Permanent Mortgages Trustee Ltd, Permanent PECOH Holdings Ltd, Permanent PECOH Ltd, Perry Nominees Ltd, Prestonfield Investments Ltd, Proton Finance Ltd, R.F. Spencer And Company Ltd, Ranelagh Nominees Ltd, Retail Revival (Burgess Hill) Investments Ltd, SARL Coliseum, SARL Hiram, SAS Compagnie Fonciere De France, SCI Astoria Invest, SCI De LHorloge, SCI Equinoxe, SCI Rambuteau CFF, SW Funding plc, SW No.1 Ltd, SWAMF (GP) Ltd, SWAMF Nominee (1) Ltd, SWAMF Nominee (2) Ltd, Saint Michel Holding Company No1, Saint Michel Investment Property, Saint Witz 2 Holding Company No1, Saint Witz 2 Investment Property, Salisbury II Securities 2016 Ltd, Salisbury II-A Securities 2017 Ltd, Salisbury III Securities 2019 DAC, Salisbury Securities 2015 Ltd, Sandown 2012-2 Holdings Ltd, Sandown 2012-2 plc, Sandown Gold 2012-1 Holdings Ltd, Sandown Gold 2012-1 plc, Savban Leasing Ltd, Scotland International Finance B.V., Scottish Widows Administration Services (Nominees) Ltd, Scottish Widows Administration Services Ltd, Scottish Widows Annuities Ltd, Scottish Widows Auto Enrolment Services Ltd, Scottish Widows Europe, Scottish Widows Financial Services Holdings, Scottish Widows Group Ltd, Scottish Widows Industrial Properties Europe B.V., Scottish Widows Ltd, Scottish Widows Pension Trustees Ltd, Scottish Widows Property Management Ltd, Scottish Widows Schroder Personal Wealth (ACD) Ltd, Scottish Widows Schroder Personal Wealth Ltd, Scottish Widows Schroder Wealth Holdings Ltd, Scottish Widows Services Ltd, Scottish Widows Trustees Ltd, Scottish Widows Unit Funds Ltd, Scottish Widows Unit Trust Managers Ltd, Scottish Widows Fund and Life Assurance Society, Seabreeze Leasing Ltd, Seaspirit Leasing Ltd, Share Dealing Nominees Ltd, Shogun Finance Ltd, Silentdale Ltd, St Andrews Group Ltd, St Andrews Insurance plc, St Andrews Life Assurance plc, St. Marys Court Investments, Standard Property Investment (1987) Ltd, Standard Property Investment Ltd, Sussex County Homes Ltd, Suzuki Financial Services Ltd, Swan Funding 2 Ltd, Syon Securities 2019 DAC, The Agricultural Mortgage Corporation Plc, The British Linen Company Ltd, The Halifax Foundation for Northern Ireland, The Mortgage Business plc, Thistle Financing Holdings Ltd, Thistle Investments (AMC) Ltd, Thistle Investments (ERM) Ltd, Thistle Leasing, Three Copthall Avenue Ltd, Tower Hill Property Investments (10) Ltd, Tower Hill Property Investments (7) Ltd, Tranquility Leasing Ltd, Trinity Financing plc, UDT Budget Leasing Ltd, UDT Sales Finance Ltd, Uberior (Moorfield) Ltd, Uberior Co-Investments Ltd, Uberior ENA Ltd, Uberior Equity Ltd, Uberior Europe Ltd, Uberior Fund Investments Ltd, Uberior Infrastructure Investments (No.2) Ltd, Uberior Infrastructure Investments Ltd, Uberior Investments Ltd, Uberior Nominees Ltd, Uberior Trading Ltd, Uberior Trustees Ltd, Uberior Ventures Australia Pty Ltd, Uberior Ventures Ltd, United Dominions Leasing Ltd, United Dominions Trust Ltd, Universe The CMI Global Network Fund, Upsaala Ltd, Vine Street IX LP, WCS Ltd, Ward Nominees (Abingdon) Ltd, Ward Nominees (Birmingham) Ltd 1, Ward Nominees (Bristol) Ltd 1, Ward Nominees Ltd 1, Waverley  Fund II Investor LLC, Waverley  Fund III Investor LLC, Waymark Asset Investments Ltd, West Craigs Ltd, Wetherby II Securities 2018 DAC, Wetherby III Securities 2019 DAC, Wetherby Securities 2017 Ltd, Wood Street Leasing Ltd, and Zurich Insurance Group - UK Workplace Pensions and Savings Business.The following companies are subsidiares of Vodafone Group: 360 Connect S.A., [email protected] Telecom, A-ccelerator B.V., A-ccelerator Holding B.V, AAA (Euro) Limited, AAA (MCR) Limited, AAA (UK) Limited, Acorn Communications Limited, Africonnect (Zambia) Limited, Ag Mercantile Company Private Limited, Al-Amin Investments Limited, Amsterdamse Beheer- en Consultingmaatschappij B.V., Apollo Submarine Cable System Limited, Array Holdings Limited, Asian Telecommunication Investments (Mauritius) Limited, Aspective Limited, Astec Communications Limited, Autoconnex Limited, Aztec Limited, BelCompany BV, Bluefish Apac Communications Pte. Ltd, Bluefish Communications, Bluefish Communications Limited, Business Serve Limited, C&W Worldwide Nigeria Limited, C.S.P. Solutions Limited, CCII (Mauritius) Inc., CGP India Investments Ltd., CGP Investments (Holdings) Limited, COOP Mobil s.r.o, CT Networks Limited, CWGNL S.A., CWW Operations Limited, Cable & Wireless Access Limited, Cable & Wireless Americas Systems Inc., Cable & Wireless Aspac Holdings Limited, Cable & Wireless CIS Services Limited, Cable & Wireless CIS Svyaz LLC, Cable & Wireless Capital Limited , Cable & Wireless Communications Data Network Services Limited, Cable & Wireless Communications Starclass Limited, Cable & Wireless Communications Technical Service (Shanghai) Co. Ltd (Beijing Branch), Cable & Wireless Europe Holdings Limited, Cable & Wireless GN Limited, Cable & Wireless Global (India) Private Limited, Cable & Wireless Global Business Services Limited, Cable & Wireless Global Holding Limited, Cable & Wireless Global Telecommunication Services Limited, Cable & Wireless Holdco Limited, Cable & Wireless Networks India Private Limited, Cable & Wireless Trade Mark Management Limited, Cable & Wireless UK Holdings Limited, Cable & Wireless UK Services Limited, Cable & Wireless Waterside Holdings Limited, Cable & Wireless Worldwide, Cable & Wireless Worldwide Limited, Cable & Wireless Worldwide Pension Trustee Limited, Cable & Wireless Worldwide Services Limited, Cable & Wireless Worldwide Voice Messaging Limited, Cable & Wireless a-Services Inc, Cable & Wireless a-Services Limited, Cable and Wireless (India) Limited, Cable and Wireless (India) Limited Indian Branch Office, Cable and Wireless Nominee Limited, Cable and Wireless Worldwide South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Cavalry Holdings Ltd, Celfocus  Solucoes Informaticas Para Telecomunicacoes S.A, Cellops Limited, Cellular Operations Limited, Central Communications Group Limited, Central Telecom (Northern) Limited, Centurion GSM Limited, Chelys Limited, City Cable (Holdings) Limited, Cobra do Brasil Servicos de Telematica ltda., Commnet Cellular Inc., Complete Network Technology, Connect (India) Mobile Technologies Private Limited, Cornerstone Telecommunications Infrastructure Limited, Dataroam Limited , Device Insight, Digital Island (UK) Ltd, Digital Mobile Spectrum Limited, East Africa Investment (Mauritius) Limited, Emtel Europe Limited, Energis (Ireland) Limited, Energis Communications Limited, Energis Holdings Limited, Energis Local Access Limited, Energis Management Limited, Energis Squared Limited, Erudite Systems Limited, Esprit Telecom B.V., Eudokia Limited, Euro Pacific Securities Ltd., Eurocall Holdings Limited, Europolitan Holdings AB (now Europolitan Vodafone AB), FB Holdings Limited, FM Associates (UK) Limited, FinCo Partner 1 B.V., FireFly Networks Limited, Flexphone Limited, GS Telecom (Pty) Limited, Gateway Communications Africa (UK) Limited, Gateway Communications Tanzania Limited, General Mobile Corporation, Generation Telecom Limited, Ghana Telecommunications, Ghana Telecommunications Company Limited, Global Cellular Rental Limited, Globe Limited, GrandCentrix GmbH, Grupo Corporativo ONO S.A.U., H3ga Properties (No 3) Pty Limited, HBO Nederland Cooperatief U.A., HBO Netherlands Channels sro, HBO Netherlands Distribution B.V., Hellas Online, How2 Telecom Limited, Hutchison Essar Ltd, Indus Towers Limited, Intercell Communications Limited, Internet Network Services Limited, Invitation Digital Limited, Ipergy Communications NV, Isis Telecommunications Management Limited, Jaguar Communications Limited, Jaykay Finholding (India) Private Limited, Jupicol (Proprietary) Limited, KABELCOM Braunschweig Gesellschaft Fur BreitbandkabelKommunikation Mit Beschrankter Haftung, KABELCOM Wolfsburg Gesellschaft Fur BreitbandkabelKommunikation Mit Beschrankter Haftung, Kabel Deutschland, Kabel Deutschland Holding, Kabel Deutschland Holding Erste Beteiligungs GmbH, Kabel Deutschland Holding Zweite Beteilgungs GmbH, Kabel Deutschland Neunte Beteiligungs GmbH, Kabel Deutschland Siebte Beteiligungs GmbH, Kabelfernsehen Munchen Servicenter GmbH & Co. KG, LG Financing Partnership, LGE HoldCo V B.V., LGE HoldCo VI B.V., LGE HoldCo VIII B.V., LGE Holdco VII B.V., LLC Vodafone Enterprise Ukraine, Le Bunt Holdings Limited, Legend Communications Limited, Liberty Global, Liberty Global Content Netherlands B.V., London Hydraulic Power Company, M-PESA Foundation, M-PESA Holding Co. Limited, ML Integration Group Limited, ML Integration Limited, ML Integration Services Limited, MV Healthcare Services Private Limited, Mannesmann AG, MetroHoldings Limited, Mezzanine Ware Proprietary Limited (RF), Mirambo Limited, Misrfone Trading Company LLC, MobiFon S.A., Mobile Commerce Solutions Limited, Mobile Phone Centre Limited, Mobile Wallet VM1, Mobile Wallet VM2, Mobile by Sainsburys Limited, Mobiles 4 Business.com Limited, Mobileworld Communications Pty Limited, Mobileworld Operating Pty Ltd, Mobilvest, Motifpros 1 (Proprietary) Limited, Multi Risk Indemnity Company Limited, Multi Risk Limited, ND Callus Info Services Private Limited, Nadal Trading Company Private Limited, Nat Comm Air Limited, National Communications Backbone Company Limited, Navtrak Ltd, Netforce Group Limited, Netgrid Telecom SRL, Number Portability Company (Proprietary) Limited, ONO, Omega Telecom Holdings Private Limited, Oni Way  Infocomunicacoes S.A, Oskar Mobil S.R.O., Oxygen Solutions Limited, P.C.P. (North West) Limited, PPL Pty Limited, PT Network Services Limited, PTI Telecom Limited, Peoples Phone Limited, Pinnacle Cellular Group Limited, Pinnacle Cellular Limited, Plex Limited, Plustech Mercantile Company Private Limited, Prime Metals Ltd., Project Telecom Holdings Limited, Quickcomm Software Solutions, Radio Opt GmbH, Rian Mobile Limited, SBC SMART CITY 1517 B.V., SMMS Investments Pvt Limited, Safaricom Limited, Safenet N.P A., Sarmady Communications, Scarlet Ibis Investments 23 (Pty) Limited, Scorpios Beverages Pvt. Ltd, Silver Stream Investments Limited, Singlepoint (4U) Limited, Singlepoint (4U) Ltd., Singlepoint Payment Services Limited, Siro Limited, Spar Aerospace (Nigeria) Limited, Sport TV Portugal S.A, Starnet, Stentor Communications Limited, Stentor Limited, Storage Technology Services (Pty) Limited, T.W. Telecom Limited, T3 Telecommunications Limited, TKS Telepost Kabel-Service Kaiserslautern Beteiligungs GmbH, TKS Telepost Kabel-Service Kaiserslautern GmbH & Co. KG, TNAS Limited, TSM NZ Limited, Talkland Airtime Services Limited, Talkland Australia Pty Limited, Talkland Communications Limited, Talkland International Limited, Talkland Midlands Limited, Talkmobile Limited, Tele2 Italia SPA, Tele2 Spain, Telecom Investments India Private Limited, Telecommunications Europe Limited, Ternhill Communications Limited, The Cobra Group, The Eastern Leasing Company Limited, The Old Telecom Sales Co. Limited, Thus Group Holdings Limited, Thus Group Limited, Thus Limited, Thus Profit Sharing Trustees Limited, TnT Expense Management LLC, Tomorrow Street GP S.a r.l., Tomorrow Street SCA, Torenspits II B.V., Townley Communications Limited, Trans Crystal Ltd., UMT Investments Limited, UPC Nederland Holding I B.V., UPC Nederland Holding II B.V., UPC Nederland Holding III B.V., Unified Communications, Uniqueair Limited, Urbana Teleunion Rostock GmbH & Co.KG, Usha Martin Telematics Limited, VAPL No. 2 Pty Limited, VBA (Mauritius) Limited, VBA Holdings Limited, VBA International (SL) Limited, VBA International Limited, VEI S.r.l., VM SA, VND S.p.A, VSSB Vodafone Shared Services Budapest Private Limited Company, Verwaltung Urbana Teleunion Rostock GmbH, Victus Networks S.A., Vizzavi Finance Limited, Vizzavi Limited, Voda Limited, Vodacall Limited, Vodacash s.p.r.l., Vodacom (Pty) Limited, Vodacom Business (Angola) Limitada, Vodacom Business (Ghana) Limited, Vodacom Business (Kenya) Limited, Vodacom Business Africa (Nigeria) Limited, Vodacom Business Africa Group (Pty) Limited, Vodacom Business Africa Group Services Limited, Vodacom Business Cameroon SA, Vodacom Business Cote Divoire S.A.R.L., Vodacom Congo (RDC) SA, Vodacom Financial Services (Proprietary) Limited, Vodacom Group Limited, Vodacom Insurance Administration Company (Proprietary) Limited, Vodacom Insurance Company (RF) Limited, Vodacom International Holdings (Pty) Limited, Vodacom International Limited, Vodacom Lesotho (Pty) Limited, Vodacom Life Assurance Company (RF) Limited, Vodacom Payment Services (Proprietary) Limited, Vodacom Properties No 1 (Proprietary) Limited, Vodacom Properties No.2 (Pty) Limited, Vodacom Tanzania Limited Zanzibar, Vodacom Tanzania Public Limited Company, Vodacom UK Limited, Vodafone (NI) Limited, Vodafone (New Zealand) Hedging Limited, Vodafone (Scotland) Limited, Vodafone 2, Vodafone 4 UK, Vodafone 5 Limited, Vodafone 5 UK, Vodafone 6 UK, Vodafone Albania Sh.A, Vodafone Alternatif Telekom Hizmetleri A.S., Vodafone Americas 4, Vodafone Americas Virginia Inc., Vodafone And Qatar Foundation L.L.C, Vodafone Asset Management Services S.a r.l., Vodafone Australia Pty Limited, Vodafone Automotive Deutschland GmbH, Vodafone Automotive Electronic Systems S.r.L, Vodafone Automotive France S.A.S, Vodafone Automotive Iberia S.L, Vodafone Automotive Italia S.p.A, Vodafone Automotive Japan K.K, Vodafone Automotive Korea Limited, Vodafone Automotive SpA, Vodafone Automotive Technologies (Beijing) Co Ltd, Vodafone Automotive Telematics Development S.A.S, Vodafone Automotive Telematics S.A, Vodafone Automotive UK Limited, Vodafone Belgium SA/NV, Vodafone Benelux Limited, Vodafone Bilgi Ve Iletisim Hizmetleri AS, Vodafone Business Services Limited, Vodafone Business Solutions Limited, Vodafone Canada Inc, Vodafone Cellular Limited, Vodafone Central Services Limited, Vodafone China Limited (China), Vodafone China Limited (Hong Kong), Vodafone Connect 2 Limited, Vodafone Connect Limited, Vodafone Consolidated Holdings Limited, Vodafone Corporate Limited, Vodafone Corporate Secretaries Limited, Vodafone Czech Republic A.S., Vodafone DC Pension Trustee Company Limited, Vodafone Dagitim Hizmetleri A.S., Vodafone Data, Vodafone Distribution Holdings Limited, Vodafone Egypt Telecommunications S.A.E., Vodafone Elektronik Para Ve Odeme Hizmetleri A.S., Vodafone Empresa Brasil Telecomunicacoes Ltda, Vodafone Empresa Mexico S.de R.L. de C.V., Vodafone Enabler Espana S.L., Vodafone Enterprise Australia Pty Limited, Vodafone Enterprise Austria GmbH, Vodafone Enterprise Bahrain W.L.L., Vodafone Enterprise Bulgaria EOOD, Vodafone Enterprise Chile SA, Vodafone Enterprise Communications Technical Services (Shanghai) Co. Ltd, Vodafone Enterprise Corporate Secretaries Limited, Vodafone Enterprise Denmark A/S, Vodafone Enterprise Equipment Limited, Vodafone Enterprise Europe (UK) Limited, Vodafone Enterprise Europe (UK) Limited  Czech Branch, Vodafone Enterprise Europe (UK) Limited  DubaiI Branch, Vodafone Enterprise Finland OY, Vodafone Enterprise France SAS, Vodafone Enterprise Germany GmbH, Vodafone Enterprise Global Businesses S.a r.l., Vodafone Enterprise Global Limited, Vodafone Enterprise Global Network HK Ltd, Vodafone Enterprise Global Network Pte. Ltd., Vodafone Enterprise Hong Kong Ltd, Vodafone Enterprise Italy S.r.L, Vodafone Enterprise Korea Limited, Vodafone Enterprise Luxembourg S.A., Vodafone Enterprise Netherlands BV, Vodafone Enterprise Norway AS, Vodafone Enterprise Regional Business Singapore Pte.Ltd., Vodafone Enterprise Singapore Pte.Ltd, Vodafone Enterprise Spain S.L.U.  Portugal Branch, Vodafone Enterprise Spain SLU, Vodafone Enterprise Sweden AB, Vodafone Enterprise Switzerland AG, Vodafone Erste Beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH, Vodafone Espana S.A.U., Vodafone Euro Hedging Limited, Vodafone Euro Hedging Two, Vodafone Europe B.V., Vodafone Europe UK, Vodafone European Investments, Vodafone European Portal Limited, Vodafone Finance Limited, Vodafone Finance Luxembourg Limited, Vodafone Finance Sweden, Vodafone Finance UK Limited, Vodafone Financial Operations, Vodafone Financial Services B.V., Vodafone Fixed Ltd, Vodafone Foundation, Vodafone Foundation Australia Pty Limited, Vodafone Gestioni S.p.A, Vodafone Ghana Mobile Financial Services Limited, Vodafone Global Content Services Limited, Vodafone Global Enterprise (Hong Kong) Limited, Vodafone Global Enterprise (Italy) S.R.L., Vodafone Global Enterprise (Japan) K.K., Vodafone Global Enterprise (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Vodafone Global Enterprise Limited, Vodafone Global Enterprise Russia LLC, Vodafone Global Enterprise Taiwan Limited, Vodafone Global Enterprise Telecommunications (Hellas) A.E., Vodafone Global Network Limited, Vodafone Global Network Limited  Slovakia Branch, Vodafone Global Services Private Limited, Vodafone GmbH, Vodafone Group (Directors) Trustee Limited, Vodafone Group Pension Trustee Limited, Vodafone Group Services GmbH, Vodafone Group Services Ireland Limited, Vodafone Group Services Limited, Vodafone Group Services No.2 Limited, Vodafone Group Share Trustee Limited, Vodafone Hire Limited, Vodafone Holding A.S., Vodafone Holdings (Jersey) Limited, Vodafone Holdings (SA) Proprietary Limited, Vodafone Holdings Europe S.L.U., Vodafone Holdings Luxembourg Limited, Vodafone Hutchison Australia Pty Limited, Vodafone Hutchison Finance Pty Limited, Vodafone Hutchison Receivables Pty Limited, Vodafone IP Licensing Limited, Vodafone India Digital Limited, Vodafone India Limited, Vodafone India Services Private Limited, Vodafone India Ventures Limited, Vodafone Institut fur Gesellschaft und Kommunikation GmbH, Vodafone Intermediate Enterprises Limited, Vodafone International 1 S.a.r.l. Luxembourg Zweigniederlassung Bern, Vodafone International 1 S.a r.l., Vodafone International 2 Limited, Vodafone International Holdings B.V., Vodafone International Holdings Limited, Vodafone International M S.a r.l., Vodafone International Operations Limited, Vodafone International Services LLC, Vodafone Investment UK, Vodafone Investments (SA) Proprietary Limited, Vodafone Investments Australia Limited, Vodafone Investments Limited, Vodafone Investments Luxembourg S.a r.l., Vodafone Investments Luxembourg S.a r.l. Luxembourg Zweigniederlassung Bern, Vodafone Ireland Distribution Limited, Vodafone Ireland Ltd., Vodafone Ireland Marketing Limited, Vodafone Ireland Property Holdings Limited, Vodafone Ireland Retail Limited, Vodafone Italia S.p.A., Vodafone Jersey Dollar Holdings Limited, Vodafone Jersey Finance, Vodafone Jersey Yen Holdings Unlimited, Vodafone Kabel Deutschland Field Services GmbH, Vodafone Kabel Deutschland GmbH, Vodafone Kabel Deutschland Kundenbetreuung GmbH, Vodafone Kenya Limited, Vodafone Leasing Limited, Vodafone Libertel B.V., Vodafone Limited, Vodafone Luxembourg 5 S.a r.l., Vodafone Luxembourg 5 S.a r.l. Luxembourg Zweigniederlassung Bern, Vodafone Luxembourg S.a r.l., Vodafone Luxembourg S.a r.l. Luxembourg Zweigniederlassung Bern, Vodafone M-PESA SH.P.K., Vodafone M-Pesa S.A, Vodafone M.C. Mobile Services Limited , Vodafone Magyarorszag Mobile Tavkozlesi Zartkoruen Mukodo Reszvenytarsasag, Vodafone Malta Limited, Vodafone Marketing UK , Vodafone Maroc SARL, Vodafone Mauritius Ltd., Vodafone Mobile Commerce Limited, Vodafone Mobile Communications Limited, Vodafone Mobile Enterprises Limited, Vodafone Mobile NZ Limited, Vodafone Mobile Network Limited, Vodafone Mobile Operations Limited, Vodafone Mobile Services Limited, Vodafone Multimedia Limited, Vodafone Nederland Holding I B.V., Vodafone Nederland Holding II B.V., Vodafone Nederland Holding III B.V., Vodafone Net Iletisim Hizmetleri A.S., Vodafone Network Pty Limited, Vodafone New Zealand Foundation Limited, Vodafone New Zealand Limited, Vodafone Next Generation Services Limited, Vodafone Nominees Limited1, Vodafone ONO S.A.U., Vodafone Oceania Limited, Vodafone Old Show Ground Site Management Limited, Vodafone Overseas Finance Limited, Vodafone Overseas Holdings Limited, Vodafone Panafon International Holdings B.V., Vodafone Panafon UK, Vodafone Partner Services Limited, Vodafone Payment Solutions S.a r.l., Vodafone Portugal  Comunicacoes Pessoais S.A., Vodafone Procurement Company S.a r.l., Vodafone Property Investments Limited, Vodafone Pty Limited, Vodafone Qatar Q.S.C., Vodafone Retail (Holdings) Limited , Vodafone Retail Limited, Vodafone Roaming Services S.a r.l., Vodafone Romania S.A, Vodafone Romania M - Payments SRL, Vodafone Romania Technologies SRL, Vodafone Sales & Services Limited, Vodafone Satellite Services Limited, Vodafone Servicios SL.U, Vodafone Servizi E Tecnologie S.R.L, Vodafone Servicos Empresariais Brasil Ltda., Vodafone Shared Services Romania SRL, Vodafone Specialist Communications Limited, Vodafone Stiftung Deutschland Gemeinnutzige GmbH, Vodafone Technology Solutions Limited, Vodafone Teknoloji Hizmetleri A.S., Vodafone Tele-Services (India) Holdings Limited, Vodafone Telecel-Comunicates Pessoais S.A., Vodafone Telecommunications (India) Limited, Vodafone Telekomunikasyon A.S, Vodafone Towers Limited, Vodafone UK Content Services Limited, Vodafone UK Investments Limited , Vodafone UK Limited1 , Vodafone US Inc, Vodafone Ventures Limited1 , Vodafone Vierte Verwaltungs AG, Vodafone Worldwide Holdings Limited, Vodafone Yen Finance Limited , Vodafone m-pesa Limited, Vodafone-Central Limited Vodaphone Limited, Vodafone-Panafon Hellenic Telecommunications Company S.A., VodafoneZiggo Group Holding B.V, Vodata Limited , Vouchercloud SA (Pty) Ltd, Wataneya Telecommunications S.A.E, Waterberg Lodge (Proprietary) Limited, Wayfinder, Wheatfields Investments 276 (Proprietary) Limited, Wireless Interactions & NFC Accelerator 2013 B.V., Woodend Cellular Limited, Woodend Communications Limited, Woodend Group Limited, Woodend Holdings Limited, XB Facilities B.V, XLink Communications (Proprietary) Limited, Your Communications Group Limited, ZUM B.V., ZYB, Zelitron S.A., Zesko B.V., Ziggo B.V., Ziggo Bond Company B.V., Ziggo Deelnemingen B.V., Ziggo Finance 2 B.V., Ziggo Financing Partnership, Ziggo Holding B.V., Ziggo Netwerk B.V., Ziggo Netwerk II B.V., Ziggo Services B.V., Ziggo Services Employment B.V., Ziggo Services Netwerk 2 B.V., Ziggo Zakelijk Services B.V., and Zoranet Connectivity Services B.V..Oasis Petroleum Inc., an independent exploration and production company, focuses on the acquisition and development of onshore unconventional oil and natural gas resources in the United States. It operates through Exploration and Production(E&P), and Midstream segments. The E&P segment engages in the acquisition and development of oil and gas properties. The Midstream segment offers midstream services, such as natural gas gathering, compression, processing and, gas lift supply; crude oil gathering, terminaling, and transportation; produced and flowback water gathering, and disposal; and water distribution. As of December 31, 2020, the company had 401,766 net leasehold acres in the Williston Basin; and 24,396 net leasehold acres in the Permian Basin, as well as approximately 152.2 million barrels of oil equivalent of estimated net proved reserves. The company sells its crude oil and natural gas to refiners, marketers, and other purchasers that have access to pipeline and rail facilities. Oasis Petroleum Inc. was founded in 2007 and is headquartered in Houston, Texas.

Read MoreLACOMBE, ALTA.Christopher Cattrall, the brother of Sex and the City star Kim Cattrall, has been found dead on his property in rural southern Alberta, according to police.

The actress tweeted Sunday afternoon that she and her family were announcing Christophers unexpected passing  less than 24 hours after she took to Instagram to ask for help in searching for her brother.

At this time we ask for privacy, Cattrall said in the post. We want to thank you all on social media for your outpouring of love and support in this trying time.

RCMP had said the 55-year-old was last heard from on Tuesday, and was believed to have been at his home on a rural property in Lacombe, Alta., at the time.

Police said in a news release Sunday afternoon that Cattralls body was found on that property.

The investigation into the circumstances surrounding his death will continue by the RCMP, but preliminary information indicates that his death is not being considered suspicious, RCMP said in the release.

Police said they would not be commenting further on the case out of respect for the family.

Kim Cattrall, who was born in the U.K. but spent much of her childhood in Canada, had said in an earlier Instagram post that her brothers keys, cellphone and wallet were left on a table in the house, and his front door was unlocked and his seven dogs were left alone.

Police did not confirm those details.

RCMP Cpl. Laurel Scott said earlier Sunday that a relative checked Cattralls home on Friday and thats when police were notified he was missing. She said police and search and rescue had checked the property.

Police issued a news release asking for the publics help finding him, and Kim Cattrall also made an appeal online

Hes a one of a kind brother, Kim Cattrall wrote in her earlier social media post. Help us bring him home safe.WINNIPEGA Yazidi boy who was held captive for three years by Iraqi militants got his wish to meet with Justin Trudeau, simply by showing up to the prime ministers town hall meeting in Winnipeg.

Thirteen-year-old Emad Mishko Tamo made a video appeal to Trudeau that was posted to social media by the Yazidi Association of Manitoba last month.

But a spokesperson for the group says they never heard back from Trudeau, and decided to try to see him at the forum at the University of Manitoba on Wednesday.

Hadji Hesso says when Emad arrived at the venue with his uncle, political staffers approached him and brought him to a dressing room, where he met Trudeau for about five minutes.

Emad was reunited with his family in Winnipeg last year after a relative saw his picture, taken in a refugee camp, on social media.

Hesso says theyd hoped for a much longer meeting with Trudeau, so Emad could talk more about the plight of other Yazidi children and bringing more refugees to Canada.

It was not the meeting that we were looking for, said Hesso, who is a spokesperson for the family. But hopefully this is just the beginning.

We requested a further meeting, another meeting, to discuss more details  if possible in Ottawa  but nothing has been confirmed yet.

Emad was separated from his family after Daesh, also known as ISIL and ISIS, displaced thousands of members of the Kurdish-minority Yazidis in 2014. He was freed last summer in the city of Mosul.

In the Yazidi Associations video, Emad held up a sign thanking Canada for helping him, followed by another sign stating that he wanted to share his story and be a voice for other Yazidi children still in captivity.

Theres a thousand other kids like me who are still held captive, one of Emads signs stated. Hon. Justin Trudeau, will you meet me?

Hesso said he got to the Max Bell Centre at the University of Manitoba early, and was waiting for Emad to arrive with his uncle and another representative with the Yazidi association. The plan wasnt complicated  just try to find the prime minister.

Read more:

Canada is our own country, says Yazidi refugee as family adjusts to new life

With 650 Yazidis now in Canada, immigration officials say target of 1,200 in sight

Canada turning its back on me: Trudeau faces more heckling during Edmonton town hall

But Hesso said he got a text telling him Emad was already with the prime minister.

During the short meeting, Hesso said Emad gave Trudeau a list of some of the issues he hoped the government could address.

Emad was excited, Hesso said, but noted more time was needed.

We were hoping for something better, longer, more detailed.

The day before the town hall, Conservative MP Michelle Rempel posted a Facebook video where she criticized Trudeau for failing to meet with Emad, noting the prime minister did meet with freed hostage Joshua Boyle.

Boyle and his family were rescued in Pakistan in October after five years of captivity in Afghanistan. Less than two weeks after their meeting with Trudeau, Ottawa police laid 15 criminal charges against Boyle, including eight counts of assault and two counts of sexual assault.

The plight of the Yazidi people is something we should be prioritizing here in Canada and I can think of no better emissary than a young boy who has survived this and has the courage to speak for his people, Rempel said in the video.

The House of Commons unanimously passed a motion in 2016 calling the persecution of Yazidis a genocide, and committing to provide asylum to Yazidi women and girls.

An email last month from a spokesperson for Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen stated that as of Dec. 31, 2017, the government issued just over 1,200 visas to government-supported survivors of Daesh.

More than 1,000 had arrived in Canada and 81 per cent of them were Yazidi, the email stated.

However, the email stated that the government would not be receiving any new applications under the initiative.

Read more about:Bilong Oyau braces against the harsh wind and drifting snowflakes of his first Canadian winter, more than 14,000 kilometres from the lush Malaysian rainforest he calls home. Face scrunched beneath a scarf, Oyaus quest for justice has brought him to downtown Toronto  35 C colder than his village  to pursue allegations of financial crimes against an Ontario real estate company.

In a rare court proceeding Monday, lawyers for the Bruno Manser Fund (BMF), a Swiss NGO that works to conserve tropical rainforests, will ask for sensitive financial records from three major banks and an accounting firm. BMF and the Malaysian activists allege Sakto Corp., based in Ottawa, may have amassed its fortune in part by laundering money from corruption in the Malaysian timber industry.

We have nothing to lose except money, said the executive director of BMF, Lukas Straumann.

Oyau is the headman of the village of Long Sait, nestled deep in the Sarawak jungle. The province, home to some of the richest rainforest in the world, lies just above the equator on the island of Borneo.

The community of Long Sait fought rapidly encroaching logging with blockades and protests that sent them to prison, but theyve been lucky  their rainforest is among the estimated 10 per cent of rainforest in Sarawak that hasnt been cut down.

Before there was logging, life was wonderful, Oyau said through a translator.

After logging . . . the trees are gone and the animals disappeared and the rivers are polluted.

Oyau and a group of fellow activists say the deforestation has destroyed Indigenous groups way of life in Sarawak, evicting them from their ancestral homes. Though the logging industry has been lucrative, none of that wealth has trickled down to the areas inhabitants.

Much of the deforestation happened under Abdul Taib Mahmud, a long-serving, powerful politician, currently the governor of Sarawak.

Taib Mahmuds daughter, Jamilah Taib Murray, founded Sakto in 1983 while she was in her early 20s, using money given to her by her father. Taib Murray has lived in Ottawa since she was a teenager.

Despite continuous losses in its first years of operation, Sakto continued to grow, making tens of millions of dollars worth of investments in Ottawa. Its currently valued at $250 million, according to BMF.

The BMF alleges Sakto is among a web of international companies used to launder the proceeds of corruption from the logging industry in Sarawak.

Sakto and Taib Murray have continuously denied the allegations, which havent been proven in court. This application is simply the latest variant in a long string of unsuccessful efforts, wrote Saktos lawyers in a filing late last month.

On Monday, BMF will ask the court to order the Royal Bank of Canada, Toronto-Dominion Bank, Manulife Financial and Deloitte to release detailed financial records related to Sakto.

Straumann says BMF hopes to use the documents, if released, to pursue private prosecution  a scarcely used type of criminal proceeding that can be started by a private citizen  against Sakto for corruption.

There is a money trail coming straight to Canada, said Harrison Ngau, a former Malaysian MP from Sarawak, part of the group in Toronto.

Canada is quietly emerging as a popular destination for global elite looking to hide money, a Toronto Star/CBC investigation found last year.

In court filings, RBC, TD, Manulife and Deloitte have said BMF hasnt presented enough evidence to prove anything criminal has taken place, and the release of the documents would raise privacy concerns.

Though the case was initially sealed, a judge ruled to make it public in September.

If the plaintiffsevidence is correct, there may be very significant criminal misconduct being committed here in aid of corrupt foreign official(s), wrote Ontario Superior Court Justice F.L. Meyers.

There may be no one else here who is interested in uncovering the truth whether it has to do with criminality here, corruption abroad that Canadians are facilitating, or deforestation and destruction of Indigenous habitat and culture in Malaysia.

Read more about:Nurses working in Ontario's overcrowded hospitals have walked away from the contract negotiations, saying demands for efficiencies will impact patients and staff, says the president of the Ontario Nurses' Association.

Vicki McKenna said ONA ended 10 days of negotiations and three days of mediation on Saturday because the Ontario Hospital Association wouldn't budge from its focus on efficiencies.

That means work harder, faster, quicker with fewer (staff,) McKenna said.

I have to keep reminding them to stop trying to industrialize health care. And our product, if you want to talk about business theories, is people. When you are caring for people, you have to look at things in a more humanized way. That is not a conversation they are willing to have with us.

The 58,000 registered nurses who work in Ontario hospitals won't be taking job action but will be speaking out publicly about the state of hospitals and the challenges faced by nurses and patients, McKenna said.

In a statement emailed to the Star, the hospital association said it is disappointed that negotiations... have reached an impasse.

All hospitals across Ontario value the hard work and dedication of all our employees, the statement said.

Our objective is to reach an agreement that is both fair to nurses and reflective of the challenges facing the hospital sector today. Negotiations in this environment are never easy but we remain committed to reaching an agreement that achieves this balance.

The two sides will meet again on Feb. 26 and 27 when they meet with a arbitrator, McKenna said. The current two-year contract expires on March 1, although nurses will use the same agreement until the arbitrator releases his decision, likely in April, she said.

In December, the hospital association pleaded with the provincial government for extra funding, saying the hospital sector is heaving under enormous pressure... Ontarios Health Minister Eric Hoskins responded with a promise of extra funding during flu seasons.

McKenna acknowledges that hospital funding has been a hot button issue for a very long time but said financial decisions must be focused on patients and staff.

If we make decisions on what is best for patients, I believe the rest will fall into place.

The nurses association heavily surveys its members and the results show nurses have two priorities: workload and professional issues, like job safety and patient care, McKenna said.

She would not give specific details on nurses demands, but said they don't want cuts to benefits and are seeking a wage increase so their salaries dont fall behind the rest of Canada.Interpol, the worlds largest police intelligence agency, has joined the hunt for an Innisfil fugitive suspected of fentanyl trafficking.

Wojciech Joseph Grzesiowski, 40, has been on the run since November, when he was named as part of an international drug ring that mistakenly admitted a police agent into its ranks.

Interpol has placed Polish-born Grzesiowski on its red list of most-wanted criminals, sharing information on him with 192 member countries.

Grzesiowskis one of nine alleged GTA mobsters who have been charged in a sweeping investigation called of Project OTremens into the fentanyl trade in southwestern Ontario and New York.

The FBI in New York City conducted a connected operation that led to charges against alleged members of the Bonanno and Gambino families.

Project OTremens was also assisted by Homeland Security from the U.S., the Colombian National Police and Italian police departments as well as RCMP liaison officers in Colombia, Mexico, Italy and the Netherlands.

The Canadian arm of the group was hit with charges for 75 offences including trafficking fentanyl, carfentanil, heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine, as well as weapons and contraband tobacco trafficking and bookmaking.

Police said undercover officers bought six kilograms of fentanyl and carfentanil in six transactions in the operation.

Two of the accused are Domenico Paolo Violi and Giuseppe (Joe) Violi, both of Hamilton. Theyre grandsons of the late Giacomo Luppino of Hamilton, who was considered by police to be a founding member of the Crimine, a governing body for criminals in the 'Ndrangheta crime group and a long-standing associate of the Buffalo mob.

Theyre also sons of the late Paolo Violi, who was murdered by the Rizzuto crime family in Montreal in 1978.

The recent operation began when officers found a mobster who turned on his old associates, police said.

Polish-born Grzesiowski is described by Interpol as 1.8 metres tall and weighing 90 kg, with brown hair and Hazel eyes.

Hes wanted on five counts of instructing commission of an offense for a criminal organization, seven counts of commission of an offense for a criminal organization, give counts of drug trafficking, three counts of possession of property obtained by crime, and two counts of possession for the purpose of trafficking.A parliamentary report is urging Ottawa to establish uniform guidelines and standards for the collection and handling of hate crime data to standardize the definition and interpretation of hate crimes by enforcement agencies.

The standing committee on Canadian heritage study also recommends the federal government create a directorate to oversee a national action plan against racism, plus increased funding for law enforcement and security agencies to probe hate speech on the internet and to enforce existing laws.

Systemic racism and religious discrimination affect Canadians in different ways. For a country as diverse as Canada, it became apparent that there cannot be a one-size-fits-all solution to these issues, said the 130-page report, titled Taking Action Against Systemic Racism and Religious Discrimination Including Islamophobia.

Delivering credibly on combating racism and religious discrimination requires not only leadership, but meaningful co-operation and comprehensive action.

The bipartisan committee initiated the study last April in response to the increasing public climate of hate and fear after the Quebec City mosque shooting that killed six while injuring 19 others.

The report reviewed Canadas approach to reducing and eliminating systemic racism and religious discrimination, highlighting Islamophobia, through 14 public hearings from 77 witnesses including representatives from national organizations, racial and religious groups, as well as officials, academics and experts.

Throughout the process, witnesses raised concerns over the prevalence of hateful speech online as well as misinformation and the distribution of fake news over the internet.

Some proposed the collection of disaggregated data across the federal public service to improve monitoring and evaluation of policies that eliminate racial discrimination and inequality, with a national action plan to help prevent hate crimes, facilitate reporting by victims and provide mandatory training for law enforcement on recognition and registration of hate crimes.

When devising policies and programs, it is important to understand the needs of the population served. Systemic racism occurs when government actions fail to address the needs of certain racialized groups within the population, resulting in unfair discriminatory practices and outcomes, said the parliamentary report, which also recommends the government designate Jan. 29 as the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Islamophobia and other religious discrimination.

To ensure that a national action plan is effective, sustainable and accountable, it must include clearly defined targets, deadlines and reporting mechanisms.

The recommendations are now before the House of Commons.From high heating bills to hallway medicine, Doug Ford said the province has suffered under the Liberals and that the Progressive Conservative party  which he wants to lead  must present Ontarians with a compassionate and responsible vision.

He also told the hundreds of supporters Saturday night at Torontos Congress Centre as he launched his leadership bid that he does not support the carbon tax  a key part of the partys platform that provides the funding for it. And, returning to a familiar Ford theme, he said that he is the only candidate that will save you money and keep your taxes low.

Urging those in attendance to become PC members, Ford told them the stakes have never been higher.

The crowd loudly jeered and booed each time the Liberals or Premier Kathleen Wynne were mentioned.

Ford, who served a term on city council, was the first to publicly declare his candidacy for PC leader, holding a press conference in the basement of his mothers Etobicoke home.

Meanwhile, former MPP Christine Elliott tweeted Im in, on Thursday afternoon.

Caroline Mulroney and Rod Phillips, neither of whom have held public office, are also expected to soon announce their intentions for the March 10 leadership contest.

Speaking to reporters, Ford said he has been in touch with Elliott  a family friend who he said he has great respect for  and wished her well.

The Tory party has been mired in chaos following the resignation of Patrick Brown, who, in a CTV report was accused of sexual impropriety with two young women when he was a federal member of parliament. He has said there is no truth to the allegations. He faces no charges.

While the PC party has said all candidates need to support the Peoples Guarantee platform released late last year by Brown, both Ford and Elliott have questioned the carbon tax.

Ford told reporters after his speech that he would look for other ways to fund campaign promises, but that he is 100 per cent against the carbon tax.

And, if the federal government attempts to force it on the provinces, just watch me, he told the crowd, echoing the words of Justin Trudeaus father, former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau.

Ford has previously said hed like to revisit the updated Ontario sex-education curriculum to give parents more input.

Candidates have to file nomination papers by Feb. 16, and pay fees totalling $125,000.

Ford entered the room to the Rocky theme Eye of the Tiger, and left as Twisted Sisters Were not gonna take it blared over the sound system.

The large crowd, a mix of all ages from the elderly to young families with children, cheered loudly for the former Toronto city councillor who was introduced by nephew Michael Ford  a one-time school trustee who now sits on council  and three of Fords four daughters.

Our dad is a man of his word, they said, adding he is a force to be reckoned with . . . the one person we can count on for anything.

Ford said he will run a positive campaign.

When asked about his intentions should he fail to become leader, he said he will still seek the Etobicoke North seat.

Mississauga resident John Barnard said he feels change is in the air for the upcoming provincial election and that Ford is the candidate who will make that happen.

Barnard, who was one of the early arrivals at Fords leadership bid kickoff Saturday night at the Toronto Congress Centre, said he is supporting Ford because he gets straight to the point.

The Liberal hold on Ontario needs to end, said Barnard, clutching a free Team Ford T-shirt he was given on his way in.

Read more about:KABUL, AfghanistanThe Afghan war takes about five dozen lives a day.

Sometimes, the bodies have just one bullet hole. Other times, after intense explosions, there is no body left at all. In between, families receive pieces of flesh and bones in a sealed coffin  something to help them find closure.

Every once in a while, the dead turn up alive.

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On Monday, on the edges of a crowded Kabul cemetery, friends dug a grave for Ahmad Tameem, 22, a police officer, as about 200 mourners took cover from the snow under a tent. Tameems relatives shouldered his sealed coffin up a winding, muddy lane for a brief final audience with his mother, then lowered him to rest near his fathers grave.

At home, loved ones prepared for the rituals of moving on. Someone opened the door of a cage to set Tameems two pet parrots free. Large, grainy pictures of him were printed with Martyr Ahmad Tameem in red ink. Notices for a memorial service were sent out.

Mohammed Qaseem, Tameems cousin, was buying groceries for a meal after the memorial service when he received a call.

Tameem is alive, one of Tameems brothers said.

Qaseem thought it a cruel joke.

I just got a call from the intelligence agency hospital, the brother continued. He has become conscious, and he borrowed the doctors phone to call me.

Qaseem rushed to the hospital. There was his cousin, badly burned and breathing with the help of a ventilator as he went in and out of consciousness. But he was not dead.

Qaseem called home.

Listen carefully to what I am about to tell you, and please dont scream, Qaseem instructed one of Tameems sisters. He was worried that someone might drop dead from a happy shock.

Tameem is alive, Qaseem told her. We found him at the hospital.

There was a moment of silence. And then she screamed. On his end of the line, Qaseem was briefly forgotten. He could hear only screams of joy. One of the sisters fainted.

Maybe it was the prayer of those parrots who were freed from the cage, Ghulam Naqshband, an older neighbour, said with a smile.

Tameem was on duty in Kabul on Jan. 27 when a Taliban bomber drove an ambulance past two checkpoints on a busy street and detonated explosives. More than 100 people were killed and at least 200 wounded.

Lately, the explosions have become so devastating that bodies are often hard to identify.

After each attack in Kabul, the bodies arrive at the citys forensic medicine department. Families go there to identify and collect the remains. Often, there is not enough to identify  just a torso, or limbs. The department does not have the capabilities for DNA testing.

Some unclaimed bodies remain at the morgue for weeks, or months. Then, quietly, municipal workers pick them up for a burial.

The explosion was so large that Mohammed Roeen, another cousin of Tameem, said he could see the smoke from their rooftop across town. Once it became clear that it had happened near the officers duty station, the search began. Tameems phone was switched off. Relatives went from the site of the attack to every city hospital.

They found no trace of him.

Roeen said they managed to reach the company commander. He said: Look, he was standing here. This is the container. This is where the car bomb detonated. How can we expect him to be alive? 

After two days of searching, they returned to the morgue. The bodies that remained were in bad shape. Qaseem said they settled on a torso that was skinny and young  like Tameems. The forensic staff members did some blood tests and said it was him. They said they would wash and prepare him in a coffin for pickup the next morning. The government gave the family a death payment of about $2,000.

Then, Qaseem turned to the more difficult task: breaking the news to Tameems mother and sisters. One of the officers sisters had set aside about $20 of her savings, saying she would give it as alms to the poor if she heard good news.

We prepared and convinced his mother that this was Gods will, that the women should not open the coffin, Qaseem said.

When the coffin was placed in the yard, the women wailed and threw themselves at it. Quickly, the men lifted the coffin again and made their way to the cemetery. No one really knows whom they buried.

As Tameems family and friends celebrate his second life, another family is still searching.

After the call of good news, Tameems mother and sisters went to the hospital. But they had to wait outside for about two hours because the Afghan president was visiting the wounded.

When his mother got in, many in the room were trying to keep it brief so that the emotions would not overwhelm Tameem.

They were both crying, Qaseem said. Tameem had tears, and he was able to move his hand.

Her son given a second life, the mother has left for their village, in Kapisa province. Four others from their village were killed in the ambulance bombing. She wanted to mourn with their families.

Naqshband, the neighbour, said distant relatives who had not been informed of the twist still arrive at the house to pay their respects.

Even today, I was just standing here and a woman came asking for directions: Where is the house of martyr Tameem?  Naqshband said. I said: He is alive. Dont you go into their house saying martyr. 

Tameem is on the mend, though his wounds are critical. Even so, Qaseem said, hospital workers ask visitors if they are there to see the dead policeman who became alive.

Read more about:Unmarked Israeli warplanes and helicopters have carried out dozens of covert attacks against the Islamic State and other terrorist groups inside the Egyptian Sinai in recent years, said two former senior U.S. officials.

The airstrikes by Israeli planes are conducted with the support of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, who has led an often brutal campaign inside Egypt to wipe out the jihadist groups but has struggled to defeat them.

In November, the Egyptian affiliate of the Islamic State launched a brazen attack in which nearly 40 gunmen stormed the al-Rawdah mosque in Egypts sparsely populated Sinai, killing more than 300 worshippers.

The terrorist group, which consists of more than 1,000 members, first came to widespread public attention for its suspected role in the downing of a Russian airliner in 2015, in which 224 people were killed. Egypts military has struggled for years to destroy the group, which briefly seized control of the northern Sinai town of Sheikh Zuweid and has launched dozens of attacks on soldiers, police and Coptic Christian churches.

The covert alliance between Egypt and Israel on counterterrorism shows how the rise of the Islamic State and other jihadist groups have helped forge quiet partnerships between Israel and its longtime Arab adversaries.

Israeli security officials say that their regional security concerns increasingly align with those of the Persian Gulf states. In 2016, Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon said Israeli officials were secretly meeting with counterparts from the gulf in closed rooms united against a common bad guy  Iran.

A former U.S. official described the covert counterterrorism alliance between Israel and Egypt as a big deal but said that in recent years, counterterrorism relationships have become a little bit insulated from ups and downs of the regions tumultuous politics.

The public perception of those two countries and how they relate is not in sync with how they work together privately on counterterrorism, said the former official, who was granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive alliance.

The Israeli counterterrorism strikes in northern Sinai were first reported by the New York Times. An Israeli military spokesperson declined to comment on the alliance or confirm the existence of Israeli military operations inside Egypt.

Although there was an awareness of the strikes within the U.S. government, the former official said, the United States did not play a significant co-ordinating or supporting role. The official described the co-operation between Egypt and Israel as organic.

The Israeli aircraft operating in Egypt are unmarked and fly circuitous routes so it does not appear as if they are flying from Israel, reflecting the sensitivity of the program, according to the Times report.

On Twitter, Israeli journalists hinted that they had been unable to report the story because of censorship restrictions. Israeli journalists are required to submit articles related to matters of national security to a military censor before publication, with regulation also covering social media posts.

Egypt, Israel and Hamas broadly began to tighten security co-operation two years ago, forming an unlikely alliance as the Islamic States offshoot in Sinai began to stage more sophisticated, sustained attacks.

Under pressure from Egypt, Hamas has tightened its border with Sinai amid concerns in Cairo that Gaza could be used by Islamic State members as a staging ground. The Islamic State has lost much of its self-declared caliphate in Iraq and Syria over the past three years but remains a threat. Some U.S. counterterrorism experts warn that the group could step up terrorist attacks to prove its relevance, despite the collapse of its armies in Iraq and the loss of Raqqa, its capital in Syria.

U.S. officials have been carefully monitoring some of the groups more significant affiliates, such the branch in Sinai, to see how they may be affected by the broader collapse of the core group.

Read more:

Jewish Canadians urge Israel to back off plan to deport African refugees

Read more about:At least two Canadian women and their children are among hundreds of Daeshis  or foreign ISIS families  held by Kurdish forces in temporary camps in northern Syria.

A 22-year-old Montreal woman, whom the Star previously reported had escaped the terrorist group and surrendered to Kurdish forces, is among the teeming camp population, according to her mother and Canadian officials.

But Nadim Houry, the director of Human Rights Watchs terrorism and counterterrorism program, met a second, previously unreported young Canadian woman while visiting the camps last month. She was eight months pregnant and told him she was from Toronto and being held with her two children; one child who was born in Canada and the other in Raqqa, former stronghold of Daesh, also known as ISIS and ISIL.

Like all the women Houry interviewed, the Toronto woman wanted to know what would happen to her and her children.

The question of what to do with the women and children of Daesh is one few countries want to answer, despite the enormity of the problem.

According to Houry, there are 800 registered ISIS families of women and children from 40 different countries detained at four Kurdish-run camps. Almost all of the women have more than one child who was born in Daesh-held territory in Iraq or Syria during the groups three-year reign  including the children, the camps population likely numbers in the thousands.

The women are in legal limbo. Their Daesh affiliation means many of their home countries are no rush to bring them back, but the U.S.-backed Kurdish forces occupying this area in northern Syria are in no rush to prosecute them.

While the Kurds have set up counterterrorism courts and prosecuted Syrian Daesh fighters, neither their control of the region nor their rudimentary justice system are internationally recognized. According to Houry, these women are a low priority in terms of the Kurdish administrations judicial triage.

Sinam Mohamed, an international representative for the administration of the Kurdish-controlled regions of northern Syria, said they encourage countries to deal with their own nationals. If any country wanted to get their citizens back home they are welcome, she said in a telephone interview from Washington.

So far, only Indonesia and Russia have worked with the Kurdish authorities to repatriate their citizens.

You need the political will to tackle these issues, but there is a fear factor that is preventing the development of any rational debate or discussion, says Houry. But by hoping that the issue just disappears by leaving them in this remote corner of north-east Syria, is just short sighted and is not going to make the problem go away. The longer it takes and years go by, the harder it will be  I just think its countries not owning up to their responsibilities.

The Canadian government is willing to repatriate its citizens, unlike some European countries such as France, where President Emmanuel Macron said decisions on allowing women and children to return from Iraq and Syria would only be made on a case-by-case basis.

Frances most famous case involves Emilie Konig, a 33-year-old French citizen and convert to Islam, who is also being held in Syria by Kurdish forces, and has publicly asked for a pardon and chance to come home.

Konig would likely face terrorism charges upon return to France as she is subject to sanctions by both the U.S. and United Nations, for her alleged role as a propagandist and recruiter for Daesh.

That differs from the case of the 22-year-old Montreal woman, known by the pseudonym Amina, whose involvement with Daesh is unknown. The RCMP has not indicated whether she will be tried for terrorism offences.

Aminas mother said her daughter called just a week after arriving in the region saying she regretted her decision, but was trapped. The mother worked for nearly three years to rescue her daughter and granddaughters from Daesh  her story the subject of the CBC documentary, The Way Out.

Amina and her 2-year-old daughter surrendered to Kurdish forces in November. She gave birth to a second daughter while in custody and now awaits her return to Canada.

The Star has agreed to not identify the Montreal woman or her mother.

Global Affairs Canada spokesperson Brianna Maxwell would not answer questions about the delay in bringing Amina and her children to Canada, citing privacy concerns, but wrote in response to the Stars questions that Canadas ability to provide consular assistance in all parts of Syria is severely limited.

It was not clear whether Ottawa was aware of the Toronto woman in the camp  or whether she had requested help to return home.

Men are held in separate camps, also in legal limbo.

The camps raise the spectre of mistakes made after the 2003 war in Iraq  future Daesh leader Abu Bakr al Baghdadi formed alliances with officials from Saddam Husseins deposed Baathist government while detained in the sprawling U.S. prison in Iraq known as Camp Bucca. Together they laid the groundwork to eventually overtake Mosul in 2014, declaring the area the so-called Islamic State.

Houry said that what struck him during his recent camp visits in Syria are the sheer number of children under 5 years old born to foreign parents who are vulnerable to falling sick in poor camp conditions  a potential stateless generation, he called them.

These children are victims. They have not committed any crimes and they need support and protection. What I find amazing is the absence of responsibility for these children, he said. Some could be entitled to foreign nationality and probably have grandparents or uncles and aunts who would care for them. These are super young children and somehow you see very little sympathy for them. Thats the main issue Ive seen.

Follow Michelle Shephard on Twitter @shephardm.

Read more about:JERUSALEMIsrael on Sunday said it plans to legalize an isolated West Bank outpost in response to the murder of one of its residents in a shooting attack last month.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his weekly Cabinet meeting that his government will legalize Havat Gilad to allow the continuing of normal life there.

Whoever thought that through the reprehensible murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, that our spirit can be broken and we can be weakened, is making a bitter mistake, Netanyahu said.

Last month, Rabbi Raziel Shevah, 35, was shot dead from a passing vehicle as he drove near his home in the unauthorized settlement outpost near the Palestinian city of Nablus. The Israeli military is still searching the area for suspects.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war, areas the Palestinians want for a future state. Israel has established about 120 West Bank settlements, which it considers legal. In addition, about 100 settlement outposts have been erected without official approval, but Israel generally tolerates them. Most of the international community considers all Jewish West Bank settlements illegal.

Havat Gilad, a community of a few hundred Israelis, is among these rogue outposts and is located deep inside the West Bank, away from areas Israel expects to keep under any peace deal with the Palestinians. Critics see their expansion as complicating peace efforts.

The anti-settlement group Peace Now called the effort to legalize the outpost a cynical exploitation of the murder.

Meanwhile, Israel on Sunday demolished a two-classroom school in a Bedouin community in the West Bank, saying the EU-funded structure was built illegally without proper permits and that it was in a precarious condition. The school served nearly 30 third and fourth grade students who were moved to a nearby guest house and barbershop to continue classes.

A statement from Cogat, the Israeli defence body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, said the demolition came after a challenge in Israels Supreme Court was overruled.

The demolition took place near the settlement of Maaleh Adumim, in the 60 per cent of the West Bank known as Area C that remains under full Israeli control. Israel has imposed severe restrictions on Palestinian development in this area, home to dozens of Israeli settlements.

The EU funds the construction of many homes, schools and other structures in the area and says the projects are needed for humanitarian reasons and economic development.

Israel says that any assistance to Palestinians in Area C must be co-ordinated with authorities.

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Read more about:WASHINGTONThe Trump administration plans to withdraw its nomination of Kathleen Hartnett White, a climate change skeptic, to lead the Council on Environmental Quality, a White House official said.

U.S. President Donald Trump in October appointed White, a former Texas environmental regulator who has said that carbon dioxide should be considered the gas of life rather than a pollutant, to be the White House senior environmental adviser. Carbon dioxide emissions contribute to global warming.

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee approved White on a party-line vote, but her nomination languished at the end of 2017. That was in part, lawmakers acknowledged, because of Whites performance at her hearing in which she not only espoused controversial views on climate change but also stumbled over science questions.

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When Sen. Ben Cardin asked White if she believes climate change is real, she said I am uncertain. She then corrected herself saying, No, Im not. I jumped ahead. Climate change is of course real. She then added she was uncertain about the extent to which humans cause climate change.

When Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse asked White to estimate how much heat in Earths atmosphere is stored in the oceans, she replied, I dont have numbers like that, adding, I believe that there are differences of opinions on that, that theres not one right answer.

The most up-to-date scientific assessment on climate change, released by the Trump administration in November, found that the worlds oceans have absorbed about 93 per cent of the excess heat caused by greenhouse gas warming since the mid-20th century, making them warmer and altering global and regional climate feedbacks.

Democrats also assailed Whites writings in which she called renewable energy unreliable and parasitic, described global warming as a creed, a faith, a dogma that has little to do with science, and asserted that science does not dictate policy in democracies.

Trump resubmitted Whites nomination to the Senate last month but now plans to withdraw it because of worries that the votes arent there, the White House official said. The official was not authorized to discuss personnel decisions and spoke on the condition of anonymity. The Washington Post on Saturday reported the White House decision to withdraw the nomination.

Democrats and environmental activists hailed the decision. Withdrawing Kathleen Hartnett Whites nomination is the right thing to do, Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, the top Democrat on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said in a statement. He said the Council on Environmental Quality should have a thoughtful environmental and public health champion to lead it.

Sara Chieffo, vice-president for government affairs at the League of Conservation Voters, blasted White as an anti-science extremist and called the decision a victory for science.

White could not be reached for comment. The Texas Public Policy Foundation, a free-market think tank where White serves as a senior fellow, also could not immediately be reached.

Withdrawing Whites name may clear the way for Senate consideration of other environmental nominees. That includes Andrew R. Wheeler, a coal lobbyist, to be deputy administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.

Read more about:Its been three years now since the Toronto Stock Exchange introduced a program to encourage companies to voluntarily increase the proportion of women on their boards and in their executive offices.

At that time, womens participation on boards of directors of the 60 largest companies listed on the TSX was a dismal 21 per cent. Worse, the ratio dropped to a meager 14 per cent when a broader selection of companies was taken into account.

Called comply or explain, the TSX program required listed companies to disclose how many women they have on their boards and in executive roles and it was recommended they adopt plans to improve their gender diversity.

Almost a year after that only 14 per cent of the 722 reporting companies had a formal plan in place for promoting women to their boards. Just 7 per cent had set specific targets.

So were companies just slow off the mark? Nope.

Almost two years later, a report from the law firm Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt found that CEOs were ignoring the message. Nearly half of all companies listed on the TSX still had zero women on their boards of directors, virtually unchanged from the year before. It also found that only 10 per cent had set targets for the number of female representatives on their board, only slightly up from the year before.

In other words, the comply or explain strategy was not working.

So it is welcome news that a group of senators is asking the federal Liberal government to toughen up legislation in Bill C-25, which is aimed at boosting diversity on corporate boards at publicly traded companies.

As it stands now, the legislation would amend the Canada Business Corporations Act to require publicly traded companies to disclose the number of women  and those from visible minorities  on their corporate boards and in senior management, along with their policies on diversity. If they fail to do so, companies would have to explain themselves to their shareholders.

The changes a group of senators are asking for arent much. Indeed, Independent Sen. Ratna Omidvar, one of the proponents of the changes, describes them simply as a nudge.

She is correct. The senators arent asking for quotas, as have been adopted by European countries such as Germany, Norway, France, Iceland and Spain.

Instead, the proposed changes would require companies merely to set percentage goals for designated groups such as women or visible minorities. They would also be required to establish a deadline for achieving those goals and to send an annual report to Parliament on how well they are doing.

Its not much to ask of the government or Corporate Canada. The Trudeau government should listen and beef up Bill C-25.

It should also make plans to go further if this nudge doesnt work, as Premier Kathleen Wynne promised to do back in 2016.

At that time Wynne directed that women make up at least 40 per cent of all appointments (not members) to provincial agencies, boards, commissions and Crown corporations by the end of 2019.

And she asked companies with at least one woman director to set a target by 2017 of appointing women to 30 per cent of the position on their boards, and to reach this goal within three to five years. For those that currently dont have any female directors, the target would be to name one. One!

If those targets are not met, she said then, the government will consider regulations or legislation to make it happen.

Ironically, there is no reason for all this nudging and threatening. Corporations should be leaping at the chance to place women on their boards of directors and in their executive suites.

As Catalyst Canada, an advocacy organization dedicated to accelerating progress for women through workplace inclusion in Canada, points out: Companies with three or more women directors in at least four of five years significantly outperformed those with sustained low representation by an astonishing 84 per cent on return on sales, 60 per cent on return on invested capital and 46 per cent on return on equity.

Nor is there a shortage of accomplished women to choose from, as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau so ably proved when he named his gender-parity cabinet.

Trudeaus government should welcome the stronger directives being recommended by some senators and give Bill C-25 a bit more bite. If that doesnt work, then there are examples of quota-setting from Europe ripe for study.Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated, Mark Twain once said after an overeager newspaper prematurely posted his obituary following an illness.

The same might be said of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party.

For months now, the fortunes of the Ontario Liberals have been in the doldrums. Despite thoughtful efforts by both her government and campaign team to turn things around, the rate of improvement has been discouragingly slow.

So, of course, with the tragic and macabre scene that was Patrick Browns resignation, predictions began to emerge that it was the trouble for the Tories, and that Bill Clinton wouldnt be the only political comeback kid.

Make no mistake  the shocking fall of Brown was a spectacle, but it was not one that will leave lasting damage on the Ontario PCs, as much as many observers might wish it were so.

In fact, it may leave the party in a stronger position than it was just two short weeks ago.

While Brown had proven to be politically adept, and had managed to stay ahead of a number of curveballs thrown at him by the premier, he also struggled to connect to voters. Something about him failed to resonate with Ontarians, though he did appear poised to sail to victory in spite of it.

What is also clear now is that Brown had a significant number of skeletons in his closet that could have easily emerged during an election campaign, dashing any hope of a PC government.

The quick removal of Brown by the party apparatus, along with a caucus that was all-too-happy to throw Brown overboard at the first sign of trouble, demonstrated that the party never truly united behind him following his come-from-nowhere win.

But the party remains surprisingly strong. Tens of thousands of memberships, millions of dollars more than the Ontario Liberals, and a slate of impressive candidates across the province indicate the Tories remain a political presence to be reckoned with.

Perhaps most importantly, the biggest potential pitfall that the party faces has thus far been avoided.

Its no secret that Progressive Conservatives are prone to infighting and petty internal politics. So, it was fair to assume the vacuum of leadership mere months before an election would create a drama worthy of Shakespeare.

But it hasnt happened. Instead, a leadership election is being planned that from the outside appears remarkably orderly. While caucus did make a brief attempt to install its own leader without the benefit of an election, that ill-advised move was promptly overturned by the party executive, which organized a speedy leadership that will conclude on March 10.

The astute move ensures the partys grassroots members will be engaged and mobilized in advance of an election, rather than demoralized and disheartened.

In addition, a PC leadership race with a choice of candidates that includes Doug Ford, Christine Elliott, Caroline Mulroney and Rod Phillips promises to hoover up media coverage.

Heading into an election, a governments best weapon is its ability to set the agenda. The PC leadership race will likely scuttle that possibility as it demands the attention of the Queens Park media gallery. Ford, in particular, is fascinating to the media and his ability to attract attention will be to the detriment of the Ontario Liberals.

Look at just last week. While the Liberals were trying to talk about the minimum wage hike, all that Ontario politicos were discussing was the optics of Doug Ford announcing his campaign for leadership from his mothers basement.

Petty and unimportant? Certainly. But a column is a column, and it was all Ontario voters were reading about.

More than that, the slate of leadership candidates is impressive. Elliott, Mulroney, Phillips and potential caucus candidate Todd Smith are all effective communicators with impressive credentials. All are capable of leadership and, most would agree, would more naturally fit the profile of premier than Brown.

Ford, for all of his faults, is a candidate who may just catch fire. The man, as noted, is an impressive communicator who intuitively knows how to get attention  and how to speak to the common person. People rewrite history now, but he came shockingly close to capturing the mayoralty of Toronto in a truncated campaign.

Who could have predicted that the Ontario PCs would manage to take what seemed initially like a disastrous situation and turn it into an opportunity?

For a party that is more used to off-the-rails political moves, this is both a change of fortunes and an exciting time. But theyre not out of the woods just yet.

Jaime Watt is the executive chairman of Navigator Ltd. and a Conservative strategist.

Read more about:A turning point in society is often born of a distressing past, which must be resolved before moving on to an enlightened future. But much depends on deft leadership. How our politicians handle the growing number of sexual and workplace harassment allegations, which have recently shocked both Parliament and legislatures, will be crucial.

The female whisper campaign to beware of certain elected officials has become a megaphone to predatory males across the spectrum. Part of a North American awakening to the misogyny that lurks below professional, political and social spaces, this moment in time is simultaneously painful for its memories and liberating for its honesty.

What are the best practices from other sectors? What works? What doesnt? Aside from process, what models of leadership will provide effective governance?

Leadership, a word that generally implies good, is often associated with power. Bad leadership rears its ugly head with a misuse of power, deliberate misconduct (criminal or immoral) or an atmosphere of intimidation.

Patrick Brown and Rick Dykstra, both former federal members of Parliament before becoming leader and president of the Ontario Progressive Conservative party respectively, have spectacularly exhibited bad leadership.

They have disgraced themselves, their supporters and their party with their reported behaviour toward women. Although the allegations have not been proven in court and Brown, in particular, denies the allegations, their partys justice was swift.

Brown was first to resign. Compounding the rare spectacle of a late night press conference, Brown showed little strength or determination. Shaken and panicked, he literally ran from the media. Dykstra has not made any personal comment except to resign after a serious allegation was levelled at him. His lawyers, however, have denied the accusation.

In contrast, a member of their own party and one of their former federal colleagues, Michelle Rempel, demonstrated remarkable leadership. The MP from Calgary Nose Hill stood in the House of Commons and took not only her own party to task, but also targeted the intertwined nexus of power in Ottawa.

She literally spoke truth to power  to all powers. Even the media was included as she suggested that press gallery members should not receive credentials unless they adhere to a formal code of conduct.

Somewhat like Catherine McKenna, the minister of the environment, who called out Rebel Media for their use of the derogatory term climate Barbie to describe her, both women showed strength of character and steely determination. It was leadership at its best.

Aside from individual courage, non-partisan leadership will be key to a systemic change in political culture. So far, the signs are encouraging.

The new NDP house leader, Ruth Ellen Brosseau, worked efficiently with Labour Minister Patty Hajdu to achieve unanimous, fast passage of Bill 65 (legislation to strengthen the existing harassment framework for federally regulated workers) to committee for a deeper examination. In turn, Hajdu says she is open to amendments by other parties.

Institutional leadership has also been shown by the Speakers Office, which has announced a mandatory sexual harassment training program for all MPs, cabinet ministers and leaders of the parties, including the prime minister.

Personal courage, legislative direction, harassment training and codes of behaviour are all hugely important for a turning point on sexual and workplace harassment. It should also apply to the administration of political parties. For example, staff or volunteers in so-called campaign war rooms (a phrase which sadly speaks volumes about party culture) historically are a law unto themselves.

Finally, leaders must decide how to manage allegations that may or may not be anonymous. Both the prime minister and Jagmeet Singh, the NDP leader, have clearly stated that women are to be believed. For women, who have been afraid to come forward with concerns, this change in onus removes a great deal of anguish. But still, tough decisions must be made.

Best practices by organizations encourage internal reporting first, which ensures confidentiality, privacy and a chance to resolve a matter before it is made public. Unfortunately, reporting mechanisms that can be trusted will take time (and money) to implement. For the moment, investigations by truly independent third parties appear to be the safest route to truth.

This week, the Senate, in a timely move, passed gender neutral words to O Canada. Thankfully, it is the moment for all of us now to show mature resolve and good leadership to put this troubled past behind us. Time is not quite up but the clock is ticking  fast.

Penny Collenette is an adjunct professor of law at the University of Ottawa and was a senior director of the Prime Ministers Office for Jean Chretien.

Read more about:You ride the streetcar home one spring morning next year, flipping through missed messages after a frantic work day. A tweet pops up with an embedded video that immediately plays a nasty attack on Justin Trudeau, making claims about corruption. It is sent by someone you have never heard of, on behalf of an obviously fictitious organization. Irritated, you scroll back to replay it, to try to figure who sent it.

It is gone.

There is no ad, no record of your having received it. Nothing. You wonder whether you imagined it, then with horror realize you did not and shudder at the appalling implications of such a tool.

This disappearing video technique, according to American technical journalists, was used by the Trump campaign  and probably by its foreign partners  thousands of times an hour in the final weeks of the 2016 campaign. It has since been enhanced to permit the use of artificial intelligence tools to capture a real video, alter its identity and edit it almost undetectably to say something different than the original.

A few seats back on the streetcar, another Twitter target discovers something strange about a good friends account. Not only have her followers grown from 1,700 to 700,000, she is saying things about Jagmeet Singh that are repulsive. She texts her pal, who is appalled at this online impersonation and immediately deletes her account. She is unaware that her digital doppelganger lives on and can be cloned thousands of times with almost imperceptible tweaks to her photo or her bio.

The New York Times last week reported that the going rate to buy stolen or fabricated IDs and retweets on the dark web is little more than one dollar for 1,000 fake Twitter accounts. A dollar.

If you have thought it improbable that some tech writers have estimated that somewhere between a third and half of Trumps 47 million claimed followers are fake, do the math. That would have cost helpful supporters not more than $25,000, less than a dinner event at Mar a Lago.

The Trump campaign pioneered another astonishing digital campaign tool: instant mass message testing. Each morning up to 10,000 computer-generated versions of the same ad, with small variations in colour, font, images, length, music, and message would be sent to a few thousand recipients. Each message opened or retweeted was tracked by type of voter  age, race, income, education  and by precinct in a congressional district.

In minutes, the campaign trimmed the messages to a few dozen, sending the highest impact to the specific voter demographic and location. One horrific example uncovered by the Times was the use of racist messages targeted at white voters in districts where a white police officer had been killed in recent months. Hourly rotations of messaging were often delivered from an ever-growing catalogue.

Until now neither Facebook, nor Twitter, nor any other social media platform, has any reliable means to discover  in advance, as it is being sent, or even after the fact  who is paying for this skulduggery. It took Facebook nearly a year to discover and to disclose the Russian use of its platform.

Put these four factors together  disappearing ads, fake senders, massive targeted volumes, anonymous sponsors  and you can see why Elections Canada is wrestling so hard with the issue of election security right now. Yes, we have better protection in one domain: its hard to print, distribute, and stuff fake paper ballots. We have as well a serious identity-checking ability about voters themselves.

We are naked and vulnerable, however, where two earlier stage threats to a level playing field are concerned: pre-election social media advertising by unknown third parties, and massive campaign period overspending, paid for offshore undetectably. This is not a future problem or fantasy. The U.S. campaign was a victim of these techniques, and probably othersyet to be revealed by Robert Mueller.

It is challenging to know how to tackle any of this. The Germans and the Brits are forcing the social media companies to be responsible for content on their networks, the real identity of those sponsoring it, and provably tracing the source of the payments. But these are enforcement techniques mostly useful after the fact. The damage the Russians did in the U.S. was unknown until many months after they had influenced thousands of voters.

In the long run, experts say a savvy and skeptical public needs to be educated about the signs of fakery. That would certainly help, but not before a federal election in less than two years time.

Robin V. Sears, a principal at Earnscliffe Strategy Group, was an NDP strategist for 20 years.

Read more about:It's always exciting to see a brand new bridal designer come to market, and it's especially positive when that designer honed their talent on the Emerald Isle.

Which is why when Grafton Academy graduate Aida Silva's designs came across the desk here at THEVOW HQ, we were instantly intrigued.

And, as you can see. Aida didn't disappoint.

The Spanish-born designer, who studied fashion at the Grafton Academy in Dublin, has created a chic capsule collection for the modern bride, where clean lines and delicate details are the main focus.

Aida has had an interest in style and fashion since childhood. Growing up in the southern Spanish town of Cadiz, she spent her teens becoming increasingly enamoured with the mix of vibrant cultures and colours of her surroundings.

However fashion wasn't the first port of call for Aida, and it wasn't until she was in her thirties that she finally decided to pursue her dream of becoming a designer.

After three years studying in Dublin's Grafton Academy, Aida continued her fellowship in the Paris and Barcelona where she discovered a penchant for feminine, structured designs, clean embellishments and fine fabrics.

Returning to Dublin to develop her brand, Aida now designs bespoke gowns for 'strong yet delicate' brides, who share her passion for timeless elegance and quality couture.

In December 2017 Aida launched her capsule collection, which features a range of modern gowns with a hint of vintage, all displaying the designer's penchant for fine materials and fabrics and precision detailing.

Dresses start at 2,000 and go up to 4,000 while bespoke designs are based on style, fabrics and time. Visit aidasilva.com for more on her collection and made-to-measure wedding and evening gowns.

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WhatsappIf you are currently a print subscriber but don't have an online account, select this option. You will need to use your 7 digit subscriber account number (with leading zeros) and your last name (in UPPERCASE).The following companies are subsidiares of Ashland Global: 565 Corporation, ASH GP INC., ASHLAND SPECIALTY CHEMICAL (SINGAPORE) PTE. LTD., ASHLAND SPECIALTY CHEMICALS (MALAYSIA) SDN.BHD, Adams Drive Totowa L.L.C., Alera Property Holdings LLC, Alera Technologies Inc., Alix Technologies LLC, Aloe Vemera S.P.R de R.L. de C.V., Ash (Gibraltar) One Limited, Ash B CIS 1 Limited, Ash B CIS 2 Limited, Ash B1 Limited, Ash B2 Limited, Ash B3 Limited, Ash B4 Limited, Ash B5 Limited, Ash CIS Canada Corp., Ash CIS Canada Holdings B.V., Ash CIS GmbH, Ash Global Holding Three GmbH, Ash Global Holdings Two B.V., Ash Junior Global Holding One LLC, Ash Junior Global Holding Two LLC, Ash Swiss Holding Two GmbH, AshLux Three S.a r.l., AshOne C. V., Ashland (Australasia) Pty. Limited, Ashland (Changzhou) Advanced Chemical Co. Ltd., Ashland (Changzhou) Specialty Chemical Co. Ltd, Ashland (China) Holdings Co. Ltd., Ashland (Gibraltar) One Holding Inc., Ashland (Thailand) Co. Ltd, Ashland Argentina S.R.L., Ashland CZ s.r.o., Ashland Canada Corp./Corporation Ashland Canada, Ashland Canada Holdings B. V., Ashland Chemco Inc., Ashland Chemical De Mexico S.A. De C.V., Ashland Chemical Hispania S. L., Ashland Chemical Trading (Shanghai) Company Limited, Ashland Chemicals (Nanjing) Company Limited, Ashland Colombia S.A.S., Ashland Comercio de Especialidades Quimicas do Brasil Ltda., Ashland Danmark ApS, Ashland Eastern Markets LLC, Ashland Ethanol Inc., Ashland Finance Limited, Ashland Finland Oy, Ashland France SAS, Ashland Global Holdings One C.V., Ashland India Private Limited, Ashland Industria de Ingredientes do Brasil Ltda., Ashland Industries Deutschland GmbH, Ashland Industries Europe GmbH, Ashland Industries France SAS, Ashland Industries Italia S.r.l., Ashland Industries Nederland B.V., Ashland Industries UK Limited, Ashland International Holdings LLC, Ashland Italia S.r.l., Ashland Japan Ltd., Ashland Korea Limited, Ashland LLC, Ashland Licensing and Intellectual Property LLC, Ashland ME Holdings Inc., Ashland Mexico Holdings One LLC, Ashland Mexico Holdings Two LLC, Ashland Nigeria Exploration Unlimited, Ashland Oil (Nigeria) Company Unlimited, Ashland Oil Inc., Ashland Pacific Pty. Ltd., Ashland Participacoes Ltda., Ashland Pharmachem International Holdings LLC, Ashland Polimeros do Brasil S.A., Ashland Services B. V., Ashland Services Mexico S.A. de C.V., Ashland Singapore Pte. Ltd., Ashland Specialties Austria GmbH, Ashland Specialties Belgium BVBA, Ashland Specialties France S.a.r.l., Ashland Specialties Hispania S.L., Ashland Specialties Holding C.V., Ashland Specialties Ireland Limited, Ashland Specialties Poland Sp. z o.o., Ashland Specialties Sverige AB, Ashland Specialties UK Limited, Ashland Specialty Chemical Korea Co. Ltd., Ashland Specialty Ingredients G.P., Ashland Technologies GmbH, Ashland-Alaskan Limited, Ashland-Plasticos De Portugal Lda., Ashmont Insurance Company Inc., Ashprop Two LLC, Avoca LLC, Avoele S.A. de C.V., Belleville Realty Corp., Bluegrass Insurance Company Limited, CLTA LLC, CVG Capital III LLC, Carol Clifton Inc., Clevedon Sp. z o.o., Curtis Bay Insurance Co. Ltd, East Bay Realty Services Inc., Ever Success Overseas Limited, FRJ Inc., Fospur, Hercofina, Hercules, Hercules Holding BV BVBA, Hercules Holding II Limited, Hercules Hydrocarbon Holdings Inc., Hercules International Limited LLC, Hercules Investment ApS, Hercules Investments Netherlands B.V., Hercules Islands Corporation, Hercules LLC, Hercules Paper Holdings Inc., Hercules Trading (Shanghai) Company Limited, ISP (Belgium) International N. V., ISP Alginates Inc., ISP Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd, ISP Biochema Schwaben GmbH, ISP Canada Corp., ISP Capital LLC, ISP Chemco LLC, ISP Chemical Products LLC, ISP Chemicals LLC, ISP Environmental Services Inc., ISP France Holding SARL, ISP France Marketing SARL, ISP Freetown Fine Chemicals Inc., ISP Freight Services N. V., ISP Global Operations (Barbados) Inc., ISP Global Technologies Deutschland Unterstutzungskasse GmbH, ISP Global Technologies Inc., ISP Global Technologies LLC, ISP HC Limited, ISP Holdings (U.K.) Ltd., ISP Hungary Holdings Limited Liability Company, ISP International Corp., ISP Investments LLC, ISP Lima LLC, ISP Luxembourg Canada S.a.r.l., ISP Management Company Inc., ISP Marl GmbH, ISP Marl Holdings GmbH, ISP Microcaps (U.K.) Limited, ISP Pharma Systems LLC, ISP Real Estate Company Inc., ISP Singapore Holding LLC, ISP Technologies Inc., ISP Technologies LLC, International Specialty Holdings LLC, International Specialty Products, International Specialty Products (India) Private Limited, International Specialty Products Funding Corporation, International Specialty Products Inc., Jiangmen Ashland Chemicals Company Limited, Nanjing Clear Environment Protection, Northwest Coatings, Oil Can Henrys, PT Ashland Asia, PT ISP Chemicals Indonesia, Pakistan Gum Industries (Private) Limited, Pharmachem Laboratories, Pharmachem Laboratories LLC, Pharmachem Laboratories Utah LLC, Prince Street Paterson LLC, Progiven S.A.S., Proprietary Nutritionals LLC, Ralop S. de R.L. de C.V., Saudi Industrial Resins Co. Ltd. (Polyester), Shanghai Ashland Industrial Trading Co. Ltd., St Croix Petrochemical Corp, Taiwan Ashland Co. Ltd., Techwax Limited, Vemera S. de R.L. de C.V., and WSP LLC.The state Division of Military and Naval Affairs is reminding residents about key dates affecting New Yorkers during the 100-year anniversary of America's entry into World War I. The information, excerpted here, is provided through the New York State Military Museum in Saratoga Springs.

When the African American National Guard Soldiers of New York's 15th Infantry Regiment arrived in France in December 1917, they expected to conduct combat training and enter the trenches of the Western Front right away.

They could not have been more wrong. The troops were ordered to unload supply ships at the docks for their first months in France, joining the mass of supply troops known as stevedores, working long hours in the port at St. Nazaire.

In St. Nazaire, the soldiers learned they would work to prepare the docks and rail lines to be a major port of entry for the hundreds of thousands of forces yet to arrive in France.

But officers, leaders and the combat soldiers had not signed up for labor. They were committed to fighting the Germans and winning the war.

The regiment's best advocate was their commander, Col. William Hayward. He would bring with him the regiment's most formidable weapon in swaying opinion: the regimental band, lauded as one of the finest in the entire Expeditionary Force.

While the regiment literally laid the tracks for the arrival of the two million troops deploying to France, the regimental band toured the region, performing for French and American audiences at rest centers and hospitals. The band is credited with introducing jazz music to France during the war.

After some three months of constructing nearby railways to move supplies forward, soldiers learned they had orders to join the French 16th Division for three weeks of combat training. They also learned they had a new regimental number as the now-renamed 369th Infantry Regiment. While the 369th Infantry would become part of the U.S. Army's 92nd Infantry Division, it would be assigned to fight with French forces.

Sign up for The Knick  Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter.

This solved the dilemma for Pershing and the American Expeditionary Forces of what to do with the African-American troops.

The black troops would see combat, but alongside French forces, who were accustomed to the many races and ethnicities already serving in the ranks of their colonial troops.

After learning lessons in trench warfare from their French partners, the soldiers of the 369th finally had their chance to prove their worth as combat troops when they entered the front lines, holding their line against the last German spring offensive near Chateau-Thierry. Their value was not lost on the French and the regiment continued to fight alongside French forces, participating in the Aisne-Marne counter offensive in the summer of 1918 alongside the French 162st Infantry Division.Washington County Sheriff's office

A 53-year-old Hartford man is facing a felony charge after he turned himself into Washington County Sheriff deputies for allegedly having sexual contact with an underage girl.

James S. Walker, 53, turned himself in on Jan. 28. Walker told deputies he had sexual contact with a girl under the age of 17, according to a news release. Deputies did not provide further details on the incident or why Walker self-reported it. He was charged with felony criminal sexual act and misdemeanor endangering the welfare of a child. He was sent to Washington County jail on $1,000 bail.Terrorists have again used a commercial semi truck to commit acts of mass violence, this time in Germanys capital city of Berlin on December 19, 2016. The truck drove through a crowded town square full of people shopping the Christmas booths set up along a pedestrian area, killing 12 people and injuring 48 more. The act was done in a similar fashion as the truck attack in Nice, France on July 14, 2016.

The dozens of photos taken of the scene clearly show the horrific aftermath. Also clearly visible is the make of the semi truck. It is a Scania R450 with the R-Sleeper-Topline cab. Scania, a Swedish brand with a rich history, is 70-percent owned by Volkswagen and 17 percent owned by MAN, which itself is also heavily owned by Volkswagen.

The particular truck features a short wheelbase, and according to specifications on Scanias website, likely has a 6x4 drive configuration, meaning the four rear tires drive the truck while the front tires only steer. The full-length trailer has six wheels, three on each side, and has canvas sides. The truck was reportedly stolen from the Polish trucking company Ariel Zurawski, named after its founder and current owner.

Reports say it was Zurawskis cousin who was operating the truck on a route from Italy to Berlin when it was purportedly hijacked. Zurawskis cousin was found shot to death inside the truck when authorities reached the scene. The hijacker has not been found. The truck was loaded with 25 tons of steel.

We will update this story if further details come to light regarding the truck.

Continue reading for more information.In Florida, Ambassador Vinh had a meeting with Congressman Ted Yoho, Chairman of the Asia-Pacific Subcommittee of the US House of Representatives and visited a number of localities and trade and research agencies of the state.

The official also worked with some local businesses, leaders of the Biotechnology Research Centre of the University of Florida, and had a talk with lecturers and students of the Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps.

Ted Yoho showed his delight at the growth of the Vietnam-US relations over the past years, especially in 2017 with the fruitful visit of Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc to the US in May 2017 and a Vietnam tour of US President Donald Trump in November 2017.

At the meetings, Vinh introduced the potential and strengths of Vietnam, pledging that Vietnamese representative office in the US will work to connect Florida businesses with Vietnamese peers. Vietnam is now Floridas ninth largest trade partner with two-way trade of nearly $2 billion.

Floridas firms spoke highly of Vietnams economic development and hoped that Florida will become one of Vietnams leading economic-trade partners in the US.

During his stay in Arkansas, Ambassador Vinh had a meeting with Governor Asa Hutchinson and a roundtable with local businesses as well as visited the Murphy Oil company and Vinh Long-Arkansas company, a Vietnamese firm in the state.

Hutchinson lauded the Vietnam-US comprehensive partnership, expressing his hope that cooperation between Arkansas and Vietnam will be strengthened, especially in investment and business. He also vowed to support Vietnamese firms operating in the locality.

Vinh affirmed that Vietnam will continue promoting ties with the US, while working with Arkansas to seek new collaboration opportunities for mutual benefit.

The diplomat asked Arkansas to create favourable conditions for Vietnamese businesses as well as Vietnamese community in the locality.

At the meeting with local firms, Vinh briefed them on cooperation potential between the two sides, while answering their questions on investment opportunities and environment in Vietnam.

Arkansas businesses were interested in Vietnam, especially in retail, production, health care services, agriculture, and clean energy.

On February 2, the Vietnamese Embassy in the US held a celebration of the upcoming traditional Lunar New Year (Tet) with the participation of about 300 overseas Vietnamese people in Washington and surrounding localities.

VNAHi,

First of all you have no reason to apologise for your English  Its certainly better than my Italian will ever be.

Its hard to predict the weather because its been fairly unusual lately. But in June the winter is really just getting started, so while it will be quite cool to chilly, its unlikely there will be a lot of rain. Usually when it does rain its in shortish storms that go for maybe half an hour to an hour or so and then stop for a couple of hours before starting up again if at all. And its rarely such a downpour that you cant go out with an umbrella or a raincoat.

So while I cant guarantee it, I think you would be reasonably OK if you came to Perth.Well...

Ranking dont mean a whole lot. Because theyre skewed by a lot of things.

For example, theyre skewed by perceived value. A 2 Star Hotel might have better ratings than a 5 Star, because the folks who stay at a 2 Star probably have lower expectations. Maybe the people who rated it badly did so for reasons you dont care about. There are a lot of complaints that wouldnt apply to me.

In a city like NYC, they can be skewed by numbers like any attraction can. Top of the rock probably rates higher than many more worthy sights. Not because its better, its just because its on the must see list of many, many tourists. TA ratings in general cant be trusted because its largely a numbers game.

And then some ratings dont actually reflect what a person writes in a review. Why give 2 stars to a place you say you loved? Why give 5 stars to a place where you say that the staff was inept and you saw cockroaches? I see inexplicable stuff like that all the time.

So look at what people wrote in the last 6 months, especially people like who who have returned to it.Did you know that you have a unique opportunity to pay for your DSTV from the comfort of your home, office or even car? Thanks to M-Pesa online banking, you don't have to go to the bank personally and waste your precious time. How to pay DSTV via M-Pesa in Kenya? Find out in the following article.

How to pay DSTV via mPesa? Simple guide for everyone

Thanks to M-Pesa online platform every DSTV customer has the opportunity to pay for DSTV bill and to check their balance. All that you need is a special DStv M-Pesa paybill number and activated personal M-Pesa account.

READ ALSO: DStv Kenya Packages and Prices

How to pay DSTV via M-Pesa in Kenya

Lots of Internet users mostly search for information like "how to pay electricity bill via M-Pesa" or "how to transfer money via M-Pesa". Few know that with the help of M-Pesa, one can pay also for DSTV. The method is quite simple and will take only a couple of minutes.

With the help of your personal computer or smartphone visit the official Safaricom website. If you have a special M-Pesa mobile application, you can use it to complete the financial operation. If, not you are free to download it from the market. It is available for Android, iOS and Microsoft users. The M-Pesa application is absolutely free for downloading. In case you are using your PC, simply visit the following website - safaricom.co.ke. Once, you have opened the Safaricom official website or used the app, visit the Safaricom SIM Tool Kit. The same for app users. Now choose M-Pesa menu and click on the icon Lipa na M-PESA. A new window will open with a lot of options. You need the Pay Bill section. Click on it. Press on the Enter Business no. field. Here you will have to enter company's personal Multichoice DSTvs Lipa na M-PESA PayBill Number. Carefully type the following digits - 444900. Check twice and only then click the "OK" button. Now click on the Enter Account no. field. Here you will have to type your personal DSTv Account Number. Proofread the entered digits and press the "OK" button. Great, you are already on the halfway! Now in the new field called Enter Amount, type the amount of money that you have to pay for the following month. If you have no idea, what is the DSTV monthly fee, check your DSTV balance. After that, press the "OK" button. A new window will open, where you will have to type your personal M-Pesa PIN and click on the "OK" button. Now you will have to proofread all the entered details once again, to avoid mistakes and further problems. If everything is OK, press the submission button.

Visit the official Safaricom website or use the special mPesa application

If your DSTV payment via M-Pesa was successful, you will receive an SMS from M-Pesa that the transaction was submitted. In case, you didn't receive the message in a couple of hours, check your M-Pesa balance again. If the transfer was successful, the needed amount will be charged. If not, the payment of DSTV via M-Pesa wan't successful, try to repeat it a bit later.

If there are any problems, please, be free to contact the M-Pesa support team on their official website. There is a Live Chat available, where operator will be happy to help you 24/7 with any question. Note, that it takes up to one hour for Multichoice DSTV to receive your payment from personal M-Pesa account.

READ ALSO: DSTV Self Service Kenya: How to Clear Error Codes Without a Technician

Now, that you know how to pay DSTV via M-Pesa easily and in shortest terms, DSTV fees won't be a problem for you anymore. Check this method personally and you will be convinced, that M-Pesa online banking is the most comfortable way to pay for your bills, online purchases, taxes etc. Have already tried to pay DSTV via M-Pesa? Great, share your experience with us in the comments section below.

Source: Tuko Breaking News- Self proclaimed general of the outlawed National Resistance Movement, Miguna Miguna was moved to Lari police station overnight

- His lawyer Edwin Sifuna claims the OCS and OCPD have been denied him and his family access

- Miguna Miguna was arrested on Friday, February 1, days after he administered the oath of office of the president to Raila Odinga

Miguna Miguna, the self appointed general of the outlawed National Resistance Movement (NRM) was on the night of Friday, February 2 moved from Githunguri police station to Lari police station

"Just as we suspected Miguna was moved overnight from Githunguri but is still within Kiambu County. We have fanned out to various outposts in the County to find him" twitted his lawyer Edwin Sifuna

Send 'NEWS' to 40227 to receive all the important breaking news as it happens

READ ALSO: Waombolezaji wamuaibisha Katibu Mkuu wa Jubilee - Raphael Tuju - nyumbani kwa kumkejeli Raila

Miguna Miguna moved overnight to Lari police station from Githunguri. Photo: NTV Kenya/ Twitter

READ ALSO: Makadara MP, George Aladwa released on free bond

TUKO.co.ke has learnt that the Officer Commanding Police Station (OCS) and the OCPD at the station have denied access to counsel and his family.

"Miguna is at Lari Police Station. OCS, OCPD have denied access to counsel and family. We do not know his state" added Sifuna

Earlier on Sifuna had indicated that High Court orders to have Miguna released on a KSh 50,000 cash bail on Friday, February 2 had been defied by the police at Githunguri police station.

READ ALSO: High Court orders immediate release of Miguna Miguna hours after dramatic arrest

Miguna's arrested elicited tension in Kiambu county after huge crowd of locals surrounded the police station to prevent Miguna Miguna from leaving

They demanded that he must apologise for abusing President Uhuru Kenyatta before they allow him to leave

An earlier report by TUKO.co.ke indicated that the High Court directed Miguna be released on a KSh 50,000 cash bail following his dramatic arrest.

READ ALSO: Miguna Miguna arrested

Miguna was arrested on Friday February 2 at his Runda home after police officers forcibly broke into his house and ransacked it before arresting him.

The self-declared general of the outlawed National Resistance Movement (NRM) had dared Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang'i to arrest him for administrating the controversial oath to Raila Odinga

Following the Tuesday, January 30 controversial inauguration of Raila Odinga as an alternative president of Kenya, the Interior Ministry declared his National Resistance Movement (NRM) an organized criminal group under the Prevention of Organized Crimes Act.

ALSO WATCH: Take down Uhuru's Portraits - Miguna Miguna

Source: Tuko- Hundreds have been rendered homeless after fire razed down homes in Majengo, Pumwani area

- An estimate of 50 families have been left out in the morning incident

Dozens of people were on the morning of Saturday, February 3 left homeless when a huge fire razed down a huge part of Majengo slum in Pumwani .

The fire razed down homes in the informal settlement leaving an estimate of 50 families homeless.

Send 'NEWS' to 40227 to receive all the important breaking news as it happens

READ ALSO: Waombolezaji wamuaibisha Katibu Mkuu wa Jubilee - Raphael Tuju - nyumbani kwa kumkejeli Raila

Hundreds rendered homeless at Majengo slums Pumwani. Photo: Yassin Juma/ Facebook

READ ALSO: We are ready for talks - Ruto tells Raila

TUKO.co.ke, has learnt that the victims lost all their possessions in the fire.

It is not yet clear what caused the fire which spreading fast to other areas.

There were no casualties of the fire that broke out during the day.

READ ALSO: Babu Owino goes back to school, claims he wants to learn more about revolutionary tactics

Hundreds rendered homeless at Majengo slums Pumwani. Photo: Yassin Juma/ Facebook

The unfortunate incidence happened a week after Dozens of people were left homeless when a huge fire razed down a huge part of a slum in Langata area, Nairobi.

National Disaster Management Unit Deputy Director Pius Masai and police confirmed that three bodies were recovered from the site.

Hundreds rendered homeless at Majengo slums Pumwani. Photo: Yassin Juma/ Facebook

READ ALSO: NO NASA was too unprepared to win the 2017 General Election - William Ruto

Hundreds rendered homeless at Majengo slums Pumwani. Photo: Yassin Juma/ Facebook

Residents blamed the Nairobi County Government firefighters for not containing the situation.

Some residents said that the firefighters took too long to respond, and when they arrived they did not have water.

Hundreds rendered homeless at Majengo slums Pumwani. Photo: Yassin Juma/ Facebook

The incident led to Nairobi County Governor sending home the County Director in Charge of Fire Department Brian Chunguli Kisali.

Chunguli was accused of negligence in handling the incident where it is reported four fire engines ran out of water a few minutes after arriving at the scene, leaving the raging inferno to spread.

Hundreds rendered homeless at Majengo slums Pumwani. Photo: Yassin Juma/ Facebook

Source: Breaking News- Mildred Owiso is one of the admins of Facebook page Buyer Beware-Kenya Original which apparently specialises in naming and shaming individuals and brands

- It emerges there are several claims of extortion and cyber bullying leveled against the group and its admins

- The viral rape claims against staff at Kenyatta National Hospital for instance originated from screenshots posted by Owiso on the group

- It also emerges that as part of investigations into Owiso's conduct, she has been placed under Kenya's immigration watchlist as it is not understood how she enters and leaves the country

- She brags of having more than three passports, non which is Kenyan. Her Kenyan passport expired in 2013

- She has only been out of Kenya through formal routes once and she used her National Identity card. She was headed to Entebbe, Uganda

- Victim accounts detail how hard it is to get Owiso or her co-admin and serve them with demand letters from lawyers

- One victim for instance narrates how Owiso demanded KSh 100,000 from her failure to which she would publish damaging information on Buyer Beware Facebook page.

Mildred Owiso, the owner of dreaded Facebook page, Buyer Beware- Kenya-Original, is under Kenya's immigration watchlist as investigations into her conduct gathers momentum.

The face behind the outrageous and viral Kenyatta National Hospital inhuman rape claims against new mothers was apparently placed on the immigration watchlist in May 2017.

Investigations by TUKO.co.ke also show that multiple claims of cyber crime, fraud and extortion have been raised against Mildred Atieno Owiso who has mysteriously managed to evade police arrest.

READ ALSO: Firearms kept as exhibits used by rogue police to commit crimes - audit shows

Documents from the Criminal Investigations department show that a total of 348 cases of cyber crime, extortion and cyber bullying have been raised against Mildred Owiso.

READ ALSO: Bungoma criminal gang apologises to victim they shot and robbed KSh 50,000

Detectives have every reason to believe that the yet-to-be confirmed rape claims leveled against staff at KNH was a product of one of Owisos extortion schemes.

The story was purely based on screenshots by ladies who have never stepped forward to substantiate their claims but that is a different story altogether.

Documents from the immigration department show how even without a Kenyan passport, Mildred has been in and out of Kenya, mostly to the United Kingdom where her immigration status still puzzles Kenyan authorities.

READ ALSO: AP officers who forced man to apply for KSh50,000 Sacco loan to bribe them arrested

The subject resides in the United Kingdom and has made several trips to the country without using any Kenyan document. She possibly resides as a refugee and we have reason to believe that she sneaks into Kenya from Uganda, reads a letter by immigration boss Maj-Gen(Rtd) Kihalangwa the Director of Criminal Investigations (DCI).

It is understood that her Kenyan passport, issued in 2003, expired in 2013 and has never been renewed.

Her travel history from the immigration department also show that she had never used the very passport at any of the recognised points of entry in Kenya.

She has only flown once from Jomo Kenyatta International Airport to Entebe,Uganda using her national Identity Card.

READ ALSO: Forget about Nairobi thugs, Thika is another place you will get mugged in broad daylight

Her travel history from the immigration department also show that she had never used the very passport at any of the recognised points of entry in Kenya.

That was in 2014 and has never came back into the country through any formal routes or points of entry and as such should be out of the country to date.

She was however live on air mid January 2018 discussing the KNH rape story and investigators believe the 40-year-old from Ukwala, Siaya county exploits Kenyas porous borders.

Owiso brags how she is well connected to big shots in the national security department and also admits to having more than one passport, non which is Kenyan.

"I actually have more than one passport, and none is Kanyan...So. you think one needs to have a Kenyan passport to travel with?...I am here, I am not a fugitive and I am here if they (police) want to arrest me," Owiso said.

Even if she holds a no-Kenyan passport, investigators believe she sneaks into Kenya through unofficial border points to evade police drug-net.

TUKO.co.ke investigation also revealed that Maj-Gen Kihalangwa has written to the British High Commission asking the embassy to provide details of Mildred Owisos travel, saying that she could be illegally holding fake UK Convention travel Documents.

Kenyas head of immigration also asked the High Commission to investigate possibilities that she could be masquerading as a different nationality, since she has only taken a flight once via Kenyas Points of Entry.

Documents from the Criminal Investigations department show that a total of 348 cases of cybercrime, extortion and cyber-bullying have been raised against Mildred Owiso.

A warrant of arrest was issued against her, and her co-admin of the Facebook Page Buyer Beware, Jackson Njeru.

Njeru has been in remand for about nine months but Owiso has proved elusive, police sources say.

Detectives have every reason to believe that the yet-to-be confirmed rape claims levelled against staff at KNH was a product of one of Owisos extortion schemes.

According to victims' tales to police, Owiso or he co-admin will privately approach an institution,business or individual with damaging information-real or fabricated- and demand for money, failure to which the same is aired on Buyer Beware Facebook page.

Similar complaints shall be fabricated by fake accounts who will comment on the post once on Buyer Beware and the ripple effect pulls in innocent followers of the page who will hurl all manner of insults and accusations without caring to verify the claims.

The two admins underground operational model, victims claim, has made it hard to get them and serve them with demand notices from lawyers.

TUKO.co.ke managed to get some Kenyans who have raised complaints against Owiso and Njeru through their lawyers as shown below.

On November 2017, Julius Gituro wrote to Owiso and Njeru demanding them to pull down a post which claimed he (Julius) was a serial conman, failure to which legal action would be taken.

On 11 December 2017, Esther Mauta wrote to Owiso and Njeru demanding a defamatory post pulled down from Facebook page Buyer Beware failure to which legal action would be taken.

In the letter, it is written how Owiso had demanded a sum of KSh 100,000 from Esther Mauta failure to which she would publish damaging information on Buyer Beware.

Interviews with the two reveal that it has been practically impossible to get Owiso and Njeru so as to serve them with the lawyers demand notices.

Do you have anything to add to this article, please send to news@tuko.co.ke

Source: Tuko.co.ke- Self proclaimed general of the outlawed National Resistance Movement, Miguna Miguna has suffered an asthma attack while at Lari police station

- His lawyer Edwin Sifuna claims the OCS at the police station have blocked him from delivering an inhaler for him

- Miguna Miguna was moved on the night of Friday, February 2 to Lari police station from Githunguri after he was re-arrested

Outlawed National Resistance Movement (NRM) self proclaimed general, Miguna Miguna, is alleged to have suffered an asthma attack on Sunday, February 4 while at Lari police station.

TUKO.co.ke understands that the Officer Commanding Police Station (OCS), has blocked his lawyer, Edwin Sifuna from delivering an inhaler to the controversial lawyer.

Send 'NEWS' to 40227 to receive all the important breaking news as it happens

"Its true. We received info that Miguna has suffered an Asthma attack." noted the lawyer.

READ ALSO: Wakumbuka maneno haya ya kushtusha ya Miguna Miguna kuhusu Raila miaka 6 iliyopita?

Miguna Miguna suffers an asthma attack while at the police cell. Photo: NTV Kenya/ Twitter

READ ALSO: Makadara MP, George Aladwa released on free bond

In e tweet seen by TUKO.co.ke, Sifuna claimed that the OCS had become hostile and that he would not allow him to see his client.

"I have with me an inhaler but the OCS has become hostile. He wont let me see my client to give him the medication." he added.

Earlier on Sifuna had indicated that Miguna Miguna had been moved from Githunguri police station to Lari police station after a high court order tgo havehim released on a KSh 50,000 cash bail was defied.

TUKO.co.ke had earlier reported that the OCS and the OCPD had denied access to the counsel and his family after he was moved to Lari Police Station.

READ ALSO: High Court orders immediate release of Miguna Miguna hours after dramatic arrest

Miguna was arrested on Friday February 2 at his Runda home after he dared Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang'i to arrest him for administrating controversial oath to Raila Odinga

The High Court directed Miguna be released on a KSh 50,000 cash bail following his dramatic arrest but the order was defied by police officers at Githunguri Police station.

His arrested elicited tension in Kiambu county after huge crowd of locals surrounded the police station to prevent him from leaving demanding he apologise for abusing President Uhuru Kenyatta before they allow him to leave

The Tuesday, January 30 controversial inauguration of Raila Odinga as an alternative president of Kenya led to Interior Ministry declaring his National Resistance Movement (NRM) an organized criminal group under the Prevention of Organized Crimes Act.

ALSO WATCH: Take down Uhuru's Portraits - Miguna Miguna

Source: Tuko.co.keThe delegation will be staying in Crimea until February 9.

A delegation of German parliamentarians from three regional parliaments are visiting Russian-occupied Crimea in violation of Ukrainian laws.

The delegation, which arrived on February 3, includes members of the far-right political party "Alternative for Germany," according to the Russian news agency RIA Novosti.

Read alsoCrimea black hole for human rights - HRWThe delegation will be staying in Crimea until February 9.

The German politicians claim they are not concerned over a possible travel ban by Ukraine.

"We don't care at all, we expect to visit Crimea more than once in future," member of the State Parliament (Landtag) of North Rhine Westphalia Roger Beckamp told journalists upon arrival at the airport in the Russian-occupied city of Simferopol.

Member of the State Parliament of Berlin (Abgeordnetenhaus) Hugh Bronson said that the German lawmakers hope that "the situation around Ukraine will be settled as times goes by, and normal work with Ukraine will be possible in future."

As UNIAN reported earlier, German politician, member of the Alternative for Germany Party Alexander Gauland called Crimea "indigenously Russian territory."Members of the Transcarpathian Hungarians Union say it might be an act of provocation.

Ukrainian authorities are probing into an attack with the use of a Molotov cocktail that was hurled at the building of the Transcarpathian Hungarians Union in the west Ukrainian city of Uzhgorod.

The incident happened after 04:00 Kyiv time on February 4, 2018, TV Channel 112 Ukraine said.

Read alsoUkraine busts gang plotting to blow up Hungarian monument in Zakarpattia to boost tensionsThe bottle with petrol was thrown into the window but as there was a double glazed window, only one layer was broken, no other damages were reported.

A criminal case is expected to be opened on the same day, the channel said, however, no legal qualification has been announced yet.

Members of the Transcarpathian Hungarians Union have declined to comment, saying that it might be an act of provocation.

The Union's building is located in the very center of Uzhgorod and neighboring buildings have video surveillance cameras. Police are examining related video footage.

As UNIAN reported earlier, an attack on a Polish tourist bus at a parking lot near the west Ukrainian city of Lviv in December 2017 was qualified as a terrorist act.One Ukrainian soldier was wounded in action; another one sustained a combat-related injury.

Donbas has seen a full ceasefire after 10:00 local time on Sunday, February 4, following three attacks on Ukrainian troops since the beginning of the day; the enemy used 120mm mortars and grenade launchers.

Read alsoUkraine reports 2 WIA's amid four enemy attacks on Feb 3"The latest attack ended at about 10:00 in the morning. Since then, a ceasefire has been observed along the entire contact line," the press service of the Ukrainian Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) Headquarters said on Facebook in an update covering the period between 00:00 and 18:00 on February 4.

In total, there have been three attacks on Ukraine over the period under review. One Ukrainian soldier was wounded in action; another one sustained a combat-related injury.

"The enemy has flagrantly violated the Minsk agreements not far from Kamianka in the Donetsk sector, having opened fire from 120mm mortars near the village. About 10 shells have been lobbed in," it said.

"Militants used grenade launchers to shell our strongholds near the village of Vodiane in the Mariupol sector," it said.

In addition, the occupation forces used small arms to fire at Ukrainian troops near the village of Zaitseve in the Luhansk sector.Filippov was one of the best pilots of a Russian assault aviation unit.

Russian Air Force Major Roman Filippov, a pilot of Russia's Su-25, who was killed after his jet had been downed in Syria, has never been a Ukrainian citizen.

"He is a Russian career military who was transferred to Crimea from the Russian Federation and became a member of the 37th mixed aviation regiment (under command of Colonel Oleg Terebunsky)," Ukrainian journalist Yuriy Butusov wrote on Facebook.

"The regiment is based in Hvardiyske in occupied Crimea. The information of the Russian Defense Ministry, spread by the Russian Novaya Gazeta newspaper that Filippov was a former Ukrainian defector, is not true," Butusov said.

Read alsoBBC: Russian fighter jet 'shot down' in Syria's Idlib province (Photo, video)According to him, Filippov was one of the best pilots of a Russian assault aviation unit, repeatedly took part in Aviadarts military drills.

"But he chose to be a terrorist and flew to the war in Syria. The Russian air force has mercilessly been bombing the town of Saraqeb and nearby settlements for over a week. For all that time the insurgents could not retaliate against Russian air terrorists," Butusov wrote.

Saraqeb is not occupied by ISIS terrorists, opposite to what the Russian media report, he said. This city has long been under Turkish-backed insurgents' control.(@ChaudhryMAli88)

A trade delegation of Rawalpindi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (RCCI) led by President Zahid Latif Khan called on Azerbaijan's Minister of Culture and Tourism Abulfaz Garayev in Baku

RAWALPINDI, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 03rd Feb, 2018 ) :A trade delegation of Rawalpindi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (RCCI) led by President Zahid Latif Khan called on Azerbaijan's Minister of Culture and Tourism Abulfaz Garayev in Baku.

Ambassador Said Khan Mohmand and former Senior Vice President RCCI Rashid Waien were also present on the occasion, said an RCCI press released here Saturday. On this occasion, Minister Abulfaz Garayev briefed RCCI delegation on Azerbaijan's tourism potential, recent work on tourism development and about projects to be implemented in future.

Speaking about the decree signed by the President of Azerbaijan on the application of visas through the "ASAN visa" system at the international airports of our country, Abulfaz Garayev said that this decree was one of the next important steps towards the development of tourism.

In addition, the minister said that last year about 2 million tourists visited the country by 20%. Pakistani Ambassador Said Khan Mohmand informed the businessmen and heads of major business organizations of Pakistan about the business opportunities.

He expressed his desire to make a great contribution to Azerbaijan's tourism sector. RCCI chief Zahid Latif Khan, briefed the Azerbaijan's minister about the RCCI 31st International Achievement Award and Business Opportunities Conference, to be held in Baku on July 4-5, 2018.(@ChaudhryMAli88)

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Pakistan has criticized the aspirants for permanent seats in an expanded U.N. Security Council -- India, Brazil, Germany and Japan -- for opposing reform of the 15-member body based on the principles of democracy, and vowed to resist any move that serves the interests of a "few" countries to the detriment of the larger membership.

"We will continue to uphold values of democracy, equal opportunity and non-discrimination for as long as it takes, but we will not be complicit in any exercise that places narrow self-serving interests of a few over the collective good of the larger UN membership." Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi told an interactive session of the deadlocked Inter-Governmental Negotiations (IGN) during which she responded to those making a case for additional permanent members on the Security Council.

"We all agree on practicing democracy at home but some argue against it at the UN," the Pakistani envoy said, while dealing with the points raised during the debate in the first session of the Inter-Governmental Negotiations, which resumed on Thursday.

Full-scale negotiations to reform the Security Council began in the General Assembly in February 2009 on five key areas -- the categories of membership, the question of veto, regional representation, size of an enlarged Security Council, and working methods of the council and its relationship with the General Assembly.

Progress towards restructuring the Security Council remains blocked as the four countries push for permanent seats while Italy/Pakistan-led Uniting for Consensus (UfC) group firmly oppose any additional permanent members.

As a compromise, UfC has proposed a new category of members -- not permanent members -- with longer duration and a possibility to get re-elected once. The Security Council is currently composed of five permanent members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States -- and 10 non-permanent members that are elected in groups of five to two-year terms.

Elaborating her arguments, Ambassador Lodhi questioned as to how could the Security Council, the preeminent body entrusted with global peace and security, be exempt from democratic principles, on which rests the structures of global governance including national governments, regional and international bodies and multilateral institutions.

"The essential requirement of democracy, she said, was elections, yet there were some who believe that a onetime election was sufficient to achieve a democratic Council, but remarked, Elections are a process not a onetime event".

"The argument that is put forward by some when translated in our national context means that governments should be permanently installed by virtue of a single election. In other words we should have a permanent prime minister and permanent members of Parliament," the Pakistani envoy said.

Criticizing the countries that demand a permanent membership to the Council based on current global realities, Ambassador Lodhi said that realities are always in flux and change over time. "There are no permanent realities.

So if realities are tied to the present, how can a "permanent" status be bestowed upon a "transient" and "fleeting" state," she added. "Hence", she added, "we cannot perpetuate a privilege based on contemporary realities".

In her remarks, Ambassador Lodhi also called for reaching an understanding among the member countries on the fundamentals of Security Council reform, saying, the inability to do so had resulted in slow progress.

Pakistan and its partners in the UfC has consistently outlined what those principles, she pointed out. "The need for a more democratic, accountable, transparent, effective and representativeness Council is not only an imperative for a comprehensive reform, these principles embed the ideal of the United Nations and the inspiring vision that it espouses for our collective humanity," The Pakistani envoy said that the framework for the "conduct" of the IGN process has to be in good faith, with mutual respect and in an open, inclusive and transparent manner.

"Just as those principles helped us establish the IGN forum, we need principles on substance of reform to pave the way for a solution that could garner the widest possible political acceptance," she said.

"These principles of reform will provide a common reference point - the ideals that we all aspire to - and a destination we all wish to reach." On the African nation' position, Ambassador Lodhi said that Pakistan and the UfC distinguish between national pursuits and consensus demands on behalf of a region, such as Africa, emanating from a genuine sense of feeling disenfranchised and perceiving that a historical injustice was meted out to them.

"Perhaps African countries have suffered the most by the deadlock created by those harbouring a false sense of entitlement," she said. "We believe the African demand can best be addressed in a just, equitable and pragmatic manner through the compromise solution offered by the UfC." APP/ift(@ChaudhryMAli88)

ISLAMABAD, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Anti Narcotics Force (ANF) has seized 1.116 Tons narcotics and arrested 27 persons including four ladies under its campaign against drug trafficking across the country.

The Force also impounded eight (08) vehicles while conducting 24 counter-narcotic strikes across the country. The seized drugs comprised 748.6 Kg Opium, 348.9 Kg Hashish, 17.2 Kg Heroin and 1.2 Kg Amphetamine.

As per details here on Sunday, ANF Quetta recovered 25 Kg Opium from mountainous area of Toba Achakzai Tehsil Deobandi District Qilla Abdullah. The drug was intended to be handed over to another narcotics gang.

Yet in another operation, ANF Quetta recovered 703 Kg Opium and 58 Kg Hashish from general area Killi Dolangi Tehsil & District Qilla Abdullah. As per initial reports, drug was intended to be handed over to another narcotic gang.

In third operation, ANF Quetta recovered 5 Kg Hashish, which resulted arrest of a drug peddler namely accused Noor Muhammad resident of Quetta. ANF Rawalpindi arrested an accused identified as Afzal Ali, resident of Gujrat at Benazir Bhutto International Airport, Islamabad and recovered 1.1 Kg Amphetamine.

He was destined to KSA by Flight No. EY-234. In another operation, ANF Rawalpindi intercepted a Motorcycle near Sanjawal Chowk, GT Road, Attock and recovered 1.1 Kg Hashish from personal possession of accused.

In third operation, ANF Rawalpindi recovered 2 Kg Opium from personal possession of a lady accused identified as Mrs. Sabira, resident of Nowshera. She was arrested near Iqbal Shaheed Toll Plaza, GT Road, Attock.

In fourth operation, ANF Rawalpindi recovered 5 Kg Hashish from personal possession of a lady accused namely accused Abida Parveen, resident of Faisalabad. She was arrested near Iqbal Shaheed Toll Plaza, GT Road, Attock.

In fifth operation, ANF Rawalpindi recovered 4 Kg Hashish from personal possession of a male and a female accused identified as Miss Yasmeen and Shakir, residents of Khyber Agency. They were arrested near Gondal Bus Stop, Attock.

In sixth operation, ANF Rawalpindi recovered 4 Kg Hashish from personal possession of the two accused identified as accused Imran Shah resident of Mardan and Miss Azra, resident of Peshawar. They were arrested near Gondal Bus Stop, Attock.

In Seventh operation, ANF Rawalpindi intercepted a Toyota Double Cabin at KFC, F-10 Markaz, Islamabad and recovered 6 Kg Heroin which was tactfully concealed under seats. Two accused persons were arrested at the spot namely Muhammad Tufail and Mumraiz Khan, residents of Peshawar.

ANF Lahore arrested a Nepali foreigner identified as Suk Bahadur at Allama Iqbal International Airport, Lahore destined to Colombo by Flight No. UL-186 on suspicion of ingestion of narco filled capsules.

He delivered 101 Heroin filled Capsules, weighing 990 grams. In another operation, ANF Lahore recovered 490 grams Heroin from a parcel being sent abroad through a courier service company near Khadim Road, Sialkot.

The seized Heroin was tactfully concealed in a Jacket. In third operation, ANF Lahore recovered 130 grams Heroin from personal possession of the accused, identified as accused Asif Rasheed resident of Lahore.

He was arrested near Haji Sardar Machli Saddar Goal, Lahore. In fourth operation, ANF Lahore intercepted a Toyota Corolla GLi car near Qaid-e-Azam Park, Sargodha Road, Chiniot and recovered 2 Kg Heroin along with a person namely Asif Ali, resident of Chaniot.

The seized drugs was tactfully concealed in secret cavities of the said car. In fifth operation, ANF Lahore intercepted a Suzuki Swift Car near Chak No. 5, GB Kamalpur, 51 South Motorway M-3 Faisalabad and recovered 10 Kg Opium and 40 Kg Hashish which was recovered from personal possession of the accused, identified as Twab Khan and resident of Peshawar.

In sixth operation, ANF Lahore recovered 500 grams Hashish from personal possession of accused identified as Sajjad Sarwar resident of Sialkot. He was apprehended near China Chowk Pasroor Road Sialkot.

In seventh operation, ANF Lahore intercepted a Truck near Jalla Chowk, Tandianwala Road, Faisalabad, recovering 211 Kg Hashish and 7 Kg Opium concealed in secret cavities of the Truck. Two persons on- board namely Arshad Ali and Muhammad Malik Cheema, residents of Sheikhupura were also apprehended during the operation.

ANF Peshawar recovered 1.2 Kg Hashish from personal possession of accused namely Muhammad Iqrar, resident of Khyber Agency. He was arrested near Motorway Toll Plaza, Peshawar. In another operation, ANF Peshawar intercepted a Suzuki Pickup near Mian Sahib Hotel Ring Road, Peshawar and recovered 3.6 Kg Heroin from personal possession of the arrested three accused identified as Amin Shah, Muhammad Abbas and Raees Khan, residents of Peshawar.

In third operation, ANF Peshawar recovered 800 grams Opium and 2.4 Kg Hashish from personal possession of the accused identified as Said Umeer, resident of Khyber Agency. He was arrested near Motorway Toll Plaza Peshawar.

In fourth operation, ANF Peshawar recovered 800 grams Opium and 3.5 Kg Hashish near Motorway Toll Plaza, Peshawar from Toyota Hiace and arrested an accused Muhammad Hamza, resident of Jhang. Drugs was concealed in audio speaker of the vehicle.

In fifth operation, ANF Peshawar recovered 1.2 Kg Hashish from personal possession of the accused namely Noor-Ud-Din, resident of Khyber Agency. He was arrested near main gate of the Educational Institute.

ANF Karachi arrested an accused near Memon Society, Karachi and recovered 4 Kg Heroin from personal possession of accused identified as Muhammad Asif, resident of Karachi. In another operation, ANF Karachi recovered 12 Kg Hashish from a drug den situated in Bismillah Colony near Landhi Railway Station, Karachi.

All cases have been registered at respective ANF Police Stations and further investigations are underway.(@rukhshanmir)

The body of a 12-year-old boy was found from the fields near PI Link Canal Breach on Burewalas Multan Road early Saturday morning

BUREWALA/KARACHI,(UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 03rd Feb, 2018 ) : The body of a 12-year-old boy was found from the fields near PI Link Canal Breach on Burewalas Multan Road early Saturday morning. The police said that the child had been murdered after rape, adding that the body has been sent for postmortem. Taking notice of the incident, Chief Minister Punjab Shehbaz Sharif ordered an inquiry into the incident.

The CM also summoned a report from the DPO on the matter. CM Shehbaz also assured that victims family of complete cooperation in the case investigation. The boy has been identified as Ali Manzoor, a resident of Azeemabad.

His family said that the minor had left his house for tuition two days ago and never returned back home. The police have arrested the prime suspect in the case with the help of victim's family.

A case has been registered and further investigation is under way. Earlier in the day, the body of a seven-year-old boy was found from Gujranwala's Kamoke town.

Authorities speculated that the boy was raped and then murdered.

The child was strangulated to death, the authorities added. Two domestic workers, employed at the victim's house, have been taken into custody and currently being investigated. In Karachi, police have arrested the brother of a minor boy who had been raped and murdered in the city.

The body of the minor was recovered near Stadium Road on Thursday. According to the post-mortem report, the minor had been sodomized before being killed. The Civil Hospital medico-legal officer (MLO) Dr Shahid said that the minor had been strangled to death after the sexual assault. Police said the suspect who is the elder brother of the victim is a drug addict and committed the crime after an argument with the father. Earlier, a case had been registered at the New Town Police Station and included charges of murder and kidnapping.(@ChaudhryMAli88)

CHITRAL, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi Sunday said that the country had been put on right track and the journey of development would go on if the democratic system continues.

Addressing the inauguration ceremony of the first power unit of Gollen Gol Hydropower Project here, the prime minister said the power and gas crises had been resolved and the erstwhile falling ratio of economic growth was now on surge.

Pakistan has been put on right track. Now you have again to decide in July (elections). This (development) process would continue if you make a right decision. You have the powers to make these decisions.

This is the democracy. This is the representation. This is the course of countrys development, the prime minister remarked after unveiling the plaque of the project.

The prime minister was accompanied by MNA from Chitral Shahzada Iftikharuddin, Chairman and senior officials as he unveiled the project.

The total installed generation capacity of the project is 108 MW with three generating units  each of them having a capacity of 36 MW. The first unit has been completed, while the second and the third unit would be commissioned in March and May 2018 respectively.

The prime minister assured the people that the project would first meet the needs of the whole of Chitral area and only the surplus would be supplied to other areas. He said no doubt, Chitral would now become load-shedding free area as the project would be capable to generate the power at least to meet Chitrals needs even during the drought season. More/iar(@ChaudhryMAli88)

ISLAMABAD, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) Sunday issued the schedule of Senate election for Federal capital, which will be held on March 3.

According to the notification, the commission has called upon the members of the National Assembly to elect the senate one member each against general seat and the seat reserved for technocrat including Ulema from the federal capital.

It said these new members will be elected in place of the members of the Senate, who are due to retire after the expiration of their term of office on March 11, 2018. It said the public notice by returning officer inviting the candidates about acquiring and submission of nomination papers would be issued on February 5.

The last date for filing of nomination papers by the candidates with the returning officer will be February 10, between 0900 hours and 1600 hours.

The last date for publication of Names of the nominated candidates would be February 11.

The last date for scrutiny of nomination papers would be February 13, from 1000 hours to 1600 hours while the last date for filling of appeals against acceptance or rejection of nominations will be February 16, from 0900 hours to 1600 hours.

The last date for disposal of appeals by the tribunal will be February 19, while the last date for publication of revised list of candidates would be February 20. The last date for withdrawal of candidature would be February 21, between 0900 hours and 1600 hours.

The polling time would be from 0900 hours to 1600 hours on March 3, while places of polling would be Parliament House, Islamabad.(@rukhshanmir)

CHITRAL, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi Sunday said the government was working on power projects on priority so that people of Chitral could be provided with affordable source of energy, thereby reducing the burden on forest resources.

He was chairing a briefing on development projects, PM office media wing said in a press release. Federal Minister for Water Resources Syed Javed Ali Shah , WAPDA Chairman Lieutenant General (retrd) Muzammil Hussain, senior officers of district administration and notables of the area were also present during the briefing.

He said completion of power projects would also encourage commerce, industry and tourism in Chitral that would provide greater employment opportunities for the local population.

The prime minister said the PML-N government had allocated unprecedented amount of resources for the development of the people of Chitral.

He said the mega projects including Lowari Tunnel, several hydropower and road infrastructure projects were completed during PML-N's tenure. He said the people of Chitral had rendered great services for the country and therefore the government would provide all possible support for socio-economic uplift of the local people.

Local notables thanked the prime minister for his visit and assured full support to the government in timely completion of development projects.(@FahadShabbir)

HYDERABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :In a bid to promote peace, tolerance, harmony and sufism, a group of amateur artists decorated a section of an outer wall of Shahbaz Building, headquarters of Hyderabad region's bureaucracy, with colourful and impressive messages and pictures.

The activity was organized here Sunday by Pakistan-US Alumni Network (PUAN) Jamshoro chapter in collaboration with US Consulate Karachi.

Around 40 young doctors, undergraduate and postgraduate students of universities and other individuals participated in the activity The PUAN Jamshoro chapter general secretary Dr Rajesh Kumar told the media that the network's members selected Shahbaz Building because of a large number of people daily visit the place.

He recalled that in a similar activity few months ago the network had covered some section of the building's boundary wall. Kumar told that the activity would continue until the whole was covered. APP/zmb/ali(@rukhshanmir)

ISLAMABAD, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Federal Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal Sunday left for a visit to the United States, Mexico, United Kingdom and Norway. He would hold meeting with the leader of these countries on issue of mutual importance, said a press release.

Ahsan Iqbal will apprise them about Pakistans efforts and achievements in the war against terror.ISLAMABAD, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Suffering with migraines could be a sign of underlying heart problems, a 19-year investigation involving more than half a million people has suggested.

Cardiovascular problems including heart attacks, stroke, blood clots and irregular heart rates are all linked to migraine, according to the research published in the British Medical Journal. The researchers found that people who suffer from migraines were more likely to have a heart attack than those with no major headache symptoms 25 per 1,000 compared with 17 per 1,000.

As many as 45 in 1,000 migraine sufferers also experienced a common form of stroke, 20 more than those who do not get migraines, Health news reported. And the number of strokes related to haemorrhages was higher in the migraine-suffering cohort (11 compared with six), while 13 compared with 11 suffered peripheral artery disease.

Danish and American researchers collected data from patients between 1995 and 2013.

Of the people assessed, over 51,000 had been diagnosed with migraines and more than 510,000 had not. Researchers found that the average age someone was diagnosed with a migraine was 35 and 71 per cent were women.

In this nationwide cohort study, migraine was associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, researchers said. This suggests that migraine should be considered a potent and persistent risk factor for most cardiovascular diseases in both men and women. But as the study was observational, no firm conclusions can be drawn about cause and effect.

Migraines are more severe than normal headaches. They regularly involve nausea, vomiting, sensitivity to light and noise, low energy and an intense, throbbing headache. For some people they last just a few hours but for others they can last up to three days.

Each year more than 8.5 million people in the UK are thought to experience a migraine, more than the number affected by asthma, diabetes and epilepsy combined.(@ChaudhryMAli88)

ISLAMABAD, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi Sunday said there was no need to go to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as the countrys economy was on the rise with different sectors witnessing healthy growth.

Speaking in a Dunya news talk show programme Mahaz hosted by Wajahat Saeed Khan, the prime minister said sometimes, the government had to take economic decisions as the policies always required correction.

Replying to a question about increase in the US Dollar rates, he said when the economy had been expanding, certain challenges cropped up which required policy correction. He said the government had increased the petroleum prices but the same were still lower when compared with other parts of the world.

To another question, the prime minister said war was no solution to the Afghan issue and reiterated that no country other than Pakistan was more interested in durable peace in Afghanistan.

The prime minister also shared the global concerns about the role of nascent Afghan army in bringing about stability in their country when the coalition forces stationed there had failed.

About Pak-US ties, he said both the countries were allies in the war on terror. We are sovereign country and know how to defend ourselves, he added. Allies worked through mutual trust and coordination without hurling tweets against each other.

Pakistan was fighting the war against terror with its own resources. The world acknowledged it and if anyone had any doubts, one could come and judge it, he added. He said recently Pakistan had handed over about 27 Afghan nationals to the Afghan authorities and maintained that no attacks were taking place from Pakistan, rather terrorists from across the Afghan soil had been targeting Pakistan.

More/irf(@rukhshanmir)

MULTAN, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) ::The Punjab government is providing assistance of Rs 10,000 per ostrich with an aim to promote the protein rich, low-fat meat and economic uplift of farmers.

At initial, the subsidy was given on 2,500 birds. The project jointly launched by Development of Ostrich Farming in Punjab and University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences was in progress to encourage ostrich farmers, said a Livestock Department official while talking to APP.

He said that People's interest for Ostrich farming was on rise and a good number of farmers were contacting the Livestock department. Advising the farmers for Ostrich farming, he said the bird was one of the biggest bird in the world, added that Ostrich uses low quantity of food but offer handsome meat.

Its meat has low cholesterol, low fats and rich protein, which beneficial for hepatitis and diabetes patients, he added He said that its skin was considered as the second expensive skin after skin of crocodile in international market.

There was high demand of Ostrich skin across the world, he said added that average price of one shoe, made of skin of Ostrich was $ 250.

He said that Ostrich skin was soft, flexible and durable adding that one mature Ostrich contribute 12 to 14 square feet skin.

Although, Ostrich meat offers low fats, but oil extracted from fats, was one of expensive oil used to abolish dryness of human skin and healing of skin cuts, he added. He said that Ostrich feathers also offer handsome returns as these were used for decoration.

The official said that Ostrich belonged to Retite family and there were many species of the bird. Every specie had different colours of neck and they were recognised from colours of their neck, he said added that Ostrich have red, blue, black and pink necks, however Ostrich of black neck was famous in the world.

The trend of Ostrich farming had increased after the bird was included in list of Livestock stock in 2012, in the province, he said added that earlier, the bird was present in list of wildlife. /atf-xl/gmf(@ChaudhryMAli88)

Thousands of people will make a chain of human hands in connection with the Kashmir Solidarity Day here on Monday to express complete solidarity with the oppressed people of occupied Jammu & Kashmir

SIALKOT, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 03rd Feb, 2018 ) :Thousands of people will make a chain of human hands in connection with the Kashmir Solidarity Day here on Monday to express complete solidarity with the oppressed people of occupied Jammu & Kashmir.

JI Sialkot District spokesperson Arif Mehmood Sheikh told the media that party's district Ameer, Dr Shakeel Thakur Advocate, would lead the activity at city's congested Allama Iqbal Chowk. Meanwhile, almost all political and religious parties, NGOs and civil society organisations would also take out rallies in Sialkot, Daska, Sambrial, Pasrur, Chawinda, Badiana, Shakargarh, Zafarwal, Narowal and other towns.CHITRAL, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi arrived here Sunday to inaugurate the first unit of Gollen Gol Hydropower Project to generate 36 megawatt of electricity to exclusively cope with the needs of Chitral and nearby areas.

This quantum of electricity is three times more than the present requirements of Chitral, and will also cater for the surge in electricity demand in future. The first units, installed in District Chitral of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, is one of the three units with similar generation capacity.

The project has been constructed on Golen Gol - a tributary of River Mastuj - near Chitral. Golen Gol Hydropower Project will result in a new era of progress and prosperity in Chitral, besides stabilizing the national economy by providing low-cost and environment-friendly electricity to the national grid.CHITRAL, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi Sunday inaugurated here the first unit of Gollen Gol Hydropower Project to generate 36 megawatts of electricity.

Constructed at Golen Gol - a tributary of River Mastuj, near Chitral, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the first unit would exclusively cope with the needs of Chitral and adjacent areas. The prime minister was accompanied by MNA from Chitral Shahzada Iftikharuddin and senior officials as he unveiled the plaque of the project.

The total installed generation capacity of the project is 108 MW with three generating units  each of them having a capacity of 36 MW. The first unit has been completed, while the second and the third unit would be commissioned in March and May 2018 respectively.

The project will provide 436 million units of electricity to the national grid every year. Benefits of the project have been estimated at Rs 3.7 billion per annum. The approved PC-I cost of the project amounts to Rs 29 billion.

In addition to WAPDAs own sources, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Saudi Fund for Development, Kuwait Development Fund and OPEC Fund for International Development had also been providing financial assistance for completion of the project.

In the wake of devastating floods of 2015 in Chitral, the Federal government directed WAPDA to supply electricity generated from the first unit of the project to Chitral to meet the energy needs for socio-economic development of the backward and far-flung areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

This quantum of electricity is three times more than the present requirements of Chitral, and will also cater for the surge in electricity demand in future. Golen Gol Hydropower Project will result in a new era of progress and prosperity in Chitral, besides stabilizing the national economy by providing low-cost and environment-friendly electricity to the national grid.(@ChaudhryMAli88)

HYDERABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :The Hyderabad police arrested a suspected narcotics smuggler and recovered 5 kilograms of hashish from his possession. The police spokesman informed here Sunday that the suspect Noor Ahmed Thaeem was arrested from Heerabad area during routine patrolling by a mobile of the Market police station.

The suspect was later booked in an FIR registered on the state's complaint by Sub Inspector Rao Muhammad Shahid under Control of Narcotics Act. APP/zmb/aliPrime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi would inaugurate the first unit of Golen Gol Hydropower Project installed in District Chitral of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa today, to add 36 megawatt of electricity

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 03rd Feb, 2018 ) :Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi would inaugurate the first unit of Golen Gol Hydropower Project installed in District Chitral of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa today, to add 36 megawatt of electricity.

The electricity to be generated from the first unit of the project is exclusively meant to cope with the needs of Chitral town and adjacent areas, said a PM Office statement. In the wake of devastating floods of 2015 in Chitral, the Federal government directed WAPDA to supply electricity generated from the first unit of the project to Chitral to meet the energy needs for socio-economic development of the backward and far-flung areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

This quantum of electricity is three times more than the present requirements of Chitral, and will also cater the future demand of the electricity. Golen Gol Hydropower Project will result in a new era of progress and prosperity in Chitral, besides stabilizing the national economy by providing low-cost and environment-friendly electricity to the national grid.

The project has been constructed on Golen Gol - a tributary of River Mastuj - near Chitral. The total installed generation capacity of the project is 108 MW with three generating units ' each of them having a capacity of 36 MW.

The first unit has been completed, while the second and the third unit would be commissioned in March and May 2018 respectively. The project will provide 436 million units of electricity to the national grid every year.

Benefits of the project have been estimated at Rs 3.7 billion per annum. The approved PC-I cost of the project amounts to Rs 29 billion. In addition to WAPDA's own sources, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Saudi Fund for Development, Kuwait Development Fund and OPEC Fund for International Development had also been providing financial assistance for completion of the project.The Institute of Agricultural Sciences of Punjab University organised an international seminar on 'Pest (Termite) Control in Food Processing Industries' here at new campus on Saturday

LAHORE, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 03rd Feb, 2018 ) :The Institute of Agricultural Sciences of Punjab University organised an international seminar on 'Pest (Termite) Control in Food Processing Industries' here at new campus on Saturday.

Exterminex Asia Pacific CEO Soh Che Kin, Exterminex Malaysia's Director Miss Lim Wei Teeng, Senior Entomologist Miss Shaza Binte Azri, International Affairs Exterminex Coordinator Zakrya Zaki, Forest Research Institute of Malaysia's (FRIM) Senior Research Officer Dr Shawn Cheng, C-Shine Pakistan's CEO Irfan Fiaz Ali Akbar, Punjab University Faculty of Life Sciences Dean Prof Dr Muhammad Naeem Khan, Institute of Agricultural Sciences (IAGS) Director Prof Dr Muhammad Saleem Haider, Food Safety Expert Dr Shinawar Waseem Ali and Entomologist Dr Azhar Ali Khan addressed the participants.

A large number of participants from food industries including Nestle, Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Engro, Unilever, Packages, Bunnys etc, Punjab Food Authority and Pest Management Service companies attended the seminar.

Prof Naeem Khan emphasised the conservation of biodiversity while applying the pest control. Mr Soh discussed the new innovative bait technologies for pest management keeping in view the environmental safety, and Dr Shawn discussed the future collaboration opportunities between FRIM and IAGS regarding the pest control services in food processing industries as well as urban pest management.

Dr Shinawar informed the participants that Exterminex products would be the first-ever local research based products in Pakistan. Dr Azher highlighted conventional malpractices for termite control in Pakistan and alternative remedies.

In closing remarks, Dr Saleem Haider thanked the participants, Exterminex, and C-Shine group for introducing environment-friendly pest control technologies in Pakistan committed to do best efforts to provide research support from IAGS.

The delegate also met PU Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Muhammad Zakria Zakir and thanked him for facilitating the international seminar. The VC appreciated the efforts of IAGS for bridging the gap between university and industry and encouraged the whole faculty to develop more future collaborations with different national/multinational agro industries in Pakistan.(@rukhshanmir)

ATTOCK, Feb 4 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) ::A taxi driver namely Asif Shah has shot dead his wife and two daughters besides injuring mentally retarded son. According to police, Asif resident of Attock city in the jurisdiction of Attock Saddar police station had a dispute with his wife over marriage of daughter.

On Saturday night, when he came back he saw a man in his house, on this, he became furious and shot dead three members of his family including wife, Ruqaya and two daughters, Komal, 22-year old, Rida 18-year old and injured his mentally retarded son Ashtar Abbas.

After committing crime, he managed to escape from the scene. The dead bodies were shifted to Asfandyar Shaheed Hospital Attock for postmortem while police had started investigation. APP/rn/majSajid Hassans Medical Condition Get worse after his hair transplant surgery gone horribly wrong

Karachi (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) Sajid Hasans Medical Condition got worse after his hair transplant surgery gone horribly wrong. Award winning and famous actor Sajid Hasan is going through severe trauma these days.

Sajid Hasan Recently shared a video massage on Facebook and social media, in which he revealed how unprofessional practice of a hair surgeon almost took him to bed of death. Sajid Hasan in his video message told that his hair surgeon operated him without any prior screening or precautionary tests which resulted in causing a horrible infection.

Due to this infection, he suffered from severe fever and pain for almost one month and his Infection is getting worse with every passing day. Award winning actor urged people to be aware of shady doctors in order to avoid such terrible condition and raise their voice so that the responsible doctor could be held accountable.

Watch Sajid Hasans Video



San Jos, Feb 4 (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Polling stations opened in Costa Rica on Sunday for the first round of the Central American country's presidential election, which is being buffeted by a debate on gay marriage.

A total 13 candidates are vying to succeed outgoing President Luis Guillermo Solis, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a second consecutive term. Same-sex marriage is seen as a key issue in the socially conservative country, where 3.3 million voters are eligible to cast ballots.(@ChaudhryMAli88)

Quito, Feb 4 (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Ecuadoreans decide the political fate of former president Rafael Correa Sunday in a referendum called by his successor turned staunched opponent and expected to prevent him from returning to power.

Correa is locked in a battle with current President Lenin Moreno for control of their deeply divided leftist ruling Country Alliance party. Sunday's referendum, in which Moreno backs the "yes" vote, features seven questions including reintroducing term limits to prevent presidents from running indefinitely.

If the current head of state gets his way, Correa will not be able to join the 2021 election race.(@ChaudhryMAli88)

Mal, Maldives, Feb 4 (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :The beleaguered Maldives government Sunday ordered police and troops to resist any move by the Supreme Court to arrest or impeach President Abdulla Yameen over his refusal to release political prisoners.

Police detained two opposition lawmakers as they returned to the country Sunday, as the political crisis in the Indian Ocean archipelago nation deepened with its top court pitted against the president.

The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) said its MPs tried to stage a meeting in defiance of a weekend order suspending parliament, but they were pushed back by armed troops. Security forces have been deployed inside the national parliament -- known as the People's Majlis -- since March last year when Yameen ordered them to evict dissident lawmakers.

The president's crackdown on dissent has tarnished the Maldives' image as an upmarket holiday paradise and sparked calls from the United Nations and several countries to restore the rule of law in the fledgling democracy.

The Supreme Court on Thursday night ordered the authorities to release nine political dissidents and restore the seats of 12 legislators who had been sacked for defecting from Yameen's party, ruling the cases were politically motivated.

But the Yameen government has so far refused to comply with the shock ruling, resisting international pressure to respect the decision. In a national television address on Sunday, Attorney General Mohamed Anil remained defiant.

"Any Supreme Court order to arrest the president would be unconstitutional and illegal," Anil said. "So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order." The Supreme Court's reinstatement of the dozen legislators gave the opposition a majority in the 85-member assembly, and it can now potentially impeach Yameen.

But authorities shut parliament indefinitely on Saturday to prevent such a move. Yameen also sacked two police chiefs after the court's decision. Atul Keshap, the US ambassador to Sri Lanka and the Maldives, has led international criticism of the Yameen government's refusal to respect court orders.

"What security risk prevents the #Maldives #Majlis from meeting tomorrow? Why are MPs pepper sprayed in the streets and arrested on arrival at airport?" he tweeted Sunday. - Political pressure - Former president and current opposition leader Mohamed Nasheed described the government's refusal to obey the Supreme Court as a "coup".

Nasheed, who was controversially convicted of a terrorism charge and jailed for 13 years in 2015, urged police and troops to uphold the constitution. "Statements made today by AG Anil... to disobey SC orders is tantamount to a coup.

They, and President Yameen must resign immediately," he tweeted on Sunday. "Security services must uphold the constitution and serve the Maldivian people." Nasheed, the country's first democratically elected leader, was toppled in 2012.

He was barred from contesting elections after his 2015 terrorism conviction, which was internationally criticised as politically motivated. He has been in exile since 2016, when he left on prison leave for medical treatment.

He is currently in Colombo, meeting Maldivian dissidents based in Sri Lanka. Several key officials have resigned due to political pressure on them to ignore the court order, the MDP said in a statement.

The MDP -- which is led by Nasheed -- has expressed fear that any move by the government to resist the Supreme Court's order may trigger unrest in the nation of 340,000 Sunni Muslims. The government said Friday it had concerns about releasing those convicted for "terrorism, corruption, embezzlement, and treason".(@rukhshanmir)

Ouagadougou, Feb 4 (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Police in northern Burkina Faso shot dead a member of an armed gang who had attempted to ambush their patrol, security forces said Sunday.

"On Saturday 3 February at around 3 pm (1600 GMT), a team from the Deou District Police Station (Oudalan Province, Sahel region) on a security mission was attacked by armed individuals", police said in a statement sent to AFP.

"During the exchange of fire, an assailant was shot dead," a security source said, adding the incident was one of a series of "recurrent ambushes against defence and security forces" in the region.

Northern Burkina Faso, bordering Mali and Niger, has seen jihadist attacks since the first quarter of 2015, claiming more than 133 lives across 80 attacks, according to an official report. Two Burkinabe policemen were shot dead last Monday in Baraboule, a northern town, bordering Mali.

In December 2016, an attack on a battalion of anti-terrorist forces stationed in Nassoumbou, near the Malian border, killed twelve people. The attack, the most lethal against the Burkinabe army, shocked the country.(@ChaudhryMAli88)

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, accused of abusing its power in its probe of links between President Donald Trump's election campaign and Russia, has become a political punching bag, experts in the US law enforcement community say

Washington, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 03rd Feb, 2018 ) :The Federal Bureau of Investigation, accused of abusing its power in its probe of links between President Donald Trump's election campaign and Russia, has become a political punching bag, experts in the US law enforcement community say.

But after two years of becoming deeply enmeshed in the swirl of American politics -- at one point in 2016, it was investigating both Trump's team and Democratic rival Hillary Clinton -- the FBI also needs to clean up its image, they say.

"I think that there are troubling things that myself, many former agents, as well as current on-board employees, would like to see a full accounting of," said retired special agent James Gagliano.

In the past few years, actions by the agency's top management "have had a deleterious effect on the reputation of the FBI," Gagliano, who is now an adjunct assistant professor at St John's University in New York, told AFP.

The FBI was accused of both aiding Clinton's campaign and causing her loss. Since then, Trump and his Republican Party claim that the agency has tried to discredit his victory -- and possibly help force him from office -- by opening a special investigation into possible collusion with Moscow.

The FBI took another brutal hit Friday when Trump spearheaded a Republican effort to tar the agency as deeply politicized, with the release of a secret, controversial GOP memo. But the agency's director Christopher Wray -- who was hand-picked by Trump six months ago, but whose future now seems unclear -- has so far stood tall.

"Talk is cheap," he told his 35,000-strong staff after the memo release, in an internal letter obtained by AFP. - History of clashes - Trump's battle with the Justice Department and FBI is not new, and is just one in a long series of fights between presidents and their top law enforcement officials.

Legendary G-Man J. Edgar Hoover, the agency's first director who served for nearly a half-century, turned the FBI into an institution feared by crooks and politicians alike. Presidents from Harry Truman to Richard Nixon considered dismissing him, but Hoover was seen as too powerful -- and dangerous.

The FBI director is appointed for a term of 10 years -- a method seen as ensuring he or she remains apolitical. But some critics say that goal has not been met. The root of the current battle is former director James Comey's personal handling of the 2016 investigation into Clinton's use of an unauthorized personal email server while she was secretary of state.

His attempts to keep that sensitive probe apolitical fell flat, reaping attacks from both parties even as he twice found the evidence lacking to charge her. "The Clinton investigation put the FBI in the center of the political battle," said Jeffrey Ringel, a veteran agent who is now director of the Soufan Group, a security consultancy.

"Either way, the FBI was going to come out bruised." - The Russia probe - After becoming president, Trump took umbrage when Comey pursued allegations that Russia had meddled in the 2016 election to help the real estate mogul win.

Comey refused to back off and declare loyalty to Trump, who fired him, accusing him of being pro-Democrat. Since then, Trump has built a campaign against the agency, alleging that Comey, his onetime deputy Andrew McCabe, agents who served on both the Clinton and Trump probes, and some Justice Department officials were biased against him.

Republicans say leaked text messages show that two investigators working both cases were deeply anti-Trump. They note that McCabe's wife was supported by Clinton in a failed run for state office in Virginia.

Before Friday's release of the memo, Trump said leaders of both the FBI and the Department of Justice had "politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of Democrats and against Republicans - something which would have been unthinkable just a short time ago." - Impossible situation - FBI agents say Comey made the best of an impossible situation -- investigating two top candidates during an election.

But he also plunged the agency too much into the limelight, and blurred the lines of impartiality, they said. Gagliano says while the agency's current predicament is not unprecedented, "it is unsettling." He insisted that while agents have their political leanings, they rigorously put them aside on the job, and that only "a few people" had compromised that.

"Their impartiality, their lack of a political agenda has been compromised to some extent via a few people," he noted. Most analysts have dismissed the criticisms in the so-called "Nunes memo" released by the House Intelligence Committee on Friday as deeply distorted and unfair to the FBI.

But current and former agents say Wray needs to strongly defend the agency -- while clearing the cloud of political bias hanging over the staff. "Wray needs to stress among the rank and file that the FBI must be seen as apolitical and cannot let their personal opinions affect their investigative actions," Ringel said.Athens, Feb 4 (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Tens of thousands of Greeks staged a mass rally in Athens Sunday, urging the government not to compromise in a festering name row with neighbouring Macedonia.

As a huge Greek flag flew over central Syntagma Square, Greeks from all over the country and abroad chanted "Hands off Macedonia", "Macedonia is Greek" and "We won't leave until we are vindicated".

Athens objects to Macedonia's name, arguing it suggests that Skopje has claims to the territory and heritage of Greece's historic northern region of the same name. However, leftist Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has been considering a resolution to the 27-year-old dispute, angering many opposition members and his own nationalist coalition partners.

Among those in the crowd was former premier Antonis Samaras -- who was foreign minister when the name dispute began in 1991 -- along with mayors, senior clerics and army officers. Organisers said they expected around a million participants on Syntagma Square.

"Macedonia is Greek and only Greek. They are trying to steal history. We all have to fight and let the world know," said Allia Sarellis, a member of the Greek diaspora who flew in from the United States.

Around 2,500 buses from northern Greece and two ships from Crete brought thousands of demonstrators, reports said. Police declined to give numbers. Some protesters wore traditional garb, including the uniform of Greek guerrillas who fought Bulgarian bands and Ottoman forces in Macedonia in the early 20th century.

"Thousands of Cretans have shed their blood for Macedonia," a bearded Cretan protester told Skai tv. The protest -- the second on the Macedonia issue in a fortnight -- has been organised and funded by Greek diaspora groups, with the support of retired officer associations, cultural unions and church groups.

- 'Don't be intimidated' - Renowned Zorba the Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis will be the keynote speaker despite battling health issues at 92. Theodorakis has trouble walking, but was galvanised after self-styled anarchists vandalised his home with red paint late Saturday.

"I am calm and ready," the resistance icon said after the incident, urging rally participants "not to be intimidated".

Anarchists were planning a counter-protest nearby, with riot police deployed to keep the two crowds apart.

Two weeks ago, tens of thousands had protested in Thessaloniki, the capital of Greece's Macedonia region. Police had estimated the turnout at over 90,000, while organisers claimed at least 400,000 attended.

The dispute has remained unresolved since the former Yugoslav republic's independence in 1991. Greece considers the name "Macedonia" to be part of its own cultural heritage, as the province was the core of Alexander the Great's ancient empire.

Athens seeks guarantees that the use of the name by its neighbour implies no claim to parts of its own territory. The government has accused far-right hardliners and the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party of trying to exploit the issue.

Georgia Bitakou, a journalist and former fight promoter, insists the rally is non-political. "We are all patriots. There are no parties, no colours. Our only goal is to give a mandate to (state) representatives," she said.

- Boost Balkan stability - However, several opposition politicians have indicated they will attend to also protest the government's tax-hiking policies. The government insists the rallies will not affect its determination to solve the issue and boost stability in the often tense Balkan region.

Athens says it is ready to accept a composite name that will establish a clear distinction from Greek Macedonia. "The government is trying to give a patriotic solution to a problem that has troubled the country, its international relations and its diplomacy for over 25 years," government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said Sunday.

"Not having a solution undermines our national interest," Prime Minister Tsipras said last week. Because of Greece's objections, Macedonia in 1993 joined the United Nations as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM).

To break the deadlock, longterm UN mediator Matthew Nimetz has now proposed several alternative Names in Macedonian, including "Republika Nova Makedonija" or the "Republic of New Macedonia". A resolution of the issue is needed before Macedonia can join NATO or the EU.Athens, Feb 4 (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 04th Feb, 2018 ) :Tens of thousands of Greeks were expected to urge the government Sunday not to compromise in a festering name row with neighbouring Macedonia, at a mass rally in Athens that organisers vow will be "majestic".

Athens objects to Macedonia's name, arguing it suggests that Skopje has claims to the territory and heritage of Greece's historic northern region of the same name. However, leftist Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has been considering a resolution to the 27-year-old dispute, angering many opposition members and his own nationalist coalition partners.

Hours before Sunday's rally was scheduled to start at 1200 GMT, crowds of flag-bearing Greeks were heading towards central Syntagma square in the capital. Organisers said they expected around a million participants on Syntagma Square, with many travelling from across the country or even abroad.

"Macedonia is Greek and only Greek. They are trying to steal history. We all have to fight and let the world know," said Allia Sarellis, a member of the Greek diaspora who flew in from the United States.

Around 2,500 buses from northern Greece and two ships from Crete were bringing thousands of demonstrators, reports said. Police declined to give numbers. Several protesters wore traditional garb, including the uniform of Greek guerrillas who fought Bulgarian bands and Ottoman forces in Macedonia in the early 20th century.

"Thousands of Cretans have shed their blood for Macedonia," a bearded Cretan protester told Skai tv. The protest -- the second on the Macedonia issue in a fortnight -- has been organised and funded by Greek diaspora groups, with the support of retired officer associations, cultural unions and church groups.

"It will be majestic... It will send a very strong message both inside and outside Greece," rally spokesman Michalis Patsikas told reporters midweek. - 'Don't be intimidated' - Renowned Zorba the Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis is expected to be the keynote speaker despite battling health issues at 92.

Theodorakis has trouble walking, but was galvanised after self-styled anarchists vandalised his home with red paint late Saturday. "I am calm and ready," the resistance icon said after the incident, urging rally participants "not to be intimidated".

Anarchists were planning a counter-protest nearby, with riot police deployed to keep the two crowds apart. Two weeks ago, tens of thousands had protested in Thessaloniki, the capital of Greece's Macedonia region.

Police had estimated the turnout at over 90,000, while organisers claimed at least 400,000 attended. "(Turnout) will be at least triple that of Thessaloniki. There are no tickets left for people to come from Thessaloniki and Crete," Patsikas said.

The dispute has remained unresolved since the former Yugoslav republic's independence in 1991. Greece considers the name "Macedonia" to be part of its own cultural heritage, as the province was the core of Alexander the Great's ancient empire.

Athens seeks guarantees that the use of the name by its neighbour implies no claim to parts of its own territory. The government has accused far-right hardliners and the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party of trying to exploit the issue.

Georgia Bitakou, a journalist and former fight promoter, insists the rally is non-political. "We are all patriots. There are no parties, no colours. Our only goal is to give a mandate to (state) representatives," she said.

- Boost Balkan stability - However, several opposition politicians have indicated they will attend to also protest the government's tax-hiking policies. The government insists the rallies will not affect its determination to solve the issue and boost stability in the often tense Balkan region.

Athens says it is ready to accept a composite name that will establish a clear distinction from Greek Macedonia. "The government is trying to give a patriotic solution to a problem that has troubled the country, its international relations and its diplomacy for over 25 years," government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said Sunday.

"Not having a solution undermines our national interest," Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said last week. Because of Greece's objections, Macedonia in 1993 joined the United Nations as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM).

To break the deadlock, longterm UN mediator Matthew Nimetz has now proposed several alternative Names in Macedonian, including "Republika Nova Makedonija" or the "Republic of New Macedonia". A resolution of the issue is needed before Macedonia can join NATO or the EU.(@rukhshanmir)

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres Saturday called on the Maldivian government to respect a Supreme Court ruling ordering the release of convicted opposition leaders, saying the UN was ready to help ease the political impasse in the country

UNITED NATIONS, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 03rd Feb, 2018 ) :Secretary-General Antonio Guterres Saturday called on the Maldivian government to respect a Supreme Court ruling ordering the release of convicted opposition leaders, saying the UN was ready to help ease the political impasse in the country.

The Secretary-General takes note of the important ruling by the Supreme Court and calls on the Government to respect it, a statement issued by his Spokesman St phane Dujarric said. The Secretary-General reiterates his belief in finding a solution to the political stalemate in the Maldives through all-party talks, which the United Nations continues to stand ready to facilitate, the statement added.

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the convictions of senior Maldivian opposition figures were questionable and politically motivated, overturned those verdicts, and ordered new trials. It also reinstated 12 parliamentarians who were expelled for defecting from President Abdulla Yameen's party.

The court ruling represents a major setback for President Yameen, and paves the way for the return of his rival Mohamed Nasheed -- whom he controversially defeated in 2013. On Friday, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) also urged the Government of the Maldives to fully respect the Supreme Court decision, which also overturned the conviction of former President Mohamed Nasheed and ordered to retry his case.

We are concerned by what appears to be an initial heavy-handed reaction by security forces in the capital Mal against people celebrating the Court's decision, Spokesperson Rupert Colville told reporters at a press briefing in Geneva, Switzerland, urging them to show understanding and restraint, and to act in full accordance with international laws and standards governing the policing of protests and other forms of public assembly.

"We also urge all those celebrating, or protesting, to do so in a peaceful fashion," he added.A Syrian rebel group linked to al-Qaida is claiming responsibility for shooting down a Russian jet near the rebel-held town of Saraqeb, Syria.

Russia's Defense Ministry confirmed the shoot-down on Saturday and said the pilot was killed by rebels after parachuting to the ground.

Syrian monitors and the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the pilot was flying a Russian-made Su-25 jet  a low-flying twin-engine aircraft designed to support ground troops  when the aircraft was damaged. Multiple witnesses on the ground say the pilot was killed after opening fire on rebels trying to capture him.

The rebel group Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) claimed responsibility and posted video of the flaming wreckage on its Ebaa News Agency, where it was monitored by the SITE intelligence service.

HTS is also known as al-Qaida in Syria and contains elements of the former al-Nusra Front, though it claims to be independent from the main body of al-Qaida.

Some reports say this is the first time rebels have shot down a Russian warplane from the ground in Syria.

HTS quoted a rebel commander saying, the shootdown "is the least that could be done to avenge our people, and to let the criminal assailants know that our skies are not a park for them to fly across without paying the price, with permission from Allah the Almighty."

A photo provided by the Ibaa News Agency, the medi A photo provided by the Ibaa News Agency, the media arm of al-Qaidas branch in Syria, reportedly shows part of a Russian jet that was shot down by rebel fighters over Idlib province in Syria, Feb. 3, 2018. A photo provided by the Ibaa News Agency, the media arm of al-Qaidas branch in Syria, reportedly shows part of a Russian jet that was shot down by rebel fighters over Idlib province in Syria, Feb. 3, 2018.

The incident took place in the northwestern province of Idlib, where the jet would have been supporting pro-government Syrian troops attacking Saraqeb.

Syrian government troops have been trying to gain access to a key highway that connects two of Syria's largest cities: Aleppo and Damascus.WASHINGTON - U.S. President Donald Trump is contending that a controversial memo alleging that the FBI abused its power in probing Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election "totally vindicates" him, but that view was challenged Sunday by one of the memo's own authors.

Trump complained in a Saturday Twitter comment that the "Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!"

This memo totally vindicates Trump in probe. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 3, 2018

But Congressman Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, one of the key authors of the Republican memo released by the House Intelligence Committee, told CBS's "Face the Nation" on Sunday that the document does not undermine the months-long investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into the Russian campaign meddling or whether Trump obstructed justice in trying to curb the probe.

House Benghazi Committee Chairman Representative T FILE - House Benghazi Committee Chairman Representative Trey Gowdy is seen prior to the start of the committee's hearing on Benghazi, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Oct. 22, 2015. FILE - House Benghazi Committee Chairman Representative Trey Gowdy is seen prior to the start of the committee's hearing on Benghazi, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Oct. 22, 2015.

The four-page "Nunes memo," named after the House Intelligence panel chairman, Congressman Devin Nunes of California, concluded that the Federal Bureau of Investigation relied excessively on opposition research funded by Democrats in a dossier compiled by a former British spy, Christopher Steele, as its sought approval from a U.S. surveillance court in October 2016 to monitor Carter Page, a Trump campaign adviser, and his links to Russia.

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., attends a speech by Pr Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., attends a speech by President Donald Trump at the 2018 House and Senate Republican Member Conference at The Greenbrier, in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, Feb. 1, 2018. Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., attends a speech by President Donald Trump at the 2018 House and Senate Republican Member Conference at The Greenbrier, in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, Feb. 1, 2018.

But the memo notes that the FBI investigation that eventually led to Mueller's probe started months earlier, in July 2016, when agents began looking into contacts between another Trump adviser, George Papadopoulos, and Russian operatives. Papadopoulos, as part of Mueller's probe, has pleaded guilty to lying to investigators about his Russian contacts and, pending his sentencing, is cooperating with Mueller's investigation.

Gowdy said in the television interview that "there is a Russia investigation without a [Steele] dossier" because of other Trump campaign links to Russia, including a June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower in New York set up by Trump's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., on the premise that a Russian lawyer would hand over incriminating evidence on Trump's election opponent, Democrat Hillary Clinton. Gowdy said the Steele dossier "also doesn't have anything to do with obstruction of justice."

Another Republican on the Intelligence panel, Congressman Chris Stewart of Utah, told Fox News, "I think it would be a mistake for anyone to suggest the special counsel should not continue his work. This memo, frankly, has nothing to do at all with the special counsel."

Democratic lawmakers opposed to Friday's release of the memo say that as soon as Monday they will seek the Intelligence committee's approval to release their counter interpretation of the classified information underlying the Nunes document. The Democrats contend that the Republican-approved statement "cherry-picks" information and overstates the importance of the Steele dossier in the FBI's effort to win approval from the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court for the monitoring of Page's activities.

Democratic Congressman Jerrold Nadler of New York said the memo released by the Republicans "is a disgrace. House Republicans should be ashamed."

Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer, in a letter Sunday, pushed Trump to approve release of the Democratic response to the Nunes memo, saying Americans should "be allowed to see both sides of the argument and make their own judgments."

Ahead of Trump's approval of release of the Republican-backed House Intelligence panel's memo, the FBI said it had "grave concerns" about its accuracy because of omissions concerning its request to the surveillance court to monitor Page. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who is overseeing the Mueller investigation, also opposed its release.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein speaks befo Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein speaks before a House Committee on the Judiciary oversight hearing on Capitol Hill, Dec. 13, 2017. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein speaks before a House Committee on the Judiciary oversight hearing on Capitol Hill, Dec. 13, 2017.

Rosenstein was one of several Justice Department officials who signed off on the request to the surveillance court to monitor Page, leaving some Trump critics to voice fears that Trump would soon fire Rosenstein.

When asked Friday whether he still had confidence in Rosenstein or was likely to fire him, Trump said, You figure that one out.

Later, however, White House spokesman Raj Shah, said on Fox News, "Rod Rosenstein's job is not on the line. We expect him to continue his job as deputy attorney general."

FBI, DOJ response

?After the memo's release, the FBI on Friday re-issued its statement saying the agency takes seriously its obligations to the FISA Court and its compliance with procedures overseen by career professionals.

The FBI noted it was given limited opportunity to review the document before lawmakers voted to release it. As expressed during our initial review, we have grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memos accuracy, the agency said.

FILE - A member of the news media walks in front o FILE - A member of the news media walks in front of the FBI headquarters building early in the morning in Washington, May 10, 2017. FILE - A member of the news media walks in front of the FBI headquarters building early in the morning in Washington, May 10, 2017.

Nunes issued a statement Friday expressing hope that the actions of Intelligence Committee Republicans would shine a light on what he called this alarming series of events.



The committee has discovered serious violations of the public trust, and the American people have a right to know when officials in crucial institutions are abusing their authority for political purposes, Nunes said. Our intelligence and law enforcement agencies exist to defend the American people, not to be exploited to target one group on behalf of another.



Attorney General Jeff Sessions weighed in on the memos release Friday, saying, he has "great confidence in the men and women of this Department [of Justice]. But no department is perfect."



FBI Director Christopher Wray, who was appointed by Trump, told agency employees Friday that he stood with them. "I stand by our shared determination to do our work independently and by the book," Wray said in a statement to 35,000 FBI staff.

Watch:

|Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades won reelection to second five-year term Sunday, promising to continue economic recovery and the island's reunification efforts.



The conservative Anastasiades beat his leftist challenger Stavros Malas 56 to 44 percent. The two also faced-off in the 2013 election.



"I will continue to be president for all Cypriots," Anastasiades told cheering supporters in Nicosia. "Tonight, there are no winners of losers. There is only a Cyprus for all of us."



Malas told his backers they can be disappointed, but said "the battle" does not begin or end with a single election. He said he telephoned Anastasiades and told him to "take care of our Cyprus."



Anastasiades is credited with helping the Greek Cypriot economy bounce back from a severe recession that required a bailout from the European Union and International Monetary Fund.



But there has been little progress in U.N.-sponsored reunification talks with the Turkish Cypriot north.



Anastasiades promises to resist Turkish demands to keep a military presence on a reunified Cyprus and continue oil and gas exploration off the Greek Cypriot coast  an enterprise that also angers Turkish Cypriots.



Cyprus has been split between a Greek Cypriot south and Turkish Cypriot north since 1974, when Turkish forces invaded in response to a military coup aimed at unifying the entire island with Greece.



Only Turkey recognizes an independent northern Cyprus while the southern half enjoys international recognition and the economic benefits of EU membership.CINCINNATI - President Donald Trump heads to Ohio on Monday to make Cincinnati-area stops focusing on the new tax overhaul  though some in a state with one of the nation's highest overdose rates would rather hear more about his plans for the drug crisis.

In Newtown, outside Cincinnati, Police Chief Tom Synan said he found Trump's comments on opioids in his State of the Union address to be "much of the same. There are very convincing words and there's yet to be very convincing actions."

Synan, a law enforcement representative on the Cincinnati-based Hamilton County Heroin Coalition, wrote a column recently for The Cincinnati Enquirer calling for more urgency in the national response.

Trump's declaration of a public health emergency in October, he wrote, hasn't been backed by more federal funding.

"We need that help to allow us to get to the next level," Synan said in an interview. "There are so many more things that could be done, so many more people we could help."

The White House didn't respond to a request for comment.

Trump,in his State of the Union address Tuesday, cited the deaths of 64,000 Americans from drug overdoses in 2016, a number expected to larger in 2017.

"It is terrible," Trump said. "We have to do something about it."

Supporters applaud as they watch President Donald Supporters applaud as they watch President Donald Trump speak at a State of the Union watch party hosted by the Hamilton County Republican Party, Jan. 30, 2018, in Cincinnati. Supporters applaud as they watch President Donald Trump speak at a State of the Union watch party hosted by the Hamilton County Republican Party, Jan. 30, 2018, in Cincinnati.

Trump said his administration was committed to fighting the problem and getting more treatment for those needing it. Stepped-up border security will help fight the drug influx, he said, and the nation needs to get "much tougher" on drug dealers to stop what he called "this scourge."

The Ohio president of the Fraternal Order of Police, Jay McDonald, attended the State of the Union speech as a guest of Republican U.S. Senator Rob Portman.

"I think he hit the nail on the head about the scope of the problem," said McDonald, of Marion in central Ohio. "I like the fact he said we need to be tough on traffickers and provide treatment to those addicted."

McDonald said he'd like to see Trump and Ohio leaders address the "drastic need for a proven prevention plan" aimed at heading off youth involvement with drugs.

Hamilton County Heroin Coalition chairwoman Denise Driehaus, a Democratic county commissioner, said she would welcome a Trump visit to discuss what's needed from the federal government for the opioid battle.

"We'd ask him to partner with us," she said. "We're limited by lack of resources."

She and Synan suggested federal, state and local authorities could coordinate for a "one-stop shop" to link drug users with treatment options, getting insurance, diversion programs and other needs. More federal funding and regulation and policy changes could expand capacity for treatment and recovery, they said.

Ohio reported 4,050 overdose deaths in 2016, the second-highest overdose death rate after neighboring West Virginia.IOWA CITY, IOWA - Republicans who control a majority of the nations statehouses are considering a wide range of abortion legislation that could test the governments legal ability to restrict a womans right to terminate a pregnancy.

The Mississippi House passed a bill Friday that would make the state the only one to ban all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. In Missouri, lawmakers heard testimony earlier in the week on a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks.

The Ohio House is expected to consider bills, already passed in the Senate, that would prohibit the most common type of procedure used to end pregnancies after 13 weeks and require that fetal remains be buried or cremated.

Rep. Becky Currie, R-Brookhaven, a registered nurs Rep. Becky Currie, R-Brookhaven, a registered nurse, explains a portion of House Bill 1510, which could make the state the first to ban most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy in House chambers at the Capitol in Jackson, Miss., Feb. 2, 2018. Rep. Becky Currie, R-Brookhaven, a registered nurse, explains a portion of House Bill 1510, which could make the state the first to ban most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy in House chambers at the Capitol in Jackson, Miss., Feb. 2, 2018.

?Crucial question

Abortion is a perennial hot button issue in statehouses across the country. Republican-controlled states have passed hundreds of bills since 2011 restricting access to the procedure while Democratic-led states have taken steps in the other direction.

The early weeks of this years state legislative sessions have seen a flurry of activity around the issue. It comes as activists on both sides say they expect the U.S. Supreme Court to soon consider a question that remains unclear: How far can states go in restricting abortion in the interest of preserving and promoting fetal life?

The state bills debated since the start of the year are all tests designed to see how far government power to legislate on behalf of a fetus can reach, said Jessica Mason Pieklo, who has been tracking legislation as the senior legal analyst for Rewire, a website that promotes views supporting abortion rights.

She said the outcome will determine whether states can legally ban abortion after a specific time period and outlaw specific medical procedures. Advocates for abortion rights say those strategies undermine the Supreme Courts 1973 ruling that women have the right to terminate pregnancies until a fetus is viable.

Republican Rep. Karianne Lisonbee speaks during a Republican Rep. Karianne Lisonbee speaks during a committee hearing at the Utah State Capitol, Jan. 25, 2018, in Salt Lake City. A committee of Utah lawmakers has pushed forward a bill that would bar doctors from performing abortions sought because the fetus has Down syndrome. Republican Rep. Karianne Lisonbee speaks during a committee hearing at the Utah State Capitol, Jan. 25, 2018, in Salt Lake City. A committee of Utah lawmakers has pushed forward a bill that would bar doctors from performing abortions sought because the fetus has Down syndrome.

?Women speak out

In Utah, critics have warned that a pending bill to prevent doctors from performing abortions on the basis of a Down syndrome diagnosis is unconstitutional. But its co-sponsor, Republican state Sen. Curt Bramble, said he is willing to defend the bill in court because its goal is to protect unborn children.

There are times if the Supreme Court got it wrong, it is appropriate to push back, said Bramble, an accountant from Provo.

The anti-abortion bills have drawn opposition from women who say they have made the excruciating choice to terminate a pregnancy, often after discovering serious fetal abnormalities.

A 20-week abortion ban sounds OK, but if that gets passed, whats next  18 weeks, 15 weeks? At what point does it make abortion truly illegal? said Robin Utz of St. Louis, 38, who submitted testimony this week against the Missouri bill. Its terrifying and its willfully ignorant.

Utz recounted terminating her pregnancy in its 21st week in November 2016, after learning her daughter would be born with a fatal kidney disease if she survived birth. She said doctors told her that dilation and evacuation, the most common abortion procedure in the second trimester, was the safest way to terminate the pregnancy.

Court challenges underway

Undeterred by such stories, the National Right to Life Committee and its allies have been pushing for state laws that ban abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy and outlaw dilation and evacuation. Supporters of both measures argue that fetuses are capable of feeling pain after 20 weeks and call the procedure dismemberment abortion.

Several court challenges to both types of laws are underway, with federal appeals courts considering the dismemberment abortion bans approved last year in Texas and Arkansas. The Kansas Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on the first-in-the-nation ban passed in that state three years ago.

Ingrid Duran, director of state legislation at the National Right to Life Committee, said the model state laws drafted by her group are aimed at U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, a swing vote who wrote the courts 2007 opinion upholding a federal ban on a procedure critics call partial-birth abortion.

She said the court could use similar reasoning to prohibit dilation and evacuation and noted it has never considered whether states have an interest in protecting fetuses from pain.

We did draft these laws with the bigger picture in mind, Duran said.

Texas ruling shifts focus

The shifted focus comes after the court dealt the anti-abortion movement a blow in 2016 by ruling that strict Texas regulations on abortion clinics and doctors were an undue burden on abortion access and unconstitutional.

Anti-abortion groups hope President Donald Trump will be able to nominate one or more justices to the Supreme Court following last years confirmation of Neil Gorsuch, potentially making the court more conservative on the issue for decades to come.

In the meantime, some of them are cautioning their allies not to go too far.

Duran said the proposed 15-week ban in Mississippi, which now goes to the state Senate, caught her by surprise. She noted that prior state laws banning abortion after 12 weeks or once a heartbeat was detected have been found unconstitutional.

In South Carolina this past week, state senators tabled a bill that would have banned most abortions to give lawmakers more time to study the consequences. Also last week, a legislative committee in Tennessee amended a bill to remove language that would have outlawed abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detectable, which is usually around six weeks. The bills sponsor, Republican Rep. Micah Van Huss, said he would be back.

I will not stop fighting for the lives of babies until abortion is abolished in this state, he said.Tens of thousands of demonstrators marched in Athens Sunday to protest a potential compromise between Greece and Macedonia over a long-standing name dispute.

Police estimated a crowd size of about 140,000, while organizers of the march claimed 1.5 million people from Greece and the Greek diaspora gathered to urge the government against brokering a deal regarding neighboring Macedonia's official name.

"The million protesters that the organizers imagined was wishful thinking," Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said in a statement released by his office.

"The crushing majority of Greek people conclude that foreign policy issues should not be dealt with with fanaticism."

Greece and Macedonia have been feuding over who gets to use the name since Macedonia's independence from Yugoslavia in 1991. Many Greeks say allowing the neighboring country to use the name insults Greek history and implies a claim on the Greek territory also known as Macedonia  a key province in Alexander the Great's ancient empire.

Greece has blocked Macedonian efforts to join the European Union and NATO because of the name dispute. The country of Macedonia is officially known at the U.N. as the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

But Tsipras, a leftist, has been open to negotiating a compromise in the 27-year dispute, sparking protests in both nations.

Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev said in recent weeks his country would rename an airport and a major road after Alexander the Great "to demonstrate, in practice, that we are committed to finding a solution."WASHINGTON - Having survived popular protests across major cities in Iran, Iranian leaders are now turning to the tools that helped protesters organize and coordinate large-scale demonstrations against the government, which continued for more than a week before the government suppressed them.

A senior Iranian official this week urged the countrys cyberspace authorities to remain vigilant and prevent another potential wave of protests.

On the sidelines of a technical summit in the capital Tehran, where high-ranking officials gathered to discuss the countrys technological challenges, General Gholamreza Jalali expressed concerns over the possibility of yet another round of popular protests aided by social media and the internet.

Jalali is head of Irans Civil Defense Organization.

FILE - In this Dec. 30, 2017 file photo, taken by FILE - In this Dec. 30, 2017 file photo, taken by an individual not employed by the Associated Press and obtained by the AP outside Iran, university students attend an anti-government protest inside Tehran University, in Tehran, Iran. FILE - In this Dec. 30, 2017 file photo, taken by an individual not employed by the Associated Press and obtained by the AP outside Iran, university students attend an anti-government protest inside Tehran University, in Tehran, Iran.

In December 2017, tens of thousands of Iranians took to the streets to protest, among other things, the countrys economic policies and the governments inability to provide economic opportunities for its citizens. Protesters were also demanding more civil liberties.

The countrys Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, met with cyberspace experts to brainstorm ideas to address what they saw as the challenges and threats that the internet and social media platforms pose to the leadership of the Islamic Republic.

Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, head of the powerful Guardians Council, told Tasnim news agency, a hard-line media outlet with ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), that Khamenei ordered the meeting to take place.

Iranian senior cleric Ahmad Khatami delivers his s FILE - Iranian senior cleric Ahmad Khatami delivers his sermon during Friday prayer ceremony in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 5, 2018. FILE - Iranian senior cleric Ahmad Khatami delivers his sermon during Friday prayer ceremony in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 5, 2018.

?It will bite again

Jannati, who did not give details of the meeting, said the government must have full control over the internet.

Im not saying it [internet] has to be fully blocked, Jannati reportedly said. Thats impossible. But we have to reduce [control] it.

Iranian leaders and their supporters voiced what it sees as the threats posed by peoples access to the internet.

Cyberspace as a platform for foreigners is a mad dog, Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami, a hard-line cleric and interim sermon to Tehrans Friday prayer said last month.

If left alone, it will bite again, Khatami added.

Some analysts believe the recent rhetoric against the internet could mean more restrictions.

The recent quotes we hear these days implies that authorities are preparing grounds for a new round of social media ban in Iran, a Tehran-based media analyst, who spoke to VOA on condition of anonymity, said.

It seems that the Iranian supreme leader wants more control over social media platforms, and no one dares to oppose him on that subject, the analyst added.

Government blocking

Iranian authorities regularly block news websites and social media platforms in addition to blocking foreign television and radio broadcasts to the country.

In an effort to control the flow of communication, the government steers local IP addresses to a domestic internet dubbed National Data Network, where it monitors peoples communication exchanges.

To avoid government surveillance, some users have found ways to bypass blocks put in place by authorities.

Now government officials are signaling they might target encrypted messaging platforms.

Hard-liners are targeting social media that can be used as an untraceable means of communication, Mohammad Ali Khorassani, a U.K.-based social media analyst, said.

These new forms of media are harder to track down and easier to convey encrypted mass messages and (are) very suitable for promoting campaigns, Khorassani added.

In some cases, when a government cannot monitor some communication platforms, the other solution is complete blockage.

As the protests gained momentum last December, the government blocked Telegram and Instagram in parts of the country. The two social media applications are widely used across the country.

The block stayed in place for several days until the protests waned. President Hassan Rouhani, who to some extent owes his victory of last years presidential election to these social media platforms, ordered the restoration of the services.

FILE - The messaging app Telegram is displayed on The messaging app Telegram is displayed on a smartphone, July 15, 2017, in Bangkok, Thailand. The messaging app Telegram is displayed on a smartphone, July 15, 2017, in Bangkok, Thailand.

?Telegram: A nightmare

For those in charge of monitoring the internet in Iran, the encrypted Telegram application is a constant headache and a nightmare.

Its not acceptable for people to use a monopolized social media, Mahmoud Vaezi, Rouhanis chief of staff, told reporters January 17, referring to only Telegram.

Founder and CEO of Telegram Pavel Durov delivers a Founder and CEO of Telegram Pavel Durov delivers a keynote speech during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain Feb. 23, 2016. Founder and CEO of Telegram Pavel Durov delivers a keynote speech during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain Feb. 23, 2016.

According to Pavel Durov, the Russian CEO and co-founder of Telegram, the messaging application has an estimated 40 million active users in Iran. Iranian officials, however say the popular social messaging tool has 30 million users, which is still a considerable number of the countrys nearly 80 million population.

The servers of any social media website or application that has more than 30 million Iranian members should not be outside the country, Jalali, the head of Irans Civil Defense Organization, said in 2017.

This is a national security necessity and not a political one, Jalali claimed.

Telegrams imminent blockage

Iranian authorities reportedly requested Durov to transfer its servers to Iran. When the company declined, prosecutors in Tehran filed a case against the company, alleging that the application provided terror groups like the Islamic State a platform for communication.

U.K.-based social media analyst Mohammad Ali Khorassani said it is just a matter of time before the government blocks Telegram.

The Telegram app, which is the most used app among Iranians, is the No. 1 target of this new blockage, Khorassani said.

The government is also pushing alternative applications, developed by Iranians, in an effort to discourage people from using the encrypted Telegram.

Last month, the official account of Irans Supreme Leader on Telegram announced the launch of an account for iGap and Soroush, which are applications similar to Telegram in function but that are controlled by the government.

In its latest report, the London-based Small Media Foundation, which monitors violations of the free flow of information, interpreted the move as a possible sign of a coming ban on Telegram in Iran.Israel's prime minister says an isolated West Bank outpost will be legalized in response to the recent murder of a rabbi who lived there.

Benjamin Netanyahu said at a Cabinet meeting Sunday that the government "will today regularize the status of Havat Gilad to allow the continuance of normal life there."

The prime minister said that those who try to "break our spirit and weaken us made a grave mistake."

Legalizing the unauthorized outpost, located "deep inside the West Bank," will enable it to receive government building permits and a state budget.

Israelis carry the body of Raziel Shevah during hi Israelis carry the body of Raziel Shevah during his funeral in Havat Gilad, an unauthorized Israeli settlement outpost near the Palestinian city of Nablus, Jan. 10, 2018. Israelis carry the body of Raziel Shevah during his funeral in Havat Gilad, an unauthorized Israeli settlement outpost near the Palestinian city of Nablus, Jan. 10, 2018.

Rabbi Raziel Shevah, a 35-year-old father of six, was shot dead near his Havat Gilad home.

There were calls for revenge at Shevah's funeral during a speech by Education Minister Naftali Bennett who said the only revenge should be the building of more settlements.

Israel does not approve all settlements. The unapproved ones are known as outposts and tend to be populated by hardline religious nationalists who see the entire West Bank as part of Israel.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and major obstacles to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

The anti-settlement Peace Now group says the legalizing of Havat Gilad is a "cynical exploitation" of Shevah's murder.BURQIN, WEST BANK - Israeli soldiers shot and killed a Palestinian teenager during an arrest raid in the village of Burqin in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian health officials said Saturday.

A Reuters witness said about 200 Palestinians were throwing stones at Israeli military vehicles when a gunshot was heard, adding that a wounded person was then carried to a car.

Israels military said its forces had been searching in Burqin for suspects involved in the fatal drive-by shooting of an Israeli rabbi from a nearby settlement Jan. 9.

A military spokeswoman said rioting had broken out while troops were apprehending several suspects connected with that shooting and troops responded with non-fatal riot dispersal means against Palestinians throwing rocks and firebombs and then with live gunfire at the main instigators.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said the teenager killed Saturday was 19 years old. The hospital in Jenin where he was taken said he had been shot in the head.

The Israeli military spokeswoman said he had climbed onto a military vehicle and had opened its door before he was shot.

Israeli forces in the adjacent city of Jenin last month shot and killed a Palestinian gunman whom they had also suspected of involvement in the rabbis shooting.

Tensions in the region have risen since U.S. President Donald Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israels capital in December. Since then at least 20 Palestinians and one Israeli have been killed.

Trumps reversal of decades of U.S. policy enraged Palestinians, who want to create an independent state in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

Israel captured those territories in the 1967 Middle East War and annexed East Jerusalem in a move not recognized internationally. It says the entire city is its eternal, indivisible capital. It pulled out of Gaza in 2005.

U.S.-led peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians broke down in 2014. A bid by Trumps administration to restart negotiations has shown no real signs of progress.SYDNEY - There is grief and anger on the small South Pacific Island nation of Kiribati after the disappearance of a ferry carrying about 80 people. Many of those on board were students heading back to school for the start of term.

This is the worst-ever loss of life on the tiny South Pacific archipelago of Kiribati.

The sinking of an interisland ferry in January is thought to have claimed at least 81 lives, among them many children and teenagers. It is thought that some whole families have drowned.

This photo released by the New Zealand Defence For This photo released by the New Zealand Defence Force shows a wooden dinghy, left, carrying seven survivors from a missing ferry and a fishing boat in the Pacific Ocean, Jan. 28, 2018. This photo released by the New Zealand Defence Force shows a wooden dinghy, left, carrying seven survivors from a missing ferry and a fishing boat in the Pacific Ocean, Jan. 28, 2018.

Only seven survivors have been found, more than a week after the ferry disappeared. They were rescued from a small wooden dinghy that had no engine, water, food or radio. They are reported to be in reasonable health. An international search effort involving New Zealand, Australia and the U.S. was abandoned Friday. Local boats will continue the search, but the expectation is they will be looking for bodies, not survivors.

Former Kiribati President Anote Tong says such loss of life is a terrible blow.

ea aeaaacaaaeaaa A handout photo supplied by the New Zealand Defence Force shows survivors from a ferry that sunk floating in a boat in the sea near the South Pacific nation of Kiribati, Jan. 27, 2018. A handout photo supplied by the New Zealand Defence Force shows survivors from a ferry that sunk floating in a boat in the sea near the South Pacific nation of Kiribati, Jan. 27, 2018.

This is by far the biggest disaster in terms of numbers. It has shocked the nation. The brightest of the islands. These are the ones that go to school, have managed to go to school, and so it will be a very significant impact.

The ferry left on January 18 for what was supposed to have been a routine two-day trip, covering 260 kilometers, but it never arrived at Kiribatis main island of Tarawa.

Kiribati comprises 33 atolls and reef islands that span millions of square kilometers in the Pacific Ocean. The mood among its 115,000 inhabitants has turned from hope to anger. In 2013, another maritime tragedy claimed 35 lives, yet some islanders complain that little appears to have been done to address safety concerns identified after the earlier tragedy.

Politicians are also asking questions after the most recent disaster, and want to know why it took eight days to raise the alarm after the ferry went missing. One Kiribati MP said the missing ferry was unseaworthy and should never have been allowed to set sail.

Kiribati, an archipelago about halfway between Hawaii and Australia, is a former British colony and gained independence in 1979.The island nation of the Maldives is in the midst of a political crisis.



The government has warned its agencies to reject any calls by the country's Supreme Court to impeach President Abdulla Yameen.



"Any Supreme Court order to arrest the president would be unconstitutional and illegal.So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order," Attorney General Mohamed Anil said Sunday in a national television address.



The top court last week ordered the release of nine political dissidents and 12 lawmakers who oppose the president, including exiled former president Mohammed Nasheed. Nasheed was the country's first democratically elected leader.



The judges said the cases were politically motivated.



With the 12 lawmakers returned to parliament, the opposition would have a majority.



Also Sunday, Parliament Secretary-General Ahmed Mohamed resigned unexpectedly.



On Saturday, parliament announced the cancellation of its opening session and shut down indefinitely. Parliament was scheduled to open Monday with an address from President Yameen.



Democratic gains in the Maldives have eroded under the leadership of Yameen, who has conducted a crackdown on the opposition and the press.Mexican officials say they have found about 300 Central American migrants crammed into two trucks in two Gulf Coast states.

The Mexican National Immigration Institute said in a statement late Saturday the men women and children were found in dangerous conditions,without proper ventilation, food or water.

Mexican authorities arrested three people on suspicion of human trafficking.

The largest group, 198 migrants from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, were detected by scanners when their truck was stopped before dawn at a checkpoint in Tamaulipas state just south of the Texas border.



The migrants told authorities they began their journey in Tabasco State and traveled through Veracruz to reach Tamaulipas.



In a separate statement authorities said that a truck was found Friday afternoon in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz, carrying 102 Central Americans, among them dozens of children, who displayed signs of dehydration and suffocation'' and whose lives were at risk.

Amnesty International warning



Amnesty International said in a recent report that Mexican migration authorities have routinely returned thousands of people from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras without considering the risk to their life and security upon return.

Rather than providing them with the protection they are entitled to, Mexico is unlawfully turning its back on these people in need, the Amnesty report said.

The so-called Northern Triangle countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras are a major source of illegal migrants being smuggled into the U.S., where President Donald Trump has promised to clamp down on both legal and illegal migration and build a wall along the Mexican border.Two sisters in Massachusetts were charged after they allegedly performed a voodoo ritual on a 5-year-old girl, burning and permanently disfiguring her, Massachusetts police said.

A Haitian hairstylist said she believed her two children  the 5-year-old girl and an 8-year-old boy  were misbehaving "due to evil spirits," and sought the help of sisters Peggy LaBossiere, 51, and Rachel Hilaire, 40, to rid the children of the demon.

The sisters, of East Bridgewater, Massachusetts, pleaded not guilty on January 29 to charges including mayhem and assault. They told police they had performed "cleansing baths" in the past, according to The Associated Press.

The boy told police his sister was tied down as the women blew fire over her face. He said they also cut the 5-year-old on the arm and collarbone, drawing blood. He said the women also threatened to cut his head off with a machete.

The girl suffered third-degree burns on her face.

The women denied harming or threatening the children. They next appear in court Wednesday.

The children's mother, who has not been charged, is receiving mental health treatment, according to AP.

Voodoo is a religion that evolved in the 17th century when colonists brought slaves to Haiti from West Africa.U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's Latin American tour took him Saturday to Argentina, where he talked with officials about conservation and diplomacy.

Traveling from Mexico City after meeting with the Mexican president and other senior officials on Friday, Tillerson arrived in Bariloche, a lakeside resort town in Argentinas Nahuel Huapi National Park.

Local news reports said Tillerson met with park rangers to discuss progress made in joint U.S.-Argentine projects on science and conservation issues. He also met with a student selected for the U.S. Fulbright scholarship program.

Tillerson was scheduled to visit the Argentine capital, Buenos Aires, to meet with his counterpart, Jorge Faurie.

On Monday, Tillerson is set to meet with Argentina President Mauricio Macri to discuss regional issues, including upcoming elections and the political crisis in Venezuela.

Before his visit, Tillerson told reporters that he hoped other countries would follow Argentinas lead on making economic reforms and generating growth.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, center, mee U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, center, meets with locals at a horse riding operation in Bariloche, Argentina, Feb. 3, 2018. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, center, meets with locals at a horse riding operation in Bariloche, Argentina, Feb. 3, 2018.

On Friday in Mexico, Tillerson said that immigrants bring "enormous value" to the U.S., but added the U.S. government lacked "good discipline" in regulating who enters the country to live.

'Out of normal order'

After meeting in Mexico City with Mexican Foreign Secretary Luis Videgaray and Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, Tillerson told reporters the U.S. had put "many mechanisms in place" over the years to control immigration, but had "never gone back to clean this up."

"Let's make sure we have systems in place where we understand who's coming into the country," Tillerson said. He said immigration in the U.S. had "gotten out of normal order," which is why President Donald Trump is pushing Congress to "fix these defects that have risen over the years."

The Mexican government has repeatedly expressed opposition to Trump's proposals to curb illegal immigration and have Mexico pay for a reinforced border wall.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is on a six- U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is on a trip to Latin America. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is on a trip to Latin America.

Differences over the issue did not preclude Videgaray from praising the U.S. He said the Mexican government's relationship with the Trump administration was "closer" than it was under former President Barack Obama's administration. Videgaray acknowledged the two countries "do have some differences" but said "we are working closely and we are about results."

Tillerson later held a closed-door meeting with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto during a time when relations have also been strained by U.S. threats to pull out of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

NAFTA, which Trump alleges costs American jobs, was discussed at the trilateral meeting, along with energy development and drug interdiction.

Tillerson's travels through Latin America will also take him to Peru and Colombia, with a final stop in Jamaica on February 7.ISTANBUL - Turkish guards at the border with Syria are indiscriminately shooting at and summarily returning asylum seekers attempting to cross into Turkey, Human Rights Watch said.

A senior Turkish government official denied the report Saturday, repeating that Turkey had taken in 3.5 million war refugees since the Syrian conflict began in 2011.

New York-based Human Rights Watch said Syrians were now fleeing heightened violence in the northwestern province of Idlib to seek refuge near Turkey's border, which remains closed to all but critical medical cases.

Syrian armed forces have thrust deeper into the mainly rebel-held province in recent months, and Turkey last month launched military action in the nearby Afrin region, targeting Kurdish YPG militia fighters.

"Syrians fleeing to the Turkish border seeking safety and asylum are being forced back with bullets and abuse," Lama Fakih, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, when asked about the HRW statement, told reporters that Turkish soldiers were there to protect these people and that Ankara has had an "open-door policy" since the start of Syria's civil war in 2011.

A senior government official later told Reuters: "There has been absolutely no case of civilians being fired upon at the border."

HRW cited U.N. figures saying 247,000 Syrians were displaced to the border area between December 15 and January 15.

Members of Turkish police special forces are seen Members of Turkish police special forces are seen near Mount Barsaya in Qastal village, Azaz city, Syria, Feb. 1, 2018. Members of Turkish police special forces are seen near Mount Barsaya in Qastal village, Azaz city, Syria, Feb. 1, 2018.

"As fighting in Idlib and Afrin displaces thousands more, the number of Syrians trapped along the border willing to risk their lives to reach Turkey is only likely to increase," Fakih said.

In the latest fighting in Afrin, five Turkish soldiers were killed Saturday when their tank was hit in an attack carried out by YPG fighters, Turkey's armed forces said.

Under fire

Of 16 Syrian refugees HRW spoke to, 13 alleged that Turkish border guards had shot toward them or other fleeing asylum seekers as they tried to cross while still in Syria, killing 10 people, including one child, and injuring several more.

Turkey has taken in more Syrian refugees than any other country, granting many temporary protection status and providing them with basic services, including medical care and education.

"However, Turkey's generous hosting of large numbers of Syrians does not absolve it of its responsibility to help those seeking protection at its borders," the HRW statement added.

It said Erdogan's government should issue standard instructions to border guards at all crossing points that lethal force must not be used against asylum seekers and that no asylum seeker is to be mistreated.NEW ORLEANS - When a heavy rain hits New Orleans, residents move their cars to higher ground for fear of fast-rising street flooding. Knee-deep potholes can eat a car's fender. When pressure drops in the city's aging water delivery system, restaurants and cafes have to boil water to feed customers.

Battered by nature and neglect, New Orleans is one of the best examples of what President Donald Trump calls the country's "crumbling infrastructure." But when looking at the billion-dollar needs of this 300-year-old city, two things become apparent: The rebuilding task is immense and it's not clear the president's new plan will help.

The city needs about $11.6 billion to bring key parts of its infrastructure into "this century," said city official Katie Dignan. That means repairing the roads, the infrastructure under them  sewer, water and drainage  as well as other parts of the drainage system that empties the city of water when it rains.

Dignan said the city has about $2 billion available, some from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to mitigate Hurricane Katrina damage and some from other sources. Now, the city faces choices on how to come up with the remainder.

Mayor Mitch Landrieu, who calls the aging sewer, water and drainage system a "prime example" of needed infrastructure work, has doubts about Trump's proposal.

Trump called on Congress to produce a bill that generates "at least $1.5 trillion" for infrastructure investment. But he hasn't detailed how much money the federal government would actually supply and has suggested that much of the money would come from state and local governments or private sector investments.

"What the president is really proposing is not HIS infrastructure plan but basically saying to the states and the cities: 'Build it on your own and find another way to pay for it through raising taxes or cutting services,' " Landrieu, a Democrat and the current president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, said Thursday.

Finding more money is a challenge in a financially strapped Louisiana  and in a city that was facing a major budget deficit when Landrieu took office eight years ago.

Workers fix a sewer main below the sidewalk in Mid Workers fix a sewer main below the sidewalk in Mid City New Orleans, Jan. 31, 2018. New Orleans mayor says President Donald Trumps infrastructure proposal puts the onus on cities and states to raise taxes and fees to pay for the improvements. Workers fix a sewer main below the sidewalk in Mid City New Orleans, Jan. 31, 2018. New Orleans mayor says President Donald Trumps infrastructure proposal puts the onus on cities and states to raise taxes and fees to pay for the improvements.

Landrieu said public-private partnerships can work on some types of projects where there's money to pay back the partner, but poorer cities  often those with the biggest infrastructure problems  are going to have a harder time. Forcing cities like New Orleans to pay for the infrastructure means taking money away from other local priorities, such as housing homeless veterans, he said.

The precariousness of the city's infrastructure was on full display last August when a massive downpour overwhelmed the pumping system and inundated many neighborhoods.

The Broad Theater was still recovering from a previous rainstorm when the August storm hit. Moviegoers evacuated waist-high waters by boat. Manager Michael Domangue lost his car to the flood. The theater closed for seven days and had to refund tickets.

And this damage all happened within sight of a pumping station that's part of the drainage system. Of the $11.6 billion, an estimated $2 billion is needed for long-term repairs and upgrades to the city's pumping system, Dignan said, although she cautioned that figure could change. The other $9.6 billion would go toward fixing the roads and the infrastructure under them. That includes a drinking water system plagued by wasteful leaks and occasional power failures and pressure drops that can let contaminants in  requiring residents to boil water.

Workers fix a sewer main below the sidewalk in Mid Workers fix a sewer main below the sidewalk in Mid City New Orleans, Jan. 31, 2018. City officials say New Orleans needs more than $11 billion to update key parts of its infrastructure but has about $2 billion in hand. Workers fix a sewer main below the sidewalk in Mid City New Orleans, Jan. 31, 2018. City officials say New Orleans needs more than $11 billion to update key parts of its infrastructure but has about $2 billion in hand.

Renee Blanchard owns the Church Alley Coffee Bar. She bought a $3,500 reverse osmosis water filtration system so that she can still make lattes and cappuccinos when the water pressure drops. Blanchard is frustrated that a small business in a big city has to deal with such expensive problems.

"That's ridiculous," she said. "I'm so small. I work most of the hours. I started off with a tiny bit of savings."

All cities have potholes, but the New Orleans streets are in another category. Locals put traffic cones or tires into especially deep potholes to warn other drivers.

"If it rains the day before and it's filled with water, you don't know the pothole's there. You could tear up your car, your front end," Kenny Buras said of his street.

Residents try to take it in stride. During the summer flooding, people canoed through the streets, sometimes with a drink in hand. In May 2016, there was a "Sinkhole de Mayo" party after a massive sinkhole opened up at the foot of Canal Street.

But there's also a real frustration about how problems in New Orleans and elsewhere will be fixed.

Resident James Jensen noted mudslides and fires in California and rising seas in Miami: "There's many New Orleans out there."Please enable cookies on your web browser in order to continue.

The new European data protection law requires us to inform you of the following before you use our website:

We use cookies and other technologies to customize your experience, perform analytics and deliver personalized advertising on our sites, apps and newsletters and across the Internet based on your interests. By clicking I agree below, you consent to the use by us and our third-party partners of cookies and data gathered from your use of our platforms. See our Privacy Policy and Third Party Partners to learn more about the use of data and your rights. You also agree to our Terms of Service.Yoga instructor Ash Bourgeois had some unusual advice for the students in her Saturday morning class.

Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 3/2/2018 (1316 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Yoga instructor Ash Bourgeois had some unusual advice for the students in her Saturday morning class.

"Your mats, they will become frozen if they haven't already," Bourgeois told the group of about thirty chilly yogis as they began the day's movements.

Participants head out onto Lake 3 to work on their sun salutations Saturday morning.

"And that's fine for poses when you're sitting down or lying down, but when you start to stand up, if you find that you're slipping it's okay to move off onto the snow."

It was a far cry from hot yoga. Bourgeois's class took place during an extreme cold warning, with the mercury reading -22C before the windchill.

Kneeling on the frozen surface of Lake 3, one of the artifical bodies of water at the FortWhyte Alive nature centre, Bourgeois used a PA system to help her students hear her instructions through their toques and fur-lined hoods.

"The point of it is to be outside," said Bourgeois, who runs the "Fire + Ice" yoga classes to help raise money for outdoor education programs for youth at FortWhyte Alive.

The stillness of nature, she explained, allows for a special kind of yoga experience.

"I get everyone tuned into the quietness of being outside, especially in winter. Kind of getting into sensations of cold noses and the light winds, and then the water bubbling up under the ice. And then from there we move into some light movement, and then some more heat-building work," she said.

"We goof off in balancing work, which is a different ballgame on snow and on ice, and then from there we do  I mean, I want to use the word 'cool-down,' but not really, it's more of a grounding. And then a meditation, and we close with some fireside tea."

Lindsay Waters spreads her yoga mat on top of a blanket shared with her sister Meghan before the start of the class.

Winnipeg sisters Meghan and Lindsay Waters were at Saturday's ice yoga class for the second year in a row. Last year's class, said Meghan Waters, "wasn't terribly cold once you got moving."

Compared to non-frozen yoga, she said, "you're not as flexible, because you're wearing more clothing, and it's awkward, and I definitely did a couple faceplants in the snow. But it was really fun, and just a neat thing to do in Winnipeg."

"It just seems so Canadian to just be out here doing something that you normally do indoors, in minus thirty degree weather," said Lindsay Waters. "And we pride ourselves on being Canadian women."

Winnipegger Michelle Michayluk and her father Kevin Michayluk was also attending their second annual ice yoga class.

"I made him come with me last year because my friend bailed, and he kind of liked it," she said.

Lindsay Waters inhales the crisp morning air and tunes in to her surroundings.

"I like being in nature for it," she added. "I always have a better time when you're doing yoga actually in nature, instead of in a little studio."

Sharon Desrosiers of Winnipeg pratices yoga weekly at a St. James studio  "but I'm not insane about it," she said.

"Today, I think I might be," laughed Desrosiers.

"The Manitoba winters can get you staying in the house way too much, and I thought, 'You know, if you're going to embrace it, just embrace it.' "

Instructor Ash Bourgeois said her ice yoga students are "really awesome adventurers, so they're pretty stoked."

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Participants work on their cat cow pose during their ice yoga class.

"At the end of the day, they really like it, and they seem to be really loving it. I mean, they keep coming back, so that's a good sign."

It's important for people to get outdoors in all seasons, Bourgeois said.

"Being in nature, I think it's integral to our well-being," she explained.

"And I think nowadays we're always plugged in, right? You have your cellphones, tablets, all the things. And when you get to be outside, the benefits are astronomical for your mind, they are able to help release stress and help release tension. Being in nature brings a level of being present."

solomon.israel@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @sol_israelThe babies had barely breathed their first breaths before they were whisked away from their mothers and tucked into a neonatal intensive care bed for a stay that could last as long as several weeks.

This article was published 3/2/2018 (1317 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The babies had barely breathed their first breaths before they were whisked away from their mothers and tucked into a neonatal intensive care bed for a stay that could last as long as several weeks.

That was the Winnipeg standard four years ago. Any baby who had been exposed to some form of addictive opioid  be it an illegal drug like heroin or a treatment like methadone  while in utero was taken, just in case, for observation.

On a staffing level it was demanding: newborns that need to be weaned off opioids are challenging to care for, requiring someone to almost always be holding them. On a personal note it was emotionally disruptive, a barrier to a mother bonding with her new baby.

"We were wondering if there was a different way," says Lisa Merrill, manager of patient care at the Childrens Hospital neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). There is.

MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS From left: Lynda Tjaden and Lisa Merrill, are responsible for spearheading a program that helps more babies with neonatal abstinence syndrome.

Sometime in 2013, Merrill accompanied her daughter to Vancouver on a gymnastics trip. While there she asked the B.C. Womens Hospital if she could pop in for a quick visit to the Fir Square Combined Care Unit, which bills itself as "the first in Canada to care for women who use substances and their newborns exposed to substances in a single unit."

In December 2014, as a result of what she learned on that trip, Merrill helped launch a Winnipeg pilot project that has yet to end.

How prevalent is neonatal abstinence syndrome? Here's a look at some key statistics about the incidence of neonatal abstinence syndrome. click to read more How prevalent is neonatal abstinence syndrome? Neonatal abstinence syndrome, or NAS, is the name used for a number of problems a newborn can face as a result of being exposed to addictive drugs while in utero. Those drugs include heroin, codeine and oxycontin, as well as opioid treatment drugs such as methadone. In Manitoba, the bulk of the babies born with NAS are treated at Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg. Here is a breakdown of babies born with NAS across the province since 2012. Winnipeg Regional Health Authority 2017: 19 born at St. Boniface (as of August 2017) 28 at HSC (as of June 2017) 2016: 20 born at St. Boniface, 54 at HSC 2015: 16 born at St. Boniface, 61 at HSC 2014: 16 born at St. Boniface, 61 at HSC 2013: 14 born at St. Boniface, 54 at HSC 2012: 13 born at St. Boniface, 54 at HSC Northern Health Authority 2017/2018: 1 (as of Oct. 17, 2017) 2016/2017: 3 2015/2016: 5 2014/2015: 2 2013/2014: 1 2012/2013: 1 2011/2012: 1 Southern Health 2017: 1 (as of Oct. 31, 2017) 2016: 1 2015: 2 2014: 0 2013: 1 2012: 2 Prairie Mountain Health 2017: 16 (as of Oct. 20, 2017) 2016: 29 2015: 23 2014: 18 2013: 13 2012: 15 Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority 2017: 1 (as of Oct. 20, 2017) 2016: 0 2015: 0 2014: 0 2013: 0 2012: 0 Close

Now, a little more than three years later, that project  which launched a shift in protocol across a number of specialties  has cut down on the number of opioid-exposed babies needing the NICU to withdraw by 40 per cent. Its also ahead of the curve. Just last month, the Canadian Paediatric Society recommended more babies stay with their mothers rather than go to the NICU for care in light of the growing number of babies born to mothers dependent on opioids.

But more importantly, says the medical director of the Addictions Foundation Manitoba, it helps cut down on the stigma surrounding those babies mothers and eases their worries at a particularly vulnerable time.

"There is a lot of fear for mothers who are pregnant and substance users," Dr. Ginette Poulin says, "when they get into that medical system, whats that going to mean for them and their baby moving forward? Will that baby be taken away from them? Will they have access to be around the baby? Are they going to be able to take care of this child?"

Imagine youve just given birth. Two hours, 10 hours, 20 hours of labour. Youre exhausted, in pain, depleted, and then theres your baby, nine some pounds of delicate tiny human that makes it worth it. She cries, her little face scrunching up, and then shes taken away because during your pregnancy you took addictive drugs or were dependent on methadone or suboxone to treat your addiction.

John Walker / TNS

It used to be an "automatic admission," Merrill says, "just in anticipation of the likelihood of them needing treatment." The mother would go to the postpartum ward to recover, while baby would go to the NICU for care. If the baby was in withdrawal, which most are, she would stay for weeks, sometimes receiving oral doses of morphine and sometimes other drugs with meals until the symptoms subsided..

But what Merrill learned in Vancouver, was that by rooming babies long-term with their mothers most wound up never needing treatment, they could safely withdraw while being skin-to-skin with mum and breast feeding.

How to tell if a baby has neonatal abstinence syndrome: The Winnipeg Regional Health Authority scores babies based on how many symptoms of neonatal abstinence syndrome they have. The higher the score, the more likely the baby will need some sort of medical help withdrawing. They use a mnemonic device  "WITHDRAWAL"  to help remember click to read more The Winnipeg Regional Health Authority scores babies based on how many symptoms of neonatal abstinence syndrome they have. The higher the score, the more likely the baby will need some sort of medical help withdrawing. They use a mnemonic device  "WITHDRAWAL"  to help remember: W - Wakefulness I - Irritability T - Tremulousness, Temperature instability, Tachypnea (abnormally rapid breathing) H - Hyperactivity, High-pitched cry, Hyperacusia (increased sensitivity to frequencies and sound volumes), Hyperreflexia (overactive or overresponsive reflexes), Hypertonia (stiff, rigid muscles) D - Diarrhea, Diaphoresis (sweating), Disorganized suck R - Rub marks, Respiratory distress, Rhinorrhea (mucus in the nasal cavity) A - Apnea, Automatic dysfunction W - Weight loss A - Apathy, Alkalosis (when body doesn't have the right balance of acids and bases), Acidosis (too much lactic acid), Appetite increased or decreased L - Lacrimation (excessive tears), Lassitude (sluggishness) Close

However, to make that change at Health Sciences Centre required a "buy in" from multiple departments, since it would impact how everyone from nurses to pediatricians to neonatologists did their jobs. Typically, a pediatrician would care for a baby recovering with mum whereas a neonatologist would look after a baby in the NICU. To make a new system work, Merrill had to make those doctors sit down with managers in the hospitals obstetrics program, its various child medicine programs, and womens health programs to make sure everyone was comfortable in shifting their admissions protocols.

"Everybody has their own," Merrill says, "but this was like a complete overlapping of every possible practice."

Instead of automatically sending newborns to the NICU, they would be moved to the postpartum ward with their mothers. Those babies who had been exposed to longer-acting opioids would spend seven days in hospital with their mothers, while those on shorter-acting opioids would usually stay for about 74 hours.

Nurses would monitor their recovery, "scoring" their symptoms on a scale of one to five to make sure the withdrawal was going smoothly. Most symptoms are relatively minor: sweating, excessive sucking, and mild tremors all rank as ones, while watery stools and marked hyperactivity are a little more severe at three.

'The more we break down those fears and those stigmas, the more we allow people to seek treatment much sooner'  Dr. Ginette Poulin

Under the new system, doctors in the NICU are informed that there is a newborn being monitored for neonatal abstinence syndrome but they only become involved if the score starts to go up. Two symptoms  sudden jerks and twitches, as well as generalized convulsions  prompt their immediate involvement.

"If their score started going up, they flag (the doctors) and its an automatic transfer," Merrill says, "so it was all of these details that kind of had to be hammered out between everyone so we could all agree."

It started in December 2014, a small test run involving women getting treatment at methadone clinics. Merrill and other practitioners met with the women to explain what they were trying to do and every single one was keen to try even though weaning a newborn from opioids is tough.

For a few women having their second or third children, it was a wonderful surprise to get the chance to keep their newborns rather than send them off immediately to intensive care.

"They were thrilled," Merrill says.

The pilot got extended and extended and extended until it was the new normal.

The extent of a babys withdrawal will depend on the drug in question  What was it? When was it last taken? How often was it taken?  as well as the newborns metabolism and "other less definable factors."

JOE BRYKSA / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Dr. Ginette Poulin, says the program will help cut down on stigma attached to these mothers.

Some babies cry excessively and continuously, others have mild tremors and feed poorly. Some show signs of nasal flaring  their nostrils widening with every breath  while others have fevers and vomit, their stool loose or watery. In more serious cases, the baby will twitch and jerk or convulse.

Health-care providers dont always know in advance if they should expect a withdrawal. While some women feel comfortable telling their provider theyre taking methadone or suboxone or have taken illegal substances while pregnant, others dont.

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"Its all about building relationships with mum in advance," Merrill says.

Even if a woman doesnt disclose until after the babys born, Dr. Poulin says HSCs emphasis on keeping the newborn with mum rather than immediately taking it to the NICU can have a big impact on the mothers parenting going forward.

"If they deliver and the babys taken away, theyre going to have questions," she says. "What am I going to do? Am I going to be able to feed the baby? What are they doing to baby while Im not there? Is there any damage or repercussions?"

Sometimes fear of being stigmatized keeps a woman from reaching out to her health-care provider until the babys birth, Poulin says, which makes it all the more important that the delivery and those early days ease rather than inflame those concerns.

"The more we break down those fears and those stigmas, the more we allow people to seek treatment much sooner," she says, "which can then lend to better outcomes for baby and mother."

jane.gerster@freepress.mb.caJoel Kinnaman in Altered Carbon. (Photo: Netflix)

Some believe that Altered Carbon  the sci-fi epic that begins streaming today  may be the most expensive production Netflix has yet bankrolled, although showrunner Laeta Kalogridis cheerfully denied a rumored $150 million production budget. Whatever it cost, Altered Carbon certainly does look expensive: sleek but also elaborate and darkly glistening  visually, it is much like Blade Runner. Altered Carbon, with its questing hero Takeshi Kovacs (Joel Kinnaman, primarily; Ill explain in the next paragraph), has the flinty dialogue of a hard-boiled detective tale; tonally, it is much like  Blade Runner again. Indeed, Ridley Scott ought to be paid some royalties for Altered Carbon. Although its based on a 2002 novel by his fellow Englishman Richard K. Morgan, the Netflix version is as much a visual sequel to Scotts 1982 movie as director Denis Villeneuves Blade Runner 2049 was last year.

In Altered Carbon, were in a future where the essence of an individuals humanity is a cluster of conscious technology called a stack, which can be removed from a person and inserted into another body  called a sleeve  endless times, thus keeping folks alive for hundreds of years, swapping bodies when necessary. We see this occur early on in Carbon, when rebel-mercenary Takeshi Kovacs, who is played by Will Yun Lee, has his stack placed in the new sleeve of Joel Kinnaman. Kinnaman-Kovacs is hired by a wealthy man, James Purefoys Laurens Bancroft, to find out who killed a previous-sleeve Bancroft. Kinnamans Kovacs roams the dirty, bleak alleyways of an overcrowded metropolis, muttering cynical thoughts; down these mean streets a man must go, as Raymond Chandler  a spiritual father to Altered Carbon  wrote in an essay about detective fiction in 1945.

Morgans source novel is an example of second-generation cyberpunk, the rebellious sci-fi offshoot where initially  in early-80s novels of William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, and others wedding the hard-boiled tone to dystopian futures  everything was as dank as the inside of Johnny Rottens torn T-shirt. In adapting Altered Carbon, show creator-writer Kalogridis has taken care to emphasize tough women as well as tough men in this story  thus, for example, the two-fisted cop Kristin Ortega, played by Martha Higareda, and the lithe warrior Reileen Kawahara, played by Dichen Lachman, who already knew a lot about swapping bodies from her time on Joss Whedons Dollhouse.

Story continues

Theres a kind of irony that, at a time when pop culture is seeking to explode the stereotypes of how men and women talk to and behave with each other, Kalogridis should be striving so valiantly to redeem a genre that is wholly rooted in retrograde social roles for women and men. The showrunner cannot avoid, for example, including a perfectly awful scenario in which Bancrofts wife, Miriam, played by Kristin Lehman, acts as a classic femme fatale, slinkily seducing a mostly silent but very willing Kovacs. Is the ample nudity of both Kinnaman and Lehman a measure of Netflix daring and equal-opportunity nekkidness? Or is it an example of titillation as cynical as one of Kovacss wisecracks?

A lot of Altered Carbon is very silly, mostly whenever any of the principals converse. Trite dialogue prevails. Coming back from the dead is a bitch, Kovacs spits out early on, along with bromides such as, The truth is a weapon! What are you starin at? a tough guy asks Kovacs, who responds, Dont worry  youre not my type. (Ooh, is that homophobic transgressiveness I hear?) When Laurens Bancroft hires Kovacs, Purefoy uses the silky, villainous tone he deployed so cornily with Kevin Bacon in The Following: Here, he murmurs to Kinnaman, I want you to solve a murder [pause, eyebrows waggle]  mine! Bwa-ha-ha!

I made it through half of Altered Carbons 10 episodes before I decided life is too short to hear lines like, Kovacs is a ticking time bomb! If you like your sci-fi good-lookin and tough talkin, I heartily recommend Altered Carbon. Me, if I want a dose of steely speculative fiction, Ill reread my old paperbacks of novels by Pat Cadigan and Lewis Shiner.

Altered Carbon is streaming now on Netflix.

Read more from Yahoo Entertainment:Photo credit: Hearst Communications, Inc. All rights reserved

From Esquire

I think I may have broken the RETURN key on my laptop. I was reading The Memo a short time after its release by the Republican majority of the House Intelligence Committee. I got to the end and I realized that, even though the Christopher Steele report is The Memos chief bogeyman, there was nothing in The Memo that undercuts anything we know about the substance of the Steele dossier. In fact, there is nothing in The Memo that undercuts anything pertaining to the relationship between the Russians and the Trump campaign, nor is there anything that undercuts what we know about the Russian ratfcking generally. I got all the way to the last of the six pages and I couldnt quite believe that this was what all the fighting had been about for the past couple of weeks. There had to be more. I kept hammering that poor RETURN key in vain. You let me down, Devin Nunes, you White House lawn ornament, you.

I grew up with the Watergate tapes. I grew up with the revelations of the Pike and the Church committees. (Revelations, I might add, that produced the FISA process and the congressional intelligence procedures that Nunes turned into dog food Friday.) I grew up with George Schultzs diaries that showed that everyone in the upper reaches of the Reagan administration was involved in the crimes of Iran-Contra. I watched every second of the several inquiries into the Whitewater land deal, which is how I know what a crock that was, but at least there was some phony substance to those phony charges. This Memo, Devin, isnt even a good try. You and your staff have to be the laziest alleged obstructors of justice that Ive ever seen. All it appears to be is a lame-ass defense of a self-important goofball Russophile named Carter Page. Thats all you got?

This is a guy that got on the FBI radar in 2013, when the president* was still firing celebrities on his television show. The FBI found that Page had been actively cultivated by Russian intelligence as a possible asset. And now, your whole argument is that the FISA warrants were prompted by the Steele dossier and that Steele is a shtunk who was biased against the president*? For this, you needed a memo? For this, you needed a months worth of drama? For this, you needed to demolish the good faith between the intelligence community and the congressional committees designed to conduct oversight of that community? You couldnt even get the date of David Corns breakthrough story in Mother Jones right. Hell, you could have saved us all the trouble and just done a couple of nights on Hannity to make that case. Youd have reached every single American that currently buys what youre peddling.

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This is threadbare. This is shabby. This reveals absolutely nothing. All it does is damage. It isn't even really good ratfcking. I mean, what the fck, Devin? You shouldve outsourced this to the Russians, who really do know how to do this kind of thing well. They wouldnt have left hanging details like this, from Section 5 of The Memo:



The Papadopoulos information triggered the opening of an FBI counterintelligence investigation in late 2016 by FBI agent Pete Strzok.

I thought it was The Dossier. Im confused.

And the Russians never would have tried to argue that Steele was simultaneously an untrustworthy operative and a longtime FBI source. The FBI wouldnt have kept him on as a longtime source if he wasnt trustworthy. The FBI is not as dumb as you are. And this is the best you have for a defense?

The Committee has discovered serious violations of the public trust, and the American people have a right to know when officials in crucial institutions are abusing their authority for political purposes. Our intelligence and law enforcement agencies exist to defend the American people, not to be exploited to target one group on behalf of another. It is my hope that the Committees actions will shine a light on this alarming series of events so we can make reforms that allow the American people to have full faith and confidence in their governing institutions.

Oh, shut up.

Of course, Page himself, who has been the strangest presence in this whole affair, had a little crowing to do, too.

The brave and assiduous oversight by Congressional leaders in discovering this unprecedented abuse of process represents a giant, historic leap in the repair of Americas democracy. Now that a few of the misdeeds against the Trump Movement have been partially revealed, I look forward to updating my pending legal action in opposition to DOJ this weekend in preparation for Mondays next small step on the long, potholed road toward helping to restore law and order in our great country.

Good lord, Carter. Brave! Assiduous! Unprecedented! Giant! Historic! The long, potholed road! Who the hell are you when youre at home?

The fact is that there isnt a serious violation of the public trust anywhere in The Memo. There is no abuse of authority. There is nothing giant and/or historic about anything in it. On MSNBC, retired FBI agent Bobby Chacon rightly called The Memo a glorified motion to dismiss the evidence, and not a very good one, either.

Naturally, various Democrats have chimed in, all expressing great disappointment that Nunes has turned out to be the unmitigated hack they all knew he was. (Hell, even gonzo former Congressman Joe Walsh believes that.) The Democrats on the Intelligence Committee said, in part:

The premise of the Nunes memo is that the FBI and DOJ corruptly sought a FISA warrant on a former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, Carter Page, and deliberately misled the court as part of a systematic abuse of the FISA process. As the Minority memo makes clear, none of this is true. The FBI had good reason to be concerned about Carter Page and would have been derelict in its responsibility to protect the country had it not sought a FISA warrant. In order to understand the context in which the FBI sought a FISA warrant for Carter Page, it is necessary to understand how the investigation began, what other information the FBI had about Russias efforts to interfere with our election, and what the FBI knew about Carter Page prior to making application to the court  including Carter Pages previous interactions with Russian intelligence operatives. This is set out in the Democratic response which the GOP so far refuses to make public.

Let us be clear about one thing. I do not care if the meatheads and morons out there buy this bilge. I dont care how effective as spin the acolytes of the Church of The Savvy think the release of The Memo is. I think the Mueller investigation will blow through this flimsy excuse for an argument like a train through a willow tree. But the damage it will do to congressional oversight of the intelligence community - a dubious proposition on its best day, which was not Friday, god knows - will be long-lasting and far-reaching.

That oversight, as well as the FISA court, grew out of the CIA and FBI horror stories revealed in the late 1970s, which was a genuine scandal, and one with an actual body count. (Some of the more noxious revelations from the congressional investigations of that time were illegal CIA operations within the United States, CIA assassination plots overseas, and the foul campaign against Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. waged by the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover.) People risked a lot to inform American citizens of what was being done in their name; Frank Church of Idaho, who led the Senate committee looking into the crimes, was defeated in the next election. Even the current system, which is not something of which I am overly fond, deserves better than what Devin Nunes did to it on Friday in order to run cover for a president* of very dubious character.

And now everybodys on board. Speaker Paul Ryan, the zombie-eyed granny starver from the state of Wisconsin, is posing once again as a civil libertarian.

Unlike most judicial proceedings, the FISA system depends not on an adversarial process, but instead on the government providing a complete presentation of the facts and circumstances underlying its warrant applications. It is clear from this memo that didnt happen in this case, and as a consequence an Americans civil liberties may have been violated.

And, meanwhile, everybody involved in Fridays burlesque, from Devin Nunes to Carter Page to the president* himself, knows full well that the Russian ratfckers are gearing up for the 2018 midterms. And the institutions of our government are being asked to resist assaults from without and within. Things are not looking up. At all.

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The father of three who lunged at Larry Nassar inside of a courtroom on Friday has been praised for his actions on social media but he says hes no hero.

Randall Margraves, whose three daughters were victims of Nassar, formally apologized when he returned to the courtroom to face contempt charges  charges which were later dismissed.

I look over here and Larry Nassars shaking his head no, like it didnt happen. Im embarrassed, Margraves told the court of his conduct.

He continued, Im not here to upstage my daughters. Im here to help them heal.

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Margraves told CBS News he did not think about wanting to kill Nassar after he requested to be alone with him, but that he did want to inflict some pain.

The father of the three girls, still racked with guilt, said the social media praise he had received was directed at the wrong person.

Im no hero, my daughters are the heroes. My daughters and the other victims, Margraves said.

Dismissing the charges against him Eaton County Judge Janice Cunningham said she felt for him.

I dont know what it would be like to stand there as a father and know that three of your girls were injured physically and emotionally by somebody sitting in a courtroom. I cant imagine that, she said.

Randall Margraves, the father of three victims of Larry Nassar, lunges at Nassar during court Friday morning

Despite understanding why Margraves reacted in violence, she said it was not acceptable that we combat assault with assault.

During Nassars third and final sentencing hearing, Margraves asked Cunningham for five minutes alone with the disgraced doctor in a locked room. After she denied his request, he asked for one minute. She denied his request again, and Margraves lunged toward Nassar.

Let me at him! I want that son of a bitch! Margraves yelled as bailiffs held him down on the courtroom floor. Give me one minute with that bastard!

Margraves tackled by three police officers

The display came after Margraves daughter Lauren testified in court, detailing that life has been a crazy whirlwind since Nassar first abused her when she was 13 years old, according to the Detroit News. Both Lauren and her sister Madison gave statements to the court and said that their other sister had also been abused by the former Michigan State and Team USA gymnastics doctor.

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In November, Nassar pleaded guilty to three counts of criminal sexual conduct, an Eaton County court spokesperson told PEOPLE. Two of the counts were first-degree and one was in the third degree. Two of the counts involved girls between the ages of 13 and 15, and one against a girl younger than 13.

Last month, Judge Rosemarie Aquilina of Michigans Ingham County Circuit Court sentenced the 54-year-old predator to up to 175 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to seven similar charges in that county. The sentencing followed days of moving impact statements from dozens of victims

Your crimes have cut into the core of this community and families and many we dont know, Aquilina said before handing down the sentence. There was no medical treatment. You did this for your pleasure and your control. You still think that somehow you are right  I wouldnt send my dogs to you, sir.

It was my honor and privilege to sentence you, Aquilina added later, stating that she wants him to remain in prison for the rest of his life. I just signed your death warrant.

More than 250 women and girls have accused Nassar of assault, including gymnasts Aly Raisman, Simone Biles, McKayla Maroney and Gabby Douglas.UPDATE, 2:35 pmHarvey Weinstein is floating legal action against actress Uma Thurman just hours after Thurman went public in The New York Times with allegations of sexual assault. The disgraced producers attorney Ben Brafman fired the latest salvo at the actress in a statement almost identical to Weinsteins earlier response today (see below).

Ms. Thurmans statements to the Times are being carefully examined and investigated before deciding whether any legal action against her would be appropriate, said Brafman in a statement that could be potentially hollow if no less ugly.

While the threat of legal action is a typical response for many of the men accused of sexual misconduct in recent months, an actual lawsuit could put the producer himself into court and under rules of discovery.

Already facing a barrage of lawsuits personally and corporately arising from allegations of sexual harassment and assault, Weinstein is scheduled to sit for a deposition in April in his own lawsuit against The Weinstein Company.

Previous, 12:08 pm Harvey Weinstein has responded to Uma Thurmans claim of a sexual attack by releasing a series of photos that his team says demonstrate the strong relationship Mr. Weinstein and Ms. Thurman had had over the years.

In a statement that claims Weinstein made an awkward pass at Thurman after misreading her signals, Weinsteins team of publicists insists that there was no physical contact during Mr. Weinsteins awkward pass and Mr. Weinstein is saddened and puzzled as to why Ms. Thurman, someone he considers a colleague and a friend, waited 25 years to make these allegations public, noting that he and Ms. Thurman have shared a very close and mutually beneficial working relationship where they have made several very successful film projects together.

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The statement, released by Weinsteins spokesperson Holly K. Baird, reads in full:

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We have pulled a number of images that demonstrate the strong relationship Mr. Weinstein and Ms. Thurman had had over the years and we wish the New York Times would have published them. Mr. Weinstein acknowledges making an awkward pass 25 years ago at Ms. Thurman in England after misreading her signals, after a flirtatious exchange in Paris, for which he immediately apologized and deeply regrets. However, her claims about being physically assaulted are untrue. And this is the first time we have heard those details. There was no physical contact during Mr. Weinsteins awkward pass and Mr. Weinstein is saddened and puzzled as to why Ms. Thurman, someone he considers a colleague and a friend, waited 25 years to make these allegations public, noting that he and Ms. Thurman have shared a very close and mutually beneficial working relationship where they have made several very successful film projects together. This is the first time we are hearing that she considered Mr. Weinstein an enemy and the pictures of their history tell a completely different story. There will be more are detailed response later from Mr. Weinsteins attorney, Ben Brafman.

To read about Thurmans accusations against Weinstein, go here.

The photographs released by Baird depict Weinstein in party surroundings with Thurman and others. One shows Weinstein and Thurman, along with John Travolta and Quentin Tarantino at a 20th anniversary party for Pulp Fiction. Whether the images bolster the disgraced producers latest claims or merely demonstrate stop-at-nothing damage control is a decision well leave to our readers:

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BAFTA Formally Terminates Harvey Weinstein MembershipPrince William and Kate Middletons four-day Scandinavian royal tour is coming to a close!

On the final day of the tour on Friday, the royal couple learned about Norwegian pop culture when they visited with some of the countrys most popular teen stars from the hit drama series, Skam.

Will and Kate traveled to Hartvig Nissen School, which was where the series filmed, and were joined by Prince Haakon and Princess Mertens-Marit on Norway. Each season of this popular show, which ended after its fourth season in 2017, focused on topics ranging from relationship difficulties, identity, eating disorders, sexual assault, homosexuality and mental health issues.

The royals met students to learn about the effect Skam had on bringing challenges teenagers face out into the open, and the role played by social media.

Kate Middleton and Prince William

Kate wore a purple Dolce and Gabbana coat when she arrived, and chatted with students as she made her way inside. During one exchange, Kate talked with a female student about science classes she took in school before heading to university.

I went to a school called Marlborough College and then onto university which is where I met William, she said. St. Andrews University in Scotland. Miles away, freezing cold. But I cant complain about that being here. Its much colder here.

She also spoke with 19-year-old Shaun Ondo and his friend Alfred Strande, 18. I told her that her coat was burgundy and she said I had very good English, Ondo says. It was nice to see them in real life and nice to see they are such friendly people.

Strands adds, We dont know much about the royal people from England. It was good that they took the time to say hello and shake hands.

Kate Middleton

Inside the school, the two royal couples met with actors in Skam and discussed how the show had changed perceptions of young peoples problems.

Tarjei Sandvik Moe, who plays a character who comes out as gay and also has a mother suffering from mental problems, told William: People from China, South Korea, France and Spain come to visit this school.

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William, who was taking part in a group discussion with students and actors accompanied by Princess Mette-Marit, asked them, Does it feel that a lot of young people are afraid of the issues, and what youve done is brought it to life?

Tarjei replied: The issues are hard for people to take. We live in a society where people expect you to deal with problems on your own.

Meanwhile, Kate, who took part in another discussion with Prince Haakon, asked how the series  which was broadcast in real time, with school scenes streamed during the day, and party scenes released at night  had changed the school.

The students told her it had had a big effect on the school, with teachers picking up on the slang used by pupils in the show and incorporating it into Norwegian language lessons.

Later, Will and Kate further cemented their burgeoning friendship with Crown Prince Haakon and Princess Mette-Marit when they were invited for lunch at the couples official home, Skaugum. The royal couples hadnt met before William and Kate stepped off their plane in snowy Oslo on Thursday.

But by the afternoon, when they strolled through the sculpture park and visited some young entrepreneurs, it was clear they were getting along royally.

Kate Middleton

Later on Friday, they will take a short tour of the Holmenkollen ski museum before ascending to the top of ski jump to talk with and observe junior ski jumpers from Norways national team.

From left: Crown Princess Mette Marit of Norway, Crown Prince Haakon of Norway and Kate Middleton

Kate and William will treasure their first official visit to the Scandinavian country. In his speech at a dinner at the Royal Palace on Thursday, William warmly praised their hosts.

Thousands of people cross the North Sea in each direction every year, he said. Friendship is the hallmark of what prompts them to make this journey. Catherine and I are delighted that, now, we too have made that journey; we too have experienced the warmth of that friendship on this very special visit.Marion Suge Knight, the one-time rap mogul behind 90s powerhouse Death Row Records, is currently in jail awaiting trial for a hit-and-run murder that occurred on the set of the N.W.A. biopic Straight Outta Comptonin early 2015. His trial is set for April, but hes now found himself at the center of some more legal drama.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Knights wife, Toi-Lin Kelly, was sentenced to three years in jail on Friday for her help in arranging interviews between Knight and the producers of a BET documentary about Death Row. This is in violation of a court order limiting his jailhouse phone communications, and comes just months after Kelly struck a plea deal for a previous incident involving Knight. In October, she pleaded no contest to conspiring to violate a court order after allegedly selling surveillance footage connected to Knights murder trial to TMZ for $55,000. That footage was, by a judges mandate, not to be shared with the media.

As recounted by the Times, Kelly is accused of funneling money into the accounts of inmates who allowed Knight to use their phone codes to place his calls. She was also, despite being barred from speaking to Knight as part of her previous plea agreement, relaying information to Knight via a private investigator aiding the defense team.

Kellys defense was that she did not understand the various court orders, which, unsurprisingly, wasnt enough to keep her out of jail.

Related Video:First-time cruisers might fear that being at sea means sacrificing spontaneity and fun while following the crowd, but nothing could be further from the truth.

It was like a scene from the comic strip Hagar the Horrible. Clutching a beaker of ale in howling sea winds, I lurched toward the prow of the Viking vessel. Baltic spray lashed my face as I raised an offering to the Norse goddess of the oceans, Ran; her consort, gir; and their nine daughters, who rule the waves. This stirring reverie was only broken when a waiter struggled through the gale to stand beside me: "Another glass, sir?"

This wasn't a sleek longship setting forth to pillage a monastery. It was the Viking Sky, a 930-passenger vessel on a tour of the shores of Scandinavia. But it's no wonder I felt transported to the Dark Ages. Many years ago, I studied the Vikings in college, where I became engrossed in their sagas and the Norse legends of gods and monsters. I had never made it to Europe's far north, however. When I heard that Viking Ocean Cruises, which launched three years ago as an extension of the popular river-cruise line, offered a sailing called Viking Homelands, I was still skeptical. I've traveled all over the world  hiked the Himalayas, driven 4WDs in the Australian outback  but I'd never been on a cruise. It seemed like the aquatic equivalent of a bus tour, where every moment is scheduled. I like to be independent.

This attitude, a cruise-aficionado friend in New York assured me, entirely misses the point. Although the Viking land excursions are known for being informative and fun, you also have the option of going off script, he said. A cruise ship could take me to a dozen destinations in as many days, and when I was in port, nobody would force me to join a group. And so I cautiously signed on. For two weeks, beginning in Stockholm and making my way to Finland, Estonia, Russia, Poland, Germany, and Denmark before finally ending in the charming coastal towns of Norway, I would explore the stunning landscapes where Viking culture was born or had a presence.

Hours after arriving in Stockholm, I stormed up the gangplank to the spanking-new ship, whose comforts would have mystified any medieval marauder. Every floor had sleek designer furniture and the gym had large windows for uplifting sea views. In fact, the Viking Sky was a triumph of Scandinavian good taste. Very pleasant for a holiday, but where were the echoes of the warriors who had terrorized Europe?

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The ship did have a charming little museum devoted to the Viking Age, which lasted from A.D. 789 to 1066. Fun fact: the Vikings never wore horned helmets; the myth is a legacy of a 19th-century costume designer for a Wagnerian opera. All very edifying. But if I wanted to channel the independent Viking spirit, I was going to have to find ways to escape the orbit of the cruise. As we set off into the Baltic Sea, I came up with a simple plan: I would leave the pack at least once a day, since we were often in port for 10-plus hours.

A coconspirator I'll call "BB" joined me in this mild rebellion. We started off easy. The night before we docked in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, we did a little research that led us to the best bike routes in town. We ended up on a remote beach eating fresh seafood and drinking Estonian wine in the sun. From Rostock, Germany, we took a three-hour train ride to Berlin to visit the city's most entertaining bar, Klunkerkranich, and became so engrossed by its contemporary art and German hipsters that we were forced to hire a taxi and speed the 150 miles to catch the ship before it left. In St. Petersburg, Russian laws made us break our own rules. Nobody without a costly visa was permitted to set foot off the ship independently, so BB and I signed up for one of the ship's sanctioned tours and saw Swan Lake at the Alexandrinsky Theatre.

Our independent spirit prepared me for the true Viking homelands of Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. It turned out that despite their law-abiding image, Scandinavians revel in their anarchic origins. In Aalborg, Denmark, a quick Google search revealed that a verdant Viking burial ground, Lindholm Hje, was located in the modern suburbs; its museum displayed unearthed skeletons. And in downtown Oslo, the Viking Ship Museum contained intact longships, wooden vessels that were sleek and ruthlessly efficient in their design.

All the strands of the journey came together when I made the pilgrimage to a "living" Viking village. We were near the end of the voyage, and planning my itinerary was getting exhausting. Gorgeous as Norway was, I was tempted by the onboard spa. Then I saw there was an excursion to Njardarheimr, a year-old village where history-loving "settlers" wearing full Viking garb spend anywhere from a weekend to several months. I was sold. Three hours on a bus was a small price to pay.

Soon I found myself in a mist-shrouded fjord that looked like the perfect home for a family of trolls. As I wandered the muddy village trails, a pigtailed Valkyrie described how the settlers had built replicas of ninth-century huts without the use of nails and given them a traditional Viking varnish of either ox blood, pine tar, or linseed oil. Carved statues of Odin and Thor stood in a grove, where bearded men practiced ax-throwing.

The residents also explained that the Norsemen were never as uncivilized as legend holds. Most were farmers, merchants, craftsmen, and bards  not raiders. Over a feast of honey-glazed vegetables and pork, the portly chieftain, Olafr Reydarsson, said that the Vikings were renowned in medieval Europe for their grooming. ("They bathed once a week!" he boasted.) They founded the first towns in Scandinavia, modeled on what they had seen in Paris, London, and Rome. And they had a refined fashion sense, with a fondness for blue dye distilled from urine.

On my last night, in Bergen, Norway, I tracked down a place called the Magic Ice Bar, a cocktail lounge set in a refrigerated locker. Surrounded by surreal ice sculptures, I watched a group of locals celebrating a wedding. Every three minutes, they bellowed "Skal!" and slammed a shot of aquavit. Before the brawling could begin, I headed back to the cruise ship. After all, I had a reservation for dinner. 15-day Viking Homelands sailings begin at $5,699.The Duchess of Cambridge has always been stylish, but her latest fashion project is also eco-friendly. With Kate Middleton's new fashion exchange, she's urging everyone in the UK and beyond to come together in the name of sustainability.

The Commonwealth Fashion Exchange with unite all 52 Commonwealth countries  the UK and its former British colonies  in the name of fashion. Specifically, they will come together to create "a one-of-a-kind sustainable outfit," according to People, that will be unveiled during London Fashion Week on February 19 at Buckingham Palace. Yes, Middleton will be there to judge these environmentally-sound lewks.

The initiative  which also has the support of Sophie, the Countess of Wessex  was created by Livia Firth, founder and creative director of Eco-Age consultancy (and spouse of the actor Colin), as a way of getting a younger generation to think about the societal implications of fashion.

Fashion is a huge weapon, because we are all connected to the clothes we wear, Firth told Vogue UK, calling out the industry's focus on fast fashion, which produces "high volumes of cheap clothes through an overwhelmingly female, low-wage workforce.

By utilizing the commonwealthand through the potential of the artisan fashion trade (which will be highlighted in the exhibition)," Firth added, "we can have a positive impact on female empowerment and poverty reduction."

Thirty-one designers will showcase their work, including New Zealand's Karen Walker, Bangladesh's Bibi Russell, and Stella McCartney and Burberry, representing the United Kingdom, along with 26 artisans including Euphemia Sydney Davies from Sierra Leone, whose line Sydney-Davies has her collaborating with a master weaver from Ghana.

The point of the project isn't only sustainability, though it "has collaboration and partnership at its heart," according to Rt. Hon. Patricia Scotland QC, Secretary-General of the Commonwealth, which will hold the Commonwealth Heads of Government Summit in April. The hope is that it will make the upcoming summit's "themes of prosperity, sustainability and fairness very real and tangible."

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For those who don't get an invite to Buckingham Palace, the outfits will be on public display at Londons Australia House on February 21 and other London cities before the designs make their way to New York this fall for Fashion Week.

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By Erin Donnelly On Monday, Sept. 13, after 16 months of pandemic-forced cancellations and postponements, the famed Met Gala will at last return, with throngs of A-listers descending upon New York City's Metropolitan Museum of Art in their most inventive fashions. Though this year's long-awaited event  often referred to as fashion prom  is being billed as more intimate in scale this go-around, rumors are already running rampant about who might be on the star-studded guest list, notoriously vetted by Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour. As the 2021 co-chairs, Timothee Chalamet, Billie Eilish, Amanda Gorman and Naomi Osaka alone are guaranteed to be gracing the most thrilling red carpet in the world, with this year's theme devoted to American fashion. But it's the legacy of a Brit that carries special significance, as this year marks the 25th anniversary of Princess Diana's visit to fashion's big night out. (In a stroke of symmetry, 2021 also marked what would have been the late royal's 60th birthday, on July 1, and 40 years since her July 29, 1981, wedding to Prince Charles.) Princess Diana's appearance on Dec. 9, 1996, remains noteworthy on several counts: her daring, lingerie-inspired dress, designed by a visionary young John Galliano in his first season at Dior; the rarity of a British royal attending the gala (although Wintour herself is a dame); and the moment's encapsulation of her transition, as Eloise Moran of Lady Di Revenge Looks puts it, "from royal to international celebrity." Moran, whose popular Instagram account chronicles Diana's "sassiest post-divorce looks" and will release The Lady Di Look Book: What Diana Was Trying to Tell Us Through Her Clothes in June 2022, says the then-35-year-old royal's attendance came as she was finding new footing among New York City's fashion crowd in the months since her scandalous split from Prince Charles. The former couple finalized their divorce on Aug. 28, 1996  a year and three days before Diana would die from injuries sustained in a Paris car crash, and just three months before the Met Gala. Was Diana's dress a "revenge" look? "One hundred percent," says Moran. For its theme that year, the gala  which started in 1948 as a more staid fundraising dinner for the Met's Costume Institute, until the legendary fashion editor Diana Vreeland came on as a consultant in the early 1970s and transformed it into the splashy, starry spectacle it is now  had chosen the work of Christian Dior. Though the eponymous French designer died in 1957, his fashion house remains one of the leading luxury labels. In 1996, all eyes were on the young British-Gibraltarian man who had just taken over as head designer, John Galliano. In his first couture collection for Dior, Galliano included a slinky midnight-blue silk slip dress reminiscent of a negligee, black lace trim emphasizing the boudoir-chic effect. It's this dress that Diana chose to wear. The princess reportedly had her reservations about the provocative look, however. According to the royal biographer Katie Nicholl, author of 2010's William and Harry, Diana worried that the dress might embarrass her then-14-year-old son William, who was struggling with his parents' split. Ultimately, the urge to make a bold sartorial statement as a newly single woman won out. Diana paired the Dior dress with a matching navy silk robe-style cover up  perfect for fending off the December chill  but didn't shy from adding some ice in the form of her sapphire and diamond cluster drop earrings. The jewels perfectly complemented her sapphire engagement ring  which, along with the earrings, has since been passed down to her daughter-in-law Kate Middleton  and the pearl and sapphire choker necklace made famous for its appearance during her 1985 dance with John Travolta. Diana also carried her go-to quilted Dior handbag, a style now known as the Lady Dior in her honor. Dressed to the nines, the princess arrived in the company of her friend Liz Tilberis, then the editor of Harper's Bazaar and a co-chair for that year's gala. (In a rare absence since becoming chairwoman of the Costume Institute  now part of the Anna Wintour Costume Center  in 1995, Wintour did not co-chair the 1996 event, though another princess, Marie-Chantal of Greece, stepped in.) Tilberis, wearing a velvet turtleneck dress with matching opera-length gloves in the same shade of midnight blue as her royal pal, was at the time undergoing treatment for ovarian cancer, and would die from the disease in 1999. Galliano himself also stayed close to Diana's side throughout the evening, reportedly introducing the princess to fashion's own version of royalty. By all accounts the mother of two was the "belle of the ball," though Moran notes that her dress  now considered an iconic look that's been displayed at London's Victoria and Albert Museum  fell flat with some more conservative royal-watchers. "That was one of her most shocking dresses, and it got slated because they said it didn't suit her figure because she obviously had quite broad shoulders," Moran says. "But I thought she looked fabulous. She just looks so happy and confident." The dress's shock value may have been the appeal, Moran adds, noting that Diana was well aware of the reaction her outfits received. What better place to push the envelope than at the Met Gala? "I think she was embracing it and enjoying it," Moran says. "She knew she could never get rid of the attention and the spotlight on her, but I think she was positioning it in a different way, as a kind of international megastar, Marilyn Monroe-type icon rather than a member of the royal family. And I think the dress really reflected that." Read more from Yahoo Life: Dwyane Wade wears Princess Diana's famous 'I'm a Luxury' sweater Prince Harry says Meghan Markle was the reason he started therapy: 'She could tell that I was hurting' 10 years after Alexander McQueens death by suicide, a look at mental health in the fashion world Want lifestyle and wellness news delivered to your inbox? Sign up here for Yahoo Lifes newsletter.Super Bowl LII is this Sunday and all we really care about is the food. After all, this is the only day of the year that its really acceptable to eat pizza, chili, wings and copious dips in one sitting without judgment. It's no surprise, then, that America has been preparing for the big game by searching for indulgent Super Bowl recipes on the Internet. GoogleTrends tracked the most popular searches in each state from the past week and came up with some curious (and some very expected) data.

Here, the most searched-for recipes in every state.

We're not surprised that nine states are jonesing for chili this year. Arkansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas and Wisconsin all seem to be taking the classic route. Jalapeno poppers will be making an appearance as well, most notably in North Carolina, Tennessee, Utah and Washington. And nine states most popular search was a dip of some sort. As for the Dakotas, it's all about pizza. North Dakotans searched heavily for pizza sauce, while South Dakotans were after marinara.

All of that is pretty tame, but here's where things get interesting. While dips like buffalo chicken dip and crab dip are pretty standard, Alaska has an affinity for dill pickle with beef dip. Then there's Mississippis love for green beans with beef broth on game day. Mississippi, you've got our attention. And so do you, Nebraska, where cream cheese jalapeno hamburgers will be taking center stage on Sunday. Below is the full list:

Alabama  Chicken

Alaska  Dill Pickle with Beef Dip

Arizona  Green Chicken Enchilada

Arkansas  Five Bean Chili

California  Fried Rice

Colorado  Baked Chicken Wings

Connecticut  Buffalo Chicken Dip

Delaware  Stuffed Peppers

Florida  Shrimp

Georgia  Ham, Bologna, Turkey Sub

Hawaii  Nachos

Idaho  Potato

Illinois  Philly Cheese Steak

Indiana  Chicken

Iowa  Stromboli

Kansas  Calzone

Kentucky  Fondue

Louisiana  Pork Tenderloin

Maine  Chicken Wing

Maryland  Crab Dip

Massachusetts  Chili

Michigan  Chili

Minnesota  Chili

Mississippi  Green Beans with Beef Broth

Missouri  Chili

Montana  Bacon Shrimp

Nebraska  Cream Cheese Jalapeno Hamburger

Nevada  Potato

New Hampshire  Chicken Wing

New Jersey  Buffalo Chicken Dip

New Mexico  Ranch Spinach Dip

New York  Chili

North Carolina  Jalapeno Poppers

North Dakota  Pizza Sauce

Ohio  Philly Cheese Steak

Oklahoma  French Onion Cream Dip

Oregon  Clam Chowder

Pennsylvania  Chili

Rhode Island  Baked Ziti

South Carolina  Crab Dip

South Dakota  Marinara Sauce

Tennessee  Jalapeno Poppers

Texas  Chili

Utah  Jalapeno Poppers

Vermont  Chicken Breast Tender

Virginia  Buffalo Chicken Dip

Washington  Jalapeno Poppers

West Virginia  Pork Carnitas Tacos

Wisconsin  Chili

Wyoming  Ground BeefUma Thurman was one of many parties affected by the seemingly countless tales of sexual assault and harassment that began to pour forth from Hollywood back in October. When asked about the allegations being brought forth against her former producer, Harvey Weinstein, she became visibly upset, saying, I am not a child and I have learned that when Ive spoken in anger, I usually regret the way I express myself, so Ive been waiting to feel less angry. And when Im ready, Ill say what I have to say, she told Access Hollywood. Now, it appears that time has come.

In November, the Imposters actress took to social media with a battle cry not unlike one her Kill Bill character, Beatrix Kiddo, would have made in the film, saying, I said I was angry recently, and I have a few reasons. #MeToo, in case you couldnt tell. I think its important to take your time, be fair, be exact, so Happy Thanksgiving everyone! (Except you, Harvey, and all your wicked conspirators  Im glad its going slowly Stay tuned.

This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. Update your settings here to see it.

Thurman, 47, has just delivered on her promise of more to come, opening up to The New York Times about her own experiences with Weinstein and the Hollywood machine.

Though she says Weinstein was not her first encounter with sexual misconduct in the business, having been the victim of assault at the hands of an older, undisclosed actor at the age of 16, her experience with the disgraced movie mogul is one shes carried with her for years.

I knew him pretty well before he attacked me, she told the outlet. He used to spend hours talking to me about material and complimenting my mind and validating me. It possibly made me overlook warning signs.

While Thurman told the Times she did have unusual encounters with Weinstein, recalling one instance in which she says he led her into a steam room in a bath robe, she didnt feel threatened. I thought he was being super idiosyncratic, like this was your kooky, eccentric uncle.

Things took a turn, however, with the actress alleging that he attacked her in a hotel room in London. It was such a bat to the head, she said. He pushed me down. He tried to shove himself on top of me. He tried to expose himself. He did all kinds of unpleasant things. But he didnt actually put his back into it and force me. Youre like an animal wriggling away, she explained. I was doing anything I could to get the train back on track. Not his track, my track.

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She says she received flowers from Weinstein afterward, and calls to work on more projects. When she tried to confront him about his behavior, however, the Pulp Fiction darling claims that the 65-year-old threatened to derail her career.

A spokesperson for Weinstein denies that he ever threatened her in a professional capacity, though he acknowledged her accounts of the episodes, according to NYT.

Thurman says Weinstein eventually apologized for his behavior after being confronted by Tarantino, who was about to make Kill Bill with both parties.

The producer released a statement (along with several pictures of the pair) from his camp confirming the apology, though he disputes other details of her allegations, saying, Mr. Weinstein acknowledges making an awkward pass 25 years ago at Ms. Thurman in England after misreading her signals, after a flirtatious exchange in Paris, for which he immediately apologized and deeply regrets. However, her claims about being physically assaulted are untrue. And this is the first time we have heard those details. There was no physical contact during Mr. Weinsteins awkward pass and Mr. Weinstein is saddened and puzzled as to why Ms. Thurman, someone he considers a colleague and a friend, waited 25 years to make these allegations public, noting that he and Ms. Thurman have shared a very close and mutually beneficial working relationship where they have made several very successful film projects together.

Later, while on set, Thurman was also subject to injury when she says that Tarantino demanded she do her own driving for the films infamous black and white scenes in a car that had been reconfigured from a stick shift to an automatic. Despite warnings that it might not be working well and against her better judgement, she filmed the scenes as directed.

The star wound up crashing, coming back from the hospital in a neck brace, with my knees damaged and a large massive egg on my head and a concussion.

While she says she has a permanently damaged neck and screwed-up knees, its her complicated feelings about Weinsteins subsequent victims that perhaps haunt her most.

I am one of the reasons that a young girl would walk into his hotel room alone, the way I did, she said. Quentin [Tarantino] used Harvey as the executive producer of Kill Bill, a movie that symbolizes female empowerment. And all these lambs walked into slaughter because they were convinced that nobody who rises to such a position would do something illegal to you, but they do.

Read her interview in full here.

What do you think of Umas chilling words? Share with us over @BritandCo.

(Photos via Nicholas Hunt + Eugene Gologurksy/Getty)

You Might Also LikeLarry Nassar is back in court for another round of sentencing regarding his systematic sexual abuse of young women in his capacity as a Michigan State University and USA Gymnastics doctor. Nassars final sentencing hearing, which began on Wednesday, has progressed thus far in a fashion similar to the first, with at least another 65 survivors expected to offer their victim impact statements by the conclusion of the trial next week. Though many aspects of this court appearance are upsettingly familiar, it will be difficult to replicate the magnetism of Judge Rosemarie Aquilina, who presided over the previous sentencing hearing in Ingham County, Michigan, last week.

At the conclusion of his initial sentencing hearing, Aquilina gave Nassar to 40 to 175 years in prison, a ruling she infamously referred to as the signing of his death warrant. By the time she rendered her judgment, Aquilina had already emerged as one of the most celebrated avengers within the #MeToo movementas she held nothing back in her evisceration of Nassar's character and comport, and she reiterated her support and admiration for the victims, whom she addressed as survivors, not victims, before she went on to address Nassar directly.

You still think that somehow you are rightthat you are a doctor, that you are entitled, that you don't have to listen, and that you did treatment, she said. I would not send my dogs to you, sir.

Women across the country went wild for Aquilina as she has ascended to a cult-like status in their eyes, minds and hearts.

But not everyone was a fan. Aquilinas punchy language led some critics to suggest that Aquilina had crossed the line of impartiality expected of judges at all levels of the United States Judiciary (though she specifically addressed how she approached the case impartially in her sentencing). In an op-ed for Vox.com, Rachel Marshall wrote that Aquilinas words should make us uncomfortable.

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Perhaps without realizing it, [one critic] wrote, Aquilina overstepped her bounds as a judge and adopted the role of victim advocate.

To be clear: Nassar is unequivocally guilty, a fact that most everyone knew before he even went to trial. Now 54 years old, he will most certainly die in jail. And yet, amidst the victory celebration for the survivors of Nassars crimesa conclusion that provided one of the most high-profile, cathartic moments of the #MeToo movement to datethere were some that felt the presiding judge was too emotive, too gleeful, in her sentencing of a man that no one, save for his lawyer, seemed to consider anything other than a monster.

The Nassar case has played out against the backdrop of an enormous cultural conversation about sexual violence. While women have largely taken on the task of reforming societal norms about sexual agency on their own behalf, their every reaction (often interpreted as overreactions) seems to be policed with a vigilantism barely accorded to perpetrators of these heinous crimes. Aquilina is a charismatic judge who happens to be a woman. In the Larry Nassar trial, she rightfully did not come to play. For that, shes been criticized. Theres a double standard here.

What are the limits of anyones ability to be impartial, especially in a case such as this? According to the Code of Conduct for United States Judges, A judge shall disqualify himself or herself in a proceeding in which the judges impartiality might reasonably be questioned, including but not limited to instances in whichthe judge has a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party.

Based on these broad guidelines, it would be next to impossible for any woman to be completely impartial in cases that concern sexual violence against women in its myriad formsand thats not necessarily a bad thing. As the #MeToo movement continues to gather steam, there is an increasing need for empathetic female judges to preside in courtrooms across the country, and President Donald Trumps record first year of judicial appointments may not advance that cause.

At the federal level, there are three levels of the judicial branchdistrict courts, circuit courts, and the Supreme Court; the president nominates appointees to all three levels and those nominees are then voted on and ultimately confirmed by the Senate. In 2017, Trump put forth a total of 58 federal judicial nominees, 91 percent of whom were white, and by the end of his first year in office, the Senate had confirmed 13 federal appeals judges for lifetime appointments (overwhelmingly white, male, and conservative), many of whom have track records of anti-woman stances on healthcare and reproductive rights.

A few of Trumps most troubling nominees? Consider Stuart Kyle Duncan, nominated to a lifetime seat on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, a lawyer who believes a womans access to birth control through insurance should be limited according to her bosss religious beliefs. Theres also Mark R. Norris, nominated by Trump to the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee, who has spent his 17 years in Tennessee state politics advocating for restricted access to abortion. Both mens nominations are still pending Senate approval.

One of the things that [the Aquilina conversation] points to is that judges have a lot of power, and they do have a lot of discretion, says Amy Matsui, Senior Counsel and Director of Government Relations for the National Womens Law Center.

They can really shape both the outcome of the case and how people view the judiciary, and that really brings me back to the records of Trump's nominees, because when you see the administration nominating someone who was the lead counsel for Hobby Lobby, or [someone who has] talked about transgender kids being proof that Satan's plan is working, you really can see how judges shape the law ... When you have judges with these kinds of things on their records, you really start to wonder whether it's an impartial third branch institution, or whether it's going to affect how the law is decided.

These nominees brazen bias against the advancement of issues concerning the rights of women, minorities and LGBTQ communities makes the scrutiny of Aquilinas adjudication in the Nassar case all the more infuriating. By firmly placing herself in the victims cornera corner most of us (hopefully?) found ourselves as well after seeing the overwhelming evidence presented against NassarAquilina was chastised for appearing to be impartial. Why is that same bar of courtroom propriety not being futuristically applied to nominees such as Duncan and Norris and so many others?

Is the method and manner in which [Aquilina] delivered [the sentence] the most important thing, or is what she said the most important thing?, asks Jeanne Marie Wrenn, candidate for Cook County Circuit Court Judge in Chicago, IL.

I think the reasoning and the logic and the sentence that she delivered is what's important, and I think that the lens [through which] she's being judged [is about] judging her as being a woman as opposed to, Was that the right sentence? Did the punishment fit the crime? I think when we dissect it as being emotional or passionate or incendiarywe're judging it based on the gender of the person who delivered it versus the content of what she said. And is that fair? Is that the right thing? I am sure there are many instances of male judges delivering impassioned sentences for people who committed heinous acts, and do we look at that and say that they were emotional or grandstanding? Or do we say, Wow that person who committed these heinous acts deserved that punishment and it was the right sentence.

Increasing the number of female judges could go a long way toward leveling the playing field in terms of how women are perceived and treated in the courtroom, as well as potentially foster a new, more realistic norm for what is considered appropriate courtroom decorum in cases of sexual violence.

"I am sure there are many instances of male judges delivering impassioned sentences for people who committed heinous acts, and do we look at that and say that they were emotional or grandstanding?" Jeanne Marie Wrenn

Since 1979, the National Association of Women Judges has worked to increase the number of women on the bench. As of 2016, only 33 percent of of active United States district or trial court judges were women, a number made all the more precarious considering the collective profile of Trumps nominees. Additionally, the NAWJ provides judicial education on cutting-edge issues of importance. One of the biggest talking points on the docket for their mid-year conference this April is navigating this thorny, new legal landscape.

When we were founded in 1979, the challenges and opportunities that the nation faced were so different than today, says NAWJ President Hon. Tanya Kennedy. One of the things that we're going to focus on is increasing the pipeline of women to the legal profession.

NAWJ is also planning to host a legislative caucus on Capitol Hill this summer that will focus on sexual assault against women.

Kennedy did not want to comment on Aquilinas handling of the Nassar trial, nor the Trump administrations picks for judicial appointments, but she was clear about what taking the judicial oath means to her.

When judges take an oath, it is not to please any particular individual or entity, she says. It's really to uphold the law, to apply the law no matter how it comes out. Certainly, judges will always be criticizedthere will always someone who doesn't like a particular decision, that's part and parcel of the job. But the bottom line is that we judges took an oath and we have to stand by that oath to be independent and impartial decision-makers no matter who that decision hurts or helps.

As a woman and an immigrant, Judge Aquilina represents a rarity in the homogenous federal court system Trump seems eager to construct. She offered a fair sentencing for crimes Nassar committed against more than 200 women. She showed empathy for survivors, and disdain for the man sexually abused them. The scales of justice still seem balanced.

Judge Janice K. Cunningham, the first woman Circuit Court judge in Eaton County, Michigan, is presiding over Larry Nassars current sentencing hearing, and victim impact statements will continue through Tuesday of next week.Shanghai (AFP) - A van caught fire and ploughed into pedestrians on a crowded pavement outside a Starbucks in central Shanghai on Friday, injuring at least 18 people, three of them seriously, authorities and witnesses said.

The incident occurred at People's Park in the heart of the city during morning rush hour, when crowds of people would have been on their way to work.

A Shanghai police statement said a preliminary investigation indicated that the driver of the van, a 40-year-old man who was among the injured, had been smoking at the wheel which apparently ignited "dangerous substances" inside the vehicle.

Zhang Sai, a security guard at an adjacent building, told AFP the van was on fire when it veered out of control and mounted the curb, striking pedestrians and sending others scurrying to get out of the way.

"It happened around 8:50 am (0050 GMT). The van was on fire before it crashed on the sidewalk," Zhang said.

Xu Xin, a 23-year-old restaurant employee, came upon the immediate aftermath during his morning jog to find injured people on the ground and bystanders calling emergency services.

Portable gas tanks that are often used to fuel stoves were inside the vehicle, he said.

"The fire department carried gas tanks from the van, like those used in restaurants," Xu said.

The driver seemed unconscious while two other people in the van were badly burned, he added.

AFP journalists who arrived at the site found it had been quickly cleared by authorities.

A small police presence remained on hand standing watch. Damage to the fencing outside the Starbucks could be seen, but otherwise there was little evidence of an accident.

However, amateur video clips shot earlier and which circulated on Chinese social media showed several people sprawled on the pavement receiving medical treatment from fire and rescue personnel.

Other images showed a fire ablaze inside the van, which had come to a stop in front of a tree near the entrance to the Starbucks.

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The coffee shop was locked up and a notice was taped to the door saying it had been closed, advising customers to go to other nearby outlets.

In 2013, two tourists were killed when a car rammed into bystanders on Beijing's iconic Tiananmen Square before bursting into flames.

Three attackers also died in the incident, which Beijing blamed on separatists from the restive western region of Xinjiang.Two women are accused of burning and permanently disfiguring a 5-year-old girl during a voodoo ritual.

Police said the ritual was meant to remove a demon inside the little girl that was causing her to misbehave, the Associated Press reported. The little girls mother requested the ritual, according to police, and has not been charged but is receiving mental health treatment. The mother is of Haitian descent, according to the report, where religious voodoo has been practiced for centuries.

The two sisters  who said theyve performed the cleansing baths before and that children are sometimes burned as spirits leave their bodies  also threatened to cut off the head of the girls 8-year-old brother with a machete, according AP.

The boy said his sister was held down twice as the women blew fire over her face, cut her arm and collarbone area and poured something in her eyes that stung, according to the report.

The two Massachusetts women, Peggy LaBossiere, 51, and Rachel Hilaire, 40, have pleaded not guilty to assault and other charges.Geneva (AFP) - At least 90 people were feared dead on Friday in the latest migrant tragedy in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Libya, the UN migration agency said.

The tragedy happened off the coast of Zuwara in the early hours Friday, International Organization for Migration (IOM) spokeswoman Olivia Headon told reporters in Geneva by phone from Tunis.

"At least 90 migrants are reported to have drowned, when a boat capsized off the coast of Libya this morning", the IOM said in a statement.

The agency said that "10 bodies are reported to have washed up on Libyan shores", including those of two Libyans and eight Pakistanis.

Two survivors from the disaster had swum to shore, while another was rescued by a fishing boat, it added.

The agency has repeatedly issued warnings over the extreme dangers facing migrants who try to reach Europe via the so-called central Mediterranean route, which connects Libya to Italy.

IOM said Friday that more than 6,600 migrants and refugees had already entered Europe by sea this year, with central Mediterranean route crossings to Italy accounting for nearly 65 percent of the entries.

It voiced surprise that Libyans were among the dead, pointing out that only 29 Libyan nationals were rescued or intercepted trying to cross the Mediterranean in all of 2017, with no Libyan deaths recorded last year.

Asked if it was common to see Libyans among the migrants trying to cross to Europe, IOM spokesman Joel Millman said "we haven't (really) seen that before."

"They could have been smugglers," he told AFP.

The large number of Pakistanis found dead could meanwhile hint at a shift in migration trends.

IOM pointed out that Pakistanis made up the 13th largest group trying to cross the Mediterranean to Europe last year, with 3,138 of them arriving in Italy in 2017, and no recorded sea deaths.

But they have already climbed to third place this year, with an estimated 240 Pakistanis reaching Italy in January, compared to just nine during the same month last year.

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- 16,000 drowned -

Drownings in the Mediterranean began surging in 2013 as Europe's worst migration crisis since World War II began picking up speed, with hundreds of thousands of people fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and elsewhere.

Over the past five years, more than 16,000 people have died trying to make the perilous crossing to Europe, according to IOM numbers.

Excluding Friday's tragedy, 246 migrants and refugees have already died trying to cross the Mediterranean since the beginning of the year, compared to 254 casualties during the first month of 2017.

Two hundred and eighteen of the deaths this year occurred on the central route, IOM said, while 28 happened on the western route that links North Africa to Spain.

No deaths have been reorded this year on the eastern Mediterranean route that connects Turkey and Greece, used by 1,089 migrants so far in 2018.

The EU last year reached controversial agreements with chaos-wracked Libya to stem the flow of migrants from that country, following a more comprehensive deal with Turkey in 2016, which sharply reduced the numbers crossing to Greece.

Casualties in the eastern Mediterranean have dropped dramatically since then.

In the 22 months since the deal with Turkey was reached in April 2016, fatalities on that route have fallen to an average of 6.75 per month, from 96.25 per month during the year prior to the agreement, IOM said.These aerial images of Icelands glaciers look like giant works of art Stunning birds eye photos of the glacial rivers in Iceland. (Photo: Jassen Todorov/Caters News)

These aerial images of glaciers as they carve the land seem almost otherworldly. The ethereal images of Icelands frozen rivers were taken by pilot and flight instructor Jassen Todorov.

The 43-year-old, whos also a music professor at San Francisco State University, specializes in aerial photography and has won multiple awards.

These Icelandic rivers are fascinating when seen from above, Todorov said. Silt flowing in glacial melt creates spectacular patterns; they look more like abstract art than actual rivers.

Some of the images are of Icelands longest river: Thjorsa. Its a glacial river, and its source is the Hofsjokull glacier.

The colors and patterns are created by glacial melt flowing through volcanic silt.

As an active pilot and aerial photographer, I have experienced incredible views.  If you want to be enchanted by natures abstract art, then your best bet is from above.

These pictures are taken during two separate trips to Iceland, in 2015 and 2016. I am just now releasing these images to the press. (Caters News)

Photography by Jassen Todorov/Caters News

See more news-related photo galleries and follow us on Yahoo News Photo Twitter and Tumblr.Eleven people have been detained over a spate of deadly attacks in Afghanistan, President Ashraf Ghani said Friday, as he vowed to take revenge for the bloodshed.

The government is under growing public pressure to improve security in the Afghan capital after three major attacks in the past two weeks demonstrated the ability of militants to strike at the heart of the country.

Since January 20, militants have stormed a luxury hotel, bombed a crowded street and raided a military compound in Kabul, killing more than 130 people.

A British charity in the eastern city of Jalalabad was also attacked. Officials said five people were killed.

"People will not forget. Even if it takes a hundred years, the Afghans will take their revenge," Ghani said in a televised address to the nation after Friday prayers. He gave no further details about the 11 detained.

Officials would submit a new security plan for Kabul on Sunday, Ghani said, speaking inside the heavily fortified presidential palace -- eight months after a devastating truck bomb in the city triggered a similar move.

Afghans "demand" peace and wanted "practical actions (from Pakistan)", he added.

His remarks came a day after Afghan officials said they had handed "undeniable" evidence to Pakistan that they claimed showed the recent attacks were planned on Pakistani soil.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack on the Intercontinental Hotel on January 20 and the street bombing last Saturday.

The Pakistani embassy in Kabul said the information was "being examined for its authenticity".

Kabul, along with Washington, has long accused Islamabad of providing safe havens to leaders of the Taliban and other militant groups.

Pakistan denies the charges, insisting it has eradicated safe havens in the tribal region along the border with Afghanistan. The area is largely inaccessible to foreign journalists.

But Islamabad is widely believed to retain links to the Taliban as a bulwark against arch-nemesis India, which it rivals for influence in Kabul.

US President Donald Trump has ratcheted up the pressure on Pakistan in 2018 with a freeze on aid.

But some analysts warn there may be no real way to pressure Islamabad, which believes keeping Kabul out of India's orbit is more important than clamping down on cross-border militancy.EMILYs List, the fundraising group that backs pro-abortion rights Democratic women, on Friday endorsed Illinois progressive Marie Newmans campaign against Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.), one of the last anti-abortion Democrats in Congress.

Support from EMILYs List, a fundraising powerhouse closely aligned with Democratic Party leadership, gives Newman a major boost in her effort to unseat Lipinski in the March 20 primary.

Throughout her career, Marie has worked to improve her community and advocate on behalf of children and families. Her record is unimpeachable, Stephanie Schriock, EMILYs List president, said in a statement that also criticized Lipinski.

He has put womens reproductive health care in jeopardy and sought to end protections against discrimination, Schriock said. This is not an acceptable way to govern  and its certainly not what the people of Illinois 3rd District deserve.

Primary challenges to incumbent Democratic members of Congress are exceedingly rare. Perhaps rarer, however, is a Democratic congressman with a history of voting for abortion restrictions. Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) is likely the only other Democratic member of Congress who flat-out opposes abortion rights.

Democrat Marie Newman, who is challenging Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) in a March 20 primary, picked up the influential endorsement of EMILY's List. (Photo: Bill Clark/Getty Images)

Newman already had the backing of NARAL Pro-Choice America, the Human Rights Campaign, a host of progressive groups, and Illinois Reps. Luis Gutierrez and Jan Schakowsky (D).

But EMILYs List and Planned Parenthood Action Fund had yet to jump in the race. Planned Parenthood Action Fund told HuffPost on Friday that the group hasnt yet announced its 2018 endorsements.

In addition to his abortion opposition, Lipinski has voted against a law banning discrimination against LGBT Americans in the workplace, and taken several conservative stances on immigration, including by voting against a 2010 version of the Dream Act. (Last summer, Lipinski co-sponsored a bill extending legal protection for undocumented immigrants who benefitted from the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.)

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Illinois 3rd District remains favorable territory for Lipinski. It encompasses southwestern suburbs of Chicago that skew more conservative than other parts of the metropolitan area.

But that may be changing. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) won Lipinskis district by 9 percentage points in the 2016 primary, and Hillary Clinton carried it by nearly double that margin in the general election. ( Lipinski backed Sanders in the primary, giving him some credibility with anti-establishment voters.)

A key advantage for Lipinski thus far has been support he retains from the districts influential labor unions. AFSCME Council 31, which represents Illinois public employees, endorses Lipinski, with spokesman Anders Lindall noting the incumbents 100-percent rating on the unions 2017 congressional scorecard and 95-percent lifetime rating.

But Lipinskis union support may be weakening. The Intercept reported on Friday that SEIU plans to endorse Newman.

Lipinski opposes raising the minimum wage to $15, a key priority for organized labor. Newman backs a federal $15 minimum wage.

Also on HuffPost

Taking Security Seriously

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) talks with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) before the start of a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing concerning the roles and responsibilities for defending the nation against cyberattacks, on Oct. 19, 2017.

With Liberty And Justice...

Members of Code Pink for Peace protest before the start of a hearing where U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions will testify to the Senate Judiciary Committee in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on Oct. 18, 2017. Committee members questioned Sessions about conversations he had with President Donald Trump about the firing of former FBI Director James Comey, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy, the ongoing investigation about Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and other subjects.

Whispers

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), right, speaks with Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) before a confirmation hearing for Christopher Sharpley, nominee for inspector general of the CIA, on Oct. 17, 2017.

Not Throwing Away His Shot

Lin-Manuel Miranda, creator of the musical "Hamilton," makes his way to a meeting of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment and Related Agencies in the Rayburn Office Building during a round of meetings to urge federal funding for the arts and humanities on Sept. 13, 2017.

Medicare For All

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), center, speaks on health care as Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), left, and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), right, listen during an event to introduce the Medicare for All Act on Sept. 13, 2017.

Bernie Bros

Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) pack his office on Sept. 8, 2017. Members of the "Draft Bernie for a People's Party" campaign delivered a petition with more than 50,000 signatures to urge the senator to start and lead a new political party.

McCain Appearance

Sen. John McCain, second from left, leaves the Capitol after his first appearance since being diagnosed with cancer. He arrived to cast a vote to help Republican senators narrowly pass the motion to proceed for the replacement of the Affordable Care Act on July 25, 2017.

A Narrow Win

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, center, speaks alongside Sens. John Barrasso, left, John Cornyn, right, and John Thune, rear, after the Senate narrowly passed the motion to proceed for the replacement of the Affordable Care Act on July 25, 2017.

Kushner Questioning

Jared Kushner, White House senior adviser and son-in-law to President Donald Trump, arrives at the Capitol on July 25, 2017. Kushner was interviewed by the House Intelligence Committee in a closed-door meeting about contacts he had with Russia.

Hot Dogs On The Hill

Rep. Frank Lucas (R-Okla.) prepares a hot dog during the American Meat Institute's annual Hot Dog Lunch in the Rayburn Office Building courtyard on July 19, 2017.

And Their Veggie Counterparts

Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) visits the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals veggie dog giveaway on July 19, 2017, countering a National Hot Dog Day event being held elsewhere on Capitol Hill.

Poised For Questions

Callista Gingrich, wife of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, waits for a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on her nomination to be the U.S. ambassador to the Vatican on July 18, 2017.

Speaking Up

Health care activists protest to stop the Republican health care bill at Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on July 17, 2017.

In The Fray

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) speaks to members of the media after announcing the revised version of the Senate Republican health care bill on Capitol Hill on July 13, 2017.

Anticipation

Christopher Wray is seated with his daughter Caroline, left, as he prepares to testify at a Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing on his nomination to be the next FBI director on July 12, 2017.

Up In Arms

Health care activists protest to stop the Republican health care bill at Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on July 10, 2017.

Across A Table

Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) meets with South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Capitol Hill on June 29, 2017.

Somber Day

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) speaks about the recent attack on the Republican congressional baseball team during her weekly press conference on Capitol Hill on June 15, 2017.

Family Matters

Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), right, and his sons, Jack, 10, and Brad, arrive in the basement of the Capitol after a shooting at the Republican baseball practice in Alexandria, Virginia, on June 14, 2017.

A Bipartisan Pause

Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), right, coach of the Republican congressional baseball team, tells the story of the shooting that occurred during a baseball practice while he stands alongside Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.), left, a coach of the Democratic congressional baseball team on June 14, 2017.

Hats On

Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.) reacts about the shooting he was present for at a Republican congressional baseball practice in Alexandria, Virginia, as he speaks with reporters at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on June 14, 2017.

Public Testimony

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions is sworn in to testify before a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Capitol Hill on June 13, 2017.

Comey's Big Day

Former FBI Director James Comey testifies before a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Russia's alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election on Capitol Hill on June 8, 2017.

Conveying His Point

U.S. Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats testifies at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on his interactions with the Trump White House and on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act on June 7, 2017.

Selfie Time

Vice President Mike Pence takes a selfie with a tourist wearing a "Make America Great Again" hat inside the U.S. Capitol rotunda on June 6, 2017. The vice president walked through the rotunda after attending the Senate Republican policy luncheon.

Budget Queries

Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney testifies before the House Budget Committee about President Donald Trump's fiscal 2018 budget proposal on Capitol Hill on May 24, 2017.

Flagged Down By Reporters

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, leaves a closed committee meeting on Capitol Hill on May 24, 2017. The committee is investigating possible Russian interference in the U.S. presidential election.

Shock And Awe

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) hold a news conference on the release of the president's fiscal 2018 budget proposal on Capitol Hill on May 23, 2017.

Seeing Double

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) arrives in the Capitol for the Senate Democrats' policy lunch on May 16, 2017.

Honoring Officers

President Donald Trump speaks at the National Peace Officers Memorial Service on the West Lawn of the Capitol on May 15, 2017.

Whispers

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.), right, and ranking member Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) talk during a hearing with the heads of the U.S. intelligence agencies in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on May 11, 2017.

Skeptical

Former acting Attorney General Sally Yates arrives to testify before a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election on Capitol Hill on May 8, 2017.

Differing Opinions

Rep. Glenn Grothman (R-Wis.) gives a thumbs-up to protesters on the East Front of the Capitol after the House passed the Republicans' bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act on May 4, 2017. The protesters support the ACA.

Real Talk

United States Naval Academy Midshipman 2nd Class Shiela Craine (left), a sexual assault survivor, testifies before the House Armed Services Committee's Subcommittee on Military Personnel with (2nd from left to right) Ariana Bullard, Stephanie Gross and Annie Kendzior in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill on May 2, 2017. Kendzior, a former midshipman, and Gross, a former cadet, were both raped twice during their time at the military academies. The academy superintendents were called to testify following the release of a survey last month by the Pentagon that said 12.2 percent of academy women and 1.7 percent of academy men reported experiencing unwanted sexual contact during the 2015-16 academic year.

In Support Of Immigrants

Congressional Hispanic Caucus Chair Rep. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D-N.M.), center, is joined by dozens of Democratic members of the House of Representatives to mark "Immigrant Rights Day" in the Capitol Visitor Center on May 1, 2017 in Washington, D.C. The Democratic legislators called on Republicans and President Donald Trump to join their push for comprehensive immigration reform.

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.Getting outside may not only change your perspective  it could actually alter the way your brain works in some unexpected ways, according to a small new study.

Your brain seems like it has to work harder and its less effective when its outside, explains Kyle Mathewson, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Alberta in Canada and the lead author of new research published in the journal Brain Research.

For the study, Mathewson, along with graduate student Joanna Scanlon, monitored the brain activity of 12 people as they listened to a series of tones. Everyone was directed to press a button when they heard one of two sounds. This task was administered twice: first while sitting still inside a dim, quiet lab, then while riding a bike outside along a street. The goal was to see how the brain functions in the two environments, and if its changed by an everyday outdoor activity, like bike riding.

They found, somewhat surprisingly, that while people were outside, their brains werent responding as robustly to the task at hand, perhaps because their attention was taxed by competing stimuli. A type of brain wave seen when the mind is at rest or meditating, which is commonly observed in the lab, all but disappeared in fresh air, Mathewson says.

Outside, there are traffic sounds, and the sights of traffic, and all these people around you, and trees and birds and the wind and the cold, Mathewson says. All these extra sensations are kind of competing with the task that youre doing, forcing the brain to work harder to achieve the same result.

Bike riding, however, did not seem to make much of a difference on brain activity. While the indoor group was sedentary in this study, in one of Mathewsons prior experiments, people rode a stationary bike indoors. Brain activity while biking inside did not differ much from when people sat quietly indoors, he says. The effects arent simply due to fresh air, either. When the researchers conducted a follow-up experiment, during which they played a recording of traffic sounds in a lab environment, they also observed reduced brain activity.

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More research is needed. Its too soon to tell whether these brain changes are positive or negative, and Mathewson says the results may not hold true for every outdoor environment. A tranquil meadow, for example, may not stress the brain in the same way as a busy urban street. Past research, in fact, has shown a host of mental health benefits associated with spending time in nature. Going outside in this case might have appeared bad because we went outside beside busy traffic, he says, but if we went outside into nature, we might have found different effects.

Since people in the study were still able to complete the test outdoors, despite their diminished cognitive response, the researchers are also repeating the experiment using progressively more difficult tasks, Mathewson says. We think this task was too easy and that we werent able to tap into the effect, he says. Now were going to try to push a little bit harder and get more and more difficult tasks to see where the brain breaks down.

The good news is that recent breakthroughs in technology  the creation of small, portable brain monitoring equipment that can be brought outside and on the go  not only made this study possible, but will continue to improve follow-up studies, Mathewson says. This is going to open up a whole new field of studying people in their natural habitat, he says.Madrid (AFP) - Moroccan rescue services have recovered the bodies of around 20 migrants in the Mediterranean, a spokeswoman for the Spanish enclave of Melilla said Sunday.

The bodies of the migrants, from sub-Saharan Africa, were spotted Saturday by a Spanish ship, which alerted the rescue services of both countries, the spokeswoman said.

She added that "about 20" bodies were then recovered in Moroccan territorial waters. Moroccan authorities have yet to issue a figure.

Late Saturday, a Spanish police patrol boat found one more body, which was taken to Melilla, a Spanish enclave bordering Morocco.

Migrants are increasingly favouring the so-called western Mediterranean route to reach Europe, which involves making the sea crossing between north Africa and southern mainland Spain.

According to the International Organization for Migration, Spain has been the second most popular point of entry for migrants coming to Europe so far this year, with 1,279 arrivals, after Italy with 4,256.

It said 243 people have died or are missing in the Mediterranean after trying to cross the Mediterranean this year, not including those recovered this weekend.

Spain was last year the third point of entry for Europe-bound migrants, after Italy and Greece. Arrivals by sea tripled in 2017 compared to the previous year, reaching a total of 22,900 migrants, according to the EU border agency Frontex.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was created, quite literally, to drain the swamp. In the not-so-far-off past, much of the southeastern United States was a malarial mess, with disease-carrying mosquitoes multiplying in the heat and moisture of the agricultural lowlands and wetlands that dominate the region. Before America became a superpower, the major threats to life and liberty werent terrorism or nuclear annihilation, but the annual scourge of fever diseases. When the CDCs predecessor, the Office of Malaria Control in War Areas, was created in 1942, its mission was to knock down the remaining barriers to personal freedom these illnesses imposed. Or, to drain them.

Seventy-five years later, malaria and yellow fever have been all but eliminated in the continental United States. The morbidity and mortality burden for the worst infectious diseases has fallen tremendously over the last century, and average life expectancy has increased by over 10 years since 1942. At the center of it all is the CDC, now a major piece of both the public-health and national-security apparatuses, and a relative constant in times of great change. But as 2017 showed, few institutions are truly immune to the political upheaval the Trump administration brought to Washingtonand now the stalwart CDC finds itself sinking into the swamp.

To say the agency has taken a step back in Trumps first year would be an understatement. On Wednesday, the new secretary of health and human services, Alex Azar, announced the resignation of CDC Director Brenda Fitzgerald, citing complex financial interests that have imposed a broad recusal limiting her ability to complete all her duties. According to a recent report from Politico, some of those holdings included eyebrow-raising investments in companies directly related to Fitzgeralds work, including thousands of dollars in drug and insurance companies.

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Close ties with these industries arent unusual among Trump administration officials: Former health secretary Tom Price had stock in biotech and pharmaceuticals companies, and Azar is a former executive with pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly. But Fitzgeralds financial activity went even beyond this new norm. Politico reported that shed held stock in tobacco companies Reynolds American, British American Tobacco, Imperial Brands, Philip Morris International, and Altria Group before she took office in July. As director, she purchased over $1,000 worth of stock in Japan Tobacco. That means that before she dumped the stocks in October, Fitzgerald held ownership in four of the Big Five tobacco companies in the world.

Recommended: Read the Full Text of the Nunes Memo

Now, there are no accusations of wrongdoing against Fitzgeraldno indication her stake made a difference in her leadershipand its unclear if she was aware of the stock purchases made in her name. But even the most generous interpretation for Fitzgerald is a scandal for the CDC. One of the centers chief public-health objectives is to end smoking. In fact, the only real public-health position on tobacco usage is that it should be eliminated entirely, a line that the CDC has held for years now. The CDCs chief holding even a penny of tobacco stock, let alone a portfolio that includes almost all the major companies, runs counter to that goal.

This particular fiasco comes during a time when the agency is facing a growing number of public-health threats. Smoking rates have dipped significantly in the past year, but the disparities in smoking rates between rich and poor have actually increaseddifferences that threaten to further entrench income inequality. Antibiotic resistance is on the rise, and more than likely portends a new wave of infectious threats that will test the American public-health system, including the imminent threat of a resurgence of sexually-transmitted diseases. The country is in the grip of one of the worst flu seasons in years, and the unprecedented opioid crisis decreasing the lifespans of millions of Americans shows no signs of relenting.

Facing that rising tide, the mothership of the countrys public-health system is floundering, in no small part because of a Republican effort to reduce its funding. In 2017, the GOPs attempts to repeal Obamacare often proposed raiding or eliminating the Prevention and Public Health Fund, which constitutes a major piece of the CDCs budget. While repeal never passed, it put CDC on the defensive, where its likely to remain: Trump has also targeted the fund for cuts.

Recommended: The Surprise in the Nunes Memo

Whats more, facing a loss of funding for its international infectious-disease effortsthere appear to be no new resources on the horizonthe agency is set to cut back its global health-security program by as much as 80 percent. In a hotter, more connected world, when global pandemic seems all the more likely, the CDC is shrinking from the world.

Paradoxically, the failure of global diseases like Ebola and Zika to establish beachheads in the United States after sustained panics has often been used as rationale for pulling the agency back and slashing its proactive public-health funds. But renewed austerity, along with controversy in leadership, could set the CDC up for failure precisely at the moment when it is needed most.

Read more from The Atlantic:

This article was originally published on The Atlantic.Beijing (AFP) - China said Sunday it is "firmly opposed" to the United States' new nuclear weapons policy statement, describing its speculation about Chinese intentions as "wild guesses".

The US Defense Department's Nuclear Posture Review released Friday outlines the Pentagon's nuclear ambitions under President Donald Trump, while spelling out how it foresees nuclear threats in the coming decades.

Although the review largely focuses on Russia, several sections are dedicated to the lack of transparency in China's nuclear buildup.

The report says China has added new types of nuclear capabilities -- ranging from a mobile intercontinental ballistic missile to a new ballistic missile submarine -- "with little to no transparency into its intentions".

The report makes "wild guesses" about China's intentions and exaggerates the threat of its nuclear force, defence ministry spokesman Ren Guoqiang said in a statement.

China is "firmly opposed to this", Ren said.

China "has always kept its own nuclear forces at the minimum level required by national security", Ren said, pointing out that the US has the world's largest nuclear arsenal.

"We hope that the United States will abandon its Cold War mentality," Ren said.

Since taking office in 2012 President Xi Jinping has pushed for a muscular China, including calls last October to develop a "world-class" military by 2050.

China's neighbours have watched warily as the People's Liberation Army has upgraded its arsenal with increasingly sophisticated weaponry and sought to create a more effective and professional fighting force.

Upgrades to its nuclear arsenal have received less attention, partly because of its small size, estimated by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute at just 270 warheads compared to 6,800 for the US.

China has also long maintained it will never allow first use of its atomic weapons.

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China "always abides by the principle of no first use of nuclear weapons under any circumstances", Ren said, and will "unconditionally not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states."

The US military wants to revamp its nuclear arsenal and develop new low-yield atomic weapons, largely in response to Russian actions in recent years, the Pentagon said.

Moscow on Saturday denounced the "bellicose" and "anti-Russian" nature of the new US nuclear policy, warning it would take necessary measures to ensure its own security.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.Colts linebacker Edwin Jackson was killed by a suspected drunk driver early Sunday morning. He was 26 years old.

Indianapolis Colts linebacker Edwin Jackson was struck and killed by a suspected drunk driver early Sunday morning.

Jackson, a 26-year-old former walk-on at Georgia Southern had worked his way up to the Colts active roster after starting out on the teams practice squad.

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Police believe Jackson was using a ride sharing service around 4 a.m. when he became ill and his driver pulled to the side of the road on I-70.

Thats when investigators say a Ford pickup truck veered onto the shoulder striking the car and killing both Jackson and his driver, 54-year-old Jeffrey Monroe.

One of the people struck was thrown into the center lane of I-70, Indiana State Police noted in its release. Shortly after the crash, and before any 911 calls were received, Trooper Ty Mays was driving through the area and noticed a vehicle in front of him make an evasive maneuver to the left. Mays then spotted the wreckage along the right side of the road and activated his emergency lights. As he slowed to stop for the crash he struck the body of the victim in the center lane.

The driver of the pickup attempted to run from the scene on foot, but was quickly caught by police. The 37-year-old suspect was believed to be intoxicated and driving without a license.

Jackson appeared in nine games for the Colts this season, recording 60 total tackles including two sacks.

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We were heartbroken to hear the news of Edwin Jacksons passing, The Colts said in statement on Sunday afternoon. Edwin was loved by all in the Colts organization. We admired his outgoing personality, competitive spirit and hard-working mentality. He was well-respected among all with whom he crossed paths, and he will be greatly missed in our locker room and throughout our entire organization. We also understand that another person lost his life in the accident, only adding to our sorrow on this day. We are shocked and saddened by this tragedy, and our thoughts and prayers are with the families of both men during this difficult time.

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Blake Schuster is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at blakeschuster@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!

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A controversial bill would add Oklahoma to the short list of states that have authorized chemical castration as an acceptable condition of release for convicted sex offenders.

Republican Rep. Rick West is sponsoring the bill at the behest of a constituent, the Associated Press reports. If it passes, men convicted of violent sex crimes could be required as a condition of release to take drugs that lower testosterone and sexual libido. Its unclear how often the option would actually be used, though the bill would require it after a second sexually violent offense, unless a court specifically decided it would not be effective or the man opted for a surgical alternative.

The bill will likely face a bumpy road to approval, as it may be considered unconstitutional. Its hard to imagine this couldnt be considered cruel or unusual, Oklahomas American Civil Liberties Union chapter spokeswoman Allie Shinn told AP.

Still, a bill that would have allowed chemical or surgical castration of sex offenders nearly passed in Oklahoma in 2002, before it was vetoed by then-Gov. Frank Keating.

At least seven other states  California, Florida, Louisiana, Georgia, Montana, Oregon and Wisconsin  have similar measures in place, according to AP. Even in these states, the option is rarely used. A spokesperson for California prisons told AP only a couple of parolees are required to take the treatment annually. In both Montana and Louisiana, prison officials were aware of only one instance in the last decade when the procedure was ordered, AP reports.San Jose (AFP) - Costa Rica voted Sunday in the first round of the Central American country's presidential election, which is being buffeted by a debate on gay marriage.

A total 13 candidates were vying to succeed outgoing President Luis Guillermo Solis, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a second consecutive term.

If no candidate wins 40 percent of the vote, a runoff election will be held on April 1.

Same-sex marriage is seen as a key issue in the socially conservative country, where 3.3 million voters are eligible to cast ballots.

An evangelical politician on the Christian right, Fabricio Alvarado, has leapt from obscurity to be the frontrunner with around 17 percent support, according to pre-election surveys, after ferociously opposing gay marriage.

Several countries -- Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Uruguay -- already legally recognize such unions and others appear poised to follow. But Costa Rica and others in Central American are resisting the growing trend.

However, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights -- located in Costa Rica's capital -- last month urged Latin American nations to accept homosexual marriage.

- 'Homophobic discourse' -

Costa Rica's outgoing government has indicated its willingness to follow the court's exhortation, but has butted up against refusal from the notaries' association that conducts marriages.

"This is the first time I'm voting. I'm a bit nervous," said Nelia Araya, a 20-year-old student casting her ballot at a school in the capital San Jose.

She said she was worried about one of the candidates' "homophobic discourse" and had urged her family to vote "so that someone who wants to take rights away from people doesn't win."

In a related gesture, eight women went to vote in different polling stations dressed in costumes modeled on "The Handmaid's Tale," a US TV series about a dystopian future in which women are subjugated, to protest what they termed a "fundamentalist threat."

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Electoral officials said voting in the first half of the day occurred with no significant incidents, and with strong turnout.

Polling in the country took place under a bright blue sky and tropical sunshine. After a slow start, lines started to appear later in the day in front of polling stations.

Overseas ballots from Costa Rican consulates abroad had been flowing in since Saturday, with the biggest number of emigrant voters found in the United States.

Solis said as he voted in San Jose to choose his successor that he saw the biggest problem facing Costa Rica to be "the fiscal deficit and its combination with the debt."

Accompanied by relatives and advisors, the outgoing leader called on voters, who were also choosing a new legislative assembly, to "elect a government better than mine, a president better than me."

A country with a costly health and pension system, Costa Rica has seen its deficit inch up to stand at 6.2 percent of gross domestic product.

Public debt is 65 percent of GDP, creating concerns among officials that much-vaunted economic stability could be threatened.

The outgoing government -- like the three before it -- was unable to push through tax reforms to counter the growing deficit.

- Corruption, insecurity -

The outcome of Sunday's election was difficult for surveys to predict. According to the most recent poll, published Wednesday, 36 percent of voters were undecided which presidential candidate to back.

Four of the candidates, including ostensible frontrunner Alvarado, led the pack, but with little between them.

Analysts said a factor in the electoral disenchantment with the candidates was a perception of political corruption, reinforced by a recent scandal over influence peddling related to a state bank loan to import Chinese concrete.

Insecurity is also a concern for voters. Though Costa Rica is far safer than the so-called Northern Triangle of Central America -- Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras -- its murder rate has hit a record high, and the police say gang activity is on the rise.Nicosia (AFP) - As Cyprus gears up for a presidential election run-off, apathy appears on the rise among young people more concerned by economic problems than the decades-long quest to reunify the island.

Conservative incumbent Nicos Anastasiades faces off against dovish left-winger Stavros Malas on Sunday in a second round of voting that looks set to be tight.

But 19-year-old Eleni Tovletian insists she is so turned off by the country's insular political class that she'll be staying away.

"I think politicians are lying to us. I'm tired of hearing them arguing on TV," the business student told AFP.

The first round in the race for the presidency on January 28 already saw turnout hit a record low in the European Union's most easterly member as some 28 percent of voters failed to show up.

There was no breakdown by age group but a study published in December showed some 62 percent of those between 18 and 35 were set to abstain.

Pushing disinterest among the youth -- who make up some 30 percent of the 800,000 population in the Greek-majority Republic of Cyprus -- is an apparent shift in priorities from older generations.

Since the 1974 division of Cyprus following an invasion and occupation by Turkish troops, the "national issue" of whether to reunify the island has dominated politics.

Last year Anastasiades and the leader of the Turkish-backed statelet in the north, Mustafa Akinci, came close to sealing a deal, but two years of painstaking negotiations collapsed in acrimony.

Now members of the younger generation, who have only ever lived in a divided homeland where the communities are split, say the question of reunification is not their driving concern.

"I think the young people are more interested in the economy, and the old ones in the Cyprus problem because they lived through it," said 21-year-old journalism student Androniki Ellina.

- 'Youth not wanted' -

While many young voters say they are keen to see the island's division resolved, it is basic issues like finding a job or paying for their studies that dominate.

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That is particularly the case in a country that is still coming to terms with a 2013 financial crisis that battered the economy and led to biting austerity measures.

Despite an impressive recovery that has seen steady growth over the past few years the economy is still smaller than it used to be and youth unemployment hovers around 25 percent.

"For the last five years the amount of government allowances for students has been reduced by 20 million euros ($25 million)," said Michalis Kanelli, a member of the pro-Malas Proodeftiki student party.

"The youth feels like the government doesn't want them."

According to the Cyprus Institute of Statisticians more than a quarter of those aged 18-28 are trying their luck abroad looking for better prospects.

- 'We are the future' -

Overall the campaign for the elections has been largely lacklustre -- but conscious of growing concerns the candidates did look to focus on the economy.

Leftist Malas is committed to putting an end to low wages in a job market where average starting salaries are around 800 to 1,000 euros a month.

Meanwhile Anastasiades played up the economic recovery of the past few years that has helped stabilise the country.

"Anastasiades' government created new occupations and prospects," insisted Yiannis Constantinou, 26, president of the Young Business Network.

"The younger generation is in an advantageous position today as they can get funding for their start-ups and innovative ideas."

But despite the pledges it seems that none of the candidates has really convinced young voters.

In a head-to-head TV debate on Wednesday before the second round of voting, arguments over reunification eclipsed the economy.

On the University of Cyprus campus in Nicosia, activist Andreas Tziamalis is all too aware of the apathy among his peers.

"Lots of young people are disappointed," said the economics student as he tried to drum up interest at a stand for the youth wing of Anastasiades' party.

"We try to convince them just to vote, it doesn't matter who for. Whatever happens we are the future of this country."Darren Osborne deliberately mowed down worshippers outside two mosques in Finsbury Park in June last year - Metropolitan Polce/PA

An unemployed "loner" who ploughed a van into a group of Muslims after becoming radicalised by far-right material within weeks has been jailed for life and told to serve at least 43 years.

Darren Osborne deliberately mowed down worshippers outside two mosques in Finsbury Park, north London, shortly after 12.15am on June 19 last year, killing 51-year-old Makram Ali and injuring 12 others.

A jury of eight women and four men took one hour to convict the father of four, who was seen smiling and blowing a kiss to angry bystanders in the moments after the terror attack, of murder and attempted murder.

Osborne stood with his hands crossed in front of him as sentence was passed by Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb.

She told him: "This was a terrorist attack. You intended to kill. Your mindset became one of malevolent hatred.

"In short you allowed your mind to be poisoned by those who claimed to be leaders."

Osborne is likely to die in jail after being jailed for a minimum of 43 years Credit: PA

Of his murderous crime in targeting Muslim worshippers, she said: "Many of them were wearing distinctive Muslim dress.

"You had found your target. You accelerated the van towards them intending to kill as many people as you could."

After the 48-year-old was effectively told he would die in jail, he said: "God bless you, thank you."

The judge also paid tribute to Mohammed Mahmoud, the Imam from the local Muslim Welfare House, who prevented the angry crowd from harming Osborne after the attack.

She said: "This was a demonstration of true leadership. His behaviour throws into sharp relief the bile spewed out on-line from those who aspire to lead the haters.

"Not because his exhortation to desist from punishing the perpetrator was remarkable but because he had the strength of character to do the right thing under pressure.

"He chose to respond to evil with good. His response should be everyones response whether it is to the evil of child grooming and abuse in Rochdale or the evil of terrorist atrocities in our cities."

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Video: Moment Darren Osborne ploughed into worshippers

Prosecutor Jonathan Rees QC read a victim impact statement from Ruzina Akhtar, the daughter of Mr Ali, to the court.

Mrs Akhtar: "I have suffered with recurring nightmares. The scene of the incident is near to our house. We walk past this this most days and are constantly reminded."

Part way through the trial Osborne, from Cardiff, suddenly denied he had been driving the van at the moment of impact, an 11th hour defence the prosecution dismissed as being conjured "out of thin air".

The attacker said he had no idea Dave - one of his two made-up accomplices - intended to smash into a group of pedestrians, and believed they were on their way to a pub to meet a third co-conspirator, Terry.

Jurors agreed with prosecutors who dubbed his increasingly improbable version of events a "total fabrication" and "frankly absurd".

The moment Darren Osborne was arrested after being detained by a crowd Credit: Sky News

During the nine-day trial, Osborne told the court he had wanted to kill senior Labour figures including leader Jeremy Corbyn and London Mayor Sadiq Khan.

He had also plotted to murder Rochdale Labour councillor Aftab Hussain but called it off because he wanted "more casualties".

Finsbury Park van attack - How it unfolded

A note written by Osborne - which complained about terrorism, the Rotherham child sex scandal, and branded Mr Corbyn a "terrorist sympathiser" - was found in the cab of the van.

Osborne, described in court as a "total loner", had become obsessed with Muslims after watching BBC drama Three Girls in May last year and was angered by what he deemed as inaction following a string of UK terror attacks, his estranged partner Sarah Andrews said.

A 30-year criminal record for 102 offences

Mr Rees said Osborne had a criminal record spanning between 1984 and 2014, and had appeared before the court on 33 occasions for 102 offences.

He said he had a history of drugs, theft, fraud, burglary and "kindred offences", as well as nine offences "against the person" including assault.

He first appeared in court aged 15 and in 2006, aged 36, was sentenced to 24 months in prison for wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.

Most recently in 2014, aged 44, he was convicted of charges of theft, attempted theft and shoplifting in South Wales.

Victim 'lived without enemies', daughter tells court

Mr Ali left behind a wife, six children and two grandchildren. His two sons are 13 and 14 years old, the court heard.

"They will now grow up without the help and support of their father," his daughter Ruzina Akhtar said. "Without his guidance and assistance in life."

Mrs Akhtar's son - Mr Ali's grandson - has also been affected since the attack.

She said: "My son is always asking where his grandad is and why he cannot go to the park every day to play with him any more. This is heartbreaking."

Makram Ali died after being knocked down by the van in Finsbury Park Credit: Metropolitan Police/PA

Mrs Akhtar said her father will "never be forgotten", saying: "His laugh will echo the walls of our home and his smile will be reflected in our eyes. His memory will be in our conversation."

He "lived without any enemies" and never hurt or upset anyone, she said.

She added: "His life was taken in a cruel way by a very narrow minded, heartless being."

Mrs Akhtar added : "My mum is scared to go out by herself in case she is attacked because she is visibly a Muslim who wears a headscarf."

Theresa May urges internet companies to act 'further and faster' over terrorist content

Downing Street said Prime Minister Theresa May wanted internet companies to go "further and faster" to remove extremist or terrorist content.

A Number 10 spokesman said Osborne "committed an appalling and cowardly attack, killing one man and injuring many others", adding: "He has now been brought to justice for this horrific act."

The spokesman added: "The internet cannot be used as a safe space for terrorists or those who want to spread terrorist or extremist content.

"We recognise there has been some progress in this area but the Prime Minister has made clear that internet companies need to go further and faster in removing this sort of content from their websites."

Asked if the Prime Minister regarded Osborne as a terrorist, the spokesman said he had not spoken to Mrs May but added: "I would say this was an act of terrorism."

Killer radicalised in weeks after seeing BBC film

On the evening of May 16 last year, Darren Osborne, an unemployed father of four from Cardiff, sat down on his sofa to watch a BBC drama about the Rochdale grooming scandal.

Such was his outrage at the events depicted in Three Girls, that he turned to the internet for more information.

Within three weeks, the extreme Right-wing material he found online had radicalised him to such an extent that he deliberately drove a hire van into a group of Muslims, killing one and injuring 12 others.

Darren Osborne in the back of a police van after his arrest Credit: Metropolitan Police/PA

The speed at which he became brainwashed by inflammatory material he found on social media sites has left counter-terrorism experts deeply concerned and has led to calls for technology giants to do more to remove it.

Before last summer, Osborne had never been known to express extreme views on religion or race.

A barmaid in his former local pub said: "He was a notorious bad boy, involved in drugs and fighting. People were scared of him. But I don't remember any racism."

Finsbury Park mosque tragedy in pictures

Ellis Osborne, 26, his nephew, who is mixed race, also said he had never heard his uncle express extreme views.

But all that changed in early June last year when he began looking at social media and other websites linked to Tommy Robinson, the former leader of the English Defence League, and Jayda Fransen and Paul Golding, the cofounders of Britain First.

When police examined his digital devices in the wake of the attack, they found he had spent hours searching for extremist material, which fuelled his growing hatred for Muslims.

Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen Credit: Nick Ansell /PA

In the weeks before the attack, he followed Mr Robinson and Ms Fransen on Twitter and Facebook and received direct messages from their accounts.

Osborne 'developed warped and twisted view'

Commander Dean Haydon, the head of Scotland Yard's counter-terrorism unit, said while the BBC drama had proved to be the catalyst, Osborne's rapid radicalisation had clearly been the result of the inflammatory material he had seen online.

Mr Haydon said: "This case demonstrates to me that individuals can be radicalised very quickly, within three or four weeks. We have to look at the role of the internet and radicalisation. It does demonstrate the speed of radicalisation ... it's a concern for us.

"Those around him described how he became obsessed with material that he started looking at online. He was researching high-profile individuals, such as Mr Robinson and Ms Fransen, as well as extreme Right-wing groups that were not proscribed.

"It was clear that, in the space of only a few weeks, he had developed a warped and twisted view, to such a degree that he was prepared to plan and carry out an attack," Mr Haydon said.

"I'm not going to call Tommy Robinson a radicaliser, but there is material out there linked to some of the groups connected to him that quite clearly has been an influence in this case."

He said while much of the "unpalatable" extreme Right-wing material available online was not illegal, social media companies could do more to proactively remove it.By Liana B. Baker and Sonam Rai

(Reuters) - Computer maker Dell Technologies Inc said on Friday it was considering a public offering of common stock or a combination with business software maker VMware Inc, its publicly held subsidiary.

Dell, the world's largest privately held technology company, is under pressure to boost profitability after its debt-laden acquisition of data storage provider EMC Corp for $67 billion in 2016 failed to meet financial targets, hurt by intensifying price competition.

Combining with VMware would provide access to VMWare's $11.6 billion in cash, helping Dell trim its $52.5 billion debt pile. Last month's U.S. tax reform made servicing that debt more expensive due to caps on deducting interest expense.

The combination would also make Dell a publicly listed company, offering a path for private equity firm Silver Lake to begin selling down its 18 percent stake if it chooses to. Silver Lake helped bankroll Dell CEO Michael Dell in taking the company private in 2013 in a $24.9 billion leveraged buyout.

A lockup provision prevents Dell from buying out the stake in VMware it does not already own until September. Any merger agreed before then would have to be structured as an acquisition of Dell by VMware: a so-called reverse merger.

"We view a reverse merger of Dell by its majority-owned subsidiary, VMware, as potentially the most beneficial alternative for Dell and Silver Lake," Wells Fargo Securities LLC analysts wrote in a research note.

A combination of Dell and VMware would place them under the same management and help them co-ordinate strategy. Dell's hardware and VMWare's software offerings could potentially be marketed in one suite of products.

"As part of our ongoing multi-year strategic planning, Dell Technologies is evaluating a number of potential business opportunities," founder Michael Dell said in a blog post. "We do this from a position of strength, with a desire to grow Dell Technologies and its businesses even faster and thrive in the very dynamic IT marketplace."

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Reuters reported on Thursday that Dell planned to announce a review of a possible reverse merger with VMware, as well as other options, including an IPO or asset sales. Sources told Reuters VMware was likely to form a special committee to consider a combination with Dell.

Dell added on Friday that nothing had been decided and the company might end up continuing to operate under its current structure.

"The board of directors follows sound corporate governance practices, and will continue to do so in connection with any potential transaction involving our controlling stockholders," VMware's lead director Paul Sagan said in a company statement.

Shares in VMware, which is 82 percent-owned by Dell, fell 2.4 percent on Friday to close at $122.72. Dell's tracking stock, which Dell issued to finance the EMC deal and which tracks the value of VMware's business, was up a little less than 1 percent at $70.90.

CHALLENGING PC MARKET

Dell has faced fierce competition in the storage market, with prices pressured by cloud-based rivals such as Amazon.com Inc's AWS and Microsoft Corp's Azure. Dell's infrastructure chief, former EMC executive David Goulden, departed last fall, and the company has been working to reorganize storage operations.

Michael Dell helped shape the personal computer market when he founded Dell in 1984 as a University pre-med freshman with $1,000 in savings. But growing popularity of smart phones and tablets has squeezed the PC market, which shrank by 0.2 percent in 2017, according to International Data Corporation.

Dell's servers have been a bright spot, helping total net revenue grow to $56.7 billion in the nine months to Nov. 3, from $41.6 billion a year earlier. Yet operating expenses soared from $10 billion to $17.3 billion and Dell's operating loss widened to $3 billion from $1.6 billion a year ago.

Dell has been considering a sale or initial public offering (IPO) of one of its fast-growing divisions, Pivotal Software Inc, sources have said.

Dell, whose technology portfolio spans servers, displays, workstations and gaming PCs, also has a security unit, RSA, and a cloud platform called Boomi.

(Reporting by Liana B. Baker in San Francisco and Sonam Rai in Bengaluru; Additional reporting by Jim Finkle in San Francisco; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty, Bill Rigby and David Gregorio)The Democrats have an unusual problem in the 2018 midterms: theyre drowning in candidates.

An unprecedented surge of competitors running for Congressmany of them women, many of them first-timersmay actually complicate the partys quest to retake the House. More candidates means more crowded primaries, and crowded primaries means Democratic candidates will spend precious time and money fighting other Democrats instead of Republican incumbents. Democrats risk being choked by their own enthusiasm as Republicans calmly glide towards the general elections.

Most grassroots groups have been so focused on recruiting and training progressive candidates that they havent given much thought to how those candidates might cannibalize one anothers campaigns. But Swing Left, an upstart progressive organization that is trying to flip the House in 2018 by directing volunteers and funding from safely blue precincts to nearby swing districts, is trying something a little different.

Rather than wade into contentious primary contests, Swing Left is already focused on fundraising for the Democratic nominee in select raceswhoever it might be. If you feel strongly about a candidate, great. But if all you want to do is win back the House, why would you give money thats going to be spent on a primary? says Ethan Todras-Whitehill, executive director of Swing Left. Were trying to shift the frame of fundraising. Were not fundraising for someone; were fundraising against someone. He calls it hacking campaign finance.

Swing Left has set up what it calls District Funds: pots of money that get donated to the Democratic nominee in a targeted race, whoever he or she is, as soon as that candidate wins the primary. So far theyve raised nearly $4 million for the project from over 61,000 individual contributions. Says Todras-Whitehill: Its like a Kickstarter, but for districts.

This fundraising strategy has even spurred some Democrats who are competing against one another to come together and raise money that could wind up in the coffers of their primary opponents. A local group in Virginias 10th District is hosting a Better Presidents Day fundraiser to raise money for the eventual Democratic nominee challenging GOP Rep. Barbara Comstock; the event page says six Democratic primary candidates will be there. In Texas, a Dallas-area Swing Left group has already raised nearly $10,000 for a Unity Fundraiser for Democrats challenging Rep. Pete Sessions in Texass 32nd district. All seven primary candidates are scheduled to attend.

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They all signed up as soon as we asked, says Chris Ferguson, a real estate attorney who is organizing the Dallas event. Were lucky that we have a slate of really qualified candidates, but to be honest any Democrat that ends up being the nominee is far better than whatever Republican running. Ferguson says the group asked the primary candidates not to give their stump speeches at the event, and to focus on their common goals instead.

Raising money for not-yet-nominated candidates isnt a new idea. The progressive fundraising platform ActBlue has been raising money in nominee funds since 2004. But they normally attract only a trickle of donations. Its always been a hard sell, says Erin Hill, executive director of ActBlue. Its hard to fundraise for a candidate who doesnt exist. Until Trump was elected, the most ActBlue had ever raised for nominee funds in an election cycle was roughly $116,000, which was distributed across 129 races during the 2008 cycle.

But last year, ActBlue, Swing Left and the liberal political group Daily Kos teamed up to raise money against Republican members of Congress who were voting to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Already ActBlue has raised $2.6 million in nominee funds from more than 66,000 contributors for the 2018 elections, which theyll distribute to 252 races as soon as a Democrat is nominated. Ive never seen them take off like theyve had this year, says Hill of the nominee funds.

Democrats still have their work cut out for them in the money chase. The billionaire Koch brothers have pledged to spend $400 million on the midterms, and the Republican National Committee has raised twice as much as the DNC. Yet Democrats have outraised Republicans in a dozen competitive races for open seats analyzed by Bloomberg, and are also performing better with small donors, who gave $22.2 million to the DCCC in 2017, more than double the haul brought in by their GOP counterparts.

The new model of raising money for whichever candidate emerges from a primary might be most useful in regions like Southern California, where at least five Democrats apiece are already running to replace retiring Republicans Darrell Issa and Ed Royce. That will create packed primaries sure to drain coffers, dampen morale and cannibalize votes in a state where so-called jungle primariesin which the top two finishers, regardless of party, run against one another in the general electioncould help Republicans keep the seats.

While Democrats fight with each other, Republicans will focus on fighting Democrats  and thats how we plan to win, said National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Steve Stivers of the fight to replace Issa. We look forward to facing whoever limps out of the Democrats battle royale: black and blue, and broke.On February 5, the central limits in the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) will enter into force and both the United States and Russia will meet their obligations. Just seven years ago, it was difficult to imagine the two states agreeing to manage their ongoing nuclear rivalry in such productive fashion. Even securing the Treatys approval in the first place was never a sure thing. Thankfully for the security of the United States, however, the agreement was negotiated in record time, approved by the Senate, and ratified by President Barack Obama in 2011.

Given all of the bad (not fake) news and tension in the U.S.-Russian relationship, it is indeed remarkable that New START exists. By containing the nuclear competition between our two countries, and providing both with unprecedented transparency, verification access and information about the size, shape and deployment of our strategic offensive nuclear forces, the treaty has maintained a modicum of predictability and professionalism in an otherwise tortured relationship. New START continues to provide benefits to both countries, despite Russias interference in Americas election, the continued illegal occupation of Crimea, and Russias continued violation of other arms control agreements like the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. It has not solved all our problems, but it has helped prevent them from spiraling out of control.

Under New START, both countries may deploy no more than 1,550 strategic offensive nuclear weapons, and deploy no more than 700 strategic nuclear delivery vehicles. An additional 100 SNDVs may be non-deployed (as models, spares, and training units, for example). More important, both sides permit the other to conduct intrusive on-site inspections that enable the parties to have high confidence that the terms of the Treaty are indeed being met. The countries also meet regularly in the Bilateral Consultative Commission to work out any disagreements or questions about interpretations or procedures.

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In short, one major element that helped manage U.S.-Russian tensions in the Cold War  nuclear arms control  has remained viable, and provides some hope for the future relationship. The fact that both states are meeting their obligations shows that both still, even in this environment, want to manage their competition that both benefit from predictability in the nuclear arena.

Sadly, New START will expire in 2021 unless the presidents of both countries agree to extend the agreement for up to five years. Thus far, however, Donald Trump shown no interest in extending New START.

The draft of the Trump administrations Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) that leaked last month has a short mention of the agreement and notes it remains in the interest of the United States that the agreement be implemented, but is silent on the issue of extension. Likewise, the Trump team has only halfheartedly pursued the strategic stability talks with Russia teed up by the Obama administration. These had been designed to re-engage Russia in a way that did not condone business as usual but could still provide critical insight into Moscows nuclear and security behavior.

Absent an extension, the limits, and the inspections that go along with them, will expire in February 2021, one month after the next President takes their oath of office. This situation is remarkably similar and equally as dangerous as the one left to the Obama administration its predecessors. The 1991 START agreement expired in December 2009, leaving precious little time for President Obamas team to negotiate a successor agreement. Without one, we would have lived the last decade without any direct transparency into Russias nuclear complex. Such conditions would likely have led to a worsened political relationship, and a resulting nuclear competition that would have made the missile and bomber gaps of the past pale by comparison. Thats to say nothing of the billions of dollars more our intelligence community would have required to compensate for the loss of inspections and data exchanges provided under the treaty.

Arms control remains a tough sell. It always has been. Critics complain that such agreements constrain Americas freedom of action, and that negotiating with our adversaries condones other unsavory behavior they are engaged in. In fact, decades of history show that arms control agreements that are verifiable and mutually implemented are key tools for securing American interests and in shaping the strategic environment to our advantage.

This, sadly, is one of the lessons Trumps Nuclear Posture Review, and indeed his overall approach to nuclear issues, fails to heed. By denigrating any agreements negotiated by President Obama (and likely exactly because they were negotiated by him), the Trump Administration is in danger of focusing only on military tools to coercion instead of using all of the diplomatic, economic, political and security tools in the American tool chest. By pursuing arms reduction agreements, America can understand more about Russias intentions, shape their thinking, enhance our alliances, and strengthen our global leadership on nonproliferation maters. By relegating arms control to an afterthought, America loses a key tool in controlling the military threats facing our country and our allies.

New START has not solved all of our problems with Russia by any means. But we know much more about Russias nuclear activities because of New START than we would have if the GOP leadership had prevailed and defeated the agreement in 2010. Moreover, we are at risk of losing the last remaining elements of stability and predictability in the bilateral nuclear relationship if we allow the question of New START extension to linger for too long.

Russia has made rebuilding its nuclear forces a priority, as they continue to face dramatic inferiority to Americas conventional capabilities, and that of our allies. Risking a new nuclear arms race, as is now likely and would be even more so should New START be allowed to expire without a replacement in hand, would divert American resources away from our conventional advantage, and bring us no additional security. It would also repeat the great mistakes of the Cold War when we learned that arms races and nuclear wars cannot be won, and are better left unfought.Google is celebrating Elizabeth Blackwells 197th birthday on Feb. 3 with a Google Doodle tribute.

The Google Doodle shows Blackwell, a pioneer of medical and feminist history, at a desk covered with books, medical supplies and a classic leather doctors bag. The sketch was drawn by Harriet Lee Merrion, who lives in the town where Blackwell was born almost two centuries ago, according to an announcement from Google.

Heres what to know about Elizabeth Blackwell on her birthday.

(Original Caption) Head and shoulders portrait of Elizabeth Blackwell (1821-1910), the first woman (in 1849), to receive a medical degree in the U.S. Undated photograph.

Elizabeth Blackwell Biography

Blackwell, who would go on to become the first woman in America to earn a medical degree, was born in Bristol, England, in 1821. Her family immigrated to the U.S. about 10 years later, settling in Ohio, according to the National Womens History Museum.

Originally a teacher, Blackwell decided to pursue medicine after a dying friend told her she wished she had a female doctor, according to the Womens History Museum. Despite the fact that medical schools did not accept women at the time, Blackwell applied and eventually attended New Yorks Geneva College. After graduating, she and one of her sisters, who also became a doctor, went on to open the New York Infirmary for Women and Children, the Womens History Museum writes.

Later in her career, Blackwell also opened a womens medical school in New York City, became a professor of gynecology in London and wrote extensively, according to the Encyclopdia Britannica.

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Elizabeth Blackwell Facts

Blackwells acceptance to Geneva College was intended as a practical joke, according to the Womens History Museum. She was rejected everywhere else she applied.

After medical school, Blackwell sought further training in Paris, according to Britannica. While there, she contracted an eye disease that left her blind in one eye, dashing her hopes of becoming a surgeon.

When she was a schoolteacher in Kentucky, Blackwell cemented herself as an abolitionist by running a Sunday school for slaves, Google writes.

Florence Nightingale, the legendary British nurse, helped Blackwell hatch the plan to open her womens medical college in New York, Britannica says.

In 1974, the U.S. Postal Service honored Blackwells achievements and contributions to history with a commemorative stamp.

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Elizabeth Blackwell QuotesJohannesburg (AFP) - The name of Eskom, Africa's largest electricity company, has become synonymous with the worst corruption scandals in South Africa and the utility could well become the final nail in the political coffin of President Jacob Zuma.

The sacking of yet another of its short-lived CEOs this week and the release of dire financial results confirmed the depth of the crisis plaguing the power utility.

Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba admitted Eskom represents the single worst crisis facing the government.

"Eskom is the biggest risk," Gigaba said. "There would be no currency, and no economy for the country if Eskom went belly up."

Parliament in South Africa has for months been probing Eskom over so-called "state capture" -- alleged corruption at South African state institutions.

A damning report published a year ago by the then-ombudswoman Thuli Madonsela first laid bare misconduct at Eskom, a state-owned monopoly founded in 1923.

Madonsela detailed how the Gupta business family, who are close friends of Zuma, allegedly arranged the 2015 appointment of Brian Molefe as Eskom chief to line up lucrative contracts to syphon off cash.

Officials and former workers appearing before a parliament hearing in recent weeks have made startling revelations of how Eskom executives helped the Gupta family benefit from favourable deals.

Whistle-blower Mosilo Mothepu, who worked for a company advising on the deals, told the parliamentary committee that Eskom was identified as a "cash cow" by the Guptas.

- Dodgy deals? -

In one case, Eskom paid more than $49-million to a Gupta-owned mining firm Tegeta to help it buy a coal mine from Glencore. The Guptas would then sell the coal to Eskom.

Former Eskom chairman Zola Tsotsi told lawmakers how one of the Gupta's three brothers, Tony, summoned him to a meeting and threatened him with dismissal because he was not "helping" them.

"Tony told me 'Chairman, you are not helping us with anything. We are the ones who put you in the position you are in. We are the ones who can take you out!'" he said.

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Respected former finance minister Pravin Gordhan, who was abruptly sacked by Zuma last March, sharply rebuked former Eskom executives appearing before the committee.

"You brought Eskom to its knees, the biggest utility in Africa," Gordhan told the utility's former chief financial officer Anoj Singh.

All implicated executives have pleaded innocence.

"There are hundreds of decisions taken at Eskom that the CEO will not know about or know the details of," said Molefe.

- Risk to national economy -

Opposition Democratic Alliance's MP Natasha Mazzone drew parallels between the denials and "omerta" -- the mafia's code of silence.

But Lynn Brown, a close ally of Zuma and minister in charge of state enterprises, denies that she covered up governance and financial irregularities at Eskom.

"We are not at that point yet that we can prove that people have done things wrong," Brown told MPs.

Eskom's woes started in 2007 with the highly unpopular power shortages that plunged many neighbourhoods into darkness on a nightly basis.

Outages have been sharply reduced, but credit rating agencies have repeatedly downgraded the power utility over its financial and liquidity problems.

Now the new head of the ruling ANC party, Cyril Ramaphosa, has moved in to overhaul Eskom -- as well as ease President Zuma out of office.

In his first major move, Ramaphosa has already appointed a new board and ordered them to sack corrupt executives.

"We are determined to address the damage that has been done to this institution," Ramaphosa said in a statement released on the presidential website.

Rescuing Eskom will not be easy, even after Ramaphosa replaces Zuma as expected.

Its annual financial results, released on January 30, showed profits plummeted 34 percent and the firm is heavily indebted to the tune of over 300 billion rand ($250 million).By Sarah Marsh

HAVANA (Reuters) - When Alan Gross heard the Trump administration's renewed U.S. push to expand internet in Cuba, disbelief washed over the American who spent five years in a Cuban jail for trying to establish clandestine communication service on the Communist-run island.

"My first response was 'Are you kidding me?" Gross said in a telephone interview with Reuters.

Gross worked in Cuba in 2009 for a U.S.-government funded program to promote political change by increasing internet access in a country that has one of the lowest web penetration rates in the world.

In January, the U.S. State Department said it was convening a Cuba Internet Task Force to examine ways of expanding information access and independent media in Cuba.

Havana protested the move that it said attempted to violate its sovereignty, highlighting the military connotation of the expression "task force."

Cuba views such programs as part of longstanding U.S. attempts to topple its government.

In 2009, Cuba arrested and later sentenced Gross to 15 years in jail, a move that put on hold a warming in U.S.-Cuban relations under former U.S. President Barack Obama, a Democrat.

It was only with his early release in 2014 that Obama and Cuban leader Raul Castro could announce a long-negotiated detente, hoping to end five decades of hostility.

That was before Republican Donald Trump became president, vowing to roll back on the normalization of relations.

"We are supposed to learn from our mistakes," said Gross on Thursday.

"I learned the hard way that it's illegal to distribute anything in Cuba that's funded in full or part by the U.S. government," said the 68-year-old, who lost five teeth in jail and around 115 pounds (52 kilograms).

"Until the government of Cuba wants the kind of assistance United States is capable of providing, the United States shouldn't be doing stuff there," said Gross.

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Cuban state-run media has written extensively this week about past U.S. attempts to manipulate telecommunications for political ends. Washington, for example, set up a social media network for Cubans called ZunZuneo even after Gross had been jailed. It ran from 2010 to 2012.

In the case of Gross, he imported banned satellite communications devices and other high-tech gear in his luggage and helped install it at Jewish centers in Havana, Santiago and Camaguey during five trips to Cuba in 2009.

Gross noted Cuba had vastly expanded internet access of its own volition during his time in jail.

The U.S. government should discuss the issue of internet directly with Cuba, providing details for example of how it could boost economic growth, he said.

"There are so many things that could be happening in a positive and constructive way," he said.

Since Obama's detente for example, various U.S. telecoms companies have reached deals with Cuba to provide roaming to their customers on the island.

Asked if it had invited Cuban officials to the first public meeting on Feb. 7 of the task force, the U.S. State Department said it was "open to the public as space allows."

"Federal Advisory Committees, such as this task force, provide objective advice in a transparent manner from a variety of perspectives, and are accessible to the public," it said.

Gross said he would return on vacation to Cuba "in a heartbeat" if Cuban officials let him, to meet up with the families of his former fellow inmates and explore the country.

(Reporting by Sarah Marsh; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)By Liana B. Baker and Greg Roumeliotis

(Reuters) - U.S. computer maker Dell Technologies Inc and business software provider VMware Inc have decided to explore options that could include a potential merger of the two companies, people familiar with the matter said on Thursday.

The move, which may not result in any deal, comes as Dell, the worlds largest privately held technology company, seeks new avenues for growth following its debt-laden acquisition of data storage provider EMC Corp for $67 billion in 2016.

Dell plans to announce as early as Friday that it will review a possible reverse merger with VMware, as well as other alternatives, including an initial public offering or asset divestitures, the three sources said.

VMware plans to announce that it will form a special committee of board directors to consider a combination with Dell, according to the sources. VMware is 80 percent-owned by Dell, so the special committee is aimed at making any combination subject to approval by disinterested directors who will safeguard the interests of VMware minority shareholders, the sources added.

The sources asked not to be identified because the matter is confidential. Dell declined to comment, while VMWare did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Dell is under pressure to boost its profitability after the EMC deal failed to deliver the cost savings and performance it projected, while higher component costs and a challenging data storage market have eroded its margins.

The Round Rock, Texas-based company has struggled with fierce competition in the storage market, as cloud-based rivals such as Amazon.com Incs AWS and Microsoft Corps Azure put pressure on prices. Dells infrastructure chief, former EMC executive David Goulden, departed last fall, and the firm has since been working to reorganize its storage operations.

The PC market, which Dell CEO Michael Dell helped shape by founding Dell in 1984 as a college freshman with $1,000 in savings, has remained stagnant due to the popularity of smart phones and tablets, shrinking by 0.2 percent in 2017, according to International Data Corporation.

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A reverse merger would see VMware, which has a market capitalization of $51 billion, buy Dell, rather than Dell buy the minority stake in VMware it does not already own. A lockup provision prevents Dell from buying out VMware until September.

"Irrespective of whether VMware or Dell is the acquirer, we think the terms of trade would have to entail a premium to VMware minority shareholders," UBS Securities LLC desk-based analyst Evren Ergin wrote in a sales commentary note on Thursday.

Another consideration for Dell in its deliberations is offering an eventual path to private equity firm Silver Lake to cash out on its investment in the company. Silver Lake helped bankroll Michael Dells $24.9 billion deal in 2013 to take the company private and owns about 18 percent of the company.

(Reporting by Liana B. Baker in San Francisco and Greg Roumeliotis in New York; Editing by Leslie Adler and Lisa Shumaker)By Eric M. Johnson

SEATTLE (Reuters) - Elon Musk, the chief executive of Tesla Inc, has said little about how he plans to turn his prototype electric truck into reality.

But Reuters has learned that Tesla is collaborating with Anheuser-Busch, PepsiCo and United Parcel Service Inc to build on-site charging terminals at their facilities as part of the automaker's efforts to roll out the vehicle next year.

Details of the partnerships, which have not been disclosed previously, are still being hammered out, but include design and engineering from Tesla, the companies said. They declined to disclose what portion of the building costs, if any, Tesla would pay, or whether Tesla would be compensated for its work.

The firms are among nine major corporations that have placed pre-orders for Tesla's truck, dubbed the Semi.

With questions swirling over whether Tesla can make good on its aggressive timetable, news of the collaboration is a sign that corporate customers are taking the effort seriously, and that Tesla is working to solve one of the biggest impediments: keeping the big-rigs powered.

Companies that spoke with Reuters said the first step is to install charging equipment on their own premises. The Semis would be limited to routes that would get them back to home base before the batteries are spent, the firms said.

PepsiCo, which has reserved 100 Tesla trucks, said it may eventually explore sharing facilities and costs with other companies. The food conglomerate has held multiple meetings with Tesla to discuss the recharging effort, said PepsiCo executive Mike O'Connell.

"We have a lot of in-house capability around energy and engineering ... and certainly Tesla brings their expertise to the table on energy and charging," said O'Connell, senior director of supply chain for Frito-Lay North America, PepsiCo's snack-food unit.

Separately, in a high-tech twist on the traditional truck stop, Tesla is moving ahead with plans for its own stations to sell electricity to truckers who pull up for a charge, according to customers and transportation industry executives who have discussed the matter with the Silicon Valley automaker.

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Tesla already operates more than 1,100 "supercharger" stations globally for drivers of its passenger cars. Musk has spoken publicly of doing something similar for its heavy-duty trucks by installing a network of solar-powered "megachargers" that could juice up a Semi battery in 30 minutes.

But just how quickly Tesla could build a robust network of electric filling stations for commercial truckers is not clear. The company is already stretched thin and burning cash. Tesla has struggled to ramp up production of its new Model 3 sedan, which has been plagued by delays. Some analysts and trucking executives doubt that Tesla can deliver the Semi in 2019, much less a vast charging infrastructure to support it.

A Tesla spokeswoman confirmed that the Fremont, California-based company is working closely with large customers to build Semi charging stations. She declined to comment further on the arrangements or Tesla's plans for its own truck-charging terminals.

Anheuser-Busch is evaluating installing its own charging equipment for its 40 Tesla Semis at large breweries and other key locations, according to James Sembrot, senior director of supply chain for the St. Louis-based beer maker.

"What was important to us was to make a big investment in this cutting-edge technology and secure our place in line," Sembrot said.

UPS, too, expects to work closely with Tesla on building on-site charging stations, according to Scott Phillippi, global engineering director for the parcel delivery behemoth. The Atlanta-based company pre-ordered 125 Semis in December.

Grocery chain Loblaw Companies Ltd will likely use solar power to juice charging stations for the 25 Semis that it has pre-ordered from Tesla, according to spokeswoman Catherine Thomas. She said Loblaw was considering Tesla as well as "a few other companies" for technology and design.

None of the companies would disclose cost estimates for building their own charging infrastructure.

U.S. transit agencies that operate electric buses provide some clues. A "fast charger" terminal serving six electric buses would cost $249,000, according to a 2016 report from the California Air Resources Board.

But analysts and automotive industry executives said the price tag for commercial truck facilities could easily reach into the millions of dollars, depending on factors such as the number of big-rigs to be recharged, the energy source for the electricity and existing energy infrastructure in a given area.

AUTOMAKER OR ENERGY SUPPLIER?

Tesla in November unveiled its prototype Semi with the aim of upending the trucking industry. At a splashy event in Hawthorne, California, Musk said the sleek, battery-powered cab could achieve up to 500 miles on a single charge, and be faster, cleaner and cheaper to operate than conventional diesels.

Base prices range from $150,000 to $200,000, according to Tesla's website, compared to $120,000 for a typical diesel. Companies including Wal-Mart Stores Inc and Sysco Corp plunked down deposits, getting plenty of public relations mileage in the process.

But Tesla's most obvious potential customers - major U.S. trucking firms - have not jumped on board.

Werner Enterprises Inc, YRC Worldwide Inc, Daseke Inc and Old Dominion Freight Line are among the transport companies holding off pre-orders of the Tesla for now, citing doubts about the Semi's promised recharge time, range, price and payload capabilities.

Derek Leathers, chief executive of Werner, said he is not among the "naysayer crowd" that doubts Tesla's ability to produce a viable electric truck.

"I think it'll happen, I just think their timeline is extremely aggressive," Leathers said.

Still, a dearth of publicly available charging infrastructure makes electrics impractical for long-haul trucking in the United States and elsewhere.

That is something Tesla's Musk has sought to address with his plans for solar-powered "megacharger" stations. But he has provided few specifics. At the November Semi unveiling, Musk said "we're guaranteeing" a 7 cents per-kilowatt-hour price for electricity at the facilities.

That is at the low end of cost figures cited by the U.S. government. Solar power for commercial use costs 9-12 cents per kilowatt hour, or 6-8 cents with a federal subsidy, according to a 2017 report from the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

Customers and industry executives said Tesla intends to buy cheap excess solar power off the U.S. energy grid, store it in enormous battery banks, then profit from selling it to drivers of Semis.

But that strategy carries risks, experts said.

"It's a departure from being a vehicle manufacturer to being an energy supplier," said Darren Gosbee, vice president of engineering at Navistar International Corp, which is working to launch an electric medium-duty truck by late 2019.

Ian Wright, a Tesla co-founder who now runs his own company making electric powertrains for industrial trucks, is sceptical that truck charging stations can be a big money maker for Tesla.

He estimated the capital costs for batteries alone would be $15 million for a single station.

"I am not seeing any profit in the energy brokering for Tesla," said Wright, whose Wrightspeed powertrain venture is based in Alameda, California.

(Reporting by Eric M. Johnson in Seattle; Additional reporting by Scott DiSavino in New York and Nichola Groom in Los Angeles; Editing by Joe White and Marla Dickerson)Savudrija (Croatia) (AFP) - For two decades Diego Makovac has made a trouble-free living fishing for sole in Piran Bay. But he now faces a flurry of Croatian and Slovenian patrol boats as the two countries fight over the water.

Police vessels from the neighbouring states escort Makovac's boat as he lets out his nets under a grey winter's sky speckled with seagulls.

"I can no longer work peacefully... They are beside us non-stop. It's stressful," said the 48-year-old, one of dozens of Croatian fishermen from coastal settlements who work in the bay in the northern Adriatic Sea.

The dispute over Piran Bay -- less than seven kilometres (four miles) long and five kilometres wide -- has poisoned ties between Croatia and Slovenia ever since they proclaimed independence from Yugoslavia nearly 27 years ago.

In June last year, an international arbitration court allocated more than two-thirds of the disputed body of water to Slovenia.

Croatia, whose coast stretches for 1,700 km, refused to accept the ruling. It wanted the maritime border to be drawn down the middle of the bay.

But Slovenia, which has just 46 km of coastline, had argued its access to international waters was at stake.

- 'Working here forever' -

Relations between the two European Union members became further strained in December, when Slovenia began implementing the ruling from the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague.

This has not stopped Makovac and his colleagues fishing in "their" half of the bay.

"This is our territorial sea. We've been working here forever," said Daniele Kolec, head of a local fishing association.

"Nobody can tell us that we cannot fish here any more. No chance!"

Each time the fishermen sail out they inform the Croatian police, who accompany them for protection in patrol boats.

As Makovac sets off from his village of Savudrija and approaches the centre of the bay, a Slovenian police dinghy with flashing blue beacons rushes to warn him that he is entering "Slovenian territorial waters".

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Makovac said that he expected a Slovenian inspection boat to be there when he retrieved the net the next day, carrying officials who would take down his details for a fine.

Both countries have begun issuing penalties for alleged "border violations" of up to 1,300 euros ($1,600) for an individual and 41,000 euros for a company.

On top of that is the risk of a collision on the water -- "especially when it's foggy," Makovac's wife, Franka, told AFP as she helped him cast out a net.

- Awaiting acceptance -

Slovenian fishermen with nets say they have so far remained cautious, sticking to one half of the bay to avoid problems and "work in peace".

"We allowed a third party to draw the border and what was done was done," said fisherman Zlatko Novogradec from the picturesque Slovenian port city of Piran, to the north of the bay.

Novogradec, a representative of small-scale Slovenian fishers, said that his colleagues would wait until Croatia accepted the ruling before extending their nets further.

"It will happen sooner or later, but it must happen eventually as a legal ruling has to be respected."

Croatia pulled out of the arbitration proceedings in 2014 following a phone-tapping scandal, in which a Slovenian judge from the tribunal and a Ljubljana official were recorded discussing tactics for a ruling favourable to Slovenia.

The proceedings nevertheless continued.

Both Croatian fishermen and the government in Zagreb say they have no intention of paying the fines now being imposed.

- Whipped-up tensions -

The Makovac family and their colleagues say their work in the bay -- whose fish patterns they know well -- is crucial to their earnings. Most of their catch is sole, which is exported to Italy.

"This is our bread, our life," said Franka, who would like to see a deal struck with the Slovenians so that they can fish together.

"It's all politics," she said.

Her view is echoed by many other Croatian and Slovenian citizens, who have long lived and worked side by side around the border area.

Slovenians say that the issue has been whipped up domestically because of upcoming parliamentary elections.

Until now local people "were never in dispute", said Peter Nussdorfer, 56, a bus driver from Piran.

While the deadlock continues, fishermen and women carry on doing their job under daily escort, with the number of police boats set to rise as the high fishing season approaches.

"Both countries have much more serious issues on which the money could be spent," said Franka.Mad Mike Hughes posing next to his rocket: Mad Mike Hughes

A man who believes the Earth is flat is planning on launching himself into orbit  though, of course, he may not use that word to describe his stunt.

Flat-earther Mike Hughes, who has previously attempted to launch across the Mojave Desert, has his sights set on the sky after people on private land said he could launch his steam-powered rocket from their plot.

The previous attempt to launch himself across the desert was shut down by the federal government, which said he had no permission to conduct his mission on public property. Even so, his promotion of the rocket launch  which is just phase one in his quest to get enough cash to be able to afford the balloon and suit necessary to get him to near-space  brought him a lot of attention.

His revised first stage in that plan is a little different than a launch across the desert. This time, hes planning on shooting himself straight up for a third of the mile. Hopefully, he can win back the faith of a public that has turned to mocking him for his lack of faith in the generally accepted shape of the planet.

The flat-Earth stuff, it makes people crazy, Mr Hughes recently told the Washington Post. No matter what I do, people are going to minimise it.

The launch will be broadcast live on the website Noize TV, according to RT, and Mr Hughes is charging $5 per viewer. No spectators will be allowed to join the crew at the launch site, and Mr Hughes has warned that any drones seen on the private property  which is located along Route 66 in Amboy, California  will be shot down.

The town of Amboy is a ghost town along that famed highway that has no running water, little electricity, but has still managed to keep four residents. The entire town was bout in 2005 at a cost of $435,000, which owner Albert Okura says is quite the drop from a few years earlier when it was listed for $1.2 million.Conakry (AFP) - Guinean opposition leaders on Sunday denounced the west African country's long-delayed local elections as fraudulent, citing vote rigging in polling stations across the west African country.

"There is fraud at the national level," said former prime minister Sidya Toure after polls closed at 1800 GMT.

"We are seeing problems, especially concerning ink, in a lot of polling stations," added Toure, who heads the opposition Union of Republican Forces (UFR).

The local elections are the first since the end of the era of military dictatorship and follow eight years of delays blamed on a lack of funds, political infighting and the 2013-16 Ebola crisis.

People chose among nearly 30,000 candidates for councillors, including 7,000 women, across the mineral-rich but deeply poor former French colony.

The campaign largely focused on failing schools, high unemployment, electricity shortages and corruption allegations.

After casting his vote, President Alpha Conde told his supporters: "We do not want fraud and if that happens, we will have to resist as we have always done."

But Toure and other opposition figures criticised the polling.

"We will demonstrate that President Alpha Conde has, with the help of the administration, stolen this election, which will not benefit him," said another former prime minister, Cellou Dalein Diallo, leader of the opposition Union of Democratic Forces of Guinea (UFDG).

The last local election was held in 2005 under the decades-long rule of authoritarian leader General Lansane Conte, who died in 2008.

The military then took control until the presidential election of Conde in 2010.

Despite the ushering in of civilian rule, the local elections were repeatedly postponed and Sunday was the first time that many councillors, controversially appointed by Conde, were facing the ballot box.

"This is the first time I have voted for a mayor. I hope my candidate wins and puts in place his programme to clean up our district, create employment and make our city safe," said taxi driver Simbaya Aboulaye Soumah in the capital Conakry.

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In Simbaya, a Conakry suburb, eager voters lined up at a polling station at a primary school an hour before polls officially opened at 0800 GMT.

"We want change for the youth because if you look for the development of a people, a nation, it is via the youth," said Mohamed Toure, a student.

"We want them (councillors) to help the young people," he added.

Sixty percent of Guinea's population are aged 25 and under, and their memories of military rule and life under authoritarian Conte are either hazy or non-existent.

Political distrust is high in Guinea, where ethnic tensions often turn deadly around election time.

More than 5.9 million Guineans were registered to vote.Vincent Cirrincione helped launched the careers of Halle Berry and Taraji P. Henson. Now, nine women are saying he sexually harassed them.

The nine women, eight of whom are African-American and one who is Asian, told the Washington Post Cirrincione made unwanted sexual advances toward them over two decades. Three of the women said he asked for sex as a condition for representing them and refused to do so when they did not have sex with him. Another women told the Post he offered to help advance her career if she agreed to have sex with him monthly. Another of the actresses said that Cirrincione masturbated in front of her in his office over the years he managed her, according to the report.

Many of the women said they quit or took extended breaks from acting, the Post reported. Many of them also said they viewed Cirrincione as a gatekeeper for the acting business, which has few paths for people of color. The women said he would use names of actresses hes previously worked with, such as Halle Berry, as bait, even telling one of the women he was the only manager who knew what to do with black actresses, according to the Post.

In total, the allegations the Post heard stretch from 1993 to 2011.

In a statement to the newspaper, Cirrincione said that he supports the movement of women calling out sexual abusers and added that hes had affairs, but said the relationships were consensual and that he did not trade sexual favors for representation.

Halle Berry released a statement regarding the allegations on Twitter Friday, saying she was saddened by the allegations and sick after reading the womens accounts.

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Im livid that used me, and the role model he helped me become, to lure and manipulate innocent, vulnerable women of color for his predatory actions, Berry posted on Twitter. Im deeply hurt and I want these woman and countless others to know I see you. I hear you. You matter. I will fight for you.

The Post said it spoke to the women, along with people they said they told about their experiences, multiple times and individually over three months.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.



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The husband of a former member of Donald Trumps household staff has suddenly ratcheted up his career to become an official of the Environmental Protection Agency. Hes just the latest Trump family connection to land a job in the administration.

According to a memo obtained by Politico, Steve Kopec of New Jersey joined the EPAs Region 2 office in New York as a special assistant in December.

The home improvement contractor brings skills regarding customer service, organizational efficiencies and team building, according to the memo from the Region 2 administrator, but, apparently, no expertise on the environment. Hes providing support services, according to the EPA. His salary is around $66,000, according to a Politico source.

Kopec, who used to run his home improvement business, Steves Tools in Motion, from his Jersey home, is married to Dagmara Kopec, who used to work in the Trumps New York home, Politico reports. Both are from Poland.

Mr. Kopec is a hard-working, dedicated employee and we appreciate his service, EPA spokeswoman Liz Bowman said in a statement to Politico.

Workers suspected of lacking qualifications for positions in the Trump administration are not unheard of. In December, Matthew Spencer Petersen, a Trump nominee for a lifetime seat in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, struggled to answer basic questions about law during his Senate confirmation hearing. He later withdrew his name from consideration.

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Last summer, the president appointed Lynne Patton, a Trump family aide who staged events at its properties, to head the New York office of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Taylor Weyeneth, a 23-year-old volunteer in the Trump presidential campaign with no experience, became the deputy chief of staff for the Office of National Drug Control Policy, which controls billions of dollars to fight illegal drug use. After The Washington Post reported on his puzzling rise and inconsistencies in his resume, the ONDCP announced that Weyeneth was stepping down last month.

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The president also drew criticism when he appointed daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner to senior White House roles over individuals with more experience in politics.

Also on HuffPost

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detained a Kansas chemistry professor as he was leaving his front yard to take his seventh-grade daughter to school last week.

Immigration authorities took 54-year-old Syed Ahmed Jamal on Jan. 24 before his family was able to say goodbye to their husband and father who arrived in the U.S. 30 years ago from Bangladesh.

As immigration authorities handcuffed Jamal, his daughter rushed into the house to tell her mother and brother. His wife tried to hug her husband as agents took him away and was told she could be charged with interfering, according to The Kansas City Star.

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A petition with nearly 5,000 signatures was started online to help stop the deportation of Jamal, a Park University adjunct professor in chemistry. Jamal, who received a doctorate in molecular, cellular and developmental biology from the University of Kansas, is now being held in a Morgan County jail in Missouri, according to the petition.

The Change.org petition described Jamal as a family man, scientist and community leader, and includes a letter written by Jamals ninth-grade son, Taseen on behalf of his siblings. Jamals son said his father called the family crying like a little child out of fear of deportation.

My little brother cries every night, my sister can't focus in school, and I cannot sleep at night, the son wrote. If my father is deported, my siblings and I may never get to see him again.

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Jeffrey Y. Bennett, a Kansas City lawyer representing the family, told the Star that Jamal was given a voluntary departure notice in 2011 and was allowed to remain in the U.S. on a supervised basis.

Bennett said ICE has the option to stay his removal but it is ultimately up to them. A friend of the Jamal family created a GoFundMe account Friday to support their legal fees.

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Jamal is only one of his five siblings to not receive U.S. citizenship.

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Were all U.S. citizens except for him, Syed Hussein Jamal, Jamals brother, told the Star. Were all in professional careers. He just was in the unfortunate situation of not having his status adjusted.

Jamal is the latest arrest made by ICE to make headlines. Under President Donald Trump, ICE deportation arrests have jumped. ICE agents made 143,470 arrests up by 25 percent from the year before.

ICE arrested a Polish doctor, who has lived in the U.S. for 40 years, in January. Lukasz Niec was brought to the U.S. by his parents when he was 5 years old. He became a doctor and started a family.

His family told The Washington Post that Niec does not speak Polish. ICE agents arrested Niec as his 12-year-old stepdaughter was leaving for school.

This article was first written by Newsweek

More from NewsweekJerusalem (AFP) - Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said ministers would grant formal authorisation Sunday to a rogue West Bank settlement in response to the murder last month of a rabbi who lived there.

"The government will today regularise the status of Havat Gilad to allow the continuance of normal life there," he said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting, referring to the wildcat settlement in the occupied West Bank.

The official cabinet agenda says ministers will hear a motion to designate the 15-year-old outpost as a "new community" which will have the necessary building permits and a state budget.

Some 50 families live in the outpost.

Rabbi Raziel Shevah was shot dead near Havat Gilad, where he lived, on January 9.

The following week, Israeli troops searching for his attackers shot dead what they described as a Palestinian suspect in the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank, about 35 kilometres (22 miles) north of Havat Gilad.

They did not, however, catch the man considered to have led the attack on Shevah, 22-year-old Ahmed Jarrar.

The manhunt continued on Saturday with a raid on the village of Burqin. In clashes that erupted there, soldiers shot dead a teenager identified by the Palestinian health ministry as Ahmad Abu Obeid, 19.

At Shevah's funeral, there were calls for "revenge" during a speech by Education Minister Naftali Bennett of the far-right Jewish Home party.

Bennett responded by saying that the only revenge should be in building more settlements, and Netanyahu said Sunday that was one of the planks of his policy.

"Anyone who thinks that through the abominable murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, they would break our spirits... is making a bitter mistake," he said.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and major obstacles to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

But Israel differentiates between settlements it has approved and those it has not.

Those without approval are referred to as outposts and tend to be populated by hardline religious nationalists who see the entire West Bank as part of Israel.Jerusalem (AFP) - Israel's cabinet voted Sunday to formally authorise a rogue West Bank settlement in response to last month's murder of a rabbi who lived there, officials said, in a rare move likely to spark an international outcry.

The vote came as European nations voiced growing concern over settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territory, but with US President Donald Trump largely refraining from such criticism, which many Israelis see as a green light.

Israeli authorities have advanced plans for thousands of new settlement homes in recent months, although cabinet votes to authorise a pre-existing outpost are relatively rare.

Sunday's vote to authorise the Havat Gilad outpost was unanimous, an official familiar with the proceedings said on condition of anonymity.

Speaking at the start of the meeting, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "the government will today regularise the status of Havat Gilad to allow the continuance of normal life there".

The official cabinet agenda said the motion would designate the 15-year-old outpost as a "new community" which will have the necessary building permits and a state budget.

The agenda said about 40 families live in the outpost, but envisages its enlargement.

Israeli media, however, said it was unclear how the authorisation would proceed, as parts of the outpost may have to be moved elsewhere if found to have been built on private Palestinian land.

Rabbi Raziel Shevach was shot dead near Havat Gilad, where he lived, on January 9.

The following week, Israeli troops searching for his attackers shot dead what they described as a Palestinian suspect in the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank, about 35 kilometres (22 miles) north of Havat Gilad.

However, they did not catch the man suspected of being responsible for Shevach's killing, 22-year-old Ahmed Jarrar.

The manhunt continued on Saturday with a raid on the West Bank village of Burqin, near Nablus, sparking clashes during which soldiers shot dead a teenager identified by the Palestinian health ministry as Ahmad Abu Obeid, 19.

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"Yesterday our forces were again in action in an effort to apprehend the last of the assassins and their accomplices in the murder of Rabbi Shevach," Netanyahu told cabinet ministers and media.

"We will not rest until we bring them to justice. And we shall bring them all to justice."

Roger Kuby, Shevach's father-in-law, told AFP the government move was "a small consolation, but an important gesture".

- 'Revenge' -

Mourners at Shevach's funeral interrupted a speech by Education Minister Naftali Bennett of the far-right Jewish Home party with calls for "revenge".

Bennett responded by saying that the only revenge should be in building more settlements, and Netanyahu said Sunday that was one of the planks of his policy.

"Anyone who thinks that through the abominable murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, they would break our spirits and weaken us is making a bitter mistake," he said.

Settlement watchdog Peace Now, however, said that retroactively granting legal status to Havat Gilad, built without development plans or construction permits, was "cynical exploitation" of Shevach's death.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and a major obstacle to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

But Israel differentiates between settlements it has approved and those it has not.

Those without approval are referred to as outposts and tend to be populated by hardline religious nationalists who see the entire West Bank as part of Israel.

Past attempts by Israeli authorities to dismantle Havat Gilad have led to clashes with settlers there.

Israel has several times given retroactive approval to outposts, and last year work began on the first completely new government-sanctioned settlement built in the Palestinian territories in quarter of a century.

Israel faced sharp criticism from the administration of former US president Barack Obama over settlement construction, but that has not been the case with Trump's White House. Israeli officials have sought to take advantage of this.

Trump's declaration of Jerusalem as Israel's capital on December 6 was also hailed by Israelis, while deeply angering the Palestinians who also see the city as their capital.

European officials and UN bodies have maintained their strong opposition to settlement building as well as the long-standing consensus that the status of Jerusalem must be negotiated.Warsaw (AFP) - The Israeli embassy in Warsaw on Friday said it has observed a "wave of anti-Semitic statements" in Poland, as a diplomatic row rages over a new Polish bill regarding the Holocaust and the definition of Nazi death camps.

Poland's senate on Thursday passed a controversial Holocaust bill that had been meant to defend the country's image abroad but which instead provoked Israel's anger and drew concern from the US as well as from various Jewish groups and global institutions like the International Auschwitz Council.

The legislation, which still needs the president's signature to take effect, was introduced by the governing right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party to stop people from erroneously describing Nazi German death camps as Polish.

Israel, however, has expressed concern that the legislation relating to the extermination of Jews by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland during World War II, could serve to deny the involvement of individual Poles in the Holocaust.

"In the last few days we could not help but notice a wave of anti-Semitic statements, reaching the Embassy through all channels of communication. Many of them targeted Ambassador Anna Azari personally," the embassy said in a statement on its website.

"Anti-Semitic statements are overflowing the internet channels in Poland, but they have become present on the main stream media too, especially on the TVP Info."

A recent commentator on the state-run TVP station had made the ironic statement that "we could say these camps were neither German nor Polish but Jewish. Because who operated the crematoria? And who died there?"

Another commenter had sent out a tweet using the Polish version of an offensive term against Jews, "greedy kike".

The Israeli embassy did not specifically mention these examples, but they triggered much criticism in Poland.

TVP later on Friday issued an official apology, deleted the offensive content from its Twitter account and announced "disciplinary action" against those responsible.

"The Management Board of Polish Television is of the opinion that there can be no place on the public broadcaster for discriminatory and exclusionary content," TVP said in a public statement that also offered an apology to Azari.Macerata (Italy) (AFP) - A far-right supporter suspected of wounding six Africans in a shooting spree in central Italy said the "trigger" for his attacks was the murder of an Italian woman, allegedly by a Nigerian asylum seeker, according to media reports Sunday.

Luca Traini was arrested and taken into custody after drive-by attacks in the town of Macerata wounded five men and one woman from Ghana, Mali and Nigeria on Saturday.

It came a day after a Nigerian asylum-seeker and drug dealer was arrested in the same town for the murder of an 18-year-old woman, whose dismembered body was discovered in suitcases.

"I was driving to the gym when I heard on the radio about the 18-year-old girl," daily newspaper Corriere della Sera quoted him as telling investigators.

"Instinctively I turned around, I went home, I opened the safe and took the pistol and decided to kill them all."

After the shootings, Traini, 28, allegedly got out of his car, made a fascist salute with a tricolour Italian flag draped over his shoulders and shouted "Viva Italia", or "Long Live Italy", and "Italy for Italians", media reports said.

Police who raided his mother's home found far-right literature, including a copy of Adolf Hitler's manifesto "Mein Kampf" and a book by fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.

Interior Minister Marco Minniti said the attack was part of a culture "of right-wing extremism with clear reference to fascism and Nazism" and deplored that the sole link between the victims was "the colour of their skin".

He said the "criminal act" was prompted by "racial hatred" and had been prepared in advance.

- Terror spree -

The man allegedly opened fire in eight areas in the town and also targeted the office of the centre-left Democratic Party in a two-hour terror spree in the sleepy town of 43,000 people, press reports said.

One victim was seriously injured in the thorax, the reports said. The other five had lesser injuries.

Story continues

A Nigerian man who was shot in the thigh while buying cigarettes on the street, telling a television channel from his hospital bed that he was in great pain, adding: "It's very serious."

Traini is a member of the far-right anti-immigration Northern League party and had run in local elections last year.

Media reports said police found a gun in the man's vehicle, a black Alfa Romeo.

"Someone who shoots is a delinquent, irrespective of the colour of his skin," said Northern league chief Matteo Salvini, ahead of legislative elections on March 4.

"I'm in a hurry to be in government to bring back security, social justice and serenity to Italy," he said.

- 'Hate will not divide us' -

Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni meanwhile made a pitch for unity after Saturday's incident, saying: "Hate and violence will not divide us."

Italians head to the polls in national elections next month, with immigration shaping up to be a key issue.

The country is a favoured landing point on Europe's southern coastline for migrants making the perilous journey across the Mediterranean, often aboard unseaworthy boats, to enter the continent.

But 2017 was a turning point for Italy: the country went from large-scale arrivals in the first six months to a sharp drop-off, thanks to controversial agreement between the EU and Libya.

Some 119,000 people landed in Italy last year, down 35 percent on 2016.

The Northern League is part of a populist coalition tipped to do well in the elections.

According to opinion polls, the alliance between ex-prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right Forza Italia (Go Italy), the post-fascist Fratelli d'Italia (Italian Brothers) and the Northern League leads with more than 35 percent ahead of the March 4 vote.By Steve Holland WASHINGTON (Reuters) - K.T. McFarland, picked by President Donald Trump to be the U.S. ambassador to Singapore, withdrew from consideration for the job on Friday after her nomination became stalled in the U.S. Senate. McFarland was on Trumps presidential transition team and later appointed deputy national security adviser under Michael Flynn. Trump nominated McFarland last May to be the U.S. envoy to Singapore. When the U.S. Senate did not act on the nomination by the end of 2017 the White House resubmitted her nomination in early January. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee said in December that McFarland's nomination had been delayed due to concerns about her testimony to Congress over communications with Russia. McFarland had said in a written response to a question from Democratic Senator Cory Booker, a foreign relations committee member, that she was "not aware" of communications between Trump's former national security adviser, Michael Flynn and Sergei Kislyak, when Kislyak was ambassador to Russia. However, the New York Times reported early in December that it had obtained an email McFarland sent on Dec. 29, 2016, the day former President Barack Obama's administration authorized new sanctions against Russia, saying Flynn would talk to Kislyak that evening. Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation about his contacts with Russia, and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors delving into the actions of Trumps inner circle before he took office. On Friday, McFarland, a former Fox News national security analyst, said in a letter to Trump, "I am asking that you withdraw my nomination to be the U.S. Ambassador to Singapore." "I have come to this decision reluctantly, because I believe in your mission," she wrote. A copy of the letter was seen by Reuters. Trump said in a statement, "K.T. served my administration with distinction. Unfortunately, some Democrats chose to play politics rather than move forward with a qualified nominee for a critically important post," he said. McFarland wrote that she believed Trump had "laid the foundations for a new foreign policy that puts Americas interests ahead of, but not at the expense of, our obligations to others." "Know that I have no intention of withdrawing from the national debate and I want to help you in whatever way I can." (Additional reporting by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Leslie Adler, Toni Reinhold)NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenyan police on Saturday detained a third opposition legislator who attended a symbolic "swearing-in" of opposition leader Raila Odinga that was a direct challenge to President Uhuru Kenyatta, who won re-election in October. The government has made several arrests and suspended three television channels that had planned to stream Tuesday's event. "George Aladwa was arrested at his house and is currently being held at the headquarters of the Directorate of Criminal Investigation," his lawyer Nelson Havi told Reuters. "He was interrogated in connection with the oath taken by Kenyan main opposition leader Raila Odinga as the people's president," he said. A police spokesman said he was not aware of his detention. The arrest follows that of opposition politician Miguna Miguna, who was detained in a dawn raid on his Nairobi home on Friday and that of another opposition leader a day earlier. Miguna was released on bail of 50,000 Kenyan shillings ($500). Miguna stood beside Odinga at Tuesday's rally and declared himself the "general" of Odinga's National Resistance Movement, which authorities have designated a "criminal group" because of its stated intent to establish a parallel government. Kenya's ban on three private television stations defied a court order to lift the move. The media crackdown has been criticised by the United Nations and the United States. The arrests and broadcast bans have shocked many Kenyans used to a freewheeling media and irreverent political culture that has taken root since 2002. (Reporting by Humphrey Malalo; Writing by Aaron Maasho; Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg)An Amtrak train collided with a CSX freight train in South Carolina early Sunday morning, the second crash to have happened within the past week.

The collision happened in Cayce, South Carolina. Two Amtrak personnel were killed and dozens were injured, according to the Associated Press. The train was en route from New York to Miami; Amtrak said eight crew members and 139 passengers were on board. All passengers have been removed from the train.

Heres what we know so far.

Why Did The Train Crash?

Amtrak train 91 collided with a freight train, authorities said early Sunday morning. The collision caused 5,000 gallons of fuel to spill and authorities are working to contain the leaks.

We just awoke to violent shaking; I just knew immediately we were off the tracks and I couldnt believe it was actually happening, Erin Wittman, a passenger on the train, told MSNBC.

South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster said that the CSX train appeared to be on the right track, and that Amtrak was on the wrong one, but declined to say anything definitively, instead deferring to experts. The National Transportation Safety Board is launching an investigation.

CSX said in a statement their personnel are on site to assist authorities and will provide more details as they develop.

How Many Fatalities and Injuries Have Been Reported?

The coroners office of Lexington County in South Carolina confirmed the two people who were killed were Amtrak personnel. They have been identified as 54-year-old Michael Kempf, an Amtrak engineer from Savannah, Georgia, and 36-year-old Michael Cella, the trains conductor, from Orange Park, Florida.

The Governor said Sunday morning 116 people were transported to local hospitals. Amtrak says 147 people  8 personnel and 139 passengers  were on the train that derailed. No one was on the CSX train, local authorities said.

The passengers who were not injured were taken off the train and transported to a local school, where Red Cross staff are on site. Alternative modes of transportation have been provided to take them to their destinations, local authorities said.

Story continues

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President Trump Briefed

The President, who is spending the weekend at his Mar-A-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla., has been briefed on the situation and is receiving regular updates. Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone that has been affected by this incident, Deputy White House Press Secretary Lindsay Walters said in a statement.

Trump tweeted similar sentiments, including thanking first responders, shortly after noon eastern time.

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The crash in North Carolina comes less than a week after an Amtrak train carrying Republican lawmakers to their annual retreat crashed into a truck in Virginia, killing a passenger in the vehicle, and sparking calls from some lawmakers for reform.

As incidents repeat, with injuries and deaths, inaction is inexcusable, Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal wrote on Twitter. Americas railroads must be made safer.

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Trump called for the passage of a $1.5 trillion infrastructure plan during his State of the Union last week, touting the desire to build gleaming new roads, bridges, highways, railways, and waterways across our land.United Nations (United States) (AFP) - UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Friday that it was "absolutely essential" for key players to hold "serious" talks on North Korea's nuclear crisis to build on a thaw in relations between Pyongyang and Seoul.

Guterres will pay an official visit to South Korea next week for talks with leaders in Seoul and to attend the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Pyeongchang.

"Our objective remains the peaceful denuclearization of the Korean peninsula," Guterres told reporters at UN headquarters.

"For that, it is absolutely essential that serious discussion take place among the key actors in this process and the UN will do everything possible to encourage them in that regard," he said.

After a series of threatening missile tests, North Korea last month agreed to hold talks with the South and send its athletes to the Winter Olympic Games, easing tensions.

The United States, however, dismissed the moves as a distraction and pressed on with a campaign to pressure North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions.

Led by the United States, the Security Council has imposed three sets of tough economic sanctions on North Korea to cut off revenue to its military programs.

After offering to hold unconditional talks with Pyongyang, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson stepped back from the offer, telling the Security Council last month that North Korea must earn its place at the negotiating table.

Guterres said the unity of the council in unanimously agreeing to slap sanctions "has created the conditions" for addressing the North Korean nuclear threat "through diplomatic engagement."

North Korea's Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho wrote to Guterres this week to ask him to help keep the momentum for improved relations by opposing plans for US-South Korea military drills to be held after the Olympics.

Spokesman Stephane Dujarric has not ruled out that the UN chief could meet with a North Korean official during his visit to South Korea.Los Angeles (AFP) - A middle school shooting that left two students injured in Los Angeles was the result of a semi-automatic handgun going off by accident in a 12-year-old girl's bag, police said Friday.

A 15-year-old boy sustained a head wound, described as a "graze," while a girl of the same age was hit in the wrist in the incident at Salvador Castro Middle School in central Los Angeles on Thursday.

Both are expected to fully recover, and Los Angeles police said they did not believe the shooting was intentional.

An 11-year-old boy, a 12-year-old girl and a 30-year-old woman "had minor abrasions to the face area, some from glass," Erik Scott of the Los Angeles Fire Department said, adding that none of the three was struck by gunfire.

The suspect was arrested at the scene and charged in juvenile court Friday with felony counts of being a minor in possession of a firearm and having a weapon on school grounds.

The girl, who is not being identified by authorities because of her age, is scheduled to be arraigned Monday, according to the District Attorney's Office, which said it would not release any further information.

Some of her friends told reporters that she claims the gun "went off" when she dropped her backpack.

"At this time, the information suggests that this was an isolated incident, involving the negligent discharge of a firearm, where innocent children and a staff member were unfortunately injured," the LAPD said in a statement.

Speaking Friday on KNX Newsradio, Mayor Eric Garcetti said a single bullet apparently went through the girl's wrist and struck the boy near one of his temples before lodging in his neck.

Chief Steve Zipperman of the Los Angeles School Police Department said Thursday it was unclear how the gun wound up on the secure campus.

"We have laws that mandate that parents who own guns, any adult who owns guns, any gun owner has an obligation to ensure that gun is locked inside a home," he added.

Story continues

The image of 12-year-old children bringing guns into the classroom has reignited the long-running debate on America's epidemic of gun violence and the ready accessibility of weapons.

Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer said the incident should be a "call to action" for gun owners to ensure weapons are kept away from children while Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis said she was "horrified" by events.

More than 33,000 people die annually in the United States from gun-related deaths -- two thirds of them suicides -- according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.By Jonathan Stempel NEW YORK (Reuters) - A judge has dismissed a lawsuit by a federal credit union in Manhattan that sought to block U.S. President Donald Trump from installing Mick Mulvaney as acting director of the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. In a decision made public on Friday, U.S. District Judge Paul Gardephe in Manhattan said the Lower East Side People's Federal Credit Union lacked legal authority to sue, rejecting what he called the plaintiff's "fear-based theory of standing." Gardephe said the credit union failed to show that any actual or expected policy changes under Mulvaney, who is also White House budget chief, would undermine its ability to fulfill its mission of improving the health of underserved communities. "Organizations advocating for a particular policy goal who have alleged no injury to themselves as organizations may not establish their standing simply on the basis of that goal," Gardephe wrote. His decision is dated Thursday. Ilann Maazel, a lawyer for the credit union, in an email said his client was disappointed. "We are evaluating our options in this extremely important case," he added. Kerri Kupec, a U.S. Department of Justice spokeswoman, said the department was pleased the court dismissed the challenge to Trump's "lawful designation" of Mulvaney as acting director. Trump appointed Mulvaney as temporary head of the CFPB in November, replacing Richard Cordray, an appointee of President Barack Obama. Mulvaney, a critic of the regulator, has since taken steps that may herald a rollback of some of Cordray's policies. CFPB supporters view the regulator as an important consumer watchdog, while opponents consider it too powerful. A federal appeals court on Wednesday said the president can fire a CFPB director only for cause, rejecting the White House argument that removal at will is also permitted. The credit union had sought to have Gardephe declare CFPB Deputy Director Leandra English, who Cordray designated as his preferred interim successor, as the acting director. English in November filed her own lawsuit in the federal court in Washington, D.C. to block Mulvaney from taking charge. In seeking to dismiss the credit union lawsuit, the Justice Department said forcing Trump to appoint English would be an "extraordinary intrusion into core Executive Branch operations" and upend the "consensus view" that Mulvaney deserved the job. The case is Lower East Side People's Federal Credit Union v Trump et al, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 17-09536. (Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by David Gregorio and Cynthia Osterman)By Randall Hill

CAYCE, S.C. (Reuters) - An Amtrak passenger train that was diverted onto a side track slammed into a parked freight train in South Carolina on Sunday, killing two crew members and injuring at least 116 others in the railroad's third fatal crash in as many months.

Amtrak Train 91, carrying nine crew members and 136 passengers, was traveling from New York to Miami when it hit the CSX Corp freight train that was stopped on a side track, or siding, at about 2:35 a.m. local time (0735 GMT).

The section of track was operated by CSX and the Amtrak train was diverted onto the siding at a switch where a padlock had been attached to steer train traffic that way, Robert Sumwalt, chairman of the U.S. National Transportation Board, told a news conference.

"Key to this investigation is learning why the switch was lined that way," he said, calling the damage to the locomotives "catastrophic." An NTSB investigation team was at the site.

Amtrak engineer Michael Kempf, 54, of Savannah, Georgia, and conductor Michael Cella, 36, of Orange Park, Florida, were killed, Lexington County Coroner Margaret Fisher told reporters. Autopsies were underway, she said.

Two of the 116 people injured were in critical condition after the wreck, which occurred about 5 miles (8 km) southwest of the state capital Columbia.

"It's a horrible thing to see, to understand what force was involved," South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster told reporters. "The first engine of the freight train was torn up, and the single engine of the passenger train is barely recognizable."

Amtrak said it was "deeply saddened" by the deaths. It said CSX owns and controls the dispatching of all trains, including the signal systems that control access to sidings and yards, Amtrak said in a statement.

DEADLY CRASHES

Amtrak President and CEO Richard Anderson said the passenger train hit the tail end of the CSX train. That train had two locomotives and 34 empty auto racks used to transport cars, the NTSB said.

Story continues

The passenger train's locomotive was left lying on its side, and the first car was bent and also derailed, although it remained upright, images from the scene showed.

At least four of the freight train's cars were crumpled, looking like crushed tin foil, but remained on the tracks.

The passenger train was part of Amtrak' Silver Star Service. Officials said some 5,000 gallons of fuel leaked as a result of the collision, but that there was no threat to public safety.

U.S. President Donald Trump received regular updates on the crash while at his resort in Palm Beach, Florida. "My thoughts and prayers are with all of the victims involved in this mornings (sic) train collision in South Carolina," he tweeted. "Thank you to our incredible First Responders for the work they've done!"

McMaster said he had been told the Amtrak train was traveling at about 59 miles (95 km) per hour upon impact.

The NTSB did not release details on the speed at which the Amtrak train was traveling.

In December, three people were killed when an Amtrak passenger train derailed in Washington state. The engineer later told the NTSB he had misread a signal and tried to brake before the accident.

In late January, an Amtrak train carrying Republican members of the U.S. Congress killed one person in a garbage truck with which it collided in Virginia.

A Federal Railroad Administration Investigative team was also on the scene in South Carolina to help establish what happened.

"It is important to understand the factors that contributed to this tragic accident and how all stakeholders can ensure a safe and reliable rail system going forward," the U.S. Department of Transportation said in a statement.

(Additional reporting by David Shepardson in Washington, Rich McKay in Atlanta, Harriet McLeod in Charleston, South Carolina, Ayesha Rascoe in West Palm Beach, Florida, Barbara Goldberg and Renita Young in New York; Writing by Barbara Goldberg and Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Jason Neely, Lisa Von Ahn and Daniel Wallis)Washington (AFP) - At least two people were killed and 70 others injured Sunday when a train carrying 147 people and a freight train collided in the eastern US state of South Carolina, authorities said.

The Amtrak train -- Train 91 -- traveling between New York and Miami derailed in Cayce, outside the state capital Columbia, in the collision with the CSX freight train, which took place at around 2:30 am (0730 GMT).

Amtrak, the national US railway service, said in a statement that the lead engine derailed along with some passenger cars. Eight crew members and 139 passengers were on board.

US media reported injuries ranged from cuts and bruises to broken bones.

The Lexington County Sheriff's Department confirmed all passengers had been evacuated. The local Red Cross opened a shelter in a school to help passengers.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said it was investigating the incident.

Officials added that although 5,000 gallons of fuel spilled following the crash, there was no danger to the public.

"The incident is very near the state farmers' market and other residential areas but right now, everyone is safe," said Derrec Becker, public information officer at the South Carolina Emergency Management Division.

Speaking to CNN, passenger Derek Pettaway said he was traveling south from Philadelphia to Orlando in a sleeper cabin when he was awoken by the impact of the crash.

Pettaway added Amtrak staff evacuated passengers in a "really calm fashion."

"Nobody was panicking," he said. "I'm pretty sure everybody was asleep and I think people were in shock."

It is not known how many people were traveling on the freight train, or whether one of the two trains was stationary at the time of the collision.

The accident is sure to raise questions about the safety of the nation's railways.

It comes just days after another Amtrak train carrying several dozen Republican lawmakers including US House Speaker Paul Ryan hit a garbage truck in Virginia, killing one person and causing six others, including a congressman, to need hospital treatment.

In December, three people were killed when an Amtrak passenger train derailed in Washington state near the city of Tacoma, sending cars flying off a bridge and onto a busy interstate highway.An Italian man opened fire on African migrants in a series of drive-by shootings in the central city of Macerata on Saturday, wounding six people.

The shootings happened just days after a Nigerian migrant was arrested in connection with the death of an 18-year-old Italian woman, whose dismembered body was discovered hidden in two suitcases near Macerata.

2018-02-03T132049Z_1_LYNXMPEE1206H_RTROPTP_4_ITALY-SHOOTING-MACERATA

Reuters

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The incident looks certain to jolt campaigning for a March 4 national election, with a center-right alliance that leads in the polls promoting a fiercely anti-migrant program.

Local media reported that migrants were shot by a man firing out of a car window as he drove around Macerata, which is located about 125 miles east of Rome.

Police later said they had arrested an Italian man, named locally as Luca Traini, and published a photo of him, with an Italian flag draped over his shoulders, being taken away by armed officers.

State television Rai said he was a 28-year-old from Macerata and that a pistol had been discovered in his Alfa Romeo car.

He had taken part in regional elections for the far-right anti-immigrant Northern League last year, and reportedly made a fascist salute when he was arrested.

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Local witnesses said a man fired out of his car window at two young African migrants shortly after 11 a.m. (5.00 a.m. ET), wounding one of them. A short while later there were reports of further drive-by shootings in the city.

The mayor had warned people to stay indoors as shooting struck. At least one of the victims is reported to be in a serious condition.

Right-wing politicians campaigning ahead of next months vote seized on the gruesome death of the teenager Pamela Mastropietro to promote their anti-migrant message.

Story continues

A preliminary postmortem on the teenager could not immediately identify her cause of death. The Nigerian suspect, who was denied asylum last year but has remained in Italy, refused to talk to police.

What was this worm still doing in Italy? Matteo Salvini, head of the far-right League, wrote on Facebook, accusing the center-left government of responsibility over Mastropietros death for allowing migrants to stay in the country.

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The left has blood on its hands, he wrote.

Magistrates say witnesses saw the Nigerian suspect carrying the suitcases that were later found to contain the teenagers body. They also found blood-stained clothes and knives in his possession.

The gunman opened fire in the Via Spalato and Via dei Velini parts of town, which have been the focus of the investigation into Mastropietro's death, reported the BBC.

More than 600,000 mainly African migrants have arrived in Italy by boat over the past four years. The center-right bloc, which includes the League, say the vast majority have no right to asylum and have promised mass expulsions if they take power.

Leftist parties have ruled out any such deportations.

The news from Macerata leaves me horrified and shocked. We must stop this spiral of hate and violence, said Pietro Grasso, who is the head of the left-wing Free and Equal party.

This article was first written by Newsweek

More from NewsweekA man wearing a hat supporting President Donald Trump confronted a group of counter-protesters during a Patriot Picnic rally at San Diego, Californias Chicano Park on Saturday, February 3.

The picnic was organized by the Bordertown Patriots, who self-describes themselves on their Facebook as a political activist and militia group.

According to NBC San Diego, Patriot Picnic organizer Roger Ogden planned the rally at Chicano Park to protest the parks name, claiming its discriminatory of non-Latinos. The Bordertown Patriots group marched with American flags and other props through Barrio Logan to Chicano Park. They were met by more than 700 counter-protesters at the park.

CBS 8 reported the Patriot group intended to raise an American flag in the park, which currently only has the flag of Aztlan flying. In a press release sent to CBS 8, the Bordertown Patriots said, it should not be tolerated to fly only one foreign flag in a city owned park without the accompanying American flag while idolizing enemies of the nation and displaying openly un-American murals that teach children they live in the wrong country.

The San Diego Police Department tweeted three arrests were made during the protests, and one officer was punched in the face. Credit: michaelstevenphotography via StoryfulMichele Bachmann, the former Republican congresswoman from Minnesota, indicated last year that she was looking for a sign from God about whether she should run for the U.S. Senate.

God  or rather a prankster claiming to be the deity  answered with an actual sign:

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Bachmann, one of Trumps evangelical advisors, told doomsday food salesman Jim Bakker in December that people have been urging her to run in Novembers special election for the seat Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) vacated after a sexual harassment scandal. Bachmann said she trusts in a big God and that she was supposed to run for president, referring to her failed 2012 bid, which she called wildly successful.

I fulfilled the calling God gave me, Bachmann said. So the question is: Am I being called to do this now? I dont know.

If shes looking for a sign, she might want to check out the billboard in St. Paul, Minnesota, which appeared to be the result of a crowdfunding project from the satirical website thegoodlordabove.com.

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Whoever wins the Republican nomination will likely face Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.). Smith was appointed to the seat after Frankens resignation.

Related...

Michele Bachmann: God Sent Trump As 'Reprieve' From Trans Rights

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.United Nations (United States) (AFP) - North Korea is flouting sanctions by exporting coal, iron, steel and other banned commodities, earning nearly $200 million in revenue last year, a UN report said Friday.

A UN panel of experts also found evidence of military cooperation by North Korea to develop Syria's chemical weapons programs and to provide Myanmar with ballistic missiles.

North Korea "continued to export almost all the commodities prohibited in the resolutions, generating nearly $200 million in revenue between January and September 2017," said the report by the experts seen by AFP.

Coal shipments were delivered to China, Malaysia, South Korea, Russia and Vietnam by ships using "a combination of multiple evasion techniques, routes and deceptive tactics," said the report.

The Security Council last year adopted a series of resolutions to tighten and expand exports bans aimed at cutting off revenue to North Korea's military programs.

The United States led the push for tough economic sanctions after North Korea's sixth nuclear test and a series of ballistic missile launches that raised fears that the US mainland could soon be within reach.

Seven ships have been barred from ports worldwide for violating UN sanctions with coal and petroleum transfers, but the experts said much more must be done to confront "these rampant illicit activities."

The panel found that North Korea "is already flouting the most recent resolutions by exploiting global oil supply chains, complicit foreign nationals, offshore company registries, and the international banking system."

- Arming Syria, Myanmar -

Syria and Myanmar are continuing cooperation with North Korea's KOMID corporation, the country's main arms exporter, which is on a UN sanctions blacklist, the report said.

The panel uncovered more than 40 previously unreported shipments from North Korea between 2012 and 2017 to front companies for Syria's Scientific Studies Research Council, also known as CERS, a key institute for Syria's chemical program.

Story continues

The investigations reveal "substantial new evidence" concerning Pyongyang's military cooperation with Damascus, including at least three visits by North Korean technicians to Syria in 2016.

A visit by a North Korean technical delegation in August 2016 involved the "transfer of special resistance valves and thermometers known for use in chemical weapons programs," said the report.

A member-state that was not named told the panel that North Korean "technicians continue to operate at chemical weapons and missile facilities at Barzei, Adra and Hama" in Syria, said the report.

Syria however told the panel that there were no North Korean technicians in its territory and that the only experts it was hosting from the country were involved in sports.

A member-state, which was not named, also notified the panel that Myanmar had received "ballistic missile systems from (North Korea) in addition to a range of conventional weapons, including multiple rocket launches and surface-to air missiles".

North Korean diplomats, in particular trade representatives, continue to provide logistical support for arms sales and help organize exchanges for military technicians, it said.

While sanctions have been significantly broadened, this "expansion of the regime is yet to be matched by the requisite political will" to implement the measures, the experts said.

The panel of experts said 2018 offered a "critical window of opportunity before a potential miscalculation with disastrous implications for international peace and security."By Stephanie Nebehay and Ahmed Elumami GENEVA/TRIPOLI (Reuters) - An estimated 90 migrants are feared to have drowned off the coast of Libya after a smuggler's boat capsized early on Friday, leaving three known survivors and 10 bodies washed up on shore, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said. Survivors told aid workers that most of the migrants on board were Pakistanis, who form a growing group heading to Italy from North Africa, IOM spokeswoman Olivia Headon said. "They have given an estimate of 90 people who drowned during the capsize, but we still need to verify the exact number of people who lost their lives during the tragedy," Headon, speaking from Tunis, told a Geneva news briefing. "What has been reported to us is that it's mostly Pakistanis who were on board the boat, but we still need to verify the nationalities and how many from what country," she said. Ten bodies have washed up on Libyan shores, two of them known to be Libyans and eight Pakistanis, she said. "I believe the Libyan coastguard is looking for other survivors off the coast," Headon added. Another IOM spokesman, Leonard Doyle, told Reuters Television that the boat was believed to have left shore on Thursday before capsizing early on Friday morning. LIBYA CLAMPS DOWN Earlier security officials in the western Libyan town of Zuwara said two Libyans and one Pakistani had been rescued from the boat. They said 10 bodies had been recovered, mostly Pakistani, but gave no further information. Zuwara, located near Libya's border with Tunisia, was a favoured site for migrant boat departures over the past two years but of late has seen only occasional departures. A statement from the Zuwara coastguard said their initial information suggested there were some 90 people on board. Libya is the main gateway for migrants trying to cross to Europe by sea, though numbers have dropped sharply since July as Libyan factions and authorities - under pressure from Italy and the European Union - have begun to block departures. More than 600,000 people are believed to have made the journey from Libya to Italy over the past four years. Prior to Friday's incident, some 6,624 migrants are believed to have arrived in Europe by sea so far this year and a further 246 have died, according to IOM figures. The Libyan coastguard, which receives EU funding and training, has become more assertive in recent months in intercepting migrants and bringing them back to Libya. Activists have criticised the policy, saying migrants often face extreme hardship and abuse in Libya, including forced labour, according to Human Rights Watch and other rights groups. Migrants who are caught trying to cross to Italy are put in severely overcrowded detention centres authorised by the interior ministry. (Additional reporting by Ulf Laessing and Aidan Lewis; Editing by Gareth Jones)Sebastien Roblin

Security, Asia

And what it could mean for NATO in the Baltics.

How North Korean Tanks Overran the Armys Task Force Smith in Korea

On June 25, 1950 eighty-nine thousand soldiers of the North Korean Peoples Army launched a devastating surprise attack on South Korea. Well equipped with Soviet-supplied tanks, artillery and automatic weapons, they swiftly overran defending South Korean troops that numbered less than half their number and seized the capital of Seoul in just three days.

U.S. president Harry Truman managed to get to the United Nations to mobilize militarily against the invasiona move only made possible due to a then-ongoing Soviet boycott.

However, intervention by UN troops would mean little if the entire Korean Peninsula was captured before the weeks it would take for them to arrive, as seemed likely. U.S. fighter planes based in Japan and on aircraft carriers soon joined the fray. However, the closest ground unit with any chance of making it in time lay just across the Tsushima Strait: the Twenty-Fourth Infantry Division, then deployed in the American occupation of Japan.

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Despite emerging from World War II with a triumphant reputation, the Army had been hollowed out in the postwar years. In the early phase of the new era of atomic warfare, it was expected that nuclear weapons would do all the killing, and troops on the ground would simply mop up what was left and guard nuclear-weapons facilities. While the Pentagon focused on strategic bombers, the Army did not even standardize equipment upgrades that it had devised by the end of World War II, such as standardizing the issue of the M26 Pershing tank and the 3.5-inch M20 Super Bazooka for the infantry.

The Twenty-Fourth Division in particular was composed largely of draftees with only two months of basic training, and was still equipped with older World War IIera support weapons. The divisional commander Maj. Gen. William Dean assigned Lt. Col. Charles Smith, a veteran of the Battle of Guadalcanal, to command the lead battalion to deploy into Korea. Butler planned on deploying the bulk of the Twenty-Fourth Division to defend the city of Taejon, but he wanted Smith to race ahead as far north as possible to delay the North Korean advance.

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Task Force Smith was composed of the understrength First Battalion of the Twenty-First Infantry regiment; with 406 men, it had only two out of the standard three infantry companies. For heavy weapons, it had only a half dozen mortars and 2.36-inch bazookas each, as well as a couple seventy-five-millimeter recoilless rifles. Artillery support was provided by six 105-millimeter howitzers from A Battery of the Fifty-Second Field Artillery battalion, which counted an additional 134 men.

Smiths battalion was airlifted to Korea on July 1, and by Independence Day he had raced his troops all the way to the village of Osan, southeast of Seoul. Just north of the village he dug his infantry in on two ninety-meter-high hills overlooking a road leading to Taejon, stretched out along a mile-long defensive line. He situated five howitzers a mile to the rear to provide fire support, while he deployed the number-six gun farther west, to pick off any vehicles passing between the two hills. You can see a map of his deployment here.

At 7:30 a.m. the following morningJuly 5the American GIs spotted a company of eight T-34/85 tanks of the 107th Tank Regiment racing down the highway towards them. During World War II, the T-34 had played a vital role in the defense of the Soviet Union from German panzers, boasting a useful combination of mobility, protection and firepower. An upgrade to a eighty-five-millimeter gun by 1944 kept the vehicle technologically viable through the end of the war and beyond.

At a quarter past eight, the howitzers began blasting the tanks with high-explosive shells from a mile away, beginning the first engagement by U.S. ground forces in the Korean War. Soon the seventy-five-millimeter recoilless rifles joined the bombardment. The T-34 crews remained buttoned inside their tanksunable to spot the American forces well, but also largely unaffected by the shrapnel shredding the air around them.

U.S. infantry waited until the lead tank had rolled up to only a dozen yards from their bazookasand then struck the Soviet-made tanks with no fewer than twenty-two antitank rockets. Apparently unaffected, the North Korean tankers simply rolled straight through the roadblock, not finding the infantry worth their time to stop and engage.

Both the old M9A1 bazooka and M20 recoilless rifle could theoretically only barely pierce the T-34s one hundred millimeters of front armor with their shaped-charge warheads. However, because hits to the weaker side armor also failed to penetrate, it seems likely the warheads were defective. Furthermore, the howitzers 105-millimeter high-explosive rounds, though powerful, were not designed for armor penetration.

As the tanks charged towards the howitzers, they ran into a carefully laid ambush: the artillerymen did possess exactly six High Explosive Anti-Tank roundsreportedly, one third of the supply then available to U.S. forces in all of Asia! These were all allocated to the number-six gun of Corporal Herman Critchfield, who managed to disable two tanks at short range.

One of the T-34s brewed up in flames, and its dismounting crewmembers sprayed a nearby machine-gun position with his burp gun, causing the first death of an American soldier in Korea. Shellfire from the T-34s blew up most of the infantrys trucks, knocked out Critchfields gun and wounded the batterys commanding officer, Capt. Miller Perry. A third tank was immobilized by a hit to its treads, while the five remaining tanks eventually continued down the road to Taejon.

Task Force Smiths misfortunes had only just begun. An hour later, another twenty-five tanks came barreling towards their position. Howitzer fire managed to immobilize another tank and damage a few more, but the rest got through and personnel from the demoralized battery nearly fled from the field before being rallied by Captain Perry.

Then, at 11 a.m., a six-mile long column of North Korean trucks from the Sixteenth and Eighteenth Infantry Regiments escorted by three tanks advanced on Smiths position, oblivious to the skirmishes that had taken place earlier that morning. Once they had closed within a thousand yards, the American troops opened fire with mortars, machine guns and howitzers, spreading chaos through the column.

However, Smiths force was outnumbered ten to one by the more than five thousand North Korean troops. Under command of Gen. Lee Kwon-mu, the Communist infantry spread out to envelope the isolated roadblock from both ends. After three hours of fighting, Smith decided he would have to withdraw to avoid losing his entire force.

Unfortunately, the passing tanks had crushed Smiths communication lines, and word of his planned orderly withdrawal did not make it to all the troops. One platoon only found out at the last moment, and left its wounded soldiers behind in its haste to escape. They were later found to have been murdered in their stretchers.

The retreat exposed the American infantry in the open to enemy fire, and as Korean machine-gun and shell fire raked their positions, panic set in. The controlled retreat disintegrated into a pell-mell route. The howitzer crews at least managed to spike the sights on their howitzers before roaring away in their truck, picking up stragglers here and there as they went.

Ultimately, Task Force Smith lost over a third of its strength: sixty men killed in action, another twenty-one wounded and eighty-two captured (only fifty of whom survived the war). The survivors straggled back to American lines over the course of several days, linking up with the defenses established by the rest of the Twenty-Fourth Infantry Division. Historians estimate the inexperienced troops had bought U.S. forces in Korea seven vital hours.

However, things did not improve much from there. Despite quickly winning air superiority, U.S. and South Korean troops suffered defeat after defeat on the ground over the next two months until they were confined to a small defensive perimeter around the southeastern port city of Pusan. The first M24 light tanks to enter action were outgunned by the T-34s, while World War IIvintage Shermans were at best only evenly matched. Only in September did a surprise amphibious assault at Inchon, west of Seoul, reverse UN fortunes in the theater by cutting North Korean supply lines.

The debacle of Task Force Smith is relatively well documented, and has become a byword in the Army for the risk that rapid-response troops hastily inserted into a crisis situation may run, by lacking the necessary firepower to defend themselves.

Could a similar situation occur today? In the Korean theater this is unlikely, as the South Korean army has grown dramatically in capability, and defenses along the demilitarized zone are very well developed. Of course, the U.S. military has also greatly improved its technological advantage vis-a-vis potential adversaries, and can field highly portable Javelin antitank weapons and more precise air-to-ground weapons.

However, there are scenarios in which a relatively small U.S. advance force could get overwhelmed. For example, during the 1991 Gulf War, the Eighty-Second Airborne division was deployed to defend a thin defensive line across the open deserts of Saudi Arabia against a vast force of Iraqi armored units. Fortunately, the Iraqi tanks did not attack, but clearly the light infantry would have been hard pressed in such a scenario.

In 2016, analysts at the RAND Corporation projected that U.S. armored units forward deployed to eastern Europe would be overwhelmed in the event of a surprise invasion of the Baltics by Russia. However, such a scenario would depend on Russia concentrating many troops in the region without NATO noticing and mustering its own forces in reply; furthermore, it is generally unlikely.

Nonetheless, the experience of Task Force Smith emphasizes the terrible price paid by soldiers asked to fight unwinnable battles on short notice with inadequate equipment and too little training. Fortunately, despite the battles disastrous outcome, it was part of a series of desperate defensive actions thatjust barelyprevented the conquest of all of South Korea until reinforcements could arrive.

Sebastien Roblin holds a Masters Degree in Conflict Resolution from Georgetown University and served as a university instructor for the Peace Corps in China. He has also worked in education, editing, and refugee resettlement in France and the United States. He currently writes on security and military history for War Is Boring.

Image: A team mans a Bazooka at the Battle of Osan. Members of the 24th Infantry Division, first United States ground units to reach the front, go into action against North Korean forces at the village of Sojong-Ni, near Osan. At right is Private First Class Kenneth Shadrick, who was killed by enemy fire a few moments after this photo was made, thus becoming the first United States soldier to die in the Korean campaign.Wikimedia Commons

Read full articleThis article first appeared on Just Security.

With President Donald Trumps blessing in hand, House Republicans released a memo Friday, spearheaded by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), that accused senior Justice Department officials of not following proper protocols when seeking permission to spy on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

The memo also insinuates that a bias against Trump may have been a motivating factor for some of the people involved in the investigation.

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The FBI, senior officials of the Justice Department, Senate Republicans and Nuness Democratic counterpart on the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), all warned against releasing the memo, saying it painted an incomplete and misleading picture of the underlying intelligence that supported the FISA warrant application for Page.

Meanwhile, the president has reportedly been telling his friends that the memo would expose bias within the FBIs top ranks and make it easier for him to argue the Russia investigations are prejudiced against him.

So, what exactly does the memo claim? Is it a  dud ? Or is it an effective disinformation tool that could help Trump unravel the investigation into his presidential campaign and its possible ties to Russian interference in the 2016 election?

To make sense of it all, I turned to some of Just Security s expert editors and contributors to get their views. Heres what they had to say.

1. Whats your big takeaway after reading the memo?

Julian Sanchez: There are some some legitimately criticizable missteps here: The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) should have been informed that Steeles research was underwritten by the Democratic National Committee; a news article was erroneously cited as an independent source of information, which it later became apparent was also based on Steeles claims.

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But thats not in itself anywhere near a worse than Watergate scandal unless we assume a lot of additional facts that arent in evidence. Instead, the memo seems designed to insinuate the facts that would elevate this from a catalogue of modest misjudgments to a narrative of serious abuse.

It implies that the application relied critically on unverified facts, but doesnt actually say it in so many words. It reads, to be blunt, like a document intended to create the appearance of a scandal in the eyes of someone who isnt parsing it closely.

GettyImages-872161986 (1)

Mark Wilson/Getty

Barbara McQuade : Although it is extremely misleading, the memo is not terribly significant to the Mueller investigation. It relates to a FISA warrant that was obtained in October 2016, after the investigation had already begun in July, and relates only to one subject, Carter Page. To suggest that this somehow taints the entire investigation is just wrong.

John Sipher : My first impression was that it was underwhelming. For all the hoopla and high-level attention, it was a pretty lame effort by Nunes and those trying to discredit the investigation. Like so many of the attacks and smear efforts against Christopher Steele and his dossier, the Nunes memo carefully avoids anything related to the actual content of the report.

Unlike a professional investigator, he purposely avoids anything that might undercut his pre-cooked conclusion, and focuses exclusively on the aspects that best supports his case.

However, even his best argument is not very strong. Just like when the FBI gets reporting of a possible terrorist attack, their responsibility is to check it out. In this case, it would have been professionally irresponsible if the FBI did not follow up on this damning and explosive counterintelligence information, even if they were not 100 percent certain of the sources reasons for passing on the lead.

Michael German: If this is the best argument the White House and House Republicans have to discredit the Special Counsel investigation they are in serious trouble. It isnt very clear what their argument is. If it is just that Steele was biased against Trump, Im not sure what that has to do with Page, because Page was no longer with the campaign and was not on the White House staff.

But the memo ignores other important realities. Most informants providing information to the FBI do it because they dont like the people they are informing on, or at least dont like what they are doing. Also, informants can be wrong on certain details without making everything they say false.

Moreover, the memo seems to suggest the FBI officials submitting the affidavit knew everything we now know today at the time they submitted the application, which of course is not likely to be true. It has to be evaluated based on what was known or not known at the time.

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There is little in the memo that hasnt been discussed publicly, so it is hard to understand why it needed to remain classified. I think Wrays interest in keeping this memo secret was more about preserving the FBIs ability to deny FISA affidavits to defendants in court cases. If parts of FISA affidavits can be released publicly for political purposes I think judges might be more open to letting defendants challenge them when their liberty is on the line as well.

2. What is a key piece of information we need to have to be able assess the memos claims that we dont have?

Sanchez : In general, whats lacking isnt any particular piece of information, but rather the whole context in which information from Steele was used. What specific claims from Steele were relied on to make the case, and were those specific claims independently corroborated? What other evidence was invoked?

McQuade: We would need to see the entire FISA application to assess the importance of the dossier in the finding of probable cause. Was the dossier the sole basis? It seems likely that additional evidence was used to establish probable cause. Of course, that document is classified and FBIs hands are tied from releasing it.

Sipher: We need the same information that Nunes needs (and should have waited for before going public). We have no information about what other information was in the applications for the warrant.

German: Obviously the whole affidavit, not cherry-picked facts, is what the FISC relied on, so it would be impossible to determine whether the probable cause determination was justified without seeing it all. I dont think at this point, just based on the process in which it was produced and released, anyone should believe the memo is a fair rendering of even the purported facts it presents.

3. By releasing the memo, which, as the FBI describes, has material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memos accuracy, what potential damage has the House Intelligence Committee done? What are the repercussions?

Sanchez: A year ago I would have said itd probably be healthy if the relationship between the IC and its oversight committees were *somewhat* less cozy, but its hard to see how this doesnt fundamentally damage the trust between them.

The Justice Department and FBI were pretty reluctant to hand over sensitive material relevant to an ongoing investigation, and to then see it mined for items to attack the Bureau in a way they clearly regard as misleading and unfair would, obviously, tend to confirm their initial reluctance.

Needless to say, you dont want it to be an exercise in pulling teeth whenever House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) needs sensitive material to conduct its oversight responsibilities. If the agencies arent just worried about genuine errors being exposed, but about material being politically repurposes this way, the overseers jobs are predictably going to get a lot harder.

McQuade: The committee has harmed public confidence in the FBI and the FISA process. It may also have harmed Muellers investigation by disclosing facts that were previously unknown to the public.

German: I think this episode has done tremendous damage to the credibility of the Intelligence Committee. When Congress created the congressional intelligence committees, as a result of the Senates 1975 Church investigation of intelligence abuses, it took steps to ensure the committees would not be partisan.

I think this release puts a dagger into that notion, which will make it harder for the agencies to share information with them in the future, and harder for the public to accept that they are looking out for our interests rather than their own.

Jennifer Daskal: We need to learn more details. But it would be highly concerning if in fact the FBI is correct and the memo omits key facts that undermine the memos credibility.

FISA is an incredibly powerful  and incredibly important  tool that authorizes the gathering of foreign intelligence evidence regarding U.S. citizens and residents pursuant to a court-issued warrant based on probable cause, albeit in situations that are shrouded in secrecy.

Its continued vitality depends in significant part on faith that those entrusted to exercise this extraordinary authority do so with ultimate commitment to uncovering truth and abiding by the rule of law.

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There is of course always risk of abuse  a risk we should all be aware of and guard against. But an allegation of abuse, in the absence of actual abuse, or even more concerning in a one-sided representation of the facts for purposes of partisan gain, would constitute a dangerous, short-sighted attack on a critically valuable national security tool, in ways that could undercut our national security over the long term.

4. What do you make of the allegations of bias in the memo? Are any of them concerning?

Sanchez: Theres an effort to imply that Steele harbored some preexisting ideological bias against Trump. Which may well be the case, but the main evidence for this is that Steele expressed a view that it was urgent Trump not become presidentwhich would be a pretty natural thing to say if he believed his sources to be telling the truth about Russias involvement.

McQuade: Ordinarily, information relating to a sources potential biases should be disclosed in an application so that a judge can weigh the allegations appropriately, but there is no allegation that the substance of the allegations are false.

To suppress the fruits of a warrant, under Franks v. Delaware, a defendant must show that false statements were made knowingly or recklessly and that there was insufficient independent evidence to establish probable cause. This allegation of bias falls far short of that standard.

Sipher: I find the allegations that Steele was biased against Trump amusing. First, all sources (as all people) have biases. Professional intelligence officers simply take these biases into account  just like they assess a sources reliability, access, motivations, experience, expertise and perspective.

More importantly, is bias the right word? Mr. Steele collected information from sources he trusted that indicated the Trump campaign might be involved in a criminal conspiracy with Russian President Vladimir Putin. His statement that he didnt want Trump to become president seems more like that of a concerned professional who is worried about what he has learned, than bias. Frankly, Id be biased too if my sources were telling me what they told him.

5. The memo states, The FBI and DOJ obtained one initial FISA warrant targeting Carter Page and three FISA renewals from the FISC. Whats the significance of the three renewals? Would the investigators need to show that the first FISA warrant was producing useful intelligence? Would those renewals depend more on the intelligence being collected vs. the original application?

Sanchez: A lot would depend on the specifics of the case, but FISC would almost certainly expect to see the initial three months of surveillance bearing some sort of fruit, though given the ambiguity of much foreign intelligence, they wouldnt necessarily demand a smoking gun.

Trained intelligence agents do not usually say lets discuss the crimes were going to do over the phone, but it seems unlikely theyd have reauthorized wiretaps three separate times if they werent seeing anything that provided grounds for suspicion.

McQuade: To obtain a renewal, FBI would need to show that the surveillance was fruitful, so we can infer that it produced valuable foreign intelligence information.

Sipher: As you have reported before, it is no easy feat to acquire a FISA renewal. The government has to show that its investigation is bearing fruit, and make a case to the judge that further investigation is warranted. The fact that Pages FISA was renewed three times seems to suggest that the government had additional information. It seems to weaken Nunes case.

Daskal: In order to obtain the initial FISA warrant, and in order to get each renewal, an independent Article III judge on the FISC needs to determine that there was probable cause to believe that Page was an agent of a foreign power  apparently meaning in this case that Page knowingly engaged in clandestine intelligence gathering activities for or on behalf of Russia, or aided or conspired with others who were doing so.

Presumably, the renewals would not have been granted unless there was evidence, likely obtained as a result of information gleaned from the earlier orders, that in fact there were grounds to believe that Page met this standard and in fact conspired, aided, or himself engaged in clandestine intelligence activities on behalf of Russia.

6. The memo says, the Carter Page FISA application also cited extensively a September 23, 2016, Yahoo News article by Michael Isikoff. In what way are journalistic sources used in FISA apps?

Sanchez: Theres no reason open source intelligence is less valid than secret intelligence. All sorts of facts might be most readily confirmed by public reporting. The problem in this case isnt that they relied on a news report, but that Steele was himself the source for that report, which could give the appearance of independent confirmation to facts that were really just the same source cited twice.

German: Yes, news articles, academic publications, almost anything you can imagine that provides the judge a clearer picture of the totality of the facts and circumstances can be used to bolster probable cause. Obviously, a judge knows that a newspaper allegation is not necessarily proof of anything, but may be enlightening nonetheless.

7. Does the FBI define as the most serious of violations an unauthorized disclosure to the media of ones relationship with the FBI, as the memo claims?

German: Obviously, you cant be a confidential source if you are not confidential. It is a breach of the agreement a confidential source makes with the FBI, which the bureau takes seriously, but it doesnt go to whether the information they provided is true. If someone that is formally closed as a confidential source for talking to the press walks in the door tomorrow with information, the FBI will of course accept it. The key is whether the information can be validated, not whether the person who gave it to you is a saint. Very few informants are saints.

Sipher: This is where I have the biggest problems. Nunes is either confused about what it means to be a source, or is seeking to confuse others. First, we do not run British citizens as intelligence sources. To be an intelligence source suggests clandestine handling and that the person is under some sort of institutional control by the United States.

If Steele were truly a source, the British government has every right to be outraged at us. Also, if he were really a source, it would be devastating to our ability to recruit new sources if members of Congress could unilaterally out a source.

8. What are we to make of this statement? Deputy Director McCabe testified before the Committee in December 2017 that po surveillance warrant would have been sought from the FISC without the Steele dossier information.

Sanchez: This is an interesting but ambiguous claim. If we read McCabe to mean that, at the time they applied for a FISA order, there wasnt substantial evidence other than the dossier to support the application, that would be pretty significant: If theyre hanging everything on that dossier, then the failure to make full disclosure about its funding becomes a bigger problem.

If we read him instead as saying that they wouldnt have turned their attention back to Page but for the dossier, thats not nearly as big a deal. But it seems telling that theyre grounding this on McCabes statement, which can be interpreted either way, rather than directly asserting that FBI found nothing else to support targeting Page based on the contents of the application.

McQuade: That makes it sound like the dossier was essential to probable cause. Special Counsel Robert Mueller can avoid any problems by simply saying he will not use any evidence obtained from the warrant.

9. The memo states, The Page FISA application also mentions information regarding fellow Trump campaign advisor George Papadopoulos, but there is no evidence of any cooperation or conspiracy between Page and Papadopoulos. So what? Why is the memo insinuating that you need evidence of any cooperation or conspiracy between Page and Papadopoulos if youre going to include information about Papadopoulos in the Page FISA application?

Sanchez: This part seems as though its intended to rebut the New York Tim es report that it was the Australian tip about Papadopoulos, rather than the Steele dossier, that sparked the inquiry into possible collusion with Russia. The implication, it appears, is that whatever grounds they had for looking at Papadopoulos, it didnt justify surveillance of Page.

Its hard to know what to make of this without knowing exactly why Papadopoulos was mentioned. If the point was just to establish a pattern of Russian assets reaching out to people associated with the Trump campaign, that would be reasonable, as long as it didnt turn into an attempt to imply guilt by association.

McQuade: This seems to be an attempt to minimize what appears to be additional evidence forming the basis for the probable cause. The absence of evidence of a conspiracy between them does not seem relevant.

Sipher: This seems to be a silly argument.

Kate Brannen is Deputy Managing Editor of Just Security and Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security at the Atlantic Council.

This article was first written by Newsweek

More from NewsweekThe House Intelligence Committee as released the so-called Nunes memo, a document that Republicans say prove that elements of the Russia investigation are politically motivated attacks against President Donald Trump.

The memo, written House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes' staff, focuses on a FISA warrant against former Trump campaign aid Carter Page during the 2016 campaign. That warrant was obtained by the Department of Justice in October 2016, and the request for the warrant was reliant at least in part on a dossier compiled by Christopher Steele, which claimed that Russia may have compromising information on Mr Trump. The FBI has noted that the Steele dossier was not the sole piece of evidence used for the warrant.

Mr Nunes' memo notes that Mr Steele's dossier was compiled for the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign, and that the Department of Justice's applications for the FISA warrant did not note that funding source.

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Reaction to the memo's release was swift and fractured.

True to form, Republicans claimed that the contents of the four page document prove that the FBI and Department of Justice were biased in their quest to spy on Carter Page, while Democrats and individuals sympathetic to the American spy apparatus, said that the memo's release amounted to little more than an attempt to discredit special counsel Robert Mueller.

"Thats it? Dishonest and misleading memo wrecked the House intel committee, destroyed trust with Intelligence Community, damaged relationship with FISA court, and inexcusably exposed classified investigation of an American citizen. For what? DOJ & FBI must keep doing their jobs," former FBI Director James Comey, who was fired by Mr Trump last year at least in part because of the Russia investigation, tweeted.

Meanwhile, civil rights organisations chimed in to say that the memo highlighted deeply troubling actions of the Justice Department and FBI, but said that the Nunes memo itself succeeded only in further confusing an already opaque spy practice.

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The completeness and accuracy of government representations to the FISA court are longstanding concerns. The Nunes memo makes serious charges of FBI and Justice Department misconduct in obtaining a warrant to surveil an American citizen, but on its own does not contain the facts needed to substantiate its charges, Christopher Anders, the deputy director of the American Civil Liberties UNion's Washington legislative office, said in a statement. Rather than one side or the other cherry-picking facts, all Americans deserve to see all of the facts, including both the minority report and the underlying documents. The goal should be more transparency, not less, particularly when a congressional committee chairman makes serious charges of abuse but does not provide the facts to either prove the charges or allow Americans to make up our own minds.

The White House itself released a statement saying that the memo "raises serious concerns about the integrity of decisions made" at the top level of the Justice Department and FBI.When House of Representatives released the so-called Nunes memo Friday, the news was one more step in a wave of controversy that has called into question the relationship between U.S. intelligence and the nations elected officials.

The GOP memo, produced by the House Intelligence Committee under committee chair Rep. Devin Nunes, contains allegations that suggest misconduct in the FBIs investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election. The decision to release it, against the wishes of the FBI and some politicians in both parties, represents a major shift in intelligence oversight, the process through which Congress and others are able to check the actions of agencies such as the FBI.

But the world of intelligence oversight wasnt always so fraught. For much of the nations history, intelligence gathering proceeded largely with bipartisan support and little questioning. That began to change in the last several decades.

Some of that change was witnessed firsthand by Loch K. Johnson, in roles that included staff director of the Subcommittee on Intelligence Oversight for the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. He was also special assistant to the chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and then a staff aide on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the mid-1970s, just as the Church Committee was investigating possible misdeeds in the course of federal intelligence-gathering.

Hes now Regents Professor of Public and International Affairs at the University of Georgia and the author of the new book Spy Watching: Intelligence Accountability in the United States. He spoke to TIME shortly before the memo was declassified on Friday about why the release of the controversial document is such big news. An edited transcript of that conversation follows.

TIME: It must be quite a time to be studying this topic. Whats your reaction, as an expert on this topic, to the news breaking this week?

JOHNSON: It is an extraordinary event to have the majority on the [House Intelligence] Committee decide to release a document with classified material in it, especially in light of the fact that the FBI has cautioned against releasing it. It does raise a question of great importance, a broader question, of when Congress should have the right to release classified information. This has been debated off and on.

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Ill tell you a story from the Church Committee days, in 1975: We did an assassination report, which was highly classified and very controversial, and Senator Church, Democrat of Idaho, decided to take it to the floor as an informational exercise. But when he got to the floor, many Senators, particularly Republicans, said, You cant release this information without a formal vote! And Church and a few others said, Were not here to take a vote. Were here to make sure the Senators are not blindsided by the media and they know what this report is. So that was one approach, I think a rather brazen one, on behalf of Frank Church, even though I was his aide. Im not sure that that report should have been released without a more formal procedure.

Another aspect of this, which I think is significant, is that the Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee objected to the Democrats releasing a rebuttal, which also had some classified information in it. As you may recall, back when [Sen. Dianne] Feinstein was investigating the torture report, she at least made it possible for the opponents to release a dissenting report.

Many people, including the President, have bemoaned the politicization of this process. Was it ever really apolitical?

From 1947, when the CIA was created, up until about 1992  so thats quite a sweep of time  when it came to intelligence, there was pretty much bipartisan unity. There were a couple of episodes during the 50s and 60s in which Mike Mansfield and a couple of others introduced proposals to reform the oversight process and make it more formal, but they were quickly defeated by both the House and the Senate. It used to be that people were so proud that [intelligence] was above the partisan fray, with the exception of the efforts of the Reagan Administration to conduct covert action in Nicaragua despite the Boland Amendment [limiting such actions]; that led to the initial friction, but since then its become commonplace. I think part of what happened there is that Newt Gingrich came along and his theory was to so denigrate the Democrats that maybe the American public would finally turn to the Republicans and make them a majority. And in fact it worked, but unfortunately it made Washington a horrible place to be, and theres so much hostility now.

You point to 1992, which is interesting to me, since it seems to me that the 1970s were when so much was changing in this world  you have the Church Committee, you have FISA, you have leaks, you have the post-Watergate disenchantment with the idea that government can be trusted

Heres the distinction I would make. Given the Watergate backdrop as well as the mendacity that accompanied the Vietnam War, there was a turn against the government by the public, and also the representatives in Congress. And the Church Committee made it clear that accountability and safeguards would apply not only to the open part of government but to the secret part of it to. But having said that, even after the Church committee there was a lot of bipartisan agreement on intelligence matters. For example, the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978] was passed almost unanimously.

So the 70s are a turning point, but not toward politicization.

Yes. A turn toward bringing the secret side of government into the actual government, and the framework that Madison and the Founders back in 1787 created.

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Speaking of the Founders, one clear thread in your book is the tension between intelligence agencies and democratic ideals. Is that tension inevitable?

I dont think its inevitable. I think it boils down really to two models of governance in a democratic society, or two ways of approaching how were going to govern ourselves. One, one could call the Cheney approach or the Hamiltonian approach. The idea is that you need a strong, fast-moving, secretive executive branch in order for the United States to survive and perform well in a very hostile world. I think that flies in the face of the founding principles of this nation, which I would sum up by calling them the Madisonian principles. Madisons idea, embraced by the other Founders by and large, was that power was a very dangerous thing. Wed learned that from George III.

A lot of it depends on what you think is true here. Do you think that intelligence agencies can be effective in a hostile world and still obey the dictates of a Madisonian system? As you can tell from my book, Im firmly on the Madisonian side, and I think most American people are too, if they think about it.

Does technology change that calculation in any way?

Only in the sense that it makes accountability more difficult because members of Congress, and to some degree their staff, are by and large not technically oriented. So Congress, in order to keep pace with the technology that the NSA and other places are thinking about, is going to have to bring in more technical people. It just requires a different kind of vigilance.

Is there anything about the evolution of this subject that you think the average person would be surprised to learn?

I think one thing thats worth pointing out is that the executive branch all too often is not faithful to the new rules about oversight. For instance, we have something called the Gang of Eight rule, and when theres a covert action, which is an effort by the CIA under White House orders to manipulate events abroad  it sounds like the Russians in our country, but we do that too of course  in times of emergency, you dont have the report immediately to the Senate and House intelligence committee. Whats happened is the executive branch, and this would apply to Democrats and Republicans alike, has ignored the provision that follows, which is that after two days you have to report to the full committees.

Then, on the legislative side the problem is distraction. When members of Congress are spending four to six hours a day making phone calls to raise money for the next election, theyre not doing a lot of oversight work.

You spoke to several people who have been Director of Central Intelligence about this topic. Did you learn anything from them that surprised you?

One thing that was surprising, and a little disheartening in a way, is that theres a wide continuum of attitude by the nations spymasters, our top leaders in the intelligence community, about this Madisonian model Ive suggested to you.

If you could go back in time and make people do something differently, is there anything about the evolution of intelligence accountability that youd change?



Id go back  do you think this is far enough?  to 1787, and Id remind the Founders that they did a fabulous job I constructing American government. It was a novel experiment and rather bold given that every other country in the world was a dictatorship or a monarchy at the time, so high marks for them. But I would have reminded them not to make an exception of intelligence. I wish the Founders and those who followed them would have realized that the hazards of putting intelligence as an exception to the Madisonian rules would lead to Operation Chaos and COINTELPRO and the assassination plots and other examples of lack of supervision, and to the great trouble that got this country.Democratic Representative Adam Schiff is the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee: Getty Images

Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee have said the release of a Republican-authored memo alleging surveillance abuses by FBI officials will do long-term damage to the intelligence community and our law enforcement agencies.

The four-page document is a shameful effort to discredit the FBI, the Justice Department and Special Counsel Robert Muellers probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election, they added.

President Donald Trump approved the release of the controversial memo despite objections from the FBI. The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Representative Devin Nunes, and his staff reportedly spent months compiling the so-called Nunes memo, which accuses federal law enforcement officials of abusing their power when they sought permission to surveil a former Trump campaign adviser, Carter Page.

Following the memos release, Mr Page said he would update a pending legal action in opposition to the Justice Department.

In response to the Nunes memo, the Democrats on the House Intelligence committee issued their own memo, which they say the Republicans are refusing to make public.

The premise of the Nunes memo is that the FBI and DOJ corruptly sought a [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] warrant on a former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, Carter Page, and deliberately misled the court as part of a systematic abuse of the FISA process, the Democrats said in a statement. As the Minority memo makes clear, none of this is true. The FBI had good reason to be concerned about Carter Page and would have been derelict in its responsibility to protect the country had it not sought a FISA warrant.

Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee voted on Monday to release the memo, giving the President five days to approve or object to the declassification of the document.

The FBI and its director, Christopher Wray, raised issues over the memo, with the bureau issuing a rare public statement on Wednesday declaring it had grave concerns about the accuracy of the classified document.

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As expressed during our initial review, we have grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memos accuracy, the FBI statement read. Mr Wray is reportedly preparing a rebuttal to the Nunes memo, although the White House is said to have tried to have accommodate concerns raised by the FBI in reviewing the document.

But Mr Trump has suggested the document shows political bias at the FBI that tainted the investigation into his campaign. The President has repeatedly said there was no collusion between his campaign advisers and the Russian government.

A lot of people should be ashamed of themselves and much worse than that, Mr Trump told reporters on Friday in the Oval Office.

The White House later said in statement that the memorandum raises serious concerns about the integrity of decisions made at the highest levels of the Department of Justice and the FBI to use the Governments most intrusive surveillance tools against American citizens.

This decision was made with input from the Presidents national security team  including law enforcement officials and members of the intelligence community, for whom the President has great respect, the White House added.

It also said it was ready to work with Congress to accommodate oversight requests on the second memo drafted by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee.

Democrats from the House and Senate sent a letter to Mr Trump on Friday warning him against using the Nunes memo as a pretext to fire Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein or Mr Mueller.

Mr Rosenstein appointed Mr Mueller to the special counsel position and has been overseeing the Russia investigation.

Firing Rod Rosenstein, DOJ (Department of Justice) leadership, or Bob Mueller could result in a constitutional crisis of the kind not seen since the Saturday night massacre, the Democrats wrote, referring to President Richard Nixons firing of the Watergate scandal special prosecutor in the 1970s.

Asked on Friday if he still has confidence in Mr Rosenstein, the President told reporters: You figure that one out.

Senator Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, also criticised the release of the Nunes memo. The Senate intelligence panel is also conducting its own investigation into Russian election meddling.

The release of this memo by House Intelligence Committee Republicans and the White House, over the objections of the FBI and the Department of Justice, is reckless and demonstrates an astonishing disregard for the truth, Mr Warner said in a statement.

Former FBI Director James Comey, who was leading the Russia probe before being fired by Mr Trump in May, also gave his two-cents on the declassification of the memo. The President suggested that he dismissed Mr Comey because this Russia thing, with Trump and Russia was a made-up story.

Thats it? Mr Comey wrote on Twitter. Dishonest and misleading memo wrecked the House intel committee, destroyed trust with Intelligence Community, damaged relationship with FISA court, and inexcusably exposed classified investigation of an American citizen. For what? DOJ & FBI must keep doing their jobs.A controversial memo alleging abuse of authority by the FBI in its Russia investigation has been declassified and released to the public.

The memo, written by the staff of House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, raises concerns about the FBI's use of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) in relation into the investigation into possible connections between officials in Donald Trump's presidential campaign and Russia

Their findings "represent a troubling breakdown of legal processes established to protect the American people from abuses related to the FISA process", the document states.

Mr Trump allowed the House Intelligence Committee to release the report to the public on Friday without redactions. The president called the contents of the memo "a disgrace" and, in relation to the FBI, that "a lot of people should be ashamed of themselves". He declined to say whether he still had faith in Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general overseeing the federal investigation.

Scroll down to see how we covered the release of the memo live.

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Democrats claimed the release of the memo was an attempt to discredit this investigation  one which would set a dangerous precedent that would do "long-term damage" to the US intelligence community.

Much of the memo concerns the process by which the FBI obtained a FISA warrant to surveil former Trump campaign advisor Carter Page, claiming the warrant application was informed largely by a Democrat-funded opposition research dossier compiled by former MI6 agent Christopher Steele.

Republicans and Democrats have fiercely debated the release of the memo since last month, when Mr Nunes made it available to members of the House. Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, claimed the memo "mischaracterises highly sensitive classified information" in order to suit Republicans' political aims.

Story continues

Chairman Nunes decision ... to publicly release misleading allegations against the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation is a shameful effort to discredit these institutions, undermine the Special Counsels ongoing investigation, and undercut congressional probes," Mr Schiff said.

The congressman claimed the FISA warrant to surveil Mr Page had been properly obtained, and was not based entirely on the Steele dossier. He added that Democrats would seek a vote to release their response to the memo, which he claimed pointed out several other factual errors.

The FBI cautioned against releasing the memo in a rare public statement this week, saying they had "grave concerns" about its accuracy.

Former FBI Director James Comey - fired by Mr Trump last year - tweeted that the newly released Republican-written memo doesn't add up to much. Mr Comey asked on Twitter, That's it?

He called the memo dishonest and misleading and not worth the damage it's done to public trust in U.S. intelligence agencies.

Mr Trump did not signal what, if any, other steps he would take in response to the memo.

"Congress will do whatever they're going to do," he said as he confirmed his support for the memo's releaseBy William James and Ben Blanchard SHANGHAI/BEIJING (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Theresa May landed in China earlier this week fending off questions about her future amid mounting accusations of poor leadership, boring policies, and weakness over Brexit. By Friday the 61-year old leader was basking in a warm reception from the leaders of world's second-largest economy, while concerned Chinese citizens affectionately nicknamed her 'Aunty May' and worried if her legs were warm enough in the Beijing cold. "What's past is prologue," said President Xi Jinping during his one-to-one meeting with May, quoting British playwright William Shakespeare to signal his hopes for strengthening ties. The three-day trade visit has seen May earn assurances from China that Brexit will not affect the country's enthusiasm for the so-called "golden era" of relations and a promise to open up Chinese markets to new British business. While words will mean little if not backed up with action, and there are scant details about the headline announcement of 9 billion pounds of trade deals signed during the trip, the mood music for May's visit pointed to a Chinese state seeking to rally support around her. "Her political style is known for being pragmatic and strong and deft at decision making. She's Britain's Iron Lady," said the Hubei Daily, an official regional newspaper, referring to the nickname of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. There was no sign of a hangover from the 2016 diplomatic spat between the two nations caused by May's decision to delay a part Chinese-funded nuclear plant over concerns about foreign investment in key British infrastructure. "China really respects Britain," said the influential Global Times tabloid - the same newspaper which in 2013 dismissed Britain as "just an old European country apt for travel and study" in a scathing editorial during a visit by May's predecessor David Cameron, who had infuriated China by meeting the Dalai Lama. One Chinese official remarked dryly to Reuters: "Nobody would call him Uncle Cameron". Asked by Chinese state television about her new moniker - a common Chinese term of endearment for respected women - May said she was honored, and her officials were privately thrilled that the name had stuck. By contrast, the front page of this week's Spectator, a British political magazine, reads "Lead or go", above a stark, unflattering cartoon of May, hunched and bow-legged. RIVAL SUITORS But, Britain is not the only state looking to woo China. Last month France's energetic young President Emmanuel Macron arrived in Beijing with an attention-grabbing gift, a rare horse, although his tough words over Xi's signature plan to create a trillion-dollar modern-day Silk Road raised eyebrows. Diplomatic sources say while China has expressed concern about Brexit, it has also been reassured by messages that Britain's door is wide open to Chinese investment - a marked contrast to the suspicious reception Chinese companies have recently received in Germany. May brought up awkward issues like democracy in Hong Kong, human rights and ethical concerns about Xi's Belt and Road initiative, but was praised as "pragmatic" by the Global Times for not pressing the issue in public. "For the prime minister, the losses outweigh the gains if she appeases the British media at the cost of the visit's friendly atmosphere," the paper wrote in an editorial on Friday. On Chinese social media, concern about May's visit focused on less weighty issues - like whether her exposed legs were warm enough after a photograph of her with husband Phillip inside Beijing's Forbidden City. "Theresa, you really know how to stand up to the cold," wrote one of over 17,000 users to comment on her official Chinese-language Weibo account. (This version of the story was refiled to correct typographical error in word "minister" in headline) (Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)Oregon is producing three times more marijuana than it can consume with formidable amounts now ending up on the black market, officials have warned.

US Attorney Billy Williams told law enforcement representatives from across the US on Friday that the state, where recreational cannabis use is legal, had a serious overproduction problem.

Mr Williams said officials needed a "bottom-line answer" on how much excess marijuana was being produced and how much of it ends up on the black market.

In a local newspaper column last month, the attorney warned huge surpluses were attracting criminal networks, causing money laundering and drug violence.

Authorities in 16 other states have reported seizing marijuana produced in Oregon, while postal agents have intercepted more than 2,600 pounds of cannabis (1,179kg) and $1.2m (850,000) in associated cash.

"Here's what I know in terms of the landscape here in Oregon and that is, we have an identifiable and formidable marijuana overproduction and diversion problem," Mr Williams told officials.

Make no mistake about it, we are going to do something about it."

The summit had been called after Attorney General Jeff Sessions withdrew an Obama administration memo guiding states with legalised cannabis on how to avoid federal scrutiny.

Representatives from 13 other US attorney's offices were in attendance, as well as the FBI, the US Postal Inspection Service, US Forest Service and US Customs and Border Protection.

Oregon voters approved the sale of recreational marijuana in 2014 and it became legal the following year. The state has allowed the use of cannabis for medical purposes since 1998.

It now has 900 licensed recreational growers, with more than 1,100 licenses awaiting approval. Some 500 retailers are licenced to sell weed and another 250 applications are pending.

Advocates deny legalisation has caused a spike in black markets sales and instead claim legal cannabis is much easier to track.

Story continues

However, former Oregon State University professor Seth Crawford told the summit the state had created the overproduction problem by not capping the number of recreational cannabis producers.

"If you were an investor and you had just dropped $4m into a [marijuana] grow and you had thousands of pounds of flower that was ready to go but you had nowhere to sell it, the only thing you can do is sell it on the black market.

"It was a system designed for failure. You created this huge industry that has nowhere to put its product."

He estimated Oregon growers produce up to three times the amount of marijuana that the state can absorb legally each year.

Leland Berger, an attorney who specialises in marijuana cases, said: "When I moved to Oregon in 1979, cannabis was a billion-dollar crop then, so the notion that this is somehow caused by legalisation or by the medical program is something that's misplaced."Social media users are blasting Speaker of the House Paul Ryan on Twitter after he boasted about the GOP tax bill by sharing a story of a Pennsylvania teacher seeing a pay increase of a little over a dollar a week.

A secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, said she was pleasantly surprised her pay went up $1.50 a week she said [that] will more than cover her Costco membership for the year, Ryan tweeted.

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The post was from an excerpt of an Associated Press report about the tax bill beginning to deliver bigger paychecks to workers.

Ryans tweet was the latest show of Republicans patting themselves on the back for the tax bill, which slashed corporate taxes. Social media users were quick to criticize Ryan for his tweet. Many pointed out how little of an impact $1.50 would have on taxpayers.

The man bragged that somebodys pay went up $1.50....PER WEEK. Not per day, not per hour, PER WEEK, Social justice advocate Shaun King said. $78 per year. Not enough to cover half a power bill in most places.

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Many users took snapshots of Ryans tweet before he deleted. Twitter user Matt McDermott called out Ryan for the donations he receives compared to the $1.50 the secretary makes.

Paul Ryan is patting himself on the back because one school teacher in Pennsylvania has an extra $1.50 to spend each week, he tweeted. Meanwhile, his billionaire donors are funneling hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer money into their savings.

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After the tax bill passed, billionaire industrialist Charles Koch gave Ryan almost $500,000 in campaign contributions. Koch and his brother, David, had spent millions working on promoting the tax bill to get it passed, according to The Wall Street Journal.

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Ahead of the bills passing, analysts warned that it would largely benefit wealthy Americans. Jefferey Snively, an aerospace engineer, told the Associated Press that he collected a 4 percent bump in his paycheck under the new tax rate. He said that he thinks that the bill will ultimately benefit corporations and the wealthy.

I think the people this bill made the most difference for are the ones who needed it least, he said.

This article was first written by Newsweek

More from NewsweekMarkowa (Poland) (AFP) - Poland's prime minister on Friday said that finding a way out of a diplomatic row with Israel and the US triggered by Warsaw's controversial Holocaust bill was a "do or die moment" for him.

The controversial bill intended to safeguard Poland's image abroad sets fines or a maximum three-year jail term for anyone who refers to Nazi German death camps as Polish or accuses Poland of complicity in the Third Reich's crimes.

Like Israel, the US, the EU and Ukraine have also slammed the legislation, warning it could limit Holocaust research and serve to deny the involvement of individual Poles in Nazi Germany's extermination of Jews.

"This is a temporary weakening of relations with Israel and the USA but I hope that soon they will improve as we will explain our position," Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki told a group of foreign journalists.

"As a prime minister this a do or die moment. We will be explaining. It's an important moment," said the leader of the right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) government who took office after a cabinet reshuffle in December.

Morawiecki and his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu have agreed to set up working groups to focus on Holocaust history in a bid to resolve the dispute.

Israel and Jewish groups across the globe are also concerned the bill could open the door to Holocaust survivors being prosecuted for their testimony should it concern the involvement of Poles in war crimes.

Morawiecki has ruled out any such possibility and insisted on Friday that the "law will not limit research at all."

- 'Can't back down' -

To take effect, the controversial bill still needs to be approved by President Andrzej Duda, who said earlier this week that Poland "absolutely can't back down, we have the right to defend the historical truth".

Morawiecki invited the foreign press along on Friday as he paid tribute to Poles who lost their lives helping Jews during World War II.

Story continues

Poland opened a museum in 2016 on the exact spot in the southeastern village of Markowa where Nazis executed a young family for sheltering Jews.

The Ulma family were killed by German soldiers on March 24, 1944.

Jozef Ulma, his seven-month pregnant wife Wiktoria and their six young children were all executed, as were the eight Jews they had been harbouring.

Saving Jews carried the death penalty in Nazi-occupied Poland.

More than 6,700 Poles -- outnumbering any other nationality -- have been honoured as "Righteous Among the Nations" by Israel's Yad Vashem Institute, a title given to non-Jews who saved Jews during the Holocaust.By Lidia Kelly and Anna Wlodarczak WARSAW (Reuters) - Poland is seeing a resurgence of anti-Semitism over pending legislation that would impose jail terms for suggestions that the nation was complicit in the Holocaust, local minority groups warned, as pressure mounts on the president to veto the bill. Parliament passed the measure on Thursday, drawing outrage from Israel, U.S. criticism and condemnation from a number of international organizations. President Andrzej Duda has 21 days to decide whether to sign it into law. The bill would impose prison sentences of up to three years for mentioning the term "Polish death camps" and for suggesting "publicly and against the facts" complicity on the part of the Polish nation or state in Nazi Germany's crimes. More than three million of Poland's 3.2 million Jews were murdered by the Nazis, accounting for about half of the Jews killed in the Holocaust. Jews from across Europe were sent to be killed at death camps built and operated by the Germans on Polish soil, including Auschwitz, Treblinka, Belzec and Sobibor. According to figures from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the Nazis also killed at least 1.9 million non-Jewish Polish civilians. In a rare show of unity, Polish minority and ethnic groups, including Jewish, Ukrainian and Russian, urged Duda and other authorities to counteract all forms of xenophobia, intolerance and anti-Semitism, although they did not directly call on the president to veto the bill. "Our particular concern and objection is caused by the numerous and loud manifestations of anti-Semitism that we have been witnessing this week after the (parliament) passed (the Holocaust bill)," the groups said in statement. GERMAN DEATH CAMPS Poland, which has gone through a painful public debate in recent years after the publication of research showing some Poles participated in the Nazi atrocities, has long sought to discourage use of the term "Polish camps" to refer to Nazi camps on its territory, arguing that the phrase implies complicity. On Saturday, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said the use of the phrase "Polish death camps" was wrong. "There is not the slightest doubt as to who was responsible for the extermination camps, operated them and murdered millions of European Jews there: namely Germans," Gabriel said in a statement. Israeli officials said the legislation criminalizes basic historical facts. The country's foreign ministry said on Thursday that Israel "adamantly opposes" the bill's approval as a whole. The Israeli embassy in Warsaw said late on Friday that Israel does not oppose Poland's fight for assuring the phrase "Polish death camps" is never used. "We would like to use this opportunity to repeat that Israel stands with Poland in using the proper term for the death camps - German Nazi camps," the embassy said in its statement. The embassy also said that it has received "a wave of anti-Semitic statements" in the past week. Poland is one of the most ethnically and religiously homogenous countries in Europe, but before World War Two Jews made up 10 percent of the population and the country also had large Ukrainian, German, Belarussian and other minorities. Poland's ruling party, the socially conservative PiS, has reignited debate on the Holocaust as part of a campaign to fuel patriotism since sweeping into power in 2015. The party says the bill is needed to protect Poland's reputation and ensure historians recognize that Poles as well as Jews were victims of the Nazis. Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the chairman of the PiS and de facto the country's leader, told the public radio Jedynka on Saturday that Poland rejects "anti-Semitism very radically". "But we are also a sovereign state and we have a duty to start, because this is only the beginning, the fight against ... this great defamatory campaign against Poland, namely, insulting Poland, blaming us for someone else's actions." FREE SPEECH Critics of the bill have raised concerns it will curb free speech and could potentially be used against Holocaust survivors or historians. A U.S. congressional task force on combating anti-Semitism and a number of Jewish groups urged Duda to veto the bill. The International Auschwitz Council, an advisory body to the office of the Polish prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, said on Friday the bill's imprecision raised "legitimate concerns about restricting freedom in discovering the truth about the Holocaust". Duda has not said whether he will sign the bill, but his spokesman told the Polish state radio Trojka: "The president believes that Poland, as any other country, has the right to defend its good name ... has the right to defend the truth". Kaczynski said that Duda should sign the law. "We must talk to our allies in a way that would allow them to understand that we have no intention of renouncing our dignity," he said. (Additional reporting by Michelle Martin in BERLIN; Writing by Lidia Kelly; Editing by Stephen Powell, Mark Heinrich and Andrew Bolton)(Photo: Tom Williams via Getty Images)

White Sulphur Springs, W.Va.  Congressional Republicans came to The Greenbrier resort for their annual retreat to rally around an election-year agenda and convince themselves that their electoral problems arent really that daunting. But amid the happy talk of a long-term strategy, Republicans ignored the challenges right in front of their faces.

Next week could be very problematic, Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) told HuffPost Thursday night.

Government funding runs out at midnight on Feb. 8, and Republicans do not, at the moment, have the votes to muscle through yet another continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government open. While Republicans have convinced themselves that Senate Democrats took the brunt of the blame for a government shutdown two weeks ago, itll be hard to blame Democrats if Republicans cant get a bill out of the House.

And even though members told HuffPost that GOP leaders had essentially shored up their support with defense hawks by coming to an agreement  in principle but not on paper, as one member put it  on overall spending caps numbers for the rest of the fiscal year, conservatives arent happy.

Im tired of a fifth time running a play that gets blocked at the line of scrimmage, Meadows said.

That fifth play is really the fifth CR Congress will have to pass to avoid a shutdown. The fiscal year started in October, yet lawmakers are still running the government with stopgap after stopgap because they dont have agreements on a deal for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) immigration program, which in turn is holding up a spending agreement for defense and non-defense programs.

Without those agreements, lawmakers cant write the bills they were supposed to have written a year ago. And because Republicans and Democrats are still haggling over last years appropriations bills, theres little point in writing new measures for next year  or in approving a new budget.

Story continues

But instead of talking about those issues or trying to figure out the outstanding problems in order make Congress and the appropriations process actually work, Republicans spent the retreat applauding themselves for passing tax cuts.

As one GOP member put it: To not address the must-do things at a retreat is a real tragedy.

Retiring Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.) told reporters here that the Republican refusal to address their actual issues is like a dysfunctional family. Dads drunk again but we dont talk about it, Dent said.

How much time and energy have we wasted on the Republican-only DACA-border security bill, which has a less than zero chance of passing the Senate, and a near-zero chance of passing the House? Dent said Thursday. And that whole exercise is simply designed to give members cover, who will vote against the inevitable compromise on DACA, so they can say they voted for it before they voted against it.

Dent argued that by proceeding with that hardline immigration bill, Republicans were actually making a compromise measure more difficult. He said he would prefer a legislative rule where lawmakers put up all the legislative proposals for votes, and the one with the most support wins.

A lot of people around here talk ad nauseam about an open process, and they want a pre-determined outcome on the bill. Well you cant have it both ways, Dent said.

The immigration issue is also complicated by President Donald Trumps on-again, off-again relationship with negotiating. At one moment, hes cutting deals with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), the next hes telling lawmakers to work it out among themselves. Now, Trump is insisting that the Senate vote on a bill that Dent says has a less than zero chance of passing that chamber.

Trump doesnt seem to have much of a sense for what an actual compromise would have to look like to win over Democrats and the requisite number of Republicans. He seems to think theres a deal that wins over almost every Republican and a small number of Democrats, and the people around Trump  in Congress and in the White House  arent telling him that such a bill doesnt exist.

In fact, immigration has become such a touchy subject that Trump is one of the few Republicans still talking about it. At the retreat, immigration wasnt its own break-out session, even though solving DACA is the linchpin to solving an omnibus bill and getting Congress back toward some semblance of a normal appropriations process.

Instead of those discussions, Republicans spent time hearing from Trump, Vice President Mike Pence, Defense Secretary James Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, White House senior adviser Kellyanne Conway  and having discussions about how they can enact work requirements for welfare programs and how they can win in November.

National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Steve Stivers (R-Ohio) told reporters here that Republicans planned to run by touting the strong economy and invoking House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who remains a potent boogeyman for Republicans eight years since shes held the speakers gavel.

But even as measurements like the generic ballot have improved for Republicans, and the once-unpopular tax bill has moved to an about equal approval rating, some members dont buy that Republicans will effectively limit their losses.

The reality is a midterm election  when one party is in power  the midterm will be a referendum on the party in power and specifically the president of the United States and his conduct in office, Dent said.

Although Republicans were touting small upticks in Trumps approval rating  a rare thing in a presidents second year  much of that movement is due to the historic lows of Trumps approval rating in the first year.

The other issue that dominated the GOP retreat was the memo  declassified by Trump and released by Republicans on Friday  alleging FBI and Justice Department bias against the Trump administration in the early stages of the Russia investigation. Seven of the nine questions asked of Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) were about the memo, leading to Ryan answering one question about calls for him to remove Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) by quickly pivoting to tax reform.

Look: the tax cuts are working, Ryan said.

That was a point all Republicans seemed to agree on during the retreat, particularly Trump.

In an extended victory lap, the president hailed the latest economic numbers as his own victory, and he asserted that Republicans were more unified than ever, saying that Ryan had called him days earlier and said as much.

He has never, ever seen the Republican Party so united, so much in like with each other, but literally united was the word he used, Trump said, recounting Ryans words.

While members may see that their unity is largely superficial, even the members most critical of Trump admit the Republican Party belongs to Trump now.

Its the presidents party now, more or less, Dent said.

He chuckled to himself, almost in disbelief. It is, he said. It is.

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.(Photo: The Washington Post via Getty Images)

WASHINGTON  Several Republican lawmakers on Sunday said that despite claims by President Donald Trump and some of their colleagues, a GOP-authored memo critical of the Russia investigation doesnt undermine the need for the probe to continue.

Following the release of the memo on Friday, Trump used the memo to call the investigation into possible collusion by his campaign with Russia to influence the 2016 presidential campaign a witch hunt and an American disgrace! Trump also said the memo  which alleges that senior Department of Justice and FBI officials improperly used information from the so-called Steele dossier to get a court to approve surveillance warrants on Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser  totally vindicates him.

In Trumps view, the memo buttressed his repeated calls for an end to the Russia investigation. Members of his own party who appeared on Sunday talk shows disagreed.

I actually dont think [the memo] has any impact on the Russia probe. There is a Russia investigation without a dossier, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C) said on CBS Face the Nation

DOJ and the FBI should continue doing their job, Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas) said on ABCs This Week.

He added that he didnt view the memo as an attack on Robert Mueller, the special counsel who heads the Russia probe, or as an attack on the men and women in the FBI,

Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), called the memo a separate issue from the investigation. I dont think it really has anything to do with that, he said on CNNs State of the Union.

The memo doesnt end [the need for the Mueller investigation] at all, Rep. Chris Stewart (R-Utah) said on Fox News Sunday. I think it would be a mistake for anyone to suggest that the special counsel shouldnt complete his work.

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The views of these Republicans not only put them at odds with Trump, but also with many of their House colleagues and prominent Fox News hosts who the president relies upon for political insights.

Story continues

House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) also tried to separate the memo from the Mueller probe last week, even as some members of his caucus accused top DOJ and FBI officials of committing treason against the U.S. Speculation continues that the memo will give Trump political cover to have Mueller fired and squelch the probe that has already seen charges brought against four of his campaign aides.

But Gowdy, who was closely involved in drafting the memo, listed a number of aspects of the investigation that have nothing to do with putting Page under surveillance based on the Steele dossier, which was funded by Democratic interests.

The dossier has nothing to do with the meeting at Trump Tower. The dossier has nothing to do with an email sent by Cambridge Analytica. The dossier really has nothing to do with George Papadopoulos meeting in Great Britain.

Gowdy was referring to Donald Trump Jr.s meeting at New Yorks Trump Tower during the campaign with a Russian lawyer who promised dirt on Clinton, the Trump campaigns dealings with Cambridge Analytica, a data firm that may have helped the Russians spread fake news and the disclosure by Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos disclosure to Australias top diplomat in Britain that the Russians had negative information on Clinton.

Gowdy also said the memo doesnt have anything to do with obstruction of justice  possible efforts by Trump and others in his administration to stymie Muellers probe.

So theres going to be a Russia probe, even without a dossier, Gowdy said.

Stewart said that he had been contacted by FBI agents in the past few days who said, in reference to the memo, thank you for doing this, we recognize that youre trying to hold us accountable.

He said the FBI and DOJ had enormous power, enormous authority. With that must come enormous accountability. Thats all were trying to do here.

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Matt Olsen, who served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the DOJs national security division during President George W. Bushs administration, called the memo politically motivated and sort of amateurish in comments on This Week.

Hurd said he did not agree with Trump that the memo vindicates the president.

I dont agree with some of my colleagues who were using hyperbole and exaggerations when they spoke about the memo, Hurd said.

CORRECTION: A previous version of this story said Rep. Brad Wenstrup was a Republican from Utah. He is a Republican from Ohio.

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Ryan Reilly is HuffPosts senior justice reporter, covering criminal justice, federal law enforcement and legal affairs. Have a tip? Reach him at ryan.reilly@huffpost.com or on Signal at 202-527-9261.

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.Madrid (AFP) - A baby who drank milk produced by the French dairy giant Lactalis has been diagnosed with salmonella in the Spanish Basque country, taking the number of cases in the country this year to two, authorities said Saturday.

"A second case of an infant affected by an infection with salmonella Agona" was detected at the Basurto University Hospital in Bilbao, the Department of Health of the Basque regional government said in a statement.

Lactalis has been engulfed in scandal since December when authorities ordered a massive international recall of the baby milk which made at least 38 babies ill in France and Spain.

The statement said the child consumed "formula milk developed by the French group Lactalis", adding the baby was in "good" state of health, was under medical surveillance but not in hospital.

Another baby who had consumed contaminated Lactalis infant milk had already been identified in the Basque region. His infection with salmonella was confirmed on January 12 by scientists at the Pasteur Institut and Public Health France.

Lactalis announced a few days later the withdrawal in Spain of 37 additional batches of infant food products potentially contaminated with salmonella.

In December it withdrew all products manufactured from February 15, 2017 at the Craon plant in western France, where salmonella contamination had been detected.

The products concerned in Spain are mainly powdered milk and cereals of the Damira, Sanutri and Puleva brands, sold exclusively in pharmacies.

Lactalis has been the target of heavy criticism after it emerged that the company's own tests found salmonella at the factory in Craon, but it did not sound the alarm because it had not detected the bacteria in the milk itself.

The company is facing several lawsuits over the outbreak, and police raided the group's headquarters in Laval, western France, earlier this year.

It recalled 12 million packages of the affected baby milk, under brands including Picot, Milumel and Celia, across 83 countries.

Salmonella causes fever and diarrhoea in infants, along with vomiting in some cases, which can lead to babies being hospitalised for dehydration.

According to French health authorities, all of the babies sickened by salmonella-tainted milk made a good recovery.Ankara (AFP) - Seven Turkish soldiers were killed Saturday in Turkey's offensive against Kurdish militia inside Syria, including five who died in a single attack on a tank, the army said.

The losses marked the highest toll in one day for the Turkish military in operation "Olive Branch", launched on January 20 against Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia seen by Ankara as a terror group.

The attack on the tank, details of which were not disclosed, was also the single deadliest attack on the military of the offensive so far.

The latest clashes brought to 14 the number of Turkish troops killed so far in operation.

The Turkish army and allied Ankara-backed Syrian rebel forces are seeking to oust the YPG from its western border stronghold of Afrin but the operation so far has been marked by fierce clashes.

The army said that one of the soldiers was killed in a clash and another on the border area, without giving further details.

In a later statement, it added a Turkish army tank had been hit in another attack, killing all five servicemen inside.

A previous statement said one serviceman was killed and another wounded in that attack.

In retaliation, Turkish war planes carried out air strikes on the area from where the attack was carried out, destroying shelters and munitions dumps, it added.

- Operation going 'as planned' -

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday the Turkish army and Ankara-backed rebels had suffered 25 fatalities between them in the operation so far.

Meanwhile, seven civilians have been killed in mortar fire on the Turkish side of the border that Ankara blames on the YPG.

Ankara says that major progress has been made in the 15-day operation, with almost 900 YPG fighters killed so far although it is not possible to verify these figures.

Erdogan on Saturday sought to reassure France's Emmanuel Macron over the operation, telling the French leader it was aimed against "terror elements" and that Ankara had no eye on Syrian territory.

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Macron had incensed Turkish officials by saying in a newspaper interview last week that France would have a "real problem" with the campaign if it turned out to be an "invasion operation".

During the phone call, "the two presidents agreed to work on a diplomatic roadmap in Syria in the coming weeks", the Elysee Palace said in a statement.

Erdogan said in a speech Saturday that the Turkish forces were beginning to take mountain positions and would now head towards Afrin itself. "There is not much to go," he said.

Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin meanwhile told journalists in Istanbul that the operation was going as planned but there was no timetable for its duration and it would "continue until we clear all those areas".

But analysts and monitors say Turkey so far has taken control of limited clumps of territory around the border without yet approaching Afrin town.

Turkey says the YPG is an offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.

However, the YPG has been working closely with the United States to fight the Islamic State extremist group in Syria.

The offensive by Washington's fellow NATO member Ankara on a US-allied force has even raised fears of a military confrontation between two alliance powers.Natalie Portmans first Saturday Night Live hosting gig way back in 2006 yielded Natalie Raps, which remains one of the Oscar-winning actresss best screen performances and a high point for the former SNL supergroup the Lonely Island. It was their own personal Star Wars, if you will, a loving reference to the black-and-white rap videos of their childhood that became a modern-day pop cultural phenomenon. So when Portman returned for her second time as emcee, it was inevitable that we were going to see a sequel to Natalie Raps, even though Lonely Islands membership, Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer, and Jorma Taccone, have all moved on to new creative galaxies far, far away from Studio 8H.

In Star Wars terms, Natalies 2nd Rap could never be The Empire Strikes Back or The Last Jedi  it just had to outclass Attack of the Clones. Thankfully Natalie Raps 2 falls squarely into Force Awakens territory, a loose repeat that knowingly plays on everything we loved about the original, right down to Sambergs cameo and Portmans No more questions tag. We also got an update on the actresss post-motherhood life, as well has her birth story, which involved some really chill kush and majestic water-breaking. But the videos high point had to be seeing Portman in her old Princess Amidala getup, a bit of galactic nostalgia that actually made us want to revisit the prequels, Jar Jar Binks and all.

Worst Sketch: Stranger Things 3

The Internet has already decided that Millie Bobby Brown and Natalie Portman are basically the same person, so a Stranger Things spoof with the former Padme as the current Eleven must have seemed like a slam dunk. Too bad the writers spent more time scrolling through the Portman-Brown Twitter memes than trying to come up with better material than boner gags and fart jokes.

Best Ad Disguised as a Sketch: Opening Monologue

Its a time-honored tradition for SNL hosts to hype their upcoming projects when they first take the stage. But Portman barely made any mention of her new movie, Annihilation  which comes out Feb. 23, for the record  instead expertly (and hilariously) shilling for NBCs upcoming Winter Olympics coverage as Kate McKinnon and Kenan Thompson provided incisive mid-monologue commentary. And like the best ads, the monologue performed a valuable public service by reminding the nation that Leslie Jones will be sharing her expert opinions from PyeongChang. Consider us sold.

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Best Drunk History Homage: Patriots vs. Philadelphia

Speaking of commercials for upcoming NBC sporting events, SNL brought back star players Rachel Dratch and Tina Fey to hype the networks telecast of Super Bowl LII. The pair headed up opposing tribes of Revolutionary War-era New England patriots and fly Philadelphians united in drunken boasting about their battlefield prowess. Fifty years from now, Drunk History should do a boozy re-creation about how this sketch came to be.

Best Weekend Update Guests: Brigitte Bardot and Catherine Deneuve

McKinnon and Cecily Strong had a grand old time playing two grand dames of French cinema, back in the news for their less-than-popular views about the #MeToo movement and sexual harassment in the movie industry. These two may not be woke, but their presence perked up an otherwise listless Update.

Trumps Return: Fox & Friends Cold Open

After taking January off, Alec Baldwin emerged from his burrow the night after Groundhog Day to reprise his Donald Trump impression for the first time since mid-December. And since we didnt see his shadow, that means it may not be another six weeks until Baldwins next SNL appearance. And maybe then he wont phone it in  literally. In the cold open, the actor rang up his friends over at Fox & Friends to chat about the news of the day, including a certain memo and the (not so) enormous State of the Union ratings. Calling in from his White House digs in the middle of his morning exercise  chowing down on a calorie-rich breakfast sandwich  Trump boasted about saving the economy and destroying ISIS before revealing he was also in the process of getting his daily intelligence briefing. His source? Fox & Friends, of course.

But this particular briefing proved to be a two-way street, as Trump shared some invented intel with the unquestioning hosts. He offered a ringing endorsement of his personal house elf, Devin Nunes, who did him a solid by penning the greatest memo since the Declaration of Independence. And as for the State of the Union, according to POTUSs dubious sources, it nabbed 10 billion viewers  3 billion more than actually exist on earth. Not only that, none other than Paul Ryan described his oration as being better than Martin Luther Kings I Dream of Jeannie speech. A lot of it certainly felt like a rerun, thats for sure.

Melanias Return: First Lady

Later on in the show, Trumps better half, Melania, got the chance to tell her side of the State of the Union, when she was visited by the spirits of first ladies past. The visitations started with Portman reprising her Oscar-nominated role as Jackie Kennedy, who commiserated with the current FLOTUS about philandering husbands. Jack cheated on me with Marilyn Monroe, Jackie pointed out, to which Melania replied, She was in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes  Donalds girl was in Guys Like It Shaved. The party got bigger when Kate McKinnons Hillary Clinton entered the room, followed by Aidy Bryant as Martha Washington and Leslie Jones as the eternally popular Michelle Obama. My arms rule, I love vegetables, and I can be president whenever I want, Michelle said to enthusiastic applause. Put that in a memo and release it!

Episode MVP: Beck Bennett

It takes a brave performer to talk out of his ass without blinking an eye. And Bennett heroically subjected his butt to a lengthy close-up in a What the hell was that? Star Trek spoof, Alien Lover, where Portmans human officer cozied up to an alien colleague whose face was his rear and vice versa. Whether flexing his buns to simulate speech or using water to turn the seat of his pants into a puddle, Bennett committed to his part with cheeky intensity. If they ever reboot Ace Ventura, hes a shoo-in to replace Jim Carrey.

Saturday Night Live airs Saturdays at 11:30 p.m. on NBC.

Read more from Yahoo Entertainment:Secretary of State Rex Tillerson may have stumbled out of the gate as he kicked off a trip to Latin America by praising a controversial 200-year-old foreign-policy doctrine, warning of imperial Chinese trade ambitions, and touting the United States as the regions preferred trade partner.

During a question-and-answer session after a speech in Austin, Texas, on Thursday, Tillerson praised the 1823 Monroe Doctrine as clearly  a success. The doctrine, and subsequent corollary to the doctrine issued in 1904 by President Theodore Roosevelt, asserted U.S. authority in the Western Hemisphere over meddling European powers, and is still seen by many in the region as a form of U.S. imperialism.

I think its as relevant today as it was the day it was written, Tillerson said of the doctrine.

The secretarys remarks were a direct repudiation of the Barack Obama administrations new-style approach to the region. In 2013, Tillersons predecessor John Kerry declared the era of the Monroe Doctrine is over.

Tillersons remarks could ruffle the feathers of his hosts on an already fraught trip. Since President Donald Trump has taken office, U.S. standing in Latin America has plummeted, and Tillersons trip, which will cover cooperation on migration, trade, and energy, may have been meant to smooth things over.

But experts say it will be an uphill battle. Thus far, all of Trumps policy attention to Latin America has been highly negative, said Cynthia Arnson of the Wilson Center, a Washington-based think tank.

During Tillersons speech in Austin, which fell on his one-year anniversary of becoming secretary of state, Tillerson also painted China as a foil to the United States. Today China is getting a foothold in Latin America. It is using economic statecraft to pull the region into its orbit. The question is: At what price? he said.

Tillerson took particular aim at Chinas economic approach to Latin America, which focused on gaining access to commodities from countries such as Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina, and Peru, but which has left little lasting benefit for those countries.

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Latin America does not need new imperial powers that seek only to benefit their own people, said the top diplomat charged with implementing the Trump administrations America first approach to the world. Chinas state-led model of development is reminiscent of the past, he said. It doesnt have to be this hemispheres future.

Tillersons trip comes as he fends off criticism back in Washington, and the State Department reels from the resignation of its top U.S. career diplomat, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon, who played a crucial role in talks on Venezuela. Shannons resignation followed the departure last fall of William Brownfield, another longtime Latin America expert and point man on anti-narcotics efforts in the region.

Tillerson vowed Washington would remain the regions steadiest, strongest, and most enduring partner.

But the offer of friendship may not be enough to sell Latin American countries on teaming up with Trump.

A recent poll by Gallup found Latin Americans approval ratings of U.S. leadership dropped from 49 percent in 2016 to 24 percent in 2017. Only 16 percent of the region approves of Trumps job performance.

Since he first announced his bid for presidency in 2015 by promising a wall at the southern U.S. border and making incendiary remarks about Mexican immigrants, Trump has pushed forward a constellation of hard-line policies that have stoked anger and resentment across Latin America.

As president, Trump withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal that included South American and Asian countries, cracked down on immigration, scuttled a temporary protected status program for Salvadorans living in the United States, and threatened to scrap the North American Free Trade Agreement. (Tillerson, for his part, said the agreement needs to be modernized, not scrapped.)

But that doesnt make Tillersons trip a lost cause. Its a good sign simply that hes going, said Earl Wayne, a former U.S. ambassador to Mexico.

He can do a lot to inject a sense that U.S. policy goes beyond the tweets of our current president, said the Wilson Centers Arnson. Most of the democracies of the region still want a positive relationship with the United States.

State Department officials say Venezuela is one of Tillersons top priorities on his six-day trip, which includes stops in Mexico, Argentina, Peru, Colombia, and Jamaica.

Venezuela, now in its fifth year of crisis, is teetering on the brink of collapse. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has violently quashed protests and worked to consolidate his power ahead of imminent presidential elections as the countrys economy goes into a tailspin, sparking concerns of a humanitarian disaster.

Tillerson also suggested that Venezuela under Maduro could face a military coup, though he stressed Washington was not advocating for regime change.

I think there will be a change, he said of Venezuela, noting that militaries oftentimes handle regime change in Latin America but saying that peaceful transitions are always preferred. Whether that will be the case here or not, I do not know, he said on Thursday, speaking at the University of Texas at Austin, his alma mater.

Tillerson didnt mince words on his views of Maduro. The corrupt and hostile regime of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela clings to a false dream and antiquated vision for the region that has already failed its citizens, he said.

Jason Marczak, a Latin America expert at the Atlantic Council, said despite its baggage, Trumps team has the basis for a strong Venezuela policy, including sanctions against the Venezuelan government and close coordination with regional allies like Colombia. On Venezuela, the administration has walked a fine line in playing a forward-leaning leadership role, but also a behind the scenes convening role, he said.

Marczak said Tillerson should use the trip to corral Latin America around a unified stance on Venezuela before the country veers off a cliff. There is no end in sight to the crisis in Venezuela, but there needs to be one, he said.

Another area where Tillerson might get plenty of traction, and even win goodwill, is on energy partnerships with Latin America.

Amid an energy boom in recent years, U.S. exports of crude oil, gasoline, and natural gas have surged. Countries across Latin America are eager customers for U.S. exports  especially now that one of the regions biggest suppliers, Venezuela, has fractured its own oil industry through chronic ineptitude and mismanagement. And Tillerson, former CEO of oil giant ExxonMobil, may be the perfect man to deliver that pitch.

The U.S. natural gas boom is also finding new customers in Latin America, with American shipments heading to at least five countries there in the second half of 2017, making it the biggest single market for U.S. liquefied gas exports. Smaller countries can now buy inexpensive gas import terminals and get modest amounts of cheap U.S. gas, which has given U.S. exporters new options.

Thirty-six percent of U.S. liquified natural gas exports now go to Latin America, Tillerson noted.

We have the chance to develop an energy partnership that spans the Western Hemisphere, to the benefit of all of our citizens, Tillerson said. We cannot afford to squander this moment.Osceola Township (United States) (AFP) - Global food conglomerate Nestle is in a battle with critics in tiny Osceola Township, Michigan where residents complain the Swiss company's water extraction techniques are ruining the environment.

Maryann Borden, a retired teacher who has lived in the western Michigan town since 1953, has photos documenting changes in the Twin Creek river since Nestle began pumping water in the region in the early 2000s for its "Ice Mountain" brand of bottled water.

"It's not the same creek," Borden, 73, told AFP. "It's narrower and deeper and therefore warmer," compared with the "biting cold" water of her youth.

"The trout can't survive in it because the water is warmer," she added.

Located about four hours north of Detroit and with a population of just 900, Osceola Township is a sleepy rural community whose biggest employer is SpringHill Camp, a Christian-oriented program for kids.

The town opposes granting Nestle a permit to build a pumping booster station along a water pipeline that feeds a tanker load dock in Evart, another small town nearby.

The booster station would help the company pump more water from a controversial Osceola County wellhead if the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality approves the project. Nestle wants to pump 400 gallons of water a minute, up from the 250 a minute currently.

Town officials voted in January to appeal a county court's ruling in Nestle's favor, portending a judicial saga.

"If you look at the culverts, they provide an historic landmark," said Tim Ladd, manager of Osceola Township.

"You don't have to be a geologist or a hydrologist to see those water levels," he added. "The water lake tables are lower today than what they were two years ago."

Nestle rejects this argument and also has some backing among supporters who praise the company for keeping water rates low.

Story continues

"There's been no measurable changes to the streams, the aquatic life there," said Arlene Anderson-Vincent, natural resource manager at Nestle Waters North America, who notes that dams in the area "can affect those streams."

Nestle points to company-sponsored research that backs up its stance, but there has been no independent scientific review of the matter.

- $200 a year -

Much of the anger in Osceola Township, that voted heavily for President Donald Trump in the 2016 US election, is due to a sense the town is being exploited by a powerful multinational blinded by profit.

Nestle pays just $200 a year to the state of Michigan to pump more than 130 million gallons (590 million liters) of water.

Other US states have struck similar arrangements with big companies, authorizing them to pump as much water as they wish for a pittance as long as they build the infrastructure themselves. This includes the beverage giants Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, which sell water under the Dasani and Aquafina brands.

"Nestle has a reputation worldwide of going to poor rural communities, offering all kinds of economic benefits to the community that never really materialize, and taking as much water as they can get and when the stream runs dry they leave," said Peggy Case, president of the Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation.

Nestle said it spends $18 million a year in Michigan, including $2.4 million in taxes in 2016. The company employs 280 people at its factory in Mecosta County, about 40 minutes away from Osceola Township where about 50 Nestle workers live.

Nestle is turning to Twin Creek River as demand for bottled water rises. Wholesale bottled water sales hit a total of $16.4 billion in 2016, surpassing soda sales of $12.5 billion for the first time, according to the Beverage Marketing consultancy.

Nestle's water brands in the US, which includes Poland Springs and Pure Life in addition to Ice Mountain, garnered 55.3 percent of the company's total worldwide water sales in 2016.

- Affordable water? -

Zackary Szakacs, city manager of Evart, credited Nestle with keeping water rates low in the region. The average income in Osceola Township is just $20,000 per year, around the poverty level for a family of three.

"Thank God we have two of those wells in the city of Evart because I would have to lay people off," Szakacs said.

"They help maintain and keep our water rates low so our residents that are poor that live in this community can afford to pay their monthly water bill."

After finding the chemical perchlorate at some wells in 2015, Nestle financed the cleanup.

Evart is only a couple of hours drive from Flint, where a major water contamination scandal has drawn national attention.

Access to affordable drinking water is becoming more problematic, and as many as 36 percent of US households may be unable to afford water within five years, according to a 2017 study by Michigan State University scholar Elizabeth Mack.Representative Trey Gowdy apparently doesnt think much of the political career hes ending.

The South Carolina Republican, who announced his impending retirement from Congress last week, said Sunday he considers himself a pretty lousy politician and doesnt think his heart is in the Washington game.

My wife hates it when I say this, but I was a pretty good prosecutor, I think. But I've been a pretty lousy politician, Gowdy told CBS News Face the Nation.

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I've done it for seven years, he added. I'm really grateful for the opportunity to do it, but it's time for me to  whatever time I've got left, I want to spend it in the justice system because that's where my heart is.

But Gowdy seemed to take a stab at the current Congress culture on his way out, saying he considers himself lousy because he can see multiple sides of a single issue.

Trey-Gowdy

Joshua Roberts/Reuters

Don't miss: Holocaust Denier Set for Republican Nomination in Congressional Race in Illinois

The fact that someone disagrees with me, does not make me challenge their love of the country. It doesn't make me believe that they're corrupt. I've got a lot of friends on the other side of the aisle, he said.

Gowdy, 53, said last week he will leave Congress when his current term runs up this year, with hopes of returning to his former career in the law.

After getting elected in 2010 as part of the tea party wave, Gowdy became best known as one of Hillary Clintons most dogged critics in Congress. He chaired the House Select Committee on Benghazi, which spent two years investigating whether Clinton, the former secretary of state, deserved blame for the 2012 attack on U.S. government facilities in Benghazi, Libya that left four Americans dead.

Most popular: Costa Rica: Same-Sex Marriage Dominates Presidential Election in Mostly Catholic Country

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The committee ultimately found no solid evidence of wrongdoing from Clinton, but its probe helped lead to the discovery of her private secretary of state email server, which ballooned into an issue that haunted her 2016 presidential bid. During the campaign, Gowdy said he believed Clinton should be prosecuted for her handling of classified information. Former FBI Director James Comey recommended no charges against Clinton for her email scandal.

In his final months in Congress, though, Gowdy seems equally eager to take shots at his own party. He has been a vocal critic in the past few days of the declassified Nunes memo that claimed there was political bias in the FBIs probe into President Donald Trumps campaign. Gowdy has said he believes the memo has no effect on the investigation into the Trump campaigns suspected collusion with Russia.

This article was first written by Newsweek

More from NewsweekWEST PALM BEACH, Florida (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump has been briefed on the Amtrak train collision in South Carolina that killed two people and injured at least 70 on Sunday, and is getting regular updates, the White House said. "Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone that has been affected by this incident," White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters told reporters. The train, with 139 passengers and eight crew on board, was traveling between New York and Miami when it collided with a CSX freight train and derailed, Amtrak said in a statement. (Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)Paul J. Saunders

Politics, Middle East

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson (R) shakes hands with Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani before their meeting at the State Department in Washington

Only by clearly and visibly identifying Qatar as a partner and friend can Washington hope eventually to ease the Saudis and others toward some form of reconciliation.

Trump Leans Toward Qatar in the Saudi Spat

What do superpowers and teenagers have in common? Speaking as a Washington-based foreign policy analyst, and as a parent, I would suggest that each becomes rather frustrated when their friends dont get along. They likewise have the same broad options in managing this problemjoin one side at the others expense, drop them both or press the parties to reconcile. Januarys U.S.-Qatar Strategic Dialogue suggests that while the Trump administration remains determined to pursue reconciliation, U.S. officials have abandoned what some saw as an earlier tilt toward Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain in their dispute with Qatar. There are good reasons to do so.

In June 2017, Riyadh and its partners cut diplomatic and transit links to Qatar, effectively imposing a blockade. While each of the players has its own narrative about the origins of the crisis, and neither is entirely agreeable to most U.S. observers, their differences center around what many see as the Arab worlds most profound security challengesthe external threat from Iran and the internal threat from (Sunni) Islamist political forces, including the Muslim Brotherhood. At risk of oversimplifying, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain prefer to confront them, while Qatar has tried to engage them.

With respect to Iran, Doha has little choice: the two share the worlds largest natural gas field, known as North Field in Qatar and South Pars in Iran. The gas field is at the core of Qatars prosperity and, for this tiny nation, its security. Semi-permanent hostility with Tehran would put Qatars future at great risk. Under the circumstances, its tough to fault the Qatari Emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, or his countrys government for maintaining a working relationship with counterparts in Iran. Saudi Arabia has no such need to cooperate with Irans Shia religious leadership.

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Qatars interaction with Islamist groups is a more complex matter. Without minimizing the Muslim Brotherhoods problematic actions and aims, Qatar has effectively made a judgment call about the region and its future, namely, that to the extent that citizens in the Arab Middle East demand greater political roles and rightssomething the United States has thus far supported, albeit with mixed successIslamist political forces will become more important. For a small country in a turbulent neighborhood, the clear policy implication is to engage them. Saudi Arabia has taken the opposite view, not merely rejecting engagement but seeking to shut down groups that could seriously threaten its domestic stability. That Saudi Arabias leaders would have this view makes sense considering that their country, with its far larger population, is likely to have a much more difficult time sustaining its wealth-based political legitimacy and, consequently, seems more vulnerable than Qatar to these kinds of internal pressures.

The bottom line is that on both issuesIran and the IslamistsQatar and Saudi Arabia have different national interests and, as a result, different policies. Time has exacerbated the problem as Irans nuclear ambitions and the nuclear deal, on one hand, and the so-called Arab Spring, on the other, heightened Riyadhs threat perception even as they pushed Doha further in its own direction. At the same time, as Qatars wealth grew, its leaders seem to have developed a greater sense of entitlement to a foreign policy independent from the interests of the Saudi ruling family.

Qatars very substantial energy resources make its security strategically important to the United States; over half of the countrys natural gas exports go to U.S. allies in Europe (where Qatars gas competes with Russias and thus reduces dependency on Moscow) and especially in Asia. However, in a manner that one assumes President Donald Trump would welcome, Doha has been quite willing to use its energy wealth to cover substantial share of the expenses for the U.S. airbase at Al-Udeid, which the Qatari government largely built and recently agreed to expand for the United States, and to buy U.S. military hardware, including thirty-six F-15 fighter jets for about $12 billion. Al-Udeid houses about 10,000 U.S. troops, hosts U.S. Central Command in the region, and supports missions in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. Having recently visited the base and met with the American base commander and other top officers (as a guest of the Qatari government, with about a dozen other U.S. experts), I can attest to its vast scale and its essential role in U.S. military operations.

The U.S.-Qatar Strategic Dialogue yielded three bilateral agreements, some of which looked like Qatari efforts to address long-standing American concerns in order to facilitate a U.S. embrace that might deflect some of the pressure Doha faces from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. Perhaps most notable from this perspective were what the Department of State described as Understandings that would expose and constrain Qatari government subsidies to Qatar Airways, an ongoing target of U.S. air carriers pressing for fair competition.

All in all, however, the most significant outcome of the Strategic Dialogue may well be one that immediately drew the attention of Qatars Al-Jazeera network but has yet to receive much attention in Washington. A formal Joint Statement of the Inaugural U.S.-Qatar Strategic Dialogue, a negotiated text endorsed by the two governments, states explicitly that the United States expressed its readiness to work jointly with Qatar to deter and confront an external threat to Qatars territorial integrity that is inconsistent with the United Nations Charter. A joint statement isnt a treaty and, as a result, isnt a legally binding commitment. But this is a clear political declaration that the United States is prepared to defend Qatar against an unprovoked attacka strong statement in the current context, despite its mild and bureaucratic phraseology.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Secretary of Defense James Mattis did not emphasize this in their public remarks prior to the Strategic Dialogue, though each was likely at least broadly familiar with the contents of the Joint Statement, which was released about six hours later. Tillerson referred to Qatar as a strong partner and a longtime friend of the United States; Mattis used almost the same language, calling Qatar a strong and valued partner and a longtime friend in the region. Tillersons counterpart, Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani, mentioned the 45th anniversary of the U.S.-Qatar alliancea more ambitious characterization of the relationshipand his colleague Defense Minister Khalid bin Muhammed al-Attiyah likewise referred to Washington and Doha as strategic military allies. Both Qatari officials are quite sophisticated and impressive and were surely aware of the distinction between their statements and the U.S. language. Still, so long as they do not reflect a dangerous underlying misunderstanding, these differences are entirely within the normal parameters of diplomacy. And the agreed text of the Joint Statement speaks for itself.

All in all, the U.S.-Qatar Strategic Dialogue and the public statements accompanying it were necessary and constructive correctives. Only by clearly and visibly identifying Qatar as a partner and friend can Washington hope eventually to ease the Saudis and others toward some form of reconciliation. The key, of course, is to find a face-saving solution that gives a semblance of symbolic victory to all sides. This will be especially tough in dealing with Saudi leaders, who also face pressure over a less-than-successful war in Yemen, and probably cant back out of too many such situations too quickly. From this point-of-view, Qatars willingness to adjust its own approaches will be important as well; any agreed end to this messy situation will require something from everyone. Its never easy to mediate disputes among friends, but in this case, the Trump administration seems to have made a good start.

Paul J. Saunders is Executive Director of the Center for the National Interest and a former State Department senior advisor in the George W. Bush administration.

Image: Reuters

Read full articleBy Ayesha Rascoe PALM BEACH, Fla. (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday that a controversial memo attacking federal law enforcement written by congressional Republicans vindicates him in the investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Trump's embrace of the memo raised again the prospect that he could use it as justification to fire special counsel Robert Mueller, who is conducting the investigation, or Deputy Attorney Rod Rosenstein, who oversees Mueller. Tweeting from his resort in Palm Beach, Florida, Trump said the memo "totally vindicates" him but added "the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their (sic) was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction." He called the investigation "an American disgrace." The White House has said there will be no changes at the Justice Department as a result of the memo's conclusions. The memo, written by Republicans on the U.S. House of Representatives Intelligence Committee chaired by Devin Nunes, argues that the federal investigation of potential collusion between Trump's 2016 presidential campaign and Russia was a product of political bias against Trump at the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Justice Department. Trey Gowdy, the Republican chairman of the powerful House Oversight committee, disagreed with Trump and said the memo has no impact on the Russia probe. "Not to me, it doesn't, and I was pretty integrally involved in the drafting of it," Gowdy said in a preview of an interview to be aired on CBS' "Face the Nation" on Sunday. Gowdy, who said this week that he will not run for re-election in November, said the Russia investigation would exist regardless of a dossier that the memo says the FBI received from a source who was strongly biased against Trump. "So there's going to be a Russia probe, even without a dossier," said Gowdy. Trump approved the release of the formerly classified memo without redactions, despite objections from the FBI in a move that deepened tension between the White House and senior law enforcement that has existed since Trump took office. Democrats contend the four-page memo mischaracterizes highly sensitive classified information and was intended to undermine the Mueller criminal probe that was launched in May 2017 as an outgrowth an earlier FBI investigation. Jerrold Nadler, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said Trump's decision to allow the release of the memo was "part of a coordinated propaganda effort to discredit, disable and defeat the Russia investigation." Some Republicans were also critical of the memo's release. John Kasich, the governor of Ohio and a former rival of Trump's for the presidential nomination, called it "a disservice to our country." Asked by reporters on Friday whether the memo made him more likely to fire Rosenstein or whether he had confidence in him, Trump replied, "You figure it out." Dismissing Rosenstein or Mueller would trigger a political firestorm much like his sacking of FBI Director James Comey last year. Mueller is also examining whether Trump has obstructed justice in trying to thwart the Russia investigation. 'PUBLIC TRUST' The memo alleges the FBI concealed the Democratic ties of a source the agency used to justify surveillance on Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser with links to Russia. It also published the names of senior FBI and Justice Department officials, including Rosenstein, who it said signed off on the surveillance. The document was commissioned by Nunes, the Republican chairman of the House intelligence panel. He said it laid bare "serious violations of the public trust, and the American people have a right to know when officials in crucial institutions are abusing their authority for political purposes." On Saturday, Nadler circulated a memo to House Democrats disputing the conclusions of the Nunes memo and arguing that Page was a lawful target of surveillance, according to NBC News. "Carter Page was, more likely than not, an agent of a foreign power. The Department of Justice thought so. A federal judge agreed," Nadler wrote in the memo. Mueller's investigation has so far led to guilty pleas by two of Trump's foreign policy advisers to charges of lying to the FBI, and indictments of former campaign manager Paul Manafort and his business partner Rick Gates. The Republican memo said the FBI used material from a source who was strongly biased against Trump, former British spy Christopher Steele, to justify its surveillance of Page. It alleged that a dossier compiled by Steele, and funded in part by Democrats, formed an "essential part" of requests to a special court to be allowed to conduct electronic surveillance on Page that began in October 2016. Despite the memo's charges, neither the focus on Page nor the FBI's investigation of Trump-Russia ties began with the Steele dossier. Page came to the FBI's attention as early as 2013, when he met in New York with Russians who were officers of the Kremlin's foreign intelligence service, sources have said. The memo acknowledges that the FBI counterintelligence investigation began in July 2016, three months before the request for electronic surveillance on Page, as a result of the activities of another Trump campaign aide, George Papadopoulos. Steve Vladeck, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Texas-Austin, said it was unprecedented for the president to feud so publicly with leaders of the U.S. intelligence agencies. "You do long-term damage to these institutions if you convince a large swath of the American public that they can't be trusted," Vladeck said. (Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom, Steve Holland and Jan Wolfe and Lucia Mutikani; Writing by James Oliphant; Editing by Bill Trott and Daniel Wallis)Bariloche (Argentina) (AFP) - President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson were both addressing drug smuggling and immigration across the southern US border.

But their stark difference in tone during separate Friday meetings underlined a divide that has some asking: "Who speaks for America?"

Trump was in Virginia, meeting border protection officers and calling for harsher measures to deal with those "pouring in from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, all over."

Tillerson was on the Mexican leg of a Latin American tour, talking to local officials about a shared effort to combat international organized crime on both sides of the border.

At the Border Patrol National Targeting Center, Trump also heard about US efforts to partner with Latin American countries to stem the flow of drugs and illegal migrants.

But his response was scathing: "And what are Mexico and Colombia and these other countries -- what are they doing about it? Nothing? Do you think they're really trying?"

Trump claimed that the United States was spending billions of dollars in aid to partner countries "and they're pouring drugs into our country and they're laughing at us."

And he explicitly linked the threat of drug gangs in America to migration from south of the border, underlining that this is the reason he is seeking to reform immigration law.

- 'Not helpful' -

The night before Trump's latest outburst, Tillerson had dined in Mexico City with his Mexican counterpart Luis Videgaray and senior Mexican military and intelligence leaders.

And, as Trump was speaking, he was following up with three-way talks with Mexico and Canada on cross-border trade and law enforcement and hearing concerns about immigration rules.

Tillerson too stressed the importance of fighting the "transnational criminal organizations" Washington says are behind the opioid drug epidemic and violent crime on both sides of the border.

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But he was careful to acknowledge that the United States has its own share of responsibility in having provided a market for drugs and allowing guns to be smuggled south to the cartels.

And, unlike Trump, he praised Mexico's efforts.

"So this is a joint effort that is very, very active, it is very robust, and we intend to maintain this effort well until we have resolved this problem," he told reporters.

So, is it a robust joint effort, or are the United States' Latin American friends not really trying?

This was not the first time Tillerson's diplomatic efforts abroad have been undercut by Trump's declarations at home.

Last year when Tillerson was in China and talking about holding open diplomatic channels to North Korea, Trump tweeted that he was "wasting his time."

Tillerson has also distanced himself publicly from the president at least once, saying that Trump was speaking "for himself" when he defended far-right demonstrators.

But, since reports last year -- denied by the administration -- that Tillerson had privately called Trump a "moron," officials have stressed they are on the same page.

Friday's conflicting remarks, however, suggested that the difference in tone is not simply a good cop-bad cop act.

Onboard Tillerson's plane from Mexico to his next set of delicate meetings in Argentina, one US official told reporters the president's remarks were "not helpful."

The secretary's closest aides would not criticize Trump directly, but stressed that Tillerson's more optimistic message reflects official US foreign policy.

Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Steve Goldstein said of Trump's remarks: "Different people speak different ways but the policy hasn't changed.

"And the secretary spoke about US foreign policy today," he added, noting that Tillerson felt he had made progress on deepening cooperation with Mexican authorities.

"We leave here feeling that we accomplished a great deal. We have more to do, but we're all on the same page and heading towards the same goal," Goldstein said.

Reform of America's immigration laws, including DACA, an initiative to shield hundreds of thousands of undocumented people brought to America as children, is not Tillerson's job.

But, representing America in Mexico, he felt the need to acknowledge the "value of those people" and admit that it is "painful" for migrants to be living in uncertainty.

Or, as Goldstein described it later: "The secretary today in his meetings was stating US foreign policy as it relates to these issues, and he has respect for all people."

- Mixed signals -

In Washington, foreign diplomats often complain of mixed signals from the administration, between the White House, the US mission at the United Nations and the State Department.

Columnists have started to suggest the United States has two policies, Trump's "America First" versus Tillerson and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis' cultivation of alliances.

Foreign leaders, wary of the disruptive effect of Trump's impulsive tweets, are careful not to publicly take sides.

But, when Tillerson addressed a news conference with Videgaray and Canada's foreign minister Chrystia Freeland, his international colleagues' choice of language was notable.

"I want to highlight the role and leadership of Secretary Tillerson, who has been instrumental to achieving this, and to bring our countries closer," Videgaray said.

And Freeland dubbed Tillerson, in words it is hard to imagine a foreign leader using about Trump, "an incredibly important voice in maintaining the rules-based international order."By Ali Kucukgocmen and Tuvan Gumrukcu ISTANBUL/ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish authorities on Friday ordered the detention of 13 people for supporting the national medical association online, the Hurriyet newspaper reported, after the organization publicly opposed a military campaign in Syria. A prosecutor this week ordered the detention of 11 senior members of the Turkish Medical Association (TTB), including its chairman, after the organization criticized the incursion into Syria's Afrin, saying "No to war, peace immediately". President Tayyip Erdogan accused the body of treason. Three of the medical association members were later released on probation after appearing at an Ankara court on Friday, Hurriyet reported. More than 300 people have been detained over social media posts that "criticized, opposed or misrepresented" the Afrin campaign, which started nearly two weeks ago, the government has said. Among the 13 people targeted by the latest detention warrants was the gay rights activist Ali Erol, who had tweeted "War is a public health problem. #WeStandWithTTB", his organization said. Another person was detained after tweeting "War is death, destruction, blood and tears. #NoToWar", other local media reported. Authorities also raided the residence of a lawyer who had publicly read the statement from the medical association, a lawmaker from the main opposition said. "They don't want to let anyone breathe," Baris Yarkadas, of the Republican People's Party (CHP), said on Twitter. 'RULE OF LAW' The crackdown on some of Turkey's top doctors has drawn international criticism from the European union, rights group Amnesty International and the World Medical Association, which has called for their protection and an immediate end to the legal proceedings. The doctors' detentions were "worrying developments undermining the rule of law and independence and impartiality of the judiciary in Turkey", EU Commissioner Johannes Hahn and EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said in a statement. The main business lobby warned that a crackdown on self-expression increased polarization and weakened the fight against terrorism. "While battling terror, a Turkey that defends its freedoms and protects its variety of views will come out of this fight successfully," TUSIAD said. Erdogan's critics see the latest arrests as emblematic of the purge that has followed a failed 2016 coup. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and 150,000 sacked or suspended from their jobs, moves the government says are necessary given the multiple security threats Turkey faces. Rights groups and some of Turkey's Western allies fear Erdogan is using the crackdown to stifle dissent and crush his opponents. Freedom House, a Washington-based watchdog, downgraded Turkey to "not free" from "partly free" in an annual report last month. Turkey launched its Afrin operation, dubbed "Operation Olive Branch", nearly two weeks ago to target Kurdish YPG fighters near its southern border. Turkey sees the militia as a terrorist group and an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Separately, authorities on Thursday ordered the detention of another 13 people in three provinces for protesting against the offensive, police said. (Additional reporting by Tulay Karadeniz and Gulsen Solaker; Editing by David Dolan, Larry King)Istanbul (AFP) - Turkey on Saturday said that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad should leave office "at some point" in the future but denied there was any kind of contact between Ankara and Damascus over ending the seven year civil war.

Ankara has been a prime foe of Assad throughout the conflict but has occasionally softened its rhetoric in the last months as Turkey strengthened cooperation with the regime's main ally Russia.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's spokesperson, Ibrahim Kalin, told journalists in Istanbul that Assad was not the leader to unite Syria and had lost legitimacy.

But Kalin said there needed to be a "political transition in Syria", leading to a new constitution and elections.

"It is not going to be easy but that's the ultimate goal to reach and at some point Assad will have to go," he added.

"Where exactly, at what point precisely (Assad leaves), is something that will be answered as we go on, obviously," he said.

He was speaking after Russia on Tuesday hosted a peace congress on Syria, with both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Erdogan expressing "satisfaction", according to the Kremlin.

Kalin, who is also regarded as Erdogan's top foreign policy advisor, also indicated that Turkey believed Russia's priority was ensuring Syria did not become a failed state, rather than concern about Assad himself.

He said the Russian position has been "not so much protecting Assad personally but protecting the state institutions, state apparatus and the Syrian army and the regime elements".

He said: "They want to make sure that the state doesn't collapse completely in Syria."

- 'No contact with regime' -

Turkey's position on Assad has been under ever greater scrutiny since Ankara on January 20 began a cross-border operation with Syrian allied rebel forces against Kurdish militia based in the town of Afrin.

The main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu has called for Ankara to make contact with the Damascus regime as the best way of ensuring Syria's territorial integrity.

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But Kalin denied any contact with Damascus "at any level".

"There is no communication, no relationship, direct (or) indirect. Nothing with the Syrian regime, at any level. I can say that categorically and very clearly," he said.

He also rejected the notion that there had been any agreement with Russia allowing the Afrin operation to go ahead in exchange for a deal over the rebel-held neighbouring region of Idlib.

"There's no deal with Russia 'you give Idlib and take Afrin'... they are two separate operations," he said.

Kalin indicated that Turkey's position on Syria was less well aligned with the other major ally of the Damascus regime, Iran.

"Iran supports the regime but we don't, and they want to keep Assad the person and we don't," said Kalin, noting that Tehran had "clear leverage" over the Damascus regime.VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan flew to Italy on Sunday ahead of talks with Pope Francis that are expected to center on Jerusalem after U.S. President Donald Trump recognized the holy city as the capital of Israel. Jerusalem is home to sites holy to the Muslim, Jewish and Christian religions, and Trump's recent announcement that he would move the U.S. embassy to the city alarmed many allies, who say the decision could doom Middle East peace efforts. Erdogan previously clashed with the pope when Francis, in 2015, became the first head of the Roman Catholic Church to publicly call the 1915 killing of as many as 1.5 million Armenians "genocide" -- something Turkey has always denied. But the two men have found common ground over Jerusalem, speaking by phone after Trump made his announcement in December and agreeing that any change to the city's status should be avoided. Before leaving Turkey, Erdogan said the United States had isolated itself over Jerusalem, which the Palestinians want to share with the Israelis as their future capital. "In the process ahead, come on and accept Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine. This is the point that is to be reached. We are now working for this," he told reporters in Istanbul. Erdogan is due to see the pope on Monday in what will be the first visit to the Vatican by a Turkish president in 59 years. The two men are also expected to discuss the situation in Syria and Iraq as well as humanitarian aid and refugees. Turkey last month sent troops into neighboring Syria to attack Kurdish YPG fighters near its southern border. Turkey sees the militia as a terrorist group and an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), and has shrugged off criticism at home and abroad over the operation. Demonstrations are expected in Rome to mark Erdogan's visit and some 3,500 police and security forces will be on duty. In an interview with La Stampa newspaper, Erdogan dismissed the likely protests. "I dont speak to people who support terrorism. I only speak to those who fight it," he was quoted as saying. The Turkish leader is also due to meet Italian President Sergio Mattarella and Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni on Monday, as well as local business leaders. "You are only 11th when it comes to the number of foreign companies active in Turkey, we need to improve that," he told La Stampa. (Additional reporting by Daren Butler in Istanbul; Writing by Crispian Balmer; Editing by Kevin Liffey)By Lesley Wroughton and David Lawder WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Treasury's top economic diplomat, David Malpass, on Friday accused China of enabling poor governance in Venezuela by propping up the socialist government of President Nicolas Maduro through murky oil-for-loan investments. In a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Malpass said China's focus on commodities and opaque financing deals had hurt, not helped, countries in the region. His attack on China's role in aiding the Venezuelan government came a day after U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, ahead of a five-day tour of Latin America, raised the prospect of a Venezuelan military coup. The Trump administration has imposed individual and economic sanctions on Venezuelas government for rights abuses and corruption. Maduro has accused Washington of seeking to oust him to improve access to the OPEC nation's oil wealth. Malpass, Treasury's under secretary for international affairs, said Venezuela's economic crisis and lack of democratic rule were among the "biggest disappointments and disasters" of the region. Washington and the opposition blame Maduro's policies. "Most of the blame for Venezuela's economic collapse and humanitarian disaster falls squarely on Venezuela's rulers, but China has been by far Venezuela's largest lender supporting poor governance," Malpass said. He said the international community and Venezuela's people would ultimately be left with rebuilding the country once democracy was restored. "China denominated many of its loans to Venezuela in barrels of oil," said Malpass. "This has the effects of masking the exact amount of payments that China made to Venezuelan officials and that Venezuelans are expected to make to China in the future," he added. Cooperation between China and the region was based on common interests and mutual needs, the Xhinhua state news agency said quoting the Chinese foreign ministry, and investments are in line with local laws. "China is a major international buyer of Latin American bulk commodities, and imports more and more agricultural and high value-added products from the region," Xhinhua reported, quoting spokesperson Hua Chunying. China has said it is confident in Venezuela's ability to properly handle its debts. Venezuela has borrowed billions of dollars from Russia and China, primarily through oil-for-loan deals that have crimped the country's hard currency revenue by requiring oil shipments to be used to service those loans. Since 2007 China has loaned more than $50 billion to Venezuela through an oil-for-loans arrangement that helped Caracas reduce reliance on U.S. energy markets. But the flow of funds from Beijing has slowed since 2014, when abundant crude oil led to a crash in oil markets and made China less interested in maintaining its alliance with Venezuela. Malpass also expressed concern at a decision by the Washington-based Inter-American Development Bank, the biggest lender to the region, to hold its 2019 annual meeting in China, saying the gathering should be held in the Americas. "The Bank's 60th anniversary is an important milestone to celebrate the Bank's accomplishments ... and it would be fitting to hold the meeting in the hemisphere among major donors and borrowers," Malpass said. The IADB did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Malpass criticism. (Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Andrew Hay and David Gregorio)Uma Thurman is speaking out about Harvey Weinstein.

In an article by New York Times op-ed columnist Maureen Dowd, the actress describes a series of abuses at the hands of Hollywood men, including the now-notorious film producer.

In the piece, Thurman expresses her complex feelings about what happened and wrestles with feeling guilty over other women who were assaulted after her.

I am one of the reasons that a young girl would walk into his room alone, the way I did, she said. Quentin used Harvey as the executive producer of Kill Bill, a movie that symbolizes female empowerment. And all these lambs walked into slaughter because they were convinced nobody rises to such a position who would do something illegal to you, but they do.

Uma Thurman is speaking out about sexual assault she has experienced in the film industry. (Photo: Bruce Glikas via Getty Images)

Thurman described an incident after the release of Pulp Fiction, when she said Weinstein donned a bathrobe during a meeting in a Paris hotel room and got her to follow him into a steam room, at which point she left. At the time, she wrote it off as him being kooky.

But on another occasion shortly thereafter, she said, Weinstein physically assaulted her, pushing her down, attempting to expose himself and doing all kinds of unpleasant things.

When Thurman later tried to confront Weinstein, he allegedly threatened to ruin her career as an actress, her friend, Ilona Herman, told the Times.

In a statement sent to HuffPost, a Weinstein spokeswoman characterized what happened in the Paris hotel room as an awkward pass made by Weinstein after misreading [Thurmans] signals. Weinstein apologized for the incident and deeply regrets it, according to the spokeswoman.

The statement also maintains that Weinstein never assaulted Thurman.

Her claims about being physically assaulted are untrue, the statement reads And this is the first time we have heard those details.

The statement included several photos of Thurman and Weinstein at events, which the spokeswoman purports demonstrate the pair had a strong relationship.

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Through the spokeswoman, Weinstein also denied that he had ever threatened Thurmans career.

Throughout the years, Ms. Thurman was a close friend and one of Mr. Weinsteins favorite actresses to work with, the spokeswoman said.

In the Times article, Thurman also discussed being coerced into sex at age 16 by an unnamed actor, as well as an abuse of power by director Quentin Tarantino.

Thurman told Dowd that on the set of Kill Bill, Tarantino pressured her into doing her own stunt driving in a situation where she felt unsafe. The incident ended in a crash, which left her with a permanently damaged neck and screwed-up knees.

Despite all that had happened previously with Weinstein, it was the crash that truly left her feeling powerless in the industry.

I had been through so many rings of fire by that point, she said. I had really always felt a connection to the greater good in my work with Quentin and most of what I allowed to happen to me and what I participated in was kind of like a horrible mud wrestle with a very angry brother. But at least I had some say, you know?

Tarantinos representatives did not immediately reply to a request for comment from HuffPost.

Thurman first spoke about Weinstein, and the Me Too movement in general, back in November.

I dont have a tidy soundbite for you, she told Access Hollywood when asked about Weinstein, in a video that can be seen above.

She added, Ive been waiting to feel less angry. And when Im ready, Ill say what I have to say.

The clip, in which Thurmans slow, ultra-controlled demeanor made her sound like she was fighting to rein in her rage, went viral.

Weeks later, she posted a foreboding message on Instagram, writing, I feel its important to take your time, be fair, be exact, so... Happy Thanksgiving Everyone! (Except you Harvey, and all your wicked conspirators  Im glad its going slowly  you dont deserve a bullet)  stay tuned.

This post has been updated with comment from a Weinstein spokeswoman.

Also on HuffPost

Tarana Burke (center), originator of the #MeToo campaign, leads marchers.

Protesters hold up signs denouncing sexual misconduct.

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A protester covered her body in messages condemning sexual assault.

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Protesters hold signs as they march through Hollywood.

One woman holds a sign echoing the #MeToo social media campaign.

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.Rome (AFP) - Italy heads to the polls next month to vote in a crowded general election -- against a backdrop of populist gains in Europe -- and the shadow of ex-leader Silvio Berlusconi still looms large.

A hung parliament is widely expected, with no party looking likely to forge a majority, so a coalition in which the veteran former prime minister acts as "kingmaker" remains a distinct possibility.

Following Britain's Brexit vote in 2016 and the rise of the far-right in France, Germany and Austria last year, attention now turns to the populist surge in the eurozone's third largest economy.

Italy's ageing population, struggling economy, "brain drain" of skilled young graduates leaving in increasing numbers and the arrival of 630,000 migrants since 2014 have created fertile ground for the anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S) and anti-immigration Northern League.

According to opinion polls, a coalition between Berlusconi's centre-right Forza Italia (Go Italy), the Northern League and the post-fascist Fratelli d'Italia (Italian Brothers) is in front with more than 35 percent ahead of the March 4 vote.

It is followed by M5S, the leading single party, with 28 percent and the ruling centre-left Democratic Party (PD) with 25 percent in the polls, which show that millions of voters remain undecided.

A new electoral law introduced last year -- bringing in a combination of proportional representation and first-past-the-post -- has made it difficult to predict the margin needed to take power, with experts saying it will fall somewhere between 40 and 45 percent.

- The Comeback Kid -

"The only one who can make it happen, from his hospital bed, is Silvio Berlusconi," said Roberto D'Alimonte, director of political science at Rome's LUISS University. The billionaire media mogul had to cancel a television appearance due to tiredness this week.

The four-time prime minister, 81, is not able to run for office himself due to a tax fraud conviction and has suffered a series of scandals -- including his notorious "bunga bunga" sex parties -- as well as having open heart surgery in 2016.

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And yet the man they used to call the "Comeback Kid" is indeed back.

Ubiquitous on his television channels -- except for this week -- Berlusconi is positioning himself as the right's kingmaker while presenting his party as a bulwark against the M5S.

His party has allied itself with the Northern League, which was once openly secessionist but, under the leadership of Matteo Salvini, has shifted towards a nationalist, anti-euro and anti-immigration stance modelled on France's National Front.

But despite seeming to embrace the League's proposal for a flat rate income tax of 23 percent earlier this month, Berlusconi has sometimes struggled to channel his fiery ally, who also wants to scrap a compulsory vaccination law.

- Who will take the top job? -

If the centre-right coalition wins the election, then manages the difficult task of forming a government, another question lingers -- who would be prime minister?

The ineligible Berlusconi has put forward the name of Antonio Tajani, the European Parliament's current president.

League chief Salvini has not been shy about his ambition for the top job, and the head of Brothers of Italy, Giorgia Meloni, has suggested a woman might be appropriate.

But their coalition is likely to fall short of forming a government by itself, so the Italian media has evaluated the prospects for some other alliances.

A mix of centrists and eurosceptics with a Go Italy and PD coalition? An anti-euro alliance of the M5S, the League and the Brothers of Italy?

There are many possible combinations, but few seem close to grasping a majority.

Even the M5S, forged through the rejection of the old political establishment, seems ready to make a deal.

Its leader Luigi di Maio, 31, has been openly groomed to run for the top job, with his clean-shaven image contrasting to that of M5S's outspoken founder, comic Beppe Grillo.

The party has even softened its stance on a referendum on the euro.

"The anti-European Union and populist camp will not win," outgoing PM Paolo Gentiloni, who remains relatively popular, said this month.

If no majority emerges, Italy's President Sergio Mattarella could keep the current government in place until a way forward is discovered.

But in a country that has had 64 governments since 1946, unpredictability is nothing new.

"We have some expertise in the art of finding solutions to political instability," Mattarella said.Buenos Aires (AFP) - The United States said Sunday it has not ruled out sanctions on Venezuelan oil as it turns the screw on President Nicolas Maduro, but is wary of hurting the country's people.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is in Argentina during a tour of Latin America to bolster a common front against Venezuela's bid to hold a presidential election that opponents deem illegitimate.

The top US diplomat has received support from other governments in the Americas, including on Sunday from his Argentine counterpart Foreign Minister Jorge Faurie, but some are cautious about sanctions.

At a joint news conference, Tillerson -- a former chief of oil giant ExxonMobil -- confirmed the ultimate option of sanctioning Venezuela's key oil sector is under consideration, but that Washington shares its allies' concerns.

Oil-rich and once one of the wealthiest countries in Latin America, Venezuela under Maduro faces economic collapse and widespread popular protest. The US, Canada and the European Union have imposed economic sanctions targeting Maduro loyalists seen as profiteers or human rights abusers.

Tillerson did not push back against the suggestion that sanctions on oil might also hurt US companies that have built refineries in the southern United States geared to accept Venezuelan crude.

"Obviously sanctioning oil or prohibiting the oil to be sold in the United States ... is something we continue to consider," Tillerson said, while acknowledging Faurie's concerns.

"As the foreign minister indicated, our disagreements are with the Venezuelan regime not with the people, the Venezuelan people are suffering mightily in the current circumstances."

Tillerson said oil sanctions could be deployed if it is decided that this would bring the crisis to a more rapid end "because not doing anything to bring this to an end is also asking the Venezuelan people to suffer for a much longer time."

But he added that Washington was also looking at how to "mitigate the impact on US business interests."

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Faurie agreed with Tillerson that Maduro's attempt to call an election on terms set by Venezuela's non-elected Constituent Assembly was illegitimate and would be rejected by Argentina.

"As for the sales of oil and trade in oil that exist, that is particularly important, we should closely follow up on this to ensure appropriate balance between what the Venezuelan nation needs and what is being used by the leaders of the Venezuelan government," he said.

Maduro shot back, in a video on Facebook, saying that Tillerson "has just threatened us with an oil boycott. Well, we are ready. Nothing and nobody is going to stop us."

Tillerson is due to meet Argentina's President Mauricio Macri on Monday before flying on to Peru and then Colombia, which has already received around half a million Venezuelan refugees.

He will then visit Jamaica for talks on how regional powers can replace the subsidized oil that Venezuela ships to Caribbean nations, in the event it is hit by sanctions or economic collapse.Washington (AFP) - In an unprecedented punitive action, the US Federal Reserve on Friday ordered troubled banking giant Wells Fargo to halt its expansion until it improves governance, following "persistent misconduct."

As part of an agreement with regulators, Wells Fargo

will replace four board members this year as it struggles to recover from a 2016 scandal in which it uncovered millions of phony accounts created without customer consent.

The Fed order restricts the bank from growing any larger "until it sufficiently improves its governance and controls," and asks Wells Fargo to submit an action plan to the Fed within 60 days.

"We cannot tolerate pervasive and persistent misconduct at any bank," outgoing Fed Chair Janet Yellen said in a statement, citing "recent and widespread consumer abuses and other compliance breakdowns."

The bank prioritized growth over ensuring effective risk management and "the enforcement action we are taking today will ensure that Wells Fargo will not expand until it is able to do so safely," Yellen said in what was perhaps her last official act as Fed chair.

Wells Fargo became engulfed in scandal in 2016 after admitting its employees had opened 3.5 million phony deposit accounts and lines of credit without clients' knowledge as part of high-pressure retail sales tactics the bank touted to investors but has since repudiated.

This led to damaged credit scores and millions of dollars in unjustified fees for customers.

- Reform plan -

Wells Fargo President and CEO Timothy Sloan said the bank will present a plan to the Fed with new compliance and risk management strategies, as well as a list of steps taken so far.

The company will then seek third-party review of the implementation of the reform steps no later than September 30, which will then be subject to Fed approval.

"We want to have this cap lifted as soon as possible. We're going to work very hard to ensure that's the case," Sloan said in a conference call.

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The bank is studying various measures, including potentially reducing some commercial accounts, to allow it to continue to operate and accept deposits from retail customers without the risk of violating the Fed's limit to keep asset size steady.

Sloan said a "very small number of customers" will be impacted by the measures but the financial impacts on the institution will be "manageable."

"We are very confident that we are going to meet the consent order requirements while continuing to serve our customers' financial needs."

Wells Fargo has paid $185 million in fines and offered redress to harmed customers.

In October, CEO John Stumpf stepped down in the wake of the scandal, which cost it the top ranking as the world's largest bank by market capitalization.

The Fed specifically cited the need to strengthen oversight by the bank's board of directors, and sent letters outlining the failures to Stumpf and another former director.

Concurrently with the Fed action, Wells Fargo will replace three current board members by April and a fourth by the end of the year.Robert Anthony OHare, a Florida inmate, currently serving time in prison for child porn charges, has been sentencing to 20 years of prison after authorities discovered that the man plotted the assassination of the judge who sent him to jail. The man, his mother, and the alleged hitman deny all allegations.

Inmate Charged with Child Porn Hires Hitman Codenamed Rabbi

On the 8th of January, Judge Don Briggs sentenced 56-year-old Robert Anthony OHare to 20 years in prison, after the prosecutors managed to prove that the man plotted to have the judge assassinated. OHare, whos currently serving time in prison for a child porn charge, pleaded not guilty and that the whole situation was simply a misunderstanding.

According to the authorities, Judge Don Briggs, OHares target, sentenced the man to jail back in 2015, after law enforcement officers discovered over 50 photos of naked children stored in OHares computer.

Furthermore, a search of OHares apartment revealed a high-power camera and a powerful telescope, both of them being used to tape the neighbors kids getting undressed. The authorities also discovered that the 56-year-old Florida man was making miniature jukeboxes with cameras mounted inside of them and offered them to his victims.

While booked into the Lake County Jail, the inmate called his Virginia OHare, his mother and sent her a coded message. According to the authorities, the coded message instructed a person called The Rabbi to assassinate Don Briggs.

An investigation revealed that the alleged hitman was a 75-year-old man called Albert Bowman. When confronted with the allegations, Bowman jestingly responded that he could not be the assassin OHare would hire, since hes in feeble health.

OHares mother also denied the allegations, saying that the message was actually referring to some Bible verses.

Image source: FlickrVatican City (AFP) - The Vatican is moving closer to a historic agreement with China over the major stumbling bloc of who ordains bishops, a source close to the matter told AFP Friday, with seven Beijing-appointed bishops due to earn recognition.

Beijing and the Vatican severed diplomatic relations in 1951 and although ties have improved as China's Catholic population grows, they have remained at odds over the designation of bishops.

"Things are moving, but it is still impossible to know when a final accord will be reached," the source said.

"In a framework agreement, however still under negotiation with China, the Vatican accepts to legitimise seven Chinese Catholic bishops chosen directly by China."

The source was confirming a Wall Street Journal report about what would be a significant Vatican concession.

The Holy See "hopes (the concession) will lead Beijing to recognise his authority as head of the Catholic Church in China," the Journal said quoting a "person familiar with the plan".

AFP's source could not offer a date for an official agreement, saying it could still take time as complex negotiations launched three years ago continue.

The Vatican has in the past officially excommunicated three of the seven bishops to be recognised by Pope Francis, said an expert on the Catholic Church in China.

China's roughly 12 million Catholics are divided between a government-run association, whose clergy are chosen by the Communist Party, and an unofficial church which swears allegiance to the Vatican.

The situation is however complex because the Vatican has previously accepted several bishops appointed by Beijing, officially an atheist regime.

The issue flared again after two underground Chinese bishops, recognised by the pope, were asked by a top Vatican diplomat to resign in favour of state-sanctioned prelates, including one who was excommunicated by the Vatican in 2011.

The resignation requests appear linked to the negotations and were first reported in January by the Vatican-linked AsiaNews website.

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That report was confirmed Monday by Cardinal Joseph Zen, bishop emeritus of semi-autonomous Hong Kong, who is a staunch opponent of any rapprochement between the Vatican and Beijing.

The long-stalled negotiations finally seem to be close to solving the issue of who ordains the bishops.

Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican number two, noted Wednesday in an interview with the Vatican Insider: "In China there are not two Churches, but two communities of faithful called to follow a gradual path of reconciliation towards unity."

The search for unity, at the core of the Holy See's diplomatic drive, clearly includes the "crucial" question of the bishops, he added, saying some people may be asked to make "sacrifices ... for the good of the Church."

However, the Vatican is one of 20 states to have diplomatic relations with Taiwan, which Beijing considers part of China and stands as another hurdle to a resumption of ties between China and the Vatican.Although headlines like to tout how far down the road lots of companies are when it comes to making driverless vehicles a day-to-day reality on our roads and an increasing number of features from driverless research are now appearing on vehicles in our showrooms, truly autonomous vehicles don't seem to be getting much closer to everyday reality. However, a report released this week by the California Department of Motor Vehicles reveals Waymo is one company that's way out ahead of its rivals, according to a key measure of autonomous driving performance.

That key measure is how rarely a human has to take over control of the vehicle, and Waymo, the self-driving arm of Google parent company Alphabet, now has vehicles that require less human input than any others right now.

The state of California requires any company engaged in developing autonomous vehicle technology and testing their self-driving vehicles on public roads to provide a report each year on the amount of miles traveled in autonomous mode, as well as the number of what are called "disengagements." Disengagements are when the self-driving system is deactivated and control of the vehicle is therefore passed back to humans, which can be due to circumstances such as a system failure, traffic, weather or road conditions that required the intervention of a human driver.

Although this data is a good way of measuring how reliable an autonomous drive system is, the regulators have still not worked out how safe driverless vehicles have to be before they are introduced in larger numbers, and crucially, eventually put on sale to the public. A current best guess at a time frame for driverless vehicles becoming a part of our everyday lives is that it could still be as far away as a decade or more.

The most recent of these disengagement reports shows Waymo vehicles between December 2016 and the end of November 2017 logged 5,596 miles without the safety drivers disengaging the autonomous system and retaking control. The next closest rival was Cruise, which is owned by General Motors, and only averaged 1,214 miles between disengagements.

But as Ford, Honda, BMW, Volkswagen AG and Tesla have said they didn't conduct any autonomous driving testing on California's roads during the time period, and therefore didn't produce disengagement reports, the picture isn't complete by any means.The White House is butting heads with the Pentagon on North Korea as senior military officials appear apprehensive about presenting President Donald Trump with military options against the rogue state, The New York Times reported Friday.

White House National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster is reportedly concerned with drawing up a specific military plan in order to reinforce Trump's various threats to the reclusive nation. Unnamed Pentagon officials are seemingly concerned the president is moving toward the use of force too quickly and worry that additional options will increase the probability Trump will move forward with an attack, according to the report.

Dana W. White, press secretary for the Pentagon, told The New York Times the defense secretary "regularly provides the president with a deep arsenal of military options," and claimed that the reports of reluctance in that regard were "false."

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Newsweek reached out to the Pentagon but did not hear back by the time of publication.

02_02_North_Korea_

Getty Images

This comes amid reports the Trump administration is mulling over conducting a "bloody nose" strike against North Korea. An attack of this sort would aim to be significant enough to pressure Kim Jong Un's regime to give up its nuclear ambitions, but not strong enough to spark a full-blown conflict. The White House reportedly would not move forward with the nomination of Victor Cha for South Korea ambassador after he voiced opposition to such a strike.

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Cha outlined his position in a recent op-ed for The Washington Post, stating, "While our population in Japan might be protected by U.S. missile defenses, the U.S. population in South Korea, let alone millions of South Koreans, has no similar active defenses against a barrage of North Korean artillery (aside from counterfire artillery).

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"To be clear: The president would be putting at risk an American population the size of a medium-size U.S. cityPittsburgh, say, or Cincinnation the assumption that a crazy and undeterrable dictator will be rationally cowed by a demonstration of U.S. kinetic power," he continued.

Former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel also expressed opposition to a "bloody nose" strike in a recent interview with Military Times, describing it as a major "gamble" that could lead to millions of deaths. "If you want to bet that if you are going to attack North Korea, however you going to do that, and think that Kim Jong Un and the North Koreans are not going to retaliateits a pretty big gamble. I wouldnt want to take that gamble," Hagel said.

This article was first written by Newsweek

More from Newsweek(HONOLULU)  A woman accused of deliberately driving off a Hawaii cliff and killing her identical twin sister was acquitted of murder Thursday.

A judge found Alexandria Duval not guilty after a trial that started Monday. Duval opted to have a judge instead of a jury decide the case.

Authorities described the 2016 crash as a hair-pulling fight over the steering wheel. The sisters were seen arguing on the narrow, winding Hana Highway on the island of Maui before their SUV plunged 200 feet over a cliff.

The crash was a tragic accident, Alexandria Duvals defense attorney, Birney Bervar said in his opening statement.

Authorities said Alexandria was behind the wheel of a Ford Explorer when witnesses saw the sisters arguing on the perilously narrow, twisting route along a scenic stretch of coastline. A witness cleaning a family gravesite on the highway shoulder told police that he heard a woman screaming in the vehicle and that the passenger was pulling the drivers hair and the steering wheel.

Anastasia Duval was in the passenger seat and was killed, and her sister Alexandria Duval was arrested. A judge later ordered Alexandria Duval released after finding no probable cause for a murder charge. She traveled to upstate New York and was arrested months later in Albany after a grand jury indicted her.

Witnesses testified seeing the women arguing on the narrow highway. Duval did not testify.

Im disappointed, Maui County Prosecuting Attorney J.D. Kim said after the verdict. The facts clearly show it was at least reckless behavior.

Duval left the courtroom without commenting, The Maui News reported.

Its been an extremely emotional ordeal for her, Bervar told the newspaper. You cant imagine losing your twin sister in that kind of catastrophic, tragic accident, then being charged with causing the death of your sister, which she didnt. Shes extremely relieved.

Duval is going to take some time to figure out what to do next, Bervar told The Associated Press.

The sisters, born Alison and Ann Dadow in the Utica, New York, area, operated popular yoga studios in Florida before they changed their names. They moved to Hawaii in 2015 from Utah.The powerful leader of Polands ruling party said Saturday that the president should approve a divisive bill that criminalizes certain statements about the Holocaust.

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Jaroslaw Kaczynski told Polands state radio that the billwhich has ignited a bitter dispute with Israelis being misunderstood.

It penalizes anyone who blames Poles as a nation for the World War II crimes committed by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland. Some six million Polish citizens, half of them Jews, were killed under the Nazi occupation, in death camps, ghettos, prisons and other circumstances.

Although the bill exempts artistic and research work, Israel and the United States say the proposed law would infringe on free speech about the Holocaust.

Kaczynski said the bill is being interpreted totally wrong. He said it penalizes accusing Poles as a nation but not someone who says that somewhere, in some village, some place, a Jewish family or one Jewish person was murdered.

Im saying this with pain and regret and with a sense of shame but such things did happen and we never denied that, Kaczynski said.

Polish President Andrzej Duda has just under three weeks to either sign the bill into law, send it back to parliament, or send it to the Constitutional Tribunal, which would check its constitutionality.

German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said Saturday that Poland can rely on his country to condemn distortions of history, such as referring to Nazi camps in occupied Poland as Polish concentration camps.

Gabriel said this organized mass murder was carried out by our country and no one else. Individual collaborators change nothing about that.

He also spoke in defense of free speech for Holocaust witnesses, saying that is needed for the full appraisal of history that can bring reconciliation.BEIJING - China on Sunday criticized a US government report that cast Beijing as a potential nuclear adversary and called on Washington to reduce its own much larger arsenal and join in promoting regional stability.

A Defense Ministry statement said China's nuclear arsenal is the "minimum level" required for security. It pledged never to be the first to use nuclear weapons "under any circumstances."The IDF and Border Police arrested overnight Saturday six Palestinians from Abu Dis who are suspected of attacking an Israeli man after he accidentally entered the village.

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The Israeli forces encountered rioting during the arrest raid, with a grenade being thrown at IDF soldiers. Regardless, no Israeli troops were hurt and no damage was caused.

The 59-year-old Israeli man from Tel Aviv went to Wadi Qelt to ride horses and got lost on his way back, ending up in Abu Dis near the Al-Quds University campus, where several Palestinians noticed him and started hurling stones at him.

Israeli's car set ablaze in Abu Dis

Palestinian security forces who arrived at the scene protected him and contacted the Jerusalem area's District Coordination and Liaison Office in order to hand him over to the IDF and Civil Administration.

The Israeli was then taken to the Palestinian security forces' local station in Abu Dis to await extraction. When the Palestinian forces disembarked towards the Israeli forces in order to hand him over, a protest broke out, in which some 200 Palestinians rioted and threw rocks.

The Palestinian rioters also completely burned down the Israeli's car.

Both the Israeli and the Palestinian forces had to ensconce themselves in one of the university's buildings until the Israeli forces arrived to extricate him.

Two of the Palestinian security forces personnel were wounded in the incident.

The Israel, who suffered a head injury among other things, was taken to the Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem for treatment.The IDF's large-scale manhunt for Ahmad Nassr Jarrar, the leader of the terror cell behind the murder of Rabbi Raziel Shevah , continued Saturday night, about three weeks after the deadly drive-by shooting near Havat Gilad.

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Security forces raided homes in the Samaria region of the West Bank at least three times over the past two weeks after receiving intelligence the terrorist was hiding inside.

Two of these raids took place over the past 24 hours in the village of Burqin, east of Jenin. The troops spent some 12 hours in the area on Saturday, but the terrorist remains at large.

IDF forces operating in Jenin and Burqin

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Palestinian health officials said a Palestinian teenager was killed in the clashes that erupted over the raid in Burqin, when some 200 Palestinians hurled stones at IDF vehicles.

An IDF spokeswoman said troops had responded with non-fatal riot dispersal measures against Palestinians throwing rocks and firebombs and then with live gunfire at the main instigators.

(Photo: IDF Spokesman's Office)

The Palestinian Health Ministry said the teenager killed on Saturday was 19 years old, while the hospital in Jenin where he was taken said he had been shot in the head.

The IDF spokeswoman said he had climbed onto a military vehicle and had opened its door before he was shot.

(Photo: IDF Spokesman's Office)

At least 10 Palestinians have been arrested so far on suspicion of direct or indirect involvement in the attack, including some who assisted the terrorists before and after the shooting. Others with close ties to Jarrar were detained for questioning in an effort to shed light on his location.

The extensive "high-signature" operations are expected to continue in the coming days, with troops from Special Forces units, the Givati Brigade's reconnaissance battalion, and Border Police taking part.

(Photo: IDF Spokesman's Office)

The IDF's working assumption is that Jarrar is armed, would not want to turn himself in, and would likely open fire at soldiers coming to arrest him.

The terror cell he led used an M-16 assault rifle, which indicates the attack was planned in advance and might have been bankrolled by an outside source, such as Hamas in Gaza.The flagship trio leading Lebanonthe Maronite Christian president, the Sunni Muslim prime minister and the Shiite Muslim parliament speakeris having trouble deciding whether the flood of threats from Israel is aimed at revealing contingency plans for a military operation, or that the only purpose of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu , Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman and senior IDF officers is to intimidate.

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And we havent mentioned Hezbollah, which is pulling all the strings in Lebanon and has no real interest in a third round of destruction and ruin. After 2,000 dead fighters in Syria and hundreds of disabled and wounded, as well as a painful cut in the Iranian funding budget, Hezbollah has more urgent matters to deal with.

As far as the leading trio in Beirut is concerned, when Lieberman talks about boots on the ground, he is pointing to a hot summer (Photo: Motti Kimchi)

The Lieberman-style figurative promise, that in the next round there will be no images of Lebanese residents on the beach while Israelis are hiding in bomb shelters, led Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah to announce that Israel also knows that it will pay a heavy price in the next war. As far as the leading trio in Beirut is concerned, when Lieberman talks about boots on the ground, he is pointing to a hot summer.

We must pay attention to the fact that the top echelon in Beirut has failed to issue any denials concerning the Iranian plan to improve Hezbollahs abilities by building factories to produce precision-guided missiles. Either theyre not in on the secret or theyre choosing to keep quiet. After Israel destroyed the Iranian military industry infrastrctures in Syria, according to foreign reports, the Revolutionary Guards are moving the effort to Lebanon without asking the leadership for permission.

The truth is that the amounts of missiles in Hezbollahs possession even before the construction of new manufacturing houses in southern Lebanon are alarming. Nasrallah is getting the media, especially the foreign media, to do the work for him. We are already talking about thousands of missiles capable of hitting precise targets in Haifa and Tel Aviv and reaching all the way to Eilat. The amounts of inaccurate missiles, medium-range missiles and quadcopters are much bigger. Our censorship wont allow an exposure.

And theres a timing issue: The Lebanese parliament elections will be held on the first week of May. The term of the parliament, where Hezbollah has the right to veto important decisions, has been extended repeatedly for the past 10 years due to security issues, the civil war in Syria and internal conflicts. Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri is now swearing that the elections will be held on May 6 and that he has no intention of postponing them, no matter what. Exactly one week later, on May 12, US President Donald Trump will have to decide about the fate of the nuclear agreements with Iran. Trump keeps tweeting that he wont be a rubber stamp.

Hezbollah leader Nasrallah. No real interest in a third round of destruction and ruin

From the Lebanese side, that week in May is expected to be dramatic. Officials at the Kirya Base in Tel Aviv are predicting that Hezbollah could reach a 70-percent majority in the parliament, pending any black surprises. As far as Israel is concerned, a Hezbollah takeover of Lebanons state institutions and decision-making process has to be curbed. How can it be curbed? It doesnt take a wild imagination to figure it out.

What exactly can Hariri do to stop Hezbollah from building up strength with Iranian backing? Absolutely nothing. His majority party will keep working with Hezbollahs representatives in the parliament, and Lebanons parliament is meaningless to begin with. All the worthless attempts to collect Hezbollahs weapons have been scornfully rejected. Nasrallah is defending Lebanon from the Zionist enemy, and the terror organizations fighters are his fighters against Israel, just like they fought for Bashar Assad's survival in Syria.

Over the years, we have gotten used to seeing Lebanon as a war games field. No one asks for permission to fly Air Force planes and UAVs on their way to hit Syrian targets, according to foreign reports. Suddenly, Lebanon is acquiring the status of a responsible sovereign state, and the Lebanese are now flexing their muscles before signing oil-drilling contracts in Block 9 within the sea, which is subject to a border dispute with Israel. Official Lebanon is vowing not to cave in on this issue. Its letting others handle the warmongering from Israel.Former Israeli minister Rafi Eitan, who filmed a message of support of the far-right Alternative for Germany Party (AfD), said Saturday he was not aware of anti-Semitic comments made by its members, nor was he concerned by the ties AfD leaders had to Nazis.

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When asked whether he didn't think it was problematic to support a party whose leader described Berlin's Holocaust memorial as a "monument of shame," Eitan said: "I haven't heard about that."

Eitan also said he was not bothered by fact senior AfD member Beatrix von Storch, whom he mentioned by name in his message of support, is the granddaughter of Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk, who served as finance minister under Adolf Hitler.

Eitan's message of support to AfD

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"We're three generations after the Holocaust, and the opinions and the entire world are changing right before our eyes," he explained. "The media, the internet, this entire system is causing a fundamental social change all over the world. This is why we need to treat people, communities, countries and parties in a global manner. There's no escaping that."

He expressed confidence that AfD would "help Israel with anything we'll ask of them."

Rafi Eitan (Photo: Motti Kimchi)

Eitan explained that he did not use these exact words, saying "The new Muslim generation, the young people, they are greatly influenced by 'Islamic Imperialism,' the Islamic issue with the fact we're not all Muslims, that we are heathens. As a result, there's a risk in all European nations, where there are large concentrations of Muslims, for terrorism and attacks, especially against Jews."

"I've offered this party several times in the past to set up a system that would take care of refugees in Muslim countries, that would take the Muslims to the culture of their countries, and thus prevent the violent acts we witness in Europe," he added.

The 91-year-old Eitan, who led the Mossad operation to capture Nazi criminal Adolf Eichmann, recorded the message of support ahead of an event against anti-Semitism the party was organizing at the German parliament.

AfD leader Alexander Gauland (Photo: AP)

"I wholeheartedly wish that you would be strong enough to stop the open borders policy, to stop the Islamization of your country, and to protect your citizens from terrorism and crime," the former minister, who was portrayed by AfD as the "legend of Israeli secret services," was quoted as saying.

"As a friend of Germany, I advise you: Close the borders to mass Muslim immigration as soon as possible. Make international alliances that would help offer a solution to the asylum seekers outside of your country. Muslim refugees need to find refuge in Muslim countries."

Israel's Ambassador to Germany Jeremy Issacharoff slammed Eitan's message, saying "It's hard to believe that the man who captured Eichmann and brought him to Israel to face justice is capable of praising German far-right elements that so admire their Nazi past, and to even go as far as to wish this would be an alternative for Europe! Sad and disgraceful."Stones were thrown at the Ashdod municipality building overnight Saturday, with the mayor blaming the act of vandalism on activists protesting the fact city inspectors began handing out fines to businesses operating on Shabbat.

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Police launched an investigation into the incident, saying however that the act of vandalism is believed to be a prank perpetrated by children.

"There's no need to be hasty. At this point, it appears there is no connection at all between the act and the protest," a police official said.

Damage caused from stones thrown at Ashdod municipality building

The stones broke the window of one of the offices in the building.

"The Shabbat plan we're formulating requires patience," Mayor Yehiel Lasri wrote on his Facebook page on Sunday morning. "I will not be dragged into the populism and incitement that hurt Ashdod's image and have unfortunately already led to acts of vandalism."

He claimed the "warnings and fines are a necessary stage in the plan in the works for unity in Ashdod, mostly due to the necessity to have (the plan) pass court scrutiny."

"Ashdod will come out of this crisis stronger," he asserted. "It will be a symbol and an example, and mostly a role model. It's all up to us, me and you."

Damage caused from stones thrown at Ashdod municipality building

Protest leaders said in response to the mayor's accusations, "We condemn any act of violence or disrespectful behavior. Our way is that of respect. No other way is acceptable. We do everything legally and with authorization. There hasn't been a single demonstration without a permit. We condemn any violence and incitement to violence. Together we will win, and only with respect."

Ashdod residents protesting what they call "religious coercion in the city" were outraged by the fines handed out to stores at the Big Fashion complex in the city on Saturday.

"Despite the mayor's declarations on efforts to calm things down, another red line was crossed today," protest leaders said in a statement. "Instead of warnings, (inspectors) began handing out NIS 320 fines. He says one thing and does another. We consider this a violation of the balance and status quo in the city. We will not rest until the municipal bylaw is amended."

Stones thrown at Ashdod municipality building

Eitan Bar-Zeev, the CEO of the Big Shopping Centers Group, reiterated his company's commitment to pay the fines given to store owners. "As we've already said and committed, 'Big' will pay the fines whenever necessary and will also cover the costs of any legal battle with the municipality," he said.

"We can only be astonished for the who-knows-what-time at the municipality's conduct. They make declarations and statements of reconciliation, while at the same time raising the bar on this insufferable religious coercion," Bar-Zeev added.

On Friday, a convoy of hundreds of vehicles left Ashdod's Tet-Vav beach in protest of the municipality's efforts to close businesses in the city on Shabbat.

At the same time, Lasri, who hasn't given any public interviews on the crisis in the city, posted on Facebook saying he will be presenting possible solutions to the Shabbat commerce problem in the near future, which he christened collectively "Living Together."

"In the past few weeks I have shown restraint. I did not allow myself to be dragged to badmouthing others and did not respond to the wild incitement campaign against me," Lasri wrote.

"I refused to take part in dividing the city and severely harming its image. The lion's share of my efforts was thus aimed at constructing a solution that is up to spec both publically and legally. Today I can say with cautious optimism that such a solution is forthcoming," the mayor continued.Israel's Population and Immigration Authority started handing out deportation notices to asylum seekers from Eritrea and Sudan who arrived at its offices Sunday to renew their residence permit, as they are required to do every two months.

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The candidates for deportation are single men who were not able to submit a request for asylum by January 1, 2018. The deportation letters summoned the asylum seekers to a hearing, during which they could make their case against being expelled.

If their arguments are not accepted and they do not leave "voluntarily" to an unnamed African country within two months in exchange for $3,500 and a plane ticket, they will be either be incarcerated indefinitely at the Saharonim Prison in the Negev or forcefully deported. Those forcefully deported will receive a "significantly reduced" monetary incentive than those leaving willingly, according to the deportation notice.

Meanwhile, 33 percent of a deposit made on their behalf will be subject to deducations as penalty for illegal stay in Israel. Israeli employers are required by law to deposit 20 percent of the African migrants' monthly salary into a bank account, which the migrants could then receive in cash or via bank transfer after passing border control at Ben-Gurion Airport.

Only a handful have received the letter so far, which claims the country they are due to be deported tobelieved to be Rwandahas "in the past decade developed tremendously, and that receives thousands of returning residents and immigrants from various African countries."

The letter further states that "In recent years, (this country) has been showing some of the highest economic growth figures in Africa, thanks to exports to Europe and the United States, as well as to the flourishing tourism industry. This country enjoys stability in its regime, which has contributed to developments in many fields, including education, medicine and infrastructure."

The deportation plan has sparked outrage in Israel, where groups of pilots, doctors, writers, rabbis, students and Holocaust survivors have appealed to have it halted. They say the deportations are unethical and would damage Israel's image as a refuge for Jewish migrants.

(Photo: Motti Kimchi)

Debasai Berharabo, 50, who received a notice of deportation, came to Israel from Eritrea nine years ago. He currently resides in Netanya and works in a senior housing project.

"They told me I had to leave to a third country. They didn't say which one, but I know it's Rwanda. It's a danger country. People who have already gone there said it was not good there and that they left. My country isn't good either. I'm afraid to go back, or to leave to Rwanda," he said.

"If I don't leave in two months they'll jail me. Let them. I prefer prison, no matter how long I'm there. They don't understand I won't leave to my death. Prison is better than death," he stated.

"I've been here for years and everything was fine. I don't understand why we're being expelled. We've done nothing wrong. We all have jobs. I'm old now, why should I leave?" Berharabo demanded.

His claims were congruent with those of assistance organizations that accompany them during their stay in Israel, with both claiming expulsion poses a potential life risk for the expellees.





An excerpt from the deportation letter handed to migrants

'Go to Rwanda? I'd rather be in jail'

Marawi Zauda, and 34-year-old Eritrean national, has been in Israel for 12 years and now resides in Pardes Katz. "They said if I don't go back (to Eritrea) in 60 days, I'll go to jail. They told me I could go back to Eritrea or move to Rwanda or Uganda. What's waiting for me in Rwanda? It's not my country. It's the same as Eritrea as far as I'm concerned," he said.

"I get nothing, only 3,500 dollars. I don't want money (anyway), I want to stay in Israel. Eritrea, Rwanda, Ugandait's all the same to me, and I'd rather be in jail," Zauda said.

"I have a lawyer, I'll speak to her and we'll see what we can do," he added. "If I'm not going back to Eritrea, why should I go to Rwanda? I'm a human being. Nobody explained anything about what'll happen to me there."

(Photo: Motti Kimchi)

"If I have to leave, I'll go back to Eritrea, to at least die in my own country. But I'm going to stay in Israel, in jail. I don't matter to mea year, two years or ten years," he said defiantly.

According to Population Authority data, some 38,000 migrants are currently in Israel, 970 of which are incarcerated at the Holot detention center and 450 in the Saharonim prison.

The Knesset's plenum approved this past December an amendment to the Anti-infiltration Law, according to which the Holot facility will close down.

(Photo: Motti Kimchi)

Right before the conclusion of 2017, Israel's Population and Immigration Authority published data that said no infiltrators entered Israel in 2017. Official requests for asylum were made, however, from 7,710 Ukrainian nationals, 1,682 Eritreans, 1,350 Georgians and 868 Sudanese.

Head of the Authority's Enforcement and Foreigners Administration Yossi Edelstein said that "Unfortunately (the Africans) abused Israel's asylum mechanism and submitted requests for asylum which we found to be groundless."The Israel Police said Sunday there is sufficient evidence to indict Welfare and Labor Minister Haim Katz and other senior Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) officials on corruption charges.

Katz served as the head of the workers' union at the IAI. Other suspects include current head of the workers' union Ehud Nof, several union members including Eli Cohen, and Brig. Gen. (res.) Amal Assad, who served as a member of the IAI board of directors.

They are suspected of bribery, fraud, breach of trust, and extortion and intimidation, among other things.SEOUL - North Korea has slammed President Donald Trump's State of the Union address, saying its nuclear capabilities will "deter Trump and his lackeys from showing off on the Korean peninsula."

In his address last week, Trump said that "no regime has oppressed its own citizens more totally or brutally than the cruel dictatorship in North Korea."

On Sunday, a North Korean foreign ministry official shot back at the president.

In comments carried by the North's official Korean Central News Agency, the official said, "If Trump does not get rid of his anachronistic and dogmatic way of thinking, it will only bring about the consequence of further endangering security and future of the United States."Minister Yisrael Katz warned the Shiite terror group Hezbollah on Sunday that it would pay a heavy price for going to war with Israel.

"Let's say this unequivocally, Lebanon will be thrown back many years. Some would say to the Stone Age," Katz said in an interview with Ynet.A Palestinian who was arrested Sunday during operations to locate illegal workers at a construction site in Kfar Yona was able to flee police custody. Police are now searching for him.Israel granted legal status on Sunday to a previously unauthorized outpost in the West Bank in response to a Palestinian shooting attack last month that killed one of its residents.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the decision to retroactively authorize the 50-family outpost of Havat Gilad was meant to "allow the continuation of normal life there."

The decision was approved unanimously by Israel's cabinet.

Palestinian officials condemned the move. "Netanyahu is trying to make facts on ground. All settlements in the West Bank, including in Jerusalem, are illegal," said Wasel Abu Youssef, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization's executive committee.Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz on Sunday warned Hezbollah that Lebanon would go back to the Stone Age and maybe even to the age of cavemen if it turned into an Iranian factory of precision-guided weapons.

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Echoing warnings issued by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and IDF Spokesperson Ronen Manelis as to the growing Iranian involvement in Lebanon and the missile factories being built by the Iranians in the country, Katz clarified in an interview to the Ynet studio that Israel has set a red lineit wont allow Lebanon to become a factory for the production of precision-guided missiles for Iran.

Katz. We are making our red line clear (Photo: Avi Moalem)

We have worked to prevent this from happening in Syria through Iranian weapon smuggling, and we are now making it clear that we wont allow Iran to build factories for the production of precision-guided missiles or for the conversion of missiles on Lebanese soil. This has been clarified in talks with Russia too, and certainly with the United States and other European countries, as messages aimed at preventing a war and a conflict we have no interest in. We are making our red line clear, said Katz, a member of Israels Political-Security Cabinet.

Asked whether Lebanon and the regions other countries had the ability to meet Israels red lines, Katz replied: Iran is working to turn Lebanon into an advanced post against Israel and has basically taken Lebanon hostage through Hezbollah by implementing its aggressive trends. On the other side, we have Israel with its abilitiesand our abilities must be clear to prevent it.

We are being very clear. If an open, comprehensive conflict develops as a result of Hezbollahs aggression, we will act very firmly, much more than we did in 2006. Not a single target in Lebanon will be immune, and any infrastructure used both by Hezbollah and for military purposes will be hit. Lebanon will go back many, many years, some say to the Stone Age and others say to the age of cavemen.

Hezbollah rally in Lebanon. Iran is trying to make the front more dangerous (Photo: EPA)

Asked whether Israel had any intelligence on an Iranian desire to launch a war, Katz replied: We are receiving intelligence that Iran is working to make the front more dangerous. Its trying to both entrench itself in Syria and arm Lebanon with accurate missiles.

Moving on to the humanitarian situation in Gaza, which he referred to as grave, Katz said: There are some 2 million people there, and the conflict between Abu Mazen (Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas) and Hamas is definitely making the situation worse. We can say that its not our businesses, but the reality is that Israel is responsible for what is happening in Gaza because of the siege. I have been suggesting a strategic separation move for a long time nowto build an island, a seaport and international facilities for water desalination and electricity. Not to reward Hamas, but reward Israel, to isolate it and free it from its responsibility.

We are already paying the price, Katz argued. The defense establishment is largely dealing with ways to prevent the sewer flooding, water salinization, prevention of hunger and diseases. My suggestion allows us to lift the siege in a security-controlled manner while maintaining security, to give Gaza an economic connection to the world, to free ourselves from our responsibility for the situation there and hand it over to the world.

Electricity crisis in Gaza. Free Israel from its responsibility (Photo: MCT)

Katz said he was unable to confirm the New York Times report that Israel had attacked Islamic State targets in Sinai more than 100 times to assist Egypt in its battle against the jihadist organization, but stated that in general, Israel and Egypt share a deep interest to prevent an ISIS entrenchment in Sinai. We must understand that after being defeated in Iraq and Syria, ISIS began flowing into Sinai, and it has Israeland definitely Egyptin its sights too.

Naturally, there is intelligence cooperation and there will likely be other forms of cooperation to target ISIS and prevent it from making good on its threats, Katz added. We must also remember that ISIS attacked Eilat and the Negev. Israel definitely sees it as a threat it has to deal with alongside the Iranian threat from the north and from Gaza.

Israel wont wait for the enemy to reach the fence

Education Minister Naftali Bennett, another member of the Political-Security Cabinet, also addressed the growing tensions with Lebanon in an interview at the Ynet studio.

I think that was isnt a necessary and inevitable thing, he said. It depends on both sides, but on us too. The clearer we are in our words and actions, clarifying that we wont allow threats on our borders, we will be able to prevent the third Lebanon war.

Bennett. The potential damage of tens of thousands of accurate missiles, isnt fundamentally different from the potential damage of a nuclear bomb (Photo: Idan Arbeli)

Asked who is expected to stop a war from breaking out, Bennett replied: We only trust ourselves. At the moment, theres a developing threat, the missile precision project in Hezbollahs state of Lebanon, and we wont let it happen. I must explain that the potential damage of tens of thousands of precision-guided missiles, God forbid, isnt far and isnt fundamentally different from the potential damage of a nuclear bomb. And just like we wouldnt let Hezbollah acquire a nuclear bomb, we cant let them acquire tens of thousands of accurate missiles that will hit us tomorrow.

After the Second Lebanon War, (Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan) Nasrallah said that had he known how Israel would respond, he wouldnt have kidnapped the soldiers. So were doing Nasrallah a favor and making it very clear that if a war develops, God forbid, and missiles are fired on us from Lebanon, Nasrallah will become Lebanons destroyer and the southern part of the country will sustain a critical blow because of his actions. There, were saying it.

Hezbollah leader Nasrallah. He will become Lebanons destroyer

As for the report that Israel was assisting Egypt in its war against ISIS, Bennett said: I have no intention of confirming or denying the reports. Let me just say this: The State of Israel wont wait for its enemy to reach the fence. We are working against our enemies far away from the fence, so that the threat wont reach our door. We are not prevented and are not restricting ourselves from operating anywhere, and the terrorists targeting Israel are at risk anywhere around the globe.

Addressing the battle between religious-Zionist rabbis and the chief of staff over womens service in the IDF and Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahus declaration that war is brewing, Bennett insisted that there is no war with the IDF, absolutely not. The IDF is us, and we are the IDF. The overwhelming majority of the Religious Zionism movement is part of the IDF and serves in the IDF. There is some criticism. There are ways to voice criticism, and its perfectly fine, but we must always respect the IDF and respect the rabbis too.Mohammed Harouf, a Palestinian resident of Nablus, was convicted Sunday as part of a plea deal of the murder of an Israeli woman with whom he was in contact.

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While the original indictment made no mention of nationalism as a factor in the murder, the plea included Harouf's admission that the murder was nationalistically motivated.

Harouf, who faces life in prison, was arrested in August 2017 after the body of 29-year-old Michal Halimi, who was eight months pregnant at the time of her death, was found near the city of Holon.

Mohammed Harouf (Photo: Yair Sagi)

During his interrogation, Harouf confessed to have strangled Halimi and striking her head with a rock. He said he then covered her body and left the scene in her car.

In addition to murder, Harouf was also convicted of car theft and of conspiring to commit a crime.

"The defendant murdered the deceased while she was carrying a baby in her womb, strangled her and tossed rocks on her. He didn't even bury her, and instead left her covered in leaves, sand and a tire," a representative from the State Attorney's Office said at court.

"We've accepted the defendant's version, according to which the murder of the deceased was nationalistically motivated, over the fact she was Jewish," he added.

Explaining why Harouf wasn't accused of nationalistically-motivated murder at the outset, the prosecution's representative said that "At first we believed the motive was not quite what the defendant had claimed, as he provided a different version to a friend."

Michal Halimi

At an earlier court hearing, Harouf was asked by reporters why he committed the murder, to which he responded, "I wanted to release prisoners." He also denied he was romantically involved with his victim, and then proceeded to kick guards before being physically removed from the court room while shouting, "I'll kill all the Jews!"

Attorney Ruty Eldar, representing Halimi's family, said at the conclusion of the hearing that, "The parents have said all alongand the court has now given it legal credencethat here was a man who carried out the premeditated murder of a Jewish woman.

"His hiding of the body caused the family untold suffering, which they can say has now ended. The case, as far as they're concerned, is closed."

Harouf's advocate, meanwhile, said, "Harouf admitted to the murder during his interrogation and explained his motive was nationalistic-security related. Unfortunately, law enforcement did not believe him and were of the opinion the murder was a crime of passion, as the original incitement said."

"Following a meeting with the district attorney, however, it was decided to accept his account and amend the charge to reflect the nationalistic motivation, to which he confessed right from the very beginning," attorney Elad Mann said.

Harouf (L) shared a photo with Halimi

Halimi's parents welcomed the plea deal. "Today, what we've been saying all along has been proven to be the truth," said Gita, Michal's mother.

She decried claims her daughter, who was married, had been in a romantic relationship with her killer. "We knew our daughter for 30 years. We raised her and we knew she was incapable of doing the things written about her. She was pregnant and happy. We, her parents, didn't know anything other than the fact she was very stressed and threatened in her final days."

Aharon Halimi, Michal's husband, made the same claim immediately following the murder. "Our relationship was constant and normal. I reported her missing in May, which may have been brought on by pressures exerted on her. It's completely nationalistic, not romantic," he said then.

"She was five months pregnant when she disappeared," her widowed husband added. "Our relationship was very good and we were waiting on that baby. Our relationship was perfect and that expectation of a new baby was nipped in the bud," he lamented.

The victim met her murderer the day she was killed

On May 23rd, Michal Halimi was reported missing. In a statement related to the disappearance, she was last reported to be in a blue Suzuki.

Harouf's Facebook profile said he got engaged May 11

Following an investigation by police, Halimi was discovered to have left her home of her own volition and was apparently staying at the house of a young Palestinian man from Nablus, with who she was in a relationship.

The two had posted pictures on Facebook indicating their intention to become engaged.

As the investigation progressed however, Harouf was questioned several times and became a suspect when inconsistencies in his statements regarding the whereabouts of Halimi began to arise.

At that point, police in the central district began to employ increasingly sophisticated technological means of investigating Harouf and detained several more suspects from the Tayibe area that were found to be involved.

The scene where Halimi's body was discovered (Photo: Police Spokesperson's Unit)

During questioning, the additional suspects confirmed to police that the two were involved in a romantic relationship and on the day of her disappearance, the two met in the Holon area where she was probably murdered.

On July 24th, Halimi's body was discovered in sand dunes near Holon following an extensive search and later positively identified at the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute.It may come as a shock to many of us! The Earths magnetic poles are on the move.

The North Magnetic Pole, it is moving towards Asia. The South Magnetic Pole is heading towards Australia. This is all part of a large scale flip of North and South called a field reversal.

Why the Earths magnetic poles could be about to swap places  and how it would affect us. Illustration by NASA showing whats going on during a geomagnetic reversal.

What is the Earth Magnetic Field?

The Earths magnetic field protects life from harmful solar radiation by deflecting charged particles away. It surrounds our planet like an invisible force field.

This field is continuously changing as demonstrated by the numerous global magnetic reversals, where north and south magnetic poles swap places.

During a reversal the magnetic field wont be zero, but will get a weaker and more complex form.

It may fall to 10% of the present-day strength and have magnetic poles at the equator or even the simultaneous existence of multiple north and south magnetic poles.

Geomagnetic reversals occur a few times every million years on average.

The interval between reversals is very irregular and can range up to tens of millions of years.

There can also be temporary and incomplete reversals, known as events and excursions, in which the magnetic poles move away from the geographic poles before returning back to their original locations.

The last full reversal, the Brunhes-Matuyama, occurred around 780,000 years ago. A temporary reversal, the Laschamp geomagnetic event, occurred around 41,000 years ago. It lasted less than 1,000 years with the actual change of polarity lasting around 250 years.

What happens when the Earths magnetic field flips?

When poles flip, the magnetic field will weaken its shielding effect, allowing heightened levels of radiation on and above the Earths surface.

The increase in charged particles reaching the Earth would result in increased risks for satellites, aviation, and ground-based electrical infrastructure.

Geomagnetic storms give us a foretaste of what we can expect with a weakened magnetic shield.

In 2003, the so-called Halloween storm caused local electricity-grid blackouts in Sweden, required the rerouting of flights to avoid communication blackout and radiation risk, and disrupted satellites and communication systems.

This storm was minor in comparison with other storms of the recent past, such as the 1859 Carrington superstorm, which caused aurorae as far south as the Caribbean.

The impact of a major storm on todays electronic infrastructure is not fully known. Of course any time spent without electricity, heating, air conditioning, GPS or internet would have a major impact; widespread blackouts could result in economic disruption measuring in tens of billions of dollars a day.

Can rapid magnetic reversals cause mass extinction? by UFL

Can Magnetic Reversals Cause a Mass Extinction?

In terms of life on Earth and the direct impact of a reversal on our species we cannot definitively predict what will happen as modern humans did not exist at the time of the last full reversal.

Several studies have tried to link past reversals with mass extinctions  suggesting some reversals and episodes of extended volcanism could be driven by a common cause.

However, there is no evidence of any impending cataclysmic volcanism and so we would only likely have to contend with the electromagnetic impact if the field does reverse relatively soon.

We do know that many animal species have some form of magnetoreception that enables them to sense the Earths magnetic field.

They may use this to assist in long-distance navigation during migration.

But it is unclear what impact a reversal might have on such species.

What is clear is that early humans did manage to live through the Laschamp event and life itself has survived the hundreds of full reversals evidenced in the geologic record.

What Causes Earths Magnetic Field to Flip?

The Earths magnetic field is generated within the liquid core of our planet, by the slow churning of molten iron.

Like the atmosphere and oceans, the way in which it moves is governed by the laws of physics.

We should therefore be able to predict the weather of the core by tracking this movement, just like we can predict real weather by looking at the atmosphere and ocean.

A reversal can then be likened to a particular type of storm in the core, where the dynamics  and magnetic field  go haywire (at least for a short while), before settling down again.

When Will The Next Reversal Happen?

We are overdue for a full reversal. The Earths field is currently decreasing at a rate of 5% per century.

Thus scientists have suggested that the field may reverse within the next 2,000 years. But pinning down an exact date will be difficult.

The difficulties of predicting the weather beyond a few days are widely known, despite us living within and directly observing the atmosphere.

Yet predicting the Earths core is a far more difficult prospect, principally because it is buried beneath 3,000km of rock such that our observations are scant and indirect.

However, we are not completely blind: we know the major composition of the material inside the core and that it is liquid.

A global network of ground-based observatories and orbiting satellites also measure how the magnetic field is changing, which gives us insight into how the liquid core is moving.

The recent discovery of a jet-stream within the core highlights our evolving ingenuity and increasing ability to measure and infer the dynamics of the core.

Coupled with numerical simulations and laboratory experiments to study the fluid dynamics of the planets interior, our understanding is developing at a rapid rate.

The prospect of being able to forecast the Earths core is perhaps not too far out of reach.

We are entering the next solar cycle, which according to astronomers, will be very weak. But as we are in the middle of a pole shift, the protection is weaker and even a medium geomagnetic storm will have consequences. Be ready! Continue reading articles on Strange Sounds and dont forget to visit Steve Quayle. [The Conversation]

Follow us: Facebook and Twitter. By the way you can also support us on Paypal. Please and thank you!The government unanimously approved Sunday the retroactive recognition of the unauthorized outpost Havat Gilad following the deadly drive-by shooting that claimed the life of Rabbi Raziel Shevah three weeks ago.

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"'Whoever thinks the reprehensible murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, can break our spirit and weaken us, is making a bitter mistake," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the outset of the weekly cabinet meeting.

He said he spoke to Rabbi Shevah's widow, Yael , shortly before the meeting. "I told her that the entire nation and all members of cabinet embrace her and the children in their time of grief; I also asked her to hug the children for us," he said.





Havat Gilad (Photo: Reuters)

"I told her our policy is being carried out in two spheres. First, exacting justice. Yesterday, our forces were again in action in an effort to apprehend the last of the assassins and their accomplices in the murder of Rabbi Shevah. We will not rest until we bring them to justice. And we will bring them all to justice," Netanyahu vowed. "Our second policy guideline is to strengthen the settlement enterprise."

Head of the Samaria Regional Council Yossi Dagan received the notice of Havat Gilad's recognition directly from Culture Minister Miri Regev, and then notified Yael Shevah, the outpost's chairman Shalom David Mann and others.

"It's a historic, moving moment," Dagan said. "For the Shevah family, for Havat Gilad and for the entire State of Israel. Havat Gilad's pioneers have proven their spirit is indomitable. It marks the victory of truth and Zionism over all else."

Yael, Rabbi Shevah's widow, said, "It's a shame this day has come, but since it's here I'm glad we were able to extricate the most comforting news possible from it. Raziel would probably have said that we should give thanks, and that this is what salvation look like."

Itai Zar, one of the outpost's founders, added, "I'm very moved and very glad. We won't forget Gilad (Zar, who was murdered in 2001 and for whom the outpost was nameded) or Raziel. I'm confident Raziel is happy and smiling up there right now."

Residents in Havat Gilad celebrate the government decision (Photo: Samaria Regional Council)

"We've always believed Havat Gilad will be declared an official community one day. It just happened quicker than we thought, and we're proud of the government for making that move," Dagan said.

The proposal passed an "executive vote," the first stage of a long and complex process to legalize the outpost. The "executive decision" is mostly declarative in nature, announcing the government's intention to legalize the outpost, but without detailing the manner in which it will be done.

Havat Gilad is made up of lands privately owned by Jews, undeveloped lands that belong to the state, and undefined land that will likely not remain part of the outpost once it is legalized.

In addition to legally recognizing the outpost, considerable funding will have to be allocated for infrastructure, including roads, street lights and electricity.A long list of Israeli international jurists contacted Attorney General Avichai Mandelblitv earlier this month, asking him to reconsider the decision to expel Eritrean and Sudanese asylum seekers to a third country.

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The jurists claimed in their public missive that the Interior Ministry's protocol, according to which migrants will receive notice of their expulsion to Rwanda, was in contravention of international law.

"The State of Israel must abstain from putting the protocol into practice and place its immigration policy within the confines of international law," the letter said.

25 top international jurists said Israel's expulsion policy was in contravention of international law (Photo: Motti Kimchi)

The legal experts claimed that the expulsion's protocol violated international laws on human rights and refugees, as well as the principle of non-refoulement, according to which a country cannot expel a person to a place where they may be subject to persecution, torture or degrading and inhumane treatment.

The experts assailed Israel's policy on several levels, also maintaining that the state did not properly examine requests for asylum. "Unlike other countries, the Israeli judicial system was in the wrong by not examining and even methodically rejecting almost all asylum requests made by Sudanese and Eritrean nationals," they claimed.

On the question of whether Rwanda indeed constituted a safe country to expel refugees to, the jurists wrote, "We're of the opinion it cannot be claimed Rwanda fits the criteria of a 'safe country' according to the standards set by the attorney general."

It was further claimed the refugees' expulsion was not truly carried out with their consent, while Rwandan authorities stated they will not be receiving migrants deported against their will.

A migrant receiving notification of forthcoming expulsion

"Detention of unlimited duration on the one hand and expulsion on the other are not alternatives to be selected from," the jurists explained. "Detention of unlimited duration is aimed solely at breaking the detainee's spirit. This constitutes a violation of international law, specifically as it pertains to human rights."

The letter's signatories also took umbrage with the fact the agreements allegedly signed with Rwanda to receive migrants remained confidential . "We are unfamiliar with a single previous precedent anywhere in the world of reaching a clandestine expulsion agreement with a country other than the detainee's country of origin," they said.

"Israel cannot and, moreover, is prohibited from counting on Rwanda in an issue with such far-reaching implications on fundamental rights," they added.

The letter's conclusion said, "The expulsion policy deals with the most basic of rights, with which all people are endowed, including the rights to life and to liberty. It is, therefore, our professional duty to speak up. We hope the Israeli government recants on its intent to illegally expel tens of thousands of people under the aforementioned protocol."

Jurists joined by innumerable Israelis in public, private life

The international experts' missive was preceded by numerous other appeals, with 350 doctors signing a petition saying, "As doctors, we cannot stand idly by when the life, health and spirit of our patients are at risk."

A demonstration against expulsion at Tel Aviv's Kibbutzim College (Photo: Motti Kimchi)

Some 500 academics also signed a petition stating that, "The history of its people obliges the state of Israel to be a paragon in treating children and adults seeking refuse from ethnic cleansing."

A group of rabbis also convened, issuing a statement saying, "As Jews who have suffered the distress of immigration and the suffering of being refugees, we should treat refugees more justly."

In addition, Holocaust survivors said they will hide people selected for expulsion in their homes, while several El Al pilots announced they will not consent to flying expellees to Rwanda.

Lastly, 35 of Israel's preeminent poets and authors called to stop the expulsion as well. "We call on you to act with the morality, humanity and compassion worthy of the Jewish people and to stop the expulsion of refugees to the hell from which they came," they wrote Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other MKs.

Migrants protest Immigration Authority's handling of asylum requests

Some 15,400 Sudanese and Eritrean nationals have submitted requests for asylum in Israel, according to the Population and Immigration Authority. The Authority has handled 6,600 requests, of which only 11 were approved.

Migrants queuing outside the Population and Immigration Authority's offices to submit asylum requests

In fact, many asylum seekers decried the Authority's handling of their requests, accusing it of ignoring their reasoning for remaining in the country or striking them down for odd reasons.

One Eritrean asylum seeker, for instance, said he had escaped his country eight years ago after his army commander demanded he shoot Ethiopians who were trying to cross the border. If he returned to Eritrea, he claimed, he will be thrown into an "underground prison."

The Interior Ministry, however, rejected his requests saying his only offense was disciplinary, and his life was therefore not in jeopardy.

Attorney Elad Kahana, who represents the migrant, said, "A person who disobeyed an order for conscientious reasons, and who went against his country's dictatorial regime, is presented by the Interior Ministry as someone who merely got in trouble with the army over a disciplinary offense and took the law into his own hands by defecting."

Another case involves a migrant who claims he was only 12 when he was forcefully conscripted in the Eritrean army. The migrant then fled his country and was held in "torture camps" in the Sinai Peninsula until he was able to enter Israel. He submitted a request for asylum, but it was denied citing that, "The mere dodging and defection from the Eritrean army do not, in and of themselves, constitutes reason enough to seek political shelter."

(Photo: Population and Immigration Authority)

Attorney Carmel Pomerantz, who represents him, said, "Under the current situation an Eritrean refugee has an equal chance of winning the lottery as he does being granted asylum in Israel, only the lottery does not demean you, call you a liar or send you to your nebulous fate. People with a similar story are received in the United States, Canada, Sweden and other countries. How come Israel gets all the liars?"

The Population and Immigration Authority noted current policy allows to expel migrants to a third country, rather than their country of origin, and that "requests for asylum are examined on a case by caserather than a groupbasis and anyone with qualms as to the process may appeal it through the proper channels."ISTANBUL  Turkey's president is on his way to Italy to meet Pope Francis at the Vatican, where the status of Jerusalem is expected to top their agenda Monday.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said before leaving Turkey on Sunday that the United States is "alone" in the Trump administration's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

Erdogan said Turkey leads 1.7 billion Muslims worldwide since the country currently holds the term presidency of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the pope is "number one" among Catholics.

He noted: "These two important blocks are in fact decisive elements in this region," emphasizing Jerusalem's importance to several world religions.Egyptian army spokesman Tamer a-Rifai denied a New York Times report according to which Israel attacked Islamic State forces in the Sinai Peninsula with Cairo's consent.

In the statement, provided to Russian news agency Sputnik, a-Rifai claimed the report was untrue and baseless. "The Egyptian army alonein conjunction with civilian policeis solely entrusted with carrying out military operations in specific regions of northern Sinai," he said.Nineteen volumes of journals written by former Palestinian Authority leader Yasser Arafat over the course of nearly 20 years were divulged Sunday in the Italian L'espresso news magazine, shedding light on both the personality and life of the former Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) chief.

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The journals, it was revealed, were kept by two trustees in Luxemburg since Arafat's death in 2004.

Arafat's secret journals, written over the course of two decades, were revealed Sunday (Photo: AP)

The article, penned by Lirio Abbate, revealed details relating to the process of reaching the Oslo agreements, as well as to Arafat's meetings with late prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and then-foreign minister Shimon Peres.

For instance, after one of Arafat's meeting with Peres, according to L'espresso, the Palestinian leader described his Israel counterpart as an "excellent person, and a beautiful ornament." It was unclear whether Arafat's statement was made with affection or disparagement.

It was further disclosed that shortly before marrying Suha Tawil, Arafat wrote in his journal, "How can I marry Suha? I'm already wedded to Palestine and its people."

'How can I marry Suha when I am already wedded to Palestine?' Arafat wondered (Photo: AFP)

Arafat's journals also show the former leader of the PLO never personally gave orders to carry out his group's terrorist attacks. When he was asked to green-light such terrorist acts by subordinates, the journals show, he'd tell them to decide for themselves.

Furthermore, when an attack he had prior knowledge of was carried out, he'd smile and say, "Good, good!"

In addition, Arafat claimed his support of Saddam Hussein during the first Gulf War, for which he was soundly criticized by other Arab states, was involuntary, and given despite the fact he thought he was making a terrible mistake. "I tried to make several phone calls to talk (Hussein) away from this madness," Arafat wrote.

Arafat (R) said he had no choice but support Saddam Hussein in the first Gulf War (Photo: Getty Images)

Most of the text carried by L'espresso deals with Arafat's ties to the uppermost echelons of Italian government. The journals reveal, for instance, that Arafat fessed up to providing a false alibi for then Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi on one of the Forza Italia leader's numerous corruption probes.

Arafat had a clandestine meeting with Berlusconi in 1998, it was divulged, and then provided a false statement to Italian prosecution, in which he alleged that Berlusconi transferred 10 billion Italian liras to the PLO to support the Palestinians, rather than to an Italian party.

Arafat, it appeared, perjured himself for a "considerable sum," which Berlusconi later provided him. The journals also contain a log of all of the sums of money Arafat received from the Italian leader.

Another affair that rocked Italy and is outlined in the journals is the PLO's involvement in the hijacking of the Achille Lauro ocean liner in 1985, which concluded with the murder of its Jewish-American disabled passenger Leon Klinghoffer.

L'espresso's cover

The journals reveal that then foreign minister and future prime minister Giulio Andreotti allowed terrorist mastermind Muhammad Zaidan, at Arafat's request, to escape to Tunisia.

Arafat also approved an agreement reached with Italy in the 1980s, according to which the PLO will abstain from carrying out attacks on Italian soil in return for authorities there turning a blind eye to its operations.Israeli authorities on Sunday tore down two EU-funded classrooms that were part of a school for Bedouins in the West Bank because they said they were built illegally.

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Palestinians condemned the move.

Israeli authorities say such demolitions carry out court rulings against unauthorized building by Palestinians. Palestinians see it as part of a broader move to seize land for potential Jewish settlement expansion.

File photo of Palestinian school in Hebron

The two classrooms, which stood separately from the rest of the hilltop school, were demolished early in the morning by a work crew while Israeli security officers closed off the area, according to residents of the Palestinian village Abu Nuwar.

Tens of thousands of Bedouin, once nomads, live in villages across the desert region of southern Israel and in the West Bank.

It was the fifth time the school has been demolished since 2016, Palestinian officials said. Residents, with the help of non-government organizations and EU funding, reconstruct it each time.

The building was built illegally and without the necessary permits. In addition, the enforcement was approved by the Supreme Court, said a statement from Israels Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, the military-run authority that deals with Palestinian civilian issues.

Shadi Othman, head of media in the EU office in Jerusalem, said: The European Union demanded from Israel more than once not to demolish projects the European Union funds and which aim to improve the living conditions of the Palestinians.

Senior Palestinian official Saeb Erekat said on Twitter the demolition was the continuation of Israels humiliation of international law and only aims to break the Palestinian will for freedom and life.Syrian activists say civilians have suffered chlorine gas poisoning during an attack on the rebel-held town of Saraqeb in Idlib province.

The Syrian Civil Defense search-and-rescue group said Sunday night that three of its rescuers and six others were injured by chlorine gas in Saraqeb, a rebel-held town less than 16 kilometers (10 miles) from the front line with government forces. The Syrian American Medical Society says its hospitals in the area treated 11 patients for chlorine gas poisoning.

The Trump administration on Thursday accused Syrian President Bashar Assad's government of producing and using "new kinds of weapons" to deliver deadly chemical poisons. The charge came after at least two reported chlorine attacks near Syria's capital. US officials said the world needed to find a way to stop the attacks.Ghanaian actor and entrepreneur, John Dumelo, is encouraging Ghanaian youth to embrace agriculture since it is one of the most lucrative jobs in the country.

Actor John Dumelo

READ ALSO: Your car should be driven by only one man  Agyin-Asare cautions women

According to the popular actor, although farming demands a lot of patience, it pays off at the end of the day.

John Dumelo spoke to Ghanaweb at Accra Girls SHS, during the National Buffer stock programme to feed free SHS students on Friday.

The actor in his interaction disclosed that every sector of agriculture including animal rearing is booming, therefore the youth must take advantage of farming.

At the end of the day, we have to eat what we grow. And we also have to support local consumption. And thats the thing I am concentrating on. We should encourage the youth to get into farming. Farming is patience but there is a lot of money in farming, he said.

READ ALSO: I couldn't attract guys with my masculine body - Wiyaala

Actor John Dumelo in his interaction insisted that there is huge demand for goat meat and other nutritious meat in Ghana today.

Currently, Im into maize farming, snails, watermelon and pepper. So people would come and buy from us. I mean its sad when you look at certain things in the country when you have people importing pork, chicken, so many of these things that we can produce in Ghana and its bad, he said.

John Dumelo added that he is going to remain in the agric sector, especially crop production and animal husbandry

The actor already owns a three-acre cassava farm in the Manya Krobo community in the Eastern Region which he hopes to expand to 10 acres very soon.

READ ALSO: The death of Kumasi Girls SHS teacher finally discovered

YEN.com.gh is building a platform where Ghanaians can share local news and own experiences with each other. Witnessing an incident? Want to tell about a local problem? Know someone who is extremely talented and needs recognition? Your stories and photos are always welcome. Message us on Facebook now

Source: Yen Newspaper- A 23 year old Ghanaian youth has been stabbed in London

- The young man has only been identified as Kobby

- The family is yet to ascertain what happened to him

A 23 year old Ghanaian man has been stabbed to death in the City of London, this according to a recent report published by the Ghanaguardian.com.

According to the report the young man - who's only been identified as Kobby - was stabbed to death on Saturday morning, February 3rd, in Tottenham, in the north of London.

Mr. Kwame Zion, the deceased's uncle who confirmed the tragic incident to Ghanaian media, stated that the family is yet to come to terms with the loss of their son.

READ ALSO: Read more: Nana Aba Anamoah trolls newspaper over redundant headline

According to Kwame Zion, his nephew had just finished college and had expressed excitement at the prospect of moving on to University.

Pay attention: Get all the latest news on the go with YEN NEWS Android app

"The family is in a complete shock, Kobby was such a good boy and all us are devastated. We are not coping at all," said Kwame Zion.

The 23 year old Ghanaian youth has become the fifth stabbing victim to have occurred in the British in the month of February alone.

A previous stabbing back in 2018, prompted friends and sympathizers to come out in their hundreds and filled the Catholic Church of St. Ignatius in Stanford Hill, in protest against violent attacks on Ghanaian in the British Capital.

READ ALSO: Places you'd be more than happy to return to Ghana from

Do you have any story to share with YEN? Get featured! We are available on Facebook

Source: Yen.com.gh-Authorities at KNUST have hinted of converting their two male halls, Katanga and Conti into mixed halls

-The conversion, they say, is to make campus accommodation more gender balanced.

-But some students are not pleased and have warned of a massive protest should the decision be carried out.

READ ALSO: Bukom Banku's Corolla crashes into Sprinter; Scores injured

The University and Unity Halls at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) will soon be accommodating female students, authorities have hinted.

According to management, plans were far advanced to convert the two exclusively male halls into mixed halls.

The move, spokesperson of the University, Kwame Yeboah Jnr., has explained was part of efforts by KNUST to meet international standards of gender balance on University campuses.

KNUST main enterance

It is to provide accommodation for more females students in the University. We will need more places for females so the result has been to continue the process of making the male halls mixed ones, he said in an interview with the school's radio station, Focus FM.

READ ALSO: Ghanaians weep as mother and son who died in accident are buried together

However, some students believe that managements decision is a strategy to curtail the long-standing rivalry between the two halls which has often turned bloody.

The University Hall and Unity Halls, popularly known as Katanga and Conti respectively, have a very fierce rivalry between themwhich sometimes get out of control.

For the concerned students, any such conversion would erase the long-standing tradition of the two halls, which must be guarded.

READ ALSO: 5 facts about Osei Kwame 'Despite' that inspire us not to give up in life

They have therefore, resolved to stage a massive demonstration in protest.

Meanwhile, the President of the Students Representative Council (SRC) of the school, David Dannah has said it was making efforts to ensure that students understand the motive behind the decision.

We also have a responsibility to protect what KNUST stands for. We are serving the interest of our students, making sure that everyone is okay with every decision that is being taken, Citifmonline reported him as saying.

READ ALSO: I know others have done worse things than this  Mother of student in Adumanu stool 'atopa' video speaks out in latest video

The KNUST, it must be noted, remains the only University in Ghana with two male halls and they have only one female hall, Africa Hall.

Your stories and photos are always welcome.

Send us a message via our official Facebook and/or Instagram page to get it published on YEN.com.gh

Source: YenThe Bays three major tertiary providers have all reaffirmed their commitment to the Bay of Plenty Tertiary Education Partnership, which aims to improve access to tertiary study and provide greater study options for students in the region.

Leaders from Te Whare Wananga o Awanuiarangi, Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology and the University of Waikato met in Whakatane recently to sign a renewed Deed of Cooperation agreement.

The Deed is being revitalised following a review of the partnership and the establishment of Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology, after the disestablishment of Bay of Plenty Polytechnic and Waiariki Institute of Technology in 2016.

The partnership was initially founded in 2006 between the former Bay of Plenty Polytechnic and the University of Waikato. In 2010, the partnership expanded to include Te Whare Wananga o Awanuiarangi and in 2014 the former Waiariki Institute of Technology joined the group. While the three institutions remain autonomous, they continue to look for opportunities to work together.

Toi Ohomai chief executive Dr Leon Fourie says the partnership brings richness and strength to the region.

By collaborating with each other, we can better meet the educational needs of our learners and the future resourcing requirements of our region. Each of us offers a unique learning environment to cater for different learning needs but we also make it easy for students to pathway into other courses across the partnership so they can continue to receive the specific qualifications and skills theyre looking for.

The purpose of the partnership is to create enhanced opportunities for students in the Bay to access tertiary education by offering a range of qualifications from certificates and diplomas, all the way up to postdoctoral study. It also aims to increase regionally relevant research which supports social and cultural development and economic sustainability, and support tertiary participation amongst Maori.

University of Waikato senior deputy vice-chancellor Professor Alister Jones says the University and, originally, Bay of Plenty Polytechnic have worked together since the 1990s to increase tertiary opportunities in the Bay.

The partnership is currently working towards the development of the new CBD tertiary campus in the heart of Tauranga city, which will open in 2019. It will provide a university campus experience for students and a nationally and internationally recognised Bay of Plenty hub for teaching, learning and research.

The tertiary providers are continuing to explore and develop joint programmes and initiatives under the partnership. New pathways for students between Toi Ohomai and University of Waikato qualifications are being developed for 2019 and beyond.

Te Whare Wananga o Awanuiarangi chief executive Professor Wiremu Doherty says it is exciting and unique to have a university, a polytechnic and a whare wananga working together to provide a broad-spectrum approach for students seeking tertiary education.

Awanuiarangi has always had bilateral arrangements with each of the partners, and we are committed to continued collaboration to provide a full spectrum of tertiary offerings within our region. Greater flexibility and seamless movement for students between organisations is key. This partnership is an opportunity collectively to use our individual strengths as wananga, university and polytechnic to develop a truly collaborative approach that provides students with a first-class tertiary education without leaving our region.

Priority One chief executive Nigel Tutt says the tertiary education partnership enables a strong tertiary sector in the BOP through the offering of cohesive, comprehensive and future-focussed programmes.

This unique situation where our tertiary institutions partner together is a great example of collaboration in the community and greatly benefits our increasingly knowledge-based economy.

Under the partnership, pathway programmes  including bridging, certificate, diploma and degree qualifications  are offered between the institutions. A number of scholarship programmes are also jointly administered every year such as Project Ignite and Summer School.

The tertiary providers also collaborate on marine and environmental research projects, most notably following the MV Rena grounding in 2011, where the effects of the wreck and pollution on Astrolabe Reef were investigated. The subsequent success of postgraduate research programmes is largely attributed to the collaborative research during the Rena event.

Recent research projects also led to the first ever Marine Biotechnology Convention held in Tauranga in 2017 under the tertiary education partnership. Other collaborative events include Treasuring the Bay and Inquire Inspire public lectures and the Coastal Marine Field Station Open Day and Sea Week.Whenever we talk about politics, one thing that always hit our minds is the hard faced individuals who know nothing about looking good.

But think again because YEN.com.gh will be bringing you a list of some 4 ministers who are just on point when it comes to the mixture of beauty and intelligence.The choice for these ministers are strictly subject to readers' assessment of how fine they are.

1. Kojo Oppong Nkrumah

The deputy communications minister was once a media personality at Joy FM and this should not surprise us considering his background in the field of communications, But his looks is yet another beautiful thing to behold.

2. Mustapha Hamid

Mustapha has made us believe that ones capacity to deliver and remain relevant in society is never etched on the colour of our skins but rather our verve to influence political debates. This minister for information also comes with his own beautiful looks which sets him apart.

3. Alan Kyerenmanteng

He is the minister of trade and was nearly elected the flagbearer of the NPP mainly because of his looks and stature. Alan cash is not all about the cash but also the looks and stature!

4. Ahonka Lindsay

The deputy trades minister is best known for his British accent and more so his innocent looks behind the camera.

YEN is building a platform where Ghanaians can share local news and own experiences with each other. Witnessing an incident? Want to tell about a local problem? Know someone who is extremely talented and needs recognition? Your stories and photos are always welcome. Send us a message via YENs official Facebook page.

Source: Yen



Sankhapala Raja Maha Buddhist Cave Temple in Sri Lanka, and a Jataka Tale About a Parrot Who Told the TruthSankhapala Raja Maha Temple is located just north of the village of Embilipitiya, on the Pelmadulla - Embilipitiya Highway.This year, January 31st was a major Buddhist holiday in Sri Lanka.It is called a Full Moon Poya Day.Poya means fasting, but the celebration is done by visiting Buddhist temples, making donations and offerings, and receiving blessings.Most businesses around the whole island are closed on Full Moon Poya days.Each Full Moon Poya Day commemorates the first time the Buddha arrived in Sri Lanka.On this Full Moon Poya day, we visited three amazing temples.Each temple was so unique and so inspiring, that we walked around with our jaws open with amazement.I was happy we visited on a Poya holiday, as we got to see many people at each temple, and we had an opportunity to participate in the ritual blessings taking place.We took many photos of the cave temples, the ancient Bodhi trees, the people visiting the temples, and the stunning art, with narrative wall paintings dating back hundreds of years.I will try to describe the a little bit about I each temple, in three different posts.Sankapali Temple is located just north of Embilipitiya.The temples full name is Sankhapala Raja Maha Viharaya.It is a cave temple, built into the rocky mountainside.It is an ancient temple, with cave inscriptions dating back to 161-131 BC.Since then, many saintly monks have spent time in peaceful meditation in one of the 14 caves of various sizes that are scattered around the Rajamaha Viharaya mountain.When we arrived, the road leading to the temple complex was lined with sellers, whose stalls offered food, drinks, ice cream, toys, kitchenware, incense and fruit and flowers for temple offerings.By the gate to the temple sat a line of beggars, looking for alms.Some of them were without legs or with twisted arms, one had elephantiasis, and a few sat in rustic wheel chairs with hands outstretched.We deposited money in each of their hands, and walked up the stone stairs to the first few caves.A large Buddha sculpture stood against the rocks.At the first platform, there were a few small caves, which were choked with people holding fruit plates and fruit baskets, as well as rice and food to offer at the shrines.Two other caves had some Buddha sculptures and wall paintings, as well as many people sitting on the floor praying.Like every visitor to the temple on the Poya day, we were asked to make a donation and to give our names.Moments later, they announced on the loudspeakers that Jules and Tali from America had made a donation.These announcements on the speakers went on all day long, announcing the names of the visitors who had just donated to the temple.Some of the caves had old sculptures of a reclining Buddha as well as a seated and standing Buddha.There were beautiful flower paintings on the ceiling, and life-sized sculptures of a Bodhisattva jumping into the mouth of a demon.A resident monk told us that this scene depicts a past incarnation of the Buddha, in which He incarnated as a Bodhisattva of compassion and willingly jumped into the harsh world (represented by the demon) to help others advance along their spiritual paths.At the top of the mountain was a stupa surrounded by many wild monkeys and parrots.It reminded me of a famous Jataka tale with a moral about how the truth in the relative world can get one into trouble.This is because the relative truth is only a personal perspective, held in the projecting mind of the individual, and filtered by how she wants to see and experience reality.The concept of time, as well as everything else that seems real in the world of duality, are all part of the dream illusion that only SEEMS real to us, but everything that is NOT eternal is NOT real.Once upon a time, when Brahmadatta was the king of Benares, a Bodhisatta came into the world as a young parrot.His name was Radha, and his youngest brother was named Potthapada.While they were still quite young, both of them were caught by a fowler and handed over to a Brahmin in Benares.The Brahmin cared for them as if they were his own children.But the Brahmin's wife was a wicked woman.There was no one watching her.One day the Brahmin had to go away on business, and he addressed his young parrots thus: "Little dears, I am going away on business.Please keep watch on your mother.Observe whether or not any man visits her."So off he went, leaving his wife in charge of the young parrots.As soon as he was gone, the woman began to do wrong.Night and day the visitors came and went.There was no end to them.Potthapada, observing this, said to Radha, "Our master put this woman into our charge, and here she is doing wickedness. I will speak to her.""Don't," said Radha.But Potthapada would not listen."Mother," said he, "why do you commit sin?"When she heard this, oh, how she longed to kill him!But making as though she wanted to fondle him, she called him to her. "Little one, you are my son! I will never do it again! Here, come to me, dear."So he came out.Then she seized him, crying, "What! You dare preach to me!You don't know your place!"And she wrung his neck, and threw him into the oven.When the Brahmin returned, he asked Radha the Bodhisatta, "Well, my dear, what about your mother?Does she do wrong, or no?"When Radha the Bodhisattva parrot did not answer, he asked the question again:I returned , my son, my journey is done, and now I am home again.Come tell me, is your mother true?Does she make love to other men?Radha answered, "Father dear,The wise speak not of things which are not conducive of blessings,Whether they are true or not,Whether they have happened or not.My brother, Potthapada, now lies dead,Burnt up beneath the ashes in the oven,For trying to speak the truth.It is not wise the truth to tell, lest Potthapada's fate I share.The wise speaks only of eternal blessings, with a heart full of kindness.Thus did the Bodhisatta tell to the Brahmin.And he went on: "This is no place for me to live in either."Then bidding the Brahmin farewell, he flew away into the woods.Serdecznie polecamy angielskojezyczny artyku, ktory zosta napisany przez Setha J. Frantzmana - warto wysac go do naszych zachodnich przyjacio!

History and populism

A dispute over a Polish law that would punish those who claim Poland was responsible for the Holocaust has led to an outpouring of hysterical anti-Polish bashing online. On January 30th I looked on Facebook and someone had shared an article about how the Polish President said something which seemed reasonable. He had insisted that while individuals committed wicked actions against Jews, there was no institutionalized role by the Polish state in the Shoah.

The rage on social media against the remarks were extraordinary. Tell that to my grandparents wrote one woman. Tell it to my father, uncle and aunts. Another suggested boycott Poland. Another woman posted a meme that says Polish Death Camps, claiming Poland was home to pogroms and anti-semitism and told the Polish state to apologize for the Holocaust. Tell that to my mothers aunt, uncle and cousins. Poland gave them a free all-expenses paid trip.. TO AUSCHWITZ, a man wrote. No people were more brutal.

Screenshot of anti-Polish comments on social media



As the Polish law progresses the rage has grown. Some have taken joy at offending Poles online, repeating the term Polish death camps just to show that they can use free speech ostensibly protesting the Polish law. But the rage and anger is deeper than just manifestations of provocation. I wrote an article about it, but since then I have given it more thought as the comments keep flowing in.

Uri Avnery, the famed Israeli journalist, sent around an article on the subject on February 2nd. He wrote about a visit to Poland years ago about a visit to Warsaw with Rachel Avnery. After coming home, Rachel happened to enter a clothes shop and hear the female owner talking with a customer in Polish. Still full of her discovery, Rachel asked the owner: Did you know that the Nazis also killed a million and half non-Jewish Poles? The woman answered Not enough! Rachel was amazed. So was I.

The story shows the degree of hatred for Poland and Poles that exists among some Israelis and some Jews. It is based on stereotypes, generalizations and memories from the 1930s. That the anger is pouring out again is simply because it has been hiding just beneath the surface for years. Deborah Lipstadt wrote in 2007 about the enduring myth the Poles were worse than the Nazis. She noted Many people, Jews primarily among them, believe the balderdash that the Germans put the death camps in Poland because the Poles would be happy to see the Jews killed. They ignore the fact that to the Germans Auschwitz was German territory and was to be the site of a major German settlement.



One of many comments on Facebook (Screenshot)

She also recalls, One person, who is well-informed and well read, found this notion of Polish non-complicity hard to grasp. Werent they guards at Auschwitz? No, I said. Well werent they part of the Einsatzgruppen, the mobile killing units? Wrong again.

Yet this false history remains. Its real pedigree could be claims made in the 1930s that Poland was preparing to exterminate Jews. In 1936 the Soviet politician Karl Radek made this claim. What Poland is preparing for her Jewish population will exceed the cruelty of the German manifold, Radek said according to the JTA. He declared that while the Jews were treated worse in Poland than in Germany, the world knew less about it. He also claims it would be difficult for Poles to commit the utter annihilation of 3,500,000 Jews.

Lapids article at Times of Israel

In Israel even senior politicians such as Yair Lapid have continued to spread the claim that the death camps were built in Poland because the Germans knew that at least some of the local population would cooperate. There is no evidence to support this claim. Most camps were actually built in German-run areas, not in Polish areas. As Lipstadt points out, the number of camps related to the size of the local population in Poland, where more than 3 million Jews lived. The camps were constructed and run by the Nazis.

However there is still much to the anti-Polish hysteria that must be challenged. Here is a list of some of the major issues.



Map at the USHMM

The was no Polish state that could collaborate with Germany because Germany had invaded and occupied Poland

A map published by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum shows the way Germany annexed most of Poland and administered it during the Holocaust. So there was no Poland that could work with the Nazis. The Polish government in exile actually helped bring information about the death camps to Jewish leaders outside Poland. The Polish nation resisted the Nazis in 1939 and continued to resist.

3 million non-Jewish Polish people were murdered by the Nazis

Often forgotten in the claims of Polish collaboration is that Poles were the victims of Nazism alongside Polish Jews. They were one of the countries brutally suppressed by the Germans. An estimated 3 million non-Jewish Poles were murdered and up to1.5 million sent as forced labor slaves to Nazi Germany.



Text of part of the Polish law

The Polish law should be read in full

The text of the Polish law doesnt criminalize all critique of Poles during the Holocaust. It specifies contrary to facts as a part of the law. The law of course is the wrong way to legislate facts, but nevertheless it should be read.

Poland had one of the largest resistance movements in Europe to Nazism

Unlike in many countries that actively collaborated or had a local government allied with the Nazis, such as Croatia, France or Italy, Poland always resisted Nazism. Up to 500,000 people joined the resistance. Germany razed Warsaw during the 1944 uprising. Many Poles were sent to concentration camps alongside Jews. In addition there are more Polish Righteous Among the Nations than any other nation in Europe. That means many thousands risked their lives saving Jews. In one case I heard about from a friend a Polish family sheltered Jews and the Jews passed themselves off as Christians with forged papers. Later, during the Polish uprising of 1944 this Polish family and the Jews they were helping were all shipped to a concentration camp. They were all labelled Christians by the German Nazis. This shows how people not only helped save Jews, but suffered alongside them.

So why the skewed history?

The Holocaust is often taught without sufficient reference to which countries collaborated and resisted. Increasingly it is also universalized and the Nazis are portrayed as not German Nazis, but rather a general evil. The education tends to emphasize individual Jewish stories, which is a good thing, but it often ignores what was happening around the people who are highlighted. In this sense the experience of Anne Frank and Elie Wiesel is somehow made to seem the same without reference to the hows and whys. This is because sometimes it seems more convenient than mentioning the tens of thousands who volunteered for the SS in Austria, Belgium, Netherlands and the thousands who did so in Denmark, Norway and elsewhere. But this means countries like Poland that did not welcome Hitler or join the SS are not given sufficient credit. There is a historical difference between collaborationist countries, and those that resisted. Poland resisted. That doesnt mean there are no Poles who harmed Jews or that there was not anti-semitism in Poland. Much of the anger directed at Poland relates to memories about the period before and after. But there is no reason to lump that in with the Shoah and reduce the German Nazi responsibility.

In addition the family stories people have and the lingering anger and stereotypes against Poland are perpetuated. Eventually history becomes myth and myth becomes fact. This twisting of history allows people to make the outlandish claim that Poles were worse than Nazis or Poland was worse than Hitler. It turns history on its head. But this is easy to do when Holocaust education doesnt both to differentiate between Hungary, Croatia, Poland, Latvia and France.

Lasting anger

It appears many wounds from the Holocaust have no healed. That is reasonable. But what is unreasonable is the number of people spreading false history against Poland. This is because of a skewed attempt to whitewash Germanys record because Germany has supposedly taken responsibility, and portray Poland as the problem for denying. But this warped sense flips history on its head. Poland is right to want the real history to be told and the story of Polish resistance and suffering under Nazism. Unfortunately too few people want to listen to the larger story.

Zrodo: www.medium.com/Grace Episcopal Church to celebrate 140th anniversary LAPEER  The bright red double-doors of Grace Episcopal Church have long served as an unofficial greeting to motorists arriving in downtown Lapeer. The church,...

Sheriff Dept. facing serious hiring issues LAPEER  Lapeer County Sheriff Scott McKenna hears a knock. Standing in the doorway, one of his deputies. He sits, hesitates, and then apologizes. Im...

Dan Osentoski remembered for love of Lapeer community LAPEER  A memorial service and rite of committal for Dan Osentoski will be held at noon Thursday (Sept. 16) at the Metamora Cemetery at...Row over race to succeed EU`s Jean-Claude Juncker

AFP, Brussels :

The race to succeed Jean-Claude Juncker as head of the first post-Brexit European Commission begins later this month-and in typical EU style it is starting with a row about how the race should be run.

While the EU's French Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier is the rumoured early front runner to take charge of the bloc's executive arm in 2019, the process itself has not even got off the ground.

At stake is not just a power struggle between national leaders and the European Parliament over who chooses Juncker's successor, but questions about democracy that could give fresh ammunition to eurosceptics opposed to the EU.

Juncker was picked in 2014 by a new and controversial "Spitzenkandidat" system-German for "lead candidate"-under which the biggest political group in the European Parliament gets to nominate its candidate for the job. The European Council of 28 national leaders then makes the final choice, "taking account" of the parliament's nomination, in the vaguely worded provision of its the EU's treaties. The whole parliament gets a vote at the end.

But many of those national leaders, who will discuss the issue at a Brussels summit on February 23, oppose what they view as a stitch-up by MEPs that robs countries of their power to pick who will fill one of the continent's most influential roles.

'Frustration In Capitals'

Juncker has said that he will not seek a second term in the job when his term expires next year.

European Council President Donald Tusk is expected to lay out options at the leaders' summit, including whether to continue with the Spitzenkandidat system again next year or reject it.

"In 2014 there was some frustration in a number of capitals that the process which led to the nomination of Juncker was not transparent enough," a European source said on condition of anonymity.

Foremost among its opponents now is Emmanuel Macron, the youthful new French president spearheading efforts to reform the bloc after Britain's vote to leave.

Critics say the system has politicised the European Commission, an issue which plays into concerns about national sovereignty versus Brussels, and possibly created the conditions for Brexit itself.



Former Adviser to the Caretaker Government Sultana Kamal speaking at a prAss conference organised by Nagorik Samaj at the Jatiya Press Club on Sunday in protest against repression on two Marma indigenous women.JU first year classes begin today

City Desk :

The classes for the 1st year honours courses under the academic session 2017-18 of Jahangirnagar Univesity (JU) will begin today.

"Due to the existing accommodation crisis at dorms, the university authority will not be able to allot seats among the newly admitted students right now," Deputy Registrar (education-1) Abu Hasan told media on Sunday.

When the seat will be vacant, associated hall provosts will take initiative to accommodate students in vacant seats, he added.

Moreover, the university authorities will launch Dhaka to JU special bus services for the first year students so that they can attend regular classes without staying at dorms, he added.

Meanwhile, the university authority has taken initiative to drive out the invalid students from dormitories.

A notice signed by JU Registrar Abu Bakr Siddique has already been issued

for the invalid students to leave dormitories as soon as possible.

This year, a total of 1,986 students have been enrolled in different

departments and institutes of the university.3 students nabbed in rape case

A Correspondent :

Police arrested three students of Amtali High School in a rape case from Baghaichhari Upazila here on Thursday.

The arrested are: Naeem Islam, Farhad Hossain, and Hafizullah.

Officer-in-Charge of Baghaichhari Police Station Jahangir Hossen said the arrested allegedly raped a girl of class six, forcibly and took a video of the act and spread it through social media.

Police also seized the mobile phone and the memory card from the arrested.42nd AGM of Jamuna Oil Co held

The 42nd AGM of Jamuna Oil Company was held at Chittagong Boat Club on Saturday.

Chittagong Bureau :

The 42nd Annual General Meeting (AGM) of Jamuna Oil Company was held at Chittagong Boat Club on Saturday .

Directors of the board Md Abdur Razzaq, Member National Board of Revenue, Mir Ali Reza, Director Marketing, Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation, Shankar Prashad Dev, Independent Directors, Abu Yousuf Meah, Deputy Chief (Planning), Energy & Mineral Resources Division, Md. Khaleque Mullick, Deputy Secretary (Budget), Energy and Mineral Resources Division, Md. Mozzammel Hoque Bhuiyan, Shareholder Director, Saifuddin Ahmed Bhuiyan, Directors, and Md. Kamrul Hasan, Director & Managing Director Jamuna Oil Company Ltd. attended the meeting and participated in discussion Company Secretary Md Nazmul Hoque conducted the metering.

The meeting also attended by BPC's representative shareholders Kazi Mohammad Hasan, Secretary Md Gias Uddin Ansari, Senior General Manager (Com & Ops), Md. Abu Hanif, Sr, General Manager (Dist & Marketing), Md Yousuf Hossain Bhuiyan, General Manager (Audit), ATM Selim, General Manager (Accounts), Moni Lal Das, General Manger (Finance), Ferdousi Masum Himel, Deputy General Manager (Admin) and good number of shareholders.

The meeting was informed that the company earned over 224.26 core post tax profit.

Protect migrant workers` rights

The annual labour attaches conference began in the city yesterday .The problems of Bangladeshi expatriate workers in different foreign countries across the globe will be discussed here. In the conference, 44 labour attaches posted at Bangladesh missions in 28 countries would get fresh reorientation about the workers' migration and their welfare issues. The move is an exceptional step of the government amidst the crisis of the narrowing remittance inflows, the loss of the foreign labour markets and the deterioration of the migrants' welfare abroad. It is anticipated that the labour attaches would get government directives for providing all out support to the hapless workers whose toil is pushing the country towards development.

News media reported that the conference would pay attention towards the exploration of new job markets for our workers abroad and be sensitive about the responsibility of the labour attaches to ensure safe migration and welfare of workers. The attaches would also be asked to take greater interest in registering the migrant workers with the Wage Earners' Welfare Board. But the campaigners for the rights of the migrants urged the authorities to motivate the labour attaches to be friendly with the country's workers abroad. Here, the labour attaches should thoroughly check the factories or other workplaces and their capacity to pay the wages and provide accommodations before certifying them as sound employers.

No government has made any investment on migration; but the untrained workers take all the responsibilities on their own shoulders to purchase a future for their family and the country in exchange of hard labour. The government must take proper moves to ensure the remitters health and safety in the workplace. As the migrant's health issues and workplace safety are being neglected by the host countries, many workers return home with chronic and communicable diseases. The migrants get no one in the missions to hear their pain and agony though the missions and the staffs are appointed to support the migrants and in fact run with their money.

It is clear that the government is only interested in their hard earned foreign exchange, whereas the migrant workers' rights violations and health danger are not tolerable. Despite this, labour attaches along with the diplomatic officials do not pay attention to the migrants' sufferings. The labour attaches must be sincere in realizing compensations for the migrant workers following their deaths and accidents. Greater attention is needed in protecting migrant workers' rights.

Maldives army sealed off parliament: 2 MPs held

Soldiers in riot gear surrounded the parliament building in Male on Sunday.

Al Jazeera News :

Security forces in the Maldives have sealed off the country's parliament and arrested two opposition legislators amid a deepening crisis over President Abdulla Yameen's refusal to free jailed politicians.

Soldiers in riot gear surrounded the parliament building in Male on Sunday soon after the opposition petitioned the parliament to remove the island nation's attorney general, chief prosecutor, as well as home and defence ministers. They accuse the four of breaking the law by failing to act on a Supreme Court ruling overturning convictions against nine dissidents, including exiled former President Mohamed Nasheed.

The top court's verdict has plunged the Maldives into fresh political turmoil and dealt a major blow to Yameen, who is accused of corruption, misrule and rights abuses. He denies the allegations.

The ruling also gave the opposition a majority in the 85-member parliament as it reinstated 12 members of parliament who were stripped of their seats last year.

But two of the 12 were arrested at the airport on Sunday, shortly after they returned to the Maldives after months in exile. Abdulla Sinan and Ilham Ahmed were detained on charges of bribery, a spokesman for the police told Al Jazeera. "We call on the police to release the MPs immediately, and to stop following unlawful order, to stop obstructing the lawful mandate of Parliamentarians," Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, parliamentary leader of the opposition, said in a statement.

"In a desperate attempt to cling onto power, President Yameen has illegally overrun the state: his Attorney General has illegally assumed the powers of the apex



court, while the military has overrun the legislature," he added. The motion to remove the chief prosecutor and three members of Yameen's cabinet came hours after Attorney General Mohamed Anil accused the Supreme Court of trying to impeach the president.

"I have informed all law enforcement agencies they must not obey such an illegal order," he said in a televised appearance flanked by the chiefs of army and the police.

Ahmed Shiyam, army chief, said the security forces would follow Anil's advice and "will not wait and watch as the Maldives goes into crisis". Later, in a ceremony broadcast live on state TV, Shiyam led soldiers and police officers in reciting their oath at the military headquarters in Male. The official who heads the parliament secretariat has also resigned.MPO-listed private school teachers continue hunger strike for 15th consecutive day on Sunday in front of the Jatiya Press Club for nationalisation of their services.Tk 5 lakh bounty for perpetrators of question leakage

Staff Reporter :

Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid has announced a bounty of Tk 500,000 for information leading to the arrest of the perpetrators who leaked the questions of Secondary School Certificate (SSC) and its equivalent examinations.

The minister took the decision in this regard at a meeting of National Monitoring Committee on Law and Order in the Education Ministry on Sunday.

It comes in the purview of an unstoppable spate of question paper leak ahead of the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examinations, which began from the first of this month.

Although, the Minister has been denying the allegation of question papers leakage since 2013, the question papers of all public examinations were leaked.

And even, the question papers of university admission tests were also leaked. "Tk 500,000 will be awarded to him who can accurately identify the perpetrators and hand them over to law enforcers," the Minister said in the Secretariat on Sunday. "A committee will be formed to probe whether the questions leaked matched the papers, the effect it had on the examinees, whether anyone had been harmed by it, and how such an examination can be evaluated."

Nurul Islam Nahid said a committee was formed to probe the allegations that the two SSC Bangla paper questions were leaked. The committee will 'monitor' all the SSC and equivalent examinations. The committee will be led by Technical and Madrasah Education Division Secretary Md Alamgir and be composed of officials from the Cabinet Division, the Local Administration Ministry, the Home Ministry, police, the Education Board and BRTC.

More officials may be added to the committee if necessary, Nahid said. Question sets and answers for the two Bangla papers in the SSC and equivalent exams went viral on the social media an hour or so before the start of both exams. The main questions in the exams matched the leak.Khaleda visits Sylhet today

Sylhet Bureau :

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia is coming to visit Sylhet today as part of the election campaign.

Awami League (AL) President and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Jatiya Party Chairman Hussein Muhammad Ershad have already visited Sylhet to begin the election canvassing.

She is likely to visit Sylhet on February 5 to start her election campaign for next national polls.

She will leave Dhaka for Sylhet by road at 10 am,

a source close to BNP confirmed it.

BNP Standing committee members Dr Abdul Moyeen Khan and Nazrul Islam Khan told that the discussion about BNP chairperson's tour to Sylhet took place recently. The next course of actions will depend on the overall situation.

According to source, the former Prime Minister is likely to return to Dhaka after offing Fateha at Hazrat Shahjalal (RA) and Hazrat Shah Paran (RA)'s shrines

But, it is not yet known whether any public meeting in Sylhet will be held or not.

Sylhet district BNP Secretary Ali Ahmed said, "Khaleda Zia will spend the night in Sylhet.

The planned tour has boosted the morale of the party activists in the district, he added.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Jatiya Party chief HM Ershad came to Sylhet on January 30 and February 1 respectively. She is awaiting a verdict in a graft case which is scheduled to be given on February 8.Khaleda's statement about judiciary untrue: Anisul

Staff Reporter :

Law Minister Anisul Huq on Sunday said, BNP Chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia's statement about the judiciary was not true.

"We all should respect the judiciary and courts of Bangladesh and everybody should express it," he said while talking to reporters after attending a seminar in a hotel at Gulshan of Dhaka city.

BNP Chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia on Saturday

said at a meeting of party's Executive Committee that "everybody knows that judiciary is independent; but actually, it is not so".

"I am sorry, what she (Khaleda) said is totally untrue, I have said earlier and I am still saying that the trial proceedings (in the case against Khaleda Zia) have been held in the court on the basis of documents and evidence," Law Minister said.

Judges deliver judgements based on the documents and evidences, he said.

About the resignation of Justice Md Abdul Wahhab Miah from the post of the Supreme Court's judge, the Law Minister said, it is personal decision of a judge whether to resign or not.Foolproof security for Book Fair: DMP boss

Staff Reporter :

Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) has taken foolproof security in and around the Ekushey Book Fair venue and its adjacent areas to hold smoothly the monthlong fair-2018.

"We have taken stringent security measures centering the Bangla Academy, Doyel Chattar, Shishu Academy, TSC and its adjoining areas likewise the previous years and the arrangement will continue till the fair ends," DMP Commissioner Asaduzzaman Miah told the reporters on Sunday afternoon after paying visit to the spot to see the overall security arrangements for the book fair.

The venues of the book fair - Bangla Academy and Suhrawardy Udyan-have already been swiped by the dog squads and bomb disposal unit as part of the security arrangement, the DMP chief said.

"A large number of police will be deployed in and outside the book fair," he said, adding that plain-clothed police personnel will guard the venues round the clock, while the squads of SWAT, bomb disposal unit and dog squad will be present there to meet emergencies. Special security has been arranged for writers, bogglers and publisher, he further said.

A total of 200 CC cameras and nine watch towers have been set up at the fair venue from where security personnel will observe the fair activities with binoculars.

Earlier, US-American writer and blogger Avijit Roy was hacked by assassins near the book fair premises and his wife was also injured in the attack. Three other bloggers and a publisher were also hacked to death later allegedly by the assassins, raising concern about the security of the writers and bloggers.New CJ pledges to maintain harmony among 3 state organs

Staff Reporter :

The newly appointed Chief Justice, Syed Mahmud Hossain, on Sunday said that he would do everything possible to establish rule of law and justice for all in the country.

He said that he would also work to maintain harmony among the three pillars of the state-the legislative, the executive and the judiciary.

"A country can march forward through mutual cooperation among the legislative, the executive and the judiciary. If there is any mistrust among these organs, the development may be jeopardised. So, I will always try to coordinate among these three organs of the state," the CJ made these comments at a felicitation programme held in the Chief Justice's courtroom of the Appellate Division in the morning.

Attorney General Mahbubey Alam and Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) President Advocate Zainul Abedin accorded the felicitation to the new Chief Justice.

According felicitations to the new Chief Justice, SCBA President Zainul Abedin said that the judiciary of the country is facing the greatest crisis today.

He accorded the new Chief Justice on behalf

of the members of the SCBA.

"The ruling political party is controlling the lower judiciary in one hand and on the other the courts are passing tough time with the huge backlog of cases. Thousands of false cases are adding regularly. At the same time there are lacking of efficient and neutral judges. That is why, litigants are in frustration and there is a lack of confidence in them," he claimed.

President of the Supreme Court Bar Association asserted that because of too many false cases the Supreme Court should make bail and anticipatory bail easy as a deterrent against false cases.

The Chief Justice said, "We shall work to build image of the court in such a manner so that the people can feel that they are all equal and they will get justice in accordance with the law. Therefore, faith and confidence of the people in the court will be stronger."

The formulation of a law for appointing the judges under Article 95(2) of the Constitution is inevitable under the present context, he added.

"The backlog of the cases is a big problem. We have to work unitedly to solve this problem. Sincere assistance of the bar association is also necessary to this effect," the Chief Justice said.

He said, "The main force of a judge is honesty. The vanguard of his accountability is his own conscience. He will follow the Constitution only and the law of the land. He will have to exercise his judicial functions beyond anger and fondness."

The SCBA president also mentioned that, "How the way the Chief Justice of the country was terminated and as a result vacuum created throwing the judiciary in the greatest crisis."

"The precondition of the democracy is a free judiciary. But our judiciary specially the lower judiciary is almost administered by the government administration. We think, this is one of the big challenges for you to rescue the judiciary from this trap," the bar President said.

"The country is facing a serious political instability. Some members of the law enforcing agencies are taking the opportunity of this instability by arresting and harassing the opposition political party workers and also the non-political persons. Some law enforcers filing false cases against them," he said.

Addressing the CJ, the SCBA leader also said, "Establishing the rule of law, protecting the human rights, securing the independence and fulfill the wounds of the judiciary will be the big challenges in front of you."

President Md Abdul Hamid on February 2 appointed Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain the new Chief Justice. The following day he took oath as the 22nd Chief Justice of the country. He will stay in the office till December 30 in 2021.

Bangladesh Bar Council Vice-President Advocate Abdul Baset Majumder, Supreme Court Bar Association's former Presidents Barrister Mainul Hosein, Advocate Khandker Mahbub Hossain, and Advocate Yousuf Hossain Humayun, Bar Secretary Barrister A M Mahbub Uddin Khokan and other senior and junior lawyers were present on the occasion.22 BNP men including municipality mayor arrested in N`ganj

UNB, Narayanganj :

Police here early Sunday arrested at least 22 leaders and activists of BNP including a municipality mayor in connection with two cases filed for vandalizing a vehicles of law enforcers and attacking them on Friday night.

Police filed the cases with Sonargaon and Siddhirganj Police Stations accusing at least 250 people.

In separate drives police arrested 22 people including municipality mayor of Kanchan in Rupganj, Abul Basar Badsha, 10 other BNP leaders of Sonargaon, and BNP president of Nasik unit Bablu Prodhan.

Police said on Friday night the BNP men attacked police and vandalised their patrolling car at Tipurdi area of Dhaka-Chittagong Highway and Dhandir bazar area of Noagaon union.Barbed wire fencing with Myanmar planned

Staff Reporter :

The government has undertaken a plan to construct barbed wire fencing along with ring road from Shahpori Island on Bangladesh-Myanmar border in phases aimed at preventing illegal intrusion, crimes, drug smuggling and border-related other criminal activities.

"We will construct 271 kilometer barbed wire fencing along with ring road from Shahpori Island on Bangladesh-Myanmar border in phases aimed at preventing unauthorised infiltration, drug smuggling and border-related criminal activities," Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal said.

He told this in the Jatiya Sangsad, while replying to a starred question from Treasury Bench member M Yeasin Ali of Thakurgaon on Sunday.

The Home Minister said that the barbed wire fencing and ring road is in primary stage, considering keeping the law and order under control in the country.

Also, responding to a question from M Mamunur Rashid Kiron (Noakhali-3), the Minister said the government has taken initiatives to build barbed wire fencing along 271 km road from Shahporir Dwip on Bangladesh-Myanmar border to halt illegal intrusion and drug.

Meanwhile, Asaduzzaman Khan on Sunday told Parliament that the government is taking appropriate steps to bring the attackers of police van under legal action through a proper investigation.

BNP activists recently attacked a prison van and snatched two detained fellowmen from it near High Court area of the capital. Three policemen were also injured as they swooped on the law enforcers guarding the vehicle with sticks, he claimed.

The Home Minister said the attack was carried out from the convoy of BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia who was crossing the area on the way to her Gulshan home from a court at Bakshibazar.

"We've the video footage. We're identifying them (attackers)," he said during a question-answer session in the House.

"It was a sudden attack on police. They poke two rifles and vandalised a prison van," the Minister added.8 CHCPs on

strike suspended

UNB, Dhaka :

Eight community health care providers (CHCPs) including the convener and chief adviser of the central committee of Community Health Care Providers Association were suspended temporally on Saturday night.

Their suspension on the ground of remaining absent from their duties came at a time when the

CHCPs have been staging a hunger strike demanding their job nationalisation. Community Based Health Care (CBHC) Director Dr. Abul Hashem Khan issued the suspension letters assigning their long absence in workplace and influencing the other CHCPs for strike all over the country as reasons. The temporally suspended CHCPs are Md. Sahidul Islam, working at Dohar as well as the convener of the central committee, Md. Kamal Hossain Sarkar of Kapashiya of Gazipur and chief adviser of the committee, Md. Asad Uddin Liton of Sherpur upazila of Bagura, Md. Mohiuddin from Mithamain Upazila of Kisharganj, Salma Yesmin from Kustia Sadar upazilla, Md. Mokammel Haque of Bhola, Sahin Sarkar of Raipura upazila of Narshindhi and Mahmuda Khanam Shimu from Makshedpur upazila of Gopalgang. Md. Sahidul Islam, a suspended health care provider told UNB that "this is the most heinous incident for the CHCPs of Bangladesh." Meanwhile, the hunger strike of CHCPs stepped into four consecutive days on Monday asking for nationalization of their jobs. The strike programme came in sequel to their five days sit-in in front of National Press Club. Some 40 of them fell sick during the strike and five of them were admitted to the Dhaka Medical College Hospital. The striking workers said they will continue the strike till their demand is met.The Undead Archives

I have finally salvaged my pre-Blogger TDR archives and added them into Blogger. They are almost totally in the form of one giant post for each month. And the formatting strayed from the originals. Sorry. But historians everywhere can rejoice that this treasure trove of my thoughts is restored to the world.Richwood, TX (77531)

Today

Rain showers early will evolve into a more steady rain for the afternoon. High 86F. Winds ENE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch..

Tonight

Rain likely. Potential for heavy rainfall. Low 76F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch.If you are looking for the new Immoral Minority posts, you should know that they can be found here at our new home Please stop by to get caught up on politics, join the conversations, or simply check out the new digs.The best bang for your buck! This option enables you to purchase online 24/7 access and receive the Sunday, Tuesday & Thursday print edition at no additional cost * Print edition only available in our carrier delivery area. Allow up to 72 hours for delivery of your print edition to begin. Print edition not available for Day Pass option.More than 400 fintech industry leaders will gather in Dubai, UAE, this month to showcase innovation in the sector, highlighting the future of fintech for the global and regional markets.



Held in partnership with the UAE Ministry of Finance, and showing off the latest products in action as well as boosting the UAE as an international hub for fintech, FinovateMiddleEast will take place on February 26 and 27, at the Madinat Jumierah Conference Centre.



The event will bring together early-stage start-ups, leading established companies, media, financial service institutions and funders drawn by the opportunity to see the future of fintech both regionally and globally, said a statement.



Heather Stowell, vice president of Finovate, a company with a large portfolio of events spanning across the globe, said: We are really excited about bringing together start-ups, leading established companies, media, financial service institutions and funders this month to discuss the future of fintech.



The UAE Ministry of Finance will explore how the region is leading the way in innovation and smart technology and give their perspective on the future of fintech globally, he said.



The events congress will bring together the biggest and best global names in fintech to Dubai including countries such as Australia, China, India, Malaysia, UAE, UK and beyond.



Keynote speakers over the two days will include: Ruth Wandhofer, managing director, global head regulatory and market strategy, Citi; Mike Cunningham, CEO, Clearly; Bryan Stirewalt, managing director, supervision, DFSA; and Sameer Singh Jaini, Fintech Asia top 100 influencer and CEO, Digital Fifth.



Other experts delivering sessions are: Paul Schulte, founder, Schulte Research; Jim Marous, author and publisher, The Financial Brand and the Digital Banking Report; Mark Hewlett, head of commodities, Ebury; Zhi Ying Ng, senior analyst, Forrester; Devie Mohan, CEO, Burnmark; Farrukh Habib, researcher, International Shariah Research Academy for Islamic Finance (ISRA); and Steve Naude, head Middle East and Africa, TransferWise.



Exploring three principal areas in fintech including financial inclusion, emerging technologies (application of AI and Blockchain technology) and how banks and fintechs can work better together, the event will focus on how the UAE is transforming from an oil-dependent economy to one led by fintech.



Other prominent topics throughout the two days will include a case study on an interbank Blockchain pilot featuring India and the UAE, how to reap the benefits from the changing environment in banking, how Malaysia is building a cryptocurrency and how banks and fintechs are working together in India.



Widely recognised as a landmark year for investing in financial technology in the Middle East, 2017 has paved the way for more investment opportunities, acquisitions and partnerships over the next 12 months.



Prominent companies such as EbankIT, munnypot, Dorsum, New Bridge, efigence, Ondot, RISQ, Wealth Migrate and ZagTrader are set to showcase and demonstrating their latest tech and products to delegates on the show floor, it stated.



Additionally, FinovateMiddleEasts signature 7-minute demos will be a core feature of the show with start-ups and established companies delivering live demonstrations of their latest fintech innovations.



With over 40 marketing sponsors, FinovateMiddleEast is supported by strategic partner: the UAE Ministry of Finance; platinum sponsor: UAE Exchange; silver sponsor: Temenos; and bronze sponsors Loxon Solutions, Ortec Finance and Plug & Play.



Finovate has established itself as the leading showcase for fintech innovation around the world, with five locations  New York, Silicon Valley, London, Hong Kong and Dubai.  TradeArabia News ServiceThe UAE government has announced a Dh7 billion ($1.9 billion) housing plan under which 7,200 new residences will be set up for the citizens across all of the emirates within the next three years.



The new plan was adopted at a UAE Cabinet meeting held today (February 4) at the Presidential Palace in Abu Dhabi, under the chairmanship of HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai.

Chairing a cabinet meeting earlier today at the Presidential Palace, HH Sheikh Mohammed said: "HH Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan set the cornerstone and established an integrated housing system in the UAE at the service of the citizens which has been contributing the wellbeing and prosperity of our people."



"Now 80 per cent of Emiratis own their homes which is one of the highest percentages globally," he stated.



"Under the directives of HH Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, we have implemented housing projects in various emirates with the highest standards of quality and sustainability and with careful consideration of the social style of the Emirati family," said Sheikh Mohammed.



The Cabinet also issued a resolution on community green spaces planned for educational institutions, residential complexes and government buildings, in line with the Vision of the UAE 2021 to establish an integrated lifestyle enhanced by outstanding government services, and the development of diverse social and cultural activities in a healthy environment and a rich natural environment.

The announcement comes close on the heels of a Royal Decree issued recently for regulating the sale of lands and houses granted in the emirate.



The decree is aimed at providing residential solutions for the beneficiaries of grants under Mohammed bin Rashid Housing Establishment (MRHE) and their families and help them protect households.



As per the decree, MBRE may permit the beneficiary of the grant, or his legal representative, to sell the house or land granted to him if the beneficiary owns another house or plot of land or if the house does not satisfy his requirements.-TradeArabia News ServiceThe United Arab Emirates has pledged Dh367 million ($100 million) to the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) for the next three years to improve education and learning outcomes of 870 million children and young people in 89 developing countries.

The announcement was made during the Global Partnership for Education Replenishment Conference held on February 1 and 2 in Dakar, the capital of Senegal, in the presence of the presidents of France and Senegal, said a Wam news agency report.

Reem Bint Ibrahim Al Hashimy, Minister of State for International Cooperation, praised the directives of the UAE's wise leadership and its swift response to support education programs in developing countries as well as providing an educational environment for children and young people.

The UAE will take responsibility for ensuring education for children, especially for girls and supporting the UN 2030 Agendas 4th Sustainable Development Goal. The UAE also plays a key role in the excellent work of the Global Partnership for Education and the global leadership that it brings to the education sector.

Reem Al Hashimy said: "This pledge comes in a year where the UAE celebrates the "Year of Zayed", which reflects the fundamentals of wisdom, human development, sustainability and respect. The GPE position of prioritizing the poorest, most vulnerable, and those residing in fragile and conflict-affected countries strikes a particular resonance with the fundamentals of UAE foreign assistance."

By announcing this pledge, the UAE became the first Arab and regional nation to support the Global Partnership for Education, which is a spin-off of one of the World Bank's initiatives; thereby enabling the UAE to fully participate in the GPEs governance structures.

Dubai Cares, part of Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Global Initiatives, which works towards providing access to education for children and young people in developing countries also participated in the conference where it announced its pledge to allocate Dh3.67 million ($1 million) to the Gender Equality portfolio which is part of the GPEs Innovation and Knowledge Exchange Initiative. Dubai Cares was the first foundation in GPEs history to commit funds to GPE at the 2nd Replenishment Conference in 2014.

Julia Gillard, Board Chair of the Global Partnership for Education and former Prime Minister of Australia said: "I am delighted that the United Arab Emirates joined the Global Partnership for Education as its first Arab and Middle East donor. The generous contribution of US$100 million will ensure that millions of marginalized children have a chance to go to school and learn."

The Global Partnership for Education is a multi-stakeholder partnership of developing and donor countries, multilateral agencies, civil society organizations, the private sector and private foundations supporting the education sector in developing countries.Beale & Company, a specialist construction and insurance law firm based in the UK, said it has appointed Scott Lambert as its new partner in the construction team at its Dubai office.



Lambert joins the company from Al Tamimi & Company, one of the largest law firms in the Middle East where he was head of construction and infrastructure. Prior to that Scott was a partner at the well regarded Australian firm Holding Redlich, said the company in a statement.



He brings with him more than 30 years of construction and infrastructure experience to Beale & Company having advised consultants, contractors and developers across a range of disputes and contracts and projects advisory matters including recently a mega mixed use tourist development in Saudi Arabia, a major Dubai rail infrastructure project, a landmark mixed use high rise tower in Dubai and new hotel development for Ras Al Khaimah, it stated.



Lambert is also a regular speaker at industry events for RICS across the GCC.



At Beale & Company he will also continue with his highly regarded breakfast seminar series.



Lambert is a leading lawyer in the adoption of Building Information Modelling (BIM) in construction projects and had recently conducted a full day workshop on BIM at the London FIDIC conference.



Welcoming the appointment, senior partner Antony Smith said: "We are delighted to welcome Lambert to the team in Dubai, strengthening what is already an extremely talented and experienced specialist construction team."



"We look forward to working with him as we continue to enhance our international capability," he added.



Beale & Company is a specialist construction and insurance law firm based in the UK, Ireland and UAE. In the Middle East, our team of partners and dedicated legal consultants advise exclusively on construction and engineering matters in relation to contract and project management, disputes and international arbitration.-TradeArabia News ServiceGulf Stevedoring (GSCCO), part of the Gulftainer group of companies, has recorded a strong performance at the Jubail Container Terminal (JCT) in Saudi Arabia, registering a container volume of over 680,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) in 2017.



JCT also recorded its highest-ever monthly throughput at 79,074 TEUs in August 2017  an impressive 33 per cent hike on July 2017, also one of the terminals best-performing months, said a statement.



With Jubails petrochemical plants now in full production, the ports in the coastal city are experiencing a steady increase in activity, it said.



In November 2017, JCT received the largest container vessel to arrive at Jubail to date with the maiden call of Evergreen Marine Corporations (EMCs) 14,424-TEU EMC Taurus. The 369-metre-long vessel completed 813 container moves on its maiden call, it added.



At a reception held by GSCCO to mark the 2017 milestones, Captain Fahd bin Ahmed Al Amer, director general of the Jubail Commercial Port, congratulated the team on the remarkable feat. The event drew the participation of senior officials from Saudi Customs, Saudi Coast Guard and the Jubail Commercial Port Authority.



Richard James, managing director of GSCCO, said: The milestones we have achieved at JCT are an indication of our commitment to consistently delivering best-in-class performance.



The Jubail port remains a key gateway for incoming and outgoing container traffic in the burgeoning Saudi market, he said.



As we identify new opportunities for growth, we remain focused on engaging our customers and partners as well as governments for long-term impact. We will also continue to invest in new talent and technologies to enhance operational excellence and increase terminal productivity, he added.



In addition to JCT, GSCCO also operates the Jubail Industrial Port (JIP) and the Northern Container Terminal (NCT) in Jeddah. To keep pace with the anticipated growth across its Saudi facilities, GSCCO has deployed three additional rubber-tired gantry (RTG) cranes to boost the capacity of the terminal and maintain its excellent productivity rates, it stated.  TradeArabia News ServiceTurkish exports to the UAE increased 7.53 per cent in 2017, from $2.99 billion in 2016 to $3.21 billion in 2017, as per the latest data released by TiM (Turkish Exporters Assembly).



In the last quarter of 2017, Turkish exports worldwide grew 10.1 percent as compared to the last quarter of 2016, revealed the data.



Top Turkish exports to the UAE include jewellery, chemical industry products, electrical and electronics and service, ready to wear and retail, steel, grain, cereals and its products, automotive, iron and other metals, furniture, paper and forest products and mining products, it said.



Turkeys economy is expected to grow 4.8 per cent annually on average over the next five years, according to analysis in a report from global ratings agency Fitch.



In its report, titled Investment and Demographics Key to EM Growth Potential, Fitch also provided a list of the 10 largest emerging markets in the world, in which Turkey ranked third in its forecast economic growth rate.



The ratings agency suggests that Turkey will see a continued growth in its working-age population over the next five years, supporting GDP growth potential and an impressive rate of capital accumulation per worker.



Already, Turkeys strong demographic lends itself to increased growth and productivity predictions, with half of Turkeys population under the age of 30  working age, or shortly due to become so.



These forecasts follow a record-breaking year for the Turkish Stock Exchange, which reached its highest-ever close on the last working day of 2017, recording 115,333 points - making it one of the top 5 performing markets of the year. This record was then exceeded on the first working day of 2018, recording 117,524 points.



Mehmet Buyukeksi, chairman of the Turkish Exporters Assembly, said: These forecasts from Fitch Ratings are very similar to our own - as we expect to see growth rates of 5.5 per cent over the coming year, driven primarily by industrial production and services.



To be specific, we expect automotive, textile and machinery to be the leading sectors in terms of industrial production and tourism to be the main source of revenue from services. 2017 was a fantastic year for the Turkish economy, with an increase in exports of over 10 per cent, strong increases in GDP across the year, and a record year for Turkish stocks, he said.



All of these factors point to 2018 being a strong year for the country, with exports playing a crucial role as we take the lead as one of the fastest growing economies globally, he added.  TradeArabia News ServiceBadir Program for Technology Incubators and Accelerators, one of the initiatives of King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST), has launched three new technical startups.



The startups all have received logistical and consultancy support from the programme, and obtained the necessary guidance for their growth and development in the local market as well its success in attracting agents and achieving the requirements of the future growth, said a statement.



The list of new applications which was launched at a recent special celebration held at the headquarters of Badir Program in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia included the application of E3MAL, which is an Arab smart phone application that works as a platform for remote work and connects employers with freelancers.



The Jibley application which provides a platform for the delivery of customers' requests from shops, restaurants, pharmacies and others.



The Oxidane application allows easy and quick access to the providers of drinking water delivery service in the kingdom.



Nawaf Al Sahhaf, CEO of Badir Program, said: The new start-up companies have received logistic and advisory support from us and the necessary guidance for their growth and business development in the local market.



The launch of these companies comes within the framework of the huge efforts exerted by King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology, represented by us to present various aspects of support for Saudi innovators and entrepreneurs and provide an environment that motivates them to develop their ideas and turn them into technical projects, he said.



We are very proud of the entrepreneurs' achievements in the three new companies and are extremely pleased that the founders of these companies can prove themselves as successful startups, thanks to the hard work that they have done in developing their business over the past period and reaching this important stage of developing their projects, he added.  TradeArabia News ServiceDu, a leading telecommunications company in the UAE, is providing its postpaid customers with the Samsung Galaxy devices of 2018, the Samsung Galaxy A8 and A8+ with zero per cent upfront.



Starting from only Dh225 ($61.26) per month for 24 months, customers will be able to enjoy an expansive view on the Samsung Galaxy A8 and A8+ with the Infinity Display amongst many features and stay connected with the value added 6GB of data and 300 flexible minutes, said a statement.



Fahad Al Hassawi, deputy CEO, said: At our company, we always promise to add life to life by delivering the latest and most innovative products and services to our customers.



The Samsung Galaxy A8 and A8+ bring flagship design features that carry greater convenience and usability for du customers to use the smartphone in their individual lifestyles. There has been great excitement around Samsungs first model in 2018 and we look forward to delighting and surprising customers with our latest postpaid plan, he added.



With the Samsung Galaxy A8 and A8+, du customers will be able to post and share their stunning photos and selfies that are captured in the brightest and clearest ways. With the Live Focus feature, users can adjust the background blur to take the perfect selfie every time.



The innovative smartphone device has an infinity display with an immersive 18.5:9 display ratio, providing an even wider cinematic viewing experience when streaming videos or downloading and playing games.



With the Samsung Galaxy A8 and A8+, du customers will have greater convenience with the Always On Display, which allows users to view information at a glance without unlocking their phone. Furthermore, the smartphone has some additional exciting features that du customers can enjoy, including Bixby, IP68 water and dust resistance, it stated.  TradeArabia News ServiceDubais Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (Dubai Tourism) has collaborated with two digital tour apps to launch two new free Dubai tours that will help visitors discover and learn more about significant and historic sites and landmarks in the city.



The tours, titled Metro Moments and Al Fahidi Architecture Tour, are available to download for free from the Apple Store and Google Play.



Supported by GPS technology, both tours use audio narrations to guide visitors through Dubai, automatically progressing from one point of interest to the next in real time, depending on the users location, said the statement from Dubai Tourism.



The pre-recorded audio is available in English, Chinese and German and each tour also comes in text form and is accompanied by a map to help with navigation.



Metro Moments is available on Voice Map, an app that uses audio guides and real-time location to direct users towards their next journey of exploration, said the statement.



The tour provides users with information on the different points of interest and attractions that can be found along the Dubai Metro route between Dubai Airport Terminal 3 and The Dubai Mall (moving in both directions).



Al Fahidi Architecture Tour, meanwhile, can be found on the Pocket Guide app, an electronic version of a human tour guide, assisting tourists with their travels in cities around the world.



The tour focuses on introducing users to the rich history and heritage of Dubais popular Al Fahidi District, part of the wider Dubai Historic District. Both apps allow users to download the free tours in advance, helping users avoid roaming charges, said the statement.



Yousuf Lootah, the executive director, Tourism Development and Investments at Dubai Tourism, said: "In accordance with the directives of HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, UAE Vice President and Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, we are continually looking for ways to enhance the visitor experience in Dubai, ensuring it is a city that is accessible for all."



"The launch of these audio tours will help people from all over the world gain an enhanced understanding of Dubai and some of its most historically and culturally important sites. Moving forward, we are working to develop further applications and services that enable visitors to discover more of the citys tourism highlights through smart, convenient and accessible platforms," remarked Lootah.



As well as being highly informative, the audio nature of the two new guides will assist visually-impaired travellers to make the most of their time in the city, and the tours are part of Dubai Tourisms commitment to Dubais People of Determination Initiative, said the top official.



This has been put in place to ensure Dubai becomes an open city for people with disabilities. The launch of the tours is also in line with the emirates Smart City initiative, which aims to streamline and enhance visitor and resident experiences in the city through the provision of innovative digital services, he added.-TradeArabia News Service

By Siddhant Mohan, TwoCircles.net

Akhilesh Yadav, former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh and national president of Samajwadi Party, attended a rally organised by Janwadi Socialist Party, a small political party of the eastern part of the state, in Varanasi on Sunday.

The rally was organised in the memory of Prithviraj Chauhan, a 12th-century king from northern India, and was dominated by the people belonging to Chauhan community. By attending the rally on Sunday, Akhilesh Yadav hinted that he and his party might be interested in a coalition with several small parties in Uttar Pradesh before next general elections in the country.

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Akhilesh Yadav lashed out at the central and the state government  both of which are governed by Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP)  and said the BJP is a shiny and fancy party, which succeeds in luring people to vote but it does not do work on the ground.

Has corruption stopped in Uttar Pradesh or in the country? There is no decline in crime in UP, yet Yogi Adityanath claims to do so every day, added Yadav. Whenever CM Yogi claims that law and order have been restored in the state, we witness one fresh case of loot and robbery.

SPs national president also accused the state government of facing failure in keeping illegal sand mining under check. He also joked on BJPs rhetoric of giving 1.5 million in the bank account of every Indian, Next budget has passed recently and we still do not have that money in our account which BJP promised during 2014 elections.

The rally, however, was organised mainly by the Janwadi Socialist Party, but Samajwadi Party was also playing a key role in managing the crowd. From the Varanasi airport to the rally ground, it was the ground cadre of Samajwadi Party which welcomed Akhilesh Yadav at every place in the way. But rally ground was almost filled with the supporters of Janwadi Socialist Party, and workers and supporters of Samajwadi Party were not allowed to raise their party flags or slogans on the rally ground.

It is indeed a fact that followers of Prithviraj Chauhan follow a soft Hindutva politics, but it has a strong alienation with the ultra-nationalist ideology of BJP. After all, it was Chauhans defeat and death in 1192 CE which many historians have considered as a chapter which led to the Islamic conquest of India. Originally considered to be Rajputs, now the Chauhan community, however, does not only belong to the Rajput section of the society but regardless of whether they are Rajputs or not, they have an emotional link with Prithviraj Chauhan.

With Akhilesh attending a rally in the name of Prithviraj Chauhan, one may get confused that why a socialist leader has been attending such a rally, but Sunil Singh Yadav, Member of Legislative Council and spokesperson of Samajwadi Party gives an insight of what SP is up to. Sunil Singh Yadav said, Samajwadi Party, under the leadership of Akhilesh Yadav, is now trying to reach out to small groups and individuals which do not believe in the kind of politics which BJP does. Akhilesh Yadavs Varanasi visit was one chapter in the same practice.

But for later, we are keeping our chances open for a coalition with all the small groups in Uttar Pradesh and around, added SP Spokesperson.

On the question of whether such practice is a planned approach or arbitrary, Yadav said nothing but he agreed to the fact that party is open to talking with every section in order to defeat Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh.LABOUR MSP, Anas Sarwar revealed this week the extent of institutional racism after he lost the vote to become Scottish Labour Leader. He revealed that a Labour councillor told him that he couldnt vote for him because Scotland wasnt ready for a brown, Muslim Paki. The MSP revealed the comments, made last year during his bid to become Scottish Labour leader to highlight the issue of institutional racism.

The issue of ingrained institutional racism isnt something exclusive to Labour, nor is it something that is exclusive to politics. The very basis of British society is founded on racist ideals and it is something everyone must realise to move forward.

Legitimisation of racial slurs

The past of our society is far from pleasant and the British Empire was fundamentally built on the extraction of resources from other countries to fuel our economic growth at the expense of the local communities. Furthermore, terror was used by our politicians and leaders to subdue any potential uprising within those regions. The Mau Mau Uprising in 1952 being one of those conflicts that highlight the atrocities caused by the Empire. However, the racist violence can be traced further back to the power of the East India Company, a private company with significant political influence who monopolised trade with the British colonies (a law was passed to declare it illegal for anyone else to impede on the monopoly of the East India Company and trade within its controlled territories).

But away from history for a moment, the language and idea behind that statement by the Labour councillor is important. Imagine for one moment that they were talking about a Jew and they had said Scotland wasnt ready for a Jew, suddenly this resonates a different response altogether because people from all sides would be in uproar over anti-Semitism (rightly so), yet the response to the report by The Mirror has been almost non-existent.

Society has allowed Muslim to become a legitimate racial slur, despite the obvious fact that it is merely a description of someones faith. But much like the term Paki was used in the 1960s by the tabloids as a derogatory term for peoples within the colonies, Muslim is slowly becoming the same within the psyche of the British public and its politicians.

This is entirely down to the way politicians use nationalist rhetoric and the press report about those of the Muslim faith and order them to condemn anything bad by their religious counterparts. Whereas if someone such as the Finchley Park Mosque terrorist, Darren Osborne  who was sentenced to life imprisonment on Thursday, where he will have to serve a jail term of a minimum 43 years  those same tabloids dont feel the need to condemn him on behalf of those who are right wing. Right wing and violence are synonymous with each other, the more extreme, the worse it is but importantly their use of language infects the psyche of the public where someones faith can be used as a legitimate racial slur. This idea is not being challenged enough and it is the fault of every politician, political party and media outlet.The last Week In Politics has seen an analysis into the governments right to buy scheme, which accuses them of fuelling the housing crisis, outsourcing giant, Capita, has issued another profit warning and the EU and UK are set to clash over citizens rights in the Brexit transitional period and the EU states agreed and released their guidelines for negotiations.

Meanwhile in the rest of the world has seen Republican Paul Ryan move to suppress the FBI. In the middle east, Trump continues to push the American in agenda against the Palestinians

Housing fire sale and government outsourcing

The Local Government Association released an analysis this week that accused the government of fuelling the housing crisis with its fire sale of council housing.

The Conservatives have spent 3.5 billion subsidising the sale of council houses but have failed to build replacements. The report says that the government have put rocket boosters under right to buy, however, have failed to build like-for-like replacements.

Outsourcing giant Capita, have cut its profit forecast again and plan to reveal 700 million through the issuing of new shares. They have previously issued several profit warnings and new chief executive said the company had become too complex and driven by a short-term focus. The move comes after the collapse of rival, Carillion. This does raise further concerns over government outsourcing as Capita operate Londons congestion charge, the governments Jobseekers Allowance helpline and administers the teachers pension scheme.

Labour MSP, Anas Sarwar, has revealed that he was told by Labour councillor that he couldnt vote for him because Scotland wasnt ready for a brown, Muslim Paki. Highlighting the inherent racism that plagues politics and society.

Brexit

The EU and the UK government look set to clash over rights for EU citizens. The EU have offered a transition period until the end of 2020 that would see the three million EU citizens in Britain retain the same rights until the end of the transitional period.

However, Theresa May has suggested that EU citizens coming into Britain after March next year, wont have the same rights.

Ministers decided not to oppose a Labour motion urging its publication, amid signs they would lose the vote. The leaked study suggests that in three different scenarios the UK economy would grow more slowly than it would if it stayed in the European Union.

The government previously claimed that the document's immediate publication could damage UK negotiations with the EU.

The EU member states agreed in around two minutes their negotiation guidelines for the transitional period. This a stark contrast to the UK government who are plagued by infighting over what kind of Brexit they want. Nonetheless the EU guidelines say:

Transition should run from Brexit in March 2019 to 31 December 2020, all EU rules and regulations - as well as EU rule changes adopted after March 2019 - should apply in the UK during the transition phase, there can be no "cherry picking" on the single market - so free movement into the UK should continue, the UK will not be involved in the decision-making of EU bodies, it cannot implement its own international agreements unless the EU agrees, work should continue on finding a solution to the Northern Ireland border question.

News of the world

Republican House Speaker, Paul Ryan, has called for cleansing of the FBI. He also told republicans that he supported the release of the memo that is critical of the FBI over the Trump-Russia probe. The language used by Ryan is clear in his message that he wants to suppress the truth and control the security services for pro-government propaganda.

However, the FBI are said to be assessing another report that has independently set out similar allegations made in the dossier that detailed Donald Trumps alleged ties to Russia. The political activist and former journalist, Cody Shearer, is being reviewed by the FBI team who are investigating Trump-Russia ties. Despite attempts by the Republicans to suppress the information, it is vital that the investigation isnt stifled or supressed for the sake of improving democratic processes.

On Thursday, Arab foreign ministers called for the creation of a UN-backed "multilateral mechanism" to help revive the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians. The appeal was issued at the end of a two-day meeting to discuss US President Donald Trump's 6 December recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital, which has sparked Arab anger. Furthermore, Trump's decision also to relocate the US embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv triggered deadly clashes in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and was rejected in a non-binding UN General Assembly resolution.THE OCCUPATION of Palestine by Israel has taken a devastating turn in the last few months, but the US have pushed forward their agenda of assisting Israels colonisers to wipe Palestine off the map. The US motive is economic fascism and only see Palestine as opposition to their imperialist genocide. But further attacks on innocent communities by the Israeli forces highlights the increasing disadvantage faced by the Palestinians.

This week has seen Israeli forces shoot dead a teenager then deny that it happened, the UN identified 206 companies that work within illegal Israeli Settlements.

UNRWA have stated that Palestinian refugees face a crisis after the US cuts funding.

Israel continue to devastate Palestinian communities

Tuesday saw Israeli soldiers shoot dead a Palestinian teenager in occupied West Bank. The teenager was named as Laith Abu Naim and was just 16 years of age when he was shot in the head after soldiers stormed the village of Al-Mugheer, which is north of Ramallah. In response to the shooting, hundreds of the villagers marched through chanting we want to live in freedom. A spokesperson for the Israeli military claimed that violent riots were taking place and stones were being thrown at soldiers and even claimed that they werent aware of any Palestinian who was killed.

Even if the former is true, it is only natural an uprising takes place against an invading force, furthermore, throwing stones at fully equipped military further highlights the attacks on innocent peoples by Israel.

On Wednesday, the United Nations (UN) human rights office identified around 206 companies that do business linked to the illegal Israeli settlements in West Bank, where violations against the Palestinians are said to be pervasive and devastating.

The report by the UN states that businesses play a central role in the expansion of Israeli settlements. Much of the companies, 143, are domiciled in Israel or the settlements, a further 22 are located within the US and 19 others are domiciled in other countries. Highlighting the role private companies play in the atrocities caused by Israel against the Palestinians.

US hypocrisy

The US withheld much of its funding from the United Nations Relief and Welfare Agency (UNRWA), subsequently, Palestinians in Syria and Lebanon who rely on this support are facing a profound crisis. Officials have said that the cuts will create an immediate risk to UNRWAs operation and it could be felt within weeks. The withholding of funds by the US also exacerbates existing shortfalls within the agency that is tasked with assisting Palestinian refugees.

On Wednesday, the US put Ismail Haniyeh, the head of Hamas, on its terrorist blacklist. The move will raise tensions already created by the move to declare Jerusalem as Israels capital. "Haniyeh has close links with Hamas' military wing and has been a proponent of armed struggle, including against civilians," the State Department said in a statement.

The move shows an astounding amount of hypocrisy by the US, especially if you consider they are actively aiding and supporting Israels attempted genocide on the Palestinian people.

If you look at the US attempts to overthrow dozens of foreign governments within the last century, their labelling of the Hamas leader as a terrorist is hypocritical at best, but what is worse it is a move to globally discredit the Palestinian opposition to Israels forced displacement of the population and desire to wipe Palestine off the map. Previously, concerns were raised that Palestine could be isolated within the region and could be pushed into a forced peace deal that takes away most of the land that belonged to them before the slow annexation of land by Israel and then some.Single-page applications are everywhere. Even blogs, simple html pages (in the beginning something like https://danluu.com/), have turned into big fat monsters  for example, jlongsters blog has 1206 stars at the moment of writing, and not because of the content (people usually subscribe to blogs rather than star the source): the only reason is that once he implemented it using React & Redux. What is the problem, though? He wants, he makes it, no questions here. The problem is that it is considered normal to make blogs for reading so bloated  of course, there are some people who complain, but the general response is utterly positive. But who cares about blogs  the problem is that nowadays pretty often question is not to SPA or not to SPA, rather which client-side framework should we use for our SPA.

I am a frontend developer, who all his career was involved into creating quite complicated single-page applications (like Lebara Play, or app.contentful.com  you have to have an account to see the actual app, though)  and for a long time the question should be a single-page application did not exist for me: of course it should! But some time ago, at my previous job, my manager came to me asking to investigate our application size  about two years ago we migrated from WordPress to React/Redux/Immutable.js stack (which is a pretty common choice, I guess), and it turned out that average load time increased twice over this time! Alright, maybe it was just our problem, and we are not that good  so I was looking into it for a couple of weeks, and after my research I re-thought a lot in front-end development.

State of the Art

Nowadays a lot of startups, cool companies and personal websites are made using single-page applications  it is pretty common, and nobody is particularly surprised when they dont see a reaload after clicking on a link inside the application.

Lets summarize the experience, starting with the pros:

no page reloads after clicking on the link

with implemented caching subsequent pages open faster, because a lot of info can be already downloaded (like user info, movie details, etc)

granular actions are super fast  like add to the favourites, subscribe to the news; of course, it is not rocket science, so you can sprinkle jQuery here and there, but it is much more complicated to maintain

frontend is decoupled from backend, makes development of complicated features much easier (especially when we need to interact between screens)

possible to create almost native (I think nobody ever felt it, though) experience, with fallbacks if no internet is there

Cons:

broken back button (sometimes it works properly, but in general people dont trust it)

broken open in a new tab behaviour  people like to handle links in onClick handler, and browser cant recognize it as a link (even if the majority of the links are valid, sooner or later youll encounter a non-link link)

handler, and browser cant recognize it as a link (even if the majority of the links are valid, sooner or later youll encounter a non-link link) sometimes broken refresh button  after refreshing you end up in a different UI (usually slightly, but still different)

increased TTI (time to interaction), more on this later

bad performance on low-end devices (and I suspect higher battery consumption, but cant really proof this one)

Why is it slow?

Back to the beginning, where I said we found that WordPress was actually faster than our new shiny stack. Our application was not the most sofisticated, but had some interactive parts  it was a financial website, where you can apply for a loan, go to your personal accout, restructure your loan, and change some personal details. Because it is financial and fully online, we had to collect a lot of data, and it was several forms with live validation, on-the-fly validation and some intrinsic flows, so it made it a perfect case for frontend. However, one problem  it was slow; as I mentioned, load time increased twice. So, I was looking into the reasons why it is so big, and is turned out, the size was basically dictated by our react ecosystem  all libraries we needed created this big chunk of js (around 350KB gzipped). Another big chunk was our actual application code  it was another 350kb, and in total we ended up with ~2.6MB non-gzipped data, which is, of course, insane. It means that no matter how optimized our code is, in order to start the application, a browser has to do several things:

Download this 650KB file Ungzip it Parse it (this task is extremely pricy for mobiles) Execute it (so well have React runtime and our components become interactive)

You can read more on this process in Addys Osmani article.

At the end, my findings were that we owe this time increase to big bundle size. As I mentioned, though, our vendor chunk was half of the size, so it means that basic functionality (we had pretty rich homepage) would require a big chunk already, and can solve the problem only partially.

I have to say that we were modern enough, and in order to help SEO and mobile clients, we had server-side rendering, implemented using Node.js + Express, where we fetched all needed data for the client. And it really helped  the user was able to see the markup (though it does not work on old mobile devices), but the problem is that before the javascript is downloaded, parsed and executed, so React can add event listeners and your page is finally interactive, a lot of time actually passes.

How slow is it?

Lets take a look at actual sizes of the applications. Usually I am logged out, and I have my adblocker enabled.

Airbnb (individual place page)

Bright engineering team, many articles about migration to React. Lets see how is it going, on the typical page of individual place:

A lot of files. Microservices in action...

There are tons of files, and in total it makes it 1.3MB gzipped. Again, 1.3MB to show you a place  pictures and description. Of course, there is a lot of user interaction, but at the end of they day, as a user, I want to look at the place  also I can be logged out. Is it user-friendly? I dont know, but Id be happy with static content to just explore what are requirements, to read description, etc. I am pretty sure that aggressive code-splitting allows them to ship features faster, but the price here is users comfort and speed.

Twitter (regular feed of logged in user)

Just 3 initial files, and 1 later (I guess lazy loading):

init file, 161KB

common file, 249KB

home page file (page splitting!), 65KB

native bundle, 44.5KB (not sure what it is, but it was loaded afterwards)

In total 475KB + 44.5KB for some lazy-loaded file. Much better than AirBnB, but still, a lot of stuff, just to show you feed. There is also a mobile version, which feels much lighter, but the size is actually similar.

Medium (Article about cost of JS)

Medium is a cool platform for blogs. So, essentially, it is an advanced place for texts, similar to one you are reading right now. Lets open an article, which I mentioned before, about cost of JS:

Also 3 files:

main bundle, 337KB

common bundle, 183KB

notes, 22.6 (maybe this amazing functionality to highlight commas)

In total 542KB, just to read an article. You can read it without JS at all, by the way, so it means that it is not that crucial for the main task.

What can be done?

All these websites Ive mentioned load on my latest 15 MBP with stable internet connection for 23 seconds, and become fully usable after another 2 seconds, which is not that bad nowadays. The problem is how normal it has become over the last decade  slack has 0.5s delay between clicking and switching to the channel, and we dont even notice it anymore.

Dont take this rant as an attack on the SPAs itself  I like them (at the end of the day, I write one for my day job!), and they allow to create very powerful user experience, which works across all platforms. However, a lot of things I was working on as a SPA, in fact should not be one. For example, some time ago Ive made a portfolio website to my wife, and of course I did using cool SPA stack  but in fact, it is just a blog with a lot of images and couple of widgets; so Im guilty of this trend more than many.

Also, feel free to take a look at the first CERN website. Just compare navigation speed when you are on this website, and the responsiveness, when you are leaving it to some external, modern one.One of the loudest voices in support of Donald Trump over the last two and a half years has been Steve Bannon, known for his job as head of the right-wing Breitbart News. After Bannon's controversial and critical thoughts about Trump and his administration were revealed in the new book "Fire And Fury," the president has decided to hit back against his former friend.

Trump on Bannon

Back in the summer of 2016, Donald Trump was on his way to becoming the Republican nominee for president, pulling off an upset over 16 other candidates. At this time, Trump's campaign manager, Paul Manafort, was forced to resign after it was revealed he had financial ties to Russia.

Replacing him was Kellyanne Conway, while Steve Bannon was brought on board to serve as campaign CEO. Bannon reportedly wielded much power behind the scenes and was eventually moved into the administration as Chief Strategist. His time there was short-lived, however, as in-fighting with other members of the team, including Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, became too much and Bannon was forced out over the summer. Since then, Bannon appeared to support Trump in public, but threw him under the bus during multiple interview with Michael Wolff for the recently released "Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House" book. Bannon has been losing support from conservatives since the excerpts were released, including big money donor Rebecca Mercer, which Trump highlighted during a January 5 tweet.

The Mercer Family recently dumped the leaker known as Sloppy Steve Bannon. Smart!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 5, 2018

In a tweet on Friday morning, Donald Trump continued his attack on Steve Bannon that started just hours after the book excerpts were released earlier this week. "The Mercer Family recently dumped the leaker known as Sloppy Steve Bannon," Trump tweeted, while adding, "Smart!" Additional reports have confirmed that Breitbart News is now contemplating whether or not they will keep Bannon following the public rift between himself and the commander in chief.

Rebekah Mercer spoke to Trump before severing financial ties with Steve Bannon: Report https://t.co/rHvDkXwc7p pic.twitter.com/Mht5YDW6EX  Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) January 5, 2018

Twitter reaction

After Donald Trump tweeted out about Steve Bannon, it was only a matter of time before his critics lashed out. "Leaker indicates there was truth to what was said.

Liar would mean it was untrue," one tweet read.

American will soon drop the Traitor known as Dotard Donnie Trump!!  Brian Krassenstein (@krassenstein) January 5, 2018

Leaker indicates there was truth to what was said. Liar would mean it was untrue.  James Harkness (@JamGolf3) January 5, 2018

"'Leaker' implies that the stories are *true*. Thanks for confirming this, Colluding Donnie," another tweet added. "You gave him security clearances. You hire the best people," a Twitter user wrote with mockery. "I heard the Mueller family will be adopting him, Smart!" a follow-up tweet wrote.

You put Sloppy Steve Bannon on the National Security Council where he was privy to America's most sensitive secrets. Not smart!  MockHimUp (@MockHimUp) January 5, 2018

Trashing the man who knows where all the bodies are buried. Smart!  Emma Kennedy (@EmmaKennedy) January 5, 2018

Leaker? He is quoted in a book along with just about everyone else in the West Wing.  pat l (@LPatherat) January 5, 2018

"American will soon drop the Traitor known as Dotard Donnie Trump!!" an additional tweet noted. "Trashing the man who knows where all the bodies are buried. Smart!" author Emma Kennedy tweeted. "You put Sloppy Steve Bannon on the National Security Council where he was privy to America's most sensitive secrets. Not smart!" a follow-up post stated.The issue of immigration reform has long been at the top of Donald Trump's political agenda since the day he announced his campaign for president. Since then, Trump has pushed Congress to move forward with his plans, and doubled down on his efforts during his most recent post on social media.

Trump on immigration

Donald Trump created a media frenzy on the floor of Trump Tower back in June 2015 when he announced his plan to run for president. It was during his speech that he received his first round of media backlash after labeling illegal immigrants from Mexico as "rapists" and "murderers." In the months that followed, the former host of "The Apprentice" went on to propose immigration policies that didn't go over well with the majority of the media and his Democratic critics, including the possibility of mass deportation as well as a border wall funded by Mexico.

Since his inauguration last January, Trump has stayed true to his vision on immigration, but has been unable to get anything through Congress despite Republicans holding a majority in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. As seen on his Twitter feed on January 4, Trump thanked Republican leaders for meeting with him on Thursday to discuss the issue.

Thank you to the great Republican Senators who showed up to our mtg on immigration reform. We must BUILD THE WALL, stop illegal immigration, end chain migration & cancel the visa lottery. The current system is unsafe & unfair to the great people of our country - time for change!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 4, 2018

Taking to Twitter on Thursday night, Donald Trump was pleased that he was able to meet with Republican members of the Senate to speak about his plans on immigration, before listing a few items he wants to make law.

"Thank you to the great Republican Senators who showed up to our mtg on immigration reform," Trump tweeted out.

President Trump on Thursday meets with Republican senators in the Roosevelt Room to discuss one of the most urgent issues of the new year: immigration reform https://t.co/BiO46hxVmZ  Axios (@axios) January 4, 2018

"We must BUILD THE WALL, stop illegal immigration, end chain migration & cancel the visa lottery," Donald Trump went on to write.

"The current system is unsafe & unfair to the great people of our country - time for change!" he concluded.

Twitter reaction

In response to Donald Trump's tweet, those who oppose the administration wasted no time pushing back. "Real leaders build bridges, psycho, egomaniacal, unstable, racist maniacs want to build walls!" Bishop Talbert Swan tweeted back.

Ur the kinda guy would get wood watchin' the nukes lifting off Donnie, you're just not fit for office.  martinmcmahon (@williamhboney1) January 4, 2018

Real leaders build bridges, psycho, egomaniacal, unstable, racist maniacs want to build walls!  Bishop Talbert Swan (@TalbertSwan) January 4, 2018

Do you live under a rock?   me.myself.and.i (@NJFarmer312) January 5, 2018

"Ur the kinda guy would get wood watchin' the nukes lifting off Donnie, you're just not fit for office," one tweet read. "Just ordered Fire and Fury, youre the laughing stock of the world!" one Twitter user replied. "Why don't you just go ahead tear down the Statue of Liberty while we're at it?" a tweet read with sarcasm.

Strange to here that words from person who has immigrant wife and even Trumps mom was immigrant too.    (@BODYCONofficial) January 5, 2018

Impressed you know how to spell "Chain Migration" Donnie but wonder why you would want to stop that form of migration. Maybe your base hears the words and thinks it is something bad.  Steve Keller (@SteveKellerNRR) January 5, 2018

Just ordered Fire and Fury, youre the laughing stock of the world!  Rita (@rita_kenyon) January 5, 2018

"Impressed you know how to spell 'Chain Migration' Donnie but wonder why you would want to stop that form of migration.

Maybe your base hears the words and thinks it is something bad," yet another tweet noted. "Strange to hear those words from a person who has an immigrant wife and even Trump's mom was immigrant too," a follow-up tweet stated.After passing their controversial tax cuts, Republicans have been quick to gloat anytime a corporation has announced raises or bonuses for their workers. For House Speaker Paul Ryan, he decided to brag about a local school secretary's pay increase, but it didn't go over well on Twitter.

Ryan's blunder

The Republican tax plan claims to put money back in the pocket of middle class Americans, but critics and Democratic rivals say otherwise. The majority of the benefits of the tax bill are going to the top one percent, with experts predicting that $1.7 trillion will be added to the national debt over the course of the next decade.

While some businesses have announced bonuses and raises, many have remained skeptical as to whether or not the tax bill was the source of the decision. As reported by Mediaite on February 3, House Speaker Paul Ryan came under fire after bringing attention to the modest raise given to school secretary.

Twitter Blows Up After Paul Ryan Hypes Tax Cuts By Highlighting Secretarys $1.50 a Week Pay Increase https://t.co/okU3PZbL3p pic.twitter.com/iEg6ZZEpgh  Mediaite (@Mediaite) February 3, 2018

Taking to Twitter on Saturday morning, Paul Ryan retweeted an article from the Associated Press about the increase in workers' paychecks. "A secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, PA said she was surprised her pay went up $1.50 a week," Ryan wrote, adding, "she said (that) will more than cover her Costco membership for the year." Ryan has since deleted the tweet after facing backlash which went viral across social media.

Instant backlash

As expected, critics of the tax cut were quick to lash out. "I don't know that this is something to tout. A check for $1,000 is a big deal for many people...I understand why elected officials promote that. But $1.50 a week shouldn't be put up as an example," Yashar Ali of New York Magazine tweeted out.

I don't know that this is something to tout. A check for $1,000 is a big deal for many people...I understand why elected officials promote that. But $1.50 a week shouldn't be put up as an example. pic.twitter.com/YeF0yjGKxM  Yashar Ali  (@yashar) February 3, 2018

@PRyan I am a middle class worker in SW Ohio and I didnt see my taxes go down a measly $1.50 per week Paul Ryan touted today ....Republicans raised my taxes and are giving it to their rich donors #Fraudsters  Joshua Birkenhauer (@TheBirkenhauer) February 3, 2018

"A dollar fifty.

A dollar fu**ing fifty. Plant this man in a fu**ing volcano," Drew Magary of Deadspin tweeted. "Youre a horrible person. How much did Lyin Donny profit from this while we should be thankful for $1.50 a week?? Vile demon," a tweet went on to read.

A dollar fifty. A dollar fucking fifty. Plant this man in a fucking volcano. https://t.co/y109lajTAF  Drew Magary (@drewmagary) February 3, 2018

Read this amazing retweet by Brian that Paul Ryan posted and then deleted. Then retweet for all to see. $1.50 per hour raise - Are you kidding me? https://t.co/sRZ10sFgoX  Maxine (@MaxineMikki) February 3, 2018

@SpeakerRyan !! Youre a horrible person. How much did Lyin Donny profit from this while we should be thankful for $1.50 a week?? Vile demon. https://t.co/IwOW63D7Oo  Dan Daniels (@DanDaniels123) February 3, 2018

"I am a middle class worker in SW Ohio and I didnt see my taxes go down a measly $1.50 per week Paul Ryan touted today....Republicans raised my taxes and are giving it to their rich donors," an additional tweet added.

"Just when I thought it was impossible to think any less of Paul Ryan...this. What an epic tool," a follow-up tweet stated. As of press time, neither Ryan nor his office have issued a response to the criticism over the deleted tweet, while Republicans are expected to continue to promote the tax cut.For Hawaii Five-O faithful, a week without the most intrepid crime-fighting force on the planet is a long time. This week, the full team came back to action from the shows brief hiatus last week with the February 2 15th episode for Season 8, He puko a kani aina (A Coral Reef Strengthens Out into Land).

The thrill of cliff diving is interrupted for some youthful enthusiasts by the discovery of the body of a private eye. Steve and Danny (Alex O'Loughlin and Scott Caan) are hoping to get their restaurant on the right track with some help from Uncle Vito (Vincent Pastore).

Danny's uncle can't quite figure out if he is being recruited for a torch job on the place for insurance profits, or equipping it for business, but he takes on the job with a hard-earned sum of $5,000 and heads right in the trouble.

Deep undercover with his new task force, Adam (Ian Anthony Dale) and his new confidential informant, Jessie Nomura (Christine Ko) are making their first move on crime lord, Hideki Tashiro (Aaron Yoo), and a very bold move of their own. The operation doesnt quite go as planned.

Less than 60 seconds

Steve is not quite comfortable with entrusting either the job or the funds with Uncle Vito, and certainly not well-versed in Vitos Jersey humor referring to dead bodies and other illicit matters.

The call comes about the case of deceased private eye Prewitt, just as Steve and Danny are clarifying details of Uncle Vito's duties, and it doesn't take even a minute for the beloved relative to be buying expensive drinks and trusting a blonde in a bikini too much. Before he knows it, Uncle Vito is bound and tied bare naked on his hotel bed, and naturally, the cash is bound for buying more bikinis.

The most intriguing Hawaii Five-O action is initiated by Adam, who boosts the ultra-expensive German car from Tashiro like a pro, right under the boss wicked watch. Adam knows how to use the skills of his life on the dark side to best advantage, and he intends to leave the set up for the heist to Jessie, who returns the car, complete with spare keys, playing her role perfectly to be employed by Tashiro.

Actor Aaron Yoo seems perfect for this villain role, and the interplay between him and Christine Ko is juicy and delicious. She tracks him to a barbershop, where she convinces him that her skills may never be right for the real world, they are perfect for his needs. In turn, Tashiro takes Jessie to his penthouse, plying her with sake, and she passes the test. A problem that no one foresees puts Adam, her, and the operation at risk.

While the team is looking into the cases that Prewitt had on file at the time he died, they come to Micah Kalani, who was once considered a missing person, but no longer. Micahs parents admit to recent troubles with money and employment faced by their son, but a phone message seems to give hope that he may be alive.

Tani (Meaghan Rath) investigates further and finds that the phone message was created by the father, to ease his wife's pain over the situation. He also admits that his son was very distraught after his father refused to give him a large sum of money. The father (Edward Edwards) fears the worst.

A bridge to nowhere

From the first interview with Micah Kalanis wife, Junior (Beulah Koale) notices a purple bead bracelet he is wearing, but his wife knows nothing about it. Tani notices that one of Kalanis photos on social media shows up close friend wearing the same bracelet. That leads her to discover that the bracelets are part of the phony spiritual development course from con man guru, Visha Kandaharu, a.k.a.

Devin Walsh (Daniel Buran).

The journey across the bridge of nothing that is described by Kundaharas book not only cost thousands of dollars for Kalani, it made his friend, Greg Isaacs (Donovan Oakleaf) insane, and now confined to an institution. With Steve and Danny realize that the bridge Isaacs mentions is a fabricated one from Kundahara/Walsh and not an actual one, they trek with the team through the remote jungle to snatch him.

The charlatans followers are not just quiet peaceniks, but an armed militia and the team faces a swarm of rifles before a shot to one of the devoted brings a dose of reality. Walsh is in custody and is informed that three of his disciples have flipped on him, so he is sure to serve prison time.

With Kamekona (Taylor Wily) coming to his rescue, Uncle Vito is able to come through with equipment for Danny and Steve, much to their delight, except for a pricey statue of Adonis. No telling what interest Kamekona will charge for this one.

A huge kink comes to Adam and Jessie's plan when Tashiros men are called to inspect his car for bugs of surveillance. Adam intercepts at the last second, putting a gun to one henchmans head. Just when he calls Jessie to let her know that things are under control, a goon dressed in black fires a laser-shock straight at Adam, and he falls. He comes to consciousness stunned and confused, as well as bound. He screams from a storage trailer, left in the jungle.

How will Jessie manage on her own, savvy as she is?

Good news came in November that Hawaii Five-O will have 24 episodes confirmed for this season, but that still means there are just nine more to go. Savor all the ohana and action while its here for the taking.

Hawaii Five-O returns with new episodes on March 2, according to previews. The team will face a not a drill nuclear threat, much like the one in recent news headlines.Arab refugees and Germans carrying pro-immigrant and anti-fascism placards marched in Cottbus on Saturday to denounce what they say are attempts by far-right groups to stoke tension in the eastern city after two knife attacks by Syrian teenagers. As Reuters writes in an article "Arab refugees march in German city hit by far-right protests", police beefed up security in the city of 100,000 near the Polish border, where the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) beat Chancellor Angela Merkels conservatives in an election last year by appealing to voters angry with her decision in 2015 to welcome more than a million asylum seekers.

We want to stop this hate between Germans and Arab refugees, said Ahmad al-Barqouni, a 28-year-old Syrian student, marching through the city with around 1,500 other people. Some people made mistakes but not everyone should pay the price for it, he added, referring to the knife attacks. Last month, two Syrian teenagers injured a 16-year-old German boy with a knife and a group of three Syrians aged under 17 threatened a German couple with a knife outside a mall in Cottbus. The attacks prompted almost weekly demonstrations by residents opposed to more migrants arriving in Cottbus. The interior ministry of Brandenburg, the federal state in which Cottbus lies, stopped sending refugees to the city last month.

We are here to make a clear stance against a rightist hate campaign, said Lea Bunke, a 25-year-old German student at the first march, adding that the knife attacks by Syrian teenagers did not justify demands by some residents that all refugees leave the city. She said Cottbus residents should be more alarmed by a rise in xenophobic attacks against refugees.

Anxiety

Anxiety about immigration is high in Cottbus, as in many eastern regions in Germany, where older generations grew up under communism, having little contact with foreigners.

Hans-Christoph Berndt, leader of Zukunft Heimat or Future Homeland, an umbrella group that has been organizing anti-immigrant protests, said his supporters were protesting against the governments immigration policy, not against migrants.

The media have been misrepresenting us, Berndt said. We are protesting against the decision to welcome everyone. There arent enough police, not enough kindergarten places and not enough teachers. We are demanding that Merkel step down.

Police on Wednesday arrested six members of the far-right National Democratic Party (NPD) - which Germanys Constitutional Court last year said resembled Adolf Hitlers Nazi party - who were handing out tear gas and flyers to Cottbus residents.

The citys technical university draws hundreds of international students each year, and the influx of foreigners and refugees has prevented the population from shrinking below 100,000 from about 145,000 on the eve of German reunification in 1990.Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron discussed Turkeys ongoing Operation Olive Branch in Syrias northwestern region of Afrin over the phone, Trend reported citing Turkish media.

Erdogan and Macron also exchanged views on bilateral relations and on the outcome of the Syrian National Dialogue Congress held in the Russian coastal city of Sochi this past week.

Erdogan shared information about Operation Olive Branch and informed Macron about the cross-border rocket attacks perpetrated by the terrorist PYD/PKK oraganization on Turkey's bordering Hatay and Kilis provinces.

During the conversation, Erdogan said Turkey does not have any design on any countrys territory and added the operation was aimed at clearing PYD/PKK, YPG and Daesh terrorists from Afrin. The leaders agreed to keep close contact oreagarding regional issues, particularly on the political process in Syria.Iran Coast Guard has seized early Sunday four trespassing Indian fishing boats with 22 crew on board in the southern end of Arvand waterway near Abadan port, southwest of Iran, Mehr news agency reported.

Commander of Abadan Coast Guard, Mohammad Ali Mousivand, said early Sunday that four Indian fishing boats that had trespassed into the Iranian territorial waters in Arvand waterway were seized by the coast guard forces for illegal fishing, and all 22 crew members were arrested.Governor of the Krasnodar Territory Veniamin Kondratiev said that over 140 foreign companies have already confirmed their participation in the Russian Investment Forum (RIF).

"In total, around 4 thousand people are expected to attend the forum, including representatives of Russian and foreign businesses, over 140 foreign companies, heads of subjects of the Russian Federation, experts and journalists," he said.Irans President Hassan Rouhani criticized Washingtons shameless hypocrisy in talking about world peace all the while threatening other countries with its new nuclear arsenal, Mehr news agency reported.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani made the remarks on Sunday via a video conference broadcasting live at the unveiling ceremony of ten cultural centers and museums dedicated to the Sacred Defense in ten provinces across the country. In todays world, everyone is threatening everyone. It seems quite far-fetched that the world would come to a point in years to come where no country would be waging wars against another, President Rouhani said, while stressing the need to revamp the countrys defense capabilities in a bid to nullify threats against the Iranian nation.

Rouhani then made an implicit reference to the Nuclear Posture Review which mostly focuses on countering Russia, slamming Washington for being so shameless in threatening Moscow with nuclear weapons. The [Americans] who believe that the use of weapons of mass destruction is a crime against humanity and have pushed for the annihilation of all nuclear weapons in the world, are now ironically engaged in an arms race to revamp their nuclear arsenal to use it against their rivals, Rouhani added.

Under such circumstances, is it really feasible for a nation to say that now is the time of peace, friendship and peaceful coexistence and therefore, there will be no need for defense power?, said Rouhani, adding that Iran will always be in need of boosting its defense power against outside threats.The Syrian Special Forces are conducting a military operation in the area, where the day before a Russian Su-25 was shot down by the Tahrir al-Sham terrorist group, killing its pilot.

"The [Russian] air forces destroyed the [terrorist] unit, which fired the MANPADs, ... at the present moment the Syrian Special Forces are working in the area. And if the elements of this MANPAD are found, then by their manufacture numbers and by origin, in the nearest future we will know where these MANPADs came from," Russian government party member Viktor Vodolatsky stated, citing his sources, Sputnik reports.

According to the lawmaker, the Russian air defense are maintaining close air-support for the offensive.

The operation takes place after the Tahrir al-Sham terrorist group, which includes Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (previously known as al-Nusra Front) terror organization, on February 3 shot down a Russian Su-25 aircraft using a handheld anti-aircraft missile while it was flying over the Idlib de-escalation zone in Syria. The pilot of the jet fighter managed to eject himself from the plane, but was killed by the militants in a subsequent fight.

The Russian side promptly responded to the attack, conducting a high-precision missile strike in an area controlled by the terrorists, killing some 30 of them.

Tahrir al-Sham has claimed responsility for the downing, releasing a post on social media quoting their commander in charge, saying that one of their militants had hit a Russian SU-25 during an "air raid" over the city of Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib.HCM CITY  Shares of the State-owned Viet Nam Rubber Group (VRG) fetched an average of VN13,011 (US$ 58 cents) as its initial public offering went undersubcribed yesterday, according to the HCM City Stock Exchange.

The price was not much higher than the initial price of VN13,000 VRG had set in the auction for selling its 475 million shares, equivalent to 11.88 per cent of its equity.

The highest bid was VN20,800 and the lowest, VN13,000.

Only 100,762,400 shares, or 21 per cent of the shares offered, were bought by 462 individuals and 36 institutional investors.

Data from the bourse shows only 33 foreign investors had registered to bid.

The group raised around VN1.3 trillion from the auction, well below its expectation of VN6.2 trillion.

The IPO was undersubscribed though VRG has been reporting profits since 2016 and has advantages like possessing 300,000ha of rubber plantations in Viet Nam and 120,000ha in Laos and Cambodia.

According to some analysts, VRG shares failed to attract foreign interest due to its stringent requirements.

For instance, strategic partners had to have a charter capital of at least VN5 trillion in case of financial institutions and at least VN1 trillion in case of others. They are also required to retain their stakes for at least five years.

Besides, the fact that the Government still owns 75 per cent of VRG was also a deterrent for them.

After the IPO, the group plans to sell another 475 million shares to strategic investors, around 50 million shares to its employees at a discount and 831,000 shares to its trade union.

It will list on UPCoM on April 1 and later on the HCM Stock Exchange.  VNSHA NOI  With the urban green growth development plan to 2030 recently approved by Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Viet Nam is hastening the transformation of its urban economic growth model towards green growth and climate change adaptation.

Nguyen Tuong Van, director of the Urban Development Agency under the Ministry of Construction, said that more studies on urban development strategies and technical infrastructure to meet green growth demand and climate change adaptation would be carried out for adjustments in urban planning.

Van said that the development of urban green growth aimed to enhance living quality, save energy and reduce emissions which would help boost economic growth and at the same time ease impacts on the environment towards sustainable development.

Under the plan approved on January 19, 23 cities and towns would be the first to pilot the development of urban green growth.

These locations included Bac Kan, Yen Bai, Phu Ly, Sa Pa, Ha Long, Sam Son, Hue, Hoi An, Tam Ky, Vung Tau, a Lat, Buon Ma Thuot, Tra Vinh, Soc Trang and Ben Tre.

In early January, the ministry issued a circular regulating criteria for green growth urban development.

According to Tran Quoc Thai, deputy director of the Urban Development Agency, many cities and towns paid attention to the transformation of the urban growth model toward green growth and gearing up efforts to promote green growth urban development.

Some had already issued their own strategies for green growth and climate change adaptation such as Hai Phong and Can Tho and some were underway such as a Nang, Bac Ninh and Tam Ky, Thai pointed out.

He said that urban green growth was still a new thing in Viet Nam, thus, many localities faced difficulties.

There was no common urban green growth model applicable for all cities and towns, he said, adding that each locality must have a comprehensive evaluation of their urban development to map out their own strategies and roadmaps appropriate to their socio-economic conditions.  VNSAs humans destroy forests and other places where wild animals live, those creatures are dying out.

Many types of animals have already gone now forever and many more are on their way to becoming extinct.

Luckily for some animals, there are people who work very hard to save them.

Two such people are Nguyen Thi Thu Hien and Tilo Nadler who work with animals in the Cuc Phuong National Park.

By Le Huong & Hong Van

A bright morning and the sun sends fragile rays through layers of leaves in Cuc Phuong National Park in the northern province of Ninh Binh.

The twittering of birds and chattering monkeys is a natural alarm for staff at the Endangered Primate Rescue Centre (EPRC).

Two attendants slowly walk on the path between the trees and cages of primates that need special cares. They talk about the monkeys they put geographical positioning rings on yesterday. They will release them back into the wild in few days.

For the past 20 years, Nguyen Thi Thu Hien and Tilo Nadler have enjoyed the start of each day walking round the centre.

Nadler first went to Cuc Phuong in 1991 to make a report for German TV on Delacours langur  one of the worlds rarest primates, which was discovered by a French expedition in 1930, based on two skins from a local hunter.

After more than 50 years without any information about this primate, in 1987 the first living individuals were seen in the national park. Nadler sent a project proposal to Frankfurt Zoological Society for conservation work and research.

In January 1993, he started the primate centre in Cuc Phuong. It was the first in Indochina.

The first goal of the centre was to provide housing for trapped or injured primates, he said, This work not only help the animals, but supports the work of rangers and forest protection authorities through the whole country.

Nadler said the knowledge about the status of many primate species in the early days was poor, the numbers of the rarest species over-estimated and the problems and survival of populations in the wild completely under-estimated.

It was often very difficult to convince forest protection authorities and police to support conservation activities, he said, With correct and stricter law enforcement, the numbers of confiscations increase, requiring us to intensify fund-raising activities abroad and to hire more staff.

With better knowledge, we recognised that several species were already on the brink of extinction. Therefore the goal of the centre concentrated not only on rescuing monkeys, but building a breeding centre to re-introduce animals back into the wild to bolster depleted wild populations or to establish a new population where they had been wiped out, he said.

The centre runs a successful breeding programmes for some of the worlds rarest primate species  the Cat Ba langur, Delacours langur, Grey-shanked douc langur, Hatinh langur and other highly endangered species. It now keeps 15 Vietnamese primate species, six of them survive only at the centre.

More than 200 primates have been born at the centre and reintroduction programmes carried out for Delacours and Ha Tinh langurs, Pygmy and Slow lorises.

The centre also carries out education programme and research activities. More than 20 Master and PhD theses are produced in co-operation with universities in Viet Nam and abroad. This has led to the publication of more than 100 scientific papers.

Nadler has not only found success in preserving primates, he found his family in Viet Nam as well.

With Hien, his assistant at the beginning of the project, Nadler has set up a happy family and now has two sons.

Yet their marriage has not been as easy as running the centre due to the 31-year-gap in their ages.

My parents and relatives did not agree until my father retired and my relatives found a letter written by my grandfather predicting that I would get married to a foreigner, Hien said.

In the year 2,000, they married in a simple ceremony in Dresden, Germany, following an engagement ceremony in Viet Nam.

"My two sons love painting," she said. "It is a talent inherited from their fathers family. They also enjoy studying nature.

On our holidays, we often visit forests and parks in Viet Nam, Thailand and other neighbouring countries to explore nature, she said.

Since 2016, Nadler and Hien have gradually transferred part of their tasks to other colleagues at the centre.

The centre now has 28 staff, a communications specialist, a volunteer co-ordinator, a foreign head keeper and one director. The main financial sources are from international organisations and zoos.

The difference between conservation work in Germany and Viet Nam is that in Germany it is funded by the government and national donors, such as companies and institutions, said Nadler, While in Viet Nam, the biggest financial source for conservation work in Viet Nam comes from abroad.

The director of the centre, Sonya Prosser, said she thought Nadler had achieved a lot. Without his work, the Delacours langur would most probably be extinct. He had the foresight to breed the animals he rescued, where most rescue centres do not.

This work is important for these species as it provides biologists with opportunities to study to animals, which better equips them for conserving the animals.

It also creates a population for re-introduction into empty areas. I think the centre, under Nadlers management provided a great source of data for researchers in many fields over its 23 years of operation, she said.

She believes now is the time for Vietnamese people to feel a sense of ownership of the EPRC.

Nadler has been caring for it, but its time for the Vietnamese people to own it, she said, This means taking responsibilities for what is happening to local wildlife.

Prosser suggested the centre generate its own running costs. Leipzig Zoo is a great support, financially - and also in attempting to reach a similar vision.

If the centre can cover its own running costs, then all additional donations or support can go directly towards education, research, re-introduction programmes. Current staff will be given opportunities to develop a career path if they desire, which in turn will grow the centres capacity.  VNS





GLOSSARY

A bright morning and the sun sends fragile rays through layers of leaves in Cuc Phuong National Park in the northern province of Ninh Binh.

If something is fragile it can break easily.

Two attendants slowly walk on the path between the trees and cages of primates that need special cares.

Primates are creatures with hands and feet as well as well-developed brains. Humans, chimpanzees, monkeys, lemurs and gorillas are all primates.

They talk about the monkeys they put geographical positioning rings on yesterday.

Geological positioning rings are rings that are attached to creatures that scientists study, which give off a signal that make it possible for the scientist to see where they are.

Nadler first went to Cuc Phuong in 1991 to make a report for German TV on Delacours langur  one of the worlds rarest primates, which was discovered by a French expedition in 1930, based on two skins from a local hunter.

If something, like the Delacours langur is rare, there are not many of them. If they are the rarest primate, there are fewer of them than there are of any other primate.

Nadler sent a project proposal to Frankfurt Zoological Society for conservation work and research.

A proposal is an idea that is put forward to someone in the hope that they will do something about it.

Conservation means keeping things, such as natural resources, alive and well and not killing them to the point that they no longer exist.

Nadler said the knowledge about the status of many primate species in the early days was poor, the numbers of the rarest species over-estimated and the problems and survival of populations in the wild completely under-estimated.

The status of a creature is its situation in terms of how many there are around, how comfortable it is in its environment and so on.

When you under-estimate something, you do not think it is as strong as it actually is.

It was often very difficult to convince forest protection authorities and police to support conservation activities, he said, With correct and stricter law enforcement, the numbers of confiscations increase, requiring us to intensify fund-raising activities abroad and to hire more staff.

To convince somebody of something means to get them to think about it in the way you would want them to think about it.

When confiscations happen, things people have that they are not supposed to have are taken away from them.

To intensify fund-raising means to do more of it and work harder at it.

With better knowledge, we recognised that several species were already on the brink of extinction.

If an animal is on the brink of extinction it is very close to becoming extinct, which means there will be none of its kind left and it will be gone forever.

Therefore the goal of the centre concentrated not only on rescuing monkeys, but building a breeding centre to re-introduce animals back into the wild to bolster depleted wild populations or to establish a new population where they had been wiped out, he said.

Concentrated means focussed

To bolster means to support.

Depleted populations are numbers of animals that have gone down.

More than 200 primates have been born at the centre and reintroduction programmes carried out for Delacours and Ha Tinh langurs, Pygmy and Slow lorises.

When animals are reintroduced to the wild they are taken from captivity to once again live in the wild where they once came from.

Nadler has not only found success in preserving primates, he found his family in Viet Nam as well.

Preserving primates means keeping them alive.

My parents and relatives did not agree until my father retired and my relatives found a letter written by my grandfather predicting that I would get married to a foreigner, Hien said.

To predict means to say what will happen sometime in the future.

In the year 2,000, they married in a simple ceremony in Dresden, Germany, following an engagement ceremony in Viet Nam.

An engagement is a statement that says two people wish to get married.

"It is a talent inherited from their fathers family. They also enjoy studying nature.

A talent is a natural skill.

Things that people inherit are characteristics and possessions handed down from previous generations, such as their parents, grandparents and so on.

Since 2016, Nadler and Hien have gradually transferred part of their tasks to other colleagues at the centre.

To transfer something means to send it from one place to another place.

Tasks are jobs and duties.

The centre now has 28 staff, a communications specialist, a volunteer co-ordinator, a foreign head keeper and one director.

A communications specialist is someone with skills to get messages across from one person to another.

A volunteer is someone who works willingly for no pay. A volunteer co-ordinator is someone who organises volunteers.

The main financial sources are from international organisations and zoos.

Financial sources are places where money come from.

The difference between conservation work in Germany and Viet Nam is that in Germany it is funded by the government and national donors, such as companies and institutions, said Nadler, While in Viet Nam, the biggest financial source for conservation work in Viet Nam comes from abroad.

Donors are people who give.

He had the foresight to breed the animals he rescued, where most rescue centres do not.

To have foresight means to see and think about what will happen in the future.

When creatures breed, they have babies.

This work is important for these species as it provides biologists with opportunities to study to animals, which better equips them for conserving the animals.

A species is a type of animal.

I think the centre, under Nadlers management provided a great source of data for researchers in many fields over its 23 years of operation, she said.

Data means information that is collected.

Nadler has been caring for it, but its time for the Vietnamese people to own it, she said, This means taking responsibilities for what is happening to local wildlife.

Taking responsibility for something means accepting that it is your duty.

WORKSHEET

State whether the following sentences are true, or false:

Nguyen Thi Thu Hien and Tilo Nadler have worked in the sanctuary in the Cuc Phuong National Park for two decades. Delacours langur was discovered by a German expedition in 1930. The primate centre in Cuc Phuong National Park was the very first in Indo China. Nguyen Thi Thu Hien and Tilo Nadler are 13 years apart in age. The Hatinh langur is one of the worlds rarest types of primates.

 Duncan Guy/Learn the News/ Viet Nam News 2018HCM CITY  Navigos Search and the Hanoi College for Electro-mechanics on February 2 officially signed a memorandum of understanding to train soft skills for lecturers and students.

The co-operation will facilitate useful training programs for students, such as resume writing and job interview skills.

For lecturers, the executive search firm Navigos Search will provide separate training programs on these skills so that the lecturers can then train students in the these courses.

The training courses for students are expected to start in the first quarter of 2018 to support the students who will graduate this year.

These training programs will be conducted by the experienced recruitment consultants of Navigos Search. VNSTOKYO  Vietnamese Ambassador to Japan Nguyen Quoc Cuong has urged Japans law enforcement agencies to soon conclude investigations into the death of ten-year-old Vietnamese girl Le Thi Nhat Linh, and bring the suspect to trial.

At a meeting with Shigeki Takizaki, Director General of the Southeast and Southwest Asian Affairs Department under Japans Ministry of Foreign Affairs, last Friday, Cuong said Linhs family is collecting signatures at home and abroad to appeal to the Chiba prefecture court to sentence the culprit to death.

In reply, Takizaki again expressed his deep sympathy to Linhs family and informed the ambassador that during a reception for Japanese State Minister for Foreign Affairs Kazuyuki Nakane on January 30, Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh also asked the Japanese side to promptly bring the case to trial.

The Japanese Foreign Ministry then had a working session with the Ministry of Justice on the issue. According to the Justice Ministry, Japans law enforcement agencies are urgently preparing procedures for the trial to take place soon.

Takizaki further explained the judicial independence in Japans Constitution, noting his hope for an early trial and that the culprit would receive deserved punishment.

The same day, Ambassador Cuong visited Linhs family in Chiba Prefecture and affirmed that the Vietnamese Embassy would continue to protect the interests of the family.

On March 24, 2017, Linh, a third-year grader at the elementary school in Matsudo, went missing after she left home in Matsudo to go to school. Two days later, she was found dead without clothes at a site near a drainage ditch about 12km from the school.

Police believed Linh was kidnapped after leaving home at 8am on March 24.

Japan arrested Yasumasa Shibuya, 46, a suspect in the murder, on April 14. Chiba police made the arrest after his DNA matched a DNA sample found on Linhs belongings.

Prosecutors of Japans Chiba prefecture on May 26 decided to prosecute Shibuya for murder.  VNSHA NOI  Thousands of poor people and the elderly in 23 communes in Thach That District, Ha Noi, were provided Tet gifts, along with free medical checkups and treatment, as part of a humanitarian programme last weekend.

Through the local Red Cross, the programme delivered 1,000 gift packages, worth VN500,000 (US$22.2) to poor households in 23 communes, along with 50 motorbikes to poor students in Thach That district.

The programme also provided free medical checkups and health consultations to nearly 500 elderly people and poor families in the area.

It also organised performances, screenings of documentary films, socio-cultural reports on Thach That region and the land of oai.

The charity programme was organised by the Ha Noi Red Cross Society, in collaboration with the Peoples Committee of Thach That district and the Xu oai May Trang Company. VNSNguyen Truong

The Le family have been living in Tien Luc Commune for more than 200 years. They are not only one of the biggest families, but also one of the biggest blood donating groups in the locality.

When we donate blood, we take more than what we give. We get a free health check, our family bonds are strengthened and we also enjoy the reward helping others in need, Le Van Phung, a member of the family, said.

Unfortunate incidents can happen to anyone at any time. For many people, the line between life and death becomes very thin and all that they desperately need is blood. By donating blood, we can save their lives, said Phung.

There are four families in Tien Luc who are frequent donors - the Le, Nguyen Van, Nguyen inh and Tran Van. Each family donates a total of about 50 units of blood (each equivalent to 250ml) every year. In 2017, the whole commune donated a total of 203 units.

Phung said family meetings, reunions, funerals and ancestor commemoration were chosen for "communication work" as he describes blood donations.

In rural areas, it is customary for families to hold a year-end meeting to sum up the achievements for the 12 months, including childrens studies or the construction of a commemoration structure for the whole family.

In recent years, reports on blood donations have also become part of discussion and frequent blood donors are honoured.

The Le family is one of the biggest families in the region with more than 300 households. The family started donating blood eight years ago.

Initially people had little understanding about blood donations. Locals thought that by donating blood they would lose the nutrients in their body, Phung said.

First: Tran Van o (standing, centre) from Hiep Hoa district is a pioneer blood donor.  Photo nihbt.org.vn

It was a common belief that a drop of blood was equivalent to nutrients contained in six bowls of rice.

Phung joined the communes Red Cross group and tried to change this perception through research and reading newspapers. He found out that blood donations did not harm the donors health, but they did help save other peoples lives.

He first encouraged his own small wife and children to donate blood. They were all excited about the idea. Blood donation became a topic of discussion in his family and the spirit spread quickly to other relations.

Nguyen inh Lam from the commune still vividly remembers first donating blood in 2008 while attending a training class in Bac Giang city. At the beginning, he felt a bit worried and unsure, yet after the volunteers explained, he joined in. After donating blood, he felt "more healthy and refreshed" because he felt glad that his blood would be used to save other people.

Lam has donated blood twice a year for more than eight years. Apart from Lam, English teacher Nguyen inh Phuc has also donated blood regularly since 2005.

Lam said that people in his big family donated blood in the hope of saving people in need. "When we meet at the end of the year, blood donors are honoured. This is a big motivation for us.

According to Le Van Tien, head of Tien Luc communes Red Cross, there is even a competition between four of the big families to see which can donate the most. All want to have the honour.

We are proud of families that have many blood donors because it means that the family is healthy. The locals here donate blood voluntarily. Every time they go, the clan rents a car for them to travel to the blood collection location. They use "attendance money" they received to hold small party together, said Tien.

Tran Van o from Hiep Hoa District in Bac Giang Province, an exemplary blood donor, was one of the first to help.

In 2006, this mountainous district with a population of only 200,000 had a total of 256 units of blood in storage.

It was hard at first, as the perception of locals on blood donation was generally negative. Many leaders didnt encourage their staff to donate blood, some families would not encourage their children, said o.

Yet o was determined to change the perspective. He asked the local authority to hold training classes with trainers from the Institute of Haematology and Blood Transfusion to raise awareness of local people and civil servants. He also went to communes to talk to locals and give them advice.

Since 2011, the amount of blood donated in Hiep Hoa has leapt to an average of 1,600 units per year.

Hiep Hoa has a high number of blood donors and o played an important role in this achievement, said Ma Thi Thin Nga, head of the provincial Red Cross.  VNSColonel Tran Minh Son, alias Bay Son, former deputy commander of the campaign and chief of staff of liberation commando forces in Sai Gon-Gia inh.  VNA/VNS Photo Thanh Chung

Viet Nam News Hoang Tuyet It has been 50 years since the night of January 31, 1968, when Sai Gon  former name of Ho Chi Minh City  was rocked by a series of attacks by South Viet Nam liberation forces during the Tet Mau Than Offensive. Among which, perhaps none was more memorable than the attack on the US Embassy. Images of the embassy under siege sent shockwaves around the world and discredited claims carefully crafted by the Johnson administration to mislead the US public that the Viet Nam War was coming to a quick conclusion. The offensive spurred anti-war movements in the US. On November 15, 1969, the largest war protest in US history took place in Washington, with half a million people in attendance. On January 27, 1973, the historic Paris Peace Accords were signed to end Americas direct combat role and to restore peace in Viet Nam. Colonel Tran Minh Son, alias Bay Son, former deputy commander of the campaign and chief of staff of liberation commando forces in Sai Gon-Gia inh, recalled his memories of the attacks. The embassy was not one of our original targets, said Bay Son. The attack on the embassy was added to the plan after a direct order from Sai Gon-Gia inh regions party secretary Sau Dan. Sau Dan was a alias of Vo Van Kiet, who later became Viet Nams Prime Minister in 1991. As the team were going over the battle plan, Sau Dan asked them why the US embassy wasnt on the attack list. Our original plan included the Presidential Palace, the Police Headquarters, TV and radio stations, Chi Hoa Prison and other important targets across the city. Given our numbers, we were already at our limit. There were simply not enough fighters to attack the embassy, Bay Son said. Secretary Sau Dan insisted the US embassy must be one of our targets. He said we may as well sit out of the Tet 1968 Offensive if we were not going to attack the embassy.

Scene outside of the US embassy in Sai Gon during the Tet Offensive.  Photo US Army Military History Institute

Its noteworthy to mention that while generally known as commandos, a notion made popular in post-war era by popular Vietnamese motion pictures such as Sai Gon Commandos, they were not all soldiers. It is perhaps more accurate to refer to some of them as infiltrators as many were carrying out spy missions and other non-combat tasks and received little to no training in direct combat.

But they had their orders. Bay Son was able to put together a team of 16 led by Ngo Thanh Van, alias Ba en. Among them were ten clerks working at the headquarters. They had five days to train with weapons and to come up with an attack plan on one of the most protected targets in the city.

In spite of their inexperience with weapons, they all volunteered for the mission. We named them Unit 11, Bay Son recalled.

Bay Son had another conversation with Unit 11 over tea and fruit preserves. Sixteen members of the unit were celebrating Tet (Lunar New Year) early. It was, after all, a very dangerous mission and they knew that many will not live to see the end of the holidays.

There was a boy, Vinh, 17. He was our youngest. Vinh was talking about going back home to get married after this mission, Bay Son said.

I asked them how ready they were for the mission. Vinh told me not to worry as they were all aware of how dangerous it was and that they were ready to fight to the bitter end.

In the early hours of January 31, the liberation fighters simultaneously attacked major US forces command and control centres across the city. All of the attacks were quickly repelled due to the superior US firepower and their heavily fortified defenses.

But Unit 11 broke through. The commandos entered the embassy compound through a hole in the wall, blown open by an explosive charge. What followed was a deadly and bloody attacks and counter attacks inside the compound that lasted for seven hours.

By the time the siege lifted, 15 members of Unit 11 had been killed and their commander Ba en taken prisoner. Bay Son learned of the news on the radio. Vinh was among the dead. The young boy never made it home to his fiancee.

They all knew the risks and were ready to fight for national cause. That much I know, but my heart ached when their families came to me and asked where their sons were, Bay Son said.

At the age of 92, Bay Sons biggest regret was he never knew the real names of all Unit 11 members.

We all had our alias. I was Seven, they were Five and Eight and Four. Nobody knew each others real names or where they came from.

After the war, Bay Son spent his years looking for the identities and collecting the remains of the fallen soldiers from Sai Gon battles during the Tet Offensive. It wasnt an easy task. The secretive nature of their work and the chaos of the 20-year-long conflict made it impossible to track them all.

Its a debt I will have to carry to the grave," said the veteran. A tear ran down the cheek of the combat-hardened commando.  VNA/VNSHavana Times Reaches 8th Birthday

By Circles Robinson, editor

https://www.havanatimes.org/?page_id=571

HAVANA TIMES  Dear readers, today weve reached eight years of bringing you our open-minded writing from and about Cuba. Most of the founders are still with us, and several new writers have also joined us in the last year.

When we started, I never expected it to last so long. It began as an after-work labor of love, at a time when I was still working for a Cuban government agency that assisted the Cuban media with translations.

In our official presentation of the site, the president of the Cuban Journalists Association (UPEC) publicly offered us his political support for our effort. My boss also stood up to say he was sure that Havana Times would make a good contribution to journalism from Cuba.

The idea of combining journalist and non-journalist writing was a novel approach for the Cuban media. I felt there was a need for greater diversity of opinion on issues involving Cubas past, present and future, and a fresh attempt to present the many viewpoints on the islands reality.

RELATED POSTS:

From the beginning, we set out to distance our publication from the polarized and conservative Cuban government media as well as from the mostly foreign-based anti-Castro media.

Six months after beginning, UPEC privately withdrew its support for our effort; this came as a disappointment but no surprise. The sharp criticism of government policies by several of our bloggers was too much for an organization that is totally dependent economically and ideologically on the government/party line.

As the project continued, it began to hit home for me just how polarized the Cuban reality was from a media standpoint. At one point, four colleagues  three Cubans and one foreigner told me, in as many words, that those young people writing in HT should stop their complaining and just leave the country if they dont like the system. Since then, tens of thousands of talented young people have left Cuba, an exodus that continues today at a high rate. In my opinion, this is a tragic loss to the nation.

Risks for HT writers

Writing for Havana Times has presented risks for our writers. Cuba isnt Mexico, Iraq or Colombia, and no journalist has been killed nor have any of our writers received a jail sentence thus far (although journalists from other independent media have). Nonetheless, several HT writers were blacklisted and are no longer able to work for the State, the only legal employer in their fields of study. A few have since left the country for further studies or to work abroad.

Some HT writers were already divorced from State employment and thus had more freedom to participate without reprisals, beyond occasional questioning by plain-clothes State Security agents. Others continue in their State jobs, using a pen name to try and dodge repression.

Funding Sources

As a self-financed site with a little help from my friends, HT has refused to apply for any grants from direct or indirect US government funding sources. Since we can only pay a very small amount per article, this has been a disadvantage compared to sites with hundreds of thousands of dollars of yearly grants from agencies such as the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), or compared to numerous Cuban government media outlets which have an army of full-time staff.

The issue of refusing such grant funding is a controversial one. Some of our writers lament the editorial policy of rejecting such funding which would allow us to pay a fair amount for articles. Others believe we should stay on the course as established.

I am not a fan of US foreign policy, neither the hard version (military aid or intervention) nor the soft democracy building funding. This, even when I may agree with some assessments regarding the lack of freedom and rights in the country involved.

I simply dont buy the idea that Washington has the right to be the worlds policeman.

I also firmly believe that the US has many human rights and democracy issues at home to deal with, and that corporate control over its electoral processes and the resulting disenfranchisement of the US population should be the first item of US business.

On the other hand, I totally understand other independent Cuba-related medias decision to accept such funding, as long as it doesnt come with strings attached regarding their work. Some would say that there are always strings involved, but I prefer not to judge. Accepting outside funding from US government sources has allowed them to maintain a paid staff and pay a fairer amount to their writers. With the economic reality in Cuba, this is quite understandable.

And speaking of funding, HT is planning in the coming year to launch a campaign for reader donations and an effort to sell some Cuba travel related advertisements. This was not a necessity in the past, but it now is.

We have rarely asked our readership for help. Id like to use this birthday celebration to recognize those readers who responded to our call this year to donate laptops to our writers, many without anything of their own to work on. The campaign facilitated their work by sending 15 laptops and 2 tablets, with a few more waiting in Europe for travelers to bring with them. To those who donated these essential computers, you have made an important contribution to both Havana Times and the individuals involved.

Havana Times Objectives remain unchanged

Eight years after our birth, we maintain the same vision and the same objectives. Some of our goals, in no special order, have been:

Present Cuban reality in all its diversity, both using the written word and photography.

Give a voice to a large and diverse group of Cubans missing from Cuban and foreign media.

Have a space where readers from a wide spectrum  from government supporters to detractors  can feel comfortable debating issues and ideas.

Offer a platform for making proposals for the future.

Provide a site where past and future visitors to Cuba can stay updated on events in a publication that is not trying to sell them a particular position.

Instead of proclaiming success or failure, we will let you judge whether these goals have or have not been met. I can assure you however, that we at the Havana Times will strive to improve our publication each and every year.

Likewise, we would like to invite you to visit Cuba and write your travel experiences on the pages of Havana Times. Your impressions will help those on the island and abroad gain greater insight into life on the island.

Contact Havana Times here: circlesrobinson@gmail.com

A Testament of Fidel Castro Appears in Paris

https://www.havanatimes.org/?p=130069

HAVANA TIMES  The piece titled Another Treaty of Paris premiered yesterday January 24th at the Hors Pistes Event 2018 | La Nation et ses Fictions, at the Pompidou Center in Paris, France.

Its authors, Luis Manuel Otero Alcantara and Yanelys Nunez Leyva, recreate through a fiction piece, a supposed political testament found with the last reflections of Fidel Castro about his government, the Revolution and the future of Cuba.

Collaborators: Enrique del Risco, Pedro Ruiz. Commissioned by Hors Pistes and Elegoa Cultural Productions.

TEXT:

Compatriots:

This being the last time I address you, I feel compelled to speak not only to those who have always accompanied me but to those who, for a mistaken notion of History, have opposed me. I want to address, finally, those who have accompanied me in my rough journey through the History of our country, no matter what side of the trench they were on: the attack on the Moncada barracks, Sierra, Giron, the Missile Crisis, Escambray, the Military Units to Aid Production (UMAPs), in Angola, in Ethiopia, at the Peruvian Embassy, the Mariel exodus, Case Number 1 of 1989 (which was the trial of Arnaldo Ochoa Sanchez), the Maleconazo protest, at the Rafters Crisis, at the Sunday parades of the Ladies in White.

In each and every one of those moments, there were always Cubans willing to shed their blood or their fellowmans blood, whether or not they were right! The task we had in front of us, to build socialism in the very face of the US Empire (or to prevent it, in the case of those who were opposed to the work of the Revolution) was a huge one. Sadly, today we are more capitalist than we were forty years ago, but we cannot say that our effort was in vain.

And it has not been in vain because it has allowed us to reflect on our successes and our mistakes. We have had many successes. And I do not only mean the education system, the health system, the Olympic medals or the great National Ballet. We must take into account the prosperous city that we Cubans have built on the other side of the Florida Strait, a city where compatriots from different generations and ideological and political conceptions of the world live together.

But also, in our effort to build a new society, we have made mistakes and have been guilty of excesses that should force us to reflect in order to avoid repeating them in the future. Because you might say, for instance, that never has any people in Latin America placed so much confidence in their leader and never has that leader betrayed this confidence to such an extent.

It could be said that, in my effort to defend the conquests of Revolution and Socialism, I stopped at nothing: neither the execution of such close collaborators as General Ochoa nor the murder of children, like those in the 13th of March tugboat. Further analysis would be required to determine if it was right to incarcerate, exile or execute so many compatriots or to have abused the peoples desires and efforts in the way that I did, to create a better world for so many.

It should be analyzed whether it was entirely correct and justified to destroy the wealth accumulated by so many generations since the beginnings of our Nation; or to make the new generations believe that our entire history was an endless accumulation of misery and that we could not aspire to anything but misery and underdevelopment.

It could even be said that never in the history of this country have the people been subjected to a government as criminal and arbitrary as mine; and that none of our rulers have possessed as much power as I had or abused that power to such an extent.

In any case, for all the failures, errors, excesses and negative tendencies suffered by this country in the last decades, nobody else can be blamed but me. The responsibility is absolutely mine. Am I going to blame somebody? No! The imperialists? No! I have to blame myself! Because, if my power were absolute, my responsibility should also be absolute in the face of the difficulties I have caused you.

For example, I could be blamed for the murder of over eight thousand people, the incarceration of tens of thousands for the felony of opposing me; and the exile of millions.

I could also be blamed for having destroyed all the best institutions in this country to build new ones at my service; found guilty of destroying the economy and annihilating its main industries; of shattering the best of our cities.

I could be blamed of turning every Cuban into a potential enemy to other Cubans and every Cuban family into a battlefield, infinitely divided. Be found guilty of turning hate and distrust into our official languages. I could be blamed for sending hundreds of thousands of our people to many parts of the world to kill and be killed for the greater glory of the Revolution.

I could be blamed for making this island an inhabitable and hostile place and for making escape from it the only possible hope for Cubans. Found guilty of the deaths of those trying to escape, and of course, the deaths of those executed while trying to escape.

Nonetheless, it was my duty to carry out this historical task and I remained true to it.

I dont know whether you are willing to forgive me for these facts. I still want to apologize. Apologize to all of those who have been hurt by my actions and decisions. But I also want to apologize to those who obeyed and still continue worshiping me. Forgive me if I have turned you into the worst version of yourselves: into oppressors, informers, into experts in the different variations of human misery. Forgive me if I did not let you find a greater sense to your lives than to serve me and my bigger than ourselves projects, like I once said. Forgive me for insisting that you defend a regime in which not even your children can or want to live.

I apologize for slandering the past of this Nation just to praise the present I offered you; I apologize for all the future I could deny you.

I apologize if I twisted the Cubans personality, if I nurtured his or her selfishness and meanness; I want to apologize for encouraging flattery and persecuting criticism.

I want to apologize for destroying the meaning of certain words and concepts: for turning the good into bad and the bad into good; for persecuting decency and rewarding abjection; for associating the nation with my regime and making myself synonymous with the country.

I am sorry for making homeland synonymous with death.

I hope that recognizing these mistakes will make us wiser and more tolerant. That is why I invite my compatriots from all over the world to unite for the prosperity of the Nation, no matter what their ideals may be. I also want to warn the new leaders of my country to be very careful with power because power corrupts, as I myself have been able to confirm. And that, in the democratic future of the island, they remember these lessons.

Homeland and life. 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strong. Airport Manager Sherry Miller says the city has made contact with four major carriers, but she would not say which ones.

Miller says the city could hear from those carriers any day. The city is working with Jet Chico, a citizen and business-based non-profit organization.

A recent study by a consultant firm shows the Chico Metropolitan service area, which includes Oroville, Paradise and Gridley would support two commercial flights departing and two arriving each day, or about 682 passengers coming and going to the area.

The passenger study is based on information derived from credit card information and zip codes from passengers in the Chico area. The study also shows Los Angeles would be the number one destination.

The last commercial service in Chico was in December of 2014. Miller told Action News Now Friday, "Businesses have left Chico because of no commercial air service and businesses have not come because of it." Miller says they are just beginning to work on revenue guarantee funds of a million dollars.

The money will come from businesses and the local community. Miller says several major businesses in Chico, including Transfer Flow and Chico State University, are on board with the effort. The public can help by participating in a 'ticket bank' by promising to buy tickets. Miller says people who Uber Drivers to get to Sacramento can put money into the ticket bank for a ticket guarantee.

An agreement with possible airlines could be made quickly, but it could take six months after that, as the carriers have to get Chico into the route planning and Transportation Security Administration or TSA has to set up equipment. Miller says she is encouraged, optimistic and excited at the direction the movement is going and they are prepared for any hurdles that may come.Trudeau defends comment on Fidel Castro's death, says he didn't intend

to ignore human rihgts

Justin Trudeau heads to Cuba, decades after his father's history making trip

Pierre Trudeau was 1st NATO leader to visit Fidel Castro's Cuba in 1976

By John Paul Tasker, CBC News Posted: Nov 14, 2016 5:00 AM ET Last Updated: Nov 29, 2016 10:47 AM ET

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-castro-special-relationship-1.3845742

Thousands of Cuban people line the streets in Havana to greet Trudeau as he drives through the city in January 1976. Castro is with him in the open car. (Fred Chartrand/Canadian Press)

Thousands of Cuban people line the streets in Havana to greet Trudeau as he drives through the city in January 1976. Castro is with him in the open car. (Fred Chartrand/Canadian Press Trudeau addresses a crowd of 20,000 Cubans as Castro listens during a rally in Cienfugeos, Cuba. (Fred Chartrand/Canadian Press) Trudeau addresses a crowd of 20,000 Cubans as Castro listens during a rally in Cienfugeos, Cuba. (Fred Chartrand/Canadian Press) Former American president Jimmy Carter and Castro leave the church following the funeral services for Trudeau. (Jacques Boissinot/Canadian Press) Former American president Jimmy Carter and Castro leave the church following the funeral services for Trudeau. (Jacques Boissinot/Canadian Press) In January 1976, then prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau rankled many when he became the first NATO leader to visit Fidel Castro's Cuba. The two got on famously, developing a close bond that would last for decades after that encounter. Now, his son, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, is heading to the Caribbean country Tuesday to try and rekindle the special bond as part of a three-country tour that will also take him to Argentina and Peru, where an APEC summit is being held. The current prime minister faces a much different Cuba than his father, who descended on the fledgling Communist country at a tense time, while the Cold War was raging. Trudeau to retrace father's historic steps in Cuba

Trudeau, Chinese premier announce exploratory free-trade talks as human rights questions persist

Obama thanks Canada for role in Cuba's reconciliation with U.S. Now, under President Barack Obama, Cuba and the U.S. have begun to forge closer ties after a decades-old trade embargo, loosening economic sanctions and restoring diplomatic relations. "Canadians imagine a special kind of relationship, because it's not one the Americans had, and it all harkens back to that Trudeau visit. We have been dining out on that idea in Cuba ever since," Robert Wright, the author of Three Nights in Havana, the definitive account of the trip, said in an interview with CBC News. Play Trudeaus visit Cuba LISTEN 00:00 00:46 Trudeaus visit Cuba0:46 The historian said Canada has in recent years been relatively "nonchalant" about maintaining ties with Cuba. "I would dare say that the idea that Canadians had a special place in Cuba is probably disappearing very quickly ... because Americans are free to go to the island." 3 Nights in Havana More than 250,000 people turned out on the streets of Havana to welcome Pierre Trudeau, Wright said, interpreting his visit as a friendly gesture amid global tumult. But the visit wasn't quite as well-received in Canada, where critics said the prime minister was lending legitimacy to an authoritarian regime backed by the big guns in Moscow. Thousands of Cuban people line the streets in Havana, Cuba, to greet Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau has he drives through the city in 1976. Fidel Castro is also along with him in the open car. (Fred Chartrand/Canadian Press) Trudeau made the visit to damp down tensions, and to "see the humanity of the enemy," Wright said. "Trudeau went expecting not to change Fidel's mind, or have his own mind changed, but rather to be able to sit down and speak respectfully with someone whose ideas he didn't share." "These two somewhat aloof, cerebral, contained, emotionally unapproachable guys hit it off. Fidel was smitten by him." Trudeau was equally taken by the revolutionary turned dictator, provocatively shouting "Long live Prime Minister Fidel Castro!" in his address to the Cuban people. Castro, who was seven years younger than Trudeau, came to see the Canadian leader as a mentor, someone he trusted, Wright said, and a leader with whom he regularly consulted. It was more than friendly relations among world leaders, it was, as Alexandre Trudeau would write in a glowing tribute to the Cuban leader in a 2006 newspaper op-ed, "extra-political." "Indeed, like my father, in private, Fidel is not a politician. He is more in the vein of a great adventurer or a great scientific mind. Fidel doesn't really do politics. He is a revolutionary." Castro was particularly fond of Michel, Justin's late brother, who accompanied his father and mother, Margaret, on that 1976 trip. "He was falling all over the baby, cooing for the cameras," Wright said. Cuban President Fidel Castro holds baby Michel as Pierre and Margaret Trudeau look on during their state visit to Cuba in Jan., 1976 photo. (Canadian Press Archives) Castro later welcomed Michel to the island for special visits for many years after that first encounter  including one in early 1990s, when Justin tagged along. Castro, Wright said, was devastated by Michel's death in an avalanche in 1998, and was equally distraught when Pierre Trudeau died. He made the trip to Montreal for Trudeau's state funeral, where he was seen hugging a teary Justin. Justin Trudeau talks to Cuban President Fidel Castro, centre, outside Notre-Dame Basillica at the beginning of the state funeral for his father, former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau in Montreal. (Fred Chartrand/Canadian Press) ?The prospect of the current prime minister replicating that sort of close, long-standing personal relationship with Raul Castro, Fidel's brother and successor, is unlikely, Wright said, in part because of the massive age gap between the two. (Raul is 85.) The visit is also for roughly 24 hours, and won't include a great deal of personal time to forge closer ties. "If 'Viva Raul' is uttered by the prime minister, I'd be very surprised," Wright said. He also doesn't expect Trudeau to push too hard on the country's persistent problems with human rights, saying Trudeau will likely follow a similar tack to the one he took during a recent visit to China. "It's not likely that he will go to Havana with any kind of heavy-handed agenda on political reforms. He has to walk that knife's edge." But the trip to Havana won't be complete, Wright said, without paying a visit to his father's old chum. "Presuming that Fidel is well enough, and lucid enough, to see him. I'd be very surprised if that wasn't on the agenda, even if briefly." Corrections This article has been changed to remove a reference to Pierre Trudeau being the first Western leader to visit Cuba after the revolution. The Swedish prime minister was the first Western head of government to visit in 1975. Nov 29, 2016 10:43 AM ET Pierre Trudeau carries son Justin on a 1973 walk to the Governor-Generals Residence: Peter Breggs images of Pierre and the kids growing up are all very special. Bregg is a very friendly and helpful photographer. Its not just about taking great photos, but the relationships you establish that can last a lifetime.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/the-unmediated-photo-is-themessage/article31389091/

Justin Trudeau on Fidel Castro: 'A legendary revolutionary' who improved education and healthcare

Trudeau recently travelled to Cuba but was unable to meet with Castro, who had been a friend of his father

A grieving Justin Trudeau is consoled by Cuban President Fidel Castro in front of Notre Dame Church prior to the funeral of Pierre Trudeau.

The Canadian Press November 26, 2016 5:35 PM EST

http://nationalpost.com/news/canada/justin-trudeau-on-fidel-castro-a-legendary-revolutionary-who-improved-education-and-healthcare

The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, today issued the following statement on the death of former Cuban President Fidel Castro:

It is with deep sorrow that I learned today of the death of Cubas longest serving President.

Fidel Castro was a larger than life leader who served his people for almost half a century. A legendary revolutionary and orator, Mr. Castro made significant improvements to the education and healthcare of his island nation.

While a controversial figure, both Mr. Castros supporters and detractors recognized his tremendous dedication and love for the Cuban people who had a deep and lasting affection for el Comandante.

I know my father was very proud to call him a friend and I had the opportunity to meet Fidel when my father passed away. It was also a real honour to meet his three sons and his brother President Raul Castro during my recent visit to Cuba.

On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family, friends and many, many supporters of Mr. Castro. We join the people of Cuba today in mourning the loss of this remarkable leader.

[/np_storybar]

The prime minister is facing criticism at home and abroad for his statement expressing deep sorrow about the death of former Cuban president Fidel Castro.

Justin Trudeau, who recently returned from a diplomatic visit to Cuba, made the statement early Saturday after the announcement that Castro had died at the age of 90.

Trudeau acknowledged the late president was a controversial figure, but remembered him as a larger-than-life leader, who made significant improvements to Cubas education and health-care systems.

A legendary revolutionary and orator, Mr. Castro made significant improvements to the education and health care of his island nation, Trudeau said.

I know my father was very proud to call him a friend, he added.

But others in Canada  and around the world  were less generous in their description of the deceased, and some have condemned the prime ministers statement, pointing out human rights violations during Castros half-century regime.

Marco Rubio, the Cuban-American senator for Florida, wrote on Twitter, Is this a real statement or a parody? Because if this is a real statement from the PM of Canada it is shameful (and) embarrassing.

Conservative leadership hopeful Lisa Raitt wrote on Facebook that Trudeau should be ashamed of himself after his remarks.

With those words, Justin Trudeau has placed himself on the wrong side of history  against the millions of Cubans yearning for freedom. The prime minister should be ashamed of himself. He must retract this statement and apologize, she wrote.

Others running to be party leader also weighed in, including Maxime Bernier and Kellie Leitch.

Foreign Affairs Minister Stephane Dion noted Castros death by tweeting: An iconic figure of the 20th century passed away last night. Deepest condolences to the people of #Cuba, following the death of Fidel Castro.

Robert Wright, who wrote the book Three Nights in Havana about the relationship between Castro and Pierre Trudeau, said it made sense Trudeau would express warm condolences for Castro.

He has to walk a knifes edge, he said. Canadians have a long, rather proper diplomatic relationship with revolutionary Cuba.

On the one hand Justin Trudeau has his family inheritance: his fathers very, very warm friendship with Fidel Castro, and Justins own warm rapport with the Cubans, Wright said. And on the other hand, he has to face criticism when Raul Castro says Cuba will take its own time on democratic reforms and wont be rushed by Obama or Justin Trudeau or anyone else.

Castro acted as an honorary pallbearer at Pierre Trudeaus funeral, along with Leonard Cohen, former U.S. president Jimmy Carter and the Aga Khan.

In his statement, Trudeau offered his condolences on behalf of Canadians, a move Wright said is likely to upset some Canadians who wouldnt want to be included in such warm remarks.

Trudeaus former foreign policy adviser Roland Paris was among those taking the prime minister to task, saying on Twitter Its not a statement I would have recommended.

Trudeaus comments also garnered criticism in the United States, a long-time political adversary of Cuba.

Website Breitbart News, which was previously run by president-elect Donald Trumps senior strategist, called the prime minister a pretty little liar in response to his comments.

And Ian Bremmer, an American political scientist who specializes in U.S. foreign policy, tweeted that Cuban citizens and exiles deserve better from Trudeau.

Trudeau defends comment on Fidel Castro's death, says he didn't intend to ignore human rights

The Canadian Press November 27, 2016 10:06 AM EST

http://nationalpost.com/news/politics/trudeau-defends-comment-on-fidel-castros-death-says-point-was-to-mark-the-death-not-ignore-human-rights

Speaking iMadagascar, where he is attending the summit of la Francophonie, Trudeau says he understands that some affected by the Castro regime would view things differently

ANTANANARIVO, Madagascar  Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the former Cuban president Fidel Castro was a dictator, but that does not mean it was inappropriate to acknowledge his achievements at the time of his death.

Adalberto Roque/AFP/Getty Images

Trudeau said the statement Saturday was meant to mark the death of a former head of a country with which Canada has had a long relationship.

Speaking in Antananarivo, Madagascar, where he is attending the summit of la Francophonie, Trudeau said he understands that some people who had been affected by the Castro regime would view things differently.

He certainly was a polarizing figure and there certainly were significant concerns around human rights, Trudeau told reporters Sunday. Thats something that Im open about and highlighted, but on the passing of his death I expressed a statement that highlighted the deep connection between the people of Canada and the people of Cuba.

Trudeau said he never shies away from raising human rights issues, including on his recent visit to Cuba.

Canadians know that I always talk about human rights, including here yesterday, including with Raul Castro two weeks ago and wherever I go around the world, he said.

The Liberal prime minister is facing criticism at home and abroad for his statement expressing deep sorrow about the death of Castro, without mentioning his human rights violations.

Trudeau, who made the statement early Saturday after the announcement that Castro had died at the age of 90, called him a legendary revolutionary and orator who made significant improvements to Cubas education and health-care systems.

I know my father was very proud to call him a friend, Trudeau also said in his statement.

Federal Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose and Tory leadership hopefuls Lisa Raitt, Maxime Bernier and Kellie Leitch were all quick to denounce Trudeaus tribute.

And social media users also took the opportunity to mock the prime minister using the hashtag #TrudeauEulogies, which imagines eulogies of dictators and criminals written in the style of Trudeaus statement.

On Sunday, Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard, who headed the Quebec delegation to la Francophonie, backed Trudeaus comments about the former Cuban leader.

Yes, his accomplishments will be (remembered) in various tones of grey  some white, some black  but historians will have to decide this, Couillard said. I see no controversy in describing him as a giant of the 20th century.FARGO, N.D. (AP) - The Latest on the sentencing of a North Dakota woman who admitted killing a pregnant neighbor (all times local):

2 p.m.

A North Dakota woman who admitted killing a pregnant neighbor and cutting the baby from the womb while the mother was still alive has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Brooke Crews pleaded guilty in December to conspiracy to commit kidnapping, conspiracy to commit murder and lying to law officers in the August death of 22-year-old Savanna Greywind of Fargo. State District Judge Frank Racek sentenced Crews on Friday.

Prosecutors say Crews admitted to cutting out the baby while Greywind went in and out of consciousness.

Fargo Police Chief Dave Todd earlier called her death a "cruel and vicious act of depravity." Her disappearance sparked extensive searches before her body was found wrapped in plastic in a river.

The baby was found alive in the apartment the 38-year-old Crews shared with her 32-year-old boyfriend, William Hoehn (hayn). He's scheduled for trial in March.

___

1:50 p.m.

Prosecutors say a North Dakota woman who admitted killing a pregnant neighbor so she and her boyfriend could keep the baby also admitted to cutting out the baby while the mother was still alive.

A judge is deciding whether Brooke Crews should get a sentence other than life in prison without parole at Friday's hearing.

Crews pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit kidnapping, conspiracy to commit murder and lying to law officers in the August death of 22-year-old Savanna Greywind of Fargo.

Prosecutors say Crews cut the baby out of the mother's womb while Greywind went in and out of consciousness. They asked for a sentence of life with no parole.

The baby was found alive in the apartment the 38-year-old Crews shared with her 32-year-old boyfriend, William Hoehn (hayn).

Hoehn is scheduled for trial in March.

___

1:15 p.m.

A North Dakota judge is deciding whether a woman who admitted killing a pregnant neighbor so she and her boyfriend could keep the baby should merit a sentence other than life in prison without parole.

Brooke Crews pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit kidnapping, conspiracy to commit murder and lying to law officers in the August death of 22-year-old Savanna Greywind of Fargo.

Crews didn't have a plea deal with prosecutors, but hoped that admitting responsibility at a December hearing would work in her favor at Friday's sentencing in Fargo. She appeared in court in orange prison clothing, cuffed at the wrists.

Authorities haven't said how Greywind was killed. The baby was found alive in the apartment the 38-year-old Crews shared with her 32-year-old boyfriend, William Hoehn (hayn).

Hoehn is scheduled for trial in March.

___

12:30 a.m.

A North Dakota judge will decide whether a woman who admitted killing a pregnant neighbor so she and her boyfriend could keep the baby should merit a sentence other than life in prison without parole.

Brooke Crews pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit kidnapping and murder and lying to law officers in the August death of 22-year-old Savanna Greywind, of Fargo.

Crews did not have a plea deal with prosecutors, but hoped that admitting responsibility at a December hearing would work in her favor at sentencing Friday in Fargo.

Authorities haven't said how Greywind was killed. The baby was found alive in the apartment the 38-year-old Crews shared with her 32-year-old boyfriend, William Hoehn (hayn).

Hoehn is scheduled for trial in March.

(Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)The fired state worker who sent an alert about an inbound ballistic missile to all Hawaii phones last month says he honestly thought the islands were under threat and was just trying to save lives.

"It's been utter hell for me and my family," he told Hawaii News Now.

He added the drill "seemed very real because it was unplanned, unannounced and it was a weekend morning. I was convinced that it was real."

In his first interview since the incident, which triggered widespread panic across the islands, the former Hawaii Emergency Management employee also told Hawaii News Now that he believes the state has unfairly targeted him rather than focusing on bigger, systemic issues and hasn't been forthcoming about what really happened from the beginning.

The man, who asked not to be identified because he is still receiving death threats, was fired after the state completed its investigation into the Jan. 13 incident.

And that internal investigation paints a different picture of what happened in the moments leading up to the false missile alert.

It says the so-called "button pusher" had twice before confused drills with real-world events, and that other employees at Hawaii Emergency Management knew the missile drill wasn't real. But the former state worker said those two previous incidents were essentially "paperwork" issues, not errant alerts.

In the wake of the incident, the head of the Emergency Management Agency and its executive officer have also resigned.

The state report did confirm that the alert was sent out during a test of the state's procedures in the event of an inbound ballistic missile. Emergency management officials have been practicing routine missile defense drills for several months, as part of a campaign to better prepare Hawaii for the threat of a nuclear attack.

In its report, released Tuesday, the state said the drill on Jan. 13 started as previous ones had: A recorded Pacific Command message was played over loudspeakers at the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency that began "exercise, exercise, exercise," then warned of an incoming ballistic missile and said, "This is not a drill."

The drill then ended with "exercise, exercise, exercise."

In its own report, the FCC said the employee who sent out the false alert heard "This is not a drill," but didn't hear "exercise."

The "button pusher" told Hawaii News Now "This is not a drill" is not part of the standard language the state uses during exercises. He added that he honestly believed an inbound missile was headed to Hawaii  and he sent the alert to save lives.Africa: Child-witchcraft or Autism symptoms?

Across Sub-Sahara Africa, children from underprivileged backgrounds who sometimes exhibit symptoms of Autism, are often labeled as witches or wizards, and victimized - poisoned, drowned, hacked to death with machetes or buried alive in an attempt to deliver their soul from the snare of the devil.



The CBI has arrested a Goods and Services Tax commissioner from Kanpur and eight others, including three officials, busting an alleged bribery racket in the department, the agency sources said.

The officials used to collect regular bribes from businessmen and industrialists of Kanpur for providing them tax-related relief and shielding them from notices of the department, the sources said.

The bribes were collected either in the form of cash or costly items like refrigerators, television sets, and mobile phones which were delivered to the commissioners residence in New Delhi, they said.

According to the agency sources, Sansar Chand, a 1986- batch Indian Revenue Service officer, posted as Commissioner, two superintendents of the department (Ajay Shrivastav, R S Chandel), one personal staff (Saurabh Pandey) and five private individuals, including the owner of Shishu Soaps, were nabbed by the CBI in a late-night operation in Kanpur and Delhi.

The agency has also named Chands wife Avinash Kaur; and Aman Shah, Superintendent, GST and Central Excise, Kanpur, in its FIR but they have not been arrested yet, the sources said, adding one arrested suspect is not mentioned in the FIR.

The CBI has alleged in its FIR that Chand along with his subordinates used to collect bribes on monthly and quarterly basis from industrialists and businessmen, they said.

The bribes in cash were routed through hawala channels to Delhi through Aman Janin and Chander Prakash, both residents of Delhi, who used to deliver it to Chands wife, the CBI has alleged.

The bribes were accepted on case-to-case basis for the assistance required by the private parties in the department, it alleged.

The agency has alleged that Chand in conspiracy with superintendents under him was systematically collecting bribes from the owners of Rimjhim Ispat Limited, SIR Pan Masala, Sugandhi Private Limited among others but it has not named them as accused in the FIR.

Source information has revealed that Sansar Chand was in the habit of taking periodic updates from his superintendents receipt of illegal gratification from various parties, the FIR alleged.

In one such case, Chand was allegedly seeking update on bribe from the owner of Shishu Soaps and Chemicals Limited, Manish Sharma, who sells his product under the brand name Rekha detergent, it said.

Sharma, who was seeking relief from the notices of the Central Excise Department, had assured that he would soon pay the bribe for the months from February, 2018 to April, 2018 which was conveyed to Chand through his middleman Amit Awasthi and arrested Superintendent Ajay Shrivastav, it said.

The payment was to be made through the middleman Awasthi, it added.

The agency got the input of the transaction through its sources.

CBI laid a trap and apprehended the accused who had received the bribe of Rs 1,50,000 on behalf of (the) commissioner and also the private accused who gave the said bribe to public servants.

The bribe money was also recovered, a CBI spokesperson said on Sunday.

He said searches were conducted on the premises of accused persons including public servants, private individuals, middlemen at Kanpur and Delhi which led to recovery of cash Rs 58,00,000 (approx.) and several incriminating documents including diaries, pen drives and documents of properties worth crore.The arrest of Indias renowned first lady detective Rajani Pandit only goes to show how one wrong step can tarnish a persons reputation. Life suddenly changed for Pandit who was put behind the bars for allegedly using illegal means for obtaining call detail records (CDRs) for her clients. What prompted a woman like Rajani, who had carved a niche for herself by entering into detective field which is mostly dominated by males to commit this crime? Was she trying to make a quick buck by selling CDRs to her clients? Wasnt she aware about the repercussion she will have to face after being nabbed by the police for being a part of this racket? Police had busted a gang of detectives and arrested four of them for illegally sourcing and selling CDRs.

Pandit has been felicitated with several awards, written two books and even a subject of a documentary named Lady James Bond. In her website, Pandit has mentioned that she has solved 75,000 cases at national and international level. Even Bollywood was inspired by Rajani to make a film based on her life. A Tamil feature film on her investigation, named as Kuttrapayirchi, will be made soon. South Indian actress Trisha Krishnan will enact her role in the film. Several foreign agencies and private couple awaiting divorce are her prime customers. Pandits over glorification as Indias first female detective has saved her from legal clutches.

Senior advocate Abha Singh said that if its proved that Rajani Pandit has illegally procured call data records then its a big offence under the IT act as it violates the right of privacy. She has obtained the data illegally and its a clear footprint of corruption. The arrest made by Mumbai Police is a very strong step and I believe they possess strong evidence against Rajani, she said. According to Abha, awareness about Human rights might have a played a strong role that police now is carrying investigation against private detectives. People are hiring private detectives to probe about the personal issues faced by them in marital lives and running business. However, detectives must be very careful while carrying out investigation and they should not violate laws. The accused have to undergo a minimum of three to five years of imprisonment if they are proved guilty, she added.

The journey towards becoming a detective was never smooth for Rajani as people often used to taunt her that she has chosen this profession due to lack of opportunities in other sector. People would often say that detective is not a womans job. Since last 27 years she has been successfully running Rajani Pandit Detective Services.

Marathi actress Samidha Guru said that the transparency of any profession lies when work is done legally. She said, Being a renowned detective and an inspiration for many, following illegal ways in process of case investigation, is unjustified. Rajani was known as a talented detective and had won many awards too. Pandits arrest is definitely a bad message for her admirers. A person whom many consider as their idol must be very careful while discharging their duties and always exercise transparency and accountability. With a new twist in Rajanis life, filmmakers of Tamil movie Kuttrapayirchi must incorporate her arrest incident too in the movie, she added.

Pandit was picked up from her residence after one of the arrested detectives, Samresh Jha informed the police that he had sourced CDRs on her instructions and delivered it to her for lump sum amount. Rajani has played different roles like blind woman, maid servant, pregnant woman and street vendor to crack several cases.Share Article



Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, center, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon Jr., left, and Deputy Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette brief the press on the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review at the Pentagon, Feb. 2, 2018. DOD photo by Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Kathryn E. Holm.

The Pentagon on Friday outlined its plans for a new era of American nuclear poweremphasizing the possibility of a nuclear response to a non-nuclear attack and announcing the development of low-yield weapons that can provide more flexibility and the possibility of a more proportional nuclear response to a smaller-scale attack.

The Defense Departments Nuclear Posture Review, ordered by President Trump shortly after he assumed office last January, is an extensive document outlining the administrations and the Pentagons view on the place of nuclear weapons in the future of US national security.

This NPR ensures we can deter any potential adversary, because they are not all alike, Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan said in rolling out the review on Friday. We must keep Americas deterrent credible by making it modern. The 2018 NPR calls for modernizing the nuclear triad and command and control system, which is necessary, affordable, and long overdue. Our nuclear triad has kept us safe for more than 70 years. We cannot afford to let it become obsolete.

The last NPR, which was produced by President Obamas administration in 2010, looked to decrease, but still modernize, the nuclear stockpile. However, the Trump document calls for an increase of smaller weapons, and emphasizes the need to use nuclear weapons to respond to non-nuclear attacks.

Given the range of potential adversaries, their capabilities and strategic objectives, this review calls for a flexible, tailored nuclear deterrent strategy, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis writes in a preface to the review. This review calls for the diverse set of nuclear capabilities that provides an American President flexibility to tailor the approach to deterring one or more potential adversaries in different circumstances.

In the short term, the draft calls for a modification of a small number of existing submarine-launched missiles to provide a low-yield option that is survivable. This option, once developed, will increase flexibility by not only providing a smaller-yield nuclear weapon, but also one that does not require host-nation support to base, unlike B61s, which are the primary strategic nuclear weapon for the B-2 bomber and can also be carried by F-16s, F-15Es, and eventually F-35s.

In the long term, the Defense Department and National Nuclear Security Administration want to make a new, low-yield submarine-launched warhead to ensure a prompt response option that is able to penetrate adversary defenses. The review claims the changes will be in compliance with New START, while also providing a response to Russias treaty violation from its reported deployment of a new cruise missile.

Much of the current nuclear stockpile is too powerful to be an effective enough deterrent, according to the review, and a less-devastating capability means the US would be more ready to use these weapons if prompted.

Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Paul Selva expanded on this effort before the review was released, telling reporters the lower-yield weapon deters adversaries from actually believing that they could engage in a limited nuclear strike because they would know the US could use a smaller weapon to respond to a smaller attack.

Russias belief that limited nuclear first use, potentially including low-yield weapons, can provide such an advantage is based, in part, on Moscows perception that its greater number and variety of non-strategic nuclear systems provide a coercive advantage in crises and at lower levels of conflict, the review states.  Correcting this mistaken Russian perception is a strategic imperative.

There is no automatic nuclear response from the US if there is a nuclear attack, the review aims to provide flexibility and more options for response, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy John Rood told reporters.

The Pentagon on Friday would not release a timeline or cost for either option, just that it would be included in the Presidents Fiscal 2019 budget request expected to be released on Feb. 12. The short-term option would be a modest amount, since it is based on existing missiles, Rood said.

The review also emphasized the possibility of a nuclear launch to respond to a non-nuclear attack, such as a debilitating cyber attack or one that causes significant damage to US infrastructure such as the power grid.

The United States would only consider the use of nuclear weapons in extreme circumstances to defend the vital interests of the United States, its allies, and partners. Extreme circumstances could include significant non-nuclear strategic attacks, states the review. Significant non-nuclear strategic attacks include, but are not limited to, attacks on the US, allied, or partner civilian population or infrastructure, and attacks on the US or allied nuclear forces, their command and control, or warning and attack assessment capabilities.

This capability will only apply to potential strikes against states that have nuclear weapons and are in compliance with non-proliferation objectives, the review states.

Given the potential of significant non-nuclear strategic attacks, the United States reserves the right to make any adjustment in the assurance that may be warranted by the evolution and proliferation of non-nuclear strategic attack technologies and US capabilities to counter that threat, the review states

Selva sought to temper the response to this claim, saying that context matters because a non-nuclear attack on infrastructure could be catastrophic and the US reserves the right to respond. The idea was presented in the 2010 review, but we just didnt say what we meant, Selva said.

The 2018 review specifically calls out four countries: Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran, claiming that the US military needs a tailored strategy for each country. North Korea poses the most immediate and dire proliferation threat to international security and stability, the review states. Iran is threatening, however, it is abiding by the 2013 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or Iran Deal, that restricts its program until 2031.

Shortly before the release of the NPR, US officials briefed Russian and Chinese officials on its content and emphasized that the US wants to have a productive relationship going forward, Acting Assistant Secretary of State Anita Friedt told reporters on Friday. The US included NATO allies in the process of developing the review and briefed them before the release as well, she said.

The NPR continues support for all three legs of the nuclear triad, by continuing the modernization plans for the Air Forces B-21 bomber, Ground Based Strategic Deterrent, Air-Launched Cruise Missiles, nuclear command and control, and the US Navys Ohio-class submarine replacement, along with recapitalizing weapons laboratories and plants to ensure the capability to design, produce, assess, and maintain these weapons for as long as they are required, the documents states. Because of purported underfunding by previous White House administrations, a large increase in spending is required. Currently, the nuclear deterrent accounts for 3 percent of the defense budget, and another 3 to 4 percent on top of that is required, Mattis writes.

Specific modernization efforts outlined include: completing the B61-12 bomb life extension program by 2024, completing W88 warhead alterations by 2024, synchronizing the National Nuclear Security Administrations W80-4 warhead life extension with the Pentagons long-range standoff cruise missile, advancing the W78 warhead replacement by one year, sustaining the B83-1 bomb beyond its retirement date, and exploring new ballistic missile warhead requirements including a possible common re-entry system for USAF and Navy systems.

The funding question is a major issue, one that some lawmakers have already said is prohibitive to modernization plans. In October, the Congressional Budget Office put a price tag on modernization at $1.2 trillion over 30 years. However, that figure actually breaks down to about $843 billion to operate and sustain the nuclear forces and $399 billion to modernize them, according to the CBO report. It also includes 100 percent of the cost of the Air Forces B-21 bomber program, rather than just the nuclear-specific costs.https://www.aish.com/ci/s/Germany-Remains-Deeply-Anti-Semitic.html

How anti-Semitic is Germany today? A Holocaust survivor stuns German TV viewers with her candid answer.

A 93-year-old survivor of Auschwitz stunned the viewers of one of Germanys most popular political talk shows last Sunday when  asked to compare the Nazi era with the situation today  she asserted that the two periods had more in common than many people may care to admit.

I think that Germany was always anti-Semitic, that has not changed much, Esther Bejarano  who was enslaved in the infamous womens orchestra of the Auschwitz death camp  told the ARD Networks flagship Anne Will Show.

Auschwitz survivor Esther Bejarano speaking on German TV.

Bejarano was one of several guests on an International Holocaust Remembrance Day edition of the show that asked the question, How anti-Semitic is Germany today? Other guests who participated in the candid and often emotional discussion included two government ministers, a prominent human rights advocate and a leading scholar of modern Jewish history.

Much of the show was dedicated to a harrowing interview with Bejarano about her incarceration in Auschwitz. She began by relating that her father had been a stalwart German patriot, convinced that the German people would reject Adolf Hitlers Nazi Party. But after the Nazis came to power and prevented the family from emigrating to British Mandatory Palestine, Bejarano was imprisoned in a hard labor camp in Germany, before being deported to the Auschwitz death camp in Poland in April 1943.

Initially assigned to a slave labor detail, Bejarano, an accomplished pianist, was selected to play the accordion in the womens orchestra that performed outside in all weathers as slave laborers toiled under the gaze of gun-wielding camp guards. The first tune she played for her Nazi tormentors, she recalled, was a popular upbeat ballad of the time entitled, Youre in luck with the women, Bel Ami!

Esther Bejarano, 1938

It was Bejaranos status as a Holocaust survivor who has spent decades sharing her experiences with younger Germans that amplified the shocked response to her claim that Germany remains deeply anti-Semitic. The humbled response to Bejarano from Germanys Minister of the Arts, Monika Grutters  Five and a half million people visit our memorial sites every year, but it can never be enough  suggested that the government too has been taken aback by the scale of the problem, even as it embarks on an effort to address it.

Germany, in the year 2018, is still facing a massive problem with hatred toward Jews.

The recent announcement of a federal commissioner to deal with anti-Semitism  as part of a legislative program to deal with anti-Jewish hostility from both the German far right and from within the Muslim immigrant community  is intended to be a major part of the governments counterattack. Interviewed by The Algemeiner last week, Josef Schuster, the president of the German Jewish community, stated candidly that Germany, in the year 2018, is still facing a massive problem with hatred toward Jews.

Several of the other guests on the Anne Will Show sounded an equally dark note about the current situation. Wenzel Michalski  the director of global human rights organization Human Rights Watchs office in Berlin  emphasized the strong showing in last years elections by the stridently anti-immigrant AfD Party in making the point, I think there is a lot of talk about the culture of remembrance, but little is done about it.

Michalski also illustrated the issue of anti-Semitism among Muslim immigrants with a deeply personal story involving his son, who was badly bullied by his schoolmates of Turkish and Arab descent. After being showered with anti-Semitic insults including Jewish murderer, Michalskis son was eventually beaten up and then subjected to a mock execution. With one exception, his teachers did nothing, Michalski disclosed.

41 percent of German children over the age of 14 had not heard of Auschwitz.

Much of the discussion on the show centered on whether visits to the sites of concentration camps should be made compulsory for immigrants who want to acquire German citizenship. Of course, not every visit to a concentration camp memorial immediately leads to immunization against anti-Semitism, said Sawsan Chebli, a leading member of the socialist SPD party, and a former Foreign Ministry spokesman. But it makes a difference if I open a book and read something or go to a memorial, Chebli, who is the daughter of Palestinian parents, added.

Lack of knowledge and empathy for the victims of the Holocaust remains a serious challenge in German schools as well. A study conducted last year by the Forsa Institute and the Korber Foundation found that 41 percent of German children over the age of 14 had not even heard of Auschwitz.

Arts Minister Grutters pledged that the German government would reinvigorate its Holocaust education programs. At a time when anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli hate speech on social media is increasing, education about National Socialism is more necessary than ever, she said.

Reprinted with permission from Algemeiner.comhttps://www.aish.com/d/w/Do-You-Only-Date-Jews.html

The defining choice for children of interfaith marriage.

I met Ali at a neighbors party. He was kind, funny, and comforting all at once. We had a great conversation that lasted over an hour. But for an intangible reason, I knew we werent going to be anything more than friends. And I knew he didnt want yet another friend, so I gave him the soft goodbye and turned away.

The next text message I received took me by surprise. It was from Ali, and it was simply a question: Hey! So, I see youre involved in a lot of Jewish organizations. Do you only date Jews?

Shocked by the honesty of the question, perhaps a bit flattered that he took the time to Facebook stalk me  a high compliment in 21st century dating  I asked myself the very same question: Am I only interested in dating a Jew?

When I first announced my move to Boston, my Christian coworkers joked that it would be the place to find a nice Jewish doctor. I told them a nice Jewish dentist would do.

They told me to find a nice Jewish doctor. I told them a nice Jewish dentist would do.

When I went to Chabad, I was met with the Rabbis wife announcing that a young mans mother was visiting in search of a match for her Israeli son. In my mind, I thought, Hes Jewish; thats perfect enough. It took me by surprise when, at brunch, that wasnt enough  not even to sustain the conversation.

When I opened a dating app for the first time, it, too, asked me the question of religion as part of the search criteria. Without even second thought, I searched only for Jews.

Somewhere within, at a place more spiritual than cognitive, I do search only for a Jewish match. I go out of my way to scope out if a Jewish-sounding last name is really Jewish. Raised in a Jewish home, lighting Shabbat candles and singing Hebrew prayers, I imagine a man who will join me at synagogue and teach our future children and me more about Judaism than I already know. In Jewish tradition, the mother is the akeret habayit, the mainstay of the home, carrying in her power the strength to create a Jewish abode.

But does that mean a mother can still create a Jewish home in a marriage of split faith?

I imagine a man who will join me at synagogue and teach our future children and me more about Judaism than I already know.

Being the daughter of an interfaith marriage myself and still a devout Jew, I struggled to answer my own question. In Deuteronomy, the Torah forbids interfaith marriage: You shall not intermarry with them for he will cause your child to turn away from after Me and they will worship the gods of others. Clearly, I have not turned away from Judaism. As other children of interfaith marriages claimed to be half-and-half, something I reserve for coffee condiments more than religious identities, I held closely to Judaism as my only heritage.

Still, I know that I could have easily turned away from Judaism, or to a lesser observance of the faith. There were days my father would invite me to church, leaving me, a small child, to put religion at odds with family. I had to be the one to say no, to choose Judaism over church when I was too young to even tie my shoes.

I wouldnt change my family at all; my loving parents are two of Gods greatest gifts to me. Even in an interfaith home, I was blessed with the spiritual guidance of my mother, my Rabbi, the Jewish community and synagogue. Though hard to imagine in an interfaith home, my non-Jewish father was often the one to sing loudest in prayer at the Shabbat services, and he proudly joined in the synagogue as I became a Bat Mitzvah. My mother carried an unparalleled spiritual strength, even when it came to making the challenging choices of refusing Easter with the in-laws in observance of Passover or lighting the Shabbat candles in the room with the Christmas tree. In that warm embrace of Judaism, there was no other option in my heart; Judaism was clearly a part of me.

Yet, there is a spiritual distance between my father and me, and his family and mine. There always will be when my foundation is in Torah and mitzvot and theirs is in a spiritual framework I do not carry.

Though dating in modern America is many steps away from marriage, if put to the test, my logical and spiritual self would not look outside the Jewish faith for a partner. If blatantly asked whether Id date a non-Jew, my instinct would be to say No.

But instinct was at odds with my childhood. In copying my parents example, I actually never dated a Jew. I dated non-religious Christians, atheists, and Jews who are Jewish only by paternal descent. And none of the relationships worked. With each of these relationships, no matter how strong the connection, I was bringing to the dynamic a devotion to God that simply couldnt be shared in the interfaith dynamic. The foundation of the relationship, the spiritual connection, was inherently fractured from the start.

A Jewish marriage is a binyan adei ad, an everlasting edifice. There is nothing more beautiful. And I have no doubt that my parents interfaith marriage will last their physical and spiritual lifetime. Their love, too, is beautiful. But its not what I want. Its not the home I will create.

I am part of a generation in which interfaith marriage is becoming commonplace. And I am one of too many young adults realizing the harm of this pattern: a growing number of young adults will receive a text like the one Ali sent me, asking the question about whether he/she only dates within the Jewish faith. These individuals, just as I did, will think back on their own experiences to the struggles of holding onto Judaism in an interfaith home and the challenge of fundamentally disagreeing with the choice our parents made. Many of us will try to emulate our parents to avoid the discomfort of wanting something other than the marriage our parents have. We will walk a fine line of honoring our parents while still deciding that our parents marriage isnt necessarily right, and certainly isnt right for us.

I did text an answer to Ali, telling him finally, Yes, I only date Jews. Thinking of my parents, connecting to my faith, it was the hardest and most empowering text message I would ever send.Davon Everson, left, was killed Feb. 3, 2018 in Birmingham. He is show here with his twin brother, Javon, and their sisters, Zatasia and Vatasia, who also are twins. (Photo contributed by family)

A Birmingham man shot to death in Ensley Saturday evening has now been identified.

Birmingham police said the victim was 22-year-old Davon Everson. The shooting happened shortly before 5:30 p.m. in the 2000 block of 28th Street in Ensley.

Sgt. Bryan Shelton said West Precinct officers were dispatched to a home after callers reported hearing multiple gunshots fired. One of those bullets, police said, had entered the callers' house and struck a wall inside their living room. The women inside that home weren't injured.

While officers were investigating the gunfire, they spotted a dark-colored vehicle parked in the bushes in Fairview Park. They then noticed Everson was in the driver's seat and was bleeding.

Everson was taken to UAB Hospital where he was pronounced dead a short time later.

Shelton said Everson was driving on 28th Street when someone from another vehicle began firing at his vehicle. Everson returned fire, but then crashed after driving through the yard of a home. He came to rest in the bushes where he was found.

Everson's family, however, said his passenger fired back at the shooters and they believe the passenger was the intended target.

Shelton said the deadly shooting may have been the result of another shooting, but a report was never filed in that incident. One person was detained and questioned after Everson's death, but is not considered a suspect.

"The killing wasn't random and may have been the culmination of an ongoing dispute,'' Shelton said. "The victim's life didn't matter to the killer, and neither did the lives of the people in the neighborhood."

The victim is Birmingham's 10th homicide so far this year. Birmingham police are investigating two other homicides that happened on Friday.

Early Friday morning, 58-year-old Ricky Parker, a retiree and church deacon, was found shot to death outside his Belview Heights home. Later, 17-year-old Michael Lee, a Parker High School student, was killed when gunfire was exchanged between the occupants of two vehicles at Birmingham's McAlpine Park. No arrests have been announced in either of the Friday slayings.

Anyone with information is asked to call Birmingham homicide detectives at 205-254-1764 or Crime Stoppers at 205-254-7777.Gunfire erupted in Ensley Saturday evening, leaving one man dead and a person of interest detained.

The shooting happened about 6 p.m. at 2000 28th Street Ensley, said Birmingham police Sgt. Bryan Shelton. The victim was taken to UAB Hospital, and pronounced dead there a short time later.

Shelton said the man was shot and then drove off, wrecking the vehicle in an alley by a park. The wreck happened about 60 feet from the shooting.

Shots also were fired into a home at 2036 28th Street, and Shelton said the two incidents were connected. No one at that home has been reported injured.

A person of interest is in custody. No additional details have been released.

This story will be updated as more information becomes available.

The victim is Birmingham's 10th homicide so far this year. Birmingham police are investigating two other homicides that happened on Friday.

Early Friday morning, 58-year-old Ricky Parker, a retiree and church deacon, was found shot to death outside his Belview Heights home.

Later, 17-year-old Michael Lee, a Parker High School student, was killed when gunfire was exchanged between the occupants of two vehicles at Birmingham's McAlpine Park. No arrests have been announced in either of the Friday slayings.

Anyone with information is asked to call Birmingham homicide detectives at 205-254-1764 or Crime Stoppers at 205-254-7777.In 2011, a Madison organization called Valor Flight organized a successful mission to take aging Tennessee Valley veterans of the Korean War to Washington D.C. to see their memorial.

The "call sign" for that effort was "Valor One -- The Flight of The Not Forgotten, said Valor Flight president Steve Celuch.

The trip cost more than $100,000, and organizer Celuch and the Valor Flight organization has been working since then to raise enough money for a second trip.

The fundraising campaign is code named "Operation 50," because its goal is to find 50 local businesses to donate $1,000 each to help the organization raise the final $50,000 or so.

"Fundraising has been tough over the last few years, yet we have managed to raise roughly $46,000 to date through the kind donations of our local community -- for which we are very thankful and grateful," Celuch said. "We still need another $54,000 to reach our overall mission goal. The economy is picking up again, and its time to get back into the public eye and reach out to our community.

"If we meet our goal, we have a good chance to fly our second and final flight in November 2018," Celuch said. "All donations are greatly appreciated, and together, we will achieve this worthy mission."

Celuch said he would be happy to visit interested companies to discuss the Valor Flight mission as needed.

Celuch said initial consideration for veterans interested in making the trip is for those Tennessee Valley vets who served in Korea and live in the counties of Limestone, Madison, Morgan, Marshall and Jackson. He said exceptions could be made for a veterans living outside of those areas.

Want to help?

Donations are accepted at valorflight.com or mailed can be mailed to Valor Flight, PO Box 1353, Madison, AL., 35758.

For more information, visit Valor Flight on Facebok at Facebook.com/ValorFlight, or call Steve Celuch at 615-545-0110An Alabama-based construction firm was chosen Friday to help rebuild the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs, site of the deadliest mass shooting in Texas history.

Myrick, Gurosky & Associates, located in Birmingham, specializes in churches, office retail, as well as healthcare facilities and institutional projects. The team is expected to layout designs in the next six weeks.



"We've done hundreds of church campuses," said Scott Gurosky, president of the firm during an interview with the Rivard Report, a San-Antonio online news source.



Twenty six people were killed and more than 20 injured on Nov. 5 after gunman Devin P. Kelley entered the church and began shooting. The 14 year-old daughter of the church's pastor was among the dead.

The church is located approximately 35 miles south-east of San Antonio.

While the church is still standing, and currently serves as a memorial to those that died, services are being held at a different location until the new church is built. It's not yet known if the old church will be torn down or remain as memorial.

The firm was chosen by the community's six-member restoration committee, formed by the First Baptist Church and other Sutherland Springs community leaders in the wake of the shooting. Pat Dzuik, chairman of the committee said that rather than a large auditorium style church, which the construction company is better known for, he said the community would build a more traditional looking church.



More than $1.1 million was raised to help fund the project with the help of San Antonio roofing executive Brad Beldon.

"It's really encouraging to see the love in the community, and the passion to continue to grow," Beldon told the Rivard Report. "We're going to build something bigger and better, and everybody in the community is going to benefit from this misfortune."Grades for Alabama's public schools were released last Thursday, for the first time in nearly two decades. There were few surprises.

The 'A' through 'F' grades generally tracked with levels of student poverty in schools. The higher the levels of poverty, the lower the grade. That wasn't always the case, though, and AL.com will be digging in to find out what those schools with higher grades are doing to improve student learning.

Reactions from education leaders across Alabama to the release of school and district report cards on Thursday ranged from questioning the numbers that factored into the grade to acknowledging there is work to be done.

Though some districts appeared to be bracing for impact, no aftershocks occurred, even though more than 758 of the 1,247 schools, or 61 percent, earned a 'C' or lower.

Overall, Alabama's schools earned a 'C.'

By all accounts, Gov. Kay Ivey has embraced her role as president of the state's board of education, something not seen in recent years. Ivey has publicly supported grading schools with letter grades, even while district officials pushed back against the method.

Ivey, speaking with AL.com after announcing her latest education initiative, said, "The grades are not what everybody would like in a lot of cases, but at the same time, it gives us a benchmark of where we are. And you can't know where you're going if you don't know where you are. So I'm glad the report cards are out there, and we'll take it from there." It is the state board of education's responsibility to set goals aiming higher and adopt strategies to move Alabama's students forward, she said.

Rep. Terri Collins, R-Decatur, who sponsored the law, passed in 2012, and followed the development of the report card for the past six years, said, "I'm very pleased by all the comments from schools and systems describing the grades as a valuable tool to evaluate teaching and learning and assess areas of success and areas to focus more attention. I've heard more conversation and focus on student success than ever before. I believe A-F will be the positive step to move Alabama student success higher."

Statewide, of the 1,247 schools that received grades, there were 137 A's, 352 B's, 437 C's, 217 D's, and 104 F's.

Of Alabama's 137 school districts, the distribution of grades is similar, except that no districts earned an 'F.' Statewide, there were 12 A's, 52 B's, 54 C's, and 19 D's.

So what did education officials across Alabama have to say after the release?

Alabama's largest district, Mobile County public schools, received a 'C'. The 55,300-student district published a video of their student advisory council's reaction.

Students on the Superintendent's Student Advisory Council shared their opinions today about the report cards handed down by the state to their schools. Hear what some of them had to say: pic.twitter.com/atDbGeXbOe  MobilePublicSchools (@MobilePublicSch) February 1, 2018

Eichold-Mertz magnet school celebrated their perfect '100' score.

I knew they were awesome when I visited, and its great to see them get a PERFECT score from the Alabama State Department of Education!!!! ROCK ON EICHOLD-MERTZ!!!!! Hands on LEARNING works!!!!! #Mobile #PerfectScore @EicholdMertzMST @MobilePublicSch pic.twitter.com/BDzZ9hHJKD  Hayley Minogue (@HayleyMinogueTV) February 1, 2018

Jefferson County schools, Alabama's second largest district with 36,000 students and 56 schools, also earned a 'C.' Officials there made it clear they didn't believe the state's measures were fair nor did those measures go far enough to describe the value of a school to its community. The district went all out, sending district-created report cards home with students and publishing videos by high school feeder zone, showing a community's school's multiple impacts.

The Jefferson County School District is #redefiningready! Follow along this week and learn how we are preparing our students to be college ready, career ready, and life ready! #morethanascore #lovepubliceducation pic.twitter.com/7Z6F5V01zT  JEFCOED (@JEFCOED) January 29, 2018

Birmingham City Schools held a press conference Thursday morning, where Superintendent Dr. Lisa Herring, on the job for only nine months, acknowledged that more than half of the district's schools earned an 'F.' Herring, along with Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin, asked the greater community to help them improve Birmingham's schools. "We cannot do this without you," Herring said.

Though nearly every student in Birmingham lives in poverty, Herring made no excuses. "We'll own our data," Herring said. "We will also own our story. We will also own our transformation."

The Marion County school board, which earned a 'C,' with 79 points out of 100, took a different view, disavowing the grade by holding a vote of "no confidence" in the new report card on Jan. 23. The resolution rails against the use of the ACT Aspire as the test used to grade schools. The state board of education ended their contract for the test last June due to concerns over whether the test was aligned with what teachers are teaching, and the cost to perform an independent alignment study that federal education officials said is required.

Madison County schools received a district grade of 'B' and 25 of their 27 schools received A's or B's. Two schools received a 'C.' Superintendent Matt Massey, in a press release, said, "While we are pleased with the results, we are always evaluating ourselves and looking for ways to improve. I am confident that all of our schools are doing an outstanding job educating our children and preparing them for success."

At the top end of the list, every one of Madison City's schools earned an 'A,' prompting this tweet:

Madison City Schools earns top grades on state report card list.

Madison school district/every school, land all As. https://t.co/lCe7Sogpl0 #mcslearn pic.twitter.com/2BpB0RCXka  Madison City Schools (@madisonschools) February 1, 2018

Madison City Schools' superintendent Robby Parker said he was pleased, and, "A school system is comprised of many parts so the credit goes to students, teachers, instructional teams, parents and all the support services that create such a positive environment."

Alabama Education Association President Sherry Tucker, in a press release, said, "The success of our children cannot be defined by a letter grade." Tucker pointed out that Alabama is the 6th poorest state in the country and nearly 20 percent of the population lives below the poverty level. "A hungry child taking a standardized test will not perform at the same level as a well-nourished child. A child who must miss school to stay at home and take care of his siblings cannot be scored as failing. When we label our children as 'failures' we create more stress in their lives." Tucker went on to acknowledge the great things happening in Alabama's schools every day and said the AEA will "continue to be at the forefront fighting for Alabama school children and the resources all of our schools need to be successful."

Sylacauga City schools, in a press release, shared the 'B' grade the district earned as well as the grades of the four schools in their system. Superintendent Dr. Todd Freeman said the "report card provides useful information for us as we continue to improve," adding, "Our focus on academic achievement and commitment to accomplishing our mission are as strong as ever." Freeman was recently announced as Vestavia Hills City Schools new superintendent.

Huntsville City schools' superintendent Dr. Matt Akin, in a press release, acknowledged schools in the district earned grades "in every letter category", 'A' through 'F,' but said he "disagrees with a school's grade being based on a single test," though he favors accountability. Akin went on to say the district knows its challenges, and his team is working on a plan for excellence. The system received a 'C,' with 75 points out of 100. Nearly one-third, or 12, of Huntsville's 37 schools received an 'F,' while two schools received A's.

Athens City schools, which earned a 'B' for the system, issued a press release encouraging those who are interested in the grades "to take the time to understand what the grades represent and, more importantly, do not represent." Superintendent Trey Holladay went on to outline concerns echoed by other district officials about the use and weight of the ACT Aspire and how chronic absenteeism was calculated, ending with "We are very proud of all of our schools. We celebrate their work."

Tuscaloosa County schools earned a 'C,' but the 31 schools across the district earned the full range of grades from 'A' to 'F', issued a "message from the superintendent," Walter Davie. The message was clear: education is a shared responsibility between the schools and the community. Davie encouraged families to review the report cards, ask questions, and "join with us as we prepare this next generation for our future."

Limestone County schools issued a press release, acknowledging the 'B' the district earned while laying out plans to improve. Officials shared their disappointment that grades were based on the ACT Aspire, the test no longer used. The release stated the district "hoped for an 'A'," but that "results demonstrate consistent, systematic improvement in student growth." A plan to continue to improve was outlined, and officials said they expect the district "will soon receive an 'A' on the state report card."

Local television news stations recorded reaction across the state. Here are a few links:

West Alabama superintendents disappointed, not discouraged, by state report card - WSFA

State's school report cards questioned widely - Times Daily

Pike Road grade reaction - AlabamaNews.net

Pike County and Troy City school systems receive letter grades from state - Troy Messenger

Caroline Novak, president of A+ Education Partnership, a proponent of school report cards, in a press release, said she hopes parents and school officials will use the grades to start conversations to improve student learning.

"Every school in Alabama is faced with different challenges and each has different strengths and weaknesses. By looking at the measurements highlighted in the Alabama State Report Card over time, communities can work together to ensure all students are on track for success in school and after they graduate."

Here's the method Alabama education officials used to calculate grades. Officials are calling the report card a "prototype," as the public is invited to weigh in on the measures and the method until Feb. 23, via email at ALreportcard@alsde.edu.

According to a press release from the state department of education, the input will be considered before issuing a final report card, which will incorporate federal accountability requirements as well.

The calculations and format will be submitted to federal education officials as an amendment to Alabama's plan under the Every Student Succeeds Act. Once federal approval has been received, only then will the report card be considered "final."Ronald Golden, the accused Craigslist cat killer, is scheduled to go on trial this week -- more than four years after he was arrested.

The trial has been postponed 10 times. But pending the outcome of a motion to suppress Golden's statements to police, the case finally could be resolved.

Ronald Golden

Golden, a 52-year-old from Athens, faces 22 counts of animal cruelty in connection with the torture and deaths of multiple cats, records show. Each charge is a felony that carries a sentence up to 10 years in prison. Golden has pleaded not guilty and not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect.

The case is on Monday's court docket in Limestone County Circuit Judge Robert Baker's courtroom. It's scheduled to begin at 9 a.m.

Golden would name the cats before throwing them to the floor, breaking their necks or stomping them to death because he was "angry at the world," Athens police Chief Floyd Johnson told reporters when the suspect was arrested more than four years ago.

Police began investigating in September 2013 when they received a report about kitten bodies found in the Bullington Road area, where Golden lived, police have said. During the investigation, police got an anonymous tip that Golden was the killer, the chief has said.

"Golden admitted to buying kittens off Craigslist, naming them and then killing them," Johnson said in 2013. "Golden told investigators he had a cat room where he would throw the kittens against the floor to break their necks, stomp on them or 'wring their necks.'"

In a motion filed this past week, Golden's attorney Lucas Beaty asked the judge to keep his client's statements out of the trial. Beaty told the judge that after Golden was interrogated, police took him to a mental hospital, where he was detained for 10 days until a probate judge deemed him "mentally ill." That judge, according to court documents, ruled that Golden was "in need of treatment and was unable to make rational and informed decisions..."

"At the time of interrogation, the defendant was mentally incapable of understanding his Miranda rights and, therefore, was unable to knowingly, voluntarily and intelligently waive the same," Beaty wrote in court records.

Limestone County District Attorney Brian Jones hasn't publicly replied to those claims. He said he will be prepared Monday morning to argue on behalf of the state.Longtime televangelist Pat Robertson is recovering after suffering an embolic stroke, according to the Christian Broadcasting Network, a Virginia-based television network Robertson founded.

Robertson, 87, was rushed to the nearest stroke center Friday after a family member recognized "the onset of symptoms," the CBN report says.

"Within minutes of receiving [clot-busting drugs], Dr. Robertson was awake and responsive and able to move all of his limbs," CBN states. He is expected to make a full recovery.

Robertson hosts CBN's flagship show "The 700 Club," where he has praised and interviewed President Donald Trump during his campaign and after his election. Robertson and some other evangelical leaders have stood by the president, even after some thought they might abandon him. Robertson, for instance, called Trump's "Access Hollywood" video "macho talk." In the fall, Robertson connected the Las Vegas mass shooting to disrespect for Trump.

For decades, Robertson has been an influential leader among certain kinds of evangelicals who consider themselves to be charismatic or Pentecostal, including those who might engage in healing services and speaking in tongues.

Robertson has founded numerous organizations, including Regent University, which is based in Virginia Beach. Robertson's past remarks, including a claim that the 2010 earthquake in Haiti was God's judgment, have generated controversy.

The son of a U.S. senator, Robertson campaigned to become the Republican Party's nominee in the 1988 presidential election. He also founded the American Center for Law & Justice, a conservative organization that is seen as often being in opposition to the American Civil Liberties Union.Taxpayers in Alabama will now be able to take advantage state-of-the-art facial recognition software to avoid being the victim of tax fraud.

The Alabama Department of Revenue trialed the software last year, and it's allowing people to use it for free this year. The app, known as Alabama eID, will be able to take selfies of themselves that a computer program will then compare against your driving license picture.

"We're proud Alabama is leading the nation in securing taxpayer identities against state income tax fraud," said Vernon Barnett, Commissioner of the Alabama Department of Revenue. "Not only will we protect taxpayers against criminals, taxpayers who use the Alabama eID app will also receive priority processing of their refund."

The Alabama Dept. of Revenue will be the first in the country to use the technology across an entire state.

The program was developed by the Massachusetts-based IDEMIA, which says the system creates a system to ensure that only the correct taxpayer can claim a refund.

"As the global leader in identity security, IDEMIA is pleased to provide the Alabama Department of Revenue the Alabama eID app for its taxpayers. The app brings the highest level of security with a simple user interface to create the leading edge technology in protecting state income tax refunds," said Ed Casey, Chief Executive Officer, IDEMIA Identity & Security North America. "The technology's unique ability is its secure link to the identity verification process residents underwent to receive their Alabama driver's license or state ID. This authenticated connection between digital identity and physical identity is what ensures only you can claim your state income tax refund."A bill introduced to the Alabama Senate will make the state's sex education standards more medically accurate and remove what advocates called discriminatory language towards the LGBTQ community if it becomes law.

Sen. Tom Whatley, R-Auburn, introduced SB269, also known as the Alabama Youth Health Protection Act, on Thursday. It asks state legislators to accept two major changes to Alabama Code 16-40-A2, which details the content, course materials and instruction to k-12 students about sex education. The first modification was switching parts of the law mentioning AIDS to HIV, since an infected person gets HIV first. HIV can become AIDS if left untreated.

It also removes language stating homosexuality "is not a lifestyle acceptable to the general public and that homosexual conduct is a criminal offense under the laws of the state." The bill can be read below.

As of Saturday morning, Whatley has not returned phone calls or emails seeking comment about the bill.

The bill has to be approved by the Education and Youth Affairs Committee before the senate can vote on it. If the bill passes through the senate, the Alabama House of Representatives and gets Gov. Kay Ivey's approval, it will become effective the first day of the third month following its passage.

Committee Chairman Sen. Dick Brewbaker said the bill will be considered as soon as Whatley makes a request to put it on the committee's agenda. Brewbaker doesn't suspect the bill will move forward.

"There has been no enforcement of the sodomy laws in 40 years," Brewbaker told AL.com on Friday. "I don't see the committee rejecting the bill, but this is Alabama legislature. So who knows."

The bill is a step in the right direction on important issues, according to LGBTQ advocacy organization Equality Alabama. Executive Director Alex Smith said the more than 40-year-old law needs to be revised because it relies on outdated medical information about HIV and AIDS.

"It brings our state's minimum standards for youth health education in line with current science and educational standards," Smith said in a statement to Al.com on Friday. "Much of the language in the current statute was crafted during the HIV crisis of the 1980s and early 1990s, so SB269 cleans up that language and brings it into the 21st century."

LGBTQ advocates throughout the country have pointed out what they called an "anti-gay" law in the statue. Smith said the removal of the language will make sex education, and classrooms, more LGBTQ inclusive.

"The bill removes harmful language that both students and educators have reported is stigmatizing and not conducive to a productive educational environment," Smith said. "Equality Alabama is excited to offer our full support for this bill and are grateful for Senator Whatley's leadership on this important issue."

Smith said they have been talking to Whatley since the beginning of the year. Equality Alabama has been pushing for a bill like this for several years with Democratic support.

"With Republican supermajorities in both chambers of legislature, very little democratic legislation moves without Republican buy-in," Smith said. "So, after several years of talking to Republican legislators and providing supporting evidence of public support for this bill, we were able to move many members to be supportive."

Alabama Youth Health Protection Act by Jonece on ScribdRosenstein.jpg

Washington Post photo by Bill O'Leary. (Bill O'Leary)

The politically charged memo from the Republican majority on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) is now public. After much speculation, we've discovered that government intelligence gathering operations require strong congressional oversight. It's also hard to ignore the smell of rank politics.

Accountability has been one of the greatest concerns about Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) programs since the law's inception. The government's success in securing FISA warrants isn't exactly comforting. In 2016, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) rejected more FISA applications in one year (34) than it did from 1979-2015 (17). Even so, those rejections accounted for less than three percent of all FISA warrant applications.

We should have already learned our lesson in 2002 when the FISC rebuked Attorney General John Ashcroft's proposed intelligence gathering procedures. Ashcroft's scheme would have given criminal prosecutors regular access to information gathered from counterintelligence searches and wiretaps without any demonstration of probable cause that a crime had been committed or was imminent.

The FISC opinion outlined 75 instances where the federal government included misstatements or omissions of material fact in FISA warrant applications. The opinion contained much more damning information than anything revealed in the recent HPSCI majority memo.

Congress ought to do its job, hold the executive branch accountable and hopefully protect our civil liberties in the process.

But we should have reached that conclusion well before chatter began over this HPSCI memo. Clearly there's more here than another call for FISA accountability.

The memo leaves a not-so-subtle breadcrumb trail suggesting that the Department of Justice (DOJ) is a cesspool of anti-Trump bias and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is part of it. The memo accuses Rosenstein and other senior DOJ officials of failing to disclose the partisan nature of Christopher Steele's opposition research dossier on Donald Trump. According to the memo, the Steele dossier served as the basis for a FISA warrant to gather information on Trump aide Carter Page.

The memo points to the testimony of FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe for the conclusion that "no surveillance warrant would have been sought from the FISC without the Steele dossier information." The subsequent inference is that the investigation of Trump's campaign wouldn't have taken off but for the surveillance of Page.

But the memo leaves that connection for the reader to make. It is silent as to the tie between the Page surveillance and Rosenstein's appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller. The Republican HPSCI majority goes so far as to explicitly deny that the memo has anything to do with Mueller's investigation. Explanatory documents connected to the memo note, "The Memo is NOT intended to undermine the Special Counsel." Obviously, Rosenstein isn't the Special Counsel, but he is the one who appointed him.

President Donald Trump, who authorized the memo's release, doesn't seem all that concerned with HPSCI Republicans' stated intent either. He isn't leaving any inference to chance. The day after the memo's release he tweeted:

This memo totally vindicates "Trump" in probe. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their [sic] was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!

We should welcome strong, consistent oversight of our government's activities under FISA. If that's the real argument of this memo, then consider me in full agreement. Otherwise, it's hard to ignore the smell of politics. Eroding Rosenstein's credibility and undermining the basis for Mueller's investigation is a far more plausible justification for the memo's release than anything being spun by the HPSCI majority.

Cameron Smith is a regular columnist for AL.com and vice president for the R Street Institute, a think tank in Washington, D.C.As Sri Lanka marks 70 years of independence, the nation has a long road ahead in tackling post-war reconciliation.

At first, the tall, brooding silhouette at her doorstep was unrecognisable.

After more than three decades, Sellaiah Manoranjan, an ex-Tamil fighter, returned to a house in Jaffna where he and his family once sought refuge from the Sri Lankan military.

It reminded his Sinhalese host of the time she risked her own safety by offering shelter to this Tamil family in the beginning of the countrys 26-year civil war.

Were still alive, arent we, my boy? she asked, patting Manoranjan on his shoulder, as if he was still a teenager. They harassed us because we supported Tamils. But we protected them anyway.

Manoranjan has returned with his nephew Jude Ratnam, a filmmaker who is retracing his uncles experiences to get closer to understanding not only the Sinhalese-Tamil conflict, but also the infighting and power struggle within Tamil separatist groups that characterised their quest for a separate homeland.

A history of discrimination

After gaining independence from Britain in 1948, Sri Lanka became embroiled in a struggle between the Sinhalese majority ethnic group and the minority Tamils.

{articleGUID}

Despite the British Raj over Sri Lanka being largely coloured by the divide-and-rule strategy, figures from the Tamil minority of Sri Lanka were appointed to high-ranking civil services jobs and played an important role in the governance of the island.

But in 1948, administrative power fell into the hands of the Sinhalese, who began an onslaught of legislative discrimination against the Tamil population.

The Ceylon Citizenship Act of 1948 denied citizenship to Sri Lankans of Indian descent (Tamils were largely of Indian descent). Then, in 1956, the Sinhala Only Act made Sinhalese the only official language of Sri Lanka. In the 1970s, importing Tamil language books, magazines and films from the Tamil cultural hub of Tamil Nadu in India, was also outlawed.

Once political parties dominated by the Sinhalese majority got entrenched, they pushed through certain policies that had an effect on the everyday life of Tamils and made them feel marginalised, said Nira Wickramasinghe, professor of modern South Asian studies at Leiden University.

This was seen as an affront to the idea of equal citizenship and created a situation that radicalised the youth and led to a feeling of discontent that was channelled into anti-state movements, she told Al Jazeera.

Once political parties dominated by the Sinhalese majority got entrenched, they pushed through certain policies that had an effect on the everyday life of Tamils and made them feel marginalised. Nira Wickramasinghe, professor of modern South Asian studies at Leiden University

Calls for the right to Tamil self-determination, reflected in the 1977 parliamentary elections, were brushed aside when the Sri Lankan government responded with an amendment to the Sri Lankan constitution, prohibiting peaceful advocacy of independence.

Four years later, in 1981, an irreversible blow to Tamil culture and history at the hands of an organised Sinhalese mob saw the Jaffna library set on fire. Over 95,000 Tamil historical texts and manuscripts were burned to ashes.

Sri Lankas Black July

In July 1983, a group of Tamil fighters ambushed a contingent of the Sri Lankan military, killing 13 soldiers. The incident sparked the 1983 anti-Tamil riots, and a bloody civil war broke out that left more than 100,000 dead and around 800,000 displaced.

{articleGUID}

That night in July 1983, the whole capital was set on fire, recalls Ratnam, referring to what is widely remembered in Sri Lankan history as Black July.

When the dust settled, thousands of Tamils had been displaced from their homes and their businesses uprooted. Many Tamils were forced to migrate to the northern parts of the country, mainly to the city of Jaffna.

Just as we were arriving in the north of the country, the Tamil fighters began to organise themselves to take up arms. The Tamil guerrillas' fight for an independent state began. Jude Ratnam, filmmaker

Ratnam was still a child when they fled the violence, but he remembers his father walking helplessly up and down the platform as his family boarded the train from Colombo to Jaffna.

That picture is deeply etched into my memory, he said. That night, I didnt realise we were fleeing Colombo as refugees. We went to the north where the majority of Tamils were already living.

Just as we were arriving in the north of the country, the Tamil fighters began to organise themselves to take up arms. The Tamil guerrillas fight for an independent state began, Ratnam said.

Manoranjan reconnects with the lady who sheltered his family from the Sri Lankan army three decades ago. [Screengrab/Al Jazeera]

A rebellion divided

{articleGUID}

Under the banner of Tamil Eelam, the struggle for a separate homeland for the Tamils, the resistance fractured before it could present itself to be a viable opposition for the state.

All the names I heard as a child, Tigers, TELO, PLOTE, EPDP, EPRLF, EROS, were those of the various Tamil militant groups, Ratnam said. I was proud of those names.

Pride soon turned into fear as infighting started within the group.

They [Tamil Tigers] were killing all those who opposed them, one by one, said Manoranjan, who was a member of the National Liberation Front of Tamileelam (NLFT). It was a small political group that stood for socialist revolution and a group that inevitably was overshadowed by the more violent and menacing Tigers.

In the early 1980s, you had a streamlining of the [Tamil resistance] groups. The Tigers really consolidated their hegemony as the dominant group and physically eliminated most of its rivals, Wickramasinghe told Al Jazeera.

The TT consolidated its place quite violently. There wasnt a rallying around in an organic way, it was a battleground for who would become the representative of this movement, she said.

The struggle for Tamil Eelam was quashed in 2009, when, after weeks of intense fighting between the Sri Lankan military and the Tamil Tigers, Velupillai Prabhakaran, the chief Tamil leader was shot and killed by security forces.

The Tigers really consolidated their hegemony as the dominant group and physically eliminated most of its rivals. Nira Wickramasinghe, professor of modern South Asian studies at Leiden University

The fear is ready to come back

Almost nine years after the end of the civil war, Sri Lanka is still grappling with its recent past. Many challenges remain unresolved and many of the physical, emotional and psychological wounds of war remain unhealed.

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According to Meenakshi Ganguly, Human Rights Watchs South Asia director, successive governments have failed to properly address issues raised by the conflict.

Immediately after the war, the government led by Mahinda Rajapaksa was unwilling to address concerns around violations of laws of war, she said.

Those seeking accountability and answers were under severe pressure with the government cracking down on freedom of expression. Those suspected of any connection or sympathy with the Tamil Tigers were subjected to arbitrary arrests, disappearances, and severe torture, including sexual abuse, in custody, Ganguly told Al Jazeera.

In March 2017, Zeid Raad al-Hussein, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, told the UN Rights Council that the consistent failure to effectively investigate, prosecute and punish serious crimes appears to reflect a broader reluctance or fear to take action against members of the security forces.

The current government stresses it has indeed been involved in efforts to address some of the concerns regarding its role in the civil war. In that light, Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena appears to contradict key findings from a UN investigation into the countrys civil war, released in September 2015.

Today, in our country, were asked to move forward, forgetting the past, said Ratnam.

Almost all traces of the war have been wiped out. Everyone wants to believe the country will develop, whatever the means. We are asked to deny our identities in order to move forward. But I know that that fear, which is buried deep inside us is ready to come back to the surface and it could happen at any moment.Migrants say they are being returned to the same conditions that made them risk their lives crossing the Sahara desert.

Lagos, Nigeria  Life has been challenging for Grace Joshua since she returned to Lagos from Libya, a dangerous transit point many Africans pass through to get to Europe.

Joshua, 32, is one of the 6,000 Nigerian migrants the International Organization for Migration (IOM) repatriated to Nigeria on a chartered flight from Libya after reports of endemic abuse and modern-day slavery.

She has been jobless since her arrival in Lagos. The joy of returning to Nigeria was short-lived by the reality she escaped when she left the country in 2014: No job.

Joshua left the city for her aunts house in Ilorin, a central state in Nigeria, to escape Lagos high cost of living and to search for employment opportunities. But her luck did not change.

I am not doing anything yet  In the whole of Ilorin, its only a cereal company they have and theres no work there, she told Al Jazeera.

Soon, she ran out of money. Her efforts to get a job and start life anew after enduring months of torture and suffering in Libya didnt yield any results.

Fleeing poverty

Through connections with human traffickers, migrants from Nigeria travel through the northern state of Kano to Agadez in Niger. Thousands of Nigerians then set off through the Sahara desert for Libya from Agadez on open cargo vehicles.





Regardless of their status  either as economic migrants or victims of the dangerous trafficking business  these migrants are all escaping grinding poverty and a high rate of unemployment, which push irregular migration across the Sahara to Libya.

A recent report from Nigerias Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said about 16 million people out of a total active labour force of 85 million were unemployed in the third quarter of 2017.

Last year, Ikechukwu Okonkwo left Lagos, the countrys commercial capital, for Libya because his fish farming business in the bustling suburb of Ikotun slowed down.

Business was moving slowly and the person I learned the business from was frustrating me, he told Al Jazeera.

I sold off some of my property and started the journey. I sold the property for 720,000 naira [$2,300] and I paid about 550,000 thousand naira [$1,700] to the connection man I met through my brother, who is in Italy.

Like many other migrants from Nigeria, Okonkwo traveled from Kano to the porous border with Niger on a motorcycle. With a small bag of clothes, shoes, and a water bottle, he made his journey from Niger to Libya through the desert.

He travelled for three weeks, seeing many dead bodies covered in the sand, trucks stuck in the desert, and stranded migrants who had been robbed.

Upon arrival in Sabha, an oasis city in southwestern Libya, Okonkwo had thought hed travel immediately to the coast for the second trip across the Mediterranean Sea into Europe. But a street gang known as the Asma Boys kidnapped and imprisoned him alongside other migrants  about 15 men.

The Asma boys harassed us, demanding  3,000 Libyan dinars [$2,200] before we would make headway to the Libyan coast, said Okonkwo. They call it settlement money.'

Daring escape

For five days, Okonkwo received continuous beatings by the gang members because he couldnt pay the ransom fee. We were told to call our family in Nigeria to demand the money.

Okonkwo and his group devised a plan to escape by attacking a guard, since they didnt have the ransom the gang demanded.

The day we escaped, many Asma Boys went out, leaving just two behind. One of the guys came to beat us again but I pushed the guy down, snatched his gun. Since he was alone with us we forced him to open the gate for us. We collected the key and ran away. Its only God that saved us because we didnt know where we are running to, Okonkwo said.





The following week, Okonkwo and other migrants left Sahba for the Libyan coast through a connection man. At 2am, they embarked on the journey across the sea on a flimsy rubber dinghy.

A few hours into the journey, Okonkwo said a helicopter flew in and began hovering over their heads. Libyan coastguard vessels soon arrived.

Okonkwo was taken to a Libyan deportation camp, where he lived on bread and water for four months, before being released and flown back to Nigeria by IOMs humanitarian return programme.

I told God that if I should leave this place I will never travel to Libya again. I cant go back to Libya again. All of them are wicked, Okonkwo said, his face mottled with contempt.

Economic reintegration

In December 2016, the European Union Trust Fund for Africa (EUTF) launched the EU-IOM joint initiative in 14 African countries: Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Cote dIvoire, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Gambia, Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria and Senegal.

In Nigeria, it was launched in May 2017 with the aim of helping stranded migrants in Libya. As part of the reintegration and support programme, IOM organised a workshop on business skills and cooperatives for returned migrants in Lagos state. Returnees were invited to Lagos and lodged in a hotel for the four-day training course.

The main purpose of this reintegration, support and this business skills training is to give them an alternative  to stay back and resolve one of the push factors, which is the economic aspect, Abraham Tamrat, IOMs programme manager, told Al Jazeera.

We also provide them with economic reintegration that will resolve the employment-related challenge that might have pushed them from the very beginning to follow irregular migration.

Training on how to start and sustain a business in Nigeria was also rolled out, with the IOM collaborating with the governments Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN).

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We need to help them identify their area of strength, their passion and be able to help them develop businesses in that line, so that as business go on the challenges of business will not overpower them, SMEDAN representative Sola Dawodu said.

IOM budgeted for just 3,000 migrants, but the number of returnees since 2017 is 6,500. Tamrat said it wont affect the programme.

What IOM did in response to that in Nigeria is to massively upscale its staff capacity, so we have triple the staff capacity we used to have before, and the support for Nigeria is about 50 million euros but it will go beyond that now.

Starting anew

As the mid-morning sun rises above the horizon in Lagos, scores of returned migrants  about 90 of them from Edo, Delta, Kwara, Osun, Ogun and Lagos states  thronged the workshop venue to get writing materials and training leaflets.

Theres possibility of surviving in this country, Osita Osemene, IOMs lead trainer for returned migrants, said. That negative energy you used to travel, convert it to positive energy and rebuild your life.

Grace Joshua is willing to begin anew. Shes poised to start off from where she stopped in 2014 as a hairdresser.

I want to establish my handwork and to proceed. I dont have anything on me but I have God, she said.You know, you hang with your friends in the town centre. The police can stop you several times in an evening. You can stand here, and get stopped, be pushed against a wall for everyone to see. You walk towards your school  you get stopped again. We feel followed.

I had just arrived at the festival. A person grabs me from the back. When someone grabs you, you react. The police thought I was resisting. He threw me on the ground, put his knee on my back, and I screamed. He called me the N-word. That was what hurt the most.

Frustration, hate, irritation, humiliation and oppression. Being subjected to discrimination. These are the feelings I get every time I get stopped. Even if you are innocent, and havent done anything, you get scared, stressed.

It was an ordinary evening, nothing special. All of a sudden, a police car stops in front of us. They jump out and push us against the car. It happened without any reason. None of us had anything strange on us. Weve never had any dealings with the police previously in terms of records. This happened because of the way we looked, we are black. We saw another group of guys in front of us, all white. They were not stopped.

This happened because of the way we looked, we are black. We saw another group of guys in front of us, all white. They were not stopped. Victim of racial profiling

These are some of the testimonies by Afro-Swedes, Muslims and Roma from marginalised areas, collected as part of a study on the Swedish police by criminologist Leandro Schclarek Mulinari on behalf of Civil Rights Defenders.

To be stopped and controlled by police is an everyday experience for very many people who do not have white bodies, Mulinari told Al Jazeera, adding that the aim of the study, published in December, was not to cast the police as racists.

There are problems with structural racism within the police force, and this study aimed to deepen the conversation around racial profiling  which is a phenomenon thats not being discussed in a Swedish context.

Leandro Schclarek Mulinari said being stopped and searched is an everyday reality for non-white Swedes [Courtesy: Leandro Schclarek Mulinari]

Before the study, an Instagram account titled Polis Brutaliteten i Orten, or Police Brutality in the Suburbs emerged in November.

Within two weeks, the page had more than 10,000 followers and was flooded with personal stories of suffering verbal and physical abuse, racial slurs and stop and searches  which did not appear to be random  by the police.

In January, an anonymous user said police called his group of friends damn Syrians.

Hossein Khodr posted in December, saying how a simple discussion with police over a parking ticket escalated, seeing him questioned of selling drugs.

Another user in December claimed that police told him that his car looks too expensive for you to own.

Similar posts relate to police intimidation and repeated stop and searches.

Military intervention in the suburbs

Fatimah Al Sharkawi, 22, one of the founders of the project, said the account was set up after troubling discussions at the political level to beef up security in the suburbs.

To us, creating the account was timely, she told Al Jazeera, especially at a time when politicians are discussing the importance of bringing the military to the suburbs to support police in battling crime, and increasing surveillance with CCTV cameras.

During the first parliamentary debates of the 2018, Jimmie Akesson, leader of the far-right Sweden Democrats, suggested using soliders to support police in fighting gang-related crimes.

Prime Minister Stefan Lofven later said using military resources was not his preferred method, but stopped short of ruling the option out altogether.

Social justice activist Aftab Soltani, who helps manage the Instagram account, said the feed is bringing up uncomfortable truths.

The Swedish police have this nice image, they are not supposed to be like the US police, she said. But these are the effects and results of structural racism, and of course it will manifest itself in one way or another.

[Mulinaris] report validated our experiences, its not just personal opinions. These are collective experiences and a reality for many. These are testimonies from all over Sweden which need to be discussed. The account and the report are mirroring the society and world we live in.

Mulinari said unlike the UK and US, data is hard to come by in Sweden.

Furthering research, he added, changes the tone of the discussion and conversation about the topic.

Police response questioned

Police responded to the testimonies within the study, claiming they were isolated cases of poor policing.

This reaction reminded Mulinari of a secret Roma register, a database formed by police set up in 2013 containing the names of 4,000 mostly Roma people.

It it against Swedish law to gather directories based on ethnicity.

For example, when the Roma registry was exposed  where Roma people in Sweden as young as two were illegally put on a registry by the police force  instead of looking at it as institutional racism, they dismissed it as the result of bad judgment by individual policemen, rather than the failure of the police force, he said.

We need to see to what extent [racial profiling] is part of the police forces work, and what consequences it has on the people.

 What they did to me is illegal and wrong

Rania  not her real name  is a 16-year-old non-white, Sweden-born citizen.

She spoke to Al Jazeera about her experience with the police.

This is her story:

As they were attending a festival in Stockholm, one friend in the group became intoxicated. It was an alcohol-free event. The police wanted to take the friend into custody so she could sober up.

We told them we can look after her, but in the end, we accepted what the police said, Rania said. As more officers started to arrive the atmosphere turned hostile very quickly.

Rania claims the police handled her roughly, handcuffed her and put her inside a police van. Inside the van, she saw another friend from the group.

After a few minutes drive, the police released the friend from the vehicle.

She was then left alone with the three officers  two males and one female.

One of the officers told her: We are now going to take a short trip to the forests.

Rania panicked.

The officers pulled me out in an industrial area into the forest.

The police are supposed to protect us, not attack us. Rania*, victim of racial profiling

We started to walk and the officer said to me: No one is going to find you here, you will regret having so much attitude towards us!

While he was doing that, he was pushing a cold hard item onto my neck. I later discovered when he pushed me down to my knees that it was a gun.

I thought they were going to kill me. He repeatedly asked me: Will you show attitude to the police again? And I repeatedly said no. I told them you can beat me up if you want. The officer replied: You dont deserve to be beaten up, you deserve to die.

Rania claimed the officers walked her deep into the forest and left her with her handbag in the dark.

She did not have a mobile phone but eventually managed to find her way out.

She saw a light by the side of the road and a security guard. He drove her to the nearest tube station. They were about 25 minutes away from the city.

Rania reported the incident to the police and the security guard testified; he had seen the police van earlier and watched them walk into the forests.

The case was closed after a few months because there was not enough evidence to prove a crime had been committed.

I never had any dealings with the police prior to this incident, said Rania. I had no negative feelings towards them. But since this happened, it has sparked hatred towards them.

Even if I had attitude, it does not justify how they treated me. What they did to me is illegal and wrong. Prior to this I heard about police brutality and racial profiling, but I did not believe it was true. The police are supposed to protect us, not attack us.

By the time of publication, police had not responded to Al Jazeeras request for comment.

Follow Fatma Naib on Twitter: @FatmaNaibAmid the Nigeria bookstore buzz, Adichies remarks on postcolonial theory were ignored. But they are just as important.

On January 25, Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie headlined the Paris edition of the Night of Ideas, a cross-continental initiative run by the French Institute, featuring public discussions on topical issues. Adichies conversation with French journalist Caroline Broue was an absorbing exchange themed power to the imagination.

It went smoothly, except for two moments. In the first instance, Broue asked: Are there any bookstores in Nigeria? to the audiences and Adichies bafflement. Adichies response: I think it reflects very poorly on French people that you have to ask me that question, sent the interview trending on traditional and social media.

The second moment came during the question and answer session, when someone sought Adichies opinion on postcolonial theory. Her response was: Postcolonial theory? I dont know what it means. I think it is something that professors made up because they needed to get jobs. This comment didnt provoke as much noise on as her clapback about bookstores in Nigeria.

As an academic, I am grateful for the interview, which eloquently demystifies postcolonial theory, despite her disavowal of it. Given students intolerance for texts longer than a sizzling clapback tweet, the interview makes for an excellent introduction to this theory.

The postcolonial spaces

If postcolonial theory is concerned with salvaging futures scarred by imperial greed, then these two exchanges illustrate the power dynamics postcolonial theorists seek to dismantle. Broues question  whether serious or a failed attempt at irony, as Ainehi Edoro notes  was authorised by French, and broadly, the Global Norths wilful ignorance about Nigeria.

The average Nigerian does not have the luxury of nursing what Adichie calls a single story about France. It is in their interest to know that France has bookstores.

France and the Global North retain inordinate amounts of power and resources, with real implications for the average Nigerians life. Certainly, France has sufficient resources to host the Night of Ideas. It will be a while before we have an Africa-run Night of Ideas. Yes, we have bookstores, but we do not have enough platforms for public engagement with ideas. And postcolonial theory explains why.

Perhaps both Adichie and Broue were being humorous. But humour is rarely innocent. Humour is to aggression what a half-slip is to a transparent skirt. It lends aggression decorum. Adichies quip about postcolonial theory is revealing about her low regard for academics.

Yet, as Kenyan poet Shailja Patel eloquently put it, Adichie is a beneficiary of the space-clearing labour of generations of postcolonial theorists. These theorists fought the epistemic injustice of canonising certain literature over others.

Chimamanda the novelist is a genius. Her accomplishments are stellar, her fame merited. But the recognition and rewarding of her gifts wasn't a happy accident. The labours and struggles of many scholars, past and present, carved out the spaces where her voice could land.  Shailja Patel (@shailjapatel) January 27, 2018

Long before she expressed her frustration at the Western Worlds tendency to read African literature as anthropology and not art, postcolonial theorists had been fighting this tendency. These theorists contest unequal assignment of value to works of art based on the geopolitical location of artists.

We are our grandmothers prayers, we are our grandfathers dreamings  so goes a Sweet Honey in the Rock song. What does it mean to giggle at the wrinkles on the hands that pried open bolted doors so we could walk in and take a seat at the table?

One thing Black women artists have taught us is the importance of acknowledging our intellectual histories and those who dreamt the futures we enjoy, and our responsibility to dream more liveable futures for those behind us.

When Adichie affirms in the interview I think of myself as coming from a tradition, and names her literary precursors, she overlooks the feminist and postcolonial theorists who made her possible. They are part of her lineage.

Writing as an act of theorisation

Oddly, the irony of dismissing postcolonial theory after a clapback against stereotypes cannot be lost on anyone familiar with Adichies fiction and essays. Those of us aligned with feminist theorist Pumla Dineo Gqolas insistence that creative works theorise, consider Adichies writing to be acts of theorisation. We also hear echoes of our literary foremothers rejection of the tag feminist, when their works were decidedly feminist.

Theory comes dressed in different registers. The postcolonial theorist Frantz Fanons theorisation of the colonial experience, like feminist theorist Obioma Nnaemekas conceptualisation of nego-feminism, comes dressed in the same story-telling robes as Adichies fiction.

Meantime, Adichies novels Purple Hibiscus and Half of a Yellow Sun are forms of theorisation, if we understand stories to be involved in analytic work. To misquote Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe, theories, like stories, lend us a second handle on reality.

Adichies Purple Hibiscus lends us an analytic handle on the familiar paradox of African nationalist icons who gave us so much, but took away so much more, because their visions of freedom were one-dimensional.

When we encounter Papa Eugene as an icon of freedom in the public sphere and a domestic tyrant in Purple Hibiscus, we begin to make sense of a Kwame Nkrumah or a Haile Selassie or a Thabo Mbeki. These are men whose pan-African dreams of freedom we enjoy today, but whose visions of freedom were narrow and harmful in other ways.

Theories, like stories, help us make sense of our worlds.

But postcolonial artists and theorists alike face an intractable challenge: the burden of representation, which American literary critic Henry Louis Gates Jr defines as that homely notion that you represent your race, thus that your actions can betray or honor it.

While Gates Jr has in mind the eight, remarkable Black men he profiles in Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Man, his concept resonates with the literary world. Because the global literary marketplace can only celebrate a few writers of colour at a time, such writers become laden with the responsibility of representing their people.

The stakes are high. Under this pressure, there is little room for decontextualised humour. The risks of erasure of entire intellectual histories and hard-earned victories are real. Perhaps the lesson is not that we should joke less.

If we are to dismantle the inequalities that limit the possibilities of art and ideas from the postcolonial world, the lesson is clear: we should all embrace postcolonial thought.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial stance.Posted 2/3/18

After hunting opportunities have ended, its important to clean and care for firearms so theyll be in good working order for the next season.

Hunters and gun owners can get information about In recent years, Asian trading partners, such as China, have seen a massive increase in their trade surplus with the US, which has been grappling with widespread deindustrialisation and manufacturing layoffs.

US President Donald Trump has taken up the issue and has promised to bring jobs back to the US. In the first year of his presidency, he effectively commenced a trade war by imposing hefty tariffs on imports of foreign-made solar panels and washing machines, where China and South Korea have been world leaders.

Over the coming months, Washington is expected to up the ante by targeting rivals in hi-tech industries, with a particular focus on Chinas alleged intellectual property rights theft.

But the risk is an unwanted escalation of hostility that could burn bridges among nations. In its wish to protect American jobs, the Trump administration could unleash a dangerous tit-for-tat dynamic among leading industrial nations. What is at stake isnt only an unprecedented era of economic globalisation, but also peace among major powers.

Massive intellectual property theft

In his highly anticipated speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Trump openly warned that his country will no longer turn a blind eye to unfair economic practices of other nations. Decades from now, Trumps speech could be remembered as the de facto declaration of the 21st-century global trade war.

In particular, he focused on alleged massive intellectual property theft, industrial subsidies and pervasive state-led economic planning by rival nations. Though he fell short of naming names, it was more than obvious that he had state capitalist nations such as China in mind.

What's clear is that almost overnight the US has transformed from a pre-eminent advocate of free trade into a protectionist villain in the eyes of both friends and foes.

Robert Lighthizer, Trumps hardline trade official, defended the imposition of 30 percent tariffs on selected foreign products as a clear indication that the new administration will always defend American workers, farmers, ranchers, and businesses in this regard.

The US International Trade Commission has determined that imports of solar panels and washing machines, for instance, have unfairly hurt domestic manufacturers.

China, the worlds leading trading nation, immediately shot back. The Chinese commerce ministry expressed strong dissatisfaction with Trumps latest trade measure for it aggravates the global trade environment.

The Asian powerhouse prodded the US to exercise restraint in using trade restrictions, warning that it will not shirk from resolutely defend[ing] its legitimate interests if push comes to shove.

Key US allies were also livid . South Korean Trade Minister Kim Hyun-chong characterised the measures as excessive and a clear violation of World Trade Organization rules.

Leading Korean companies, namely Samsung and LG, were the prime targets of the latest American tariffs. Mexico, another major trading partner, warned that it will utilise all legal resources available against the US.

All these came against the backdrop of the Trump administrations decision to unilaterally renegotiate existing free trade agreements with both South Korea and Mexico, embittering historically cordial relations with long-time allies.

A leap into the a byss

The 1930 Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, under which the US imposed tariffs on over 20,000 imported goods, added fuel to the Great Depression of the early 20th century.

As the worlds leading economy back then, the US aggressive protectionism ensured the virtual collapse of global trade, as each nation adopted corresponding measures to defend their local industries.

The upshot was a mutually assured financial destruction, which precipitated the most destructive war in human history. In recent decades, the US has flirted with virtual trade wars with often-disastrous results.

When former US President Barack Obama decided to imposea 35 percent tariff on Chinese tires in 2009, the Asian powerhouse responded by imposing restrictions on US food imports.





Were the Trump administration to impose new trade sanctions, China would likely respond by squeezing US companies already operating on its soil, while permanently shutting out others form the worlds largest consumer market.

China could start ditching multibillion-dollar purchases of US Boeing aircrafts in favour of European Airbus, tighten regulation on manufacturing and sales of Apple products, reduce imports of US soybeans and food products, and even draw down its purchase of US treasury bills, which have kept the US economy afloat.

The Trump administration, however, is obstinately standing its ground, as it panders to its nationalist base. Specifically, its moving to employ a triumvirate of unilateral trade weapons, which could precipitate wide-scope sanctions against China and other major trading partners.

These include provisions in US trade law to launch investigations. In early January, the Department of Commerce submitted a report on steel imports based on Section 232 of the 1962 Trade Expansion Act, which allows restrictions on trade to be imposed to protect national security. In the next few months, the Trump administration will have to decide whether to impose tariffs on steel imports, which would affect China  the worlds biggest exporter of steel.

A probe has also been initiated into aluminium imports and another one into violation of US intellectual property rights under Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act.

Trump has already warned of a very big intellectual property potential fine, which, he claims, is going to come out soon. If the threats push through, China and other major trading partners are widely expected to, at the very least, take the US to court for alleged violation of multilateral trading regimes.

This frightening scenario would immediately have a ripple effect across the whole global economy, which depends heavily on stable trade relations among leading powers.

Whats clear is that almost overnight the US has transformed from a pre-eminent advocate of free trade into a protectionist villain in the eyes of both friends and foes. The bigger threat, however, is trade war turning into hot war, as the nationalist fervour extinguishes the fruits of globalisation.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial stance.Or does it just suffer from the misfortune of being a neighbour of the US?

In 2006, Mexico launched a war on drugs with the fervent backing of its ever-helpful neighbour to the north, the United States of America.

Now a bit more than a decade later, some 200,000 people are estimated to have been killed thus far as a result, with an additional 30,000 or more disappeared and a continuous discovery of unmarked mass graves.

Recent reports suggest that 2017 was, in fact, Mexicos most violent year, in terms of homicides, since the Mexican government began publicising crime data in 1997. More than 29,000 murders were recorded last year alone.

And what do you know: Drugs continue to flow into the US, where the proscription of mind-altering substances that are in sky-high demand is precisely what has rendered the drug business in Mexico so lethally lucrative in the first place.

Perverse symbiosis

Arturo Cano, a journalist with the prominent Mexican newspaper La Jornada, once commented to me on the perverse symbiosis that has long characterised the US-Mexico relationship: Mexico provides the cheap labour and the US provides the deportees. Mexico provides the dead and disappeared and the US the armies of drug users.

Cano went on to invoke a lament attributed to former Mexican dictator Porfirio Diaz, who died in 1915: Poor Mexico, so far from God, so close to the United States.

Indeed, thanks to acute geographical misfortune, Mexico has been an easy target for economic abuse by its northern neighbour  entailing magical forms of free trade in which the US is permitted to freely bombard the Mexican market with subsidised products while driving several million Mexican farmers out of business.

Unsurprisingly, destroying a whole lot of livelihoods is not the best way to deter people from pursuing options more conducive to financial survival  including, as it turns out, in the field of narco-activity.

Meanwhile, the US handily offsets its considerable contributions to the forging of the Mexican narco-state by donating billions of dollars to the drug war effort.

This arrangement effectively amounts to throwing more money into a landscape of impunity in which notoriously corrupt security forces are implicated in extrajudicial massacres and deadly collaboration with drug cartels.

Not that a country where police regularly kill unarmed black people should be regarded as the standard bearer for ethical behaviour.

Perpetuating war

Amnesty International has noted that, as a result of Mexicos drug war, reports of torture and other ill-treatment by Mexican police and military officials grew by 600 percent between 2003 and 2013.

And according to a 2016 Amnesty International document, Mexican security forces routinely torture and ill-treat women who they detain in group arrests in order to to boost figures and show society that the governments security efforts are yielding results.

When it comes to keeping the old casus belli alive, the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is in the very same boat on the other side of the border; after all, if you actually win a war on drugs, therell be no more incoming funds to fight that war forever and ever.

As Carmen Boullosa and Mike Wallace observe in their book A Narco History: How the United States and Mexico Jointly Created the Mexican Drug War, the DEA would be hard-pressed to justify its annual budget of roughly $2.5bn if the legal ground shifted beneath it towards drug decriminalisation.

In 2006, as Ginger Thompson ably narrates in a New Yorker piece titled Trafficking in Terror, the DEA hoisted itself onto the ever-profitable war on terror bandwagon with the help of the scary new crime of narco-terrorism.

But just as the US is unqualified to fight a literal war on terror  engaging as it does in regular bouts of terror-inducing activity across the globe  the countrys drug war credentials are somewhat less than impeccable, particularly when one considers New York Times headlines like The CIA Drug Connection Is as Old as the Agency.

Dangers galore

It would require a document longer than Donald Trumps fetishised border wall to adequately delve into the US history of complicity in the international drug trade  from Vietnam to Pakistan to Panama and Honduras.

In one especially memorable episode in the 1980s, an endearing US partnership with right-wing Nicaraguan Contras led to a certain crack cocaine epidemic in the US and the devastation of black communities in South Central Los Angeles.

In more recent years, US shamelessness has included cooperation between the DEA and none other than Mexicos Sinaloa cartel.

Enter current US president and disseminator extraordinaire of fake news, who tweeted on January 18 with regard to his proposed border monstrosity: We need the Wall to help stop the massive inflow of drugs from Mexico, now rated the number one most dangerous country in the world.

Never mind that Mexicos homicide rate is in fact lower than that of other regional US buddies  and preferred drug war partners  like Colombia.

In any case, Trumpian reality has now officially awarded the position of number one most dangerous country in the world to a place long victimised by the US  the very same US that, in cultivating a disproportionately trigger-happy culture at home, could very well stand to issue travel advisories for its own domestic classrooms, nightclubs, and playgrounds.

Add to these truths the US habit of invading and traumatising other countries at will, and the country itself might  just might  start to seem like the most dangerous one on earth.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial stance.After being called a brown, Muslim P**i by a senior Labour councillor, Sarwar is determined to stamp out racism.

A Scottish politician has called for the government and public to accept that everyday Islamophobia is a direct threat to Muslims, after claiming he was unsuccessful in his bid to lead the Scottish Labour Party because of insidious racism.

Member of Scottish Parliament (MSP) Anas Sarwar, who was born in Glasgow to Pakistani parents, secured just 43 percent of the vote in November last year, losing the race to Richard Leonard.

Sarwar recently alleged that a senior Labour councillor, Davie McLachlan, told him he refused to vote for the 34-year-old because Scotland was not ready for a brown, Muslim P**i.

In our drive to be accepted, our drive to be seen as equal or normal like everyone else, we have been shy in speaking about everyday racism and Islamophobia. Anas Sarwar, Scottish politician

When Sarwar questioned the use of McLachlans racist language, the councillor dismissed the comment as pub banter.

McLachlan, who denies the allegations, has been suspended from the party awaiting investigation.

Sarwar also claimed that another party member withdrew her support from his campaign after seeing photographs of his wife, Furheen, wearing the hijab, or headscarf.

Just as we have everyday sexism, everyday homophobia, we also have everyday racism and everyday Islamophobia, too, Sarwar said in an interview with Al Jazeera, explaining that he recently launched a cross-parliamentary group tackling anti-Muslim racism.

One of the challenges as an ethnic minority politician, as a Muslim politician, has been being honest about [racism]. In our drive to be accepted, our drive to be seen as equal or normal like everyone else, we have been shy in speaking about everyday racism and Islamophobia.

The politician said it would take a great deal to consider running for party leadership again, given his traumatic experience.

But what it has encouraged me to do is to stand up and speak about it, he said. My children know what racism is. They know what Islamophobia is. They experience racism and Islamophobia. I owe it to them and their generation to make sure that when they are my age, they can see that in that 20 or 30 years we have made progress. If we dont, then we will have failed them.

Anas Sarwars wife Furheen and their children attend the launch of his campaign to be Scottish Labour leader in Glasgow [File: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images]

Sarwars father, Mohammad, was elected as the first Muslim MP in the UK in 1997 and was also subject to racial abuse.

It surprised me to hear the same language used 20 years on, because I thought wed moved on, he said, adding he had been physically assaulted while campaigning for his father.

I think theres less of that overt, aggressive, violent racism on our streets [today], he said. We now have a more insidious, institutionalised form [of racism] that impacts on workplaces, college, university campuses, and playgrounds across the country.

Sarwars allegations surfaced against the backdrop of increasing anti-Muslim racism in the country.

According to a report by the Scottish governments advisory panel on hate crime, Islamophobic attacks rose by 89 percent between 2015 and 2016.

Abuse, the report noted, rose following attacks where the perpetrator was revealed to be of Muslim background, with collective punishment rolled out to Islamic communities.

Moral support

Several politicians and organisations have offered moral support to Sarwar.

A Scottish Labour Party spokesperson said in a statement that Sarwars experience was completely unacceptable.

Labour has a zero-tolerance approach to any form of racism and bigotry. This reported behaviour falls well short of what we expect, the spokesperson said, promising an investigation.

First Leader Nicola Sturgeon has praised Sarwars openness.

Anas and I are political opponents locally as well as nationally, but I genuinely admire the way he has spoken up this week, and the bravery with which he has done it, she said in parliament.

It would be brave in any circumstances but I think all of us know that when were raising issues that involve people within our own parties that is even more difficult to do, and therefore, the praise should be even greater for having done so.

Humza Yousaf, Scottish National Party politician and transport minister said on Twitter: Utterly shocking  Everyday racism alive and well.

Tell MAMA, an organisation monitoring anti-Muslim attacks, tweeted: Scotland needs to do more to combat anti-Muslim hatred.A look at Cameroons language divide

English speakers in Cameroon are demanding an end to what they say is discrimination by the French-speaking majority.Corsicas nationalists stage protest before Macron visit

Thousands of nationalist protesters have marched on the French island of Corsica, demanding greater autonomy from France.Nicosia, Cyprus  Voters in the Republic of Cyprus are going to the polls in a runoff ballot to decide who will be the countrys next president.

The race on Sunday pits incumbent Nicos Anastasiades, a conservative who won 35.5 percent in the first round, against Stavros Malas, a leftist-backed independent who came in second with 30.2 percent.

The winner will be expected to pick up the pieces of a suspended peace process on the ethnically split island, as well as oversee the economic recovery of a country still bouncing back from a crippling financial crisis.

A hardened politician, 71-year-old Anastasiades is a prominent figure in the Greek Cypriot political old guard with decades of experience. In contrast, Malas, a 50-year-old a geneticist, has been relatively absent from Cypruss central political arena, even though he faced off Anastasiades  and lost  in the last presidential elections five years ago.

Both finalists are in favour of resuming UN-mediated peace talks with Turkish Cypriots in a bid to reunify Cyprus as a two-zone federation. However, their economic visions differ.

Past opinion polls suggested Anastasiades was most likely to win, but Malass strong performance in the first round means the result is far from a foregone conclusion.

My estimate is that there has been a complete shift in mood compared to the predictions prior to the first round, said political analyst Charalambos Chrisostomou, pointing out, among others, to the smaller-than-expected margin between the top two rivals in the January 28 vote.

I expect the runoff to be an extremely tight race, he added.

Voters arrive in a Nicosia school serving as polling station [Dimitris Sideridis/Al Jazeera]

On a cloudy day in the capital, Nicosia, voters streamed in and out of polling stations at a slow and orderly pace.

Marios, a 40-year-old trainer who did not vote for neither Anastasiades nor Malas in the first round, said he came to cast his ballot with the issue of the economy on his mind.

This is for me the most important issue, he said, adding that he did not expect any major developments in the long-running Cyprus problem.

The government must support small businesses and the most vulnerable members of the population, as well as prioritise funding for education and university research so that we have a better future.

No alliances

The election uncertainty is being reinforced by the unprecedented fact that both Anastasiades and Malas proceed to the second round without the endorsement of smaller parties whose candidates were knocked out a week ago.

Those contenders  including Nicolas Papadopoulos, who came third with 25.7 percent  had supported a different, more inflexible, approach to the negotiations to resolve the Cyprus conflict compared with the finalists.

Now out of the presidential race, the trailing candidates have recommended to their supporters to vote at will, or cast a blank ballot.

For the first time, Cypriot parties that failed to make it to the second round did not publicly back a specific candidate, said Chrisostomou, citing the different positions on the Cyprus issue and growing frustration among voters over a favours-for-votes system as the main reasons that prevented the official formation of alliances.

This means that their [smaller parties] voters have been freed to move either towards the least harmful option, or not vote at all.

The runoff between Anastasiades (L) and Malas (R) is a rematch of the 2013 vote [Dimitris Sideridis/Al Jazeera]

Meanwhile, looming over it all is uncertainty about who will turn out to vote. In the first round, abstention reached a record 28.1 percent.

Cyprus, a small Mediterranean island, has been divided along ethnic lines since 1974 when Turkish troops seized its northern third in response to an Athens-inspired Greek Cypriot coup seeking union with Greece.

Diplomatic efforts to unify the island have failed repeatedly, the latest being in July 2017 in the Swiss resort of Crans Montana when negotiations between Anastasiades and Mustafa Akinci, the Turkish Cypriot leader, broke down in acrimony.

Competing economic narratives

The runoff comes as Cyprus seeks to close one of the most traumatising chapters in its recent history after a combination of failed banks, government overspending and market financing exclusion pushed it to the brink of bankruptcy in 2013.

At the time, the newly elected government of Anastasiades was forced to seek a 10 billion euro ($12.4bn) bailout from international creditors to stave off the financial meltdown. In exchange, it agreed to a series of harsh economic measures, including salary and benefit cuts, as well as inflicting heavy losses on some bondholders and depositors to shore up the countrys ailing banking sector.

Three years later, the European Union member state successfully exited the programme, with creditors hailing the recovery as a success story. In the first half of 2017, its economy grew by 3.6 percent, accelerating from 2.8 percent the year before.

For most voters, the Cyprus problem and the economy are the important issues [Dimitris Sideridis/Al Jazeera]

In the lead-up to the elections, Anastasiades campaigned mostly on a platform of stability while emphasising his governments economic record after taking over from the communist party AKEL.

For his part, Malas, who is backed by AKEL, focused on the need for a new economic policy that would guarantee labour and social rights.

Today, the economic stability that we have achieved together allowed us, within five years, to tackle all the consequences of the crisis we were called upon to manage, Anastasiades said in his final address to voters on Friday.

Your decision [on Sunday] will determine whether we will return to the dogmatic policies that led us to the brink of bankruptcy or whether we will continue to steadily pursue the development of the country, he added in the televised speech, using a familiar line to refer to the 2008-2013 AKEL government.

Anastasiades might be eager to point out to the turnaround of the economy, but critics insist that Cypruss economy  burdened by nonperforming loans and structural problems  is still not out of the woods. Opponents also say that the improvement of financial indicators has come at the expense of the working and middle classes whose members are still dealing with persistent financial insecurity.

In his final address also on Friday, Malas praised voters in the first round for saying no to the constantly rising social inequalities.

Appealing, among others, to the middle class that is being crushed and to the workers who are struggling to make ends meet, as well as to the young people who are unable to find work, Malas asked the electorate to turn the page and trust him with their vote for a new start.

Chrisostomou said two competing narratives were at play in Sundays poll: one focusing on the pain caused by past negative experiences and one offering the promise of hope for a better future.

It remains to be seen which one will have a bigger effect on peoples psyche, he said.

Polling stations opened at 7am local time (05:00GMT) and will close at 6pm (16:00 GMT). A final result is expected about 90 minutes later.

In the 2013 runoff, Anastasiades defeated Malas by securing 57.48 percent of the vote. The two finalists had respectfully won 45.46 percent and 26.91 percent in the first round a week earlier.Severe flooding hits central parts of South America, leaving at least six people dead.

At least six people have died in heavy flooding across the Andean nation of Bolivia, where days of rain have left thousands of people homeless, fields underwater and houses destroyed.

One man died when he was dragged away by a swollen river and five people were killed in road accidents caused by the rain, said the mayor of Cotagaita in the southern Potosi department.

Authorities have said that at least 50,000 people in seven of the countrys nine departments have been left homeless. The hardest-hit areas are near the southern border with Paraguay and Argentina.

Rural and Land Development Minister Cesar Cacarico said the flooding has also damaged 33,000 fields.

During a visit to the town of Tupiza in Potosi department, President Evo Morales promised to help victims rebuild and to provide farmers with seeds.

Authorities have now activated the Emergency National Operations Committee (COEN) to coordinate efforts to provide flood victims with aid.

South of the border, raging floodwaters washed away cars and homes in Argentina after heavy rains caused a river to overflow in the northwest.

Around 10,000 residents were evacuated from villages along the Pilcomayo River on Friday.

The stretch of the Pilcomayo which runs through Salta, in northwest Argentina, rose rapidly overnight after unusually heavy rains, such that some residents had to be plucked from waist-high waters.

Officials said the river has risen at least six metres and is expected to continue rising until the middle of this week.No group has claimed responsibility for act of vandalism in port city The Hague.

A mosque in the Dutch port city of The Hague has been vandalized late Friday.

So far, no group has claimed responsibility for the act of vandalism, in which a Turkish flag was crossed with red paint with slogans against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan also written on it.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency on Saturday, Sinasi Koc, the head of Ahi Evran Mosque, which is currently under construction and belongs to the Islamic Foundation in the Netherlands, condemned the attack.

Koc said the attack was probably related to Turkeys ongoing Operation Olive Branch in Syrias Afrin.

There are those who do not want our unity and solidarity, and those who want to bring disorder to us. They will not succeed, for Allah is with us, Koc said.

Since Turkey launched Operation Olive Branch on January 20 to rid Afrin, northwestern Syria, of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party in Syria (PYD), the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS), there have been numerous attacks on mosques across Europe by PYD/PKK supporting groups.

According to the Turkish General Staff, the operation aims to establish security and stability along Turkeys borders and the region as well as protect Syrians from oppression and cruelty.

In Rotterdam, supporters of the PYD/PKK organisation attacked Turkish demonstrators, an Anadolu Agency correspondent at the scene reported.

The supporters, who were holding banners at the market hall, also attacked reporters, not allowing them to take footage.

Europe has experienced a growing number of protests and violence from PYD/PKK supporters since the group launched a campaign two weeks ago to protest Turkeys operation.Israel gives asylum seekers from Eritrea and Sudan 60 days to leave the country in first wave of deportation notices.

Israel has started issuing deportation notices to African asylum seekers from Eritrea and Sudan.

On Sunday, the first wave of notices were distributed to men who are in the country without families, the Israeli daily Haaretz reported.

The 20,000 people who are not held in the countrys open detention facility will be expected to leave within 60 days, or risk being imprisoned indefinitely.

According to Haaretz, the refugees will be asked to either leave for Rwanda, or back to their home countries.

Israeli officials have said the decision to refrain from forcibly deporting parents, women and children will likely change in the future.

In December, the Israeli parliament passed a bill authorising the government to force asylum seekers out of the country.

During visits to detention centres, government representatives provided refugees with a letter that listed Rwanda  and on a previous occasion, Uganda  to relocate to.





We would like to inform you that the state of Israel has signed agreements allowing you to leave Israel for a safe third country that will absorb you and give you a residency visa that will allow you to work in that country, and promises not to remove you to your country of origin, the letter read, according to Haaretz.

Shortly after, Rwanda and Uganda rejected claims of signing a controversial deal to take in African migrants from the country.

Currently, Israel is home to about 40,000 asylum seekers, according to government figures. That includes 27,500 Eritrean and 7,800 Sudanese asylum seekers, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) has reported.

Most asylum seekers in Israel are from Sudan and Eritrea who arrived over the last 10 years from neighbouring Egypt. Most have fled war, torture and other mistreatment.

Between December 2013 and June 2017, about 4,000 Sudanese and Eritrean asylum seekers were deported under Israels voluntary departure programme to Rwanda and Uganda, according to UNHCR.

Meanwhile, Holot, a detention centre that houses some of the asylum seekers in the countrys southern Negev desert, is scheduled to close down in six weeks.Recognising Havat Gilad is meant to facilitate orderly life for its illegal settlers in the occupied West Bank.

The Israeli government has officially recognised the illegal settlement outpost of Havat Gilad in response to the death of an Israeli settler who was shot in the area.

On Sunday, members of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus cabinet approved the motion.

The move to retroactively authorise the outpost will grant it the necessary building permits and access to the states budget.

Today, the government will provide for the status of Havat Gilad in order to facilitate orderly life there, Netanyahu said, in reference to the deadly shooting that took place outside the outpost near the occupied West Bank city of Nablus.

Raziel Shevah, 35, was shot dead from a passing vehicle as he drove near his home in the unauthorised settlement last month.

The anti-settlement group Peace Now called the effort to legalise the outpost a cynical exploitation of the murder.





Since last months incident, the Israeli army has carried out a number of raids in Palestinian villages near the city, as it searches for Ahmad Jarrar, a 22-year-old Palestinian who is wanted for his alleged role in the killing.

His cousin of the same name was killed on January 18 after a 10-hour military operation, in what Palestinians believe was a case of mistaken identity.

Bulldozers and drones usually accompany the army during such incursions. Israeli forces have also laid siege to several houses in the village of Wadi Burqin in Jenin, which was last raided on Saturday.

The confrontation resulted in the death of a 19-year-old Palestinian man.

Israeli forces declared Jenin a closed military zone and imposed a curfew on several neighbourhoods.

While most of Israels settlements in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank are built with the governments permission, outposts are constructed without authorisation and are theoretically illegal under Israeli law, but still receive governmental support and financial assistance.

Both settlements and outposts are considered illegal under international law.

With the signing of the Oslo Accords, settlement building was meant to end, but Israel has continued to expand existing settlements on Palestinian land.

Last year, for the first time in 25 years, the government approved the construction of an entirely new settlement in the West Bank.

Today, between 600,000 and 750,000 Israelis live in illegal settlements.United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. JUAN ALEJANDRO RODRIGUEZ CUYA, Defendant-Appellant. No. 15-10491 Decided: February 02, 2018

Before WILSON, WILLIAM PRYOR and JORDAN, Circuit Judges.

Juan Alejandro Rodriguez Cuya appeals his convictions and sentence for one count of conspiring to commit mail and wire fraud, 18 U.S.C.  1349, nine counts of mail fraud, id.  1341, fourteen counts of wire fraud, id.  1343, and two counts of attempted extortion, id.  1951(a). Rodriguez Cuya challenges the denial of his motion for a judgment of acquittal, the refusal to give a jury instruction about corporate and personal liability, and the admission of a summary of bank records as evidence at trial. Rodriguez Cuya also challenges the enhancement of his sentence for an amount of loss between $1 and $2.5 million and challenges, for the first time, the enhancement for an offense involving more than 250 victims. We affirm.

Rodriguez Cuya and his mother, Maria Luzula, used their businesses in Peru and Miami, Florida, to defraud Spanish-speaking residents of the United States. Rodriguez Cuya and Luzula obtained customer lists from companies who had sold products to the victims and directed employees in telephone call centers that Rodriguez Cuya operated in Peru to contact the victims and to misrepresent that they were agents in a legal department of a private or government organization who were collecting overdue payments for products the victims purportedly had purchased. Rodriguez Cuya and Luzula supervised the employees who demanded payment for the fabricated orders. After victims agreed to pay bogus fees to settle the matters, their calls were routed to Miami where Luzula and her employees processed credit card payments and mailed packages containing the products the victims allegedly had ordered. Investigators examined Luzula's computer system and bank records and discovered that, between October 2012 and January 2014, she and Rodriguez Cuya swindled $2,115,520 from 8,477 victims that, after accounting for refunds, resulted in net proceeds of $1,707,901. Rodriguez Cuya received $828,531 of the proceeds.

At the close of the evidence, Rodriguez Cuya moved for an acquittal on all counts, but on appeal, he contests only his convictions for using the wires to defraud Rene Gonzalez and for attempting to extort money and other property from Luz Padron and Paula Tinoco. We deem abandoned any challenge that Rodriguez Cuya could have raised to the denial of his motion to acquit him of conspiracy, nine counts of mail fraud, and the remaining thirteen counts of wire fraud. See Sapuppo v. Allstate Floridian Ins. Co., 739 F.3d 678, 680 (11th Cir. 2014).

The district court did not err by denying Rodriguez Cuya's motion. Rodriguez Cuya's employees exacted money from Padron, Tinoco, and Gonzalez under the false pretense of satisfying amounts they owed and penalties they purportedly incurred for ordering weight loss products. See United States v. Bradley, 644 F.3d 1213, 1238 (11th Cir. 2011) (reciting elements of wire fraud); 18 U.S.C.  1951(b)(2) (defining extortion). Employees Pia Silva Pilar and Cinthya Guerrero recounted demanding from victims substantial fees for items they had not ordered or had not received and coercing them to pay part of the fees by threatening that nonpayment would result in a court appearance, being reported to credit bureaus, and incurring fines. See United States v. Lee, 427 F.3d 881, 88991 (11th Cir. 2005). Rodriguez Cuya sent Luzula by email scripts directing employees to demand a fine of $1,700 and orders for employees to exact a payment before victims could dispute the fees. Padron's caller said that he was an attorney, that he had mailed her a summons, and that she needed to appear in court with counsel and pay a fee of $1,700, but he accepted $200 from her in settlement. Tinoco's caller identified himself as an employee of the state legal department, he warned her about being sued, detained, and having her property seized for failing to pay a fine of $1,700, and she resolved the matter by paying $255. The government also introduced the recording of a collection call to Gonzalez, which Rodriguez Cuya argues was inadmissible hearsay, but as the district court explained to the jury, the recording was offered as evidence that the call[ ] [was] made and what was stated during the phone call[ ] instead of for the truth of what was stated. See Fed. R. Evid. 801(c). Ample evidence supported Rodriguez Cuya's convictions for wire fraud and extortion.

Rodriguez Cuya argues that, under United States v. Pendergraft, 297 F.3d 1198 (11th Cir. 2002), his employees' threats of litigation were legally insufficient to support his convictions. In Pendergraft, we ruled that a threat of litigation against a county government, even though made in bad faith and supported by false affidavits, was not wrongful within the meaning of the extortion statute. Id. at 120508. We also held that the mailing of false affidavits with knowledge that the opponent would deny their truth was not intended to deceive or defraud, as required to prove mail fraud. Id. at 120809.

Pendergraft does not apply. Rodriguez Cuya's threats of bogus lawsuits, detentions, and seizures of property were plainly wrongful and extortionate. And his threats of litigation were intended to and did deceive his victims. Pendergraft grants no immunity to those who make threats of these kinds clothed in legalese. Lee, 427 F.3d at 891.

The district court did not abuse its discretion when it refused to give Rodriguez Cuya's proposed jury instruction. A refusal to give an instruction only [constitutes reversible error] if: (1) the requested instruction was a correct statement of the law, (2) its subject matter was not substantially covered by other instructions, and (3) its subject matter dealt with an issue in the trial court that was so important that failure to give it seriously impaired the defendant's ability to defend himself. United States v. Hill, 643 F.3d 807, 850 (11th Cir. 2011) (quoting United States v. Jordan, 582 F.3d 1239, 124748 (11th Cir. 2009)). Rodriguez Cuya proposed to instruct the jury that [p]articipation by a business entity in a scheme to defraud in no way necessitate that the officers or owners were participants in the scheme, but the evidence involved Rodriguez Cuya's conduct, not that of the entities he controlled. And the statement in his proposed instruction that [t]he government [had to] prove beyond a reasonable doubt each element of the charge against [him] personally incorrectly suggested that Rodriguez Cuya could not be liable for his coconspirators' conduct.

The district court substantially covered Rodriguez Cuya's theory about individual liability. See id. The district court instructed the jury that merely being present at the scene of an event or merely associating with participants was not enough to find Rodriguez Cuya guilty of conspiracy and that he had to kn[o]w the unlawful purpose of [its] plan and willfully join [ ] in it. With respect to mail and wire fraud, the district court instructed the jury that Rodriguez Cuya had to have knowingly devised or participated in [the] scheme to defraud, to have intended to defraud someone, and to have mail[ed] or  caus[ed] to be mailed something and transmitted or caused to be transmitted by wire some communication in interstate commerce that help [ed] carry out the scheme to defraud. The district court also instructed the jury that, if Rodriguez Cuya did not personally participate in the mail and wire fraud, he was not guilty of those offenses unless he was a knowing and willful member of the conspiracy when the crime was committed and [i]t was reasonably foreseeable that a coconspirator would commit the crime as a consequence of the conspiracy. The jury could discern from these instructions that Rodriguez Cuya could not be guilty based only on his ownership of the business in Peru and its misconduct. And the failure to give his proposed jury instruction could not have seriously impaired [his] ability to defend himself. See Hill, 643 F.3d at 850.

The district court also did not abuse its discretion when it admitted into evidence a summary of the bank records of the entities that Rodriguez Cuya and his mother owned. A party may use a summary, chart, or calculation to prove the content of voluminous writings, recordings, or photographs that cannot be conveniently examined in court. Fed. R. Evid. 1006. The summary prepared by Robert Passero, an analyst associated with the United Postal Inspection Service, compiled the numerous credit card payments deposited between October 2012 and January 2014 into business accounts that Luzula had opened at Bank of America and at JP Morgan Chase and wire transfers from those accounts to Rodriguez Cuya's business accounts in Peru. Rodriguez Cuya argues that the summary was irrelevant, see Fed. R. Evid. 402, and unduly prejudicial, see Fed. R. Evid. 403, because there was no evidence linking even a dollar of the deposited funds to any fraudulent activity, but we disagree. Because Rodriguez Cuya's collection center ended its legitimate marketing activities in 2012, the victims paid by credit card, and Luzula divided the proceeds equally with Rodriguez Cuya, a reasonable jury could have found that the money Luzula received and that she transferred to Rodriguez Cuya was connected to their scheme to defraud. It was not an abuse of discretion to admit the summary to prove the content of voluminous bank records.

The district court did not clearly err in calculating the amount of loss attributable to Rodriguez Cuya. A defendant is subject to a 16-level increase of his base offense level when his offense results in an actual or intended loss between $1 and $2.5 million. United States Sentencing Guidelines Manual  2B1.1(b)(1)(I) & cmt. n.3(A) (Nov. 2014). And the government provided reliable and specific evidence that Rodriguez Cuya's fraud resulted in a loss of more than $1 million. See Bradley, 644 F.3d at 1290. Luke Shoemaker, a paralegal with the Department of Justice, provided a declaration that 88 to 94 percent of the victims paid money in response to threatening calls. Shoemaker screened recordings of the calls, and he identified 162,000 telephone calls involving conversations lasting at least one minute and a smaller subset of calls in which the victims were threatened. Shoemaker used a random number formula to select 63 of the 8,477 victims who paid the Miami office, excluded six victims who did not pay between October 2012 and January 2014 or whose conversation he could not locate, and listened to the corresponding calls to verify that 53 of the remaining 56 victims paid under threat of incurring penalties or a lawsuit. The district court made a reasonable estimate that Rodriguez Cuya obtained 88 percent of the total proceeds of the scheme to defraud, or about $1.8 million, through fraud and intimidation. See United States v. Barrington, 648 F.3d 1178, 1197 (11th Cir. 2011).

Rodriguez Cuya failed to object to the calculation of the number of victims of his fraudulent scheme, so we review that ruling for plain error. See United States v. Rodriguez, 751 F.3d 1244, 1257 (11th Cir. 2014). A defendant is subject to the addition of 6 levels to his base offense level if his offense involves more than 250 victims. See U.S.S.G.  2B1.1(b)(2)(C). Rodriguez Cuya failed to object to, and is deemed to have admitted, the facts in his presentence report that he defrauded 8,477 persons between October 2012 and January 2014. See United States v. Beckles, 565 F.3d 832, 844 (11th Cir. 2009). The district court did not err, much less plainly so, by relying on undisputed evidence of the number of Rodriguez Cuya's victims to sentence him for his multiple crimes.

We AFFIRM Rodriguez Cuya's convictions and sentence.

PER CURIAM:Border situation tense after four soldiers die and one is wounded in Rajouri sector in the Jammu region.

Srinagar, Indian-administered Kashmir  Four Indian soldiers, including an officer, have been killed in the latest cross-border clashes in Indian-administered Kashmir.

Shahid Iqbal Choudhary, deputy commissioner of Rajouri sector, told Al Jazeera the four troops were killed and one wounded after the Pakistani army opened fire on Indian posts in the Jammu region on Sunday evening.

The situation is tense currently on the border, Choudhary said.

The latest shelling was ongoing until late on Sunday, he added.

Most of the areas near the border have been affected due to the ceasefire violation. Though it is difficult to evacuate the civilians at night, we are continuously monitoring the situation, said Choudhary.

Officials ordered the closure of schools near the border for the next three days.

There was no immediate response from Pakistan.

Increased hostilities

Hostilities between India and Pakistan have increased on the de facto border since last month.

More than a dozen people, including six civilians, were killed in January with deadly clashes between the two countries continuing for three days.

Despite a 2003 ceasefire, India and Pakistan regularly trade fire across the so-called Line of Control (LoC), the military demarcation between the Indian and Pakistani controlled parts of Kashmir.

India regularly accuses Pakistan of aiding fighters in crossing the LoC to attack Indian targets. Pakistan denies the allegations.

The civilian population living near the border has been severely affected because of the latest violence between the two nuclear-armed neighbours. Earlier on Sunday, a teenage girl was wounded in the Poonch region.

Since independence in 1947 from Britain, India and Pakistan have fought two of three wars over Kashmir, which both countries claim in its entirety.

Anti-India sentiment runs deep among Kashmirs mostly Muslim population, and most support the rebels cause against Indian rule.

Tens of thousands of people have died in the decades of violence.Macedonia is Greece: A look back at the decades-old row

Skopje has refused to relinquish the name Macedonia and Greece rejects the use of even a composite name that includes it.Top court hits back at President Abdulla Yameens refusal to free opponents after its surprise ruling last week.

The Maldives Supreme Court has hit back at President Abdulla Yameens refusal to free his jailed opponents amid an escalating crisis that saw security forces seal off the countrys parliament and arrest two opposition lawmakers on Sunday.

Judges of the top court said there should be no legal barrier to releasing the nine people, including the island nations exiled former president Mohamed Nasheed, whose terrorism and corruption convictions it overturned last week.

Their statement came after Attorney-General Mohamed Anil raised concerns about freeing people convicted of terrorism, bomb attacks, corruption, embezzlement and fraud.

The top courts ruling last week has plunged the Maldives into political turmoil and dealt a major blow to Yameen, who critics accuse of corruption, misrule and rights abuses.

He denies the allegations.

The sudden about face by the Supreme Court, which sided with Yameen in the past, and the widespread international support for its verdict puts unprecedented pressure on the president to free his opponents ahead of a presidential election later this year.

{articleGUID}

The government accused the Supreme Court of trying to oust the president, a claim judges did not respond to in their statement late on Sunday.

Earlier in the day, the attorney general, in a televised appearance flanked by the chiefs of the army and the police, said the government has received news of an imminent order by the Supreme Court to impeach Yameen.

I have informed all law enforcement agencies they must not obey such an illegal order, Anil said.

Ahmed Shiyam, the army chief, said the security forces would follow the attorney-generals advice and will not wait and watch as the Maldives descends into crisis.

The opposition called Anils order to the security forces unconstitutional, highly illegal, and dangerous and petitioned parliament to oust Anil, as well as the countrys chief prosecutor.

Shortly afterwards, soldiers surrounded the parliament building and sealed it off.

The opposition now have a majority in the 85-member house as the Supreme Court ruling also reinstated 12 members of parliament who were stripped of their seats last year.

But two of the 12 were arrested at the airport on Sunday, shortly after they returned to the Maldives after spending months in exile.

Abdulla Sinan and Ilham Ahmed were detained on charges of bribery, a police spokesman told Al Jazeera.

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Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, an opposition parliamentarian, condemned their arrest in a statement.

We call on the police to release the MPs immediately, and to stop following unlawful orders, to stop obstructing the lawful mandate of parliamentarians, Solih said.

In a desperate attempt to cling onto power, President Yameen has illegally overrun the state. His attorney-general has illegally assumed the powers of the apex court, while the military has overrun the legislature, he added.

On Sunday night, hundreds of flag-waving opposition supporters took to the streets of the capital Male calling on the government to abide by the court ruling.

#HappeningNow

Peaceful protesters gathered near #MDP Haruge with joined MPs continue to call on the govt to follow the Supreme Court's ruling & to stop intimidating the judiciary.#Maldives pic.twitter.com/89JDD2EZj7  Nauty (@nautymatox) February 4, 2018

The ruling party also held a rally in support of Yameen.

tonights rally in support of the government and President Yameen.. #Maldives pic.twitter.com/uFCKu90O24  Mohamed Saeed (@em_saeed) February 4, 2018

Meanwhile, the official who heads the parliaments secretariat resigned after the speaker, a Yameen ally, cancelled the opening of the parliament, scheduled for Tuesday, over unspecified security concerns. .

I have stepped down, Ahmed Mohamed told Al Jazeera on Sunday, without offering further details.

The heads of the Maldives main high-security prison and the elections commission have also quit in recent days.

Nasheed, speaking to a private television channel from neighbouring Sri Lanka on Sunday, called for protests and urged rank-and-file members of the security forces to arrest the attorney-general as well as the chiefs of the army and police.

Anils statements were tantamount to a coup, the former president said in a post on Twitter.

The United Nations, European Union, and several foreign governments including India, the US and UK, have urged Yameen to comply with the Supreme Courts ruling.

Additional reporting by Hassan Moosa from MaleAttorney General warns of plot to remove President Abdulla Yameen days after top court orders release of his opponents.

The Maldives chief law enforcement officer has accused the island nations Supreme Court of trying to remove President Abdulla Yameen, days after the top court ordered the release of several jailed opposition leaders.

Mohamed Anil, the attorney general, said on Sunday that security forces in the Maldives have learned the Supreme Court may issue an order to impeach the president.

In a televised appearance, flanked by the chiefs of the army and the police Anil said he has informed all law enforcement agencies they must not obey such an illegal order.

The Maldives is heading towards a crisis, he warned.

A joint opposition alliance condemned Anils statement as an unconstitutional, highly illegal, and dangerous attempt to usurp the powers of the judiciary,

Tensions are escalating in the Maldives capital, Male, as Yameens government continues to ignore a court ruling overturning terrorism and corruption convictions against nine high-profile politicians, including exiled former President Mohamed Nasheed, who immediately urged rank and file members of the security forces to arrest Anil and the chiefs of the police and army.

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Speaking to a private television channel from Colombo, Nasheed urged members of the security forces not to obey the orders of the attorney general and arrest all three of them immediately.

He also called on Maldivians living in the countrys far-flung islands to travel to the capital and protest against the government.

Neither the attorney general, nor the chief of defence forces, nor the acting police chief can override the constitution of the Maldives, he said.

I urge Maldivian citizens to take to the streets against their illegal actions.

The latest crisis was triggered on Thursday when judges of the Supreme Court turned against their ally Yameen and ordered the release of his opponents. The surprise verdict prompted celebrations and sporadic protests in Male and drew widespread international support.

Antonio Guterres, UN chief, added his voice to the chorus of calls urging Yameen to comply with the Supreme Court ruling late on Friday.

But the 58-year-old leader of the Maldives, who critics accuse of corruption and misrule, remained defiant as he made his first public appearance since the court order on Saturday.

President Yameen is not a person to flee at such a difficult time for the public, he told a group of cheering supporters outside the ruling party headquarters in Male.

The president and the state must be afforded time to speak with the Supreme Court to take measures to comply with its rulings, he said, adding that he will check how this came to happen.

The speech came hours after he fired his second police chief in three days, and cancelled the opening of the parliament, scheduled for Monday.

The opposition has a majority in the 85-member house as the Supreme Court also reinstated 12 parliamentarians who had been stripped of their seats when they defected from the ruling party.

Meanwhile, the police have accused family members of the chief justice and a second judge on the five-member Supreme Court bench of corruption, and raided the home of the chief judicial administrator.

On Sunday, Anil said he has ordered the security forces to stop any unrest in the capital.

Army chief, Ahmed Shiyam, said security forces cannot watch and wait as the Maldives goes into crisis.

He added: We will follow the attorney generals legal advice and we will not obey any illegal orders.Israeli army raided the village of Wadi Burqin in the northern West Bank and killed a Palestinian man.

A Palestinian man was killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank during a confrontation sparked by the soldiers.

Ahmad Samir Obeid, 19, was shot in the head after the Israeli army raided the village of Wadi Burqin, near the northern town of Jenin on Saturday night.

He was taken to the local hospital, where doctors declared his death a short time later. He is the seventh Palestinian to be killed by Israel this year.

Eight other Palestinians were injured by the Israeli army, who used live ammunition and rubber-coated steel bullets. Local media reported that at least four Palestinians were arrested.

The army was accompanied by bulldozers and drones, and lay siege to several houses in the village, in their continued search for another Palestinian, Ahmad Jarrar.

The 22-year-old Jarrar is wanted by the Israeli army for his alleged role in the killing of a Jewish settler last month. His cousin, who has the same name, was killed on January 18 after a ten-hour military operation by the Israeli army, in what Palestinians believe was a case of mistaken identity.

Residents told local media that soldiers used loudspeakers to call out, Ahmad Jarrar, turn yourself in or we will demolish the village house by house.

A curfew was also imposed on Wadi Burqin, and some residents were forcefully kicked out of their homes as the soldiers temporarily turned them into military bases.

Three homes belonging to the Jarrar family were previously demolished by the army during their first incursion in January.

The Israeli military did not comment on the raid.Palestine Liberation Organization says it is devising plans to disengage from Israel at all levels, including security.

The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) has said it is taking a series of measures to begin disengaging from Israel, including seeking action against the latter at the United Nations and the International Criminal Court (ICC).

After a long meeting on Saturday evening, the executive committee of the PLO said it had asked the Palestinian government to begin devising plans to disengage from the Israeli occupation authorities at the political, security, economic and administrative levels 

According to the official Palestinian news agency, Wafa, the executive committee also decided to form a higher committee to implement decisions such as the suspension of the PLOs recognition of Israel.

The PLO  an umbrella of major Palestinian political parties  has been under pressure to change its strategy towards Israel in recent weeks.

On December 6, the United States decided to recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel  dealing a blow to the Palestinian leadership that has for more than two decades attempted to establish a state on the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as the capital.

Last month, the PLO announced it would look into revoking its recognition of Israel until the latter recognises the State of Palestine on those borders.

The statements, however, have been largely vague and non-binding, leading several other Palestinian political parties to disregard and criticise them.

Under the agreements signed between the PLO and Israel in 1993 and 1995  known as the Oslo Accords Israel has complete control over the Palestinian economy, civil and security matters in over 60 percent of the West Bank.

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The Oslo deals also introduced security coordination between Israel and the Palestinians  a practice that involved sharing intelligence about attacks planned by Palestinians against Israelis.

But while the PLO has on several occasions vowed to end security coordination, it has never done so.

International Criminal Court

In a press release circulated after the meeting, the PLO said it had decided to request the ICC to start a judicial inquiry into Israeli settlements, racial discrimination and the ongoing ethnic cleansing

The aim, it said, is to hold Israeli politicians and military and security officials accountable and bring them before international justice.

While Israel is not a party to the Rome Statute  the treaty of the ICC to which all members are bound to  its nationals could be tried by The Hague-based court for crimes committed on occupied Palestinian territory.

In 2015, the Palestinian government submitted its first file of evidence of Israeli war crimes.

{articleGUID}

But until now, the ICC has not moved past the preliminary examination of the situation in Palestine.

In this phase, the prosecutor is meant to determine whether the criteria have been met to warrant pursuing a formal investigation based on the information available publicly or submitted to the office and whether local courts are carrying out credible investigations.

In addition to vows to take Israel to the ICC, the PLO statement said Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, would be speaking at the UN Security Council on February 20 to reiterate his commitment for a peaceful settlement with Israel.The review of US nuclear policy published on Friday has riled Russia, which viewed the document as confrontational.

Iran has accused the United States of threatening Russia with a new atomic weapon, after Washington published a document outlining plans to expand its nuclear capabilities to deter others.

The review of US nuclear policy published on Friday has riled Russia, which viewed the document as confrontational, and raised fears that it could increase the risk of miscalculation between the two world powers.

The Americans are shamelessly threatening Russia with a new atomic weapon, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, a pragmatist who opened the way to Tehrans 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, including longtime adversary Washington, said in a speech on Sunday.

The same people who supposedly believe that using weapons of mass destruction is a crime against humanity  are talking about new weapons to threaten or use against rivals, he said in his televised address.

Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif earlier warned in a tweet that the US policy document posed the risk of bringing humankind closer to annihilation.

The US military has put countering China and Russia, dubbed revisionist powers, at the centre of a new national defence strategy unveiled earlier this month, shifting priorities away from action against Muslim fighters.

By expanding its own, low-yield nuclear capability, the US would deter Russia from using nuclear weapons, according to American officials.

Washington has also maintained that it cannot accept a nuclear-armed North Korea.

Zarif also said in his tweet: Trumps obduracy in killing the #JCPOA [Irans nuclear deal with world powers] stems from the same dangerous imprudence.

Trump gave the Iran nuclear deal, negotiated before he took office, a final reprieve last month, but warned European allies and Congress they had to work with him to fix the disastrous flaws in the pact or face a US exit.

He said he would waive sanctions against Iran, that were lifted as part of the international deal, for the last time unless his conditions were met.

The ultimatum put pressure on European Union powers  key backers and parties to the 2015 international agreement to curb Irans nuclear programme  to satisfy Trump, who wants the pact strengthened with a separate agreement.Observatory group says at least 68 attacks hit area near where fighter jet was shot down in early hours of Sunday.

Russia has launched a series of air attacks in the area where one of its fighter jets was shot down by Syrian rebels on Saturday, leaving dozens of fighters and civilians dead, according to Syrian activists and Russian officials.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitor of Syrias civil war, said at least 68 attacks hit Idlib province in the early hours of Sunday morning, following about 35 attacks on Saturday.

It said at least five people had been killed and thousands of civilians had fled the area to avoid getting caught up in the bombardment.

The White Helmets, an opposition rescue group, reported 21 civilian deaths in villages surrounding the site of the downed Sukhoi 25 jet, but it was unclear whether its toll included those on the SOHR tally.

Earlier, the Russian defence ministry claimed to have killed at least 30 fighters in air attacks, who it said were responsible for shooting down the fighter jet.

The pilot of the Sukhoi was killed after being ejected from the aircraft by rebel fighters, including members of the Hayet Tahrir al-Sham group, commonly known as Tahrir al-Sham.

The group is spearheaded by the former al-Nusra Front, which used to be al-Qaedas branch in Syria.

Analyst Richard Weitz of the Hudson Institute told Al Jazeera it was too early to say how exactly the plane was brought down.

Some reports say it was brought down by machine-gun fire. Theres a couple of reports out there saying it was shot down by a missile but rebels are not known to have surface-to-air missiles with this kind of range, he said.

The Russian plane was shot down above Idlib province, which is one of the so-called de-escalation zones set up in Syria last September in an effort to scale back the conflict.

However, bombardments from Syrian government forces and their Russian allies have continued.

Hospitals, markets and bakeries across Idlib province, believed to be the largest remaining rebel-held area in Syria, have been hit by government air raids.

Tens of thousands of civilians have fled the area, which is home to more than two million people, most of them internally displaced.The names of 60 individuals including the daughter of late Saddam Hussein, Raghad, are on Iraqs most wanted list.

The Iraqi government has placed the name of late Saddam Husseins daughter, Raghad, on the most wanted list, together with 59 other individuals.

The 60 people are wanted on suspicion of belonging to the Islamic State in Iraq and Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS), al-Qaeda or the Baath Party.

The list, seen by AFP, includes the name of Saddams daughter, Raghad, who lives in Jordan.

It also features 28 suspected ISIL fighters, 12 from Al-Qaeda and 20 from the Baath party, giving details of the roles they allegedly play in their organisations, the alleged crimes of which they are suspected, and, in most cases, photographs.

All are Iraqis, apart from Maan Bashour, a Lebanese man accused of recruiting fellow citizens to fight in Iraq.

The list includes senior members of the group, among them Fawaz Mohammad Mutlaq, a former officer in Saddams Fedayeen paramilitary organisation who later became a member of the ISIL military council.

The name of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of ISIL, is absent from the list. A senior security official contacted by AFP declined to explain why.

These are the terrorists most wanted by the judicial authorities and the security services, the official said. This is the first time we publish these names which, until now, were secret.

The ISIL fighters the document lists are accused of fighting in Iraqs second city, Mosul, and the surrounding province of Nineveh, as well as in the provinces of Kirkuk, Diyala and Anbar.

ISIL took a third of Iraqs territory during a lightning advance in 2014, before being beaten back by Iraqi forces backed by a US-led coalition.It has been a year since prominent Muslim lawyer Ko Ni was assassinated, however, Aung San Suu Kyi is yet to utter a single word to mark the first death anniversary of the man credited with enabling her to become the countrys state counsellor.

While the Nobel prize winner did term the killing a great loss for the party a month after the murder on January 29, 2017, Suu Kyi, who has in recent times faced strong criticism for her continued silence on the plight of persecuted Rohingya Muslim community, appears to be not pushing for all the facts of the case to come to surface by her stony silence.

The assassination of Ko Ni continues to be shrouded in mystery despite the fact that the alleged assassin who pulled the trigger at Yangon International Airport has been in police custody since late February 2017 along with three other suspects who supposedly paid him for the killing.

Gunman Kyi Lin, who was arrested shortly after the shooting, has reportedly confessed to having been hired by a group of three ex-military officers and a businessman.

Three alleged co-conspirators Zeya Phyo, Aung Win Zaw and Aung Win Tun were arrested in February 2017; however, the suspected group leader, Aung Win Khaing, remains at large. The exact motive of the killing, which took place after Ko Ni had called for further amendments to the constitution, remains unclear.

Man of humble origins

Ko Ni was a man of humble origins. He was born in a small town of Katha in central Sagaing region in 1952. He was the son of a Muslim Bengali father from India and a Burmese mother, according to his friends and family members.

His father came from India when he was with the British Indian Army in the early 1990s. His mother was a Myanmar Buddhist, said another prominent Muslim lawyer Robert San Aung, who was honored with Martin Ennals Award in 2015 in recognition of his works as one of the countrys top human rights defenders.

San Aung said he had known Ko Ni since 1974 when he arrived at University of Yangon to study law. Ko Ni used to be a lecturer there from 1976 to 1979, he added.

He was a good friend of mine as well as like my brother. He was good at arguments. I knew he would become a good lawyer, he said.

But Ko Ni was not always into activism.

He was not an activist while I was there [at the university], he said, adding that Ko Ni had never participated in any demonstration against the military government while he himself was imprisoned six times between 1974 and 2010.

He was just interested in laws, especially in studying various constitutions. I was the first person he would discuss when he found something, a confusion or a loophole, in a constitution, San Aung added.

Ko Ni established his own Laurel Law Firm in 1995. During his career, he oversaw more than 900 criminal cases and 1,400 civil cases.

He wrote several articles on many subjects, including the constitution, rule of law and civil rights in Myanmar. He also published six books: Whose fingerprint is this? (published in 2010); How shall we vote in the upcoming election? (2012); Article collections on Rule of Law (2012); How shall we amend the 2008 Constitution (2013); What is PR? Quintana, Myanmar and 1982 Citizenship Law (2013); and Democratic Elections, Fraud and Public Rights (2015).

Suu Kyis strong supporter

Ko Ni, like many others in the country, used to be a staunch supporter of Suu Kyi and her party, National League for Democracy (NLD), since after the militarys brutal crackdown on mass movement against the military government in 1988.

He joined the party only after the NLD saw a landslide in the 2012 by-elections.

He usually made strong criticism of the 2008 constitution. He believed it was time to start working for an amendment. Thats why he joined the party, Ko Nis eldest daughter, Yin New Khaing, told Anadolu Agency.

After joining the party as legal adviser to party leader Suu Kyi, he was appointed member of the Legal Advisory Committee and the Central Legal Aid Committee. He was also appointed Central Committee Member for Constitutional Amendments.

He seemed really happy at finding ways to amend the constitution in those days, she recalled.

And he really believed he could help the NLD in amending the constitution.

Ko Ni, who was often targeted by nationalist groups because of his religion, as well as his expertise in finding loopholes in the junta-draft constitution, was the one who enabled a constitutional way for Suu Kyi to become the countrys state counselor.

The previous constitution had barred Suu Kyi from running for the presidency.

After another NLD landslide in 2015 general elections, eyes were on Suu Kyi to see if she could amend Article 59(f) of the constitution that was stopping her from becoming the president.

Shortly after the election victory, Ko Ni made a landmark comment that made the military and the then ruling military-back Union Solidarity and Development Party very angry.

There is an informal way [to amend the constitution] in which we have to enact a special law, temporarily suspend that clause [Article 59-f].

This special law can be enacted by a majority vote [51 percent] in the Union Parliaments, Ko Ni had told journalists before the NLD-led government took office in March 2016.

It was only after he had pointed to such a way forward that a new top position called State Counsellor was created in April 2016 for Suu Kyi to oversee Myanmars cabinet.

NLD leader U Nyan Win confirmed Ko Nis decisive role in establishing that position for Suu Kyi.

He noticed that the constitution doesnt state such a top position can be created or not, then we drafted a bill for the position so that she [Suu Kyi] could effectively run the cabinet, he said to Anadolu.

Nyan Win said the party continued to miss the Muslim lawyers contributions.

Its a major loss for us, especially in our effort to amend the constitution, he added.United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit. ELI ALMANZAR MOREY, Petitioner v. ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Respondent No. 17-1499 Decided: February 02, 2018

Before: VANASKIE, SHWARTZ, and FUENTES, Circuit Judges

OPINION*

Petitioner Eli Almanzar Morey is a national of the Dominican Republic. He was initially admitted to the United States in April 1996 as a Conditional Permanent Resident and became a Lawful Permanent Resident in September 2010. In 2010, Morey was convicted of 5th Degree Criminal Sale of a Controlled Substance in New York state court in violation of New York Penal Law  220.31. After a period outside the country, Morey arrived at Newark Liberty International Airport on March 17, 2015. At that time, he applied for admission as a returning Lawful Permanent Resident.

Morey was denied entry and two days later was served with a Notice to Appear by the Department of Homeland Security charging him as removable. These charges were based on Morey's 2010 New York drug conviction. The Immigration Judge, in a written decision, determined that Morey's conviction renders him inadmissible and he is removable under INA  212(a)(2)(A)(i)(II) and denied his application for cancellation of removal. In her decision, the Judge determined that  220.31 was divisible and that because the specific drug Morey soldheroinis a controlled substance under both New York and federal law, this conviction bars him from admission and requires his removal. Morey appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals (the Board) on only the determination of his removability. The Board affirmed, agreeing that the statute is divisible and that the Immigration Judge properly applied the modified categorical approach. It also dismissed Morey's argument that the New York statute is more broad than the federal statute because it criminalizes at least one more drug. The Board determined this argument was foreclosed by its ruling in Matter of Ferreira. In Ferreira, the Board held that where a state statute seems on its face to cover a controlled substance that the federal list does not, there must be a realistic probability that the state actually prosecutes conduct falling outside the federal generic crime. The Board noted that Morey had not shown such a realistic probability and, thus, the New York statute could be considered a categorical match for the federal statute.

Morey now petitions us for review of the final Board decision that he is inadmissible. He presents two issues for our review: (1) whether the Board erroneously found that  220.31 is divisible and thus subject to the modified categorical approach; and (2) whether, if the statute were divisible, the Board erroneously relied on Matter of Ferreira and required Morey to demonstrate a realistic probability that  220.31 would be applied to prosecute conduct not proscribed under federal law. For the reasons that follow, we will deny the petition for review.

I.

The same day Morey filed his opening brief on this appeal, the Second Circuit issued its decision in Harbin v. Sessions. In this decision, the Second Circuit held that  220.31 was indivisible, an issue directly relevant to this appeal. Since this decision, Morey has argued that we should adopt the rationale of the Second Circuit, while the Attorney General has invited us to create a circuit split with the Second Circuit regarding interpretation of the state law of one of its constituent states. Assuming, without deciding, that the Second Circuit's Harbin decision is accurate in its holding that  220.31 is indivisible, Morey is still not entitled to relief as he has not demonstrated a realistic probability the New York statute in question is actually applied to conduct involving controlled substances outside of the scope of the federal controlled substances schedule.

Morey claims that he is not removable because the New York statute he was convicted under,  220.31, criminalizes a broader swath of conduct than federal law and as a result is not a categorical match for the generic statute. In support of this assertion Morey notes that a drug that appears on the New York list, chorionic gonadotropin, is not prohibited under the related federal law. Morey claims that  220.31 is not a categorical match for the generic statute and, thus, he has not violated a state law relating to a controlled substance as defined by federal law. Because his removal was predicated on his violation of a state law relating to a controlled substance offense, he argues his removal is impermissible. Morey is mistaken.

The Supreme Court has instructed that in considering whether a state statute criminalizes conduct beyond that of its federal corollary, there must be a realistic probability, not a theoretical possibility, that the State would apply its statute to conduct that falls outside the generic definition of a crime.  Absent this analysis, the categorical approach becomes an invitation to apply legal imagination to the state offense. Morey must thus demonstrate that there is a realistic probability that the New York statute is actually applied to conduct outside the scope of the federal controlled substance schedules. He has failed to do so.

Morey does not cite any New York case where an individual has been prosecuted for selling chorionic gonadotropin, nor have we been able to identify one. As Morey has failed to identify a single instance of New York prosecuting someone for the sale of chorionic gonadotropin, such a prosecution is merely a theoretical possibility and does not prevent  220.31 from being considered a categorical match for the generic offense. The Board did not err in relying on Matter of Ferreira to come to the same conclusion.

II.

For the reasons set forth above, we deny the petition to review the Board's denial of Morey's appeal of his removability charge.

FOOTNOTES

. See 8 U.S.C.  1182(a)(2)(A)(i)(II) and 1182(a)(2)(C).

. INA  212(a)(2)(A)(i)(II) is codified in the United States Code at 8 U.S.C.  1182(a)(2)(A)(i)(II).

. A.R. 30.

. Morey Br. at 5.

. 26 I&N Dec. 415 (BIA 2014).

. Id. at 420-21.

. 860 F.3d 58 (2d Cir. 2017).

. Id. at 61.

. See, e.g., Descamps v. United States, 570 U.S. 254, 257 (2013) (explaining that the categorical approach compare[s] the elements of the statute forming the basis of the defendant's conviction with the elements of the generic crimei.e., the offense as commonly understood).

. See 21 U.S.C.  802; 21 C.F.R.  1308.11-15.

. 8 U.S.C.  1182 (a)(2)(A)(i)(II); see Moncrieffe v. Holder, 569 U.S. 184, 192 (2013) (holding that to qualify as a conviction relating to a federally controlled substance, a state drug offense must meet two conditions: It must necessarily proscribe conduct that is an offense under the [Controlled Substances Act], and the [Act] must necessarily prescribe felony punishment for that conduct).

. Id. at 191 (quoting Gonzalez v. Duenas-Alvarez, 549 U.S. 183, 193 (2007)).

. Id. (quoting Duenas-Alvarez, 549 U.S. at 193).

. See id.

. See id.

FUENTES, Circuit Judge.Eight Turkish soldiers killed in northern Syria, some of whom died after Kurdish forces hit their tank, army says.

Turkey says it has suffered its deadliest day yet in northern Syria since launching its offensive against YPG Kurdish fighters there more than two weeks ago.

On Saturday, eight Turkish soldiers were killed, according to a Turkish army statement.

Some died after their tank came under fire from Syrian Kurdish forces.

Turkey wants to push the YPG, which it says are terrorists, out of Afrin to create a buffer zone along its southern border.

YPG fighters targeted the Turkish army tank in Sheikh Haruz, northeast of Afrin, killing five soldiers. Three other soldiers were killed in fighting elsewhere in Afrin.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim promised to retaliate in a statement on Twitter.

They will pay for this twice as much. We have given the necessary response instantly, and we continue to do so, Yildirim said.

Immediately after the attack at Sheikh Haruz, an air operation targeting YPG positions and weapon storages in the area was launched, the army said.

Turkeys Operation Olive Branch began on January 20 along with the Free Syrian Army (FSA) to clear armed Kurdish groups and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) fighters from Afrin in northwestern Syria.

Since the start of the operation, Kurdish fighters have carried out cross-border attacks by firing rockets into southern Turkey.

According to the Turkish army, the operation aims to establish security and stability along Turkish borders and the region as well as to protect Syrians from what Ankara called terrorist oppression and cruelty.

Russian retaliation

Meanwhile, Syrian rebels shot down a Russian warplane in northwestern Idlib province on Saturday, the Russian defence ministry said.

The pilot of the aircraft, a Sukhoi 25, used his ejection seat after his plane was hit by a man-carried portable air defence missile.

He was later killed when rebels tried to capture him.

The pilot managed to report the ejection in the area controlled by the militants of Jabhat al-Nusra, but later he died fighting the terrorists, a statement by the Russian ministry of defence said.

The downing of the aircraft has been claimed by Hayet Tahrir al-Sham, commonly known as Tahrir al-Sham. The group is spearheaded by the former al-Nusra Front, which used to be al-Qaedas branch in Syria.

Moscow has retaliated with dozens of attacks in which at least 10 civilians were killed, according to local activists. Russia says it has killed 30 fighters.

There has been heavy fighting in Idlib for weeks. The UN says about 100,000 civilians have been displaced.United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit. MARIO ALBERTO LOPEZ GARZA, The Executor of the estate of Hans Jorg Schneider Sauter, Appellant v. CITIGROUP INC. No. 16-4332 Decided: February 02, 2018

Before: AMBRO, KRAUSE, Circuit Judges, and CONTI,* Chief District Judge

OPINION**

This appeal concerns a transnational dispute over hundreds of millions of dollars allegedly due the estate of Mexican national Hans Jorg Schneider Sauter (the Estate), for which Appellant Mario Alberto Lopez Garza serves as executor. The Estate filed in the District Court a one-count complaint (the Complaint) demanding an accounting by Appellee Citigroup Inc. on the premise that Citigroup controls the bank hosting the accounts with the disputed funds. Whatever complexities there may be in the peripheries

of this litigation, the questions before us in the Estate's appeal are straightforward: (1) did the District Court err when it granted Citigroup's motion for judgment on the pleadings; and (2) did the District Court abuse its discretion when it refused to grant leave to amend, both before dismissing the Complaint and later in denying the Estate's motion for reconsideration? Answering both questions in the negative, we will affirm.

I.

According to the Complaint, Schneider Sauter was a Mexican citizen and businessman involved in currency trading and real estate. Apparently Mexican authorities believed that Schneider Sauter was engaged in illicit activity, and he served time in a Mexican prison. After Schneider Sauter died in 2008, Garza was appointed by a probate court in Mexico to serve as executor of the Estate.

Through his investigation of assets available to the Estate, Garza allegedly uncovered three documents indicating that substantial fundsno less than $300,000,000were on deposit in accounts held in Schneider Sauter's name at Banco Nacional de Mexico S.A. integrante del Grupo Financiero Banamex (Banamex), Citigroup's full-service bank subsidiary in Mexico. JA 44. After Garza obtained several orders from the Mexican probate court directing Banamex to turn over to the Estate all funds in the Schneider Sauter accounts, Banamex instituted collateral amparo proceedings to challenge the legal authority of the probate court.

Stymied in the Mexican court system, the Estate brought the Banamex litigation to the United States courts, first by filing suit in the Southern District of New York, and then by filing the Complaint in the District of Delaware. The only defendant named in the Complaint was Citigroup. Citing the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Dec. 17, 1992, reprinted in 32 I.L.M. 296-456, 605-800 (1993), the Expedited Funds Availability Act (the EFAA), 12 U.S.C.  4001-4010, and Mexican law, the Estate alleged that Citigroup possesses information regarding the Banamex accounts because it is required  to oversee, control and supervise the activity of its subsidiary banks. JA 46. A single count in the Complaint demanded an accounting that would permit Garza to ascertain all transfers of funds into and out of the bank accounts formerly belonging to the decedent. JA 47.

Citigroup answered the Complaint and then filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings under Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(c) or, in the alternative, for a stay of all federal litigation pending resolution of the proceedings in Mexico. In its Rule 12(c) motion and oral argument before the District Court, Citigroup argued under Delaware law that an accounting is strictly a remedy and, thus, cannot be pleaded as a stand-alone claim. In any event, Citigroup contended, the Estate failed to sufficiently plead the fiduciary relationship between Schneider Sauter and Citigroup necessary to support an accounting action. In response, the Estate urged the District Court that the Complaint stated a viable demand for an accounting and, alternatively, that leave to amend should be granted.

The District Court granted Citigroup's motion and dismissed the Complaint with prejudice. The District Court agreed with Citigroup that the Estate's failure to plead any underlying substantive cause of action or fiduciary relationship renders its claim for an accounting legally invalid on its face under Delaware law. JA 19. It concluded that the Complaint revealed no basis to impute to Citigroup any duty that Banamexas host of the accounts with the disputed fundsmight owe the Estate. Deeming the Estate's pleading defects to be incurable, the District Court denied leave to amend on futility grounds.

The District Court also denied reconsideration, rejecting the Estate's arguments that it should have been granted leave to amend with unspecified additional facts, JA 284, and that NAFTA provided a basis for a fiduciary relationship between the Estate and Citigroup. This appeal followed.

II.3

On appeal, the Estate argues, first, that the District Court erred in granting a motion for judgment on the pleadings because the Complaint adequately stated a claim for an accounting, and, second, that even if the Complaint were in any way defective, the District Court should have granted the Estate an opportunity to amend [it]. Appellant's Br. at 39. Neither argument is persuasive.

A. The District Court's Ruling on the Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings.

A party may move for judgment on the pleadings after the pleadings are closed so long as the timing of the motion does not delay trial. Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(c). A motion for judgment on the pleadings based on the defense that the plaintiff has failed to state a claim is analyzed under the same standards that apply to a Rule 12(b)(6) motion. Revell v. Port Auth. of N.Y. & N.J., 598 F.3d 128, 134 (3d Cir. 2010). Accordingly, judgment on the pleadings is proper where the plaintiff's factual allegations, taken as true and viewed in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, are not sufficient to state a claim for relief that is plausible on its face. Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007).

The federal pleading standard guides our assessment of whether the Estate's Complaint sets forth a viable claim under applicable state law. As a federal court sitting in diversity, we are required to apply the substantive law of the state whose laws govern the action.  Norfolk S. Ry. Co. v. Basell USA Inc., 512 F.3d 86, 91 (3d Cir. 2008) (quoting Robertson v. Allied Signal, 914 F.2d 360, 378 (3d Cir. 1990)). Here, the District Court chose to apply the law of Delaware, and the parties do not contest that choice on appeal.

Delaware law provides a right to an accounting in specified situations, only one of which is potentially relevant here, i.e., where a fiduciary relationship exists between the parties and a duty rests upon defendant to render an account. Pan Am. Trade & Inv. Corp. v. Commercial Metals Co., 94 A.2d 700, 701 (Del. Ch. 1953). Citigroup contends that, even assuming an accounting demand can be maintained under Delaware law as a stand-alone claim, the Estate failed to sufficiently plead the requisite fiduciary relationship. We agree that no such relationship is apparent from the facts in the Complaint, and the District Court therefore properly granted Citigroup's motion for judgment on the pleadings.

The thrust of the Estate's main argument for recognizing Citigroup as a fiduciary flows from a critical assumption built into the Complaint: that there is a duty owed by Banamex to Schneider Sauter as its depositor. From that relationship, the Estate would extrapolate a duty to Citigroup on the ground that Banamex is allegedly a subsidiary bank[ ]. JA 46. The problem with this theory is that, under Delaware law, the relation between a bank and a mere general depositor of funds is that of debtor and creditor, and is in no sense of a fiduciary nature. Tharp v. St. Georges Tr. Co., 34 A.2d 253, 255 (Del. Ch. 1943); cf. Paradise Hotel Corp. v. Bank of Nova Scotia, 842 F.2d 47, 53 (3d Cir. 1988) (Creditor-debtor relationships such as that between the Bank and Paradise rarely are found to give rise to a fiduciary duty.). And if Schneider Sauter is not owed a fiduciary duty by Banamex, then a fortiori there is no such duty that can be imputed to Citigroup as Banamex's alleged corporate parent. See Greco v. Univ. of Delaware, 619 A.2d 900, 903 (Del. 1993) (imputing liability requires underlying liability).

The Estate's arguments to the contrary are unavailing. Even if the Estate were correct that it is owed a fiduciary duty from Banamex, that duty could not pass to Citigroup without piercing the legal veil that generally shields a parent corporation from the acts of its subsidiaries. See United States v. Bestfoods, 524 U.S. 51, 61 (1998). Persuading a Delaware court to disregard the corporate entity, however, is a difficult task, Wallace ex rel. Cencom Cable Income Partners II, Inc., L.P. v. Wood, 752 A.2d 1175, 1183 (Del. Ch. 1999) (citation and internal quotations omitted), and, as Citigroup correctly points out, the factual allegations in the Complaint, taken as true, reveal not Citigroup's control of Banamex's day-to-day operations or a complete disregard of the corporate form between the two entities, but instead the expected level of supervision by a parent company of its foreign subsidiary. Appellee's Br. at 28. Thus, the District Court properly determined that the Complaint lacked factual allegations necessary to support veil-piercing under Delaware law. See Outokumpu Eng'g Enter., Inc. v. Kvaerner EnviroPower, Inc., 685 A.2d 724, 729-30 (Del. Super. Ct. 1996) (discussing alter-ego and agency theories of liability for corporate parent).

The Estate is no more successful with its argument that the sources of law cited in the Complaintfrom jurisdictions other than Delawareshow Citigroup owed a fiduciary duty to Schneider Sauter directly, rather than through the conduit of Banamex. The NAFTA provision cited in the Complaint imposes obligations on parties to the treaty with respect to their treatment of foreign financial institutions and investors in those institutions; it does not impose new obligations on banks to their customers. See 32 I.L.M. at 657-63; cf. LeClerc v. Webb, 419 F.3d 405, 412 n.12 (5th Cir. 2005) (individual citizen of Canada was not a beneficiary of NAFTA). For its part, the EFAA merely requires that depository institution[s] make available for prompt withdrawal their customers' deposited funds. See Bank One Chicago, N.A. v. Midwest Bank & Tr. Co., 516 U.S. 264, 267 (1996). It thus has no bearing here, insofar as the Complaint alleged that the disputed funds had been deposited into accounts with Banamex, not Citigroup. Finally, the Estate posits that Mexican law require[s] banks to turn over funds immediately to an Estate in the event of the death of an account holder, JA 45, but conclusory legal assertions need not be credited without supporting factual allegations in reviewing a motion under Rule 12(c), see Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 679, and, even if credited, the Mexican law described by the Estate would appear to impose an obligation only on the bank holding the decedent's fundsagain, Banamex, not Citigroup.

In sum, even accepting as true the factual allegations in the Complaint and considering the various sources of law to which it cites, the Estate failed to plead a viable accounting action against Citigroup under Delaware law. The District Court thus did not err when it granted Citigroup's motion for judgment on the pleadings.

B. The District Court's Denial of Leave to Amend.

In arguing that leave to amend should have been granted, the Estate attacks both the District Court's pre-judgment denial of leave to amend and its refusal to reconsider. We perceive no error in either of those rulings.

The Estate requested leave to amend, as an alternative to dismissal, in its opposition to Citigroup's Rule 12(c) motion and at oral argument on the motion. It later argued in support of reconsideration that the District Court erred when it dismissed the Complaint with prejudice rather than granting Plaintiff an opportunity to amend. JA 283. At none of those junctures, however, did the Estate proffer a proposed amended complaint or even describe with any detail the substance of the putative pleading. Our precedent is clear that district courts act within the bounds of their discretion when they reject undeveloped requests for leave to amend that, like the Estate's, are unaccompanied by a proposed amended pleading. See, e.g., Fletcher-Harlee Corp. v. Pote Concrete Contractors, Inc., 482 F.3d 247, 252 (3d Cir. 2007); Lake v. Arnold, 232 F.3d 360, 374 (3d Cir. 2000). For that reason alone, the District Court did not abuse its discretion when it refused to grant leave to amend before judgment or upon the Estate's motion for reconsideration.

A proper motion for reconsideration under Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e) must be based on one of three grounds: (1) an intervening change in controlling law; (2) the availability of new evidence; or (3) the need to correct clear error of law or prevent manifest injustice. Lazaridis v. Wehmer, 591 F.3d 666, 669 (3d Cir. 2010) (per curiam). None pertain here. The Estate's motion for reconsideration provided nothing in the way of new or overlooked law or facts to impugn the District Court's ruling that amendment would be futile. And, in fact, the District Court, going beyond what was required in this case, carefully considered the Estate's argument that a fiduciary relationship existed between the Estate and Citigroup, as well as the extra-pleading evidence offered in support of that argument, before it granted Citigroup's Rule 12(c) motion and denied the Estate's motion for reconsideration. The District Court's thorough analysis confirms that there was no errormuch less clear error or manifest injusticein its conclusion on reconsideration that leave to amend would be futile because the Estate could not adequately plead a plausible claim for relief. See Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570.

The cases cited by the Estate are not to the contrary. In United States ex rel. Customs Fraud Investigations v. Victaulic Co., 839 F.3d 242 (3d Cir. 2016), the district court granted the defendant's Rule 12(b) motion with prejudice, without any discussion of why [the relator-plaintiff] should not be afforded the opportunity to amend its complaint to solve any perceived deficiencies. Id. at 247. By contrast, the District Court here explained in its opinion why it was granting Citigroup's motion with prejudice and denying leave to amend. Additionally, in Victaulic, after the relator-plaintiff's complaint was dismissed, it promptly filed a motion for leave to amend that included a proposed First Amended Complaint. Id. Here, however, the Estate, in moving for reconsideration after dismissal, merely alluded to unspecified additional record evidence that it obtained [b]ased on ongoing investigation, JA 284, and it failed to submit a timely proposed amended pleading.

Newark Branch, NAACP v. Town of Harrison, New Jersey, 907 F.2d 1408 (3d Cir. 1990), is even farther afield. In that case, the district court mistakenly believed that it no longer had the power to entertain amendments once the original complaint had been dismissed for lack of standing. Id. at 1416. We vacated the district court's order denying leave to amend because: (1) an adverse judgment, even one based on a determination that the case is non-justiciable, is not a complete impediment to amendment; and (2) the NAACP's post-judgment motion for leave to amend was accompanied by a proposed amendment that was not facially meritless. Id. at 1417. In contrast, the District Court here did not misunderstand the scope of its power to grant leave to amend and, again, the Estate failed to accompany its requests for such relief with a properly formulated proposed amended pleading.

In the last case cited by the Estate on this point, Grayson v. Mayview State Hospital, 293 F.3d 103, 114 (3d Cir. 2002), we held that, notwithstanding the enactment of the Prison Litigation Reform Act, 42 U.S.C.  1997e, et seq., pro se plaintiffs proceeding in forma pauperis who file complaints subject to dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) should receive leave to amend unless amendment would be inequitable or futile. Id. at 114. The applicability of the sua sponte amendment rule, however, is cabined to cases like Grayson; [i]n non-civil rights cases, the settled rule is that properly requesting leave to amend a complaint requires submitting a draft amended complaint. Fletcher-Harlee, 482 F.3d at 252-53.

In sum, under applicable precedent and the standard for motions under Rule 59(e), the District Court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to grant leave to amend and denying reconsideration.

III.

For the foregoing reasons, the District Court's orders dismissing the case and denying reconsideration will be affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

. We separately address Citigroup's cross-appeal, which concerns only the District Court's order granting in part Citigroup's motion for relief under Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(d).

. As the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has explained it, the amparo is a highly complex legal institution  somewhat similar to habeas corpus and, inter alia, is the means to review and annul unconstitutional judicial decisions. United States v. Fowlie, 24 F.3d 1059, 1064 (9th Cir. 1994) (emphasis in original). Citigroup represents that the amparo proceedings are still pending.

. The District Court had subject matter jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.  1332(a)(2). We have appellate jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.  1291. We review the District Court's order granting Citigroup's motion under Rule 12(c) de novo, see In re Fosamax (Alendronate Sodium) Prod. Liab. Litig. (No. II), 751 F.3d 150, 165 n.11 (3d Cir. 2014), and may affirm on any grounds supported by the record. Maher Terminals, LLC v. Port Auth. of N.Y. & N.J., 805 F.3d 98, 105 n.4 (3d Cir. 2015). The District Court's order denying the Estate's motion for reconsideration is reviewed for abuse of discretion, see Chesapeake Appalachia, LLC v. Scout Petroleum, LLC, 809 F.3d 746, 753 (3d Cir. 2016), as is its refusal to grant leave to amend. See U.S. ex rel. Petratos v. Genentech Inc., 855 F.3d 481, 486 (3d Cir. 2016).

. As a threshold matter, the Estate asserts that the District Court misapplied the Rule 12(c) standard when it failed to accept the veracity of certain allegations in the Complaint. Cf. Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009). However, there is no indication that the District Court failed to accept as true all well-pleaded allegations in the Complaint. In any event, accepting those allegations as true, we reach the same conclusion as the District Court on de novo review.

. The Delaware Supreme Court characterizes an accounting as an equitable remedy. See, e.g., Rebstock v. Lutz, 158 A.2d 487, 489 (Del. 1960). And the Delaware Code does the same. See Del. Code Ann. tit. 12,  3581(b)(4) (2017). The Delaware Supreme Court has not yet addressed whether a demand for an accounting may be pleaded as a stand-alone form of action, but we need not predict how this state law issue ultimately will be resolved because, even assuming an accounting demand can be pleaded without a companion claim, the Estate's Complaint was properly dismissed on Rule 12(c) grounds.

. Moreover, contrary to the Estate's argument in the District Court that NAFTA permits it to bring suit in the United States against the party that has sought and obtained Mexican permission to operate in Mexico, namely Citi, JA 284, federal law expressly disclaims the availability of a private right of action under NAFTA. See 19 U.S.C.  3312(c).

. Indeed, the Estate did not submit a proposed amended complaint until the filing of its reply brief in support of reconsideration, a submission the District Court was well within its discretion to refuse to consider. See D. Del. LR 7.1.5(a) (2010). Although the District Court signed off on a stipulation between the parties permitting the Estate to file a reply in this case, its willingness to consider the Estate's rebuttal to arguments raised in Citigroup's responsive briefing was not an open invitation to submit an amended complaint at that late stage and does not excuse the Estate's untimely submission. Moreover, the District Court's Local Rules require that a party seeking leave to amend attach to his request two documents: [t]he proposed pleading as amended and [a] form of the amended pleading which shall indicate in what respect it differs from the pleading which it amends, by bracketing or striking through materials to be deleted and underlining materials to be added. D. Del. LR 15.1 (2010). The Estate failed to attach the latter document to its reply.

. In addition to Victaulic, Newark Branch, NAACP, and Grayson, the Estate's opening brief cited non-precedential opinions of this Court. As we have pointed out on multiple occasions, however, such opinions  are not regarded as precedents that bind the court because they do not circulate to the full court before filing.  In re Grand Jury Investigation, 445 F.3d 266, 276 (3d Cir. 2006) (quoting 3d Cir. I.O.P. 5.7 (2002)); accord Watson v. Rozum, 834 F.3d 417, 427 (3d Cir. 2016).

KRAUSE, Circuit Judge.Christianity is Right about Sex and Marriage

On January 31, 2018, my wife and I celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary. At the end of this year, in mid-December, my wonderful parents will celebrate their 50th. Before my beloved father-in-law was criminally taken from us by a drunk driver in 2015, he and my sweet mother-in-law were married for almost 46 years. Taken together, those are rare numbers these days in our slow-to-marry, quick-to-divorce, sex-crazed, hook-up culture. Like every other marriage in human history, none of the unions mentioned above were, or are, perfect. Each of us has certainly seen our fair share of tough times, but, as far as I know, there has never been even a hint of adultery, and divorce has never even been whispered. Of course, if any of us decided to abandon what God has revealed and go our own way when it comes to sex and marriage, disaster would result.

If you are similarly blessed in marriage within your own family, then almost certainly you or your spouse, parents, siblings, in-laws, and the like, subscribe to -- or at least are heavily influenced by -- Christian teaching on marriage, sex, and the family. Tragically, that is true of fewer and fewer Americans. As we broadly examine the condition of and attitudes toward sex, marriage, and the family across the U.S., disaster would be a fair description of what exists. U.S. marriage rates continue to remain at record lows, while out-of-wedlock births remain at record highs. Again, the results of these trends are particularly devastating for children. The breakdown of the family is the single greatest cause of poverty in the U.S. As Robert Rector pointed out years ago, Being raised in a married family reduced a childs probability of living in poverty by about 80 percent. In order to further their big government agenda, modern liberals often point to education as the answer to poverty in America. However, marriage is a far better weapon against poverty than is education. Again, as Rector points out, being married has the same effect in reducing poverty that adding five to six years to a parents level of education has. In addition, a child in a single-parent home where the parent is a college graduate is nearly twice as likely to live in poverty as a child living with his or her married parents whose highest level of education is completing high school. Along with poverty, children brought up outside of a marriage relationship (with their biological mom and dad) face a significantly greater danger of experiencing physical and sexual abuse. As Marripedia points out: The rate of physical abuse is 3 times higher in the single-parent family.

The rate of physical abuse is 4 times higher if mother is cohabiting with the childs biological father (unmarried).

The rate of physical abuse is 5 times higher if the child is living in a married step family.

The rate of physical abuse is 10 times higher if the mother is cohabiting with a boyfriend. The rates for sexual abuse are even worse than physical abuse: The rate of sexual abuse is 5 times higher in the single parent family and when both biological parents are cohabiting (i.e. unmarried).

The rate of sexual abuse is 8.6 times higher if the child is living in a married step family.

The rate of sexual abuse is 20 times higher if the mother is cohabiting with a boyfriend. As both of the last bullet points above imply, one of the most dangerous places for a child in America is with mom and her live-in boyfriend. However, because modern liberalism teaches that we have the right to do whatever we wish in the sexual realm, without any consequences, the most dangerous place for a child in America is in the womb. This is particularly tragic considering that a mothers womb should be one of the safest places in the universe. In a wicked attempt to justify the killing of the most helpless and innocent among us, aided and abetted by Hollywood and the Democrat Party, for decades the left in America has dehumanized the unborn. In other words, ignoring what Christianity has long revealed about human life, tens of millions of unborn children have suffered death because liberals in the United States have rejected basic science and morality. After a half century of denying the irrefutable science of life in the womb, liberals have become quite adept at denial of almost any truth. Thus, we now must debate who is a man and who is a woman -- along with pretending that there is all sorts of in-between nonsense along the mythical gender spectrum. As long as American liberals hold any significant amount of political or judicial power -- especially within or over the federal courts -- dont be surprised to see the gender debate go the way of the marriage debate. Ignoring the laws of the Law Giver, ruling in favor of the right to kill children in the womb (Planned Parenthood v. Casey), the perpetually deceived Anthony Kennedy declared a quarter of a century ago, At the heart of liberty is the right to define ones own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life. Of course, Kennedy reinforced this ignorant thinking with his perverse decision on marriage. Because such folly is almost standard today among the left, it wouldnt be surprising to read a ruling from a federal judge that declares a man has a right to live his life as a woman, because At the heart of liberty is the right to define ones own concept of existence And, if Justice Anthony Kennedy has such a say in the matter, given his previous decisions on abortion and marriage, dont be surprised to see Hollywood attempt to lionize his life through film. Depictions of graphic sex have become the sine qua non of Hollywood productions and have given rise to the massive and deadly porn industry. As U.S. marriage rates plummet and out-of-wedlock births skyrocket, porn use and STD rates are at astronomical levels. In 2015, viewers watched a shocking 4,392,486,580 hours -- equivalent to over 500,000 years -- of porn on PornHub. As millions of Americans have replaced healthy human relationships with porn addiction, no doubt this obsession with fake sex has played a role in the declining rate of marriage in the U.S. Additionally, and equally shocking, according to the New York Times, 110 million Americans --over one-third of our population -- are now saddled with a sexually transmitted disease. Thus, when theyre not watching porn, many Americans are headed to a bar, a club, a house party, a frat party, and the like, looking for their next hook-up, and many are paying a steep physical -- along with emotional -- price. Because those who rebel in the sexual realm are prone to rebel as it pleases them, individuals steeped in the hook-up culture are prone to a whole host of risky behaviors. As a 2016 study of American high school students published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reveals, teens who engage in dangerous (and sinful) sexual activity -- such as homosexuality or heterosexual promiscuity -- were much more likely also to engage in other unhealthy activities. Teenagers least likely to put their health and lives in danger (along with the health and lives of others) are those who are choosing to follow the moral precepts of their Creator by refraining from sex until they are married. We didnt used to need a study to know such was the case, because waiting for sex until marriage is exactly what Christianity teaches. If much of America continues to embrace the lies of Hollywood -- and the rest of the perverse modern left -- on sex and the like, the next study, the next set of data, along with many personal anecdotes more and more of us will witness, will continue to paint a bleak picture for our nation. Trevor Grant Thomas At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason. www.trevorgrantthomas.com Trevor is the author of The Miracle and Magnificence of America tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.comThe open part of the report, submitted by Treasury 11 minutes before the statutory expiry date, contains the names of 210 individuals, including high-ranking officials from Russia's Presidential Administration, government members, and representatives of large businesses with a fortune of more than $ 1 billion.

Criticism and mockery accompanied publication of the US Department of the Treasurys long-awaited report on the Russian authorities and President Putin's closest associates (the oligarchs list). But a close analysis of the context and form of the report indicates that President Trump may once again gain leverage as his clueless critics smirk at his presumed incompetence.

Publication of the report was mandated by the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, passed by Congress in July 2017. The bill resembles a politico-strategic document in the form of a law, the purpose of which is to force President Trump to remain within the agenda of the political establishment and not to let him pursue any political rapprochement with Russia.

The document provoked many negative reactions among prominent members of Congress, academic experts and media. The list was criticized for being devised in an amateurish and primitive way. The lists authors included some people that advocated normalization of relations with the United States, in particular, and the West in general, as well as some businesspeople that are not related to the closest circle of Putin and are not part of the Russian corruption hierarchy pyramid. At the same time, the creators of the report were accused of missing some odious representatives of the ruling regime that caused severe damage to the United States and its allies by their actions, who deserve to be at the top of that list.

The authors of the report were also reproached for lack of professionalism and absence of specific goals. There was widespread joking that Trump's had provided Congress with some names from the Kremlin phone book and Forbes Magazines Russian edition. The Atlantic Council, a think-tank, charged that the Department of the Treasury had changed the document at the last minute, so that Congress received an entirely different list from what was prepared originally by the White House experts.

In Russia, the reaction was completely mixed. The ruling political elite perceived the publication of the "oligarchs list" with sarcasm, mocking the administration of the US President for the simplicity of the document. Nevertheless, I am deeply convinced that this reaction was in fact aimed at an internal audience, especially the ruling elite. The goal was to show that this list does not pose any threats to the Russian authorities and Putin personally. Meanwhile, the Russian President's Press Secretary, Dmitry Peskov, accused the US of interfering in the presidential elections in the Russian Federation.

In fact, this document comprises the entire political and economic elite of Russia. The architects of the whole process have sent an alarm to warn them about potential forthcoming disaster  sanctions  but gave the enough time to avoid restrictions on the part of the United States. These billionaires now face a choice in what to do to protect themselves and their wealth.

Most of these entrepreneurs hold dual or even triple citizenship. Considering the fact that the legal system of Russia does not guarantee the right to private property and anyone can lose his or her property at the will of one person, it is logical to assume that much of their accumulated wealth already has been exported from Russia to other countries or offshore zones. According to various sources, over the past 22 years, the outflow of capital from Russia has amounted to about $700 billion.

It should also be noted that most of these businesspeople are not tax residents of the Russian Federation, since they do not reside on its territory for more than six months during a year. While living abroad, especially in the USA and EU, many have managed to establish strong business relations with large Western companies, take part in large-scale investment projects, purchase expensive real estate and personal property, and open and maintain accounts in Western banks, as well as get long-term loans at low interest.

But having been included in what is seen as a blacklist of the US Treasury, they face a dilemma: remaining loyal to the Russian ruling regime and risking losing major parts of their wealth from forthcoming sanctions, or trying to shield themselves and their capital through American lobbying organizations, leaving Russia, and taking away as much as possible of their remaining wealth there.

From a business standpoint, the first option is less attractive, as the potential for the security and growth of their wealth in Russia is limited, owing to the existing tough economic and political circumstances, while the possible loss from US sanctions could be considerable. Consequently, it is likely that the majority of them will prefer to keep their fortunes, business ties and contacts overseas, leaving Russia.

It is also important to note that many of these people originally acquired most of their wealth in conjunction with the state, having by various means appropriated its financial flows or natural resources. This means that they obtained crucial information about the peculiarities of the corruption pyramid and the schemes used in Russia. This kind of knowledge is of enormous value to the United States.

Given all the above-mentioned context, it is possible to say with near certainty that America's lobbying organizations will be put to work in the upcoming months by Russian oligarchs, and new folders with compromising materials that are extremely dangerous for Putin's administration will appear at the disposal of the US federal investigative bodies.

Thus, the Trump Administration is likely to gain a significant lever of influence on the political and economic elite of Russia. If it is put to efficient use, it will be possible to shake the monolithic power structure created by Putin, and seed distrust among the ruling elite of the country. If we take into account the fact that this process takes place on the eve of the presidential elections in Russia, it becomes much more threatening for the Russian authorities.

In this context, the seemingly pro forma statement by Putin's Press Secretary, accusing the United States of America of interfering in the presidential elections in the Russian Federation, may actually have some truth to it.

Artur Ghazinya PhD, is Head of the Center for European Studies.As the Russian Collusion story disintegrates, it takes with it any reason to rely on the Fourth Estate, which in large part assisted in Obama administration wrongdoing. It has proven to be a handmaiden of those who concocted a big lie to bring down a political opponent. As Josephus said of Haman -- Antiq., 50:2, c. 6,) without a remark upon the almighty power, and admirable justice of the wisdom of God; not only in bringing Haman to his deserved punishment, but in trapping him in the very snare which he had laid for another, and turning a malicious invention upon the head of the inventor. This time, its not only Haman -- the FBI and DOJ officials involved in lying to the FISC and unmasking what they learned -- but their hangers-on in the press that are trapped as well.

As she so often does, Kimberley Strassel nailed it:

Kimberley StrasselVerified account @KimStrassel 1) I've covered politics a long time. I've never -- never -- seen anything approaching the desperations Ds have to keep this memo quiet. And as we know that worry about law enforcement (Snowden/Manning) is not their biggest worry, this memo must be damning to the core. 2) Have been in journalism all my life. Have never -- never -- seen the press corps fight so hard against transparency. Same media that after election wondered if it was out of touch with avg Americans, now ignoring the legit worries so many have about govt. accountability. 3) Every journo should be asked if they'd be fighting this hard against disclosure if it was a Bush DOJ/FBI accused of wiretapping abuses. Of course not. They'd be leading the charge to put it all out. 4th estate is supposed to enlighten the people. Not cover for govt. officials

Others took up the same tack. Notable among them was Mark Penn, a long-time Clinton pollster. He notes the shocking calls by the NY Times and Washington Post for prior restraint -- blocking the release of the memo House Intelligence Chairman Nunes prepared based on what witnesses told the committee and official documentation about the spying on the Trump campaign. The hypocrisy of their efforts is astonishing -- these are some of the same people who argued successfully that the public was entitled to see (and then to publish) the Pentagon Papers. Penn observes, as we must, that the dossier is nonsense, and has been discredited -- not as the press is wont to say, unverified.

So mainstream journalism today tells us we should see the dossier, even if its filled with junk, and read the Comey memos, even if they have no verification -- and, yet, be prevented from reading the report of the House Intelligence Committee based on documents that it took the committee six months to pry out of the FBI and Justice Department. I believe in the First Amendment, and I thought that mainstream media did too. I did not see it as a doctrine of convenience that applied only to documents that buttress one side but then not applied if it might conceivably help the other side.

The effect of this, he concludes, is to keep the public seriously in the dark about what shocking things have occurred -- something to remember when some of your friends and family seem to be on a different planet than you are:

So its a fact that six senior leaders of the FBI or Justice Department have been either reassigned or fired based on facts that have come out largely from the work of this committee and of the inspector general of the Justice Department. Yet, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) is being branded almost as a lunatic. The hypocrisy here is not confined to newspaper editorial pages. We have seen a veritable news blockade on information coming out of these investigations on the front pages. In the last Harvard CAPS/Harris Poll, we read people a list of recent facts that have come out and almost all of them were unknown to the public, even when prompted. A majority did know that Comey had drafted the memo on the Clinton investigation long before the investigation was over. But most people did not know who paid for the dossier, and most had not heard about the text messages and their reference to an insurance policy in case Trump was elected. After hearing this information, 75 percent said it was significant and 63 percent said the FBI needs to be investigated.

2. Panic and Hypocrisy on the Left

Lacking any coherent policies, the Democrats have pinned their hopes on persuading Americans that Trump is Hitler, Stalin, a usurper and a traitor who must be impeached. Their reaction to the release of the memo underscored their fright as this last remaining hope -- impeachment -- slips away. A prominent voice on that end has been Congressman Adam Schiff, who claimed falsely that the memo was inaccurate. Other Dems claimed it would reveal sources and methods that would endanger national security. (It didnt, by the way.) The Wall Street Journals Best of the Web took hard aim at Schiff:

In March of 2007, a very libertarian sort of Congressman announced that he was deeply troubled by what he called abuses of authority by the FBI in acquiring personal information on U.S. citizens. Over the years, he urged various restrictions on the ability of the executive branch to get information on Americans phone calls. In order to protect privacy and increase transparency he sought in various ways to reform the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court -- the very court that approved the electronic surveillance of a Trump associate for reasons that are still not entirely clear. Way ahead of the news, he specifically introduced the Ending Secret Law Act which according to a press release from his office, would require the Attorney General to declassify significant Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) opinions, allowing Americans to know how the Court has interpreted its legal authorities. He said that his legislation will help ensure we have true checks and balances when it comes to the judges who are given the responsibility of overseeing our most sensitive intelligence gathering and national security programs. His name is Adam Schiff, and he is now the ranking member on House Intelligence. But oddly he doesnt seem to want to take credit for his early concern for civil liberties.

Some on the left are continuing this line. Others, predictably, have changed their tune now that its been released: now, its a nothingburger.

It isnt.

Adam Schiff, Dianne Feinstein, Nancy Pelosi, among seemingly dozens of Democrats, not to mention half the mainstream media, had been warning us for days that the release of the memo authored by Republican members of the House Intelligence Committee would place our national security at grave risk. "Sources and methods" would be revealed. Now that we have seen the memo, it's clear that was an absolutely bald-faced lie of the most obvious sort. Nothing in it impacts national security in the slightest. There's no mention whatsoever of any "sources and methods." [snip] So what was up here below the surface? It can't just be the "evil party" trying to live up to its nickname, although that certainly happened. It seems this particular lie was a last line of defense -- for now -- against a coming potential Armageddon for their party. This memo, bad as it is, is apparently only the first of many, a small percentage of what is to come. And the Democrats know it. Fear is operative. Maybe panic. An entire weltanschauung is under threat, jobs, friends, self-image, who knows what. If this goes on much longer and much more comes out, some Democrats -- not apparatchik Schiff, needless to say, but others -- might have to face reality and say something.

3.The Nunes Memo

The whining that releasing the memo would reveal sources and methods, thereby endangering national security, proved as false as all the other claims about the memo. The details of Fridays memo also rebut most of the criticisms of its release. The details betray no intelligence sources and methods. As to the claim that the release tarnishes the FBI and FISA court, exposing abuses is the essence of accountability in a democracy.

Heres the memo in easy to read format.

Heres the short form version.

The NRO zeroed in on the dossier:

The Obama Justice Department and the FBI used the unverified Steele dossier to convince a federal court to issue a warrant authorizing surveillance of a Trump campaign adviser [Carter Page]. Confirmation came in the much-anticipated memorandum released today by the Republican-controlled House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. The memo states that the Obama administration concealed from the court that the dossier was commissioned and paid for by the political campaign of Donald Trumps Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton. Nor was the court informed that the dossiers author, former British spy Christopher Steele, told a senior Justice Department official that he was desperate to prevent Trump from being elected president. Moreover, despite presenting dossier information as probable cause on four separate occasions  for the initial FISA warrant in October 2016, and three times in the ensuing months  the FBI failed to verify the dossiers explosive allegations and failed to inform the court that its efforts to corroborate the allegations had been unavailing. Indeed, the memo relates that the government once presented a news story to the court as corroboration for Steeles claims, apparently unaware that Steele himself was the source for the news story. The dossier was a compilation of Steeles reports, based on anonymous Russian sources. His informants provided information based on accounts that were multiple levels of hearsay removed from the events they purported to describe. The FISA court warrant targeted Carter Page, who had volunteered to serve as a Trump campaign foreign-policy adviser. The memo relates that the warrant was originally issued on October 21, 2016, and re-authorized three times thereafter. Under FISA, warrants targeting American citizens lapse after 90 days. If youre keeping score that means a warrant based on claims that Trump was corruptly aligned with the Kremlin was renewed twice after Donald Trump became president. According to the committee testimony of former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe, the information in the dossier was necessary to the probable-cause showing required to justify issuance of a FISA warrant. That is, the warrant would not have been issued without the dossier information.

The pretext for the warrants was that an obscure minor figure in the campaign, Carter Page, was an alleged agent of Russia. Michael Spikey Isikoff, who got it from Steele, first floated that claim on Yahoo. It was that story that the FBI absurdly offered up to the Court as corroboration for their suspicions. Steele then peddled the story to David Corn of Mother Jones, and when the FBI found out, they fired Steele as an agency informant. (Isikoff and Corn might be familiar to readers as the promoters of the fairytale that Valerie Plame was a covert agent whose identity had been revealed out of vengeance against her husband for telling tales about Iraq.) In any event, after years of surveillance and providing cover for the unprecedented snooping by the FBI and DOJ, Page has never been charged with espionage or criminal activity at all. He has sued Yahoo and the Huffington Post for slander.

Why was Page selected? The FBI apparently had him under observation since 2013 and it was clear he was neither a Russian agent nor any danger of becoming one. In fact, he was a businessman who frequently traveled to Russia and may even have been an FBI asset who in 2013 helped them nab a Russian agent Victor Podobny. Byron York offers up a rationale: Put it all together, and Page was the easiest guy to go after. Plus, the wiretap would allow the FBI not just to listen to Page's phone calls but to read his emails, not only going forward from the date of the warrant, but going backward for as long as Page had kept them. If Page truly were the beating heart of a Trump-Russia conspiracy, then there would likely be email evidence the FBI could use.

The memo discloses a sordid tale of state corruption, says Mark Steyn.

In the "national security" sphere, the entire system is ex parte. Carter Page, the peripheral Trump campaign volunteer who was the target of the surveillance, was not represented in court. In fact, he did not even know he was on "trial". A year and a half after he attracted the attentions of Deputy Director McCabe and his chums, Mr. Page has not been charged with a single crime, never mind (to be old-fashioned about these things) convicted of one. Indeed, the only reason he is even aware that he is/was under 24/7 surveillance by the panopticon state is because McCabe's FBI found it politic to leak that fact to the newspapers -- via the coy disclosure that he briefly came under FISA surveillance as "Male-1" five years earlier. Mr. Page has committed no crime and been charged with none, but is routinely spoken of in the press as if he has been. In it is interesting to contrast his treatment with, say, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), whom the Department of Justice designated as "unindicted co-conspirators" in a major terrorism-funding case, but which designation is apparently no obstacle to their continued respectability in the media, their invitations to speak at small-town libraries, churches and schools (for example, a CAIR operative will be spreading the word at Firelands College in Huron, Ohio next month), and even their influence upon Robert Mueller's FBI. [snip] The DoJ/FBI did not "inform the tribunal of all material facts" but misled the judge, seriously, on fundamental matters necessary to "enable the tribunal to make an informed decision". They misled him/her as to the nature of the document, its provenance, its credibility, the motivations of its author, and his financial ties to the Clinton camp. They did, however, argue that the dossier had been independently "corroborated" by a September 2016 story in Yahoo News -- even though that Yahoo story came from the same guy who authored the dossier: in effect, the Government got its surveillance warrant by arguing that its fake-news dossier from Christopher Steele had been independently corroborated by a fake-news story from Christopher Steele. Either the FBI is exceedingly stupid, which would be disturbing, given their lavish budget. Or the same tight group of FBI/DoJ officials knew very well what they were doing in presenting such drivel to the FISA court. They're really the two choices here: either "the world's premier law enforcement agency" was manipulated by one freaky Brit spook, or "the world's premier law enforcement agency" conspired with the freaky Brit spook to manipulate the judge.

How serious was the misuse of the FISA procedure? So serious, to my mind, that Congress must interrogate the judges involved and find out how the Court allowed itself to be so misled. Perhaps the law needs to be revised.

Streetwise Professor compares the actions of the DOJ and FBI officials to Russian Siloviki (security forces who came to power in Russia).

There is a constitutional crisis, he argues -- though its not, as Leon Panetta and other Democrats claimed, caused by the memo having been made public.

Disclosing information about the misbehavior of executive branch officials does not represent a Constitutional crisis: if anything, it is the misbehavior of those officials during a presidential election that raise the issue of such a crisis. Some of the reporting and commentary on this issue has been utterly incredible (in many senses of the word). For example, Trump overruled current-FBI director Wrays objection to releasing the memo. The WaPo framed this as Trump defies Wray. Um, who the hell works for whom? If there is defiance going on, it is Wrays going public with his objections to the actions of his Constitutional superior. Wray should have raised his objections in private to Trump, and if overruled (as he was, in the event), kept his mouth shut in public, or resigned -- and then kept his mouth shut. To lobby publicly (and disingenuously, by raising national security concerns) in an attempt to pressure his superior into doing something is beyond the pale. Or should be, anyways. But one thing that this entire sordid episode has demonstrated is that the bureaucracy generally, and the intelligence and federal law enforcement agencies in particular, consider themselves an independent power, a co-equal -- superior actually -- branch of government, the Constitution be damned. Trump is deemed the usurper. Indeed, it is clear that many senior members of the FBI, DOJ, and the intelligence community considered it their right to intervene in the election in order to prevent Trumps election, and failing that, to kneecap his presidency. And virtually all of the political class in the US is on their side. This is the real Constitutional crisis. You should view this as a Constitutional danger regardless of your partisan leanings. For ask yourself: would you like the same to be done to your guy (or gal)? It is also disgustingly ironic that in a fervid controversy about the alleged intervention of the Russian siloviki into an American election reveals that high-ranking American officials in control of the vast powers of US law enforcement and intelligence used siloviki methods (including most likely disinformation planted by Russian siloviki!) in an attempt to influence an American election and then to cripple the winner of that election when their original plotting failed.

4. Upcoming

Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley is about to release his report on Steele, the FBI, and the dossier.

The Justice Departments Office of the Inspector General is about to release his report on the FBI and DOJ handling of the Clinton investigation. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has referred the allegations about the DOJ and FBI officials to the Inspector General for further investigation.The Democrats' Defense of the Indefensible

The "memo" has been released! Most of what is revealed within it is not surprising; much of this information has been out there for all to read for many months, almost a year, for those interested in getting to the bottom of this major scandal. But there were a few surprises, among them McCabe's admission that the fake dossier was primarily used to get the FISA warrant and the court was not told it was opposition research. The mainstream media have assiduously avoided reporting on any of it; their gullible and ill-informed readers and viewers needed to be kept in the dark. It is a sad commentary on the intellectual curiosity of leftists. To quote The Wiz, don't give them "no bad news." If they do not know it, have not read it, it does not exist. What is Uranium One? Who knows? What is the "dossier"? Never heard of it the Trump-haters say. They choose the bliss of ignorance. As for the memo, "is that all there is," they say. Nothing to see here. Move along. They pretend to be giddy but while flailing about like fish out of water, anyone can see that they are panicked. The Nunes memo, a summary of hundreds of pages of documents finally turned over to the Intelligence Committee, proves how dogged the left has been in covering up the crimes of the DNC, the Hillary Clinton campaign, the Obama administration, the FBI, the DOJ, and the State Dept. as they tried to prevent a Trump presidency, both before and after his election. The country has been badly served by its premier law enforcement institutions. Obama transformed them from the non-partisan agencies they were meant to be into partisan tools of the left. What does that mean? It means the abrogation of the Constitution, a particular objective of Obama. It means the primacy of illegal immigrants over the rights of native born and legal immigrant citizens. The Democrats need new voters who are wholly dependent upon them. It means they will do anything to further their open-borders agenda. It means they had to defeat Trump, who clearly loves the country as it was founded. He wants to make America great again. They still want to "fundamentally transform America, " Obama's stated goal. Obama made good on his promise to the detriment of us all. Trump is making good on his promise to undo all that nonsense that infected American life and the economy across the board.

The most confounding aspect of the response to "the memo" is the Left's hysteria over its release to the public. For days their adherents have been ranting and raving about the "national security" dangers, the damage it will do to "the investigation." They say it omits the underlying documents, that its talking points are taken out of context. They demand that those foundational documents be revealed. The Republicans say fine, release all of them. Uh-oh. That must mean that the underlying documents and transcripts prove the points made in the memo. The Democrats forgot to remember that. They, the left, operate on minute-to-minute cable news channel feed. They seem unable to foresee the consequences their feverish denials might have the next day. They always operate on the belief that the public is ignorant. They not only believe it, they count on it. Now that we have read the memo, it is clear there are no national security issues. That was a lie, a feint. The Democrats know very well that the swells at the FBI, DOJ, DNC, NSA, State, and the Clinton campaign contrived to sabotage the Trump candidacy and after the election to submarine his presidency. They not only approve of their various unconstitutional plans to subvert the electorate, they champion them. It's who they are. In their blinkered brains, pickled by the destructive ideology of leftism, they think they are wiser, smarter, and better than anyone on the political right. For the citizens between the coasts with regional issues the left cannot be bothered with, they have only disdain. They cannot imagine that those people matter, that their votes count. In their minds they are an annoyance. They hate that their votes count. The Left's fight against the publication of the memo was an idiotic ploy. They seem incapable of thinking even five minutes ahead of each day's talking points, ("the memo cherry-picked... etc." was repeated all day long on the left media) as though the future when the whole truth emerges is inconceivable to them. Adam Schiff has made himself into a national joke by mindlessly and relentlessly pushing the Trump/Russia collusion which clearly never existed. It was a setup from the beginning. So invested in his commitment to that fabricated meme, he has made himself a lifelong figure of ridicule. If late night comedy was not so ideologically far left, Schiff would be a staple subject of mockery. The memo lays out what actually occurred: our premier law enforcement institutions were weaponized by the Obama administration and the masters of those institutions came to believe themselves above the law. This cabal of our betters meant to override the voters should they elect the wrong person. Then we did elect the wrong person, the one we all like better than the one who lost. They wanted Hillary despite her forty-year record of venality. The rest of us wanted anyone but her. This despicable bunch of self-appointed guardians of leftist orthodoxy decided to fix things and instead fixed themselves as objects of infamy for the remainder of American history. They keep threatening that "if Trump fires Mueller it will cause a Constitutional crisis." Seems we are already there. The Democrats are defending the corruption of the FBI, the DOJ, and the State Dept. If that is not a Constitutional crisis what is?We Must Never Forget

The often-quoted phrase, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing," paraphrasing a passage from Edmund Burke, is pertinent to the problem of the persistence of anti-Semitism. Sinning by silence, a cowardly act, instead of protesting, allows the cancer to persist and metastasize. European countries are still confronted by the disease and lack a cure. The problem, concern with the disease and attempts to deal with it can be examined in three countries.

In Britain, according to a survey by the Community Security Trust, anti-Semitic hate crimes reached a record level in 2017. These incidents can be defined as malicious acts aimed at Jewish people, organizations, and property, targeted because the victim is believed to be Jewish. With members of the Jewish community targeted at a rate of nearly four times a day, there were 1,382 recorded incidents, three-quarters of which were in Greater London and Greater Manchester. It does not appear these incidents were caused by reactions to specific trigger events. The most common type of incident involved verbal abuse randomly directed against visibly Jewish people, distinguished by religious clothing, school uniforms, or jewelry bearing Jewish symbols. Those responsible come from various groups, the far right, the far left and also part of the Labour party, and Islamists. Despite efforts they have not been sufficiently confronted by government and legal authorities. Interestingly, the number of incidents involving social media fell in 2017, possibly as a result of the efforts of social media companies to deal with on-line hate speech. German leaders are aware of the problem. On January 27, 2017 Chancellor Angela Merkel said, "it is inconceivable and shameful that no Jewish institution can exist without police protection, whether it is a school, a kindergarten, or a synagogue." Chancellor Merkel, who was the first German leader to address the Israeli Knesset, is considering the appointment of a government commissioner on anti-Semitism. Despite the actions of Merkel, some signs suggest the situation in Germany is getting worse. Recent polls indicate that about 10% of Germans express classic anti-Semitic feelings, and many more have mild anti-Semitic prejudices. Demonstrations in Berlin against the decision of President Donald Trump on December 7, 2017 to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital might be considered a political action. But protestors chanted anti-Semitic slogans as well as torching Israeli flags. Another disturbing incident is that memorial plaques outside the homes of Holocaust victims were dug out of the ground and stolen. More troubling is the rise of the far-right political party AfD, only four years old, which at the 2017 Federal parliamentary election got 12.6% of the vote and 94 seats and is presently the third largest party in the Bundestag. The AfD is a xenophobic, nationalist, and populist party though it does not declare itself anti-Semitic or Nazi. Nevertheless, utterances by some of the prominent people in the party are troubling. One of the founders, Bjorn Hocke, is critical of the Holocaust memorial in Berlin, designed by Peter Eisenman and inaugurated in 2005. "We Germans are the only people in the world who have planted a memorial of shame in the heart of their capital." Another member of AfD has dismissed the Holocaust as merely "certain misdeeds" and argued, contrary to German law, that Holocaust denial is legitimate. Curiously, Austrian authorities are acting against the virus. Chancellor Sebastian Kurz on January 31, 2018, said he was preparing to dissolve a student fraternity, Germania, which has links to the far-right Freedom party FPO, a junior partner in the governing coalition, because of the fraternity songbook mocking victims of the Holocaust. The former vice chair of the fraternity ran as a candidate for an Austrian state election. Lines in the song included "Step on the gas, you ancient Germanic peoples, we'll manage the seventh million", a direct reference to the six million murdered by Nazis. The issue is doubly troubling, partly because a large number of FPO politicians have ties to student fraternities, and partly because the FPO in the October 2017 legislative election gained support, coming in third and winning 20.5% of the vote and 51 seats. France has tried to deal with the disease in different ways. Two actions illustrate the problem. One is the quick response of President Emmanuel Macron to the physical attack on January 29, 2018 in Sarcelles on an eight-year-old Jewish boy wearing a kippa. The Republic as a whole, Macron said, is assaulted: the Republic stands alongside the French people of Jewish faith to fight these vile acts. The second, a more controversial question, is the decision of leading Paris publisher Gallimard to shelve plans to reissue a collection of anti-Semitic pamphlets by Louis-Ferdinand Celine written in the late 1930s. For some French people, Celine is regarded not only as a prominent writer but even as a cultural icon. But he was an obsessive anti-Semite whose pamphlets are virulent and bigoted. Celine fled France in 1944, was later convicted in absentia of collaboration with Nazi Germany, but was granted amnesty and returned to France. On him, opinions differ widely. French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe thought his collection should be published with a critical and contextual commentary because Celine has a central position in French literature. The indefatigable hunter of anti-Semites, Serge Klarsfeld, threatened legal action if the collection was published. Gallimard, even if reluctantly, made the right decision. The Preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights proclaimed by the UN General Assembly on December 10, 1948 spoke of the need for recognition of equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family. Sadly, this hope and promise has not been fulfilled, as world disasters and tragedies have shown around the world, in Cambodia, Kosovo, Darfur, Syria, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Iraq. Above all, the disease of anti-Semitism still spreads. Medical research has made unbelievable progress in curing illness. If only there were some form of social cauterization that could destroy the anti-Semitic disease. The cure is Never Again.Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner may be one of the most unpopular governors within his own party in the country. This isn't surprising. Named the nation's "Worst Republican Governor" by the National Review , Rauner has betrayed his conservative base more times than can be counted.

I crisscrossed our state, looked people in the eye, and promised to fight business as usual. This boast came about a month after Cardinal Blase Cupich accused him of breaking his word and the Chicago Sun-Times put his picture on its front page, below a headline that shouted: Benedict Rauner. The governors offense was to have signed what may be Americas most radical abortion-funding law after vowing to veto it. The betrayal capped a season of defeats for conservatives, including an income-tax hike, a big bailout of Chicagos public schools, and turning Illinois into what critics of illegal immigration are calling a sanctuary state.

The state went without a budget for two years as Democrats successfully painted his reform program as "radical." Eventually, Rauner gave in on the budget, on a school funding formula that was a giveaway to Chicago schools, and massive income tax hike.

Every one of his 44 promises of reform died either in the Democratic legislature or in the liberal state courts. Public pension reform and reform of public unions were shot down, leaving the state with a $250 billion pension shortfall and no way to fix it.

Conservative activists started looking for a credible challenger and found one in a state House representative, Jeanne Ives. Ives is a West Point grad and has served in the legislature since 2012. Judging by this provocative and controversial ad released by Ives this weekend, conservatives chose wisely.

The ad has been called "racist,"and transphobic," "Disgusting and unacceptable" were the words used to describe it by the GOP party chairman.

That may or may not be true. We all know that charges of racism and transphobia are tossed about with ease by activsts these days. But one thing that is undeniable about the ad; it's true.

"Thank you for signing legislation that lets me use the girl's bathroom," says a masculine looking man in a dress. And it gets better:

ABC 7:

The ad takes Governor Bruce Rauner to task for signing House Bill 40 which provides taxpayer funded abortions to poor women and state employees. It was a bill Rauner told party conservatives last Spring he would veto.



Another portion of the ad says, "Thank you for making all Illinois families pay for my abortions."



Ives ad also attacks Rauner over the so-called Sanctuary State law he signed and over the bi-partisan school funding bill he approved that contained what critics called the "Chicago bailout."



Another part of the ad says, "Thank you Bruce Rauner for making the rest of Illinois bail out Chicago teacher pension. And for giving Rahm everything he wanted and more."



ABC7 political analyst Laura Washington said Ives is playing to discontent among many Illinois Republicans.



"This one is very edgy. She is really going for the jugular on this one, and she's going for the heart of Rauner's conservative base," Washington said. "It's going to anger voters who are upset with Bruce Rauner."

An ironic twist to the ad is that it mirrors a technique to attack Illinois Democrats used by Rauner. The Rauner ad features 4 neighboring GOP governors thanking Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan for sending business and residents their way.

There have been precious few polls in the GOP primary race and Rauner is thought to still be far ahead. Ives has little name recognition outside of conservative activist circles. But an ad like this should improve her standing and establish her as a viable alternative to Rauner.Other stuff the Nunes memo exposes, besides FISA abuse

Now that the Nunes memo is out, the people that said it would be full of inaccuracies have not yet said what was inaccurate. Instead, they are saying that it doesn't report everything, takes things out of context and greatly harms the FBI and Justice Department -- all without telling us how. We do know that for days Adam Schiff and other Democrats were guilty of bald-faced lying when they said it was dangerous to the FBI because it would give classified information about sources and methods. Of course, the complicit media just repeated those lies as if they were true without reading the memo itself.

The most interesting thing to me is that the Obama Administration wanted to spy on their political opponents. They knew that the Steele dossier was funded by the Democrats and was unverified, yet they used it anyway to justify the FISA warrant -- without telling the courts that Democrats and not intelligence created the document. They knew that Steele hated Trump and wanted to see him lose and yet didn't tell the court he was the source. Then, to get additional justification, they used news stories that journalists wrote where they just repeated information from Steele as if it were true. (Basically, the last eighteen months of reporting by the media on Russian collusion have been false but are presented as if they are factual stories even though they attempted no verification of the stories) A summary: the Obama Administration, bureaucrats at intelligence and Justice and the media all wanted Hillary to win at all costs. To do that they had to destroy Trump with whatever means they could, and elect Hillary no matter what she did. So massive corruption and lying occurred to try to ensure the results. Since they didn't get Hillary elected, they have set out to destroy or at least get rid of Trump no matter what they had to do. They cleared Hillary and her staff of multiple crimes and illegally spied on Trump people as they illegally spied on hundreds or even thousands of others. The most disgusting thing that we have seen the last eighteen months is how the complicit media just repeats what they are told without verification, quoting anonymous sources. They portray themselves as fact checkers and people holding the powerful to account, but that couldn't be further from the truth. They have shown themselves to be partisan hacks. There was never any actual indication of Russian collusion with Trump! If the media actually cared, they would want the Justice Department and FBI to treat everyone equally under the law and get rid of the clear politicization of the departments that truly escalated under Obama. If Watergate and the Pentagon Papers stories had occurred during the Obama years, the stories would never have come out. Comey essentially did what he was told and has continually lied. McCabe clearly did everything he could to protect Hillary. The fact that the media and other Democrats pretend that Comey and McCabe were honest brokers that shouldn't have been fired shows that they don't care. Nunes and other Republicans may save the Justice Department from what it has become if the media would do their job.United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. RATHDAPHONE VONGDEUANE, Defendant  Appellant. No. 17-7421 Decided: February 02, 2018

Before MOTZ and KEENAN, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior Circuit Judge. Rathdaphone Vongdeuane, Appellant Pro Se. Elizabeth Jeanne Howard, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Greenville, South Carolina, for Appellee.

Rathdaphone Vongdeuane seeks to appeal the district court's order denying relief on her 28 U.S.C.  2255 (2012) motion. The order is not appealable unless a circuit justice or judge issues a certificate of appealability. 28 U.S.C.  2253(c)(1)(B) (2012). A certificate of appealability will not issue absent a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right. 28 U.S.C.  2253(c)(2) (2012). When the district court denies relief on the merits, a prisoner satisfies this standard by demonstrating that reasonable jurists would find that the district court's assessment of the constitutional claims is debatable or wrong. Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000); see Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336-38 (2003). When the district court denies relief on procedural grounds, the prisoner must demonstrate both that the dispositive procedural ruling is debatable, and that the motion states a debatable claim of the denial of a constitutional right. Slack, 529 U.S. at 484-85.

We have independently reviewed the record and conclude that Vongdeuane has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly, we deny a certificate of appealability and dismiss the appeal. We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

DISMISSED

PER CURIAM:Our View: Any thoughts about Rideouts affiliation with Adventist Health?

Your opportunity to make comments about the deal and how its done is coming later this monthUnited States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. ROWN WASHINGTON, a/k/a Folly, Defendant - Appellant. No. 17-7183 Decided: February 02, 2018

Before MOTZ and KEENAN, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior Circuit Judge. Rown Washington, Appellant Pro Se. John David Rowell, Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellee.

Rown Washington seeks to appeal the district court's order dismissing as untimely his 28 U.S.C.  2255 (2012) motion. The order is not appealable unless a circuit justice or judge issues a certificate of appealability. 28 U.S.C.  2253(c)(1)(B) (2012). A certificate of appealability will not issue absent a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right. 28 U.S.C.  2253(c)(2) (2012). When the district court denies relief on the merits, a prisoner satisfies this standard by demonstrating that reasonable jurists would find that the district court's assessment of the constitutional claims is debatable or wrong. Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000); see Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336-38 (2003). When the district court denies relief on procedural grounds, the prisoner must demonstrate both that the dispositive procedural ruling is debatable, and that the motion states a debatable claim of the denial of a constitutional right. Slack, 529 U.S. at 484-85.

We have independently reviewed the record and conclude that Washington has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly, we deny Washington's motion for a certificate of appealability and dismiss the appeal. We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

DISMISSED

PER CURIAM:United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit. United States of America Plaintiff - Appellee v. Justin Troendle Defendant - Appellant No. 17-1318 Decided: February 02, 2018

Before WOLLMAN, COLLOTON, and BENTON, Circuit Judges.

Justin P. Troendle pled guilty to failing to register as a sex offender in violation of 18 U.S.C.  2250(a). The district court sentenced him to 24 months' imprisonment and five years' supervised release. After prison, he violated the conditions of release. The court revoked the release, sentencing him to another 24 months' imprisonment and five years' supervised release. He appeals. Having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.  1291, this court affirms.

This court reviews a district court's decision to revoke a defendant's supervised release for an abuse of discretion. United States v. Melton, 666 F.3d 513, 516 (8th Cir. 2012). Where, as here, a sentence imposed is within the advisory guideline range, this court typically accord[s] it a presumption of reasonableness. United States v. Scales, 735 F.3d 1048, 1052 (8th Cir. 2013). It is the defendant's burden to rebut the presumption and to show that the sentence should have been lower. United States v. Goodale, 738 F.3d 917, 926 (8th Cir. 2013). [I]t will be the unusual case when [this court] reverse[s] a district court sentencewhether within, above, or below the applicable Guidelines rangeas substantively unreasonable. United States v. Feemster, 572 F.3d 455, 464 (8th Cir. 2009) (en banc).

Troendle believes his sentence is substantively unreasonable because the district court improperly gave significant weight to irrelevant factors, failed to consider relevant factors, and committed clear error in weighing the factors. Imposing a within-guidelines sentence, the court properly considered his criminal history; past failures to comply with terms of supervision; and numerous current violations of supervised release, including assault:

In arriving at a disposition, the Court is required to and the Court has in this case carefully considered all of the factors at 18 United States Code Section 3553(a) that apply in a revocation proceeding. Mr. Troendle is here because of an offense that occurred when he was 15 years old, in which he sexually abused two children, a 7-year-old and I think an older sibling of that first victim. Paragraph 21 of the presentence investigation reports, and this was not objected to at the time of sentencing, that defendant threatened to physically harm the child victim if the victim reported the abuse.

After his conviction for that offense, actually, hethis was a juvenile adjudication, and he went to foster care for adolescent sex offenders and received probation, was discharged from probation, and then in the years that followed, he was noncompliant with registration requirements for sex offenders and was noncompliant while on court supervision and received revocations of probation for a variety of violations that are detailed in Paragraphs 22 and 23 of the presentence investigation report.

While under supervision in this Court, he's been noncompliant. The Court and, most importantly, Probation has tried to work with him in the community. And the violations, all of the violations, show a pattern of just not doing what he is supposed to do. And if that weren't enough, then the assault on Samantha Hastings that the Court heard about here. The Court does believe Samantha Hastings. And Mr. Troendle, maybe he doesn't remember what he did, but I do believe Samantha Hastings's statements in court under oath today.

Troendle argues the district court erred in his revocation sentence by seeking to punish him for the new [assault] violation he incurred in state court. This argument is without merit. While on supervised release, Troendle was charged with domestic abuse assault, an Iowa class D felony. The charge later was amended to a serious misdemeanor. Troendle contested whether his state court serious misdemeanor conviction for assault was a Grade A violation on federal supervised release. In response, the government called the victim to testify. Based on testimony that Troendle twice choked her and impeded her breathing, the court found Troendle's conviction was an Iowa class D felony (and, therefore, a Grade A violation). The court thus addressed the assault conviction because Troendle contested the issue. It said nothing about needing to punish him for his behavior. In fact, it made clear the sentence did not depend on whether he committed a misdemeanor or a felony:

I would be imposing the same disposition whether or not Mr. Troendle is only guilty of the assault that he pled to in state court, but I reaffirm that, in my opinion, he has committed the more serious offense. But regardless, mythe outcome would be the same.

The sentence was not substantively unreasonable.

The judgment is affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

. The Honorable Linda R. Reade, United States District Judge for the Northern District of Iowa.

PER CURIAM.To defeat BJPs Goliath, Narendra Modi, the Congress president will need a powerful army of allies.

The Modi-led BJP, which seemed to be on the backfoot, following the partys poor performance in Gujarat and the devastating blow in Rajasthan, is also at work.

Fifteen months ahead of the crucial 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the cheer is slowly but steadily returning to the Opposition camp, spurred by the near victory in the Gujarat Assembly elections and a clean sweep in the Rajasthan bypolls. There are still miles to go, egos to shed and seats to share, but a beginning has been made with senior leaders like NCP chief Sharad Pawar, CPI general secretary D. Raja, Congress Sushilkumar Shinde and Omar Abdullah of the National Conference joining hands at a 'Save the Constitution' rally in Mumbai and deliberating on strategy in a rare show of Opposition unity. The hurdles for the opposition are many  towering over them is PM Modi whose popularity is unmatched as ever, vouched by every opinion poll. Getting West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee to toe the line of a combined Opposition is no mean task and neither is getting a heterogenous mix of parties to accept the leadership of a single leader like Congress president Rahul Gandhi. The scion of the Gandhi family is a different leader altogether after the Gujarat polls but his poll-winning abilities are yet to be proved beyond doubt. What could finally melt the differences is the question of survival  most small parties know that a Modi win in 2019 will make him invincible and them irrelevant beyond recovery. Sanjay Basak analyses the patterns emerging on the national scene and finds out if the BJP-led NDA may have to face the might of a combined opposition or a clutter of parties with no unity in sight.

Congress president Rahul Gandhi, charged up by the convincing bypoll victories in Rajasthan and a stellar performance in Prime Minister Narendra Modis home turf-Gujarat might have spoken too early when he tweeted: 4 years gone... Thankfully, only 1 more year to go.

To defeat BJPs Goliath, Narendra Modi, the Congress president will need a powerful army of allies. On a one on one popularity contest, Modi towers over Rahul Gandhi with a whopping 30% lead. A recent survey conducted by an English magazine claimed that Modi received the backing of 53 per cent people as the next Prime Minister while his closest competition, Rahul Gandhi, lagged far behind at a distant 22 per cent. Yet to Mr Gandhis credit, he has worked himself up from the bottom of the pyramid of popularity (four per cent) and made giant strides to hold the number two position.

Mr Gandhi, in his newly energised avatar, is in on the hunt. Hes looking for allies outside UPA to build up a grand invincible formation. But the hurdles are many. The first is mercurial Queen of Hearts  Trinamul Congress Mamata Banerjee. A primary antagonist, she has so far refused to be led by Congress, particularly Mr Gandhi.

She dealt the first blow to talks of Opposition unity by skipping Sonia Gandhis Opposition unity meet held recently. West Bengal has 42 Lok Sabha seats and despite BJPs relentless efforts to make inroads into her territory, Didi as Ms Banerjee is popularly called, continues to reign supreme. In the recently held bypolls in Uluberia Lok Sabha berth, she not only retained the seat, she also wrested Noapara Assembly from the CPI(M).

Before Ms Banerjee, the first blood was drawn by JD(U)s Nitish Kumar. The efforts at Opposition unity, which were at the nascent stages during the presidential polls last year, were dealt a body blow when Mr Kumar walked out of the Bihar Grand Alliance with RJD and Congress and crossed over to the BJP-led NDA. With Mr Kumar gone, the TMC members began a chorus saying  Mamata Banerjee is the only credible face to lead the Opposition.

The other major hurdle propped up when the CPI(M) Central Committee rejected the party general secretary, Sitaram Yechurys draft resolution to tie up with Congress for 2019. Stitching together a coalition of the Opposition parties is the only way to stop the Modi chariot, the Yechury camp argued. But the majority led by former CPI(M) boss, Prakash Karat, refused to see the writing on the wall. A final call on the draft will be taken at the party congress in April in Hyderabad. The CPI(M) party congress will be held after the elections in three North-East states. The CPM-ruled Tripura is going to polls on February 18, while Nagaland and Meghalaya will vote on February 27. The adopted draft resolution, pushed by the Karat camp, stated that there would not be any electoral alliance or electoral front with the Congress during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Left Front will go it alone against the BJP.

Mr Karat has been accused by senior leaders of being the architect of CPI(M)s downslide, but he is in no mood to let Mr Yechury have his way.

The third horseman in this Opposition apocalypse is the Maratha strongman, Sharad Pawar. The NCP chief called an Opposition meet to send a signal and demonstrate to everyone that he, not the Congress, was the leading force. That ambition received a jolt when no representative of the Trinamul Congress, DMK, SP and BSP made it to the meet. The Congress representatives, Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma who attended Mr Pawars attempt at a show of strength used the opportunity to suggest another Opposition meet, this time headed by the UPA chairperson, Sonia Gandhi.

Mrs Gandhi held the meet on Budget day, and the leaders who attended included NCP supremo Sharad Pawar and Praful Patel, National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah, TMCs Derek OBrien, CPI national secretary D. Raja, SPs Ram Gopal Yadav and Naresh Agrawal, besides CPMs Mohammed Salim and T.K. Rangarajan. JD(S) leader Kupendra Reddy, breakaway JD(U) leader Sharad Yadav, RLDs Ajit Singh, RJDs Misa Bharati and Jaiprakash Narayan Yadav, JMMs Sanjiv Kumar, AIUDFs Badruddin Ajmal, Kerala Congresss Joy Abrahim, IUMLs P.K. Kunhalikutty and RPS N.K. Premchandran were also present at the meet. The meeting was an effort to galvanise support of all 17 Opposition parties, many of whom had come together during the presidential and vice presidential polls against the ruling party.

At this juncture, the Samajwadi Party led by Akhilesh Yadav and RJD are the only major outfits which are willing to be led by Mr Gandhi. But then, neither Akhilesh nor RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadavs son Tejaswi Yadav has any national ambition.

The Congress is clearly playing a mother-son card to bring in the allies, banking on Sonia Gandhis personal equation with Opposition leaders like Mamata Banerjee, Sharad Pawar among others to swell up her army.

The Modi-led BJP, which seemed to be on the backfoot following the partys poor performance in Gujarat and the devastating blow in Rajasthan, is also at work.

Mr Modi has already met the DMK chief, Karunanidhi, and unlike Atal Behari Vajpayee, the Prime Minister is willing to tap any outfit which can be dragged to the saffron side of the fence, as he did with Nitish Kumar. For if the BJP knows one thing, it is this  despite Mr Modis popularity, a grand alliance of the Opposition could be a tough opponent to beat.The government has already sought dividend of about Rs 13,000 crore from the Reserve Bank of India for 2016-17.

In the budget for 2017-18, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had pegged dividend income from the RBI, public sector banks and financial institutions at Rs 74,901 crore. (Photo: PTI)

New Delhi: The government is eyeing Rs 3,000-4,000 crore surplus funds lying with markets regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) as part of exercise to mop up non-tax revenue to bridge the fiscal deficit gap, a senior official has said.

The government has already sought dividend of about Rs 13,000 crore from the Reserve Bank of India for 2016-17.

The SEBI has two kinds of money. One what they earn as penalties and fine etc. That belongs to the government that they regularly deposit. The other one that they earn by way of fee and other decision.

"They have run up into some surplus already. So, there is that should be kept in public account rather than banks. That is being discussed. That amount is not very large, it's around Rs 3,000-4000 crore," Economic Affairs Secretary S C Garg said.

Asked about additional surplus transfer by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Garg said, the central government has asked for remaining part lying with the central bank to be transfered during the current fiscal.

"We have asked for remaining part of the surplus which is about Rs 13,000 crore. The RBI has made certain suggestions.

It is being discussed with the RBI. The money should come before March 31," he said.

In August, the RBI had paid a dividend of Rs 30,659 crore for the fiscal ended June 2017. It was less than half the Rs 65,876 crore it had paid in 2015-16.

The government had budgeted for a Rs 58,000 crore dividend from the RBI in its Budget for this fiscal year.

RBI's profit was about Rs 44,000 crore, of which Rs 30,000 crore has been distributed and Rs 13,000 crore it retained towards risks and reserves. So the government has made a suggestion that the Rs 13,000 crore may also be transferred, he had said.

In the budget for 2017-18, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had pegged dividend income from the RBI, public sector banks and financial institutions at Rs 74,901 crore.

However, as per the revised estimate it was substantially lowered down to Rs 54,810 crore from the earlier estimate of Rs 74,901 crore. Public sector banks still struggled to make profits because of the heavy stressed asset load on their balance sheets.Foreign direct investment in sector during first half of current fiscal has been to tune of USD 6.08 billion.

Under the NTP 2018, the telecom sector should be able to deploy 2 million public wireless local area network, including Wi-Fi hotspots in the country by 2020. (File Photo)

New Delhi: The telecom sector should be able to address global requirements and attract investments of about USD 100 billion by 2022 under the new policy in works, as per suggestions made by sector regulator Trai today.

The regulator recommended that under the new policy framework, the telecom sector should be able to generate 20 lakh jobs, achieve 900 million broadband subscriptions with download speed of 2 Mbps and connect all gram panchayats with at least 1 gigabit per second with wireless broadband by 2022.

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) reiterated its long pending demand of putting in place an ombudsman based consumer grievance redressal mechanism "by end of 2018".

The regulator in March 2017 had recommended DoT to set-up ombudsman in the sector, which should have the power to levy penalties on the telecom service providers. The Department of Telecom had sought views of Trai on National Telecom Policy (NTP) 2018 on August 21, 2017.

The regulator listed out seven broad missions and 18 objectives that should be achieved under the NTP 2018. Trai said that the NTP 2018 should be able to enable access at affordable prices for wireless broadband services, including through satellite to 90 per cent population and there should be 65 per cent active unique mobile subscribers by 2022.

The teledensity in the country is around 91 per cent but the total number of subscribers include individuals with multiple mobile connections.

Trai said that the vision of the new telecom policy in works should be developing a competitive, sustainable, and investor-friendly information and communication technologies (ICT) market for rollout of state-of-the-art ubiquitous digital communication infrastructure.

"...to provide resilient, reliable, affordable, and consumer friendly products and services to meet local as well as global needs; and in the process, transform India's knowledge economy, support inclusive development, foster innovation, and stimulate job creation," Trai said.

The regulator recommended that the mission of NTP 2018 should include development of "indigenous technologies, equipments, platforms, and applications ecosystem for providing digital services to local and global markets".

Trai has recommended that NTP 2018 should aim to make the sector net positive in international trade of communication systems and services by 2022.

It said that mission of the sector should attract investments by enhancing ease of doing business through simplification of licensing and regulatory frameworks, rationalisation of taxes, levies and related compliances, and facilitating availability of resources, including spectrum.

The regulator said that NTP should be able "to attract an investment equivalent to USD 60 billion in communication sector by 2020 and USD 100 billion by 2022".

The foreign direct investment in the sector during first half of current fiscal has been to the tune of USD 6.08 billion.

Trai said that an online centralised platform should be created by 2019 for facilitating single window clearance for rolling out telecom infrastructure in the country.

Under the NTP 2018, the telecom sector should be able to deploy 2 million public wireless local area network, including Wi-Fi hotspots in the country by 2020 and 5 million by 2022, enable access for connecting 1 billion internet of things (IoT)/ machine-to-machine sensors or devices by 2020 and 5 billion by 2022 and establish a policy framework for facilitating setting up of data centres by 2019.The US was the second most popular destination for migrating HNWIs in 2017 at 9,000, followed by Canada (5,000) and United Arab Emirates (5,000).

As per the report, India has been ranked sixth in the list of wealthiest countries with total wealth of $8,230 billion. (Photo: Pixabay)

New Delhi: India witnessed the second largest number of millionaire outflow globally after China with 7,000 high net worth individuals changing their domicile during 2017, 16 per cent more than last year, according to a report.

According to the report by New World Wealth, 7,000 ultra-rich Indians shifted overseas in 2017. In 2016, the figure stood at 6,000, while in 2015 as many as 4,000 millionaires shifted base.

Globally, as many as 10,000 super-rich Chinese changed their domicile in 2017. Other countries that witnessed large high net worth individual (HNWis) outflows include Turkey (6,000), United Kingdom (4,000), France (4,000) and Russia (3,000).

As per the migration trends, Indian HNWIs moved to the US, the UAE, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, while Chinese HNWIs moved to the US, Canada and Australia. The report, however, noted that the outflows of HNWIs from India and China are not concerning as these countries are producing far more new HNWIs than they are losing.

Also, once the standard of living in these countries improves, we expect several wealthy people to move back, it added.

On the other hand, Australia was the top country for HNWI inflows in 2017 with 10,000 ultra-rich people shifting base to this country, beating out its main rival the US for the third year running. Over the past 10 years, total wealth held in Australia has risen by 83 per cent compared to 20 per cent growth in the US. As a result, the average Australian is now significantly wealthier than the average US citizen, which was not the case 10 years ago, it added.

The US was the second most popular destination for migrating HNWIs in 2017 at 9,000, followed by Canada (5,000) and United Arab Emirates (5,000).

As per the report, India has been ranked sixth in the list of wealthiest countries with total wealth of $8,230 billion.

India is home to 3,30,400 HNWIs (individuals with $1 million or more in net assets). Globally, India was ranked 9th in this aspect. India has 20,730 multi-millionaires, 7th largest in the world. In terms of resident billionaires, India with 119 such individuals was named among the top three countries globally, after the US and China.The severe protests around the film had taken not only SLB but also his stars by surprise.

The much-beleaguered Padmaavat has finally found relief  over a week after it finally released. The Karni Sena, which had been at the forefront of protests against the film, and attempting to block its release, has finally withdrawn its year-long protest.

According to reports, Rajput Karni Senas Mumbai leader Yogendra Singh Katar admitted that after a few of the fringe groups members watched the movie, they found nothing objectionable in the content.

Initially, the Karni Sena had objected to the release of the movie, as it believed that it distorted history. Now, its has announced that there, indeed, arent any objectionable scenes between Allaudin Khilji and Padmavati in the movie, which was their initial grouse with the film.

Karni Sena men burn an effigy of Sanjay Leela Bhansali

In fact, the members of the group stated that the movie speaks positively about the Rajputs and glorifies their valour and sacrifice. He added that every Rajput would feel proud after watching it.

The Karni Sena will now also be helping the film get a release in Gujarat, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, after fringe elements blocked Padmaavats release in these states. This, despite the Supreme Courts orders that the movie can-not be banned in any state.

Director Sanjay Leela Bhansali is understandably circumspect on the issue. I never understood what the protests were all about in the first place. I still dont understand. Im just happy that the film has been released and appreciated widely. Of course, wed like our film to release in states where it hasnt been so far. Isnt that the least we can expect, after all weve gone through? he asks.

The severe protests around the film had taken not only SLB but also his stars by surprise. We were all surprised by the turn of events, Shahid Kapoor had said, clearly frustrated by the delay in the movies release. Things arent extremely bad, but its very strange that people are choosing to decide whats in the film, without watching it; its very weird. I have been saying all along that you need to watch the film before forming an opinion. Why do you have so many pre-conceived notions about the film without knowing the facts of its content?

Padmaavats sets were vandalised

The actor had also slammed the Karni Sena for threatening Deepika Padukone with physical harm. Its in terrible taste. Im surprised there are such things being said about a lady; Im shocked, he had said.

But while Bhansali will say no more, a team member from the film wonders why the Karni Sena has suddenly decided to calm down. Its all bizarre, sighs the source, on the condition of anonymity. The flare-up, the film industrys silence, the way Padmaavat was hounded, and now this sudden calming of nerves after the film is released, and the bogus Rajput protests that have been discredited completely.

Whatever the case may be, the team of Padmaavat would be heaving a sigh of relief with the long battle with the Karni Sena coming to an end. The fact that it has a release in the remaining states of India to look forward to only makes the deal sweeter.

A violent trail

In January 2017, members of the Karni Sena roughed up Bhansali on the sets of the movie in Jaipur, Rajasthan. After the sets were moved out, vandalism was reported in Kolhapur.

Abhishek Som, a Meerut-based man, offered `5 crore to anyone who

beheaded the director and Deepika. This followed news of a Karni Sena

member threatening to chop off Deepikas nose for violating Indian culture.

The Karni Sena also threatened a nationwide bandh in November 2017, over the movies release.

After theatres went ahead with listing shows of Padmaavat, with the

backing of the Supreme Court, there was a fresh wave of violence in January this year. More than 150 vehicles were damaged, when mobs went on a

rampage in Ahmedabad, attacking three theatres inside malls and another

complex. Section 144 (Unlawful Assembly) was also enforced in Gurgaon,

over the release.

 With inputs from Subhash K. Jha and Sanskriti Media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.But having started a fashion label recently, Padmini smiles as she talks about her movie career.

Veteran actress Padmini Kolhapure is back with vigour. She was last seen as Shahid Kapoors mother in Phata Poster Nikla Hero in 2013, but is now ready to take on more films.

I did Phata Poster because I like the work of the director Rajkumar Santoshi, and wanted to work with him someday. The script was also good. Im now doing a film in Marathi as well, and then there are talks of another Hindi and Bengali film, she explains.

But having started a fashion label recently, Padmini smiles as she talks about her movie career. Acting will always be my first love, says the actress, who started her career as a child artiste in movies like Satyam Shivam Sundaram and Dream Girl.

Meanwhile Padmini, who happens to be Shraddha Kapoors aunt, is also quite appreciative of her career. Shes doing good work and sings very well too. Her mother Shivangi, who is also my sister, has been singing since childhood. And shes as melodious as her mother, smiles Padmini.16-year-old Tusshar died in his school's toilet after a fight with fellow students in northeast Delhi's Karawal Nagar.

Local residents along with the boy's family members staged a protest at the Karawal Nagar Chowk and demanded a probe into the matter.(Photo: ANI | Twitter)

New Delhi: An absconding minor accused in the murder of a class 9 student in the toilet of a school in northeast Delhi was on Saturday apprehended, the police said. This takes the total to four students who have been apprehended in the case.

16-year-old Tusshar died in his school's toilet after a fight with fellow students in northeast Delhi's Karawal Nagar.

After scanning CCTV footage, police apprehended three students of the school and transferred the case registered under Section 304 to 302 (murder).

Also read: Class 9 boy found dead in Delhi school toilet, 3 students apprehended

They found that the boy had got involved in a fight with four students.

The boy fell down after receiving punches during the fight and died later, Ajit K Singla, DCP (northeast) said.

Tusshar was found unconscious by some students in the bathroom and was taken to a hospital. He was later referred to the GTB Hospital where he was declared brought dead, they said.

Though the school administration claimed that he was suffering loose motions, the boy's family alleged that he had a fight with some students and was thrashed, police said.

However, the police said that no injury marks were found on the boy's body.

On the basis of a complaint by the boy's family, a case was registered. The medical board will conduct the post-mortem on Friday, they said.

Police are questioning his classmates and the students who had found him in an unconscious state in the bathroom.

Tusshar is a resident of Karawal Nagar.

The family also alleged that school authorities were trying to shield the students he had a fight with.

They alleged that he was beaten up by some students and left to die in the washroom, according to a report in NDTV.

Local residents along with the boy's family members staged a protest at the Karawal Nagar Chowk and demanded a probe into the matter.

This resembles the Pradyuman murder case, where a class 2 student of Gurgaon's Ryan International School was found dead with his throat slit in the school toilet on September 8, 2017.

(With agency inputs)UP Shia Central Waqf Board had submitted proposal before SC for settlement of decades-old dispute over Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid site.

The BJP leader was speaking at the inauguration of the 25th Rashtriya Kavi Sammelan in Thane. (Photo: ANI Twitter)

Thane: Union minister Giriraj Singh said he hoped Sunni Muslims would come out in support of building a Ram Temple in Ayodhya just as Shias extended their support to the cause.

The BJP leader was speaking at the inauguration of the 25th Rashtriya Kavi Sammelan in Thane.

"Shias have already supported the construction of a Ram Temple in Ayodhya. I'm hopeful Sunni Muslims will also extend their support for the cause," he told reporters in Thane on Sunday night.

In November, 2017, the Uttar Pradesh Shia Central Waqf Board had submitted before the Supreme Court a proposal for settlement of the decades-old dispute over the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid site, saying a temple can be built in Ayodhya and the mosque could be raised in Lucknow.

Singh said he widely used social media to blunt the opposition's criticism of Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, where the BJP posted a thumping victory in 2017.

"The prime minister came under attack by his opponents during the UP elections but I extensively made use of social media to spread the message of what good had been done (under him) and you see the results for yourselves," he said.

In his inaugural address at the meet, he said there was a need to check the growth of population which was a major problem being faced by the country.

He said birth control measures were required to curb population and ease the pressure on utilisation of resources like land and water.As many as 25 MoUs, entailing Rs 35,000 crore investment, were signed on the final day of the summit on Sunday.

'This particular initiative will raise hope and expectation of young people and energise them,' Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said. (Photo: advantageassam.com)

Guwahati: Assam has received investment commitments worth Rs 1 lakh crore through over 200 business pacts signed at its first Global Investment Summit (GIS) in Guwahati, an official said on Sunday.

As many as 25 MoUs, entailing Rs 35,000 crore investment, were signed on the final day of the summit on Sunday.

"The two-day summit has seen signing of over 200 MoUs with investment commitments crossing Rs 1 lakh crore," said the spokesperson of 'Advantage Assam Global Investment Summit 2018'.

As many as 176 MoUs were signed on Saturday with a range of companies committing investments worth Rs 65,186 crore in the state.

"This has been a good summit, considering the fact that Assam is organising such a global meet of leading investors for the first time," the spokesperson said.

"This particular initiative will raise hope and expectation of young people and energise them," Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said at the closing function.

Some of the MoUs include companies like Ola for running river taxi in Brahmaputra and skill mission for setting up three mega centres of excellence.

Besides, another agreement was signed with Ola to train 12,000 youths, the spokesperson said.

MoUs were also signed between IIT-Guwahati and Kalam Institute of Health Technology on technology transfer in the domain of medical technologies.

"We conducted fruitful discussion with Asian Development Bank to set up skill city, having 12 different skill training schools to make the state a global hub of skilled human resource," said the spokesperson, who is a senior bureaucrat of the state government.

Some other developments include laying of foundation stone for tech city of Assam, setting up of NIXI node, establishing a Centre of Excellence for Application Security at NIC and handover of Master Services Agreement for multiple BPO units, he added.

"Discussions were also held to set up a institute in media and film sector with the help of Whistling Woods International of Subhash Ghai and a technical institute with Pawanhans group," the spokesperson said.

On the first day of the summit on Saturday, public sector oil behemoth ONGC committed to pump in Rs 13,000 crore in the state in the years to come, followed by the rival oil PSU firm Oil India Ltd with a pledge to pump in Rs 10,000 crore.

Another two oil companies IOC and NRL have also announced investments worth Rs 3,432 crore and Rs 3,410 crore respectively.

Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani had announced an investment of Rs 2,500 crore in Assam in various sectors, including retail, petroleum, telecom, tourism and sports, creating jobs for at least 80,000 people over the next three years.

The state government had identified 12 focus sectors for the summit, including agriculture and food processing, handloom-textile-handicrafts, logistics, river transport-port township, IT-ITeS, pharmaceutical-medical equipment, plastics-petrochemicals and power.The Delhi HC had asked the EC to state the factual aspects behind its decision to disqualify the 20 AAP MLAs.

In a blow to Delhi's ruling Aam Aadmi Party, the EC on Januray 19 recommended disqualification of 20 AAP MLAs for holding office of profit which was also accepted by President Ram Nath Kovind. (Photo: PTI/File)

New Delhi: The Election Commission on Saturday told Delhi High Court that it was not bound to call the 20 Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLAs for a hearing before being disqualified for holding office of profit.

The poll body said that the lawmakers were given "ample opportunity to come and participate in several hearings" earlier but the lawmakers "gave only illusionary responses", according to a report in NDTV.

The Delhi High Court had on Tuesday asked the Election Commission to state the factual aspects behind its decision to disqualify the 20 AAP MLAs for holding office of profit by filing an affidavit.

A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Chander Shekhar asked the poll panel to file the affidavit after the EC said it wanted to respond to some of the allegations made in the MLAs' pleas challenging their disqualification from the Delhi Assembly.

A day after the EC recommended disqualification of 20 AAP MLAs, Deputy Chief Minister of Delhi, Manish Sisodia claimed that there was no hearing and they were not given a chance to explain their stand.

Also Read: President gives nod to EC recommendation disqualifying 20 AAP MLAs

Sisodia also alleged that his government was being deliberately targeted for the "honest work" they have been doing in Delhi.

He said the attempt by the EC was another move by the Centre to deter AAP from pursuing the path of honest politics.

In a blow to Delhi's ruling Aam Aadmi Party, the EC on January 19 recommended disqualification of 20 AAP MLAs for holding office of profit which was also accepted by President Ram Nath Kovind, setting the stage for their ouster from Delhi Assembly.

The MLAs had moved the Delhi High Court but the court refused to pass any interim relief to the legislators.The ill mariner was given first-aid by the ICG medical team on board the merchant vessel.

The Indian Coast Guard station in Haldia received an immediate medical evacuation request from the master of a Panama registered merchant vessel Yan Dun Jiao-I which was about 64 nautical miles south of the Sagar Island in South 24 Parganas on Saturday. (Photo: Asian Age)

Kolkata: In sharp contrast to the China's aggression at the Sino-India border, the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) evacuated a Chinese mariner who fell ill onboard to a merchant ship in the Bay of Bengal.

At around 5 pm on Saturday, the ICG station in Haldia received an immediate medical evacuation request from the master of a Panama registered merchant vessel Yan Dun Jiao-I which was about 64 nautical miles south of the Sagar Island in South 24 Parganas.

One of the crew members, Xia Jianting (46), was suffering from severe abdominal pain and continuous vomitting, said ICG (North East) deputy commandant Avinandan Mitra.

Swinging into action, the ICG Maritime Rescue Sub Centre diverted ICGS Raziya Sultana, which was patrolling in the exclusive economic zone of India in the deep sea, to the vessel.

The ill mariner was given first-aid by the ICG medical team onboard to the merchant vessel. When he became slightly stable by midnight, he was shifted to ICGS Raziya Sultana, said Eastern Command chief public relation officer Wing Commander SS Birdi.

Early on Sunday, an ICG fast interceptor boat C-418 was sent from Haldia to the sea. The patient was shifted to the boat which reached Haldia at around 11 am, Wing Commander Birdi added.

He was later handed over to the merchant vessel's local agent for his further treatment in Kolkata.Inspector Dave said that investigations were underway to find out the source of the fake software as well as the biometric data.

The arrested duo used a duplicate software and obtained a data bank of beneficiaries from an unknown source.(Photo: Representational | PTI)

Surat: Two owners of government-funded ration shops were arrested by the police in Gujarat's Surat for allegedly pilfering subsidised foodgrain by using hacked software and unauthorised biometric Aadhaar data of beneficiaries.

Police said that Babubhai Boriwal (53) and Sampatlal Shah (61) were arrested on Saturday and were sent to police custody for five days.

Explaining the modus operandi, Crime Branch Inspector BN Dave said, "The state government had in April 2016 launched the Annapurna Yojana under the National Food Security Act-2013. Fair price shops, renamed as Pandit Deendayal grahak bhandar, were computerised so that subsidised food items reached the actual beneficiaries."

Inspector Dave said that ration shops were supposed to use an application called E-FPS, provided by the government, with a databank of beneficiaries fed into it.

He added, "As part of this, fair price shop owners were given a username and password to access the biometric data bank of beneficiaries to create an electronic record of beneficiaries availing subsidised grains from their shops."

"The beneficiary had to provide his finger print, details of his ration card and UID (Aadhaar) numbers to match the data fed into the computer. This would generate a slip on the basis of which he was given subsidised ration every month," Inspector Dave said.

The arrested duo, he said, used a duplicate software and obtained a data bank of beneficiaries from an unknown source.

"They used this data bank to create an electronic record every month to show that beneficiaries had obtained subsidised foodgrain when in reality they had not," he said.

Inspector Dave said that investigations were underway to find out the source of the fake software as well as the biometric data.

Earlier, eight separate FIRs were lodged against as many fair price shop owners in the city following an investigation carried out by the district administration after some beneficiaries complained. The matter was then handed over to the Crime Branch.

Police said that the two had been booked under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) including section 406, 409 (criminal breach of trust), 467, 468, 471 (forgery), as well as sections of the Information Technology Act and the Essential Commodities Act.Brahmaputra has enough tributaries with adequate rainfall in catchments areas after coming down to the plains to bring in water to it.

China has denied reports that it is diverting water of Tsangpo to Xinjiang province. (Photo: PTI)

Kolkata: The alleged diversion of water of Tsangpo-Brahmaputra river by China does not pose any threat to India, Former Army chief General (retd) Shankar Roy Chowdhury said.

Even if the charge is true, the river, which is the mighty Brahmaputra in India, has enough tributaries with adequate rainfall in catchments areas after coming down to the plains to bring in water to it, he said.

"Even if China diverts water of the river, India does not need to worry," Roy Chowdhury said at a symposium 'India-China relations - Ways to resolve contentious issues'.

China has denied reports that it is diverting water of Tsangpo to Xinjiang province.

Former National Security Advisor M K Narayanan, however, took a stronger view of the issue, saying China is trying to start a water war with India.

"China is actively considering a water war over the Brahmaputra," he said.

Gen Roy Chowdhury blamed the laziness and lack of on the part of the Indian economic sector for lagging behind the Chinese in the industrial and manufacturing front.

Referring to the dumping of Chinese goods in India, including even the Lord Ganesha idols, he said it is India's fault not to have pursued a three-pronged approach of "cooperate, compete and confront."

"It is the lazy and greedy Indian economic sector to blame, and not China. We should manufacture good quality products cheaper than China," he said.

He said 'Made in China' products have overtaken India a long ago and asserted that the Indian manufacturing sector should be strengthened in order to compete with that country.

With the Asian economy outgrowing the western economy, focus has shifted from the USA and Europe to Asia and from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean, Narayanan said.

"Rarely has the world seen the rise of two populations at one time and that too in the same region and the results have not been benign; China and India are competing on several counts - political, economic and military," Narayanan said.

Though the USA is at present their main adversary, the Chinese feel that the real challenge they will face will be from India, the former NSA said at the two-day symposium organised by the Research Centre for Eastern and North Eastern Regional Studies, a Kolkata-based think-tank, that ended yesterday.

Former Indian Air Force chief Air Marshal (retd) Arup Raha said, to counter the Chinese threat of befriending our neighbours, India should engage more with these countries by selling them military hardware and also by holding joint military exercises, both bilateral and multi-lateral.Pilot said that the 'so-called pro-farmer budget' reflects agrarian distress and BJP will pay a heavy price for it.

Pilot, who is largely seen as the Cong's chief ministerial face in Rajasthan, said the elections were 'very crucial' as they came just seven or eight months before Assembly polls in the state. (Photo: File)

New Delhi: The recent Congress victory in key bypolls in Rajasthan has busted the "myth" of the BJP being an election-winning machine and sent out a message that its "jumlebaazi" (rhetoric) will not work, party state unit chief Sachin Pilot said on Sunday.

Pilot, who campaigned intensely and worked at the grass-roots level for the two Lok Sabha constituencies and one Assembly seat, said the outcome would also have a bearing on the upcoming polls in other states, including Karnataka.

He said the results had come at a time when the BJP was on the "back foot".

"The fact that they were forced to make a so-called pro-farmer budget shows that the agrarian distress all over India is having its impact and the BJP will have to pay a heavy price for it," Pilot said in New Delhi.

The Congress put up a strong performance in Rajasthan where its candidates wrested the Alwar and Ajmer Lok Sabha and Mandalgarh Assembly seats from the BJP by impressive margins last week.

Also read: People of Rajasthan have rejected Vasundhara Raje's govt: Sachin Pilot

Pilot, who is largely seen as the Congress's chief ministerial face in Rajasthan, said the elections were "very crucial" as they came just seven or eight months before Assembly polls in the state.

"These by-elections are a very positive indication for the times to come, and not just in Rajasthan but in other states also. I think it will have a good bearing on the Karnataka polls that are coming up," the 40-year-old leader said, adding the myth that the BJP was an election-winning machine had been busted.

Noting that bypolls have historically been won in the state by the ruling dispensation, Pilot said the mandate that the Congress received was not just a rejection of the Vasundhara Raje government but an approval of the Congress's stand on various issues and policies.

"The myth that the BJP is an election-winning machine and cannot be defeated at the hustings at the booth level, that myth has been put to rest now," he said.

"The whole pracharak, vistarak and the booth management... take pride in saying that they are the best apparently...(It) has now been proven that we can defeat them if the Congress party workers work with zeal," Pilot said.

Also read: Rajasthan bypolls: Cong wins 3 seats, major blow to BJP before 2019 LS elections

Asked if the mandate was against the Raje government or the BJP-led government at the Centre, Pilot said, "You cannot segregate. This is a mandate against the BJP."

"Governance has failed in Rajasthan. But the larger BJP policies of the GST, 'notebandi' (demonetisation)... have had their impact," he said.

"There is a message also for the BJP that four years of jumlebaazi, of creating so many crore jobs, depositing Rs 15 lakh in each account etc will not work. That has also been very clearly indicated in the elections," Pilot said.

Asked whether the Congress would name a chief ministerial candidate before the polls in Rajasthan, Pilot said, "We as a party have traditionally not done this. The BJP takes pride in doing this but has not done it in Rajasthan."

"In our party, the elected MLAs and the leadership will decide who will form the government. The singular job at our hand is to win the state elections. Collective efforts of all leaders are towards that," he said.

Also read: Budget will uplift Dalits, farmers, tribals, says PM Modi

He also asserted that there was no factionalism in the state unit of the party and all leaders were united in their objective of defeating the BJP in Rajasthan.

The margin of victory registered by the Congress had been striking with its candidate Karan Singh Yadav trouncing his nearest BJP rival Jaswant Yadav by 1,96,496 votes in Alwar, and the main opposition party's nominee for Ajmer Raghu Sharma beating BJP's Swaroop Lamba by over 84,414 votes.

The Congress's Vivek Dhakad won the Mandalgarh Assembly seat, defeating his nearest BJP rival Shakti Singh Hada by nearly 13,000 votes.

Pilot alleged the BJP attempted to polarise the polls and divert the campaign discourse from the main issues.

"I must salute the people of Rajasthan that they did not allow this communal and venomous politics to take centre-stage... The BJP's desperate attempt at the fag end to communalise (the bypolls) came a cropper," Pilot said.

He pointed out there were eight Assembly segments in each parliamentary seat and the Congress won all the eight in Alwar and in Ajmer.

"So it shows that even the urban centres where we were not so strong conventionally, those people -- the middle class, young people -- have come strongly in the Congress's fold," Pilot said.Chidambaram termed Arvind Subramanian a 'good doctor' whose advice on the economy was not being heeded by the government.

Chidambaram also said he regarded the CEA as the doctor-in-residence to check his patients health every day and, in case the patient fell ill, to prescribe the course of treatment and the medicines. (Photo: PTI/File)

New Delhi: Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram said on Sunday the Narendra Modi-led NDA government was in denial over the economic situation and dubbed it a terrible patient which makes its own diagnosis.

The former finance minister also termed chief economic adviser Arvind Subramanian a good doctor whose advice on the economy was not being heeded by the government.

Arvind Subramanian has been a good doctor since his appointment as the CEA in October 2014. The NDA government has been a terrible patient, he tweeted.

The government continues to be in denial. It denies the objective situation in the economy. It denies farm distress. It denies joblessness. It denies the oppositions arguments. Now, it denies even the diagnosis and the prescription of the doctor it engaged in 2014, he alleged.

Chidambaram also said he regarded the CEA as the doctor-in-residence to check his patients health every day and, in case the patient fell ill, to prescribe the course of treatment and the medicines.

A bad patient will not take the medicines, and make his own diagnosis and prescription, he said.

In a series of tweets, the minister said the budget was an occasion to outline the reforms and set a schedule.

Instead, what we got was Elizabethan prose about an ambitious reform agenda under the rubric of an Enhanced Access and Service Excellence (EASE) programme, he said.

The Congress leader said the Economic Survey emphasised the four Rs (Recognition, Resolution, Recapitalisation and Reforms) and pointed out that, although the first three were done, banking reforms had still not been undertaken.

A modest rise in exports in recent months, he said, may have made the government complacent. There are no grounds for complacency because merchandise exports have barely come back to the level of a few years ago, he said.

He claimed the Economic Survey pointed out that it is striking that the Centres tax-GDP ratio is no higher than it was in the 1980s and said, after demonetisation and the GST, it would be interesting to see how good the collections have been and also the projections for 2019.China is willing to work with Sri Lanka for better development of strategic cooperative partnership between the two countries, Chinese President Xi Jinping said in a message addressed to Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena on Sunday.

Chinese President Xi Jinping [File Photo: Xinhua]

In the message to congratulate Sri Lanka on the 70th anniversary of its independence from the British colonial rule in 1948, Xi recalled the traditional friendship and mutual assistance between China and Sri Lanka, and said that the two countries have conducted pragmatic cooperation within the framework of joint construction of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, achieving fruitful results.

"I pay high attention to the development of China-Sri Lanka relations, and I am willing to make concerted efforts with President Sirisena to push the China-Sri Lanka strategic cooperative partnership of sincere mutual assistance and long-standing friendship to keep achieving greater development in the better interest of the two countries and the two peoples," Xi said.

Proposed by China in 2013, the Belt and Road Initiative aims to build trade and infrastructure networks connecting Asia with Europe and Africa based on ancient land and maritime trade routes.



Following the incident, the J&K police had even lodged an FIR against personnel of the 10 Garhwal and even named a senior officer, Major Aditya.

Top security sources claimed initial investigations had revealed that the security personnel resorted to firing only in self-defence as a large mob of stone-pelters had surrounded an Army convoy. (Representational Image)

New Delhi: No significant action is likely to be initiated against Army personnel of the Garhwal Regiment who were involved in a shooting incident last week in Shopian district of Jammu and Kashmir in which two youth were killed.

Top security sources claimed initial investigations had revealed that the security personnel resorted to firing only in self-defence as a large mob of stone-pelters had surrounded an Army convoy.

It has also been confirmed, sources added, that had the Army personnel not fired on the massive crowd who was resorting to heavy stone-pelting on the convoy in Shopians Ganowpora area, the mob would have lynched a Junior Commissioned Officer (JCO), who had been surrounded by a group of violent local residents.

What the Army personnel did was only in self-defence as they had come under heavy stone-pelting which was not expected in this particular locality. Further they had to save the life of the JCO who was unconscious after being hit by a stone and was trapped in the middle of a violent mob and would have been definitely killed so the action was only in self-defence, a senior security official involved in the probe added.

The incident had also triggered strong reaction from J&K chief minister Mehbooba Mufti who lodged a strong protest with the Centre over the shooting in which two youth were killed while another was critically injured.

Following the incident, the J&K police had even lodged an FIR against personnel of the 10 Garhwal and even named a senior officer, Major Aditya. However, security sources claimed that Maj. Aditya was not an accused in the case and his name figures in the FIR primarily on the grounds that he was leading that particular convoy which came under attack from the local residents.

Security officials also clarified that as per provisions of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which is imposed in most parts of J&K, it is mandatory for the local police to register an FIR whenever a civilian is killed in a security operation.

Army personnel are working in very difficult situation in the terror-infested Valley and are fully aware of their responsibility. It is not case of Army personnel being trigger happy but then they have to protect and secure lives of their officers also, specially like this incident when the JCO fell unconscious. The mob was planning to set the Army convoy on fire which could have resulted in a bigger tragedy, an officer added.

On its part the Army has already given a detailed written account of the incident to the local police which is also known as the ``diary. Apart from the FIR, the State Government has also ordered a magisterial probe into the Shopian incident.'But talaq is a way provided by the Quran in Islam. It's a message, and no ruler has the right to interfere with that,' Pawar said.

Pawar also hit out at the NDA government over its agricultural policies. (Photo: File)

Aurangabad: NCP chief Sharad Pawar on Saturday said no government has the right to interfere in Islamic laws related to talaq (divorce), which have their origins in the Quran.

He said that said if banning instant triple talaq was about giving protection to women, then "whatever one intends to do should be done by taking prominent people in the Muslim community and clerics in confidence".

"But talaq is a way provided by the Quran in Islam. It's a message, and no ruler has the right to interfere with that," he said at a party rally in Aurangabad.

The Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Bill, 2017 was passed by the Lok Sabha in the recently concluded winter session, but could not be passed in the Rajya Sabha with the opposition demanding that it be sent to a parliamentary panel for detailed scrutiny.

According to the draft law, instant triple talaq will attract a jail term of three years for the husband.

Pawar also hit out at the NDA government over its agricultural policies.

The growers are not getting good prices for their crops and the government isn't worried about farmer suicides, he alleged.

The government promised an increase in the minimum support price for farm produce in the budget, but it didn't spell out how it would be done, Pawar said.

When the UPA government announced a Rs 71,000-crore loan waiver scheme for farmers, money was transferred to farmers' accounts within a few days, he said.

Farmers in Maharashtra are waiting for money even months after the BJP-led state government announced a loan waiver in June 2017.

On violence in Kasganj in Uttar Pradesh, Sharad Pawar alleged that members of the Muslim community who were celebrating Republic Day were attacked by those close to the BJP.

NCP leader and Leader of Opposition in the Maharashtra Legislative Council Dhananjay Munde alleged the state government tried to create hurdles in Saturday's rally by "denying or delaying" permission.

"You may disrupt Internet services, but how would you suppress people's voice," he said.Tharoor added Hinduism and religion have been made the front and centre in the politics of the BJP.

Shashi Tharoor said, 'Many many Hindus, certainly my generation, grew up as believing and practising Hindus but never showed it outside as they didn't feel like doing so.' (Photo: File/Youtube)

Jaipur: Rahul Gandhi's visits to temples of late were not merely for "demonstration effect" but underline the fact that what was being done quietly in the past is now done openly, senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor has said.

"Many many Hindus, certainly my generation, grew up as believing and practising Hindus but never showed it outside as they didn't feel like doing so," the Lok Sabha member said during an interview at the recently-concluded Jaipur Literature Festival.

"In those days, religion was seen as an intensely personal matter you practice what you like you don't have to show the outside world. And in any case, your religion had nothing to do with political affiliation; that was the assumption," the 61-year-old leader said.

However, Tharoor said now Hinduism and religion have been made the front and centre in the politics of the BJP and those supporting that are openly saying that they are the only good Hindus and everybody else is bad.

"Why should we cede this narrative to them? To my mind, we may as well show publicly what we have been doing privately. This is not in my view merely for demonstration effect or appearances. It is merely that what used to be done quietly in the past is being done openly now," he said when asked about Gandhi's visits to temples during the Gujarat polls campaign.

Tharoor also said he feels that Gandhi was symbolising a change in the Congress.

Noting that the Congress had performed well in Gujarat due to the effectiveness of Gandhi's campaign, he said that the Congress now has an "energetic leader" who does not hesitate to use wit and humour in a relaxed style, which in the past, was not associated with the party leadership.

"So, when Gandhi issues a tweet after Donald Trump makes a pro-Pakistan statement, some ask what is this but many say 'what a refreshing style, let's listen to this guy'. So in many ways I would say, our politics is changing and Rahul Gandhi is leading and symbolising that change," he said.

Tharoor also said that the Congress stands a good chance in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.

"In fact, we are getting more and more rumours that the government may advance the elections because it thinks it would lose the elections if these are held in March-April 2019 due to the momentum the Congress is clearly beginning to get," he claimed.

He also termed the controversy of the film 'Padmaavat' as very unfortunate.

"The classical principle of freedom of expression is fundamental to any democracy. If you don't like what I have written in my book, don't read my book. If you don't like a film, don't watch it," Tharoor said.

"At the worst, you can even encourage others to boycott it. But you have no right to threaten violence, least of all to conduct violence," the MP from Thiruvananthapuram said.MEA spokesperson informed that the Indian authorities based in Nigeria have sought the countrys help in locating the missing oil tanker.

'Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860,' Kumar informed in another tweet. (Photo: Twitter | ANI)

New Delhi: The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Sunday informed that an oil tanker with 22 Indian nationals onboard is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar in a tweet said, A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo-Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

He informed that the Indian authorities based in Nigeria have sought the countrys help in locating the missing oil tanker.

Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860, he informed in another tweet.

The owners of the tanker, which was loaded with gas oil, have urged the Directorate General of Shipping in Mumbai to get in touch with their counterparts in Nigeria and Benin to carry out search operations for the merchant ship.

According to reports, the ship vanished from West Africa and a possibility of hijack is high. Meanwhile, Nigerian authorities have alerted all boats to look out for the missing tanker ship and if sighted to report to the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) Anti-Piracy Reporting Centre immediately in London.Pak Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing to which India retaliated strongly and effectively, a defence official said.

The injured civilians were identified as Shahnaz Bano (15) and Yasin Arif (14), residents of Islamabad village. (Photo: PTI)

Jammu: A jawan and two teenagers were injured as Pakistani troops violated ceasefire by targeting forward posts and villages along the Line of Control (LoC) in Poonch and Rajouri districts on Sunday, officials said.

The three were injured in the Shahpur sector of Poonch district in shelling from across the border which started this morning and was continuing intermittently, a police official said.

The injured civilians were identified as Shahnaz Bano (15) and Yasin Arif (14), residents of Islamabad village, the official said. Both of them were hospitalised.

A defence spokesman said Pakistan Army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing from small arms, automatics, and mortars around 1110 hours.

The Indian Army retaliated strongly and effectively, he said.

In another ceasefire violation in nearby Rajouri district, six mortars fired by Pakistani forces exploded near Neaka Panjgrain and Tarkundi villages in Manjakote sector around 1540 hours, a police official said.

The Indian forces responded, triggering an exchange of fire between the two sides which was continuing when last reports were received, he said.

Fourteen persons, including eight civilians, were killed and over 70 injured in intense shelling by Pakistan along the IB in Jammu, Kathua and Samba districts and LoC in Poonch and Rajouri districts in January 2017.Gen. Goldfein, who arrived in the Rajasthan city on Friday, was accompanied by IAF Air Vice-Marshal A.P. Singh as co-pilot during the sortie.

General David L. Goldfein, Chief of Staff of the US Air Force, is on an official visit to India. He flew a sortie in #MadeinIndia LCA Tejas aircraft at AF Stn Jodhpur today, the IAF said on Twitter. (Photo: PTI)

New Delhi: In a symbolic gesture of the increasingly closer cooperation between the Indian and US militaries, the visiting Chief of Staff of the US Air Force, General David L. Goldfein, on Saturday flew Indias indigenous light combat aircraft at the Air Force station in Jodhpur.

General David L. Goldfein, Chief of Staff of the US Air Force, is on an official visit to India. He flew a sortie in #MadeinIndia LCA Tejas aircraft at AF Stn Jodhpur today, the IAF said on Twitter.

Gen. Goldfein, who arrived in the Rajasthan city on Friday, was accompanied by IAF Air Vice-Marshal A.P. Singh as co-pilot during the sortie.

Inducted into the Flying Daggers 45 Squadron on July 1, 2016, the Tejas is a supersonic, light-weight, all-weather, multi-role fighter designed for air-to-air, air-to-ground and air-to-sea combat roles. It plugs a vital gap in IAFs might that is suffering from a critical shortage of fighter squadrons.

Conceptualised in 1970s to replace the aging MiG-21 fleet, the LCA is designed and developed by the Aeronautical Development Agency and Hindustan Aeronautics Limited.

The Tejas uses a GE F404-IN 20 engine. CFC materials make up for up to 45% of its airframe by weight, including in the fuselage (doors and skins), wings, tailfin, rudder, airbrakes, and landing gears.

Presently, about 70 per cent of the LCA components are manufactured in India. The LCA is made of carbon fibre composites (CFC) (45 per cent), aluminium-lithium alloys (43 per cent), titanium alloys 5 per cent, steels 4.5 per cent and others 2.5 per cent.Modi woos poll-bound Ktaka, says 10% commission govt at exit gate.

Bengaluru: Sounding the clarion call for the BJP ahead of the Karnataka Assembly elections due in May this year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday launched a full-fledged attack on the Siddaramaiah government, saying it was neck-deep in corruption and dubbed it a 10 per cent commission government.

The countdown for the downfall of the Congress government has begun, the PM said, addressing over one lakh BJP workers at the concluding function of the partys 85-day statewide Parivar-thana Yatra at the Palace Grounds here, and added that the Siddaramaiah government was at the exit gate.

Without paying 10 per cent commission, no work can taken place in the Congress government, Mr Modi remarked. Starting and ending his speech in Kannada, the PM recalled some great personalities of Karnataka, starting from Nada Prabhu Kempegowda, and said: The BJP will definitely ensure Congress-mukt Karnataka, we dont want the Congress culture to exist in the nation. Once our government comes to power, the implementation of development projects will happen faster in coordination with the Centre.

Listing the release of Central funds to Karnataka over the past four years, he said the state government had not implemented the projects effectively and made the people suffer. After the BJP-led NDA came to power in 2014, in Karnataka, more than 1.16 crore Jan Dhan account had been opened, and the Mudra Bank has financed loans to one crore people and given gas connections to 1.85 lakh households, he noted. The previous Congress-led UPA government gave Rs 73,000 crores to Karnataka when it was in power, however after we assumed power, we have released over Rs 2 lakh crore as the state share to Karnataka, he said, and blamed the Congress government for failing to implement the Fasal Bhima Yojana, Swachchh Bharat Abhiyan and other Centrally-sponsored schemes in Karnataka.

We have provided drinking water connections to four crore people in the country, in Karnataka seven lakh people have got the connections. In Karnataka, projects worth `83,000 crores have been taken up including infrastructures projects. As many as 33 railway projects have been taken up in the state. When the UPA was in power, they constructed 950 km of national highways in the state, after we came to power, we completed 1,600 km, Mr Modi explained.

Referring to farmers distress in Karnataka, the PM blamed the Congress government for not taking any steps to provide a better life to farmers. In the Union Budget, we have announced an enhanced minimum support price to the farming sector, 1.5 times more than the cost of production of the produce. If B.S. Yeddyurappa becomes CM, he will provide Rs 1 lakh crores for irrigation projects and the Centre will provide a helping hand to him to implement the projects. He will also effectively implement Centrally-sponsored schemes for the farming sector, including the increased MSP for farmers, Mr Modi said.

Dwelling on initiatives for small and medium scale enterprises in the Budget, he said the Centre has reduced corporate tax for the sector from 30 per cent to 25 per cent and added that this would help create more than three crore new jobs.Modiji is the first ever Indian PM whose words dont mean anything #CantFindThe Accord. Nagaland goes to the polls on February 27.

New Delhi: Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Sunday lashed out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the Naga peace accord signed by the latter in 2015, saying the agreement was yet nowhere to be seen. Taking to Twitter, the Congress chief said: August 2015, Mr Modi claims to create history by signing the NAGA accord. Feb 2018, Naga Accord is still nowhere to be found. Modiji is the first ever Indian PM whose words dont mean anything #CantFindThe Accord. Nagaland goes to the polls on February 27.

Two other states in the Northeast  Meghalaya and Tripura  will also go to the polls this month.

The Naga peace accord was signed in August 2015 by Prime Minister Modi and the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah) to end the insurgency in the state. The Congress Party had then too sought details on the contours of the agreement.

The Congress has already kickstarted its campaign in the Northeast. The party president was in Shillong on a two-day visit, where he met Congress workers and state leaders. The party is going all out to retain power in Meghalaya. Mr Gandhi also attended a musical night in Shillong where bands from the state were playing.

While uncertainty continues over the issue of Opposition unity to take on the BJP in next years Lok Sabha polls, the Congress is positioning itself as the main alternative. Congress spokes-man Randeep Surjewala said that Rahul Gandhi is the only alternative to Prime Minister Narendra Modi while he was speaking to reporters on Sunday, and emphasised that unity of the Opposition would bring forth a wave of change in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Mr Surjewala said there were two models before the country today  one represented by Mr Modi, and the other by the Congress president.

Talking about the Assembly elections to be held in eight states this year, the Congress spokesman said the partys victory in the recent byelections in Rajasthan was just a trailer. He added: We are confident of coming back to power in Karnataka, one of the most developed states, and to win by huge margins in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and other poll-bound states.

UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi had recently convened a meeting of all its constituents, which was to ensure that the alliance remains intact at the national level, he added. As far as states are concerned, the constituents of the UPA have contested elections against each other... In the days to come, the contours of the poll alliance will be discussed. With the spectre of an early Lok Sabha poll looming large, the UPA wants to be battle-ready for any eventuality.The Saudi King is the patron of the festival and New Delhi on Sunday thanked the Saudi King for the invitation.

New Delhi: India is stepping up its diplomacy with the Arab world where a large number of Indians stay and work. While it is already known that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Palestine, the United Arab Emirates and Oman from February 9 to 12, it was announced on Sunday that external affairs minister (EAM) Sushma Swaraj will visit Saudi Arabia from February 6 to 8. Ms Swarajs visit will be to inaugurate the Janadriyah Festival of Saudi Arabia, the ministry of external affairs (MEA) said. India has been invited as the Guest of Honour country at the festival. The Janadriyah Festival is the most prestigious and popular National Heritage and Culture Festival of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which is organised annually, since 1985. The Saudi King is the patron of the festival and New Delhi on Sunday thanked the Saudi King for the invitation.

MEA ppokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted, EAM @SushmaSwaraj will visit Saudi Arabia from 6-8 February to inaugurate the Janadriyah Festival of Saudi Arabia on 7 February. Interestingly, India will also be showcasing both Yoga and Bollywood as part of the cultural component during the festival.

At a Joint Press Conference in Saudi Arabia with the Saudi Minister of National Guard, minister of state for external affairs Gen. V.K. Singh (Retd) said, It is a matter of great honour for India to be invited as Guest of Honour country for the prestigious National Festival. The Festival is the most prestigious and popular National Heritage and Culture Festival of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which is being organised annually, since 1985. The Custodian of Two Holy Mosques himself patronises the festival. I wish to thank The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques on behalf of my leadership for bestowing this honour on India. ... External Affairs Minister of India Sushma Swaraj will be leading the Indian delegation for inauguration of this historical event on February 7. ... The festival is organised by the Ministry of National Guard (SANG) and Minister of National Guard presides over the Supreme Committee of the Festival.

Gen. Singh added, We greatly value our close and deep rooted civilisational and strategic relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This relationship got further impetus and new direction after the historical visit of Honble Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the Kingdom in 2016. The Kingdom is also home to more than 3 million-strong Indian community. I have no doubt that Indias participation in this festival will take our relationship to new heights. Indias participation in the festival will be multifaceted. We will have an Indian Pavilion where we will project a number of Indian themes and projects. The India Pavilion will comprise glimpses of Traditional and Modern India. There will be displays and presentations by ministries/departments such as Indian Ordnance Factories Board, ISRO, Ministry of AYUSH, Handicrafts Promotion Council, Ministry of Food Processing Industries, Skill development, Digital India, Make in India.

The MoS further said, On the traditional side, India Pavilion will have presentations representing our socio-cultural heritage, folklore, traditional costumes and Indian perfumes.Police said that Ravindra Bali, a former captain in army, was living as a recluse in a makeshift tent on a footpath in the Pune Camp Area.

Police said a case of murder had been registered against unidentified persons and investigations were underway to identify and arrest them. (Photo: Representational Image)

Pune: The body of a former captain in the army was found in the Pune Cantonment area late Thursday night with police stating that he had been bludgeoned to death by two unidentified people.

Police said that Ravindra Bali (67), a former captain in the army, was living as a recluse in a makeshift tent on a footpath in the Pune Camp Area.

"The watchman of a bungalow, who saw two people assaulting Bali and fleeing from the scene, alerted the police," said an officer with Lashkar police station.

"Bali was not in touch with his family for several years and was leading a reclusive life. During investigations, we managed to get details of his family and this in turn helped us identify Bali," the official said.

He added that a case of murder had been registered against unidentified persons and investigations were underway to identify and arrest them.The BJP claimed that the jacket was a Burberry original, which cost about Rs 63,000.

Even as the country prepared for budget day, two of Indias biggest political parties  BJP and Congress  were busy exchanging diatribes over Rahul Gandhis jacket. The BJP claimed that the jacket was a Burberry original, which cost about Rs 63,000. What made the jibe interesting is that Rahul had mocked Prime Minister Narendra Modis specially designed suit, that had his named marked on it. He had called the government suit boot ki sarkaar back then.

However, the question is: why is what a politician wears an issue for rival parties? Is the idea that politicians should dress simply ingrained in the Indian ethos? We talk to social thinkers.

its an easy way of reinforcing a stereotype

People remember stories, not facts. What politicians wear is hardly of consequence till someone chooses to assign meaning to it. Its an easy way of reinforcing a stereotype and de-positioning a competitor to expose a gap in their words and actions. For me, it is ok and important for politicians to have a particular style that defines them  Indira Gandhis hair, Sonia Gandhis sarees, Kejriwals muffler are all symbols of their individual brand identity.

let them enjoy their youth and wear what they want

It is not their clothes but deeds that should matter. The white khadi shirt and dhoti has become more of a uniform now for politicians. They always carry extra pairs with them because khadi crumbles and gets dirty fast.

And, this dress code, in a way, alienates them from the common man. Also, what is the point if the purity of white clothes is not visible in their actions? Another thing is that when a politician comes down to the level of a common man  which also includes dressing up like them  would he be able to relate to their thoughts and empathise with them?

I see many young politicians in parties and moviehouses wearing jeans and T-shirts or coloured shirts, but when they appear in a public function they are back to white. Let them enjoy their youth and wear what they want. We accept them for what they are and not by what they wear.

people are making a note of everything;

Every person has a personal choice. But there is a difference between trolling Rahul Gandhi and Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the choice of clothes they wore. The PM has been elected by the people of India and it is the right of the people of India, as well as leaders of Opposition to ask about the expenditure on his clothes. Rahul Gandhi's clothes could have even been gifted, who knows? This was nothing but a mere cheap tactic by the BJP to distract the people from the flaws in the budget. But the people are not fools, they are making a note of everything

worlds politicians are impeccably dressed

I am not surprised at this bickering. In India, parties tend to pick the pettiest of the issues just to put their rivals down. I think if someone wants to dress well, they shouldnt be attacked for it. Politicians around the world are impeccably dressed and when it comes to the cost, Rahul Gandhi has no other expenses  like he doesnt have a family to support, so why not? Unfortunately, these kinds of fights do attract the peoples eyeballs and they do affect them. But whether such jibes at rival parties will actually sway a persons loyalty towards a party, I cannot say.

a public figure has to apparently conform to a certain stereotype to be accepted

I think the reason is that under it all, we are still unconsciously a social society. For years, socialism was the ethos everyone followed. So, if you dressed well, it was seen as conspicuous consumption. In fact, we almost advocated conspicuous poverty. Today, when youre aspirational, theres a clash between aspiration and socialism, which we dont even recognise. Everyone would like to wear a good dress, but youre not supposed to be too conspicuous about it. I call it a continuation of hypocrisy by other means.

At one level its too insignificant to mention. Whether its suit boot ki sarkar or a Burberry jacket or Narendra Modis suit, I think these are all peripherals. And to a certain extent, theyre trying to curb each others freedom, because a public figure has to conform to a certain stereotype to be accepted. Another political stereotype is that youre not supposed to benefit from office. So, if youre wearing good clothes, it means you are corrupt.Planned murder in winter to slow decomposition.

New Delhi: A 26-year-old physiotherapist turned into a murderer after he smothered his wife to death and bundled the body inside the bed box after wrapping it in a quilt. Aware of the nitty-gritty of a bodys composition and decomposition, the accused executed the murder in winter so that it could give him time to be at large.

A team of Delhi police arrested the accused, Suresh Singh (26), the son of a retired subedar major from Assam Rifles and a native of Dehradun. The police said that Suresh had completed a four-and-a-half-year deg-ree course in physiotherapy (BSc. Physiotherapy) from Sai Institute in Dehradun and completed his internship from Escorts Hospital in Delhi. He was practicing as a freelancer.

Probe revealed that Suresh murdered his wife, Maria Massey alias Savitri Mehra, owing to her constant pressure to meet his family. Suresh had met Maria, also from Uttarakhand, on Facebook.

Soon, they became friends and Suresh offered Maria help in finding a job in Dehradhun. Separated from her husband Usman, Maria and Suresh began living together from 2013.

In 2015, Suresh married Maria secretly in a temple after constant pressurisation on her part. However, Maria was unaware of the fact that Suresh was already married to one Lata in his native place. Soon, Sureshs game was exposed after both the wives learnt about each other and began pressurising Suresh to choose one of them.

The police said that being a physiotherapist by profession, Suresh knew the intricacies of a human body and the time it would take to decompose. He hatched a plan to eliminate Maria and waited till winter. Months before the murder, he brought Maria to Delhi and was living in a rented flat in Southeast Delhis Tughlakabad. On January 11, Suresh smothered Maria to death, wrapped her body in a quilt and bundled it in a bed box. He then locked the house from the outside and escaped. Nearly 17 days later, the murder came to light when Marias ex-husband, Usman, received a call on January 28 from Marias brother asking about her. According to police, Usman knew about Suresh and his two marriages. He went to check on Maria and found the house locked. When Usman called up Suresh, he didnt respond to his call and dropped a text message saying that he was in Bengaluru along with Maria.

Usman grew suspicious and on January 29 broke open their door, with the help of the landlord, only to find the decomposed body. The police was informed, who then registered a case. After a game of hide and seek, a team arrested Suresh near his village, from where he was trying to flee to Nepal.Everyone is looking up to India with expectation because they think that Indians have the DNA to protect the environment.

New Delhi: On Saturday, Union minister Harsh Vardhan asked the teaching community of Delhi to join a campaign to sensitise everyone about the climatic changes and global warming, which he termed was a matter of concern for the world.

The whole world is concerned about the dangers of global warming and climate change. Everyone is looking up to India with expectation because they think that Indians have the DNA to protect the environment. Our ancestors had made protection of environment an integral part of their lifestyle, the minister said. He also said that the department of science and technology would launch a mission on cyber-physical systems (CPS) to support the setting up of centres of excellence in the areas of robotics, artificial intelligence, digital manufacturing, big data analysis, quantum communication, and the internet. Referring to the crucial role played by Polio Sainiks from the municipal corporation-run schools in the Pulse Polio campaign, the Union environment minister underlined the need for Green Sainiks to broaden the Green Good Deeds campaign and take it to the grassroots level.

Addressing around 700 principals of all government schools from the North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC), he said: The whole world is concerned about the dangers of global warming and climate change. People in Delhi are already facing air pollution. Environment and its effects on the life of human beings are now on the agenda at every global forum. Mr Vardhan reminded the teachers of their green social responsibility, which is similar to their corporate social responsibility. Asserting that it was not impossible to restore the environment to its clean and green state, the minister said, It is not merely a technical issue, but a moral responsibility to restore and give back a clean and green environment to the next generation.

A mobile application named Dr Harsh Vardhan, developed to reach out to people across India, has also been launched recently for the campaign.The Supreme Court on September 23, 2016 had imposed ban on sale of chewable tobacco products in twin packets.

Former Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Dinesh Trivedi also stressed the need for immediate measure to arrest deaths in cancer. (Photo: File)

Kolkata: Oncologists are unanimous that 90 per cent of oral cancers could be prevented if the government implements the Supreme Court's order banning chewable tobacco products.

The Supreme Court on September 23, 2016 had imposed ban on sale of chewable tobacco products in twin packets such as gutka, tobacco, pan masala, khaini etc.

"When we are aware what causes 90 per cent of oral cancers and the law is there to ban these chewable tobacco products in twin packs, then what is stopping the enforcement?" Head and Neck Surgery Oncologist, Dr Sourav Dutta said on the World Cancer Day on Sunday.

Dutta, also the state patron of the Voice of Tobacco Victims, said it is alarming that about 10 lakh deaths are reported every year due to tobacco, and the government must strictly enforce the ban.

"As per the Global Adult Tobacco Survey 2017, there are 26.7 crore users of tobacco in India and 5,500 children initiate tobacco use everyday. One-third of these tobacco users will die prematurely," Sambandh Health Foundation Trustee and Head of Tobacco Control Sanjay Seth said.

"Lakhs of Indian families are devastated with cancer deaths, which are preventable. Tobacco is the single most preventable cause of death," he added.

Former Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Dinesh Trivedi also stressed the need for immediate measure to arrest deaths in cancer.

"Prevention is better than cure. The governments should think over it seriously as it accounts for more deaths worldwide than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined," said the Trinamool Congress MP.

"As Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, I had suggested the then government to reduce tobacco cultivation and compensate the farmers for the losses in other ways, but nothing has been done as yet," he said.

Interacting with students in Delhi University recently, Trivedi had said, "Confidence comes from the way you carry yourself and not from the brand of cigarette you smoke.... I request you to choose a healthy lifestyle instead of a cancerous hobby."It focuses on safeguarding the Central Indian Landscape, home to over 600 tigers, which accounts for 30 per cent of Indias tigers.

Mumbai:While a lot has been talked about tiger conservation in India, there has not been much emphasis on strengthening forest staff and including communities in the wildlife area in the process.

Adopting a new approach towards tiger conservation, the Tiger Matters programme initiated by the Wildlife Conservation Trust (WCT), in collaboration with the US Agency for International Development (USAID), has 190 anti-poaching campaigns and 88 Special Tiger Protection Forces (STPF) in Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh.

It focuses on safeguarding the Central Indian Landscape, home to over 600 tigers, which accounts for 30 per cent of Indias tigers. Along with training forest personnel, the initiative highlights the need to include community livelihood as a major step towards tiger conservation. Through the Tiger Matters Programme, over 4,500 forest guards were trained in wildlife law enforcement and crime prevention techniques. With the rise in poorly planned development projects and increasing human-wildlife conflict, conservation efforts today need to lay equal emphasis on empowering local communities as well as protecting forests, said Anish Andheria, President, WCT.

While empowering communities plays a major role in landscape conservation, it is not limited to employment but also a better understanding of the environment. The initiative reached out to more than 29,000 children in over 400 schools through its education intervention. Around 3,300 youth from more than 90 buffer zone villages of protected areas were provided with vocational skills.

The project aims at creating a wider database of tiger population and movement. We are trying to achieve it by camera trappings, genetic studies and GIS mapping of the landscape, added Mr. Andheria.

The project is currently conducting Indias largest camera trapping exercise outside of tiger reserves in order to monitor tiger and leopard populations. Around 9,000 square kilometres of area through camera trapping was sampled to monitor tiger movement.Police have arrested Chintan as well as other three accused in the case.

Mumbai: The Bombay high court has directed the Mumbai Crime Branch to provide copies of witness statements to artist Chintan Upadhyay, who was arrested in the case related to the 2016 murder of his estranged wife and her lawyer. The court, while hearing the Upadhyays application, observed that an accused was entitled to the copies of statements of witnesses that were being relied upon by the prosecution.

Upadhyays wife Hema, an installation artist, and her lawyer Haresh Bhambani were killed on December 11, 2016 and their bodies were disposed of in cardboard boxes, which were found in a drain in suburban Kandivali. Police have arrested Chintan as well as other three accused in the case. Upadhyay approached HC after Dindoshi sessions court had rejected his bail last year. A single bench of Justice Sadhana Jadha on last week was hearing bail application of Chintan Upadhyay. He had claimed that he was not given copies of statements, which, according to him, are vital in proving his innocence in the case.

The accused person would be entitled under law to have copies of statements of all witnesses which are being relied upon by the prosecution. The prosecution cannot withhold the same, Justice Jadhav said.

The HC has kept the bail plea for hearing on February 24 and directed the prosecuting agency to provide copies of statements to the accused. The high court also permitted the intervening application filed by Bhambhanis family members opposing Upadhyays bail application.Terror suspect was dissuaded by Riyaz Bhatkal.

Mumbai: Mumbai-bred terror suspect Abdul Subhan Qureshi had allegedly approached the Indian Mujahideen (IM)s absconding chief Riyaz Bhatkal for help, including weapons, to organise targeted attacks on members of a political party in Gujarat after the arrest of 13 senior Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) leaders in March 2008. A then Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA and a party office-bearer were on the terror hit list, according to counter-terror sources associated with the probe against Qureshi, who was arrested in Delhi recently. However, Bhatkal allegedly convinced him instead to help in terms of manpower for his conspiracy to conduct blasts, on the ground that target attacks were small work.

Qureshi is being questioned for his alleged role in terror activities, including the July 2008 Gujarat blasts conspiracy. After the arrest of the SIMI leaders, including the then chief Safdar Nagori in Indore, Qureshi, alias Touqeer, took over the mantle of the banned outfit and allegedly began re-organising, exhorting trusted operatives for action as a retaliation against the arrests and the loss of Muslim lives in the Gujarat riots of 2002, said a source. He allegedly arrived in Ahmedabad in April and met SIMI members, including Qayamuddin Kapadia and Younus Mansuri.

The SIMI group subsequently rented a flat at Vatva at the rate of `900 per month, for which a deposit of `5,000 was given. During a meeting of the SIMI members, it was decided that one way of retaliation could be by targeting a then BJP MLA and a party office-bearer. Since they needed a weapon, Touqeer left for Karnataka saying that he will procure the weapons and come back, said the source.

When Qureshi returned early in July, he had carried back a mobile phone that Bhatkal had given him. Qureshi told the SIMI members that he had met Bhatkal, who said that target killing is a small work and that we will do some big work, he said.

Bhatkal had Qureshis help to keep his team ready in Ahmedabad, for the big work, which turned out to be the blasts in Ahmedabad, said the source. The phone was to be used for receiving calls from Bhatkal. Bhatkal later reached Ahmedabad and met some of Qureshis SIMI colleagues, separately, to seek their help in the terror conspiracy. Bhatkal had initially stayed at the Vatva flat, before asking for its vacation then moving to a rented flat at Narol, where the blasts preparations were allegedly done, according to the source.Leadership believes if Naidu leaves NDA, they may have to follow his footsteps.

Shiv Sena has declared that it will contest next Lok Sabha and Assembly elections on its own.

Mumbai: The Shiv Senas leadership is keenly watching the political developments in Andhra Pradesh politics. Andhra Pradesh chief minister and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief Chandrababu Naidu had threatened to leave the National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

Mr Naidu met the party leaders in his home state to discuss whether to continue being in alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Though the decision on leaving the alliance was not taken by the TDP, Sena leadership feels

that if Mr Naidu decides to leave the NDA, they will be under pressure to follow in his footsteps.

Senior leaders of Telugu Desam Party (TDP) met in Amaravati, Andhra on Sunday to decide on alliance with the BJP.

Mr Naidu held meeting with senior leaders on the issue. Later speaking to media in Amaravati, union minister YS Chowdhary said, Our party will not break up with BJP now. But we have decided to push our demand for special funds to Andhra for its capital. We will pressurise union government for it.

Meanwhile, Sena leadership is constantly in touch with key persons involved in this development, said Sena sources. Shiv Sena has already declared its decision to contest next Lok Sabha and Assembly elections on its own.

But Sena leadership is reluctant to leave the government early.

According to sources, Sena leadership feels that if TDP pulled out of the government in next few days, then it will create moral pressure on the party to walk out from power.

There was a buzz on Sunday morning that Mr Naidu called Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and requested him to walk out of the union government and the NDA.

But the TDP has denied that any such conversation took place between two leaders. Similarly, Sena too has denied that any talks were held between leaders.Vishwakarma's campaign has come into spotlight at a time when there is a buzz around the Bollywood movie 'Padman'.

Bhopal: At a time when the entire country is talking about the upcoming film "Padman", a woman scientist in Madhya Pradesh, who returned from the US, has been silently working on her mission to educate tribal women about menstrual health and offering them cheap sanitary pads.

Maya Vishwakarma started her mission two years ago, prompted by her own experience of unsafe menstrual hygiene during her early years.

"I did not use sanitary pads till the age of 26. I even did not know about it. At that time, neither did I have money, nor information," Vishwakarma told PTI.

The 36-year-old biologist has returned to her village Mehragaon in Narsinghpur district from the US, where she went for higher studies, and is devoting her energy in spreading awareness about menstrual hygiene among tribal women.

Her early life's experience led her back to her native place, where she is working for menstrual hygiene and cost- effective manufacturing of quality sanitary pads under the banner of her organisation - Sukarma Foundation.

"I was told to use cloth by a woman relative during my first period. This had caused several infections. Talking about menstrual health is still a taboo in our society. My experiences in early life inspired me to work in this field."

Vishwakarma's campaign has come into spotlight at a time when there is a buzz around the Bollywood movie "Padman", which will hit theatres on February 9.

The Akshay Kumar-starrer social drama is a fictionalised account of Tamil Nadu-based social entrepreneur Arunachalam Muruganantham, who invented a low-cost sanitary pad-making machine. His machine manufactured affordable sanitary towels for women in villages.

"My work has nothing to do with the movie. I have been working on menstrual health since the past two years. I had met Muruganantham in connection with my work in 2016. He was known to me from my California days," Vishwakarma said.

"I have seen Muruganantham's machine but it was different from our equipment. Our machines are semi-automatic. Now, more and more women are coming forward to join us."

She said films like "Padman" would create awareness about menstrual cycle and related problems but this alone is not sufficient and more work on the ground is needed.

"Real groundwork is needed. I work in areas, which lack basic amenities like power. We need Padwoman and Padman who can work on the ground. Only movies can't bring change."

She urged Kumar to share the profit of his movie on providing cost-effective pads to women in the tribal areas and villages.

"As compared to branded products, the pads made by us are much cheaper. We procure raw materials at cheaper rates while labour is also cost-effective. So, our cost of a pack of seven pads would be around Rs 15-20 while the price of branded products is much higher."

Vishwakarma, daughter of a poor `lohar' (blacksmith), said she studied in the village school and then moved to a nearby town for further schooling before shifting to Jabalpur for pursuing MSc in biochemistry.

Later, she got an opportunity to do research at the AIIMS, New Delhi and moved to the US for a PhD in chemical and biological engineering which she could not complete.

Vishwakarma said during the past two years she has been spending about 6-8 months every year in India and the rest in California.

"After two years of research, production of sanitary pads started in October last after machines were arranged through my own resources and crowd funding. We are now working on packaging," she said.

"Women and girls even don't dry their inner clothes in the open. They do not talk about their problems. They consider menstruation a curse. So, education on this issue is needed. I visit tribal villages of Narsinghpur and adjoining districts and educate women about menstruation."

The factory set up by her is producing 2,000 sanitary pads per day. "We are struggling with initial problems but would soon increase the production," she said.Two military-court constitutional amendments in two-and-a-quarter years settled that debate.

Its Pakistans version of the gang that couldnt shoot straight. Part circular firing squad, part regular firing squad, and part wedding video of aerial firing that sends guests and gunmen alike scrambling. Welcome to 2018.

Possibly, arguably, already worse than 2017. Because with the latest act to join the national circus, we have a full programme. Part tragedy, mostly comedy, its wholly unpredictable. At least when it comes to guessing what may come next.

Politeness  and fear of the gavel  will cause most to either look away or pretend to examine the weeds and draw out nuance and theory. Its apparent there is none.

Because this is a war the judiciary cant win. The populist, people-oriented aspect we can set aside. If the court wants to probe the lurid and the tawdry to protect us all, go right ahead. If it wants to throw crumbs at the poor and the desperate, why the hell not. Its not like we were on the verge of great reform.

Two military-court constitutional amendments in two-and-a-quarter years settled that debate. There has not and wont be anything that cuts closer to the heart of judicial power. Because the first and last rule of institutional relevance is to protect institutional turf.

Its what caused the power of anti-terrorism courts to be watered down all those years ago and what has left the FSC in limbo.

Even, funnily enough, in times of dictatorship. Because the court has positioned itself as the only institution that can deliver legitimacy in the first instance. Ever wonder why a newly-installed dictator has not tried a different path?

Say, by holding a rigged referendum in the first 90 days of taking over or throwing together a council of elders to bestow legitimacy?

The dictator cant because the court has positioned itself as the only place where legitimacy can be sought and granted. Its why military rule is synonymous with PCO.

Judicial reform, or the distant dream of judicial reform, died when the court validated the military-court constitutional amendments because it reinforced the status quo. What the boys want, the boys get  as long as theyre polite enough to allow the court to give its imprimatur.

So let the court have its say and fun in a broken system where theres largesse to be bestowed and public approval to be won. We werent exactly on the verge of great judicial reform anyway.

The problem is in the political realm. Theres already a bit of queue and you can bet that therell be others lining up soon enough. Because what greater honour than to have a chance to please the boss and show your loyalty by lining up to be locked up for contempt.

One down, two to go. And then another and another. It is, after all, an election year.

If youre Nawaz, you may even encourage it. The more it looks like the court has a problem with him, the less legitimate his judicial woes will seem. And thats an edge he needs in a season of electoral gridlock and uncertainty.

Short of a direct takeover, the only other realistic possibility of keeping Nawaz shut out of the system was a solidly reasoned, good-precedent-setting judgment. That didnt happen  not because Nawaz says it didnt happen, but because everyone can see it didnt happen.

But fate and the sequence of judicial elevation may have created the tiniest of openings for a third possibility. Of the five who disqualified Nawaz, number one and number two in seniority are slotted to become the next CJP, and after a gap of one, the CJP after.

All of that, though, would only kick in after an election and after Parliament has had a few months to settle in and bargain over the constitutional fate of Nawaz.

A smoother, less controversial path to nailing the door shut on Nawazs return to electoral politics would be for someone other than the original five to reach the same conclusion  and to do it in a more measured tone. Instead, by jumping the gun and firing off in all directions, the timeline for judicial controversy has been brought forward. The steady hand has given way to mercurialness. And mercurial justice is the best friend of the politician in trouble seeking electoral redemption.

From here, every little bit will add to the story of political victimhood. If the judge vows that the door has been slammed shut on dictatorship, it only serves to remind everyone of the possibility of dictatorship.

If the judge avers that justice will be done in every instance, it only serves to remind everyone that maybe justice hasnt been done in a certain instance.

If the judge starts locking up people for contempt, it may grow the queue  or, dangerously, encourage Nawaz to jump to the front of the queue. A bad idea doesnt turn good by doing more of it. This is a war the judiciary cant win.

By arrangement with DawnIn recent weeks, some important events outline just how the Deep States strategy has been panning.

Recent incidents of stone-throwing and intimidation of the Army in Kashmir should not have surprised keen observers who are aware of the dynamics of this and other proxy conflicts. Pakistan wont allow the stabilisation process in Kashmir to persist because turbulence there reflects the success of its core strategy. This situation has been seen in the past with varying dynamics, in 1999, 2006-07, 2011-12 and somewhat in 2015 too. However, each time Pakistans Deep State and the separatists were able to turn the tables with triggers which helped to recreate turbulence.

This really means Indias strategy has been effective in countering the military domain of proxy war, but failed to take that success to eventual peace. In conflict theory terms, this means that conflict stabilisation has been largely successful but conflict termination has fallen prey to the machinations of the Deep State and the separatists.

In recent weeks, some important events outline just how the Deep States strategy has been panning. Being aware that domination by the security forces is something India always seeks and focuses upon before any other efforts, the Deep State has focused on the social and psychological factors to enhance alienation, with women and youth the key entities. The use of mosques to run the alienation agenda is rampant with vigilantism on the rise immediately after Burhan Wanis death in 2016. With religion, and particularly Islamic radicalism, becoming a worldwide phenomenon, especially since the advent of Islamic State (Daesh), the Islamic factor has been frequently used to show Kashmiri Muslims how they need to be outside the ambit of Indias pluralist tradition and support their faith. The frequent use of clarion calls from mosques and social media messaging to impress flash mobs to encounter sites has been a huge facilitator towards alienation. These actions ensure that after or during each such encounter, one or

two young Kashmiris die in attempting to intimidate the forces. That is sufficient fodder with a follow-up by the media and shrill demands by rabble-rousers, that helps create further alienation. With the security forces having effectively synced their operations and created better standard operating procedures the feasibility of success of vigilantes and overground workers is slowly on the wane.

The attempt to directly target the 11-vehicle convoy of 10 Garhwal Rifles near Shopian, in south Kashmir, on January 27 was a change in tactics, to give confrontation a different colour. The strategy is obviously being drafted across the LoC by observers who are keeping a keen eye on developments in the Valley. They are fully aware that an effective transition by J&K state, and therefore India, from conflict stabilisation to conflict termination will spell the death knell of the entire Deep State strategy. With dwindling strength of terrorists and arms, ammunition and other wherewithal, the ability to conduct terrorist operations has been marginalised. With low snow levels, a surge in infiltration can be expected to regain flexibility in operations. Pending that, time is slipping away. Ways and means to draw the forces, particularly the Army, into negative situations where civilian deaths can substantially increase, is the crying need for trans-LoC planners. That will also raise demands to reduce the Armys presence so that its domination is compromised. Calls for abrogation of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act will get more weight from the political Opposition, and lead to embarrassment for the state government. The issue of the FIR against the Army, with much disinformation about charges against the officer of 10 Garhwal Rifles, is a typical aspect of information warfare, with doubts sowed and passions raised across India, leading to greater alienation. In such circumstances, a single spokesman and a single statement outlining the governments position would have effectively quelled all rumours. Its a lesson repeatedly learnt by the establishment, but never implemented. It only substantiates the need for a Unified Command approach, in which a spokesman speaks jointly on behalf of the state government, the Centre and the Army. The scope for controversy will lessen, but all will need to seek ways of remaining on the same page in all future contingencies.

In the light of all this, J&K chief minister Mehbooba Muftis bold and candid speech in the Assembly is indeed a brave one. In fact, she flagged almost every relevant issue in her 46-minute intervention. It takes courageous prudence on a politicians part to admit and even advise the people that if they wish to see the back of AFSPA, they will have to stop their support to violent activities. The logic is simple. The Armys largescale presence is to prevent a resurgence of violence. If violence drops substantially and for a sustained period, only then can the publics demand for AFSPAs removal or dilution be considered. The CM, while denouncing the misuse of mosques for vigilantism and condemning the separatist calls for bandhs, also coined a fine slogan in Connectivity, Productivity and Employability. The refreshing aspect of this slogan is the obvious focus on governance, but the real test is how effective this is going to be in transforming the daily lives of people in Kashmir. It has always been my abiding belief that its the psychological connect between the three regions of J&K which must receive the state governments focus. The key is Jammu, which has its legitimate aspirations that cannot be ignored, and its through it that Kashmir must connect to rest of India. This realisation is emerging, but still insufficiently. It needs a strategic political mind to peg this to our thinking.

The need of the hour is to ensure that the Deep States intent of creating turbulence through diverse means is countered and a combined approach is projected. The Armys strong presence, along with the CRPF and J&K police, is vital, and 2018 will be a crucially testing year due to the unpredictability of the Sino-Pakistani collusion on the borders and within. But the governance domain must receive the fullest support of all agencies. Stability through military domination, effective governance and increased intra-state connect must form the cornerstone of Indias strategy through 2018.The current situation in the island state is fraught with risks for Indian interests.

In December 2017, the government of President Abdulla Yameen in the Maldives had sought to punish the Indian ambassador for meeting three local officials  not at all an irregular act for a diplomatic representative, specially when Male continues to formally proclaim an India First policy  about the same time that it was ramming a free trade agreement with China through its Parliament without discussion, signalling its strong tilt in favour of Beijing.

On that occasion, New Delhi had officially pleaded with Male to keep Indian sensitivities in mind. In the face of the present looming crisis in the strategically-located Indian Ocean island nation, with its Supreme Court ordering the freeing of political prisoners, including former President Mohammed Nasheed, and President Yameen appearing to defiantly ignore the directive, India appears to have taken a stronger line, although its the follow-through that is important.

Without bothering with diplomatic language, New Delhi asked the government in Male to act in accordance with its own Supreme Courts order. Perhaps it found the freedom to do so as the United States, Britain, Australia and Canada were doing the same. However, these nations dont have the same immediate interest in the Maldives, a member of the Saarc grouping which of late has been surreptitiously promoting Islamist activities in cahoots with Pakistani elements, as India does. As such, India needs to be ready with an action plan to goad Male in the direction it wants, that is to bring the nation back to the democratic track.

For now, that seems the only way to cut its losses in the context of the strategic disadvantage it suffered of late due to the Yameen government undermining Indias position on a consistent basis and advancing Chinas.

After the Supreme Court ordered the release of political prisoners, and subsequently restored the status of Opposition MPs who were disqualified on account of an anti-defection provision, Mr Yameens party appears to be in a minority. Perhaps thats why the President has suddenly stopped a Parliament session from continuing, and given the impression of issuing a threat to Supreme Court judges at a rally. Given this, its hard to take his statement at face value that he is ready to call a fresh election.

India needs to steer the necessary processes in the Maldives in that direction, and ensure that everyone, including Mr Nasheed, is free to contest and no obstacles will be placed in their path. This may call for diplomatic and security-related moves.

The current situation in the island state is fraught with risks for Indian interests. Given the faceoff between the Supreme Court and the presidency, there should be no surprise if the internal situation blows up and street fighting erupts, instigated by Islamist elements with the encouragement of pro-government lobbies.The government has created the new division after realising the need to keep a tab on crimes dominating the Internet space.

An IAS couple in Mumbai are on the verge of losing their government allotted house in Malabar Hill to the citys mayor, who reportedly has been searching for accommodation for the past 10 months. The house occupied by the senior babus apparently belongs to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) and has been designated as the official mayoral residence.

Sources say that the state government has requested the BMC that Pravin and Pallavi Darade be allowed to live there as long as they are posted in Mumbai.

The real issue, sources say, is the ongoing tussle between the Maharashtra government and the BMC over official residences in a city where sarkari accommodation is limited and therefore almost always hotly contested over.

Govts Sebi dilemma

The government is in a bind over appointing whole-time members with capital markets regulator Sebi. To maintain the regulators autonomy and independence it mandates IAS officers to resign from service if they have to take up the job of whole-time member with Sebi. Now Sanjeev Kaushik, a 1992-batch Kerala cadre IAS officer, who was asked by the Centre to resign to take up the Sebi job, has reportedly declined the offer. The IAS officer, currently on deputation with the finance ministry, has instead chosen to return to Kerala to take up the post of principal secretary. Sources say that Mr Kaushik had requested the Centre that he be allowed to go to Sebi on deputation, but this was declined.

Many observers feel that the rule not allowing IAS officers to go on deputation to Sebi may make it difficult for the government to find younger and specialised talent from the pool of officers. No IAS officer would like to take up a three-year job when he has more than 10 years or more of service left with the government.

With Mr Kaushik declining the job, Sebi now has to hunt for two WTMs as the regulator recently created one more post for a WTM.

Cyber babus

A new division called cyber and information security (CIS) was created last November under the ministry of home affairs under which Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre and the Cyber Police Force are being set up.

The CIS division will have four wings  security clearance, cyber-crime prevention, cyber security and information security wings each  headed by an undersecretary-level officer. Sources say that home minister Rajnath Singh and home secretary Rajiv Gauba reviewed the progress of the functioning of the new division recently. Apparently, it was proposed to appoint the chief information security officer (CISO) and deputy CISO under the MHA.

The government has created the new division after realising the need to keep a tab on crimes dominating the Internet space. The government wants the division to create an effective mechanism to strictly monitor cyber space and block website flouting Indias laws, especially child porn. An online portal for preparing, follow up and issue of advisory on financial fraud related matters is also in the offing. However, it is still not clear how many babus will work in the division and who will head it. Watch this space for updates.

Tailpiece

A spook by any other name is a writer! Though there are quite many civil servants, present and past, who have displayed writing skills beyond jottings on official files, it is not often that one stumbles upon a former top spook who has found a way to unburden his mind without endangering national security! Having hung up the old cloak and dagger a few years ago, he now authors a blog, which has a refreshing whiff of whimsy about it. Some poetry (in Hindi), tongue-in-cheek piece on the difficulty of linking his Aadhaar to his bank account, an ode to P.G. Wodehouse, and several short reveries about an eventful life. You can read more at kcverma.in. More power to your pen, sir!The tiny tourist archipelago has been plunged into a political crisis pitting the country's top court against President Yameen.

The reinstatement of the dozen legislators gave the opposition a majority in the 85-member assembly, and it can now potentially impeach Yameen. (Photo: AP)

Male: The beleaguered Maldives government Sunday ordered police and troops to reject any move by the Supreme Court to arrest or impeach President Abdulla Yameen over his refusal to release political prisoners.

The tiny tourist archipelago has been plunged into a political crisis pitting the country's top court against Yameen, whose crackdown on dissent has tarnished the nation's image as an upmarket holiday paradise.

On Thursday -- in a move that surprised many -- judges ordered authorities to release nine political dissidents and restore the seats of 12 legislators who had been sacked for defecting from Yameen's party, ruling the cases were politically motivated.

But the Yameen government has so far refused, shuttering parliament and resisting international calls to comply.

In a national television address on Sunday Attorney General Mohamed Anil said the government remained defiant.

"Any Supreme Court order to arrest the president would be unconstitutional and illegal. So I have asked the police and the army not to implement any unconstitutional order," Anil said.

The reinstatement of the dozen legislators gave the opposition a majority in the 85-member assembly, and it can now potentially impeach Yameen.

However the authorities shut parliament indefinitely on Saturday to avert such a move. Yameen also sacked two police chiefs after the court's decision.

The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party -- led by the country's first democratically-elected president Mohamed Nasheed -- has urged the government to respect the top court's decision, fearing any refusal might trigger unrest in the nation of 340,000 Sunni Muslims.

The Maldivian government said Friday it had concerns about releasing those convicted for "terrorism, corruption, embezzlement, and treason".

The United Nations, Australia, Britain, Canada, India and the United States welcomed the court's decision as a move towards restoring democracy in the politically troubled Indian Ocean nation.

Nasheed was barred from contesting any election in the Maldives after a controversial 2015 terrorism conviction which was internationally criticised as politically motivated. He lives abroad after travelling out of the country in 2016 on prison leave for medical treatment.The Russian plane was shot down, close to a major highway where the Syrian army and Iranian-backed militias are trying to advance.

A Russian pilot who ejected from his fighter jet after it was shot down in northwestern Syria on Saturday was killed by militants after he landed alive on the ground and resisted capture by an al-Qaida-linked group, Syrian monitors and a Syrian militant said. (Photo: AP)

Amman: Syrian rebels shot down a Russian warplane on Saturday and killed its pilot on the ground after he ejected from the plane, Russias defence ministry and Syrian rebels said.

The SU-25 came down in an area of northern Idlib province that has seen heavy air strikes and fighting on the ground between Syrias government forces backed by Russia and Iran, and rebel groups opposed to President Bashar al-Assad.

Syrians opposed to Assad see Russia as an invading force they blame for the deaths of thousands of civilians since Moscow joined the war on the side of the government in 2015. The US State Department said it had seen reports about the incident and allegations that the United States provided missiles to groups in Syria.

The United States has never provided MANPAD missiles to any group in Syria, and we are deeply concerned that such weapons are being used, said State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert. The solution to the violence is a return to the Geneva process as soon as possible and we call on Russia to live up to its commitments in that regards.

The Russian plane was shot down over the town of Khan al-Subl near the city of Saraqeb, close to a major highway where the Syrian army and Iranian-backed militias are trying to advance, a rebel source said. Although the Russian pilot escaped the crash, he was killed by rebels who had tried to capture him, the source said.

Tharir al-Sham, a jihadist group spearheaded by the former Syrian branch of al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for shooting down the plane on social media, saying one of its fighters had scored a direct hit with a shoulder launched anti-aircraft missile.

This work is the least we can do to revenge our people. Let the criminal invaders know that our skies are not a picnic and they will not pass through without paying a price, God willing, senior commander Mahmoud Turkomani said in a statement released by the group.

Russias Defence Ministry also said that the aircraft was downed by a portable surface-to-air missile. The pilot reported that he had ejected by parachute, it said, and he was later killed on the ground. The pilot died in a fight with terrorists, the ministry said.

Plane Wreckage

TASS news agency quoted the Russian Defence Ministry as saying Moscow retaliated with a strike from an undisclosed high-precision weapon that killed more than 30 militants in an area of Idlib province where the plane was downed. The Syrian opposition released footage on social media that purported to show the wreckage of the plane and the body of the pilot surrounded by fighters.

Rebels said the downed warplane had taken part in strikes that targeted civilian convoys fleeing along a major Syrian highway from villages that the army and foreign militias had overrun. Syrias civil war, which is now entering its eighth year, has killed hundreds of thousands of people and driven more than 11 million from their homes.

A Russian plane was blamed for the death of seven civilians and scores of injuries after cars were targeted on the highway, according to a witness and two rebels sources.

Syrian soldiers and Iranian-backed militiamen were now around twelve kilometres from Saraqeb, advancing toward the Damascus-Aleppo highway under cover of heavy Russian air strikes, two opposition sources said. At least five civilians were killed in Saraqeb city on Saturday, which residents blamed on Russian planes.

Syrians in rebel-held areas say they can distinguish between Russian warplanes and those of the Syrian air force, because the Russian planes fly at higher altitude.

Residents say thousands of people have been forced by air strikes to flee the area, moving further north to the safety of makeshift camps on the Syrian side of the Turkish border. Russias Defence Ministry regularly says it targets only hardline Islamist militants in Syria.Trump is trying to destabilise market conditions for those who want to work in Iran.

But Trump's arrival in the White House a year ago, and his regular denunciations of the deal with Iran and the country in general, cooled their ardour. (Photo: File)

Tehran: Iran's oil minister lashed out at the United States Sunday, saying that hostile comments by President Donald Trump had torpedoed new oil and gas contracts for the Islamic republic.

"Trump is trying to destabilise market conditions for those who want to work in Iran," Bijan Namdar Zanganeh told a press conference.

"For the past year, every three or four months, he has destabilised the market. One cannot say that this is not without effect," he said.

The agreement in July 2015 of a nuclear deal between Iran and world powers sparked keen interest among international investors keen to focus on the country's petroleum riches.

But Trump's arrival in the White House a year ago, and his regular denunciations of the deal with Iran and the country in general, cooled their ardour.

Zanganeh revealed that Tehran was currently negotiating with "more than 20 foreign companies" to develop its oil and gas fields.

"But I dare not name the projects that are near to being agreed. If I do so, from tomorrow there will be pressure for them not to sign contracts with us," he said.

Some countries "both at the international and regional level" are exerting pressure on European and Asian firms not to agree contracts with Iran, Zanganeh added, without naming them.

However, he did say he was optimistic about a USD 5-billion (four-billion-euro) contract signed last July with the French group Total, which heads a consortium with China's CNPC to develop a gas field.

"I consider that Total is very serious... I hope it will implement the accord and I think that in a short period of time, it will sign agreements with subcontractors," Zanganeh said.

He added that Iran had planned measures "if the deal ever runs into trouble" because of pressure from the United States.The Pakistan Maritime Security Agency arrested 47 Indian fishermen and seized nine launches for illegally fishing in Pakistani waters.

The arrested fishermen were handed over to the Docks police for further proceedings and investigation. (Photo: AFP)

Karachi: Forty-seven Indian fishermen have been arrested by Pakistani authorities for allegedly fishing in the countrys territorial waters in the Arabian Sea, according to a maritime official.

The Pakistan Maritime Security Agency (PMSA) on Saturday arrested 47 Indian fishermen and seized nine launches for illegally fishing in Pakistani waters, a PMSA spokesperson was quoted as saying by the Express Tribune.

The arrested fishermen were handed over to the Docks police for further proceedings and investigation, it said.

The Indian boats have been confiscated for violating Pakistans coastal territory, the spokesperson said, adding that said PMSA vessels and fast attack boats took part in an open sea operation for the purpose.

On January 19, as many as 17 Indian fishermen had been arrested by the PSMA for allegedly fishing in Pakistans territorial waters. Three boats had also been impounded.

Pakistan had released 292 Indian fishermen as a goodwill gesture in December-January.

Pakistan and India frequently arrest fishermen as there is no clear demarcation of the maritime border in the Arabian Sea and these fishermen do not have boats equipped with the technology to know their precise location.

A number of non-governmental organisations in both India and Pakistan have raised the issue, pressing their governments to release the arrested fishermen without delay.At the Angelus, Pope Francis invites Christians and all people of goodwill to pray for peace for the world and especially for the Democratic Republic of Congo and for South Sudan, afflicted by violent civil wars and millions of refugees. The question: "What can I do for peace?". "Victories gained through violence are false victories; while working for peace is good for everyone ". The miracles of Jesus and the awakening of faith in the people he meets. The streets are the place of the mission for the Church "under the sign of going out". The beatification of Teresio Olivelli, martyr in the concentration camp of Hersbruck. The Day for Life.

Vatican City (AsiaNews) - Pope Francis is calling Christians worldwide to hold a Day of Prayer and Fasting for Peace on February 23 next, the first Friday of Lent. Speaking to the pilgrims gathered in St Peter's Square, after the recital of the Angelus, Francis explained his call motivated by "the tragic protracted situations of conflict in different parts of the world". The Day will be offered "in particular for the populations of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Sudan".

In Congo (R.D), the refusal of President Joseph Kabila to resign at the end of his term in December sparked demonstrations, clashes and arrests and wars between militias and has created at least 4 million refugees.

In South Sudan there is a civil war in which the neighboring countries, Uganda and Kenya are not foreign. Here too, there are at least 2 million refugees.

"As on other similar occasions - added the pontiff - I also invite non-Catholic and non-Christian brothers and sisters to join this initiative in ways that they deem most appropriate". In the past, in September 2013, Pope Francis invited Christians and non-Christians from all over the world to unite for a prayer vigil for peace in Syria.

"May our heavenly Father - Francis explained - always listens to His children who cry out to him in pain and anguish," heal the broken hearts and band their wounds "(Psalm 147.3). I address a heartfelt appeal so that we too hear this cry and, each in ther own conscience, before God, ask ourselves: 'What can I do for peace?'. We can certainly pray; but not only: everyone can concretely say 'no' to violence as much as it depends on him or her. Because the victories obtained through violence are false victories; while working for peace is good for everyone! "

Previously, before the Marian prayer, Francis paused to comment on the Sunday Gospel (5th for year, B, Mark 1, 21-39), in which "the evangelist Mark emphasizes the relationship between Christ's miracles and the awakening of faith in the people he meets ".

"Mark brings out a general meaning of miracles: the healing of the body aims at healing of the heart. The episode thus contains an exhortation valid for every believer: once freed from the grips of evil and having regained their strength following Christ's intervention, we must follow the example of Peter's mother-in-law, who immediately put herself at the service of the Lord and other guests".

Speaking then of the crowd that gathered in front of the house where Jesus was staying, he added: "The crowd, marked by physical sufferings and spiritual miseries, constitutes, so to speak, 'the vital environment' in which the mission of Jesus is carried out, made up of words and gestures that heal and console. It is a humanity crossed by sufferings, labors and problems: the powerful, liberating and renewing action of Jesus is directed to this poor humanity ".

"The proclamation of the Kingdom of God by Jesus - he concluded - finds its most proper place in the streets. To the disciples who seek him out to bring him back to the city, He replies: "Let us go elsewhere, to the nearby villages, so that I may preach there also" (v. 38). This was the path of the Son of God and this will be the path of his disciples. The street, as a place of the joyful proclamation of the Gospel, places the mission of the Church under the sign of 'going out', of 'movement' and never of imobility".

After the Angelus, Francis recalled that yesterday, in Vigevano, the young Teresio Olivelli, killed for his Christian faith in the concentration camp of Hersbruck in 1945, was beatified. "He gave witness to Christ in his love for the weakest and joins the long line of martyrs of the last century. His heroic sacrifice is a seed of hope and fraternity especially for the young ".

The pontiff then joined the Italian bishops in today's celebration of the Day for Life, whose theme is "The Gospel of Life, Joy for the World". "I associate myself with the Message of the Italian Bishops - he said - and I express my appreciation and encouragement to the different ecclesial realities that in many ways promote and sustain life, especially the Movement for Life, whose supporters are present here and whom I greet", "Not so numerous in a world where weapons are built and where the culture of waste is dominant".By Gernot Heiser, Chief Research Scientist at CSIRO's Data61; Scientia Professor and John Lions Chair, UNSW

Shutterstock

The disclosure of the Meltdown and Spectre computer vulnerabilities on January 2, 2018 was in many ways unprecedented. It shocked  and scared  even the experts.

The vulnerabilities bypass traditional security measures in the computer and affect billions of devices, from mobile phones to massive cloud servers.

We have, unfortunately, grown used to attacks on computer systems that exploit the inevitable flaws resulting from vast conceptual complexity. Our computer systems are the most complex artefacts humans have ever built, and the growth of complexity has far outstripped our ability to manage it.





Read more:

What are software vulnerabilities, and why are there so many of them?





A new kind of vulnerability

Meltdown and Spectre are qualitatively different from previous computer vulnerabilities. Not only are they effective across a wide class of computer hardware and operating systems from competing vendors. And not only were the vulnerabilities hiding in plain sight for more than a decade. The really shocking realisation is that Meltdown and Spectre do not exploit flaws in the computer hardware or software.

As Intel stated in its press release, these attacks:

gather sensitive data from computing devices that are operating as designed.

The ingenuity of the attacks lies in combining seemingly unrelated design features that were thought to be well understood  stuff we teach undergraduate computer science students. The vulnerability is not in any of the individual features, but in the complex interaction between them.

It turns out that computer systems are insecure not because of mistakes made in the implementation, but because of ill-conceived design.

As a community of computer systems experts, we have to ask ourselves how such a debacle is possible, and how a recurrence can be prevented.

We have known for a while that the established wait for something to happen and then try to fix it approach  better known as patch and pray  does not work even for more common implementation flaws, as witnessed by the proliferation of exploits. It works even less well for such insecure-by-design situations.

Automated evaluation of designs

The fundamental problem is that humans are unable to fully understand the conceptual complexity of modern computer systems and how its seemingly unrelated features might interact. There is no hope that this will change.

But solving complex problems is what machines are increasingly good at. So, the only real solution can be the automated evaluation of designs, with the aim of mathematically proving that under all circumstances a design will behave in a way that is considered secure  in particular by not leaking secret data.

In other words, a design must be considered insecure unless there is a rigorous mathematical proof to the contrary.

This is not an easy ask by any definition, and much more work across many areas of computer science and engineering is needed to make it a reality. But we need to start somewhere, and we need to start now.





Read more:

Artificial intelligence cyber attacks are coming  but what does that mean?





We will reap benefits of embarking on such a program long before we achieve the goal of rigorous end-to-end proof. Significant improvements will be achieved through partial results, both in the form of proving weaker properties, and by establishing desired properties in a less rigorous fashion.

For example, an incomplete evaluation may be more feasible than a complete one, and produce a probabilistic result, such as a greatly reduced likelihood of exploits.

Rewriting the hardware-software contract

A necessary, and overdue, first step is a new and improved hardware-software contract.

Computer systems are a combination of hardware and software. The people and companies that develop hardware are largely separate from those developing the software. Given the vastly different skills and experience required, this is inevitable.

To make development practical, both sides work to an interface, called the instruction-set architecture (ISA), which presents the contract between hardware and software functionality.

The problem, clearly exhibited by the Meltdown and Spectre attacks, is that the ISA is under-specified for security, or safety for that matter. It simply does not provide ways to isolate the speed of progress of a computation from other system activities.





Read more:

Apple, Android and PC chip problem  why your smartphone and laptop are so at risk





The ISA a functional specification, meaning it defines how the visible state of the machine will (eventually) change if an operation is triggered. It intentionally abstracts away anything to do with time. In particular, it hides how long operations take and how this time depends on the internal state of the machine. The problem is that this internal state depends on potentially confidential data processed by previous operations.

This means that by observing the exact timing of particular sequences of operations, it is possible to infer data that is supposed to be kept secret. This is exactly what happened with Meltdown and Spectre.

The abstraction is there for a good reason: It allows hardware designers to change things under the hood, usually in order to improve performance. Consequently, there will be resistance from hardware manufacturers to a tighter contract. But we believe that the refined specifications can be kept abstract enough to retain manufacturers ability to innovate, and to avoid exposing confidential IP.

The recent debacle has shown that the ISA is too abstract, making it impossible to tell whether a system is secure or if it will leak secrets. This must change, urgently.

Gernot Heiser receives funding from the Australian Department of Defence and has received funding from Google for research on timing-channel defence mechanisms. He has in the past received funding from Intel for unrelated research.

Yuval Yarom is a member of the international team that discovered the Meltdown and Spectre exploits.

Originally published in The Conversation.Hi, I am new to the forum. I previously had a permanent resident visa that expired in October 2017. Unfortunately I could not relocate and have no connections to Australia at this point. I applied for an RRV immediately after expiry asking for 3 months to relocate as I had a favorable job situation to relocate just few days before expiry but it was too late to move. But since then I have now decided to relocate on the next opportunity regardless of my job situation. To be honest, I do not think there is a chance for approval of my RRV application. Meanwhile, I have received an invite to apply for new 189 visa.



My questions are -



(a) Can I apply for the new visa while my RRV is pending assessment. It has been 4 months and have had no response from CO.



(b) When I tried to lodge a new application online, the immi system said that I already have an unfinalised application that may need to be withdrawn but I was allowed to proceed filling the application form. Will there be a problem if I keep RRV application also open? I would appreciate any suggestions. Thanks.Thats all. Thats it. He doesnt say that the church should bless gay marriage or gay adoption. He doesnt explicitly reject church teaching, which prescribes chastity for gay men and lesbians, though he questions the language  intrinsically disordered  with which it describes homosexuality.

Photo



But that hasnt stopped his detractors from casting him as a terrifying enemy of the faith  Regan in The Exorcist and Damien in The Omen rolled together and grown up into a balding and bespectacled Jesuit  and silencing him whenever they can. A talk about Jesus that he was supposed to give in London last fall was canceled. So was a similar talk at the Theological College of the Catholic University of America.

And the vitriol to which he has been subjected is breathtaking, a reminder not just of how much homophobia is still out there but also of how presumptuous, overwrought, cruel and destructive discourse in this digital age can be.

Inexcusably ugly was how the Roman Catholic archbishop of Philadelphia, Charles Chaput, described the attacks on Father Martin in an essay for the Catholic journal First Things in September . Archbishop Chaput is no progressive, but still he was moved to write that the bitterness directed at the person of Father Martin is not just unwarranted and unjust; its a destructive counter-witness to the Gospel. He cited a recent article in a French publication with the headline  Catholic Cyber-Militias and the New Censorship , observing, We live at a time when civility is universally longed for and just as universally (and too often gleefully) violated.

I spoke with Bishop McElroy recently, and he said that while there are calm-voiced critics of Father Martin with earnest concerns about what they see as the churchs drift from traditional sexual morality, there are also out-and-out bigots whose methods are incompatible with what we hope to be as a church.

We have to face the fact that there is a group of people across all religious views that are particularly antagonistic to L.G.B.T. people, he told me. That comes from deep within the human soul, and its really corrosive and repugnant.

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I have known Father Martin for many years and have long been struck by the painstakingly careful balance that he maintains. Is he telling his fellow Catholics to judge L.G.B.T. people less harshly, whether theyre chaste or not? Absolutely. When he and I talked a few days ago, he repeated a recommendation in Building a Bridge that Catholic institutions stop firing gay people, which has happened repeatedly.

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Straight couples do not have their sexual lives put under a microscope like that, nor are they targeted, he told me. A couple living together before theyre married arent fired from a Catholic school. But that arrangement runs as afoul of church teaching as a sexually active gay or lesbian couples does.

and bishops. From listening to Father Martin, its certainly possible to conclude that, or at least wonder if, he has qualms with church teaching about homosexuality. But hes so restrained and respectful that the president of the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States officially approved Building a Bridge, which has also been endorsed by an array of prominent cardinals

And he trails behind many members of his faith in his publicly stated views. According to a poll by the Pew Research Center last June , 67 percent of Americans who identify as Catholic support the legalization of same-sex marriage, in contrast to 62 percent of Americans across the board.

But the far right isnt quietly ceding the fight. Thats clear not only in the response to Father Martin but also in a federal education bill, drafted by Republicans, that would protect colleges that ban openly gay relationships or bar gays from certain religious organizations on campus.

Lyle Garcia, 72, one of the parishioners involved in the decision to invite Father Martin, admitted to me that he was very concerned that in changing the location of the event, theyd rewarded and emboldened the haters. But at least, he said, the talk would proceed.

As will Father Martin. An expanded edition of Building a Bridge will be published in March, and it includes material about L.G.B.T. Catholics who told him, as he promoted the book, that it had given them desperately needed comfort.

Im at total peace, he told me. I really am. An ocean of hate online is really wiped out by just a few tears from an L.G.B.T. person. Only one thing to say to that: Amen.Work and Holiday visa (subclass 462)



Features



This visa is for young people who want to holiday and work in Australia for up to a year.



Requirements



You might be able to get this visa if you:

are at least 18 but not yet 31 years of age

don't have a dependent child with you at any time during your stay in Australia

have a passport from: Argentina

Bangladesh

Chile

China, People's Republic of

Hungary

Indonesia

Israel

Luxembourg

Malaysia

Peru

Poland

Portugal

San Marino

Singapore

Slovak Republic

Slovenia

Spain



Thailand

Turkey

USA

Uruguay

Vietnam ************ On list ( only hear rumour restricted to about 200 a year - not sure if true)Harold Pierce covers education and health for The Californian. He can be reached at 661-395-7404. Follow him on Twitter @RoldyPierceIn secret, behind locked gates, our Nation's Oldest City dumped a landfill in a lake (Old City Reservoir), while emitting sewage in our rivers and salt marsh. Organized citizens exposed and defeated pollution, racism and cronyism. We elected a new Mayor. We're transforming our City -- advanced citizenship. Ask questions. Make disclosures. Demand answers. Be involved. Expect democracy. Report and expose corruption. Smile! Help enact a St. Augustine National Park and Seashore. We shall overcome!Uh-oh! It could be you, or it could be us, but there's no page here.Razor Clamming Closed On All But North Oregon Coast; Commercial Crabbing South Gets OK

Published 02/04/2018 at 12:55 PM PDT

By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff





(Oregon Coast)  Domoic acid, a marine toxin, has reared its unpleasant head once again on the Oregon coast, causing the closure of recreational razor clamming to grow even bigger. As of now, the activity is closed for all of the southern coast and central coast.

Meanwhile, the last stretch of Oregon still not open to commercial crabbing now has a green light. The Oregon Department of Agriculture (ODA) and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) have announced that recreational crabbing is now open from Cape Blanco, north of Port Orford, to the California border.

Levels of the biotoxins in crab from the area have found to be sufficiently decreased and now sit well below the alert range.

Commercial crabbers in this area of the south coast can set gear for a three-day presoak beginning Sunday, February 4 and start landing crab on Wednesday, February 7. For more details on the commercial opening schedule, see the ODFW site here.

ODA and ODFW said they will continue monitoring marine toxins in crab and shellfish to ensure that the concentrations remain below the alert level.

For more information on toxins, call ODAs shellfish safety information hotline at (800) 448-2474 or visit the ODA shellfish closures web page at https://oda.direct/ShellfishClosures

While razor clamming on coastal beaches is prohibited because of toxins on almost all of the southern Oregon coast, even that segment is now closed: the 37 or so miles from the southern jetty of the Umpqua River near Reedsport to the south jetty of Coos Bay.

This now makes all of the southern coast off limits to personal clamming, as well as the entire central Oregon coast, including Newport and Lincoln City.

Everything from Cascade Head to the Columbia River is open, leaving only the upper third of the coastline for razor clams: the north coast areas around Pacific City, Oceanside, Tillamook Bay, Manzanita, Cannon Beach, Seaside and Warrenton.

ODA will continue testing shellfish around the region every other week, as tides permit them. To reopen an area, scientists need two consecutive tests with safe levels.

You can also call ODAs shellfish safety information hotline at (800) 448-2474 or visit the ODA shellfish closures web page at https://oda.direct/ShellfishClosures

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All Content, unless otherwise attributed, copyright BeachConnection.net Unauthorized use or publication is not permitted(CNN)  A decision by the US Food and Drug Administration to shut down a nicotine addiction study has stirred debate about what the future holds for medical research on animals.

The agency ended the study after the deaths of four squirrel monkeys involved in the research.

The study -- intended to investigate the role that various levels of nicotine play in the onset of nicotine addiction in teens and young adults -- had been placed on hold and put under review to determine the safety and well-being of the animals involved.

Now, the 26 remaining animals will be placed in a permanent sanctuary home, and the FDA is working to establish an Animal Welfare Council to oversee all animal research under the agency's purview, Commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb said in a statement last week.

While animal rights activists celebrated the move, some scientists raised concern about why the decision was made -- and what it could mean for the future of medical research.

Humans have been using animals as models in research since the earliest days of medical science. Yet in recent years, activists and scientists have debated whether the role animals play in some studies should continue.

In wake of the FDA's latest decision, that debate will continue.

The monkey controversy timeline

In 2014, the FDA's National Center for Toxicological Research moved forward with a study to examine the behavioral and biological effects of nicotine in squirrel monkeys and to better understand how reducing levels of nicotine would impact them.

After learning about the study, the White Coat Waste Project, an advocacy group working to stop taxpayer-funded animal experiments, filed a Freedom of Information Act request for documents and additional materials related to the study. The group claimed that the response it received didn't comply with its request, and in August, it sued the FDA.

In September, world-renowned primatologist Jane Goodall wrote a letter to Gottlieb indicating that she was "disturbed" and "shocked" to learn that the agency was still performing nicotine addiction experiments on monkeys.

Gottlieb responded to Goodall in a letter: "After learning of concerns related to the study you referenced, I directed the agency to place a hold on the research study earlier this month. Accordingly, at this time, all experimentation involving the monkeys in the study you referenced has been halted."

The FDA decided to put a permanent end to the study after veterinarians and other animal-care professionals conducted a site visit at the National Center for Toxicological Research to evaluate the monkeys involved, Gottlieb said in his statement last week.

"Based on this team's findings, it is clear the study was not consistent with the agency's high animal welfare standards and why the agency has permanently ended this study and will place the monkeys involved in a new permanent sanctuary home, which will provide them with appropriate long-term care," Gottlieb said in the statement.

"However, our work is not done," he said. "These findings indicate that FDA's animal program may need to be strengthened in some important areas. As such, I am taking additional steps to ensure that any concerns related to current processes and procedures have been addressed and to identify additional actions the agency might take to better ensure the welfare of the animals in our care."

Animal studies are intended to test medical products when non-animal testing is not yet a scientifically valid and available option, according to the FDA.

'This type of monkey business is totally bananas'

Some in the biomedical research community have expressed concern that the FDA's decision appears to have been made in response to animal rights groups pushing for an end to animal studies, said Matthew Bailey, president of the Foundation for Biomedical Research, a nonprofit that promotes public understanding and support for such research.

"Research into the effects of nicotine is indeed a public health issue, especially given the rise in popularity of vaping devices among teenagers," Bailey said of the FDA's now-terminated study.

"My understanding is that the research project in question aimed to determine whether there is or is not a safe level of nicotine absorption by young people," he said. "That's an important question."

Bailey added that it remains unclear what the FDA's newly established Animal Welfare Council would do beyond the already federally mandated Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees. These committees, mandated under the Animal Welfare Act and the Health Research Extension Act, provide oversight for most institutions using animals in research, teaching and testing.

FDA spokeswoman Tara Rabin wrote in an email that individual animal care committees are tasked with study-specific oversight, but "the newly established Animal Welfare Council will track all studies across the FDA and provide centralized oversight and coordination of all animal research activities and facilities under the agency's purview. This Council will advise on the agency's approach to animal welfare issues and ensure alignment of animal studies with the agency's mission."

There are about 270 non-human primates under the FDA's care and 10 active animal studies involving non-human primates, she said.

The US National Institutes of Health funds most of the basic medical research conducted across the country, and every academic institution it funds that conducts medical research with animals is required to have an Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee to oversee care of those animals, according to the institutes.

The institutes will not fund research that uses animals if the committee has not given its approval to the proposed study.

Though many studies across the US are federally funded, many others are conducted as private research. For instance, biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, sometimes in partnership with the National Institutes of Health, conduct animal studies.

"The laws and regulations governing animal research conducted in the United States are among the strictest in the world, and each is designed to protect the welfare of animals in a laboratory setting," Bailey said.

"Researchers consistently work to reduce the number of animals used, replace laboratory animals with other means where feasible and refine the methodologies of experiments involving animals," he said. "Additional oversight efforts need to be balanced by efforts to reduce the significant amount of regulatory burden felt daily by research scientists in the US."

Some politicians celebrated the FDA's decision to shut down its nicotine study and establish a council to review future animal research.

"Throughout my career, I have consistently worked to end wasteful and abusive experiments on animals," California Rep. Ken Calvert wrote in an email. "I applaud the Food and Drug Administration for halting these controversial monkey nicotine tests and taking action to protect these animals."

Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake wrote in a email, "Addressing addiction is an important issue but wasting millions of dollars on this type of monkey business is totally bananas."

Nevada Rep. Dina Titus also opposes the monkey testing and wrote in an email, "Now that the FDA has canceled these studies, I'm working to ensure the animals are relocated to a suitable sanctuary and we end other cruel, unwarranted government testing on animals."

Justin Goodman, vice president of the White Coat Waste Project, called the FDA's decision a "huge win" not only for animals but for taxpayers.

"A majority of Americans oppose taxpayer-funded animal experiments, and we are pleased that Scott Gottlieb has heeded the calls from the American public," Goodman said.

"There's a stunning lack of transparency and accountability about how the government is spending our money in animal laboratories, and it's critical that taxpayers speak up, because it's clear that they can make a difference," he said, adding that the majority of drugs shown to be safe in animal studies end up failing in human clinical trials.

"Nicotine experiments on monkeys have not improved public health," he said. "The FDA has decided that it's in the best interest of the agency, taxpayers and animals to end the project and to send the primates to sanctuaries where they belong."

'A very dangerous proposition'

In his statement, Gottlieb noted that "there are still some areas for which non-animal testing is not yet a scientifically valid or available option. For example, animal research with primates continues to be an essential part of the safe and effective development of certain critical childhood vaccines."

The FDA conducted a study in baboons that found that whooping cough vaccines to be effective in preventing the disease among those vaccinated but that vaccines may not protect against transmissible infection from the actual bacteria behind whooping cough. So the bacteria could spread to other people, including those not vaccinated.

The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in 2013, also offered some clues to the recent resurgence of whooping cough.

Bailey said it's difficult to find a medical advance that hasn't been informed in some way by animal research.

"Animals played a role in the development of each of the top 25 most prescribed drugs in America," he said, adding that our pets, farm animals and wildlife also benefit from medical treatments developed in part from animal research.

"Farm animals and wildlife are routinely vaccinated against any number of diseases, but those vaccines wouldn't be available without animal research. So if you love animals, you really should support animal research," he said.

"Undoubtedly, some will argue that this recent action by the FDA is a reason to end research with animal models. But given the inextricable role humane and responsible animal research plays in the health of the overall population, and the health of the animals about which we care so deeply, that is a very dangerous proposition," he said.

This story was first published on CNN.com, "FDA reviewing animal studies in wake of monkey deaths."Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 4)  A group of doctors wants the Department of Justice (DOJ) to halt autopsies on children vaccinated with Dengvaxia.

The group Doctors for Public Welfare, who counts former Health Secretary Esperanza Cabral as member, released a statement Saturday calling on the Public Attorney's Office (PAO) "to stop performing autopsies on these children and to leave the matter of determining the cause of death to competent forensic pathologists."

The doctors issued the statement following the findings of the Philippine General Hospital's Dengue Investigative Task Force that only two out of the 14 vaccinated children who died could be linked to vaccine failure.

READ: 2 deaths may be due to Dengvaxia failure  experts

"None of the deaths of the 14 children autopsied were proven to be due to Dengvaxia," the group said.

The PAO, which is under the DOJ, has conducted at least seven autopsies on vaccinated children. The families of the children sought the help of agency after Dengvaxia maker Sanofi Pasteur announced in November the vaccine poses serious risks for children who have never had dengue.

READ: PAO forensic consultant suspects 'strong link' between Dengvaxia, seven deaths

"In light of these findings by the pathologists of the Philippine General Hospital, it makes no sense for any more families to be subjected to the torture of having a loved one exhumed and cut up only to find out thats no useful information was derived from the cruel act," the group said.

PAO's findings state the deaths show "strong links" to Dengavaxia, although it added the results are inconclusive.

The doctors urged the PAO to stop performing autopsies on these children and to leave the matter of determining the cause of death to competent forensic pathologists.

In a statement Sunday, PAO Chief Persida Acosta said her office has credible pathologists to conduct examinations.

"Ang PAO forensic team ay maninindigan at magpapatuloy sa pagsunod sa utos ng tamang awtoridad gaya ng DOJ, at hindi sa kung anumang pribadong grupo ng mga doktor," she added.

[Translation: The PAO forensic team will stand by its work and it will follow the orders of the DOJ, and not of any private group of doctors.]

The PAO's Forensic Laboratory Director Dr. Erwin Erfe, who conducted the autopsies, also told CNN Philippines Sunday the PGH investigators should to conduct their own independent forensic exams on the bodies of the 14 cases.

"Unfortunately, they chose to review just the clinical records," he said.

Erfe said he will "continue with the work entrusted to my by victims' families, the PAO, and the DOJ" unless instructed otherwise.

RELATED: TIMELINE: The Dengvaxia controversy(CNN)  North Korea is planning to show off dozens of long-range missiles at a February 8 parade, the day before the Winter Olympics is set to begin in South Korea, two diplomatic sources with deep knowledge of North Korea's intentions told CNN Wednesday.

The display of "hundreds" of missiles and rockets would be an attempt "to scare the hell out of the Americans," one of the sources said.

The parade is expected to include dozens of intercontinental-range Hwasong-15 missiles, which the North Koreans test-fired for the first time in late November, the sources said.

They also didn't rule out a missile test "in the near future" to send a strong message to American forces currently deployed in the region.

The news comes after US President Donald Trump delivered his first State of the Union speech, during which he criticized the Kim Jong Un regime's human rights abuses and "reckless pursuit" of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles that could soon threaten the US homeland.

In his address, Trump highlighted personal stories of victims of the Kim regime, inviting as guests North Korean defector Ji Seong-ho and the parents of Otto Warmbier, who died shortly after returning from North Korea where he spent 17 months in captivity.

Winter Olympics woes

The inter-Korean talks which led to the North's decision to participate in the Winter OIympics had been hailed as a breakthrough that could ease escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula. However, the process has not been smooth.

On Monday, North Korea said it canceled a joint cultural performance that was to be held in advance of the Olympics in response to unflattering coverage by South Korean media.

According to a statement from South Korea's Unification Ministry, the North Koreans pulled out because "South Korean media continue to insult North Korea's genuine measures regarding the PyeongChang Olympics and take issues with its domestic festival."

The sources that spoke to CNN said that other planned events could be canceled.

Cracks

Chad O'Carroll, managing director of the Korea Risk Group in Seoul, said the planned military parade could undermine Washington's support of dialogue between the two Koreas.

"The ongoing US support for inter-Korean rapprochement already appears to be showing cracks and will likely be seriously tested in the event of a major DPRK ICBM parade on the eve of the Olympics," he said.

Foreign media will be banned from covering the upcoming military parade, the sources said.

This is a dramatic change from last year, when many global news organizations were invited to cover a military parade in April that saw Pyongyang unveil new long-range missiles. A diplomatic source said this was due to the sensitivity of the weapons that will be on display, and to avoid questions about the deploy ability of the missiles. By banning foreign press, North Korea controls all of the imagery the world sees.

North Korean state media in recent days has been increasing its anti-US rhetoric, warning of grave consequences if postponed joint military exercises resume after the Olympics.

Policy divisions

Earlier Tuesday, sources told CNN that the Trump administration had decided not to nominate Victor Cha, its widely rumored selection as US ambassador to South Korea, apparently because of a difference over Korea policy, specifically over its consideration of a pre-emptive strike.

Cha, a widely respected former academic and former Bush administration official, said in a Washington Post op-ed Monday that the answer to the "real and unprecedented threats" North Korea presents is not, "as some Trump administration officials have suggested, a preventive military strike."

Instead, Cha laid out what he called "a forceful military option available that can address the threat without escalating into a war that would likely kill tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of Americans."

This story was first published on CNN.com, "North Korea to parade dozens of long-range missiles before Winter Olympics."(CNN)  Islamic scholar and TV analyst Tariq Ramadan has been arrested in Paris and charged with rape, a judicial source told CNN.

Ramadan, 55, was arrested on Wednesday, charged Friday and will remain in custody in France until his next hearing, the source said.

The arrest of the Oxford University professor follows public claims by two women that he assaulted them in French hotel rooms.

CNN has reached out to Ramadan's lawyer for comment.

Ramadan is a Swiss citizen who often has been featured by international media, including CNN, and whose grandfather, Hassan al-Banna, founded Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood movement.

Ramadan wrote in an October post on Facebook: "Unfounded allegations can never take the place of concrete truth. These accusations are simply false, and betray all the ideals I have long strived for and believed in."

A statement in November by Oxford University said Ramadan "categorically denies" any wrongdoing.

Ramadan took a leave of absence from Oxford in late 2017.

Accusations date to 2009 and 2012

Two accusations against Ramadan were filed in October, related to alleged incidents in 2009 and 2012, CNN affiliate BFM reported.

The first woman to accuse Ramadan of rape is Henda Ayari, a former Ramadan follower who has since become a secular activist. She publicly accused him in a Facebook post and later told The New York Times she "could not forget what happened to (her) that night with him."

A second accuser, a disabled woman who has not been named, has also accused Ramadan of rape, BFM reported last month.

"If there are other victims in France or elsewhere, they now know that justice will take notice of what they have been through," Ayari's lawyer, Jonas Haddad, told Le Monde newspaper Friday.

Ayari will soon face Ramadan in court, Haddad told BFMTV.

This story was first published on CNN.com, France jails Islamic scholar on rape charge, judicial source says."Thats What She Said What Men Need to Know (and Women Need to Tell Them) About Working Together by Joanne Lipman William Morrow/HarperCollins Publishers 297 pages; $28.99 In early January, James Damore, a software engineer, sued Google for workplace discrimination, accusing it of bias against conservative white men. Mr Damore was fired by Google last summer, after posting a now infamous analysis of why the company had failed to hire more female engineers. Among other reasons, Mr Damore argued that womens biology was at fault, as it rendered them less ...City-based is aiming to raise Rs 2.5-2.7 billion (Rs 250-270 crore) from the employee share offer which started from January 31, 2018, a top official of the bank has said.

"We plan to raise between Rs 2.5 billion (Rs 250 crore) and Rs 2.7 billion (Rs 270 crore) as capital from the employee share offer. The bank is giving a 25 per cent discount on pricing at Rs 53.94 per share to the employees," MD and CEO of Usha Ananthasubramanian told PTI.

She said that was the first among the public sector banks (PSBs) to offer shares to its employees and got the approval of the board, Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Securities and Exchange Board of India and the Finance Ministry.

The offer would remain open for two weeks.

The bank is also planning to come out with a qualified institutional placement (QIP) in the third week of March to raise around Rs 10 billion (Rs 1,000 crore), Subramanian said.

Last month, the RBI had also initiated prompt corrective action (PCA) against the state-run lender over its high bad loans.

High net non-performing assets (NPA) and a negative Return On Assets (ROA) for two years in a row had prompted the action by the central bank.

So far in the current financial year, the bank has raised Rs 7 billion (Rs 700 crore) as capital and also raised some bonds.The local manufacturers in the medical devices industry, which foots a Rs 273.4 billion imports bill annually, are in for a rude shock. The finance ministry has decided to allow a 2.5 per cent exemption to device importers while it has raised the customs duty (to protect the local industry and encourage Make in India) to 10 per cent on certain devices as against the current 7.5 per cent.

The latest move by the ministry effectively nullifies the impact of the customs duty hike. Local players claim that if no corrective action is taken, then 25 per cent of units may close in the next two ...is weighing options of sourcing mangoes and a few other fruits from West Bengal for brands like Maaza, a company official has said.

The company would soon make a decision on it, the official said.

"We are exploring 2-3 fruits for sourcing from this state including mangoes and pineapples," and South West Asia president T Krishnakumar said.

The company is holding dialogues with the horticulture department of the state for sourcing mangoes initially.

"Currently, we do not source any fruit from Bengal. We are holding dialogues with the horticulture department. In this summer season, some trial sourcing might be carried out for mango," Bengal Beverage-Dankuni managing director S R Goenka told PTI.

Bengal Beverage-Dankuni is a bottler for Coca-Cola in West Bengal.

Sources said that Coca-Cola may also test market Maaza by mixing Bengal varieties of mangoes.

The state produces several mango varieties including 'Himsagar' and 'Langra'.

West Bengal's average mango production is around 700,000 tonnes. In a bumper year, it has even touched 1 million tonnes in the past.

Setting up of a processing unit through partners may come up later as it will require a certain level of volume, they said.

Coca-Cola has embarked on enhancing the existing portfolio of juices with fruits that are locally grown in various regions of India. The initiative is aimed at becoming a complete beverage company.

expects its mango fruit drink Maaza to become a $1 billion brand by 2023.

Coca-Cola, along with its bottling partners in India, presently procures around 100,000 metric tonnes of mango pulp annually.

This may double to 200,000 metric tonnes, worth nearly Rs 11 billion, and help 100,000 farmers by 2023, the company officials had said earlier.The Beating Retreat ceremony that marks the end of the Republic Day celebrations in New Delhi each year has its origins in ancient warfare. At the end of the days battle, drums would be sounded to signal a halt in fighting, the withdrawal of forces, the gathering and disposal of the dead and the lowering of flags to honour those who had made the supreme sacrifice.

Over the centuries, the ceremony was adapted in various ways. In England, an order from King William III in 1694 stated that drummers would march down the main streets of various townships, their drumming answered ...A minor, who was on the run, was apprehended on Saturday in connection with the mysterious death of a Class 9 student in northeast Delhi's Karawal Nagar, police said.

Tusshar (16) was found unconscious by some students in his school bathroom and was taken to a hospital on February 1. He was later referred to the GTB Hospital where he was declared brought dead.

Three students were apprehended in the case on Friday, while one juvenile was on the run. The fourth juvenile was apprehended this evening from Khajuri Khas, they said.

CCTV footage revealed that some students went after him in the washroom, the police said.

They allegedly punched him in the neck and face. It was suspected that the student died of internal injuries sustained during the scuffle, they said.

Three of the students with whom he had a fight were apprehended, a senior police official said, adding that they were minors.

Police said they are probing whether there were other students involved in the scuffle.

The family members of the deceased alleged that he was thrashed by the students, the official said.

On the basis of a complaint by the boy's family, a murder case was registered yesterday.For the Winter Olympics?? February 9-25th in PyeongChang, S Korea.PyeongChang 2018's vision for the 2018 Games is to offer the Olympic Movement and the world of winter sports New Horizons - a legacy of new growth and new potential never seen before. Its Winter Games plan is one of the most compact in Olympic history, it offers a unique stage on which the worlds best athletes can achieve superior performances. With PyeongChangs strategic position in Asia and its access to a young and fast-growing youth market, the 2018 Olympic Winter Games will no doubt expose new generations of potential athletes to the power of winter sport.And this is interesting. Whether the athletes experience the thrill of victory OR the agony of defeat, condoms will be provided."A record-breaking 110,000 condoms have already been donated to the Winter Olympics in South Korea  10,000 more than the number of rubbers distributed in Vancouver in 2012 and Sochi in 2014.With 2,925 men and women set to participate, it averages out to nearly 38 condoms per athlete over the two-week period  though the sheaths will also be available to members of the press and staff.Baskets with condoms will be placed at both mens and womens toilets at athletes village in Pyeongchang and Gangneung, the main press center, the medical village as well as the medical center, organizers told the South China Morning Post." Winter Olympic athletes to be provided with 110,000 condoms - NY Daily NewsTearing into the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka, Prime Minister Narendra Modi today chided it for setting "new records" in corruption and asserted that the countdown for its exit has begun.

"Congress government is at the exit gate," Modi said, as he mounted an all-out attack on the Congress rule at a huge rally here, dubbing it a "10 per cent commission government" and saying criminals were ruling the roost under it.

Modi also referred to the spate of killings of BJP and Hindu activists, an issue the party has brought to the focal point of its discourse, saying, "ease of doing murders" was being discussed in the state while his government talked about ease of doing business.

Slamming the government on the law and order front, Modi said, "instead of the rule of law, the criminals are ruling the roost."



The rally at the sprawling Palace Grounds marked the culmination of the state BJP's 85-day "Parivarthana Yatra" that crisscrossed all the 224 assembly constituencies and virtually sounded the bugle for the coming Assembly polls in the state, due early this year.

The BJP had ruled the state from 2008 to 2013, marked by internal squabbles that saw three Chief Ministers, including BS Yeddyurappa, who quit on graft charge.

The BJP has set a target to win 150-plus seats for the coming polls.

Karnataka is the second major state after Punjab where the Congress is ruling, with BJP going all out to unseat it in the assembly polls as part of its "Congress Mukht Bharat" mission.

Asserting that there was a "saffron wave" in the state, Modi said people of Karnataka had decided to make the state Congress free and to get rid of Congress culture.

"Congress government is a 10 per cent government, where no work happens without paying a commission of 10 per cent.It is a matter of shame if this becomes the identity of a government," he said.

Charging that the state "is setting new records in corruption," Modi said, "Congress-free government means freedom from dynastic rule, nepotism, corruption, and loot."



He also referred to the IT raids at the residences of two state ministers recently and that a raid on a senior Congress leader revealed Benami property and said: "there are steel mafia, sand mafia and transfer mafia' in the state.""Some people hatched a conspiracy to pocket crores of rupees in the name of building a steel bridge. Due to public outrage and BJP's protest, the project was dropped," Modi said.

He was referring to a steel bridge project in the city at a major traffic junction, which was scrapped after public protest.

Referring to a spate of killings of activists of BJP and Sangh Parivar, he said a number of workers associated with BJP and its affiliated organisations have been murdered.

"It is an assault on the social fabric. I appeal to the people of Karnataka to vote against the government which attacks the social fabric of the state."



Modi said, "I am seeing that Karnataka has decided to free Karnataka from Congress. To free from Congress' culture, from society, from public life, from politics."



Congress had "ruined" the society, culture and politics, he said, adding, "I can see that the BJP government in Karnataka is not far away."



While referring to the law and order situation, Modi said, on the one hand, BJP at the Centre was trying to take India forward, while on the other in Karnataka "there is such a government that there is a reverse flow."



He said criminals are ruling the roost in Bengaluru.

"In Bengaluru also criminal elements have caused worry to the common man. You might have felt this."



Modi said "in the whole world there is discussion about ease of doing business and there are efforts in that direction. Our government is making efforts for the ease of doing business and talking about ease of living."



"But with Congress government in Karnataka, here there are discussions regarding ease of doing murders," he said



BJP government means only development while Congress government means corruption, appeasement, casteism and nepotism, Modi said.

Accusing Congress of practising "appeasement politics" on the issue of triple talaq, Modi said, "Congress' vote bank politics has once again come before Muslim women to take away their rights."



"Congress is trying to hang a bill related to triple talaq", he said, also pointing to Congress opposition to grant constitutional status to the OBC commission.

"To take the country to new heights we want to take everyone together and move forward..... Hundreds of lotuses will bloom in Karnataka from the sludge that is spread by Congress. I have confidence that BJPwill get a resounding victory," Modi said in Kannada.

He said the BJP government would take the state in the direction of progress with the motto "Sabka Sath, Sabka Vikas".

The "Parivarthana Yatra" was launched by BJP President Amit Shah on November 2 last year.

According to party leaders, the "Yatra' has traversed over 15,000 km during its journey, aimed at "exposing misdeeds" of the Siddaramaiah government.The Uttar Pradesh Police on Sunday said that the Noida shootout was not an encounter but a case of personal enmity.

While addressing a press conference, Love Kumar, Senior Superintendent of Police, Noida said, "Prima facie it looks like a case of personal enmity. During the probe, it was found that the trainee sub-inspector knew the elder brother of the man who was shot. This is certainly not a case of an encounter. Prima facie it seems a case of personal enmity. We are verifying everything."

The senior official further said that the four policemen involved in the shootout have been suspended and the sub-inspector who fired the gunshots has been sent to jail.

"The four policemen have been suspended with immediate effect. We have seized service revolver of the sub-inspector who fired the gunshots and sent him to jail. Besides sending the accused trainee sub-inspector to jail, the role of other three policemen, two constables and a sub-inspector is being investigated. All four of them remain suspended," said SSP Love Kumar.

"Staff communicated to me that there had been some argument with the man (who was shot) during which the sub-inspector shot at him and they are taking him to the hospital," he added.

Earlier today, the family of Jitendra Yadav family had alleged he was shot in a "fake" encounter by police. The family members had also accused the policemen involved in the incident of targeting the duo because of their caste.

As per the family, four boys were returning from Bahrampur at around 10:30 pm, when the police personnel stopped the vehicle and fired at one of them without any reason.

On Saturday, two people were allegedly shot at by police personnel in Uttar Pradesh's Noida Sector-122.

Among the injured, Jitendra Yadav, who was shot in the neck, is said to be critical, while Sunil has wounded his leg. Yadav is currently admitted at Fortis, where heavy security is deployed at present.Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) general secretary on Saturday said that the party and the Centre would soon be extending the olive branch to Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and leader of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) N Chandrababu Naidu to resolve his concerns in a mutually beneficial to both parties.

Responding to Naidu's expression of disappointment over the Union Budget proposals for 2018-19 not addressing the needs of Andhra Pradesh, Madhav said, "There seems to be some kind of unhappiness, we will talk it out. TDP is an old ally of the BJP. We will talk it out with them and will tell them we are committed to the interests of Andhra Pradesh."

Madhav further said, "We at the BJP are committed not only to address the TDP's concerns with regard to the Budget proposals, but also, all other issues of concern that it may have. We will convince Mr Naidu and the TDP not to think of severing their ties with the BJP or the NDA. They are a valuable ally."

Madhav's response came days after a disappointed Naidu summoned an emergency meeting of his party to decide on the future course of action with regard to the TDP's association with the Bharatiya Janata Party.

An upset TDP pitched its senior leader and union minister Y S Chowdhary to tell the media in no uncertain terms that it was unhappy over no monetary allocation for Andhra Pradesh on many issues such as Polavaram project, funding for the new state capital of Amravati, making Visakhapatnam a zonal railways headquarters and clearance for the Kadappa steel plant project.

Chowdhary had February 1 warned that the TDP had three options before it, namely, (1) either try and continue the alliance (2) make their MPs resign and (3) simply terminate association with the BJP and the NDA.

He said that the TDP executive would in all probability meet on Sunday to take a final decision on the matter. It has been reported that TDP MPs have been called to Vijayawada for a meeting at 10:30 a.m. on Sunday morning.

Last week, Naidu had issued an ultimatum to the BJP about chart its own course if the BJP did not wish to continue with the alliance.

The TDP is the BJP's largest political ally in southern India. Its warning came shortly after another disgruntled ally, the Shiv Sena, publicly slammed the BJP for treating its allies improperly and threatened to sever the partnership.

The TDP is of the view that the 2018 Budget proposals are 'anti-people and corporate friendly', and a betrayal of the interests of Andhra Pradesh. It has said that its concerns are of a serious nature and need to be addressed effectively and promptly.

The TDP, which has been an ally of the BJP and a member of the NDA between 1998 and 2002, and again since 2013 to the present, is reportedly looking at a political alternative in the run-up to the 2019 general elections. It is being reported that the party and Chief Minister Naidu have already carried out an assessment of the pros and cons of a split with the BJP.

Meetings have reportedly been taking place between the leaderships of the two parties, but as of now, the options are few and far, and if the TDP's demands are not met, it could withdraw its members from the union cabinet as a first step.

To improve his vote share Naidu is eyeing the sizeable minority vote in the state. Last time, the Muslim vote had gone to the YSR Congress as the Congress party was seen as a weak rival to keep the BJP away.

The BJP is reportedly concerned about gaining a toehold in South India. It wants to have allies in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.Spirituality and family system are our greatest strengths: Vice President



Addresses second anniversary of Swarna Bharat Trust





The Vice President of India, Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu has said that every citizen of the country must contribute for the welfare of the nation and country will prosper when women, youth and farmers are given their due. He was addressing the gathering at the second anniversary of Swarna Bharat Trust and to inaugurate Mega Health Camp on the occasion of World Cancer Day, in Atkur, Andhra Pradesh today. The judge of the Supreme Court of India, Justice L. Nageswara Rao, the Speaker of Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly, Dr. Kodela Sivaprasad, the Minister for Health and Medical Education, Andhra Pradesh, Dr. Kamineni Sreenivas, Film Hero, Shri Venkatesh and other dignitaries were present on the occasion.

The Vice President said that diseases like cancer require early detection for better treatment. He further said that lifestyle changes, environmental changes are reason for these health problems. We must have adequate facilities for identifying health problems to provide medicines on time, he added.

The Vice President asked everyone to understand the meaning of life and purpose of our life and asked people to realise the potential of the country's heritage and culture. India a capital of spirituality, spirituality and family system are our greatest strengths, this system is a model for the whole world, he added.

The Vice President said that corruption has become a dreaded concern of the society and is spreading like a cancer spoiling nation's development. He further said that honest practices must come into system. Everyone must do their duty to make the country mighty, he said asking the young gathering to work for the all round development of the nation, he added.We must promote a greater understanding and appreciation of cultural diversity around the world: Vice President



Inaugurates 1st International Kala Mela





The Vice President of India, Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu has said that we must collectively promote, through events like International Kala Mela, a greater understanding and appreciation of the cultural diversity around the world. He was addressing the gathering after inaugurating the 1st International Kala Mela, organized by the Lalit Kala Akademi, here today. The Minister of State for Culture (I/C) and Environment, Forest & Climate Change, Dr. Mahesh Sharma, the Administrator of Lalit Kala Akademi, Shri C.S. Krishna Setty and other dignitaries were present on the occasion.

The Vice President said that the culture is like the heartbeat of a civilization and it is an expression of its world view, a symbol of its value system. He further said that it represents the hopes and aspirations of its people and it chronicles the saga of their lives. It springs from the depths of their hearts and touches the inner core of humanity and is truly the barometer of the quality of life, he added.

The Vice President welcomed the delegates from various countries, and said to a country that had believed that the entire world is like one large family. It is also a country that believed that we should treat our guests with reverence Atithi Devobhava, he added.

The Vice President said that India is one of the oldest civilizations with an unmatched richness in culture and heritage which are manifested in different art forms. The spirit of tolerance and accommodation is an Indian way of life and best encapsulated by the principle of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam (the entire universe is one family), he added.

The Vice President said that as the world is becoming increasingly globalized, we should preserve and propagate the best facets of our individual cultures. We should bring out the best traditions, noble ideals and the finest expressions of human excellence in all art forms, he added.

The Vice President congratulated the Lalit Kala Akademi for fostering cultural contacts within the country and also with other countries, through art exhibition and such Art Festivals.

Following is the text of Vice Presidents address :

I am extremely happy to be amidst you to inaugurate the first International Kala Mela, which will showcase and celebrate various art and cultural forms from across India and abroad by providing a platform to artists from different genres. This indeed is a major international event of its kind and I must congratulate the organizers for holding it.

Sisters and brothers,

I recall what Mahatma Gandhi, who is reverentially called the Father of our nation, said about culture:

A nations culture resides in the hearts and in the soul of its people".

In essence, it is like the heartbeat of a civilization. It is an expression of its world view. It is a symbol of its value system. It represents the hopes and aspirations of its people. It chronicles the saga of their lives. It springs from the depths of their hearts and touches the inner core of humanity. It is truly the barometer of the quality of life.

Each country in the world has its own distinct culture. There is a unique richness in each of these cultures. Since we live in an interconnected world, there has been an intermingling of cultures. Our world is richer because of this diversity in cultures.

Gandhi ji had also said:

No culture can live if it attempts to be exclusive."

We must collectively promote, through events like the one we are having today, a greater understanding and appreciation of the cultural diversity around the world.

Friends from different countries around the world!

Let me welcome you to India, a country that had believed that the entire world is like one large family. It is also a country that believed that we should treat our guests with reverence Atithi Devobhava.

India is one of the oldest civilizations with an unmatched richness in culture and heritage which are manifested in different art forms. Indeed, India is a cultural melting pot in which people from different religions, languages and ethnicities co-exist reflecting their unity in diversity. The spirit of tolerance and accommodation is an Indian way of life and best encapsulated by the principle of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam (the entire universe is one family).

The cultural diversity of India from cuisine to various performing arts is represented by the distinct flavor of each region. Various musical genres, dance forms, plays, dramas, folk theatre, paintings, architecture and songs are as diverse as different flowers in a bouquet.

Culture and creativity manifest themselves in almost all economic, social and other activities. It can be a positive force that gives meaning to human life.

Dear Sisters and brothers,

We are inheritors of a rich intangible cultural heritage consisting of songs, music, dance, theatre, folk traditions, performing arts, rites and rituals, paintings and writings.

As the world is becoming increasingly globalized, we should preserve and propagate the best facets of our individual cultures. We should bring out the best traditions, noble ideals and the finest expressions of human excellence in all art forms. We have a unique opportunity today through technology to learn from each other, appreciate the subtle nuances of artistic expressions and enrich our collective cultural capital.

I urge all of you to continue your artistic pursuits and create a world of literature, music, dance, paintings, sculpture, architecture and other art forms.

I congratulate the Lalit Kala Akademi for fostering cultural contacts within the country and also with other countries, through art exhibition and such Art Festivals.

Sisters and brothers,

Let me mention to you that in the grand Indian tradition, there are 64 kala"s or fine arts. We believe that goddess Lalitha is an embodiment of these fine arts. She is called chatus-shasti- kalaamayi". She is also kalyani", an embodiment of well being and happiness. It is this unique blend of kala" with kalyana" that we should aspire for. Let us strive for a world where art unites hearts. Let us avoid distracting cacophony and, together, create a symphony that makes our lives more livable.

As the Upanishadic sages in India said centuries ago: Let us hear all that is pleasant, let us see all that is beautiful and with strong bodies and sound minds, dedicate ourselves to the pursuit of common good".

Thank you. Jai Hind."Unilever brought its Rexona deodorant to China a decade ago, dreaming of a market with 2.6 billion armpits. Wages were rising, consumers were spending and the run-up to the 2008 Beijing Olympics was making Chinese people feel more cosmopolitan. More of them, it stood to reason, would be open to a Western hygiene product. We had created established markets for Rexona from scratch in many countries, and we did not see any reason why we couldnt do the same in China, Frank Braeken, Unilevers former China head, said by telephone from Dubai, where he now works as an ...One problem the brilliant minds at Google have yet to solve: How to beat Amazon.com at its own game. It isnt for a lack of trying. Over the last couple of years, the internet search giant has aggressively built up its own cloud-computing business and pumped out its own line of smart speaker productstwo relatively new businesses that have been wildly successful for Amazon.

And that hasnt been without some success on Googles part. Its cloud-computing arm is now generating more than $1 billion in revenue every quarter. And its Home line of smart speakers now ...Trump took to Twitter on Saturday and said, "This memo totally vindicates "Trump" in probe. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. There was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!"

The memo also includes information which could complicate Trump and his allies efforts to undermine special counsel Robert Mueller's inquiry, said local reports.

The possibility of firing Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and Special Counsel Robert Mueller also aroused after the release of the memo.

An official of the White House on Saturday, however, said that there were no discussions about firing United States Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.

The Democrats, in a letter, said Trump that using the Republican memo as a "pretext" to fire Rosenstein or Special Counsel Robert Mueller would spark a "constitutional crisis".

"We write to inform you that we would consider such an unwarranted act as an attempt to obstruct justice in the Russia investigation. Firing Rod Rosenstein, DOJ (Department of Justice) leadership or Bob Mueller could result in a constitutional crisis...," the Democrats said in a letter to the President.

White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah said, "I'm saying it on behalf of the White House, and that's that no changes are going to be made at the Department of Justice."

"There are no discussions or consideration of firing Rod Rosenstein," the official said to local media.

The controversial Nunes memo was released on Friday after Trump gave a green signal to it.

"I think it's a disgrace. A lot of people should be ashamed of themselves," Trump said in Oval Office after approving the memo.

The decision clears the way for the Intelligence Committee to release the memo, reported The Hill.

"It was declassified and let's see what happens," Trump added.

In a rare public statement on Wednesday, the FBI had said: "We are gravely concerned that critical facts are missing from the documents and has painted an inaccurate picture of how the bureau sought approval to conduct surveillance in the probe."

The probe grew out of the FBI's Russia investigation after Trump fired FBI director James Comey and Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the investigation.

Russia, however, has denied meddling in the election campaign and Trump has called Mueller's probe a "political witch hunt".Mount Everest is the tallest mountain in the world, but precisely how tall is it? Its not such a simple question. In the past, geologists have disagreed about what to include in their calculations: Should the summits snowcap be included? Or should surveyors drill down to the peaks rock base? What about the recent earthquakes in Nepal, which geologists believe shrunk the mountain by about three centimeters, or a little more than an inch? Or the fact that wind speed affects how much snow covers the summit at any given time? Then there is the challenge of ...At least two women have been killed and five others injured in a roadside explosion in Afghanistan's Gelan district.

Tolo News quoted Ghazni officials on Sunday as saying that the incident took place on Saturday after a civilian vehicle hit the Improvised explosive device (IED).

The injured were rushed to the hospital for medical assistance.

The victims were the members of the same family.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)At least two people were killed and 50 others injured after a passenger train collided with a freight train in South Carolina on Sunday morning.

The CNN quoted authorities said the collision occurred near Charleston Highway and Pine Ridge Road.

Amtrak in a statement said, the accident happened due to the derailment of the lead engine and some passenger cars.

The train was operating between New York and Miami, and had 139 passengers and eight crew members on board, it added.

The injured were rushed to a nearby hospital for medical assistance.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)At least 32 Pakistani nationals were aboard the ship that had recently capsized off the coast of Libya, Pakistan's Foreign Office said on Sunday.

"There were 32 Pakistanis among 80 to 90 people aboard the boat," Foreign Office spokesman Dr. Mohammad Faisal said in a statement.

He added that officials of the Pakistani mission had reached the site on the same day (February 01), Geo News reported.

Faisal said information on the deceased Pakistani nationals was made available on the Foreign Office's website. He added that four Pakistani nationals have not been identified yet.

"Efforts are being made to bring bodies of deceased Pakistani citizens, for which funds have been provided to the embassy," Faisal maintained.

On Saturday, Faisal confirmed that 16 Pakistani nationals, out of the 90 people had died in the shipwreck.

At least 90 migrants were reportedly feared drowned off the coast of Libya after their boat capsized last Thursday, according to the International Organisation for Migration (IOM).

The IOM stated that the shipwreck did not occur due to inclement weather as the sea was calm. It said that most of the migrants were believed to be Pakistani nationals.

The IOM added that out of the ten bodies recovered, two of them were Libyans, while the remaining eight were Pakistanis during the initial rescue operations.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday said condition of Tripura under the ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist) has been very poor.

Underlining the fact that 66 percent people in Tripura cannot even afford a cycle, Singh, while addressing an election rally in Agartala, said, "If one compares present situation in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh to what it was 15 years back, they'll know how development is done, they'll know what is the art of development, after 25-years of CPIM's government, 66 percent of the people here cannot even afford a cycle."

Singh, on the occasion, also raked the murder case of journalist Sudip Datta Bhowmik and assured a CBI inquiry in the matter.

Underlining the fact that CPIM did not take any action in connection with the murder of the scribe, the Home Minister said, "There should be CBI investigation in the murder of journalists in Tripura. Till state government hasn't recommend it, if our government comes to power in the state within a week we will initiate CBI probe in Sudip Datta Bhowmik case."

Tripura assembly elections will be held on February 18. The results of all the same will be declared on March 3.

BJP-IPFT alliance is eyeing to oust the Left Front government which has been in power since 1993.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)At least eight militants affiliated to terror outfit Taliban have been killed during "Alburz 12" operation in Chamtal district of Afghan's northern Balkh province. In addition, 12 other militants were wounded, TOLO News reported.

"Two Afghan security forces were also wounded in the clashes," a spokesman for the military in the north of Afghanistan Nastratullah Jamshidi said.

The Taliban has not commented on it by far.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Afghanistan's Ministry of Defence said on Sunday that at least one hundred militants were killed by the security forces in the past 24 hours across the country.

Tolo News quoted ministry spokesman Dawlat Waziri as saying that an operation was carried out in Faryab, Kandahar, Ghazni, Nangarhar, Helmand, Maidan Wardak and Logar provinces.

He further said several weapons have also been seized.

The operation was conducted after three major militant attacks had taken place in Kabul during the past two weeks.

Since January 20, militants have stormed a luxury hotel, bombed a crowded street and raided a military compound in Kabul, killing more than 130 people.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Bangladesh elite force Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) has recovered 10 Chinese-made rockets, firearms among other arms and ammunition from a forest that lies close to the Tripura border.

Three cases have been registered regarding the same.

The firearms were found hidden in bunkers on Saturday, during a search conducted in a remote forest of Satchhari Park, Bangladesh.

Mufti Mahamud Khan, director of RAB's legal and media wing, told reporters that one of their teams began the search operation on Friday, following a tip-off from the force's detective wing.

It is suspected that the weapons were being stocked by the banned militant group of Tripura, All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF) which has its headquarters in Satchhari.

In 2014, RAB had found a huge amount of arms and ammunition, including seized mortar shells, rocket launchers, machine guns and other explosives, from the same area hidden in similar bunkers.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Congress leader Anand Sharma on Sunday criticised the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for defaming his party by raking the Bofors case.

"BJP has been carrying this political campaign to defame opposition. Investigation has been done, Judiciary has already given verdict. It is a tactic by Modi Government to deflect attention from their failure," Sharmasaid while addressing the media here.

He called it a 'non issue' and added that they (BJP) are 'flogging a dead horse'.

Delhi's Tis Hazari Court will hear arguments in Bofors pay-off scam case on February 17, after a fresh application, submitted by Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), sought further investigation on the same

On February 2, the CBI moved the Supreme Court challenging the 2005 Delhi High Court's order, which quashed charges against the accused in the scam, saying that certain new material has surfaced in the case that needs further investigation.

The Rs. 64-crore Bofors scam, relating to alleged payment of kickbacks in the procurement of howitzer artillery guns, dates back to 1980s and 1990s when the Congress was in power with Rajiv Gandhi as the prime minister.

The then central government had signed a 1.4-billion dollar defence deal with Swedish arms manufacturer Bofors for the sale of 410 field howitzer guns and a supply contract almost twice that amount.

In April 1987, the Swedish Radio had claimed that the company paid bribes to senior Indian politicians and Army personnel to secure the deal. Gandhi was also implicated in the case.

In 1990, the CBI booked then president of Bofors, Martin Ardbo, alleged middleman Win Chadda and the Hinduja brothers under charges of criminal conspiracy, cheating and forgery under the Indian Penal Code, as well as for corruption.

The first charge sheet was filed in the case in 1999.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Sunday that the Congress' countdown has begun, and it would soon be shown the "exit door" in Karnataka.

"Your enthusiasm shows that the countdown of Congress to make an exit has begun. Congress is standing at the exit gate in Karnataka. It has caused destruction here and Karnataka does not need a Congress culture," he said while addressing an election rally in Bengaluru.

In a veiled attack at the Siddaramaih-led Karnataka government, the Prime Minister said people of the state have not received the benefits of Centre's funds.

"Can you see the funds provided by the centre utilised properly in Karnataka? Can you see the benefits of funds provided by the centre to Karnataka?" he asked the attendees.

He further trained guns at the Congress over agrarian issues and said during its regime, farmers have had to face a lot of trouble.

The legislative assembly election in Karnataka will be held in April-May this year to elect members of the 224 constituencies in the state.

Currently, Siddaramaih-led Congress government is in the power in the state.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has arrested a Registrar and a lawyer of Delhi Dental Council in an alleged bribery case of approximately Rs 4,73,000.

The accused Registrar Dr Rishi Raj and Advocate N Pradeep Sharma were produced in Delhi's Competent Court and remanded to four days of police custody.

Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Kumar Jain has also come under the scanner after relevant documents in his name were recovered during the raid by the CBI at the residence and office of the Registrar on Sunday.

The CBI registered a case under Sections 7 (illegal gratification taken by public servant) and 8 (taking illegal gratification to influence public servant) of the Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act and Section 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), after a dentist filed a complaint alleging the accused demanded a bribe of Rs 4.73 lakhs in return for favourable order from the council and for extending help in further legal proceedings in his matter.

Acting upon the complaint, the investigative agency laid a trap and caught the accused while demanding and accepting a bribe of Rs. 4.73 lakh from the complainant.

During the raids, around Rs 24 lakh in cash and a half kg of gold were recovered along with alleged documents relating to the Health Minister.

The documents recovered are of three properties, including two sale deeds and one Power of Attorney (POA) of land properties in Delhi's Karala Village.

In addition, one deposit slip book of IDBI Bank was recovered that contained counterfoils detailing cheque deposits of approximately Rs 2 crores during the year 2011, in the name of Jain, his family members as well as in the name of the companies wherein he was serving as Director.

Forty-one chequebooks in the name of Jain, his wife, and in the name of a private estate firm were also recovered.

Further investigation is underway.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Retired Army Captain Ravindra Kumar Bali, who used to reside on the foothpath near Pune Cantonment was found dead on late Thursday night.

Bali was bludgeoned to death by unknown miscreants between 12 a.m. to 1 a.m, informed the police.

The police said a cement bock was used to murder the 65 -year-old.

Police suspects that the victim was attacked for money.

"The watchman of a bungalow, who saw two people assaulting Bali and fleeing from the scene, alerted the police," said a Lashkar police officer.

As per reports, Bali was an officer of batch of 1970 and was posted at engineering department in the Defence Academy (NDA) Pune.

He also worked with some IT companies, but was living on the footpath of Pune Cantonment area.

He was not in contact with his family or any relative. The police informed that nobody was willing to accept Bali's body.

Bail's funeral will be conducted on February 5 at Sasoon Hospital Pune.

An FIR has been registered in this regard.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)United States President Donald Trump said that the Nunes memo revealed how the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) were used to influence the presidential elections in 2016.

The President alleged that the FBI became a "tool of anti-Trump political actors" and dismissed it be a non-partisan enforcer of the law.

In a series of tweets, he said, "The four page memo released Friday reports the disturbing fact about how the FBI and FISA appear to have been used to influence the 2016 election and its aftermath....The FBI failed to inform the FISA court that the Clinton campaign had funded the dossier....the FBI became...."

"a tool of anti-Trump political actors. This is unacceptable in a democracy and ought to alarm anyone who wants the FBI to be a nonpartisan enforcer of the law....The FBI wasn't straight with Congress, as it hid most of these facts from investigators." Wall Street Journal", he said in another tweet.

Earlier on Saturday, the President had also claimed total vindication from the memo released and alleged that the FBI misused its surveillance powers during the probe of Russian meddling in the elections.

He also called the investigation "an American disgrace".

He tweeted, "This memo totally vindicates "Trump" in probe. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!"

The memo also includes information which could complicate Trump and his allies efforts to undermine special counsel Robert Mueller's inquiry, said local reports.

The possibility of firing Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and Special Counsel Robert Mueller also aroused after the release of the memo.

An official of the White House on Saturday, however, said that there were no discussions about firing United States Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.

The Democrats, in a letter, said Trump that using the Republican memo as a "pretext" to fire Rosenstein or Special Counsel Robert Mueller would spark a "constitutional crisis".

"We write to inform you that we would consider such an unwarranted act as an attempt to obstruct justice in the Russia investigation. Firing Rod Rosenstein, DOJ (Department of Justice) leadership or Bob Mueller could result in a constitutional crisis...," the Democrats said in a letter to the President.

White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah said, "I'm saying it on behalf of the White House, and that's that no changes are going to be made at the Department of Justice."

"There are no discussions or consideration of firing Rod Rosenstein," the official said to local media.

The controversial Nunes memo was released on Friday after Trump gave a green signal to it.

"I think it's a disgrace. A lot of people should be ashamed of themselves," Trump said in Oval Office after approving the memo.

The decision clears the way for the Intelligence Committee to release the memo, reported The Hill.

"It was declassified and let's see what happens," Trump added.

In a rare public statement on Wednesday, the FBI had said: "We are gravely concerned that critical facts are missing from the documents and has painted an inaccurate picture of how the bureau sought approval to conduct surveillance in the probe."

The probe grew out of the FBI's Russia investigation after Trump fired FBI director James Comey and Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the investigation.

Russia, however, has denied meddling in the election campaign and Trump has called Mueller's probe a "political witch hunt".

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Prompt and timely rescue operation by the Indian Air Force (IAF) has helped save many lives in the Budhal bus accident that killed three persons and injured 20 others on Saturday.

A minibus on way to Kotranka from Budhal fell in a ditch in Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir after the driver lost control.

The nearest Airforce Station at Jammu was alerted and an immediate sortie for casualty evacuation was planned.

Wing Commander Vishal during the sortie planning process found that the helipad at Budhal was too small and unfit for the Russian Mi-17 1V helicopters he flies.

He suggested that the casualties be brought to Rajouri by road as soon as possible and the air evacuation could be effected from Rajouri. The plan was agreed upon and the captain with his team took off for Rajouri helipad, a bigger and better-equipped helipad.

Upon landing at Rajouri the crew had to wait for the casualties to be brought to Rajouri by road. Some casualties expired during the journey.

The helicopter with casualties and their near and dear ones took off from Rajouri helipad and landed at Jammu.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Indrani Mukerjea, the prime accused in the Sheena Bora murder case, is likely to be produced before a Delhi court on Monday in connection with the INX media case.

A Mumbai Court on Friday allowed a production warrant against Indrani from Delhi's Patiala House Court after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) told the court that there were discrepancies in the income tax details of INX Media.

A special court for the ED cases in Delhi had directed that she be produced before it.

The ED had earlier registered a case against INX Media, its founder Peter Mukerjea and his wife Indrani under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

INX Media has been accused of violating Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) guidelines while receiving investments from Mauritius.

Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram's son Karti is also an accused in the case, which relates to FIPB approval granted in 2006 for receipt of funds by INX Media.

The Mukerjeas are currently facing a trial in Mumbai for conspiring to kill Sheena Bora, Indrani's daughter from an earlier marriage, in April 2012.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Investigation Agency (NIA) arrested a Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) cadre here on Sunday.

The arrested worker has been identified as 22- year-old Mahfooz Alam, a resident of Bihar's Gopalganj district.

Alam is accused of providing logistic and financial support to another LeT cadre, Naeem, said the NIA.

Alma was arrested from Delhi and produced before the NIA Special Court today, which sent him to two-day police custody.

In connection with LeT's activities, the investigative agency also conducted searches at two suspected hawala operators in Uttar Pradesh and seized Rs 15 lakh and Rs 32.84 lakh along with some other documents.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)In a big blow to democracy and civilian rule in the Maldives, President Mohammed Yameen (give full name) has put the army on alert and refused to follow the orders of the Supreme Court to reinstate sacked 12 opposition Members if Parliament or allow the release of other detained prisoners.

Earlier on Sunday, Chief Justice Hassan Saeed rejected the government's petition for review, saying the latter has to first implement the apex court's order and only then seek a review.

With the political crisis in the Maldives showing no signs of abating, the chief justice has reportedly also received threats to his life via anonymous telephone calls.

Ahmed Mahloof, spokesperson of the joint opposition, told ANI over phone, "We are deeply worried that the security of the chief justice and other judges has been withdrawn. The government should stop intimidating the judges. President Yameen is threatening the judges using the security forces. It is a threat to democracy as we have been always calling for an independent judiciary".

Fearing for his life, the chief justice has taken shelter in the Supreme Court and will be spending the night there. Along with him are Justice Ali Handed and Judicial Administrator Hassan Saeed.

During the day, police forcibly broke into and entered the house of Hassan Saeed while he was in court, breaking his house lock.

Eva Abdullah, a member of Parliament told ANI, "We are seeing escalation of crackdown, and are very fearful of increased unrest. When the attorney general and the chief of defense openly defy the Supreme Court, we are in unprecedented territory".

She added, "President Yameen's refusal to implement the ruling puts him outside his constitutional mandate. He is now ruling unlawfully".

Ali Zahir, deputy leader of the Adalat Party, said, "Yes, I have learnt that the Supreme Court judges are getting life threats. Perhaps, there is an atmosphere of absolute fear and no hope for democracy or rule of law. Furthermore, the nation is heading for a dictatorship as the acting police commissioner, the chief of the defence forces and the attorney general have said they will not abide by the court's orders."

On Sunday evening, opposition Members of Parliament held a joint meeting and decided to lead a massive protest against President Mohammed Yameen.Demanding justice and a return of the rule of law, they called for the immediate release of all political prisoners.

Abdullah Riyaz, a former Commissioner of Police said, "People of Maldives are demanding the President to step down. We don't have faith in him because he did not respect the constitution and judiciary".

An absolute fear has gripped the island, in anticipation of a major showdown.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)In the ongoing political crisis in the Maldives, 12 reinstated Maldivian parliamentary members managed to enter the Parliament premises in Male on Sunday despite the military blockade.

Maldives' Supreme Court on Thursday had ordered to reinstate the 12 MPs who were previously stripped of their seats to give the opposition coalition a majority in parliament, which has the power to impeach the president.

The court also ordered for the immediate release of nine high-profile prisoners including former Maldivian president Mohamed Nasheed and former Maldivian vice president Ahmed Adeeb.

However, President Abdulla Yameen refused to obey the order, throwing the country into crisis.

Also, Maldivian authorities on Saturday announced an indefinite postponement of parliamentary session

Earlier today, the Maldives police allegedly used force and pepper spray on a group of people gathered outside Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed's residence in Male to stop his arrest.

There were scuffles between the protesters trying to protect the chief justice from getting arrested and the police dressed in riot gear outside the senior judge's residence.

However, the police denied the reports that they entered his house and arrested him.

"Reports about police entering the chief justice's residence and that he was arrested are not true," they tweeted.

Describing the ordeal, Eva Abdulla, Member of Parliament of the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP), told ANI over the phone, "Absolute breakdown of law and order. The public is on the edge. I am very concerned as we are facing increased unrest. They (police) have just used pepper spray and tear gas on the crowd."

Eva added, "We need our neighbours, especially India to do all that it can to impress upon the government of Maldives to implement the SC ruling."

The Maldives has been in a state of turmoil since 2015 when Nasheed, the first democratically elected president of the country, was arrested on "terrorism" charges, relating to the arrest of a judge during his tenure.

The arrest had led to widespread protests across the country and resulted in the arrest of hundreds of dissidents. The apex court had sentenced Nasheed to 13 years in prison.

In 2016, Nasheed sought political asylum in the United Kingdom (UK) after travelling there on medical leave from prison.

Ten years ago, the Maldives became a multiparty democracy, after three decades of autocratic rule of former strongman and Yameen's half-brother Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The police took to Twitter and said in Dhivehi, "Reports about police entering the Chief Justice's residence and that he was arrested is not true."

The police made the statement after rumours of his arrest spread in the country.

The current political unrest in the Maldives took a new turn when agitators massively protested outside Chief Justice Saeed's house in Male late on Saturday.

Reportedly, there were scuffles between the protesters and police in riot gear outside the Chief Justice's residence.

The agitators are trying to force Justice Saeed and another supreme justice, Ali Hameed to resign.

Eva Abdulla, Member of Parliament, of the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) describing the ordeal told ANI over the phone, "Absolute breakdown of law and order. The public is on the edge. I am very concerned as we are facing increased unrest. They (police) have just used pepper spray and tear gas on the crowd."

Meanwhile, Justice Saeed said, "We need our neighbours, especially India to do all that it can to impress upon the Govt of Maldives to implement the SC ruling."

Agitators in the Maldivian capital on Saturday opened the gate of Maafushi Prison, where the 12 parliamentary members have been kept in detention, but did not enter inside.

The prison officers came in their riot gears and tried to control the agitators in Male. Later, the National Defence Force also came in their riot gears.

Protests continued in the Maldivian capital as President Abdulla Yameen refused to follow the Maldivian Supreme Court's ruling to release key political prisoners and reinstate the 12 parliamentary members.

This decision has pushed the island nation into a crisis with the likelihood of emergency being declared, as Yameen has got the first session of parliament of 2018 (scheduled for February 5) cancelled, sensing that the opposition will be in majority because of the apex court order.

On Thursday, the Supreme Court acquitted former Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed and former Maldivian Vice President Ahmed Adeeb along with 12 other parliamentary members.

The court ordered the immediate release of high-profile prisoners and held that "the prisoners were free until fair trials could be conducted without undue influence".

The order given on late Thursday evening could be a major blow to the Maldivian President, who has a tight grip on power, controlling institutions like the judiciary, police and the bureaucracy.

The main opposition party, the MDP hailed the ruling and described it as a "death knell for President Yameen's corrupt and criminal dictatorship".

Yameen took over as the president after winning a controversial runoff against Nasheed.

The Maldives was plagued by political unrest in 2015 when Nasheed, the first democratically elected president of the country, was arrested on "terrorism" charges, relating to the arrest of a judge during his tenure.

The arrest led to widespread protests across the country and resulted in the arrest of hundreds of dissidents. The apex court had sentenced Nasheed to 13 years in prison.

In 2016, Nasheed also sought political asylum in the United Kingdom after travelling there on medical leave from prison.

Ten years ago, the Maldives became a multiparty democracy, after three decades of autocratic rule of former strongman and Yameen's half-brother Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Maldives police has allegedly used force and pepper spray on a group of people gathered outside Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed's residence in Male to stop his arrest.

"#Maldives Police use pepper spray to disperse the protesters," tweeted Maldives Voice.

Moreover, in a video posted on the Twitter handle of Maldives Voice, the police was also seen obstructing the media.

There were scuffles between the protesters trying to protect the Chief Justice from getting arrested and the police dressed in riot gear outside the former's residence.

However, the police denied the reports that they entered his house and arrested him.

"Reports about police entering the Chief Justice's residence and that he was arrested is not true," they tweeted.

Describing the ordeal, Eva Abdulla, Member of Parliament of the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP), told ANI over the phone, "Absolute breakdown of law and order. The public is on the edge. I am very concerned as we are facing increased unrest. They (police) have just used pepper spray and tear gas on the crowd."

Eva added, "We need our neighbours, especially India to do all that it can to impress upon the Govt of Maldives to implement the SC ruling."

Protests continued in the Maldivian capital as President Abdulla Yameen refused to follow the Maldivian Supreme Court's ruling to release former Maldivian president Mohamed Nasheed and former Maldivian vice president Ahmed Adeeb along with 12 other parliamentary members.

Yameen had taken over as the President after winning a controversial runoff against Nasheed.

The Maldives was plagued by political unrest in 2015 when Nasheed, the first democratically elected president of the country, was arrested on "terrorism" charges, relating to the arrest of a judge during his tenure.

The arrest had led to widespread protests across the country and resulted in the arrest of hundreds of dissidents. The apex court had sentenced Nasheed to 13 years in prison.

In 2016, Nasheed had sought political asylum in the United Kingdom (UK) after travelling there on medical leave from prison.

Ten years ago, the Maldives became a multiparty democracy, after three decades of autocratic rule of former strongman and Yameen's half-brother Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Mrs India Asia International, Mansi Gulati who is also a Yoga enthusiast on Sunday organised a yoga session at Charminar in Hyderabad.

This yoga was to unite the Hindu and Muslims, says the Yoga practitioner.

Mansi Gulati told ANI, "This yoga session is specially organised to unite Hindu and Muslim. We are even planning to conduct more such sessions at different monuments of the city and even country. "

Meanwhile, people who had participated in the yoga session expressed their happiness on attending the session.

"I really enjoyed the yoga session today and I will continue practicing yoga. I will even tell my friends to do," said a visitor.

"Today is the first time tried yoga and I really felt refreshed. I will continue to practice it," said another visitor.

Mansi has travelled across the country and taught yoga to a cross-section of people including State heads, Governors, school children, housewives, jail inmates.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)North Korea on Sunday slammed United States President Donald Trump's recent State of the Union (SOTU) address as "heights of arrogance" and "arbitrariness", according to its state media.

A North Korean ministry spokesperson said that it would deter Trump's "sinister intention" to do something about its regime, the Yonhap news agency reported.

"Trump described last year as a year fully recorded with incredible progress and extraordinary success," the agency quoted spokesman as saying. "This is indeed the height of Trump-style arrogance, arbitrariness and self-conceit," the spokesperson said in a statement.

"The whole is deeply concerned, seeing as an omen of new disaster the address of Trump who asserted 'America First' and 'unmatched power' based on nuclear weapons while forcing other countries to submit themselves to the U.S. chauvinistic interest," the statement further read.

North Korea criticised Trump for "revealing hostility" toward the country and reasserted that it would defend itself and deter the threat with its "nuclear force".

"Our self-reliant defence capability with the nuclear force as its backbone will, however, completely deter Trump and his lackeys from showing off on the Korean peninsula," the statement continued.

In his first SOTU address on Wednesday, Trump took a swipe on North Korea as he underscored the "cruel dictatorship" in the reclusive country.

United States President Donald Trump and his South Korean counterpart Moon Jae-in spoke over the phone on Friday and agreed to address the human rights violations in North Korea.

Trump met with a group of North Korean defectors at the Oval Office in White House on Friday and discussed ways to end the nuclear programme of North Korea and highlighted the human right abuses of the country as well.

The US and North Korea have long been engaged in back-and-forth barbs over the latter's threat of a nuclear attack.

Trump threatened to rain "fire and fury" on North Korea and also called Kim Jong-un as "Little Rocket Man", while North Korea denounced Trump as a "mentally deranged US dotard.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Andhra Pradesh Minister of State for Science and Technology Y. S. Chowdary on Sunday that the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) will continue to press the Centre for more funds for the state.

"During the meeting of Union Budget, no allocations to Andhra Pradesh were discussed. We will continue to press the centre for it. We will also raise the matter in the Parliament, if it is needed," said Chowdary while addressing the media after a crucial meeting Telugu Desam Party (TDP).

He also said that Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu has not spoken to Shiv Sena, another rebel party that recently announced that it would contest the 2019 Maharashtra Assembly and Lok Sabha elections alone.

"Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu did not speak to Shiv Sena. There has been no communication between Amit Shah and the chief minister either," Chowdary added.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president N Chandrababu Naidu held a crucial meeting with the party MPs, senior MLAs and leaders in Amaravati on Sunday.

The meeting was reportedly called to review the party's ties with its ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Naidu is apparently upset with the saffron party over the poor allocation for the state in the Union Budget 2018 that was presented on February 1 by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Sunday informed that an oil tanker with 22 Indian nationals onboard is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.

MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar in a tweet said, "A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo-Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea."



A merchant vessel Marine Express (oil tanker), owned by Mumbai-based Anglo Eastern shipping company with 22 Indian nationals onboard, is presumably missing off the coast of Benin in the Gulf of Guinea.  Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) February 3, 2018

He informed that the Indian authorities based in Nigeria have sought their help in locating the missing oil tanker.

"Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860," he informed in another tweet.



Our Mission in Abuja (Nigeria) is in touch with the authorities in Benin and Nigeria for their help in locating the ship and is constantly monitoring the situation. A 24-hour helpline number set up by the Embassy for information on those missing is +234-9070343860  Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) February 3, 2018

The owners of the tanker, which was loaded with gas oil, have urged the Directorate General of Shipping in Mumbai to get in touch with their counterparts in Nigeria and Benin to carry out search operations for the merchant ship.

According to reports, the ship vanished from West Africa and a possibility of hijack is high.

Meanwhile, Nigerian authorities have alerted all boats to look out for the missing tanker ship and if sighted to report to the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) Anti-Piracy Reporting Centre immediately in London.Thousands of Pashtuns gathered outside the press club in Islamabad and chanted Azadi (Freedom) slogans by highlighting human rights violations against the community.

They undertook a Long March demanding justice for Naqeeb Mahsood, a Pashtun killed in a fake police encounter on January 13 in Karachi.

Police had also put forged charges against Naqeeb with having links with terrorist groups like Jashkar-e-Jhangvi and Islamic State of Syria and Iraq.

The false claim was challenged by the family and relatives of Naqeeb Mahsood and subsequently an inquiry commission was established by the government of Sindh province to investigate the police encounter.

The investigation team has announced Naqeeb innocent and killed in fake police encounter.

Youth from Waziristan started a long march from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on January 26 against the ongoing slow motion Pashtun genocide in Pakistan, human rights violations in FATA and State imposed terrorism and militarism.

Protesters loudly chanted slogans criticizing Pakistan's security agencies for harbouring, sheltering and conducting terrorism in FATA and Afghanistan, aimed at de-Pashtunisation and undermining US led war on terror.

The Long March was joined by more than 10,000 Pashtuns from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan provinces.

A protester said, this is a beginning of the movement against the barbarism which this government is committing for the past 15 years in FATA, Waziristan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Today, we have announced that we will not going to face this barbarism anymore".

Another protester said while addressing a gathering, "the people of this region are not the terrorists, but this government is a terrorist, which represents the elite class of Punjab".

Several tribal elders from Waziristan also addressed the procession and said Pakistan's security forces have been planting landmines and bombs in the area, taking lives of children and animals.

They called on the United Nations and US led international community to take immediate notice of Pakistan sponsored terrorism, human rights violations and slow motion Pashtun genocide in FATA.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)A miscreant has been injured during a police encounter in Uttar Pradesh's Sitapur.

A team led by SHO, Telangana was conducting night patrolling on Saturday when a group of three miscreants came on a motorcycle and started firing at them.

The police retaliated during which one of the miscreants suffered a bullet injury.

The injured criminal has been identified as Rohit Singh, who was on the wanted list of the police for killing a 'gram pradhan'.

He carried a cash reward of Rs 10,000 on his head.

The police is raiding the area to nab the other two criminals, who managed to flee from the spot.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)During a fierce fight with the forces of President Bashar al-Assad and his foreign backers, a Russian fighter jet was shot down by Syrian rebels in northern Syria's Idlib province.

The pilot of the warplane Su-25 was later killed on the ground by the rebels, said the Russian defence ministry.

Initial reports said that a portable ground-to-air missile was used to hit the plane in an area under the control of al-Qaida's Syrian link, the Guardian cited the Ministry as saying.

Although the rebels wanted to capture the pilot alive, he was shot when he opened fire at them.

The pilot has not been identified yet.

Russia has lost four warplanes, four helicopters and about 50 servicemen in the conflict, local media said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Pakistani Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal asserted that he will consider the Supreme Court an independent body after it will issue the arrest orders for former president retired General Pervez Musharraf.

Iqbal said, "Sending contempt notices to political workers like Talal Chaudhry will not help to restore the dignity of the Supreme Court. Instead it should summon former president Musharraf and take action against him for damaging the constitution, making the then chief justice and his children hostage and manhandling him," the Dawn reported.

Addressing a media conference here, he said the former president committed the biggest contempt of court and the apex court should issue a contempt notice against him as it did in Nehal Hashmi's case.

Hashmi has been imprisoned for one month and fined Rs50,000 for contempt. He cannot hold a public office for the next five years as well.

"I will admit the judiciary is free and sovereign once Musharraf summoned and sent to Adiyala Jail on similar charges," Iqbal added.

Meanwhile, He also noted that nobody in Pakistan thought that the disqualification decision taken against the former prime minister Nawaz Sharif was based on justice.

Iqbal empathized, "From Karachi to Gwadar no one is ready to believe that the actions being taken against the PML-N and Nawaz Sharif are based on justice," adding that the judiciary would become controversial by taking such decisions.

The minister used the occasion to express that the entire party is now united on Shehbaz Sharif's nomination as the next prime minister.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)The Union railway minister Piyush Goyal addressed the technical staff of Indian Railways on the occasion of 7th Indian railway service of electrical engineer.

He highlighted the modernization of electrical industry as he launched the first-ever mobile application of the electrical department. This shall help in receiving timely feedbacks of the employees in the electrical industry.

He stressed on ensuring transparency and simplification of the process of filling the tenders in railways. According to him, this would help in saving 25% of the current expenses

He spoke of establishing a customer-centric system that would encourage the customers to send in their feedback regarding the railway services and help the industry to analyze them and improve accordingly.

He further mentioned about the 7th pay commission where the government allocated 15,000 crores for paying out the salaries to the employees and 7,000 crores for the pension to the ex-employees.

He also appreciated the department for reducing the cases of failure of electrical equipment and increasing the efficiency of railway department.

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)